How Instagram got so many Instafans and changed how we take pictures of our world.
Taking photos isn’t a new thing. Amazingly, the photograph’s 200th anniversary is coming up in 2026 and it’s worth googling the first-ever picture taken to see how they’ve evolved.
It’s a view from the window of Joseph Niépce house in Chalonssur-Saône which required an exposure of about eight hours. The result is an austere, semi-abstract effect not without artistic merit. Black and white, obviously.
Boy have we moved on from that. What is the appeal of a photograph and is it the same now in our world of selfie infatuation and VIP influencers? Is it about capturing time in a world where we find we have so little of it? It used to be a cliché that the first thing you’d grab from a fire in the photo album. So when social media started monopolizing our daily lives after the millennium, it wasn’t exactly a surprise that sharing photos and videos would be popular.
Initially released in 2010, Instagram now has 500 million users. It is one of the most popular social networks on the planet. Facebook saw its huge potential and acquired it for £760 million in 2012 and since then the journey has been staggering. But does it all boil down to pure narcissism? After all, Instagram popularised the concept of the selfie, and then really went to town exploiting it to the max. In short, no.
Constant evolution is key to the Insta success story
Instagram triumphs because it’s so easy to use. Let’s be honest, we’re a mobile society now and Instagram is so mobile-orientated that certain functions are not even available UNLESS you’re on your mobile.
Instagram has proven that humans are more responsive to imagery than text. Digesting visual information is easier, quicker, and more enjoyable. The avid readers of this world are, sadly, dwindling in number. And Instagram evolves too. It fuels vanity. Astute add-ons and improved features like 360-degree panoramas or Photoshop, PicMonkey, and Snapseed allow us to edit and erase our facial imperfections.
It takes the casual snap to new levels of humor or flawlessness. When developing its mobile gaming platform, the SuperOne team takes a close look at the success stories of the social media world. The compulsive zeal which leads to so many millennials checking their Insta feed first thing in the morning, starting their story at breakfast, and returning to Instagram throughout the day is clearly something that SuperOne strives for.
SuperOne has particularly noted the constant innovations that Instagram has brought out, the relationships it has with third-party apps, and its effortless ability to remain relevant in a world of constant change. By adding a social media dimension as a spin-off to the central gaming experience, SuperOne is deeply conscious that it can tap into the perpetual requirement of millennials to stay connected.
And then there’s the upbeat mood of Instagram to aspire to as well. ‘A largely positive place’ While Twitter seems ever more insidious and Facebook increasingly draconian, Instagram remains a largely positive place. Social media was supposed to be fun. It was supposed to provide escapism.
It was not supposed to be the place you confronted endless keyboard warriors with their politics-laden and unimaginative vitriol. Whether or not all the perfectly preened photos on Instagram make you feel better or worse about yourself is the subject of quite a bit of academic study right now. But at least you don’t have as many people yelling at you in the comments section.
No one dislikes photos. We’ve reached such a level of comfort with sharing our captured memories that influencers upload and share, literally, their whole lives. So click away.
Capture all your nights out, days in, pubs and clubs, city breaks, orange skies, blue skies, skyscrapers, zoos, booze, new shoes, yummy dinners, romantic dates, staying up late, full moons, ‘see-you-soons’, selfies, groupies, babies in onesies, make-up on the train, picnics in the rain, funny pets, cats in hats, school plays, summer days, Christmas lights and snowy nights.
Niépce would have been proud