Instagram reaches 600 million users
Instagram reaches 600 million users:- You may not have known this, but Instagram is a pretty big deal.
On Thursday, the Facebook-owned company announced it had crossed the 600 million users mark, with 100 million users joining the service in the past six months.
The jump is even more impressive when considered in the larger context. In 2012, Facebook purchased the photo-sharing company for $1 billion, a decision that baffled many online who didn’t understand why they would spend so much money for an app with just 30 million users at the time. However, Instagram quickly jumped to 100 million users in early 2013, 300 million by late 2014, and 500 million by June of this year.
At 600 million users, it also becomes Facebook’s latest product to reach that mark, joining the main Facebook product as well as messaging apps like WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, which each passed the 1 billion users milestone earlier this year.
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Instagram’s growth comes as the company is trying to position itself as a direct rival to Snap Inc’s Snapchat, a company Facebook famously failed to acquire for $3 billion in 2013.
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Over the past month, Instagram launched several features that are very similar to Snapchat’s offerings, including a “Stories” function as well as the ability to send disappearing private messages to friends through what it calls Instagram Direct.
Both are battling for the attention of millennials, a market Snapchat has built its brand on. Snapchat is planning to go public early next year, with an initial public offering targeting a valuation for the company of $25 billion.
Source:-Â http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/news/2016/12/15/instagram-reaches-600-million-users/95465182/
