The thing that gave it early success — its focus on building large, loyal audiences and rewarding users for doing so — has trapped the platform in an outmoded model for serving up content.
It's a catch-22 for Instagram. The thing that gave it early success — its focus on building large, loyal audiences and rewarding users for doing so — has trapped the platform in an outmoded model for serving up content. Making too significant a change could spell disaster for the app, alienating power users and undermining its core business. For now, it is stuck somewhere in between the original Instagram model and a TikTok look-alike, not quite succeeding in either arena.