In a bold expansion move to capture photos and video sharing market; Instagram has introduced "Stories" - a feature similar to 'Snapchat Live Stories' which allows you to compile a series of photos and videos into a single stream.
Instagram made the announcement on Tuesday. The company said in a blog post,“With Instagram Stories, you don’t have to worry about over-posting. Instead, you can share as much as you want throughout the day — with as much creativity as you want. You can bring your story to life in new ways with text and draw tools. The photos and videos will disappear after 24 hours and won’t appear on your profile grid or in the feed."
To see an Instagram Story, you can choose from a top navigation bar that also includes your friends or popular Instagram accounts. When the user has added a new photo or video to their Story, a colourful ring will appear around their avatar. Unlike regular Instagram posts, stories have no likes or comments. Like Snapchat, users can reply to stories via text messages.
To create a story, you can tap on a new stylised "+" icon at the top left-hand corner of the screen. Or you can also post a story by swiping left on the camera capture option. Instagram’s story camera includes three drawing tools: a "standard" pen, a "highlighter" to emphasise text by colouring it, and a "neon pen" that draws in white with neon colour borders.
Facebook-owned Instagram already has 500 million users and with this new feature, the app is trying to woo Snapchat users. Instagram already has a direct message feature where people can chat or share photos. The update for "Stories" is slowly rolling out on iOS and Android, it is currently available for users in the US and beta testers. We expect it to debut in other regions soon.
