Power

Instagram's plan to take on TikTok: Copy it, then crush it

With Reels, Instagram has a vertical-scrolling, short-form, discovery-focused video tool of its own.

Instagram Reels

Instagram Reels takes what's great about TikTok and puts it in Instagram.

Image: Instagram

Instagram didn't build Reels in response to President Trump's threat to ban TikTok. It's been testing the feature since last fall, first in Brazil and then in a handful of other countries. But it's surely no accident that Reels — which is either an homage to TikTok or a shameless rip-off of it, depending on your perspective — is launching now. TikTok is under threat, and Instagram sees its chance to capitalize.

Instagram isn't the only app making a direct run at TikTok. Not even close. Triller, a 5-year-old app that has emerged as a go-to "TikTok but not TikTok" option, is at the top of both Google and Apple's app stores. Dubsmash, Byte, Likee, Clash and others have all seen downloads surge in the last several weeks as the possibility of TikTok's disappearance became more real. This week, Snap announced that users will soon be able to add music to their Snaps … which is to say: Snap announced TikTok.

But if you were going to bet on one company successfully copying what makes TikTok great — or "adapting" it, to use Mark Zuckerberg's term from the Big Tech hearing last week — and then beating TikTok at its own game, you'd have to bet on Instagram. Instagram knows exactly how to do it.

On a call with reporters ahead of the Reels launch, Instagram's head of product, Vishal Shah, acknowledged that it isn't a new idea. "It's not something that's unique to our platform," he said. "Others are definitely tapping into this format, whether that's a TikTok or YouTube or Snap, or actually before that Musical.ly and Vine." It was reminiscent of when Instagram launched Stories in 2016, and Kevin Systrom effectively admitted to copying Snapchat but also argued it didn't matter. "They deserve all the credit," Systrom said at the time, but "this isn't about who invented something. This is about a format and how you take it to a network and put your own spin on it." Reels proves that Instagram's thinking hasn't changed a bit.

Let's start with Instagram's network, which is unmatched (except by Facebook's, though Instagram's cool factor gives it an advantage even there). Instagram has more than a billion monthly users, more than 500 million daily users, more than 500 million daily users of Stories. Along with YouTube, it has become the home base for many creators; they'll use other apps and experiment with other things, but their business starts with Instagram. Over the last week, as the possibility of a TikTok ban became more real, lots of well-known creators started telling their fans to follow them on Instagram.

That's not to say Facebook and Instagram can dominate any market by virtue of sheer size, though. IGTV hasn't become the future-of-entertainment service Instagram intended it to be. (If it had, TikTok may never have taken off in the first place.) And Facebook's been trying to crack social video for years, and none of it — not Lasso, Poke or Camera — ever took off.

Now let's talk about Instagram's spin on TikTok. Reels isn't a separate app but rather a feature inside Instagram, a new tab in every creator's profile. When someone makes a 15-second Reel — which they do in the Instagram app, with existing Instagram filters, a huge library of music, and all the artistic tools they get from the rest of Instagram — they can upload it to their feed, their Stories, send it as a DM, or just let it live in Reels.

When you're just watching a video, though? Reels is TikTok. The full-screen video, the scrolling, the interactions. It's all TikTok.

The most important TikTok feature Instagram is "adapting" is the way discovery works. Instagram has always centered on two things: who people follow and what they're interested in. The service is already very good at surfacing your favorite Formula 1 driver, and other popular Formula 1 posts you might like. But, as Shah put it, "Instagram is also a place and a home for entertainment, and Reels is going to be a really important part of the future of entertainment for Instagram."

That means making it easier for people to find stuff they like — and making it easier for creators to gain a following. Shah noted that one big complaint about Instagram is that it's hard for new creators to find an audience, something TikTok cleverly solved with viral challenges, song-based discovery and the whole idea of the For You page. That's part of why TikTok has been so successful: As a group of creators described in an open letter calling for Trump not to ban the app, "It does not matter whether you have a reputation as a creator or if you know people who do. Small-town shop owners in India have the same opportunity to make a living from their talents as A-list celebrities."

On Instagram, Reels are integrated into the Explore page, where viewers can tap on a song to see all the Reels made with that music, or tap on a profile to see a creator's other Reels. Going forward, Shah said, "it's a blend of curation and AI to source the material." In its early days, Instagram relied heavily on manual curation to help surface the best stuff on the platform, and it will do the same with Reels. Shah also said Reels is causing Instagram to think differently about those recommendations: "It isn't just about optimizing for your experience as a consumer, but thinking about what it means for a new creator to find an audience. And that's new on Instagram." That likely means a trade-off, with Instagram leaning less on ultrapersonalized content and more on showing users new things.

Copying TikTok's discovery means copying its algorithm, though, and that won't be easy for Instagram or anyone else. TikTok's algorithm is famous for knowing what people want to watch, so much so that it seems to anticipate their interests. Since ByteDance's early days building a news app, it has been refining its machine-learning tools, always attuned to what people like more than who they follow. Even with TikTok promising total algorithmic transparency, its unique brand of addictiveness will be hard to copy.

The way Instagram sees it, Reels fit into a unique slot in the service. They're more public and discoverable than Stories, which are most useful for engaging with an existing audience. But they're less high-stakes than the main feed, which for many creators is now such an important portfolio and storefront that every post gets extra scrutiny. Reels is a place creators can be themselves, can experiment and try things, but also be shared and discovered.

Shah was quick to say that TikTok has done a lot of things right, and that competition is good for everyone in the space. Its ambitions are clear, though: Instagram's long hoped to be more than just a social network. It wants to be the future of entertainment, too. Clearly, the future of entertainment looks like TikTok. But it might be called Reels.

Fintech

Judge Zia Faruqui is trying to teach you crypto, one ‘SNL’ reference at a time

His decisions on major cryptocurrency cases have quoted "The Big Lebowski," "SNL," and "Dr. Strangelove." That’s because he wants you — yes, you — to read them.

The ways Zia Faruqui (right) has weighed on cases that have come before him can give lawyers clues as to what legal frameworks will pass muster.

Photo: Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post via Getty Images

“Cryptocurrency and related software analytics tools are ‘The wave of the future, Dude. One hundred percent electronic.’”

That’s not a quote from "The Big Lebowski" — at least, not directly. It’s a quote from a Washington, D.C., district court memorandum opinion on the role cryptocurrency analytics tools can play in government investigations. The author is Magistrate Judge Zia Faruqui.

Keep ReadingShow less
Veronica Irwin

Veronica Irwin (@vronirwin) is a San Francisco-based reporter at Protocol covering fintech. Previously she was at the San Francisco Examiner, covering tech from a hyper-local angle. Before that, her byline was featured in SF Weekly, The Nation, Techworker, Ms. Magazine and The Frisc.

The financial technology transformation is driving competition, creating consumer choice, and shaping the future of finance. Hear from seven fintech leaders who are reshaping the future of finance, and join the inaugural Financial Technology Association Fintech Summit to learn more.

Keep ReadingShow less
FTA
The Financial Technology Association (FTA) represents industry leaders shaping the future of finance. We champion the power of technology-centered financial services and advocate for the modernization of financial regulation to support inclusion and responsible innovation.
Enterprise

AWS CEO: The cloud isn’t just about technology

As AWS preps for its annual re:Invent conference, Adam Selipsky talks product strategy, support for hybrid environments, and the value of the cloud in uncertain economic times.

Photo: Noah Berger/Getty Images for Amazon Web Services

AWS is gearing up for re:Invent, its annual cloud computing conference where announcements this year are expected to focus on its end-to-end data strategy and delivering new industry-specific services.

It will be the second re:Invent with CEO Adam Selipsky as leader of the industry’s largest cloud provider after his return last year to AWS from data visualization company Tableau Software.

Keep ReadingShow less
Donna Goodison

Donna Goodison (@dgoodison) is Protocol's senior reporter focusing on enterprise infrastructure technology, from the 'Big 3' cloud computing providers to data centers. She previously covered the public cloud at CRN after 15 years as a business reporter for the Boston Herald. Based in Massachusetts, she also has worked as a Boston Globe freelancer, business reporter at the Boston Business Journal and real estate reporter at Banker & Tradesman after toiling at weekly newspapers.

Image: Protocol

We launched Protocol in February 2020 to cover the evolving power center of tech. It is with deep sadness that just under three years later, we are winding down the publication.

As of today, we will not publish any more stories. All of our newsletters, apart from our flagship, Source Code, will no longer be sent. Source Code will be published and sent for the next few weeks, but it will also close down in December.

Keep ReadingShow less
Bennett Richardson

Bennett Richardson ( @bennettrich) is the president of Protocol. Prior to joining Protocol in 2019, Bennett was executive director of global strategic partnerships at POLITICO, where he led strategic growth efforts including POLITICO's European expansion in Brussels and POLITICO's creative agency POLITICO Focus during his six years with the company. Prior to POLITICO, Bennett was co-founder and CMO of Hinge, the mobile dating company recently acquired by Match Group. Bennett began his career in digital and social brand marketing working with major brands across tech, energy, and health care at leading marketing and communications agencies including Edelman and GMMB. Bennett is originally from Portland, Maine, and received his bachelor's degree from Colgate University.

Enterprise

Why large enterprises struggle to find suitable platforms for MLops

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, and as larger enterprises go from deploying hundreds of models to thousands and even millions of models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

As companies expand their use of AI beyond running just a few machine learning models, ML practitioners say that they have yet to find what they need from prepackaged MLops systems.

Photo: artpartner-images via Getty Images

On any given day, Lily AI runs hundreds of machine learning models using computer vision and natural language processing that are customized for its retail and ecommerce clients to make website product recommendations, forecast demand, and plan merchandising. But this spring when the company was in the market for a machine learning operations platform to manage its expanding model roster, it wasn’t easy to find a suitable off-the-shelf system that could handle such a large number of models in deployment while also meeting other criteria.

Some MLops platforms are not well-suited for maintaining even more than 10 machine learning models when it comes to keeping track of data, navigating their user interfaces, or reporting capabilities, Matthew Nokleby, machine learning manager for Lily AI’s product intelligence team, told Protocol earlier this year. “The duct tape starts to show,” he said.

Keep ReadingShow less
Kate Kaye

Kate Kaye is an award-winning multimedia reporter digging deep and telling print, digital and audio stories. She covers AI and data for Protocol. Her reporting on AI and tech ethics issues has been published in OneZero, Fast Company, MIT Technology Review, CityLab, Ad Age and Digiday and heard on NPR. Kate is the creator of RedTailMedia.org and is the author of "Campaign '08: A Turning Point for Digital Media," a book about how the 2008 presidential campaigns used digital media and data.

Latest Stories
Bulletins