I don't hate Reels

Here & There 08.18.22

Instagram. The platform that everyone loves to hate. Most recently the Instagram-related outrage has been directed at their focus on Reels, short snippets of video (with music or other audio), that mirror the patterns and trends popularized by TikTok. Reels are not new on Instagram, but recent design and algorithmic choices are pushing them more to the forefront of the platform.

Much of the criticism stems from a decrease in engagement around photo posts. People that have built large followings through sharing their photos are now upset that they’re being “forced” to use Reels and Stories to reach their (large) audiences. I understand this — my current reach on photo posts is minimal compared to when I post Reels. To be fair, my audience is already mostly unengaged, since I’ve posted photos so intermittently over the last few years.

Many people built their entire careers by utilizing a new platform, audience, and strategy around sharing visual content on Instagram. That worked, because Instagram’s user base was currently embracing that form of content. Whether you like it or not, that same user base is changing the “content du jour” and shifting it in a more active, video-focused direction. Some folks have made a big hullabaloo about “we should leave and join platform XYZ because they really respect creatives” (several times), and then quietly limp back to the comfort of their massive audience on Instagram because no one was actually that upset about anything. People didn’t migrate to Glass, or Ello, or one of the other “not Instagram” competitors. Few of these competitors ever managed to cultivate a true identity and consistent community beyond “We’re not Instagram”.

I think the focus on Reels is representative of a shift both in how people use Instagram, and trends in how we communicate visually. Recently, Instagram (for better or worse) has become a better *discovery* platform, rather than a platform focused on immediate social connections. The type of content we share most often has also changed. If you’re like me, you’ve probably already shifted much of your usage on Instagram to *stories* rather than *posts* (even prior to Instagram’s focus on Reels). This is the way that people are connecting with their friends and followers on a more everyday basis, rather than static posts with long captions.

Yes, Reels is a copy of TikTok. But, I’m also reminded of when Instagram launched their own version of Stories. It was downplayed as a cheap copy of Snapchat, but I felt that while this was true, it was actually better for a bunch of reasons (I wrote a whole article about it at the time). In the same way, Reels serve a different function for me than TikTok. Instagram is extremely dialed in to my interests (outdoors, travel, running, etc), and the content in my discovery feed reflects that. TikTok, on the other hand, has built an (incredible) algorithm to guess what I want to see, but that content still tends to be extremely wide-ranging, and slightly skewed towards “whats hip on TikTok and slightly related to a video you watched for 1 second too long”. And while the power of the TikTok algorithm can sometimes surface a great video from someone with 10 followers to millions of people (this is perhaps TikTok’s greatest superpower), the fact remains that millions of people already have communities on Instagram (mostly us old, decrepit millennials).

It think the biggest challenge that Reels still faces is that Instagram is heavily dominated by unattainable inspiration and personalities (travel porn, professional photographers, celebrities, etc). TikTok remains a place where that type of content exists, but there’s also a seemingly equal opportunity for someone like Hank Green to just…explain science and be himself. Or for a laid-off Senegalese-Italian factory worker to grow to 140 MILLION followers with his reaction videos and video responses.

It took me a while to jump in on reels, but I’ve been posting more videos lately…and I’m actually quite enjoying myself. It’s a new way to express places and feelings through visual content — and the existence of trends, templates and patterns (while potentially pigeonholing people into creating “similar” things), kind of makes it easier to find ways to share. In many ways, it’s an extension of the kind of storytelling I was already doing with ‘produced’ stories that I prepare ahead of time.

While it remains to be seen whether the focus on video/reels will be a positive or negative overall for Instagram, I tend to lean towards the side that the people who are working on the product aren’t idiots. It’s in Meta’s interest to keep people engaged with their platforms, so if they’re focusing on Reels…it’s probably because people *like* that feature, even if everyone in *your* bubble says they hate it. In the end, I’m a bit ambivalent. Things change, sometimes you’ve just got to roll with it. It also doesn’t hurt that my work and income aren’t heavily tied to a platform I have no control over 🤷‍♂️. None of my commentary means that Meta/Instagram have no serious problems. You never know, maybe this is the death knell of Instagram and we’re in for a long, slow decline. Them’s the breaks.