The app is going through a lot of big changes lately. Most notable is the change to a feed that is non-chronological. People have been freaking out over their images not being seen by their followers, but they need to know one thing before flipping out. Instagram is a business that survives off your attention.
If Instagram wants to survive it has to serve its users, and a chronological feed has been notoriously bad at one thing. Chronological feeds do not stream content that viewers are interested in all the time. Now, your feed should be calibrated to things you historically like. This is what the change means. Your feed will have more of what you are interested in shown first!
OK!... So what???
Now, to get into why I love Instagram. This app is more than an image sharing service. It is a diverse and complex community that engages beautifully together over content that they love to consume, share, and create. The “real” people on Instagram are not filling feeds with BS that clutters your feed.
Your feed is all your own. Direct content from people you like, and content you love. I enjoy my two niches of business and photography as well as some of my friend’s photos mixed in. Getting to see visual representations of what people are up to is refreshing in a text heavy world.
Directly communicating over images with the creators and fellow fans is another big feature that Instagram offers. I can comment in the feed of a photo asking questions or simply complimenting the content, and it opens a public line of communication not only I benefit from, but others engaging in the feed benefit from as well!
Instagram is constantly changing, adapting, and growing. They have to! Get over being romantic about the platform. Since Instagram came into existence it has come from square formats, iPhone exclusive, and photos only to what it is today. I welcome their changes personally because I believe in the app that I have enjoyed for the last several years!