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Instagram Will Soon Let You See Posts Once They Are Published
25 Mar, 2018 / 03:52 pm / OMNES News

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com

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At last Instagram is will have some changes to make it possible for users to see posts as soon as they are out. 

A post on the company's blog Thursday said the photo-sharing app's feed now gives more weight to when a post was made and will prevent old posts from showing up high in your feed. Instagram's algorithm will still use a mix of factors to decide when you should see posts, including your relationship to the person making the post.

“With these changes, your feed will feel more fresh, and you won’t miss the moments you care about,” the blog post said. “So if your best friend shares a selfie from her vacation in Australia, it will be waiting for you when you wake up.”

Instagram, which was bought by Facebook in 2012, used to show posts in the order in which they were posted. But it introduced a Facebook-like algorithm in 2016 that sorted posts based on other factors, such as “the likelihood you’ll be interested in the content.”

The social network hoped that would mean that people saw more content that was relevant to them — a move particularly helpful for brands looking to reach the network's young and growing audience without having to post constantly.

Many people on Instagram have since been clamoring for a return to the old feed, complaining that the algorithm often serves up photos and posts that are days old.

Instagram spokesman Gabriel Madway said the company has no plans to return to a chronological feed.

Instagram also introduced a button to manually refresh the News Feed, to prevent people from accidentally refreshing their feeds — and losing their place — by tapping the top of their screens.

The company said more updates are still to come, but it didn’t specify what those will be.

Instagram is growing quickly. It hit 800 million users near the end of last year and is expanding at a faster clip than its parent company — and holding its own against competitors such as Snapchat. Keeping the user feed relevant is crucial for the company, which needs the data on what people look at, when they look at it and why for its advertising networks.