ICYMI: Desktop Instagram Edition
Here's what happened on social media this week, October 21
Welcome! If you’re just clicking in for the first time: this is a weekly recap of social trends, platform updates and resources for creators. It’s been a busy week so this update is going to be brief-ish.
🔑 Roadmap
💻 The ability to post to Instagram from desktop took 4,032 days but it’s finally here! Check for the + sign to be able to drag and drop photos and video up to 60 seconds. Social media managers and creators rejoice!
Instagram also released several other new features this week, notably Collabs which allows two creators to share a post with both names listed. The reaction has been mostly positive and if used for good, it’s potentially a great growth hack for collaborative-minded creators.
But... remember when people complained about too many Feed posts being shared to Stories so Instagram started limiting who could share posts to Stories? What will happen when users start to complain they’re seeing duplicate posts in their Feeds?!
As with any new feature, now’s a good time to jump on board, experiment and try to get as much mileage out of it as possible before the rest of us ruin it for you!
Instagram’s other updates are Reels focused, including Superbeat, a new music beat effect, and two new Lyrics effects to apply to your video.
And while Instagram gives, it also takes away. Creators are sounding the alarm about losing Link Stickers for minor or contested infractions. BuzzFeed dug in on the ban.
🎨 Facebook is planning to rebrand with a new name that reflects their focus on the metaverse [and to disassociate from all the bad shit they’ve done]. The Internet is having a field day with this headline.
📲 Snap and Google partnered on a “Tap to Snap” feature — a camera-mode version of Snapchat on the Pixel 6 that's accessible directly from the phone lockscreen. No surprise, this now makes the Pixel 6 the fastest phone to make a Snap.
📖 YouTube is enabling auto chapters as a search element. That means even if a creator hasn’t defined chapters in their video, the platform can still highlight specific segments in response to searches, It gives people more help in finding what they’re looking for and makes your videos potentially more discoverable!
👆🏻 Click Thru
📚 Google launched a Creator hub to help people get started with content strategy, audience engagement and monetization. It’s very Influencer 101 right now but they plan to expand and hopefully they dig deeper into actual search-related issues creators need help with.
🛍 YouTube plans to host a week-long live shopping event, “YouTube Holiday Stream and Shop,” starting November 15 — it’s like a digital swap meet featuring shopping, creator interactions and more online activities.
📹 It’s been a year since Shorts launched on YouTube, here’s what the platform has learned. Hint: it’s always about money.
📌 Pinterest announced a $20 million Creator Rewards fund and some new tools this week, notably Takes. Similar to TikTok’s video replies, Takes lets people respond to a creator's idea with their own Pin.
🌟 From YouTube to TikTok and Instagram to Snapchat, the Wall Street Journal reports on platforms building in-house talent agencies to scout for the next creator superstars. YouTube’s got more than 1,000 employees offering support and guidance to creators, while Instagram has …and this should come as no surprise, 40 people.
🚫 Selena Gomez gave a new interview explaining why she quit social media three years ago, a move she says saved her life. Now, when she wants to post to her 400 million followers she texts an assistant who does it for her.
📱 Kourtney Kardashian’s future step-son Landon is about due for some Kris Jenner social media spin training — until then, let’s hope for more candid and unproduced KUWK videos like this TikTok he shared after his dad’s engagement to Kourtney.
🖼 In a genius publicity move, a group of museums in Vienna created an explicit art OnlyFans account to get around nude or lewd content censorship on other platforms.
😄 The juxtaposition of this headline: “Kat Norton’s spiritual journey to becoming a Microsoft Excel influencer.” VLOOKUP TikTok is the digital personification of this Instagram favorite: “If cauliflower can somehow become pizza, you can do anything!”
☕️ MrBeast and Emma Chamberlain dominated the 2021 Streamys nominations. MrBeast tops this year’s nominations with a total of seven, followed by vlogger, coffee queen and No. 1 teen favorite Emma Chamberlain, who got four noms.
👯♀️ Cardi B and Penn Badgley swapped Twitter avatars and no one was happier than Twitter’s partnership lead.
