Facebook Meet Instagram

About one week ago, Facebook purchased Instagram for one billion dollars–a business move not many people saw coming.

As a faithful Instagram user, I had mixed feelings about the purchase. Beyond personal uses, I use Instagram at least once a week for my internship. At the Urban Districts Alliance, we feature six of the best Instagram photos tagged with #downtownsgf in our weekly email. Every Wednesday, I go to Inkstagram.com and check out all the fun, quirky photos taken around downtown Springfield, Mo.

While I am excited for the success of the nine employees at Instagram, I cannot help but fear its ruin under the mammoth social media platform, Facebook, and wonder how it will affect my daily and weekly rituals of taking photos of coffee, cats and things.

Google & Picnik

Most of my fears stem from the recent demise of one of my favorite sites: Picnik. In March 2011, Google purchased Picnik, a photo editing site that allows users to make basic edits to photographs and share them on social media sites. At first, Google began to integrate Picnik into their other platforms such as Picasa, but in January 2012, Google announced that Picnik would be closed on April 19, 2012.

My mind is still trying to adjust the idea of a world with no Picnik in just two days, so when I heard that Facebook bought Instagram, my instant thought was, “Please don’t kill Instagram, Facebook.”

Google & YouTube

However, there are always two sides of every story. In October 2006, Google acquired YouTube for over one billion dollars, and YouTube has never looked better. Google transformed YouTube is a fabulous way, while still staying true to the core values of the platform. As Chris Taylor of Mashable points out,

“But YouTube was different — it was tiny. And Google was different — it was smart.”

Facebook Meet Instagram

So Facebook, I would like to introduce you to a friend of mine: Instagram. I know you have a lot of great resources to make my friend even better, but I think you should know what makes my friend great.

Instagram is great because…

• It is easy.
• It is quirky.
• It is fun.
• It is vintage.
• It is mobile.

Facebook, my only request is that you remember what makes Instagram a great company worth one billion dollars. I hope that Instagram holds the same fate at YouTube, and six years from today, it will be thriving and growing.

What do you think about Facebook’s recent acquisition of Facebook?

If you want to connect with me on Instagram, my username is @bparry08.