Instagram App Adds Video Sharing Capability

Instagram, the popular photo-sharing app that was acquired by Facebook in a $1 billion deal last year, rolled out video capabilities today [June 20]

At a press event at Facebook’s Menlo Park headquarters, Instagram’s co-founder and CEO Kevin Systrom debuted the new feature which lets people create 15-second videos, with 13 filters, to share on the service.

A post on the Instagram blog said, “Today, we’re thrilled to introduce Video on Instagram and bring you another way to share your stories. When you go to take a photo on Instagram, you’ll now see a movie camera icon. Tap it to enter video mode, where you can take up to fifteen seconds of video through the Instagram camera.

“You’ll also find that we’ve added thirteen filters built specifically for video so you can keep sharing beautiful content on Instagram. When you post a video, you’ll also be able to select your favorite scene from what you’ve recorded as your cover image so your videos are beautiful even when they’re not playing.”

TechCrunch reports, “This feature, which is rolling out to all Instagram users on iOS and Android today, will impact a huge number of people, due to Instagram’s current reach. Systrom said today that Instagram has 130 million monthly users, who have shared 16 billion photos to date. Engagement on the app is high: Over one billion ‘likes’ are added to the service every day.”

The move is widely thought to be in reaction to Vine, a video sharing app owned by Facebook’s competitor Twitter, which allows for 6 second loops to be shared.

Instagram continues to grow in popularity with Bermudians, and in this past month there has been a surge of locals joining Vine.

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