With Instagram Direct, Facebook's Pursuit of Snapchat Is Over

I was mostly wrong about Instagram's plans and also mostly right. I know, that oxymoronic statement makes little sense unless you consider that Instagram Direct, unveiled on Thursday in New York, is the very first big step into a full-scale encroachment on Snapchat's territory. it also means Facebook, to borrow a Taylor Swift lyric, will never, ever, ever bid on Snapchat again.

A couple of days ago, I predicted Instagram would unveil some sort of direct image messaging system, I almost called it Instagram Direct: "The ability to make chat-based or direct Instagrams temporary." Instagram Direct is, as I guessed, a way of sharing images "between only a group of Instagram friends or with just one other user." Read more...