Instagram Clarifies How It Oversees the User Activities to Enhance Their Experience

There are many misconceptions regarding Instagram hiding the posts of its users. Adam Mosseri, its CEO, explicated how the app decides which posts the users can and can’t view on the app.

According to Mosseri, Instagram uses multiple algorithms to supervise its users’ activities. They also make use of many classifiers and processes which has different purposes. According to him, it is a method to use technology to personalise the experience of the users in an efficient manner.  

In 2010, the app provided the users images in chronological order. It did not have many other features. But now the app provides the users different kinds of experiences through the feed, reels and explore features. Each of these features provides the users personalised contents which has enhanced the user experience.

Every part of the app is designed according to how a user utilises them. while people tend to look for familiar faces in Stories and Feed, they look for new and innovative content in Explore part of the app.

The app first designs a feature in its own terms and them monitors the activities of the users around this feature. Feed and Stories provide the users with the recent posts shared by the people whom you follow and are your friends. Apart from a few ads the Feed and Stories part give you posts from people whom you may know. The app then monitors the activities of the users like what was posted, who posted the contents and your preferences. These are called ‘signals’.

Signals would include information like who shared the post to how well you tend to like videos. Using these signals educated guesses are made to enhance each of the features provided by the app.

They deal with misinformation in another manner. If a post that you shared is deemed as misinformation by a third party, instead of taking down the post they apply a label and make the post to appear lower in the feeds. Any post from a user who has posted multiple contents that were deemed as misinformation would be made harder to find by the app. 

The CEO explained that the app has always been accused of silencing its users by taking down their posts. Most of the accusations come as the app does not take the effort to explain to its users how they work why some posts are taken down. The app deals with a large amount of data and it is highly important that they manage their activities as a small mistake could affect the app experience of millions of people across the globe.