One good thing deserves another. But that good thing also deserves to be copied. After Instagram and Facebook copied some of Snapchat's popular features, Instagram is again having another go in copying Snapchat.
On November 21st, 2016, besides taking Facebook's feature to itself, Instagram is also rolling out ephemeral Live video and messages. What this means is that Instagram users will see disappearing contents.
When users are creating a story, they'll be able to swipe over to open the camera, tap the “Start Live Video” button and start sharing. This is essentially a feature where users can livestream for up to an hour. The feature is similar to Facebook's, but minus the emoji reactions. When users start streaming, the app sends a notification to their followers so they can watch and leave comment. The comments can be pinned to the top of the feed, or turned off completely.
Users can also check out new live stories on Explore. They just need to tap "Top Live" to see live stories happening at that moment and swipe right and left to easily skip around.
Videos that have been broadcasted, won't be posted on the user's profile automatically, not like Facebook. Instagram is rolling out this feature to all users gradually.
The next thing is the ephemeral messages. Users can tap on the new messaging icon on the top right corner of the app's home screen. Here, they'll be able to send private photos and videos to people that are following them.
"Today's update keeps regular direct messages the same and adds a more visual way to connect with your closest friends - all in one convenient place," said Instagram announcing the feature in its blog post.
This is a copy of Snapchat which first brought the feature to popularity.
To send disappearing messages, users just need to tap on the arrow after taking a photo/video, to send it privately. They can choose a group or create one in a few taps, and they can also send the message to individual friends at the same time.
Because the messages are ephemeral messages, they're unlike other messages in Direct as they will disappear from the inboxes of the people that received them, after being seen.
