Direct messages are now IG reality and I, for one, am plenty excited. Almost as much as with the roll-out of 15-sec. video this summer.
I don't care if this is a knee-jerk to keep young IG users from wandering onto Snapchat or Path, this is a feature I've been dreaming about ever since I first waded into Instagram over two years ago.
By that time, I was a Twitter junkie and although the Instagram platform was so engaging, I really missed the opportunity to contact followers directly. I wasn't about to adopt a secondary platform like Kik - as many did - just to contact my to IG friends directly.
I've sent one sorry little DM so far, so I've nowhere near explored the possibilities of this feature, but my mind is racing. I can now send a pic or 15-second video clip to one, or any combination, of my followers. That's a big deal. Why?
Here are four simple things Instagram DMs will do for me and IG users across Instaverse.
1) We can now share messages privately, rather than conversing in public under someone else's pics and vids. Hey, I love the whole watercooler thing, you know. The idea that IG conversations are convened around public images. But sometimes rather than communicating on public bulletin board, all I want to do is leave a private post-it.
(Anyway, thank you Instagram. And thank you Facebook for not messing up platform I still love, at least so far, after you horrified everyone with your $1 billion IG purchase 18 months ago.)
2) Community managers for organizational Instagram ccounts can now respond to followers privately. This gives them greater flexibility to offer guidance or deal with complaints.
3) Instagram pics and video will allow for asynchronous meetings. Sure you can do this on other platforms already. But IGers will appreciate the fact that working groups, organizational teams, and family members can now huddle privately, whenever.
4) Personalized Christmas or holiday greetings to friends, colleagues and family members will be a cinch. There's a lot to be said for warm and fuzzy video/pics targeted to people you love.
As with any new tech, IG users will respond to the DM ability by creating a tonne of new uses for the feature.
Some tech press is already hailing Instagram's DM announcement as meh, and sure it's been a long time coming.
But IG users are going to go crazy for the next few weeks.
Since Instagram added the ability to shoot 15-second video, you've likely been experimenting with this new medium. It's perfect for giving people a taste of what you're experiencing, from a brilliant sunset, concert or festival, to a skateboard move, a newborn - or even the fish that didn't get away.
While scanning the hashtags I came upon three videos that really got me thinking about movement. Hope these will inspire you, too.
1) Choreographed one-shot video. Most of us build our Instagram videos and Vines with quick cuts and the occasional pan. But what if you eliminated the cuts entirely and shot in one take? Look at the flow - and great choreography - evident in this work from Sarah Vickers who blogs at classygirlswearpearls.com. Note how the fashion is almost incidental to the setting. There are more fluid one-shot videos in her Instagram gallery to inspire you. Click here to see them.
2) Falling out of frame. This visually surprising work comes from Miklas Manneke from South Africa who used the hashtag #tiltvidgram to describe the action. It came out on top in @Instagram's recent #whpmyfavoriteplace challenge. Creative motion requires some deliberate out-of-box thinking - and Miklas and collaborator @garethpon rocked the muse on this one. Go to Miklas' gallery here.
3) Urban stop-motion. New York Times columnist and author Nick Bilton created this brain-tickling video that entertains your eyes by showing stop-motion vehicular and pedestrian traffic on a busy city street. Click here to check out the awesome stills in his Instagram gallery, too.
Upstart platform Vine has had a tremendous impact on the social media landscape with its easy-to-shoot, six-second video format. But Instagram struck back brilliantly this week by introducing video to its uber-popular photo-sharing site. As of July 20, 2013, you can now record and post 15-second videos to your Instagram account.
This isn't simply a great competitive countermove, but a handy new tool for educators for all the reasons I cite in the video above. I know you'll find your own reasons to love Instagram video. If you're a teacher without an IG account yet, consider opening one and start contributing to this tremendously supportive and creative community. It's a great way to share what the world looks like through your eyes and the eyes of your students (if you have social media releases for them, of course).
Instagram lets you share so many of the amazing places, people and moments that enrich your life. You'll stop your car on the way to Safeway just to grab a sunset. Your family will question your IG obsession. It's all good.
With the luxury of a month off, I experimented with social media a fair bit over the summer--between long walks on knock-out gorgeous evenings, playing ukulele and singing with my son, and over-indulging at crazy good summer barbeques.
Here are a few of the things I learned while playing with pixels.
Instagram
This
is my go-to creative outlet. The community is overwhelmingly
supportive. The IG app has undergone three updates since being bought by
Facebook. The latest incarnation has brought
many cosmetic changes, plus photomaps--ostensibly a way for you to
browse and display geo-tagged photos. The mid-August launch saw a rush of
people loading their pics to these maps.
I don't geotag--ever--and that makes me an odd person out. But I keep wondering
what's in this geo-tagging frenzy for Facebook as it inevitably merges IG
with its timeline sometime down the road. While I enjoy FB, I don't want to be any more an accomplice than I already am in its marketing plans.
A few weeks ago, I discovered that the
daily forum by @joshjohnson (175K followers) is a great way to find great mobile photographers and to
get followed by same.
The daily forum is somewhat reminiscent of an #edchat. Not
nearly as intense but a superb way to make connections. The rules are usually something along the lines of "like three pics and comment on two for every image you post." I shot this pic at the Mennonite Village Museum in Steinbach, Manitoba. It was one of four winners out of over 6,000 posts on the nightly challenge.
Many
serious IGers were looking for the death of the "popular page", because it can be gamed by people who sometimes post vanity shots. But it's
still alive, just tucked under the Explore page's now more nuanced search box. And whereas you used
to be able to search without getting exposed to suggestive content, alas, not anymore.
In spite of that, the
IG creative process and associated apps are such a rush. You can't help
but have fun. I'll make a point of reviewing some of my favourite apps in a future post.
If you're already on Twitter, take the plunge and download Instagram. A few weeks on IG and you'll begin to see the world in a different way--to actually look at the sky, appreciate the sunsets, slow down and record the beautiful people and places in your world.
Facebook
The latest mobile update
to FB is snappier, prettier, and lets you like comments--something you
couldn't do before. Esthetically it's a substantial improvement.
If
you're have a corporate fan page, the Facebook Pages app is a
must because it will let you manage it right from
your mobile device. While you can post pictures right from the iPhone or iPad to your page on the standard Facebook app, Facebook Pages also lets you perform a few other functions like checking your stats plus sending and receiving messages. In order to do that, though, you'll have
to be logged into both your FB and FB Pages apps.
There's also a new Facebook Camera app that let's you take, view and post nothing but pictures. When it first came out, many asked, "why buy Instagram and then come out with your own photo-sharing app?!" But Facebook Camera is a different beast, developed before the IG purchase. I use it only to do a quick review of the snaps I've already posted. It's handy if you're looking for a pic and don't want to scroll forever down your, or someone else's, timeline.
tumblr
When it comes to firing off quick, short blog posts, tumblr is incredible for ease of use and for its gorgeous free templates. This site is definitely the extemely visual, colourful, and sometimes seedy underbelly of the blogging world. Its versatility is crazy, its users are legion--and it skews younger than other blogging platforms.
After experimenting quite a bit, I've found a place to fit tumblr into my life--but it's very esoteric. I
use it almost exclusively to look up ukulele song covers and it never fails to disappoint. It's so easy to ferret out
YouTube content from the scads of posts that hit every day. And these are so fresh they
often don't turn up in typical YouTube search. I made this contribution to the ukulele hashtag on a day I was feeling brave.
There is a also a vigorous
education community built around tumblr blogs as attested to by
@coolcatteacher--the extraordinaryVicki Davis--who celebrated the year anniversary of
her Tumblr blog this summer. To wit:
I’ve learned so much from so many of you and now I’m in Tumblr daily.
Just looked and have no idea where all these tumblr folks come from. It
blows my mind that since March or so, over 10,000 people have chosen to
follow this little blog that I just messed around with on the side.
Just wanted to stop and say thank you but also to comment on the awe
of what Tumblr is becoming. I love Twitter and Facebook and my first
blog at coolcatteacher. Pinterest is cool but Tumblr is action packed
and intense. It definitely has a place in anyone’s social media
experience.
YouTube
Clarence Fisher aka
@glassbeed tweeted that YouTube is the most popular way for kids to
listen to and discover new music.* This is so true of my 16-year-old and
I. Sure I still hang on to my Mott the Hoople, T-Rex and Bowie albums.
But there is so much good music being created, covered and written by young
musicians these days, it would be a shame to stay stuck in the past.
How could you ever discover hyperactively fun melodies like this one from We Were Evergreen? Have a quick watch.
Of
course, it's not enough to simply use YouTube as a video search engine. Its full
value is only evident once you start creating and posting content - and
subscribing to other channels. Don't let your account go to waste. Start to create and connect.
And I can't mention YouTube without including a plug for...
iCab Mobile
Sure
downloading videos from YouTube is verboten according to YouTube's TOS.
But say you're giving a keynote and want to show a couple of clips. Are
you really going to trust your brilliant tee-up with the hotel's wi-fi? Exactly.
iCab Mobile is an alternative browser to Safari which
also let's you download video to your iPad beautifully. It will take you
a few minutes to figure out how to navigate through, save and display
videos. But once you do, you'll never be at the mercy of wimpy wireless
again. Here's some help.
Bump
Okay, that once-upon-a-time fun app you downloaded a few tech conference ago to swap contact information is now capable of performing something really useful.
You
can transfer photos by tapping iPhone or iPad against the space bar of
your desktop keyboard. It works...instantly. So give it a go at https://bu.mp.
Cut already!
Ok, long post, and there's a lot more to tell. But I'd love to hear about your summer on social media. So, tell me, what did you play with and learn?
*Besides being an awesome educator, Clarence is also the mayor of the town of Snow Lake, Manitoba.
Snapguide is a free, simple and very slick iPhone/iPad application for creating and sharing step-by-step "how-to" guides. Even though it only made its App Store debut on March 27, it's easy to see why Snapguide could be big - maybe even Instagram big.
You create attractive guides right from the app taking advantage of your iPhone or iPad's camera and some sweet Snapguide creation tools. Text, photos and video clips are combined in a step-by-step sideways swipe format and each guide features your name and pic plus like, comment and share buttons on the front cover. The results can be stunning.
You'll recognize the social components as being highly reminiscent of Instagram - simple and workable. The explore buttons will let you search for any category of guide you'd like instead of relying on app-generated suggestions.
Now, initially, the range of guides isn't as wide as you'd like to see, but the app is in its infancy and topics will certainly broaden in the coming weeks and months. For now, titles include everything from "How to Roast Your Own Coffee" to "How to Keep a Parrot as a Companion Bird."
Face it, everyone knows how to do something, but doesn't necessarily have the venue to easily share it. Sure there are DIY sites on the web, and YouTube videos are useful for learning new tricks, but this particular mobile format lends itself so well to easy creation and consumption. There is a Snapguide website as well, but the creative fun is definitely in the mobile app.
So, have fun with this one, kick out a few guides of your own and see how Snapguide grows. Looks like a winner.
