Instagram expands ads to Explore feeds

Instagram said Wednesday it planned to launch advertising on its Explore page, expanding marketing opportunities on the Facebook-owned, visual-focused social network.

In the coming months, ads will appear on the Explore feed, where users go to discover content aligned with their interests, an Instagram blog post said.

“Today, 80 percent of people follow a business on Instagram, and Explore can help them find the next business or product they might love,” the Instagram business team wrote.

“Whether it’s shopping, catching up on stories or discovering the latest trends, we see people actively looking to connect with brands they like. That’s why, over the next few months, we’ll be introducing ads in Explore feed.”

The statement said the ad rollout would be done “slowly and thoughtfully” in the coming months.

“For advertisers, this is an opportunity to be part of what’s culturally relevant and trending while reaching new audiences who are looking to discover something new,” the Instagram team said.

Instagram, which now has more than a billion users worldwide and has attracted some users tired of the core Facebook platform, has become an important source of advertising revenue for the California social networking giant.

Although Facebook does not offer a detailed breakdown, the research firm eMarketer estimated that Instagram ad revenue in the US will grow nearly 47 percent this year to reach $9.08 billion.

“Instagram advertising is very popular, and Explore will open up a pipeline of valuable new ad inventory,” said eMarketer analyst Debra Aho Williamson.

“Half of Instagram users use Explore, making it a highly popular feature. We expect advertisers to quickly adopt this ad placement.”

Instagram, acquired by Facebook in 2012, began limited advertising in 2013 and two years later began serving up video ads.

Earlier this week, Instagram chief Adam Mosseri sought to quell fears that the social network uses private messages as part of its ad targeting strategy.

“We don’t look at your messages, we don’t listen in on your microphone; doing so would be super problematic for a lot of different reasons,” Mosseri said in an interview with CBS.

#Facebook and #Instagram are down for some users around the world

Facebook and Instagram appear to be partially down for some users around the world today. While you can open both platforms, it looks like you can’t send or receive messages on either platform, and you can’t post new content either.

WhatsAppappeared to be fine for many people, but users in Paraguay, India, Bangladesh, Argentina, and more note that they are experiencing issues with sending messages. DownDetector indicates that those in Brazil were experiencing the most severe outages.

We tested multiple accounts at The Verge, and found that Messenger couldn’t load at all on desktop, although the mobile app was working. Instagram was worse: posts weren’t loading, Instagram Stories were down, and direct messages and the button to post new content were also not working. Facebook’s ad section was not functioning either, and it led to an internal error when you tried to buy an ad.

About an hour after users noted the outage, Facebook responded on Twitter. It also noted that “the issue is not related to a DDoS attack.”

Facebook

✔@facebook

We’re aware that some people are currently having trouble accessing the Facebook family of apps. We’re working to resolve the issue as soon as possible.

15.5K

6:49 PM - Mar 13, 2019

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Instagram on desktop as of 1PM ET.

According to DownDetector, it looks like the outages are mainly in New England; Texas; Seattle, Washington; parts of Latin America, including Peru; the UK; India; and the Philippines. Users have written in from Canada, Las Vegas, and Turkey to note outages there as well. We’ve reached out to Facebook and Instagram to learn more.

It now looks like Oculus is also down. One user in California wrote in to The Verge, “Nobody can log in to any multiplayer games purchased through the Oculus store. They also can’t access their Oculus Home environments.” Users also reported being unable to buy games from the Oculus store.

Victor E Garcia@otiteb

 · 1h

@oculus , i am having problems managing apps on the dashboard: users in release channel that were already in are not appearing now. Are your systems having some sort of issues today?

Oculus Support

✔@OculusSupport

Hey there, we're currently looking into an issue on our end, and hope to have it resolved soon. We really appreciate your patience. Thank you!

8:16 PM - Mar 13, 2019

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Other users noted that attempting to use Facebook to sign into apps like Tinder or Spotify wasn’t working either. Attempting to do so would bring up an error saying this feature isn’t available right now. If you were already signed into Spotify, it appears that your login is still valid, but once you sign out, you’ll be unable to get back in.

via Theverge

Reality Show Star Kim Kardashian Shares IG Snap Of Herself Baking In Underwear

Kim Kardashian made baking look sexy on Thursday in an Instagram post. The 37-year-old reality star shared a snap of herself cooking in her underwear.

Kim in the photo wore an olive bra and matching high-cut bottoms while wiping chocolate from a spoon with her finger.

She wrote in the caption for her roughly 115 million Instagram followers: 'bake sesh'. Kim had her long dark hair down and wore full eye makeup and lipstick for her baking session.

CELEBRITY! Khloé Kardashian fans troll cheater Tristan Thompson on Instagram

Khloe Kardashian’s boyfriend and baby daddy,Tristan Thompson was trolled by girlfriend Khloé Kardashian’s loyal fans after he was caught cheating on her just days before she gave birth to their first child, True Thompson.
And even though the new mom has opted to make it work with her boyfriend Tristan Thompson, it seems as though her fans are not as forgiving.

It began when the 34-year-old shared a beautiful image of an ocean on Instagram with the caption, ‘Take me please’.

‘Where do you wanna go my love?’ quickly replied the NBA star.
And while Tristan seemed to want to take his girlfriend on a trip, protective fans pounced on the opportunity to roast him over his infidelity.

Kylie Jenner deletes all photos of her daughter

She's been sharing the journey of motherhood with her 109 million Instagram followers since her daughter Stormi's birth back in February.

But it appears as though Kylie Jenner now wants to take the four-month-old out of spotlight by deleting all the photos she had previously uploaded of the bub that showcased her face.
Taking to the social media on Sunday, the 20-year-old revealed she wouldn't be sharing anymore photos of Stormi 'right now', after she was slammed for cutting out her baby from an image.

'i spy with my little eye...' she captioned a sweet makeup free photo that saw Stormi's head just peaking through.
And it wasn't long before fans accused her of cropping out her baby - leading Kylie to hit back.
'Yeah i cut my baby out. I'm not sharing photos of my girl right now.' replied the beauty mogul.

And although Kylie confirmed she wouldn't be posting shots of her daughter moving forward, she's gone as far as to delete any other photo already uploaded that showcased her face.

Although it's unsure why Kylie has opted to remove the daughter she shares with Travis Scott from her social media accounts.