Instagram, the highly renowned and popular photo-sharing platform, has allowed all the social butterflies to connect with a variety of different people worldwide, including, but not limited to, musicians and artists. Ultimately, there was always a missing ingredient in the mix.
Kevin Systrom, the CEO and founder of Instagram, decided to implement music within the platform calling this special feature @music. This is the first handle on instagram ever that is dedicated, by instagram, to highlighting a specific brand of content. According to Systrom, “The music community is – and always has been – an important part of Instagram.” Throughout the lifespan of the platform, it has steadily grown as a way for artists to spread the news about their upcoming projects, filling in their fans on the latest music releases, and keeping close contact throughout their creative process.
The special feature will consist of 11 series and six posts a week Tuesday to Sunday which will introduce fans to aspiring, up and coming artists, varying in genre and style. There is bound to be something for everyone.
“Unlike Facebook, there’s not a field of structured data for people to identify as musicians,” says Jonathan Hull, head of strategic partnerships/music for Facebook and Instagram. “We just rolled out verification at beginning of the year, so we’re still getting to know the verified folks and developing a much more robust list of verified music accounts. We don’t have the number yet, but we can see how important music is when we just look at the top accounts – we know who they are, even if their name is @champagnepapi.”