Headline May 08, 2015/ ''' BIG-BAD-READY TO MAKE MONEY : INSTAGRAM '''

''' BIG-BAD-READY TO MAKE MONEY :

 INSTAGRAM '''

FROM STAY-AT-HOME MOMS to full-time Instagrammers, many loyal followers, have parlayed their hobby into a lucrative career.

Today many professional photographers are finding that Instagram can be a good way to promote and complement their work.

One example is David Guttenfieder, a veteran photojournalist who has travelled the world for the Associated Press, winning a World Press Photo Award seven times.

In 2013, when he got access to North Korea to spend a year chronicling the lives of everyday citizens, he began publishing a portion of his work on Instagram. His feed, which now boasts 349,000 followers-

Became  a repository of for photos snapped quickly of small curiosities. Time named him the 2013 Instagram Photographer of the Year,

Systrom and Krieger think all of this cool, but they are mostly focused on making Instagram work really well and really fast. Systrom get visibly excited, says the author, when discussing things like latency -the time delay between when you summon your photo stream and when it appears.

Just later and for over three months the duo had cut the time it takes for an image to render by two-thirds. For a communications platform to work, it needs to be absolutely reliable all the time-

And dependability and ease of use were big reasons Instagram took off rather rather than early photo-app rivals such as PicPlz and Hipstamatic.

''It came down to a simple, clear product built for speed of sharing, and the laser focus on a single-use case, sharing photo with friends, allowed it to spread easily,'' says Taylor Davidson, a professional photographer who is a also a venture capitalist investing in photo-related startups. 

In a hotel lobby in downtown Austin, skateboarding legend Tony Hawk whips out his iPhone to display the photo he's just uploaded to Instagram.

In six hours the X Games will start, and he has captured a skate ramp set up in front of the Texas Capitol, perfectly framing the building. So far it has more than 25,000 likes.

Hawk was one of the first celebrities to embrace Instagram. He found it on his own in 2011 by checking out what the teenage skateboarders he coached were using. Hawk, 47, has 1.4 million followers.

Unlike many other celebrities, he controls his own profile and takes most of the photos himself. Instagram has become his primary marketing vehicle for his events and his announcements about Activision's line of Tony Hank videogames.

''Initially Activision would kind of get annoyed with me if I let it slip on Instagram before a games's launch was announced,'' says Hawk. But his accident marketing seemed to work. ''Now they encourage it,'' he says. 

As with most advertising on Instagram right now, the company doesn't profit Hawk's success directly. Despite significant advertiser demand, it has been slow to roll out advertising products.

Systrom says he and Krieger don't want to screw anything up by moving too fast. The company finally launched its first sponsored-ads product by testing 10 campaigns.

In Facebook's most recent earning call, COO Sandberg pointed to the success of one campaign for Levi's, which featured pictures of denim-clad people in gorgeous outdoor locations. 

The ad targeted 18 to 34 and reached some 7.4 million people, according to Facebook.

Sandberg held it up as success, saying that it  ''drove a 24-point lift in ad recall, which was three times the control group.''

Early marketing efforts often achieve outsize success on social media because the advertising takes  users by surprise, and they pay attention. But Systrom is putting unusual emphasis on quality so as not to alienate his users.

In choosing its first 10 advertisers, Instagram was careful to select brands that that would appeal naturally to Instagram's audience. Systrom personally reviews every ad designed for Instagram, and he isn't shy about offering critiques.

When Airbnb advertised on the site recently, Systrom initially sent the proposed photographs of exotic Airbnb location back to his team, asking them to make better use of the location feature on the caption- To indicate where a photo was taken.  

''I thought they could get more out of it,'' says Systrom.

The Honour and Serving of  ''technology operational research''   on this great company, Instagram, continues. Thank you for reading, and maybe -learning something.

With respectful dedication to all the Students of the world. See Ya all on !WOW!  -the World Students Society Computers-Internet-Wireless:

''' Open To The World '''

'''Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless

Headline May 07, 2015/ ''' THE INSTAGRAM SHOT '''

''' THE INSTAGRAM SHOT '''

SOCIAL MEDIA PROPERTIES can often be like nightclubs. They are cool while the trendy people are there, and they disappear without leaving a trace. No trace then, whatsoever.

In fact, Facebook has tremendous value to Instagram, say Krieger and Systrom. The company leans heavily on Facebook's  spam-and fraud prevention team, for example.

And Krieger, who is thinking a good deal about management these days, calls regularly on an executive coach Facebook provides to help navigate the sorts of challenges that emerge when your workforce increases by factor of 10.

The first real test of Instagram's autonomy came three months after the acquisition. Facebook suggested that Istagram revise its terms of service, allowing the company to access users photos for advertising purposes without asking or notifying them.

Instagram went ahead with the policy change. The terms announced late on a Monday and Systrom and Krieger woke up to a storm of outrage the next morning. They watched as account deletions soared. ''That was a scary moment. I thought, Did we just kill Instagram?'' says Systrom.

Kriger immediately convened Instagram's executive team, while Systrome met with Zuckerberg, Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg, and the legal team.

''Let's roll it back,'' Systrom urged them. They tried to persuade him to stick with the change, says Systrom. But he argued that with no immediate plans to add advertising to the platform, it wasn't worth alienating users. They could revisit the issue later.

''It took a while for people to get comfortable with it, but I was pretty adamant that would work,'' says Systrom. He published a blog post rolling back the terms of service, and the account-deletions stopped.

The users had spoken. Instagram had listened. And Facebook had, as promised, stayed out of the way.

Snapchart hired social media theorist Nathan Jurgenson to study why people take disappearing photos. Facebook works with researchers to inquire as to the psychology of status updates.

By contrast, Instagram hands out stickers. The company has a nine person team that encourages community. It maintains Instagram's corporate blog, which is as much an industry rag for people like Skinny as it is a vehicle for announcing the occasional business update.

When the global InstaMeet happened, the company sent kits to all the organizers it could identify. The kits included a massive red balloon as a prop and a bunch of stickers with the company's name on them.

So why, exactly, has Instagram become so popular so fast?  A survey of academics, photographers, and investors suggests its rise corresponds with a larger shift to a more visual style of communication.

People want to share photo to describe their life experiences. This became evident when Facebook bested Myspace, then the dominant social network, in part because its technology made it easier for users to upload and share photos.

In 2007 the launch of the iPhone made it substantially easier {and more fun} to take and share pictures. Systrom and Kreiger's service took the evolution a step further. 

Indeed, beyond the comparison to Kodak's popularization of photography decades ago  (which would apply to smartphones as well as to Instagram), the photo-sharing service has a second analogue, one that may be even more important: iTunes.

Where for decades the technical quality of a photo (or the sound quality of a song) gained ever more importance, all of a sudden, with the advent of iTunes and Instagram, the quality of  distribution trumped all. 

To audio purists {and anybody with good ears}, iTunes has second rate sound. But the the ease of distribution made it a global hit.

So it was with Instagram, with a twist: By adding simple editing tools like filters, Instagram let mainstream web users become  -or at least do an impression of  -good photographers.

Regular people were now able to manipulate their photographs to reflect ideas and feelings.

Many professional photographers were horrified. Suddenly anybody could be a photographer. What's more, Instagram helped take jobs from the professionals. Just over two years ago:

The Chicago Sun-Times fired its entire staff of photographers and trained its journalists to take and edit photos on their iPhones and upload them to the appropriate social feeds.

The Honour and Serving of the  ''technology operational research'' continues.

With respectful dedication to all the Social's Biggest Players : Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Linkedin, Google, Pinterest. See Ya all on !WOW!  -the World Students Society Computers-Internet-Wireless:

''' Users Of Media Services '''

'''Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless

What does it mean to be your own hero

The parable of Spiderman, Superman and Ironman and many others tell us something. These characters possess extraordinary powers to kill the evil character. In real life, the story is no different; if we ought to be superheroes, we need to begin by slaying the evil within ourselves.  The heroes rise triumphant over their fears. Their fears don’t control their behavior because they don’t succumb to the fears but get past it. Kill the fear monsters that breed egoistic, dishonest and deceptive behavior.

More than anything else, be the hero of your life, not the victim. It has nothing to do with money, ego,  stuff to show off and power. It has everything whatsoever to do with emotional honesty, courage, positive thoughts, integrity.

You can't be anyone's hero until you become your own hero first.

The process begins by building a heroic courage within yourself which comes with inner strength of character, being intellectually and emotionally honest with yourself as well as with others.

Everyone wants to be proud of himself/herself but they aren’t quite sure how would it happen. 

For example, I’ve witnessed many of my friends getting perplexed by the question which leads to inner conflict - How to tell if it’s true love or addiction/infatuation?

You truly love someone when they’re good human beings, when they have the virtues of a great person, for example, honesty, sincerity, truthfulness, and the most important thing - holding a conscience. If you’re loving someone who’s bad, then you’re only addicted. Just like you get addicted to drugs which you know are harmful to your health but there’s no way you’re ready to give them up. There’s a greater amount of pain attached in case of leaving the people you love. True love gives you the power, the courage to stand tall, i.e., you won’t be afraid to let go of a bad person. You’d love them enough to let them go. Because inside your head, the concepts of goodness and badness and their potential repercussions are all clear.  

If you’re Dishonest, what does it tell about you:

When you shun honesty in your relationships, you do so solely out of fear. Your best heroic potential is stunted right there.  Heroic behavior doesn’t grow. 

If you’re envious, what does it tell about you:

Being envious, shameful, criticizer, guilty and player of blame game, you’re exuding the tumultuous conflict inside of you. As a result you end up in darkness. And there’s only one way out, fight and kill the monsters within you. Win the duel and meet yourself in real form!

Some questions and a pathway to answers

Ask yourself, do you honour truth, do you honour your friends? Do you treat your girlfriend, boyfriend, colleagues, spouse, family with respect? Have you been granted the trust of person closest to you? How much do they trust you?

Emerging out of your dark side, leveling up the low goals, making yourself extraordinary is part of heroism. It’s natural to be afraid of many consequences. In situations of muddiness and disarray, standing up and doing something that must be done is heroism. One has to strike a balance between feeling no fear and being a total coward. 

With a keen eye, you’ll be able to see that there’s a decipherable pattern in the events happening around you. The irrefutable argument is - We can go deeper into the tiers of meanings of our life by taking a panoramic view of our own life. The things you discover with this practice will surprise you!

Headline May 06, 2015/ ''' INSTAGRAMMERS BY SOCIALS '''

''' INSTAGRAMMERS BY SOCIALS '''

UNLIKE SOME OF ITS social media rivals, Instagram isn't given to asking existential questions about the nature of its own appeal.

Systrom, who serves as CEO, believes Instagram is up to the challenge. In 2014, when he hired employee No:145, and Instagram had just expanded to-

Fill out most of its floor in a building on Facebook's faux-urban Menlo Park, Calif., campus, where Systrom is within walking distance of Facebook's leadership team.

He acknowledges that expanding  -and realizing the economic potential of  -his service is no small task. But he counters with a question of his own: Just how many companies have figured out how to nurture the point:

That it has an audience of more than a billion people? Before anyone can answer, he interrupts: ''One.'' he says. ''The one we work at.''

One of Systrom's new obsessions is flying drones, writes the authors.''You can get some cool photos of the world by looking down at it, he points out. It changes your perspective. 

And so on a June afternoon, I found myself with Systrom, Kreiger, and some other Instagrammers on-

Stanford University's campus in front of its  320-foot Andy Goldsworthy stone wall sculpture. Fifty feet above us, a-two-by-two-foot Phantum2Vision+   -a $,299 toy -swivelled its camera to point directly down.

Systrom, who towered above the rest of us at 6-foot-5 and was wearing an argyle tie fashioned to his blue-button with a silver tie clip, had linked his iPhone to the drone's camera, and we peered at the screen.

The Goldsworthy sculpture looked like a snake gliding across the lawn. Systrom snapped, snapped and snapped again.

He didn't post anything right away. Later that evening, he reviewed the photos. He picked the best one, cropped it, ran it through a filter, tweaked the saturation, and uploaded it, sharing it with his 1.5 million Instagram followers.

More than 10,000 people  ''liked'' it.  The 175 comments, however, mostly came from Instagram users who wanted customer service on their accounts, a reminder (along with the tie) that Systrom is after all the boss.''

Systrom wasn't a photograph aficionado before Instagram. He and co-founder Krieger, who is Instagram's technical lead, originally set out to build a location-based sharing app. Systrom, who grew up in Holliston, Mass, a tony Boston suburb, first met the Brazilian-born Krieger at Stanford.

Like many before them, they hatched their collaboration in a coffee shop. Their messaging app was called Burbn. It mostly let friends say where they were and share a few photos. But early on they discovered that photos were what hooked people.

The quickly built a simple photo app and selected 100 people - Apple's maximum limit for a beta test-  to test it. this time, instead of asking their friends to try it, as they had with Burbn, they reached out to two target groups.  -designers and reporters.

They launched Instagram on Oct-6, 2010. and attracted  100,000 users the first week. It has been among the top 10 most downloaded apps ever since.

Just over a year later, Facebook and Twitter began jockeying to buy Instagram. In April 2011, after reportedly turning down acquisition offers by each of the social media giants, Systrom and Kriger closed a $50 million round of funding led by venture capital firm Sequoia. The plan was to stay independent.

But on the Friday that Zuckerberg received the news about the funding, he asked to meet with Systrom. The Facebook founder raised his offer to $ 1 billion, twice what Tweeter had offered. Just as important he had promised autonomy.

Systrom and Kreiger decided to take the deal. Systrom spent most of the following weekend at the Facebook CEO's house for negotiations that were interrupted only briefly on Sunday evening so that Zuckerberg, an avid:

Game of Thrones fan, could host a long-scheduled viewing party. On Monday, April 9, before Twitter had the chance to make a counteroffer, Systrom and Zuckerberg announced the deal. Instagram's emplyees drove down the 101 to Facebook's Menlo Park Headquarters for a tour.

From an internal balcony, designer Keegan Jones Instagrammed a photo of his 12 colleagues looking up somewhat bewildered as if to say, ''What just happened?''   

Many people criticized Instagram for selling out so early when the app's popularity was skyrocketing. But the Instagram team insist that the executive at their parent company have been remarkable hands-off.

Kreiger credits Jay Parikh, head of Facebook's infrastructure group, explaining:

''Before we got here, he told everyone,  'Don't bug them. But if they ask you for help, do whatever you can.' ''

The Honour and Serving of the  ''technology operational research'' continues. Thank you for reading and see Ya all on the following one.

With respectful dedication to all the Students, Professors and Teachers of the world. See Ya all on !WOW!   -the World Students Society Computers-Internet-Wireless:

'''Social's Biggest Player To Be'''

'''Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless

Headline May 05, 2015/ ''' INSTAGRAM : THE PHOTO-SHARING LOVE '''

''' INSTAGRAM : 

THE PHOTO-SHARING LOVE '''

INSTAGRAM'S USERS SHARE over 60 million photos a day and have shared over and above, and more than 23 billion in total.

In an attempt to harness this enthusiasm, Instagram has begun calling on its corporate blog for the occasional worldwide  ''InstaMeet''. Just recently was the ninth global gathering;

On the same day, Instagrammers were  snapping and sharing  photos from London to South Africa. Skinny learned about the Brooklyn InstaMeet from local organizers he follows- who spread the word in the captions of photos they posted.

Afterward, the Instagrammers selected their favourite shots, edited them, applied the app's distinctive filters, and posted them to Instagram with the hashtag #thatnycmeet; in no time there were 838, at least three of which were added by Skinny.

Skinny, 29, loves Instagram. An account manager at a publishing company, he goes to friends' Instagram meet-ups nearly every weekend, uploads photos every day, and post them under the handle @skinnywashere. 

He has 35,000 followers, which is a lot but not quiet enough yet for him to leverage into making real money. Mostly he's inspired by his passion. He calls Instagram a  ''visual diary'' that lets him connect to other creative people. 

First thing every morning he reaches for his phone, eager to see what has transpired on the app.while he was sleeping. ''I used to do BMX with my friends on the weekend, but now I Instagram,'' he says.

This is exactly kind of devotion that Facebook generated in the earliest days. That's why, two years ago, Facebook CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg paid nearly $ 1 billion to buy the photo-sharing app. People thought he was crazy.

At the time  Instagram  had 13 employees, fewer than 22 million active users, and no website. Today it boasts more than 200 million active users  -almost as many as Twitter-  who upload 60 million photos every day.

They spend spend an average of 3.7 hours on Instagram every month, according to Nielson more time than people spend on Twitter or Pinterest. The acquisition has been a boon for Facebook, helping it connect to younger users.

Says RBC managing director Mark Mahaney : ''It might turn out to be one of the best deals we've seen in the history of the consumer Internet.''

That's true in part because Instagram has helped spawn a powerful new social phenomenon: Just as Kodak's invention of a roll film made it easy for almost anyone to take photographs a century ago, Instagram's invention of a-

Social feed paired with easy-to-use editing tools makes everyone capable of creating and sharing nuanced, edited pictures today.

And that photo sharing has empowered people in powerful, unexpected ways  -even those not named Kardashian or Bieber.

A 13 year-old professional skateboarder, for instance, can draw a large audience for practice skate session with one photo posted to his 42,000 followers. And an Oxford, Miss., who started using Instagram to exchanges photos with her sister-

Has amassed an audience of 530,000. Her pictures were so popular she set up a storefront and began selling prints   -enough to quit her job. Much as YouTube did for Google, Instagram has put Facebook squarely in the heart of an increasingly important medium of communication.

Businesses are leaping onto the platform. Companies from apparel maker Free People to General Electric have launched their own Instagram feeds, which they say have generated much more user engagement (in the form of ''likes'' and comments) than other social sites.

Patagonia invited climbers to instagram photos of themselves mountain climbing, tagging them #VIDAPatagonia, and then publish the photos on Patagonia.com. Others like Puma, are hiring Instagrammers with large, deeply engaged followings at rate of up to $5,000 a day to capture photos that showcase the company's products.

Just about the only party not trying to make money on Instagram right now is Instagram's corporate parent. It doesn't need to. Facebook's revenues jumped 55% last year to $7.9 billion   -and not one penny from it came from Instagram.

In 2014, In Facebook's April earning call, Zuckerberg said that he thinks Instagram has a lot of room to grow and that it will start to be an important business in the future. But, as he put it:

''Monetization isn't our near-term priority here.''  In March , 2014, Instagram signed its first deal with an ad agency, when Omnicom pledged to place around $40 million in ads on the service.

There's no guarantee of course, that the steady ascent in popularity will continue. Instagram's co-founders, Kevin Systrom, 31, and Mike Kriger, 29, know this. For one, there are myriad technical challenges, from maintaining infrastructure-

For ever more users to providing support in foreign languages. Also a host of messaging services like Snapchat and Whatsapp (now owned by Facebook) have emerged and a mounting desire for people to share photos privately rather than publicly.

The company must figure out how to evolve to meet changing tastes without changing what its users love about it.

The Honour and Serving of the  ''operational research''  continues. Thank you for reading and, maybe learning something, and see ya all on the following one.

With respectful dedication to all users of Instagram. See Ya all on !WOW!  -the World Students Society Computers-Internet-Wireless:

''' Ready For The Shot '''

'''Good Night and God Bless

SAM Daily Times - the Voice of the Voiceless