Instagram will promote original content to recommendations, not copies

Author:
Liza Brovko
Date:

Instagram is changing its content recommendation system to prioritize original content and accounts with a small number of followers.

The Verge writes about it.

The biggest change concerns aggregators — accounts that publish content from other users, often without any mention of authorship. The social network will remove the posts of such accounts from the recommendations.

The update applies to "serial reposters" who share someone elseʼs content without changing it more than ten times in 30 days. Such accounts will be able to get into recommendations again 30 days after the last re-posting of "unoriginal" content. The changes will not affect some accounts identified by Instagram and with license agreements or reposting permissions from content creators.

Also, Instagram will replace republished content with the authorʼs original post in recommendations. However, this will only be done once the system is satisfied that the posts are identical "based on audio and visual cues." Content creators will be notified when their original content replaces reposts.

Previously, Instagram rated content primarily based on how an accountʼs followers interacted with it, and the algorithm decided whether to promote it to recommendations. Instagram is now changing its approach to give smaller accounts an equal chance to be promoted.