No Hearts for Instagram

Last week, Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri announced the company will be experimenting with removing likes on some posts in the U.S., and perhaps removing likes altogether. The company said the purpose of the change is to allow users to “focus on the photos and videos you share, not how many likes they get.” Despite this change, users will still be able to see likes on their own photos. This experiment had already been conducted in seven countries prior to their current experiment in the U.S.

With this change, the company says it’s about “creating a less pressurized environment where people feel comfortable expressing themselves.” However, there is no proven benefit from removing likes from an audience’s eyes but not the user who owns the post. This kind of change instead hurts social media influencers by making it more difficult for brands to assess how well a social media influencer does with engaging with their current audience. This isn’t an attack on the effects of social media on user’s mental health, but rather on the businesses that rely on Instagram to make a living.

At the end of the day, users can still see how well or how bad a post does and can influence the kind of content the user makes in order to achieve more likes on their posts. The removal of likes will not cause a positive shift towards more creative, original content. Instead, it puts business owners and social media influencers who rely on the platform at risk of losing potential customers. If Instagram decides to go through with removing likes for all users, the company should remove the visibility of likes altogether. If Instagram wants to make a more positive impact on their platform, they should hide likes for everyone to combat users “over-obsessing” about the amount of likes they get.