Adam Mosseri says Instagram is all about short videos

Recently a creator asked me: “Are we going to do longer videos on Instagram?” The answer is no, and I want to explain why.

We do a lot of different things at Instagram, but at its core, we’re focused on two things: Connecting you with friends. Helping you explore your interests, usually through short videos.

It feels like these two things are symbiotic. You see an amazing video that makes you laugh from a comedian’s performance, and you send it to someone who you know will laugh as loud as you. Or for me, I see a highlight of an amazing football goal or trick, and I send it to someone who I know loves football as much as I do. So these things are about connecting with friends based on your interests.

It seems like longer videos are less symbiotic with these other jobs. If you watch a 10 or 20 minute video, you see less content from friends, you interact less with your friends, and you’re actually less likely to send that content or that video to a friend. So we’re not going after that business because connecting people with friends is part of our core identity and we don’t want to undermine that by going after longer videos.

We understand that shortform video doesn’t always do this, but it can. We try and prioritize shortform video that does this. So let me know what you think in the comments below. I’m sure there will be a lot of scathing comments on this. Peace.