Facebook typically tests new Facebook and
Instagram features in smaller markets before
bringing them to the U.S., if it ever does. The
company would not comment on what it’s
learned from the Canada test or if it has plans to
expand it to the U.S. any time soon.
One group that may be affected is Instagram
“influencers,” the major, minor or micro
celebrities who use social media to market
products and otherwise influence their hordes
of followers. After all, if you post a photo and no
one likes it, did you really post it?
People can still see how many people liked their
own photos, but won’t see counts for other
people’s posts. Rather, they could tap to see a
list of all the accounts that liked the other posts,
but would have to count the total manually. It’s
a task few people would bother with. Likewise,
though Instagram isn’t hiding the number of
followers on an account, it still requires an extra
tap or two to find that.
“It makes it hard to find who the influencers are,”
said Ryan Hilton, a 27-year old Canadian who
works in social media and has been part of the
no-likes test for months. “It’s hard to know who
to follow because everyone looks the same.”
Hilton, who has a personal account as well as
one for his dog, the latter with more than 3,200
followers, added that he understands why
Instagram is doing this. Hilton said his younger
sister, who is in high school, is “obsessed” with likes.
“It’s mostly for the younger generation, people
in high school and stuff,” he said. “There is a
lot of pressure. If someone has 1,000 likes and
someone has two likes, that probably makes
them feel not very nice.”