Instagram Is Hiding ‘Likes’

Instagram Has Begun Hiding ‘Like’ Counts In The US

Instagram Is Hiding ‘Likes’

Katherine Conner, Staff Writer

If you live in the United States, don’t panic when there are no likes on your new post. This is an experiment being run by Instagram. According to Business Insider, Instagram’s CEO, Adam Mosseri, announced on Friday that the platform will begin hiding “like” counts on posts this week. At first, likes will disappear only for certain users as a test of the feature. Instagram has been hiding likes in many countries since July. The countries include Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Brazil, Ireland, Italy, and Japan.

According to Mosseri, in an interview with Buzzfeed News, removing like counts was about “creating a less pressurized environment where people feel comfortable expressing themselves.”

Instagram isn’t the only social media to try hiding like counts. In September, Facebook, who owns Instagram, experimented with removing “like” counts on posts, and Twitter CEO, Jack Dorsey, has been hinting at wanting to remove public likes from tweets for over a year. Users, however, can still like posts by either double tapping a picture or clicking the heart below the post and the user can’t see how many people have like the picture.

But, some people say that hiding likes won’t really solve any problems. It could cause added stress to a user’s life. The users might get some symptoms of anxiety, worrying if their posts are doing well or not.

According to CNN Business, some influencers are strongly objecting the hiding of likes on Instagram. Nicki Minaj, the rapper and singer, said she would ‘stop posting’ if likes were gone. Rapper Cardi B posted and said that the nasty comments on Instagram were more of an issue than likes when it comes to users’ well being. Mosseri has said that he and his team don’t know how long the experiment is going to be running for.

According to a survey run by #paid, over 50% of influencers have seen that their numbers have dropped since Instagram has started running their experiment.