Instagram reaches a billion users, launches IGTV

Instagram announced the app has reached 1 billion users, a mere eight years after launch and six years after its 2012 acquisition by Facebook. Facebook now has four platforms in the billion-plus users club: Facebook (2.2 billion), Messenger (1.3 billion), Whatsapp (1.5 billion) and now Instagram.

In other Insta-news, the company also introduced a new app for creating and showing long-form, vertical videos called IGTV. The app is aimed squarely at user-generated content creators who populate YouTube and Snapchat. The app will group content into channels, based on creators. Users will be able to subscribe to creator channels, as well as send direct videos to other users.

The company said the app will roll out globally for iOS and Android “over the next few weeks.”