Everything is TV now, including Instagram

Chaos Brewing Meter: ☕☕☕☕

Hear that? It’s the sound of your attention span slowly roasting over a Fire TV. The Amazon-built devices will soon be home to a brand-new Instagram TV app. It’s a mark of how our social media consumption has shifted—light on social, heavy on media. Meta is using the app as a testing ground, likely to compete with YouTube, TikTok, and even traditional streamers. And we’re not surprised: As journalist Derek Thompson put it recently, everything is television now—the vast majority of time on Instagram and Facebook today is spent watching videos, not liking friends’ vacation pics. So far, YouTube is the undisputed king of the small screen, pulling in over a billion TV viewing hours a day (more than Disney and Netflix). The Instagram TV launch only reinforces that social platforms and streamers are now direct competitors. Meanwhile, Meta signaled this is just the beginning by also teasing a push into longer-form content. At this point, it’s just a matter of time before the first vertical 60-inch TV hits store shelves.