Instagram removing likes is about money, not mental health

Hi Dave,

I am a heavy Instagram user (~1hr+ per day) and would argue against this change not impacting mental health. I have struggled in the past with image and self-esteem, and was caught up in the number of likes I was getting on my posts or views on my Instagram Stories. I clung on to the external validation of digital hearts for a while, as it provided me with a sense of worth in my life – “people think I am interesting”, “people like what I’m doing”, etc.

Whilst I am less of a slave to the gram these days, I can only empathise with the younger generations who are/have been swept up in the validation they receive on social media.

I have noticed a shift in my mindset since the changes were made to the platform a few days ago – in that I am enjoying the content on my feed more, and not pressured to think that I have to like the content just because another 5,000 people have. I am also seeing people (and by people I mean friends of mine, not brands, or meme accounts) posting more – this is a sign to me that the changes made have had a positive impact on the way people are interacting with the platform and are less worried about the “likes” they might get on a photo. I would hope others are feeling the same as I am.

The other thing I would like to comment on is that there IS a tool to track activity usage, which does send a pop-up notification when you have reached the daily limit you have set for yourself. Please refer to the “Your Activity” tab when navigating towards your account preferences.

I understand your skepticism to Facebook/Instagram in that everything they do is designed to make more ad revenue dollars or gather even more data (i.e. Libra), but I hope this encourages you to be more receptive and open to how this can (and is, in my case) help with mental health in teens, young adults and even adults in a good way.

Very well said David. Of course it is about money. Be interesting to see if Instagram engagement goes down as a result of the change.

Spot on, from the opening quote to the conclusion. I suspect if and when ‘time on site’ plummets, likes will either be back or some new insidious social collateral measurement feature will take its place.

As the first comment above attests, it would be a damn good thing if the change, whatever it’s motivation, resulted in positive consequences. But I’m deeply sceptical people’s mental health, societies discourse or thriving real world communities are metrics these organisations give a flying click about.

Good info. I laugh everytime I see an article regarding Insta hiding Likes. No, they are still dangling the dope in front of those chasing the dope (red hearts)

You are correct. This move is all to benefit Zuck and crew. They will never remove the red heart bc this is how Social Memememedia stays alive. Why people waste their days, hours and time on these useless platforms is always a mystery…

#GrowYourOwnPlatform

Great to see so many privileged middle aged white men know so much about how this is effecting teenagers self esteem & mental health. Im sure you know how they operate so well.

Good article Dave and interesting take on the fact that hiding likes has now removed the pressure of SMB’s to advertise. Thanks for sharing!

Pssst Mumbrella.

I’m not sure how you conclude in your precis that ‘Murmur’s Dave Leggett thinks that’s “bullshit”.’

Mind you Dave Levett’s article does a good job of that.

Or maybe Dave Leggett Dave Levett’s nom de plume on Instagram.

Please don’t write bullshit articles for click bait reasons. This just empowers Mumbrella website for SEO and bullshit fake news.

Perhaps actually talk with Facebook account managers before writing your bullshit opinion and talking in the third person.

If hiding likes really is about mental health and bringing the platform back to its sole purpose of photo sharing, then follower counts would be removed too. No point hiding likes if everyone with fake followers looks successful and popular.

It’s definitely all about the money- I won’t be surprised if soon there is a paid option to show likes or a new ranking metric pops up.

Grrr

It’s absolutely about platform engagement and not mental health.

Users will be much more inclined to raise their content submissions, without fear that they will ‘fatigue’ their ‘audiences’ (ie friends) and therefore receive ’embarrassingly’ low like counts.

User engagement goes up, time on the platform goes up, ad revenues go up.

Easy!

I 100% agree with your argument Dave. It’s not about mental health, it’s about revenue. Instagram is a business and they’re looking after their bottom line – it’s all about ad revenue. A positive effect on mental health is simply their PR angle. Yes, I’m sure it is good for mental health, but it’s not the core reason for their decision.

Interesting article Dave particularly on the skew and relevance of small business in FB’s strategic growth targets.

Out of interest were you able to find the relative revenue size of small business spend to the large guys?

From personal view point, I’d seen the change in likes largely being an audience behavior play, encouraging Instagram users to be comfortable to engage from the platform to site (i.e. if you reduce the audience member’s value of a like they would be more likely to do other things like click to site). This is turn I’d seen as more valuable to larger players, particularly in retail/e-com space where’s Instagrams content is strong so increasing spend from these partners by improving their traffic behaviour would mean more $.

Can’t it be both?

Headpace is literally for mental health and it literally makes money off it.

and that is fine.

Everyone needs to relax

I would say it is in a big part also a way to take away power from the people and give it back to Instagram. Businesses don’t advertise on Instagram only through Instagram. Huge part of it is through influencers. I think Instagram is pretty annoyed they don’t get a part of that. That is also why they constantly tweak their algorithm so less and less people see your posts/so that they control what users see in their feed… sadly IG is going down the FB path.

You can still see user’s LIKES even though it’s hidden — this can be seen through Phlanx “Instagram Likes Calculator” they have a free calculator that shows the likes count per post, just created today exclusive for brands who still need to use likes to check if the influencers suit their brands.

Well said. Can’t believe anyone buys this ‘mental health’ reason.
It’s to increase engagement from people who were become too embarrassed to engage with the platform.
Increase ad revenue.
Also – take ad revenue back from influencers.

How about this for an idea? If it affects your mental health, don’t use it, period. Don’t try changing it just because you’re a sook. Always catering for the minority, well in this case, pretending to.

If you for one minute pretend Insta cares about your mental health its time to deprogram. Everything from open to close in this article is on the money. no pun

Does anyone realise the “like” count is only on mobile. The “like” count is still active on desktop.

I disagree with your article. If Instagram really did bring this in to increase cost of ads for small businesses, it would have removed likes on ads and not on individuals posts. As well as this, I don’t like the slating Instagram received in this article, even if it was to increase revenue, the overall health effects on the population would still be positive which should be celebrated by the public!

I think this is overall a good change because this is not just about big influencers but about small influencers as well. Content creation is going to be the key player here and engagement will be of the essence when the likes are totally removed.