Social media giant Instagram is pausing the rollout of features such as a full-screen feed emphasizing Reels and an increase in posts from accounts that users don’t follow after many of its platform users decried the move. 

The proposed features have now been put on pause or are being reduced, a Meta spokesperson told reporters. Many of the thousands who signed a Change.org petition are likely to be excited to hear the news. High profile Instagram users like Kim Kardashian and Kylie Jenner had shared a post from Tati Bruening who goes by the name @illumitati decrying the platforms changes.

Meta’s top brass have taken that feedback seriously by the looks of it. Users like Jenner, who commands a 360 million follower count had denounced Snapchat’s user interface changes back in 2018, causing $1.3 billion in the app’s market value to be obliterated in a single day.

However, the roll back is not permanent. With the rise of TikTok, the dominance of the social media app has been threatened. The ByteDance-owned video company is the most downloaded app in the world according to analytics firm App Tower. Not just that, but TikTok users spend more time on the app than they do on YouTube and it was the most visited website in 2021. 

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While Instagram has said that it will reduce the amount of recommended posts as it continues to work on its algorithm, CEO of Meta, Mark Zuckerberg told investors over the Quarter 2 earnings call that the time spent by users watching Reels grew by 30%, a clear indication that users actually want to watch short-form video.

Instagram isn’t the only one that had been affected. Meta has recently directed changes to how Facebook’s Home and Feed tabs work. However, there haven’t been reports about discontentment with the proposed changes from Facebook users.