Instagram version 9.7 has been updated to introduce a new feature in August that was called the ‘Stories’, which allowed the users to bring together multiple photos or video clips that can be stringed into a single short video.
This short video called the Instagram Story can then be shared by the users with their family and friends. The Instagram Stories feature has been widely compared with the Story feature of Snapchat, the rival app of Instagram. With an aim of expanding the reach of its latest feature, the photo-sharing social media network had brought the ‘Stories’ feature to the ‘Explore’ tab, recently in October. Now, Instagram has added two other new features which provide more functionality to its Instagram Stories.
The latest update to the Instagram app arrives with new features which include ‘Boomerang’ and ‘Mentions’ which were initially meant for the Stories feature.
Boomerang to Instagram Stories
The Boomerang feature is here to add something out of the blue to make the everyday moments more fun. The Boomerang feature has been added to the Instagram Stories feature, which will now allow the users to create a short video clip. The users will have to swipe right from their feed to open the stories camera. There is a new format picker below the record button which allows the user to select the ‘Boomerang’ mode. Then the users can tap to record and the camera will now string together a bunch of photos into a short video clip. As the name ‘Boomerang’ suggests, the video clip can be played forward and backward. The users can then share this short Boomerang video on their Stories feed.
Mentions to Instagram Stories
‘Mentions’ is a feature which allows the people to share who they are with or if they are thinking of someone by just mentioning them in a Story. By bringing the ‘Mentions’ feature to the Stories, the users will now be allowed to tag other people from their Instagram contacts inside their stories. When the users add text, they will just have to type ‘@’ which should be followed by the username of the other contact. The mentioned username will appear underlined in the user’s Story. The Mention feature works exactly like the way it is done in captions and in comments. The company had mentioned in its release notes that when the Mentions feature in a friend’s Story is tapped by a user, a pop-up will appear which will take them to the friend’s profile. When a person is mentioned in someone else’s Story, the person will receive a notification about it in Direct, which can be tapped to go straight to the Story. However, the user can preview the Story only if it is Live.
In a report to the Financial Times, the CEO of Instagram had further confirmed that they are also working on bringing the popular Live Video feature to the Instagram app. The CEO was quoted saying that the Live feature is something which is really exciting for the company and they think that taking things Live can enhance everything that the photo-sharing social media network is already doing. The official also quoted an example saying that if a person is trying to strengthen their relationships with someone they love, then Live streaming of a video would be an amazing way to get closer to them.
Links to ‘See More’
Instagram has worked on a way if the user wants to dig deeper and watch someone else’s story. For doing this, the user will have to look out for the “See More” links which are present at the bottom of few stories. This feature is still in its testing stages which will allow verified user accounts to add links so that it is easy to learn more.
The ‘See More’ feature can be used to discover anything right from the latest music by the popular singers to knowing about the latest movie starring the top actors up to reading the latest news article from Bustle (@bustle). The users will just have to tap on “See More” button or they can also just swipe up so that the link can be viewed right inside the Instagram app.
Go Insta in Stories
Just last month, there were reports which suggested that Instagram has been testing its Live video feature, also known as ‘Go Insta’. The Go Insta feature was found to be working in the ‘Stories’ section for a few users on the beta version of the Android app in Russia.
This latest update to the Instagram app version 9.7 which brings the Boomerang and Mentions feature to Stories is available for the users for the iOS platform at the App Store, for the Android platform at the Google Play Store and for Windows 10 at the Windows Store.