The introduction of Notes in Instagram is nostalgic for AIM
AOL Instant Messenger, or AIM, is dead — but external messaging lives on, thanks to Instagram’s latest update.
On Tuesday, the social media platform launched a series of updates, including a notes feature, which allows users to leave text or emoji updates in posts of up to 60 characters.
Within hours of the platform revealing the new features, social media users noticed the similarity of Instagram notes to external messages in the early 2000s.
Singer Lou Miceli Jr. said: chirp. “But that’s just literally, anything else you post about is stupid.”
“I didn’t expect instagram to reinvent AIM messages so far tbh,” writer Ella Cerón said chirp.
Sports reporter Madi Hudak Wrote: “I’m sorry Instagram gave us AIM messages away lmao.”
AIM was discontinued in 2017 after 20 years, but in its heyday in 2000, AIM messaging away was the most popular way to share what was really on a person’s mind, passive-aggressive response to a dispute or share a lyric to a fan.
With the rise of Facebook status and later the Twitter tweet, social media users have new ways to share what’s on their mind. But in the ’20s, nostalgia for Y2K culture shaped much of social media and fashion, giving Instagram a chance to seemingly reinvent the message away.
“During testing, we learned that people love having an easy, lightweight way to share what’s on their mind and start conversations,” Instagram explained in a blog post about the new feature. “From asking for recommendations to sharing what they’re planning, Notes gives people a spontaneous, intuitive way to express themselves and connect with each other.”
The feature will appear in users’ inboxes as a left-to-right swipe over their direct messages. The text is displayed as a short blurb above the user’s avatar.
In addition to the feedback feature, Instagram said it’s testing “candid stories,” which appear to be takes on app BeReal’s candid photo-sharing platform, as well as group profiles, which will allow multiple people to collaborate and post on the same account.
When asked for comment, a spokesperson for Meta, which owns Instagram, didn’t touch on nostalgia for AIM.
They reiterated a similar message to the blog’s ad, stating that “Notes give people a free, spontaneous way to express themselves and connect.”
The spokesperson added that people send more than 140 billion messages per day via Meta’s messaging apps.
On platforms like Twitter, it was clear what new feature was a huge hit with millennials clinging to nostalgia for their teenage years.
Some tweeted that now was their chance to post slick pop-punk lyrics, which often featured the distant messages of emo millennials.
“Instagram really pushed the messages back and made no fuss about it. About to launch a mid-2000s emo playlist and start hoarding lyrics,” sports journalist Pete Blackburn chirp.
Others pondered the implications of the AIM message for those who grew up with it.
“Recreating the messages on Instagram made me wonder if we were all on AIM because we were emo or we were emo because we were all on AIM,” sports journalist Peter Bukowski Wrote.
Internet reporter Scott Nover celebrated both Instagram and the apparent return of the outdoorsy message in a tweet.
“This is the first good feature to come to Instagram in a decade,” he said Wrote. “We got away with the letters, baby.”
#introduction #Notes #Instagram #nostalgic #AIM