Instagram has announced that the number of people using the service has surpassed 300 million. In a blog post published on Wednesday, Instagram’s Kevin Systrom revealed that 70 million photos and videos are being shared by users every single day. This is an important piece of information, especially since Instagram has given no indication as to what percentage of that 300 million are “active users” who signed up for the service and post regularly.
Systrom also used news of the milestone to announce the arrival of verified badges for celebrities, athletes, and brands. Instagram users will start seeing these badges over the coming days. However, there’s no information as to the criteria Instagram will consider in establishing accounts worthy of a ‘verified’ tag. For example, Twitter doesn’t accept requests for verification from users but Facebook does have a form where owners of pages representing celebrities, public figures, sports teams, and various other media and entertainment entities can apply for verification (though it does warn that “most” Pages and profiles are not eligible for verification, including business pages).
It seems logical to assume that Instagram would operate under the same policy as its parent company, but Facebook has been pretty hands off when it comes to the day-to-day operation of Instagram. Similar to WhatsApp, Instagram still has its own CEO (Mark Zuckerberg didn’t strip co-founder Kevin Systrom of his title when he bought the company in 2012) and the company runs independently of Facebook. So, really, it’s equally possible it won’t entertain any requests for verification at all. You’ll just have to hope Instagram recognizes the strength of your account without intervention.
[source]Instagram[/source]
