Huh: Instagram has a new feature and we don't understand it at all

What are we supposed to do with this now? Instagram has launched a new feature called Notes, where users can post a status of up to 60 characters that appears above their profile picture. Instagram has also added a new row to the overview of private messages where you can find these statuses, and my only question is: why?

Notes basically works exactly the same as Stories. It is a temporary message that remains visible to your followers for 24 hours, but you can also choose to show your Note only to your list of best friends. When you click on a Note, you have the option to respond via a private message with an emoticon or a written message, just like with Stories.

Instagram is known for having dropped the ball quite a bit lately. The algorithm is no longer what it used to be, and you see less and less content from your friends, while posts from big creators are being heavily pushed. It also seems that every new feature is more or less copied from another platform. We already saw that with Stories, which were first popular on Snapchat, and with Reels, which are taken one-to-one from TikTok. The fact that Instagram lacks creative ideas is evident again now, with the Notes feature that suspiciously resembles Twitter.

As far as I'm concerned, this is a completely unnecessary feature, with one small plus: Instagram Notes secretly brings me back to about fifteen years ago, when we massively shared our feelings in our MSN status in the form of a sensitive song lyric. So you know what to do the next time you go through a nasty break-up: run to your Notes very quickly and blast your favorite part of ‘If I Were a Boy’ by Beyoncé or ‘Take a Bow’ by Rihanna in your status.