Leak Suggests Instagram Is Going After BeReal

pcmag.com:

Instagram appears to be working on a feature that will allow it to compete with BeReal.

The new feature, Candid Challenges, was leaked by Alessandro Paluzzi on Aug. 22:

Candid Challenges was pretty clearly inspired by a social media app called BeReal. Released in 2019, it has become an increasingly popular(Opens in a new window) way to document candid, "real" shots of what people are doing, as opposed to staged shots on the app that's apparently trying to rip it off.

"Everyday at a different time," BeReal says on its website(Opens in a new window), "everyone is notified simultaneously to capture and share a Photo in 2 Minutes." (Capitalization of "photo" and "minutes" theirs.)

Paluzzi's leak suggests Candid Challenges isn't just similar in concept to BeReal—it's a straight copy, right down to the two-minute timeframe and use of the grammatically incorrect "everyday(Opens in a new window)."

For its part, Instagram says it's not planning to release Candid Challenges any time soon. "This feature is an internal prototype," Meta told PCMag, "and not something we're testing."

For now. The idea's straightforward enough—BeReal wasn't even the first app based on the concept; it's simply the most successful to date—that it'd BeRealEasy for Instagram to copy.

Instagram isn't above ripping off other apps; just look at Stories (Snapchat) and its effort to duplicate the success of TikTok with an increased focused on Reels. The latter backfired recently amid pushback from the Kardashians(Opens in a new window) of all people.

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