We’re seeing chatter on Twitter that Instagram photos are not showing up in Twitter streams anymore. This is obviously interesting considering Instagram’s recent moves to remove support for Twitter cards last week. We’ve reached out to both Facebook and Twitter for confirmation. (See UPDATES below.)
Basically, when users push an Instagram photo to Twitter, instead of a cropped photo, there is just a white space in the Tweet, and a link to the web-version of the photo on Instagram. Here’s another example.
Last week, Facebook-owned Instagram decided to turn off support for Twitter Card functionality for its photos. Basically, you would no longer see the full images; rather, you’d see a cropped version.
Instagram co-founder Kevin Systrom said at LeWeb that this was done to drive more traffic to the web experience for Instagram. Instagram recently revamped its entire web presence and wants to create more engagement on its web platform. Systrom also mentioned at the event that eventually, photos would be gone completely from Twitter streams, so perhaps this is the reason why users aren’t seeing their photos in Twitter anymore.
Of course, this latest issue could be some sort of temporary glitch, or an issue with Twitter Cards. On Friday, we started seeing full Instagram photos back in Twitter streams, but this was a regression. And some users are reporting the ability to see Instagram photos in Twitter streams.
As our own Michael Arrington wrote last week, the move itself is not good for users in the long run.
Adding more fuel to this fire, Twitter is reportedly planning to build Instagram-like photo filters into a new version of its mobile app.
We’ll update the post when we hear back from Facebook and Twitter.
Additional reporting from Drew Olanoff.
UPDATE: Instagram photos are no longer displayed on Twitter, as promised by Systrom, with the Cards integration, or the regressed state that came after it. We are waiting for a comment from both Facebook and Twitter to confirm that this is how things will be for users moving forward.
UPDATE 2: Instagram confirms Twitter cards have been turned off. This is the end of viewing Instagram photos in any fashion within Twitter streams, on both mobile and desktop. Just links.
UPDATE 3: Twitter has confirmed as well. Here’s what a short note on its Status blog says:
Instagram has disabled photo integration with Twitter. As a result, photos are no longer appearing in Tweets or user photo galleries. While tweeting links to Instagram photos is still possible, you can no longer view the photos on Twitter, as was previously the case.
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Users are experiencing issues with viewing Instagram photos on Twitter. Issues include cropped images. This is due to Instagram disabling its Twitter cards integration, and as a result, photos are being displayed using a pre-cards experience. So, when users click on Tweets with an Instagram link, photos appear cropped.
https://twitter.com/geekgiant/status/277894594367193088Photo Credit/Mike Isaac
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