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Last month the FTC issued warnings to celebrities who plugged products on their Instagram accounts without clearly identifying their relationships with brands. The letters were meant to “educate” the celebrities on how to post without violating the organization’s disclosure guidelines.

The FTC said it sent out similar letters to each influencer to “call attention” to the post in question. Each letter reads: “The FTC’s Endorsement Guides state that if there is a ‘material connection’ between the endorser and the marketer of a product — in other words, a connection that might affect the weight or credibility that consumers give the endorsement — that connection should be clearly and conspicuously disclosed, unless the connection is already clear from the context of the communication containing the endorsement. Material connections could consist of a business or family relationship, monetary payment, or the provision of free products to the endorser.”

The FTC cited cases in which disclosures appeared in captions at the bottom of a post, and were only found if consumers clicked on the “more” button to reveal the full text. Multiple hashtags, tags and links also were frowned upon, as they obscure the disclosure.

“There’s a lot of exciting work being done around augmented reality,” an Instagram spokesperson said when asked about the app copying Snapchat’s face filters. “We’ve heard from our community that they want more creative ways to share everyday moments and engage with friends. With face filters, they have more tools than ever at their fingertips, and all in one place.” While that dodges the question a bit, the last part is revealing. Instagram wants to be the one-stop shop for visual communication

Instagram’s spin on Snapchat’s selfie masks is designed to make them simple and less wacky so they appeal to users beyond teens

The increasingly technical nature of marketing means the marketing department has a closer relationship with IT than either is comfortable with.

We have found that aligning our organization along DevOps principles helps eliminate that friction. DevOps is a cultural and professional movement that is focused on building and operating high velocity organizations. The movement started in the software industry, but it’s more concerned with people and structure than with technology.

One key aspect of DevOps is the relationship between accountability and empowerment. The DevOps philosophy says that those who are most accountable for a specific change should be empowered to make that change themselves.

post with more engagement is likely going to rank higher on your Instagram feed. The types of engagement that the Instagram algorithm considers can include likes, comments, video views, shares (via direct message), saves, story views, and live video views.

An Instagram spokesperson told Business Insider that ranking of Instagram posts will not be a popularity contest. Posts with less engagement but which are more relevant to you can still appear right at the top of your feed.

This implies that content from your “best friends” likely ranks higher on your feed.

Big brands usually take their ad campaigns very seriously. But sometimes they don’t. In their latest attempt to win over the coveted Generation Z, companies from Uber to Netflix are laughing at themselves in sponsored memes, or funny vignettes, on Instagram. 

Meme accounts are a way for brands to reach a powerful audience that doesn’t consume media in the same way their parents and grandparents did. Gen Z, roughly between the ages of 7 and 22,  is the biggest consumer cohort globally, with spending power to the tune of more than $143 billion in the U.S. alone. And while Instagram remains the most popular social platform among teenagers, Dino said meme accounts are one of the fastest growing parts of Instagram.

We’ve rounded up responses from some of the journalists we’ve had the chance to interview. Read on for their best tips on pitching.

On original reporting, Facebook says that it will now seek to identify and boost outlets that are the first to break a developing story or topic. "We do this by looking at groups of articles on a particular story topic and identifying the ones most often cited as the original source. We’ll start by identifying original reporting in English language news and will do the same for news in other languages in the future."