Briefly on Instagram

Much has already been written about Facebook’s $1 billion acquisition of Instagram, but I’d like to share my own thoughts with the benefit of a few days to reflect. The central topic of the traditional financial press’ coverage of the deal is Instagram’s incredibly rapid growth: zero to a billion in 18 months, the last $500 million in roughly one week’s time. I think that’s a shortsighted way to look at the business, as Instagram enjoyed some incredible advantages over the typical start-up.