How Instagram Combined Art and Commerce With Facebook’s Scale to Become an Advertising Powerhouse

The app had to evolve quickly to get where it is today

If Andy Warhol were alive today, there’s little doubt the godfather of pop art would be a master manipulator of social media. And the 20th century icon—who started out making print ads in the 1950s—would likely be drawn to, in particular, the image factory that is Instagram.

Instagram CEO and co-founder Kevin Systrom isn’t Andy Warhol reborn. However, both founded their own aesthetics-minded millhouse—one that’s led to the mass production of art, the other to the mass production of ads and filter-aided imagery from everyday folks.

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This story first appeared in the June 12, 2017, issue of Adweek magazine. Click here to subscribe.