It seems hard to believe that less than three years ago there was no such thing as Instagram (remember Flickr)?

In October 2010 two friends, Kevin Systrom and Michael Krieger, quietly launched a basic image-sharing platform. They called it Instagram. 

Over the next 28 months Instagram would be acquired by Facebook for US $1 billion and be rocked by privacy scandals.

But most imortantly – Instagram's community would continue to grow at an unprecedented rate and now boasts 100 million monthy users.

Image is everything

Kevin Systrom, now Instagram's CEO, announced the milestone in a blog post.

“Over 100 million people use Instagram every month. It’s easy to see this as an accomplishment for a company, but I think the truth is that it’s an accomplishment for our community.

Now, more than ever, people are capturing the world in real-time using Instagram—sharing images from the farthest corners of the globe. What we see as a result is a world more connected and understood through photographs.” wrote Systrom.

Strength to strength

Since being acquired by Facebook in 2012, Instagram's growth has been huge, and consistent.

The platform experienced 1000 per cent growth in the six months prior to September 2012, and in January 2013 its first official figures revealed Instagram had 90 million monthly users and 40 million photos were uploaded every day.

Cementing power

It hasn't all been smooth sailing. In late 2012 Instagram controversially shut off support for Twitter Cards, meaning users could no longer upload photos from Instagram to their Twitter account. The move gave Instagram greater control over its content, and more bargaining power with advertisers.

But the biggest backlash came in December 2012 when Instagram updated its privacy policy, giving the platform the right to potentially employ user images in advertisements – without their consent. Instagram has since revised its guidelines and removed this clause.

It seems the public has forgiven Instagram, or least 100 million of them.

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