For millions of smartphone wielding fans of the program it meant easier access to more fun and games but for canny creators in China, in particular, it opened a whole new world of possibilities.
By the time the Facebook move was made, Instagram had been downloaded more than 50 million times and Chinese companies such as Tuding have quickly stepped up their marketing campaigns to try and grab a slice of the photo-sharing market too.
With an estimated six million users, Tuding's main market is Chinese consumers aged between 25 and 35 and the company's services are on five smartphone platforms -- iOS, Android, WindowsPhone7, Symbian and Blackberry.
The big challenge, the company says, is to expand the way the Chinese consumer uses photo-sharing programs.
Instead of "lifestyle" photos of places and people, at the moment most Chinese "prefer to put photos of themselves or their meals online," Tuding's vice-president of marketing and sales Yang Jianling told the China Daily newspaper.
The Chinese photo editing program Meituxiuxiu has been downloaded 190 million times and is used by 17 million people per day, according to its developer Meitu.com.
The company now wants to expand the service into photo-sharing but thinks that it will be tough convincing China's online community to expand outside of the massively popular Weibo platform, which is a Chinese mix of Twitter and Facebook services. It is estimated some 250 million Chinese use Weibo each day.
Another Chinese photo editing program is FotoRus, which was released towards the end of last year by the Fotoable.inc group. The company has claimed the program has six million users in total and around 600,000 to 700,000 of those are active each day -- and that it complements the company's photo-sharing program Weitu.
The Chinese photo-sharing market is set to expand even further over the next 12 months, too, with the likes of the massive online retailer Taobao.com now saying it is planning to enter the fray.
MS
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