Adam Mosseri, head of Instagram, testified during a US antitrust trial against Meta Platforms Inc., recognizing TikTok as a major competitor.

He highlighted that Instagram has shifted its focus to video content due to this competition, noting that only one in six Stories now comes from interactions with friends and family.

The FTC is pursuing a case against Meta, accusing the company of holding a monopoly in personal social networking services.

Mosseri also mentioned Instagram’s investments in features and AI to compete with TikTok. He referenced a 2019 internal document calling TikTok a “big concern” for user engagement.

The FTC presented evidence showing that Instagram’s focus on personal relationships has declined, which Mosseri acknowledged. However, he affirmed that he pushed for more resources to improve safety efforts.

🔗 Source: Bloomberg

🧠 Food for thought

1️⃣ Social media’s seismic shift from connection to entertainment

Instagram’s revelation that only one in six Stories now come from friends and family marks a fundamental transformation in social media’s purpose.

The platform has moved away from its original friend-focused model toward an entertainment-first approach, reflecting broader industry changes driven by competition with TikTok 1.

This shift is quantified in user behavior: people spend an average of 34 hours monthly on TikTok versus just 15 hours and 50 minutes on Instagram, highlighting the engagement gap Meta is trying to close 2.

Despite this evolution, internal communications from 2018 reveal Mosseri himself once warned Zuckerberg against abandoning Instagram’s friends and family focus, calling such a move “a mistake”—showing the tension between the platform’s origins and its competitive pressures 3.

The transformation reflects a broader industry trend where platforms that began as spaces for personal connection have increasingly prioritized algorithmically-driven entertainment content to maximize engagement.

2️⃣ The high-stakes race to capture Gen Z attention

Instagram’s massive investment to combat TikTok reflects the importance of maintaining relevance with younger users, who represent the future of platform growth.

Meta’s internal documents from 2019 conservatively attributed 40% of Instagram’s year-over-year engagement decline directly to TikTok’s rise, triggering alarm at the highest levels of the company 4.