Effects Of Instagram Videos On The Mobile Network

In June, Instagram unveiled new video sharing capabilities and saw users upload more than five million 15-second videos on the first day by many of its 130 million active users. In the recent past, we used phones for real-time two-way communications, but now we have SMS and Instagram for faster, easier communication.

The natural direction is to move to photos and now video communication, which is causing an exponential increase in data usage when compared to 160 characters messages. While it is still unknown what impact those videos will eventually have on mobile networks and in turn our data plans - we do know that as video streaming continues gaining popularity, mobile networks must be up to the task.

Juniper specializes in helping service providers move mobile subscriber data more efficiently throughout the network. Almost all the video we're seeing now is store-and-forward, but networks have the capacity to support real-time two-way video communication like we used to see in Star Trek. Interestingly, there's a new generation of users who have grown up in the smartphone world. They choose to use their mobile phones for social networking first and voice calls last.

This has a dramatic impact on network providers and communications in general, but as Juniper partners with the world's leading service providers, mobile networks will be up to the task.

Show more