"Everyone was in a panic": how a global social disruption affected Russian bloggers

The total business losses from a large-scale disruption in the work of Facebook, as well as its Instagram and WhatsApp, could amount to more than $ 580 million. Vladimir Kalugin, head of the special projects department of Group-IB, expressed this forecast in an interview with RT.

He noted that the company will soon be able to smooth out losses after a six-hour disruption, since it remains "the largest owner of social platforms with more than 1/3 of the global market share."

At the same time, businessmen and bloggers who make money using social networks, including Instagram, suffered losses from the disruption.

“Services owned by Facebook are not only social platforms for communication, but also the largest advertising platforms.

It is no secret that many businesses, especially small ones, are present exclusively on these sites, and therefore depend heavily on them.

According to our superficial estimates, the total loss of a business can be $ 582.4 million for six hours of failure, "said Vladimir Kalugin in an interview with RT.

"Absolutely disgusting sensation"

Bloggers who make money using Instagram say they were shocked when the social network unexpectedly went down. 

“Yesterday Instagram collapsed at a very important moment for me: we had to open links to the landing page for my marathon.

And exactly at the moment when everything was ready, minute by minute, Instagram just “lay down”.

I and the whole team were just shocked, ”said blogger Christina Shvets, who has 56.8 thousand followers on Instagram.

Due to a malfunction, the girl had to delay the start of sales.

This affected the number of marathon participants and her earnings.

According to Christina, in the evening she had the opportunity to distract herself from the social network for a while, but her hands were constantly reaching out to open the application.

“And then you realize how emotionally attached to Instagram is.

There was no fear that it would not be repaired: after all, it is an important strategic platform for everyone.

But there was an absolutely disgusting feeling when you realize that all sales and activities are concentrated on Instagram and when it stops working, earnings disappear, ”added Shvets.

Instagram is one of the most lucrative advertising platforms for Russian users.

According to the analytical service ADinBlog, which was previously cited by the Sekret Firmy publication, in 2020 Russian Instagram bloggers earned about 5.8 billion rubles thanks to advertising on the social network.

The Russian branch of the international association The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) has come to the conclusion that advertising revenue on Instagram among Russian users amounted to 7 billion rubles in 2020, TASS reports.

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Blogger Tatyana Fadeeva (12.6 thousand users subscribed to her) on October 4 also planned to launch sales for her animation training course.

“On the first day, there are always a lot of applications, but this time we received only a few pieces due to a breakdown.

We will try to fix everything, but, of course, it affected the earnings, ”said the interlocutor.

According to Tatyana, now for her and her team, Instagram is the most profitable platform, but she also maintains a blog on Telegram.

“Yes, there were some experiences, but we also have an audience on Telegram.

So failure is a serious problem, but not a tragedy.

I think that we would have switched more densely to maintaining the Telegram channel and TikTok, of course!

Well, if everyone loses electricity forever, then I have a degree in sociology and two foreign languages ​​in reserve, ”the blogger laughs.

"Three hours later, I discovered a terrible" withdrawal "

Users interviewed by RT say that the largest disruption in the work of social networks caused not material, but moral damage.

Many say that it was psychologically difficult for them to cope with the "disappearance" of their favorite social network.

So, Elena Sazhina (9.6 million subscribers) recalls that when the first interruptions in the application began, she was afraid that her page could be deleted. 

“I got scared and started trying to search for my page from other accounts, and then I realized that Instagram was simply not working, and even exhaled,” she shares her impressions with RT.

- Then there were incomprehensible sensations.

I thought that now it will be 5, 10 minutes, an hour, two, three and everything will return, but the application did not work. "

According to the girl, the evening of October 4 without Instagram became a legitimate reason for her to put down her phone and "be with her thoughts."

“Although I had a lot of material that I did not upload, for example, from my birthday I just started uploading and it was somehow offensive inside.

But the main thing is to just look at any situation with a positive attitude, ”the interlocutor believes.

Most of the bloggers interviewed by RT admit that they are not going to transfer their blogs to other social networks anyway.

So, Valeria Chekalina (9.9 million subscribers), who maintains a blog about selling decorative cosmetics, believes that now there is no platform that could immediately become an alternative to Instagram.

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“TikTok is developing at a very fast pace, and I'm sure it will be possible to launch its own products in the future.

In terms of earnings, Instagram is often the main source of income for many bloggers.

But our family has its own cosmetics brand and stores, so we are not worried about our income due to Instagram blocking, ”she said.

Blogger Sofia Rozhnovskaya (1 million subscribers) says she used the Instagram glitch to train her students, whom she teaches to promote bloggers.

According to her, many of the course participants panicked at the thought that Instagram might not work for a long time.

“They were all in a panic, and I suggested that we think about what we will do if Instagram really doesn’t work.

As a result, everyone not only calmed down, but also realized that the business would not collapse, everything would be fine in any case, ”says the interlocutor.

"If Instagram hadn't recovered, then in three days, crowds of bloggers and experts would have rushed to TikTok and a new era would have just begun."

According to Sofia, the platform failure even increased the activity of her blog: "Today my reach has almost doubled."

But despite the fact that Sofia was not worried about the development of the business, it was difficult for her to cope with the emotional dependence on the social network.

“After the failure, after three hours I found myself just awful“ withdrawal ”, I so wanted to just look through the story!

For me, this is a way to relax, ”said the blogger.