“ Sure, there are other notable iOS-only apps—Instapaper, for example, or Flipboard. And of course Apple itself makes a slew of useful apps that best anything similar on competing platforms—like the aforementioned iMessage and Safari. But all of those have analogues on other platforms. Not Instagram. Others apps may duplicate what it does—when it comes to photo processing, that is—but without the network, none have its appeal. You want to be on the thing your friends are on. You want to go where the real-time visual network already exists. And, for now at least, that’s not Android or Windows Phone.
Inside Instagram: How Slowing Its Roll Put the Little Startup in the Fast Lane
