The sole reason for removing likes on Instagram comes down to one thing: ad dollars.

Removing likes is Instagram’s way of taking back some $ that‘s currently going from brand to influencers. Now brands will be forced to pay $ to Instagram in order to get the reach they want. https://twitter.com/blakeir/status/1194629541282508806

BTW- brands will actually prefer this because through Instagram (in reality this is all done by Facebook’s ad manager- there’s no difference), targeted ads will be much more effective. With organic influencers it’s hard to reach a very specific crowd. So ROI for brands is better.

At the end of the day, the people who end up hurt the most by Instagram removing likes are influencers themselves.

When a platform owns your followers, that platform also has the power to take away your influence once they realize the $$ value is accruing to you.

Love the discussion that this thread is generating :)

I wrote a longer post that expands my thinking here! https://twitter.com/katherineykwu/status/1194974419187306496?s=21