As social media increases, so do its uses. Instagram may have originally been just another unique way to share parts of our lives with friends, but it has grown to be that and so much more.

Countless businesses are hopping on this social media platform to promote new products, sales, and increase their reach to customers.

Similarly, newspapers, magazines, and other media sources are using Instagram to reach their viewers and update them on current events faster than ever before.

Celebrities of all industries are using it to promote themselves and what they’re up to, as well as connect with their own fans.

And, of course, professional artists are using the platform as a way to show off their new work, give fans a behind the scenes view, and share art in a new way as well as a new kind of art.

There are so many uses for this new platform for so many kinds of users, but what does it all mean for the art of photography itself? I follow two of my favorite professional photographers on Instagram as well as accounts like The Photo Society, National Geographic, and more. Yet, I often scroll right past Stephen Shore and have to quickly reverse my train of thought because I think I saw his name somewhere in there.

If I was in a gallery, I could never miss an image by Stephen Shore simply because I am paying more attention and taking more time to view the images.

While Shore’s body of work that he is presenting on Instagram is very different from his “fine art” work, I still can spend as little as five seconds enjoying the work.

As Elizabeth Porter points out in her essay “Taking Images Seriously,” “The explosion in the number of circulating images and in the variety of platforms for seeing those images has transformed the way people read, write, and think” (1719). Instagram has changed the way we look at photography, at least when we are using the app.

It’s a very different experience to scroll through Instagram on the bus to work than purposely enter a gallery setting and take in the work. And that makes it hard to compare our mindsets in each situation.

Like most things, the popularity of Instagram and iPhoneography has its pros and cons.

Since its inception, photography has been fairly limited to the public. At first, daguerreotypes and other early forms of photography were extremely expensive and required extensive training in technique. Then, as technology moved forward, it became increasingly available to more people. And the increase in smartphone cameras is just the next natural step in this timeline.

“An incredible 200,000 filter-dipped photos are uploaded through the app every hour. Its rapid rise has been fuelled by the proliferation of smartphones; Apple now supplies more cameras than anyone else, and over 10 per cent of all photos ever taken by mankind were taken in the last 12 months.” (Pyne, 1)

“People now see more images in a day than our ancestors would have seen in their lives; over 3.5 trillion photos have been taken, and there are ubiquitous tools for sharing such photos” (Porter, 1699).

Photo-sharing is unavoidable and will only increase as technology continues to progress. Having a 8 megapixel, or better, camera in your pocket at all times makes it easy for any experience level of photographer to make snapshots anywhere. “Our media are more colorful and far more interactive, but they are also – at least sometimes – more superficial. In addition, as a result of constant connectivity, recording an event has become an integral aspect of experiencing it, blurring the divide between the lived experience and narration, between narration and marketing” (Porter, 1720).

Holler Executive Creative Director Will Pyne believes that professional photographers should not be threatened by this omnipresence of cameras and ameateur photography. “It encourages people to embrace creativity, even if it does mean more snails and burritos. Professionals shouldn't be concerned, as long as their own #nofilter, deftly-composed photographs are patently in a different class” (1).

Some photographers are choosing to embrace this new perspective and creativity by choosing to shoot with their iPhones. iPhoneographer Tim Young is one of those people. "I'm a photographer that chooses to use an iPhone. It's about ease of use, unobtrusiveness—it's my dark room, apparatus, and gallery. The technology lets me share test images with effects quickly,

then turn around the final shots on a tight deadline, but at the end of the day, my clients want me for my artistry, not the device."

In 2012, when Hurricane Sandy was scheduled to hit the East Coast, TIME magazine had limited time to get to the site and the violent weather conditions made uploading and transferring digital camera files unreliable. So, the Director of Photography Kira Pollack decided to send out 5 photographers with their iPhones. "It was a way to get images up as quickly as we could, but we had to have the right photographers to make it work” (Marshall, 48).

Pollack described how one photographer, Michael Christopher Brown “was literally shooting images in the middle of the night—in total darkness, with the power out in the city and only minimal light available – using nothing but his cellphone” (Marshall, 48).

Many journalists are getting behind the pocket camera movement for its convenience – not only in size and portability but also ease of uploading and editing, especially under a time crunch.

National Geographic photographer Ben Lowy argues "I think, with the democratization of photography, people look at what they have readily available and they can say, 'I take a picture of my lunch or my cat with my iPhone, and this guy is using an iPhone to photograph Afghanistan or Libya or the hurricane.' It brings it that much closer to them. It's not some foreign tool. It's like a very small psychological bridge that you can use to connect with your audience."