But if you’d like to hear a little (actually, a lot) about how Instagram got to where it did, read on.
Last night, Krieger gave a presentation at an Airbnb event for employees and members of the network, part of a regular series called the Tech Talk. The subject was “Scaling Instagram.”
Considering his company was just bought for $1 billion, it’s a pretty remarkable effort, 185 slides in all.
The talk, as the name of the event would suggest, is mainly about engineering and back-end work. It goes through some of the obstacles and solutions that Krieger and team faced as Instagram instantly picked up millions of users. Some notable points:
It’s true that Instagram never had to create a “fail whale” but they had some clear 404′s early on and “tons of errors.”
Possibly the truest test of scaling: “replacing all components of a car while driving it at 100mph”. Also: Don’t try to reinvent the wheel in your work. And be open to getting knowledge from others (“awesome advisors”) — without passing the buck (“don’t think ‘someone else will join and take care of this’”).
