Will Instagram force student to shut down his app? Photo-sharing site takes on 'illegal' service that uploads its images from a PC

Home »Will Instagram force student to shut down his app? Photo-sharing site takes on 'illegal' service that uploads its images from a PC

Will Instagram force student to shut down his app? Photo-sharing site takes on 'illegal' service that uploads its images from a PC

Posted by sciencetech-blog on Wednesday, April 1, 2015 Label:

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A 17 year-old college student could face a battle with Instagram after hacking the popular photo-sharing app.

Caleb Benn, a University of California, Irvine student, recently developed a $4.99 (£3.24) app for iOS devices using Instagram's application program interface.

Called 'Uploader for Instagram', it allows users to upload photos to Instagram directly from their computer rather than using only their smartphone.

Caleb Benn, a University of California, Irvine student, has developed a $4.99 (£3.24) app for iOS devices using Instagram's application program interface (screen shot pictured). Now, the 17 year-old college student could face a battle with Instagram over hackings its API

According Jillian Eugenios at CNNMoney, the teenager is currently making $1,000 (£675.70) a day from the app – and Instagram isn't happy.

An engineer from Instagram allegedly sent Benn an email last week claiming the app violated the company's terms of service.

CNNMoney claims the email asked Benn to 'fix' the app by Monday, but Benn said doing this would make the app would be pointless.

Facebook who owns Instagram has restrictions against using its private API.

An engineer from Instagram allegedly sent Benn an email last week, claiming the app violated the company's terms of service. Pictured on the right is a screenshot of the 'Uploader for Instagram' service

Chris Messina, a Silicon Valley technologist told CNNMoney the problem is that accessing the API 'opens up possibilities for all kinds of abuse, from spambots or people uploading stuff from other channels.'

INSTAGRAM UNVEILS LAYOUT APP

One in five Instagram users now combine their photos into a single image before uploading it to the app.

To capitalise on this, the Californian firm has launched its latest standalone app called Layout that lets people create such collages with up to nine images and 11 combinations.

Photos can be selected from the phone's camera roll, or taken with the Photo Booth tool, and Layouts can then be 'remixed' and edited with mirror effects and flips.

The Layout app has four main features called Faces, Mirroring, Photo Booth and Previews.

Users begin by selecting as many images, up to the maximum of nine, to feature in the collage. Photos can be selected or deselected at any point.

As they add more images, the layout of the collage changes and photos can be dragged between sections and different sized boxes as desired.

These photos can then be zoomed, flipped to form a mirror image, or turned upside down.

He added, if Instagram wanted users to post from a computer, they can do so themselves.

The company did release a web version of its software, called 'Your Instagram Feed on the Web' in February 2013.

This allowed users to comment on each other's photos from a desktop, but the photo sharing site still does not allow uploaded of images from a PC.

To combat the problem, some Instagram fans have installed special software, such as BlueStacks App Player, designed to simulate a mobile phone operating system on their computer.

Uploader for Instagram offers a simpler workaround, and it is already garnering positive reviews on the App store.

One user wrote: 'For my job, we post eight to ten Instagram pictures a week that are first designed on the computer.

'So it's always been a bit of a nuisance to transfer the image over to my phone then upload to Instagram. This app takes care of that.'

Instagram, which Facebook acquired in 2012 for $1 billion, has 300 million monthly users.

A spokesperson for Instagram declined to comment to DailyMail.com about the developments. Caleb Benn has yet to respond to queries.

Uploader for Instagram is already garnering positive reviews on the App store.One user wrote: 'For my job, we post eight to ten Instagram pictures a week that are first designed on the computer.'So it's always been a bit of a nuisance to transfer the image over to my phone then upload to Instagram. This app takes care of that'

Will Instagram shut down this 17-year-old's app? - Mar. 31, 2015

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