Instagram will downrank Reels which are just TikTok ripoffs

Instagram will soon be downranking Reels videos that are not original to the platform. This means that all reshared content from other apps like TikTok or any short video-format platform will be downranked to give more credit to original content.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri recently took to Twitter to announce the new changes to the app. In a video, Mosseri explains that Instagram will be adding three new features/changes to the platform – Product tags, enhanced people tags and higher ranking for original Reels.
Check out the video below.

📣 New Features 📣
We’ve added new ways to tag and improved ranking:
– Product Tags– Enhanced Tags– Ranking for originality
Creators are so important to the future of Instagram, and we want to make sure that they are successful and get all the credit they deserve. pic.twitter.com/PP7Qa10oJr
— Adam Mosseri (@mosseri) April 20, 2022
“If you create something from scratch, you should get more credit than if you are resharing something that you found from someone else,” Mosseri said in the video. This change leaves a few things up in the air.
But what happens to Reels that are reshared videos from your own handles on other platforms? Are they any less original than videos you create on Instagram Reels directly? We should find out soon enough.
‘Identifying originality is hard’
Responding to a comment when providing some more clarity on the matter, Mosseri said that “identifying originality is hard” and that the platform will “iterate over time” on what counts as original and what does not. Until there is more clarity on the same, the move could also be interpreted as a tactic to further persuade people from not resharing videos from platforms like TikTok on Reels.
While Reels has done well in markets like India, one reason is that TikTok is banned here. But in markets like the US, UK, etc, Instagram Reels faces tough competition from TikTok, which remains the leading short video platform. This would explain why Instagram is insing creators make original content for Reels, rather than just reposting their TikTok video to the platform. After all, it wants less videos that have the TikTok logo added to them, which is currently the case for a lot of the viral content on the platform.

Product tags and enhanced people tags
Meanwhile, Instagram’s other two new features are relatively easier to understand. Product tags allow users to tag products and drive some traffic or attention to a business, creator or company that you love. This feature was made available to some users already, but it will now come to all Instagram users.
The ‘Enhanced Tags’ features allows users to set a category for themselves like dancer, rapper or chef to make themselves more identifiable.  That category will then show up when the user is tagged in another post, allowing credit to flow back to the original source.