Yesterday, the world came crashing down for those addicted to Facebook and/or Instagram. The apps, both part of the Facebook Social Media family, stopped working correctly. The outage affected people differently. For instance, I didn’t have any problems logging into either platform but I couldn’t “Like” any posts and I couldn’t comment. As soon as I clicked the “Like” icon, it would light up as if I was liking something but then it would immediately disappear. Others, though, weren’t even able to log in.

At first, I thought it might just be my phone or my apps. So, I shut my phone down for a few minutes, restarted it and there was no difference. Next, I removed my Instagram app and reinstalled it. Still, it wasn’t working. Then, I went into Twitter and discovered tons of Tweets from people sharing that their Facebook and Instagram were down, too. That put an end to my attempts to repair the issue because I knew it was out of my hands.

People handled this event differently. For some, they saw it as an opportunity to put their phones and tablets down for a day and live in the real world. Others were frustrated and unhappy that they couldn’t post or interact with posts from those they follow. Then, others just did all their posting on other Social Media platforms like Twitter. Finally, there was the reaction from those who don’t do any Social Media – they just went on with their normal day, totally unaware that others were having their lives completely disrupted!