Facebook to Buy Instagram for $1 Billion

Facebook announced today that it has reached an agreement to acquire the Instagram photo sharing app for about $1 billion in cash and shares. According to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the social network is “committed to building and growing Instagram independently.”

For years, we’ve focused on building the best experience for sharing photos with your friends and family. Now, we’ll be able to work even more closely with the Instagram team to also offer the best experiences for sharing beautiful mobile photos with people based on your interests.

We believe these are different experiences that complement each other. But in order to do this well, we need to be mindful about keeping and building on Instagram’s strengths and features rather than just trying to integrate everything into Facebook.

That’s why we’re committed to building and growing Instagram independently. Millions of people around the world love the Instagram app and the brand associated with it, and our goal is to help spread this app and brand to even more people.

via All Things D