In an effort to continue its dominance in the social networking world – and the universe – Facebook announced a deal Monday to purchase Instagram for $1 billion. [INSERT: Dr. Evil finger gesture]
According to TechCrunch, Instagram secured $1 billion in cash and stock in the mother of all deals, and it will remain a stand-alone app with exclusive ties to Facebook. The Insta-acquirement will bring Zuckerberg and friends a community of 27 million registered photo-sharing – and loving – tech junkies.
Mark Zuckerberg confirmed the purchase on his Facebook Timeline late Monday morning.
“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,” he said.
“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.”
It didn’t take long for Instagram to trend on Twitter, where many lashed out against the deal.
“Well guess it’s time to delete my instagram app before Facebook ruins it,” tweeted @cybercharlie.
This, while others cut right to the chase.
“Instagram uninstall in progress,” tweeted @eienzi.
[Read more Twitter overreactions on Buzzfeed.]
Mashable also wasted no time, publishing a how-to piece on how to save your photos before deleting your Instagram account. Check it out.
the RAMOS project 
Lovely! They just acquired TagTile the other day and there’s talk about them buying Path or Pinterest next.