Are Facebook & Instagram App Economy Rip-Off Artists?

Cover bands sometime make a living copying the work of others. Their ability to mimic a chosen group is often what makes them desirable to see live. Some big-name artists cover each other's songs, and it's typically a nod of admiration. In the app economy, we can't say the same is true. Rather than a tribute to an art form, 'copied' apps pile onto the original, burying it. Facebook might be the best at this practice. With Rooms, they came under fire for copying an eerily similar app named Room. Now, Facebook-owned Instagram seems to have followed suit with Layout.

Let's backtrack a touch. Rooms is seen by many an absolute copy of Room, if not lightly retouched aesthetically. Feature-for-feature, the two are so close it's hard to consider Facebook wasn't aware of Room ahead of developing Rooms.

Before that, Facebook stepped all over FiftyThree's app, Paper, giving their new-look Facebook newsfeed app the same name. The confusion caused FiftyThree to 'rename' their app to 'Paper by FiftyThree'; a decidedly less alluring name, but likely done so to avoid legal wrangling over trademarks with the deep-pocketed Facebook.

This week, Instagram unveiled Layout, which lets you take a few pictures and cobble them together into a single image. A neat app that will undoubtedly find an audience based on Instagram/Facebook's significant seat at the social table.

Layout isn't Layout, though. I mean, it is — but it also isn't. Layout is an app from 2012; actually named one of Apple's best of the year, winning an Editor's Choice nod.

Layout (by Instagram) also lets you take multiple images and make a single image. Like Layout. Layout is the real Layout, except it's not Layout (by Instagram).

Layout is $1.99 in the App Store. Layout (by Instagram) is free. The confusion (naturally) has led to some unwitting customers downloading the original Layout app (naturally) but Mike Swanson of JuicyBits, maker of the original Layout, isn't that happy about it all:

You might think I'd be happy that some people will inadvertently come across my Layout app and buy it, confident that they're buying the Instagram app (actually, I first heard about the new Instagram app from an article that incorrectly linked to my Layout app). While I like sales as much as any independent developer, I don't like sales that I haven't earned. And I certainly don't like sales where customers are confused. I'm sure I'll hear from many who didn't get what they expected, and that will lead to one-star reviews and refunds.

Just an indie Dev tryin' to get by, y'all. Swanson has updated his blog post to reflect he's seen emails from confused users. Luckily, his ratings don't reflect nonsensical reviews just yet. We hope they never do.

This hits on a larger problem, though, even if we are using Facebook as an example. Instagram could have just as easily called their app 'Collage', which is what it does. Incidentally, 'Collage' is not an app name that comes up. There's 'Pic Collage' and 'InstaCollage', but not 'Collage'.

I'm not saying there was any malice to what Instagram did, or in Facebook claiming 'Rooms' as their app name/theme. I am saying that as the larger entities, both Facebook and Instagram owe it to the independent (or smaller, in the case of FiftyThree) Developers to not step on their throats as they step on their toes. Swanson was one of the lucky ones who is — even if he's not really a fan of it — benefitting.

Facebook just wrapped up their F8 conference, where they encouraged independent Developers from all over to get excited about what they had to offer. That's hard to do when your company and it's subsidiaries are coldly – if not blatantly — ripping off the work indie Devs do.

Even if Instagram created Layout independent of any Facebook involvement (which is just as likely as Facebook giving Layout the nod), it was coarse.

Layout, Rooms, Paper — these aren't gracious mimics of their predecessors. These apps show willful ignorance at best. This is Facebook and Instagram saying "great work, we'll take it form here" without even the courtesy of an acquihire offer.

It's an example of the letter of the law being obeyed, not the spirit. The bottom line is no logged IP was violated, and at least in Swanson's case, Layout wasn't trademarked.

In all this, I think the final word belongs to Swanson, who likely echoes sentiment felt by independent Developers everywhere:

I know it's naïve to think that everyone in our community of software developers will do the right thing, but I'd like to think that most of the well-known companies in our industry would recognize their leadership roles and lead by example.

For what it's worth, I like Instagram, and I'm a frequent Facebook user. I don't have anywhere near their resources, and I'm not interested in a fight. I'd like them to do the right thing: use the same time, effort, and energy to make a unique contribution instead of squatting on an existing name that they already know is confusing.