Last night millions of users worldwide had their Instagram, WhatsApp and Facebook down, all at the same time. But what’s the reason behind the outage? How did the users react? Did it make you think about life too? Let’s read to find out!
Social media has become a huge part of our lives. Whether it’s for news updates, connecting with friends, DMing, chatting, sharing memes or just passing time, Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram are a huge part of our daily lives and a source of entertainment. Last night for around a solid 6 hours, the Facebook owned apps blacked out. A big yikes!
Initial Reaction
I thought, like many others that my phone or internet wasn’t working. I checked the WiFi, rebooted the phone. Nothing. Panic kicked in. Then my parents asked if my internet or WhatsApp was working. Internet was but WhatsApp wasn’t. That’s when I realized that ‘uh oh, there’s a problem.’ More panic. Work was pending, Instagram wasn’t working and life seemed like somebody had pressed the pause button. Oops
This happened with everyone I’m sure.
What Happened Though?
Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg went on to say that the outage was “caused by configuration changes to its routers which coordinate network traffic between the company’s data centers” (via: the independent)
The Consequences
Mark Zuckerberg’s personal wealth fell by more than $6 billion in a few hours, knocking him down a notch on the list of the world’s richest people, after a whistleblower came forward and the outages took Facebook Inc.’s flagship products offline. He’s now the 6th richest person, with a net worth of $121.6 billion
A selloff sent the social-media giant’s stock plummeting 4.9% on Monday, adding to a drop of about 15% since mid-September.
Facebook took to Twitter (how ironic) to assure users that they’re working to fix the problem.
Users In Dismay
These social media platforms have over 3.5 billion users and they were all left wondering what was going on. Thankfully Twitter came to our rescue, count in Snapchat too!
Twitter was FLOODED with tweets as everyone turned to it for expressing their feelings and thanked Twitter for saving the day! See for yourself! (Safe to say people got creative and served the best memes and tweets)
Twitter Sure Had A Blast
Are You Guilty Of Restarting Your Phones & Routers Too?
Oops! We Finally Realized The Amount Of Time We Spend Online
Did The Outage Make You Think About Life Too?
Surely, I think it made everyone think where our priorities lie. It made me realize the hours I spend online just aimlessly scrolling through my feed, switching through apps going through memes, chatting for hours and just being there. It made me realize that I could utilize and prioritize those hours into doing something productive.
In all honesty, the apps being down was a breath of fresh air. But I don’t ever want to experience that ever again. Do you have the same sentiments? Let us know!
