I wouldn’t ever actually admit to enjoying the workplace chat app Slack (that would be horrifically uncool). But the data speaks for itself.
Slack sends out a year-end wrap-up with data for its enterprise accounts, including which users posted the most lines of text. For 2024, I was Business Insider’s second most prolific Slack poster, which is incredibly embarrassing and not a compliment at all.
Look, I love chatting! I love sharing links and musings with my colleagues! Fire me! (To my editor reading this: Please don’t, I promise I’ll get back to work.)
But despite this, there’s one thing that stymies me over and over — and I know I’m not the only one out there who is plagued by this problem.
Whenever you post a link to an Instagram or Threads post in Slack, the link doesn’t “unfurl” with a preview. Basically, it looks like this:
If you’re unfamiliar with Slack (or don’t paste social media links into Slack because you use it like a responsible professional), the thing is that posts from X, LinkedIn, Reddit, and even BlueSky do actually work!
For example, an X post unfurls like this:
What’s frustrating is that Instagram used to work on Slack. I remember those glory days! It was probably only two or so years ago — my guess here — that it stopped working.
So why is this happening? If X and Bluesky can do it, why can’t Instagram and Threads?
I’m not sure of the answer, but I have some good guesses.
First, I don’t think it’s a case where Slack and Meta are mad at each other and are revoking this access to spite each other. If you think that sounds ridiculous — why would a big company make things harder for its users just to settle some petty beef? — keep in mind that Instagram did exactly that when it stopped allowing Instagram posts to fully display on Twitter back in 2012.
As far as I know, Meta and Slack aren’t locked in a vicious fight. Meta isn’t above being petty when it comes to competitors like TikTok or companies that threaten its business like Apple — but Slack, which is owned by Salesforce, isn’t really an enemy or direct competitor. Sure, some people use Slack for group chats with friends, which might compete with WhatsApp, but mainly it’s for workplace productivity.
A representative for Slack told Business Insider, “Thanks for flagging! We are looking into it.” Meta didn’t have a response.
I am not an engineer or a computer programmer, so I am not going to pretend that I know the exact solution here.
But I refuse to accept that no one has the technical expertise to come up with a solution for the thousands — millions, perhaps! — of people with fake email jobs who need to post Instagram links to their coworkers on Slack.
Despite some of the terrifying and bad ways that social media and technology have affected our lives, I still maintain optimism. I believe that a repaired union between Slack and Instagram will improve my life by at least 2%! We all deserve better!
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