Nowhere was the effect more apparent than with celebrities. Justin Bieber had more than 11 million followers on Twitter. So when the 17-year-old pop star joined Instagram and tweeted out his first filtered photo, a high-contrast take on traffic in Los Angeles, Krieger’s alarm sounded. The servers were stressed as Bieber gained 50 followers a minute. “Justin Bieber Joins Instagram, World Explodes,” Time magazine reported. Almost every time the singer posted, throngs of tween girls would overload the servers again, often taking them down.
