Instagram is launching its own awards for content creators, dubbed Instagram Rings. According to the platform, "This award is for the creators who don’t just participate in culture - but shift it, breaking through whatever barrier holds them back to realize their ambitions."
How The Instagram Rings Award Works
Most major art mediums have their own awards. There are the Oscars for filmmakers, the Grammys for musicians and people working in the music industry, the Emmys for those involved with TV, the Tonys for the Broadway world, the Golden Globes for, uh, TV and films again...you get it. But making an award specifically for content creators is more daunting than all of those fields combined, given the sheer number of potential candidates.
Instagram says the Rings...Ringies? Instas? Instagrammys?...uh, the Instagram Rings — will honor 25 of the top creators on Instagram with both physical and virtual rings. Winners will receive a custom ring created by English jewelry designer Grace Wales Bonner as well as a new special "ring" around their profile image when they post a story. They will also apparently get to have a custom take on the "like" button.
The winners will be selected by a panel of judges whose expertise spans multiple industries. Those judges are responsible for voting on creators from a list of nominees. Eve Chen, who is the head of fashion partnerships at Instagram, told The Hollywood Reporter that ultimately the winners should be people who spark conversations and inspire others to create as well.
"I’m saying this as a judge," Chen says. "Seeing the huge list of nominees, and being able to cull it down just to 25, it was a challenge, and I know that, like the other judges, it was too many great people to choose from. But really, we were looking for people who take creative chances and who are always pushing the envelope and thinking about new ways to talk to their audience."
The full list of judges is: Spike Lee, Marc Jacobs, Grace Wales Bonner, KAWS, Pat McGrath, Marques Brownlee (MKBHD), Yara Shahidi, Cédric Grolet, Ilonha Maher, Tainy, Murad Osmann, Eva Chen, and Instagram head Adam Mosseri.
Another Attempt To Honor Creators
To be clear, Instagram Rings are not the first awards to honor creators on a specific platform. The YouTube Streamy Awards started all the way back in 2009 and are produced by Dick Clark Productions (of American Music Awards and Rockin' New Years Eve fame). Though the awards started independent from YouTube, the platform eventually bought the naming rights in 2020 to make the Streamy Awards officially a YouTube event.
Twitch streamer QTCinderella founded The Streamer Awards in 2022 as a way to recognize Twitch streamers. The annual program has gone on to become a pretty major event that gets the Twitch co-sign, even if Twitch itself isn't a founder or sponsor of the event.
The Shorty Awards also started back in the late 00s, originally as a way to recognize Twitter creators, of all things. Now the Shorty Awards are given out every Spring and recognize short-form creators across multiple platforms.
And lastly, perhaps the most-recognized name in digital content awards of all: The Webby Awards. The Webbys started all the way back in 1997. These awards are given by the International Academy of Arts and Sciences, which include everybody from famous actors and musicians to yes, Instagram's Eva Chen.
The Webby Awards have honored short-form creators in myriad ways, including a "Most Viral" award for short-form creators. In fact, there are dozens upon dozens of potential categories for creators to win Webby Awards.
Does It Matter?
So here's the real question: do the Instagram Rings, or really any award shows, truly matter? It's easy to be a little jaded by them, especially given how many there are and how often it seems like a self-congratulatory exercise. But as we've seen before, these awards can have a major impact on a creator's profile, especially for smaller creators.
They are aspirational in many instances, but they also do drive awareness and appreciation for creators of all kinds. Still, for some creators it can feel out of reach.
While Instagram sports billions of creators, it seems fairly far-fetched that any one creator will have the opportunity to compete for one of the 25 awards. Likewise, Mr. Beast has won Creator Of The Year for four straight years at the Streamy Awards. At some point it kind of seems less aspirational and more unattainable.
But the fact remains, that when people talk about creators, they benefit. And hey, why not you? Remember, your favorite creators were all where you were at one point, too.
And now more than ever with the deluge of AI slop hitting platforms, honoring genuine content seems like taking a stand for human creators as much as it is an opportunity to award any creator individually. (Though, if you want a massive eye roll, there are also "AI-only" awards taking place now, too...).