Earlier this week Google Photos celebrated its first birthday. Anil Sabharwal, Vice President of Google Photos, wrote a post on the company’s blog releasing somewhat startling (or are they?) statistics on how we most commonly use the popular feature. The most noteworthy number was that, thanks to the service’s 200 million users, 24 billion selfies have been uploaded this year. Keep in mind this is exclusively pertaining to selfies on Google Photos, not including other photo sharing services like Instagram, Flickr, or Facebook — or, God forbid, Snapchat.
But are we even surprised? With the recent erection of the selfie statue in Sugar Land Texas, which seemed to spark some debatable dialogue, its safe to say we’re slowly starting to embrace our wonderfully narcissistic society. (Kim Kardashian’s recent book of selfies was also received with decidedly mixed reviews, which is at least better than even she had probably hoped for.) If you calculate how many selfies that is per user, it averages out to about 12, and if I alone have 1,542 (and counting) on my account, well then what does that mean for everyone else? Truly this just further proves that we have all been living and giving in favorable lighting this past year and will continue to power through into 2017.
Thank you Google Photos for the subtle drag and safe reminder that we all are susceptible to some self-indulgence. Happy belated birthday.