Facebook's track record with apps is disappointing. Critics point out that the most innovative
and popular products coming out of Facebook are those that it recently purchased, rather than any developed in-house. Facebook has launched a number of ho-hum apps that few people use. Home was an Android feature that locked your smartphone screen to your Facebook. Wasn't the Web, including smartphones, supposed to be a place where you could find new and different things? Instead, Home made the Internet and Web like a mirror of yourself and friends. Few adopted this app. Seeing the rapid growth of Instagram, the photo-based social site, Facebook developed a copycat app called Camera. Then it bought Instagram for in April 2012 for $1 billion before launching Camera. Instagram has since grown from 40 to 100 million users but does not yet generate any revenue. The rationale for the purchase was to attract young social network users who had gravitated to the site, rather than using Facebook's photo app, and of course to prevent it from becoming a rival. Facebook has continued to run Instagram as a separate, autonomous unit since its purchase