Everyone has heard of picture sharing powerhouse Instagram (portmanteau of Instant Telegram) but have you heard of the rag tag bunch of Instagram “outlaws,”running the streets of New York City? There seems to be a bunch of instagrammers building up street cred by accessing off-limit places, taking some truly breathtaking photos, while building names for themselves as amateur photographers. They make up a group, or daresay, a new sub-culture, of so-called “urban explorers.”
Instagram made headlines back in 2012 when Facebook bought the company out for $1 billion, and has over 300 million viewers as of December 2013. The photo sharing service created by Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger, launched in 2010, is a cross-platform phenomena, available for iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, and Android handsets across the world.
Some individuals have taken the photo application and turned its on its head with some truly amazing photographs, pissing the NYPD off, all the while. Instagram outlaws have been compared to urban graffiti artists, another underground subculture that fashion their art out of the urban landscape. Although some of the individuals have gained tens of thousands of followers, the community remained largely hidden, until recently a couple of unrelated Instagram outlaws have made headlines in conjunction with NYPD non-approval.
One outlaw named Humza Deas, or, as he is known by, @humzadeas (take a look at some his awesome photos!), nearly blew up the scene last summer when he replaced an American flag with a white one high atop the Brooklyn Bridge last summer sparking outrage by the NYPD and the MTA. The best outlaw instagrammers are known by some specialty that sets them apart. Deas is climbing bridges. He once climbed the Manhattan Bridge and stood atop a suspension cable, as hundreds of cars were flying by. Deas’ impressive Instagram profile has earned him some 22,000 followers.
In more recent news, another Instagram outlaw has made headlines again. A teen photographer who goes by @icarus_nyc was put on public blast, and received a personal reprimanding from NYPD commissioner Bill Bratton for climbing atop the Triborough Bridge, 210 feet in the air.The NYPD and MTA cite safety as a concern to stop the would-be Instagram outlaws. The NYPD says they would rather see the Instagram outlaws arrested before failing to their death. They say they will implement additional security at the Triborough Bridge in retaliation to @icarus_nyc‘s latest stunt.
