Adam Mosseri: AI is a tailwind for authenticity
About this episode
Adam Mosseri discusses the evolving landscape of product management and the impact of AI on Instagram's authenticity and user engagement.
Adam Mosseri is the Head of Instagram, where he oversees an app used by over 3 billion people. He also leads the team building Threads. Adam has run Instagram for longer than its founders did, after taking over from Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger in 2018. A designer by training, he spent over 15 years at Meta, starting as a designer on Facebook’s mobile app, rising to lead Facebook’s News Feed, and eventually chosen to lead Instagram. During his tenure, Instagram’s user base has more than tripled. In our in-depth conversation, we discuss: 1. How the canonical product team structure is changing in 2026, from baker’s-dozen specialist teams to lean pods of four to six generalists 2. The rise of the “product staff” role—a blending of PM, design, data science, and research into one generalist operator 3. Why Adam is bullish on designers even as functional boundaries dissolve, and which roles are most at risk 4. What the Instagram algorithm knows about you, and why it’s only now catching up to what people assumed it knew years ago 5. Why the rise of AI-generated content is a tailwind for Instagram, and how the company is thinking about creator identity in a synthetic-content world 6…
People in this episode
Host: Lenny Rachitsky
Guest: Adam Mosseri
Topics covered
- AI and authenticity
- Instagram product strategy
- Product team structure
- AI-generated content
- User engagement
- Product management
Keywords
- AI
- product management
- authenticity
- user engagement
- design
- algorithm
- Threads
- product failures
Sponsors
WorkOS, Mercury
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Instagram, Meta
Products: Threads, Facebook Home, Reels
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