Wasn’t joining Meta exactly what the Instagram app needed as an accelerator? Systrom responds to that question by saying that’s not exactly what happened. Sure, some things Meta did helped Instagram grow more quickly, but there were also “parts that were more challenging that didn’t get fulfilled. It was a mixed bag.” Systrom later concedes that working with Meta’s growth team was great “if you could work with them,” which calls back to his earlier testimony that Zuckerberg at one point pulled that staff off Instagram.