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As the uncle of three teenage nieces, this article hit home for me. It's a look at some of the elaborate rules teenagers have created on how to use apps like S
by randycupertino 11y ago
As the uncle of three teenage nieces, this article hit home for me. It's a look at some of the elaborate rules teenagers have created on how to use apps like Snapchat and Instagram to maintain their self-image and what it means to get insufficient likes.
It's amazing how mean I see girls being to my 15 year old niece on Instagram. Their little meangirl phrase is "tbh" - short for "to be honest." So they're write something nice, then "tbh" and then something mean. It goes like this, "you're a sweet girl but tbh your new backpack is kinda ratchet" or "your hair is beautiful but tbh u r slutty." Or whatever... I told my sister about this and she locked down her insta but she still gets random comments like this all the time. They all do.
Getting likes weighs on my neices 24/7. They were complaining when I took them to Star Wars that their insta photograph of them kissing yoda "only" got 15 likes.... and were considering deleting it! Because only 15 likes is about 30 too few likes.
- Swizec 11y agoAs teenagers we craved for acceptance, now acceptance has a hard number associated with it.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- hellofunk 11y agoI don't know why you deleted your other comment just now, but I agree with it. When I get just one like, I'm thinking to myself how awesome I must be because I touched another person's experience this moment with some photo or comment I made to the world electronically. If I got 15 likes, I'd be wondering if I'm some kind of gifted social icon without knowing it!
- drakenot 11y agoLikes are extremely cheap in the world of young people, so I can see how "only" 15 likes is a signal that the post wasn't greatly received. I watched my nephew (12 year old) use Instagram over the holidays and it was interesting to see how he used the app. He rapidly scrolled through his feed, barely giving each post enough time to register what it was, and he double-tapped (liked) around 80-90% of all posts as they went by. If people are liking 90% of the posts on their feed, the "like" doesn't become that useful of a signal to determine what people truly like. It is being used for something else at this point. Some way of extending and re-inforcing a persons graph of friends? I'm not entirely sure.
- hellofunk 11y agoWow that's crazy. I'm sure that usage is not the expectation from the app makers. It almost makes me wonder if there is a strange counter-psychology going on there, as if your acceptance was in part measured by your participation, and that if someone did not see a like from you, it had consequences.
- Swizec 11y ago> that if someone did not see a like from you, it had consequences. I'm 28 and people definitely notice when you don't notice one of their posts. A like is often just an aknowledgement of "Yes, I saw this, I still follow what you're up to, we're still friends"
- sliverstorm 11y agoYou could think of it as a development to handle the absence of "dislike". Those 10% of posts which do not receive a "like" can be assumed to be "dislike".
- megablast 11y agoSure. And when I was a kid, $2 was a lot of money.
- richardbrevig 11y agoThe general metrics I've observed on Instagram to show success: - have at least twice as many followers as you follow - have at least 10% the number of followers as likes per pic So, you could have 700 followers, but follow no more than 350 people, and must get 70 likes or more per pic. That's "success." Granted, as you get into 2,000+ followers, it can get harder to maintain the 10%.
- CuriousSkeptic 11y agoI'm curious. Since I don't have an Instagram account. How does Instagram "success" impact life in general?
- q-base 11y agoMade me laugh - hits the nail on the head!
- DominikR 11y agoOne could argue that kids and teenagers use these apps to learn promoting oneself successfully. This is a useful skill to have.
- robterrell 11y agoIt's a measure of social success. All the mean bullshit of middle/high school is now quantitatively measurable.
- dghughes 11y agoI'm male but I think many people also overlook that Instagram is a visual medium which along with upvotes/downvotes for girls is powerful medium.