3 ms·

Instagram can actually be a nice place, if used as a platform to look at cool pictures and not at all as a social network. I never added any friends or family,

Instagram can actually be a nice place, if used as a platform to look at cool pictures and not at all as a social network. I never added any friends or family, I just follow accounts and topics I'm interested in. So my feed is almost entirely pixel art, cool architecture, and retro console mods, and it's very pleasant. Considering they're Facebook-owned, I see surprisingly little effort to cram low-effort garbage down my throat. I've even bought a couple of things via ads, as they seem to be pretty aligned with my interests (as you would expect from that level of data collection). The only real issue I've had is that a weirdly large number of people seem to tag their family photos with the #architecture hashtag.

kuu 5y ago
> The only real issue I've had is that a weirdly large number of people seem to tag their family photos with the #architecture hashtag. Because for most people hasthags are a way of getting people to view their picture than to label the content
72deluxe 5y ago
When you run a Pi-Hole you see how much telemetry is being sent back with the DNS requests to many different domains. Insane, simply for scrolling through pictures. I think it tells you a lot.
- jreese 5y ago
  FWIW, most of what happens with the unique subdomains is done with the intention of automatically routing you to the nearest edge/pop that has the best chance of either having the asset cached, or in the best location for routing your request to a datacenter that can serve the asset from disk. By generating the seemingly random subdomains when serving the metadata to the client, it can most efficiently fetch the media to be displayed. It's entirely possible (likely?) that multiple users in the same ISP/location to be vended the same subdomain/url, but physically/topologically distant users will get different urls.
forinti 5y ago
Same here, I don't seek out anyone on Instagram. I follow accounts that interest me, such as Museums, Ministry of Culture, language teachers, etc. The Hermitage Museum, for example, posts excellent content.
alistairSH 5y ago
Same. On IG, I follow a minimal number of family/friends (basically people I see in meat-space at least monthly, plus a very few childhood friends who I still see when we're in the same town). Beyond that, I follow a few cycling and car feeds. On FB, I actively unfollwed or defriended everybody but family. 99% of my FB use today is marketplace groups and that's 2-3x week. I've been much less stressed after making those changes. No more anxiety-porn in the feeds. No more politics. Etc. Just close friends, bicycles, and sometimes cute animals my wife forwards.
SamBam 5y ago
I think there are a few different modes that people use it in (and I'm sure the folks at Instagram have this down to a more precise science): * Consumer-only: simply following artists/whatever and not contributing anything * Family and friends: Sharing pictures of your holiday/kid/cat/food with people you know * Influencers and wannabe influencers: Actively seeking to grow an audience I don't think between 1 & 2 anyone can say one is better than the other, they're two quite different modes of using the app. Number 2 obviously can lead to people wondering why their 15th funny picture of their cat didn't get as many likes, and it's for this group that I think turning off likes altogether can help the most. I would expect, though, that if everyone in a family-and-friends circle were turning off their likes, comments would become a proxy for likes, and there would be an expectation to add "nice!", "beautiful!" "how funny!" to posts, and then a similar feeling when posts don't get any response.
nonbirithm 5y ago
I only use Instagram to send messages to a single person who won't get back to me through text messages. We had serious issues seeing responses to each others' communication until I gave in and made an Instagram account for messaging. But I don't believe I ought to criticize them over this. Instagram is their normal, and the place where a significant portion of their social life converges, and I never had any control over that from the beginning. Facebook did. When I see them in real life, our interactions are positive, so I really believe our usage of Instagram is simply what works out the most practically for them. I don't use Instagram for any other purpose. But because of the network effect, I can easily see how Instagram can redirect the attention of other people this way, and make the app their new normal, repeating the vicious cycle.
- sneak 5y ago
  Mind you, your being on Instagram, via the network effect, makes the platform more valuable and attractive to other users, such as your friend or other people who know you. If you delete your account, Instagram becomes less useful to your bad-at-SMS friend.
  - nonbirithm 5y ago
    The problem I see with this is that, to my friend, choosing to delete my Instagram account indicates that my principles for social media are more valuable than our friendship. In my case, the friendship wins out. Irrespective of whether or not I choose to be on Instagram, they want to have an audience they will post for. They choose to play the social media game where I don't. That is their decision. In my mind, judging them based on the value of that decision sounds petty to me, and is probably futile. I do not think that imposing my morals on anyone who disagrees with me is the right option, and our attempts at moving the conversation off the platform have not succeeded anyway. If that's the platforms' defense mechanism, that making the users believe the networks are beneficial for them shuts out opinions to the contrary, then so be it. I could think, "but if they were a true friend, they would put up with the inconveniences caused by interacting outside Instagram." I want to believe this is true, but I don't think how my friend spends their time or what platform they're motivated to use is a major indicator of the quality of our friendship. Legitimate best friends can still have Instagram accounts, the same as the "friends in name only" the networks would define. And if by this definition we are not actually true friends, then maybe that's a valid statement on my ability to find and maintain the correct friendships, or maybe it's just excess paranoia. Also, they are the only person I've felt comfortable talking to, and they aren't part of a compensated or therapeutic relationship. That relationship is the value that Facebook supposedly holds. That is what they lend out to me when I ask for it. And this is the very mechanism which Facebook uses to capture so many people's attention. I can go on and on over how I believe that social media is a net negative on society, and how it destroys my attention span if I give its other features enough credence, and yet I still have to use Instagram to have a chance at interacting with this person who has legitimately made a significant impact on my life elsewhere. About all I can ask is what would incentivize them to stop using the platform if their usage has not reached pathological or mentally damaging levels, and I don't have an answer to that question.

kuu 5y ago

> The only real issue I've had is that a weirdly large number of people seem to tag their family photos with the #architecture hashtag. Because for most people hasthags are a way of getting people to view their picture than to label the content

72deluxe 5y ago

When you run a Pi-Hole you see how much telemetry is being sent back with the DNS requests to many different domains. Insane, simply for scrolling through pictures. I think it tells you a lot.

jreese 5y ago
FWIW, most of what happens with the unique subdomains is done with the intention of automatically routing you to the nearest edge/pop that has the best chance of either having the asset cached, or in the best location for routing your request to a datacenter that can serve the asset from disk. By generating the seemingly random subdomains when serving the metadata to the client, it can most efficiently fetch the media to be displayed. It's entirely possible (likely?) that multiple users in the same ISP/location to be vended the same subdomain/url, but physically/topologically distant users will get different urls.

forinti 5y ago

Same here, I don't seek out anyone on Instagram. I follow accounts that interest me, such as Museums, Ministry of Culture, language teachers, etc. The Hermitage Museum, for example, posts excellent content.

alistairSH 5y ago

Same. On IG, I follow a minimal number of family/friends (basically people I see in meat-space at least monthly, plus a very few childhood friends who I still see when we're in the same town). Beyond that, I follow a few cycling and car feeds. On FB, I actively unfollwed or defriended everybody but family. 99% of my FB use today is marketplace groups and that's 2-3x week. I've been much less stressed after making those changes. No more anxiety-porn in the feeds. No more politics. Etc. Just close friends, bicycles, and sometimes cute animals my wife forwards.

SamBam 5y ago

I think there are a few different modes that people use it in (and I'm sure the folks at Instagram have this down to a more precise science): * Consumer-only: simply following artists/whatever and not contributing anything * Family and friends: Sharing pictures of your holiday/kid/cat/food with people you know * Influencers and wannabe influencers: Actively seeking to grow an audience I don't think between 1 & 2 anyone can say one is better than the other, they're two quite different modes of using the app. Number 2 obviously can lead to people wondering why their 15th funny picture of their cat didn't get as many likes, and it's for this group that I think turning off likes altogether can help the most. I would expect, though, that if everyone in a family-and-friends circle were turning off their likes, comments would become a proxy for likes, and there would be an expectation to add "nice!", "beautiful!" "how funny!" to posts, and then a similar feeling when posts don't get any response.

nonbirithm 5y ago

I only use Instagram to send messages to a single person who won't get back to me through text messages. We had serious issues seeing responses to each others' communication until I gave in and made an Instagram account for messaging. But I don't believe I ought to criticize them over this. Instagram is their normal, and the place where a significant portion of their social life converges, and I never had any control over that from the beginning. Facebook did. When I see them in real life, our interactions are positive, so I really believe our usage of Instagram is simply what works out the most practically for them. I don't use Instagram for any other purpose. But because of the network effect, I can easily see how Instagram can redirect the attention of other people this way, and make the app their new normal, repeating the vicious cycle.

sneak 5y ago
Mind you, your being on Instagram, via the network effect, makes the platform more valuable and attractive to other users, such as your friend or other people who know you. If you delete your account, Instagram becomes less useful to your bad-at-SMS friend.
- nonbirithm 5y ago
  The problem I see with this is that, to my friend, choosing to delete my Instagram account indicates that my principles for social media are more valuable than our friendship. In my case, the friendship wins out. Irrespective of whether or not I choose to be on Instagram, they want to have an audience they will post for. They choose to play the social media game where I don't. That is their decision. In my mind, judging them based on the value of that decision sounds petty to me, and is probably futile. I do not think that imposing my morals on anyone who disagrees with me is the right option, and our attempts at moving the conversation off the platform have not succeeded anyway. If that's the platforms' defense mechanism, that making the users believe the networks are beneficial for them shuts out opinions to the contrary, then so be it. I could think, "but if they were a true friend, they would put up with the inconveniences caused by interacting outside Instagram." I want to believe this is true, but I don't think how my friend spends their time or what platform they're motivated to use is a major indicator of the quality of our friendship. Legitimate best friends can still have Instagram accounts, the same as the "friends in name only" the networks would define. And if by this definition we are not actually true friends, then maybe that's a valid statement on my ability to find and maintain the correct friendships, or maybe it's just excess paranoia. Also, they are the only person I've felt comfortable talking to, and they aren't part of a compensated or therapeutic relationship. That relationship is the value that Facebook supposedly holds. That is what they lend out to me when I ask for it. And this is the very mechanism which Facebook uses to capture so many people's attention. I can go on and on over how I believe that social media is a net negative on society, and how it destroys my attention span if I give its other features enough credence, and yet I still have to use Instagram to have a chance at interacting with this person who has legitimately made a significant impact on my life elsewhere. About all I can ask is what would incentivize them to stop using the platform if their usage has not reached pathological or mentally damaging levels, and I don't have an answer to that question.