6 ms·

i check Instagram maybe a couple of times a year and it's almost exactly like watching your college friends' kids age from afar. Each time you see them, the sen

i check Instagram maybe a couple of times a year and it's almost exactly like watching your college friends' kids age from afar. Each time you see them, the sensation of how much they've grown is so overwhelming that you can hardly resist saying something along the lines of "I can't believe how big they've gotten!". except with Instagram it's, "this is so much less usable than the last time I tried it. Why does anybody put up with it?"

hbn 4y ago
Yeah it's legitimately shocking how bad it is at this point. My feed feels like I have more ads than content from people I follow. And of the people I follow, they really don't post much there these days anyway? Maybe that's also to do with younger people preferring the more ephemeral forms of social media after we all grew up had Facebook pull up embarrassing posts from when we were 13, but I see a lot of stories but not many posts on the main feed.
aNoob7000 4y ago
Personally, I think the future is in messenger apps. Why login to Instagram or Facebook to see updates when you can have a family/friends group in Whatsapp/Telegram/Signal (pick your poison).
- TremendousJudge 4y ago
  because I want to know what my friends from college are up to? being in a messenger app group represents a much closer social relationship
  - slothtrop 4y ago
    So, voyeurism for curated updates. Personally I don't get it, and if old friends matter to me at all I'd message them to ask anyway.
    - standardUser 4y ago
      The fact that you don't desire a more granular spectrum of communication with different people in your life should not prevent you from understanding why many people do want that.
      - slothtrop 4y ago
        > granular spectrum That's generous.
  - rchaud 4y ago
    After grad school, I completely lost interest in keeping up with people I wasn't in at least semi-regular contact with. The drip feed of info on social media is irritating to deal with. I feel like a 5 minute catchup st a 5-10 year reunion would achieve the exact same thing and be more pleasant to hear about and engage with.
- bobthepanda 4y ago
  There’s not really money in that, though. Messenger and Whatsapp are not pulling its weight in revenue, though not for lack of trying. Also, it’s worth noting that HN isn’t exactly representative of the population at large.
- bastardoperator 4y ago
  Why login to anything at all? Why use whatsapp, telegram, or signal when every phone already does this and has been doing this for years? I have all of my friends and family in specific groups devoid of any specific apps. To be fair people were saying the same thing 20 years ago when AIM, ICQ, MSN Messenger and Yahoo messenger were the big thing. All messaging platforms will eventually die is my experience thus far.
  - dzikimarian 4y ago
    SMS is slow and bad at rich media. Unless you're talking about iMessage - then you are logged in with your Apple ID - it's exactly like WhatsApp/Telegram + closed for people outside of your hardware ecosystem.
    - bastardoperator 4y ago
      I have people in my groups that are on android. Doesn't seem to be an issue for them. Then again, if I want to have a real conversation, I just call them.
      - dzikimarian 4y ago
        What would happen if those people on Android tried to convince you to let's say telegram?
  - Shish2k 4y ago
    Why rely on electronics at all when you can just send smoke signals? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
  - rmsaksida 4y ago
    In many countries, SMS isn't free (or didn't used to be). That's the reason why Whatsapp was successful in the first place, it was cheaper to use Whatsapp over data than to use SMS for texting.
    - skydhash 4y ago
- jerojero 4y ago
  Most people dont use instagram just to follow their friends, but strangers.
- marssaxman 4y ago
  Those systems don't scale past single digit membership numbers. You could maybe keep in touch with everyone if you all had lots of sharded, overlapping groups, but what a pain that would be!

hbn 4y ago

Yeah it's legitimately shocking how bad it is at this point. My feed feels like I have more ads than content from people I follow. And of the people I follow, they really don't post much there these days anyway? Maybe that's also to do with younger people preferring the more ephemeral forms of social media after we all grew up had Facebook pull up embarrassing posts from when we were 13, but I see a lot of stories but not many posts on the main feed.

aNoob7000 4y ago

Personally, I think the future is in messenger apps. Why login to Instagram or Facebook to see updates when you can have a family/friends group in Whatsapp/Telegram/Signal (pick your poison).

TremendousJudge 4y ago
because I want to know what my friends from college are up to? being in a messenger app group represents a much closer social relationship
- slothtrop 4y ago
  So, voyeurism for curated updates. Personally I don't get it, and if old friends matter to me at all I'd message them to ask anyway.
  - standardUser 4y ago
    The fact that you don't desire a more granular spectrum of communication with different people in your life should not prevent you from understanding why many people do want that.
    - slothtrop 4y ago
      > granular spectrum That's generous.
- rchaud 4y ago
  After grad school, I completely lost interest in keeping up with people I wasn't in at least semi-regular contact with. The drip feed of info on social media is irritating to deal with. I feel like a 5 minute catchup st a 5-10 year reunion would achieve the exact same thing and be more pleasant to hear about and engage with.
bobthepanda 4y ago
There’s not really money in that, though. Messenger and Whatsapp are not pulling its weight in revenue, though not for lack of trying. Also, it’s worth noting that HN isn’t exactly representative of the population at large.
bastardoperator 4y ago
Why login to anything at all? Why use whatsapp, telegram, or signal when every phone already does this and has been doing this for years? I have all of my friends and family in specific groups devoid of any specific apps. To be fair people were saying the same thing 20 years ago when AIM, ICQ, MSN Messenger and Yahoo messenger were the big thing. All messaging platforms will eventually die is my experience thus far.
- dzikimarian 4y ago
  SMS is slow and bad at rich media. Unless you're talking about iMessage - then you are logged in with your Apple ID - it's exactly like WhatsApp/Telegram + closed for people outside of your hardware ecosystem.
  - bastardoperator 4y ago
    I have people in my groups that are on android. Doesn't seem to be an issue for them. Then again, if I want to have a real conversation, I just call them.
    - dzikimarian 4y ago
      What would happen if those people on Android tried to convince you to let's say telegram?
- Shish2k 4y ago
  Why rely on electronics at all when you can just send smoke signals? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
- rmsaksida 4y ago
  In many countries, SMS isn't free (or didn't used to be). That's the reason why Whatsapp was successful in the first place, it was cheaper to use Whatsapp over data than to use SMS for texting.
  - skydhash 4y ago
jerojero 4y ago
Most people dont use instagram just to follow their friends, but strangers.
marssaxman 4y ago
Those systems don't scale past single digit membership numbers. You could maybe keep in touch with everyone if you all had lots of sharded, overlapping groups, but what a pain that would be!