4 ms·

The problem is that everyone is reading Instagram. I don't understand why. I made an account recently in order to access a specific thing. I can confirm the ap

by immibis 11mo ago

The problem is that everyone is reading Instagram. I don't understand why. I made an account recently in order to access a specific thing. I can confirm the app is 100% pure garbage. The home feed is garbage and navigation is awful (to keep you on the home feed). I uninstalled it after they were caught bypassing the permission system to spy on you, by binding localhost ports that web ads would access. The web app is no better garbage-wise (but it can't bind ports). And it's the subcultures that you'd expect to be the most untied from corporate shackles, that are the ones most on Instagram. I don't get it.

MichaelZuo 11mo ago
By definition someone’s actions, if repeated sufficiently often, define their real character. You don’t have to take claimed pretenses seriously.
- fsflover 11mo ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_what_it_does https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_wha...
- roughly 11mo ago
  This is a bit of a harsh take. These same groups use Signal for all their internal messaging - by and large the will is there, but they're not tech savvy and we haven't given them viable alternatives.
  - MichaelZuo 11mo ago
    People can have multiple facets of character? Or do you think that’s not even possible?
ipaddr 11mo ago
Instagram is useless unless their are people you want to follow or get people to follow you.
roughly 11mo ago
I think it's two aspects - one is that Insta started out as the "not-facebook" platform and Meta's somehow managed not to fuck that up, and the other is there's a massive network effect - every tattoo artist, venue, and band are on instagram now, and it all becomes very self-reinforcing.
- timeon 11mo ago
  > Meta's somehow managed not to fuck that up But then they fucked up. Several years ago.
- deleted 11mo ago
  [deleted]
- stephen_g 11mo ago
  They're trying... They finally released a native iPad version of the app this year (after so many years), and its default pane is not the one that includes people you actually follow (like the phone app) - it's just reels, and you have to go looking for the right page in the menu to see anything from people you care about. It's very revealing about where they wish they could have taken the app already, where you don't follow anyone, just trust the algorithm to force-feed you content. Doing that too quickly would instantly kill it, so it's been years of boiling the frog. The 'Snooze suggested content in feed for 30 days' thing is already bad enough, if they stopped letting you do that Instagram would be insufferable to use.
charcircuit 11mo ago
>bypassing the permission system On Android you can't make a network service permissioned. And when you make a binder service permissioned it's up to the app itself to specify with what permission a caller needs in order to be able to use the service, or the service can choose to be unpermissioned. Either way apps on Android are free to host unpermissioned services that other apps on the system connect to. Chrome connecting to such a service did not have to bypass a permission since there was no permission protecting it.
- immibis 11mo ago
  What they were caught doing was opening some local port via TCP sockets (let's say localhost:9000) and then advertisements would connect to localhost:9000 to add themselves to your advertising profile even if you were in a private browser, had cookies blocked, or anything like that. Both Facebook and Instagram apps were caught doing it. Now, if they were formally caught by the legal system, they'd go to prison (,in countries other than the USA) so as soon as it made front page HN, they removed it from the apps.
  - charcircuit 11mo ago
    >even if you were in a private browser Incognito mode is about not saving data or browser history to your computer. Sites can still identify you if you login or even just from your IP. It's not meant to make you anonymous. This is a common misconception which is why these modes show a big warning explaination when you enable them. >they'd go to prison That's for the courts to decide. The Facebook and Instagram apps may have already gotten consent from the user to share this information.
    - immibis 11mo ago
      I don't understand your defense of Instagram. It's not even a very good defense. The fact that Facebook removed the code as soon as they were caught means they also think they would be in serious trouble. Unauthorized use of a computer is broadly illegal in many jurisdictions, including the USA federally. In Europe, misinformed consent is not consent. "Authorization" generally refers to a reasonable person's expectation of giving consent, and does not refer to any technical property such as Android permissions.

by immibis 11mo ago

MichaelZuo 11mo ago

By definition someone’s actions, if repeated sufficiently often, define their real character. You don’t have to take claimed pretenses seriously.

fsflover 11mo ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_what_it_does https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_wha...
roughly 11mo ago
This is a bit of a harsh take. These same groups use Signal for all their internal messaging - by and large the will is there, but they're not tech savvy and we haven't given them viable alternatives.
- MichaelZuo 11mo ago
  People can have multiple facets of character? Or do you think that’s not even possible?

ipaddr 11mo ago

Instagram is useless unless their are people you want to follow or get people to follow you.

roughly 11mo ago

I think it's two aspects - one is that Insta started out as the "not-facebook" platform and Meta's somehow managed not to fuck that up, and the other is there's a massive network effect - every tattoo artist, venue, and band are on instagram now, and it all becomes very self-reinforcing.

timeon 11mo ago
> Meta's somehow managed not to fuck that up But then they fucked up. Several years ago.
deleted 11mo ago
[deleted]
stephen_g 11mo ago
They're trying... They finally released a native iPad version of the app this year (after so many years), and its default pane is not the one that includes people you actually follow (like the phone app) - it's just reels, and you have to go looking for the right page in the menu to see anything from people you care about. It's very revealing about where they wish they could have taken the app already, where you don't follow anyone, just trust the algorithm to force-feed you content. Doing that too quickly would instantly kill it, so it's been years of boiling the frog. The 'Snooze suggested content in feed for 30 days' thing is already bad enough, if they stopped letting you do that Instagram would be insufferable to use.

charcircuit 11mo ago

>bypassing the permission system On Android you can't make a network service permissioned. And when you make a binder service permissioned it's up to the app itself to specify with what permission a caller needs in order to be able to use the service, or the service can choose to be unpermissioned. Either way apps on Android are free to host unpermissioned services that other apps on the system connect to. Chrome connecting to such a service did not have to bypass a permission since there was no permission protecting it.

immibis 11mo ago
What they were caught doing was opening some local port via TCP sockets (let's say localhost:9000) and then advertisements would connect to localhost:9000 to add themselves to your advertising profile even if you were in a private browser, had cookies blocked, or anything like that. Both Facebook and Instagram apps were caught doing it. Now, if they were formally caught by the legal system, they'd go to prison (,in countries other than the USA) so as soon as it made front page HN, they removed it from the apps.
- charcircuit 11mo ago
  >even if you were in a private browser Incognito mode is about not saving data or browser history to your computer. Sites can still identify you if you login or even just from your IP. It's not meant to make you anonymous. This is a common misconception which is why these modes show a big warning explaination when you enable them. >they'd go to prison That's for the courts to decide. The Facebook and Instagram apps may have already gotten consent from the user to share this information.
  - immibis 11mo ago
    I don't understand your defense of Instagram. It's not even a very good defense. The fact that Facebook removed the code as soon as they were caught means they also think they would be in serious trouble. Unauthorized use of a computer is broadly illegal in many jurisdictions, including the USA federally. In Europe, misinformed consent is not consent. "Authorization" generally refers to a reasonable person's expectation of giving consent, and does not refer to any technical property such as Android permissions.