The insight of Instagram
6 January 12
It’s easy to dismiss Instagram as a lomo-hipster triviality, but over the last few weeks I’ve come to think of it as perhaps the most interesting social software around.
I enjoyed a largely disconnected Christmas, but during ad breaks and satiated sofa slumps I still popped online occasionally. While Twitter and Facebook were quieter than usual, Instagram sprang to life with fragments of people’s holidays. Instead of the usual likebait of sunsets and cats, it filled up with photos of family, presents, and smiles. Significant moments – the ones that become memories. And of course there was the meat oneupmanship: turduckens, geese, and the very droll #thisismyham.
The ambient intimacy of Twitter has faded as brands and promoted tweets have invaded, and people turn it into a tool for the presentation of self. Now, there’s nothing wrong with that per se, and I suppose it’s the natural evolution of a popular system. Instagram isn’t immune to hierarchies and rules either. Instacelebrities rule the Popular tab, SLRs are usually considered cheating, and the dread cries of “Great capture!” have bled in from Flickr.
But over Christmas none of that really mattered, as Instagram returned to its true purpose as a wormhole in space-time, a window into people’s lives. It reminded me of one of my favourite public works of art, the 1980 installation Hole in Space.
As Hole in Space did, Instagram has become something that can genuinely bring people closer. A tool of mutual self-disclosure and hence intimacy. I think that’s worth celebrating.
Subscribe via RSS
Follow me on Twitter
3 comments on The insight of Instagram
Absolutely agree. It’s a bit amazing how “pure” (for lack of a better word) the experience is. View. Like. Comment. That’s it.
That being said it’s already starting to see some spammy hash business emerging. A few people on my feed have taken to entering a slew of hash-tags after posting a photo in order to generate more likes. It’s a good way to ruin an otherwise-good photo.
My other main complaint with Instagram is that its iPhone-only nature has overstayed its welcome. I can’t count the amount of times that I’ve clicked on an Instagram photo through Twitter and wished I could like/comment/folllow directly from the web interface. The app-only approach (which has been copied by Path and others) is a cumbersome game that leads to the dumbing down of the web by breaking its interactivity.
I can appreciate the fact that you might not be able to capture photos or add filters from the browser, and I can understand maintaining a sort of “exclusive” vibe, but there’s really no reason why I shouldn’t be able to perform simple actions whenever I encounter an Instagram photo.
Certainly agree about the iPhone lock-in – it bugs me that I can’t share my photos properly with the wider web, and I’d love a viable alternative to the decrepit Flickr.
Hashtag cross-selling is a shame, but I suppose it’s good for the “engagement metrics” (ugh), so I expect that sort of behaviour will continue to be rewarded. I’d definitely appreciate it being deprioritised in the UI though.
My Instagram experience started fairly early and I haven’t been able to get back into it after being disillusioned with some of the teething problems.
The prevalence of stolen, HDR, or otherwise professional photographs, along with the pollution of ‘popular’ by flesh shots ruined the main benefit I saw in Instagram.
As someone new to photography it was something to spark my creativity, understanding what sort of quirky shots were possible and discovering different styles and approaches. I find it difficult to get to that again, and each fresh attempt at discovery drags me into the photo challenge and ‘professional’ cliques. This occurs either through comment spam, or just the way they can fill up popular and ‘suggested users’ through their 1,2,3 rules.
To misquote Yogi Berra – “It’s too popular, no one uses it anymore”
Add a comment