We All Hate Instagram, So Here’s What You Can Do.

I truly believe this title. I do not personally know anyone who loves the Instagram experience. I’m sure there are people out there who absolutely love the app, but I don’t know them. Instead, I know people who are constantly frustrated with how the app treats them as contributors and consumers. As contributors, they are frustrated that the people who follow them do not see their content. As a consumer, they’re frustrated that their feed is full of ads and “suggested accounts” rather than people they follow. They’re frustrated that with every update, the bait-and-switch experience gets more and more distant from the golden era of the app. I mean, who asked for audio to play automatically on Reels?

Upper management of the app has basically become President Orlean and staff from Don’t Look Up, holding a rally every week via Mosseri’s updates and telling all of us what “content creators want” and giving us “highly demanded features,” all the while a digitally destructive asteroid is heading right for them. A quick Google search for “do people like Instagram” populated my feed with many negative articles.

Instagram has a beautiful origin story but a tragic survival story. Instagram was one of the original innovators of social media. Let’s remember where we came from. Myspace brought up a personal landing page. Facebook brought us status updates and likes. Instagram brought us media sharing. Youtube brought us videos. Snapchat brought us real-time stories. TikTok brought us short form video. This is the evolution of social media contributions.

Instagram features today look like this: Photo feed (their innovation), IGTV (knock-off Youtube), Stories (knock-off Snapchat), and Reels (knock-off TikTok). They have made it clear that they are “no longer a photo sharing app,” and have been pushing photo/feed posts way down in value while promoting Reels. There are even groups trying to game the algorithm by liking/commenting/saving posts of other creators, as if that’s going to get them exposure. It doesn’t. You simply will not beat the Instagram algorithm.

When a company stops innovating, it begins dying. Unstuck has this chart about organizational growth, and I find it applies well to any organization in any industry. The front side of the curve is innovative and building something, the back side of the curve is decline and irrelevancy. To me it’s pretty obvious that Instagram is in the Preservation section of the back curve, trying everything they can to capitalize on what’s popular in other platforms innovations to stay relevant.

This is no new strategy. Even Apple does this. Apple didn’t create the first mp3 player or smart phone or watch. They just did it better than everyone else. The problem with Instagram is that when they bring features to market, it’s just worse than the IP they stole. Need an example? Look no further than how many Reels on Instagram end. It’s the TikTok logo.

Look, I get that Meta is a publicly traded ad agency that makes billions of dollars for their shareholders and sustains thousands of jobs. They need to make money, because that’s what corporations do. That’s fine. We just get to decide our personal threshold and tolerance of being a product that we allow them to monetize. And I think we’re all getting closer and closer to our breaking point.

So what are our options? I’ve got three ideas for you.

• Option #1. If you’re a creative, own your platform. This has been good advice for many years. If you don’t have a website, it’s time to get one. If you don’t have a mailing list, it’s time to start one. I’ve always had a website, but I basically abandoned it for many years. It’s was on old Wordpress site I had on an old domain I’ve owned since 2007. I got tired of fighting the spam and hacks so I eventually just took it down. Today, I put a lot of energy and focus into this site. I bought https://dave.online because it was short and memorable, and I was shook no one had it already. I use Squarespace (with a bit of custom coding) to host this site. It’s easy, does what I need, and works well without a lot of drama. And I have a mailing list through here that I reach out to a few times a month with updates.

• Option #2. Shop around for a better UX and migrate to it. There are other apps out there trying to be what Instagram once was, but if I’m honest, I haven’t found anything I want to give my time to. I’ve tried many, from Vero to Gala to Glass and others. The best one I’ve found is Ello. It actually has a decent user base, and isn’t quite Instagram, but similar. It’s a feed of many art mediums, with gigs as well. Outside of IG competitors, there’s always Twitter (where many photographers have migrated to), but I don’t love the Twitter experience, personally. Of course, if you’re into the short-form video content, you’re probably on TikTok primarily, so just…stay there.

• Option #3. Run. That’s right, just peace-out. This is kind of where I’m at. I use to post every single day. For years I put energy into scheduling my feed posts, and posting daily. I don’t do that anymore. When less than 10% of my followers see my posts, and I don’t really need it for my portfolio, why give it energy at all? I do appreciate the DM’s / communication side of IG, because I have many friends I message with on there. But that’s about it. I’m still posting on my feed, but it’s maybe 3-4x / week instead of 7x / week. And I never get on and scroll anymore. My entire feed is suggested posts. I don’t see my friends posts unless I go to their account. The company I manage IG for got the latest update, and it has turned every feed post into a Reel-style UX. When that update comes to @daveherring, I’ll for sure be on even less. It’s just not for me.

It’s the end of an era. What once was is now gone, and it isn’t coming back. I was sad when Myspace became irrelevant almost twenty years ago. I’m not sad about Instagram, though. It’s like a prime-time TV show that has outlived it’s shelf life and is now only playing on the CW. Except there are no reruns of your favorite episodes, only poorly produced story-lines, shoddy filmography, irrelevant cultural significance, and out of touch with their viewers. It’s basically LOST in it’s final season. That’s an appropriate reference, in my option. Instagram is LOST. And I’m eventually getting off the island.