[orthecreedence]

Instagram is a platform dedicated to presenting fabrication. The entire point is to create a better version of yourself. An unrealistically perfect distillation of all of your best qualities.

Why on earth would instagram want to break this illusion in any way? Their entire existence is in service to the illusion.

[codemonkeysh]

I have a lot to say, but I'll try to keep it brief.

1. Would this take away the illusion? I think it'll just inform people of what they already know; it's not 100% real. The indicator will only serve to reduce the anxiety and depression in some folks by reminding them that what you say isn't 100% real.

I don't think Instagram wasn't to be a service of unhappiness and illusion. That would destroy their brand and I honestly don't believe the people working at Meta have such ill intentions. I think they do take pride in having a large number of users and a large number of people who are generally speaking, happy to use the service, but don't fully realize how deeply it can impact impressionable folks.

All that being said, a lot of people are starting to have negative emotions about Meta and similar companies because of a) their success b) their social impact and c) along with both of these some pretty deep negative impacts that I believe Zuck and the many workers that never intended. Basically, it's a negative by product.

This is all an opinion and I could be full of shit.

[orthecreedence]

> Would this take away the illusion?

I think so, yeah. It's a reminder that the image you're seeing has been modified. That act of modification is exactly what Instagram provides, but under the guise that there is no modification.

> The indicator will only serve to reduce the anxiety and depression in some folks by reminding them that what you say isn't 100% real.

I agree with you. I think that's a good thing. What I'm saying is that it would be great for everyone, but harmful for Instagram.

> I don't think Instagram wasn't to be a service of unhappiness and illusion.

No, I don't think they ever intended this to be the case. But we often have no control over how the tools we create are used. It has evolved past its original purpose into a finely-tuned machine dedicated to presenting perfection.

Instagram knows this, and they know this is where their value lies. To expect them to go against market forces and do the right thing won't yield much fruit.

> I honestly don't believe the people working at Meta have such ill intentions.

The people working at Meta and the people deciding how Meta positions its products are two very different groups (welcome to capitalism). I could go on a 10-page rant about how the complete toxicity of Facebook and Instagram are entirely profit-driven and we should abolish capitalism and yada yada. I'll spare you.

That said, we need to at least stop pretending companies are going to the right thing. Meta knows Instagram is toxic to most of their users. But this is what makes them money. I don't think they're going to change it any time soon.

[xcambar]

Helping teenagers and adults alike to read an explicit mention of image manipulation can certainly remove some self-criticism that many Instagram consumers impose to themselves.

[agent008t]

Is there an actual positive use case to teenagers using instagram?

It seems overall very similar to smoking. It is bad for you; there are strong network effects, as in teenagers get peer pressure to do it if everyone else is doing it; it is difficult to get them to stop once they start; it is difficult to prevent them from starting.

[tomc1985]

Why can't it be about sharing cool photos you took?

People need to stop pointing the camera at themselves. The world is so much more beautiful.

[jakear]

> People need to stop pointing the camera at themselves. The world is so much more beautiful.

Uh what? People don't need to do anything. You might think the world is prettier without all the divas in it, and I might be of the same opinion. Doesn't mean anyone else needs to change. Just follow the accounts you like, mute the ones you don't but 'need' to follow (friends, etc.)

[tomc1985]

With ads every other or third post or so, you don't get nearly as much control over your feed as you think.

> Just follow the accounts you like, mute the ones you don't but 'need' to follow (friends, etc.)

If I had a penny for every time someone here casually drops such milquetoast advice (that DOESNT WORK), I'd be rich.

[jakear]

Goalposts drifting faster than my kayak in a windstorm.

First you say there's too many faces, I give you an easy solution. Now you say there's too many ads, I say to make a script that pulls in latest images from a set of accounts using Instagram's Basic Display API.

Next you'll probably say you don't want to do any actual work, but also won't pay someone else to do work, in which case I have no solutions.

[tomc1985]

My point is that a casual "just change your feed settings," answer, which signals an implicit approval for a shitty status quo, doesn't work.

What I want is for people to change. For society to stop navel-gazing. For people to get over themselves. It's idealistic, for sure. But I am an idealist.

And for the record, those ads are going to show you more obnoxiously smiley faces, but this time they're hawking some bullshit product on top of it. So unless you can make the ads go away, whatever you set your feed to won't matter.

[jakear]

Literally write a script. The scripts other people are paid to write aren't going to help you if you refuse to participate in their profit model.

If you want something to exist either finance it or make it. Don't whine that other people aren't building it for free. I'm thankful the API even exists, it'd be easy for them to keep their walled garden totally isolated.