I seem to be immune from much of humanity’s collective insanity – society, nationalism, cars, football, shops, TV – and Instagram is another one I just don’t get. I always found it very restrictive and constrictive.

I feel like I must have written something like this before but apparently haven’t. I’ve never enjoyed anything about the Instagram experience, much as I used to try in the past. A recent look at the app reveals I’m now bombarded with ads and videos and pictures from companies and people I’m not even following.

1. Young people won’t remember this but in the day of film photography, friends and relatives used to bore each other to death by showing off their holiday photos when they got back from a trip and got their film developed (I was also guilty of doing this). Instagram is a never-ending stream of that, every single day.

2. It wants to be TikTok.

3. The text is too small.

4. I always used to forgot to add tags. I thought they were stupid, cheating and took too much time.

5. Links only work in bio.

6. Can’t upload GIFs.

7. Can’t copy and paste text.

8. An old-fashioned, clunky-feeling app that still asks ‘Log out of your account?’

9. I know much of our human activities, more and more, are utterly pointless, ugly and hedonistic, but there’s something about Instagram that encapsulates this.

10. It’s all about algorithms, engagement and really horrible marketing words and concepts. It lives in a parallel world where there’s no war or climate change. Oh yeah, it’s called social media.

Previously on Barnflakes
Flickagrams
Instagram hasn’t heard of climate change
Notes on...
Barnflakes on Instagram
Top ten most boring Instagram subjects
A brief history of photography (part three)
A brief history of photography (part two)
A brief history of photography (part one)
Photo opportunity

Barnflakes elsewhere
Instagram
Flickr