So I got the message from instagram about either paying or using it free (at the cost personalised ads) just now.
Doesn’t this go against the GDPR? Either way, is there a FOSS alternative for instagram like piped is to youtube? It seems like a good opportunity to stop using the official app, even though it would be better to not use instagram at all (sadly not an option for me right now).
Any suggestions, and if so, are there any that provide functionality for: stories, posts, dms? Those are the 3 things I use instagram for.
Many thanks!
Edit: For messaging I do use beeper, though some media like carousels and posts sent to my dms cant be shown in there, so for those cases I open the official app.
Edit 2: many people have suggested pixelfed. Ive heard of it, and want to use it, but unfortunately the only reason Im still sticking with instagram is because I have very dear friends who would never change to anything non-mainstream. Theyre important enough that im willing to not delete it just yet, but I dont want to agree to either pay or pay with my data.
What im looking for is more like a piped for youtube, thing. So a frintend that has instagram content/features, but isnt the main app and avoids the problems I listed above
Edit 3: I ended up installing the site as a PWA on my phone as thats the only device I use it on, and uninstalled the official app. Thanks to everyone for all your input!
Should have posted that chain-text to my Facebook wall years ago so my profile would be blue and safe…
Please forgive me,… I failed you all… 😭
I swear these specific copypastas are started by grad school sociology students for their thesis research or something.
Those, and the copypastas that end with “I want to see who’s brave/caring/proud enough to repost.”
Lmao completely forgot about that
“Your info won’t be used for ads”
But we’ll still be tracking everything you do and selling that on to everyone who wants it.
deleted
That said “will” not “won’t” FYI.Ah I’m dumb ignore me.
I have fond memories of the Internet 20-25 years ago.
How did it turn into this much of a mess? Social Media, SEO, adverts, data mining, profiling, privacy nightmares… what a shit show.
The venture capital dollars started running out. Returns started being demanded. Companies that made slightly improved and/or more accessible versions of more open products extinguished those products using venture capital dollars then started rolling out the enshittification, demands for money, intrusive ads, spying, dark patterns, sabotaging, paid tiers.
Back in those days the internet was a curiosity. A hobby. A fun thing to share, something a company might hope to break even on or earn minor profits with, these days big profits are demanded, centralization. Addiction to high resolution and size video and image content which is expensive to host and serve. The network effect drained smaller sites and resources, concentrating people in larger venues that had the investment dollars to support them at the cost of their privacy. Combine with search engine optimization and it became harder to even find smaller places. Add in digitally uneducated kids who thought fb and such were most of the internet and never bother to venture beneath the top 6 google results and older people and this is what you have.
Take something like Omegle. I don’t want to defend what it was for most of its existence as the bad outweighed the good IMO (like 4chan) but something like that if made today would require linking your facebook or google account and serve you video ads every 5 minutes on top of banner ads. But back then it was just something some random guy could make for fun and not think “hmm I need real identities to monetize these people to ad networks to pay for this and turn a big profit selling the data they input”.
Enshittification happened.
Here is how platforms die: first, they are good to their users; then they abuse their users to make things better for their business customers; finally, they abuse those business customers to claw back all the value for themselves. Then, they die.
13€? Are they insane? If I were to use the platform I’d be willing to pay 3€ at most. 13€ is just ridiculous.
It’s on purpose. They know most people won’t pay, so now it’s carte blanche to their data. And if somebody’s desperate enough, they’ll pay 13€ and meta will make more money on the user than with ads.
They will collect and sell your data either way. They just won’t force ads down your throat if you pay them. This is what billionaires have done to our beloved internet.
The call to action button is the free plan, with subscribe having a secondary button style. That alone makes it clear they want to show you ads more than they want you to subscribe.
They don’t want you to choose the paid option. They make more in the ads and info.
Per account! I have 2 on Instagram an done on FB. They offered an intro price for €10 that would go up to €19 on may 1st. I believe it is because one of my accounts is linked across IG and FB so they count as one… 🤷 lucky me! At this moment I have uninstalled and waiting to see how EU reacts to the “choice options”. Its more like a forced option really
€12.99/mo. sounds wildly overpriced to me in comparison to 1) cost to serve and 2) ad revenue. I’m not an ad revenue expert, but I have a hard time believing they make anywhere near €13/user/mo. from advertisers.
I guess the information they gather is worth enough that overpricing the subscription makes them more likely to retain free users.
The wording and the dark pattern on this screen should be violating the rules already. They very clearly want people to stay on the free plan, and likely aren’t even going to stop tracking users?
Maybe they just want to show how it “failed” and make a case that people don’t care
My god I just glanced quickly and thought it was 2.99. Asking 12.99 is an absolute joke.
Meta makes their ARPU readily available to the public, so you really don’t have to guess in this regard: https://www.statista.com/statistics/251328/facebooks-average-revenue-per-user-by-region/
Last quarter posted there, it was $19.04 for European users, or €17.84 with today’s exchange rate.
Those appear to be per-quarter numbers, and if so that would mean ~€5.95/month.
Looks like they report ARPU on a quarterly basis, yes.
FOSS alternative is PixelFed
Ive heard of it, and want to use it, but unfortunately the only reason Im still sticking with instagram is because I have very dear friends who would never change to anything non-mainstream.
This is called the network effect, it’s a social problem and no amount of technology will solve this. So your choices are either to stop using apps where you are the product, and obviously convince your friends to stop that as well, or grin and bear it. Maybe think about what you did 20 years ago and do that instead.
Removed by mod
Pixelfed it is then
Is pixelfed an entirely different platform? Sadly i have many good friends on insta who i talk with, and they wouldnt ever switch to anything else, so because of that im stuck with meta. Otherwise i would 100% leave it
It is Instagram but federated in a nutshell. Just like Lemmy is similar to Reddit but federated. Whoah, wait I saw your profile and you do not know about Pixelfed?
Ahh i see. Im going to edit my post now to specify that Im looking for an alternative frontend to instagram, such as piped is for youtube. Sadly i have friends on insta that I cant stop using it for now because of
Edit: haha ive heard of it, but its not really what im looking for sadly
Doesn’t exist.
Just switch to Pixelfed.
Good friends will talk to you elsewhere like Telegram or Signal.
XD, I mean that you look like you would now a lot of this stuff, just that. Take it as a compliment.
Actually lemmy was my first introduction to federated platforms. Im still a newbie :D
I chose option C, don’t use Instagram. But thanks, I guess!
The fact that the ad revenue button is more emphasized and easier to press (closer to screen edge) says a lot about the value of you being their product vs. you simply paying them for access.
Option 3: uninstall
The sane choice would be to leave.
foss alternative to Instagram
Pixelfed?
I setup my own pixelfed instance to share pictures of my kids and family. I own and control all the data on my server and no one gets to monetize pictures of my children.
Not many of my family members are on there but I still prefer it to Instagram
