When IG started it was definitely a photography platform that was interesting and inspiring. The more it grew and the need to turn investment into profit the more it moved away from this. It is now, at best, a time sucking evil, at worst, a mirror to the vanity and vacuousness of huge swathes of society. IG plays on this by asking its 'users' to dance a little fucking dance in order for more engagement. It knows its users desperately crave this and they'll do anything for more likes and followers. Subsequently the idea of any kind of creative endeavor being viewed on the platform is not done through the lens of craft appreciation but through monetization and short cuts. How many accounts do you see that post about 'achieving the film look' or 'get the cinematic look' etc etc. It isn't about learning photography and trying to work out your own style or voice. It's simply a mechanism in which to copy what achieved high engagement for someone else. I don't work for Flickr or more recently the new Fotoapp but these platforms take the way we engage with photography much more seriously. In short they just care more about it. IG does not care about photography and if the platform doesn't care about it then this will only rub off on most of the users who will just see photography as more disposable 'content'. God... this makes me sound very bitter. I'm not bitter I just fucking hate Instagram and its parent company. I'd like to pull it out at the plug and it will all be gone in a bloodless pop.
"When it all began with IG," is not ancient history. Perhaps the digital natives feel there was no active visual presence before it emerged as a viable professional networking channel. Prior to that, we immersed ourselves in reading, researching, experimentation. Yes, a lot of it insular. But didn't that expand the collective consciousness? So, yes, now social media is ubiquitous. And??? It's circular perpetuity. And, yet, we are experiencing variations on a theme.
When IG started it was definitely a photography platform that was interesting and inspiring. The more it grew and the need to turn investment into profit the more it moved away from this. It is now, at best, a time sucking evil, at worst, a mirror to the vanity and vacuousness of huge swathes of society. IG plays on this by asking its 'users' to dance a little fucking dance in order for more engagement. It knows its users desperately crave this and they'll do anything for more likes and followers. Subsequently the idea of any kind of creative endeavor being viewed on the platform is not done through the lens of craft appreciation but through monetization and short cuts. How many accounts do you see that post about 'achieving the film look' or 'get the cinematic look' etc etc. It isn't about learning photography and trying to work out your own style or voice. It's simply a mechanism in which to copy what achieved high engagement for someone else. I don't work for Flickr or more recently the new Fotoapp but these platforms take the way we engage with photography much more seriously. In short they just care more about it. IG does not care about photography and if the platform doesn't care about it then this will only rub off on most of the users who will just see photography as more disposable 'content'. God... this makes me sound very bitter. I'm not bitter I just fucking hate Instagram and its parent company. I'd like to pull it out at the plug and it will all be gone in a bloodless pop.
"When it all began with IG," is not ancient history. Perhaps the digital natives feel there was no active visual presence before it emerged as a viable professional networking channel. Prior to that, we immersed ourselves in reading, researching, experimentation. Yes, a lot of it insular. But didn't that expand the collective consciousness? So, yes, now social media is ubiquitous. And??? It's circular perpetuity. And, yet, we are experiencing variations on a theme.