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!
Just STOP using their service.
This situation isn’t getting any better. After this they will regularly up the price and take out features that you are used to and charged you extra.
They are still gathering and selling your information. Meaning you might not get ads on instagram but your digital fingerprint is still being used literally on every other website that FB works with.
Corporate social media is a toxic parasite that’s only going to enshittify more and more while people are willing frogs boiling themselves slowly.
Join mastodon, pixelfed and peertube. That’s the future of consumer rights and clawing away from billionaire ownership.
It absolutely is not. You are using enshitification incorrectly. This is the core business model of facebook since the very beginning. They don’t give a shit about people spending $13/mo. They absolutely do not want people to choose that option. This is literally about about a legal loophole they think they have found to get around GDPR and have people “opt-in” to the same kind of data collection their business is based on.
It’s linked to the same thing though. Investor pressure to produce a profit or sink. It’s the service getting worse. And Facebook wrote the book on enshittification- think 2006 Facebook.
Im already on mastodon and i use piped, but sadly I cant leave insta yet because i have very dear friends on there who i chat with, and they’d never switch to something else (… And meta knows this btw)
If he only follows them through Instagram it’s most likely a para-social relationship, and not a real friend at all.
I had to do the same thing. If they are dear friends then they shouldn’t have a problem getting a free app to chat with you. Otherwise sms is always an option.
Someone has to be the catalyst for change. Otherwise the corporate grip is only going to get stronger and soon enough all corporate social media will be subscription only.
Well someones gotta go first. Nah, I’m kidding and I get it. I tried it myself with Snapchat and Discord and it was a very slow and tedious process. But I got it done. Migrated to SMS for the people that refused to adopt a new platform and since SMS is …quite bad it does get easier to convince once you’re there. Feel somewhat guilty for bothering people but I sure don’t miss the old platforms. Good riddance.
If the only thing you do on instagram is chat. maybe try Beeper? It’s a matrix client with an instagram bridge. You still have to trust beeper but you can host your own matrix server and use their brigdes.
Instagram still gets your chat data but it won’t be scooping up anything else.
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.
“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.
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.
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
