Why People Hate Instagram

The other day the Hashtag "Why I Hate Instagram" was trending on Twitter and I thought I'd write a post about it cause there are SO many things to say about that and I thought it'd be entertaining for those of you out there using the app.

First of all, I'd like to talk about the Misunderstandings, which lead to the Misuses:

The Format - The square form, is a format, not a "cropping", it does NOT crop your photos, it is the intended format for it; meaning, they planned for you to compose your photos (before taking them, obviously) in that squared format. If you want a 35mm photo, there are tons of other apps you can use and they also have cool filters. Also, a ton of people don't know how to properly use this format, and end up cropping (manually) their photos in a way they're not even understandable. If you look at your photo and realize that anyone else but you can make up what it is, spare us all and don't post it, leave abstract art for real canvases.

If you don't see this symbol anywhere, that means you're NOT cropping.

The Selfies - Some people have the wrong impression that Instagram is some kind of 365-selfies project and ALL you see in their photos are selfies: in the bathroom, in the room, in the kitchen, again in the bathroom, etc. Yes, a selfie here and there never hurt anyone, however, an only selfies album? Nobody is THAT interesting.

Really?

The Filters - Instagram has cool filters, yes, and sometimes it is okay not to use any of them as long as the purpose of its (Instagram's) use is to use the (squared) format. It is not an app intended for you to post pictures taken with a real camera and "pimp it" out with its filters and "crop" it.

The Zoom - Again, this has to do with the format. In a medium format (real) camera you will not be able to zoom in or out as the square format is what distinguishes this type of format. So if you wanna zoom in/out, again, use another app.

The Hashtags - This has gone crazy now, everyone is using hashtags pretty much even when they're talking! Hashtags are metadata tags ONLY intended to be used where they can work as such, this means: Twitter, Tumbler, Tout, Identi.ca, Google+ and, of course, Instagram. This means, they have NO use on email messages, Blog Posts and much less (and most importantly for you to remember!), on Facebook, so please, spare us all and if you're not posting them on any of the "valid" places, don't use a hashtag.
Another thing about hashtags is how crazy people can go over them by trying to get a million likes using a TON of them, not only is it annoying but most of them really make no sense. So, please, don't go around doing this:

Please, don't.

The Oversharing - Some people would post 10+ photos in one day and, unless you're taking a trip in an awesome place that begs to be shared with the world, we don't need to see that many photos, especially if only 1 out of those 10 is half good.

Then, what people really don't like about it, but shouldn't really matter. The
Dislikes:

The Food Shots - The main reason why everyone hates the Food shots is because people don't really know how to do it or they simply overdo it and take photos of every single thing they eat! If you wanna do a food shot, that's fine, we all love them and it doesn't really have to be only about exotic food or dishes served in a fancy way, you can also shoot "regular" food, however, you need to be careful and try to make a good -or at least worthy- shot, with decent lighting and a decent composition to make it look attractive and make people wanna have that -which is the main objective of Food Photography.

Honestly, would you want to eat that? (You can't even tell what that is!)

The Verifications - People were complaining a lot that Instagram does not offer the verification sign like Twitter does and then they can't tell if it's the real celebrity or not. Well, most celebs will have their "official" Instagram (and social networking) accounts announced on their official websites, plus, this is an app with photos, you could (most of the times) tell really easily if it's the real celebrity posting or a fake is fooling you.

I think it's safe to say Kim K posted this herself.

The Pets - A lot of people were saying how much they hate people keep posting photos of their pets, well, I agree on this one. Why do we have to see a picture of your cat/dog in the very same position on the couch, kitchen, bed, bathroom, etc. Unless you put funny clothes on them or they can do a trick worthy of a photo capture, please, spare us all.

What's so cute about this cat?

The Watermarks - Unless you're a professional photographer and/or take AMAZING Instagram photos, there is really no need to put a watermark on them. Yes, I know we were all a bit hesitant when they changed their TOS (Terms of Service) and all but, come on, do you really think Instagram is gonna steal the terrible picture of your dinner with no proper/decent lighting and all grainy?...Exactly!

Who would want to steal this? Seriously!

The Concert Shots - We all dislike these ones; unless you were at the The Killer's concert in the rows nearby to the stage and were able to get a real nice shot of Brandon's beautiful face, NOBODY needs (nor wants) to see an all dark square with a white noise (aka the stage) in the center and caption reading "The Killers rocked". Total no-no.

WTF is this?!

And now, what people don't know how to do and, therefore, complain about it "not existing". The Unknown:

The Follows - Some peeps were complaining that they can't follow people, can't view their followers or who they're following- all via laptop. Well, via laptop (or any computer) you can actually follow people: when (i.e.) someone posts a photo and also posts it on Twitter, you click on that url and it will open a new window with the photo, giving you the option to follow that person (if not already following) on the top left, and it syncs with the app on your phone in real time. And, regarding your Followers and who you're Following, that indeed cannot be done via web, however, keep in mind this is an app intended for mobile devices, mainly.

The Photographers - I am putting this one under the Unknown because many of you may not know that yet and I'm sorry to be the one breaking this to you but...taking photos with your iPhone does not make you a photographer, well, technically speaking it does, but only in the sense of the mere expression "s/he's a photographer because s/he takes photographs"; however, that does not mean you have to put on your profile something like: "Student/Photographer, Barista/Photographer, or Dog Walker/Photographer", etc. You take photos, we get that, who doesn't these days? That does not make you a photographer, if anything, you're (more accurately speaking) a snapshot maker or, at the very least an Amateur Photographer, which is he who takes photographs for pleasure and to record an event, emotion, place, or person.

The Battery Life - People also complained a lot about the app using a lot of the phone battery, well, newsflash, there's something called "closing your apps" and it, surprisingly, allows you to save your device battery when you're not actually using an app. Trust me, Instagram does not need to be running in the back 24/7, you can feel free to close it and open it only when you need to, you'll be saving a lot of battery that way.

What do YOU hate about Instagram?