Instagram is becoming a one-stop shop for all your social media, shopping, and love needs. And that is extremely bad.
As of recently, everyone can share links in the Instagram app. Here, of course, you can go shopping in online stores created by influencers. With the help of Meta (Facebook), Instagram is well on its way to becoming a great app—basically, one app where you can do practically anything. Which in the world of apps has never been the best or what users want. So a digital ecosystem that is itself a place where you can go shopping, order a car, and text your friends and schedule a doctor's appointment. You no longer need to have any other applications on your phone. Instagram is enough!
There are many good reasons why users might be attracted to such an awesome app. It's convenient, everything is in one place, and the user experience is simple because you don't have to learn how to navigate multiple different platforms. But!
But as Instagram adds more and more tools, it becomes less and less useful – less transparent and less user-friendly. Scrolling through Instagram hoping to find a post from someone you actually know is like looking for a designer shirt in your size during the summer sale. Practically impossible. That's because the platform is loaded with shopping ads and sponsored posts designed to turn Instagram into an e-commerce site on top of the existing social network platform. And when you're not inundated with products for sale, the recommended posts fill your feed with what appears to be a sad attempt at inspiration from the social network “Pinterest”.
Absolutely too much stimulation in one place!
Have you noticed that you have less likes, views...
Have you noticed lately that you are not seeing posts from your friends?! Or that there are far fewer of these posts? The reason lies in the recently changed algorithm, which favors large professional profiles. I influence the teams and their "entertainment program". That is, it shows those "clowns" of Instagram who professionally entertain people. This is also why we noticed that large profiles gain exponentially in terms of engagement with users, while medium and smaller profiles lose. The reason is that the Instagram platform has calculated which users manage to keep their followers the most or the longest. Of course, these are the biggest ones. With engaging content. And since time = money, it makes perfect sense!
Too much
Posting to your network has become secondary. Shopping is more attractive than networking. The “Reels” feature is a poor copy of TikTok. The messaging system is just not good. Instagram turns out to be a place for everyone that looks a lot like a place for nothing.
Monopoly always breaks and degrades the application
A lack of competition within the app ecosystem can make platforms have less desire to actually be good. Usually, when you don't like an app, you can leave it or switch to another app. The problem arises when the application has a monopoly. When Facebook became "bad", users left it and replaced it with Snapchat and Instagram. As Instagram became less fun for some users, they left the app and are now TikTok users. But wherever you go when you want to escape the app, you have a problem. You are leaving an application that is necessary for everything online. This is also why Facebook has a huge number of dead users who are only on the platform because of Messenger or some other functionality. For example, logging into other applications with Facebook login.
One app for all
This is an extreme example of the “WeChat” applications. There are currently 2 million mini-apps available on WeChat. For comparison, I think Apple's app store has about 3 million apps. So you have two-thirds of that available in just one app.
WeChat is based in China, which has a political ecosystem that makes it easy for the super app to thrive. The opposite is true in the US, where there are some regulations that ensure a free market and competition and limit monopolies.
But trusting our entire digital lives to one company might not be a smart idea – for our mental health, for our privacy.
You can imagine losing your Facebook account or having it blocked. And that your entire life on social networks is tied to it. Maybe even a company. Horror stories are circulating on social media of individuals losing their accounts or being blocked for sharing pictures of art or prize-winning photos from global competitions on Facebook. The algorithm that checks the posts determined the post to be harmful and restricted or even deleted such accounts.
Slovenian companies also have similar stories, when certain posts on social networks made normal business operations of the company completely impossible. Similar stories are also happening in Slovenian media companies.
Jesse Lehrich, founder of the nonprofit organization Accountable Tech, is thus engaged in social media reform in an effort to promote a healthier democracy online.
We think super apps in general are a bit worrisome, because the point of super apps is that they are for-profit companies trying to convince users to never leave their ecosystem.
