--- title: "Instagram" id: "3686" type: "post" slug: "instagram" published_at: "2012-12-24T15:44:04+00:00" modified_at: "2022-06-23T03:10:41+00:00" url: "https://johnpoelstra.com/instagram/" markdown_url: "https://johnpoelstra.com/instagram.md" excerpt: "I’m not a current Instagram user though I have been following all the chatter on twitter. The part I find a little interesting (well summarized in the XKCD comic above) is when you are using a service provided by someone......" taxonomy_category: - "Productivity" --- [Skip to the content](#site-content) [John Poelstra](https://johnpoelstra.com) ### Bringing order to chaos and clarity to confusion - [One Conversation](https://johnpoelstra.com/) - [Podcast](https://johnpoelstra.com/category/podcast/) - [Coaching for Directors](https://johnpoelstra.com/coach/) - [About](https://johnpoelstra.com/about/) Toggle search field - [One Conversation](https://johnpoelstra.com/) - [Podcast](https://johnpoelstra.com/category/podcast/) - [Coaching for Directors](https://johnpoelstra.com/coach/) - [About](https://johnpoelstra.com/about/) # [Instagram](https://johnpoelstra.com/instagram/) [http://xkcd.com/1150/](http://xkcd.com/1150/) I’m not a current Instagram user though I have been following all the chatter on twitter. The part I find a little interesting (well summarized in the [XKCD comic](http://xkcd.com/1150/) above) is when you are using a service provided by someone else and they are bearing the cost of operating that service, they really can do whatever they want. You may not like or want that service and you may choose not to use it, but I don’t completely understand the outrage. [This opinion piece from CNN](http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/20/opinion/rushkoff-instagram-users/) sums it up, > What irks us, of course, is the sense that we’ve been betrayed. Instagram felt a little alternative, authentically bottom-up. It’s a tiny piece of software, and if they had figured out a way for us to store our photos locally or to pay a small charge for server space exceeding some amount (as Flickr does), it could have stayed a rather noncommercial affair. Moreover, Instagram’s community, perhaps rightly, feels as though it was responsible for its own formation. Even though this community formed around a piece of commercial software, the relationships within it are real and the result of a significant investment of time and energy and trust. Now that those relationships have turned out to be commodities, many people feel exposed and cheated. No longer the users, but the used. Sorry, but — in a word — tough. This is the way of the Internet: pay or, well, pay. Just as Facebook’s users must come to grips with the fact that they can longer reach all their friends with an update unless they pay for “promotion,” Instagram’s users must reconcile themselves to the fact that their photographic creations are now grist for some advertiser’s mill. I started using [Pinboard for site bookmarking](http://pinboard.in/) instead of Delicious. It feels really good to pay a nominal amount of money for a service that is useful, I consume, and that provides value. While there are no guarantees, I figure it has a better chance of lasting longer and not being hosed up or abandoned like Delicious (given it’s history). Pinboard feels less clunky than Delicious and is a breeze to use with the javascript bookmarks to save new content. My Pinboard page is at [https://pinboard.in/u:johnpoelstra](https://pinboard.in/u:johnpoelstra) [https://pinboard.in/u:johnpoelstra](https://pinboard.in/u:johnpoelstra) if you want to search my bookmarks or follow my feed as I add stuff. #### John Poelstra John Poelstra coaches directors in finance and software. Trained through the Co-Active Training Institute, he has coached for more than 10 years, with over 520 clients and 3,150 sessions, including people at well-known Fortune 100 companies. In over 30 years of professional experience, he spent 25 in technology and finance: software testing, project management and team leadership at Red Hat and Dell/EMC, and finance as a bank auditor at Wells Fargo and a CPA at Grant Thornton. He hosts The John Poelstra Show podcast and is based in Portland, Oregon. [Author archive](https://johnpoelstra.com/author/john-poelstra/) [Author website](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-john-poelstra-show/id1130635146) December 24, 2012 [Productivity](https://johnpoelstra.com/category/productivity/) [Previous post](https://johnpoelstra.com/shutdown/) [Next post](https://johnpoelstra.com/honest-marketing/) ### Leave a Reply [Cancel reply](/instagram/#respond) ### John Poelstra [https://johnpoelstra.com/?attachment_id=3756](https://johnpoelstra.com/?attachment_id=3756) ### Work With Me I coach directors in finance and software who want to prioritize, delegate, and lead with clarity. 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