I’ve been getting into automotive photography, been doing it for my own interests for years, but as of late, I’ve been wanting to grow out of it, go it a little more “pro-hobbiest” level and be able to share publicly.
I’ve tried posting on other social medias like 500px or pixelfed, but no one knows what these are, and people quickly lose interest when I don’t give them a Instagram handle or something familiar, especially as where I live everything is IG, so as it stands, the only way I share is in person, face to face and hope people are happy for me to text/email them links to a proton drive, and that goes about as smoothly as you’d imagine, so with that in mind, I’d like to try and see if there is a way I can run a IG account with privacy in mind.
I have a old LG G8s Thinq that I was considering putting another OS on and use only with either home internet or hotspot off of my main phone, use the LG only for Instagram and having all my images stripped of metadata before posting, but wondering what other tips people have in mind if they had to do this themselves. I understand that with anything Meta, true privacy is pretty much impossible, so a good enough solution is well, good enough.
Much appreciated!
not Instagram but
a) I was medium large on Twitter in its heyday (way before Musk) - 10k followers, average of 100 likes per tweet, big ones doing 100k
b) my wife’s friend (and mine) is an IG fashion lady who has 100k followers.
Generally, to make it successful, you post all day every day exactly one type of content. Easy for me as I wrote jokes and sketches, which is what I like doing - but it does become a job.
For the objective of posting photos to an Instagram account while preserving as much privacy as possible, your approach of a separate machine and uploading using its web browser should be sufficient. That said, Instagram for web could also be sandboxed using a private browsing tab on your existing desktop. Certainly, avoiding an installed app – such as the mobile app – will prevent the most obtuse forms of espionage/tracking.
That said, your titular question was about how to maintain an Instagram account, not just post images. And I would say that as a social media platform, this would include engagement with other accounts and with comments. For that objective, having a separate machine is more unwieldy. But even using a private browsing tab on your existing machine is still subject to the limits that Instagram intentionally imposes on their desktop app: they save all the crucial value-add features for the mobile app, where their privacy invasion is greatest.
To use Instagram in the least obtuse manner means to play the game by their rules, which isn’t really compatible with privacy preservation. To that end, if you did want a full Instagram experience, I would suggest getting a separate, cheap mobile phone (aka a “YOLO phone”) to dedicate to this task. If IG doesn’t need a mobile number, then you won’t even need a working SIM account. Then load your intended images using USB file transfer, and use an app like Imagepipe (available on F-Droid) to strip image metadata.
Hey, Sorry I never got back to this comment, but just wanting to reply to say thanks! I never had really anything to add to this or ask about, hence I didn’t really, but over the week, I kept coming back to this comment as essentially a reference guide, and everything you mentioned here was very well thought out and has made everything go much more smoothly then I could have imagined, only hitch I am having right now is a “Could not name image” error when posting from the phone, but just bypassing it now by posting from a VM, But anyway, something to figure out over time. Again, just wanting to say thanks! You’ve been a massive help, and you’re a total legend! Much appreciated
Can you manage an Instagram account via browser or must it be done via app?
I would recommend managing it by both browser and via an app - If not on your phone, a tablet or some laptops will do (i think)
- browser makes it possible to post images of varying size (rectangular alongside square ones) alternatively you can add margins onto photos before posting them, so they’re all the same proportion.
- I can’t remember if posting on browser or on app gives better quality. Probably app is better but most people don’t want the faff of transferring photos from their camera, to their PC (for editing), to their phone (for posting).
- using the app on a portable device is the only way to post stories + reels and stories + reels are very good for promoting your page and distributing the content.
TL;DR Instagram is rigged for people with cutting edge high functioning smartphones who post Instagram reels&stories. If you only want to post images you can use the browser but your page won’t attract as many people.
This is really helpful and good knowledge to have, appreciate it! I don’t plan on reels or stories but good to know what to do if I do decide, as for now just a place to post too and to share with people face to face when they ask where they can find me online. I have had many interactions with people eager to follow me online only to then weird them out because i have no FB/IG/Tiktok/Fitter, then never hear or see them again, so it is mainly for that reason.
You wont reach anyone on Instagram with pictures alone - you need to post videos.
I have a carefully curated landscape photography feed on Instagram for which I’m quite proud of. I’ve been managing that page for closer to 15 years. I get more likes on my posts on my few year old Pixelfed profile.
I still have Instagram as it’s a place I can point most people to but nobody is going to independently find me there.
If you’re in an urban kinda area, have you considered going to car meets and exchanging Instagram @s ?
Might be helpful to get your insta out there by going where the people already are.Most if not all my local car meets all advertise their next meet up spot on insta either plainly or by code name. I didn’t even post car pics, but organizers here (hawaii :) will follow anyone back, especially if they post car stuff.
This is exactly the plan. I go to a lot of meets, underground and public eye, so the plan is just to exchange at these events/meets. Currently there is just knowledge of people based on common of appearance and 1 person I have exchanged numbers with, but I have multiple people asking every meet for a IG or that alike asking to see what I shoot, and this is the sole reason of asking the question. I’d love to satisfy these people, be able to give them a page, a “portfolio” they are familiar with, but also somehow still keep my privacy with the systems I use
I guess I’d start by unblocking instagram in my hosts file lol
DAE le meta bad???
this but unironically
Can new account really grow?
Not without content or SEO services and such.
I have started running an Instagram account for a niche thing that after the heat death of Twitter shifted its attention to Insta. I was one of those insufferable Facebook leavers in the mid teens and had deleted my own FB and Insta accounts. So I created a new one. But I’ve never accessed it without a VPN. To get all the functions I’m running the app on an old phone under permanent, dead man switch VPN connection. And crucially it’s a phone that never had Insta installed on it before when I was using it under my main driver account.
And I’m using it because the interaction is there. In the decade I wasn’t on Insta it has turned to shit. And it’s no longer the app to share pictures. If you want people who appreciate just good pictures, maybe try Pixelfed instead.
Pixelfed is nice, but there is very little traction there, but as my aim isn’t to gain global followers or gain any fame, I am not fussed with posting somewhere that would garner that attention, instead a more portfolio like, easily shareable and understood amongst the masses media that could also be a way for someone to reach out if they wished. I plan on posting to both and promote the pixelfed on IG in the future if I go down that route too. Separate hardware for the 1 task of posting and occasional interaction seems to be the way, I am hesitant on a VPN though as long in the past I tried making and running an account while only on a VPN, and within minutes the account got shut down due to “suspicious activity”, which required a pic of me and government ID to unlock the account, and I haven’t touched meta since, with or without VPN.
I wouldn’t, honestly.
I wish it was as easy as that, but not much in terms of an alternate when it comes to my location and the community of people I’d be doing shoots with. Very little in terms of publicly accepted social medias outside of IG, FB, Tiktok and Xitter, even reddit although is common, I still wouldn’t call it a household name here outside of major cities
I have gotten more interaction with pixelfed than with Instagram.
I have more followers in 1 year on pixelfed than 4 years on Instagram.
About 60% of my followers are only fans bots and the other 30% are people I know. The last 10% are organic followers who like my photos. I don’t do short form videos so I don’t have any lasting engagement.
I have advertised my pixelfed I think twice on the fediverse. But not any more than that.
If you want to have the community, I’ve heard that flickr is probably the best. Many people use it and it’s photography focused.
Instagram is taken over by short form videos. If you’re not doing that or making really really good photos in unique areas, then you’ll max out at 2-3 hundred followers.
