Comments on: All Your Apps Are Welded Boxes

By: Tim Owens

Tim Owens — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 18:13:08 +0000

“Even with your 20 share options, it is the ones they give you.”

Yeah, but one of those options is “Copy Link”. I don’t know how much more granular they could get. :) Tell me again about my iPhone! *bats lashes*

By: Alan

Alan — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 12:32:18 +0000

Timmmmyboy, “Tell me again about my apps….”

Yeah, I get it. I dont want/expect my iAppliance to be the same as the web. I used the same argument about open devices before so it’s fair to have it pushed back at me.

Even with your 20 share options, it is the ones they give you. I just have a hard time with the fact that my appliance knows the URL for media it displays but keeps that info from me.

You dog with your fancy 4S!!!!!

By: Tim Owens

Tim Owens — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 11:48:05 +0000

Let’s remember what Instagram is to begin with, a service that only works on the Iphone and iPod Touch (and I suppose if you wanted to look a bit like a tool you could use it on an iPad). No web interface at all, no application that anyone without an iOS device can use. It’s a community that has been walled from the start. Yes, the pictures have a site they live on and in the past year they opened up the API a bit so other services could get to those images, but their intent has been clear from the start. But let’s not lump all mobile apps in the same boat. Reading this post on Reeder I had the option of sending it to one of over 20 different services. Not quite the “welded box” you describe.

Comparisons between native apps and the “open” web are rarely helpful when talking about mobile devices. The ecosystem is different. Both have their place. Users prefer native apps for obvious reasons of performance and functionality. HTML5 will not fix this (maybe HTML 6 or 7, but I doubt it). I’m glad that Apple put a ton of effort into making Mobile Safari as standards-compliant as possible. It’s bar-none the best web browser on a mobile device (coming from someone who struggled with Android for 2 years before finally getting a 4S). But they tried the “web apps are great and the future” bit and no one bought it. I guess native apps are “closed” in the sense my microwave or refrigerator is “closed” but that’s ok with me. I don’t need to view the source of my appliances, same goes for my phone.

By: Jen

Jen — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 20:51:26 +0000

I go back and forth on it. Right now I like it, but I’m a fan of ephemera. To me, it reminds me of school desk drawings. I remember the thrill of sliding into my school desk to see someone had left a drawing, or a message. I’d add a comment, or a drawing, knowing the next person could erase it. I liked trying to imagine the reaction of the next person to see my stolen moment, when I ought to have been listening in class. Often times I check into instagram when I should be paying attention in a meeting, or doing something more grown-up. I even like the “like” button. To me, it just lets me know someone saw something I did. My sharing was part of someone else’s moment. I don’t need to own it, or preserve it. I could always change my mind, though.

By: Graham Hibbert

Graham Hibbert — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 19:07:52 +0000

I know what you mean though, it would be very nice to share things a lot easier to a wider audience. Myself, I always send everything to Filckr as well, and I use those urls rather than the Instagram ones. If there wasn’t a way of sending images to Flickr as well as internally then I doubt I would have used it for so long.

(Thanks re. those train pictures of mine. I always worry that I’m boring the pants off everyone with them ;) )

By: D'Arcy Norman

D'Arcy Norman — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 16:30:14 +0000

It’s possible to host your own ephemeral media, and you get to control links, image sizes, metadata, comments, etc… The silos are attractive because they’re so fracking easy, but with just a little additional effort (surprisingly little, in many ways) you can run your own stuff without relying on the design/marketing whims of anyone else.

By: Andrew Forgrave

Andrew Forgrave — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 15:18:50 +0000

“Packed like lemmings into shiny metal boxes …”
from “Synchronicity II” (1983), The Police

Yeah, an interesting dilemma. I recall we had had a brief conversation about our use of Instragram when we visited back in August. Graham’s descriptors “quick” and “easy” do closely parallel my use of it.

I also agree with Graham’s use of the word “throwaway,” although I do wish Instagram would do something to address that. It would be nice to browse a given user’s photos via the web, in galleries, as provided by sites like Flickr. While there are overlaps in folks I follow on Flickr and Instagram, the communities are different. But it would be useful to have full web access, embedding, etc.

I do, at times, choose to go with an Instagram of a subject, rather than use my DSLR. Maybe I only have my phone and not my camera (rare). But more likely, I think I like the built-in filters within Instagram that allow one to emphasize a mood that might be present at the instant that the photo is taken — something that can be lost if you have to wait to get back to a computer to process?

So yeah, that, and the community.

By: Alan Levine aka CogDog

Alan Levine aka CogDog — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 13:06:42 +0000

I get that the simplicity is a key to Instagram and in my talks about photography as a “lens” into informal learning, I use this very notion cited at
http://thenextweb.com/location/2010/12/30/more-on-instagram-or-why-facebook-hasn%E2%80%99t-won-everything/

Yet I do not see this changing at all by adding a simple “Copy URL” button where the new “Tweet” one is.

I get the fun, and likely my self prohibition wont last (I enjoy your train pics BTW), but to me there is a larger issue to ponder lurking below the glow of fun apps. They are boxes and we are putting ourselves happily inside them.

By: Graham Hibbert

Graham Hibbert — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 08:34:40 +0000

In a way though, this behaviour is partly what has made Instagram so fun and popular. It’s primarily a photo app where the onus is on quick and easy, and disposable, rather than a fully-formed photo sharing website.

The sharing part of it is something that’s emerged as a result of its popularity, so it makes sense to me that it’s an as-yet crude aspect.

I must admit that it did seem odd to not be able to look through my stuff on the web, but I think they would argue that that’s what the app is for. It’s a bit of a walled garden, but the only way to really see what’s going on inside is to take part, and that’s part of the fun.

By: Cheryl Colan

Cheryl Colan — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 06:08:55 +0000

I noticed the first few times I saw Instagram links via twitter and hence never used Instagram. Thanks for blogging it. I figured I was fighting a lost cause, just like my dislike of Facebook.