Things That Instagram Need To Change

Delayed Deletion

So, there you are, all set to post. You've got your killer shot, you've filtered the hell out of it, you've chosen fifteen excellent and highly pertinent tags and finally, then you can hit share. But. Oh. Bollocking. Hell. You hate the picture. It looks wrong. Too dark. Not cool enough. And you want it gone. Like, now. Does Instagram allow you to end your misery promptly and efficiently? Does it balls. No. You've deleted, but Someone Up There In Silcone Valley wants to prolong your agony. They like you to suffer the embarrassment of thousands of people seeing an in-limbo-not-likeable image just sitting there, mockingly, for what seems like hours. How difficult would it be for them to make deletion instant? Not very, I'd wager.

Porn

It is everywhere on IG. Absolutely fucking everywhere. Under every tag, even the most seemingly innocuous. And I do not want to see it. At all. Ever. Please someone take it away FFS. I can't imagine what it's doing to children's little brains. (Hashtag: Won'tSomebodyThinkOfTheChildren). And does it ever piss me off when I go on, say, the Adidas Originals tag and I see my sneakers next to a pair of Russian boobs. I imagine there's some sort of hit squad at IG HQ deleting porn as fast as it appears, but, basically, they're just not doing it quick enough. #notsquadgoals

Blurred Lines

I've mentioned this before, and to a few gal-pals on IG as well, but it seriously grinds my gears. Essentially, you can have a perfectly sharp image that you've posted, only to then have it become catastrophically blurred. Sometimes after two minutes, sometimes after two hours, but eventually all images on Instagram seem to become hazy and rubbish. And I've got 16 million pixies in my camera! Why does this need to happen? I reckon it doesn't.

Hacked Off

Hacking seems to be happening increasingly on IG, particularly to 'big' accounts. Your usually once serene, minimalist fashion blogger all of a sudden starts randomly holding iPhone giveaway competitions, and often loads of followers seem to fall for it. Or they have a brand new whizz-bang emoji keyboard they want you to download. It must be awful for the girls trying to wrestle their accounts back from the hackers clutches. If that happened to me I wouldn't have a clue where to start. Again, please pretty please get on it IG.

What irritates you about Instagram company policy? Lemmie know x 

PS Check out my MNZ Robertas!! Not really (obvs), they're just the Mango dupes, but aren't they sick? I must stop buying granny shoes (but I can't). PPS Thank-you to Look magazine who put my granny-shoed feet on Page 24 of last week's issue. Seeing them there was a very weird experience fo' shure.

Jeans- Topshop//Jumper- Zara//Shoes- Mango

My Weird Week On Instagram

Despite having been on Instagram for nearly two years now, I still have no freaking clue how the place actually works. Whilst I've finally figured out to edit my captions (Yay! Fat Fingers Be Gone!), I still don't understand how hashtagless pictures ever get seen. Or why certain Dutch girls think it's okay to follow and unfollow you four times in as many months (babe, I've clocked you, srsly just piss off ). The struggle has been #long and #real to get any kind of momentum going for my lil' old account, but last week, outta nowhere things finally seemed to be starting to happen.

The Power Of The Pink Bag

First up, I posted a pic of my beloved Acne carrier bag. This thing seems to basically act as #gramnip for IGers. I'd like to say I don't know why- but it is an object of desire and it is a thing of beauty- so we don't need to really linger too long as to why peeps go cray for it. But 800 likes cray? It seemed insanely disproportionate to me, but the followers also came along with the likes- so I wasn't gonna argue.

Smug Face

And then the followers- shockingly- kept coming. Ain't gonna lie, on a regular IG day I'll maybe get 10 followers at best, and probably lose 5 along the way. I realise these numbers are embarrassingly impoverished and that even Danielle Bernstein's dog gets more love than that. Way more love. But strange things were afoot. I was getting 40, 50 even- gasp- 60 followers a day. So, although I'm an atheist I kept thanking God periodically just so he knew how grateful I was. This quite amazing deluge happened errryday for four whole days.

The Crash

And then reality bit back. I think it was a pic of some Converse that started my downward spiral- which is weird coz Chucks tend to do okay in my experience. It even got a 'good' amount of likes. But no, the haemorrhage had started and my stress returned to accompany it. Why had I gotten some momentum? And why had it fallen away again? Like I said, IG is utterly unfathomable to me. Even what happened next couldn't stem the flow.

Topshop Girl In A Topshop World

So, on Friday evening I threw on a snap of me sitting on the floor in a Fila sweatshirt and some frayed jeans. (I say threw- my "effortless" photo took two hours of blood sweat and tears). Coz I don't shoot outside anymore and coz my face is a bit like Quasimodo's on a good day this is how picture-taking now rolls for me: I have to spend large amounts of daylight hours sitting on my arse, with my camera balanced on a Nike box, running back into frame (once I've triggered the self-timer and dangled an object in front of the lens for it to focus on), trying desperately to keep my head out of shot whilst attempting to look thin, cool, relaxed and a bit like 'Oh me? Just sitting here casually on the floor again'. I was reticent to put the final 'masterpiece' on IG because, well, I basically feel like that about every pic I take for there. So I crossed myself (the more atheist I feel the more religious I act, go figure) about 18 times and waited for it to bomb. I normally log off once I've shared a piccie as I can't bear to see how unpopular I am, which I duly did. But for some reason I logged on again about 15 minutes later and saw that I had a tag. OMG- could it be ASOS? (About a year ago I got one single solitary like from them and it got me- wait for this- 300 followers). But no, it wasn't them. It was something that I don't think most bloggers ever even dare dream of- it was- drumroll- an RG from Topshop.

The Party Was Short, But Funny

At first I was like, WTF. Then I was like, "LIFE MADE!!!!!". I once read that a regram from ASOS gets you approximately 1000 followers, so I calculated that Topshop having 6 million followers (and ASOS having 3 million) should, in theory, have garnered me more than that. My maths is shit, but the hope was very real. Once again I logged off with a spring in my step and a sunny disposition so rare that my family were suspicious. I knew it though. Only me, with my impeccable Reverse Midas Touch could fuck this up. Who gets a shout-out to 6 million people and "only" gets 250 followers? (For that was my tally). This chica, that's who. I'd like to think that it was the Granny shoes what did it. Most of the girls commenting under my pic seemed to be utterly repulsed by them, and kept calling them 'cabin shoes', and doing Crying-Laughing Emojis. So I can only assume Toppers has a helluva lot of air hostesses following their account. But actually I don't mind a bit that those girls hated them, in fact, I quite enjoyed that aspect of the whole thing. And before you characterise me as some ungrateful ho' who needs to stop number-crunching and chill the fuck out and get things into perspective a bit more (hearin' you btw), I was actually beyond buzzed that someone at Toppers HQ liked what I'm doing. That is deffo more important than putting on shit-loads of followers. To the point that I'd actually like it carved on my gravestone. ("Here Lies Belle, She Was Once Regrammed By Topshop You Know"). But still it niggles. And so does the girl who posts the dullest cycle of "Quote/Food/Converse/Selfie/Quote/Food/Converse/Selfie" on her IG- in some kind of never-ending mouse-wheel nightmare, but has now got 11k. Or that the girl who posts once a week (if that) is the new owner of a Triangl (yes, I'm still going on about that). Or that Auld Muddy Face just breathes in and gets 5k likes per pic. It niggles like hell. And it ain't going away. I'll leave you with Gore Vidal. "Every time one of my friends succeeds, something inside me dies". Amen bro. Amen.

Shoes- Topshop//Jeans- Topshop//Jumper- Zara

InstaYear

Instagram Intagram, how I love thee, let me count the ways. Ditto, how I hate thee. Let me count those too. To be honest, to be brutal, and to be fair, I haven't actually been on IG for a whole year yet, so this is technically an 'InstaEightMonths'. Annnnd, even more technically and brutally, these are actually, *GASP* unpublished IGs. Ones that dint make the cut. Why didn't they? Various reasons really.

Let Me Take A Selfie (Not)

1. Posting selfies freaks me out. And it would probably freak out those who had to look at my face too. And as you can see, I'm not cool. I just look like a fucking geek.

Me & Flatlays We Got Issues

2. Flatlays sometimes don't fit in the freaking IG square do they? Why I don't I get an app thingy that resizes everything so they fit in? Coz...er...I've forgotten my password. I put £20 of credit on my iPad, then went and forgot everything. Gun Emoji. 

Fat Feet

3. Feet can look rubbish can't they? Look at my swollen duck foot there not sliding into an Adilette. Bleugh.

Sock It To Me

4. Socks are great. But somehow every picture I took this year con sock and slide, or con sock and sneak looked toats (this is how my sis spells totes and I'm a convert) dumb. Again, a severe case of me trying to be cool and massively failing. 

Apple Problems

5. iPhones and iPads take rubbish kwality piccies don't they? Like, shit. I mean, I dunno about a 6 or a 6s or whatever they're called, but all I can get on mine is blur. Unless the sunlight is double bright. Which is rare in this here Blightly of ours. So I've got into the very time-consuming habit of taking my IGs with my Nikon. You're right. Life is too short.

Lace

6. Broderie Bombs. I like Broderie Anglais. Scratch that, I freaking love it. But when I posted this pic of me propping up a wall wearing this darling lace top, nobody dug on it. Sadface. So I deleted. Taylor Swiftly.

Boat Race

7. Oh yeah. There's my face again. Let's move on. 

So there we have it, a slightly abbreviated (unseen) InstaYear. How's your year been on IG? 

Tell all :) xx