Instagram Tests Recommendations Reset for Fresh Start

[scorpio vega]

TikTok has this already, was a joy to use after the election 😂

TikTok is slightly worse in a different way. It’s aggressive as heck. I looked at one trump video and suddenly I have right wing racist rhetoric videos constantly lmao. I was like dang.

It’s like you view one topic once and that’s 98 percent all of what they will show you.

 

[Dr McKay]

I had to choose “Not Interested” for some accounts. I’ve been wishing for something like this.

I tried that for weeks and weeks to no avail. Instagram seemed determined to make at least 50% of my recommendations be thirst traps despite only interacting with funny cat videos and tech videos. In the end I got so frustrated I deleted my instagram.

 

[Apple Knowledge Navigator]

This is as much of an admission that their ‘tools’ don’t work to begin with.

 

[Skyscraperfan]

That algorithm is flawed, because it does not register blocking accounts as a negative signal. Instead the opposite happens. In order to block an account, you have to visit the profile. Instagram than sees that as a positive signal and shows you more posts from similar accounts.

So imagine you are annoyed by stuff about Taylor Swift. So you block every Taylor Swift fan page that is recommended to you. As a result, Instagram will show you more stuff about Taylor Swift than before, because you clicked on all those profiles for blocking them.

Why did nobody at Instagram understand that blocking an account means "I want to the less of this!"?

 

[cdrider]

I use Instagram once or twice a week and have no idea what Explore, Reels, and Feed recommendations are. There is no onboarding experience or tutorial at all.

 

[wanha]

How about no recommendations, just posts from people you follow 🤷‍♂️.
Tired of the nonstop ads (recommendations) and not seeing people I follow.

My guess is that Meta has studied this extensively and concluded that users spend more time on the platform and have more engagement when you give them an algorithmic feed full of clickbait, outrage, and whacky cat videos than by letting them just get posts from people they follow.

 

[wanha]

This "reset" feature feels like the final obstacle to stop someone from leaving their platform

"Hey dear user, instead of leaving, why don't you just stay and let us reset your feed?"

 

[Cervisia]

Would be nice. Their algorithm is so advanced that when I open a profile for the sole purpose of blocking it, it registers as interest, and starts spamming similar stuff.

 

[ah123]

I think I need this feature for X/Twitter. Every time I go there I seem to get bombarded with weird right-wing/racist/anti-immigration stuff that I'm pretty sure I've never been into.

I think that's about all that's left on the platform, tbf

 

[kahkityoong]

Seriously. Hard to imagine people still wanting to spend their time on these platforms.

I’ll bet you find it hard to imagine lots of things

 

[InTeCredo]

I would love to be able to nuke all the likes or comments I have left after a set period as well. Doing it one by one is time consuming and doesn't even work, because it eventually just gives you errors about not being able to delete

I went on a purge spell one day, reducing the long list of followings and such. After a certain number of "unfollow" done, I got a bizarre warning that my heavy activity violated the terms and led to the activity suspension for three days. I could access my account and browse through the posts, stories, and reels, but I couldn't post, comment, follow or unfollow, and like.

Another thing that peeved me the most was my plain vanilla comments kept getting tagged as spam or violation instantly after I posted them. No recourse for me to appeal the stoooopid decisions.

The most annoying thing was those ads that kept coming up so often even though I clicked on "irrelevant" or "I see too many similar ads." Sometimes, they would go away for a month or so then come back with venegeance.

 

[Seanm87]

Seriously. Hard to imagine people still wanting to spend their time on these platforms.

I find people on this website far more annoying than anything on instagram.

 

[apples_arrogance]

I would love to be able to nuke all the likes or comments I have left after a set period as well. Doing it one by one is time consuming and doesn't even work, because it eventually just gives you errors about not being able to delete

Various Fediverse services do this for you already plus you don't see ads.

 

[contacos]

Various Fediverse services do this for you already plus you don't see ads.

What's a Fediverse

 

[apples_arrogance]

What's a Fediverse

Not sure if joking or not, but there is an extensive wikipedia page when you search for the term.

 

[contacos]

Not sure if joking or not, but there is an extensive wikipedia page when you search for the term.

Just googled it but it seems to be unrelated to Instagram

 

[nostradumbass]

Waiting for Zucks to take action against sex bots and phishing scams

(unless he and the crypto bros indirectly profit from victims forced to put liquidity into this scam dark economy)

 

[CarpalMac]

Are traditional websites and message boards, which I’ve been visiting since the 1990’s, equivalent to you? I’ve been reading Macrumors since 2006 for news and, early on, a lot of learning and conversations here on the forums. There’s no algorithm here and nothing to constantly refresh.

That being said, I am indeed slowly moving away from internet usage as much as possible, leaving it for a few sites to check in with on occasion, email, and necessary life tasks. Social media was the first to go some time ago.

Could not agree more. Genuinely.

I have a moderator, admin, owner, co-owner and of course, regular forum user for over 20 years, chatting with like minded people about things. Getting support and providing it too, when needed or able to. My excitement was when new posts and threads were started about new and fun topics!

The overall world has however changed, and in my opinion, not for the better, despite the chance to do so.

So many automobile forums I used to use are now desolate wastelands, overtaken by people using facebook and youtube. They used to be a trememndous source of knowledge and helpful articles. Now when searching I just see whatever Google and the like think I should see. Between this and the IOT I personally think we are on a downward spiral.

Somehow Macrumors has bucked this trend, but it is in a minority.

Soon there will be "AI" type content driven by previous "AI" content, imagine the quality of that....