I'm not a daily active user of either service but what I've noticed is how Instagram has started injecting way more "suggested" content into my feed than it used to, really making it similar to TikTok's feed.
I'd say Instagram's algorithm is a few steps behind TikTok when it comes to really nailing what kind of things I want to watch, but Instagram has the added advantage of being somewhere I keep track of friends and family, so I get a much more "personal" feed of people I'm close to.
Both are time vacuums if I'm not careful though. If I have either app on my phone, I routinely fall into the trap of the infinite scroll. Instagram has definitely done a better job of keeping me scrolling longer than it used to. Best (for me) to just keep them off my devices and check in every so often when I want to catch up a bit.
YouTube's little "shorts" feed on the other hand though, that is the wild west, never know what you're gonna be shown.
For anyone looking to spend less time on social media, I suggest using Instagram exclusively on desktop, because it's the same content but you can block ads and the interface isn't as addictive.
Yeah, but the annoying thing is that instagram now is focusing almost exclusively on content from people out of my network other than the friends I want to keep connected to. It would be good if they kept the exploration part exclusively on reels.
I don't even use the feed anymore because of so much external garbage it tries to throw at me.
Or, TikTok has been banned in India since 2020, and all the chhapri/pullingo content moved to IG and YT Shorts as a result
India's been Instagram's (and Meta in general) largest market for years now and 75% of Indians on the Internet use IG [0], and every month an additional million users in India seem to join based on MAU stats.
Exactly. I'm surprised that tiktok has been able to maintain its top spot for so long.
The biggest headscratcher is why india didn't ban facebook, instagram, youtube, etc along with tiktok. My hope was india would build up their own tech giants. Instead india just handed their social media environment to zuckerburg. What's the long term plan there? Give zuckerburg's properties ( facebook, instagram, whatsapp, etc ) monopoly over india? Are there any competent leaders in india? I simply don't get it.
> why india didn't ban facebook, instagram, youtube, etc
Has India almost went to war with the US in the last 5 years? No.
Has India almost went to war with China in the last 5 years? Yes.
That's why.
Before 2020, Chinese firms were trying to expand into India as their ideal target market. In retaliation for Galwan, they got kicked out.
> would build up their own tech giants
Why?
How many global software giants can you name from Israel, Japan, or South Korea (let alone the entire EU)?
The biggest reason that countries like Israel were able to rapidly develop was because of the soft power of being so integrated in the American tech industry.
IP driven industries like ICT, Pharmaecuticals, Semiconductors, and Finance represent 33% of Indian exports [0] but 10% of China's [1], and India's entire R&D capacity was built by western private sector companies like IBM, GE, TI, Intel, Nvidia, Apple, etc.
Kicking them out is economic and research suicide for India.
> I'm surprised that tiktok has been able to maintain its top spot for so long
Because every other country uses it because it's so popular.
Political momentum keeps building for banning it in the USA as well. It's driven by both Chinese (too much control) and Israeli (not enough control) propaganda concerns.
Basically Instagram Reels algorithm started to get very good, they found the magic algorithm and it's so much easier to click the Reels button than switch to the TikTok app. Plus, everyone has their friends on Instagram so why switch to another app?
That's my theory anyway. I remember when Instagram Reels was just awful and all the suggestions sucked, now it's actually good.
Surprising outcome, but very similar to what happened with Snapchat. Everyone used Snapchat and suddenly Instagram added Stories and over time people just used Instagram again when Instagram polished Stories enough.
Hmm, I guess Meta is unstoppable in the social media space.
How are these numbers calculated? Are these new downloads by first time users? Do people switching phones and downloading the app to a new device tallied in these counts? Should that really count? Sure it was downloaded again, but that's not an extra pair of eyeballs. It the same pair of eyeballs on a different device.
The active user seems like the metric that would matter vs downloads.
Those numbers are available but they’re self-reported. If you’re the type to distrust meta or byte dances self reported numbers it’s good to get a third party proxy number
I think anyone talking about TikTok's content is doing themselves a disservice, because it fails to understand that the content is heavily curated by the algorithm.
I tried installing TikTok on a blank developer phone, and the content was vastly different from what I was used to. Absolutely appalling content, the worst that humanity has to offer.
But my own feed is nothing but serious and mature content.
The question is rather how those algorithms can have a negative influence on people's perception of reality.
Who decides what is bad content? Sociologists? Should we suppress it, to save democracy? Or does that kind of censorship lead to fascism?
I haven't used TikTok in 3-ish years now but I always found that funny. "All I see are underage girls dancing", you're outing yourself... Skip a few of those videos or long-click to say you're not interested and your feed will change. When I was on TikTok I saw a few curated witty/humor accounts, accounts related to a few TV shows I liked, and some news that I cared about.
> I tried installing TikTok on a blank developer phone, and the content was vastly different from what I was used to. Absolutely appalling content, the worst that humanity has to offer
I've had similar experiences with new TikTok installs. One thing I've noticed is that I get lower quality content with new installs using mobile network shared IP addresses, while better content with residential IP addresses.
They will also not show you certain content if you register it in an untraceable manner, e.g. they detect you run inside a sandbox with a non-american phone number they will just outright now show you certain channels, if you go to these channels they will show up as banned, but if you were to open that same channel in some kind of incognito web browser they will show up.
Beware: Instagram and TikTok and all of Facebook's apps store "eternal cookies" on your iPhone via the iOS "Keychain", separate from browser cookies.
Those cookies persist even after you delete the app, even if you completely disable and sign out of iCloud, and even after you restore your iCloud back on another iPhone/iPad.
There is no way to see or delete that data, except by using those apps, if they offer you an option to delete it, and so there's no way to be sure if that's all the data they store.
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I'd say Instagram's algorithm is a few steps behind TikTok when it comes to really nailing what kind of things I want to watch, but Instagram has the added advantage of being somewhere I keep track of friends and family, so I get a much more "personal" feed of people I'm close to.
Both are time vacuums if I'm not careful though. If I have either app on my phone, I routinely fall into the trap of the infinite scroll. Instagram has definitely done a better job of keeping me scrolling longer than it used to. Best (for me) to just keep them off my devices and check in every so often when I want to catch up a bit.
YouTube's little "shorts" feed on the other hand though, that is the wild west, never know what you're gonna be shown.
India's been Instagram's (and Meta in general) largest market for years now and 75% of Indians on the Internet use IG [0], and every month an additional million users in India seem to join based on MAU stats.
[0] - https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/instagram-users-by-country
Chhapri is now used to represent the Hindi subculture similar to Pullingo, same way Punjabi and Haryanvi speakers use "Jatt" now.
It's a cool example of dialectic change due to slang.
Edit: though now that I think about it, someone like Elvish Yadav wouldn't own up to being Chhapri but his Pullingo equivalent would
Exactly. I'm surprised that tiktok has been able to maintain its top spot for so long.
The biggest headscratcher is why india didn't ban facebook, instagram, youtube, etc along with tiktok. My hope was india would build up their own tech giants. Instead india just handed their social media environment to zuckerburg. What's the long term plan there? Give zuckerburg's properties ( facebook, instagram, whatsapp, etc ) monopoly over india? Are there any competent leaders in india? I simply don't get it.
Has India almost went to war with the US in the last 5 years? No.
Has India almost went to war with China in the last 5 years? Yes.
That's why.
Before 2020, Chinese firms were trying to expand into India as their ideal target market. In retaliation for Galwan, they got kicked out.
> would build up their own tech giants
Why?
How many global software giants can you name from Israel, Japan, or South Korea (let alone the entire EU)?
The biggest reason that countries like Israel were able to rapidly develop was because of the soft power of being so integrated in the American tech industry.
IP driven industries like ICT, Pharmaecuticals, Semiconductors, and Finance represent 33% of Indian exports [0] but 10% of China's [1], and India's entire R&D capacity was built by western private sector companies like IBM, GE, TI, Intel, Nvidia, Apple, etc.
Kicking them out is economic and research suicide for India.
> I'm surprised that tiktok has been able to maintain its top spot for so long
Because every other country uses it because it's so popular.
[Is it just me or has HN gotten dumber recently?]
[0] - https://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/countries/104/export-basket
[1] - https://atlas.cid.harvard.edu/countries/43/export-basket
That's my theory anyway. I remember when Instagram Reels was just awful and all the suggestions sucked, now it's actually good.
Surprising outcome, but very similar to what happened with Snapchat. Everyone used Snapchat and suddenly Instagram added Stories and over time people just used Instagram again when Instagram polished Stories enough.
Hmm, I guess Meta is unstoppable in the social media space.
Many countries ban them because of that relationship and this hindered their ability to grow before Meta could go after them.
Deleted Comment
Which itself was a copycat of Vine.
The active user seems like the metric that would matter vs downloads.
I tried installing TikTok on a blank developer phone, and the content was vastly different from what I was used to. Absolutely appalling content, the worst that humanity has to offer.
But my own feed is nothing but serious and mature content.
The question is rather how those algorithms can have a negative influence on people's perception of reality.
Who decides what is bad content? Sociologists? Should we suppress it, to save democracy? Or does that kind of censorship lead to fascism?
I've had similar experiences with new TikTok installs. One thing I've noticed is that I get lower quality content with new installs using mobile network shared IP addresses, while better content with residential IP addresses.
Those cookies persist even after you delete the app, even if you completely disable and sign out of iCloud, and even after you restore your iCloud back on another iPhone/iPad.
There is no way to see or delete that data, except by using those apps, if they offer you an option to delete it, and so there's no way to be sure if that's all the data they store.
tiktok shows my videos to ~500 people instantly, then stops. instagram shows it to ~10 then stops.
presumably both are measuring view to like ratio or something. tiktok is 2%, ig is 0%. i assume that’s too low and why they stop showing it.