I was able to download all my data from Instagram before deactivating it. It was easier than I thought it would be. You can put in a request to download all your data from the Settings –> Privacy section. It might take awhile for Instagram to come back with a link to download your data. Mine didn't take that long as I didn't have that many posts. Total size for my data was around 220 MB.

Upon inspecting the data that I downloaded, it is amazing how much quality is lost from uploading photos and videos to Instagram. People just don't notice it on the phone because the screen is small. But, seriously some photos are pretty bad and pixelated. I was planning on uploading those same photos to Snap.as to post on this journal, but the quality is so low that I think I will just find the original photos and upload those instead.

I skipped the part where I notified friends following my public account. They'll live. And some of them are already following my private account so there's that. I can always send them an instant message if I need to reach out and vice versa.

#QuittingSocialMedia #Instagram

Update: I ended up creating a new Facebook account, here's why. My public Instagram account is still deactivated.

I have two Instagram accounts; a public one and a private one. I'm looking at deactivating my public Instagram account.

The plan is to replace that public Instagram account with this online journal. Instead of posting photos on that account, I will post the photos on here. I'm thinking of starting a new series called “Photo Log” which will basically feature photos, just like posting photos on Instagram. My first attempt at trying out that idea was this post.

I know Snap.as has a photo album feature. I might look into that as well in the future.

Why Am I Doing This?

I want to take back control of my data. I want to move it out of a social network and move it into a domain that I control. I want this site to be the place that you go to, if you want to look at photos that I've shared online.

Before I can deactivate my account though, I need to figure out the following steps:

• Download all the photos from my public Instagram account.
• Notify my friends who are following that account to either follow my private account, or better yet, just follow this online journal instead.
• Deactivate (or maybe even delete?) public Instagram account.

Now The Irony

Part of the reason I still have Instagram accounts is because there is content on there that is hard to find elsewhere online.

• For example I follow the #Mazdaspeed3 hashtag because Instagram seems to have the most photos of Mazdspeed3s. I follow that hashtag because seeing other people share photos of their Speed3s, helps me stay motivated to keep driving my car instead of buying a new one.
• Another hashtag I follow is #SoloBoardGaming because as you can guess, I have an interest in playing solo board games.
• There are also a number of cycling hashtags that I follow, because some of the most beautiful photos of bicycles I have only seen on Instagram.

All that to say, I might end up creating an Instagram account purely for curating a feed and viewing content. No posting of photos, just a way to view content. Ironic, yes I know, but I don't know of an alternative solution to being able to view content from a curated feed without an account.

Anyway, I could probably re-use my public Instagram account to just view photos, but people might start asking what happened with my account or why I un-followed their accounts, etc... I don't want to deal with that. So I'll just create a new one.

Tags: #QuittingSocialMedia #Instagram

Update: I ended up creating a new Facebook account, here's why.

It didn’t feel that way in the beginning though. I thought sharing photos about my car, my gadgets, my road trips/vacations, my son, was one of the best ways to utilize Facebook. Somehow I forgot that the point was to connect with other people. But what else is there to do after you’ve added them as a friend, have browsed through their profile and liked/commented on their posts? Anyways, of course I was rewarded with some likes here and there, which simply made me want to do it more. It was not until I noticed other people doing the same thing that I started to question what I was doing.

Was I rubbing people the wrong way by regularly posting about my “highlight reels” on Facebook? Was it offending people that I was posting about my car or mobile phone, when other people on my friends list can’t even readily afford those items? Was I being insensitive when I post photos of my son when I have friends who want to, but could not have kids?

One time I kept posting about the car seat that I bought for my son. It was a Britax B-Safe 35 Elite infant car seat. I thought it was really cool and so I was regularly posting photos of it online. At one point a friend commented, asking me if I was advertising the car seat. I was like “no, I’m not,” but that made me stop and reflect on what I was doing. I couldn’t tell if my friend was offended or if he was just genuinely asking a question. Either way, after receiving that comment, I never posted about the car seat again.

I also noticed that it became more of a competition when other people started posting about the same thing or the same themes. It was like a contest of:

• who had the best vacation?
• who had the newest phone?
• who had the coolest gaming PC?
• who had the most expensive car?
• who had the fanciest dinner?
• who has the smartest kid?

All of it leading up to, who has the better life? It was like people were unconsciously one-upping each other. Anything you can do, I can do better. If I can’t do it better, then I will at least show everyone that I can keep up.

Such is the extent of the influence that Facebook has on how people use their app/service, that people don’t even notice what they are doing. As long as the likes keep coming, they’ll want to continue doing what they were doing, almost unconsciously. All this happens almost unconsciously. Whether or not people knew what, or why they were posting about the things they were posting, I don’t know. All I know is, I was unconsciously a participant in that contest, a contest that I no longer wanted to be in.

If you stop posting about material things, what is there to post about everyday? Well you can post selfies, or you can post about your feelings or you can post about your kids. I don’t do selfies, and I don’t post about dramas in my life, and I have stopped regularly posting photos of my son due to privacy concerns, so that left me with nothing to post about. And considering how much tiring the news feed was and how it was making me judge other people, why bother keeping my account active?

#SocialMedia #QuittingSocialMedia #Facebook

Update: I ended up creating a new Facebook account, here's why.

My wife said the problem with me is that I read through every post that is shared on my news feed. Yes, I do. Isn't that the point of the news feed? To see what people are sharing? My wife has this ability, where she can just scroll through posts without really looking at them, or more importantly, without being affected by them. I don't have that ability. I stop to look at every post that is shared. And so if the post evokes some kind of negative emotion in me, I sometimes, unfortunately start getting judgemental. And I really, really don't want to be that kind of person. Who am I to judge really? I don't know what that person was going through when they shared that post; I shouldn't be judging.

So I started trying to be mindful of my thoughts. Whenever I see a post, I would try to remind myself not to judge. I can't really say that it worked all the time. Sometimes my brain was too tired from work that I didn't remember to be mindful anymore. I would then catch myself being judgemental and feel bad, feel embarrassed. Then I wonder, what am I even gaining from browsing through my news feed?

What's weird is how I don't get judgemental when interacting with people in the real world. Maybe it's the fact that I can talk to them, I can read their body language, I can listen to the intonation of their voice when they speak. I feel like you don't get judgemental when socializing with people in the real world, because you get some context with regards to what they are saying or doing at the moment.

Unfortunately you don't get that context online. I found that this problem for me only occurs on social media, like with Facebook. So as soon as I realized that the news feed was making me unconsciously judgemental, I cut it out. I quit. Deactivated my account and now I don't have this problem anymore.

#SocialMedia #QuittingSocialMedia #Facebook

Update: I ended up creating a new Facebook account, here's why.

I couldn't control the news feed. It wasn't for lack of trying too. During the months leading up to the day when I deactivated my account, I put in a lot of effort to try to control my news feed. Here are some of the things I tried:

• I went through all the pages I followed and “unfollowed” those that didn't post worthwhile content, or those whose content no longer meant anything to me.
• I went through all the Facebook groups I was member of and left those that I didn't want to be a part of anymore. One group I was in had some form of online drama every month or so. I was surprised that I didn't leave that FB group earlier. I didn't just leave a group because of what showed up on my news feed either; I left other groups due to privacy and security reasons. Some groups I only became a member of, out of courtesy to the one who created the group. However if I didn't know the other members, that ends up as being a security issue for me.
• Lastly I did the same thing for my friends on Facebook. I went through all of the people on my friends list and evaluated whose posts get to show up on my news feed. I gotta be honest, while some people had really worthwhile posts, others posted or shared crap. The people that posted crap got “unfollowed”, sorry. However, just because they were “unfollowed” doesn't mean I no longer want to be friends with them; I just couldn't stand their posts. Which is sad really. Facebook is supposed to connect people, but here it is causing a rift between friends.

So anyway I did all that plus implemented a new rule for myself. Whenever I open up my Facebook news feed, I would go through the first 5-10 posts and evaluate them. If the post wasn't worth my time, in other words if it didn't add value to my life, the post will get blocked/hidden. If I notice that I keep blocking posts from the same person, I then “unfollow” that person.

All this worked for a week or two, but I still always ended up unsatisfied after browsing through my news feed. (Side note, infinite news feeds are evil!) After awhile I simply got tired of policing my news feed. Why was I wasting all this time trying to clean up my news feed, when I could be doing more productive things? So I simply quit. Deactivated my account and never had to deal with the news feed again.

Wow it feels good to write all this down. Thank you write.as!

Also thanks to bleak and pretty for the idea of using giphy to add memes on here.

#SocialMedia #QuittingSocialMedia #Facebook