How Instagram’s new trend is changing the social media landscape
If you aren’t on Instagram these days, then where have you been? Everyone has, or has had, an account because frankly, it’s hard to live without one.
You can use it to follow people, self promote, shop or just waste time tapping through everyone’s instagram stories. The constant content being fed to Instagram users fills your time, but are the things we enjoy doing on Instagram good?
Recently, Instagram stories came out with a new filter format that is like a Buzzfeed quiz, in that anyone is able to create different ones for others to use.
Popular examples of this trend have included ‘Which Disney character are you?,’ ‘Which Office character are you?’ and ‘What will your future job be?
Here are a few examples of the videos!
Video courtesy of Sienna Hicks.
The worst part about this “trend” is just how contagious it is. While most people start off annoyed by it, once one of your friends does it, it’s everywhere. Soon enough you are curious about the hype.
That said, while it is fun to see what Trader Joe’s food item you are, it’s not as fun for everyone else to see it. While a lot of people flaunt their results on their Instagram accounts, some people decide to just send what Disney character they got to their friends.
Jillian Verner, a senior art major, has used several different filters.
“I’ve done which Office character are you, what hole are you, what cat are you, what disney character are you,” Verner said. “I’ve only posted three for my close friends story, and only once on my regular story. I think they are funny, but I don’t really care what other peoples results are because its random and it isn’t based on what you look like.”
Olivia Archibald, a senior psychology major, uses the Instagram filters as well.
“I first started using them in December when my friend sent me which animal are you, and I posted that to my close friends story,” Archibald said. “[They are] gaining in popularity and I started seeing them on everyone’s stories.”
However, Archibald doesn’t think they’re accurate, after using the ’What Disney Princess are you?’ filter.
“I got Jasmine, which doesn’t really sense, and the second time I did it I got Mulan, which is weird because I don’t resemble them,” Archibald said.
Because the spinning results above your head aren’t actually impacted by how you look, it kind of defeats the purpose of it face tracking you.
“I didn’t really care about the results other people get because it’s all just random,” Archibald said. “Just send your results to your friends, you don’t need to be posting them on your story.”
In a Wired article by Tyler Coates entitled, “’Which Character Are You?’ Instagram Filters Are Radically Dumb,” he explained how “Our incessant need to generate content for others to see is at the heart of these popular filters, as evidenced by the extremely bored looks on everyone’s faces as they wait for their fictional, often animated counterparts to be assigned to them.”
Coates has a point when he says that were just creating boring content with these filters, and that our results are not interesting enough to force others to see. Instead we should be putting impactful content on our Instagram stories, content that informs or gives an insight on current issues.
Sure, entertain yourself, indulge in instagrams magic eight ball toy, but don’t expect your friends to care about what your results are. Most of us would just rather see what you ate that day.