This is a perfect example of how ignorance can lead to fear, uncertainty and doubt. It's also an example of how erroneous media can easily mislead the public.
Instagram was never going to "sell your photos." If you read the TOS, they were reserving the right to advertise against your photos much like how sponsored stories work on Facebook.
But advertising is so evil right? Time to give up Google Search, Gmail, Google Maps, LinkedIn, New York Times, etc.
Frankly, I find it funny that your everyday consumer is in an uproar because they think that their kissy-face photos could even be sold.
Companies like National Geographic whose businesses are built on the IP around their photos have legitimate reasons to be concerned in general. In this case, though, these changes would've allowed them to advertise their magazine on Instagram. Professional photographers may also want to protect their content from being used in advertising.
But 99% of users are every day people taking pictures of babies, dogs and the sunset...content that would almost never be "sold."
Also, the fine print on AppData shows that their method of measuring users is completely prone to error. Many other apps showed a drop off and FB made some algo changes around the same time.
>Instagram was never going to "sell your photos." If you read the TOS, they were reserving the right to advertise against your photos much like how sponsored stories work on Facebook.
Dude, are you Instagram's lawyer? How can you be so sure?? Either way, you still don't get the point. It wasn't about whether they were going to sell it or not. It was about they giving themselves the 'right' to automatically, possibly do so in the future.
Naturally, when you do something like this, especially with others' data, you could in the least inform them. Because it's their fucking content. When I joined facebook and orkut, I saw the ads on the side. I knew it was a compromise I had to make. So it really didn't matter to me.
That's why I still use Google. Because I know the company is trying to make money by letting me use it. With Instagram, when I joined it, there were no ads nor did they tell me or give me a hint that my photos would be 'sold'. An average user would have assumed it would remain free forever, but I knew they would somehow need to make money. But, they didn't express their intent to make money (through selling your photos) clearly because they knew if they did so, no one would join their service. Hence they basically deceived you into joining their service for free initially and one fine day gave themselves the rights to sell your photos. That's unethical. The problem here is I took the effort to get the photo right, but I am NOT compensated monetarily for my effort. Instead Instagram just benefits from it. So it's like a free photo sharing site first that is automatically turned into a stock photo site without your consent where you don't even get any benefits when your photo is sold. I'm sorry, that's unacceptable and that's unethical.
What the consumer owns is none of your business - be it
babies, dogs, sunset or even elephants. It's their will to do what they want with their phone's camera. And like I said, there's even nothing wrong with monetizing these photos as long as you express your intent clearly.
Of course ANYTHING is possible. The world could end tomorrow.
But show me one good example of a widely used Internet service that's owned by a public company that willingly cheated its users when it had the chance? Even Apple and Google have not done anything like that.
Also, the change in the TOS wasn't much different than it was before. They were just making it more clear as far as their intent to monetize by allowing your content to be sponsored.
The problem with your position is that its assuming that the company is trying to bait and switch you. It's not.
Google is no better or worse and thinking that they are is ignorance on your side that probably due to bias of media and the general tech community. Want to talk about bait and switch? What about Google Apps that used to be free for small businesses and is no longer? What about Gmail before ads? You can bet that its a matter of time before Google+ uses social ads and any location based service will use your location ads. Bait and switch?
It's ridiculous for you to complain that they didn't "express their intent to make money." Listen to yourself! Look at this site? It was a startup! Of course they want to make lone, as does every other for profit startup on Hacker News.
There's no deception. There's no unethical behavior.
Google benefits from serving content I've ceeated on its search engine by returning it as organic search result. Why am I not compensated?
Why does it not compensate sites like Wikipedia where their content and links are returned under their search engine?
Take a step back and remove your bias. No ones out to get you.
>But show me one good example of a widely used Internet service that's owned by a public company that willingly cheated its users when it had the chance?
Do you know how many times Facebook has done this? Thanks for atleast demonstrating your ignorance, dude.
Are you affiliated to Instagram somehow? If yes, let's not waste both of our times (Atleast, I have none to lose to a troll)
Did you read my comment properly? The problem with you guys is you half-ass read everything before you comment. I mentioned I knew they WILL make money, but it's the average user's perception that they wouldn't do so. Either 1)You failed in your English classes or 2)You are mis-representing whatever I said, time and again.
>There's no deception. There's no unethical behavior.
Let's have it like this. I give you free canvas'es to paint on. And you create a dozen paintings. One fine day, you notice at the back of each canvas, there's a tiny print that says I have the right to sell these paintings as mine. I would love to see you not be upset about this.
When I gave you these free canvas'es, I never told you about these nor did these tiny prints exist. Of course your common sense must have told you there must be some catch. But this is too extreme of a catch. I gave such free canvas'es to a dozen people like you and they were just 'average users' who thought they are getting this canvas for free. And suddenly they realize I somehow sneakily printed in small letters that whatever the painting be on canvas is mine and I can fucking resell it under my name. The question is, if you knew of such a catch and if you were a passionate artist, would you have got these free canvas'es from me? If you say yes, then I can atleast confirm you are a troll arguing for fuck's sake.
>Take a step back and remove your bias. No ones out to get you.
It's not bias. That's the whole point. I feel so sorry for you though. I can send you some english books via FedEx for free (trust me, there are no catches here) so you can learn to understand english sentences in general.
Your assumption that these photos can not be sold is simply false. Maybe you specifically won't pay but i would. I pay for premium services when i need graphics. Think of an instagram api you can get access to and showcase pictures with tags x,y that are popular within your service.
Instagram was never going to "sell your photos." If you read the TOS, they were reserving the right to advertise against your photos much like how sponsored stories work on Facebook.
But advertising is so evil right? Time to give up Google Search, Gmail, Google Maps, LinkedIn, New York Times, etc.
Frankly, I find it funny that your everyday consumer is in an uproar because they think that their kissy-face photos could even be sold.
Companies like National Geographic whose businesses are built on the IP around their photos have legitimate reasons to be concerned in general. In this case, though, these changes would've allowed them to advertise their magazine on Instagram. Professional photographers may also want to protect their content from being used in advertising.
But 99% of users are every day people taking pictures of babies, dogs and the sunset...content that would almost never be "sold."
Also, the fine print on AppData shows that their method of measuring users is completely prone to error. Many other apps showed a drop off and FB made some algo changes around the same time.