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Comment by javagram | Hacker News Reader

Facebook app probably has better ad revenue potential?

I just opened up instagram and scrolled through for a bit and I didn’t see a single ad. Seems very different from the Facebook experience.

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I don't know which Instagram you're using, but every two or three posts for me is an ad. The "second person's story" when watching stories is an ad. Instagram has, by far, more ads than any other app that I use.

Mine used to be completely devoid of adds, and then all of a sudden every 2-3 posts became an add, and the second story - just like yours.

I don't know how I had a glorious ad free instagram, but some people do. At the time mine was ad free, others complained of constant ads.

Perhaps it depends on your average engagement with the app (the official iOS one, to be clear). I only open it once a month or so, and follow only a few dozen accounts. Perhaps it doesn’t know enough about me to target ads or there is some algorithm that avoids showing ads when you come back after a long break.

Don't-scare-new-users-away mode. Ease you back in with a gradual increase in ads the more engagement they see from you?

If you don't care about notifications uninstall the app and use the web interface in a browser. It's not quite as slick and responsive as the app, but I've never seen an ad there.

Unfortunately the web version still lacks messages and stories, which are what brings me in.

Stories are on the web (to view, not to publish)

me too ever since about Nov/Dec? is when I noticed the increase in "sponsored content". and the result has been me spending less time looking at IG

I also think instagram ads are actually pretty close to normal posts [embedded effectively] so to me they are more effective. another reason to avoid being used by zuck

I'm scrolling through my IG feed to compare notes. Of my feed posts, the following are ads:

2nd, 6th, 10th, 15th, 20th, 25th, 30th…

Of my stories, the following are ads:

2nd, 5th, 9th, 13th, 17th, 21st, 25th, 29th, 33rd…

There's a small subset of people on Instagram that have "ad free" accounts. I have two Instagram accounts, a larger and older one, and a newer and smaller one. The larger one has never gotten ads despite following several hundred people. The smaller one has ads even with zero followers and an empty feed.

Mine was completely add free for the first few years that I had it, then suddenly changed one day. Since then I've mostly stopped using it and only scroll through it via their web interface where UBO makes it tolerable.

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