Instagram confirms test of 'unskippable' ads | Hacker News Reader

Instagram confirms test of 'unskippable' ads

techcrunch.com

20 pointsAlexandrB20 comments

This a great move.

I will instantly uninstall Instagram the first time this happens to me and not come back like I did with YouTube. I'll get more useful stuff done and have higher quality down time.

When Youtube was in the midst of screwing with adblockers any way possible I used the platform basically not at all. I also applaud more apps going around ad avoidances as their primary mode of monetization.

Another example illustrating how ads are like an invasive, malignant cancer that spreads relentlessly. You can try to remove it from one platform, but it always seems to return. Isn't it ironic how we abandoned television to escape unskippable commercials, only to find them now on so many online platforms?

Commercials on TV haven't been unskippable since the first DVR came out in 1999.

It boggles my mind that there are still people that put up with online advertising.

what do you mean?

Meta have made the Instagram web experience terrible so that they can get people to use their app, which many people do because sharing photos with your friends is enjoyable.

it is appalling that they have just completely wrecked it, though, like everything else they - and other big companies that have set expectations of billions of dollars profit a quarter - touch.

Much easier to block or mute and look away than the other format ("and before we contine, I want to tell you about Squarespace, which is a great way to ...").

Just wait until apple lets them at the eyeball position in faceid

I haven't seen an (explicit) ad on Instagram in years, and I use both web and mobile. DNS/PiHole, on Android there are customized clients as well. I always wonder about comments here on these topics, I guessed more of the HN crowd knows the way around these things.

Maybe there will be a point where these methods will be rendered useless, and then rage would be more justified, but that point is not yet here.

I believe rage is warranted when these platforms do everything they can to get around workarounds like adblockers - and that says nothing of the fact that such technical solutions shouldn't even be necessary to begin with.

Does the content creator get a cut of the revenue ? If no I think they should move elsewhere.

Guess I'll go confirm my test of "deletable" apps.

As the ad-enshittification ratchets up, old-school adblockers will need to transform into proactive agents for the user: Login to the app on my behalf. Scroll through all content since last run. Save that content into an ad-free format/archive that I can scroll through at the time and manner I choose.

And the steady march of enshittification continues for Meta products.

Instagram used to be great to avoid all of the BS posts and ads from FB. Now it’s just an endless scroll or reels and I don’t even see anything from the real people I’m friends with.

Use the "followed" tab, not "for me". Same as Youtube actually ("Subscribed" tab).

We got so much for "free" during low interest rates, now we're finding out what all the nice tech stuff really costs. We're gonna see most tech products get enshittified, especially ones with high switching costs

I think it's a good thing. A lot of no-value-add nonsense has been created for no good reason other than cheap money.

Thing is, instagram can derive plenty of healthy profit without this. This is just about trying to drive additional growth for shareholders to justify the inflated PE ratios that came about from low interest rates.

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