Normally, I just read articles about social media. Sometimes, I share them with my friends. But after seeing an article in the local paper that echoed another one I saw, and now I have opinions. The topics are all somewhat connected, so I thought I’d just put it all in one post.

Instagram & Homes

So the article that started everything was this: Ugly Side of Pretty Instagram Shots by The Straits Times. While I knew that people in Singapore love pretty shots (me too), I didn’t think that they were this bad. It really reminded me of this article called Please stop ‘influencing’ on our doorsteps, Notting Hill residents tell ‘unapologetic’ Instagrammers by the Evening Standard. In both cases, instagrammers (stars and wannabe stars) inconvenience people by taking photos in front of their home. There’s even this line by a Johnson Chong in the Straits Time article:

“I find it silly that the residents would complain about this. If you choose to live in a heritage, tourism-prone area, what else do you expect?”

Um, what?

People are being inconvenienced. And this isn’t even public space – it’s someone’s home. Yes, it’s pretty but it’s not your home. And I can think of tons of examples where this would annoy me; off the top of my head: what if you want to get in or get out but there’s a line of people standing outside your gate? I know that if it happened to me, I would be very annoyed.

I suppose the Singapore instagrammers could be worse; in the article by the Evening Strand, it’s mentioned that some people actually bring tents and set up camp for hours. That sounds majorly intrusive.

Another reason why the line quoted above annoyed me enough that I looked for all the articles I read previously was because it reminded me of this article by Curbed: Whose facade is it, anyway?

In the article, an influencer basically says the same thing as thing as Johnson but goes a step further to share a negative story about the homeowner. The homeowner in question was actually battling cancer. Which goes to show – you might not think that you’re inconveniencing someone, but you don’t actually know if your assumption is true.

The article in Curbed also brings up the point that when you take photos of someone’s house, you’re also taking a picture of part of their private life. And to do that without asking permission is pretty rude. It reminds me of one thing that was stressed to us when we first arrived in Japan: don’t take pictures of strangers without permission. Basically, we were all newcomers to Japan and were firmly in the “document everything” phase, including cute kids or street photos. So our teachers spent some time explaining about how it was rude and an invasion of people’s privacy to take their pictures and post it without permission – it’s one reason why I seem friendless on public blogs (I don’t share photos with friends unless I’ve actually asked them).

Instagram in the Home

Moving inside the home, I found this article by The Ringer: Home Is Where the Photo Booth Is: How Instagram Is Changing Our Living Spaces. My home is definitely not instagram-worthy, but I understand the impulse to make it so! And I’m not going to lie – I thought the concept for Instaset (instagram backdrops) was really smart. If I could work it into reviews of teas and books, or rather, if I had time to take pictures for every single post (I take it for tea but not books), I would probably be really tempted to get it.

I also read a related post by The Verge called Welcome to Airspace: it’s basically about how instagram has made all airbnbs look similar.

While I have lots of feelings about instagram shots of other people’s homes, I don’t actually have any opinion on instagram within the home. I think it’s a really personal thing, and if you want to optimise your home for photos, that’s great (can I come visit)? I just shared these articles because they were interesting and related to instagram.

Instagram & Tourist Spots

Rounding out the instagram and offline spaces theme, I’ve also seen some articles specifically talking about instagram and tourist spots. Two of them, Is Geotagging on Instagram ruining Natural Wonders? Some say yes and Under the Influence of a ‘Super Bloom’. Both articles talk about overtourism and/or the effect of a boom in tourism on a town, but the root cause of the increase in visitors is the same: instagram.

It’s pretty clear that while an increase in tourism can be good, it can also cause harm because not everyone who visits is considerate (very much like the people who take instagram photos in front of other people’s houses). In fact, I’ve read an article by The Verge where a sunflower farm banned all visitors because way too many people came.

tl;dr of the whole post: if you’re taking photos outside your home for instagram, be considerate. If it’s inside your home, what you do is up to you.

P.s. After writing this, I realised that it’s similar to the round-up of longform essays I like that I used to do. This was actually pretty fun so I might do it again if I find a topic that interests me.