Assignment 3 – Report
Eleanor Holloway s3769461
I declare that in submitting all work for this assessment I have read, understood and agree to the content and expectations of the assessment declaration – https://www.rmit.edu.au/students/support-and-facilities/student-support/equitable-learning-services
Blog Reflections
Authorship, Publication, and Distribution in an Instagram Economy Influenced by the ‘Instagram Aesthetic’
Instagram users have a range of affordances to work with, with tagging and sharing common. Additionally, following a particular visual trend is part of the mainstream, and ‘editing is encouraged’ (Leaver et al., 2020). The affordances of Instagram facilitate the spread of these visual trends. In authoring, there are editing facilities within the app. In publishing, one can develop their post with captions and hashtags. Distribution is a large part of the process for users, and in particular bigger accounts, where the post is optimised for as much spread as possible. In the current iteration of the app, the ‘Instagram aesthetic’ dominates as commercialisation opportunities are optimised for bigger users. Due to this, trends cycle quickly, as they reach huge audiences on Instagram and beyond platform. The following is an investigation into how trends can be recreated by smaller users, and if those posts have the ability to gain attention from or influence other users.
Affordances, being the properties of an object that indicate usability, are present on Instagram as the various functions the app provides. According to Donald Norman, these would be ‘perceived affordances’ (1998), as they exist on a graphic interface. When Instagram was created in 2010, it was designed as an app to share images found on the web. In just 10 years, it has become a hugely popular platform whereby millions of users interact. The affordances of Instagram allow users to publish, author, and distribute images within the app. Additionally, as there are a wide range of different platforms on the web, Instagram has become a part of the network, a communication paradigm of actors, platforms, and websites (Niederer, 2018). When posts are distributed, or shared across to other platforms, they become networked content. Users may do this to have a connection between various social media accounts. In publishing, the user can add captions to an image, and use hashtags to reach audiences spread across Instagram. Authoring images on Instagram can be done with the camera function within the app, and edited with the filters provided. An ‘Instagram aesthetic’ can be achieved in this way, or outside of the app, whereby users follow particular visual trends dominating the app at that moment. This can be influenced by many things, but in recent years, seems to stem from popular Instagram users, and can affect real-world campaigns and commercial projects.
The ‘Instagram aesthetic’ has developed over the years. In Manovich’s ‘Instagramism’ he outlines the aesthetic inspired by Denmark’s ‘Kinfolk’ magazine (2017). Not only does the hashtag have over two million uses on Instagram, the minimalistic flat-lay technique became a huge trend, reaching almost every corner of the platform.
As Hund indicates, replication is encouraged on Instagram, which is how these trends spread (2017). This consistent borrowing is not independent to one aesthetic however, as authored posts from highly-popular users – such as influencers – are a driving force behind the popularisation of a certain aesthetic. Popular user Emma Chamberlain (@emmachamberlain) shares a film-look trend to her 9.5 million followers.
There is no denying that Instagram has too become an environment of ‘commercialisation and advertising’ (Hund, 2017), either. For example, Calvin Klein’s campaign ‘#mycalvins’ has been popularised by user Kendall Jenner (@kendalljenner). Currently, there are over 800,000 uses of the hashtag on Instagram alone.
In this current Instagram economy, a visual trend is originally authored and then imitated by other users, before ‘being repackaged, reproduced, and recirculated by brands’ (Hund, 2017). The lines are blurred more than ever now between casual users, professional users, and brands – so trends develop and spread at a rapid pace throughout all facets of the app. This is evident in how the affordances of Instagram have developed up to now, too. As was reflected in my blogposts, Instagram today has an optimised interface for publishing and distribution. I had the ability to geotag, tag other users, use an unlimited number of hashtags, and even share to other platforms, all in the ‘new post’ page. Further options are available in ‘advanced settings’, more prominently utilised by professional accounts.
The main goal for my Instagram posts were to utilise the affordances in the authoring, publishing, and distribution process, and how that may have an effect on the networked image. Additionally, I aimed to follow Instagram and photography trends outlined by Manovich in 2017.
This included trends in minimalism, landscape photography, black and white photography, and a ‘clean-looking’ caption. All of these elements have visually been prominent on Instagram over the years, with some of the trends taking inspiration from traditional photography practice. I found that my posts received a small, or non-existent level of interactivity from other users. Even using popular hashtags, for example, ‘#catsofinstagram’ and ‘#nofilter’, did not encourage user interaction.
From this it is clear that new accounts with little to no followers hardly influence the trends across Instagram. Where publication and distribution trends can be quantified, such as hashtag use and geotagged locations, smaller users do make a difference, however. Visual trends and the constantly changing ‘Instagram aesthetic’ can only originate from accounts with masses of followers. The affordances of Instagram allow for these trends to be continually followed, whether than be in the content, caption, or tags.
Additionally, as I was following trends that today are not deemed current – like the #nofilter – this may have had an impact on the amount of response I got. Even a particular tag or filter popularised a short time ago can so quickly become unfashionable. As Hund states, ‘[Instagram] requires renewed academic attention in a time where such metrics have an increasingly direct impact on the production of culture’ (2017). In a day and age where public figures and brands network every part of their personal or public campaigns, trends are bound to cycle through the platforms quickly.
In looking at the affordances of Instagram to discover how these Images are optimised for distribution, I believe I could have utlised these functions entirely, not picking and choosing each time. Additionally, I could have mimicked various posts directly, to further understand the affordances presented in the authoring phase. I believe overall that creating an Instagram page and aiming to reach a certain level of success is not possible unless the user does entirely use the affordances of Instagram to reach the largest audience possible. It is entirely possible to achieve the ‘Instagram aesthetic’ inside the app however, and follow trends as they happen. Overall, the research on the topic is vast, and as required, is becoming more prominent as Instagram trends affect more than just it’s own platform. Working from a larger account would have assisted this process further, in analysis of how followers employ the trends.
References
Hund, E 2017. Measured Beauty: Exploring the aesthetics of Instagram’s fashion influencers. Annenberg School for Communication, Pensylvannia
Leaver, T., Highfield, T., Abidin, C. 2020, Instagram: Visual Social Media Cultures. Digital Media and Society, United Kingdom
Manovich, L. 2016, Instagram and the Contemporary Image, University of San Diego, USA
Niederer, S 2018, Networked images: visual methodologies for the digital age. Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, Amsterdam.
Norman, D 1998, The design of everyday things , Basic Book, New York