Instagram

A friend told me I should sign up for an Instagram account. Instagram is a picture and video social media sharing site using your smartphone. She said there were a lot of art challenges and contests that I might like.

Bored while watching it snow on Saturday, I signed up for an account. My first pic to upload was a storm picture.  Instagram then suggested people for me to follow.

I'm still trying to figure the ins and outs of the app. The app allows you to edit your images though what you can do with them seems quite limited to me. Maybe I just haven't figured it all out yet.

I'm also not sure of Instagram etiquette.  How often should you spam share pictures with your followers? Once or twice a day? Once or twice an hour? (-;

You can leave comments or click a heart to like someone's pictures. With Twitter you can retweet, and with Facebook you can share, but there doesn't seem to me to be a way to share Instagram content  with  friends. Maybe I haven't figured that out, either.

My website promotes my calligraphy services. Twitter does, too, to a certain extent. I can show my work on the blog. I can also whine, review tools, software and services which hopefully will show more of me beyond calligraphy. I use Tumblr as an electronic portfolio. But I'm not sure how Instagram goes beyond the social media I already use.  The people I'm following and who are following me back already see my stuff on the other social media sites.

I'm also more of a computer person than an app person. Call me old(-fashioned). I'd prefer to edit my photos on the computer and upload them to a site. I can tweet, Facebook, and Tumblr all from the comfort of my computer keyboard. That doesn't seem possible with Instagram.

So, the jury's still out as to Instagram's value for me. Perhaps I just need more time to figure it out.

If you're on Instagram and need another follower, you can find me at cjkennedyink. And if you want to let me know what I'm missing, that would be great, too.