My personal tips and tricks to stay sane on instagram

There is a lot to say about algorithms and social media but I will not go into the vortex of sharing my opinions. I will share some things that help me:

1. I have folders on Instagram and lists on Twitter. 
2. I opt-out of promotional content when possible (aka suggested posts).
3. I made my Instagram stream contain those I follow only.

I had a 4th hack for Facebook, but it is broken now. When I find a way around it, I will post it too. 

And here are detains:

I created lists on Twitter and folders on Instagram. There I collect people or posts by the subject matter. For example, I have a list of the "epidemic-related" accounts on Twitter. And another one for local news. I collect things that inspire me in another thread. On Instagram, I have a folder where I save things that I want to draw, and another one, with humor/cartoons. There is a folder for everything I want to save related to the war in Ukraine. I collect quotes/expressions that I want to remember or find interesting to talk to people about. There is a folder for color. Materials. Recipes. Books. Music. And many others. The idea is that a) I can find things that I saved b) I can get a dose of tailored inspiration - and there is a finite amount of stuff there.

Opting out and de-personalizing targeted ads is a multi-step process and it is changing often - the proper way to do this is to do a research and adjust settings on your phone etc. But a simple (and very powerful - at least for the short run) thing that you can do is next time when you see a "suggested post" in your stream of posts on instagram - in the upper right corner of that post tap three vertical dots and opt out.

And the best present is adjusting your stream to those you follow only - in the app on your phone, on the hole screen there is an instagram logo in the upper left corner. Tap on it once and a n arrow appears to the right form the logo. Tap it and choose "following" - I think you will need to do it every time you restart your application. But this converts your stream to a chronological collection of things posted by the people you actually followed. Here is a screenshot that might help: