Looks like the last time I posted about Pixelfed (the federated photo-microblogging platform) was (*checks notes) in 2020 – time moves quickly when flies have fun!
Since then, Pixelfed gained some more ground, some apps, plenty of finesse, a lot of users, and, for the purpose of this entry, an Instagram import feature.
It works!
All I needed to do was go to the Import page, and upload my Instagram archive:
The importer threw an error message at me about half the time, but my images were still imported. I also noticed that after importing 916 pictures, my Pixelfed profile still says I have 480 posts, so somehow the imported ones don’t count against the Pixelfed counter. Oh well, I can live with that.
Side note: Instagram is (still) a mess.
To get my Insta archive, I needed to go to Instagram. This involved logging in and requesting my archive. OK fine, although, language.
While I was waiting for my email with the archive link, I thought I’d unfollow (most) people I followed last time I browsed Instagram.
Well, after about 5 unfollows, computer says no: Instagram treats multiple unfollows unusual activity, and simply won’t do it, and you have to try later.
These little dark patterns, friction wherever you want to do something they don’t want you to do, is a big part of the reason I left.