Instagram is the most popular image- and video-sharing platform. It's famous and widely-used for many reasons.
But throughout the years, the platform has received numerous backlash, especially from those privacy-concerned users, anti-Meta individuals, and those who just don't like targeted ads. Their solution for an ad-free and suggestion-free Instagram, is 'The OG App'.
Or, at least it was.
OG is just like the official Instagram app, but with more features.
"Tired of too many ads? We block them for you," OG said on its website.
Many like the OG provides the experience, and privacy, that the real Instagram had to step in and intervene.
However, following our removal from the Google Play Store and Apple App Store - OG will be unable to continue serving users through our mobile app.
— The OG App (@TheOGapp_) October 7, 2022
App stores serve two types of users, who often contradict each other.
The first type, is end-users, who wish to have the best experience while using an app. These people want a fast and reliable service, which can do what they say they can do. The second type, is the developers of the app themselves. These people want full exposure, and tend to hunger for user data.
As something that stands in between the two, can be difficult.
But when it concerns legality and copyright, and policy, both Apple that operates the App Store and Google that runs Google Play Store, has to choose a side.
And in The OG App case, Apple decided to remove the app from its App Store.
About a week later, the Instagram client that promised to provide an ad-free and suggestion-free feed is also booted from Google Play Store, when Google followed the suit.
The two had to ban The OG App due to its malicious practice.
The OG App is an unofficial Instagram client, launched in September 2021 with the aim of helping users relive the good old days when Instagram wasn’t controlled by Meta's attention-hungry algorithm, Reels, and annoying ads.
The men behind the app, are developers Ansh Nanda and Hardik Patil.
Through their company, Un1feed, they recoded Instagram’s API to make Instagram the way they want.
With The OG App, users could curate different feeds, set up defaults, prevent feeds from refreshing for 24 hours, and turn off read receipts for DMs.
But things go more than just that.
Since the app has a workaround for accessing Instagram by tampering the API, it is said that the app also risk users' privacy and the leak of user data.
A few users on Twitter said that Instagram started alerting them to suspicious logins after they trusted The OG App with their credentials.
The developers attempted to explain the reasons for the warnings, but some people still remain worried.
So of course, the existence of The OG App annoyed Instagram. And asking both Apple and Google to ban the app is the most obvious thing to do.
In a Twitter thread, co-founders of Un1feed said that the startup won’t be able to serve its users following the app’s removal from both iOS and Android’s app stores.
In a note displayed on The OG App’s website, the founders said that they are thinking about what's best, and what would be their next step.