Fact: if your entire portfolio is only on Instagram, then you’re probably only making photographs for Instagram likes. And if that’s the case, then are you really a photographer or a content creator? Do you not know the difference? A content creator appeals to an attention economy while a photographer doesn’t. This can get even deeper when you consider things like taxation and legal definitions.
You’re probably wondering why the label matters. Well, it surely does when it comes into the large point of building your career. Are people hiring you for your images or are they hiring you because of your reach on social media? If it’s the latter, then you’re an influencer and social media content creator. If you’re the former, then you’re making assets for them to use.
But if your entire portfolio is just on Instagram, then you’re making images solely for a place that caters to an algorithm. If you’re putting images on your own website, then it shoes that you’ve got a deeper level of respect for your own work. More importantly, if you’re updating your website and making it into something that’s meaningful and organized, then it truly shows how much you care about your own product.
When you make a website, then you’re completely on the side of not letting AI scrape your website to make images on its own. But when you upload to social media, it’s a different story. You’re then letting it feed the AI. With a website, though, you’re not giving AI companies permission at all. They might violate that, but you can at least go after them for it.
We don’t have to go into this a whole lot more to be frank with you. But uploading your images to Instagram and social media alone associates a completely different kind of mindset. You’re acknowledging that you’re letting your copyrights go. And that’s not smart at all.