Why and How to Delete you Instagram Account
Now
You may be under the assumption that Instagram do not have the right to sell any and all of your photos that you dutifully filter and upload to it, and you'd be right.
Instagram's current Privacy Policy and Terms of Use mean that while they can move your photos around and share them with pretty much everyone, you still own them and they cannot sell them.
So far.
From the 16th of January 2013 that changes, and Instagram will be allowed to use and abuse your images as they see fit.
This includes selling them without telling you about it, let alone paying you.
Many people are flocking (back?) to Twitter to rage about it, with Instagram Selling Photos, Deleted Instagram, and finally Instagram Alternatives trending in some areas of the world, and yielding millions of results.
Soon
From the 16th of January 2013 Instagram's New Priavcy Policy and New Terms of Use come into affect.
Under there update Terms of Use, Rights, Sections 2 and 3 read thus:
Some or all of the Service may be supported by advertising revenue. To help us deliver interesting paid or sponsored content or promotions, you agree that a business or other entity may pay us to display your username, likeness, photos (along with any associated metadata), and/or actions you take, in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions, without any compensation to you. If you are under the age of eighteen (18), or under any other applicable age of majority, you represent that at least one of your parents or legal guardians has also agreed to this provision (and the use of your name, likeness, username, and/or photos (along with any associated metadata)) on your behalf. You acknowledge that we may not always identify paid services, sponsored content, or commercial communications as such.
Instagram, emphasis and color added.
What to do?
When you delete your account, your photos, comments, likes, and friendships (everything) will be removed permanently and will not be recoverable.
We cannot reactivate accounts.
Additionally, you will not be able to sign up with the same username again.
Instagram, emphasis and breaks added.
Delete your Instagram AccountSave you Photos
You may wish to download all your data before removing it from Instagram when you Delete your Account.
Well, Instagram actually recommends a way to do this, it's called Instaport.
Download your Instagram PhotosInstaport are experiencing high traffic right now. If you have problems downloading your photos, please try again later.
Remember, these new policies don't come into affect until January 16th, so there's still time to save your photos.
Instaport allows you to Download your Instagram Photos as a Zip file.
You can download all your photos, the last however many (most recent), photos between two dates, ones you liked, and the most recent photos tagged with a tag you specify (maximum 500).
Another service, OpenPhoto, are far more flexible with your photos, storing them in Amazon S3, Dropbox, Box.com, or just onto your computer. You can download photos from Facebook, Flickr, and, of course, Instagram. They even have an iPhone App.
InstaBackup is an OS X Only app for downloading the (low-res) photos Instagram stores directly onto your Mac.
Copygram is another simple web-based service, just login and download an archive of all your photos, or the latest ten to forty-thousand. They also do prints.