A purge of spam accounts on Instagram has resulted in not only millions of accounts disappearing, but a surge of complaints from celebrities and teens alike.

The company announced December 9th that it would start to permanently ban spam accounts versus their previous practice of deactivating them. Perhaps foretelling the reaction, the company noted that the the move will “only be noticed by legitimate users in reduced follower accounts.”

Among the celebrities hardest hit were Justin Beiber who dropped 3.5 million followers, Ariana Grande down 1.5 million and Kim Kardashian dropping 1.3 million. In all three cases the percentage of followers lost was in the 5-15 percent range, suggesting that they hadn’t been purchased followers.

Celebrities that had been purchasing followers to bump up their often dubious claims to fame are the ones most highly affected by the purge.

Jenni Farley, JWoww of Jersey Shore “fame” (I use the word loosely) saw her follower count on Instagram drop from 2.6 million to 115,000. Mase, who is reportedly a musician, lost over 1.2 million followers leaving him with a count of 270,000 followers, such a huge blow apparently that he has now quit Instagram in protest.

It wasn’t just celebrities who lost followers, with the plebeians taking to Twitter Inc. to scream blue murder at the loss of their followers. Reactions ranged for vowing never to use Instagram again, several calling for a boycott, some blaming parent company Facebook Inc. for destroying the service, through to simple displays of dismay.

I lost 300 followers from that whole span deleting thing on Instagram I’m so freakin pissed

— Jobesss (@Jobes__) December 19, 2014

Showing that humor isn’t dead, others on Twitter mocked the crestfallen and even noted that they missed out on the excitement.

i didn’t lose any instagram spam followers and frankly i am feeling very left out

— fionativity (@lustcluster) December 19, 2014

For a further breakdown of the numbers, Zach Allia has put together a list of brands and celebrities that have dropped followers at 64px. 

photo credit: Fiery-Phoenix via photopin cc