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The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

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Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#41

Post by Aromasin »

badpun wrote: post #34
colmvp wrote: post #13

I think it's telling that those in tech, including billionaire execs like Jobs, were/are very sensitive to the usage of tech devices by their kids. Addiction to games, news, apps, entertainment is real, but that's only half the issue. It fosters this itch where we can't linger on uncomfortable thoughts without instinctively grabbing our phone to be distracted. This include when we're trying to really go deep on a sub…

I wonder what do you do during the downtime? Nothing?

Sure. I think meditation has become popular specifically because we no longer just do "nothing" anymore, so people need to now dedicate time to doing nothing, just like we devote time to fitness. Evolutionarily speaking, I imagine humans spent vasts amount of time doing nothing over the past few million years - so one would think that it could be somehow vital to our physiology. I wouldn't be surprised if we find out in the near future that it's just as an important process as sleep for our mental health.

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#42

Post by weavie »

badpun wrote: post #34
colmvp wrote: post #13

I think it's telling that those in tech, including billionaire execs like Jobs, were/are very sensitive to the usage of tech devices by their kids. Addiction to games, news, apps, entertainment is real, but that's only half the issue. It fosters this itch where we can't linger on uncomfortable thoughts without instinctively grabbing our phone to be distracted. This include when we're trying to really go deep on a sub…

I wonder what do you do during the downtime? Nothing?

Breathe, think, observe the world around you. Pretty much what humans have always been doing during the downtime until about 10 years ago.

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#43

Post by CM30 »

I agree with the sentiment, but the methodology here seems suspect to say the least.

I mean, in their own words:

> The authors evaluated a total of 43 billion tweets and analyzed the top 50 trending hashtags in the world every hour on the hour, from 2013 to 2016. They then calculated the time the hashtags remained popular and found that in 2013, a hashtag remained in the top 50 list for an average of 17.5 hours, but the figure had dropped to 11.9 hours by 2016.

It's based on how long a hashtag stays popular on Twitter.

That's not a good source of data for something like this. For one thing, it's bloody Twitter, a service where topics change very rapidly and posts are at most 280 characters long.

Not exactly an environment conductive to deep thinking or lengthy session times.

Secondly, it doesn't really show attention span declining as much as it does the over saturation of media nowadays. New stuff is coming out all the time now, whether its news, movies, games, TV shows, music, books or anything else. There's just more to discuss, and less time to discuss it.

Hell, in games alone, we're approaching E3 right now. In that timeframe, it's likely at least 100 new games will be announced across systems, and many more will have new trailers, concept art, fact sheets and other info released.

Popular hashtags on Twitter for games will probably change every few minutes as a result.

This research just showed that when more stuff is released/documented, popular topics change rapidly day in and day out.

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#44

Post by tyfon »

jcims wrote: post #14
gwilkes wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In case this is a serious question and not a joke (unclear which it is) then he may be saying that older movies and shows had these longer intros that seemed normal at the time, but if you watch them again now they seem long and boring now. So that is one to show how your attention span has become shorter

That’s exactly what I was getting at... The best is watching it with your kids...they can’t take it lol.

Meanwhile, in Norway, slow tv [1] is quite popular.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_television

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#45

Post by basetop »

This article really isn't saying attention span is getting shorter ( or it's misunderstanding what "attention span" means ). It's that global interest timeframe is getting shorter ( aka how long a product or news is relevant is shrinking because we are getting more product, news, etc ).

"The authors evaluated a total of 43 billion tweets and analyzed the top 50 trending hashtags in the world every hour on the hour, from 2013 to 2016. They then calculated the time the hashtags remained popular and found that in 2013, a hashtag remained in the top 50 list for an average of 17.5 hours, but the figure had dropped to 11.9 hours by 2016."

This doesn't mean that attention span is shrinking. It just means that there are tons more tweets and hashtags in 2016 as there are in 2013.

Just like with movies, the article mentioned. It has nothing to do with "attention span" since Endgame is a 3 hour long film. It just means that the movie industry is producing a lot more movies/blockbusters and the time a blockbluster can stay at the top is limited because another blockbuster is bound to release soon after.

It's like in the past we only had the "classics" as college subjects. Now we have physics, biology, chemistry, computer science, etc. And the new subjects means that our attention span got shorter. Which is absurd.

I think human attention span got shorter, but the article isn't really arguing that or it isn't arguing it well. And I'm not sure if human attention span getting shorter is necessarily a bad thing. Why sit through commercials, intros and so much filler/fluff in most media? As long as you are able to concentrate on things that deserve concentration, nothing wrong with short attention span for fluff.

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#46

Post by jfk13 »

wallace_f wrote: post #21
nicklaf wrote: post #12

(First, this article is not about individual attention span: it's about an increase in volume of content and the consequently dwindling amount of time the collective public has to dwell on a given piece of published content.) Anyway, this brings to mind one good thing about Hacker News: while breaking stories make it to the front page, so does older content worthy of discussion. We need more people to care about cura…

>good thing about Hacker News: while breaking stories make it to the front page, so does older content worthy of discussion. Yea, I also trust a democracy of people to highlight what's important or interesting more than corporate news. Or at least, as a complement to it.

Not strictly a democracy of people, though, is it? There are opaque algorithms behind the scenes doing their magic, and moderators who step in and distort the "democratic" process; it isn't just about upvotes.

(In the case of HN, I'm not criticising this; in general I think it's probably MUCH better than it would be if it didn't have these non-democratic mechanisms helping to manage the site. I don't actually trust that "a democracy of people" can be relied on to make good decisions, in general.)

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#48

Post by jfk13 »

flukus wrote: post #33
jcims wrote: post #6

Just watch the intro to an old movie or sitcom that you can remember from back in the day.

I generally used to flip channels or read something or talk during them, did anyone ever regularly sit through them attentively?

If I wanted to read or talk to someone, why on earth would I have the television on?

If it's on, it's because there is something I feel is worth my time and attention.

(One reason I broke up with an otherwise-potentially-serious partner some years ago was that she -- and her family, it was a familial trait -- seemed unable to be in a room for more than a minute without turning on a TV.)

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#49

Post by TeMPOraL »

CM30 wrote: post #43

I agree with the sentiment, but the methodology here seems suspect to say the least. I mean, in their own words: > The authors evaluated a total of 43 billion tweets and analyzed the top 50 trending hashtags in the world every hour on the hour, from 2013 to 2016. They then calculated the time the hashtags remained popular and found that in 2013, a hashtag remained in the top 50 list for an average of 17.5 hours, but…

Yup. Hashtag popularity period is basically proxy for growth of a) Twitter and b) world around it.

That said, maybe the (perception of) shortening attention span is also just a proxy for growth.

Re: The Global Attention Span Is Getting Shorter

#50

Post by TeMPOraL »

miemo wrote: post #40
KitDuncan wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are doing well, because they have resources that 99.99% of humans never will have. It's very hard to draw any conclusions here.

> They are doing well, because... you just drew a big one

Still, what's more likely? Rich children doing better because of overcontrolling parents, or doing better because they have access to enough resources to resolve almost any difficulty they face in their lives?
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