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Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

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Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#291

Post by alchemyromcom »

Animats wrote: post #71

The key point here is that TikTok is now beating all the US social networks. This may be the beginning of the end for what Silicon Valley calls "tech", but is just ads with social content. Peak Facebook was in Q2 2021.[1] Instagram is losing to TikTok. (If you think the "metaverse" is going to be important in the social space, check out what's happening in China in that area. While the US has been distracted by the N…

>This may be the beginning of the end for what Silicon Valley calls "tech"

There's something about the way you phrased this that just made me just realize there's a very real possibility that the internet could turn into television part two. If you think about the most popular platforms, they are mostly video and now the other very popular ones are trying to follow in kind. There's also all the streaming platforms that are not really thought of as the internet, but work basically the same. It really might be that the internet as we think of it--text based--might be a bit of a niche interest (not that this is necessarily a bad thing).

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#292

Post by sakopov »

_jal wrote: post #116
yashap wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You really think Google have a failure to innovate? Obviously search was their first, core innovation, but over the years they’ve delivered so many other successful products (many acquired, true, but even those they’ve evolved really well). Off the top of my head: - Maps - AdWords - Gmail - YouTube - Analytics - Translate - Calendar - Sheets - Docs - Drive - Meet - Slides - Drawings - Forms - Trends - Alerts I’m sure…

Edited to add acquisitions, where appropriate: - Maps (Keyhole, Where2, Endoxion) - AdWords (Doubleclick) - Gmail (reMail) - YouTube (Youtube) - Analytics (Urchin) - Translate (Phonetic Arts) - Calendar (Timeful) - Docs (Upstartle)

I thought Gmail was someone's "20% time" personal project?

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#293

Post by slig »

alexpotato wrote: post #280

As a casual user of both Facebook and TikTok, I would share my impression of how they share videos: TikTok - Their algorithm seems to very quickly hone in on things I actually want to see. - e.g. if figured out that I like to see comedy clips, some woodworking videos etc - I suspect that they do this by a combination of showing you some "test" videos that quickly bucket your interests and then using additional data b…

For me, it feels like the recommendations from Youtube, FB, Instagram, Spotify, etc, are really what they would want you to see, not what I would want to see. Never listened to those shitty podcasts, and that's what recommended for me on Spotify. The Youtube search is flooded with "recommendations" and "what's hot" that are hot garbage. Google search is getting useless, with tons of spam and obvious duplicated content.

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#294

Post by welshwelsh »

FrenchDevRemote wrote: post #79
thefz wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They have the highest leetcode standards out of FAANG. As does Snap. They hire people that basically memorized computer science algorithms. And so their employees are bookish, not innovative people. Apple, Microsoft, and Amazon do not have the same issues with creating new products. I don't think this is necessarily true because the people designing products are not the same people creating/implementing them. Even…

>there's some code out there that is a work of art and can inspire awe in everyone. and the people who wrote it didn't spend thousands of hours memorizing the same stupid leetcode exercises to pass lame interviews for 6 figures job, they worked on real projects tell me the fast inverse square root from Carmack would have been praised in an interview...

Leetcode isn't an alternative to real world projects, it's an alternative to textbooks and lectures for beginners.

Zuckerberg was able to build Facebook because he got a good education and understood graph theory enough to apply it to social networks.

In the past, the only people who really understood concepts like graphs were people who endured rigorous four-year computer science curriculums. And only top students at elite schools would learn this. The average CS graduate has a very poor understanding of fundamental data structures and algorithms.

But with Leetcode, anyone can solve 5-10 graph problems and obtain the same knowledge. It's extremely efficient. In a couple of days, you can learn what used to take years.

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#295

Post by not-my-account »

asdff wrote: post #282
not-my-account wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Profits matter, though! We need them to pay people to do the research and development, which people will not do for nothing - our dependence on food and shelter makes this necessary. If an American firm absorbs all the costs, but gains none of the benefit, it will not survive as long, meaning the research will also disappear alongside it. China, on the other hand, can spend those funds elsewhere while also poaching t…

Profits aren't necessary for R&D, that's just one model where R&D is funded by consumers through direct purchases. Another model is where R&D is simply funded through taxation and grants. That is the model that medical research is often funded through, and it works well because it allows researchers around the world to help our species overcome disease.

Totally good point! Though, that is also quite restrictive. Some of the biggest innovations which change society the most are incredibly weird, out of left field innovations that a governmental or grant program would most likely not fund - just because the nascent idea is too crazy.

You get a lot of money funding weird ideas in VC firms, where the incentive structure (of profit) makes it possible to fund a tonne of ideas, where it is expected that most of the ideas will fail.

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#296

Post by mrtksn »

winternett wrote: post #287
mrtksn wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TikTok quickly learns what you don't like and the homepage becomes a mix of your subscriptions, new content that you might like and very new kind of content that you haven't been exposed or stuff that you outgrew but you might like to revisit. Learning the things you don't like is important. It's much more pleasant experience when you are not exposed to the stuff you don't like. Unlike Twitter, the stuff you don't li…

Most political things don't generate huge amounts of platform advertising money probably on TikTok... The autopilot ad revenue is easy for them to make on political content as well because right now, there's only a few different aspects competing with each other... It's likely that a lot of users don't primarily go to TikTok for political content, it's primarily music and social influencer based as well... This is wh…

There's definitely political content too. It's just that it tends to be expressed much more creatively, through music, dancing and acting.

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#297

Post by biztos »

Animats wrote: post #71

The key point here is that TikTok is now beating all the US social networks. This may be the beginning of the end for what Silicon Valley calls "tech", but is just ads with social content. Peak Facebook was in Q2 2021.[1] Instagram is losing to TikTok. (If you think the "metaverse" is going to be important in the social space, check out what's happening in China in that area. While the US has been distracted by the N…

I'm a huge admirer of TikTok and love to use it -- once a week only! -- but I sort of agree with the US government that it's crazy to give that much of (mostly) your youth's attention to an adversary.

However I find it baffling that all the VC in the Global West is unable to come up with a popular alternative, even though it's glaringly obvious[0] what the "secret sauce" is in TikTok and why it works so well.

Instead we get stuff like this, where a quite good photo-sharing service radically undermines its inherent advantages in order to play catch-up, with most of the videos still sporting a TikTok logo.

At some level I'm happy if Zuckerberg destroys my artists' community on IG because it at least opens the door to creating a better one elsewhere. But I'm also a little worried that this coterie of billionaires keeps having their lunch eaten by a pretty straightforward system run on a pretty classic Valley model.

[0]: https://www.listennotes.com/podcasts/a16z-podcast/tiktoks-al...

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#298

Post by winternett »

rvz wrote: post #118
winternett wrote: post #2

It's interesting that they don't care, it's a Marie Antoinette-esque attitude to their lifeblood, and ultimately what will end their dominance. The truth is they converted a free service into a pay service (the gas-lights creators and businesses into paying for visibility). The visibility, even when paid for is not very fruitful for many as well... If you run a small business like a restaurant in the US, but get 40,0…

> I really don't think TikTok is much better now either, these apps all use the technique of phasing adds and slowly reducing (external) visibility for creators, and just judging from comments I see on Twitter, the economy is imploding as a result. Exactly. Every single social media company with VC capital has thrown their small users and creators under the bus in favour of the ad driven corporations, mainstream medi…

I've noticed (on multiple accounts) that TikTok stops view counts on videos after a point... Even though they can still be viewed directly, TikTok does not update view counts. Many creators stay in agonizing limbo even though they are getting views. It's pretty crazy how much TikTok gaslights everyone, there no better than anyone else.

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#299

Post by rightbyte »

edm0nd wrote: post #199
alexb_ wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are Chinese companies doing metaverse wise?

Likely waiting on stolen metaverse R&D from American companies given to them from the Chinese government. That's the entire Chinese nation-state backed hackers MO. Steal R&D from Fortune 500 companies to then give it to private Chinese businesses to further the Chinese economy. Why waste your own time/money/resources on R&D when you can just steal it. Same with IP and IP laws. - https://www.cbsnews.com/news/chinese-h…

The mere thought of Facebook codebase being usable anywhere else but by Facebook is silly. If someone gave somebody a dump of Google's monolith were to even begin looking?

You need the engineers too. There is no Bond-like blueprint to steal.

Re: Instagram is shifting to videos – users aren't happy

#300

Post by bsder »

edm0nd wrote: post #199
alexb_ wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are Chinese companies doing metaverse wise?

Likely waiting on stolen metaverse R&D from American companies given to them from the Chinese government. That's the entire Chinese nation-state backed hackers MO. Steal R&D from Fortune 500 companies to then give it to private Chinese businesses to further the Chinese economy. Why waste your own time/money/resources on R&D when you can just steal it. Same with IP and IP laws. - https://www.cbsnews.com/news/chinese-h…

And all that Silicon Valley is doing is funding young 20 somethings for the next social groupcrap over and over and over. It's not exactly like Silicon Valley is being innovative.

TikTok is just making Silicon Valley mad because they finally met a bigger VC (the Chinese government) running their own playbook and they can't beat it.

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