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Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

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Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#141

Post by ryandrake »

cwkoss wrote: post #78
slowmovintarget wrote: post #32

The Three Trends (according to the article): 1. Medium: text -> images -> video -> 3D graphics -> VR 2. AI: time -> rank -> recommend -> generate 3. UI: click -> scroll -> tap -> swipe -> autoplay By this definition, the end of the line is a totally passive consumption of endorphin-inducing pablum that blots out the real world. (I may be exaggerating a touch.) It might stop short of a wire into the pleasure centers o…

VR is never going to be a replacement for short form video. Casual passive consumption of video benefits from being able to fit in between other activities easily. I'm never going to want an immersive experience when I have 2 minutes to kill waiting for a friend to show up at a bar - I just want easily digestible content snacks.

> Casual passive consumption of video benefits from being able to fit in between other activities easily. I'm never going to want an immersive experience when I have 2 minutes to kill waiting for a friend to show up at a bar - I just want easily digestible content snacks.

This presumes the existence of important "other activities", and relegates this content consumption as some lower-priority thing done between these activities. I know people who really don't have any important other activities: passively scrolling through video after video is their primary activity. For this [I'd guess growing] group, VR's ability to block out the unimportant real-world is the next obvious step.

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#142

Post by HappySweeney »

jonny_eh wrote: post #136
HappySweeney wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't so much that they are addicted (though they are), but that someone will take their spot while they are up.

That's just a rationalization they tell themselves.

It's more than that. In a game like roulette, probability has no memory. In slots, the payout must come eventually, and playing losing rounds only brings you closer to that. There are slots players just waiting for others to go bust so they can swoop in.

Also, one would hope that those that are so addicted that they are fine to just haul-off and piss themselves would be able to think ahead and simply wear a diaper.

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#143

Post by gen220 »

ricardobeat wrote: post #135
benreesman wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might enjoy The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect [1]. It addresses these themes quite directly. The thing is, we're sort of talking (still somewhat hypothetically) about the Internet becoming more like hard drugs here in terms of entertainment/pleasure/addiction potential, which puts pretty much everyone except for (by HN standards) serious conservatives in a bind on slamming social media: liberals like me and th…

There is most definitely something different at play here, though I can't point out exactly what. It's hard to imagine a 60-year old grandmother hooked on crack, porn or painkillers, but I know several who spend 8+ hours a day glued to a screen playing Candy Crush.

I think it's that crack, porn, and painkillers are, to varying extents, counterculture or taboo. Whereas an "innocent" Candy Crush addiction is more socially acceptable.

It's fun to speculate on why that's the case, but it seems likely intractable to nail down.

Although, I'll point out that while they're both categories of addiction, pension funds can only invest in and make profits from the more "innocent-feeling" category.

I'd guess that, if there were a regulatory environment that allowed for public companies that could legally encourage people to indulge their $taboo_addiction, then said $taboo_addiction would cease to be taboo and become more prevalent, for better and worse.

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#144

Post by evouga »

hammock wrote: post #108
cwkoss wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

VR is never going to be a replacement for short form video. Casual passive consumption of video benefits from being able to fit in between other activities easily. I'm never going to want an immersive experience when I have 2 minutes to kill waiting for a friend to show up at a bar - I just want easily digestible content snacks.

>Casual passive consumption of video benefits from being able to fit in between other activities easily The same was said of video vs. reading. “I’m never going to want a video experience, it doesn’t fit in between other activities as well as reading a page of something.”

Sure, but plenty of people still browse Reddit or Instagram (or HackerNews), listen to podcasts, etc.

There is a middle ground between "AR will never take off as an entertainment medium" and "AR will kill video/images/text."

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#145

Post by scottmcdot »

slowmovintarget wrote: post #32

The Three Trends (according to the article): 1. Medium: text -> images -> video -> 3D graphics -> VR 2. AI: time -> rank -> recommend -> generate 3. UI: click -> scroll -> tap -> swipe -> autoplay By this definition, the end of the line is a totally passive consumption of endorphin-inducing pablum that blots out the real world. (I may be exaggerating a touch.) It might stop short of a wire into the pleasure centers o…

Can I coin the term "recommedia"?

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#146

Post by ryandrake »

thelock85 wrote: post #88
slowmovintarget wrote: post #32

The Three Trends (according to the article): 1. Medium: text -> images -> video -> 3D graphics -> VR 2. AI: time -> rank -> recommend -> generate 3. UI: click -> scroll -> tap -> swipe -> autoplay By this definition, the end of the line is a totally passive consumption of endorphin-inducing pablum that blots out the real world. (I may be exaggerating a touch.) It might stop short of a wire into the pleasure centers o…

This reminds me of the evolution of the slot machine (as read in Matthew Crawford's The World Beyond Your Head ). A rough analog would be: 1. Medium: Mechanical reel > Digital reel 2. Gameplay: Fixed odds > Adjustable odds > Programmatic adaptive odds 3. Experience: Pull the lever and win or lose > Pull the lever and win even if you lose (e.g. get back change) > Swipe a card and win even if you lose > Swipe a card an…

Reminds me a little of Star Trek TNG's The Game[1], where the crew becomes addicted to an automated AR/VR game that just sits there autoplaying, directly manipulating the brain's pleasure sensors. Something like this, but one that also slowly transfers the contents of the user's bank account to a corporation, could be the ultimate end-result of our current capitalist-technologist trajectory.

1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Game_(Star_Trek:_The_Next_...

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#147

Post by evouga »

bmazed wrote: post #101
nomel wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, I think most everyone agrees that XR is the future, not VR. XR could easily take the replacement.

over/under 2040 ?

Under. Way under.

Google Glass's spectacular failure had a chilling effect on the entire industry, but it failed due to (1) lack of killer apps, (2) poor aesthetics, and (3) consumer concern about privacy.

But ML has revolutionized image and video processing, Apple etc. could design a less hideous headset, and nobody cares about privacy anymore.

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#148

Post by evouga »

slowmovintarget wrote: post #32

The Three Trends (according to the article): 1. Medium: text -> images -> video -> 3D graphics -> VR 2. AI: time -> rank -> recommend -> generate 3. UI: click -> scroll -> tap -> swipe -> autoplay By this definition, the end of the line is a totally passive consumption of endorphin-inducing pablum that blots out the real world. (I may be exaggerating a touch.) It might stop short of a wire into the pleasure centers o…

"Medium" and "AI" are spot-on IMO, but the "UI" track seems suspect to me.

"Click" and "Tap" are essentially the same thing (on a desktop vs. on a mobile device): the user actively selecting what content to view next. So are "scroll" and "autoplay" (for text/image and video content, respectively). In the former, the user has agency over what to view, and in the latter, the transition is automated.

I'm very skeptical that fully automated UI will ever replace giving the user a small selection of recommended items.

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#149

Post by nomel »

evouga wrote: post #147
bmazed wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

over/under 2040 ?

Under. Way under. Google Glass's spectacular failure had a chilling effect on the entire industry, but it failed due to (1) lack of killer apps, (2) poor aesthetics, and (3) consumer concern about privacy. But ML has revolutionized image and video processing, Apple etc. could design a less hideous headset, and nobody cares about privacy anymore.

> could design a less hideous headset, and nobody cares about privacy anymore.

I think it would help to not make most of the promotional material about video recording, and not make a huge camera the most visible feature. I don't think it's a coincidence that the Quest lineup, including rumored Cambria and Apple renders, obscure the forward looking cameras.

Google Glass picture, which looks like a webcam on your face: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2014/feb/19/google-gl...

Re: Instagram, TikTok, and the Three Trends

#150

Post by joegahona »

NCC1701DEngage wrote: post #124
jatins wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that it's not clear (at least to me) whether adding the "Youtube face" is making people click on the videos more, or is it just making YouTube push the video to a wider audience resulting in higher engagement. Is there some way to assert "Given the same audience of X people, adding such thumbnails results in more clicks"?

It is pretty obvious as a creator. The analytics available encourage experimentation. You find that mentioning subscribing or making a more visually engaging thumbnail will significantly boost important metrics like CTR. CTR is a metric almost entirely dependent on thumbnail image, although title and description play small roles, and CTR is an incredibly important metric for getting the content served by the algorith…

"Please take a moment to subscribe" and "smash that bell icon" are the video version of "Subscribe to my crappy newsletter" popups. And before that, in the world of print magazines, it was multiple subscription cards that fell into your lap -- even if you were already a subscriber. The reason is an unsatisfying one: They work, and it's difficult to measure penalty metrics that show they're causing more harm than good.

I would think a human face would be the most effective thumbnail, and that there are psychological reasons for this. When I worked in print magazines, there were metrics thrown around a lot for how well cover subjects did in terms of newsstand copies sold: Animals > inanimate objects; Humans > animals; color > b&w; photos > illustrations; eye contact with the camera > looking away; females > males.

Apps are also getting into the fun, and tons are now including screaming faces[1] as their icon, no matter how related to the gameplay. Can't wait for a productivity app trying to pull off this icon...

[1] https://i.redd.it/2t190ls2j2571.png

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