I don’t know why people are underestimating Instagram Reels. Instagram may be becoming more of an entertainment app like TikTok but it is still a social network. All content creators care about is engagement, and having the ability to push your short video into your Stories and your follower’s main feed increases your chances of it being seen instead of relying on an algorithm.
TikTok and the network effects of creativity
21–30 of 72 posts
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#22The author is very incorrect. > By network effects of creativity, I mean that every additional user on TikTok makes every other user more creative. That is false. TikTok isn't a creativity amplification network, it's a mimic network. The extreme majority of humans are mimics, they essentially never create or do anything creative or original. They are incapable of that (cue the outrage at such a statement, even though…
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Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#23The author is very incorrect. > By network effects of creativity, I mean that every additional user on TikTok makes every other user more creative. That is false. TikTok isn't a creativity amplification network, it's a mimic network. The extreme majority of humans are mimics, they essentially never create or do anything creative or original. They are incapable of that (cue the outrage at such a statement, even though…
Sounds like you're talking about the difference between a sourcerer and a wizard in Discworld.
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#24The author is very incorrect. > By network effects of creativity, I mean that every additional user on TikTok makes every other user more creative. That is false. TikTok isn't a creativity amplification network, it's a mimic network. The extreme majority of humans are mimics, they essentially never create or do anything creative or original. They are incapable of that (cue the outrage at such a statement, even though…
> The extreme majority of humans are mimics, they essentially never create or do anything creative or original. They are incapable of that (cue the outrage at such a statement, even though it's true).
Of course people are going to be outraged over the statement. You're playing a semantic game where you came up with your own definition of creativity that excludes what most people do, and then not actually defining it or justifying it. If you used a more common definition of creative you'd have no argument to make.
Novelty isn't the only thing that makes something creative, a string of randomly generated numbers is always novel but wouldn't be considered creative. Creativity requires novelty conveyed through recognizable patterns, which means some amount of mimicry has to be involved.
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#25The author is very incorrect. > By network effects of creativity, I mean that every additional user on TikTok makes every other user more creative. That is false. TikTok isn't a creativity amplification network, it's a mimic network. The extreme majority of humans are mimics, they essentially never create or do anything creative or original. They are incapable of that (cue the outrage at such a statement, even though…
> The extreme majority of humans are mimics, they essentially never create or do anything creative or original. They are incapable of that (cue the outrage at such a statement, even though it's true). Of course people are going to be outraged over the statement. You're playing a semantic game where you came up with your own definition of creativity that excludes what most people do, and then not actually defining it…
Every dictionary definition of the word I’m looking at right now includes the words “original”, “originality”, or “not imitated.”
I think the word “prolific” applies to what TikTok facilitates, much more than the word “creative.” And personally I find the amount of word for word and beat for beat mimicry on the app maddening.
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#26This comment is a slightly tangential shameless plug, but I just want to point out that I loved the structure of this essay. There were a lot of great little ideas that I don't think would have seen the light of day in a more traditional sort of blog post. > All the points I wanted to cover seem hyperlinked in a sprawling loose tangle. This could easily have been several standalone posts. I've been stuck on how to st…
What kind of format would it be published in? This is pretty interesting as it is a problem I struggle with too. Your landing page there reminds me of something else I’m a fan of, e.g. Building a Second Brain through notes and web clips as discussed here: https://tanners.blog/diy-second-brain/ But these are more focused solely on the background processes of organizing information. I’m curious about how your system wo…
I'm a fan of Building a Second Brain too, and I've taken a lot of inspiration from it. In fact, the precise reason I'm working on this project is because "organizing information as a background process" feels a bit too much like navel gazing to me and things are a lot more fun when the process includes interacting and sharing with other people.
The particular way I'm attempting to encourage publishing is an editor that lets you lay out your stuff as a directed graph instead of as a linked list. The reader navigates the graph by clicking on hyperlinks that take them in tangential directions that may or may not converge with the main thread.
The inspiration for this includes those really good conversations you have with your friends where you go completely off topic but in an interesting way, and also the experience of going down a wikipedia or tvtropes rabbit hole that consumes hours of your time.
It's a tough problem because your eyes and ears are only able to process information serially, but concept-space is a complex multi-dimensional snaggle. How do we bridge that gap? The conventional answer is "good writing" but that's really tough to do. Eugene Wei didn't feel up to the task with the ideas in the OP, for example. I'm hoping that by giving people more room to play with how they structure their thoughts and ideas "writing skill" will be less of a constraint on human communication. I definitely don't think I've hit an optimal solution yet but it is a very fun problem to work on and talk about!
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe all creativity is just mimics who repeat things and add a little bit of variation. I think the book Steal Like an Artist addresses this.
Or maybe it isnt, and the great breakthroughs are the result of fantastic imaginative and courageous minds.
I dont think this is true. Creativity happens when you combine/blend prior knowledge. We don't magically create new information without prior meaning.
TikTok acts likes this and the remix is like a blending/combining prior creativity that leads to continuous new creativity.
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or maybe it isnt, and the great breakthroughs are the result of fantastic imaginative and courageous minds.
I dont think this is true. Creativity happens when you combine/blend prior knowledge. We don't magically create new information without prior meaning. TikTok acts likes this and the remix is like a blending/combining prior creativity that leads to continuous new creativity.
This very easily refuted, then no creativity is possible because who was going to create the "first knowledge"
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#29The most disruptive part of Tiktok is how it managed to dramatically reduce the "rich gets richer" effect of entertainment platforms. If you upload a video, TikTok will show it to other users even if it's your first. This allows them to assess it and progressively grow its audience. On YouTube and Instagram you'd have to rely on search traffic or external sources to build up your audience and get recommended (except for the new Reels / YouTube Shorts that are mimicking TikTok's UI).
I've done an experiment on the new year and created a video on a new account trying to catch people's attention (relevant to the new year, funny, with something unusual). I've done i on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. On TikTok it gained over half a million views, with 0 views on YouTube and Instagram.
Another way to frame this is around the Gini Coefficient of these platform. TikTok has a much lower inequality measure, which increases the incentives to produce content and hence the quality of content.
Re: TikTok and the network effects of creativity
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or maybe it isnt, and the great breakthroughs are the result of fantastic imaginative and courageous minds.
Fantastic and courageous minds working from the void? Or fantastic and courageous minds responding to some cultural or historical material? (Which would be much in the way a TikToker responds to a meme while adding some of their own spice). Let’s not get bogged down by the fact that one domain might be perceived as more valuable/respected and the other not so. What have philosophers ever done post-Socrates except com…
Yes, fantastic and courageous minds. The kind of person we all due our civilization: Newton, Hooke, Darwin,Gauss, Euler,Watts.