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Signups opened this week for Loops, a short-form looping video app from the creator of Instagram alternative Pixelfed, reports TechCrunch.
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Hmmm…
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Surprised they’re not asking for peoples’ firstborns.
At this point, it’s sounding more and more like a social experiment.
Welp thars a hard no.
What a great way to build trust in a newly born platform! And how respecting to the people that are using the platform! Way to go!
TikTok is popular because it’s addicting, not because it’s useful, so I don’t understand why anyone would use this.
TikTok is popular because it’s addicting, not because it’s useful
TikTok is profitable because it is addictive. But the idea that short-form video is less useful than print or radio is flawed.
I don’t understand why anyone would use this.
For the same reason someone would turn on the TV, download a podcast, or pick up a magazine.
If it doesn’t work out, it doesn’t work out. It seems like an idea worth trying. What is there to lose?
TikTok gathering data and selling it to whoever is a problem but it’s not the problem.
The problem of TikTok and many other social media is that it drains our energy and motivation. It’s like digital weed, creates the feeling that there’s no reason to change things. We can just consume things.
Barkbarkbark
TikTok is designed to make you consume and not meaningfully engage. As complex as the algorithm is, users’ ability to participate in discussions is severely limited.
ByteDance is capable of writing software that predicts what you want to see next, but it can’t write comment sorting, or basic threading like Reddit?
The severe limitations in communication are deliberate. You’re not supposed to engage meaningfully, you’re supposed to look at it, feel something, and then scroll.
One of the reasons I like seeing new social media startups (like Lemmy) is that the current offerings are harmful to us, and any challenge to them as the potential to make positive change.
Bark
That’s a problem. Absolutely. It’s not the problem though. I’m not sure the problem can be summarized so succinctly. This is the way I’ve been putting it:
These are the top reasons humanity needs successful, decentralized, open social media platforms:
- Collecting and selling user’s private data is dangerous and unethical.
- Using that data to intentionally and directly manipulate user’s thinking is even worse.
- All of the major centralized social media companies have been proven to either allow these illicit information campaigns or coordinate them directly. TikTok is the focus right now but Sophie Zhang exposed Facebook for doing exactly what TikTok has been exposed for recently. Can you recall any meaningful consequences for Facebook? Do you think Facebook is now safe to use?
- It’s clear that most political leaders are either too ignorant, too corrupt, or too inept to meaningfully legislate against these problems.
- The concerned public can’t shut Pandora’s box. No one is coming to save us from big tech or the monied interests and nation-states that wield it.
- The concerned public can’t easily and legally audit the platforms big tech builds because they are closed and proprietary.
- Personal choice is not enough. Not using centralized social media increases personal safety but does little to curb its influence otherwise.
These are listed by order of intuitive acceptance rather than importance. I find it aids the conversation.
The best reasonable answer to these problems I’ve seen proposed is for the public to create an open and decentralized alternative that’s easier to use and provides a better user experience.
Will that kind of alternative be a force for pure good? I’m not sure. To your point: I’m not convinced social media of any kind can be more than self-medication to cope with modernity. Then again I’ve had incredible and meaningful conversations with close friends after passing the bong around and spent time on Facebook/Reddit, and now Mastodon/Lemmy/etc, doing the same. Those interactions were uplifting and humanizing in ways that unified and encouraged all involved.
I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle. We need to take care of each other, refuse pure hedonism, and protect the vulnerable (and we’re all varying degrees of vulnerable). At the same time: humans aren’t happy in sterile viceless productivity prisons. Creating spaces for leisure which do no harm in the course of their use isn’t just a nice idea… It’s necessary for a functional and happy society.
it drains our energy and motivation
All this time, I thought the daily grind of employment - consuming 8-12 hours of my day for someone else’s profit - was what exhausted my free time, limited my opportunities for socializing, and drained my enthusiasm for local organizing. Turns out it was the fifteen minutes of free time between meetings checking current events that was to blame.
It’s like digital weed
So its palliative care for our lack of comprehensive healthcare, but even less effective at the job?
Nah man, Social Media Companies are at an evil genius level of greed. They are the ones creating the feeling of consuming a “digital weed,” as you call it. Blaming the users is tantamount to saying the world is polluted because people love cars, as if the oil and gas lobby isn’t cultivating that and profiting massively off of it.
ITT: People in their mid-twenties or later, who feel superior to those that like one form of media over their preferred media.
Elitism aside, I don’t really see what federation solves here. What benefits does federation offer the user? How does the recommendation algorithm give users what they want? How will a decentralised platform perform the kind of centralised events a platform like TikTok is known for?
A distributed service is much less vulnerable to being bought up by a single narcissistic billionaire who can ruin the online experience of millions of people at once.
A distributed service like Lemmy is spread out over 600 Instances in countries all over the world. If someone buys the most popular Lemmy Instance and wrecks it, those users can simply move to the same communities on the second or third or fourth most popular Instance and the original Instance will wither and die. This also works for communities with power tripping moderators. You can quickly find out through a search which community is the “real” one by the number of subscribers it has.
But again, what tangible benefit does that have for the average user? They don’t give a fuck about billionaire ownership, moderation, or where an “instance” or server is located.
Well, you should care about it because that’s how online communities get ruined. Case in point: Twitter has become a propaganda tool for an apartheid-loving fascist since he bought it.
Why should a user care about the health of an online community? To them it should “just work”.
(I’m being purposely facetious here, because the average person really doesn’t care about this shit. When Twitter no longer serves its purpose to them they just leave and go to the next place)
Why should a person who goes to the park care about the park?
If people are dumping trash everywhere and all the plants and animals are dying, I assume you wouldn’t like to spend much time there anymore.
Sure another park might be opened, but constantly changing parks isn’t what you want to do long term. If someone buys up the basketball court and turns it into a cesspool of hate, you can unsubscribe from that court and remove it from your park. Adding another one that is nicer, without completely going to a new park.
But again, what tangible benefit does that have for the average user?
You have more control over your front-page content. If you don’t want to get a particular feed, you unsubscribe from it.
ITT: People in their mid-twenties or later, who feel superior to those that like one form of media over their preferred media.
You’re just waving away an important fact, which is that shorts and their equivalents are notoriously known for killing attention spans and disrupting the management of dopamine in the brain, causing depression in particular.
We are no longer simply in the traditional custom of the elderly who despise the activities of the younger generations, we are talking about health.
While true, how is that any different to the arguments that were used for TV? Additionally, Lemmy is a social network in the same way that Reddit is. Is this not also dangerous?
As has been the recommendation for practically everything for the four decades I’ve been on this earth, moderation is key. Instead of hating new media, either regulate it (if the evidence is truly that great) or treat it with healthy moderation.
Let’s be blunt here. Most of the people in this thread aren’t worried about health. They don’t like short-form video/foreign-owned companies/things they didn’t grow up with, and their elitism is getting the better of them instead of them letting people like what they want to like.
I made a rule that i only do social media on desktop pc. Phone is only for emails and rss feeds. Seems to work
While true, how is that any different to the arguments that were used for TV?
Television is bad because it is a passive activity, but it is less harmful than the continuous ingestion of micro-videos. But I don’t see what it has to do here.
Additionally, Lemmy is a social network in the same way that Reddit is. Is this not also dangerous?
What’s the connection? I didn’t mention Reddit.
As has been the recommendation for practically everything for the four decades I’ve been on this earth, moderation is key. Instead of hating new media, either regulate it (if the evidence is truly that great) or treat it with healthy moderation.
This would be to ignore the particularly addictive nature of this kind of content. It would be like comparing apples to Snickers: both are sweet, yes, but one is much more problematic.
Let’s be blunt here. Most of the people in this thread aren’t worried about health
That could be a point, but I’m pretty sure that if you ask anybody, the main reason given would be that it makes you stupid. But I can agree that this opinion would not necessarily be based on anything other than the eternal contempt for novelty as video games or manga were, for example, before they became popular.
Federation can solve the danger zone content for you, how about a federation network with just kids content, other with more adult ones, etc to the just nsfw isolated from each others?
That’s…actually a really good use case for something like this. I’d argue that a recommendation algorithm that tailors to the best content a given federated service can provide for their use-case is probably a better source than what you’d get from a single source of truth that could give you everything and nothing.
Moderation
You may see shorts in lemmy in the near future because of that.
I don’t think they’ll be able to do any type of direct competition for TikTok with a lack of advertising and payments You’re not going to draw quality creators. Decentralized algorithm sounds like a nightmare to manage.
However one place they will have some advantage is censorship. Anything that’s not explicitly illegal Will be a hell of a lot harder to stamp out. Moderation will probably be very light.
who feel superior to those that like one form of media over their preferred media
I don’t watch the TikToks. I get my information from a source I know I can trust.
What benefits does federation offer the user? How does the recommendation algorithm give users what they want? How will a decentralised platform perform the kind of centralised events a platform like TikTok is known for?
I might argue that the ability to curate your own content, rather than being plugged into the Main Feed that just front-loads whatever the highest bidder wants shoved into your eyeballs, is a relative improvement to the current Facebook/Google ad-supported algorithm model.
But in the end, it just gives more weight to advertisers and influencers. You have to lure people into subscribing (like old school newspapers/radio/TV had to do) rather than buying visual real estate directly in their eye-line. You’re still going to have InfoWars and Drudge Report and Joe Rogan tier content. Its just something you’re going to be baited into opting into rather than struggling to opt out of.
But it will keep you using the Fediverse as a model longer, because you feel like you’ve got a degree of control (I don’t have to listen to Rogan if I don’t want to). Whereas services like YouTube and Facebook are forcing their users to choose between getting injected with the cheapest, hackeyest swill or to switching providers.
Authwalls, data sovereignty, self controlled open source algorithms for finding content without manipulation by corporations, etc
All true, but what explicit problem do they solve for the average user?
Authwalls are an issue for everyone because everyone doesn’t have an account unless they create one.
the benefit i can see is that instead of having to share out to other social media, you can just see it in any fediverse account you have thanks to activity pub which eliminates one of the barriers to being viral.
that said i don’t think it will get mainstream appeal.
Not interested in the short-video concept. But I like the name, though. Short, sweet, doesn’t sound too “techy”, not too complicated to pronounce or spell.
Awesome! This sounds like a much better way for me to share the occasional video of either or both of my dogs being super cute on c/dogs (and on other non-Lemmy forums) than relying on an anonymous YouTube account.
(I may have partially used this post as an excuse to share a video of one of my dogs being super cute.)
I’m still waiting for the further instructions they promised to send by mail lol
Bröthër, whërë ärë my lööps?
big Pete why are you so BIG
Very cool that its federated but to be honest i just dont like this kind of short form content. I ratherd watch a youtube video.
My biggest problem with short form content is I want to pick what I’ll watch based on the uploader, title and thumbnail, not be algorithmically fed videos I may or may not be interested in. All of the video providers are going straight for the algorithm so I have zero interest.
The algorithm won’t know what kind of content I’m in the mood for so I want to be in control to choose. The algorithm also likes to try to feed me content by some creators who aren’t worth my time and I don’t want to watch one second of their videos
Especially repost bots, engagement bait, or just plain misinformation. It’s rampant on Instagram.
In recent months YouTube has been suggesting content that screams “meninist/right wing onboarding” so if I just watched whatever it recommended I might be in a very different place right now…
Short form content ruins people’s attention span. I’ll pass.
Same
Go fediverse 😍
(insert here the “The TikTok at home” meme format) So actually I did my own with PeerTube (self hosted server side) and Latrix (mobile client to live stream) and you can see the result at https://video.benetou.fr/w/p/hfPcHz1kCgnM6zKhfPrS4b (playlist of 6 short videos with progress over time).
I’d argue it… works. Is it necessary or useful? Well I didn’t keep up with the format but it potentially can be. My point being… we already have quite a few tools in place.
Maybe I’m just old, but I traveled by plane recently (I don’t fly very often) and seeing everyone around me mindlessly scrolling short-form video content was shocking. Looked identical to the people in the space ship in WALL-E.
Dude, it’s the airport. It’s boring as fuck.
So are 10 second videos.
Maybe the next one won’t be boring though
Or the next one
One more video and ill stop
Millions upon millions disagree. Some people are alcoholics and some people can enjoy a drink now and then. It’s the same with short form video content. Not everyone is an addict and I like that I can search something and actually get answers instead of an article or 10 minute video begging for subscribers and 1/3 of the video being an intro.
TikTok quantified the precise amount of viewing it takes for someone to form a habit: 260 videos.
Kentucky authorities note that while it might seem a lot, TikTok videos can be just a few seconds long.
“Thus, in under 35 minutes, an average user is likely to become addicted to the platform,” the state investigators concluded.
https://www.npr.org/2024/10/12/g-s1-28040/teens-tiktok-addiction-lawsuit-investigation-documents
If only I could get addicted to something socially acceptable in under 35 minutes, like doing chores, or at least maths
Unfortunately the addictability and social acceptability are mutually exclusive. I can’t think of anything that’s both. Maybe coffee.
I’m a proud #CoffeeHater!
For what it’s worth, getting in the habit of making excuses for one’s use is part of alcoholism.
I’m not an alcoholic and I’m not addicted to TikTok because I watch it at the airport.
Right, exactly this. Also not ALL of the stuff that’s shortform is brain rot or nonsense. There’s so many different people doing so many different things and if you give it a chance enough to find the things you like it can be as enjoyable as a long form YouTube video or whatever form of media you do consider to be more respectable than short form videos. Dismissing ALL short form content is just silly. And sure if you actually just don’t enjoy it than that’s your thing.
You’re right that there is a lot of good content, too. The problem is that a platform doesn’t care as long as you stay and watch, also you’ll need quite a lot of effort to find your own good content. So when I come to YouTube for something and end up watching more, I always know that I failed to YouTube trying to rip me off
They should go do a crossword puzzle and get off my lawn.
Tbh, doesn’t sound like a bad option.
Sudoku is my go-to for boring time on the airplane
Yeah there’s probably a park with a lot more grass
also not a fan of them, but people are enjoying it. so by definition it’s not boring for them
You can have tons of fun at the airport as long as you don’t mind getting on the no-fly list.
Fair, but I traveled for a music festival and saw lots of people pulling up their phones to get a few hits of TikTok/insta when there was a small lull in action. And most of them were with friends. Just enjoy your surroundings.
I was at a party with a small group of friends recently. We were all talking in a group and then one guy started watching tik/insta/whatever with the volume on. Everyone kinda looked at each other like wtf? I asked our friend if he wanted to borrow my headphones to watch that. He took the hint and rejoined the conversation. I still was gobsmacked someone would do that while hanging out with people.
Endorphins are a hell of a drug.
Next time I’m in an airport food court I’ll try to really take in the view of the cinnabon next to the starbucks.
And there are so many things you could do even just on your phone than mindless, objectively bad for your mental health shit like tiktok style content. Watch actual videos about interesting, cool and/or fun things, play a game, talk with a friend etc.
TikTok DOES have videos of interesting, cool, fun, and even educational things. If the algorithm has you on garbage, it’s because of what you watch.
The way you write tells me you are young.
The older you get (and having a family of your own) the more you enjoy the quiet moments, just like the ones when you sit in an airport, waiting for the plane.
It’s really feels like a weight has been lifted from your shoulders.
I’m 37 with 2 kids. Sometimes I watch short form videos to kill time when bored. I’m aware of the fact that it’s not great for me. I also drink too much caffeine.
WALL-E was depressingly prescient.
As opposed to doing what exactly?
If you are upset by the video length I can provide you plenty of videos of absolute tosh that are over 18 minutes long.
Reading, maybe. People don’t read actual literature as much as they used to.
A long video would also be better for you, yes, instead of being designed to catch your attention and keep giving you dopamine hits.
What tf you want them to do?
I don’t see how reading magazines, what people used to do, is any better.
I’m not an expert, so take this as far as you’d like — reading has real benefits to our brains such as improving vocabulary, improving critical thinking skills, and improving focus. I don’t think short form videos give us the same brain benefits.
Here’s an article from Piedmont health on the benefits of reading. I haven’t seen such an article for short form videos, but am open to it if there is one.
https://www.piedmont.org/living-real-change/health-benefits-of-reading
You don’t see how reading is better than watching a video?
Doesn’t it depend on the content? Textbook vs tabloid magazine/ educational video vs top 10 celebrity meltdowns. I don’t see how one medium is inherently better than the other.
It depends on the content, not the media.
Why have we got to gatekeep absolutely everything?
Reading the same nonsense isn’t any different from watching it
Instagram has been getting me with this. I like to post sometimes, but my friends and I recently compared our screen time stats and I couldn’t believe I was regularly wasting hours a day mindlessly scrolling IG. I uninstalled the app and will just occasionally post from my computer.
I took it off my home screen and started using one of those screen time apps. I check it two or three times a day now, instead of however many it was before.
I’m glad there’s still a place left for us old curmudgeons that isn’t overrun by normies yet. i saw somebody suggest hosting things on tor, just for the purpose of keeping normies away from it. hilarious but probably would work great!
TikTok has 2 versions:
One is what we use. People mindlessly scroll brainrot contents with algorithm desinged to as addictive as possible.
Another one is chinese version. It has actualy useful and educative content, but its China only.
I don’t think the national security risk from tiktok is people watching it while waiting an hour for the plane to actually take off.
it’s from the clear boosting of propaganda.
The boosting of propaganda and the identification, tracking and exploitation of government targets.
People in key government positions are still people like us and they love social media too. Having an app on their phone doing data mining can identify people of interest and then collect data, target and compromise them. Even without the app on a government issued phone they can identify key people using their personal phones and then target them for more sophisticated surveillance.
As a Chinese person, no. Chinese version is just censored more. Both are good as far as format goes.
I’m not in china and I get chess, math and physics videos.
Regardless of whether the content is “useful and educative” or “brainrot”, I just don’t seem how you can comprehend rapidly-changing and very short content at all, this just seems unnatural. Is that how ADHD feels like? And not like you can get comprehensive knowledge from such bite-sized videos anyway, maximum disjointed factoids.
Yeah, fucking sheep!
I also thought about those scenes in Wally when I was walking the dog the other day.
Soon all of us will float around in armchairs and never step outside.
Welcome to the new world.
PS: I am old too.
Ignoring the myriad of other issues listed in this thread, the bit about training AI is pretty misleading. It’s not hard to scrape webpages for whatever kind of data you like, even if loops doesn’t outright hand things over for third parties for that purpose.
And the kind of people who are downloading the entire internet to train AIs are the type to be willing to just scrape without permission.
And while they claim in their FAQ to not sell your content and/or use it or provide it to others as GenAI training data, according to the Terms&Services you have to grant them the right to do pretty much exactly that (and everything else): https://loops.video/legal/terms-of-service#7
They are claiming not to train AI using your videos/info theirselves. I don’t think it’s misleading just because other people can scrape that info.
loops doesn’t outright hand things over for third parties for that purpose.
Hey, check it out; it’s the thing loops said buried in the middle of your paragraph highlighting what other parties can or will do.
Not that that has anything to do with them of course.
I don’t think TikTok community is compatible with the idea of fediverse
TikTok exists to give you large floods of endorphins via either an algorithm trained to your interests or by giving you big numbers. And this is not exclusive to TikTok, this is just how modern “social” media works, it’s the sole reason why bluesky succeeded more than mastodon
Modern social media is mostly a hive mind of people affirming each other driven by algorithms. Fediverse on the other hand, always boils down to a old fashioned usenet style network made just so people can talk with each other. You can’t really get addicted to fedi
I wasn’t really alive during the wild west internet (im 19). I got into the net during the transition from forums to modern social media and reddit was my first social. I tried getting into facebook and instagram because everyone else was there but I just didn’t like it much.
I don’t know why but “the algorithm” is really boring for me. I only tried algorithm driven feeds on reddit (after u/spez) and on tumblr but the recommendations were always extremely “fake”. Other sorting methods like “new” or “by most active” just feel more like as if there was someone on the other side of the keyboard
You can’t really get addicted to fedi
Hmm… anxiously eyeing my Lemmy post history…
Yeah, I’m not as addicted to Lemmy as I was with Reddit, because there aren’t as many comments and niche communities and an algorithm messing with me, but like I check Lemmy throughout each day and if I’m honest there’s not much purpose aside from getting that hit.
I’m kinda in line with you, but I have noticed that there are more days and even weeks if I’m busy where I never look at Lemmy. I don’t think I went a full day without Reddit unless I specifically decided to for like a trip with an SO or family
You can’t really get addicted to fedi
Phew, I was getting a bit worried.
Could be worse. Could be flying squid.
Partly why I use Voyager with page numbers. Gives you a clear stop point.
I had some days that I spent hours debating with people, other days I just chill and chat with people, particularly on Mastodon.
and then theres… Lemmy, I was probably addicted to the hardest. The score system would keep me checking it and i’d be interested in keeping my score up high. I’d even argue that it made me a better human being.
Me too😂
An interesting point, that a lot of younger people might not know: social media wasn’t always like this.
When I joined facebook around 2008-09, it wasn’t algorithm driven, there weren’t even ads. You had a chronological feed of your friends’ interactions, so you could see if someone posts a photo, comments something, or shares a stupid quiz. It was a very-very different feeling compared to what we have now. It was useful and practical, but the enshittification killed it.
I would never sign up for something like this today, absolutely useless - only reason I’m still there is the messaging app, which I use daily with most of my friends/family.
I have been so happy since I’ve adopted the “intentional browsing” concept. It means I am the only one choosing what I want to see so I use NewPipe instead of YouTube, Mastodon instead of Twitter, Lemmy and a RSS reader instead of Reddit. My life has improved so much I am not even kidding. I feel ‘clean’
I would like to read an elaborate post about this!
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I don’t think anything is un-addictable (making up words here). I do agree that the social media mindset and fedi are not compatible though, basically because of the algorithm concept.
At the end of the day I hate all social media because they feed me what they think I want to eat. Regardless of how well they do that I hate the concept because I want to decide for myself what I want to partake in. Fedi allows that without getting in my way.
It’s weird seeing how “the algorithm” has genuinely only made things worse. Falling into the YouTube rabbit hole was a thing, and it was entirely organic. From the loose connections of topics, you could start from any feel good funny video, and end in detailed documentary about MK Ultra.
The best algorithm was no algorithm and there’s no way of ever going back to that. I feel pretty lucky to have experienced the internet before it became everything.
I don’t think algorithms themselves are to blame but what they are tuned for. While engagement/eyeball hours for the adserver is the prime metric the quality of experience will be subservient to it. If the algorithms could better measure your mood and stimulation levels and maximise for that the effect would be less toxic. Ideally if it realised you were just mindlessly consuming it could suggest maybe you’ve done enough today and to try something else. But that I fear that is not something the owners of the various ecosystems want.
my favorite feel good funny videos are about Mk Ultra and the three letter agencies (IRS FDA MSG)
I’d be surprised if it wasn’t a bit more subtle than that. While the medium really facilitate the behavior that you describe, I’m pretty sure that it also hosts sane usages, creative content and positive communities.
Sounds cool for hosting videos! Maybe I’ll try it.
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