TikTok has definitely become the platform for short form video content. It used to be YouTube, but it's since matured into a place to watch more well produced videos in the 20 minute range. If you haven't given TikTok a chance, try it out.
Won’t be surprised to see it eventually happen.
I'd say 1B users don't really care, and rightly so, because really the data of which Tik-Tok videos you watch is not really something life threatening for most of them.
None of these 1B users upload their credit card info or social security numbers to the platform.
People didn't care after the Equifax hack, and that had far more personal information.
Please stop with the Sinophobia already
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/9/11/sinophobia-the-...
American apathy on data privacy has created some real monsters, but those monsters are not comparable to the CCP.
Calling it Sinophobia dismisses it as an irrational fear.
It is largely undisputed that the CCP dragnet tracks, manipulates, and censors the most minutiae of details to actively shape and control the culture of billions of people while also disappearing millions that don't conform to be tortured and killed in concentration camps.
It should be assumed any product operating under CCP rule will at some point be covertly used to further the surveillance dominance of the CCP.
It is possible to have great respect for the Chinese people and their rich history and culture while also having a very healthy fear for giving the CCP more ways to extend their culture control goals beyond their borders.
TikTok has already been been caught censoring CCP criticism: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/sep/25/revealed-...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcX2O47NZuc
I take issue with everything you've written. You somehow still believe the words you use are themselves evidence (and it's obvious they originate from western media firms who manufacture consent - it impacts you (unconsciously) even if you consider yourself very progressive/leftist).
Who controls the world through financial imperialism? It isn't China.
Seriously, please consider a few of these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2khAmMTAjI
(It wasn’t trusting my incognito mode when using playwright, but saving session while in iPhone mode worked)
I am well aware of the privacy and social issues around using those websites. Being careful and mindful with my access and the content I let them receive (e.g. limiting permissions via a browser instead of native app, not uploading my entire life to the site, not regularly interacting with the content) is how I manage my personal risk.
If you're aware of some methods Facebook is using to break out of the browser sandbox and access my content without my permission, then by all means I'm open to review any sources you may have to suggest that my mobile browser is an inappropriate tool for restricting access.
Of course, every deal with the devil offers something in the short term.
TikTok is imho one of the closest approximations of a marketplace of ideas, or a penny-university. Every topic under the sun is talked about (even if TikTok tries to censor a bunch of topics), you have various experts from their fields giving insights into their daily lives (like snippets from the daily life on an arctic base) or short tutorials (how to draw an owl kind of stuff), but also discussions about philosophy or how to deal with daily life (e.g. how to declutter your space if you are depressed, or how to arrange furniture). And unlike e.g. YouTube's recommendation algorithm that makes everything seem bland because it only shows you stuff that's like stuff you already know, TikTok's algorithm keeps exposing you to new things tangentially related to what you watched/liked, so it's more like drifting though an ocean of videos, with new stuff happening all the time.
That said, TikTok should totally be enjoyed in moderation, and there are some places on TikTok you should avoid. If you linger on videos showing teens twerking, you will get more videos of teens twerking; and it's easy to see how that kind of content makes it a worse place for teens specifically (plus the extreme prevalence of filters, so everyone on TikTok looks "better" than their real life version)
Millennials created this trend, Generation Z is growing it. Social media is essentially an addicting & fun platform for mass brainwashing.
Individual humans got along just fine for millennia without being able to broadcast the minutia of their thoughts for likes and subscribes: what are we really gaining by suddenly being able to do so in the course of two decades, and is it really worth the trade offs?
1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_coffeehouses_in_the_17...
That aside, my broader concern is with our civilizational stability. We are still too close to and to involved in the events of the past two years to achieve any kind of objectivity, but I am increasingly concerned that, at least in the American context, things are not going to work out. Between worsening climate change, an incipient and solidifying neo-Fascist mass movement, the disinformational chaos of social media, the mass death of a pandemic, and an increasingly sclerotic US hegemony, our civilization is experiencing profound pressures of the sort which historically presaged extended periods of violence and chaos.
I hope that I am completely wrong, but it’s difficult to read the stories (and for that matter the crueler comments) of r/HermanCainAward and not come away with the conclusion that social media has broken our society to the tune of 2000 unvaccinated dead per day and counting.
Why would someone for whom reading requires little effort want to engage with people for whom reading requires too much effort?
Given they are fairly aggressive at censoring views that run against progressive perspectives, can they really be a true marketplace of ideas? Topics like the lab leak theory or nuanced views on trans issues will net you a ban a lot sooner than on other platforms.
[0] meme reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NywzrUJnmTo
[1] how to fold ingredients: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1JjaT-Y8Pc
Downsides of tiktok is:
* can’t find upload date
* cant effectively share links in comments (they aren’t clickable)
* pretty confusing video editor if you don’t wanna share results
It's not about content, it's about communicating with video snippets.
If it was simply the short video aspect lending itself to feeling like it's a conversation that's driving engagement, Vine wouldn't have died the ignoble death it did. So imo there's more to it than that but it's definitely successful.
It is about content (imo) but that content came at the exact right time in humanity's history - during a pandemic when many people are feeling lonely, and a time when many people have their own smartphone and Internet is ubiquitous. The content, along with the algorithm surfacing it, is highly personal. While a video is obviously not personally made for me, the character in the video talks to me like it was, and that small delusion, makes the content highly engaging, and the short duration makes for more signal to plug into the algorithm.
But if you do want to consume sensory input, what I find TikTok excels at is: * Dances / skits * Musical collaborations (esp. The Wellerman) * Funny little videos like with a kitten or puppy * Recipes / cooking techniques
It’s only recently in response to TikTok that they had YouTube Shorts, a “timeline” that occasionally shows up on your feed consisting of 1-3mins(?) videos.
I’ve tried to see what all the fuss is about multiple times and from what I’ve seen it just seems so out of character for the HN crowd to like that platform.
> My impression is that TikTok is the most shameless exploiter of curating content to maximize attention. You resign all the control and hope to petition "the algorithm" to change what you get to see -- like some kind of a god that ultimatly controls you, no matter what you sacrifice. They are in a position to spread propaganda and prevent imformation from spreading -- or you from being heard. Even more so, this can be individualized (especially with the rise of virtual influencers). I wonder, if it might eventually be able to change someone's mind by slowly nudging them in the right direction, breaking down pre-existing beliefs and positions. And as youtube, twitter, etc. have shown, one of the main ways to increase addiction is to spread controversy. Have people screem and cry at one another, who wants mediation? Society is being reduced to a means of entertainment.
Considering that one out of eight human being are using this app is terrifying to me. Even more when considering that people in the third world might be less likely to use a video-intensive service like this, meaning that in the first-world, especially among people my age the rate is even higher! I consider it a concrete danger, that should be taken seriously.
Yes, everyone using TikTok as their only source of news and entertainment is incredibly bad. But that can be said (and has been said) about almost any source of news or entertainment. We should rather teach us and our children healthy engagement with media, how to avoid addiction and how to make sure we engage with different platforms.
If you don't let any one platform monopolize your attention, having a Chinese platform as counterbalance to all the American platforms seems great. A Chinese platform is unlikely to have the same interests as a US platform, so it's easier to see the bias in either if you consume both.