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Comment by spunker540 | Hacker News Reader

Why do you think complex algos, complex feeds, across large search space (all content instead of friends and family) turns out to be more profitable? Are ads suddenly more valuable in that context? I don’t think so. And it’s certainly much more expensive to operate than a simple chronological feed of friends and family.

It comes down to time spent. People spend more time on the apps and see more ads. We can argue over whether that’s a sign people like the app more… but no one is being forced to scroll a feed they don’t enjoy. Interesting that people “are begging for changes” yet using the apps more and more anyways.

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Addictiveness is not necessarily an indicator of utility. Drug addicts keep going back to heroin even if it's ruining their lives.

Just because I feel compelled to scroll and endless, algorithmic feed it does not mean that this is how I want to use social media or that such usage reflects the role I want it to have in my life.

The average American watches close to 3 hours of tv per day— I just don’t see what the fuss is about. It seems like you simply don’t approve of how other people choose to spend their time.

It's almost a self fulfilling effect at this point.

Scrolling a feed doesn't mean a person is watching the feed, in fact you could argue the opposite. It seems like the content is engineered to be skipped over while still registering as a view.

My, thank god people are perfect utility-optimising machines and not complex brains with a ton of psychological and neurological weaknesses and quirks :-)

If people behaved like you're saying there would be no drug addicts or gambling addicts, or even obesity or depression.

There's definitely a school of thought that goes "If they're gambling, then gambling must be their highest value; and they're lying if they say otherwise."

"Revealed preferences", if you want something to search for. The most obvious issue is that humans aren't utility-maximizers.

> but no one is being forced to scroll a feed they don’t enjoy

On what do you base this?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doomscrolling

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