Just put the political stuff aside, they are often too short for any details over any topics if not straightly brainrot, ending up making people get distracted and lost patience easily. I never a fan of YouTube shorts and instagram reels either because of the same reason.
Perhaps they are good for promotion, but as a user perspective, can anyone really point out one good reason to use these platforms?
It's bonkers to me, but I guess my patterns of information lookup have just calcified with age.
At first, it was all about the novelty: lip-syncing and dance videos. Over time, though, my interests evolved. I started following creators for travel vlogs, occasional financial advice, health tips, yoga and exercise—and last but not least, singing, which I only began at age 55.
I don’t have many viewers, and that’s perfectly fine. My account isn’t about chasing likes or comments. It’s simply a way for people to see who I am rather than engage with a random, unknown profile—if they’re curious enough to look. It also helps avoid mixed signals: when you know who I am (even though you never truly know someone), you can usually tell whether something is meant as a dad joke… or a Daddy joke
As a result, my consumption of TV, Netflix, and HBO has dropped significantly. I find it far more engaging to follow real people and see what they’re doing with their lives. And here’s the irony: aside from the first two or three seasons of Survivor, I’ve never been into reality TV—yet somehow, I’m completely hooked on this one.
[ Wordsmithed by AI ]
Ps: I think my joke has been taken badly by someone. The point is internet with few hundred million or just few million people is a minefield and like now somehow jokes don't click and knowing the person behind the joke, being able to if not ID them at least have them semi public is a credibility bridge that anonymity does not provide. By being public, you are more accountable than you normally would be
They are a replacement for TV. You know, the thing that people used to watch for hours upon hours a day?
Can you tell me what exactly THE ERROR when I want to find a single good thing about TikTok when I don’t understand it?
For your view point, you logic is the following for the good reason using TikTok:
“Addiction is bad, but many people are using it anyway, just like any media back in the days.”
Are you really sure you have answered A GOOD REASON of using TikTok? Sounds like a horrible argument for me. Addiction is a bad habit to begin with, it won’t magically validated just because the media has been changed.
Can you give a GOOD REASON?
Heck, how does that person think people read books? Six to ten hour sitting marathons?
It introduces her to new fashion, new restaurants, new places to visit. Local, hyper local and hidden, and her favorite travel destinations.
It's full of bite size tutorials. Tips and tricks. Genuinely useful stuff. Blogs and websites you'd find this stuff on are not as visual, not as well edited, and are hard to find or full of SEO spam.
It's introduced her to all kinds of hobbies. Gen Z is all about finding old consumer digital cameras from 2000 or even older Kodak one-use disposables and transplanting the lenses. TikTok nucleates these interests and trends.
The news breaks almost immediately on TikTok, and there's immediately insightful community commentary - why would you ever need CNN talking heads?
Every day there's a new "fad". It changes fast, on a day to day basis. Just a few days ago, there was this "an owl but from [x]" meme that was really cute/funny.
TikTok is genuinely everything. It's amazing. Much of the old internet it replaces doesn't hold a candle to it.
Not arguing against the rest of your comment, but I find the concept of "breaking news" to be generally terrible for society. News outlets should wait until they have enough information to present an event as accurately as possible, but the rush to be the one that gets there first means this is often not the case.
And I expect this goes double for randos publishing on TikTok.
The only valid use for “breaking news” imo, are disasters.
For example, one day she came over and showed me a short where this lady was warning women the Rs were starting their discrimination campaigns up, because Kentucky was looking to pass an amendment making women get certified doctor letters on if/the status of their pregnancy.
I called out how ridiculous that was pretty quickly and she told me this is 100% real and the lady in the video wasn't lying. I looked it up, and it was a real proposal[1]... Made several years earlier by a Democrat as a satire bill that was never under true consideration.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/fact-check/kentucky-democrat...
Don't get me wrong, I like instagram for the political commentary; but the vibe is different, Instagram is a supplementary source and not a primary one. It's still not a perfect system either, for example Instagram doesn't allow clickable links which can really hamoer organization and spreading important information.
This is the reason why I have raised this question, as I don’t really understand why people are so into this platform since I don’t enjoy short form contents.
Perhaps just because it is short, with properly use, TikTok can discover many niche topics that we probably don’t know.
Does it change my decision of using this platform? Probably not because I prefer longer and slower paced contents, but I could at least know that TikTok is not just about brainrots or random people dancing like many people as claimed, at least now I know there are people finding their passion in this platform or discovering new place to explore.
My wife loves TikTok to a point that she will take it personally when I complain about it, but I absolutely hate the "vertical short form video" crap that's gotten popular. I'm probably just showing my age, even with my admittedly-quite-flakey attention span, I feel like TikTok and YouTube shorts are just kind of irritating. So much stuff on there is either low-effort crap with lip syncing to some clip from a movie, or shit yelling at me with burned in giant subtitles, both of which are almost certainly part of my own personal hell.
Your situation is similar to why I have quit Pinterest. Memes and jokes are fun, and some of the images are inspiring, but it simply wastes too much valuable time which I can learn something new or take a deep rest.
You know perfectly well that a question-mark does not a question make.
And, apparently you also see the utility in posting very short, dumb sections of content.
So, by your own standards, you should be able to do the math and answer your own so-called question.
For most people, it's a distracting little jolt of dopamine and a way to get quick news or commentary.
It's definitely not good for our brains for that to be the main kind of content we consume, but it's not useless.
You don’t need something to have a point at all, just make something apparently cool or trendy, and there always a crowd rush into the trend. Could you find the point of Labubus or Stanley cups besides its popularity?
I am not going to against the news part, as you could see my other replies from someone who find niche hobbies with it.
The answer to this is the same as the answer to your first question.
I don’t see this is a good reason to use TikTok.