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by squigz 211 days ago
> Even if you're just watching turtles for 30 seconds, the loop and the switch to next video are fast-paced context switching, which is stimulating.

I'll agree that it's stimulating... I guess the question is then: how stimulating it is, vs how stimulating the content itself is? As the initial comment said, we need more data on the specific types of content.
1 comments
chickensong 211 days ago
It's an interesting question. Personally, I feel like it's a combination of factors.

On the content side, I think the content editing can have more of an impact than the subject itself. For example, I can watch something like a fast-paced action movie with a reasonable amount of camera tricks for a couple hours without any noticeable strain, but 30 mins of a modern cooking show can be exhausting just because the average time between camera cuts and zooms is only a few seconds. The latter jams so much stimulation into a small window that baking a cake is on par with a car chase.

On the format side, regardless of content, the loop and video switch gives me similar vibes to the editing tricks, but ofc the short video probably also contains similar editing, so it's a double whammy, and likely spread across different subjects as you scroll every minute or so. Bonus points if the content itself is stimulating.

If the modern cooking show I described is cocaine, doom scrolling shorts is crack cocaine. Harder, faster, more addictive.

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squigz 211 days ago
Aye, the fast-paced editing is extremely jarring. Another variable that makes these discussions so difficult to reach a conclusion! :( We need to consider stuff like this - content and subject matter, not just format - when it comes to figuring out what is harmful about this stuff, not just say "short form videos are bad!"

Very similar to social media. What is it about social media that's harmful? Is it the connecting with other humans - which seems to me to define social media? Or is it the algorithms? The infinite scrolling? Something else?

(I'm not denying we're facing very serious issues that are certainly being exacerbated if not entirely caused by popular uses of online platforms; I want to solve those issues. I just want to solve them in a productive and non-reductive manner. Taking correlations and running with them is not that, and will not only not solve the problems, but will lead to massive privacy and security issues (see: ID verification))

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