this post was submitted on 26 Oct 2024
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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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[–] dumbass@leminal.space 2 points 1 day ago

The first round of applications are for ios only, android has to wait, would have liked to have known that information before I spent the last week waiting.

[–] Schmerzbold@feddit.org 45 points 3 days ago (5 children)

Hmmm…

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[–] WhyFlip@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago

Surprised they're not asking for peoples' firstborns.

[–] dezmd@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago

Welp thars a hard no.

[–] ObsidianZed@lemmy.world 8 points 3 days ago

At this point, it's sounding more and more like a social experiment.

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[–] vga@sopuli.xyz 52 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (4 children)

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.

[–] literally_a_dog@lemm.ee 24 points 3 days ago

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

[–] derek@infosec.pub 12 points 3 days ago

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:

  1. Collecting and selling user's private data is dangerous and unethical.
  2. Using that data to intentionally and directly manipulate user's thinking is even worse.
  3. 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?
  4. It's clear that most political leaders are either too ignorant, too corrupt, or too inept to meaningfully legislate against these problems.
  5. 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.
  6. The concerned public can't easily and legally audit the platforms big tech builds because they are closed and proprietary.
  7. 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.

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[–] sudoer777@lemmy.ml 34 points 3 days ago (2 children)

TikTok is popular because it's addicting, not because it's useful, so I don't understand why anyone would use this.

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 16 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

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.

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[–] precarious_primes@lemmy.ml 276 points 4 days ago (21 children)

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.

[–] NineMileTower@lemmy.world 250 points 4 days ago (10 children)

Dude, it's the airport. It's boring as fuck.

[–] conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works 107 points 4 days ago (4 children)
[–] Lennny@lemmy.world 108 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Maybe the next one won't be boring though

[–] TheFriar@lemm.ee 22 points 4 days ago (1 children)
[–] crowbar@lemm.ee 19 points 4 days ago (1 children)

One more video and ill stop

[–] NineMileTower@lemmy.world 45 points 4 days ago (5 children)

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.

[–] rimu@piefed.social 46 points 4 days ago (3 children)

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

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[–] jaybone@lemmy.world 28 points 4 days ago (3 children)

They should go do a crossword puzzle and get off my lawn.

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[–] FenrirIII@lemmy.world 56 points 4 days ago (1 children)

You can have tons of fun at the airport as long as you don't mind getting on the no-fly list.

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[–] yogurtwrong@lemmy.world 136 points 4 days ago (10 children)

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

[–] floofloof@lemmy.ca 120 points 4 days ago (6 children)

You can’t really get addicted to fedi

Hmm... anxiously eyeing my Lemmy post history...

[–] CoggyMcFee@lemmy.world 48 points 4 days ago (1 children)

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.

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[–] slaacaa@lemmy.world 20 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

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.

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[–] EnderMB@lemmy.world 24 points 3 days ago (12 children)

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?

[–] NutWrench@lemmy.world 16 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) (5 children)

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.

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[–] Waryle@jlai.lu 17 points 3 days ago (3 children)

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.

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[–] Olgratin_Magmatoe@lemmy.world 45 points 4 days ago (4 children)

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.

[–] DrSteveBrule@mander.xyz 13 points 3 days ago

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.

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[–] Tattorack@lemmy.world 55 points 4 days ago (18 children)

Yes, and it will still be brainrot.

My attention span is just fine. I don't need to see it ruined by short format nonsense with about as much intellectual value as the nutritional value of a McDonald's cheeseburger.

I never installed TikTok or Snapchat on my phone, not because I had privacy concerns, but because I hate everything about the format.

[–] mitrosus@discuss.tchncs.de 26 points 4 days ago (5 children)

The problem with tiktok is not close-source and being centralised. It is being tiktok

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[–] Soapbox1858@lemm.ee 69 points 4 days ago (10 children)

My problem with tiktok/reels/shorts is not that they aren't federated. It's the entire format/concept I hate.

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[–] conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works 82 points 4 days ago (5 children)

They don't have to sell or provide videos to third parties, because they can just do it themselves.

That's the nature of actual federation. It's not private.

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[–] Fizz 76 points 4 days ago (6 children)

Im guessing it's going to be missing all the features that make tiktok popular like duets and pedophilia.

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[–] mark@programming.dev 20 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

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.

[–] AI_toothbrush@lemmy.zip 25 points 3 days ago (3 children)

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.

[–] Trainguyrom@reddthat.com 10 points 3 days ago (2 children)

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

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[–] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 18 points 3 days ago

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.)

[–] ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world 13 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Bröthër, whërë ärë my lööps?

[–] RiQuY@lemm.ee 21 points 4 days ago (4 children)

Isn't it just a Pixelfed instance but yellow?

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