Setting the woo aside, there is a lot of data on disorders like central sensitization syndrome that show our psychological state has a very strong modulating effect on our perception of pain.
> I still haven't come across things that see against the natural order.
So many people these days spend hours watching short-form videos spray endlessly from a screen while they stare dumbly at it. They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it.
Every time I see someone doing that, I just absolutely cannot relate to what's going on in their head at all. I'm certainly not above watching some YouTube, but the complete mindlessness of it, they watch it goes on forever, and the utter stupidity of the videos. I feel like I'm watching zombies in an opium den.
But billions of people are doing that shit every day, so what do I know?
I don't want to defend short-form video feeds too much, but "They aren't even picking which videos to watch" is overstating it. Essentially nobody behaves like: watch 100% of a video, swipe, watch 100%, swipe. The expected behavior is that you swipe away if you're not interested, which is often done within a fraction of a second. Accordingly, Tiktok's content selection algorithm heavily weighs watch time as a signal of interest in related content. That actually can create a bit of a perverse incentive; if you linger on a video long enough to report it (as in for a TOS violation) or to click the "show less like this", it can lead to being shown more videos like that.
In many ways, TikTok is kinda like channel surfing. Watch a few seconds, next channel, watch a few seconds, next channel, oh this is interesting, sure I'll watch a "How It's Made" marathon.
> In many ways, TikTok is kinda like channel surfing.
I've been making the same comparison as well. As someone not watching the videos yet still hear the videos being played, the constant switching is very noticeable much like being the one in the room that didn't have the clicker in their hand. You're not in control of the constant switching which I think makes it even that much more annoying.
Rather than just parking on the marathon, choosing to turn it off and do something else entirely is still my preferred "old man yells at clouds" option.
Ha, that’s the thing that gets me too. Also people watching mashed up YouTube clip compilations - these seem obviously designed for addiction.
The other thing is watching the videos in public with the tinny speakers blaring. Judging by reactions on the trains, this is socially acceptable to most people now ???
I find it really hard to relate to people who do that. I never want people to see/hear what I am doing on my phone or computer, especially if it's something dumb or time-wasting. And to broadcast that into the world in a public space?? its crazy how different people are
> So many people these days spend hours watching short-form videos spray endlessly from a screen while they stare dumbly at it. They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it.
This is how TV broadcasts also work, though. You could even argue there's an algorithm behind TV broadcasts too - it's just a kinda poor human-run algorithm trying to maximize viewer numbers.
Unlike many people, I still often watch TV broadcasts to relax for exactly this reason - there's no decision fatigue since I don't need to choose what to watch. Usually there's only one channel with something that's even remotely interesting and it's kind of an obvious choice.
With the (somehow sadly) added value that the TV broadcast algorithm is kinda known by everyone (morning programs, prime time etc), and that if there wasn't nothing interesting to watch, we would just do something else.
yeah but do we really need some trash reality-TV for a "shared social experience"? most of TV's programming was garbage anyway and contributed to a lot of what was/is wrong with the society
>They aren't even picking which videos to watch, just letting the algorithm do it.
As a teenager, I used to torrent content I liked and scoff at my parents generation for letting tv feed then slop :)
It's hard to understand why TikTok is addictive from the outside, precisely because if you look at the app over someone's shoulder you'll see their tailored content, not yours.
Give the algorithm a couple weeks and it WILL find the weird thing that gets you to check. Maybe you find someone restoring books relaxing, or like toy commercials from where you were a kid, or are attentive on news of potential pandemics out of fear. It will learn.
The default is very very heavily weighted in Googles "Chromebook" favour. Getting a school with Windows (or Mac) exclusivity is a 4-leaf clover. Google genuinely have a pretty good product with Google Classroom though, so it's not completely lost. It's just a problem when schoolkids grow up and end up with new Windows/Mac laptops and have no idea how computers work outside of the web browser.
> I don't really get why people have the audacity to presume what other people like and do.
Part of this is that we are increasingly in self-selected communities of people just like us. Prior to the Internet and social media, you more often interacted with people that all you had in common with was spatial location and a dash of socio-economic status. It wasn't an unbiased slice of the populace, but it was at least less biased.
But today, it's much easier to have all of your social interactions limited to a social media bubble that reflects yourself.
That in turn makes it really easy to believe that whatever is true for you must be true for everyone because it seems to be largely true for all the people you see on a daily basis.
No surprise. People like being more productive when they reap some of the benefits of that increased productivity. If you're expected to be 10x more productive but don't get a raise, all you're doing is stuffing money in some executive's pocket while your job security goes down.
I'm being heavily consulted to advise management on culture change towards AI. And my number one message is this: make the number one, first and potentially only beneficiary of AI use the individual staff members themselves. If they have more time now, DO NOT start filling that with more work for them to do. If they do more all by themselves accept it as a bonus (experience says this is overwhelming what will happen anyway). Whichever way it goes, let them experience directly the benefit, and let the culture change happen organically downstream from that.
I think all these companies front-loading staff reductions are actively sabotaging themselves in the worst possible way in this regard.
I would love to hear more about your advice and the coaching you are giving to management. We also have a strong push to prove evidence of climbing productivity with clearly state future staffing goals. I would like to advocate for this, at even partially, enhancement and quality of life improvement for IC folks.
It starts with the generic pitch around culture change - "culture eats strategy for breakfast" style. Then a bit of shock and awe around how extensively AI is going to redesign business processes in the long run, leading into an argument about it being a marathon, not a sprint and at the moment everyone is treating it like a sprint, the real winners will be those gearing up for endurance. Then structuring the pathway: personal productivity as a cornerstone ebbing into pilots of implementation in areas highly aligned with AI capabilities minimised risk - all as preparation for the main game which will ultimately redesign core business processes in an AI first way.
I will say I am a bit of an outlier. I see others mostly pitching for things like small teams of "AI Champions" etc. I don't favor this because I think it will lead to dysfunctional outcomes (people trying to make the initiatives fail because they weren't "chosen" etc). So I pitch for the broad based, whole organization journey etc. But it does require a strong argument for acceptance of a slower pace of externally visible adoption.
I’m in a dreadful situation right now. Everyone in team got a claude account, but I’m a contractor so not for me (the only dev in team of 25 consultants). Someone in the team assigned me a task to review claude skill that opens up tickets for me. I’m not even using claude and official policy is no AI use for development…
Otherwise it’s been mixed bag. Pace definitely picked up and things that I actually enjoyed doing (UI) it does very well. Things that are actually hard (backend logic) it sucks and painted me in corner too many times.
> Yes that, and also, the more complicated the solution, the more likely no one reads or reviews it too carefully, and will instead depend on an LLM to ‘read’ and ‘review it’
Exactly right. It's the other end of the bikeshed continuum[1]. If you send out a two-page design doc or a hundred like pull request, the recipient will actually review it. Let AI inflate that to ten pages or a thousand lines of code and they feel like they don't have enough mental capacity to tackle it so they let it slide.
> The summary but no content thing is interesting. I’ve seen it in many forms and I’m not sure why it plays out that way.
I would guess that it's because the incentives and goals are different.
The point of a summary is to entice a listener to begin the podcast. So it has to offer the promise of interesting depth.
Once they've started listening, all the body of the podcast has to do is be soothing enough to get the user to keep listening until the next ad comes on. It has no need to actually keep the promise unless the listener is paying enough attention to hold it accountable.
If the kind of AI slop the article talks about entertains/infuriates/depresses you and you want more, you will definitely like the "kroshay" subreddit: http://reddit.com/r/kroshay
Imagine your favorite third place[1], a library, park, bar, etc. The place you regularly go to get connection to people without having to jump through all of the hoops to create and organize an actual event. It's a way to satisfy your innate need for conviviality without requiring much effort or willpower, which are always in finite supply.
You've been going to this place for years. You're a regular. You've made friends with other regulars. It feels good to be a familiar face and to see those familiar faces. A kind of warm sense of safety that we have evolved to experience since we first sat around a fire in prehistoric days. That sense of "Ah, good, I'm here nestled among my tribe."
Now imagine how it feels to walk into that room and discover that half the seats are occupied by mannequins. Each mannequin has a loudspeaker attached to it constantly playing random word salad.
Some of the regulars are still there, maybe. It's hard to see them through all the plastic limbs or hear them through the cacophony of meaningless noise.
How does being in that space make you feel? Now compare it to how you felt before the dead-eyed inanimate bodies showed up. That's what we've all lost.
> About two-thirds of all scurvy is found in autistic people.
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