Thoughts on the "shorts" video format?

I had sworn off social media about a decade ago. So I was pretty much a passenger as TikTok rose to prominence. I feel TikTok has been the defining social media phenomenon since it emerged. YouTube and Instagram have been forced to copy it and there seem to American congressional hearings twice a day pertaining to TikTok.

You can guess from the first sentence how I feel about it. But I wanted to ask this of people who use this format/engage with it. How do you feel about it?

JoeDaRedTrooperYT ,
@JoeDaRedTrooperYT@lemmygrad.ml avatar

Filled with brain rot spam, hence why I don't use TikTok.

Jennie ,
@Jennie@lemmygrad.ml avatar

I personally don't like it nor do I really use TikTok or YouTube Shorts.

DamarcusArt ,
@DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml avatar

Terrible for informative and educational content, absolutely fantastic at destroying your attention span. Unfortunately, this is how most people consume media these days, so it's something with have to work with, not against.

funky_tomatoe ,
@funky_tomatoe@lemmygrad.ml avatar

I hate it. Luckily enough the YT reVanced app makes it possible to hide it so I don´t see them on my phone. I still see them on my Laptop tho and clicked one yesterday. Spent an hour mindlessly scrolling and felt disgusting afterwards. There should at least be an age lock on shorts, I feel like that stuff is melting childrens brains and attention spans but maybe I'm just slowly getting boomer brained as well idk. Definetly not a big fan.

bleepingblorp ,

Good question comrade,

While I also personally don't use social media for mental health reasons, I don't feel the shorts format is any worse than any other media format for distributing information. I'll elaborate.

The "shorts" format is essentially a meme is video format. Short. Concise. To the point. Ideally witty or catching (depending on the skill of the creator). And what is a meme to a Communist? It is agitprop.

Memes are to the early 21st century Communist what Agitprop was to Bolshevic revolutionary. If the "shorts" format is a meme (or modern agitprop) in video form, we cannot afford to dismiss it as Communists looking to organize.

Say what you will, but Fascists are very good at using modern methods for spreading their bullshit, and it works. If we remain stuck using early 20th century methods, we'll stay far behind amd our world will suffer for it.

The "shorts" video format has a place, just like every other form of messaging.

mozz Admin ,
mozz avatar

Is bullshit

I suspect that there's some kind of dopamine-effect that if you watch enough of the little quick nuggets of stimulation, then your brain gets addicted and you start wanting to do it more. I haven't done it enough to test that theory for myself, but one friend of mine who's on TikTok a lot reported, more or less, that that was how he felt about watching them.

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