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0 pointsrunako1mo ago0 comments

I'll come at it from another angle. Some of the most popular podcasts (and YouTubers) produce hours of long-form video (an acceptable format) daily. Without naming names, some of those convey less information in 2-3 hours of video than some short form creators do in 2-3 minutes.

The medium influences the message, but the channel still matters.

(And some messengers, especially public intellectuals, are not doing the long form video/audio at all. One prominent TikTok poster has a $$$$$ job as a public intellectual and outside of short form, the other options to consume his content involve $$$ subscriptions or $$$$ in-person events. I'll take his 5-minute videos over those alternatives.)

Separately, I am chuckling at people saying TikTok is "all X" or "nothing but Y" or "overrun with Z." Do people still not know that statements like these are confessions?

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hombre_fatal1mo ago

> Without naming names, some of those convey less information in 2-3 hours of video than some short form creators do in 2-3 minutes.

Even if you have a 3-minute video that yammers off back-to-back facts to maximize info density, it's still low value because you've only spent 3 minutes with those facts.

There's nothing a 3-minute video can do to compete with a good video 2-3 hour video due to the limitations of the medium.

I would wager a 2-3 hour video of something you find worthless, like celebrity gossip, is preferable to the same thing in TikTok form because at least the longer video challenged you with following a narrative of some length.

When you fill your time with TikTok videos, you're basically regressing to the mental activation normally relegated to babies and toddlers. I think it's fair to demand a little more aspiration of ourselves.

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