Go back to the 1990s (even probably the 2000s?) and ask literally anyone what they think of the idea of people spending huge quantities of their time on this mortal plane watching videos of other people talking about how they do their make up and pick their outfits.

Are those videos "worth watching"? Are videos of people playing video games "worth watching"? Are videos of people opening products and saying out loud the information written on the box and also easily accessible on the public internet "worth watching"?

I'm not happy about these developments, but that isn't a factor of much concern to the people driving and following these trends, it turns out.

It's been a long time since "quality" and "success" have been decoupled. Which is to say - I hope you like the taste of hats.

Bad TV is a lot older than that. It probably seems weird nowadays to watch “I Dream of Jeanie” and “Gilligan’s Island” reruns because that’s what was on TV. Or how about game shows and soap operas? Daytime TV was the worst. But people watched.

I'm pretty sure humans have been finding ways to unproductively waste time for millenium...

I'm not sure how watching lightweight videos on subjects you're curious about is any worse than how people wasted time in the past?

Personally I waste time watching videos on outdoor gear, coffee making equipment and PC hardware. I certainy don't regret it because I had no plans to do anything productive with that time either.

videos of other people talking about how they do their make up and pick their outfits.

Doesn't seem that much different from a fashion magazine interview about what X celebrity likes to wear. Those have been around for quite a long time.

Ahh, you e touched on a big problem with our society rn - nothing is worth doing.

I've been really thinking about lawns lately and how much time men and women spend maintaining them, how much pride many of them have in such activity... lawns aren't real tho, it's just a personal park nobody ever uses that we all thought we wanted bc rich ppl had them. Front lawns especially, just for looks, nobody normal ever sits on them even.

Case in point is all the people that live in an apartment - they don't do lawns. They might think they want to and some might even enjoy up keeping a lawn but it's not an activity that's "worth it" in fact there are many reasons not have a lawn, it isn't an activity that justifies itself as so many pretend.

Everything is like that. Almost nothing any of us do adds to humanities' general progress or improves our own situations even.

Mowing a lawn and watching TV are incredibly similar activities if you have a nice lawnmower.

I'm not disputing that people waste inordinate amounts of time running out the clock before they shuffle off this mortal coil. (cough every X demograph reacts to Y video cough).

Agreement to eat said head apparel is predicated upon "infectious energy" (i.e. quality) - NOT success. I'll draft up a more officious document later.

Note: I am the sole arbiter of what constitutes quality.

> It's been a long time since "quality" and "success" have been decoupled.

I think so, too.

I guess quality was a property of interest in the old days, because the path e.g. for commercial music was: Maximize profit -> Maximize sales -> Maximize what the target audience likes -> Maximize quality.

For TikTok etc. they bypass the market sales stuff and replace it by an 'algorithm', that optimizes for retention, which is tightly coupled to ad revenue. I imagine the algorithm as a function of many arguments.

Just relying on quality is an inefficient approximation in contrast to that.

We used to have some "radio station" in shoutcast during the 90s. It was very local and geeky, but had a couple of listeners. It was kind of a podcast

Good point. I absolutely abhorred reaction videos until I found a channel that works for me. A guy who reacts to videos about ultra luxury mansions. I find it interesting hearing an expert in the field point out things that most of us wouldn't think of. Plus he's got a great sense of humor.

What blew my mind was that there would be a market to watch other people play video games. You never know what catches on.

> Go back to the 1990s (even probably the 2000s?) and ask literally anyone what they think of the idea of people spending huge quantities of their time on this mortal plane watching videos of other people talking about how they do their make up and pick their outfits.

So like supermarket magazines in video form? I think people would get it.

To me, unboxing videos are documentation, not entertainment. When I need to know exactly what's in a box and how it's packaged, an unboxing video is the only source of that information.