[HN Gopher] Half a million people watch me study on TikTok
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Half a million people watch me study on TikTok
Author : vitabenes
Score : 182 points
Date : 2022-05-06 13:17 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
| kirykl wrote:
| I wonder if theres any auditing of these engagement numbers. I'd
| think advertisers would require it as due diligence but I've
| never seen any independent analysis
| status200 wrote:
| Ads are not featured in the "Live" section of their app. TikTok
| makes more money from their gift economy (TT takes a cut when a
| user buys "coins" to send to another user) and then taking 50%
| from the content creators when they attempt to withdraw those
| gifted coins and turn them into cash.
| throwaway4good wrote:
| Maybe we can do a similar one for programmers working at home?
| joshspankit wrote:
| If you have not found it, you might be a part of an untapped
| market. If that's the case: start the stream yourself (you'd be
| surprised how helpful it can be to be the streamer)
| M4v3R wrote:
| I'm occasionally doing literally this on Twitch.tv, while
| working on some side projects that otherwise I wouldn't time
| for to work on them. So far it's working pretty well, even if I
| don't have half a million of audience.
| dewey wrote:
| YouTube is FULL of "study with me", "program with me" videos
| with background music for a long time already.
| anyfactor wrote:
| I did it for a while. But I am super bad at narrating what I do
| in real time. I couldn't stream myself doing my job so I
| thought I should do puzzles and stuff, which is also something
| I am horrible at. So, I thought let's try learning and
| exploring new programming stuff (vim, jupyter notebook, de/da,
| stats, github projects) and stream that but guess what I am bad
| demoing stuff too.
|
| But I do enjoy filming myself on a webcam and seeing the
| emotional ride I go through on a routinely basis in my attempts
| to solve problems.
| criddell wrote:
| There's generally little or no narrating in these study
| videos. The specific one talked about in this article
| sometimes has 5-10 mins of discussion every 50 minutes.
| pingeroo wrote:
| I love occassionaly putting on George Hotz's streams while
| programming. Here's an 11 hour stream of him implementing SLAM
| from a closet:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Hlb8YX2-W8&t=10316s&ab_chan...
|
| The guy's a certified legend. Sadly he 'quit' streaming but the
| hundreds of hours in the archive should suffice.
| kingkongjaffa wrote:
| I would love to but I can't exactly live stream my companies
| codebase!
| 867-5309 wrote:
| it's more a big brother voyeurism thing than a collaborative
| screencast
| lettergram wrote:
| Wasn't it TikTok that posts fake engagements and views?
|
| Well, high likelihood anyway:
|
| https://www.quora.com/Is-the-number-of-views-in-TikTok-video...
|
| Personally, any app that serves people what to watch; is going to
| be subject to a lot of bias counts anyway.
| eunos wrote:
| The answer is fundamentally incorrect since it assume total
| engagements as per video engagements.
| slkdk32 wrote:
| noisy_boy wrote:
| In "The Truman Show", it was so easy to despise Ed Harris'
| character; little did we know that we will be practically vying
| to become the same show monkeys - no deceptive confinement by
| villainous scheming director required.
| oefrha wrote:
| > we will be practically vying to become the same show monkeys
| - no deceptive confinement by villainous scheming director
| required.
|
| Unlike in The Truman Show, you can make a fortune being "show
| monkeys" here, so hardly surprising.
| 0des wrote:
| Yeah this is a weird side effect of streaming. I've been
| streaming a live cam on dlive of a project thing im working
| on, and the amount of people who sign in, donate, and
| disappear is very odd. what could the possible motivation for
| this be?
| ohgodplsno wrote:
| Watch for a few minutes, figure out it looks cool, 5 bucks
| isn't much, donate before you leave. There's no particular
| motivation, just a "huh, that looks cool".
| corobo wrote:
| Also unlike in the show, consent
| [deleted]
| password54321 wrote:
| I swear the Truman Show has become the new thing for the
| internet to shoehorn into everything.
| zahma wrote:
| Clever way to motivate himself to study, though I wonder if it
| worked more by physically separating himself from his phone more
| than it psychologically encouraged him to do what he said the
| stream was for.
|
| For others, I'm kind of mystified. Maybe it also works to
| separate one's eyes from the feed. But some of the quotes mention
| people checking in because they wanted to study with another
| person. How lonely we must be as a society if that's true in
| aggregate? In uni, we all would show up in conference rooms even
| if we weren't actively talking through concepts or problems. That
| gave us a sense of collective struggle through finals week. This
| seems to me like another example of social media induced
| detachment.
| dunefox wrote:
| At my university we didn't have study rooms, only regular
| lecture halls and rooms that were either locked or in use. We
| had to study at the cafeteria which worked as well as you'd
| expect. So we studied in a small group of 3-4 people at
| someone's place if possible or via discord.
| teruakohatu wrote:
| Is studying at university and public libraries not a thing
| elsewhere?
|
| At the universities here you have to get up early to grab a
| good seat on one of the better floors (higher/better view and
| smaller/less noisy) around the end of semester.
|
| The public libraries are usually full of university and non-
| university students on Saturday mornings. Charging points are
| highly prized.
| dunefox wrote:
| At a library you can't talk, so that's quite useless.
| macintux wrote:
| That may be a regional/cultural difference. Certainly
| loud talking has always been discouraged in my neck of
| the woods, but there are now quiet study rooms, and
| everywhere else talking is more acceptable.
| dunefox wrote:
| Well, I'm in Germany, here you get strung up for talking
| in a library.
| lupire wrote:
| We are only lonely when we aren't social. Joining a stream is
| the opposite of loneliness. This is social media induced
| _attachment_.
|
| Would you say people at bars and cafes and libraries and
| churches are lonely? Only as much as people at a restaurant are
| hungry.
| smrq wrote:
| Lots of people in those places are lonely, yes. Have you
| never been lonely while surrounded by people before?
| jVinc wrote:
| I feel like a lot of what's in the category of "you wont believe
| this is getting popular" on tiktok is a result of them faking
| views and follower numbers to rope in creators who then go on to
| think tens of thousands of people are watching them do some
| random videos, which makes them double down and focus and then
| eventually gain a real but still much lower real following.
|
| I don't have any evidence to back up the claim that they are
| faking views, but I know for a fact that the hundreds of
| followers I have gained making almost no content are not real.
| And it seems extremely suspicious that they've engineered their
| whole "creator fund" around trying to not pay creators based just
| on views/likes and subs, if they where real that would be the
| most accurate measure to target. But feels like they've decided
| to completely ignore them and to "sort" creators, likely because
| they know there's some creators with majorly fake followers that
| they don't want to pay, but still want to keep on the platform so
| they keep their fake engagement metrics high, and then there's
| the "real" popular names that they know they need to pay, but
| still underpay compared to other platforms. But creators still
| stick to tiktok because "they have a much larger following". It
| smells.
| wirthjason wrote:
| For some reason this article stirs a lot of internal conflict in
| me.
|
| A part of me wants to view it without any judgement but another
| part, the old man part, feels there's something deeply wrong with
| this. The problem is that I cannot think of a substantive reason
| it's wrong other than "half a million people don't have something
| better to do than watch someone study?" Or "do kids have such a
| weak will that they cannot study by themselves?" Or, "are we so
| lonely/needy that we have to broadcast ourselves/watch others
| doing mundane things rather than something more important?"
|
| Neither of these are really true and in fact it's a positive that
| others are accomplishing they study goals by watching him.
|
| I'm just in my 40's but it feels like the old Simpsons joke "old
| man yells at cloud". This is a bit unsettling.
| seydor wrote:
| Young people are much more lonely and isolated. Partly
| demographic decline, partly culture. They have a longing for
| connection as always though, and they find it online
| Aerroon wrote:
| > _Or "do kids have such a weak will that they cannot study by
| themselves?"_
|
| Yes, but this isn't new. Half of the job of a teacher is
| precisely this. They're there to make you do the work. After
| all _everything_ the teacher teaches you is already there in
| the textbook. All you have to do to learn it is pick up the
| book and read it. But very few will actually do it without
| being prompted.
| doliveira wrote:
| I'm 27 and I kind of feel the same way. But what I do have an
| aversion to is the idea of watching digital influencers and
| being, well, influenced by them...
|
| It's not much different from old-fashioned celebrity worship,
| though. At least it's more productive.
| criddell wrote:
| I think of it more as a digital version of studying in a
| library or coffee shop. I don't think I'd classify the young
| man in the article as an influencer.
| bezospen15 wrote:
| Let's ignore the elephant in the room that there are much
| better platforms to do something like this on...
| lupire wrote:
| The elephant in the room is that someone is doing something
| good on a platform you don't like, making the platform
| better?
| criddell wrote:
| Better depends on what you are optimizing for.
| joeman1000 wrote:
| I was talking about this today with my wife, who is incredibly
| introverted, but who actually does enjoy these 'study with me'
| videos. I had read a post on reddit where someone was asking
| for public zoom meetings where they could go 'for the
| atmosphere' of other people working, which helped them work.
| Like how you felt about this article, this reddit post rubbed
| me the wrong way. There was something weak, dirty, unsettling
| about that posters need for vicarious work. It made me think of
| those gross 'mukbang' videos which are popular now.
|
| Anyway, my wife explained that the videos encouraged her to
| focus, no more and no less. She is always comparing herself to
| others, so I guess this is why it helps her. I think zoom calls
| are different though. Very strange. I cannot study without
| silence, and can never study with people around. Horses for
| courses.
| sudhirj wrote:
| I very strongly doubt people are "watching him study", more
| likely they're studying along at the same time. This isn't very
| different from a peloton class or a fitness instructor having
| people work out with them - he's setting the pace with the
| pomodoro timer, setting the mood with unobtrusive music and
| keeping everyone accountable by doing it himself and setting an
| example.
| hombre_fatal wrote:
| I've always felt the same about Twitch in general.
|
| If I had to choose between the two, I'd much rather my kid
| waste his time playing games than watching someone else play
| games. At least do _something_.
|
| I managed to even make Twitch a daily habit for a year in my
| 20s, so I understand the allure of it. But I was never proud of
| that.
| ryandrake wrote:
| I'm also in my 40s and had the same "old man yells at cloud"
| judgmental reaction, but when you think about it, it's no
| different than watching TV. I think of all the dreck on _that_
| glowing rectangle that my generation wasted hours of each day
| on, passively consuming. It 's pretty much the same as watching
| some streamer, so hey, whatever floats their boats.
|
| I think I'm just way too old to understand the specific allure
| of streaming random people talking about random, mundane
| things. My daughter watches a few streamers, and in my view,
| watching over her shoulder, they are all just bland, boring
| nobodies[1], talking about nothing in particular. They just
| talk about their day, talk about video games sometimes while
| playing, talk about other videos they're simultaneously
| watching (yes, streaming someone talking while the streamer
| himself streams another video!). It just seems such a pointless
| waste, but I think back to the stupid things I liked as a kid
| and I guess it's no different. I just hope she grows out of it
| and (with my parental guidance) starts getting motivated to do
| actual things rather than sit there watching other people do
| things.
|
| 1: I know some streamers have particular interesting or
| extraordinary talents, but I'm not talking about those shows.
| dstroot wrote:
| Thank you for putting into words exactly how I was feeling. I
| often find myself wondering how much time people spend on
| social media and wonder how much loss to society all this
| "wasted time" is - but of course it's not "wasted" for the
| participants. They get something in return. It is no different
| than wondering in previous decades how much time people spent
| watching TV or reading books. It all depends on what content
| you consume and why. Come to think of it I spend a lot of time
| on HN....
| Spooky23 wrote:
| One the magic things about social media is that it's like
| radio + tv all in one.
| Merad wrote:
| I'm approaching 40 so I don't really disagree with you, but I
| do find it fascinating in its own way. I tried TikTok a couple
| years ago and deleted it after a week. I could tell that it was
| massaging my brain in the right ways to keep me scrolling and
| scrolling so that I ended up wasting tons of time in the app,
| and I didn't like it. The guy from TFA is essentially hijacking
| the algorithm to help break people free from the endless
| scrolling and time wasting that's encouraged by the algorithm.
| I assume he's benefiting from it, of course, but still it's an
| interesting commentary on the modern world that young people
| especially have to wade through.
| nightski wrote:
| I'm in my upper 30s and I can relate to the post. Am by no
| means lonely or alone (I have a wife, family, and friends all
| around). But for me some times it is nice just to know someone
| out there is doing the same thing as you. Whether it is
| studying a book or any solo activity I find it
| inspiring/motivating. It's not a matter of having a weak will
| either as I have learned plenty of things on my own (in fact I
| tend to learn the best through self study). But all I can
| explain it with is that it is motivating and comforting.
| staindk wrote:
| As I mentioned in my own reply to the top-level commenter,
| this[1] notion of 'body doubling' is interesting to read
| about. I can definitely relate to it.
|
| Every time I studied "with" a classmate at e.g. the
| university library I would end up still just studying by
| myself, though just knowing there are others around doing the
| same/similar thing had a positive effect on me.
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31303234
| wirthjason wrote:
| I'm a firm believer in many of the things mentioned.
|
| When I study with someone there's a real life component. We
| take breaks together, chat, ask each other questions.
|
| Also, studying in common places can remove environmental
| distractions. For some reason during finals time I had the
| urge to clean the apartment.
|
| I can relate to the physical in-person-ness of the
| experience. I cannot relate to the non-interactive, passive
| watching of it.
| staindk wrote:
| No idea if the study streamer in the article does this,
| but a lot of popular streamers make it a priority to
| interact with their viewers - e.g. CohhCarnage, Day9,
| Pestily. It's a great thing to do if there is some amount
| of 'down time' between games or during loading screens
| and such, but from what I've seen it does help make their
| viewers feel more heard and such.
|
| In the article they mention he studies with a pomodoro
| timer, so I guess he interacts with the "stream chat"
| during the off time and such.
|
| -\\_(tsu)_/-
|
| Definitely not for everyone! But I can see the appeal.
| chownie wrote:
| > Or "do kids have such a weak will that they cannot study by
| themselves?"
|
| For what it's worth, people have been heading to libraries and
| coffee shops for the communal-work environment for ages, this
| is just the parasocial analogue to that practice.
|
| Set and setting, not just for drugs!
| snek_case wrote:
| I clicked on the post thinking it must be because the
| streamer is a hot young woman. That was the stereotype of
| popular streamer doing something uninteresting that came to
| my mind based on what's been going on with the game streamer
| community on twitch. Some girl in a microbikini with fake
| glasses pretenting do read a book and winking at the camera
| from time to time. Like, yeah, ok, I'm sure you could get as
| many viewers with sexy beekeeping.
|
| It actually seems a lot more wholesome that people are
| wanting a virtual "study pal" as motivation. That's pretty
| normal and healthy. We're a social species. If this helps
| people not feel alone and it helps them get started, there
| doesn't seem to be anything wrong with it. I'm sure some
| people also watch this guy because they think he's
| attractive, but at least he's giving them a positive
| stereotype, attractive because he's doing something good for
| his own development vs attention grabbing and attractive
| because skimpy outfit.
| vmception wrote:
| Hmm, I'll empathize that there was a time when I would have
| assumed that, but ive used tiktok enough to not think that
| from the headline or by surprised at all by the article
|
| maybe just use tiktok for a while, its time. it took a
| while for my feed to not be cringy but just follow people
| you hear about (like this article) or that get reshared on
| other social media sites (all videos have a watermark with
| the username), and your tiktok feed will warp to stuff like
| that very quickly
| sandworm101 wrote:
| >> sexy beekeeping.
|
| Greenlit. 12 episodes. Where do I send the check? Do we see
| them being stung or is that CGI?
| sidpatil wrote:
| _Bee Movie_ came out in 2007.
| bbarnett wrote:
| You made me think, I started wondering about the
| beekeeping outfit, which is typically thick, loose,
| baggy.
|
| But I bet a latex catsuit would prevent stingers, show
| all the curves, and fall right inline with this concept.
|
| If anyone wants to seriously pursue this, I have the
| perfect Quebec actress for this role.
|
| Bam, take it up a notch! Sexy french, latex clad,
| beekeeping.
|
| "Zee bees, zey are my passion mon cheri"
|
| This could seriously work.
|
| The only downside, societially speaking, would be those
| which fetishize the bees + sex. That's just not going to
| end well.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| It is about the screaming. Just like old horror movie,
| the selling point is an attractive young woman screaming
| as she is attacked by something. Then there is the bonus
| of her having to rip off clothes and/or jumping into
| water to escape. Then the older male rescuer, a veteran
| beekeeper, can show up and mansplain the correct method
| of handing bees. This is perfect for the History
| Channel's demographic. It can go right between the
| Hitler/WWII hour and that show about the best boardwalk
| restaurants for peoplewatching.
| jt2190 wrote:
| > half a million people don't have something better to do than
| watch someone study
|
| They're not _watching_ him study, he's modeling studying
| behavior and his audience is leveraging that to trigger their
| own studying. (Mirror neurons are a thing.)
| PartiallyTyped wrote:
| Not only that, from sociology we know that it introduces a
| form of accountability and collective effort mentality.
| jt2190 wrote:
| Very interesting! (I was pretty loose with my "mirror
| neurons" reply, hoping that someone would provide
| corrections and/or more nuance.)
| sandworm101 wrote:
| It isn't week will. It is a lack of confidence. Kids are
| socially aware. Group dynamics are more important than grades.
| They don't like doing anything on their own because that risks
| doing something that might not be socially acceptable. Studying
| with a partner means constant validation that studying is a
| worthwhile activity. It is like a young dog that will not
| settle until it sees another dog do so first. So it isn't lack
| of will rather the very modern need to comport with social
| norms that drives people to stream someone studying. It
| validates their decision to study too.
|
| Think of echo chambers/bubbles in politics. People think one
| thing, then find other people online who think the same.
| Finding other people saying the same things then reinforces
| their beliefs. So someone wanting to spend a few hours studying
| finds someone online doing the same, reinforcing their choice
| to study.
| Siira wrote:
| There is some genuine insight here, but it is needlessly
| bundled with defending the kids. Blind conformity is bad, and
| falls under the umbrella of having a weak will.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| Don't blame the kids for their blind conformity. That is
| dictated at them from above. Kids today live in fear of
| being singled out in an negative manner. It can destroy
| your future. Mistakes are now permanent. A viral video of
| you doing something stupid as a teenager might come up in
| job applications decades later. Getting caught drinking
| alcohol in the park on a Friday night might mean
| jail/expulsion from school. And don't get me started on
| grade inflation. Study the wrong material, bomb a test, and
| you can say goodbye to that 97% average needed for
| university applications. So every kid is desperate to make
| sure they are studying exactly the same material as
| everyone else. That is the only safe way to make sure you
| don't waste time on a tangent. Kids today do and _should_
| fear breaking social norms. They live in a very rigid
| society.
| BolexNOLA wrote:
| > Kids today live in fear of being singled out in an
| negative manner.
|
| This is not a new phenomenon in the slightest. Bullying
| and teasing have been around forever. The only thing that
| changes are what people will be bullied and teased about,
| but ultimately it doesn't impact whether the bullying
| happens.
|
| Kids will always find a way to identify themselves by
| what they are not, or single out someone for not
| conforming, even if it's completely innocuous or out of
| their control. Hell adults do it too. Kids just don't
| have the ability to couch it in dog whistles or cover it
| with some window dressing. They will pick on a kid for
| being different until an adult teaches them to respect
| differences. That has always been the case.
| lupire wrote:
| It's not a very interesting criticism to say that most of
| humanity and mammals are social and look to each other for
| reassurance.
|
| You could turn it around and criticize people for being
| anti-social in their independence and disrepst for other
| people's needs and wisdom.
| Retric wrote:
| There is nothing inherently blind about following because
| there is normally multiple examples to chose from. Picking
| a stream of someone studying among all the other possible
| streams is very much a choice even if that choice provides
| some validation.
|
| In aggregate culture is a back and forth of people pushing
| in new directions or independently discovering existing
| ones and others following their lead, but it's the
| followers who determine what's normal more than the
| pioneers.
| pixl97 wrote:
| Most people are weak willed, hence society exists.
| LigmaYC wrote:
| A lack of individuality such that an action needs to be
| validated externally is definitely a weak will.
| chenmike wrote:
| For me, the unsettling part is that this has to be done
| virtually now.
|
| I remember fondly during my college years the times I was
| studying in silence with my friends. We were bonding over the
| shared experience of working towards our goals together. And I
| felt motivated by being with them.
|
| There's nothing weak-willed about benefiting from
| accountability devices. But I do wonder if the unidirectional
| nature of it (his followers know him and not vice versa)
| actually fulfills a social need for his followers rather than
| just feeling like it does.
| lupire wrote:
| Eh, the strangers in the library aren't my lifelong friends,
| but I'm glad they are either.
| the_only_law wrote:
| I had someone send me a bit of malware they had received (I
| like to pick it apart in my spare time occasionally).
|
| Too my shock, the guy asked if I could stream my work. No one
| even wants to watch me play games. I tried to explain that it
| was probably going to be slow and boring, but he insisted.
| wirthjason wrote:
| I don't think there's anything wrong with watching it to
| learn something new like malmare dissection. I can appreciate
| the rawness of it, even if some consider it "boring", because
| it accurately shows how it really is. Editing it out presents
| a false idea about what really happens.
|
| That said, watching something for the sake of it, without
| purpose or end goal feels odd4
| yread wrote:
| r/WatchPeopleCode used to be moderately popular. It's not a
| bad way to learn
| staindk wrote:
| In my experience people often want something on 'in the
| background' basically at all times. Music, a TV show, sports, a
| podcast, or a livestream of some sort.
|
| I'm guessing most of this guy's viewers aren't actively just
| watching him study, but rather have his stream open on their
| phone or a second screen while studying "with" the guy. Sounds
| like a great idea and something like this may have helped me
| back in the day.
|
| This[1] other comment mentions "body doubling" which sounds
| about right.
|
| [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31303234
| paulryanrogers wrote:
| This does remind me of preferring to do homework in a
| moderately loud study hall at school instead of at home back
| in the late 90s. Then doing the same in quieter halls in
| college. Just feeling that others around me were in a similar
| situation was a motivator to just get the work done, and stop
| putting it off.
| BolexNOLA wrote:
| A discord I'm on has a ping we use called "Office Hours."
| Any given day 2-5 of us will be on the general voice
| channel chatting and working, with people muting/deafening
| if they need to be heads down or get a call or something.
| It's really nice when my work is a bit more rote. As
| someone with ADHD having a background hum of activity is
| just really helpful too.
| cronix wrote:
| Tim Pool threw a camera up on his chicken coop and makes about
| $1500-2k a day in super chats ("Chicken City" on YouTube).
| Super chats just trigger a song and some animated chickens
| dancing on an overlay. $36k a month. It's literally just a live
| feed of a chicken coop and once in awhile someone
| feeding/cleaning. Zoos should take note lol. He started it like
| 2 months ago and it keeps growing.
| vmception wrote:
| Think of it more like the world has always been Darwinian and
| this has made it slightly more accommodating for people that
| would get weeded out from forms of social/upwards mobility.
| rightbyte wrote:
| There is a South Park episode about exactly this. With the
| message that the younger kids' new thing (watching streamers)
| being seriously lame. I.e. "youth these days" sometimes are
| just accurate.
| astura wrote:
| Humans have been this way longer than you've been alive.
|
| When I was in college (early internet, pre social media) I
| found it MUCH easier to study in the library. I went from
| getting Cs in non-CS classes to getting As and Bs and my
| confidence shot up. Why? Because the library is for studying
| and I'm surrounded by other people doing the same. Absolutely
| nothing wrong with a virtual version of that.
| 300bps wrote:
| I'm in my 40s too and it made total sense to me.
|
| I'm more focused with work at Starbucks surrounded by other
| people than on my couch alone.
| HidyBush wrote:
| When half a million people follow something you are doing I think
| it should be time to ask yourself what the effects of your
| actions are. Do most people just waste their time watching you?
| Does what you do actually help people study or concentrate? Does
| your livestream just give young people a parasocial experience to
| feel coddled while being lonely?
|
| I don't think I could keep doing such things with a clear
| conscience if I had even the slightest concern about my
| livestreams being a time waster for so many people: and knowing
| social media mechanics it's not just a slight concern but a
| certainty.
| criddell wrote:
| That's a healthy perspective. It made me wonder who has the
| opposite take? There have to be more than a few people seeing
| this and wondering how it can be monetized...
| lupire wrote:
| And the same question should be asked of classroom teachers and
| employers and governments.
| paulcole wrote:
| Regardless of the number of people involved we should all be
| thinking about the effects of our actions. And honestly,
| wasting somebody's time is the least of the problems caused by
| our everyday actions and choices.
|
| I'll admit it's more fun to judge others than look in the
| mirror though.
| macintux wrote:
| It sounds like some/many are using it as a way to _gain_ focus
| for their own studies.
|
| No, I don't think he has any responsibility to protect his
| viewers from themselves.
| seydor wrote:
| What if he was a virtual teacher or 'life coach'
| sys_64738 wrote:
| Tik Tok is just the latest in an endless waste of time social
| media networks.
|
| The real utility for something like this is where you are working
| and leave a Zoom room with camera running so folks can drop in
| and ask you questions then leave. Sort of like in a non-remote
| setting at an office. Quite effective.
| SemanticStrengh wrote:
| Body doubling is very underrated and is the main non
| pharmacological way to bring focus for most
| https://bodydoubling.com/
| rubicks wrote:
| My informal polling of my co-workers does not support this
| assertion.
| 0des wrote:
| is this why i have a monitor just playing various interviews im
| not interested in while im coding? I used to have a tiny black
| and white Bentley portable TV above my desk playing FOX all day
| long on low volume, then when that died, I moved to a separate
| monitor that currently appears to be running through police
| interrogations. anything at a constant volume, any type of long
| format talking, is what I go for. I always wondered what it
| was, because it doesnt have to be something im interested in,
| just a normalized volume with not a lot of noises punctuating
| it. I listen to a lot of loud music when Im not doing that.
| never knew this was due to adhd, I just assumed it was so that
| I don't hear boogers rustling around in my nose when breathing,
| or the sound of my heartbeat.
| eastbound wrote:
| I use this to sleep. General-knowledge videos on Youtube,
| generally, constant voice, interesting facts. Otherwise I
| develop stories in my mind and become angry (to the point of
| breaking stuff, relationships, and probably suicide if I let
| it run unchecked). I'm quite a fine person and even
| appreciated if I use this method to suppress my internal
| dialogue.
|
| Do those symptoms match with ADHD? Or is it simply the
| mundanity of solitude around 40, when one has a few extremely
| bad experienced that tend to not get forgotten easily? I
| avoid alcohol, but do normal people's use of alcohol helps
| with deleting those memories? Do normal people have a nagging
| girlfriend that plays the role of keeping the mind busy with
| something else? Or would anyone suggest another diagnosis
| that I should investigate?
|
| I find myself in quite unhealthy mental health because of
| that. I've always thought it's just solitude turning me
| crazy, but it would be sad to not be aware that it's a
| specific condition.
| SemanticStrengh wrote:
| I can't speculate on any diagnosis given you have not given
| us enough information.
|
| > I use this to sleep. General-knowledge videos on Youtube,
| generally, constant voice, interesting facts. > I use this
| method to suppress my internal dialogue. classic, pretty
| normal
|
| What's weird is the underspecified > develop stories in my
| mind and become angry (to the point of breaking stuff,
| relationships, and probably suicide if I let it run
| unchecked)
|
| I mean, If people have no distraction at night, it's not
| uncommon for many to be too mentally excited to fall
| asleep. But your other symptoms means you have something
| else going on. It doesn't need to be catalogued as a mental
| disorder, it could just be you have e.g. bad/cringe
| memories of the past or minor emotional traumas. You should
| attempt to reconciliate those memories, relativize their
| importance or plain forget them. You should attempt to have
| a meaningful lifestyle routine by doing meaningful
| activities/virtues. e.g. I encourage you to maintain a
| hapiness scale journal, where you note and rank what makes
| you the most happy when you experience it. Note relevant
| metadata such as how much is this specific activity
| reconsummable (recyclable pleasure) this accounts for
| sports, arts in all mediums, etc Loneliness in excess can
| be like a disease and must be fighted as a priority. It's
| not that hard to socialize, humans are generally quite
| welcoming in the right contexts. But like a muscle it needs
| practice. You could e.g easily contact again an old friend
| and see him while doing a cool activity (e.g. laser tag or
| karaoke) or you could start a new passion like being taught
| dancing, and meet new people there like a highschool 2.0
|
| as for pharmacological "solutions" to pathological
| excessive anger, I don't know if specifics exist for this
| emotion but I assume e.g an NMDA antagonist could help
| during a crisis (magnesium lthreonate) or more potently
| memantine, memantine induce brain fog though at least at
| first. This reduce a neural excitatory overload. You could
| also calm yourself with l-theanine, ashwaganda and/or
| glycine (very underatted, help to sleep too). I would also
| recommend taking an antioxidant like ALCAR for general
| health. While what I suggested is benign and can be
| combined, that is not the case for memantine. it is a
| potent medication with side effects and tradeoffs, although
| trying doesn't cost anything. But it is essential to
| understand that generally pharmacology is not a proper
| solutions and is generally a slippery slope with side
| effects and tolerance mechanisms (except for the benign
| things I mentionned) and you will get much more in life
| through meaningful lifestyle changes than with
| pharmacology. And while durable lifestyle changes are hard
| to instill, again body doubling comes to the rescue, e.g.
| https://www.reddit.com/r/GetMotivatedBuddies/ Alcohol
| should be strongly avoided, it can destroy lifes.
| Alternative to podcasts at night and glycine for sleep
| would be calm ambient music, meditation and ASMR. You might
| also wanna check your blood pressure (unlikely). Indeed you
| might benefit from therapy/paid coaching.
|
| also.. any youtube podcasts to recommend?
| eastbound wrote:
| Hyperthanks for this... overview. This summary of
| possibilities. I'll discuss them with my psychiatrist.
|
| > Missing part
|
| Yeah, the missing part is the dark mundanities of living.
| I've been late in dating (started at 23), I have weak
| negociating stance (I don't like supermanly men who step
| upon others, so I don't do it), so, many people profit
| from it and step onto me, especially girls unfortunately,
| so I became misogynistic. But you know what they say at
| kindergarten, if you didn't kiss at girl at 8 that means
| you are gay, and my psychiatrists keep fixating on the
| gay part, and I don't mind being gay (but I'm not sure I
| am, really) I've had the gay life and dated men and did
| my coming out, but that's not the problem, the problem is
| being misogynistic. Living at a period where women have
| priority for everything "for fairness" doesn't help -
| which it isn't, if you work more you should be the one
| promoted - So I took my revenge, slammed the door at
| every company that only promoted women, founded my own
| and became millionaire in ~7 years - I'm not ungifted,
| it's just people who are assholes with me, because I
| leave room for others and they take it as an opportunity
| to step upon me. So now I'm the cliche of a white
| misogynistic male CEO 39 years old with a big house and a
| big car who eats meat, and it's sad both for me and for
| my opponents, because the loop has reproduced itself, and
| I, like my opponents, wish it hadn't. I'd have been
| perfectly happy with a 2BR flat with a loving girl with
| whom I'd share the housework equally, but every time I
| dated, the girl played games, and the world helped her
| win.
|
| But psychologists fixate on me being gay, that's the only
| explanation they have for me being misogynistic. It's
| tiring, and I'm clearly not getting the mental health
| response I need. For mental health, one needs to live in
| an intelligible world. I've tried living the gay life
| recommended by the various psychiatrists, and it didn't
| solve my misogyny (obviously). My problem is I'd like to
| live an equal life with women, and society keeps giving
| women priority for everything, the discrepancy between
| society's wording and society's actions is
| unreconciliable for me, and the degree we have to battle
| to obtain the normal things is exhausting. I've tried to
| move from programmer to a more talkative job because I
| knew I'd get bitter if i didn't, and companies kept
| promoting women only, and moving to a talkative job is
| something my mental health required. But they kept
| promoting the women. That's unfair to me. I didn't get
| the basic things I needed in life, and really, being a
| CEO is an unhealthy revenge.
|
| (On the plus side, I've increased all my employees 30%
| this year, I've donated a dozen thousands along the
| years, I was the one accompanying the friend who got
| cancer in the group, I've helped in many charities in my
| life until I discovered that people would never help _the
| white male_ back, I've done my share in this world).
| windowsrookie wrote:
| I don't think this matches ADHD symptoms.
|
| I have many ADHD symptoms and I personally cannot
| concentrate on anything unless I have absolute silence and
| no distractions. Any background videos playing would ruin
| my ability to focus. Even being able to hear someone in the
| next room is too distracting for me.
|
| Developing stories in your mind that make you angry sounds
| like some other issue. I have never experienced that. I
| would genuinely recommend talking to some sort of mental
| health professional because that is not healthy.
| thomastjeffery wrote:
| Different people have different experiences with ADHD. I
| tend to experience one or the other depending on the day
| and my mood.
| bpicolo wrote:
| I feel like it's an unpopular opinion regarding remote work,
| but this is a big positive effect I feel being in an office
| that only works when others are there too, hah.
| PragmaticPulp wrote:
| It may not be popular on the internet, but it's true for
| many. Context switching into an office where people around
| you are focusing sets the tone for work.
|
| Conversely, switching into an office where everybody is
| chatting away will hurt focus for the same reasons.
|
| This is why it's important to have good working context
| whether you're in the office or at home.
| nazka wrote:
| Depends the type of job! For the little story I had a job
| at a small startup 50+ people. We were like 20 people at
| the tech and we had 20 sellers. The whole company was in
| the same floor open space one big room. Sellers loved to
| chat all the time, be loud, cut each other in what they
| were doing... A big contract closed on the phone? They had
| a small belt to be ringed! At some point it was so noisy
| that even with headphones we couldn't concentrate. Of
| course the tech part of room was quite silent. One time we
| asked them how can they ever focus with this noise and be
| productive?? They said that for them it's like giving them
| the smile, being chatty being part of the job, the
| adrenaline rush to make it seems like the next big deal is
| right there on the next call.
| dijit wrote:
| Sample of one: I have many markers of ADHD but do not wish to
| be diagnosed as such because there are stark warnings about
| holding certain types of jobs and health insurance increases.
|
| But, being around people does not help me focus at all, I have
| an anxiety about them interrupting me, maybe I need to pay
| attention to something going on in the environment because
| there are people.
|
| Open offices are a nightmare, and I talk about it openly.
|
| Strangely, this issue does not exist in coffee shops. I think
| it's something to do with the fact that people are extremely
| unlikely to interact with me in a coffee shop. So, take that
| for whatever it's worth. Body doubling certainly isn't
| universal among people with ADHD markers.
| [deleted]
| neilv wrote:
| I'm sure it helps some people focus, but also sure it's
| counterproductive for some.
|
| Overall, I find I usually get better non-interactive work done
| when _not_ in such close proximity that social behaviors are
| activating. (Interactive real-time collaboration is a different
| matter, and that has its moments.)
|
| Someone sitting across right across from me, or right next to
| me, when we're not collaborating, for example? I'll be lucky if
| I can mindlessly tweak UI visual details, or spit out design or
| code that I've thought about only superficially. There's no way
| I could fairly rigorous thinking-through and creative
| connection-making, in that context, like I can in some other
| contexts.
| lr4444lr wrote:
| Why do you think this works? I think it has to do with a mental
| and/or physiological response to loneliness increasing our
| stress.
| seydor wrote:
| Memetism, apes like apeing each other, it's why we have
| classes of all kinds
| queuebert wrote:
| Mirror neurons
| daedalus_f wrote:
| To quote wikipedia: _To date, no widely accepted neural or
| computational models have been put forward to describe how
| mirror neuron activity supports cognitive functions._
|
| There's lots of guff in the media and lots of speculation
| in the discussion section of papers about what they might
| be important for in broad hand-wavy terms, but really we
| don't have a good understanding of them.
| omarfarooq wrote:
| Shame minimization.
| [deleted]
| phantomathkg wrote:
| The only problem is, it is TikTok.
| WalterBright wrote:
| I sometimes watch cab rides on youtube as a sort of "moving
| wallpaper". Well, I don't actually _watch_ them, it 's just a
| decoration like a picture on a wall.
| rightbyte wrote:
| I have train dash cams going when I work sometimes on the 2nd
| screen. Nice when you look away from the code.
|
| I guess a loot of the views of those kind of videos are as
| ambient videos.
| sha-3 wrote:
| Where can I get train dash cam feeds?
| WalterBright wrote:
| Search "cab ride" on youtube.
| rightbyte wrote:
| I have just made a playlist on Youtube (and I am using
| uBLock ...). So not live feeds.
|
| E.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkgIWGM60z4
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LuX8Ew3OyJk
|
| There are plenty. The bridge in the 2nd one is my favorite.
| steve76 wrote:
| radar1310 wrote:
| I've watched Louis Rossmann repair Macbooks for hours on YouTube
| before. Like watching paint dry in a kind of way.
| smoldesu wrote:
| He readily admits that he's not the most sociable person (which
| is corroborated from watching pretty much any of his self-
| described "rant videos"), but the flow he gets into when doing
| board repair is remarkable. I'm not sure if he owes it to a
| really impressive knowledge of EE or the fact that he
| exclusively repairs Macbooks, but it's crazy how every single
| feasible repair looks like it's second nature to him.
| ceva wrote:
| throwaway1777 wrote:
| All these comments about enjoying being around other people doing
| the same thing, getting more motivated, etc. All I can think is
| that this must have some relation to wfh.
| Fnoord wrote:
| Counter of viewers does not equal amount of people who watch.
| Bots, people who only listen, people who forgot to disable video,
| autoplay (that time you find out your YouTube has been playing
| for _days_ and you ended up in _that_ video), attention span
| diversification, etc. Pageviews does not equal amount of people
| who read a page either. Its annoying when such gets extrapolated.
| Frummy wrote:
| I posted a bunch of minute long math solution videos to tiktok
| while improving an old admission test score. Some of them caught
| on and the most popular has 16k views. Slightly tempted to
| continue, but I find myself pouring my energy elsewhere.
| slkdk32 wrote:
| telesilla wrote:
| When writing my thesis I met with a group of strangers online who
| were also studying or other computer-based activities. We had a
| pomodoro bell go every 25 minutes or so, when we'd chat for a few
| minutes during the break. Just having people around, really made
| a huge difference and helped me get through months of hard work.
| I've seen some startups come up with this idea - seems a bit sad
| to make a business out of people keeping each other company but I
| suppose some prefer to have that curated for them.
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