What's addicting about it? Admittedly it kept me entertained the first day or two that I used it, but from that point forward it never wavered from the content that entertained me that first day and soon it became really boring to see the same type of thing over and over, leaving no remaining appeal.
Because everyone talks about how great the recommendation engine is, and me wanting to find great content, I went back to it after a while to see if they fixed the problem. But no, still the same content that bored me away from the app the first time.
I had the same experience. I’ve given TikTok three different tries over the same number of years and it didn’t connect with me at all.
I’ve spent several hours using it and there seems to be very little of interest to me (a 53 year old Canadian living in Texas). It did show me a video of a guy doing some great welding (stack of dimes!) and I watched the whole thing. The algorithm decided that I must want to see every welding video ever uploaded and I really don’t. One or two is enough.
I concluded that TikTok isn’t for my demographic, maybe by design.
I found it took some curating to get the algorithm to what you're interested in - like videos you enjoy, and aggressively mark videos you don't (hold and select "not interested"). In my experience, by the end of day, the recommendations were more on target.
Maybe TikTok appeals more to teenagers who have an underdeveloped sense of self. I remember at that age conflating popularity with accuracy and authority. Now when I watch TikTok it's just an exercise in frustration that nothing is cited and it's all about presentation over substance. And that's when the algorithm isn't showing me strange videos in a desperate attempt to keep my attention, a la spiderman/elsa YouTube mashups of yore.
I believe you but you should know you are in the minority here. Part of why TikTok has taken over the social media space is because of how addicting it is compared to the older players.
I can completely understand how it keeps your attention longer than looking at photos of your neighbour's cat like Facebook gives you. It's just the lack of variety that makes addiction hard to fathom. Do others not get bored of seeing the same thing over and over and over?
To avoid seeing the same thing over and over, the most direct form of feedback that works for me is when that content comes up, quickly swipe past it. If you keep swiping, it'll start throwing more random stuff at you to see what sticks. I'm also always tweaking the list of people I follow so that if FYP gets stale, I can just look at their content for a bit.
I have heard that before, and tried it briefly, but it didn't accomplish much in the short time I tried. I can believe if I put a lot more time and effort into it that might change, but the last thing I need is another job. The whole value proposition of trying TikTok was the promise that it would do that work for me.
They're testing features to let you "reset" your algorithm to improve content diversity. But even without that kids spend over 80 minutes a day on TikTok.
Do you have the stats for that? I recall reading something earlier this year than Insta is still king for teens/young people. I can't find the source though.
For me, the moment I see two videos in a row of the same format and with the same music under it I get a sense of existential dread and close the app. Something stops feeling human and that's why I deleted my tiktok and might delete my Instagram next
What's addicting about it? Admittedly it kept me entertained the first day or two that I used it, but from that point forward it never wavered from the content that entertained me that first day and soon it became really boring to see the same type of thing over and over, leaving no remaining appeal.
Because everyone talks about how great the recommendation engine is, and me wanting to find great content, I went back to it after a while to see if they fixed the problem. But no, still the same content that bored me away from the app the first time.