Some people say they are addictive, but to me shorts are an absolute nightmare, I despise them, I hate them, I’m allergic to them.
The ultra quick cutting, the often chopped style, the accelerated voice talking at you without pause or mercy even at 1.0, the subtitles in the center that I cannot disable. It’s an attack on my senses, pure overstimulation.
My wife sends me couple of shorts each day and sometimes it’s even interesting content-wise, but I absolutely hate this horrible format, procrastinate watching them and wish back a world where this form of media did not exist. It all started even before shorts in the way people did videos, and somehow it spiraled into this kind of hell scape.
Anyone else feeling like this?
EDIT: thanks everyone, now I feel validated, thought maybe I’m the odd one with so strong negative feelings about them! And sorry about the confusion about pants and stocks (that provoked some funny answers though so no regrets). Yes - as you have all figured out, I’m talking about the annoying short videos almost everyone seems to be addicted to.
I don’t mind some of them but the obnoxious subtitles, they just put me off so much and the video controls that are just always there getting in the way.
I too absolutely despise the whole format.
Do none of you remember vines??
“Shorts” / “TikToks” / w/e are just short form multimedia content taken to their logical extreme. Small tidbits of context free, useless information, slammed into your soul so fast you miss all of the important bits and just get the buzz.
Yeah, useless time sink with lots of flashy distraction. The people who envisioned and built the internet surely did not anticipate it will evolve into THIS.
Man I was sure this was about shorts vs pants too. Pants all day every day. Is that another adhd thing now?
No, shorts are awesome.
Especially booty shorts.
I thought it was about the stock market. And I haven’t the faintest of clue what a short is, except that it’s used in films about the stock market lol
I know you didn’t ask but an opportunity to info dump is always fun.
Shorting is basically borrowing stock from someone, selling it. and then buying it back later before the person wants their stock back. Since (mostly) all shares are equal, as long as I return to the same stock, there’s no reason to hold onto a specific share.
If a stock is going down, if I borrow a share for a week, sell it for $100, then in 6 days buy it for $50 and return it to you, then I’ve just made $50.
It’s a way to make money when the stock market is going down, but is often riskier because with buying stock, you can just hold indefinitely. If I buy a $100 share, and the price goes to $0. I just lost $100. The most I can possibly lose is $100. (edit: and I sell at any point in the future when I decide. Could be 1 week, could be 30 years.)
But when shorting, you have to return the shares to the actual owner at some point, and since you sold the shares, you MUST get them back. But if I sold your $100 share, and in 6 days it is now $10,000 (this wouldn’t happen, but for example), and I don’t have $10,000, now I can’t return your share to you, and I’m in REAL big trouble. The amount of money I can lose is technically infinite, and since I don’t have infinite money to lose, it probably just devolves into legal issues.
Oh I love an info dump. Thank you for taking the time to explain it. It sounds like a twisted way to fuck yourself over financially or hit it real big.
… I’d rather take my chances at a craps table, sheesh!
Thanks again!
So I essentially bet that the market crashes and thus make bank on it?
Oh man, same. I’m new to the culture, and I thought this was another thing I have to get into now. It’s like a friend of mine who married into a Jewish family and now has to learn all this new stuff and he’s always like oh so this is a thing?
I especially can’t stand it when either of these two things happen:
- The subtitles show one word at a time (???)
- The subtitles are animated
The one word at a time is because studies have shown it improves reading speed with no loss of comprehension.
It also makes my head hurt
That is what I thought looks like those speed reading techniques, but by force. So annoying. Not sure the “without loss of comprehension” is so true, all that I read says that speed reading is pseudoscience
I thought you meant the short pants. I love them. I’m so sweaty all the time and long pants feel uncomfortable on my legs even if loose. Only wear them when necessary. Shorts are a godsend.
Ah so that is where this reference is from! I’m too uneducated / young, only played the GBA Generation games
You could’ve seen it if you played Fire Red/Leaf Green ;)
Ugh! My work uniform is technically PPE, so I’m required to wear it…black T shirt, black trousers that are too heavy for summer and too light for winter, and a black coat. The labourers get to wear shorts. They don’t use power tools and mostly just run materials around in a truck with AC… bastards…
For patriotic reasons I am against them, only children and tourists wear shorts in my country.
What country is that? If you don’t want to share I get it. I only ask because that’s what everyone said about Spain, and everyone I travelled with refused to pack shorts except for me. It was the height of summer, in the middle of a heat wave. Literally every single local was wearing shorts.
Funny enough, it is a Spanish-speaking country
Yep. Absolutely despise shorts. For all the reasons you say, on top of the fact that 98% of them are bullshit and wrong.
Which is bizarre, because I get sucked into facebook reels once in a while. I blame the cat clips.
(I always browse with the volume muted. I despise shitty sound effects like the fake laughter, shitty music, or the AI voice.)
I despise them because they’re shallow as fuck, “content” that requires zero brain to enjoy (I do enjoy some of that shit on occasion, but not in the form of short videos, I prefer the lazy approach of putting something on and not having to move a finger for 10+ minutes).
Another thing that makes me hate that kind of video is that it’s a breeding ground for “reacts”, as if the longer form of that wasn’t already a piece of shit. Neither of these problems are exclusive to YT, they’re just following on Tiktok, like Instagram didReaction videos are the worst, in any form. I’m waiting for the day until there’s a reaction video loop referring to nothing than other reacts in circle and nobody knows what the actual underlying video was. The recursive reaction from hell.
I basically only watch YouTube on my TV via Roku, I hate shorts and wish there was a way to block them on the Roku app.
If google really wants to push shorts then make it a separate app. If someone is watching on a TV then chances are they aren’t looking for short form content, so stop pushing it on that medium.
They had one years ago called Vine.
I remember that being an ok way spend a smoke break, I couldn’t imagine living on it the way people use shorts/Tik Tok. The algorithm must be way more intense now.
I get what you’re saying but Vine was an independent company that got bought by Twitter then killed.
I was thinking that Google should make their own app called YouTube shorts and take on tiktok that way. Google/YouTube is trying to have an all in one app, the problem is that muddies the waters and when you stand for everything you stand for nothing. Not to mention that YouTube spent years promoting longer for content and that’s what the user base thinks of now when you say YouTube.
You can play off the YouTube brand with a separate app and still get the branding boost. But actively muddying the waters and annoying your user base is just… well I would say bad business… but given their track record, it’s pretty on brand for a Google property.
Ah, I’d forgotten that Vine was independent at first. Thanks for the correction.
Instagram’d algorithm, at least, will prioritise reels over everything else - leading a lot of accounts to post still images as “reels”
Yes, I also strongly dislike the very short video format you can find on multiple social media platforms these days. On the occasion when my friends forward me things, I find it somewhat manageable if the sound is off. Most of those videos have subtitles and if they’re silent they feel less obnoxious.
Shorts are cancer and vertical videos need to die.
Word. We should start a political party.
Sometimes I get clickbaited into watching one because yt doesn’t let me hide them forever (is there an extension for that maybe? Surely it’s doable with css or something), and they’ve been alright. Though the ones I clicked on have only been from one creator and I don’t mind fast talking (not sped up) and those didn’t have the fast cuts.
I also really don’t get the appeal of the format. I’ve been sent shorts from other creators and it just feels worse than the same thing as a proper video. It doesn’t overload me because it’s essentially how my brain operates anyway, but that’s also why I want things that make me take a break from constantly thinking in overdrive by simply being slow.
I use a Firefox extension called Youtube-shorts Block that does what it says in the name. I think my ADHD brain rejects them for the same reasons a lot of other people are mentioning here…
Thanks, I’ll have to check that out
I hate them so much for all the reasons you mention and a few more.
But there are times that I prefer them over a 2-3 minute vidoe padded to 12-15 minutes for monetization.
I honestly prefer text over either of those options. Saves time and doesn’t over stimulate. Plus, if I lose focus I can just go back, which would be tedious in a video.
More importantly, you can search text to get straight to the point you need. Doing that in video or audio is not possible, you have to memorize timestamps
This, 100%
