Crap and gold (+ weekly update)
There’s a lot of crap on the internet. But there’s also a lot of gold.
That’s usually fine. You ignore the crap, and enjoy the gold.
Except when you start using certain platforms. Products like Instagram, TikTok and Twitter.
On these platforms, crap and gold mix freely. If you want the gold, you have to put up with the crap.
You might think it strange that the crap is shown to you at all, since you’d think it makes your experience of the platform worse.
It’s because of the concept of variable rewards. In Hooked, a book about making addictive products, author Nir Eyal says that a key part of addictiveness is using a system of variable rewards, where a user does not always know what to expect when they are using the product.
Much like a slot machine, you might ‘win’, by getting something you want, or ‘lose’, by getting something you don’t. A slot machine needs there to be crap outcomes.
Similarly, platforms have to make sure there’s lots of crap to keep you addicted. They also show you crap to make money, in other words adverts. Most adverts are crap, most of the time.
What you end up with is a highly addictive platform where you have both crap and gold, and you find it hard to leave because you value the gold so highly.
Is it worth being on platforms like this, where you are forced to put up with a mixed bag of crap and gold that you have no control over?
I don’t think so. But we all are.
Anyway, gotta TikTok, see you later.
Holy crap, you’re actually reading this
Fun fact: I almost didn’t publish this post because the headline (and therefore the email subject line, for subscribers) includes the word ‘crap’.
In other posts, I’ve extolled the virtues of talking to an audience directly via email, instead of relying on big platforms. But email is not without its issues.
In theory, you can be an email anarchist. You can buy your own domain, set up hosting and storage for it, then install open source software which will look for inbound mail. You’ll have full control over which emails make it through to your inbox. I can’t find numbers, but I’d guess <0.1% of email users do this.
In practice, your email is probably managed by either Google or Microsoft, even if your address isn’t @gmail.com or @outlook.com — since their inbox software is so popular with businesses.
Understandably, Google and Microsoft want to filter out spam. But that’s resulted in a sprawling, opaque system of anti-spam filters, blocklists, and algorithms which have become de facto gatekeepers for most email.
Which brings me to the key question I had to consider before publishing this article: does Google think ‘crap’ is rude?
I couldn’t find an answer, so I’m going ahead. The proof will be in the pudding, and the pudding is the open rate of this email compared to previous ones.
Weekly update
This is my first 12 Challenges weekly update where I lead with *actual content* and keep the updates themselves nice and brief.
Challenge 1, Linknames: I went all out this week, with two pitches made to massive stars to adopt linknames.
Giving Glover Gil.ga: I put up a pitch to Donald Glover at Gil.ga. Best to read it here if you want full context on what Gilga is (short version: it’s the name of his creative studio). Also posted on the r/donaldglover subreddit, which went down like a lead balloon.
I sent an open pitch on LinkedIn to will.i.am, to urge him to embrace his status as linkname pioneer and become the Great Prophet Of Linknames In The World.
Challenge 2, TrojanTok: Cole is keeping up the good fight on this side. We worried we may have been shadowbanned following an experiment in paid promotion, but looks like newer videos are reaching the For You Page (FYP).
Challenge 3, TikTok Data Black Hole? I’m still thinking about whether to pursue a challenge of finding out the most viewed TikTok top videos. Here are all the methods I’ve considered.
Also, I was pointed towards the awesome Auditing TikTok blog and realized I’ve met a couple of the folks from German tech thinktank SNV running it, so I’ve reached out to chat.
Activity: I started posting more to Mastodon and Bluesky, in addition to Twitter. And a bunch of posts on LinkedIn, too. Still not driving many new subscribers from any of them. In particular, it’s quite bizarre how dead Twitter feels these days.
Stats: 131 subscribers, up 3 this week. Welcome! If I keep that modest rate up I’ll have 4.7k subscribers in 3 years time, which I’d be very happy with. But I think I can do better.
This week’s writing
That’s all — have a great weekend and I’ll be back next week, possibly with a letter to the European Commission and/or TikTok demanding that they give us the basic data we deserve!