this post was submitted on 26 Oct 2024
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Signups opened this week for Loops, a short-form looping video app from the creator of Instagram alternative Pixelfed, reports TechCrunch.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The first round of applications are for ios only, android has to wait, would have liked to have known that information before I spent the last week waiting.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Edit: had to reset my password via the reset link in the welcome email.

But the Android app is already available. Although I can't log in... Is this because the server is overwhelmed or are Android users indeed blocked? Why would they release the app then?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago

Did you reset your password, the welcome email has a link to change it.

[–] [email protected] 47 points 2 months ago (6 children)

Hmmm…

Submissions: By directly sending us any question, comment, suggestion, idea, feedback, or other information about the Services ("Submissions"), you agree to assign to us all intellectual property rights in such Submission. You agree that we shall own this Submission and be entitled to its unrestricted use and dissemination for any lawful purpose, commercial or otherwise, without acknowledgment or compensation to you.

Contributions: The Services may invite you to chat, contribute to, or participate in blogs, message boards, online forums, and other functionality during which you may create, submit, post, display, transmit, publish, distribute, or broadcast content and materials to us or through the Services, including but not limited to text, writings, video, audio, photographs, music, graphics, comments, reviews, rating suggestions, personal information, or other material ("Contributions"). Any Submission that is publicly posted shall also be treated as a Contribution.

You understand that Contributions may be viewable by other users of the Services and possibly through third-party websites.

When you post Contributions, you grant us a license (including use of your name, trademarks, and logos): By posting any Contributions, you grant us an unrestricted, unlimited, irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, royalty-free, fully-paid, worldwide right, and license to: use, copy, reproduce, distribute, sell, resell, publish, broadcast, retitle, store, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part), and exploit your Contributions (including, without limitation, your image, name, and voice) for any purpose, commercial, advertising, or otherwise, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, your Contributions, and to sublicense the licenses granted in this section. Our use and distribution may occur in any media formats and through any media channels.

This license includes our use of your name, company name, and franchise name, as applicable, and any of the trademarks, service marks, trade names, logos, and personal and commercial images you provide.

from https://loops.video/legal/terms-of-service

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Clicked on the link. Pronouns for a company is wild 😆

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

sounds like Facebook

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

Surprised they're not asking for peoples' firstborns.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

At this point, it's sounding more and more like a social experiment.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

What a great way to build trust in a newly born platform! And how respecting to the people that are using the platform! Way to go!

[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago

Welp thars a hard no.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 2 months ago (2 children)

TikTok is popular because it's addicting, not because it's useful, so I don't understand why anyone would use this.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

If it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out. It seems like an idea worth trying. What is there to lose?

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

TikTok is popular because it’s addicting, not because it’s useful

TikTok is profitable because it is addictive. But the idea that short-form video is less useful than print or radio is flawed.

I don’t understand why anyone would use this.

For the same reason someone would turn on the TV, download a podcast, or pick up a magazine.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

Go fediverse 😍

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

will it be fruity ?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

I'm still waiting for the further instructions they promised to send by mail lol

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

(insert here the "The TikTok at home" meme format) So actually I did my own with PeerTube (self hosted server side) and Latrix (mobile client to live stream) and you can see the result at https://video.benetou.fr/w/p/hfPcHz1kCgnM6zKhfPrS4b (playlist of 6 short videos with progress over time).

I'd argue it... works. Is it necessary or useful? Well I didn't keep up with the format but it potentially can be. My point being... we already have quite a few tools in place.

[–] [email protected] 52 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (4 children)

TikTok gathering data and selling it to whoever is a problem but it's not the problem.

The problem of TikTok and many other social media is that it drains our energy and motivation. It's like digital weed, creates the feeling that there's no reason to change things. We can just consume things.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

it drains our energy and motivation

All this time, I thought the daily grind of employment - consuming 8-12 hours of my day for someone else's profit - was what exhausted my free time, limited my opportunities for socializing, and drained my enthusiasm for local organizing. Turns out it was the fifteen minutes of free time between meetings checking current events that was to blame.

It’s like digital weed

So its palliative care for our lack of comprehensive healthcare, but even less effective at the job?

[–] [email protected] 12 points 2 months ago

That's a problem. Absolutely. It's not the problem though. I'm not sure the problem can be summarized so succinctly. This is the way I've been putting it:

These are the top reasons humanity needs successful, decentralized, open social media platforms:

  1. Collecting and selling user's private data is dangerous and unethical.
  2. Using that data to intentionally and directly manipulate user's thinking is even worse.
  3. All of the major centralized social media companies have been proven to either allow these illicit information campaigns or coordinate them directly. TikTok is the focus right now but Sophie Zhang exposed Facebook for doing exactly what TikTok has been exposed for recently. Can you recall any meaningful consequences for Facebook? Do you think Facebook is now safe to use?
  4. It's clear that most political leaders are either too ignorant, too corrupt, or too inept to meaningfully legislate against these problems.
  5. The concerned public can't shut Pandora's box. No one is coming to save us from big tech or the monied interests and nation-states that wield it.
  6. The concerned public can't easily and legally audit the platforms big tech builds because they are closed and proprietary.
  7. Personal choice is not enough. Not using centralized social media increases personal safety but does little to curb its influence otherwise.

These are listed by order of intuitive acceptance rather than importance. I find it aids the conversation.

The best reasonable answer to these problems I've seen proposed is for the public to create an open and decentralized alternative that's easier to use and provides a better user experience.

Will that kind of alternative be a force for pure good? I'm not sure. To your point: I'm not convinced social media of any kind can be more than self-medication to cope with modernity. Then again I've had incredible and meaningful conversations with close friends after passing the bong around and spent time on Facebook/Reddit, and now Mastodon/Lemmy/etc, doing the same. Those interactions were uplifting and humanizing in ways that unified and encouraged all involved.

I think the truth lies somewhere in the middle. We need to take care of each other, refuse pure hedonism, and protect the vulnerable (and we're all varying degrees of vulnerable). At the same time: humans aren't happy in sterile viceless productivity prisons. Creating spaces for leisure which do no harm in the course of their use isn't just a nice idea... It's necessary for a functional and happy society.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 2 months ago

Nah man, Social Media Companies are at an evil genius level of greed. They are the ones creating the feeling of consuming a "digital weed," as you call it. Blaming the users is tantamount to saying the world is polluted because people love cars, as if the oil and gas lobby isn't cultivating that and profiting massively off of it.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 months ago

Barkbarkbark

TikTok is designed to make you consume and not meaningfully engage. As complex as the algorithm is, users' ability to participate in discussions is severely limited.

ByteDance is capable of writing software that predicts what you want to see next, but it can't write comment sorting, or basic threading like Reddit?

The severe limitations in communication are deliberate. You're not supposed to engage meaningfully, you're supposed to look at it, feel something, and then scroll.

One of the reasons I like seeing new social media startups (like Lemmy) is that the current offerings are harmful to us, and any challenge to them as the potential to make positive change.

Bark

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