the entire "pivot to video" strategy that destroyed many of the sites you used to love was based on Facebook lying about video metrics, convincing everyone that was the only way their content was getting shared they half-heartedly "apologized" for this years later, leaving burning wreckage behind - ThreadSky

rincewind.run • 57 days ago

the entire "pivot to video" strategy that destroyed many of the sites you used to love was based on Facebook lying about video metrics, convincing everyone that was the only way their content was getting shared

they half-heartedly "apologized" for this years later, leaving burning wreckage behind

Reposted from Carli Velocci 👽

As a reminder, Facebook had a giant hand in the death of online journalism in the mid 2010s because they inflated metrics that caused publications to crash and burn. Many of us haven't trusted it in a long, long time.

Comments

irsotss.bsky.social•56 days ago

If I don't see information written in front of me, it's difficult for me to process it. I hate only video format.

craftycooper.bsky.social•56 days ago

Going to a website and seeing the information only offered in a video gives me the same visceral "click away" response as going to a website that autoplays music.

dalemccune.bsky.social•56 days ago

Same!!

Who thinks video and podcasting as news sources is superior to reading? I get that some things need to be video but most dont. I only have so much time (limited) in a day to listen to things. I don’t have earbuds in 24/7. However, I have tons of time to silently read and view.

animystic.bsky.social•57 days ago

luxenjoyer.com•57 days ago

The whole motivation behind this was that you can watch a video without leaving the Facebook, enabling them to sell more ads. It’s the same reason twitter is deprioritizing links now. plus ça change

carlpavlock.bsky.social•57 days ago

That should have been the end for Facebook, but unfortunately it was allowed to grow and continue

theycallhimbfg.bsky.social•57 days ago

As a photographer, I always hated that IG was pretty much twisting our arms to make Reels in order to be seen. I just wanted another place to put some of my portfolio work. Now I have a second job in making video, in addition to taking photos and marketing.

imperatorgabs.bsky.social•56 days ago

Every year we get a new billionaire main villain, which ok. The problem is that when the new villain emerges, we forget about the villains that came before. We're in the Musk era now and that means people kinda wiped their memories of the awful shit of the Zuckerberg era, who sucked as much or more.

maximoverdrive.bsky.social•57 days ago

geekgrammy.com•57 days ago

I hate everything being video now, even stuff that would work BETTER as text.

It annoys me to have to get my earbuds out for a video that I *have* to watch because the information isn't in text anywhere.

ratingbook.bsky.social•57 days ago

Yep, metrics aka RATINGS. The CEO of X used to be in charge of "Audience Engagement" at Comcast. She's the one who announced the Roberts family would "make up their own ratings" when they didn't like what the pros were telling her. Much like not liking "community policing." Their lying continues!

bikeengineer.bsky.social•57 days ago

📌

bunneee.bsky.social•57 days ago

Facebook is a dead platform of bots talking to bots posting AI pics of shrimp Jesus and dhar mann videos. They need to burn the whole place down

crs1.bsky.social•57 days ago

large corps are awful for art and the only solution that ever worked was young ppl on indie platforms playing for like minded folk

Competing for the masses on those corp platforms will always be at cross purposes

Politics like music requires you to control your own masters in order to thrive

houndminternet.bsky.social•56 days ago

I wonder if this mindset was also behind the Tumblr ”we’re a liveblogging/video site” debacle.

cafemuscato.bsky.social•57 days ago

My previous employer, never strong on tech, panicked about the “pivot” and threw ridiculous amounts of money to train people around the world (many in countries with Internet penetration in the single digits) to make videos that then garnered maybe a few dozen views.

And they’re still doing it.

ionotter.bsky.social•56 days ago

Ah. You must be talking about my previous employer, a massive telecommunications company that rhymes with horizon?

cafemuscato.bsky.social•56 days ago

Ah, no—I was, God help me, a public servant, toiling for a sizeable entity that rhymes with Mate Compartment.

dandb.bsky.social•57 days ago

I still think it's crazy that we believe clickthrough metrics when these tech baronies have every incentive to inflate them

gravelinfluencer.bsky.social•57 days ago

At least clickthrough you can validate on your website end with Google Analytics. Since video lived in the platform you were at the mercy of the metrics they provided.

bananapantz.bsky.social•57 days ago

This post received 239k views.

Xitter, probably

gravelinfluencer.bsky.social•57 days ago

Post impressions are just as bullshit as video views to be honest. I always bang the drum for engagements because that is much better data. But impressions are nice becuase they're a big number. This is why I like being in a nonprofit where I don't have the need to BS my analytics.

dandb.bsky.social•57 days ago

Unless they're Google ads

gravelinfluencer.bsky.social•57 days ago

Yeah, but you can at least still see the traffic to your website. Clickthrough attribution is not perfect, but it's far better than anything video or impressions related.

ecarney.bsky.social•57 days ago

"Impressions." Oh man, remember when Musk took over Twitter and one of his early "innovations" was adding a counter for how many times a tweet had been "viewed"?

dandb.bsky.social•57 days ago

Nah I left before that, seems sus tho

beewubs.bsky.social•56 days ago

We’ve got to stop allowing companies to externalize the consequences of their actions.

david.uncensored.zip•57 days ago

as a person doing ads at the time, it was clear they were bullshit even then but managers and leaders didn't want to hear that. they preferred that the line keep going up on "engagement"

dseitz.bsky.social•57 days ago

They needed that sweet sweet VC cash to turn them into the New York Times for Millennials.

karistinalafae.bsky.social•57 days ago

Video has NEVER been my preferred format, so I always hated the "pivot to video" thing.

But I thought I was in the minority, when it turns out that not many people were interested in all of that video content that ruined everything.

whirringsoftly.bsky.social•57 days ago

There's so much content I avoid purely because it's video. I don't want to watch videos, most videos are terrible and even the good stuff rarely gets to the point quickly.

ecarney.bsky.social•57 days ago

It rules that pretty much every defining shift in culture and media over the past 20 years has just been some bullshit foisted upon us by one corporation or another as a tool of market manipulation.

stismail.bsky.social•57 days ago

"Fun" fact: that also includes the anti-vaxxer movement, which only happened because a**hole extraordinaire Andrew Wakefield wanted to peddle his own measles vaccine, so he needed to discredit the MMR vaccine.

neotiamat99.bsky.social•56 days ago

Man, I used to absolutely adore Cracked, it was my daily coffee read, and the pivot to video first gutted and then basically killed it.

birdjay.bsky.social•57 days ago

god i miss when the internet was mostly text-based. i hate that everything is a video now.

peter-butler.bsky.social•56 days ago

I talk about this all the time to anyone who will listen

Compare 1990-2005 (YouTube) to 2005-2025

Big difference! I want someone to write Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death, Part II, the Internet

https://traversingtradition.com/2020/10/26/neil-postman-and-the-internet-age/