Sharing Pics and Videos

Ben Evans pulls some stats on the photos being shared via social networks:
“Over 1.5bn new photos are shared every day on Facebook, WhatsApp and Snapchat alone, which equates to about 550bn a year…Total sharing across all social networks, if we include Wechat and other platforms, is certain to be over 1 trillion this year.”
Wow!

Nick Confalone wrote this very funny article describing his stay-at-home-dad experience with Vine, the video sharing app that restricts each video to just 6 seconds. It started off as fun, something to kill time:
“My set would be our house. My supporting cast would be stuffed animals, a plastic giraffe named Sophie, and a 25-pound cat. My star, my muse, and my co-director would be my 3-month-old son.”
The videos soon became popular. Among the reasons for his popularity:
“Mom friends told me part of our appeal came from seeing what Dad does with the baby when Mom’s not around. I let him lick money (oops); I propped him up, but he fell over (oops); I let him suck on a peanut butter jar lid (oops).”
The Internet proclaimed Confalone to be a Good Dad:
“Vine commenters unanimously agreed that I was great with my son. Sure, the cultural bar for competent fathers is so low you could trip over it.”
As his online followers increased, companies started approaching him:
“Use a Popsicle as a main character? If you say so! Play the ukulele while the kid wears Gap clothes? Sounds good! Get into Disneyland for free? Only because you’re twisting my arm.”
Alas! Soon the baby got “older, fussier, and harder to bend to my directorial will”:
“Take 1: baby not looking at camera. Take 2: wardrobe malfunction. Take 3: spit-up. Take 4: not good. Take 5: worse. Take 6: awful. Take 7: Seriously, what is wrong with this baby?! Take 8: Please, smile. Take 9: I mean honestly, babies smile all the time. Take 10: Just smile. Take 11: COME ON!!! Take 12: “I’m not mad anymore, I’m just disappointed.” Take 13: I’m a little mad still.”
(I can so relate to this feeling with my daughter as she has gotten older).

And then Confalone realized what had happened:
“I couldn’t pretend my Vines were about having fun with my kid anymore. I had become a Skinner rat, refreshing posts every 10 seconds to check for more “likes.” And it didn’t matter if I was making them for myself or for somebody else. I was forcing him to do what I wanted.”
And so he stepped back:
“I only pitch ideas I know we can do organically, based on what he’s interested in at the time, like recording him seeing the simple beauty of a puddle in the backyard that splashes the palm of his tiny hand on a hot day, or sticking his fingers in power outlets.”
And so now his videos are made to “look back on my son’s first year of life”.

The prodigal dad had returned.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why we Deceive Ourselves

In their book, The Elephant in the Brain , the authors describe this weird aspect of deception that we practice: deceiving ourselves! That is so weird: “If our minds contain maps of our worlds, what good comes from having an inaccurate version of these maps?” The Sigmund Freud school of thought treats self-deception as a defense mechanism, “a way for the ego to protect itself”. The mind seeks to protect itself from anxiety and other negative emotions. Many object to this reasoning: since accurate information is so critical to our survival, surely distorting information would be dangerous. Wouldn’t the goal of protecting our self-esteem have been better achieved by making the brain’s self-esteem mechanism stronger instead? The new school of thought explains self-deception as “primarily outward-facing, manipulative, and ultimately self-serving”. This is based on Thomas Schelling’s work on game theory: “In a variety of scenarios, limiting or sabotaging yourself is the winn...
Read more

Europe #3 - Innsbruck

The last city we visited in Europe was Innsbruck in the Austrian Alps. After the cold and windy experience (at times) of Paris and Netherlands, Innsbruck was a wonderful change – it didn’t feel that cold, it was not windy all of which made it easy to walk around. Something absolutely necessary given how scenic the place is.   Since the hotel check-in time was much later in the day, we left the baggage and went to the Swarovski HQ-cum-museum about an hour by bus from Innsbruck. The crystal exhibits were brilliant – colorful, bright, shiny. Jewellery aside, it was a display of what one can do with crystals. While my wife and daughter loved the jewellery, I liked the superhero themed exhibits of Batman, Spiderman, the Hulk, and Star Wars. We didn’t buy anything there, though we did buy stuff in the Swarovski store in Innsbruck – jewellery, not the superhero stuff.   Innsbruck is a major tourist attraction during the skiing season but now in summer, we saw many groups of ...
Read more

The Thrill of the Chase

So many people complain about the difficulty in making decisions while shopping. Do you buy Brand X that gives 20% extra free? Or Brand Y that has 10% off? Or Brand Z that gives something else free with it? Do you buy that flat screen TV today or wait for the sale at Diwali? Now since the customer is king, shouldn’t companies be simplifying pricing choices? Like maybe offering consistently low prices all the time? Not so fast, as the US store, JC Penney discovered to its cost. Turns out that while people do complain about pricing choices, they are irrational. Also, they enjoy the thrill of the chase. Huh? The word “sale” acts like a siren call for many people: it lures them in to make that purchase. Consistently low prices don’t do the same. Besides, if a competitor lowers their prices just one time of the year, and Poof! Suddenly that low price claim becomes suspect in shoppers’ eyes. Then there are those sites that offer coupons: have lunch at Restaurant A on Wedne...
Read more