Thursday, September 02, 2021
Enticement point-missing
The web's "telepathy" works well in some places and not at all in others.
Youtube certainly knows what I like, but the Suggested For You column rarely includes anything I like. It seems to be stuck on old TV comedians like Rodney Dangerfield, who I never watched on live TV and never watched on Youtube. Totally uninteresting.
Now Quora is doing the same thing. In the last few months when I was in survival mode, not creating much, just spewing out bile, I was spending ENTIRELY TOO MUCH TIME on Quora. They should have learned what I want to see and what I hate. They know what makes me click.
This week they're switching over to part subscription mode, with about 10% of the items grayed out to entice you. None of these items entice me. They don't belong to the category that triggers serious and knowledgeable answers, and they don't belong to the category that triggers a FUCK OFF reaction. They're just uninteresting and unclickworthy.
After reading their explanation: Oddly, they're not trying for clicks. They're only monetizing a few "chosen" writers. Well, I didn't choose any of them, so FUCK OFF. This is a WEIRD business model! Quora is asking the customer to pay for products the management likes, but not for products the customer likes.
Reminds me of Detroit's attitude in the late '50s when Nash was proving that a significant number of drivers wanted plainer and smaller and more practical cars. Detroit wanted to sell only what the management liked. Finally and grudgingly they offered competitors to Rambler, but their attitude was: WE KNOW WHAT'S GOOD FOR YOU. PRACTICAL CARS ARE HORRIBLE. WE'LL MAKE SURE YOU KNOW GOOD AND GODDAMN WELL THAT YOU ARE DRIVING A HORRIBLE CAR.
Labels: AI point-missing, Bemusement
¶ 11:27 PM
