Every day on the Internet we are more and more “recommended” and less and less given to choose for ourselves. More and more things are being created that make it easier to view content and at the same time give less freedom of choice.
One important difference between the Internet and television is the ability to independently choose the information consumed. You can stop reading or watching at any time and switch to something else. When watching TV, you can also switch to another channel at any time. But the number of channels, although large, is not as limitless as the amount of content on the Internet. All channels can be clicked in a few (tens) minutes. While on youtube alone in May 2019, 500 hours of video per minute were uploaded .
However, the ability to independently choose the consumed content, in addition to the two extreme states: "there is a possibility" and "no possibility" has many intermediate values. And as far as I can see, there are a lot of tricks right now to reduce the ability to choose what content is consumed. Some of them are aimed at reducing the time and reducing the number of actions from the desire of a person to watch something to directly viewing the content.
A small excursion into history.
In ancient times, the main method of transmitting information was word of mouth. And there was no great freedom of choice in the information received: either to communicate with people who were nearby, or not.
With the emergence of writing and the massive distribution of printed publications, additional sources of information appeared: books and newspapers. It became possible to choose which books and newspapers to read. At the beginning, there were few printed sources of information; over time, their number grew to fairly large volumes ( about two million books are published annually ). There are plenty to choose from today. Plus books and newspapers tend to run out. This means there is an opportunity to think about what to do next: do something else, or start a new book (which still needs to be selected and found).
With the development of electricity, radio appeared. Another source of information. Its significant difference from printed publications, in addition to the speed of transmission of information and its amount per unit of time, is its easier consumption. You need to buy a newspaper or book (not always), pick it up, find a suitable place (preferably comfortable and quiet) and start reading. Not colossal, but a certain amount of purposeful effort must be made. It is enough to turn on the radio and the efforts can be said to be over (efforts to buy a radio are one-time). You can sometimes switch stations, but the effort is minimal. You can listen to the radio constantly without bothering yourself. There are exceptions when it is necessary to listen with concentration and delve into the radio broadcast. But this is rare, in my opinion. While listening to the radio, you can choose from several radio stations. The radio stations decidewhat information the listeners will receive. You can switch to another station, go read a book or newspaper, or talk to other people.
Television appeared somewhat later. It's the same with him as with the radio. Included and further efforts - these are gearchanging channels. But, unlike radio, the visual channel of receiving information is also busy. It is more difficult to get distracted from the TV than from the radio - they show something there. TV channels work around the clock. This means that there is no end point (there are ads, but it doesn't help much) when you can turn off the TV and change activities. It takes an external factor or a conscious effort to stop watching TV. Almost complete control over the information provided by the TV channels.
By the end of the 20th century, the Internet appeared and began to develop. At that time, the sites consisted practically of text. Music, images and videos were rare. At that time, to get information, you had to find it and read it - this requires a conscious effort, almost like with books and newspapers. The development of transmission channels has made widespread dissemination of images and videos possible. This is the type of information that can be perceived without any mental effort.
And they began to do things that allow you to consume videos and pictures with minimal effort. The easier it is to consume content, the longer the user stays on a particular site or application:
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Autoplay, "recommendations", endless pages and endless news make it easier to browse content and reduce the number of places where you might think, "What do I want to do next?" This means people spend more time, make less choices, and rely more on “referrals”. Thus, some parts of the Internet become very similar to television: endless videos / pictures / news that you decide to show.
We still have a lot more freedom of choice when using the Internet than when we watch television. But the tendency of service owners to make it easier to get content so that users spend as much time as possible on it I really don't like. You have to constantly be on your guard so as not to accidentally spend several hours scrolling and viewing something incomprehensible.
I don't think that the Internet will ever completely become like television, when, opening any site, you get endless videos at once without the ability to stop or switch them. But already now, in many places, more and more people are deciding what to watch.
I hope someday all these tricks will be perceived by people as an attempt to deceive them and cash in on them. Maybe then their use will become bad manners.