Greg Hochmuth was one of the first software engineers hired at Instagram.He worked on a team in 2012 that developed the first Android app for the slick photo-sharing service. In its first 24 hours, the app was downloaded more than one million times.
But Mr. Hochmuth eventually came to realize that the platform’s pleasing features — the interface that made it easy for people to upload and share beautiful images, the personalized suggestions of accounts to follow — also had potential downsides.
The same design qualities that make an app enthralling, he said, may also make it difficult for people to put down. And the more popular such services become, the more appeal they hold for users — a phenomenon known as the network effect.
“Once people come in, then the network effect kicks in and there’s an overload of content. People click around. There’s always another hashtag to click on,” Mr. Hochmuth, who left Instagram last year and started his own data consulting firm in Manhattan, told me recently. “Then it takes on its own life, like an organism, and people can become obsessive.”
Now Mr. Hochmuth and Jonathan Harris, an artist and computer scientist, have collaborated on a project that explores the implications of such compelling digital platforms for the human psyche. Titled “Network Effect,”the site invites users to click through a video and audio smorgasbord of human behavior. It includes 10,000 clips of people primping, eating, kissing, blinking and so on.
Unlike delectable cooking apps or engrossing music streaming apps that may elicit pleasure responses in the brain, however, the voyeuristic site is deliberately disjointed and discomfiting. To challenge the idea that people entirely exercise free will during their online sessions, the site also automatically turns itself off after a few minutes, shutting out users for 24 hours.
“The endpoint makes you reflect,” Mr. Hochmuth said. “Do I want to keep browsing and clicking and being obsessed? Or do I want to do something else?”
As the site underscores, digital life keeps us hooked with an infinite entertainment stream as its default setting. Tech companies often set it up that way.
There’s Facebook beckoning with its bottomless news feed. There’s Netflix autoplaying the next episode in a TV series 10 seconds after the previous one ends. There’s Tinder encouraging us to keep swiping in search of the next potential paramour.
And then there are the constant notices and reminders — a friend liked your photo or tweet; a colleague wants to connect with you on LinkedIn; an Evite awaits your response — which automatically induce feelings of social obligation. You damn yourself to distraction if you respond, and to fear of missing out if you don’t.
Tech companies tend to present these feedback loops as consumer conveniences. A new Intel TV ad, for instance, shows a young girl in the back of a car growing sad because the laptop on which she was watching a singalong video suddenly runs out of power. The company’s new battery-preserving processor, though, ultimately saves the day, “so you never have to stop watching.” T-Mobile has just introduced BingeOn, a feature that offers subscribers on certain plans unlimited high-speed access to popular streaming video channels.
There’s even an industry term for the experts who continually test and tweak apps and sites to better hook consumers, keep them coming back and persuade them to stay longer: growth hackers.
“How do you drive habitual use of a product?” said Sean Ellis, the chief executive of GrowthHackers.com, a software company specializing in online growth techniques. “It’s not just about getting new people. It’s about retaining the people you already have and, ultimately, getting them to bring in more people.”
by Natasha Singer, NY Times | Read more:
But Mr. Hochmuth eventually came to realize that the platform’s pleasing features — the interface that made it easy for people to upload and share beautiful images, the personalized suggestions of accounts to follow — also had potential downsides.
The same design qualities that make an app enthralling, he said, may also make it difficult for people to put down. And the more popular such services become, the more appeal they hold for users — a phenomenon known as the network effect.“Once people come in, then the network effect kicks in and there’s an overload of content. People click around. There’s always another hashtag to click on,” Mr. Hochmuth, who left Instagram last year and started his own data consulting firm in Manhattan, told me recently. “Then it takes on its own life, like an organism, and people can become obsessive.”
Now Mr. Hochmuth and Jonathan Harris, an artist and computer scientist, have collaborated on a project that explores the implications of such compelling digital platforms for the human psyche. Titled “Network Effect,”the site invites users to click through a video and audio smorgasbord of human behavior. It includes 10,000 clips of people primping, eating, kissing, blinking and so on.
Unlike delectable cooking apps or engrossing music streaming apps that may elicit pleasure responses in the brain, however, the voyeuristic site is deliberately disjointed and discomfiting. To challenge the idea that people entirely exercise free will during their online sessions, the site also automatically turns itself off after a few minutes, shutting out users for 24 hours.
“The endpoint makes you reflect,” Mr. Hochmuth said. “Do I want to keep browsing and clicking and being obsessed? Or do I want to do something else?”
As the site underscores, digital life keeps us hooked with an infinite entertainment stream as its default setting. Tech companies often set it up that way.
There’s Facebook beckoning with its bottomless news feed. There’s Netflix autoplaying the next episode in a TV series 10 seconds after the previous one ends. There’s Tinder encouraging us to keep swiping in search of the next potential paramour.
And then there are the constant notices and reminders — a friend liked your photo or tweet; a colleague wants to connect with you on LinkedIn; an Evite awaits your response — which automatically induce feelings of social obligation. You damn yourself to distraction if you respond, and to fear of missing out if you don’t.
Tech companies tend to present these feedback loops as consumer conveniences. A new Intel TV ad, for instance, shows a young girl in the back of a car growing sad because the laptop on which she was watching a singalong video suddenly runs out of power. The company’s new battery-preserving processor, though, ultimately saves the day, “so you never have to stop watching.” T-Mobile has just introduced BingeOn, a feature that offers subscribers on certain plans unlimited high-speed access to popular streaming video channels.
There’s even an industry term for the experts who continually test and tweak apps and sites to better hook consumers, keep them coming back and persuade them to stay longer: growth hackers.
“How do you drive habitual use of a product?” said Sean Ellis, the chief executive of GrowthHackers.com, a software company specializing in online growth techniques. “It’s not just about getting new people. It’s about retaining the people you already have and, ultimately, getting them to bring in more people.”
by Natasha Singer, NY Times | Read more:
Image: The Network Effect
