Re:Clubhouse is the big stinker that nobody wants to talk about
by derefr on Sunday July 25, 2021 @11:34AM
(#27949900)
I think you're incorrect/dated about what you consider to be the modern medium for engagement with "long-form high-word-count content."
Beyond engaging with blog posts, or podcasts, or Twitch-style livestreams, the real #1 way people are consuming long-form content these days, is serialized — i.e. as "tweetstorms" or their AV equivalent in Instagram/TikTok. Pre-prepared, granularized "bites" of a long-form piece, that are pushed out one-at-a-time — and engaged with one-at-a-time between other things, as time permits, if you're consuming them "live" — but which also permit/encourage all-at-once consumption if you find them after-the-fact.
There is a reason people use Twitter for blogging, rather than "just having a blog." And that reason is that readers are able to concurrently engage with several ongoing text threads at once, if presented serialized in this manner, in a way that they would find harder to, if presented long-form, or impossible, if presented in a higher-engagement medium like voice or video.
And when readers are able to concurrently engage with several ongoing threads at once, they become willing to consume threads that, in a "consume all-at-once" medium, would never be able to "win" their full attention. Authors can settle for being the thing everyone is scheduling into their #2 or #3 or #5 attention-slot, rather than their #1 attention-slot, and still get engagement based on that.
Beyond engaging with blog posts, or podcasts, or Twitch-style livestreams, the real #1 way people are consuming long-form content these days, is serialized — i.e. as "tweetstorms" or their AV equivalent in Instagram/TikTok. Pre-prepared, granularized "bites" of a long-form piece, that are pushed out one-at-a-time — and engaged with one-at-a-time between other things, as time permits, if you're consuming them "live" — but which also permit/encourage all-at-once consumption if you find them after-the-fact.
There is a reason people use Twitter for blogging, rather than "just having a blog." And that reason is that readers are able to concurrently engage with several ongoing text threads at once, if presented serialized in this manner, in a way that they would find harder to, if presented long-form, or impossible, if presented in a higher-engagement medium like voice or video.
And when readers are able to concurrently engage with several ongoing threads at once, they become willing to consume threads that, in a "consume all-at-once" medium, would never be able to "win" their full attention. Authors can settle for being the thing everyone is scheduling into their #2 or #3 or #5 attention-slot, rather than their #1 attention-slot, and still get engagement based on that.