Addiction by design.
What I learned from being addicted to TikTok
This is how it usually starts, I will unlock my phone, tap on the app icon to quickly relax, or get entertained and I find myself hooked, clicking, and swiping for hours. Talking about hooked what made me pay attention to my addiction to TikTok was after I read the book Hooked by Nir Eyal.
TikTok is a social media platform used to make a variety of short-form videos, from genres like dance, comedy, and education, that have a duration from 3 seconds to 1 minute. The product is actually at a point where a lot of digital products would aspire to be and their success isn’t by mistake or magic.
Quick fact: I decided to name this article “Addiction by design” not addiction by interface design as most designers would think, although this also contributes to its success, I think Tiktok success was achieved by a great deal of human-centered engineering on the technical aspect and design (I will explain this in a bit).
This article is based on my observation and experience which might be subjective and bias but I will try and make it objective by comparing this app to other apps in the market and I will also back up my observation with some scientific facts and some books I read in the past.
I decided to uninstall TicTok from my device but I later installed it again after a few weeks, I went through this circle like 8 to 10 times in 7 months, after which I decided to investigate what was pulling me back to the app. I analyzed the app from the onboarding process to the content and algorithm and compared it to other social media and entertainment apps like Instagram and youtube.
One step onboarding: The onboarding process is a very important aspect of a mobile app especially in the era of personalization, this is where the system knows more about to user in other to determine what will be shown to the user bases on their interest. This forms the user’s first impression of your app. What makes Tiktok’s onboarding process different is that it is short and fun. What I see with some app is that they try to fit a lot into these screens, and learn everything about the users, showing every functionality of the app, the app’s value, and navigational instructions that highlight key benefits and features, which I think is not necessary depending on the context (some mobile app requires long onboarding process and also a detailed onboarding might be needed to explain new features people are not familiar with) While a lot of applications are looking for a way to make users divulge everything about them, Tiktok allows you to uses the app immediately without stressing the users and learn about you on the go with it human-centered algorithm (I will come back to this point later)
when you first open the app, there is a screen filled with emojis where you can choose your interest, they also made this optional by adding skip, they removed every signup snag, they also make sure they categorized everything in the app is summarize to only one and a half screen, to prevent choice overload bais. The next thing you see a simple navigational Gif telling you to scroll up, just to show how to navigate the app, Immediately you scroll up you get delighted immediately.
“It took me 16.5 sec to be to go through the login and onboarding process, which is short when compared to other entertainment apps”
Instant Delight: TikTok hit the nail on the head by delivering the value it has promised the users immediately, there is no need for the user to click through any category or channel, just like youtube or Netflix, as you see in the picture above, once you have passed the onboarding state the short video will start playing immediately without asking the users to take any action. I think this work out well for Tik Tok especially because it is an entertainment platform and also this resonates with the lazy human nature and rewarding for the brain, the only thing the users have to do is to use their eye to watch.
Human-centered algorithm: Tiktok stands out by relying on less input from the users. It is hard to find an app in the entertainment industry that does its leverage on personalization which is powered by artificial intelligence. After all, this is inseparable from human nature, everybody loves to talk about their interest, and it is human nature to favor whatever puts our interest forward according to Dale Carnegie. Unlike applications like youtube, Netflix, Spotify that use recommendation systems, Tik Tok stands out by adding making it humane, they were able to achieve this in two ways:
- Learning about the users on the go
- Balancing the user interest with a bit on adventure and discovery
Learning about the users on the go: Due to the short onboarding process, TikTok’s algorithm will not be able to have access to the basic KYC needed to personalize the experience for the users, TikTok approach this in a very different way, rather than just asking the users explicitly or presenting a list of recommendation like Facebook and Youtube, (which also slow down the user decision ) the Ai algorithm this figure out on it own by paying close attention to the user interaction with the contents, this is where every single click like follow or swipe, and the seconds (weather the user watch till the end or swipe away quickly are relevant input for the algorithm to learn.) used on each video matters a lot to the algorithm. These choices are used to optimize what will be shown to the users. This approach is human-based by learning directly from the decision made by the uses but not relying on the users to input this because sometimes the user doesn’t even know what they like
Balancing the user interest with a bit on adventure and discovery: Beyond hooking the users in their like and dislike zone, Tiktok also added a bit of exploration and discovery in its feed, unlike the youtube algorithm that only fills the users feed based on the content they like or interact with the most and also based on the activities of other users on the content (How many people watch the video, number of likes and dislike, the share and save factor). I noticed that the algorithm shows me things that are a little bit outside what I have interacted with in the past but very similar in the exploration or discovery speed. Tiktok successful make the algorithm the product instead of building the product first and then putting a layer of an algorithm to it, they started with understanding how people think and behave and then model an algorithm after this, this high level of modding help them to successfully humanize artificial intelligence and which is based on the principle of human-centered design and I think putting people at the center of the design and engineering process is a very good health approach to the recommendation system
An immersive interface design that will hook you: The fullscreen design allows for an immersive experience, no other distractions, unlike Youtube, Facebook, and Instagram, although Instagram partially adopts this method, immersive experience does not last, once you start scrolling, the app relying on the user to fit each content into the mobile device viewport. Once the user attempts to scroll to the next content by swiping up or the previous context by swiping down on Tik Tok, the app does the rest of the work for the user by automatically snapping into the viewport thereby preventing the users from seeing the other content, which reduces distraction.
This approach helps to enhance the algorithm because this will eliminate any guesswork and will allow the algorithm to be able to determine the engagement with each content based on the user actions, thereby allowing the algorithms to work with accurate quantitative data. for instance, the amount of time used on each video, follow, like, skip and share, they even added a subtle trigger when the video is on repeat, the algorithm assumes you are interested and automatically change the color of the share button to a sharp blue color with simple animation, this just a simple way of influencing user behavior as discussed in the Nir Eyal’s book hooked B=MAT. This is a great example of how engineering meets design.
Fast entertainment for both the consumer and the creators: I think the advantage Tiktok has on all other entertainment platforms that rely greatly on video is the quick and short entertainment available on the platform. On the consumers’ side, It would probably take me between a minimum of two to 5 minute to complete a video on youtube, whereas at this same time I would probably go through 8 to 10 videos on Tiktok, which get me entertained faster and also giving the algorithm much more data to work within a shorter time and thereby rewarding the user with similar content which very rewarding for the human brain. The speed of action and reaction which is the basics of interaction is faster on Tik Tok when compared to other entertainment platforms like Netflix and youtube.
This same approach is adopted on the creator’s side. Content is faster and cheaper to create on Tik Tok when compared to youtube, all I need as a content creator on Tik Tok is just my mobile device, all other resources are available on the platform. The creator does not have to look for genuine content to start with, I can use the ready-made content provided by other users by using a feature called Deut for video and a can also do the same for sound too, this allows the user to add their creativity to pre-existing content on the platform. This approach gave rise to a new set of content creators by lowering the barrier of entry for context creators. This also creates a sense of social connection and shared community which is very important by Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of need.
The oil of the 21st century: for decades the national economy has rested on the industrial revolution (Mechanical, Chemical, and electrical era) There is a great shift in power in the fourth industrial revolution which is fueled by technological breakthroughs. Artificial intelligence is a major driver and as we have seen how it has managed to enter all aspect of our lives, technological companies in china are in the sweet spot of applying the learning that has been learned over the years of research in Ai and I think Tiltok has successfully revolutionized the application of AI in consumer technology.
