Gen Z is right to reject the myth of productivity

Against the Stickiness of TikTok, an Internet Archival Site for Self-Discovery and Self-discovery: The Case of Moving Pictures

TikTok’s ascent to becoming the most popular site on the internet has sparked endless discussions about its stickiness—as if it were capable of hacking our normal cognitive pathways and transmitting messages straight into our brains. Critical analysis said the platform was effective because of its seemingly all-powerful algorithm. Eleanor Cummins and Rob Horning were able to show how the tool for self-discovery was used to ensure an endorsement of the content it delivered. Others have dissected the cultural appeal of the algorithm, claiming that it fills a void in contemporary spiritual life by positioning itself as a data-backed deity that reads our swipes and likes much like the ancient oracles did our palms and stars. Taken as a whole, these analyses see misplaced faith in the algorithm as the primary culprit behind our particular vulnerabilities to TikTok.

Take, for example, the transition from the cinema to TV that occurred in the mid-20th century and enabled moving images to enter our homes. Once constrained to the theater, this content began to live alongside us—we watched it as we got ready in the mornings, ate dinner, hosted guests, spent time with family. Theorists like Marshall McLuhan noticed that as moving pictures were taken out of the dark, anonymous communes of the theater and placed within our domestic spaces, the foundational mechanics of how we received, processed, and related to them changed. Heidegger recognizes the connections between our sense of being in the world and newly ingrained features of our dwellings, which take on a familiar casualness. Donald Horton and R. Richard Wohl argue in their paper that viewers became friends with the people they saw on the screens. Home audiences grew to see these mass media personas as confidants and friends, giving broadcasters the means to manipulate audiences at a more personal level.

The platforms used to want to be device-agnostic and accessible to everyone. According to Kyle Chayka, this allowed companies to say that they would use any device on the site to avoid particularities like class, nationality or identity. This logic is indicative of the mission of Google to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible. Discussions have rarely focused on the specifics of our encounter with these platforms—the instruments used, context, or materiality.

Now as Y2K trends reemerge, we are all a little older and, we’d like to think, a little wiser. Sentiments that powered those trends feel uncannily present.

“So here you have the end of the millennium, there’s anticipation. There is a weird desire to categorize what we have accomplished in the last decade in a western way. There is a sense of unease when you’re in the middle of a dot-com boom.

How quaint it all seems now. Right on time, the unerring 20-year-trend cycle has brought it all back: The silvery, space-age silhouettes. Our eye is wary of technology. The fragile optimism. The fear of not knowing. We feel like we are at the edge of our existence after hearing a note of apocalypse in the air.

So while the materials were different, and the look was different, the heart of a lot of Y2K style was the same it had been in generations before: A fascination with the future.

The Atomic Era had an effect on the space travel community in the 1960’s. The futuristic curves of Googie architecture are reflected in the design from that period. Disney World’s Tomorrowland, for example, is a caricature of this kind of style and the wide-eyed optimism it often invoked.

He says that because of advances in material technology, he can see an evolution of these forms. “In the Y2K era everything was plastic, shiny. Those blob forms that people saw as futuristic in earlier years became inflatable plastic furniture. It is interesting to see how that can be applied across different design fields, because of the silver translucency and sheer elements of futuristic materials.

What happened in the Age of Technology: a cataclysmic event that changed our lives during the boom of the 2000’s

The change of date could cause computers to malfunction and possibly lead to a halt of life if we weren’t careful, and this was what we knew in the years leading up to 2000.

Not everyone thought such a cataclysm would happen but it was a major cultural conversation and it was very real. Entertainment and popular media found ways to creatively present this hyperbole, like the Time magazine cover above that was published in January 1999.

“After Y2K, there was a bit of a hangover,” says Froyo Tam, a researcher for CARI. “After an era of futurism, things got more regressive and hedonistic. Nihilistic as well. It was an era of McBling and McMansions and consumerism driven by the notion we would have endless prosperity. The great recession of 2008 left us a bit left in the wind.

When I asked my youngest, Soleil, about whether it was a good thing or a bad thing to grow up with all this technology, she answered like a Zen master: “I just think it’s a thing. I don’t think it’s a good or bad thing. … There is not much people can do about it. It is just a thing. She reminded me that it was the world she would have chosen rather than this one.

Generation Z: When Technology Meets Technology: How Gen Z Feels Like An Obsession or an Ambiguity? The Case of Generation Z

Therein lies the difference. We still stuck to our promise that things would get better despite being in a tough position at the beginning. Gen X and boomer elders all claimed to have paid their dues when they were young, but now they own houses. We had every reason to believe that at some point, our fortunes would improve and our dues would reap dividends. Gen Z enjoys no such delusions.

A lot of the forces that are negatively impacting us are from the 90s, says Collins. “But at the time there was an idea that technology could survive all of our issues, that it could advance climate change measures and help solve political issues.”

Two decades later, the millennial tide of techno-optimism has significantly ebbed. Scientists think we can’t invent a way to escape from the consequences of climate change. Climate change was the most serious problem for Gen Z, according to a new report. Technology that was new and exciting in the last millennium is now essential to our daily lives, and for many, feels like an obligation rather than an escape. Nearly half of the Gen Z population says social media makes them feel anxious, sad or depressed, according to a 2019 study, and more than half say they actively seek “relief” from its influence.

“So many times, millennials tell me they finally feel like they’re on the right track,” Dorsey says, “and then something happens that’s beyond their control.”

Still, when I first read last year that the oldest millennials were starting to turn 40, that detail jumped out at me. The concept seemed so surprising. For so long, we’ve seen the same picture painted of millennials over and over.

Why are Millennials Turning 40 shoichets a year after their First Two Teeths? An Empathy in My Mum’s Memory

My husband and I went on a trip back in May and I was alone with our baby for the first time. “I can do this,” I thought, trying to reassure myself. It won’t be hard. One night, my daughter had her first two teeth poke through her gums. After watching on the baby monitor as she thrashed in her crib for what probably was only a few minutes, but seemed like an eternity, I ended up holding her in my arms for the rest of the night to comfort her.

As the sun rose, we sat bleary-eyed on the floor of her room together. Her pajamas were covered with the cherry-flavored Children’s Tylenol she’d spit out when I tried to give it to her the night before. For a brief time, we were able to relax and just enjoy ourselves, as she was smiling and I could finally relax.

I was overwhelmed with emotion and was shaking. I saw my daughter playing with me. There were so many questions I wish I’d asked my mom about how to take care of her. Instead of calling my mom that day to ask for advice, I would race to Michigan to help plan her funeral.

For years, for example, headlines have blared that millennials aren’t having kids. The reality, though, is more complicated, according to Kim Parker, director of social trends research at the Pew Research Center.

The women are having children earlier. When looking at completed fertility, we have not seen that they are having fewer children, just starting later. It isn’t necessarily a completely different way of approaching family life.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/31/us/millennials-turning-40-shoichet-cec/index.html

Turning 40-Shoichet-Cec: What Happens When a Baby is Born: Generational Change in the 21st Century

Even in our most joyful moments, many middle-aged people like me are feeling pressure. There is still more research to be done on how this shift is changing our society.

They contend that many more factors can shape someone’s life than the year they were born – race and socioeconomic status, for example. When analyzing a group of people without digging into what they were saying, important details about social change end up getting lost.

Philip N. Cohen wrote in a Washington Post opinion piece that drawing lines between birth years isn’t helping. The professor of sociology at the University of Maryland has been leading a group of academics pushing for the Pew Research Center and others to stop promoting generational labels altogether.

There is a large age gap between older and younger members of our generation, a wide range of life experiences and more.

To make things even more confusing, there’s no concrete definition of when the millennial generation begins and ends. The 1991 book credited with introducing the term states that millennials were born in 1982. Widely cited definitions on the Pew Research Center’s website describe millennials as those born between 1981 and 1996. Other researchers have floated theories that millennials were born in the late 1970s and even up to the early 2000s.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/31/us/millennials-turning-40-shoichet-cec/index.html

How millennials are buying their first home: A financial advisor in Washington states that buying a house is okay, but it’s not okay to rent

It is important to understand that not all differences are caused by being a part of a generation, and that the other factors are more important than simply being part of a generation.

For years that milestone didn’t matter much to either of us. We’ve house-sat, and rented, and focused our energy and finances on doing things we enjoy together in our free time.

Buying a house feels like it would have been done already, since we have a daughter. It is out of reach as housing costs remain high and mortgage rates go up.

We’re not alone in feeling like we’re behind in taking this big step, according to Kevin Mahoney, a financial advisor in Washington who specializes in helping millennials.

He says that people are stressed out about not being homeowners. I try to let them know that it’s okay to rent. You’re buying yourself flexibility. You are buying yourself some time to figure out what you want your future to look like.

Older millennials aged 32-41 made up a quarter of homebuyers this year, according to a National Association of Realtors report, and millennials have been the largest share of homebuyers since 2014.

Kimbrough says it’s hard to think about getting married, having kids, moving out with roommates and other transitions in the housing market like we have now.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/31/us/millennials-turning-40-shoichet-cec/index.html

Dorsey and Pollak: Why do Millennials turn into flakes? The case of an American worker who isn’t a lasso

That’s around when Dorsey says he saw anti-millennial hype intensifying. Back in 2007, he appeared on a “60 Minutes” segment ominously titled, “The Millennials Are Coming.”

Reporter Morley Safer didn’t pull any punches in the piece’s introduction: “A new breed of American worker is about to attack everything you hold sacred: from giving orders, to your starched white shirt and tie.”

He finds that many employees had bought into the stereotype and assumed millennials were slackers or flakes. But actually, he says, millennials are often among a company’s most successful workers and managers. And by the end of his presentation, all of them are raising their hands.

I missed that segment when I was a reporter, I was on the Saturday night shift and didn’t have time to cover breaking news on the Sunday.

I think I would have found the premise problematic even then, but now, with the clarity of hindsight, the “60 Minutes” story seems almost cartoonish – another chapter in a tale as old as time. “Anxious Older Generation Worries Naïve Younger Generation Is Destroying Everything” could have been an equally fitting title.

Lindsey Pollak believes that the rise of social media is partly to blame for the bad reputation of young people. Pollak thinks that our generation came of age under a microscope.

“Obviously people earlier in their careers shift jobs at a higher rate than people later in their careers,” he says. “Millennials have not been uniquely more likely to job-hop earlier in their careers. They are changing jobs less. There has been a decline in job-switching since 2000.

Many of my friends have worked for their employers for a long time. Others who stayed would have fallen victim to corporate restructuring.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/31/us/millennials-turning-40-shoichet-cec/index.html

Millennials Turning 40-shoichet-cec: How I Meteorized My Dad and I Amused by My Mom and Dad

I remember when my dad turned 40. The mere idea of it seemed ANCIENT to me. His coworkers hung black crepe paper around his photo. I wrote a poem about how he shouldn’t feel bad about aging and gave it to him when I was 9.

I am still trying to wrap my head around the idea that I am in my 40s. On most days, I still see myself as a young adult finding my way in this crazy, confusing world.

I realize I am not old, but I am annoyed by our ever-growing list of weird aches and pains, as well as how we don’t like going to loud restaurants anymore.

My parents were at this point in their lives when she was younger. Or, put another way, I’m already so much older than my parents were when they were raising me. When my daughter was born, I was 39 years old. My husband was 41 years old. We will both be almost 60 when she graduates from college. We could be 80 when we become grandparents, if she waits as long as we did to have kids.

writer Amil Niazi describes how she finds herself constantly doing this kind of math while she has two young children and gets hung up on the numbers.

She wrote that she now wants to hit pause, not on their growing and changing, but on her and her version of herself as a parent. “To pause the back and knee pain that grows a little more sharply every year, to halt the gray hairs and the high cholesterol, skip over the inevitable medical scares and exhaustion that seem to envelop more and more of my days.”

“My entire life … the cultural story has always been about our youth. Niazi said that it was always about the young disruptive generation who was spoiled and upending family life, retirement, housing and employment. “We’ve grown up seeing ourselves that way, as the young upstarts, as the disruptors, as the people around whom culture, and especially youth culture, are shaped. We are now middle aged, so we will feel fed up.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/31/us/millennials-turning-40-shoichet-cec/index.html

The Time Machine Revisited: Putting a Baby to the Test for Self-Dual Power in an Overcrowded Universe, I Wondering Who Am I?

When I put her down she jumped over to the magazine section, where there were so many things to check out.

I almost corrected her. I realized it wasn’t her if she was able to see me on the magazine cover.

All of us are still trying to figure out how we got here, as we make our way through life.

One thing I know is that if I ever had a child of my own, I would still want to go to the bookstore with my daughter, but right now we are so lucky that we are together.

Her generation doesn’t even have a name yet – or at least not one we know will stick. No matter what we call them someday, I can’t wait to see what they do.

What Tech Can Learn about Moms and Their Brains: A Talk with Real Experts in Closing Life (Tips & Frozen)

Her tour is very personable and easy to follow for apartment dwellers like me. Fox put her bed in the living room so her son would have a playroom. There are toy boxes and shoe boxes in the kitchen, but a small mouse problem. Writing for Romper, Evie Ebert described the video’s authentic feel, observing that what Fox showed us isn’t the typical “perfectly imperfect” influencer content that offers brief moments of messiness in otherwise antiseptic TikTok feeds. Ebert thought that Fox would be more interested in the trash box in Ebert’s apartment, which would be a great place for a single mom and her toddler to live.

Emily Feret, the creator of the TikTok toys, is normalizing normal by talking about her diet, struggles with getting out of bed and showing off her playroom. I’ve written before about Feret, who serves as a corrective to how the perfection (or performance thereof) of certain momfluencers can worm into your brain, even if you strongly suspect that their online lives are something of a put-on.

While those glossy moms of social media — with their spotless backsplashes and blown-out hair — are still very influential and attractive to advertisers, I do feel that we’re seeing, for lack of a better term, a vibe shift among moms online, moving away from the unattainable ideal and gravitating toward content that actually resembles real life.

There is no denying – or escaping – this one simple but far-reaching fact: Americans are surrounded by screens. As a doctor and a journalist, but most important as a dad to teens coming of age in a screen-infused world, I’m concerned. Technology makes our lives easier, but it is also costly to our health.

In the new season of “Chasing Life” I discuss how technology affects brains and what we can do about it. I’m talking to experts and doing something I’ve never really done on my podcast before: I’m speaking to each of my kids – the real experts.

What Do My Daughters and I Really Know About Screens? Talking with my Daughters, Sage, Sky, 15, and Soleil, in a Basement Studio

A couple of statistics jumped out at me: About two years ago, roughly 85% of US adults reported being online at least daily, with 31% saying they were online “almost constantly.” And as of last spring, for teens, the numbers were even higher: A stunning 97% report being online every day, with 46% saying they’re online almost constantly, according to Pew Research Center surveys.

It is not surprising that those numbers are worrying. We’re obliged to do so much on our screens for work and school. Killing time on TikTok is one of the things we do for fun. Add to that constant communication; we text, Snap and Slack throughout the day. It is easy for us to be on the screens a lot.

I started this journey by talking with each of my daughters, all proud digital natives and Gen Zers: Sage, 17, Sky, 15, and Soleil, 13 – in my tiny basement studio. (Even if you don’t host a podcast, I highly recommend sitting down with loved ones and having uninterrupted, face-to-face conversations on any important topic. You will learn so much!)

I am no exception, and most parents think their kids are smart. I found our conversations to be very thoughtful, with good insights. And they did not hold back.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/02/14/health/screens-technology-brain-chasing-life-gupta/index.html

How do we live? I’m afraid I may be too young, but I know I shouldn’t. How do I feel about my kids? What do we really need?

She is right that it would be hard and isolating for a young person to be completely off everything. Sage also said she couldn’t see herself still using social media like Snapchat at age 20, 30 or 40, because that would be “embarrassing” – but she can’t envision using another platform to communicate, either.

Sky told me she’s happy with how she manages her time: spending about three hours a day on social media, texting and playing games. She reassured me that she doesn’t let it interfere with her homework, but she did admit that on the weekends, she lets it interfere with her sleep.

My daughters think that the teens of the future will have to figure out how to control their impulses, the same way people do around temptations like chocolate and potato chips.

I also learned what they think about my and my wife, Rebecca’s, parenting decisions around screens. The Gupta House Rules require the kids to wait until middle school to get a phone. We have time limits on their social media accounts. We also try to have family dinners every night, when we all cook together and everyone’s phone – including mine – is put away.

I had talked to my daughters and several other experts and now question if we provided the proper guardrails. I would never toss my car keys to a 16-year-old with only a learner’s permit and say, “You’re on your own!” But I wonder if I did the digital equivalent.

Talking about screens and limits makes me feel vulnerable. I always wonder if I am doing the right thing. Am I being a good dad? Is it too strict or too pushover for me?

I don’t have the answers and data to back them up but I am used to that as a doctor. These are uncharted waters for me, and for parents (and people) everywhere. There is no handbook, no agreed-upon best practices. Because this is all so new, the studies haven’t been done, and in fact many of the questions haven’t been formulated yet. Five new questions crop up even when we get a handle on one. The water serpent grows two new heads for each one cut off, similar to a hydra.

I am concerned that my values from the 70s and 80s will be passed down to my kids, just like my parents did to me and my brother. It felt like their beliefs were not up to date.

Even though I have my own experience, it is unnerved me to know that I cannot rely on it as a parent. We usually have reference points where we can get directions to make decisions in our families. But with screens, I can’t say, “This is the way we used to do it when I was a kid,” because nothing so all-encompassing existed back then.

She says that she has a graveyard of products that stare at her in her bathroom. De-influencing will hopefully stop people from tying their identity to what they buy, but she has already noticed something strange: it’s morphing to influencing.

The global recession has already affected the way advertisers approach influencer campaigns as audiences are more sensitive to showboating during a cost of living crisis. But de-influencing wasn’t just triggered by the economy; it’s a response to the way TikTok itself has changed.

“The same way there was backlash to photoshopped ads in magazines or the facetuning of selfies, people are burnt out,” says Charlotte Palermino, the 35-year-old, Brooklyn-based CEO of skincare brand Dieux. Palermino is not surprised by the rise of de-influencing. Being sold to constantly is tiring. Being told that a product is a miracle is tiring.

“My dad wasn’t really sure what TikTok is, but he has been so pleased and grateful,” Richards says. People appreciate him very much. Even some brands have commented. These people were not familiar with who he was a few weeks ago. The Tootsie Roll account was cheering him on.

Getting More Like Your Dad Through De-Impulsing Video: Alyssa Kromelis and Marguerite Richards

Because they make their money by suggesting products, many of them are afraid of the de-influencing trend. This is not really the case. Palermino herself is a “skinfluencer” with over 267,000 followers on Instagram.

Alyssa Kromelis is a 26-year-old marketing consultant from Dallas who created a popular de-influencing video in late January; she has now shot from 30,000 to 123,000 TikTok followers by making regular de-influencing clips.

Marguerite Richards was hoping to get some interest when she bragged about her dad’s novel. A few dozen new readers, maybe. As the first few positive comments started rolling in, she was pleased to have done something nice for a dad who definitely deserved it.

She had no idea that, within a matter of days, millions of people would see her video, and her father’s book would rocket to the top of Amazon’s Best Seller list.

In 2012 Lloyd Devereux Richards published his first novel, Stone Maidens. It’s a thriller about an FBI agent following a killer in Indiana and, by his daughter’s account, it’s quite good. The original release was not very exciting, since the publishing industry can be hard on new releases.

A STORY OF LODGE DEVEROUGH RAYS ON TITAK TOK TO KNOW YOUR PAMEL, AND WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO

“I saw how much time and effort and passion my dad put into his book. I know what a lovely storyteller he is,” she told CNN. “He never stopped writing, and he always stayed positive.”

This particular episode falls under a social media genre best described as “Young people giving their elders love and recognition on a platform the latter doesn’t understand.” It’s a fruitful one, full of parents just like Lloyd Devereux Richards who wake up one morning to find their talents, hobbies or peculiar habits have been broadcast to the world – and won them legions of admirers.

A lot of people who are struggling with a project, who thought they were way off track, this has given them the motivation to regroup. “Everyone can relate to the feeling of being a late bloomer.”

We can see the people who are following and watching us. Richards says they read as many comments as they can. “There are young people who have said they’ve never bought a book for pleasure, or they don’t read a lot. They are sitting and reading, they are loving it.

Lloyd Devereux Richards has more than 300,000 followers on TikTok, and he has a new story to tell. He has plans for the future, too, though it would be very un-authorly of him to give them all away at once.

Why do bare minimum Mondays get so much done in the first few months of our lives? The story of Marcos Jo Mayes

Editor’s Note: Holly Thomas is a writer and editor based in London. She is the morning editor at the media company. She tweets @HolstaT. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author. View more opinion on CNN.

This is the premise of TikTok creator, startup founder, and convert, Marcos Jo Mayes. Many of us spend Sundays making “insanely long to-do lists,” putting ourselves under “paralyzing” pressure to get our lives together. As a result, we hit Mondays primed for stress and unable to focus or engage properly with work. This sense of chaotic unease ripples across the week, costing us more in terms of productivity and vitality than any amount of effort can compensate for. Bare minimum Monday devotees instead make the conscious decision to coast on the first day of the working week, thus conserving their energy. Mayes claims that a magic spell came over him. I felt better. I wasn’t overwhelmed, I got more done than I expected.

Unlike “quiet quitting,” which was a misleading descriptor of the phenomenon it described, bare minimum Mondays do pretty much what the packet promised. The trends share one vital characteristic, though. They are both proof that the younger generation is made up of self-care obsessives.

In practice, however, even Gen Z-ers who manage to execute bare minimum Mondays (or quiet quitting) will, in all likelihood, still enjoy an inferior ratio of effort to reward to the boomers and Gen X-ers who went before them. The same thing happened to them as they entered the workforce. Gen Z knows what is coming.

I graduated into sub-par conditions just like today’s entry level workers. In 2010 the effect of the Great Recession lingered like a head cold and employers took advantage of the laws relating to internships.

Securing remunerated work in any capacity was an ambition that necessitated relentless drive paired with zero regard for one’s own wellbeing. It was intensely competitive, and the triumph of landing a catch went some way to making up for the punishing conditions that almost inevitably followed.

The first several years of my working life passed in a haze of fluorescent office light and breakfasts consumed any time between 4 and 10 am consisting entirely of caffeine pills, Pepsi Max and coffee. I made less money each month than I’d be charged in rent a decade later and conducted my business and relationships in a permanent state of adrenalized exhaustion.

Concerned Pret A Manger baristas offered me free croissants, and lacking a permanent place to stay, I carried an overnight bag with me at all times. I was dependent on the stability afforded my wealthier peers because of the flats their parents bought for them. But I was also fond of it.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/02/opinions/bare-minimum-mondays-tiktok-productivity-thomas-ctrp/index.html

Interning: Strange Heaven? How to Murder Your Life, or How to Make Yourself a Million Dollars a Year Before You Die

Cat Marnell, the pillhead of Manhattan and a bestselling author, captured this beautifully in her memoir How To Murder Your Life.

She said that interning was strange heaven. It’s frenetic but suffused with aspiration, like you’re living the training montage that’ll culminate in your electrifying victory in a short few years. Or at least, that’s how it felt back in the late noughties and early 2010s.

America is the most tired nation in the world. Since 1950, productivity per employee has increased by 434%), yet the supposed rewards like buying property are out of reach.