![]() Like a stalker recording when I entered and exited my building, it logged my watch times. The algorithm obediently archived my psychographic data: preferences for Cirque du Soleil and tattoo artists with acrylic nails, search histories for impressions of Julia Fox. It was winter in New York, and we were falling in love, my screen and I. ![]() It told me something about allure and control: it’s not about content but rhythm and timing. After a round of sound bowl healers, the algorithm stoked my paranoia with CCTV footage of humanoid aliens crossing freeways but then washed it all away with a dog staring into the ocean-a pattern that presented its videos as the sole solution (balm) to a problem it created (anxiety). Something about the bite-size content was just as stimulating as a Diet Coke yet as inebriating as a beta-blocker. From the start, TikTok felt wholesome but tinged with perversity. About a year and a half ago, I first downloaded TikTok, a user-generated video roulette app, to destress my life with ASMR videos: girls-always girls-whispering sweet, soft nothings while they sprayed whipped cream on a Saran-wrapped microphone. One night, I got served a clip of young female couples making out at various cultural landmarks worldwide: the Eiffel Tower, the Great Wall of China. While my Instagram reels (e.g., hot guys at techno clubs) seemed to know I was gay, why wasn’t TikTok getting the picture? In one sense, it did. ![]() ![]() The TikTok algorithm kept serving me-a gay Chinese American male-videos of hot girls drinking coffee, or singing along to pop songs in the car, to which I’d spasmodically scroll up, perhaps a touch too quick, to train the algorithm that I wasn’t interested. ![]() At first, it was weird then, it was boring. ![]()
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