I have a theory that bad data from autoplay is creating a perception that people are more interested in super-short videos than they actually are.

How many times have you been on a website where a video autoplays, or you've finished watching a video and another one autoplays.

How many times, when that happens, have you either automatically hit the stop button (if one exists) or left the website?

Think about the number of people who do the exact same as you.

Each time that happens, the average watch time gets shorter.

For example, imagine there's a 10 minute video. One person watches it right to the end. Then three people who never wanted to see the video are shown it as an autoplay.

The average view time across those four people is now around 2 minutes and 30 seconds.

Except in reality, only one person actually watched it, for the full 10 minutes. The other three stopped a video they didn't want to see because it autoplayed as quickly as possible.

Yet what the person who saw the video sees is the average watch time in 2 minutes 30 seconds. So they try to make the next video 2 minutes and 30 seconds.

My suspicion is, on some social media platforms, this is far more common than people realise.

Over time, the received wisdom becomes that people only have short attention spans and will only watch a 3 minute video.

In reality, the people who are actually interested will watch the full 10 minutes if it's compelling, and the actual number of people watching is far lower than the stats suggest.

#webdev #videoproduction #socialmedia #video #TV

]]>https://board.circlewithadot.net/topic/e91ebae3-6e4b-4e0b-a7bb-c8337473ab00/i-have-a-theory-that-bad-data-from-autoplay-is-creating-a-perception-that-people-are-more-interested-in-super-short-videos-than-they-actually-areRSS for NodeFri, 15 May 2026 00:36:58 GMTThu, 23 Apr 2026 13:12:28 GMT60