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Hi there, I can assure you that a lot of research went into this article.

GrinningFool 13y ago
Well, I'm reassured... Reading through this and a couple of other articles (presumably yours)... yes, I see that research was done; but that it was largely superficial, summarizing marginally interesting content from a few different sources. As GP noted, it seems more focused on link-garnering than providing in-depth information. </brutal-truth>
- 31reasons 13y ago
  Primarily because she is hired to write a blog which is intended to improve SEO and market their product to the right audience.
wpietri 13y ago
Hi, Alina. This is not a dig on your work, but mainly a comment about the site. Sure, I believe you did a lot of research. But then the article could have been written to maximize accuracy or to maximize virality. I write a lot, and there's a big difference between the styles. For some topics, that can translate into a big difference in the content of an article. Productivity is definitely prone to that. There's a whole genre known as "productivity porn", so called because some people feel compelled to look at it far beyond actual utility. Right from the title of the article, I was put on guard. The word "unlock" indicates minor action will bring great improvement, freeing me from possibly-unsuspected constraints. Who wouldn't want that? Then we get three awesome, hard-to-reach states in a row. Next a mysterious sciencey-sounding effect named after somebody I've never heard of but who has an intriguing name. It's a perfect productivity porn title. When I clicked through, my skepticism was increased. On my phone, the first thing I saw was a bunch of share buttons with some needy, manipulative copy to get me to click them. There's a big stock photo of a pretty woman that conveys zero actual information. There were a modest number of short, upbeat paragraphs broken up with large titles. There are what I'm sure were links to other productivity articles in the body. There's relatively little subtlety, and a concluding paragraph that dubiously hates on the 8-hour work day. Then we get a paragraph trolling for comments, which increase stickiness. And then more share buttons with the same manipulative copy. I understand that this is a popular way to build a profitable content business these days. But I also understand that "profitable content business" and "reliable source of high-integrity, low-drama journalism" are poorly correlated. No matter how solid your writing and how true your heart, the context and the constraints of written-for-virality prose make me skeptical. Too many other people writing for similar sites and with similar structures have written excessively upbeat, low-thought articles for me to trust ones on this site without doing a lot more due diligence than I normally will for a quick morning read.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
- hnriot 13y ago
  there's a lot of cynicism here! there's no great mystery to any of this, and what the article is saying is rather obvious (we remember the stuff we didn't finish yet - no shit!) but I just don't see all these cynical intent concerns you have.
  - wpietri 13y ago
    That's not cynicism. That's just reverse engineering a content business. I worked in publishing in the 90s, including doing some print design. I've done a fair bit of UI and information design since then. And I helped start a successful modern content business. Plus I write pretty much every day. I'm not saying anybody there intends to be evil. I'm sure they're all very nice. I'm saying that they're embedded in a business context that shapes behavior. The incentives work strongly against thoughtful, sober journalism, and toward high-viral, high-click, high-engagement content that stimulates a need without ever really satisfying that.
sdoering 13y ago
Really? Then why do you never even mention, that oftentimes this effect could not be replicated in experiments by other psychologists? Or that the effect was even the exact opposite in some experiments? Why? Till now, nobody knows, but to write a blogpost, that does state this effect as fact is quite a stretch, when saying a lot of research went into it. Sorry to be that harsh, but what I told my students oftentimes is, that time of research does not always equal quality of research. [Edit]: Typo

Well, I'm reassured... Reading through this and a couple of other articles (presumably yours)... yes, I see that research was done; but that it was largely superficial, summarizing marginally interesting content from a few different sources. As GP noted, it seems more focused on link-garnering than providing in-depth information. </brutal-truth>

31reasons 13y ago
Primarily because she is hired to write a blog which is intended to improve SEO and market their product to the right audience.

wpietri 13y ago

Hi, Alina. This is not a dig on your work, but mainly a comment about the site. Sure, I believe you did a lot of research. But then the article could have been written to maximize accuracy or to maximize virality. I write a lot, and there's a big difference between the styles. For some topics, that can translate into a big difference in the content of an article. Productivity is definitely prone to that. There's a whole genre known as "productivity porn", so called because some people feel compelled to look at it far beyond actual utility. Right from the title of the article, I was put on guard. The word "unlock" indicates minor action will bring great improvement, freeing me from possibly-unsuspected constraints. Who wouldn't want that? Then we get three awesome, hard-to-reach states in a row. Next a mysterious sciencey-sounding effect named after somebody I've never heard of but who has an intriguing name. It's a perfect productivity porn title. When I clicked through, my skepticism was increased. On my phone, the first thing I saw was a bunch of share buttons with some needy, manipulative copy to get me to click them. There's a big stock photo of a pretty woman that conveys zero actual information. There were a modest number of short, upbeat paragraphs broken up with large titles. There are what I'm sure were links to other productivity articles in the body. There's relatively little subtlety, and a concluding paragraph that dubiously hates on the 8-hour work day. Then we get a paragraph trolling for comments, which increase stickiness. And then more share buttons with the same manipulative copy. I understand that this is a popular way to build a profitable content business these days. But I also understand that "profitable content business" and "reliable source of high-integrity, low-drama journalism" are poorly correlated. No matter how solid your writing and how true your heart, the context and the constraints of written-for-virality prose make me skeptical. Too many other people writing for similar sites and with similar structures have written excessively upbeat, low-thought articles for me to trust ones on this site without doing a lot more due diligence than I normally will for a quick morning read.

deleted 13y ago
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hnriot 13y ago
there's a lot of cynicism here! there's no great mystery to any of this, and what the article is saying is rather obvious (we remember the stuff we didn't finish yet - no shit!) but I just don't see all these cynical intent concerns you have.
- wpietri 13y ago
  That's not cynicism. That's just reverse engineering a content business. I worked in publishing in the 90s, including doing some print design. I've done a fair bit of UI and information design since then. And I helped start a successful modern content business. Plus I write pretty much every day. I'm not saying anybody there intends to be evil. I'm sure they're all very nice. I'm saying that they're embedded in a business context that shapes behavior. The incentives work strongly against thoughtful, sober journalism, and toward high-viral, high-click, high-engagement content that stimulates a need without ever really satisfying that.

sdoering 13y ago

Really? Then why do you never even mention, that oftentimes this effect could not be replicated in experiments by other psychologists? Or that the effect was even the exact opposite in some experiments? Why? Till now, nobody knows, but to write a blogpost, that does state this effect as fact is quite a stretch, when saying a lot of research went into it. Sorry to be that harsh, but what I told my students oftentimes is, that time of research does not always equal quality of research. [Edit]: Typo