X is rolling out a dedicated vertical video feed for US users | TechCrunch
Social network X is trying to capitalize on the uncertainty surrounding ByteDance apps like TikTok and Lemon8 by launching a dedicated vertical video
You're viewing a single thread.
and I’ll still be here wondering why the fuck people continue to shoot vertical
Because it works on phones?
So does landscape.
I mean sure, but if you look at it that way, vertical also 'works' on TVs.
The point is that when you're scrolling through stuff on your phone, you do it portrait.
Since this is the internet, I know I'm going to get a "But I scroll through everything on my phone landscape", because of course I will. That's cool. Go chat about it with the other 0.002% of people who do that.
You can't turn your TV sideways without a lot of headache and potential damage, though.
I mean, I get your overall point, but the initial analogy doesn't quite work.
I will bite. You could scroll through landscape videos with a swipe of the thumb, in just the same way as you can with portrait. I watch YouTube videos in landscape, it's not really a hassle for me to rotate my phone, it can pivot on a pinch really effortlessly, that's the beauty of a small screen in your hand. I am obviously not going to remount a TV for the same reason, so the analogy is kind of mute.
While there is a use case for both orientations, landscape is generally better (especially for the content I like), which is why it was chosen for video content across the world before these shortform vertical videos took off with social media. But I suppose for content where someone just talking to you, then portrait fills the screen better with their face.
Don't be pedantic.
On TikTok you often read comments and stuff, it's very impractical to constantly rotate the screen and a good chunk of it is just people talking where the horizontal space would be wasted anyway. You get used to it and it makes sense there specifically. It's just not the same kind of content.
Phone users want to consume short form video that way.
