by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner
I’ve finally come to believe that Tik-Tok can’t read my mind. I’ve finally come to believe that all that’s happening is their algorithms really are so good that what appears to be “spooky-they-can-read-my-mind” pushed videos is simply very good algorithm technology. (Which, I believe, in itself is dangerous and a national security risk, but, lulz.) I say this because I ran some casual experiments in my mind and, if Tik-Tok can read my mind, it chose to ignore the bait.
Also, I think a lot of what I’m noticing comes from Tik-Tok really REALLY rooting around in anything I do online, even if I’m not using my phone. Somehow, it’s also scanning what I’m writing right now and all that writing I’ve been doing for the four novels.
So, Tik-Tok is NOT reading my mind.
But, there is a specific aspect of Tik-Tok that at least causes me some puzzlement — the specific women’s videos it choses to push me.
This is where things get really, really, murky. How Tik-Tok would know I like a specific type of woman with a specific type of appearance is something I struggle with. That there are two or three women with the late Annie Shapiro’s phenotype that I get pushed is very curious indeed.
And then there’s Emily Blunt.
Even though she’s talented, witty and beautiful, I’ve never much thought of myself as a Emily Blunt fan. She’s just another hot brunette British actress who did a really great turn on SNL a while back, if I recall. But today, I was pondering all of this and something occurred to me — maybe it’s not Emily Blunt, but Alexa Chung that I’m being pushed via a proxy.
Now, at this point, I have to say that a long time ago I had something of a celebrity crush on Ms. Chung. An online troll played a prank on me, causing me to think something was real that was not real (sort of a catfish, if you will) and, as such, now I’m in terror that any mention of her on my part will cause the FBI or her “people” to swoop down on this blog, looking for proof that I’m a deranged fan.
This is not at all the case. I don’t even think about her at all anymore, feel extremely sheepish about the minor misunderstanding and just want to forget the whole thing. In fact, given that someone in Brooklyn is REALLY interested in me since I mentioned I want to cover NYFW at some point in the next two to three years, I suddenly am paranoid that her “people” are worried I’ll bump into her while taking street fashion pictures in 2022 or 2023.
Trust me, I will either actively work to avoid that from happening or if I did accidently run into her just because it was NYFW I would feel so bad that there was even a small chance that she would be alarmed at my presence that I would probably turn a heel and walk in the exact opposite direction to avoid that nightmarish situation.
In other words, leave me alone, FBI agent. Stop putting any post that mentions Ms. Chung in my file.
But anyway, back to the issue of Emily Blunt as an Alexa Chung proxy.
Why would I be pushed Emily Blunt if I’m not really a fan of hers? If you wanted to put on your tinfoil hat, you could say that since there aren’t that many videos on Tik-Tok about Ms. Chung, I get Emily Blunt videos instead.
Anyway. Lulz, nothing matters.
I have four novels to develop and write as quickly as possible.
