I really do not like video as a medium for things that could be written. I don’t really care for “wow look at this wacky thing that happened”. I really dislike videos that are just someone talking at the camera. (Standup comedy gets a pass, but that’s also not something I watch much)

So I’m probably not watching most videos.

If I didn’t ask to be sent a video, I will almost certainly not watch a video of any length.

Honestly, my answer is zero. It’s a rare day when I click on one.

I particularly dislike talking videos. I would always prefer to read instead of hearing someone talk.

Considering its only moderately interesting and is not of any particular intrest to me, the maximum I would spend is like a minute.

5/10 interestingness gets 0 seconds of watch time for me, there’s just too much quality content produced in my topics of interest every day for me to keep up with. I already have to miss some 7/10 projects just because there’s only so much free time in a day.

Regarding the time question, for something that barely crosses the “okay I’ll watch it” threshold, 10-15 minutes is probably what I’ll give it. It can be longer than that, I’ll just skip through parts of the video for the gist to decide if I want to give it more time.

Worth noting though, that for extremely interesting content, a 15 minute duration actually dissuades me from watching it, as I doubt there’s enough time to cover much of anything at a decent level in that little an amount of time. So like, for a neat history vid on a topic I’d like to hear more about, if it’s 30 minutes or less then I’m less likely to give it a chance, unless it’s covering something super narrow where there wouldn’t be as much to talk about. But if you’re going to cover a major historical event, you better be at least a half hour. There are some exceptions to this, Indy Nidell(sp?) is a good example, but it’s my general rule.

For a random moderately interesting subject, I’d rather read a blog post.

Depends on where it links to (e.g. it’s a tiktok-link, vs. a video they directly uploaded into the chat), what the thumbnail looks like (if any), how much I like that person, and how interesting their previous links (if any) were. Also, if it’s something they recorded themselves.

If it’s only 5/10, I probably wouldn’t watch it. Maybe I’d do a few seconds to a minute. My friends pass around mid meme videos all the time and I barely watch any. If i’m not sober however, then probably like 5 mins.

Any length… As long as its content related…

Why 15/20 rambling minutes of banality to describe something that needs 2 minutes. I don’t care about you, your fucked up goofy smile, a cross fade to your dog doing stupid shit, banal commentwry on the state of the world etc while you are there to show me how to wire an electric plug.

Random friend, a minute. Random person on the Internet, 10 seconds.

If it’s from a good friend, maybe twenty minutes. If it’s from an acquaintance, maybe five minutes. If it’s from a stranger, I’m not gonna watch it unless I find the subject very interesting.

I don’t open any email attachments of any kind unless they are critically important and the sender has spoken to me about them in advance.

Surfing videos, on YouTube for example, I might casually look at a video up to about 10 minutes long. I only look at longer ones if I sought out the specific video.

There are SO many variables at play here, I have no idea how to answer this. What am I currently doing, where am I, what time is it, did I just wake up, have I had my meds, have I eaten, was the food good, am I bored, am I waiting for an appointment, what is the appointment, is the video mildly interesting because it’s about a thing I like or because I like the other person, are they waiting for my reaction, how urgent is it…

About 5 seconds. Give me an article instead.

How long I’m willing to watch depends more on the video than on who sent it. If it’s too long to watch right then but still interesting I might save it for later.