All posts tagged: Hooked

TikTok Is Designed to Get Users Hooked

TikTok Is Designed to Get Users Hooked

Published by Jenni Sidey

In late January 2026, TikTok settled a social media addiction lawsuit with a plaintiff who argued that TikTok is designed to hook young users. That same plaintiff continued her suit against Meta and YouTube, where she recently prevailed. Those two companies were just found negligent for designing platforms that harmed the mental health of the plaintiff. Who becomes a TikTok power user? An article in The Washington Post offers an enlightening account of how TikTok turns casual users into heavy or “power” users of the app. A casual user is someone who opens the app only occasionally, while power users already spend several hours a day over the course of multiple sessions. More than 800 TikTok casual and power users voluntarily shared their data for the story. Analysts focused on three metrics to understand the viewing habits of users: How much time a person spends on the app viewing videos How many times users opened the app during a day How much time was spent watching a video before swiping for a different one Based …

Photographer Wonders If He Should Refund Bride After Staff Member Hooked Up With Groom

Photographer Wonders If He Should Refund Bride After Staff Member Hooked Up With Groom

Published by Jenni Sidey

An anonymous wedding photographer asked for advice on the subreddit r/WeddingPhotography after a colleague betrayed him and the newlyweds they worked with. He found himself in an incredibly awkward situation after he discovered that another photographer he doesn’t usually work with hooked up with the groom from the wedding they shot. The angry bride thinks the photographer should take full responsibility even though he had no control over what happened. The bride wants a refund on her wedding photos after learning her new husband cheated on her with one of their wedding photographers.  The photographer explained that his usual co-photographer couldn’t make it to a wedding he photographed a few months ago, so he hired someone else whom he found online with top-notch skills. They photographed the wedding, edited the pictures, and sent them over to the bride and groom after the wedding. “Everything seemed business as usual,” he reported. Alexander Mass | Pexels A few weeks after the wedding, he received an email from the bride. “She wanted a refund because the lady I …

Hooked by Asako Yuzuki – When Loneliness Becomes a Predator

Hooked by Asako Yuzuki – When Loneliness Becomes a Predator

Published by José Betancourt

Eriko Shimura is, on paper, the kind of woman who wins. She works at a prestigious Tokyo trading firm, lives in a spotless apartment, and moves through professional life with a composure that other women find both admirable and slightly unreadable. What she lacks — and what gradually consumes her — is a friend. Not a contact or a colleague, but a woman she can call something-chan: someone whose wedding she would attend, someone who would pick up her call, someone to go to the cinema with. She is thirty, successful, and entirely alone. Shōko, meanwhile, writes a popular lifestyle blog under the persona “Hallie B” — cheerful, laidback, frank about her mess. She and her easy-going husband live simply in Tokyo, and her blog documents a life of deliberate smallness. Her online persona is an edited version of contentment, maintained with practiced lightness, until someone decides to look behind it. Hooked by Asako Yuzuki opens with these two women orbiting the same city without touching, then brings them together with the quiet inevitability of …

Birds Are Getting Hooked on Cigarettes

Birds Are Getting Hooked on Cigarettes

Published by José Betancourt

Sign up to see the future, today Can’t-miss innovations from the bleeding edge of science and tech Nicotine, the highly addictive chemical compound in cigarettes, is having a bit of a resurgence as of late — with patches of the stuff even appearing in vending machines at tech company offices, offering overworked staffers a way to get through the day. Even some species of birds are getting hooked on cigarettes — but not for the reason you might think. Instead of suffering from a debilitating nicotine addiction, blue tits across Europe are hoarding cigarette butts to ward off parasites using the natural and artificial toxins in tobacco and cigarette butts, as the New York Times reports. It’s a bizarre evolutionary outcome resulting from an otherwise ecologically damaging side effect of our collective smoking addiction. As detailed in a new paper published in the journal Animal Behavior, a team of researchers at the University of Lodz in Poland suggests that volatile compounds from the cigarette remains being brought into Eurasian blue tit nests could be helping …

Hooked by Asako Yuzuki review – follow-up to global hit Butter | Fiction in translation

Hooked by Asako Yuzuki review – follow-up to global hit Butter | Fiction in translation

Published by Sam Flores

Asako Yuzuki’s international bestseller Butter was a taste sensation based on the true story of a Japanese female serial killer and gourmet chef who scammed and poisoned male victims with her culinary offerings. Attempting to get a scoop, a journalist bonds with the convicted prisoner by asking her for recipe tips, and gradually reassesses her own life and values as a result of this peculiar relationship. One review described the book as “the Martha Stewart Show meets The Silence of the Lambs”, but as well as the crime thriller/foodie mashup, a critique of capitalist society and deep-seated misogyny also emerged from the narrative. Yuzuki’s prose style, a mix of the banal and the profound, proved to be catnip for sales. Hooked is the follow-up for English-language readers, though it was written earlier, in 2015, and like the previous novel is translated with crackling verve by Polly Barton. While a more introspective work, its high-wire plot and uneven trajectory make for a relentlessly dizzying experience. Fans of Butter might even view it as a trial run. The book again features …

Viewers hooked on ‘irresistible’ 8-part period bonkbuster A Woman of Substance

Viewers hooked on ‘irresistible’ 8-part period bonkbuster A Woman of Substance

Published by Daniella Wilson

If you’re a fan of period dramas adapted from a classic bonkbuster novel, then Channel 4‘s latest series, A Woman of Substance, is a must-watch. The eight-part drama landed on screens on Wednesday and has already proved a hit with viewers, with many praising Vera star Brenda Blethyn’s lead performance. Told over two timelines, the series is adapted from Barbara Taylor Bradford OBE’s 1979 novel and spans 60 years. The story centres on heroine Emma Harte, who works her way up from being a “penniless” maid in Yorkshire to a “powerful” business mogul. © Channel 4/The Forge/Sam TaylorEmma Harte (JESSICA REYNOLDS) What have viewers said about A Woman of Substance? The series has proved a hit with viewers, with many taking to X to share their thoughts.  WATCH: A Woman Of Substance Official Trailer “I watched A Woman of Substance on Channel 4 yesterday and was absolutely thrilled. It’s worth watching just for Brenda Blethyn. The whole team did a fantastic job,” said one person, while another penned: “What a woman, Brenda’s incredible – a complete …

Viewers binge-watching ‘phenomenal’ new 6-part thriller: ‘I’m hooked’

Viewers binge-watching ‘phenomenal’ new 6-part thriller: ‘I’m hooked’

Published by Daniella Wilson

Viewers are hooked on Prime Video’s latest thriller, Steal, which arrived on the streaming platform on Wednesday.  Sophie Turner (Game of Thrones) stars in the series as office worker Zara, whose world is turned upside down when she finds herself at the centre of a heist.  It’s no surprise that viewers are loving the series. Its creative team know what they’re doing when it comes to creating gripping drama, with executive producer Greg Brenman having previously worked on TV hits such as Peaky Blinders and Doctor Foster, while creator Sotiris Nikitas is a crime novelist who writes under the pen name Ray Celestin. Fans of edge-of-your-seat thrillers on the hunt for your next TV binge, look no further. Find out more below… WATCH: The trailer for Steal What are viewers saying about the show?  It’s safe to say that the show has gone down well with viewers, who have praised the series on social media.  © Samuel Dore/Prime VideoSophie Turner stars in Steal One person wrote: “Just started watching this new show #Steal with Sophie Turner …

Fury as Amazon Ring Cameras Are Hooked Up to ICE System

Fury as Amazon Ring Cameras Are Hooked Up to ICE System

Published by José Betancourt

Illustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins / Futurism. Source: Charly Triballeau / AFP via Getty Images; Future Publishing via Getty Images As US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents wreak havoc on American communities, big tech companies have been making themselves indispensable to the increasingly tyrannical state. Among them is Amazon subsidiary Ring, the company behind those AI doorbell cameras that have exploded in popularity over the last few years. Back in October, Ring announced that its devices would soon be looped into a network of Flock AI surveillance cameras. That network, an investigation by 404 Media found, has been available to local and federal police and enforcement agencies like ICE — leaving many worried that their Ring doorbell cams are now feeding into a government panopticon. Sure enough, as anti-ICE protests ramp up throughout the US, activists are pushing a grassroots campaign to convince Ring users to smash their devices. Doing so, they say, could help deprive the federal government of footage it’s using to enact a campaign of harassment, arrests, and deportation. “Smash your Ring doorbells,” …

Do You Have ADHD and Feel Hooked to Your Phone?

Do You Have ADHD and Feel Hooked to Your Phone?

Published by Jenni Sidey

How many hours a day are you on the phone? Do you pick up your phone as soon as you wake up and scroll your favorite app as you fall asleep? Many adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) describe a frustrating pattern. They intend to check their smartphone for a moment and, suddenly, hours are gone. They scroll Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, and toggle between their messages and their favorite games. This is not a failure of discipline. It reflects how the ADHD brain interacts with modern technology. In my practice as a psychiatrist specializing in adult ADHD, I often see how this pattern quietly consumes evenings and undermines sleep, relationships, and personal goals. Researchers believe that ADHD involves differences in dopamine signaling, reward anticipation, and impulse control. Smartphones deliver novelty, rapid feedback, and unpredictable rewards. This is exactly the combination that captures and holds the ADHD brain. The phone offers the promise of stimulation or relief from mental fatigue. Over time, the phone becomes the default way to deal with stress and boredom, and this …

Researchers Concerned to Find That Five-Year-Olds Are Already Deeply Hooked on Brain Rot Content

Researchers Concerned to Find That Five-Year-Olds Are Already Deeply Hooked on Brain Rot Content

Published by José Betancourt

The brains of neurotypical children under the age of five years old experience a turbo-charged growth spurt that takes them from drooling infants to potty-trained kids ready to learn their ABCs in school. That’s why it’s so worrisome that we’re inadvertently subjecting a large group of these children to an epic amount of internet brain rot that’s disrupting that crucial period, according to an analytical report from researchers at the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ), a British policy group focused on people in poverty — a state of affairs that’s likely resulting in sprawling deleterious outcomes. “I’ve got two children [in my class] who physically cannot sit on the carpet,” said one teacher quoted in the report. “They don’t have core strength. And when I went to visit one of the girls in July, she’d never been to a nursery, she’d been sat in a corner sofa on an iPad so she hasn’t developed her core strength and it’s really affecting her whole development.” The impact from this massive uncontrolled experiment is already being felt, …