# The Speedy Media Manifesto
You can literally watch every episode of
_[Stranger Things (Season 1)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb4uR9gTVXI)_ in
[3 hours and 20 minutes](https://www.bingeclock.com/s/stranger-things/season/1/).
Yes, you can _literally_ watch a 400-minute series in 200 minutes... if you're
willing to break some speed limits.
But why would you want toβ½
## In Search of Lost
What's the duration of a 250-page book? To answer this question, you must first
ask: _how much does the reader want to understand?_
Of course reading-speed depends on the difficulty of the text β 250 pages of
J.K. Rowling is not 250 pages of James Joyce. But even _Harry Potter and the
Chamber of Secrets_ may take 2 hours for a bright child, or 2 _weeks_ for a
tired Literature student working on the 4th draft of a midterm project.
The duration of every book is tempered to our thirst for fun or information or
whatever. Pages follow the rhythm of hearts, not the rhythm of watches.
Movies, podcasts, etc. naturally move at the rhythm of watches, but do they have
to? What if we viewed 1X speed as a _recommendation_ than a _requirement_?
Rather than asking "how many hours will this media take?" β ask "how many hours
does this media _deserve_?"
## 100% Comprehension
Consider the
[Law of Diminishing Marginal Utility](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marginal_utility#Diminishing_marginal_utility):
> The law says, first, that the marginal utility of each homogenous unit
> decreases as the supply of units increases (and vice versa)....
Four pretzels does not make you 4X happier than one pretzel. And
[watching _Grown Ups 2_ 52 times](http://www.worstideaofalltime.com/about.html)
does not make you 52X happier.
Drugs are valued by the experiences they evoke. MDMA makes you feel a certain
amount of happiness for a certain amount of time. It's a simple matter of
maximizing intensity and duration. If movies were like drugs (whose utility are
the literal experience), then 4K would be _incredibly_ better than 1080p. But
it's not. Reading a book on higher-quality paper is not _incredibly_ better.
Watching a film in theaters is not _incredibly_ better than your laptop.
In the same way, watching one movie at half-speed _does not_ make the movie
_twice_ as enjoyable.
The "utility" of media is the communication of its _ideas_. And _comprehension_
is the efficiency of idea transmission. Media can be used for entertainment or
information, but it's not useful if the consumer doesn't understand what's being
communicated. But _comprehension_ is a sticky topic. For instance, take
[this David Lynch short-film about rabbits](https://vimeo.com/191360387) β I may
not comprehend Lynch's _intent_, but I certainly understand what I'm seeing. I
certainly understand that there is a rabbit family in a family room, but I fail
to grasp the deeper meaning of the film (if there is any). And I doubt that
watching it slower or higher-resolution or louder would affect my understanding.
In other words, _ideas_ are usually the important parts of films, podcasts, etc.
(regardless of author or author's intent). And each additional minute you spend
with an idea _up to a point_ will give you smaller and smaller amounts of value.
If it takes you 60 seconds to understand an essay with 45% comprehension, 60
minutes may only afford you 65% comprehension. And 60 hours would probably only
get you up to 75% accuracy.
What if you were required to submit written exams as you left theaters? What
level of comprehension do you think you would score for _Jurassic Park_?
- Did you understand
[the basic plot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jurassic_Park)?
- Did you
[notice what was written on the raptors](https://www.reddit.com/r/JurassicPark/comments/3ah37c/this_was_always_my_favorite_shot_in_jurassic_park/)?
- Did you understand the significance of
[the seatbelt scene](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51Za8lQqgqs)?
- Did you understand
[the contrasting plots of neophilia and ludditism](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWz1E3oHd8w)?
The point is, everything has an infinite amount of detail, and it's okay to
miss things. It's okay to comprehend 85% of _Jurassic Park_.
Nobody aims for 100% comprehension. **Comprehension does not scale linearly with
effort.**
On average, each additional second pored into a piece of media returns less and
less utility.
Why don't people spend their lives watching their favorite films on repeat?
Because at some point, they get it. They get what the film was doing. They get
what the film was trying to say, or what the film uniquely spoke to them. At
some point, they heard the message and hung up the phone. And maybe months or
years later they'll watch it again with brand new eyes.
So what if you had a magic dial that traded comprehension for time/effort?
| | π | π’ | π | π |
| ----- | --- | ---- | --- | --- |
| time | 2h | 1.5h | 1h | 30m |
| comp. | 86% | 80% | 71% | 46% |
If you could magically choose between π/π’/π/π on any book or television
series or film, would you?
Spoiler alert: you _can_ choose. Even better, π and π’ probably yield the same
comprehension.
## Comprehension and Control Theory
It takes [1.25 days](https://www.bingeclock.com/s/avatar-the-last-airbender/)
(1830 minutes) to watch
[Avatar: The Last Airbender](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1EnW4kn1kg)
(a.k.a. ATLA) at the _recommended_ viewing speed.
ATLA is one of my treasures. I've watched the entire series 4-5 times (and will
probably rewatch it again soon). I've committed more than 4 _days_ to this
single piece of media, because it's just that important to me.
I love ATLA dearly, so why would I watch the series at double-speedβ½ Here's my
simplistic defense:
- My attention frequently drifts when I watch ATLA at the _recommended_ viewing
speed.
- I enjoy ATLA more when my attention doesn't drift.
- My attention doesn't drift when I watch ATLA at ~1.75X.
- Therefore I enjoy ATLA _more_ at ~1.75X.
The following is true for most people in most situations:
| Speed | Comprehension | Engagement |
| ------------- | ------------------------- | ---------- |
| way too slow | incomprehensible | π |
| too slow | lost comprehension | π΄ |
| slightly slow | inefficient comprehension | π |
| perfect | full comprehension | π€ |
| slightly fast | lost comprehension | π° |
| too fast | incomprehensible | π΅ |
| way too fast | | π€― |
The key is staying _engaged_. It's about tuning the speed of incoming ideas to
the speed of your mind. If the flow is too slow, you'll actually _lose_
comprehension due to distractions.
## Asymmetries of Understanding
So how inefficient is _default_ speed?
Ears are faster than mouths. Humans can listen about _twice_ as fast as they can
speak without loss of comprehension.
| | |
| --------- | ----------- |
| listening | 250-315 WPM |
| speaking | 140-180 WPM |
Eyes handle more throughput than ears.
[Visual cortexes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visual_cortex) dwarf
[auditory cortexes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auditory_cortex). Audiobooks
are great, but they're not as efficient as books.
| | |
| --------- | ------------ |
| reading | 300-2000 WPM |
| listening | 250-315 WPM |
Recordings can move faster than actors. We can understand movements and
behaviors _much_ faster than we can perform them.
| | |
| -------- | ----- |
| watching | 1x-8x |
| acting | 1x |
## Subs vs. Dubs
[Subs are better than dubs](https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SubbingVersusDubbing).
My top listening speed is ~350WPM, which means dialogue becomes unintelligble at
3X. But my top _reading_ speed is ~1100WPM, which means I can theoretically
process subtitles at 7-8X. In practice, video-comprehension (personally) starts
plummeting at 4X speed. It is possible to keep up with simple stories, but
trying to read 600WPM subtitles while watching the images flash by is no easy
feat.
I'm not sure if I recommend moving to subtitles for speed purposes, but it
definitely raises the speed limit for videos.
## The Scenic Route β The Slow Route
Every person and media forge a new experience together. Sometimes you want to
savor every morsel of every frame. Sometimes you want to understand the bare
minimum of the plot. Sometimes you want to skip around to the fight scenes.
Let's step through some hypotheticals:
- If savoring every second is what truly matters...
- ...are rollercoasters more fun at half-speed?
- ...why wouldn't we spend more time on dessert than dinner?
- ...why isn't
[Porter Robinson's _Worlds_ (Slowed 800%)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vL4DQeRe_4)
as enjoyable as the original?
Every experience has a sweet-spot on its speedometer.
## Conclusion(s)
1. Time is precious.
2. Ideas are also precious.
3. Comprehension is a measure of idea transmission.
4. Comprehension is precious (following _(2)_ and _(3)_).
5. You can trade small amounts of comprehension for large amounts of time.
6. Speeding up media is a natural way to trade comprehension for time.
7. You _should_ speed up media when time is more precious than its ideas
(following _(1)_, _(4)_, _(5)_, and _(6)_).
8. There exist naturally inefficient asymmetries between the speeds of
transmission and comprehension, e.g. speaking vs. listening.
9. When transmission inefficiencies can be exploited at no cost of
comprehension, you _should_ speed up your media (following _(1)_, _(4)_,
_(5)_, _(6)_, and _(8)_).
## _TL;DR_
We can trade small amounts of comprehension for large amounts of time.
---
## Further Reading
- [Using Time-Compression To Make Multimedia Learning More Efficient: Current Research and Practice](/the-speedy-media-manifesto-pastoreritzhaupt.pdf)
- [Time-Compression: Systems Concerns, Usage, and Benefits](https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/publication/time-compression-systems-concerns-usage-and-benefits/)
- [Techniques, Perception, and Applications of Time-Compressed Speech](http://alumni.media.mit.edu/~barons/html/avios92.html)