How bullet chess and TikTok can both ruin your attention span
Please please please do not use TikTok or similar platforms.
Bullet chess, in case you haven't heard of it, is basically a degenerate version of normal chess. Here's a list of their differences:
- average length of 1 game
- bullet chess: 90 seconds
- classical chess: 2-3 hours
- quality of gameplay
- bullet chess: extremely low[1]
- classical chess: high
- addictiveness:
- bullet chess: very addicting[2]
- classical chess: not addicting
Nigel Short has a good quote on point 3:
"I play way too much bullet chess. It rots the brain just as surely as alcohol." —Nigel Short, English chess grandmaster and commentator
I played in a real chess tournament last week. I struggled to focus during that tournament, because I played too much bullet in the weeks prior. You know what? My third-grade English teacher would enjoy this analogy:
Bullet chess is to classical chess as TikTok is to other media.
Bullet chess obliterates your attention span and makes it harder to play classical chess. In the same vein, TikTok[3] also obliterates your attention span and makes it harder to pay attention to all other media: books, movies, music, etc.
I will say this ad nauseum: do not use TikTok!! Please!!