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* 1 Introduction
* 2 Technological Object
* 3 Cultural Object
* 4 Tactile Essence
* 5 Algorithm Traps
* 6 Reclaiming Agency
* 7 Conclusions

Dicho–
tomies
Losing
Agency to
Agency to
a Digital
Gesture
And
How to
Gain it
Back
Back
Losing
Agency
to a
Digital
Gesture
And
And
How to
How to
Gain it Back

SWIPING DICHOTOMIES

An MFA thesis written by
Akseli Manner

Klasse Digitale Grafik
HFBK Hamburg

2024

WHO?

Akseli Manner was born in Helsinki in 1999, and got his first smartphone, which
was a Samsung Galaxy Star Pro S7260, in 2013. After that he’s had several
iPhones, coming down to the current iPhone Xs, whose case has worn out and the
glass is shattered.

1 INTRODUCTION

The planning of this thesis started from two subjective emotional pulls:
curiosity and fear. On one hand, I wanted to deal with my own problematic
relationship with my smartphone, but on the other, I wanted to invest time in
finding out what’s up with dating apps. And more specifically: why do we
gravitate towards them, even when we think that they are evil?1 One could argue
that this curiosity also stems from my personal traumas, but I thought there is
more to it. After all, dating apps are simultaneously a taboo and a laughing
matter—a target for many mixed emotions. Me and my friends rest our romantic
hopes on them, while treating them as a joke. Either way, we talk about them a
lot, and use them more than we dare to admit, and that’s where their charming
paradox lingers.

As I study graphic design, the common ground to study these addictive user
experience (UX) patterns and dating apps is easy to pinpoint: it’s the act of
swiping. “Left or right?”, you know the hassle. Tinder’s binary navigation
principle might be the most famous (and most commonly referred) example of the
swiping instance, but actually there’s much more to it’s cultural depth. In
fact, the gesture’s impact affects us both in all kinds of apps and even beyond
the screens.

Consequently, this study also needed to be stretched outside the technological
user experience and interface (UX and UI) contexts, in which the issue is
usually dealt with. As a response, we walk through the topic with two main
dichotomies. Firstly, the act of swiping is viewed both as a technological
object and a cultural object. This shows the path from the very roots of
swiping, at the code level, to the physical everyday practice, which it is
today. Now the act of swiping is charged with cultural weight, shaping the way
we interact digitally, make decisions, and even form relationships.

Secondly, both of these objects’ natures are examined through their tactile
essence, but also through algorithms’ impact. This is done by viewing swiping as
a today’s social ritual of touching a smartphone. The thesis states a smartphone
as a gadget that enables the apps to manipulate us, and on the flipside, offers
focusing on smartphones’ tactile dimension as the way out. Through exploring
these tangents, the thesis aims to answer questions like how could I have
control on my swiping habits and seeks for solutions for my fading digital
self-determination.

Here are a few disclaimers. The thesis focuses specifically on smartphones and
leaves aside tablets and less common touch-screen devices. Also the main focus
is in social media applications and dating apps especially on Apple iOS
products. This delimitation is due to my extensive personal experience on using
these products, and on the other hand, Apple has played a key role in the
development of swipe technology. The study of mobile games, while they
undeniably often work with swiping, is also excluded as I want to focus on the
importance of the phenomenon especially in the context of social media and
dating apps.

Lastly before we get to it, this thesis springs from my own anxiety of high
screen times and I treat writing this as a tool to deal with it. I suppose the
text can also be relatable and, therefore, helpful to its reader. I know that
one size doesn't fit everybody, but along with my subjective experiences, this
thesis is equipped with a swipeable assortment of objective observations and
anecdotes, so you can also treat it as a mini dictionary to the topic of
swiping.

2 TECHNOLOGICAL OBJECT

The Cambridge Dictionary defines that swiping is

to move your finger over the screen of a mobile phone or tablet in order to move
onto the next page, choose something, etc.:2

This academic definition is rather vague but still worth considering. To find a
more technologically precise answer, we can look into the website
amazingalgorithms.com, which defines it as:

The method of using a finger or stylus to quickly move across a touch screen in
a specified direction, typically to unlock a device, access a feature, or
navigate a user interface.3

Indeed, swiping both takes care of navigation and assigning actions at the code
level, but that is nearly not all that it does—these definitions ignore the
user. A cultural definition, which also includes (my)self could be: swiping is a
technologically enhanced social ritual that condenses the responses to our
thirst for information, need to be entertained and sexual desire into a simple
flick. Both a technological and cultural object, swiping is a certain
swiss-army-knife of digital navigation.

Now, it does many things: scrolling, shutting windows, browsing sequences of
stories, verifying payments, writing, drawing, and searching partners. On the
flip side, it's addictive, strains my wrist and produces brain fog, blurring my
perception of the surroundings. While it messes with my life on such a large
scale, where does it come from? To answer that, we need to look outside of the
user interface and even outside of smartphones.

2.1 FROM ORIGINS TO A DAILY PRACTICE

In order to register a swipe, a machine needs to be able to track more than one
point. When it comes to touchscreen technology, namely its invention, the usual
mindset turns to Steve Jobs and the iPhone. However, digital swiping has existed
decades earlier—as long as touch screens have been able to read the movements of
fingers.4

Swiping in its purest and most original form, is dragging something on a surface
to leave a mark. For the first time, this act was electrified in the 1970s by an
American tech firm, Applicon, which pioneered the study of gesture commands.
They were the first ones to craft an electronic CAD tablet where users could
draw simple geometric shapes with a stylus.56 Essentially, this can be seen as
the starting point of digital swiping—only, that it wasn't yet done by fingers.
The primary user group for CAD was engineers, working with mechanics and circuit
board designs7—in short, it was a device made by engineers for engineers.

By the 1990s, touch gestures became more common in devices like PenPoint tablets
and Palm PDAs. These earlier examples of swiping mostly work with a stylus, but
the introduction of the iPhone in 2007 was when fingers came into play. Also the
iPhone introduced new types of swiping and pinching gestures.8 Although the
iPhone wasn't the first smartphone, it was one that reached a larger audience,
therefore also popularizing the swiping act.9 Until its release, IBM Simon,
released in 1994, and Blackberry 850, released in 1999, were smartphones,
primarily developed for the needs of business professionals, and were both
operated with a stylus.1011

In 2024, the most popular smartphone brands worldwide are Apple and Samsung,
which dominate the market by a big share. Going down the list, come brands such
as Xiaomi, Oppo and Vivo.12 Regardless of Apple’s lead in shipped phones
worldwide, the popularity of their iOS operating system is far behind the one of
Samsung’s: Android.13 This is because the operating systems of Xiaomi, Oppo and
Vivo are also based on Android, with their own hardware optimisations.

There are differences between these operating systems, but one connecting factor
is that they all are swipeable. To gain an understanding of how many people
swipe daily, we can look into several statistics from 2024. First of all, there
are 7.21 billion smartphones worldwide, which is theoretically enough to cover
90% of the 8 billion population.14 China has 974.69 million smartphone users
(69% of the country’s population), while the US has 276.14 million (80% of the
country’s population). Since 2017, the average screen time on smartphones in the
US has been 2 hours 21 minutes.15 Assumably other countries get close to this
number too. There are no numbers for how much of this screen time consists of
swiping, but it must be a big one, considering that the average Tinder user
spends 35 minutes daily on the app16 and the average TikTok user nearly an
hour17.

It’s not straightforward to draw a line between the 1970s engineer’s niche tool
and the global phenomenon swiping has become, but it shows how technology can
evolve in surprising ways. I wonder if the engineers at Applicon could have
thought that their inventions would so soon be applied to making art18—or, even
funnier, 40 years later, to changing the course of romantic matchmaking.

2.2 HARDWARE

Smartphones are optimized for swiping. This is evident, for example, in how my
iPhone fits pretty comfortably in hand and is practical to carry around. These
features are a result of hardware developments made throughout the 90s and into
the early 2000s. Compared to early mobile phones, for one, screens have become
flat and touchable and batteries are finally powerful enough to keep the device
running through the days19.20 Let’s take a brief look through how smartphones
have developed to the swiping device they are.

First of all, their screens consist of light-emitting diodes (LED) covered with
a thin glass. Most of them use capacitive touch technology, which works as
follows: the glass is coated with indium tin oxide or another electrically
conducting material. When fingers touch this coat, they draw some of its
electricity, lowering the screen’s electrostatic field. A sensor grid embedded
inside the screen detects this change. Then, the touchscreen controller
processes it as a touch command, which is executed by the phone's central
processing unit (CPU). In addition to capacitive technology, other types of
touchscreen technology do exist. However, smartphones mostly have capacitive
screens for better accuracy and durability since there are no moving mechanical
parts that would wear out in stress.21

From the touch screen it’s natural to proceed to investigate the phone’s body.
At the spectacular slideshow debut of Apple's first iPhone in 2007, Steve Jobs
claimed that: “no one's going to buy a big phone”22. The iPhone was marketed
with a promise that it “fits beautifully in the palm of your hand,” making it
comfortable for calling.23 The studies on consumer behavior have since proven
this claim wrong.24 When iPhone 5 was released, the main feedback from users was
that its screen was too small. Consequently, Jobs' hypothesis about the small
size of the phone as a market driver wasn't correct—compared to other phones,
the size wasn't its advantage, but its weakness.25 In 2011, as Tim Cook took
over as the CEO of Apple, the firm started gradually moving towards larger
screens.26

In 2020 Apple gave small phones a second chance by launching the iPhone 12 mini
(still boasting a way bigger 5.42 inches screen compared to the first iPhone
with a 3.5-inch screen), but it ended up selling poorly and was quickly
discontinued. As it turns out, when making a purchase decision, users put other
needs before the physical size of the phone. One reason for this is that small
screens put more strain on the eyes than larger screens because they require the
eyes to work harder to maintain focus and convergence at close distances.
Conclusively, it seems like the users value an immersive viewing experience over
practical single hand use of the phone.

In retrospect, it's funny to consider the part of Jobs’ speech where he
established the iphone as

a widescreen iPod with touch controls, a revolutionary mobile phone and a
breakthrough internet communicator.27

The phone, indeed, ended up “revolutionizing” all these aspects, but it had a
compromised calling function.28 When you think of a smartphone like the iPhone,
it's not very convenient for calling without headphones. In fact, the call
feature feels glued-on—holding it against your cheek leaves a smudge on the
screen, and to me it feels weird to point the front camera into my ear. The
iPhone was designed primarily as a phone29, but it ended up being more of the
two other things he mentioned. Not so much a phone, but rather a revolutionary
swiping gadget.

The hardware solutions dictate how the smartphone feels in hand, and thereby lay
the foundation of how swiping physically feels. However, the hardware is only
half of the technology that makes swiping possible. The rest is embedded into
code.

2.3 CODE

The functions of swipeable applications are based on two primary factors: user’s
gestures and the software that interprets them. This section sheds light on the
ways these coding mechanisms generally detect, analyze, and respond to touch
inputs. The focus is on smartphones so-called native applications, such as
Tinder and TikTok and their frameworks. Please, bear with me—it's not only ones
and zeros.

The native mobile applications track both touch events and touch gestures. That
means 1) tracking when the user’s finger touches the screen, how it moves, and
when it leaves, and 2) interpreting the movement data—what path the finger
followed, how long the gesture lasted, and what kind of interaction (e.g.,
swipe, flick, or tap) took place.30

In iOS, native applications use frameworks like UIKit, which is a part of the
Xcode environment. UIKit has tools for gesture recognition such as
UISwipeGestureRecognizer, which allows it to extract specific details from a
user’s movements, such as direction, speed and touch pressure. These details
come from the collection of “granular data points”, which refer to very specific
data collected from hardware components such as the capacitive touch screen, and
the phone’s internal gyroscope (which interprets the movement and orientation of
the phone). Native applications generally have better access to these hardware
level data sources, compared to browser-based libraries (such as the popular
Swiper JS library, utilized on websites). This enables for precise touch
interactions.3132 In addition, native apps also can be set to handle
interruptions during gestures.33 An example of this could be that an incoming
call interrupts the transition to the next TikTok video and returns you the
previous one in the middle of a swipe.

Ultimately, the success of apps like TikTok is based on hiding their code and
algorithm logics behind their business secrets and we can only make educated
guesses about how their applications work.34 It's therefore useful to approach
the subject at a more general level, with practical examples. The logic of the
swiping mechanism may feel straightforward: mimicking the motion of a finger and
the experience of turning a physical page. However, there are many parameters
beneath the surface that customize the behavior and appearance of the swiping.
These parameters define the different types of swipes: how they look and how
they feel.

2.4 DIFFERENT SWIPES

As stated earlier, in order to register a swipe, a device needs to track more
than one point. This differentiates swiping from gestures like tapping, for
which tracking only one point is usually enough. In addition to these, there are
technical differences in the different types of swipes. One way to differentiate
these swipe gestures from each other, is to examine if they are path-based or
not. In other words, does the precise path the finger moves on the screen
matter, or is the gesture about the direction and speed? www.tpgi.com in an
article “Is swiping a path-based gesture?” sets the following rules:

* Path-based gestures are dragging movements where the path is significant.
* Sliding is the same as dragging movement.
* Swiping is either a directional dragging movement where a gesture is
recognized after the pointer has moved a minimum distance, or, a directional
gesture that’s only recognized on the pointer-up event (or both).
* Flicking (aka. Flinging) is a directional gesture that’s only recognized on
the pointer-up event.

From these definitions, we can identify two gestures that don’t need to be
considered any further:

* Flicking is never a path-based gesture because only the direction is
significant, or even specified (notwithstanding things like pressure and
acceleration, which are unrelated concerns).
* Consequently, flick-swiping is also never a path-based gesture.35

In this light, swiping can be either path-based or non-path-based, depending on
how it's implemented. However, non-path-based actions don't seem to be very
common nowadays, probably due to path-based gestures having a more natural and
intuitive nature. For instance, the navigation of TikTok (vertical swipe
snapping full-screen videos into the view) is actually path-based, even if it's
not very remarkable for the overall user experience. Similarly, on Tinder you
are able to drag the profile cards across the screen within certain limits, but
the gesture’s origin is non-path-based. On the other hand, the navigation on map
applications is strictly path-based, since they take into account the precise
starting point and endpoint of the dragging and move the map accordingly.

Let’s consider a concrete example, such as a hypothetical book reader
application. In this app you can turn the pages, by swiping the page from the
right side of the screen. The key question is: how should the app interpret the
user’s gesture? Some parameters to consider are:

* Should you be able to hold the page, while slowly moving the finger sideways,
thereby allowing dragging, or should the page snap back to its initial
position if you don't perform the swipe fast enough?
* How far should the finger move in order for it to register a swipe?
Essentially, this forms the difference between a flick and a swipe. It can be
annoying, if the tiniest, accidental flick to the side turns the page.
* What counts as an acceptable angle for the swipe? If you swipe horizontally
in 90 degrees, that should obviously turn the page. But what degree is then
off-angle? If you swipe in 45 degrees, should it count as a page turn or a
vertical stroke (for whatever that gesture is assigned for)?

Looking into this example gives a rough idea of what parameters the code behind
swipe mechanisms could have. Since this thesis is focused primarily in swiping
in the context of social media and dating applications, we can conclude that
their swipeable nature was originally non-path-based, but they are increasingly
moving to a path-based direction. This means that they were originally designed
to be fast-paced and flickable. As drawn from the list by www.tpgi.com, flicking
is, indeed, never path-based and this makes a key distinction with other types
of swipeable platforms: E-books and map applications are not designed to be
fast.

Later on we will learn about the culturally multifaceted nature of the swiping
act, but the most important lesson we can learn from this section is that, at
the code level, the different swiping gestures are a spectrum.

2.5 MILESTONES

Some swipes are more famous than others. On surface, they may look the same, but
one might be flashy and decorated, filled with emotional weight, whereas the
other is subtle and pragmatically navigational, performed almost automatically.
Here is a list that goes through some remarkable innovations from the field of
smartphone swiping technology. The listed features are divided in two:
applications and iOS native navigational features. All the features mark either
technological or cultural significance—or both, as these two often walk
hand-in-hand. Since the focus is on the pioneers of swiping, the list excludes
apps like Musical.ly and Youtube. While they are swipeable and inevitably
stacked with cultural value, they haven't contributed much to swiping
technology.

1. Tinder (Left or right?)

Released 2013 Environment Application Swipe function Right to accept, left to
deny. Also later: up to super-like. Innovation Gamification turned profiles into
a sort of deck of cards.36 Connected page navigation and decision-making under a
single instance. Cultural impact The swipeable interface, and ultimately, the
word “swiping” became synonymous with dating apps.37 Started universally to
accelerate the decision-making process on dating apps.38

2. Snapchat (MyStory)

Released 201339 Environment Application Swipe function The horizontal swipe
shifts between the users’ personal channels. Innovation The stories were only
visible for 24 hours.40 Cultural impact The story format came to change the way
people consume short-lived content and share casual snapshots.41 Later, adapted
by Instagram and Facebook, who added a rotating 3D effect.

3. Vine (navigation)

Lifeline 2013–201642 Environment Application Swipe function Vertical swiping
through a feed of videos. Innovation Immersive and looping short videos.43
Cultural impact Vine laid the foundation for the success of TikTok, by
popularizing the format of short videos. Left a significant mark on the
development of meme culture.

4. Venmo, MobilePay (payment verification)

Released Early 2010s Environment Application Swipe function “Slide to confirm”
or “swipe to pay”. Slide from left to right within the container to verify the
payment. Innovation Resembles a bank card swipe. Reduces the chance of an
accidental payment, compared to a button press. Cultural impact This feels like
one of the most emotionally loaded swipes you can make. Obviously depending on
the personality, but many want to make sure they do it right.

5. Safari (back and forward)

Released 2013 Environment iOS native environment Swipe function Swipe right on
the left side of the screen to go to the previous page, swipe left from the
right side to go forward to the last screen you returned from.46 Innovation
Accelerated forward and backward movement between screens, compared to the back
and forward buttons.

6. Slide to unlock

Lifeline 2007–2016 Environment iOS native environment Swipe function On the
lockscreen, slide the bolt all the way to the right side of the container to
unlock the phone. If not slid all the way, the bolt will snap back to its
initial position. Innovation Unlocks the iPhone lock screen by mimicking a
real-life gesture of dragging a bolt back across a door to unlock it. Later
replaced by first Touch ID and then by Face ID. Cultural impact A prominent case
of “fiddle factor,” which attempts to demystify technology by making it
recognizable and approachable. The feature was also a subject of a long-running
lawsuit against Android.4748

7. App switcher (swipeable on the iPhones with Face ID)

Released 2017 Environment iOS native environment Swipe function The App switcher
is opened by sliding up slowly from the bottom. If this action is made in a fast
flicking motion, it exits the current app and returns to the homescreen. This is
the main way of returning to the home screen on iPhones with Face ID (from the
iPhone X onwards) that don't have the home button. On App switcher, the apps are
displayed side-by-side and can be navigated with sideways swipes and force
quitted by flicking them upwards.4950 Innovation Practical for switching between
recently active apps, and also for accessing apps that were opened earlier with
a small amount of swipes. Cultural impact Hard to evaluate, since it’s a purely
pragmatic improvement.

As can be gathered from these few examples, swiping plays different roles both
in the user experience of social media apps and iPhone’s native environment:
decision-making (Tinder), navigation (Safari, Snapchat, Vine), verification
(payment apps), and access control (slide to unlock, app switcher). On the apps
side the swiping mechanisms are more about gamification and immersive
dimensions, which influence the ways users share and interact with content. On
the other hand, the improvements on the iPhone native environment are
essentially for navigation and multi-tasking, shaping universally the
technological standards of swipeable technology.51For example, Google has
recently adapted Apple’s UIKit components, such as the back-and-forward swipe
for its navigation.52

So far, I have painted a picture of swiping as a technological object. We have
answered questions, such as where swiping originates, how it works and looks,
and in what ways it's applied. Also: how it feels, on a surface level. Now, the
remaining questions are: how it affects me and the people around me and how that
makes me feel. The cultural object of swiping embeds a web of social and power
relations that can't be described in tech lingo (sorry again for that), but
needs to be addressed in a slightly different tone.

3 CULTURAL OBJECT

I worked for a week at my old kindergarten in 2013 as part of my middle school's
work experience program. At that time, smartphones were rapidly becoming popular
among people of my age, but most of the younger children did not have them. The
closest they got to swiping was their habit of spilling lunch soup on the table
and licking it off the surface, if I may stretch the concept of swiping this
far. Because the kindergarteners couldn't usually access smartphones, they had a
huge interest in those gadgets. I had to answer daily questions about my
smartphone, like what games it had and if it had a touch screen.

If I mistakenly pulled out my phone in their sight, they would immediately feel
entitled to poke it, asking, “Is it a touchscreen? Can I try?” For them, the
touch screen seemed synonymous with the liberating feeling of playing Fruit
Ninja or Angry Birds. Just touching my phone brought them closer to that
dimension, even if only for a brief moment. I thought it was funny at the time,
but looking back, it's ironic that I, similarly, used every short break as an
opportunity to hide in the bathroom to respond to my friends' snaps.

3.1 EXTENDING SWIPE CULTURE

When examining the cultural significance of swiping, we can ask ourselves what
the word brings to mind. For some, it may be the world conquest of iPad kids53
or the flood of negative news making us sad and anxious.54 However, many will
think of swipe culture. The term is related to dating, but I think it has
potential for describing the cultural nature of common swipeable apps on a
larger scale. Since the roots of the term are in UI design, let's start there.

In my view, the cultural significance of swiping poses the challenge of
distinguishing the gesture itself (technical function) from the surrounding
mediascape and cultural framework. As a matter of fact, the function and the
media are inseparable: while the development of swiping technology changes the
mechanisms of the applications, swiping is also adjusted to the specific needs
of each application. As pointed out in the list of the remarkable swiping
innovations (2.3 Milestones), swiping can be seen on one hand, as one of the
features in an application or, on the other hand, a determinant of the overall
user experience. The latter option can make an application synonymous with the
word “swiping”.

This is what happened to Tinder, whose left-or-right feature gave a whole new
meaning to swiping in 55 Back then the app’s initially click-based (or
tap-based) interface was replaced with the swiping method, allowing for a faster
user experience.56 The basic promise of this update was that a user is able to
make more lifelike, hasty decisions on whom they like or not, judging by their
looks. For the first time, page navigation and decision-making were connected
under a single swiping instance.57 Art imitates life—or how was it? Ironically,
as this same simplistic swipe mechanism has spread to other dating applications,
the shift has begun to globally reshape the dating scene and the way we view
each other.58 This is what people refer to as swipe culture.

Essentially, we're talking of a way of approaching people by looking at them.
Emphasizing looks over deeper connections, reducing judgments about people to a
left-or-right motion. Sherry Turkle, in her book “Alone Together”, argues that
technology has enabled us to explore relationships at a distance, offering the
illusion of intimacy while avoiding any deeper emotional engagement:

“Technology proposes itself as the architect of our intimacies. These days, it
suggests substitutions that put the real on the run... Digital connections may
offer the illusion of companionship without the demands of friendship.”59

In this case, the way we value others becomes visual, leaving emotional and
intellectual connection aside. The personas that we swipe to either reject or
accept, and possibly fall in love with, are an illusion. To understand why we
become attached to non-existent characters, we can look to Jean Baudrillard's
theory of hyper-reality. In his work Simulacra and Simulation he describes how
media has the ability to produce experiences that are indistinguishable from
reality, and in that way they create a kind of simulation, which he calls
hyper-reality:

"Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being, or a
substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality: a
hyperreal. The territory no longer precedes the map, nor does it survive it. It
is nevertheless the map that precedes the territory—precession of simulacra—that
engenders the territory..." 60

This extended reality can even feel so real that it makes the simulation appear
more desirable than the real world.61 The hyper-reality, that is the online
dating world, combined with Turkle’s theory suggests an idea that by swiping,
users interact not with the person but with a simulation of the person. It's
constructed through carefully curated photos and a bio. In this way, swiping
becomes a process of engaging with “simulacra”, not an authentic person.

Both writers point out the dehumanizing features of modern technology: Turkle by
questioning the change in social relations, and Baudrillard by being concerned
about the fading perception of reality. When people’s dating profiles become
more “real” than the people behind them, it moves dating increasingly to a more
superficial direction, and eventually messes with our idea of what we expect of
other people and ourselves.

Swipe culture culminates in the concept of “FOBO” which stands for Fear Of a
Better Option62; or to put it more traditionally: grass is always greener on the
other side of the fence. Only that GIAGOTOSOTF doesn't have such a good clang.
On dating apps the hyper-reality, puts us in a cycle of chasing for
illusions—there may always be a more interesting profile behind the next swipe.
There is also evidence that the same cycle is repeated in real life: we're
increasingly more hesitant to commit to long-term relationships, whilst
considering other options.63 This constant need to swipe for something better
leads to emotional dissatisfaction and also creates decision fatigue64—the
endless options on certain swipeable apps makes it harder to settle on any
choice, which doesn't satisfy the users.

As a matter of fact, the whole social ritual of swiping on these platforms can
be summed up in the idea of rejecting the previous in the thirst for new. Social
media, short video and dating apps universally support this kind of disposable
culture where there is always a more attractive alternative around the corner.
In this spirit, Baudrillard’s theory on hyper-reality can also be generalized on
all these platforms, where representations in the form of curated profiles,
pictures, and brief captions replace reality. Think of Instagram—we connect with
people we don't know, and get a very reduced, yet glorified image of them. And
on the other hand, I occasionally find myself in a loop of communicating with
some of my friends only with Reels (Instagram’s own version of looping short
videos), which promotes a reduced mode of engagement—speaking with them in words
of Instagram, about issues related to Instagram. What is happening to our
friendship?

Building on this concept, I will extend the term swipe culture to cover the
themes related to fast and disposable media culture on these platforms. It's
practical to condense this cultural nature of swiping into a single term as we
move on to observe the phenomenon from other angles. In the same manner, I will
collect the apps, such as TikTok, Tinder, Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook under
the name of swipe-cultural apps.

Lastly, to add to the earlier question about what people think when they use the
word swiping: the word has started to live outside the phones. In colloquial
speech, swiping can mean, for example, the act of lounging on the couch and
scrolling through Instagram. With the popularity of Tinder, swiping is also
associated with decision-making, also outside of romantic matchmaking. I believe
that in speech it's used at most in an ironic tone: "oh, oatmeal again? Swipe
left!". Also: “ah, raisins and grated carrots? It’s a match!”

3.2 FEAR OF SWIPING

Applicon might have been among the first ones to technologically enable digital
swiping, but behind the phenomenon is a long tradition of non-digital-swiping
and inventing ways to browse information. Consequently, we can say that the
swipe gesture did not emerge in a vacuum, but there always was a human need to
swipe. For instance, take the bookwheel. This medieval device is a sort of
rotating bookcase created by an Italian military engineer Agostino Ramelli in
1558. It allows its user to browse through multiple books in a crosswise
manner.65 According to the Atlantic, the bookwheel’s invention marked an early
emergence of literary restlessness, further laying the foundation for the need
for e-readers and iPads.66

In this human need to assort sequences of information, also lies a big
contradiction: we not only need swiping, we fear it. What was once drawing in
the mud with a finger or a stick later became the bookwheel, and eventually
digital swiping. However, the human tendency to organize things with their
fingertips has probably never been as widely condemned as swiping is today. In
contemporary discourse, smartphones are frequently criticized for their role in
fragmenting attention spans and pulling us apart from each other. Matthew B.
Crawford, in his work Attention as a Cultural Problem, addresses this concern:

“It’s hard to open a newspaper or magazine these days without reading a
complaint about our fractured mental lives, diminished attention spans, and a
widespread sense of distraction... Attention has also become an acute collective
problem of modern life — a cultural problem.”67

This excerpt pictures the current societal discourse on digital media—the same
cultural environment where the concepts of doom scrolling68 and, the previously
mentioned iPad kids were born. In a nutshell, people are scared of excessive
swiping, and for a good reason (we will return to the reasons later). Crawford
also underlines that attention isn't only an individual challenge, but also
collective, because this overwhelming habitat is created by society.69 Now the
apps’ architecture is designed in manipulative ways to capture and maintain our
focus and further commodify it70 (also for later!).

To return to the historical perspective, it can be noted that the concerns about
the emergence of new technology are not new to our time. As a matter of fact,
every major technological advancement has faced resistance and fear of its
potential consequences. For example, In the 15th century the gutenberg machine
was feared to blow up the amount of dangerous heretical ideals.71 Also, at the
turn of the 20th century, electricity was feared to be harmful to health and
moral values, among other things because it allowed for a wilder nightlife72.
Moreover, in the light of recent knowledge, we know that trains don't disrupt
cows' milking instincts–this wasn't always the case.73

Accordingly, there seems to be a built-in resistance in people for new
technologies, and in fact, to everything else that is new. Just look at the
support for the far right and conservative parties across Europe74. Similar
concerns of technology taking over our minds, indeed, apply to swiping. These
fears, as with other new innovations, are rooted in a typical human perception
that new innovations may challenge established social structures, cultural
values, and sense of 75 This fear casts a fat dark shadow on the word swiping,
which definitely contributes to its cultural essence.

Smartphones are scary and therefore loaded with cultural affect. In fact, there
are countless cultural discourses to grasp. For instance, on the level of
hardware: a question of power relations—who can afford a phone? Who builds it,
and at what price? Where are lithium and other raw metals, necessary for
manufacturing, mined, and how does this contribute to climate change? On the
level of software, for instance, questions of user rights, open-source code and
the ethics of porn industry are central. I place this naively simplistic list
only to demonstrate the endlessness of the discourse and sort of disclaim that
swiping is only one of the issues, yet a very prominent and, therefore,
graspable one in our digital native lives. Yikes.

Like Agostino Ramelli and the Italian military forces, I also follow the
historical continuum and have the need to swipe. Even though I demonize the
phenomenon myself, I'm good at justifying to myself why I need swiping.
Therefore, swiping and I have a complex relationship: for me, it’s a source of
convenience, but at the same time, it’s an embodiment of modern time’s
anxieties. While I notice (most) of its flaws, swiping also feels alluring and
inescapable. In this thesis, the cultural significance of swiping crystallizes
in this contradiction.

4 TACTILE ESSENCE

“He [Frodo] shut his eyes and tried to remember the evening, but all that he
could recall was the gleam of the gold ring as it lay on the smooth dark surface
of the table. It had an unwholesome fascination. It lay on the table, glowing
faintly as if with a fire within.”
(The Fellowship of the Ring, Book II, Chapter 1: "Many Meetings")

“But the Ring was upon him. Frodo’s thoughts were drawn to it: his will was
lost. His hand moved on its own accord toward the chain about his neck."
(The Two Towers, Book IV, Chapter 1: "The Taming of Sméagol")

4.1 HAPTICS

What happens when you remove content from swiping? You are left with touch. But
how tactile is swiping, really?

As stated in the introduction, not much has been written about the sense of
touch in the field of digitality and social media. While the importance of touch
is a huge discourse in the history of art research, it has not been extended
much to smartphones in art context. Instead, when talking about touch in the
context of digital devices, the research is commonly centered around the
technological viewpoint and something called “haptics”. This term originally
derives from the Greek word “haptesthai”, which translates “to touch”.76 In tech
lingo it means transmitting and understanding information through the sense of
touch, and interfaces that have tactile sensation to them.7778

In the case of smartphones, “haptics” includes, for example, vibration and pulse
effects that simulate physical sensations. These haptic features appeal to
different senses, often working together with sight and sound to make the
devices more immersive and even add to accessibility.79 Because of this, I may
notice a notification even in a noisy environment. This is due to the haptic
vibration, while at the same time, the screen turns on, indicating an incoming
message.

However, swiping (at least as the term is understood within swipe culture)
doesn't typically involve haptic feedback. The reason for this probably is due
to the fluid and frictionless nature of a swipe. To back up this point, Apple’s
Human Gesture guidelines state that gestures should “enhance the experience of
direct manipulation” and “provide users with a sense of immediate feedback.”
With this, they push the designers to handle gestures in ways that feel natural
and intuitive.80 In other words, the gesture isn't intended to feel like a
friction-heavy physical event, but rather something intuitive and fluid.
Consequently, swiping isn't worth enhancing with multisensory interplay, such as
vibrations and blinking lights, because that would make it flashier than it
needs to be.

As a disclaimer, there still are instances where haptic feedback is linked to
swiping. However, I would argue that these examples are not culturally
significant to swipe culture, and for example the list of remarkable swipe
features (2.3 Milestones) doesn't involve examples with haptic features. That
said, apps are increasingly using haptic vibrations in their navigation, which
inevitably overlaps with some swiping functions. For example, Tinder on iPhone
vibrates when scrolling up a menu to let you know that the top or bottom of the
page has been reached81. This could be viewed as a sort of UX easter egg that
adds triggers for sensory stimulation to the app's navigation beyond its primary
left-right-swipe function, with an aim for a more engaging user experience.

The non-haptic and frictionless nature of swiping makes it a delicious object of
study in relation to other gestures. For example, A 2021 research by Michelle
Kramer and colleagues suggests that swiping is actually a better measure for
psychological studies, compared to the traditional way of button presses. In the
study, they challenged people to play a game called Airport scanner in which the
idea is to categorize luggage correctly by swiping. The team was focused on two
measures: time-to-touch (how long it takes for a person to first touch the
screen) and 'time-to-swipe' (how long it takes to complete the swipe once they
have touched the screen). Their key discovery was that longer 'time-to-swipe'
often led to mistakes, unlike the initial touch (like with button presses) which
gives less insight into decision-making.82 Conclusively, it seems likely that
the study of user interfaces should be more focused on tracking people’s swiping
habits in the future.

The disconnection of the swiping gesture from traditional discourse of hapticity
centered around button presses, is also one of the reasons why I argue for the
relevance of examining the tactile nature of swiping. In addition, it works as
an example of why the nature of swiping should be studied in a broader framework
of touch, because otherwise the discussion unnecessarily gets limited to the
digital user interface. This ignores other aspects that contribute to the
tactile experience—one of the most important ones, obviously, being the way you
hold the phone.

4.2 HOLDING A PHONE

When you stare into the black and cold screen of a shut-off iPhone, you may not
necessarily think that the inventor of the gadget was an eccentric hippie. The
biography of Steve Jobs states that the man was heavily invested in
counter-movements of the 1960s and he admired Eastern spirituality.
Consequently, he twisted the Zen Buddhist ideal of minimalism and
human-centricity into a commodity, by creating a sleek design language for the
Apple products.83 Even if, through this, his ideas of simplicity and
spiritualism were commodified, this cultural background casts a different light
on the tactile user experience of an iPhone. Jobs wanted to connect it to a
mindset that emphasizes human touch as the basis of communality84.

The way users physically hold their phones significantly impacts the tactile
experience, with different grips affecting comfort and usability. Most typically
the swiping gesture is performed with either the thumb or the index finger (left
or right depending on handedness). The common one-handed method has the three
central fingers supporting the phone on the back and the pinkie (by the way,
this can be harmful to the pinkie and ache the wrist85)86. This allows the thumb
to move in a wide arc on the screen in a lever-like manner, making use of both
joints. Also the thumb can easily move to use the buttons on the side of the
phone, and the same with the index finger on the opposite side. The most common
two-handed holding method has the other hand cradled, having a sturdy hold of
the phone, while the free hand controls the touchscreen with either an
outstretched index finger or a thumb87.

In 2013 Steven Hoober carried out a study of people’s phone holding habits. He
observed people in everyday situations, such as in cafés, at the airport and on
public transport, and came to the conclusion that people hold phones in one of
the three basic grips:

At 49%, the one-handed grip was most popular; 36% cradled the phone in one hand
and jabbed with the finger or thumb of the other; and the remaining 15% adopted
the two-handed BlackBerry-prayer posture, tapping away with both thumbs.88

The study is already over a decade old and the results would likely be different
in the modern day habitat. Nowadays, as smartphones generally are larger and the
touch screen covers most of the front side, different modes of holding the phone
are needed for different purposes. Hoober’s important conclusion, that can be
applied also for today, is that holding a phone isn't a static state, but
already 11 years ago, when he carried the research, the users were constantly
switching between the different modes of holding; changing even every few
seconds.

Larger screens make the one-handed use of the phone more challenging, especially
for reaching corners, which affects the design of user interfaces. Therefore
designers must consider thumb reachability zones and the most accessible areas
for touch.89 Also pop-sockets were invented to increase accessibility through a
better grip.90

Conclusively, one-handed grips are efficient for quick, casual interactions,
such as typing short messages or repeating a simple swipe on TikTok. On the
other hand, the one-handed grip may limit reach and control, especially on
larger devices. Two-handed grips provide better stability and precision, ideal
for typing longer texts or playing games. Two-handed grip is also often
necessary when operating larger screens. Varying grip positions are due not only
to changing situations, applications, but also to the user becoming tired of a
simple movement that puts strain on a single finger91 .

It’s also noteworthy that there is an ethos on the internet suggesting that
different typing techniques would differ between generations. It boils down to
the idea that the digital native zoomers and millennials type more deftly with
one hand and a thumb, while older generations poke the screen with their index
finger.9293 Speculatively, I can say that there may be a grain of truth in the
notion that young people use devices in more casual situations and are generally
more adept at controlling them than previous generations. However, in light of
the evidence we have gathered, depending on the size of the screen and the
current application, all of us, regardless of age, need to switch between
different positions frequently. While the app interfaces are designed
differently, depending on the primary target (age) group94 I haven't found any
empirical research showing that young people use their thumbs to swipe more than
old people.

4.3 SWIPING AS A PROSTHESIS

Have you bumped into this idea that we're using smartphones so much that they
are growing to be extensions of our arms? According to a quick Google search on
“phone grows to be a part of body”, it seems to be a relatively common rhetoric
among tech-savvy news outlets, such as Medium. One of the main arguments Medium
uses is that no other device has made such a cultural impact that we couldn't
function without one, and therefore we can't even leave home without it95. In
addition, I quite like their metaphor of seeing virtual reality as a sensory
entity, which only smartphones allow us to experience. In this way, the Medium
article presents the phone as a sensory organ with its own function.96 Perhaps
this concept could help us understand why I experience sensations of the virtual
realm as if they were part of our natural sensory world.

To align the conclusions from this discourse with the topic of my thesis, I
would like to go one step deeper to think in what relation the object of swiping
(cultural and technological) is to this organ. Because swiping is another
technical feature, added to enhance the functionality of the smartphone organ,
we could think of it as a prosthesis. To establish a smartphone’s connection to
our physical body, let’s start by considering the ways touching a smartphone
affects us neurologically.

Reading some papers on the psychology of haptics, it turns out that repeated
touch interactions on smartphones, such as swiping and tapping, are bound to
activating the brain's sensory reward systems. This stimulation can strengthen
my habits, causing me to grab my phone unconsciously and use it almost in an
automated manner.97 These habits are formed in stable contexts, which are
habitual everyday rituals.98 In my case, this points to the habits of checking
my phone the first thing in the morning after waking up and always swiping
Instagram, while commuting by S-Bahn.

This discovery aligns with certain theories from haptic perception which point
that “active exploration”, done through touching, enhances sensory satisfaction
in users of a touch screen device.99100 In this context, ”active exploration”
means goal-oriented and purposeful fiddling of a gadget. On this basis we can
draw that touching a phone is neurologically rewarding in itself. This pleasure
is an outcome of the actions producing dopamine bursts, which encourage
repeating the act, ultimately reinforcing the previously discussed automated
behavioral patterns.101 Through this, the smartphone can be seen as an organ,
responsible for causing pleasure in my body on a frequent basis.

To then extract what role swiping plays in this procedure, we need to first
differentiate its psychological effects from those of other digital gestures.
One way to do this is to look again into swipe culture, because it’s the culture
which best summarizes swiping’s nature, and it essentially doesn’t involve
button pressing or other common gestures. As discussed in 4.1 Haptics, swiping
is different from other major navigational gestures on smartphones due to its
fluid and frictionless nature. Therefore the reason why swiping is addictive
can’t be pointed to the act’s hapticity.

Instead, a major feature that makes swiping addictive and practically an
automated act, is the logic of variable rewards, in which many swipe-cultural
apps are built. Variable rewards are infamously present in gambling machines,
with the core idea that it's not predictable when you get rewarded next102. Only
that in swiping the reward isn't always as concrete as getting a jackpot on a
slot machine. For example, on TikTok the reward is a new stimulating video,
jumping into the window, but its actual value to a user is abstract compared to
a cash prize. On Tinder, however, the “jackpot” is highlighted in the event of a
match. When swiping right, if I get lucky, the screen turns green and my picture
is portrayed next to theirs—the dreams could finally come true.

Conclusively we can say that touching a smartphone, in itself, is a pleasurable
act, but the pleasantness-enhancing factor in swiping isn't based on the act’s
tactility or hapticity, but on psychological satisfaction, through the gambling
logic. In this light, swiping can be seen as a prosthesis, which enhances the
acts of the smartphone organ—in collaboration, they work similarly to other
organs (the ones usually found inside the body, covered in blood): by providing
sensory input that activates the brain—and in this case, its reward system. This
makes the smartphone organ a sort of dopamine tap and the swiping prosthesis its
handle, controlling the flow. Due to the dominance of swipe culture, using this
part of the body causes excitement and pleasure, but in the long run, it may
turn into an addiction, which may eventually drain the dopamine source.103

4.4 ORGAN DYSFUNCTION

The smartphone organ has its beneficial sides, allowing us to sense virtual
reality and accelerating dopamine production in my body, and its actions are
enhanced by the swiping prosthesis. What if the prosthesis fails? How does this
breakage in the habits affect me?

To swipe intuitively, I need to know my phone like the back of my hand. As we
have gathered, swiping is optimized not only to speed up my daily communication
tasks, but also to stimulate my brains with content. Both of these fundamentally
require that the mobile phone can be handled in as familiar a way as possible.
Only then the user experience is smooth and the transition from reality to the
virtual is immediate.

Breaking my phone may cause a breakage in the swiping prosthesis. There are
different levels of breakage: the edges of the protective glass shatter, the
protective glass shatters causing visual harm to the display, the screen breaks
down making it difficult to control, the components of the phone break down
causing a power cut.

While a switched-off mobile phone prevents you from using it at all, even minor
cracks can distract me, making it difficult to see content clearly and causing
discomfort during use. Also, a shattered screen can lead to touch sensitivity
issues, where parts of the screen no longer respond accurately to touch (in the
worst case this causes random click events around the display with bad
consequences). This not only slows down navigation but also forces me to change
how they interact with their devices, often requiring me to adjust the grip to
reach for the responsive areas of the screen. This change disrupts the seamless
transition from physical to digital interactions.

On discussions-apple.com Apple community site, the user Crystalgems04 struggles
with swipe-to-unlocking their recently cracked phone screen (note that this is
the unlocking system on newer iPhones which don't have the original
slide-to-unlock feature, however the main idea is similar). As a response, they
are told that the only way to open their mobile phone again is to repair the
screen.104 Without knowing exactly what state the user's Crystalgems04 screen is
in, it would seem ironic if only the bottom edge of the screen was inoperable
and therefore the unlock slider there was unusable. In other words, while Apple
wanted to make unlocking the screen intuitive and easy by condensing it into a
simple swipe-element, if it malfunctions, unlocking isn't possible.

The user experience is also impaired, breaking the digital immersion, if the
phone is working slowly. There are many reasons for this, for example if the
phone's Random access memory (RAM) or cache is full or about to fill up. A weak
internet connection will also slow the swiping experience, forcing the user
either to find a faster connection or quit altogether.

While the smartphone organ is designed to bridge the physical and digital worlds
seamlessly, a death (or even a mild injury) of the system shows its fragility.
Screen damage, battery failures, software glitches, touchscreen malfunctions,
connection issues and overheating are all issues breaking the immersion that the
smartphone is supposed to offer. These interruptions don't only destroy the
enjoyment and utility of smartphones, but also undermine the core promise of
these devices. As a whole, there is something rather odd about a sleek modern
technology and design showpiece that becomes unusable in the hand. Broken
iPhones are not what you are used to seeing in Apple's advertising.

The broken screen of my iPhone doesn't keep me from swiping, but the need is so
often so hard that I would even keep pushing under the risk of shattered glass.
Because of my automated swiping cycles, I will keep swiping through blood and
shattered glass, even if the device is hurting me physically. It seems like the
death of the swiping organ wouldn't be the death of me, but I'm not sure how
losing it would affect me.

Swiping is a form of touching, but it’s not like hugging a friend. Rather
something subtle and unconscious, usually performed automatically. This makes
the act similar to walking—it’s a way of freely roaming around and navigating
virtual reality, unless it gets directed by external forces. The biggest threat
to this freedom of movement are the traps built into the apps.

5 ALGORITHM TRAPS

The earlier question (in the beginning of 4.1 Tactile essence) hypothetically
asks what happens when the content is taken out of its swiping context. Well, in
a way, this isn’t a very meaningful question, since without content, there is
nothing to swipe. After all, it’s easier to imagine the end of the world than
the end of the Insta feed105.

Regardless, this thesis doesn't delve into the content of the swipeable
platforms because it would extend the thesis’ scope too much. Therefore, things
like trends and memes are excluded. And even while some topics, such as swipe
culture, closely deal with the fast paced nature of TikTok videos and curating
of dating profiles, they are discussed in an abstract manner, without concrete
examples. However, the content on swipe-cultural apps defines the swiping
phenomenon so largely that it needs to be addressed in some way. As a response,
this following section touches content, focusing on algorithms. So, not content
itself, but the way it's managed. And ultimately, how these algorithms are
designed to manage me.

5.1 UNDERSTANDING ATTENTION ECOLOGY

“When you gaze into TikTok, TikTok gazes into you”, states a case study from
Harvard Business School, pointing how apps like TikTok adjust their algorithms
to manipulate user behavior. According to the study, TikTok’s algorithm is
designed to first capture and then hold user attention by feeding personalized
content that feels familiar.106 This is the way swipe-cultural apps usually aim
to turn my attention into profit. A prime example of the tendencies
characteristic of the attention economy, which has its roots in the days before
smartphones107. For now, please excuse this minor detour, as we try to picture
the economic state, within which we swipe.

The term attention economy means commercialization of attention, where it's
treated as a scarce commodity that can be bought and sold. This economic model
focuses on the commercial value of user attention, with platforms using various
strategies, such as personalized algorithms, to maximize engagement and profit.
In contrast, there is a cultural framework, called attention ecology (it’s easy
to confuse the two), which is suitable for the scope of this thesis. Compared to
the attention economy, attention ecology offers a more holistic approach,
emphasizing the interactions and relationships between individuals and their
environments. It views attention as a key process for sustaining these
connections and frames it as a dynamic thing within the intersection of media,
technology, and culture.108 This approach is crucial for understanding how the
algorithms affect my personal autonomy.

In his book “The Ecology of Attention”, Yves Citton describes attention as
functioning like an ecosystem, influenced by the media we consume, the devices
we use, and the social contexts in which we live. In his view, attention isn't a
resource, but a renewable process formed in interactions.109 In contrast, the
concept of the attention economy, as described by thinkers like Herbert A. Simon
and Michael Goldhaber, frames attention as a limited and valuable resource in
the digital age. Simon noted that "a wealth of information creates a poverty of
attention," highlighting the challenge of managing attention in the middle of
information overload. Goldhaber further argued that in the digital era, the
traditional economic principles of the information economy, where information
was the main commodity, are less relevant. Instead, attention has become the
most scarce and valuable resource.110

Whereas attention economy sees attention as a commodity, attention ecology sees
that the real value (which can be turned into profit in the attention economic
framework) is generated in interactions—like in this context, swiping.
Therefore, applying the theory of attention ecology gives a better cultural
viewpoint to this thesis than attention economy.

5.2 USER DATA AS A COMMODITY

So, we know that most111 swipe-cultural apps work according to attention
ecological models. How do they do it in practice?

The principles of the attention ecology are a defining factor in the
functionality of swipe culture, and therefore the apps are dependent on the
scarcity of our attention in several ways. Firstly, they study our interests and
swiping habits to feed the algorithms. In addition to capturing and holding
attention, media corporations sell this data, commodifying our attention as
preferences, interests, and swiping habits.112 This is an example of the
ecological approach, which sees the value in interactions. These behavioral
profiles are then sold to advertisers who push customized imagery and links to
our screens. As Shoshana Zuboff describes in The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
this process is a new kind of market that trades in behavioral futures, where
companies like Google and Meta profit by predicting and influencing what we will
do next.113 This market is a direct outcome of treating attention as a scarce
resource.

The algorithms on different apps have very different goals that align with their
business agenda. Therefore, it's not really meaningful to try to summarize the
essence of the different algorithms here, so let’s keep using TikTok as a case
example. Allegedly, its algorithm has four main goals: 用户价值, 用户价值 (长期), 作者价值,
and 平台价值. These the company translates as “user value,” “long-term user
value,”“creator value,” and “platform value.”114 These goals are reached by
tracking such as what videos a user likes, shares, or comments on, as well as
how much time a user spends engaging with different types of content.115

All of this data helps build a detailed profile of your preferences, which can
be sold to advertisers. According to these profiles, advertisers can target
specific audiences based on detailed criteria, such as age, location, interests,
past behaviors, and even the type of device you are using. This is why you often
see ads that hit the bull’s eye with your recent searches or interests.116

On top of supporting the operation of applications and algorithms with user
data, the platforms like TikTok also harvest what Zuboff calls "behavioral
surplus," the excess data drawn from our online interactions that go beyond the
point of which is necessary to maintain the functions of the service. This
surplus data is analyzed to create detailed behavioral profiles that can predict
user actions and preferences.117 In practice, the different apps also collect
data like your device identifiers, including your phone’s unique device ID, and
the network addresses you connect to.118

An alarming example of surplus data collection comes from 2020, when the
controversy about the privacy of clipboard data while using TikTok surfaced. At
the time, already the world's most downloaded app turned out to be able to read
and store any type of data a user currently had on the clipboard. Concerns
intensified by Apple devices' ability to sync clipboard data between a user's
different devices, potentially exposing personal information such as passwords.
TikTok quickly responded to allegations made by the Telegraph magazine by
announcing that it would stop spying on clipboards in the coming weeks. However,
the monitoring did not stop, but research shows that TikTok continued to analyze
clipboard contents at an accelerating rate, with checks being made every few
seconds.119

Also Tinder has shown a tendency to unpredictably collect surplus data by
storing a user’s location history, which hackers have been able to access by
querying Tinder’s API.120 In 2020, a report by Norwegian Consumer Council (NCC)
found that dating apps, Tinder and Grindr on the forefront, violate numerous EU
privacy regulations by sharing information such as users' locations and sexual
orientation with third party advertisers. The NCC highlighted the seriousness of
the situation by implying that a user's ability to control the availability of
their own data was superficial, posing them under a risk of different forms of
discrimination and exclusion without even knowing about it.121

In addition to taking over your personal time management, the algorithms’ can be
harmful in different ways. In 2018, Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook
(nowadays Meta), decided to change the goal of their algorithm to prioritize
social interactions over public posts by news outlets and ads.122 This change
was due to the discovery that the increasing amount of video content on the
platform leads to a more passive user experience, which was harmful for their
mental health.123124 Zuckerberg reacted to the app’s shrinking user base, by
noting that “protecting our community is more important than maximizing our
profits.”125126 Additionally, he also has claimed that “using social apps to
connect with other people can have positive mental health benefits and
well-being benefits by helping people feel more connected and less lonely.” Now
these claims appear awkward, since a recent leak of “Facebook files” showed that
Zuckerberg has intentionally hidden the fact that he is aware that Facebook and
Instagram are harmful to mental health, and especially among teenage girls.127
Although he lied when claiming to view community well-being as an intrinsic
value, he was right in saying that the passive consumption media is indeed
harmful128.

Luckily, there are also recent measures against algorithmic cruelty; most
notably the 2021 EU acts: Digital Services Act (DSA) and Digital Markets Act
(DMA). A central driving force of these agreements is the need to give smaller
digital companies a competitive advantage over the market ecologies of large
media 129 However, they also have a major impact on an individual user, offering
to opt out of certain types of algorithmic processing. (EU) One example of the
benefits of these acts is the update to the Facebook feed that allows to sort
the content by "Most recent", instead of the obscure default algorithm. However
this feature is somewhat awkwardly hidden under a separate "feeds" tab, instead
of having the button visible in the opening view, but at least it's there. On
top of that, since 2021, both Facebook and Instagram (both operated by Meta)
have been featuring a “why am I seeing this?”-option to give more direct answers
to the questions regarding the algorithms. Hopefully, these are some milestones
on the way to a better algorithmic awareness.

5.3 DARK PATTERNS

The user deception doesn't end with a sneaky algorithm. The manipulative
tendencies of swipe-based cultural apps manifest physically in the form of dark
patterns (also known as deceptive patterns). As stated in 4.1 Haptics, swiping
is a natural, intuitive and frictionless act, which makes it easy to fall into a
swiping cycle. For that reason, I should always keep on my toes to avoid falling
into a trap.

“Oops! You missed a match.”

Tinder has a tendency to charge the user for having lost their focus and making
an error. While swiping, if a user mistakenly slips an attractive user's account
to the left, they must pay to rewind the account back into view. This is a
carefully calculated model by Tinder, where the lack of attention caused by
repeated swiping leads to error and frustration, potentially increasing the
user's propensity to invest in paid subscription—a very concrete example of the
user’s lack of attention to being monetized.

This example from Tinder is just a tip of the iceberg of dark patterns, veiled
behind business secrecy. The common swipeable applications are packed with
similar patterns, with an aim to trick users into investing more of their time,
attention or money on the platform.130 The concept of dark patterns is rather
vague and unscientific. Although there are lists on the internet that categorize
its different types131. The apps we use try to lead us in so many ways that
their boundaries are blurred. What kind of guidance is useful to us and when is
our online presence exploited? Media content based apps are also ephemeral in
the sense that the secret algorithms are in control of the UX, which has evolved
to maximize engagement and profit.132 Therefore, it's challenging to pinpoint
exactly when a design choice crosses the line into manipulation.

For instance, a feature such as Youtube’s video recommendation is a double-edged
sword. On one hand, it studies your preferences133 and makes sure that you
always have interesting, entertaining and, sometimes, even educational videos in
line. On the other, the autoplay features, unless you disable them, push new
videos endlessly, promoting a prolonged viewing session. When the timer starts
to count down from 5 seconds, marking the end of the previous video, you don't
have time to consider whether to swipe up from the bottom of the screen, to kill
the app, before the next one already starts playing.

On short video platforms that are navigated by swiping, there is a similar trick
to Youtube’s autoplay, guiding user behavior is the so-called "infinite scroll",
which, you guessed it, pushes an infinite amount of content into view as you
keep going. This is a common type of dark pattern, playfully referred to as
“roach motel”. The point is that, while it's easy to enter the application,
leaving it's made hard–thus promoting forced continuity.134

This repetitive principle is, in fact, characteristic to the swipe culture as a
whole: the user becomes numb to what is currently visible and instinctively
seeks for more. This is also closely related to the earlier discussed variable
rewards logic. For example, similarly to YouTube, TikTok doesn't even give you a
chance to get bored, but after finishing one video, the platform immediately
offers more stimulating content. To emphasize the urgency, the video below
bounces twice by a few dozen pixels into view, inviting you to scroll upwards.

Matthew B. Crawford describes how the "intensification of nervous stimulation"
brought by modern technology limits people's ability to direct their attention
where they please. This often leads to the crisis of self-ownership while people
can't be present in simple activities such as family meetings.135 Yves Citton
echoes this point by highlighting how our collective attentional capacities are
shaped by the media we consume: “It's the media that decides to what we pay our
attention (or not)”.136 Both imply that the media has the power to direct our
attention in the directions they want, when it suits them best.

Conclusively, these apps do more than just show us content they know we will
like—they manipulate our behaviors and preferences to align with their
commercial goals, by showing us imagery they want us to like. As my friend
Vilppu Rantanen aptly put it: “one day the big social media corporations will be
treated as cigarette companies are today”. Indeed, the way they first hook us up
and then keep us in the endless loop of swiping is nasty. Chronic brain fog can
complicate life as much as a smoker's cough.

6 RECLAIMING AGENCY

Surveillance capitalism’s operations [are] a challenge to the elemental right to
the future tense, which accounts for the individual’s ability to imagine,
intend, promise, and construct a future. It is an essential condition of free
will and, more poignantly, of the inner resources from which we draw the will to
will.
(The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, p. 21)

6.1 SWIPING CYBORG

This thesis presents swiping as a matter of two dichotomies. Firstly, it's both
a technological and a cultural object. Secondly, its nastier side is exposed in
a dichotomy which juxtaposes both the tactile and algorithmic tricks as a web of
user deception. Now, having read about them, it feels that I hardly see any
point in using swipe-cultural apps anymore and I would even consider letting my
phone go. But actually, these options don't feel so meaningful to me. After all,
I still see value in swiping (remember, according to the ideas expressed in 3.2
Fear of swiping: I need to swipe). My friends are there and I don't want to miss
out. Also my profession requires a certain presence on social media. Overall,
sacrificing the phone, thereby paralyzing an organ, is a step I'm not ready to
make. I'm left questioning: are there ways to make the experience healthier for
me? How could I have a better control on what I'm doing? And even: who am I in
this digital space—a product of algorithmic manipulation or, still, a real
person that is able to define theirself autonomously?

Some clarity to these questions could be found through picturing my digital self
as a cyborg. Like I do, this 80s sci-fi archetype has technological components
replacing organs and sticking out of the body. Donna Haraway in her text A
Cyborg Manifesto defines the cyborg as a hybrid entity that blends the organic
with the technological. She argues that "we're all chimeras, theorized and
fabricated hybrids of machine and organism."137 With this, she highlights
today’s inseparability of human beings and the machines they make. The text is
written in 1985, but the described phenomena have kept accumulating until today.
In the current state, the technical and organic are increasingly mixed,
especially with the rise of cybernetics (for example Elon Musk’s Neuralink138),
but more tangibly, it’s evident in our relationship with smartphones, which now
are our bodily extensions.

Additionally, Haraway points that this blurring of boundaries has gone to a
point that cultural and even scientific frameworks recognise this blended
existence: "there is no fundamental, ontological separation in our formal
knowledge of machine and organism, of technical and organic." Consequently, the
whole concept of human moves to the direction of a technological being. With
each swipe, that I decide to either engage or disengage with the swipe-cultural
simulacra, I'm increasingly transforming real-life people into technological
beings which consist of images, bios, and an absurd amount of surplus metadata,
out of my reach. In other words, physical gestures turn into content and this
makes swiping an embodiment of cyborgian hybridity. Now we're dependent of the
technology, but also the other way around:

"One consequence is that our sense of connection to our tools is heightened...
Perhaps paraplegics and other severely handicapped people can (and sometimes do)
have the most intense experiences of complex hybridization with other
communication devices... Why should our bodies end at the skin, or include at
best other beings encapsulated by skin? ... For us, in imagination and in other
practice, machines can be prosthetic devices, intimate components, friendly
selves." 139

Without the technology, the swipe means nothing, and without the human touch,
the machine is useless. So having a smartphone organ, enhanced with a swiping
prosthesis, makes me a cyborg. Neat. What am I capable of?

The swiping cyborg has a certain degree of autonomy in choosing what they engage
with and how they present themself, but this is partly limited by dark patterns
and algorithmic tricks. And, indeed, as long as I'm not completely consumed by
scroll and decision fatigue, and directed by dark patterns and conditioned to
automated habitual patterns, I can make decisions such as: who I want to engage
with, what sites and apps I want to use, and what posts to like. But then again,
the invisible architecture on swipe-cultural apps aims to exhaust my
self-determination. Seemingly, I can swipe, like and reject as I wish, but all
these decisions are heavily shaped by manipulative algorithms. How could I
liberate myself from them?

Luckily, Haraway’s cyborg isn't a passive entity: “The cyborg is a kind of
disassembled and reassembled, postmodern collective and personal self. This is
the self feminists must code.” The cyborg has a cool ability to question and
rework their identity, even under oppression. And this is the mentality I should
adopt in order to understand my relationship with swiping. By questioning the
influence that the platforms have on me, I'm, perhaps, able to reclaim some
control over my digital self. But due to the algorithm traps, it's not very
easy.

As a solution, we could turn to what swiping fundamentally is: touching. Even
Aristotle argued that touching is our most important sense for survival, because
it's our primary way of perceiving the world around us and interacting with
it.140 Even if swiping isn't like regular touching, given its automated nature,
it still is the way we approach smartphones: slide-to-unlock, swipe to open an
app, swipe the app. Touching promotes closeness and warmth in contrast to the
cold world of technology.

6.2 TACTILE LIBERATION

To learn about the risks of excessive phone usage and how to avoid it, we can
read various lists on the internet. They provide some solutions against mindless
swiping: create phone-free zones, set time limits, turn off notifications et
cetera.141 Or in terms of dating apps: ask yourself if you really have the
energy for dates, replace distraction and find alternative ways of meeting
people.142 However, these lists are concentrated on how to avoid the phone. But
once the phone is my bodily extension, it's hard to avoid it. Moreover, avoiding
it doesn't align with my need to swipe.

Once the swiping is my prosthesis—a bodily expansion, I should also treat it as
one. Let me elaborate: the goal for my legs is to reach physical destinations,
without me having to think actively how to move them. The same no-brainer logic
is universal to my body: I can grab the desired object with my hands and my
fingers know what to do. Now I would like to get this same level of
intentionality to my swiping. One problem with swiping is that the goal is often
unclear. When I just habitually grab my phone, not having a task in mind, I'm
most vulnerable to dark patterns and algorithm games. Due to the natural,
intuitive and frictionless nature of swiping, my swiping will know how to
maneuver, and therefore I often find myself in unpleasant places. Now I should
learn to turn this intuitive way of moving into my strength.

To gain a better consciousness of my swiping choices, I propose to bring the
focus on the sense of touch. According to Aristotle’s book “De Anima”, our skin
senses hotness and coldness and with these animals know to look for nourishment
and dodge danger.143 For instance, take the star-nosed mole. This mighty
creature may be blind, but its star-shaped nose is so sensitive for touch that
it creates an image of the surroundings. This super-sense is great for hunting
for earthworms (a mole’s great nourishment).144 With its tactile sense it also
quickly escapes from predators (a definite danger).

This is exactly the type of skill set I need to support my smartphone use: I
deserve to contact my friends regularly, read daily news articles and even swipe
reels (nourishment), but on the other hand, I need to look out for passive
watching of videos and extended swiping cycles (danger). How is this done, you
may ask. Well, it's like learning to walk again.

There are practices for conscious walking, like the Zen Buddhist mindfulness
practice of Kinhin (though here, I refer to it purely as an example, removing it
from its cultural and spiritual context). Kinhin guides people to walk slowly,
focusing on the sensation of each step and maintaining balance through a
specific posture, which helps for a better awareness of the body and
surroundings. The sensation of touch is central in this practice, since the
focus is in the way your feet connect with the ground.145 In addition to Kinhin,
there are other meditational walking methods, like sensory and body awareness
walking, which aim for a better connection with the environment, by shifting the
focus between soles and auditive and visual observations.146

Similarly to these, there could be a conscious swiping practice, which could go
something like follows. When I realize that I'm falling to a swiping loop (or
have already fallen), I should stop and ask myself the following questions:

* Is the swipe fast or slow?
* Is it path-based or not?
* How long is the touch?
* Is it emotionally charged?
* Is there another way I could take?

I should also focus on how the phone feels in my hand. The feeling of touch
could be a reminder of my own physical presence.

* Is the screen broken or intact?
* Is it clean or smudgy?
* How is my pinky situated and does it ache my wrist?
* Does the phone feel good right now or does it already burn in my palm?

And most importantly:

* Am I swiping with a goal in mind, or am I lost in the action?

In this way, I can let my fingers intuitively guide me through the virtual
spaces, while still retaining the agency, at least for most of the time. Also, I
get more aware of the possible traps and I could make the decision if I want to
engage or disengage with them. Sometimes it's also good to set the auto-pilot
on. Regardless, like the star-nosed mole, I will sense the danger when it's
present, and will know how to escape it.

Considering myself a rebellious swiping cyborg, combined with a practice of
mindful swiping I'm now equipped with tools for having a clearer digital
self-image and knowing when to stop if needed. In the future, these lessons
could hopefully end in a healthier swiping practice. Swiping should be something
I can control, rather than something that controls me.

7 CONCLUSIONS

7.1 THE TACTILE FUTURE OF SWIPE CULTURE

Right now, many apps like Spotify (music streaming service) and Netflix (service
for movies and series) are adapting to the faster TikTok-like-communication
style with their new scrollable feeds that contain short snippets of music and
videos.147 It feels like a certain last state of swiping has been reached, since
now apps that were born outside of swipe-cultural context, become
swipe-cultural. The designers have a responsibility to now utilize the powerful
tools of digital gestures for a healthier swipe culture.

As proven in 2.1 From origins to a daily practice, technology can develop in
surprising ways, and therefore it’s hard to predict where the swipe culture is
actually going. Many of the phenomenon’s current problems are widely out of a
designer’s reach. A designer can’t directly affect the apps’ hidden
architecture, shaped by sneaky algorithms and dark patterns. Instead, it feels
like the only way for the companies to actually change their policies is through
international unions to set more regulations. While certain steps (as the EU
regulations, pointed in 5.2 User data as a commodity) have been made for more
transparent algorithms and awareness on dark patterns is spreading, not enough
is being done. Nobody can argue that the swipe-cultural apps would be less
addictive and exploitative than they used to be. Rather the opposite.

Even if we can’t directly affect the bigger picture decision-making, the chapter
6.1 Swiping cyborg points out that I’m, as a cyborg, able to resist oppression.
So let’s think in what ways designers can take action by getting inspired by the
mentality of tactile liberation. Here are three principles:

* Intentional swiping Swipe culture has accelerated decision-making, especially
on dating apps. Therefore we need to consider if this acceleration is
actually beneficial for users. Can swiping be endlessly optimized, or is it
time to slow down? The swipeable interfaces should support conscious
interaction over automated actions. For example Tinder could learn from Hinge
on how to slow down the decision-making process148. Tinder’s left-right-swipe
is iconic, but time has passed it by, given how much it has accelerated the
decision-making process. One solution would be to put the user first to
review the whole profile, until they can make their decision—whether it’s
then made by swiping or pressing a button. Consequently, the navigation
should be automated only in the places where not much emotion is connected to
the swiping act. Browsing people’s profiles is emotional, and it’s weird to
do it fast, but scrolling through the settings window should remain quick and
intuitive.
* Healthy haptics The rising trend of incorporating haptic feedback into
swiping gestures has added an extra layer of sensory engagement. However, for
a better swipe culture, it’s important to make sure that haptics serve other
purposes than just adding stimulation. As pointed in 4.3 Swiping as a
prosthesis, touching a smartphone is in itself a psychologically pleasurable
act. Haptic features, such as pulses and vibrations, can be seen to further
enhance this fiddle factor, creating a more immersive and stimulating user
experience. The challenge, though, is to prevent haptics from supporting
addictive behaviors. In the future, haptic effects should enhance navigation
in subtle and playful ways, but they shouldn’t contribute to supporting
overstimulation and addictive behavior. For instance, haptic feedback
shouldn’t be tied to quick decision-making processes, as seen on Tinder, or
to endless scrolling feeds, like on TikTok and Instagram, but rather to
decorate navigation in places, where it's not harmful to a user—or, in
contrast, is even helpful.
* Tactile awareness Swipe culture is essentially about speed and quick
gratification, but what if it wasn’t like this? Drawing from 6.2 Tactile
liberation, swiping shouldn't be only about efficiency, but also about
connecting the user and the device in a balanced tactile way. Designers could
think of ways to enhance ways for users to take breaks and reflect during the
moments of emotional significance. For instance, an app could purposefully
but subtly remind the user about the fact that they are touching the phone,
rather than trying to hide it. This could be achieved through gentle haptic
feedback or visual cues that encourage to pause and think about the physical
interaction with the device. In this way, the experience is less about
mindless consumption and more about creating a connection between the user
and the content they are interacting with.

Apps are increasingly turning swipe-cultural, which is not a problem in itself,
but therefore we need to work for a healthier swipe culture. The previously
listed changes in app design could potentially encourage a shift in people’s
priorities—from maximizing engagement at any cost to fostering a healthier
relationship between users and their devices. To me, a better swipe culture
means people can use the apps they want, as much as they want, but stay in
control of how they use them.

7.2 REFLECTION

While writing this thesis, I struggled with describing to people what my
perspective on swiping would be, because I was going in so many directions. As
stated in the introduction, I wanted to work on my own smartphone relationship,
but when I was discussing the topic with other people, everyone seemed to relate
to it in some way. Usually people would greet me for a “great and a topical
issue”, start telling me about their own habits, often by mimicking the swiping
motion with their hands. Keeping in mind that many people would be touched by
the topic helped me carry on with writing. I knew that even if my conclusions
are not applicable for everyone’s situation, this thesis could work at least as
a collection of helpful anecdotes.

In the end, there are two juxtaposed themes: the algorithm traps’ impact on my
digital self-determination and the tactile essence of swiping. The first
mentioned closely resembles other existential reflections, commonly found in the
field of media art, while the second one feels a bit more like my own—something
yet unexplored. But in a way, there isn't one without the other. It feels like I
couldn't have pictured the whole essence of swiping without going deeper to its
cultural framework, where content needs to be included. And, on the other hand,
the physical act of swiping is nowadays so intertwined with our (mine at least)
digital self-image that it was a necessity to address both issues side-by-side.
Consequently, the result is a mixture of a little bit of everything. And I think
it’s cool, since I wanted to gain extensive knowledge of the topic anyway.

With confidence, I can now say that swiping is simultaneously four things: a
technological object, a cultural object, a tactile object and a nasty object
that tries to trick you. In the future, this is a valid starting point to give
to the people who ask for some insight from the world of swiping. The biggest
challenge, however, was the specificity of the topic. Answers to the
technological and psychological aspects of smartphones and also swiping are
largely available on the internet, but it was difficult to combine these
lessons, extracting which smartphone characteristics are specific only for
swiping. And, on the other hand, how deep should I delve into smartphones and
their history to understand which things are relevant for the development of
swiping. Is it in a good balance? Some might consider that this thesis starts
out slowly, but I personally like having this extensive look into smartphone
technology before the real deal.

For research, I needed to refer to various blogs and tech news outlets, and I
tried to focus on big ones that I knew from before, such as Medium, the Verge
and Wired. Writing about such a contemporary issue causes the challenge that
academic studies are not up to date with technology’s latest updates. Therefore,
when I needed information about a specific technological feature, I needed to
rely on a source, which has already covered it. Regardless, I tried to maintain
source criticism in the blog posts I have chosen.

Because I needed to borrow some terminology from common smartphone discourses
and apply them into swiping—and the other way around—there turned out to be some
gaps to fill. Practically, I was responsible for naming things that remained
unnamed, and in those spots I think we actually face some unique ideas. Through
this we ended up with things such as “swipe-cultural apps”, “need to swipe”,
“swiping prosthesis” and “algorithm traps”. Out of these, my favorite one was
the extended theme of swipe culture, which also (kind of) was my original
starting point for writing this. It ended up being a really useful term,
pointing to the connection between the different apps, regardless that they
serve different purposes.

On top of these terms seeing the daylight, now there also is the mindful swiping
practice, which for one, sure is unique, but its actual level of utility is for
you to judge. MFA (master of fine arts) theses on UI (user interface) give some
thematic wiggle room—such as making this publication pink. All in all, even if
I, at times, struggled to clearly point out the connection between the
philosophical questions surrounding algorithms and the tactile study of swiping,
I think these new terms mark a good effort.

If I were to continue this research, I would definitely compare these lessons to
ones on other fields of digital media art. The essence of immersiveness and the
flow-state interest me, and would be interesting to compare in what ways they
are treated, for instance in artworks and research about virtual reality (VR).
Personally, I see VR artworks often quite artificial, in the way they prioritize
visually over stimulating experiences over grounded interactions. While their
point may, indeed, be imagining alternative virtual dimensions, I'm more
interested in ones that are already existing. And that’s part of the reason why
I’m currently fixated on studying how smartphones work. An imagined universe, in
the form of a VR artwork, can have such a big impact on an individual, but what
about exposing features about your own virtual reality, constructed through your
daily habits? I would be interested in testing this hypothesis in practice.

7.2 SHOULD I STAY ON DATING APPS?

For the very last thing, let’s try to answer an important question that
originally got this whole thing rolling—and it's in regards to my dating life.
In a nutshell, the main problem is in my mindset. Specifically, I view dating as
too swiping-centric. In fact, this also applies to many other aspects in my
personal life, as an effect caused by my fear of swiping (3.2 Fear of Swiping)
combined with the swipe-cultural apps’ ability to direct my attention into
unwanted directions (5.3 Dark Patterns). As I mentioned earlier, swiping is
partly an embodiment of our modern anxieties and I notice this adding up to a
personal tendency of blaming my screen time for all kinds of personal
problems—even those that shouldn't be connected to smartphones. This is due to
two things: firstly, me swiping a lot and secondly, demonizing that action and
smartphones as a whole, aligning my opinions on it with the societal narrative
of smartphones as an antagonist, “fracturing my mental life”149.

Doing so, I capture myself thinking in a very swiping-centric manner, by stating
swiping guilty for several of my personal fears, such as: I don't read enough, I
struggle to meet genuine people for dating and I'm not present to my close-ones
in real-life situations. I take the easy way out pointing my finger to swiping
as if it was my main problem, while these issues are actually way more complex.
In this way, I adopt a distorted version of the mentality, which Sherry Turkle
calls “tethered self”, suggesting that one’s digital habits are an inherent part
of their identity.150 And I indeed tend to take my high screen time as a given
personal trait—as something that I can't change about myself, and which I just
need to learn to cope with. This leads to me internalizing the twisted idea that
there must be a certain amount of swiping in every day.

As a response, I should learn to turn this situation upside down. This means
thinking that the reason why I'm not reading books is neither the high screen
time, nor the hundreds of reels I swipe through every day. Instead, I should
view them as a consequence of not reading more. Also, the reason for not meeting
people isn't because I wouldn’t know how to balance with the algorithms on
Tinder and Hinge. It's because my mindset is too stuck in apps and instead I
should “get out there”. Both are things I'm accustomed to thinking about in a
screen-time-centric, albeit unpleasant, light.

And lastly, regardless of my extensive swiping background, I haven’t lost the
ability to be present for my close-ones. The fear of swiping is learned, and
therefore I can also unlearn it. Swipe culture is pervasive, but doesn't have to
be the default mode of living. By focusing on things that I enjoy, outside of
swiping, there is less need to swipe. To come back to the question, if I should
stay on dating apps, the answer is: probably not. I’m beginning to see this
swiping-centrism so harmful for myself, that I should cut certain ties to it.
Dating is often stressful anyway, and the apps just make it worse. Luckily,
dating can (yes!—still) be done without swiping.

THANKS

My dearest thanks to my family and grandparents for supporting the writing of
this. In addition, extra huge thanks go to Marco and Ida-Lotta for commenting.
Also Ute Kalender for supervising and Klasse Digitale Grafik for the ideas, and
Freundeskreis der HFBK for financially supporting my artistic work through the
year 2024.

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