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Vibe coding: a new source of dopamine 🤤
Meta has launched Pocket in the US, an app with an endless feed of interactive content that users create from prompts.
Vibe coding: a new source of dopamine 🤤
Meta* has launched Pocket in the US, an app with an endless feed of interactive content that users create from prompts.
At its core, Pocket is TikTok with mini-games instead of short videos. One notable feature is “remixes”: with the creator’s permission, users can clone a game they like from the feed, add to its prompt and publish their own version.
At first glance, this may look like a pocket-sized game development tool. But Pocket is less a new game builder than an emotion builder — and a major product experiment for Meta*. Social networks used to ask us to watch, read and listen. Now Zuckerberg is testing whether we are ready to scroll, play and immediately remix other people’s creations.
My guess is that millennials will give yet another entertainment app from Meta a pass. But the bet on a younger audience raised on TikTok, Roblox and neural networks could pay off. If the experiment succeeds, Pocket may not remain a separate sandbox for long. I wouldn’t be surprised if mini-games and interactive posts eventually appeared in the main Facebook* and Instagram* feeds, although the company currently denies that this is the plan.
So we should get ready for an era in which endless games hook us alongside endless videos: created in a minute, played for ten seconds, then forgotten — or remixed.
Meta is designated an extremist organization and banned in Russia. Facebook and Instagram, which it owns, are also banned.