Touchgrass-en

Touchgrass-en
Official TouchGrass articles in English: feature explainers, open-web notes, and safer social software without addictive feeds or platform lock-in.

Why does TouchGrass not have videos?

TouchGrass does not include native video because video-first social products often pull the whole product toward watch time, recommendation loops, and engagement pressure. TouchGrass is built for a safe, open social home for real life: friends, circles, profiles, posts, long-form writing, photos, albums, recommendations, and exit doors. That does not mean video is bad everywhere. It means TouchGrass is choosing not to build the product around video mechanics today.

Why we chose this

Video changes software. It can be expressive, useful, funny, personal, educational, and beautiful. But in social platforms, native video often brings a familiar machine with it: autoplay, ranking, watch-time optimization, short loops, endless recommendations, and pressure to keep scrolling.

Once that machine arrives, it tends to shape everything else. Posts become secondary. Albums feel too slow. Long-form writing becomes harder to notice. Recommendations become content units. Profiles become channels. The product starts asking a different question: not “Who is this for?” but “How do we keep people watching?”

TouchGrass wants a different center of gravity. It is for real-life social context, not a video treadmill. Photos, albums, posts, recommendations, and writing leave more room for reflection, memory, and intentional audience choices.

That is why “no videos” is not an absence by accident. It is a product decision.

How this works on TouchGrass

Today, TouchGrass focuses on formats that fit a profile as a place: posts, long-form writing, photos, albums, recommendations, friends, and circles.

Photos can capture a day, a project, a meal, a walk, a trip, or a memory without turning the product into an autoplay feed. Albums can gather related moments instead of scattering them through a stream. Long-form writing can explain something properly. Recommendations can point people toward places, things, and experiences worth sharing.

TouchGrass also avoids the mechanics that usually come with video-first social media: no algorithmic feed, no infinite scroll, no public like-count scoreboard, and no native video treadmill built around watch time.

Audience controls still matter. A photo album for friends is different from a public recommendation. A circle post is different from a public essay. Removing video does not remove the need for privacy caveats, but it helps keep the product from being organized around maximum consumption.

Worth knowing

Video can be valuable. TouchGrass is making a product choice about what not to center.

Public, friends, and circle audiences still need clear explanation. Screenshots, copying, remote-server behavior, and recipient misuse remain relevant caveats.

FAQ

Why avoid video?

Because native video often brings watch-time optimization, autoplay assumptions, recommendation loops, and addictive feed mechanics. TouchGrass is choosing formats that better fit intentional social sharing.

Is TouchGrass saying video is bad?

No. Video can be useful and meaningful. TouchGrass is saying that a video-first social product tends to pull design in a direction it does not want to follow.

What can people share instead?

TouchGrass centers posts, long-form writing, photos, albums, recommendations, profiles, friends, and circles.

Does no video mean no addictive mechanics?

It helps, but it is not the whole story. TouchGrass also avoids algorithmic feeds, infinite scroll, public like counts, and engagement traps.

Keep reading

Read more about non-addictive social media

Read the comparison page

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