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Our attention is the only valuable thing left. Browsers run competing tech stacks and pile on and draw off a mass of blinking things trying to get the attention

Our attention is the only valuable thing left. Browsers run competing tech stacks and pile on and draw off a mass of blinking things trying to get the attention. It's a tiny little war happening in real time on our screens. AI chat things are liquids held in vials, a thumb flick away from pouring into our favorite places online, changing them irrevocably. Will our attention in these places (reddit, here, et al) remain high when most of the people we're talking with are algorithmic? Media companies create new shows and pull them away more quickly than we can finish consuming them, as realtime engagement metrics quickly show their bosses which must be most profitable, most popular, most attention grabbing. It makes a good case for going back: watching shows from decades earlier, that have a beginning middle and end. Dropping social media time for books. And the missing analogue, how to give up on google searches because they too, are at a parity of value with their offering and their attention stealing properties. I'm just an angry person shaking his fist at the sky from an armchair. I love these threads because I always come away with a new perspective.

marginalia_nu 4y ago
> Our attention is the only valuable thing left. Browsers run competing tech stacks and pile on and draw off a mass of blinking things trying to get the attention. It's a tiny little war happening in real time on our screens. This seems fantastically counter-productive though. If you want to capture someone's attention, you've got to remove the distractions and clean up your presentation. The effort seems misplaced to focus entirely on drawing attention at the expense of maintaining it.
- bick_nyers 4y ago
  That's if you want to capture someone's focus, not their attention.
  - marginalia_nu 4y ago
    If you capture their focus, are you not also capturing their attention?
    - bick_nyers 4y ago
      Yes, but not necessarily the other way around. I'm not saying one is necessarily better than the other, but I think the 2 different UIs are serving 2 different goals. Focus requires commitment at some level, and I don't think most websites are predicated on the notion that the average user is committed, at least initially. Maybe once you make a sale to them and they get access to your product you can safely prioritize focus because you now have that commitment. I think engineers generally are above average on the skill of summoning focus, as you kind of need it in order to perform math, analysis, and logic.
- brookst 4y ago
  It’s more about selling someone’s attention than holding it. The best possible outcome for both websites and Google is for a user to click on on a website from search and then immediately click on an ad. To the extent you find the site useful and don’t need what’s being advertised, that’s a fail for both of them.
- OccamsMirror 4y ago
  More like they monetise it at the expense of maintaining it.
HWR_14 4y ago
Media companies pulling shows so quickly makes me sad. It's one of those cases where I think they constantly misread the data. "People don't watch shows with a long story arc as they come out, so we should cancel them" is really "people don't trust us to continue shows with a long story arc until a good stopping place, so they don't want to invest the time in starting new ones"
- kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
  Part of it is they don't want to renegotiate pay with the cast of a successful show so they cut them off before that becomes an issue.
  - HWR_14 4y ago
    That's usually solved by multi-year initial contacts.
danaris 4y ago
> Our attention is the only valuable thing left. That's...just not true, though. You know what's still more valuable than our attention? Our money. The only reason they want our attention is to get our money. A big part of the problem is how many people simply don't have enough money, due to the stagnation of real wages and the increase in the cost of housing, health care, and higher education, among other things. If everyone had a reasonable amount of disposable income, as is true in a healthy society/economy, it would be much, much more viable for many websites and apps to charge for their usage, rather than being ad-supported.
- auggierose 4y ago
  Nah, that's not true. People just don't like to spend money, especially when they are rich.
  - JohnFen 4y ago
    Most people in the US love spending money. It's considered a recreational activity.
    - auggierose 4y ago
      Hmmh, so why do so many people complain about paying for all the different streaming services like Disney plus, Netflix, Amazon prime, etc.? It's really peanuts compared to the value delivered.
      - JohnFen 4y ago
        "Value" is a very personal thing, though. You may find something is great value for money, and others may not, and neither is wrong. Personally, I don't find that the streaming services are good value. I don't complain about it, though. I just don't subscribe to them. Also, buying services doesn't satisfy the "shopping as a recreational activity" itch. A big part of the recreation is the actual shopping, and coming home with physical stuff.

marginalia_nu 4y ago

> Our attention is the only valuable thing left. Browsers run competing tech stacks and pile on and draw off a mass of blinking things trying to get the attention. It's a tiny little war happening in real time on our screens. This seems fantastically counter-productive though. If you want to capture someone's attention, you've got to remove the distractions and clean up your presentation. The effort seems misplaced to focus entirely on drawing attention at the expense of maintaining it.

bick_nyers 4y ago
That's if you want to capture someone's focus, not their attention.
- marginalia_nu 4y ago
  If you capture their focus, are you not also capturing their attention?
  - bick_nyers 4y ago
    Yes, but not necessarily the other way around. I'm not saying one is necessarily better than the other, but I think the 2 different UIs are serving 2 different goals. Focus requires commitment at some level, and I don't think most websites are predicated on the notion that the average user is committed, at least initially. Maybe once you make a sale to them and they get access to your product you can safely prioritize focus because you now have that commitment. I think engineers generally are above average on the skill of summoning focus, as you kind of need it in order to perform math, analysis, and logic.
brookst 4y ago
It’s more about selling someone’s attention than holding it. The best possible outcome for both websites and Google is for a user to click on on a website from search and then immediately click on an ad. To the extent you find the site useful and don’t need what’s being advertised, that’s a fail for both of them.
OccamsMirror 4y ago
More like they monetise it at the expense of maintaining it.

HWR_14 4y ago

Media companies pulling shows so quickly makes me sad. It's one of those cases where I think they constantly misread the data. "People don't watch shows with a long story arc as they come out, so we should cancel them" is really "people don't trust us to continue shows with a long story arc until a good stopping place, so they don't want to invest the time in starting new ones"

kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
Part of it is they don't want to renegotiate pay with the cast of a successful show so they cut them off before that becomes an issue.
- HWR_14 4y ago
  That's usually solved by multi-year initial contacts.

danaris 4y ago

> Our attention is the only valuable thing left. That's...just not true, though. You know what's still more valuable than our attention? Our money. The only reason they want our attention is to get our money. A big part of the problem is how many people simply don't have enough money, due to the stagnation of real wages and the increase in the cost of housing, health care, and higher education, among other things. If everyone had a reasonable amount of disposable income, as is true in a healthy society/economy, it would be much, much more viable for many websites and apps to charge for their usage, rather than being ad-supported.

auggierose 4y ago
Nah, that's not true. People just don't like to spend money, especially when they are rich.
- JohnFen 4y ago
  Most people in the US love spending money. It's considered a recreational activity.
  - auggierose 4y ago
    Hmmh, so why do so many people complain about paying for all the different streaming services like Disney plus, Netflix, Amazon prime, etc.? It's really peanuts compared to the value delivered.
    - JohnFen 4y ago
      "Value" is a very personal thing, though. You may find something is great value for money, and others may not, and neither is wrong. Personally, I don't find that the streaming services are good value. I don't complain about it, though. I just don't subscribe to them. Also, buying services doesn't satisfy the "shopping as a recreational activity" itch. A big part of the recreation is the actual shopping, and coming home with physical stuff.