First half of this comment is going to be the history. Second half are the solutions. The tech companies started collecting data to "fix" their initial solutio

First half of this comment is going to be the history. Second half are the solutions. The tech companies started collecting data to "fix" their initial solutions to Info Explosion the network they designed produced. This info collection was used to improve search and discovery. In the arms race with each other to collect the most info about everyone, they made email, chat, search, video, games etc "Free". Market capture became the goal. The only way to keep it free was to sell the info collected to advertisors. And when they realized the advertisors didn't have the skills to build the tech to target people with all that info, they then built Ad Tech for them which has becomes their largest source of Revenue. Technologists have not shown any signs at any point in this story that they knew what they were dealing with. They were quick to take credit for anything positive that came out of this half baked system. And then blame everyone else - the investors are stupid - the customers are stupid - the advertisors are stupid - and the corporations who fund the advertisors are stupid. When Promoting Tech Leaders with the above traits know what you buy, Change and solutions come from accepting Human Attention is finite, and the Internet has Produced more Content than there is Attention in the world to Consume it. This state won't last for ever. So before it blows up, think about how your systems handle Attention at individual and global levels. Some stuff ppl are already working on - Algos optimizing for time spent on platforms, shift to optimizing for *value derived per unit of time*. Success would be mean deprioritizing over sensationalized headlines and repetitive trends. Mindful Consumption features - allow users to *allocate specific amounts of time* for creative or exploratory content versus purely entertainment-based content. Centralized discovery around large corp creates homogeneity in the content and snuffs out stuff the early internet was famous for. Promote more decentralized models of content discovery where individuals or small groups curate unique content ecosystems. ANd use AI to help users discover niche stuff instead of simply reinforcing their current pref. Users "spend" their attention, but media platforms rarely reward or recognize this. That model has to change. Subscription models (Netflix, Substack etc) have to be refined further to produce/promote content that otherwise get lost in ad-driven ecosystems. Interactive and collaborative content beats passive content consumtion systems in terms of generating meaning ala early internet. Shifts focus from virality to depth. Add features that slow down consumption. *Time-limited content feeds* or *content scheduling* etc Once handling Attention as a finite resource becomes a guide lot of paths open up in terms of how to fix things. Also don't just work with tech people bring in people from art, sociology, polsci, economics, law as early as you can in any design process. Mistakes and failure should be rewards cause thats the only path to discovery of something better.