Algorithms and the attention economy

Last week FiveThirtyEight published Where The Algorithms Can't Find You, an article about how the modern internet's cookies and web analytics funnel everyone toward the same content with "algorithms that think you only want to watch beauty tutorials, Avengers outtakes or product unboxings."

Presumably in response to this state of affairs, a few people have started websites that specifically serve up videos that other people aren't watching. Here's one of the author's favorites from Default Filename TV, a website that finds and plays random YouTube videos with names like DSC 3307:

The algorithms will never recommend a video like this because it doesn't look like anything people in general or the current viewer in particular already watch, and I think that's a problem.

Earlier this year I read an article¹ about how attention is the currency of the internet economy. Since eyeballs equals revenue, personalized recommendations, ads, and so on are all designed with the explicit purpose of keeping people on a website or platform or app for as long as possible. By default, video platforms like YouTube or Netflix queue up the next video or episode and will happily keep playing forever. Facebook and Twitter have bottomless feeds through which users can keep scrolling endlessly. News sites, whether MSNBC, Fox News, or The New York Times will constantly recommend related stories, or failing that, news from the archives. The internet's default setting is neverending engagement.

This works because people enjoy (or at least tolerate) this engagement, and the author points out that "cookies and analytics power recommendations that keep users comfortable and clicking." The issue I see is that for the most part people grow when they're challenged, not when they're comfortable. Although the context is different, I'm still reminded of some of my favorite classic dystopian literature. Remember Fire Chief Beatty from Fahrenheit 451? He had some timeless observations about movement versus fulfillment:

"People want to be happy, isn't that right? Haven't you heard it all your life? 'I want to be happy,' people say. Well, aren't they? Don't we keep them moving, don't we give them fun? That's all we live for, isn't it? For pleasure, for titillation? And you must admit our culture provides plenty of these."

Or maybe it's more like Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, but instead of soma we have recommendation engines and clickbait and gamified phone apps.

I fully acknowledge that people need fun and comfort and relaxation – they're a prerequisite for having a balanced life and to be in a place where growth is possible. I just wonder about the implications of an essentially amoral system that exists to capture people's attention and suck up their time by any means necessary, and that system's real value...at least its value outside of market share, which seems to be very high indeed.²


1 Not the same article but in the same vein: Your attention is the hottest currency on the Internet. It also has some interesting ideas about what a "less paternal" internet could look like. (back)

2 At the time of publication the top 5 companies by market capitalization are all algorithmically-savvy tech companies: Microsoft, Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Alphabet/Google (back)