Attention is not a commodity
Doc Searls,
Doc Searls Weblog,
Sept 19, 2022
Doc Searls responds to a post from Scott Galloway comparing human attention to oil. "The scale of the world's largest companies, the wealth of its richest people, and the power of governments are all rooted in the extraction, monetization, and custody of attention," writes Galloway. His column is intended to serve as a warning about external governments seeking to undermine national interests or domestic companies who don't care what damage they cause. Searls takes an ethical stance in his response. "My point here is that reducing humans to beings who are only attentive—and passively so—is radically dehumanizing," he writes, "and it is important to call that out. It's the same reductionism we get with the word 'consumers.'" Well, yes, it is, but this addresses mostly the style of the message, I think, and not the content. Do we need to be concerned about how companies seek to grab and monetize attention? As an educator, I would say that we do. How to respond? Searls advises that we should build tools and services to develop an intention economy.
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