exploring the inner workings and dynamics of companies building products engineered to hook us, addict us, and hijack our attention to sell more ad inventory
Business model shapes outcomes. In a subscription based model, you build tools people use and pay for. In an ad-based model, you build engagement hacks.
As Tristan Harris put it:
“we've moved away from having a tools-based technology environment to an addiction and manipulation based... See more
One of the weirdest things about the Internet is that even though we’re just a click away from the greatest authors of all-time, from Plato to Tolstoy, we default to just scrolling Twitter