Strange Beliefs

I have read that we all have strange beliefs. That sounds strange to me, I think all of my beliefs are fine. I believe that the attention economy influences people like never before, and the small barrier to entry–namely that people used to have to implement it–has evaporated in the face of predictive large language models that even a child can set up.

This influence had, well let’s just say, an impact on the American election. It wasn’t like our enemies flipped a switch and we voted for Trump. It was like they played content on our phones, and we voted for Trump. Well, I didn’t vote for him. Indeed, don’t blame me for the dramala, I voted for Kamala. But, as Matthew Carlson of the Canned Fish Files recently noted: “You have to pack the fish you got.”

If the impact was only a swing of 5% to 7% of those who voted, it was sufficient. Additionally, people become more subject to this influence every passing day. Come with me, I will show you.

If we were to collect a group of people back in 1980, and ask them if watching a video added to its value, they would undoubtedly respond that it did not.

People now believe that watching a video adds value to that video. It is a result of two things. First, network computing has facilitated real time two way communication. (This is not always good, as the originator of the communication is almost always anonymous, frequently not human, and the communication could be malicious.) Second, the person has been indoctrinated by what I refer to as the attention economy. They have been taught behaviors of engagement with whatever social media they are using. This engagement began innocently enough, disguised as simply useful for advertising, and absolutely necessary to facilitate development! However innocent its origins, the attention economy has mutated into an unintended abomination. Could it be that the data collected, and more importantly the methods of using that data to shape preferences, had an impact on our own self determination as a country? Sounds strange.

This influence from the attention economy is a new phenomenon, and would not have been known only a generation ago. So we look again at that group from 1980, those unindoctrinated. Every passing year, those people die, and new people are born. The children today will be indoctrinated. Without question, they will learn very early that they can like a video, and that helps the creator! A first step along a dark path, largely unregulated at the moment.

People require two things for our system of governance to work. They must have true information, and they must think for themselves. Good luck on the thinking thing, but I have something to say with regard to the truth! 

There is no mandate for truth in the attention economy, while my veracious and dear newspapers must not print lies. Why? Regulate something as widely consumed as water at least as laxly as a tabloid newspaper. To be clear, regulate electronic publishing as paper publishing is regulated. A brilliant first step to an illuminated future. And if Twitter can’t stand to be regulated to the standards of the National Enquirer, then that’s on them.

As the old die, and the indoctrinated young take their place, the number of people subject to the influence of an unregulated attention economy increases as a percentage of our population. The problem of untrue information corrupting our ability to control our government will only get worse, and more difficult to mitigate over time.

 

 

 

Please find the blurb above read by me below.  The words are always my own.

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