Attention-Economy

The Attention Economy Is an Extraction Economy

I want to describe an economy that did not exist in my time but that I recognize immediately, because its structure is identical to other extraction economies I have studied: the attention economy.

The attention economy is a system in which human attention – your capacity to focus, to notice, to care – is treated as a raw material to be extracted, refined, and sold. The platforms that operate in this economy do not sell you a product. They sell your attention to advertisers. You are not the customer. You are the resource.