I have to admit, I'm kind of scared of the internet now. It's been so long since I've actually tried to engage with it. You know like when you're trying to jump rope and you're watching the rope to see when you should jump in? Yeah, kind of that, except there are like five million ropes going in all directions at once... Somewhere in this merry journey of capitalism, we seem to have shifted our focus from actually acquiring capital, or labor, to simply acquiring attention. I guess it was when Elon Musk bought Twitter for way more than it was worth - in terms of actual capital value, at least. We've always had models in the world that sell attention. The Byron Echo gets delivered to my house once a week, as it does to every resident in the shire, and I don't have to pay for it. The team at the Echo know that they are going to lose money on every paper. What they are is an attention merchant. They have people reading their free newspaper, so they can sell ...
I walked behind her, the city swirling in the human ejecta that had arrived predictably from the office buildings as the workday drew to a close. She brushed awkwardly against the tide of pedestrian traffic, distracted, her honey brown hair swinging. The leather satchel hung heavily from her shoulder, making the task at hand that much more difficult. Her secondary goals were to catch the train, to cross the busy streets, but her primary focus right now, in the bustle of the busiest city street was her smartphone. She held it out like a compass, engaged in a pressing conversation. I saw the blurs of blue and green as she dodged the passers by - the telling hues of the Android SMS app. I stared at her golden hoop earring, mesmerized, as it swayed all of its own accord with the rhythm of the street. It seemed almost comical, to watch somebody furiously engaged in texting, in this peculiar form of social interaction, in the middle of a million people. I began to w...