Attention as a Public Good
Here's an interesting chat I had about what the future attention economy should look like. I asked it to come up with a hard question for modernity. Overall I like the direction we went, this creates tons of ideas in me for how to create an an AI that helps curate all information you receive, for you.
Here's one genuinely hard modern question:
Should society treat "attention" as a protected public good, the way we treat clean air, public health, or financial stability?
Meaning:
Not just "social media is bad" or "people should have self-control," but the deeper question:
If powerful platforms can systematically capture, shape, and monetize human attention at scale, should governments regulate attention markets the way they regulate pollution, gambling, drugs, financial products, or food safety?
The hard parts:
On one side, you could argue:
Yes. Human attention is finite. If companies use psychological optimization to keep people scrolling, radicalize them, worsen loneliness, distort politics, and make children less able to focus, then "free choice" becomes a weak defense. It is like saying people freely choose junk food while ignoring billion-dollar food engineering.
On the other side:
No. Regulating attention quickly becomes regulating speech, art, entertainment, advertising, political persuasion, and personal freedom. Who decides what counts as "harmful attention capture"? A government? That can become paternalistic or authoritarian very quickly.
The core question is:
At what point does persuasion become extraction?
That one question opens up philosophy, tech, economics, law, parenting, democracy, free speech, addiction, and capitalism all at once.
okay this is a really good question.
So what exactly is attention? it's the information that a person receives, right? like, everything you consume, information wise, is stuff you paid attention to, so in the broadest sense, all information you consume is..well idk if "attention" is the word for that, but it's related. I guess attention to the potential things you can see? no i don't know, maybe we should just settle on a real term. So attention refers to our ability to consume information, and the question is thus to what extent should the information we consume be regulated, right? and that covers multiple sub questions: what information should be publicly available, what information should be mandatory for people to have access to and/or consume (which itself has two parts: what should people have access to, and what should be forced upon people to consume, maybe certain legal notices or whatever for the latter, for example, u know) but obviously the tougher areas is to do with forced consumption of information (what information can we force upon people to consume), and also what information people should be allowed to make available to eachother, and to be clear, make available isn't just like the opportunity to consume, but like, u know, sometimes u can't just not pay attention to something, like a billboard or whatever, humans naturally will consume that as they pass by..unless we have an ai information adapter layer, which is where i want to bring this convo to eventually)
Okay so anyway, we have our definitions and areas. so yeah the most clear "threat" for letting powerful entities have control over what we pay attention to, the classical answer is political influence, like back in the day whoever owned newspapers were able to control or influence the popular narrative, right? i don't even need to talk about social media even though that's just the technological advancement of the age old newspaper / mass media idea.
Okay so first of all, instead of a state regulated thing, which creates gigantic risk of state capture, unless we agree on universal principles which we hope that institutions can preserve, which im open to since im an institutionalist but yeah.
I think there are two answers and thats: institutionalism OR letting it all be micro level managed by improved human discernment (which is just going to be people letting their own ais handle things)
Yes, I think you're circling the right distinction, but I'd sharpen the terms slightly.
I would not define attention as "the information a person receives." That's too broad. A better definition:
Attention is the scarce cognitive capacity by which a person selects, prioritizes, processes, and responds to information.
So the issue is not merely "what information exists?" It is:
Who gets to shape the menu of salience?
Meaning: who decides what feels urgent, visible, important, emotionally charged, socially rewarded, or unavoidable?
That matters because attention is not neutral. The same fact can be:
buried in a report shown as a phone notification turned into a viral outrage clip repeated on a billboard inserted into a school curriculum recommended by an algorithm summarized by your personal AI assistant hidden behind friction made socially embarrassing to ignore
All of those are different forms of attention control.
So I'd split the problem into four layers:
1. Availability
What information may exist publicly?
This is classic free speech / censorship territory. Books, websites, posts, news, leaked documents, political opinions, pornography, misinformation, extremist content, state secrets, etc.
The core question:
What may people publish or access?
2. Visibility
What information is amplified, recommended, ranked, advertised, or placed in public space?
This is where newspapers, TV, social media feeds, search engines, billboards, app notifications, trending pages, and recommender algorithms live.
The core question:
What gets pushed into collective attention?
This is probably where the modern battle is. Not censorship exactly, but attention allocation.
3. Intrusion
What information can force itself upon you?
Billboards, loud ads, spam calls, push notifications, political propaganda, mandatory warnings, emergency alerts, legal notices, public health messages.
The core question:
When is it legitimate to make people notice something?
This is where your "forced consumption" idea fits.
4. Mediation
Who filters information before it reaches you?
Historically: editors, priests, teachers, parents, newspapers, broadcasters, libraries.
Currently: platforms, algorithms, influencers, friend networks.
Soon: personal AI agents.
The core question:
Who stands between raw reality and your mind?
And this is where your AI adapter layer becomes really interesting.
Because if everyone has a personal AI that filters the world for them, then the political question changes. It is no longer only:
Should the state regulate platforms?
It becomes:
Who governs the filters that govern us?
Your two answers are basically:
- Institutionalism: trusted public institutions establish rules, limits, duties, transparency requirements, rights, and guardrails.
- Personal AI discernment: each person delegates filtering to their own agent, which protects their attention according to their values.
The hard part is that both can fail.
Institutionalism can become censorship, propaganda, regulatory capture, moral panic, or state paternalism.
Personal AI discernment can become private manipulation, corporate capture, epistemic bubbles, invisible nudging, or class inequality where rich people get good filters and poor people get exploitative ones.
So the deeper question becomes:
Should attention be governed as a public institution, a private right, or a personal technology problem?
My instinct is that the best answer is a layered one:
The state should not decide what citizens should think, but it may legitimately regulate the architecture of forced salience.
In other words, the state should be very cautious about regulating content, but more willing to regulate attention mechanics.
For example, less like:
"This political opinion is banned."
More like:
"Platforms must disclose when content is paid amplification." "Children cannot be targeted with addictive recommendation loops." "Users must have the right to disable algorithmic ranking." "Public emergency alerts are allowed, but commercial push intrusion is limited." "Political ads must be transparent." "Dark patterns and manipulative notification systems are restricted." "Users have a right to use third-party or personal-AI filters."
That preserves the institutional role without letting the state become the Ministry of Truth.
Then personal AI becomes a kind of cognitive firewall.
Not an oracle that tells you what is true, but an agent that says:
"This is emotionally manipulative." "This claim is disputed." "This ad is targeting your insecurity." "This outrage clip omits context." "This is probably not worth your attention." "You said you wanted less political ragebait, so I'm downranking this."
That could be genuinely liberating.
But then the next hard question is:
Can a personal AI truly serve the user if it is built, hosted, updated, and monetized by a corporation?
Because if your AI filter is itself owned by the same attention economy, then it is not a shield. It is just a more intimate advertising surface.
So I'd phrase the next question like this:
In a future where personal AI agents mediate reality, should people have a legal right to an agent that is loyal to them rather than to advertisers, platforms, employers, or the state?
okay i think that's fair enough. honestly, i think a high availability and high disclosure environment might be what an ideal regulatory framework would be? and then we pass the actual processing to the mediation layer.
hear me out, don't ban misinformation, and allow the mediation layer to flag likely falsehoods or lack of corroboration.
but more interestingly: enforce a standards for disclosure of certain meta information, like whose posting, who owns, demographic facts about the publisher (not like age or whatever but like, positionally important facts like that allows mediators to determine how aligned or misaligned with the narrative they might be, u know?), and allow the disclosure stuff to be litigatable. and again let the mediation layer take care of that.
the ideal mediation layer automatically handles visibility, of course it just kicks the can down the road to what's visible to the mediation layer, but at the very least it can filter out things before u are forcibly impressed by them (e.g. the mediation layer will not fall to clickbait), u know?
Yes. This is actually a very coherent model:
Maximize availability, maximize disclosure, decentralize interpretation through mediation.
That is much better than the crude model of "ban bad information" versus "free-for-all."
The principle would be something like:
The state should not usually decide whether a claim is true, but it can require that claims enter the public information ecosystem with enough metadata for others to evaluate them.
So instead of regulating truth directly, you regulate the conditions of epistemic evaluation.
That is a very institutionalist-but-not-authoritarian position.
The framework could look like this:
1. High availability
The default should be that information may be published, accessed, quoted, criticized, archived, and reinterpreted.
So you avoid the strongest censorship risk.
The state does not usually say:
"This narrative is illegal."
It says:
"This narrative must carry legally meaningful context about its origin, funding, incentives, and method of production."
That is a big difference.
2. High disclosure
This is the key part of your idea.
The law does not ban someone from saying:
"This new policy is destroying the country."
But depending on the context, it may require disclosure like:
This was paid for by X. X is owned by Y. Y receives funding from Z. This account is automated. This image was AI-generated. This publisher has a formal political affiliation. This "independent" think tank receives 70% of its funding from affected industry groups. This article cites a study funded by the product's manufacturer. This influencer was compensated. This viral campaign originated from coordinated accounts. This media outlet is state-owned or state-funded. This expert witness is being paid by a party with a direct interest.
Then your mediation layer can process that.
The important thing is that disclosure should focus on epistemically relevant metadata, not invasive personal information.
So not:
"What race, religion, age, sexuality, or private life does this speaker have?"
But yes:
"What institutional role, financial incentive, political affiliation, ownership structure, automation status, sponsorship, or material conflict of interest affects how this message should be interpreted?"
That distinction matters a lot.
3. Litigation around disclosure, not truth
This is probably the strongest part of your proposal.
Instead of suing over "you said a false political thing," which quickly becomes dangerous, you make disclosure obligations legally contestable.
So the legal question becomes:
"Did the publisher fail to disclose a material relationship, funding source, ownership interest, automation status, or synthetic-media status?"
Not:
"Did the government approve this opinion?"
That is much safer.
It is closer to securities law, consumer protection, advertising disclosure, conflict-of-interest rules, and food labeling than censorship.
You are not banning people from eating junk food. You are requiring ingredient labels.
You are not banning people from investing badly. You are requiring disclosure of risk and conflicts.
You are not banning people from listening to propaganda. You are requiring disclosure that it is propaganda, funded by X, targeted at Y, using Z methods.
4. Mediation layer handles visibility
Then the personal AI layer says:
"This claim is uncorroborated." "This outlet has an undisclosed but later-litigated conflict." "This is a paid political message." "This uses outrage framing." "This is a synthetic image." "The source has a financial interest in your believing this." "You usually regret engaging with this kind of content." "Here is the strongest opposing version before you react."
That is much better than a platform algorithm optimizing for engagement.
Because the mediation layer's job is not:
"What will keep Azam watching?"
It is:
"What would Azam, under his own reflective values, want his attention exposed to?"
That is the real ideal: attention sovereignty.
The huge unresolved problem
The hard part is this:
Who controls the mediator?
Because your whole model works only if the mediation layer is genuinely loyal to the user.
If the mediator is controlled by:
advertisers, political actors, the state, the platform, the employer, the app store, or the AI company,
then the mediator just becomes the new propaganda priesthood.
So your framework needs one more principle:
5. Right to loyal mediation
A person should have a legal right to use a mediator that is:
portable, inspectable, replaceable, not locked to one platform, not secretly paid to prefer certain narratives, and legally bound to act in the user's interest.
Basically, a fiduciary duty for personal AI.
Like:
Your AI attention agent must owe loyalty to you.
Not "engagement." Not "advertiser ROI." Not "state harmony." Not "platform retention."
You.
That could become one of the major legal rights of the AI age.
The clean version of your position
I'd phrase your view like this:
A free society should preserve broad availability of information, but require robust disclosure of epistemically relevant metadata. The state should usually avoid deciding truth directly. Instead, it should enforce transparency about source, funding, ownership, automation, conflicts of interest, and manipulation methods. Individuals should then rely on personally loyal mediation layers to filter, contextualize, and prioritize information according to their own values.
That is a really strong position.
The next hard question is:
Should disclosure duties apply only to powerful/institutional actors, or also to ordinary individuals?
Because that is where the framework gets dangerous.
For example:
A newspaper? Definitely.
A political campaign? Definitely.
A think tank? Definitely.
A corporation? Definitely.
A viral influencer with sponsors? Probably.
A normal citizen posting an angry opinion? Probably not.
An anonymous whistleblower? Special protection.
A bot account pretending to be a citizen? Disclosure required.
A foreign state-linked account? Disclosure required.
So the real line might be:
Disclosure obligations should scale with reach, money, institutional power, automation, and intent to influence.
That preserves normal speech while regulating industrialized persuasion.
yeah threshold based disclosure requirements make the most sense.
Anyway i think we have enough to make a half-pager thesis. please write it up, and this is meant to be my own thesis on the matter so make sure u capture it from that perspective, not your own. half pager pure text in your chat response
My view is that the ideal information environment should be built around high availability, high disclosure, and personally mediated interpretation. The state should generally avoid banning misinformation or deciding which narratives are officially true, because that creates an obvious risk of censorship, institutional capture, and political abuse. But that does not mean the information ecosystem should be treated as a total free-for-all. The better regulatory target is not truth itself, but the conditions under which people evaluate truth.
So my preferred framework is this: information should usually remain publicly available, but powerful or high-reach actors should be subject to robust disclosure duties. These duties should focus on epistemically relevant metadata: who owns the publisher, who funded the message, whether it is sponsored, whether it was generated or amplified by bots or AI, whether there are material conflicts of interest, whether the speaker is a state-linked actor, and whether the content is part of a coordinated influence campaign. These disclosures should be legally enforceable and litigatable, not because the state gets to decide the correct interpretation, but because people and their mediation tools need reliable context to judge the information for themselves.
The key distinction is that disclosure obligations should be threshold-based. They should scale with reach, money, institutional power, automation, and intent to influence. A normal citizen posting an opinion should not be burdened with heavy compliance duties. But a media company, corporation, political campaign, think tank, influencer with sponsorships, bot network, or state-linked actor should not be allowed to shape public attention while hiding material facts about its incentives and position.
The actual processing of information should then happen mostly at the mediation layer. In the future, this may mean personal AI agents that filter, contextualize, rank, and warn users about the information they encounter. Instead of the state banning falsehoods, the mediation layer can flag lack of corroboration, likely manipulation, conflicts of interest, clickbait, synthetic media, or narrative bias. This preserves broad freedom of speech while protecting people from industrialized persuasion.
The central value behind this is attention sovereignty. People should have the right to access information broadly, but also the right not to have their attention captured by opaque systems. A good society should not require the state to control what people think. It should require powerful speakers to disclose who they are, what interests they serve, and how they are trying to influence attention—then allow individuals, through loyal mediation tools, to decide what deserves their minds.