Internet-economy payoff structures reward provocation because shame no longer constrains behavior

Evidence

All of this followed from the logic of the internet economy: “People are just trying to get attention by any means,” Grandmaison explained. “That’s really what’s going to be the thing that decides if you’re successful or not. And it’s kind of all about if you really want to play that game or not.” In a world where money reigned supreme and norms no longer constrained behavior, there was no downside to chasing the most extreme forms of provocation. Shame was just another roadblock to profit. — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 823

Categorization

• XREF: Extends the book’s core argument about status competition and norm collapse to the content-economy incentive structure; connects to Marx’s ‘death of the sellout’ mechanism. — connects to: Platform incentives structurally favor anger over kindness toward outgroups — Rachel Hartman et al., Interventions to Reduce Partisan…, 56