Information abundance makes attention the binding constraint, so attention becomes the thing competed for.
Herbert Simon stated the underlying point in 1971: a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention. Every free product monetised by advertising is an application of it.
In practice
- A newsletter's actual competitor is not other newsletters but the podcast, the group chat and the walk to the station.
- A museum's rival for a Saturday afternoon is a sofa, not the gallery across town.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Communication & Media
- Essay
- Theories of what stands between an event and its audience