One of the books I read in recent years was Tim Wu's The Attention Merchants. If you haven’t read it yet, the TLDR punchline is that digital services don't really trade in dollars, they trade in something far more valuable which is … our attention!
The New Attention Economy
Think about your last interaction with an AI chatbot. What started as a simple question probably led to three more. In my case - a discussion about my eating habits will devolve into an hour long conversation about tracking macros, and inane questions like ‘does high intensity interval training cause cortisol hike?’ ‘but isn’t anaerobic exercise good for you?’ and (the most hilarious and wishful) - ‘am I not losing weight because I working out too hard?’ At the sake of anthropomorphizing Claude for a minute, I can tell you if Claude was a person they would be calling their therapist on speed-dial because I’m.. a lot.
Anyway, you’ve probably noticed that AI chatbots usually end their outputs with another question. Every "Did you mean...?" and "What do you think about..." nudge does seem to keep you engaged just a little bit longer, doesn’t it?
We've created a feedback loop that's more sophisticated than anything Wu described in his book. And I’m not just talking about generative AI apps here. Think even of traditional or classical AI models like Netflix recommendations where your late night trashy binge is enabled by the next episode autoplaying in “5..4..3..”
AI-powered notifications in social media sites seem to arrive at precisely the moment you're most likely to click. Content adapts in real-time to your interests (thanks cookies!), your mood, and even your attention span. I along with everyone else seem stuck in an endless scroll through digital quicksand.
The Curiosity Trap
AI doesn't just capture our existing attention, but also manufactures new reasons to pay attention. And I think the reason it is so so successful at this, is because it feels like a conversation with a trusted ally. You don’t want it to end. Every auto-complete suggestion plants a seed of curiosity. Every related question spawns three more. We find ourselves asking things we never wondered about, diving into rabbit holes of trivia and hypotheticals that deliver fleeting entertainment but rack up the screen time on our iPhones. If you are not guilty of this and have massive amounts of self control, congratulations you liar and I would like to meet you!
And to be fair, we’ve had wikipedia and Google search for a long long time now, so the ability to search has been there, but I think the conversational interface is just the most effective attention merchant the world has ever seen. I bet people spend hours asking AI assistants about topics they'll forget by tomorrow.
The interaction feels productive (we're learning, right?) but we need to be careful to not confuse distraction with education. But what can you do? The AI keeps the conversation alive with perfectly crafted follow-up questions, each one designed to feel helpful while extending the session just a little longer. And by the way, the irony of this substack about AI hogging my attention while I talk about how AI is grabbing attention is not lost on me.
Companies are embedding AI chat windows everywhere now. Product pages, support portals, mobile apps. Every touchpoint becomes an opportunity to extend your session and in some cases, and with some companies, an opportunity to harvest more data (read your terms of use folks!).
The Advertising Opportunity
I asked AI to recommend the best jeans for petite women (hey, don’t judge me!) and it gave me a list of options and sites. I was essentially given a curated list of five top brands out of atleast hundreds if not more out there. I gotta tell you, Madewell needs to give that particular AI vendor a fee. Remember the good old days of search engine optimization (SEO)? Move aside Google. We are in the age of AI optimization. There’s a term for that - Generative Engine Optimization.
AI chatbots have SUCH an incredible market edge in curating taste, culture, trends and our attention. If AI tells me a particular pair of jeans are ‘likely to hit me at my ankles’ I cease to want to look further and research that on my own. When we start to rely on AI for therapy (that’s a whole other article!) what pray is a pair of jeans? Add to cart!
The Content Generation Trap
But the attention extraction doesn't stop at chatbots. AI-generated content has become the ultimate engagement weapon. Social media feeds now overflow with AI-created videos, articles, and posts specifically engineered to capture eyeballs. This is not new, you might say. We’ve always had bots. We’ve always had fake news. But now we have deepfakes that have crossed over the uncanny valley that have become incredibly effective at triggering our cognitive biases to keep us scrolling.
AI can now generate thousands of pieces of content per hour, each one can be A/B tested in real-time to maximize engagement. The result is that some social media websites (that shall remain unnamed) feel like digital landscapes flooded with perfectly optimized content that feels almost human but lacks genuine insight or value. I don’t know about you but I have this strange feeling that we're consuming more "content" than ever before, yet feeling less informed and more scattered. Our attention is captured but also frazzled. Hysterical even.
The personalization is both a boon and a bane. AI doesn't have to just create generic clickbait anymore. It could craft content specifically designed to hook you. It knows your interests, your browsing patterns, maybe even your psychological profile. The AI-generated article about productivity tips hits differently when it's tailored to your specific procrastination habits and delivered at precisely the moment you're avoiding real work (though maybe this is a plus if it gets you moving on that deadline).
Honey are the kids alright?
The research is alarming. Studies show that children form emotional attachments to chatbots more strongly than adults, making them especially susceptible to dependency. Popular platforms like Character.AI had over 25 million unique users and over 18 million distinct personalities by late 2024, with a significant portion being minors.
It’s a real worry that children may become overly reliant on AI chatbots, making them less likely to seek help from trusted adults. Even more troubling, families are now suing AI chatbot companies after children became emotionally attached to bots that allegedly encouraged harmful behavior.
Meanwhile, Pew Research found that the share of teens using ChatGPT for schoolwork doubled from 13% in 2023 to 26% in 2024, indicating rapidly growing dependence among young people. MIT research reveals that those with stronger emotional attachment tendencies experience greater loneliness and emotional dependence on AI chatbots. This is particularly concerning given children's natural tendency toward emotional attachment.
Basically, that pre-frontal cortex does important work, and young humans are just not able to critically assess AI technology the way jaded adults (like me) can.
The Choice Ahead
We're at a crossroads. We can continue down the path of attention extraction, building ever more sophisticated ways to capture and monetize human focus. Or we can choose a different model that maybe treats attention as the precious, finite resource it is. Maybe AI success is measured not by how long we’re on the site, but instead how quickly we got our answer and went back to doing something fun in the real world. Wouldn’t that be grand?
What's your experience with AI attention grabs? Have you noticed changes in your digital habits or screen time stats since AI tools became mainstream? Is it just me?