The Attention Merchants by Tim Wu
Probably the best (or at least, most vital) book I read in 2016 was The Attention Merchants by Tim Wu. This book should be administered like a vaccine to all internet users. Some lingering effects for me have been deleting Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, LinkedIn and Instagram from my phone. It was itchy. But I feel like I’ve regain a little bit of my volition and certain a lot of my time.
A choice quote:
While the goals of reclaiming our time and attention are easy to praise, they can prove surprisingly difficult to achieve. Even for a weekend, it can be painful to resist deeply ingrained habits like checking email, Facebook, and other social media; browsing random news stories, let alone more titillating clickbait; or flopping onto the couch to channel surf for a few hours. The difficulty reflects years of conditioning and the attention merchants’ determination to maximize, by any means possible, the time spent with them. When engrossed in work, reading a book, or playing with children, we may as well be stealing the attention merchants’ lights. They want– need –us to be constantly poking around for dibs and dabs of their entertainment, to be tuned to commercial breaks in their programming, or be catching up with friends in a manner that can also serve some branding effort.












