Dec 6, 2023·edited Dec 6, 2023Liked by Rohit Krishnan
And no group is more battered by that increasing volatility than college students. The myth of the meritocracy is so thick on college campuses you could lose a boot in it -- it’s hard to just say, "you can be the best and still lose," and expect people to just shrug and not mind their lifetime of effort chasing shadow promises.
Was about to make this point! Though I have to say it is not just Kerala state, grade inflation is affecting even the CBSE, where getting a 90% requires only mediocre effort these days. IIT-JEE and the medical entrance exams are the only valuable signals left.
1.Agree supply has expanded/democratized; distribution costs have tended towards zero but I don't agree that demand has a ceiling. What you're quoting is "old" media continuing to lose while the creators gain. (Mr Beast appears to have added 100m subscribers in less than an year). So the polarization is between "old"/heavy/monoculture & "new"/indie/all shades.
2.Still plenty of hard problems to solve - whether you look at health, education, energy... - so perhaps the framing is not so much demise of the professional but expansion of the professional's capability so organizations have to become more flexible, org designs more iterative - incentives, collaboration, culture will need to be rethought. Some orgs will adapt & do this well, others will fall by the wayside. "Why use a car when a horse doesn't require gasoline and can eat grass?"
While the e/acc folks are bonkers in some ways, this is a time to be optimistic about the birth of new professions, new ways of trying/ flying
Don’t get fooled into accepting his optimism pessimism false dichotomy. To say that there will be new winners is just a truism. It’s a matter of whether the games are worth playing, or if you just look pathetic for trying
Yes. "However, in their case, demand still has a ceiling. There’s only 24 hours in a day. The way attention economy grows here is not just through eyeballs but market expansion. See things in multiple languages, in multiple markets, in multiple formats."
Right, I'm agreeing with you and, I think, disagreeing with the original comment. Ultimately the attention economy turns zero sum once everyone has a smartphone and a particular content's expansion has to come at the expense of other content.
And no group is more battered by that increasing volatility than college students. The myth of the meritocracy is so thick on college campuses you could lose a boot in it -- it’s hard to just say, "you can be the best and still lose," and expect people to just shrug and not mind their lifetime of effort chasing shadow promises.
There is even more uncertainty in the Corporatopia. The inhabitants are compared to those of the magnificent seven or worse VC-funded startups and the certainty of even half a decade ago is kaput. Anyway on grade inflation, some of us have democratised it too :) https://www.onmanorama.com/career-and-campus/top-news/2023/12/05/shanavas-education-director-a-plus-sslc-evaluation.html
Was about to make this point! Though I have to say it is not just Kerala state, grade inflation is affecting even the CBSE, where getting a 90% requires only mediocre effort these days. IIT-JEE and the medical entrance exams are the only valuable signals left.
1.Agree supply has expanded/democratized; distribution costs have tended towards zero but I don't agree that demand has a ceiling. What you're quoting is "old" media continuing to lose while the creators gain. (Mr Beast appears to have added 100m subscribers in less than an year). So the polarization is between "old"/heavy/monoculture & "new"/indie/all shades.
2.Still plenty of hard problems to solve - whether you look at health, education, energy... - so perhaps the framing is not so much demise of the professional but expansion of the professional's capability so organizations have to become more flexible, org designs more iterative - incentives, collaboration, culture will need to be rethought. Some orgs will adapt & do this well, others will fall by the wayside. "Why use a car when a horse doesn't require gasoline and can eat grass?"
While the e/acc folks are bonkers in some ways, this is a time to be optimistic about the birth of new professions, new ways of trying/ flying
Nothing I wrote should be taken as an indication that I am not optimistic. The world is full of problems and we will solve them.
Don’t get fooled into accepting his optimism pessimism false dichotomy. To say that there will be new winners is just a truism. It’s a matter of whether the games are worth playing, or if you just look pathetic for trying
Surely the demand for content has to have a ceiling? Unless the AIs start watching Netflix...
Yes. "However, in their case, demand still has a ceiling. There’s only 24 hours in a day. The way attention economy grows here is not just through eyeballs but market expansion. See things in multiple languages, in multiple markets, in multiple formats."
Right, I'm agreeing with you and, I think, disagreeing with the original comment. Ultimately the attention economy turns zero sum once everyone has a smartphone and a particular content's expansion has to come at the expense of other content.
So three factors:
Markets widening, which generate longer 'tails'
Automation spreading to symbolic output, which creates more volume relative to consumption, lengthening tails more
Fewer / changed gatekeepers to symbolic content, meaning less predictability in the power of institutional support to generate success
SO
Longer 'tails' means steeper benefits of success vs. failure
Lower power of institutions as sorting mechanisms
Less predictability means fiercer conflict
All of which means greater potential for unmediated elite conflict?
What am I missing?
That's my thesis, called the "great polarisation" here in lieu of a better pithy name.
> Technology levels the playing field for people who aren’t professionals.
This is the entire explanation for the ongoing tantrums about "art theft" as related to generative AI.
The world class institutional artists are demoralized, not sure what you’re talking about