Scott Karp on Getting Attention, MySpace and the Economics of Poetry

In What If No One Will Pay for Content?, Scott Karp quotes from the same Esther Dyson interview that I referenced on Wednesday and goes a step further:

In media 1.0, brands paid for the attention that media companies gathered by offering people news and entertainment (e.g. TV) in exchange for their attention. In media 2.0, people are more likely to give their attention in exchange for OTHER PEOPLE’S ATTENTION.

This is why MySpace can’t effectively monetize its 70 million users through advertising — people use MySpace not to GIVE their attention to something that is entertaining or informative (which could thus be sold to advertisers) but rather to GET attention from other users. Why is it so appealing to MySpace users to be able to post messages publicly on other users’ sites? Because they can GET attention as a function of GIVING it.

This make perfect sense in a world of participatory media — the value flow has reversed itself. MySpace can’t sell attention to advertisers because the site itself HAS NONE. Nobody pays attention to MySpace — users pay attention to each other, and compete for each other’s attention — it’s as if the site itself doesn’t exist...

What if the economics of media in the 21st century begin to look like the economics of poetry in the 20th century? — Lot’s of people do it for their own personal gratification, but nobody makes any money from it.

tags: attention attentiontrust scott karp