The "lean in" people and incentives have made society suffer for profit. Perhaps we can define a better set of incentives that reward companies of people building products.
We can. It's called pay directly for the services you use. It is a time-honored system where you give providers money in exchange for goods and services. In response, their incentive is to keep you happy and healthy and prosperous so you can continue to give them money.
No, their incentive is to get your money and get other people like you in case you die on 'em. They don't need you specifically, and they extra much don't need you to be prosperous.
The message 'you can save all this money, using us!' always means 'you can spend all this money with us'. I'm not faulting the general system or even your point here: I am, however, suggesting that while the system is fine it does NOT in any way imply that such people have or feel ANY incentive to your well-being.
You could maybe make a case that such a company might feel an incentive to the POPULATION it depends on… but even then, I feel like that might be mythical. In theory you don't want to eat your own seed corn, but such incentives toward good behavior are so easily ignored… and even if they are honored, it's a collective concern, NOT personal.
They don't care about you, and you are damn lucky if they care even a little about your wellbeing as a class or demographic… most likely they do not. And that's where the system tends to break down.
> In response, their incentive is to keep you happy and healthy and prosperous so you can continue to give them money.
Their incentive is to find a way to get your money; we can see in the world around us that many of them have no problem if you're insecure, addicted, and indebted.
Which will never happen. That takes customer impetus, it's not there. People don't understand the cost of the free products they use, they are unlikely to switch.
So what ways would influence your outcome to actually happen? Because I think it would be the right way to run software platforms as well, I just don't see a pathway there that isn't heavy handed.
I would be for regulating the advertising industry, since I feel it is the root of all this. None of the unethical software magnates would exist if not for the advertising dollars pouring through the door thanks to the ad-tech apparatuses they have built, and the poor incentives that creates. But that regulation is challenging and unlikely too.
I think a freemium model would be better. You should have to pay for having a large number of followers/friends past a certain point.
For example, maybe an account with 1,000 friends is free. Up to 10,000: $5 / month, up to 100,000 $50/month, and so on.
If you're Kim Kardashian with 250 million followers and you're making millions of dollars hawking skin cream or whatever, you can afford to pay a few thousand dollars a month to reach your large, valuable audience.
This way, the content creators can sell ads if they want. The platform doesn't sell ads. Users only see ads if they follow a creator who has sponsors. It's up to that creator to make their content worthwhile enough for people to choose to follow them in spite of the ads.
A platform should be like a company that sells TV broadcast towers. They give people a way to reach an audience. What that content creator does with their audience is up to them. Maybe they could charge a subscription. Maybe they get sponsors. If it's a large non-profit or government organization, maybe they pay at a lower rate or get to use it for free.
