People complain, especially about the younger generation, having a very short attention span, but maybe that is a natural adaptation. Maybe it’s better this way.

Allow me to explain: Our brain is designed to take shortcuts, the most efficient route from where I am right now to what I want. Throughout history, we have optimized for that.

Instead of hunting all day for a meal, you simply go to the supermarket today. No amount of reminiscing about the good old days can stop this optimizing process.

Artifacts of the Old World

For the most part, we have accepted this change, but here and there, we hold onto relics from the past that serve no purpose anymore.

Yesterday, I had to write a letter to a government institution:

Dear Department of Parks & Recreation,

bla bla formal and considered language bla bla

Sincerely,

The Dude

I ultimately decided to use ChatGPT to write this letter for me, as 90% of it consists of filler words and follows a format that is hundreds of years old, created during a time when someone on horseback had to transport my letter.

What once made sense is just baggage today. Since people have read and written these same words so many times, over and over again, we don’t have much patience for them anymore. And with good reason.

New Media Is Different

Many things in life are like that. Articles are still written with the physical limitations of paper in mind, and media content is still produced as if we only had a limited time slot, akin to TV or radio.

Much of that is unnecessary filler material that we are being flooded with now. So I say, embrace the short attention span, cut out all the baggage, and get straight to the point.

Of course, there is still room for long-form content. But don’t waste your audience’s time with things they have heard or seen a thousand times before. When we consume longer news formats today, we want raw, unedited, authentic content instead of spoon-fed and produced narratives.