thoughts: AdSense’s Contributions to Content Hell

i think it's really interesting. i'm reading content by kate eichhorn right now, and while introducing adsense as the content industry rose, it was the gateway and prime transition point to how we base our current understanding of content. it's absolutely wild to me to be able to really point at a specific event and note that this is how everything changes.

i can completely understand how it would lead to our current content ecosystem though. as eichhorn explains, adsense wasn't extremely profitable on a small scale. adsense users could make extra income based off of some of their own personal websites, but to scale that to a livable income was far out of reach for a personal website. people took this and became entreprenuers to learn how to maniuplate the system. individuals and corporations gained countless websites and began funneling hundreds/thousands of sources of income into a single point.

the content on those websites had to be good or else people wouldn't go to them, but learning that game too was a part of the process, leading to clickbait and a learned emphasis on traffic and human behavior while interacting online. it's not a far leap to see how diving down that hole got us to 2024.

it's absolutely crazy to boil it down to one pivot point in my head, and of course, a lot of factors should be taken into consideration, but this is singular.