In my opinion there isn't an external _nefarious_ force causing all of this. Certainly those forces exist but without them much the same would be happening.

It's the economy of everything being free but supported with advertising. That mechanic is what leads to the race to the bottom lowest common denominator human motivation hacking attention toxicity. (yes that's a bit of a ramble).

If people weren't getting paid for the smallest increment of attention they could grab, it wouldn't be promoted the way it is. I don't have a high opinion of the things which grab my attention, but they still manage to do it sometimes. I think many people are in that boat. If there were other mechanisms with which we rewarded people for doing things, something different would be optimized.

And people just wouldn't reward the 10-second-gratification in anywhere near the same way if it weren't for the advertising.