[CONTEXT]

The Anti-Social Century described by Derek Thompson, has a business/economic case posited by Alex Mayyasi in recent interviews. Simply put, businesses that keep people alone and isolated from one another are easier to scale, than businesses that bring people together. Netflix beats theaters, Doordash beats restaurants and AI companions are being pushed on us now, and they will certainly have better margins than trying to monetize actual friendship. Our economy is being structured by business logic to fund the Anti-Social Century.

[MY TAKE]

The people profiting from this world do not actually live in it. They fly to be on each other’s podcasts and conferences. They built the entire infrastructure for geography to not matter and then clustered harder than any industry in history. They limit their kids’ use of technology and send them to private schools that ban screens. They do not accept the product they are selling as the highest form of social reality for themselves. When the stakes are status, trust, deal flow, alignment, or influence, they still want the unmediated.

[WRAP]

They are not building a post-social future. They are building a tiered one. Real life for insiders, simulation for the rest. The anti-social century will not abolish face-to-face life, but it will make it scarce, and scarcity makes it a luxury good. Friends for me but not for thee.