Collective Attention and Media Watch

This article surveys various recent theorizations of the collective constitution of our attention in the age of ubiquitous computation. It develops a critical analysis of the current dynamics driven by the mass media inherited from the 20th century, as they are colonized by nefarious attractors like “populism” and “terrorism”. It attempts to understand how 21st century digital media, based on the ambivalent powers of deep learning, can transform the nature of and workings of our collective attention. It invites us to reconsider the very notion of attention, in order to differentiate various gestures (both mental and social) that tend to be confused under this reference.