I don’t know if I would have become as upset upon receiving so many automated messages, but maybe I’m at the point where my expectations are so low that I don’t expect a human-human interaction anymore.

I’d love to see this view point fleshed out a bit in relation to “click bait”, though. It seems that the entire reader-publication relationship has been reduced to publications trying to pipeline readers into advertising channels rather than producing content.

I read an article last week about IP mapping and the negative impacts it was having on random people and was shocked to find actual journalism in the article. The author had actually conducted what you might call an “investigation” and actually followed through to see their research create change. I was pretty much dumbfounded that writers were still practicing actual journalism in 2016 and I think that says a lot about the state of that industry nowadays.

Our expectations have been shifted away from quality content and instead towards photo lists, content taken directly from Reddit, listicles, and clickbait headlines. We don’t get real content anymore, just the 50th time Disney Princesses have been “boldly re-imagined” as cans of soup. I’ve even noticed places like Buzzfeed inserting images that load only once you hover over the “Next” button, with what I can only assume is the intention that I “accidentally” click on the ad above it. It’s dishonest and fits directly with your point about the consumer/audience being treated with utter contempt. We exist only as agents to click on ads. If they could replace us with robots, they probably would.

Ultimately, I hope this trend is self-defeating. There are great content creators out there on YouTube and Soundcloud if only you have the time to find them. I’m sure the same goes for companies in general. Some people still care about the quality of the product, not the quantity. The more we reward people who care about quality, the more quality we will see in the world.