BINGO. You nailed it. This is absolutely how it works. It's not even a "conspiracy" in the traditional sense, evil tends to naturally become "industry standard" in a "highly competitive market."

Also I'd like to add to this, how people are working more than ever, and participation in civics, local politics, hobbies, religious organizations, etc... Have been trending downward for ages. "Third places" between home and work are also disappearing. If you set foot outside your home, you're on somebody's turf and you'd better be buying something or working for them.

And talking with others? My goodness how unproductive! Gotta be working on these 3 side hustles. "Maybe you can monetize talking with friends!" /s

My neighborhood personally is full of renters who never bother to meet each other and are rarely seen outside at all, and many will probably be gone within 3 months. Knocking on your neighbor's door will just get your face on a Ring video posted with

"ANYBODY KNOW THIS GUY? PROBABLY CASING THE PLACE OMG." with responses like

"Never answer your door and get a gun and a big dog. I've seen this on TV and a friend got robbed once."

This all adds up to literally seeing and experiencing the world through a digital filter. A filter that makes tons and tons of money when everybody is in a pocket universe. Scared of each other. Filtering each other. Weaponized by politics. Swayed by ads. Nobody shares resources. Nobody talks. Nobody gathers.

They're all the most important thing in their own little worlds, buying products and generating data. I liken this to when we started seeing split-screen disappear from video games. "Well now each player needs a game console, and a subscription, and the game..."

Lol sorry didn't mean to follow your TED talk with a blog post of my own. But, yeah, how the heck do we get this message out there...our humanity is hanging on by a thread...