The Attention Economy
How the Battle for the Human Mind Became the Defining War of Our EraBy Rio Vale
Length8h 16m
About this audiobook
Every second you spend scrolling, someone is getting paid. Not for your time — for your attention, bought and sold in fractions of a cent, engineered to be irresistible.
This book begins with a leaked dataset from a Silicon Valley persuasion lab and never lets go. Following the trail across three continents and six years of investigative reporting, it reveals how a generation of behavioral scientists, product engineers, and reformed insiders accidentally built the most efficient behavior-modification apparatus in human history — and why no single person meant to.
You’ll meet the engineer who invented the infinite scroll. The neuroscientist measuring what it does to a teenager’s developing brain. The Norwegian regulator who fined a streaming giant into changing its defaults. The Brussels lawyers rewriting the rules of digital engagement. The Ohio parents who fought back.
Audiobook details
Rating★★★★ 4.3 (18)
Includes Amazon, Goodreads
GenrePolitics and Government
Length8 hrs 16 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateMay 16, 2026
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1Dedication
2Acknowledgments
3Chapter 1: The Leak
4Chapter 2: What Attention Is
5Chapter 3: The Engineer Who Built the Scroll
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6Chapter 4: The Dopamine Lab
7Chapter 5: The Casino in Your Pocket
8Chapter 6: Bergen, in Winter
9Chapter 7: The Family in Mansfield
10Chapter 8: The Whistleblower Goes Public
11Chapter 9: Brussels Is Not Bored
12Chapter 10: The Lagos Argument
13Chapter 11: The Child Brain
14Chapter 12: The Algorithm’s Author
15Chapter 13: What the Insurer Saw
16Chapter 14: The Norwegian Fine
17Chapter 15: The Industry Strikes Back
18Chapter 16: The Court Files
19Chapter 17: The Reform Coalition
20Chapter 18: The Self-Experiment
21Chapter 19: Schools That Worked
22Chapter 20: Six Months After Marsh
23Chapter 21: What Doesn’t Work
24Chapter 22: The 2025 Hearings
25Chapter 23: An Honest Accounting
26Chapter 24: What We Notice
27Character Guide
28References & Bibliography
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