Agency, a la Carte

The author argues that airdrops and memecoins are a discretionary, arbitrarily distributed form of value, and that the attention economy makes users pay the costs that produce it. The essay ties this to AI, where models draw on public internet data, and to venture capital, which it says aims to externalize social costs and internalize cultural production. It proposes that onchain social apps with intrinsically selective incentives, such as a Farcaster channel and frame for a token distribution gated by proof of humanity or contribution, could be more sustainable than current incentive systems.