If you can read this in one unbroken go

In the age of the gnat-sized attention span, short bursts of content are all the rage. Fair enough. The mob has its own capacity that must be respected as 'taste'. Football World Cup matches now feature two 'hydration' breaks, even when players look more parched for goals than for water in perfect conditions. Commercials must be fitted for screen time, and one can be sure that soon market research will find evidence that 8 ad breaks per 45-min half can surely be squeezed in without upsetting footie fans. Streaming platforms, once the haven for uninterrupted viewing, also have rediscovered the joys of ads we thought were 'oh so cable'.

Yet, in this land of fractured focus, the uninterrupted consumer is poised to be king. The one who can watch a film without fleeing to an Insta reel during a pivotal scene; who can read an article longer than a tweet. Not today, but tomorrow, this rare creature will inherit the Earth. For attention has become the scarcest commodity. Algorithms chase it, advertisers worship it, and platforms serve it as ever-smaller canapes. But scarcity breeds value. Those who can resist the siren call of the skip button will command the marketplace, shaping culture not in fragments but in wholes. True luxury will not be premium subscriptions, but the ability to sit still, uninterrupted, and consume something in its entirety.