Meerkat Prompts: Attention Hounds
I did contemplate titling this post with a different term, but since I broadly seek to keep Meerkat Musings 12A/PG-13 (with a few notable exceptions!), I can’t really do that!
I am once again drawing wisdom and inspiration from the eloquent Rawen Wolf, who has written about one of the most basic economic principles of all time, supply & demand, and specifically how this relates to people seeking attention.
In some respects, we all seek attention. I know I do. I will share website articles, issue tweets and social media posts about my books, and air my views and opinions both here and elsewhere, on a fairly routine basis. However, I am not one to generally preen for the camera, so to speak. I am not a ‘look at me, spend time and effort on me!’ type of person. In fact, in many ways I am happier to glide under the radar, popping my head up on occasion as and when I feel the desire to.
This might be detrimental to my popularity, but then again, popularity is not something I need or crave. For others, it’s a different matter. For others, TikTok views and the number of likes on Instagram are the driving force behind their egos and confidence (to say nothing of a revenue stream that could dry up without regular content). These people are constantly sharing anything they think might get them a second look. It can easily be argued that this is very unhealthy.
Mind you, what’s worse, being the attention-seeking hound, or the one that feeds into their need? Social media has made it very easy to endlessly scroll through a meandering mess of material, from stuff that verges on pornographic on Instagram, to the briefly-fun, endorphin-producing videos of squirrel puppets dancing on TikTok. The creators of this content are well-aware there’s a market for it. People want and need distractions from the grind of daily life, even if it’s only for a few seconds, and with attention spans waning, these fast bursts of brevity offer the relief society as a whole desires.
I am not immune to this. I find my patience for even short videos is more limited. If there’s a TikTok vid purporting to show a stupid action of some kind, I find myself wanting the 30-second clip to hurry up and get to the point. I think I am diverging from the overall thrust of this post; perhaps the topic is loosely related?
To get attention for one’s site, social media, and in some cases, product, you need to be constantly engaging with people. You need to adapt to today’s methods of advertising, as it were. I don’t think I am particularly adapted! I do use Twitter, and TikTok, and occasionally Instagram to share thoughts and even showcase my books, but I don’t have the… let’s call it ‘endurance’, to churn out content, least of all enough to shout over the scores of voices already doing so. I guess I prefer long-form posts, such as blog entries, where I can offer more detailed thoughts and opinions. Ironically, this puts me at odds with modern attention spans!
What’s right or wrong in these circumstances? Is it wise to even try to compete as an attention hound? Is it right to feed the need of those who pose for the camera, as it were? Is society spinning down the drain of the brief burst of engagement? Might the best analogy for all of this be the snake eating its own tail, in the race for swift gratification? Alternatively, am I merely being a dour, grumpy greymuzzle, making a mountain out of a molehill?
Do feel free to flood this post with attention and comments!
There’s a fine line between aggressively promoting your writing and being an attention whore. As a writer, I want as many people as possible to read my wring. No one writes to not be read. 😜
That said, I know some people who endlessly self-promote. I typically ignore/unfollow them.
It’s definitely a balancing act. I hate feeling like I might be spamming social media with book links, but like you say, we’re writers, we want people to read what we’ve written, so we have to do something!