2026-05-08 –, Grégr Stage
Attention has become the decisive resource shaping culture, behaviour, and public discourse. This talk argues that engagement-driven algorithms concentrate this power in a few platforms, amplifying harm and social fragmentation. It explores how value-aligned metrics and community governance could redirect systems toward long-term human flourishing.
This talk examines how digital platforms have come to steer individual and collective attention, concentrating influence over culture, identity, and public discourse. Drawing on the speaker's personal work in social media governance in Australia and contributions to UN data governance discussions via the Nantian Institute, it traces how engagement-maximising algorithms drive profit while contributing to polarisation, declining social cohesion, and harms to young people.
It then addresses the core challenge: these systems now function as critical civic infrastructure, making reform complex and potentially risky. The talk proposes a shift from short-term engagement metrics toward long-term, value-aligned design. Using frameworks such as the UN Sustainable Development Goals and emerging regulatory approaches to recommendation systems, it explores how societies might define what is worth paying attention to.
Finally, it argues for a multi-layered model of governance—from global principles to community-level input—and for empowering individuals with greater agency over their data and attention. The session closes by connecting these ideas to speculative futures, asking how decentralised technologies and new incentive structures could help realign digital systems with human flourishing rather than mere engagement.
Alexander Trauth-Goik is Research Fellow at the University of Vienna. He studies how platforms shape attention and behaviour. He has contributed to social media governance reforms in Australia and to UN data governance consultations via the Nantian Institute, advancing frameworks for value-aligned algorithms and long-term, human-centred digital systems.