The AI disruption in media is about demand: Machine audiences are becoming the primary consumers, and whoever owns the interface captures the value. The demand signal, not clicks or time spent, is the defining asset. Also read her take on liquid content economics. (Shuwei Fang, The Economist)
- The demand signal (accumulated context plus intent) is the defining asset of this new market, not clicks or time spent, and it accrues by default to the AI interface layer, not the knowledge producers.
- For journalists and media professionals, this is a structural warning: the intermediary absorbs the relationship, and without access to the demand signal, publishers lose sight of the humans they are supposed to serve.