Content Saturation Has Inverted Cultural Memory
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We used to remember things because they were exceptional. Moments, dialogue, speeches, films and ideas etched themselves into culture by sheer force of quality. They were better-crafted. Better at sticking. Better at resonating.
But that was when culture moved slowly.
To be remembered, something had to stand out against silence.
Now it has to scream.
Content saturation has rewired the mechanics of cultural memory. When we’re faced with more stimuli than any brain has evolved to manage, our collective attention doesn’t coalesce around excellence.
It can’t.
There's too much.
So instead, it flocks to the repeatable, the clippable, the memetic. Cultural staying power has detached from quality and grafted itself onto transmissibility. If it can be misheard, clipped out of context, and reposted with rage emojis, it will be.
