The Information War

As we float into a new year I wanted to discuss a topic with you that is of dire consequences and exceptional ignorance. This topic is the ongoing Information War in the West. By Information War I do not mean cyber warfare and I certainly do not mean the whisper down the lane games you play with Karen by the water cooler. The Information War is the ongoing struggle of who owns the narrative and who doesn’t. Who is generating the most conversations and Energy to produce the most market value over time. The most powerful agents of the market are no longer who own the natural resources, property, funds or human capital, it’s who owns the narrative. All the oil refineries in the world couldn’t compete with the growing sentiment of climate change consciousness in North America. With enough lobbying power across all mediums of information exchange the Consumer is no longer ‘always right’ but strategically placed and intentionally aware. Furthermore, it’s not lobbying at the highest levels that wins the war. Contrary to popular belief no one has less power than the President. The Consumers' fixations are of the highest regard in the Information War. 

Addiction cycles

Capitalization of addiction cycles and strategic placement of highly addicted individuals is how Information Warriors win battles. (Speaking as the Information Warrior) If I can give enough Consumers enough reasons to buy subsequent products or enable the purchase of subsequent products, then I have won the battle. Whatever your addictions are, ‘experts’ and special interest groups will target you and your family in order to get closer to finding the right drugs for you to increase their market value over time. Do you not like your body? Do you have sexual perversions? Do you have fantasies of power? A wanting to belong? To get an edge on your competitors? Do you want to feel young again? Do you feel weak? Are your thoughts too painful? Whatever the affliction, there’s always a pill to fill the holes implanted in you through years of strategic marketing and public schooling. 

City Consumers and Energy Harvesting 

As a consequence of over-socialization and hyper-individualism, cities and public school systems are the primary sources of energy harvesting. The Information Warrior must harvest enough energy from strategically placed populations to build a narrative that meets his product feature requirements. Cities are the perfect hubs for energy harvesting because the Consumer has only other Consumers to base their value off of. It is foolish to own resources when placed in a city. Thus, without ownership the city Consumer is left to buy products to meet temporary fixations in comparison to other city Consumers. In order to sell more products the Information Warrior must generate more conversations within his Consumer base while creating more anxiety within the Consumer to invigorate their relevant fixations. The more socialized and individualistic the Consumer base the more energy you can pump through social pressure valves to align addiction cycles with product features. 

Issues and Experts

The Issue and The Expert are the most useful weapons for an Information Warrior. The Expert enables the Consumer to continue their addictive cycle without liability while shielding the Information Warrior from liability of the consequences of their product features. The Information Warrior can use the Expert to generate anxiety and consensus on an Issue. Issues are the main mechanisms used to pump energy and generate conversations in a strategically placed population. An Issue is a problem manufactured by the Information Warrior to pump enough anxiety in the Consumer to intensify behavior in their relevant addiction cycles. Addictive behavior is primarily intensified by social cohesion which is itself intensified by the propagation of Issues. In order to detect an Issue a Consumer must validate whether or not the Issue would be causing anxiety in their life without exposure to Experts and Issue related conversations with peer Consumers.

Exposure and Influence 

The Information Warrior must utilize various exposure mechanisms in order to generate enough market value from Consumer addiction cycles and win battles. The three prominent exposure mechanisms are news agencies, Influencers and social media platforms. A news agency produces low to high fidelity content an Information Warrior can leverage to propagate Issues to their Consumer base. Influencers are higher ranking Consumers who can be leveraged to propagate high trust exposure within a target Consumer base. Influencers can act as Experts or ‘Expert Consumers’ to enable addiction cycles to flow in their follower base. Social Media platforms are effective exposure mechanisms for propagating Issue-related content and solidify addictive behavior in strategically placed populations. Constant exposure to Issues is the primary strategy an Information Warrior uses to solidify the addiction cycles of their target Consumers. Products can be sold both directly and indirectly to an Issue exposed Consumer population.

What should I do as a Consumer?

A Consumer has two options in the Information Wars; one is to continue spending and the other is to stop spending. In order to stop spending the Consumer must effectively work on themselves to break their addiction cycles and rectify their bad behavior.