Episode Description
If you've felt exhausted before you've even opened an app, you're not imagining it — content overload is a real, measurable problem, and it started well before AI showed up. This episode traces it back to 2015, debunks the "humans have shorter attention spans than goldfish" myth that never had real science behind it, and gets into why AI didn't create the oversupply problem, it just stepped on the accelerator.
I pulled stats on what's happening right now: 74% of new web pages contain detectable AI-generated content, a startup is producing 3,000 AI podcast episodes a week for a dollar each, and consumer trust in AI content has dropped from 60% to 26% in three years. I also get into the attention span myth, because it turns out the whole "humans now have shorter attention spans than goldfish" thing didn't really come from any real science. People aren't broken. They just got pickier. And pickier is a very different thing to compete against.
The practical section at the end is what I'd actually want you to take away, specifically what this means if you're a creative professional making content for clients or for your own brand right now.
RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED→ Ahrefs study – Analysis of nearly a million web pages measuring AI-generated content prevalence
→ Gartner projection – Forecast on synthetically generated content by 2026
→ Nielsen survey – Research on streaming subscriber overwhelm and subscription behaviour
→ McKinsey research – Data on UK media consumption trends and attention plateauing
→ Adobe digital trends report – Survey on marketer adoption of generative AI workflows in 2026
→ Inception Point AI – The startup producing 3,000 AI podcast episodes a week
If this resonated, hit follow on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. New episode every week.
The written version of this one, plus extra thoughts that didn't make it into the recording, is over on the newsletter. Link below.
And if you've got 30 seconds, a rating on Apple or Spotify helps new listeners find the show more than you'd think.
LET'S CONNECT!