Killing Moloch with “Nudge tech”?

Context

I come from the SaaS startup world and I intend to help kill some inadequate equilibria in the next few years, specifically around the attention economy.

I’ll outline what I’m thinking, below, and would appreciate any help from the LW community:

Specific questions I hope to answer:

  • From a god’s-eye-view, where is the project likely to fail?

  • How might you approach accomplishing a similar goal? What would you change?

  • What should I read /​ who should I talk with to learn more?

Project Description

“Turn tech from addicting to revitalizing, with nudge tech”

A continually-improving “nudge tech” that digitally overlays computers/​smartphones, and gently changes the quality of life for those individuals and populations who opt in.

  • It will lessen the pull of companies who legally but unethically get people to self-sabotage (e.g. phone addiction, sleep deprivation, empty content and empty calories)

  • It will minimize the tribalistic tendency of humans to ‘other’ populations by popping algorithmic bubbles

  • It will increase serendipity and innovation in its users by exposing them to relevant and timely diverse viewpoints and opportunities

It will be continually improved by open-source plugin contributions; plugins will be tested automatically and successful ones will be rolled out to those who opt in.

Nudge tech—definition

Nudge tech is technology that changes the probability of specific human behaviors by modifying 1+ of the following:

  • What behavior prompts a person gets

  • The difficulty of accomplishing a behavior

  • The reward/​punishment from a given behavior

‘Nudge tech’, is used by tech companies like Facebook, Netflix, etc. to keep users engaged and therefore make money. But nudge tech can be used to defend against exploitation by these same companies.

That’s it! I’m looking forward to your thoughts.