Last week, reader Léah wrote:

Hey Ian,

Thanks for this take on Verticals -- nice to hear from the faith side of things! I've been dedicating time to studying them recently and the trends coming out of China.

The thing that makes me reluctant about making verticals is the addiction aspect. A producer from China shared that psychologically, it's exactly like gambling, as verticals are structured to keep people hooked indefinitely, while feeding their content addiction. There's also the problem of limiting people's attention spans significantly to the point they don't want to watch long form content, just the "quick wins". The companies see this as a good thing, because it makes them lots of money, of course! It kinda made me feel gross about the whole thing. Television has always been good at "hooking" people, and there's nothing like a good binge of a great show, but I feel like the soapy content and the megashort format make verticals a very different beast.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this though? How can we redeem this beast for God's kingdom? :)

Léah