Earlier quoted context omitted.
From the article, "Those relatively comfortable “problems” of modern life have already been solved to death, beginning with Alexander Bell and ending (sort of, for now) with Mark Zuckerberg, Sergey Brin and Larry Page. Many of the apps we have nowadays — the successful ones, at least — revolve around game mechanics, addiction, self-reference, and narcissism. Even apps I use and actually like quite a lot fall into thi…
The most charitable reading I can give it still has it missing the point and not understanding what it is that's being built up with all these companies. Facebook, as I've said, restores and maintains social connections. This is absolutely not a minor thing, it's life-altering. Perhaps it's too early on in the process to understand that, but 10 or 20 years from now, everyone will get it when they look at who has been…
I think her point was that it doesn't track what everyone in the world is thinking about. It tracks what everyone wealthy enough to have the free time to commit to maintaining their social network presence is thinking about.
> universal customer loyalty system
2.4 billion people (about a quarter of the planet) make less than $1000 year. Only 500 million people's income exceeds $11,500 a year. (http://ucatlas.ucsc.edu/income.php)
It is extremely significant that the businesses she picks on (not saying it's fair to call other folks' life's work pointless) focus on creating narrower and narrower slices of the 500 million. The 90% of the planet (!) that lives on less than $11000 a year is completely untouched by customer loyalty programs and social connections apps.
To be clear, I'm not arguing that the businesses you mentioned aren't doing the things you say they are. My life is richer because of the internet and specifically social networking. I am arguing, similar to the author, that the work Silicon Valley seems to be dedicated and that seems to get the most attention is not solving problems most of the world has.