[matrix_overload]

They have been. But in the old times such behavior would quickly get you labelled as a village slut and become avoided by most people.

But in the social media age companies need such people to generate content that drives engagement, and serves a a conduit for ads. This creates incentives for such destructive behavior, and forces such people into others' attention spans, reinforcing the loop.

[chias]

I think it was also just harder to do at scale.

In the aftermath of his death, we discovered that one of my great grandfathers had a whole other family a few villages over, and neither family knew of the other. Being logistically limited to just two groups probably helped make it "work".