And that, comrades, is yet another way to realize our economy's incentive system is misaligned with people's material needs.

Says the person with free time to write, freedom to express an opinion, food in their belly, shelter, hot water, a computer in their pocket, access to a free vaccine, yada yada yada.

What the parent comment describes is what people who aren't capable of material or intellectual contribution do to products to create the illusion of value where none exists, or to manipulate users into paying as much as possible regardless of the effective value of the product.

This stifles development of things that are actually useful. It puts money and influence in the hands of people who shouldn't have either, creating bad incentives in the market and within the company. It gives marketing a gloss of false legitimacy, allowing for all the things that have us in a feverish race to the bottom.

Everything you just touted has been achieved despite the Idiocracy fan-fic that seems to be the current mission statement of corporate America.

There's no economic incentive system without transaction costs.

In the webapp ecosystem, those transaction costs take the form of annoying signup pages and mail spam. Could be worse.