The Curious Rise of The High-Agency Person
Viral concepts and "just doing things"
I am convinced that the next blockbuster nonfiction book will have a title like The High-Agency Individual: You Can Just do Things.1
The concept of “agency” has become ubiquitous in tech circles over the past year. I interpret the term as something like “the ability to take action to solve your own problems & create your own opportunities, without relying on an authority to tell you what to do.”
You can see its growth at a macro level, in the frequency of its use on tech-related forums:
You can also see it at the micro-level, as in this tech reporter’s dating misadventure:
It is easy to look at this and scratch your head, because agency is such a foundational concept — “tech bros discovered the idea self-determination.” On the other hand, thinking about this concept in this neat little package of “agency” is…useful!
I dusted off my twitter account (X, the everything app, it’s all happening on X) to post this poll. The majority say the concept has helped them, and of the modest sample 5 people said it has helped them a lot, including my friend
who’s found it particularly impactful:
It’s benefited me, too — I wrote about it in an exceedingly earnest post at the beginning of 2024. A lot of my adulthood has been spent unlearning the idea that I will have a successful life if I am good at doing what I am told to do, and trying to internalize the idea that I should author the things I am doing instead. “Agency” is a useful shorthand for this.
How did “agency” go viral, and why now?
“Agency” is an example of a particularly effective way of “going viral:2” taking a concept that lots of people feel, but have not explicitly named, and then to name it.
A recent post from Emmett Shear articulates this well. I wonder if he was thinking in part about “agency” when he tweeted this, because he’s also written about teaching people agency in a very useful way.
I’ve experienced this in sharing data projects. The ugly chart below is by far the thing I’ve made that the most people have seen, with a bunch of upvotes on reddit and ~200k people viewing the article over the years. Partly that is because of Swift’s popularity, but partly it’s because lots of people had noticed her becoming more PG-13 as she grew up, but hadn’t quite put their finger on it. Data is one way of helping people put their finger on something, and when you do it right people get excited about it and share it.
Why now?
It is not coincidence that the concept of agency is catching fire at the same time artificial intelligence has come to dominate tech’s mindshare. AI “agents” which can take action in the world instead of being confined to their own applications are well on their way, and questions about what it means to be human are at the forefront of people’s minds.
This combines with the fact that lots of institutions which have historically granted people permission to do things (universities, governments, media) are decaying in prestige, and people are recognizing that they may not need permission from them to get what they want out of life.
These factors have made people feel the concept of agency, and the concept being tidily packaged in the word has helped it take hold in people’s minds and spread.
Thanks for reading. Let me know what you think about the concept of agency…and for my single readers, discuss it on dates at your own risk.
If you’re interested in this topic, I highly recommend
’s writing and particularly this article about coining aesthetics and its importance as AI commoditizes more and more of the techniques of creation.Culture wars are won through aesthetics, and authoring an iconic aesthetic—creating, coining, and embedding it in culture—may be one of the last defining human acts.
Aesthetic Warfare (or the Power of Coining an Aesthetic), Anu Atluru
If you work in publishing and want to give me (just some guy) a handsome advance to write this book, remember: you can just do things!
“Going viral” is itself an example of this — it is a useful shorthand for the concept of a highly transferable idea, and the shorthand has helped it become pervasive and shaped people’s thinking
One of the most impactful things I learned as a product manager over the years is the power of naming things effectively
I really liked your post! In addition to the part about permission, I think that people just feel comfortable when being told what to do, and in recent years, as we're being constantly monitored and on call, we always behave—whether it's the fear of being canceled or being chained to your phone on vacation to avoid pissing off your boss. And then, we saw a rise of politicians—in the US, it's the Trump posse, of course—that just takes advantage of their "agency"; they don't play by the rules, and they don't do what they're "supposed" to do. I mean, most people accept reality as it is—I have a smartphone, so I must be available; I have a job, so I have to show up; I was invited to a party, so I have to go; I have body hair, so I have to shave it, etc. People are now, again, TOLD that they don't HAVE to do those things. They can get a flip phone, they can quit their job, they can bail on the party, and they can grow out their body hair. There will be consequences, but the world will keep turning, and the sun will most likely rise again. It's kind of silly. Also maybe a response to the wave of incompetence and self-pity people, at least online, have been on since the pandemic.