Battling the ADD that drives today’s hyper-cyber “consumer” isn’t just the sport of advertisers. Especially for one young composer looking to make a very lasting impression.

From Vine to Flash Fiction, bite-sized online content trimmed to the size of an iPhone and the length of a traffic light is the new now. So what is a composer schooled in the classics to do?

The answer, or at least one of them, came to us in a performance last month of a work by Charlie Martin, the winner of the 2013 Exponential Ensemble/Fordham Young Composers’ Competition. His piece, a thoroughly modern trio entitled “The Height of Spring,” included one movement (of four) that took a mere 90 seconds to play.

Now, whatever you may know about the art form, you know it takes it’s time. And for pretty good reason. Among other things, length gives a composer time to shift the pace, tone and mood–something Martin has collaspsed in the movement to fit the interactive attention span. The result is an intense interplay between clarinet, violin and bass.

“As a composer in the 21st century, ” Martin told me, “my challenge is to move an audience that doesn’t have any time or patience to spare.” He added that, “the 90-second movement packs in a lot of different musical material.” In other words, fasten your seat belts.

Did anyone ask for this? “They didn’t have to,” says Martin, “I don’t have any time to spare either. Still, he believes he has “created a rhythmic, tonal, and timbral experience that holds the listeners’ attention for the entire duration.”

How many agency creatives can say that?

Just back from Mexico City–and a visit to its new Center for Digital Culture. A subterranean museum under the Paseo de Reforma (look for the post-modern, 350ft.-high monument to Mexican Independence that stands above it), this government-sponsored exhibition space opened just last year. And it’s a must see.

Featured right now is an installation by Mexican artist Ricardo Cortez that blew us away. After a brief introduction (stenciled on the wall as you enter), we walked into an open, biomorphic space bathed in color and sound. A sizzling pink morphing into an electric blue, then violet, then green–all to the tune of an echoing, primal chant. According to the artist, the effort (successful, I’d say) engineered to evoke our most instinctive reactions to changes in what we see, hear and feel around us.

Leaving the show, I asked a Museum guide if there was any written material on the Installation. No paper here, she said, it’s all online. Duh. http://www.centrodeculturadigital.com.

Lather. Okay. Rinse. Of course. Repeat. Why not!  Because even if there is absolutely no practical or emotional reason to double my intake of this product, I’m going to do it anyway.

Are we really that mindless? Though some may argue, I say no.

By the same token, it does make you wonder. What does a bottle of shampoo tell us about why consumers blindly follow the command to consume? To “act now?” Or for that matter, to “just do it?” The answer: Tell people something they believe, and they’ll believe the next thing you tell them.

Obvious, right? Time is running out–FACT, so “call today.” Fast food is all the same–FACT, so “have it your way.”

You bet your ass I will!

But what intrigues me most is when the formula gets more complex. Take “Think Different.” On its own, the call to action implies I’m an uninspired clone. So what tees it up? Something I simply cannot argue with–the brilliance of Einstein, the creativity of Picasso. Suddenly, “thinking different” makes me a Nobel Prize winner. And what’s the first way to prove that I’m a candidate for Mensa? Buy an Apple.

Where do I sign?