---
id: "quote-ai-rationality"
type: "quote"
source_timestamps: ["¶4"]
tags: ["ai-behavior", "advertising"]
related: ["concept-agentic-rationality", "claim-ad-revenue-collapse"]
quote: "AI agents are rational, not emotional. They don’t see ads. They don’t impulse buy. They don’t get locked into ecosystems."
speaker: "Yuanyuan Gina Cui, Patrick van Esch and Jan Kietzmann"
speakers: ["Yuanyuan Gina Cui", "Patrick van Esch", "Jan Kietzmann"]
sources: ["attention"]
sourceVaultSlug: "hbr-seg-attention"
originDay: 4
articleStem: "hbr-foci-69-ai-threatening-platforms"
sourceUrl: "https://hbr.org/2026/04/how-ai-is-threatening-platforms-revenue-streams"
sourceTitle: "How AI Is Threatening Platforms’ Revenue Streams"
---
# AI Agents Are Rational, Not Emotional

> AI agents are rational, not emotional. They don’t see ads. They don’t impulse buy. They don’t get locked into ecosystems.
>
> — [[entity-yuanyuan-gina-cui]], [[entity-patrick-van-esch]] & [[entity-jan-kietzmann]] (¶4)

This is the **load-bearing premise** of the entire article. Every threatened revenue stream traces back to this single behavioral claim: no ad-seeing → [[claim-ad-revenue-collapse]]; no impulse buying and no ecosystem lock-in → [[concept-agentic-rationality]] and [[concept-subscription-psychology]]. If this premise is even partly false (agents encode human/brand preferences), the downstream threats soften proportionally.