A field manual to the technologies that are changing our lives at bewildering speed
Adam Greenfield has worked as a lead information architect for the Tokyo office of internet services consultancy Razorfish, head of design direction for service and user-interface design at Nokia headquarters in Helsinki, and Senior Urban Fellow at the LSE Cities Centre of the London School of Economics. He is currently an instructor in Urban Design at the Bartlett, University College London. His books include Everyware: The Dawning Age of Ubiquitous Computing, Urban Computing and its Discontents, and the 2013 pamphlet 'Against the smart city.'
Adam Greenfield goes digging into the layers that constitute what
we experience as smooth tech surface. He unsettles and repositions
much of that smoothness. Radical Technologies is brilliant and
scary
*Saskia Sassen, Columbia University, author of
Expulsions*
We exist within an ever-thickening web of technologies whose
workings are increasingly opaque to us. In this illuminating and
sometimes deeply disturbing book, Adam Greenfield explores how
these systems work, how they synergize with each other, and the
resultant effects on our societies, our politics, and our psyches.
This is an essential book
*Brian Eno*
A tremendously intelligent and stylish book on the 'colonization of
everyday life by information processing' calls for resistance to
rule by the tech elite... a landmark primer and spur to more
informed and effective opposition.
*Guardian*
A systematic analysis of the hazards posed by the most
revolutionary of new technologies... his analyses are extremely
proficient at uncovering the risks and contradictions that our
enthusiasm for new technology has occluded... a vital
counter-statement to such pervasive utopianism
*Public Seminar*
Does an excellent job of introducing non-specialist readers to some
of the game-changing technologies that are transforming our lives
and that are set to affect the social, economic, political and
cultural evolution of humanity ... a very valuable contribution to
the discussion about what that future should look like.
*Morning Star*
A work of remarkable breadth and legibility that acts as both a
technical design guide and a sharp political critique of the
networked products that are reshaping society.
*The Monthly [Australia]*
Provides a grounded guide, a cautionary tale in which each chapter
walks readers through another layer of a dazzling and treacherous
landscape.
*Times Literary Supplement*
Of all the books I've read this year, one that really stood out was
Radical Technologies by Adam Greenfield, which describes some of
the ways innovation is transforming our daily lives ... Change is
inevitable. The big question is, How do we retool ourselves? How do
we function in this new, utterly transparent world? What are the
social consequences of what we are experiencing?
*Wall Street Journal [Books of the Year, 2017]*
"Fascinating and scary.[Adam Greenfield] is very well informed
about a whole host of technologies that we hear a lot about but (if
you're like me) have a hard time grasping. He's a graceful writer,
so even when he's angry he's eloquent without relying on emotional
cues or nostalgia. More importantly, he thinks new technologies
have a lot of potential - but if we fail to pay attention, all of
its benefits will reinforce current power structures. What they
call 'innovation' now that 'progress' has gone out of style is the
entrenchment of power and wealth."
*Inside Higher Ed*
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