Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart

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Social media and instant digital communication have enabled the sharing of information on scales unprecedented in human history. Much has changed since the earliest telephones of the 1800s, especially as we now enter the age of AI and  experience firsthand how modern communication technology all too often brings out the worst in us.

Nicholas Carr is one of our leading commentators on the social and political impacts of technology. His Pulitzer-Prize finalist book, The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains (2010), was one of the first to sound the alarm on the corrosive effects of modern digital technology. Now, in Superbloom: How Technologies of Connection Tear Us Apart, he takes a deeper dive into history, exploring the ways in which mechanized, highly efficient communication have often led to misunderstanding, strife, and polarization. Tracing this history to the present, he asks what role tech companies have played in this superbloom of information, and what we as users of media technology can do to prevent the worst harms and excesses of our accelerated digital and media landscape.

Join Nicholas and Senior Fellow Akash Kapur on Thursday, February 6 at 12 PM ET for a discussion on Superbloom and how the media technology landscape has altered our relationships with society, others, and ourselves.

You can order Superbloom here.