by Steven Brill
First published 2024
Steven Brill witnessed the collapse of shared facts from the front lines. As co-founder of a company tracking online misinformation, he watched Silicon Valley executives program algorithms to maximize profits by amplifying divisive content. He saw automated advertising systems reward conspiracy theories and lies. Politicians and hucksters exploited these ad-driven machines while America's enemies turned our own social media tools against us through massive disinformation campaigns. Russian agents even targeted Brill and his family after his company exposed their operations. Now generative artificial intelligence threatens to make everything exponentially worse. Brill reveals the engineering decisions that fractured our common understanding of reality and offers concrete solutions to reverse the damage before it's too late.
Genres: political-science, non-fiction, 21st-century, current-affairs
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: investigative-journalism, social-commentary
Setting: Silicon Valley
Period: 21st-century
336 pages · Hardcover · Knopf
Content warnings: violence