Nothing pains me quite as much as having to admit I might have been wrong about something. But news breaking last week may force me to reconsider my opinion of Dave Eggers' 2013 novel "The Circle."I don't think the book has gotten any better. The main character is still annoying and, worse, a dimwit. The dialogue is still as flaccid as the plot is obvious. Spoiler alert for anyone who has never heard of Facebook or Mark Zuckerberg, but the mysterious stranger running around the campus in a hoodie is the company's founder!That said, Eggers did paint a portrait of a massive tech company infiltrating itself so far into all of our lives that citizens become consumers in an always-on society. The Circle, the tech company in the novel, is with us 24/7, as well as above us -- and the government. My reappraisal, however, was not initiated by news that Apple was refusing to cooperate with the federal government in its Continue reading at AdAge.com Continue reading at 'Advertising Age'
[ Advertising Age | 2016-02-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
The Wall Street Journal published a bombshell story on Tuesday about what reporters Kirsten Grind and Deepa Seetharaman call “the messy, expensive split between Facebook and WhatsApp’s founders.” The dishy piece makes for great reading. (Do the multi-billionaire founders of global communications... Continue reading at Slate
[ Slate | 2018-06-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Mark Zuckerberg is over it. Yes, Facebook allowed the data of more than 80 million users to land in the hands of a partisan political consulting firm during an obscenely contentious presidential election, but that's all in the distant past. You know,... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2018-05-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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OUP president Niko Pfund told PW that after Mark Zuckerberg’s testimony on Capitol Hill, it became clear that Siva Vaidhyanathan's book, originall scheduled for fall, "needed to be part of the conversation" now taking place. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2018-04-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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After two days of testimony on Capitol Hill, Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg wants you to know: He’s sorry — really, really sorry — about that Cambridge Analytica thing, and he’s open to some degree of internet regulation. Is he really sorry? If contrition is measured in a willingness to put on a suit... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2018-04-12 00:00:00 UTC ]
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In an interview released for the first time today, the Facebook CEO discussed privacy with Freaknonomics Radio last summer. It was a simpler time. Last summer, months before Mark Zuckerberg was feeling the intense pressure of the Cambridge Analytica data scandal, the Facebook CEO said he knew... Continue reading at Fast Company
[ Fast Company | 2018-04-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Mark Zuckerberg's terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad 2018 keeps getting worse. As people have begun downloading their Facebook data, they've found something unsettling: videos they recorded, but never published on the site. Recently, a Select/All... Continue reading at Engadget
[ Engadget | 2018-03-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The Federal Trade Commission confirmed Monday that it opened an investigation of Facebook and the Senate Judiciary Committee called on the company’s chief executive, Mark Zuckerberg, to testify as scrutiny mounts over the social media giant’s handling of user data. The unfolding crisis at... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2018-03-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Among this week's headlines: Despite another blizzard, librarians make it to PLA in Philadelphia; Mark Zuckerberg is sorry; And Congress passes a bill that critics say will harm free speech online. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2018-03-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The theme of this year's PEN World Voices Festival, "Resist and Reimagine," brings writers including Colson Whitehead, Roxane Gay, Eileen Myles, Jhumpa Lahiri, Dave Eggers, and Masha Gessen together in New York for six days in April. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2018-02-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Mark Zuckerberg has issued his annual New Year challenge to himself, and it's a big one: Fixing Facebook.The hoodie-wearing CEO, who has previously taken on learning Mandarin, reading books and visiting new parts of the country, is setting a less concrete goal in focusing on fixing important... Continue reading at Advertising Age
[ Advertising Age | 2018-01-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The music streaming service faces a claim on behalf of artists including Neil Young and Janis Joplin as it prepares a share saleMusic streaming service Spotify has been sued by a music publishing company for $1.6bn (£1.18bn), for hosting songs it allegedly doesn’t have the full rights to. The... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2018-01-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook defends itselfWhen companies place job ads on Facebook and target them to younger users, is that ageist? Non-profit news organization ProPublica and The New York Times just raised concerns about the issue, adding that Amazon, Verizon, Goldman Sachs and Facebook itself use that practice;... Continue reading at Advertising Age
[ Advertising Age | 2017-12-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Serious debate, discussion, and great books and authors await librarians at the upcoming 2018 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Denver. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2017-12-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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New York City looms large for debut novelist Hermione Hoby's main character, and on the Strick&Williams–designed book jacket. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2017-11-28 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Author Dave Eggers and illustrator Shawn Harris open this year's US and Canada #GiveBooks campaign charity for book ownership among underserved children. The post Dave Eggers and Shawn Harris kick off the 2017 US and Canada #GiveBooks Campaign appeared first on Publishing Perspectives. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives
[ Publishing Perspectives | 2017-11-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Turtles All the Way Down is best-selling author John Green's first novel since 2012's runaway success, The Fault in Our Stars. While that book tackled the issue of teens with cancer, this book centres on a protagonist suffering from anxiety and obsessive-compulsive thoughts and behaviour. Green,... Continue reading at Stuff
[ Stuff | 2017-11-04 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Lies have become alternative facts and truth irrelevant in the face of power, while we all give up our privacyIn Book 8 of The Odyssey we read that the gods weave misfortune so that later generations have something to sing about. It wasn’t a god but a conman who now leads me to describe how –... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2017-10-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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AT&T Chief Executive Randall Stephenson indicated that President Trump’s tensions with CNN should not factor into the federal government’s blessing of AT&T’s proposed $85-billion purchase of Time Warner Inc., which owns the cable news network. “I don’t know what the relevance is of CNN... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2017-10-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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The Facebook CEO points to last year’s primaries as the moment he had a “political awakening.” But do his actions—and words—reflect that? Since January, we’ve seen story after story offer speculation about whether Mark Zuckerberg will make a bid for the presidency. It won’t surprise you, then,... Continue reading at Fast Company
[ Fast Company | 2017-09-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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"It's funny, as people ask me that all the time, and I just wish I was more interesting." Min Jin Lee is talking about the similarities between herself and the main character in her 2007 debut novel, Free Food for Millionaires. Published again this month after the success earlier this year of... Continue reading at Stuff
[ Stuff | 2017-09-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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