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Blood in the machine : the origins of the rebellion against big tech / Brian Merchant.

Loaned to Another Library HC254.5 .M47 2023
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Format:
Book
Author/Creator:
Merchant, Brian, author.
Language:
English
Subjects (All):
Industrial revolution--Great Britain.
Industrial revolution.
Industrialization--Great Britain.
Industrialization.
Technology and civilization.
Technology--Social aspects--Great Britain.
Technology.
Artificial intelligence--Forecasting.
Artificial intelligence.
Physical Description:
xxiii, 465 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm
Edition:
First edition.
Place of Publication:
New York : Little, Brown and Company, 2023.
Summary:
"The true story of the first time machines came for human jobs--and how the Luddite uprising explains the power, threat, and toll of big tech today"--Dust jacket flap.
The most urgent story in modern tech begins not in Silicon Valley but two hundred years ago in rural England, when workers known as the Luddites rose up rather than starve at the hands of factory owners who were using automated machines to erase their livelihoods. The Luddites organized guerrilla raids to smash those machines--on punishment of death--and won the support of Lord Byron, enraged the Prince Regent, and inspired the birth of science fiction. This all-but-forgotten class struggle brought nineteenth-century England to its knees. Today, technology imperils millions of jobs, robots are crowding factory floors, and artificial intelligence will soon pervade every aspect of our economy. How will this change the way we live? And what can we do about it? The answers lie in Blood in the Machine. Brian Merchant intertwines a lucid examination of our current age with the story of the Luddites, showing how automation changed our world--and is shaping our future.
Contents:
Power looms
The great coment
Metropolis of discontent
Breaking frames, breaking bones
More value than work or gold
The modern Prometheus
The owners of the new machine age.
Notes:
Includes bibliographical references (pages 417-453) and index.
ISBN:
9780316487740
0316487740
OCLC:
1389775757

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