The Blind Giant

Nick Harkaway, author of Angelmaker, presents a rousing and energizing look at how we can meaningfully and constructively engage with technology—creating an essential handbook for anyone trying to be human in a digital age. Some say our devices will lead us to ruin: isolating us from our neighbors, warping communication, delivering an unregulated flood of information that will destroy our humanity. Some say they will be our salvation: enabling global communication and social engagement, putting all the world’s facts at our fingertips, and erasing the barriers that divide us, bringing out the best qualities of humanity. In The Blind Giant, novelist and blogger Nick Harkaway takes us on a lucid, insightful and personal tour of how we live our lives in our technology-obsessed culture. A self-described “missing link” between the pre-Internet generation and the “digital natives” who have grown up with technology, Nick is an enthusiastic guide to digital culture who weaves together examples from literature, psychology, neurology, sociology, history, and his own life while exploring the hazards and joys of the human-machine relationship. In the final analysis, whether we meaningfully engage with the machines we have created, or risk living in a world which is designed to serve computers and corporations rather than people, this book is a must-read for anyone concerned with our digital future.

The digital age. An age of isolation, warped communication, disintegrating community. Where unfiltered and unregulated information pours relentlessly into our lives, destroying what it means to be human. Or an age of marvels. Where there is a world of wonder at our fingertips. Where we can communicate across the globe, learn in the blink of an eye, pull down the barriers that divide us and move forward together. Whatever your reaction to technological culture, the speed with which our world is changing is both mesmerising and challenging. In The Blind Giant, novelist and tech blogger Nick Harkaway draws together fascinating and disparate ideas to challenge the notion that digital culture is the source of all our modern ills, while at the same time showing where the dangers are real and suggesting how they can be combated. Ultimately, the choice is ours: engage with the machines that we have created, or risk creating a world which is designed for corporations and computers rather than people. This is an essential handbook for everyone trying to be human in a digital age.

Brutality in the workplace, rage in the streets, seething in the home. The vulnerability of political parties when they've forgotten why they're there. The intellectual torpor of modern Australia. How power corrupts. The Blind Giant is Dancing is an angry and tender depiction of an idealist, Allen Fitzgerald, who becomes so embroiled in a party power struggle that he loses sight of what's at stake. When it premiered in 1983, The Blind Giant is Dancing felt like a sharp slap in the face. Now, in an age of ICAC, union credit cards, speculative housing bubbles, a pulverised working class and vapid.

Reproduction of the original: A Beacon For the Blind Being a LifeOf Henry Fawcett by Winifred Holt