Other Books By The Author Of Filterworld How Algorithms Flattened Culture
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Filterworld
From New Yorker staff writer and author of The Longing for Less Kyle Chayka comes a timely history and investigation of a world ruled by algorithms, which determine the shape of culture itself. From trendy restaurants to city grids, to TikTok and Netflix feeds the world round, algorithmic recommendations dictate our experiences and choices. The algorithm is present in the familiar neon signs and exposed brick of Internet cafes, be it in Nairobi or Portland, and the skeletal, modern furniture of Airbnbs in cities big and small. Over the last decade, this network of mathematically determined decisions has taken over, almost unnoticed—informing the songs we listen to, the friends with whom we stay in touch—as we’ve grown increasingly accustomed to our insipid new normal. This ever-tightening web woven by algorithms is called “Filterworld.” Kyle Chayka shows us how online and offline spaces alike have been engineered for seamless consumption, becoming a source of pervasive anxiety in the process. Users of technology have been forced to contend with data-driven equations that try to anticipate their desires—and often get them wrong. What results is a state of docility that allows tech companies to curtail human experiences—human lives—for profit. But to have our tastes, behaviors, and emotions governed by computers, while convenient, does nothing short of call the very notion of free will into question. In Filterworld, Chayka traces this creeping, machine-guided curation as it infiltrates the furthest reaches of our digital, physical, and psychological spaces. With algorithms increasingly influencing not just what culture we consume, but what culture is produced, urgent questions arise: What happens when shareability supersedes messiness, innovation, and creativity—the qualities that make us human? What does it mean to make a choice when the options have been so carefully arranged for us? Is personal freedom possible on the Internet? To the last question, Filterworld argues yes—but to escape Filterworld, and even transcend it, we must first understand it.
What Algorithms Want
The gap between theoretical ideas and messy reality, as seen in Neal Stephenson, Adam Smith, and Star Trek. We depend on—we believe in—algorithms to help us get a ride, choose which book to buy, execute a mathematical proof. It's as if we think of code as a magic spell, an incantation to reveal what we need to know and even what we want. Humans have always believed that certain invocations—the marriage vow, the shaman's curse—do not merely describe the world but make it. Computation casts a cultural shadow that is shaped by this long tradition of magical thinking. In this book, Ed Finn considers how the algorithm—in practical terms, “a method for solving a problem”—has its roots not only in mathematical logic but also in cybernetics, philosophy, and magical thinking. Finn argues that the algorithm deploys concepts from the idealized space of computation in a messy reality, with unpredictable and sometimes fascinating results. Drawing on sources that range from Neal Stephenson's Snow Crash to Diderot's Encyclopédie, from Adam Smith to the Star Trek computer, Finn explores the gap between theoretical ideas and pragmatic instructions. He examines the development of intelligent assistants like Siri, the rise of algorithmic aesthetics at Netflix, Ian Bogost's satiric Facebook game Cow Clicker, and the revolutionary economics of Bitcoin. He describes Google's goal of anticipating our questions, Uber's cartoon maps and black box accounting, and what Facebook tells us about programmable value, among other things. If we want to understand the gap between abstraction and messy reality, Finn argues, we need to build a model of “algorithmic reading” and scholarship that attends to process, spearheading a new experimental humanities.
The Business of Television
In this expanded and updated second edition, esteemed television executive and Harvard lecturer Ken Basin offers a comprehensive and readable overview of the business, financial, and legal structure of the U.S. television industry, as well as its deal-making norms. The Business of Television explores the basic structure and recent history of the television and streaming business, rights and talent negotiations, intellectual property, backend deals, licensing, international production, and much more. This expanded and updated second edition also features an in-depth exploration of the evolution of the streaming business, offers valuable new insights about negotiation, reflects the historic impacts of the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic and 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, addresses the intersection of artificial intelligence technology and intellectual property law, and provides a greater breadth and depth of technical material about a wide variety of common television deals. The book also includes breakdowns after each chapter summarizing major deal terms and points of negotiation, a significantly expanded glossary, an extensive list of referenced articles and cases, and a wealth of real-world examples to help readers put the material into context. Written for a diverse audience of working or aspiring creative professionals, executives, agents, managers, lawyers, and students, The Business of Television is the definitive reference guide for the ever-changing television industry.