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Another opportunity on Hacker News to recommend Niel Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death". Best book I've read in the last 5 years and goes deep on this issue
by DavidPiper 3y ago
Another opportunity on Hacker News to recommend Niel Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death". Best book I've read in the last 5 years and goes deep on this issue as it presented ~40 years ago with televised mass media. The books has aged pretty flawlessly - still 100% applicable to the internet age.
A few comments here revealing a core point: It is a feature, not a bug, that people don't consciously realise it's happening to them.
- zingababba 3y agoFranco Berardi has the best handle on the current phenomena IMO. "The Soul at Work", "Futurability", "And: Phenomenology of the End"... all fantastic.
- temeya 3y agoSeconding Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death," for its prescience, and I would also recommend Alfie Bown's "Candy Crush and Capitalism," as it makes a connection to how our notions of distracting ourselves acts as a way to emphasize the importance of our work, whatever it may be.