{"id":206,"date":"2025-04-20T15:38:32","date_gmt":"2025-04-20T15:38:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/?p=206"},"modified":"2025-04-20T18:10:33","modified_gmt":"2025-04-20T18:10:33","slug":"books-the-algorithm-hates-and-you-should-probably-read-anyway","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/2025\/04\/20\/books-the-algorithm-hates-and-you-should-probably-read-anyway\/","title":{"rendered":"Books the Algorithm Hates (and You Should Probably Read Anyway)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

How to become ungovernable by reading slow, deep, thoughtful things<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"six
Books about the algorithm <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

________________________________________
1. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism by Shoshana Zuboff<\/em><\/strong>
Why it gets buried<\/em>: Too long. Too true. Too terrifying. Also, it uses big words and makes tech bros uncomfortable.
Buy here (affiliated link)<\/a>
________________________________________
2. Filterworld: How Algorithms Make Everything the Same by Kyle Chayka<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why it gets buried<\/em>:<\/em> Algorithms flatten culture, reduce complexity, and quietly decide what we get to see.
Why it belongs:<\/em> If you\u2019ve ever wondered why the weird stuff doesn\u2019t go viral anymore ~ this is the answer.
Buy here (affiliated)<\/em><\/a>
________________________________________
3. The Twittering Machine by Richard Seymour<\/em><\/strong>
Why it gets buried<\/em>: It’s about how we\u2019re all trapped in a loop of doom-scrolling for meaning.
Buy here, (affiliated link)<\/a>
________________________________________
4. Stolen Focus: Why You Can\u2019t Pay Attention by Johann Hari<\/em><\/strong>
Why it gets buried<\/em>: It points at tech, capitalism, and our own bad habits. No one wants to admit that.
Buy here, (affiliated link)<\/a>
________________________________________
5. Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology by Neil Postman<\/em><\/strong>
Why it gets buried<\/em>: Old-school but prescient. Doesn’t praise innovation for innovation’s sake.
Buy here, (affiliated link)<\/a>
________________________________________
6. You Are Not a Gadget by Jaron Lanier<\/em><\/strong>
Why it gets buried<\/em>: The guy helped build the digital world, and now he\u2019s like \u201cactually this might be bad.\u201d
Buy here, (affiliated link)<\/a>
________________________________________

If you want to resist the algorithm, start by reading the stuff it ignores. Then talk about it somewhere the algorithm isn\u2019t watching (yet).
________________________________________<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And here’s a bonus article written by a real writer Max Read<\/a> (and not a tired bookseller cobbling links together for clicks) about the second book in the list Filterworld: How Algorithms Make Everything the Same by Kyle Chayka<\/em><\/strong><\/a>. There are some other links to some other good books and blogs on there too,

Affiliate links help support small bookshops and independent creators. If you purchase through the above links, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you ~ and it helps me keep my bookshop open. Many thanks for your support. You can also search anything on Amazon here<\/a> and that might score me a sip of coffee \ud83d\ude09
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you want to resist the algorithm, start by reading the stuff it ignores. Then talk about it somewhere the algorithm isn\u2019t watching (yet).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[64,63,70,5,73,68,74,71,76,75,67,72,69,65],"class_list":["post-206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-non-fiction","tag-algorithm","tag-algorithms","tag-attention","tag-books","tag-capitalism","tag-culture","tag-data","tag-focus","tag-media","tag-social","tag-surveillance","tag-tech","tag-technocracy","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":222,"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206\/revisions\/222"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borderbooks.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}