Traffic: Genius, Rivalry, and Delusion in the Billion-Dollar Race

Ben Smith

1,354 ratings by Goodreads

Language: English

Published by Penguin Putnam Inc, 2023

0593299752 / 9780593299753

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Seller: World of Books (was SecondSale), Montgomery, IL, U.S.A.World of Books (was SecondSale)

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If attention is the new oil, Ben Smith's Traffic is the story of the time between the first gusher and the perceptible impact of climate change. The curtain opens in Soho in the early 2000s, after the first dot-com crash but before Google, Apple, and Facebook exploded, when it seemed that New York City, rather than Silicon Valley, might become tech's center of gravity. There, within a few square blocks, Nick Denton's merry band of nihilists at his growing Gawker empire and Jonah Peretti's sunnier team at HuffPost and BuzzFeed were building the foundations of viral internet media. It was tech's age of innocence: The old establishment might have been discredited by the Iraq War, but digital news would empower the spread of truth. After all, didn't the progressive internet get Barack Obama elected? Ben Smith, who would go on to earn a controversial reputation as BuzzFeed's editor in chief, was there to see it, and he chronicles it all with marvelous lucidity underscored by dark wit, sparing no one - and certainly not himself. Smith tells a nuanced story: Yes, Denton's ideology of radical transparency was problematic, but at least he had an ideology. Jonah Peretti survived long after Denton's Gawker perished because his focus on clicks was relentlessly content-agnostic, but unintended consequences began to snowball. Traffic explores one of the great ironies of our time: The internet, which was going to help the left remake the world in its image, has become the motive force of right populism. People like Steve Bannon and Andrew Breitbart and Chris Poole, the creator of 4chan, all initially seemed like minor characters in the narrative in which Nick, Jonah, and crew were the stars. But today, any reasonable observer might wonder if the opposite wasn't the case. To understand how we got here, Traffic is essential and enthralling reading.

Seller Inventory # 00071398541

Title
Traffic: Genius, Rivalry, and Delusion in the Billion-Dollar Race
Author
Ben Smith
Publisher
Penguin Putnam Inc
Publication year
2023
Condition
Good
Binding
Hardback
Language
English
ISBN 10
0593299752
ISBN 13
9780593299753

World of Books (was SecondSale)

Montgomery, IL, U.S.A.

5-star seller

AbeBooks seller since December 20, 2007

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Founded in 2002, World of Books is a leading online destination for buying and selling both preloved and new books, committed to making sustainable reading accessible to all. With a mission to help people read more and waste less, World of Books offers a huge range of affordable, high-quality books — giving both new and preloved titles a second life. The company also operates World of Books – Sell Your Books, an easy-to-use platform that allows customers to trade in unwanted books for cash, helping to keep books in circulation while promoting sustainability. As a Certified B Corp, World of Books is driven by a vision to become the world’s largest and most sustainable dedicated online bookstore. The company measures its success through the positive environmental impact it creates, the value it provides to customers, and its ability to operate profitably while supporting its sustainable mission

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