Filterworld

New Yorker staff writer and author of The Longing for Less Kyle Chayka delivers a timely history and investigation of a world ruled by algorithms, which determine the shape of culture itself. One of Esquire's 25 Best Nonfiction Books of 2024 “[Filterworld] brings stark clarity to the formulas that guide our behaviors online…it does the near impossible: It makes algorithms, those dull formulas of inputs and outputs, fascinating.” —The Atlantic “A thought-provoking account of how Big Tech and its algorithms have rewired interests, degraded language and shaped users to ‘seek out culture that embraces nothingness.’” —The New York Times Book Review 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…