James Bridle, NUOVA ERA OSCURA, 2019

The Internet, the network and digital technologies should have illuminated the world: instead, they have led to a dark pit in which conspiracy theories, mass surveillance, crisis of thought and environmental catastrophes are rampant. But how was it possible that instruments with such great potential finally led us to the threshold of a new dark era, a real digital Middle Ages dominated by increasingly lacerating inequalities and lack of understanding of the world around us?

From political fake news to financial flash crashes, from science failures to disturbing children’s videos produced by Youtube algorithms, James Bridle leads us through the nightmares of a present in which the worst is yet to come, to help us understand that only by getting rid of the dogmas of the past can we hope for a future of justice and sharing.

James Bridle is an expert in technology, writer, journalist and visual artist. He writes for the Guardian, l’Observer, Wired, Frieze, Atlantic and many other magazines.