Survival of the Richest

April 1, 2022

A CUNY media theory and digital economics professor, Rushkoff was named one of the world's ten most influential intellectuals by MIT in 2013, which may explain why five tech billionaires invited him to a desert hideaway to explain their plans for surviving the sociopolitical apocalypse they anticipated. Mars, island bunkers, and the Metaverse--these were among the solutions they were considering, having everything to do with protecting themselves and nothing to do with protecting the rest of us. Rushkoff delineates the Silicon Valley mindset while suggesting alternatives.

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June 27, 2022
Media theorist Rushkoff (Team Human) presents a fascinating and distressing account of how the very wealthy prep for doomsday. His premise is that über-rich individuals are operating with “The Mindset,” or the belief that with enough wealth and resources, they can “insulate themselves from the damage they are creating” and survive an event that decimates the general population. Rushkoff introduces readers to the purveyor of multiple “residential farm communities for millionaires” designed to provide safety for the upper class in the future; the concept of “seasteading,” the creation of “independent, free-floating city-states” in the ocean; and “prepper construction companies” in Texas that offer million-dollar luxury bunkers outfitted with bowling allies and pools. He also argues that supposedly innovative solutions to climate change that focus on the crisis as an opportunity for continued economic growth are only going to make the rich richer at the expense of everyone else. It’s all rather intriguing, even if a couple of chapters feel somewhat tangential (one is a brief history of how the internet went from an ethos of “serving others” to a source of profits). This is an eye-popping look at some outlandish visions for the future. Agent: Mollie Glick, Creative Artists Agency.

July 15, 2022
A media theorist dismantles the tech-centric fantasies of the wealthiest people in the world. In this scathing book, Rushkoff opens with an account of a meeting he attended with five of the world's richest men, who sought his opinions on their strategies to survive an "Event" that would render the world as we know it unlivable. These men and the rest of their technocrat counterparts suffer from what Rushkoff calls "The Mindset," a worldview marked by a staunch bias toward quantifiable data and "a faith in technology to solve problems," especially the problems that those billionaires' own technologies have wrought. While digital technologies initially offered opportunities for more meaningfully connected and innovative ways of life, Rushkoff argues that the hopes were corrupted by market goals. As a result, new technologies were designed less for consumer satisfaction and more for investor profit. Another major detriment is the winner-take-all attitude among tech "innovators," who aren't interested in incremental progress as much as creating a singular invention for which they can take all the credit. However, notes the author, "these totalizing solutions perpetuate the myth that only a technocratic elite can possibly fix our problems." Rushkoff describes an interesting connection between tech billionaires and the prominence of psychedelics in tech culture, further illustrating the need of the tech elite to believe that they are singularly capable of providing the solutions humankind needs--while getting rich in the process. The idea that technology can remedy the ills that technology created is founded on a faulty belief that only what's quantifiable has value, but the "squishier" subjects and ways of thinking that explore our dignity and humanity are still important, and it is imperative we don't leave them behind. Though Rushkoff occasionally displays too evident a disdain for his subjects, he writes with knowledge and authority. The text conveys an appropriately urgent and serious message, while the closing section offers sound reason for hope and reasonable steps to take for a better future. A dense but thorough and authoritative condemnation of tech worship.

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August 1, 2022

Five billionaires asked Rushkoff (digital economics and media theory, CUNY Queens Coll.; Team Human) to speak at an event on a remote island. They wanted advice on building bunkers for an apocalyptic event. These billionaires had something that Rushkoff calls "the Mindset," an escapist belief that the wealthy and most technologically efficient can somehow leave the laws of physics and economics, and ultimately other people, behind. The author presents several examples of the Mindset, including COVID and the quarantine it necessitated. For instance, Rushkoff writes, the pandemic helped many people to justify a societal trend already in progress: isolation from others and life in a technology bubble. He cites a lot of research from news outlets, books, scholarship on technology, politics, human behavior, and sustainability to drive home his point that technology is running society. VERDICT Rushkoff's anecdotes and relatable voice will attract readers interested in technology and business, as well as those who want to know more about how wealthy tech magnates live.--Natalie Browning

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.