Against the Machine: Being Human in the Age of the Electronic Mob

by Lee Siegel

book data

76 ratings, 3.11 average rating, 34 reviews (more data...)

rating	frequency	%
5		10%
4		31%
3		27%
2		18%
1		11%

edit

published

January 22nd 2008 by Spiegel & Grau

binding

Hardcover, 192 pages

isbn

0385522657 (isbn13: 9780385522656)

description

From the author hailed by the New York Times Book Review for his “drive-by brilliance” and dubbed by the New York Times Magazine as “one of the countr

...more

find at: Amazon | Half.com | Barnes & Noble | compare prices ($10.00)…

new topic
discuss this book

topics	posts	views	last activity
Worth a skim, some interesting commentary	1	7	03/11/2008 02:53PM

friend reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

lists with this book

The Daily Show Reading Club

26 books | 19 voters

More lists...

other reviews (showing 1-20 of 176)

sort: default (?) | date
filters: all | text-only

03/12/08

womanimal rated it:

Read in March, 2008

Despite its compelling title and slew of vehement arguments, Against the Machine doesn’t really deliver. Lee Siegel, a prolific author and cultural critic, adopts the premise that all Internet interactions, whether via online marketplaces or social networking sites, equate to commercial transactions. He argues that the Internet extends capitalism into our most intimate moments, reducing all participants to “prosumers” whose leisure time is dominated by the continuous urge to create and con...more

Like this review? yes (1 person liked it)

add a comment

03/01/08

Tom rated it:

Read in April, 2008

recommends it for: nobody

Boring neo-luddite polemic. There are a few interesting ideas here, but nothing is well researched if researched at all. Instead of being thoughtfully critical of (what Siegel calls) the "Internet Boosters", he is instead malicious and insulting - with the result that he comes off more as a spoiled child than a cultural critic. There is so much in this book ranging from the ill-thought-out to the just-plain-wrong that I could have written volumes in response, but in the end I felt li...more

Like this review? yes (1 person liked it)

add a comment

02/10/08

R.John rated it:

bookshelves: nonfiction

Read in February, 2008

recommends it for: Readers 2.0

The polemic that the internet equals commerce is hardly new, nor are the glances at examples Siegel trots out. His points, all important and valid, are tainted by their own obviousness. Where the critique could have gone deeper, he instead, seems poised to jump feet first into the superficiality of the raging debate. Instead of countering the internet cheerleaders with something philosophically devastating, he is content to offer a tongue lashing - ultimately falling prey to all the same pratfal...more

Like this review? yes (1 person liked it)

1 comment

03/11/09

Chris rated it:

Siegel mounts a bracing and effective critique of the Internet, web culture and its attendant effects (which he sees as largely negative) on our popular culture and democracy. In many respects, Siegel's argument updates and extends the critique of "market populism" developed by Thomas Frank and other writers associated with the political/cultural journal The Baffler in the 1990s, a time in which high-flying dot.com utopians appropriated the language of democracy, liberation, and revolu...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/28/08

Charles rated it:

bookshelves: currently-reading

I read the New York Times review and was intrigued -- a critic looking at the "dark side" of the Internet and the blogosphere -- I'm in the middle of it, and agreeing mostly, but also wishing he'd make the points stronger. I think the Internet is a wonderful technology, but not ever one can use it well -- like not every one is a good driver. The car is good technology, but it can also kill in the wrong hands. I think I'm a Luddite in some respects. More anon.

Like this review? yes (1 person liked it)

add a comment

04/05/09

Rashaan rated it:

bookshelves: academics--textbooks---pedagogy-, non-fiction

Lee Siegel raises excellent critical theories about our latest and greatest tool, though much of the text seems to veer into personal rant. Some of his finer points include:

Like the car, the Internet has been made out to be a miracle of social and personal transformation when it is really a marvel of convenience--and in this case of the Internet, a marvel of convenience that has caused a social and personal upheaval. As with the car, the highly arbitrary way in which the Internet has evo

...more Lee Siegel raises excellent critical theories about our latest and greatest tool, though much of the text seems to veer into personal rant. Some of his finer points include:

Like the car, the Internet has been made out to be a miracle of social and personal transformation when it is really a marvel of convenience--and in this case of the Internet, a marvel of convenience that has caused a social and personal upheaval. As with the car, the highly arbitrary way in which the Internet has evolved has been portrayed as inevitable and inexorable.

Including scathing critiques against the rampant "self expression" that he insists tyrannize the web:

But self-expression is not the same thing as imagination. 'Self expression' is one of those big, baggy terms bulging with lots of cultural change and cultural history to the point where it gestures toward a kind of general meaning without expressing a particular one.

Siegel steps in as Cassandra warning us of the dangers of an insulated "Youniverse" where personal instant gratification is the rule of the day. His most enlightening observation, how digital technology is currently changing our language and perception of the world:

We have undergone a complete 'transvaluation of values,' the phrase that the German philosopher Fredrich Nietzsche used to describe the process by which a new way of looking at the world slops into our familiar outlook. Nietzsche believed that Christianity, for example, had 'transvalued' earlier pagan and aristocratic values of heroism, power, and fame into meekness, humility, and eternal life. The early Christians did this while retaining pagan vocabulary, so that Jesus was still a "prince" and God as "mighty" as any Roman emperor; God's realm was as much a 'kingdom' as that of Nero. But although the former vocabulary remained, the new values had an entirely different meaning.

In this digital revolution, at the dawn of the Informization Age, as Mike Davis noted in a recent interview with Bill Moyers, like Obama, we can't see the Grand Canyon. Davis recalls the first Western explorers were unable to comprehend the magnitude of America's vast earthly chasm, at the time of its Western discovery, we simply did not have the technology to measure it and certainly could not fathom the grandness of it.
http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/032020...
Today, we use capitalist terms and concepts to conceive this new digital horizon before us. We scramble to gain perspective as the landscape transforms underneath our feet.

My Composition students appreciated turning the technology on its head. Most of my freshman were weaned on digital waves, so they appreciated hearing his skepticism, though many complained that Siegel's argument inclined towards repetition and, like most literary arguments, he leads us to a solution-less, and therefore, anti-climactic conclusion. Which makes me wonder why we, as writers, can't do more than pose great critical ideas. Must we always linger in the haze of abstraction? If we're going to pose a problem, shouldn't we bother to conceive a viable solution? Nevertheless, the text generated excellent and engaged discussions--what more can a teacher ask for? (less)

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/03/09

Justin rated it:

Read in January, 2009

Most reviews of this book sound like people had an idea of what the book was going to be about before reading it, and kept it up until they read it. And then they made the same judgments afterward.

He's not as old-man-get-off-my-lawn as people claim him to be. He's a bit grumpy, but I think his disdain for the worthless tripe on the net (and on most media, for that matter) is justified. He makes a decent case for it.

He is a bit of a snob, but it'd be hard to write this book wi...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

10/06/08

S added it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

This book was really different from normal books I read, was also a suggested book from a friend of mine that reads more counter-culture books then I do which helps explain a few things. Not to mention I'm more for the machine then against like the author Lee Siegel, but you should always try to see more then your view of a subject.
The book is about the internet age and how it is changing and effecting everything. Being titled 'Against the Machine' should help point out he's not looking for...more This book was really different from normal books I read, was also a suggested book from a friend of mine that reads more counter-culture books then I do which helps explain a few things. Not to mention I'm more for the machine then against like the author Lee Siegel, but you should always try to see more then your view of a subject.
The book is about the internet age and how it is changing and effecting everything. Being titled 'Against the Machine' should help point out he's not looking for the positive changes, but more of the negative ones. Some of his points are quite right I feel, concepts like how the internet is making the images of 'cool' a more and bigger part of life which isn't a good thing I feel. While I am aware that popularity has always been apart of life no matter the time, it has become bigger and more widespread of an issue. 20 years ago if you did something embarrassing you could leave somewhere and start over again. Yes this would be a major thing, but you could at least have a fresh start as long as it wasn't a criminal issue. But now it's not always that simple with people like 'the Star Wars kid' and Andrew "Don't Tase Me, Bro" amongst others. These people can't hide from this since it's all over the internet and there isn't many places to hide.
On the other side of the problem though is he does mention things that I just don't agree with, one being about the usage and mis-usage of Wikipedia. Siegel made a pseudo-argument about Wikipedia against the encyclopedia Britannica and how the Britannica was written by professors and other such people. The biggest problem was that first he tried to play both sides when he is obviously against it which makes it hard for him to see any good since Wikipedia can be altered. The problem is that the Britannica doesn't help with many pop-culture like subjects. Look up something like Internet Viral Video Stars and the Britannica will lead you to find out your on crack and no such thing exists, but Wikipedia will explain it. Yes the Britannica was written by professional people of higher education but that is no reason that I should feel that they would have all the answers and be able to dictate what I should and should not know. Wikipedia will help in subjects from the well known to the obscure and sometimes you really do need to know something lesser known at times.
All in all a interesting read with some good points, but he tries to make it like a debate with only his view point and not enough effort to tackle to subject beyond his own views(less)

Like this review? yes

add a comment

08/18/08

Martin rated it:

Read in September, 2008

After reading an awful lot lately about the economic and cultural significance of life in the digital age (boosterism), I picked this little diddy up at the library recently in an attempt to get an opposing viewpoint. I mean, Lee Siegel IS one of the most important cultural critics in American today...it says so right there on the dust jacket!

I cannot speak to Mr Sigel's significance in the realm of cultural criticism - I'm not sure if I have ever run across (though I probably have ...more After reading an awful lot lately about the economic and cultural significance of life in the digital age (boosterism), I picked this little diddy up at the library recently in an attempt to get an opposing viewpoint. I mean, Lee Siegel IS one of the most important cultural critics in American today...it says so right there on the dust jacket!

I cannot speak to Mr Sigel's significance in the realm of cultural criticism - I'm not sure if I have ever run across (though I probably have at some point without realizing it) any of his writing for Slate, The New Republic, Harper's or The Atlantic; though I do have some fuzzy memory of some hubub about his posing as an anonymous poster in the comments section of the New Republic website (which he mentions in the introduction here) offering up defenses of himself against vitriolic (anonymous) comments regarding an article he had written. Or something of the sort.

Anyway, all of this considered, and using this book as my main reference point, I just wish he was a better writer.

The prose in this book comes off as stale and whiny, and this has nothing to do with whether you agree or disagree with the content. Siegel does make some valid points about the dangers of completely giving over our lives to the digital realm at the risk of narrowing our viewpoints, deluding ourselves with consenting opinions, and losing our public personas and identity...not to mention our social communication skills.
Some of his arguments made me think about things in a slightly different way, but they did not, on the whole, really challenge me intellectually. Isn't that part of what a "cultural critic" is supposed to do? And no, I'm not really *that* smart.

Overall, what I took from this book is a few ideas that I might not have considered before, or might have forgotten to consider, and that I suppose is a good thing. But I think the arguments could have been much more convincing if they did not suffer from a sometimes bland and confusing ramble of writing. He spends an awful lot of time poking sticks at so called internet prophets and profiteers without offering any sort of engaging or coherent rebuttal. I found myself at times just wishing he was better at making his point, at least when I could figure out what said point was amidst all the noise.

-m

(less)

Like this review? yes

add a comment

04/01/08

Scot rated it:

A prophet, crying in the wilderness, warns us of the transvaluation of human experience, focus on self, and loss of knowledge (understanding as opposed to available information) occuring as a result of the burgeoning of the Internet, specifically the much-lauded Web 2.0 revolution. This piece is at sometimes a sermon, at others an eloquent reflective essay, and still at others a lament, with bristling anger barely concealed. Evidence is often scanty, but I am drawn to the important reflexive p...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

02/28/08

Sophia rated it:

bookshelves: 2008, borrowed, nonfiction

Read in March, 2008

I was intrigued by this book when the author was interviewed on the Daily Show because, after almost ten years of very extensive involvement in internet communities, I've started to become uneasy not so much with the commercialization of the media but of the anonymity he speaks about. I find, on the whole, that people are willing to say appalling things when they don't have to attach their own names to it, especially when they don't have to respond in a real-time, face to face confrontation but ...more I was intrigued by this book when the author was interviewed on the Daily Show because, after almost ten years of very extensive involvement in internet communities, I've started to become uneasy not so much with the commercialization of the media but of the anonymity he speaks about. I find, on the whole, that people are willing to say appalling things when they don't have to attach their own names to it, especially when they don't have to respond in a real-time, face to face confrontation but can instead take their time and avoid open conflict.

All of which seemed to be what the author was going to discuss... but I got nearly halfway through before being bored to tears by his discussion of a number of entrepreneurs and thinkers whose ideas date from the dotcom boom, thus being almost completely irrelevant today given the fast pace of e-business. Worse, his "discussion" involved nothing more than a string of critiques, leaving it up to the reader to figure out what his own position might be in a vacuum rather than merely in response to other thinkers' positions.

His introduction confirmed what I suspected; he's approached the internet from a professional writer's point of view a generation ahead of this reader born in 1981, and so he's coming from a powerful outsider's position in which he's accustomed to having a much more lopsided interaction with his readers. When he related having created what we'd refer to as a "sockpuppet" to reply anonymously in his own defense to some (admittedly vile) detractors commenting on his columns I knew we were in trouble -- he apparently saw nothing shady about this at the time, whereas in the communities I'm used to your identity is your greatest currency, a reputation to be polished and added to, and diluting it with anonymous comments of your own is disingenuous to say the least.

His descriptions of the impact of the internet on modern life did resonate with me to some degree, especially the concept of using the same interface to access many spheres of interaction, from shopping to dating to porn-searching to emailing to... book-reviewing. I find that I need to establish discrete identities in different areas of the internet, and the bleedover can be disorienting. However this was just one bright spot in a sea of rather uninteresting (and uninformed, to some degree) arguments, so I ended up putting this one down.

Furthermore I've seen more informed and worthwhile commentary along these lines in the communities I mentioned above, which was enough to render this book as a kind of sidenote from an outsider not versed in real internet interaction.(less)

Like this review? yes

add a comment

03/27/09

Douglas rated it:

I'm cursed at the moment. This book tosses out phrases like "hermetic" and "couched in the rational and rationalizing..."

The point of the book is that technology drives us to our mob behavior. Not like this point hasn't been made for centuries (anyone read the Edmund Burke book I liked?), and the notion that changing social mores result from process & technological changes (anyone read Plato's Republic).

But rarely has so little been said with so many w...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

06/19/09

Jricket rated it:

Read in June, 2009

Good title; mediocre book. Many quotes about what other famous & semi-famous people have thought about the Internet and computers, but no real original thoughts and no main theme spelling out what he thinks about the subject or where he thinks it's all taking us. I didn't finish it because I reached a point where I felt there were better things to do with my time. Maybe someone who is relatively new to the web and technology would appreciate it more.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

12/01/08

Molly rated it:

Read in December, 2008

recommends it for: people who question the popularity of things like YouTube and American Idol

Siegel is a little too reactionary for my taste, and I have to wonder if he's had some problematic personal encounters with Malcolm Gladwell... but those issues aside, it's the sort of extended essay on possible negative effects of the Internet that I've been wanting to read for a long time. He succeeds in his mission, as long as you manage to ignore the occasional bouts of self-indulgent stodginess on Siegel's part.

Like this review? yes

add a comment

01/30/08

Dmitry rated it:

I agree with all the conclusions of the book, but consider its argument fatally flawed. Yes, there's nothing good on the Internet, but Siegel's accusations--it's too commercial, too puerile, too crass, and the writing sucks--doesn't begin to deal with the problem. After all, every one of those charges can equally apply to publishing, comics, TV, theater, music and movies. Theodore Sturgeon said that 90 percent of everything is shit, and he was too generous. The problem with the Internet, is ...more

Like this review? yes

5 comments

02/12/08

Sarah rated it:

A great critique of internet culture...what people think is the hallmark of "freedom" and "choice" is really more corporate conformism, packaged in the guise of a revolution. A few great quotes:
"For what this new religion of information has done is pretend that information now has the power of knowledge. In the process, knowledge has been devalued into information."
"It is knowledge that gives us our ethical and historical bearings, and knowledge als...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

05/28/08

Mia rated it:

Read in June, 2008

Many excellent points beginning from old questions. Why do we idolize machines and the new? How does a technology change an epistemology? Why (o Karl) have we turned things into fetishes and people into things? And are we suffering from whiplash, just now, having embraced the internet in 10-some years when it took the printing press 300 years to make it from the rooms of scholars to those of readers? Also: what's the dealie with anonymous internet shit talking, stalking, living-through-screens e...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

04/21/08

Nick rated it:

Read in April, 2008

It is a shame that the important, true things that Lee Siegel argues in this book are obscured by his all out attack on the Internet's down side which does not recognize that for every rude, self-serving, ill-informed blog there is a reasoned opinion elsewhere on line; for every source of misinformation there is an authoritative source of solid fact; and so on. Siegel can be infuriating, silly or simply wrong, but that should not stop anyone who uses the Internet from reading his book carefully...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

06/20/08

Leah rated it:

Read in July, 2008

Ugh, I wish this book was worth it enough to write more here than "soooo lame." Emphasis on the trailing vowels there. Seriously--I was hoping that reading this would give me a better argument to back up why I don't really like most elements of Web 2.0, text messaging, or anything else that I'm supposed to be going wild about. Nope, not here. I think the word that comes to mind when reading this might be "crankypants" or "fuddy-duddy". It almost makes me want t...more

Like this review? yes

add a comment

03/12/08

Nomi rated it:

bookshelves: nonfiction

Read in March, 2008

If you're looking to have your mind blown via the nonfiction counterpart to a William Gibson novel don't bother. This author fully embodies the captain obvious persona...(Wait a minute-The internet isn't really healthy and "social"? the internet has redefined commerce/business with its language of laissez faire/independent spiritedness and simultaneous claim to new agey "community building"? Has this author not been exposed to any cultural criticism over the last 10 years?

Like this review? yes

add a comment

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 next »

recent status updates | recommend it | blog it

combine
other editions

None found

quotes from this book

"Mandel, who died in 1995, had mastered the art of packaging his interiority, an innovation that would become the driving engine behind Web culture." More quotes...