Veronika answers “Does it kind of freak you out to consider...”

Mary asked this question about The Circle (The Circle, #1):

Does it kind of freak you out to consider making comments about this book online at Goodreads, owned by Amazon? An "elevator speech" sum-up of The Circle, imho, is: Alice in Wonderland travels to Brave New World and finds it's 1984, and that's okay with her. This book has made me even more scared than I was before. Thanks, dave eggers!

Veronika Yes, actually, it does freak me out. And at the same time I am envious and think that I am a neanderthal with my smartphone and one display laptop. Wh…moreYes, actually, it does freak me out. And at the same time I am envious and think that I am a neanderthal with my smartphone and one display laptop. When I was reading about the campus and the way they worked it did seem very - well, cool. But I think from the time that book was published and now, everybody kind of evolved. Now there are not as many pages a'la "like to help the kids in wherever" and the people that measure themselves in likes, comments or followers have gone down. At least the people I know. Of course there are still some left, but not as many as before. You don't check and compare anymore. Now privacy and not owning social media accounts and buying at local markets has become "cool". So I really think there will be a balance. First the hype of new technology and then the step back. And now everybody is aware and scared of tracking and GPS and what not.

Now the thing with goodreads and amazon: Amazon has all the information about reading when you have a goodreads account. But they didn't connect it - yet. I still get recommendations for books, that I marked as "read" on goodreads, and not that many recommendations for books that I marked as "want to read". Something that would be quite helpful even. But Google, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, ... you name them are all collecting data, but don't really use it yet in a potential they could. Everybody is collecting data but the way to use all this is not as simple as they put it in this book.

And now my last piece of mind about the 1984: I honestly think it's more of a "how to get to 1984" than that it is 1984. In the circle, everyone willingly and openly gives up privacy - in 1984 they are already robbed of it and the government has all knowledge and can change the news and past as they wish. Ty mentioned exactly that at the end, that this is where it will lead, eventually. So IMO this could be considered a modern prequel of 1984. (less)

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