MIT Press Live! presents an author talk with Jathan Sadowski & Meredith Broussard.
Learn more about Too Smart
Smart technology is everywhere: smart umbrellas that light up when rain is in the forecast; smart cars that relieve drivers of the drudgery of driving; smart toothbrushes that send your dental hygiene details to the cloud. Nothing is safe from smartification. In Too Smart, Jathan Sadowski looks at the proliferation of smart stuff in our lives and asks whether the tradeoff—exchanging our personal data for convenience and connectivity—is worth it. Who benefits from smart technology?
Learn more about Artificial Unintelligence
In Artificial Unintelligence, Meredith Broussard argues that our collective enthusiasm for applying computer technology to every aspect of life has resulted in a tremendous amount of poorly designed systems. We are so eager to do everything digitally—hiring, driving, paying bills, even choosing romantic partners—that we have stopped demanding that our technology actually work. Broussard, a software developer and journalist, reminds us that there are fundamental limits to what we can (and should) do with technology. With this book, she offers a guide to understanding the inner workings and outer limits of technology—and issues a warning that we should never assume that computers always get things right.
About the authors
Jathan Sadowski is a Research Fellow in the Emerging Technologies Research Lab at Monash University.
Meredith Broussard is an Assistant Professor at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University. A former features editor at the Philadelphia Inquirer and software developer at AT&T Bell Labs and the MIT Media Lab, she has written articles and essays for the Atlantic, Harper’s, Slate, the Washington Post, and other publications.