Brave New World Dept.
Can Smart Wood Help You Log Off?
The designers of a block of wood with a touch screen and an Internet connection want to help cure digital overload.
By Andrew Marantz
A Reporter at Large
Can a Machine Learn to Write for The New Yorker?
How predictive-text technology could transform the future of the written word.
By John Seabrook
Annals of Technology
How the Anthony Levandowski Indictment Helps Big Tech Stifle Innovation in Silicon Valley
Tech giants, many of which have benefitted from intellectual-property thefts but now worry that they’ll be on the wrong side of the purloiner dynamic going forward, may have found a willing enforcer in the federal government.
By Charles Duhigg
Currency
How Elizabeth Warren Came Up with a Plan to Break Up Big Tech
In March, Warren released a plan that aims to reverse what is now a nearly four-decade trend in the concentration of corporate power in the U.S. economy.
By Sheelah Kolhatkar
Dispatch
The Messy Reality of Personalized Learning
Untangling the mixed record of the latest big-fix educational trend promoted by Silicon Valley.
By E. Tammy Kim
The Political Scene Podcast
Will the Government Get Tough on Big Tech?
Sue Halpern on antitrust investigations, and why tech giants are now asking the government to regulate them.
Daily Comment
The House Judiciary Committee Considers Antitrust Law, the Tech Giants, and the Future of News
Google, Facebook, and their cousins Apple and Amazon have grown so vast that they have aroused the ire of the entire political establishment. And they aren’t only transforming journalism but also politics, retail, and virtually all commerce.
By Jeffrey Toobin
Annals of Technology
Mark Zuckerberg, Elizabeth Warren, and the Case for Regulating Big Tech
The E.U.’s Commissioner for Competition and Senator Warren see Big Tech as a threat to competition, consumer choice, and fairness in the marketplace.
By Sue Halpern
Cultural Comment
How Big Tech Built the Iron Cage
Shoshana Zuboff’s “The Age of Surveillance Capitalism” explains how a handful of companies came to dominate our lives.
By Alex Ross
Our Columnists
It’s Time to Confront the Threat of Right-Wing Terrorism
As the attack in New Zealand has shown, we are now faced, around the world, with the rise of a hateful ideology that targets minorities, glorifies violence, and thrives on social media.
By John Cassidy
Double Take
Sunday Reading: The Birth of Tech
From The New Yorker’s archive, pieces from the early days of tech culture, when going online was a novelty.
By Erin Overbey and Joshua Rothman
The New Yorker Radio Hour
Accusing R. Kelly, and the Fall of a Chinese Pop Star
A new documentary implicates the singer R. Kelly, his enablers, and even his fans, with a history of abuse allegations. And the singer Denise Ho reflects on the cost of taking a stand in China.
Annals of Technology
The Search for Anti-Conservative Bias on Google
The #StopTheBias campaign has a pernicious goal: it is yet another way for Trump and his minions to undermine the credibility of the mainstream media.
By Sue Halpern
Annals of Technology
The Friendship That Made Google Huge
Coding together at the same computer, Jeff Dean and Sanjay Ghemawat changed the course of the company—and the Internet.
By James Somers
A Reporter at Large
Did Uber Steal Google’s Intellectual Property?
Silicon Valley was built on job-hopping. But when a leader of Google’s self-driving-car unit joined Uber, Google filed suit. Now the Feds are on the case.
By Charles Duhigg
Comment
Alex Jones, the First Amendment, and the Digital Public Square
How should we challenge hate-mongering in the age of social media?
By Steve Coll