Electronic rights in a highly topical polemic that relates directly to the controversy over Facebook’s data breach continuing to make headlines around the world are still available, according to UK agency Peters, Fraser & Dunlop.
In the UK Penguin Random House imprint Ebury has brought forward publication of The People Vs Tech: How the Internet is killing democracy by Jamie Bartlett, director of the UK’s Centre for the Analysis of Social Media. Originally scheduled for 31 May it will be published in e-book on 5 April and in physical on 15 April.
The decision to bring forward publication was taken to capitalise on the publicity surrounding the use of millions of people’s data from Facebook by the US company Cambridge Analytica. The allegation is that this data was used in campaigning in the US election and in the Brexit decision in the UK.
Bartlett argues that the internet is “killing democracy” and he puts forward 20 “radical” proposals as a solution. Among them are new government policies, laws and a ‘citizen fightback’.
He believes the tension between our analogue democracy and our digital technologies has become “increasingly obvious” and is “one of the most pressing questions of our time”. He adds: “On the current trajectory, democracy won’t survive. This book sets out an alternative.”
Ebury deputy publishing director Andrew Goodfellow said the book “brilliantly anchored the overload of noise in the press, distilling the swirling debate down to what we need to know and what we can do to make change”.