The Age of Earthquakes
A Guide to the Extreme Present
Published on 5. March 2015
Book
Paperback/Softback
256 pages
978-0-14-197956-4 (ISBN)
Description
Planet Earth needs a self-help book, and this is it
The future is happening to us far faster than we thought it would and this book explains why
Fifty years after Marshall McLuhan's ground breaking book on the influence of technology on culture The Medium is the Massage, Shumon Basar, Douglas Coupland and Hans Ulrich Obrist extend the analysis to today, touring the world that's redefined by the Internet, decoding and explaining what they call the 'extreme present'.
The Age of Earthquakes is a quick-fire paperback, harnessing the images, language and perceptions of our unfurling digital lives. The authors invent a glossary of new words to describe how we are truly feeling today; and 'mindsource' images and illustrations from over 30 contemporary artists. Wayne Daly's striking graphic design imports the surreal, juxtaposed, mashed mannerisms of screen to page. It's like a culturally prescient, all-knowing email to the reader: possibly the best email they will ever read.
Welcome to The Age of Earthquakes, a paper portrait of Now, where the Internet hasn't just changed the structure of our brains these past few years, it's also changing the structure of the planet. This is a new history of the world that fits perfectly in your back pocket.
The future is happening to us far faster than we thought it would and this book explains why
Fifty years after Marshall McLuhan's ground breaking book on the influence of technology on culture The Medium is the Massage, Shumon Basar, Douglas Coupland and Hans Ulrich Obrist extend the analysis to today, touring the world that's redefined by the Internet, decoding and explaining what they call the 'extreme present'.
The Age of Earthquakes is a quick-fire paperback, harnessing the images, language and perceptions of our unfurling digital lives. The authors invent a glossary of new words to describe how we are truly feeling today; and 'mindsource' images and illustrations from over 30 contemporary artists. Wayne Daly's striking graphic design imports the surreal, juxtaposed, mashed mannerisms of screen to page. It's like a culturally prescient, all-knowing email to the reader: possibly the best email they will ever read.
Welcome to The Age of Earthquakes, a paper portrait of Now, where the Internet hasn't just changed the structure of our brains these past few years, it's also changing the structure of the planet. This is a new history of the world that fits perfectly in your back pocket.
Reviews / Votes
Brainy book that will rock your world * Evening Standard * Absolutely amazing -- Jon Snow * Channel 4 News * An email-like, culturally-perceptive exploration of our digital realities... a mix between a dystopian modern glossary, Internet memes, multiple-choice dropdowns, mindsourced images and a fair bit of wisdom, it is a self-help book for the "last generation that will die" * AnOther Magazine * A philosophical Anarchist Cookbook for the online era, when we are in touch with everyone at once all the time, or like to feel that we are... Like Marshall McLuhan's iconic dictum "the medium is the message" or the staccato bursts of meaning of George W.S. Trow's essay-book In the Context of No Context, The Age of Earthquakes is an abstract representation of how we feel now about how we are now. It's a book insistently engaged with the present tense... Perhaps it is the 21st century's first book-meme * Pacific Standard * Many of us feel like technologies of the future are arriving too slowly, but a new philosophy-cum-modern-self-help book suggests that, in fact, it's dawning on us faster than we ever thought possible * Vice * A pocket-sized primer on our blossoming obsolescence -- Kate Sutton * Art Forum * Age of Earthquakes = panic-inducingly addictive -- Penny Martin, editor of The Gentlewoman It's a fun, visual and easy read. Verdict: In the future all books will be written this way -- Sultan Saood Al Qassimi An abstract representation of how we feel about our digital world * Hello! * I don't know about you but I would very much like a guide to this brave new world * Huck *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Dimensions
Height: 180 mm
Width: 114 mm
Thickness: 22 mm
Weight
196 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-14-197956-4 (9780141979564)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Shumon Basar | Douglas Coupland | Hans Ulrich Obrist
The Age of Earthquakes
A Guide to the Extreme Present
E-Book
03/2015
1st Edition
Penguin Books Ltd
€9.49
Available for download
Persons
Hans Ulrich Obrist is a curator and writer. Since 2006 he has been co-director of the Serpentine Gallery, London. He is the author of Ways of Curating and, with Ai Weiwei, of Ai Weiwei Speaks.