Monday, July 6, 2015

[Review] The Circle by Dave Eggers

Title: The Circle
Author: Dave Eggers
Publisher: Knopf
Published: October 8th, 2013
Page: 508p
ISBN: 9780385351393
Borrow from Astrid Lim

First of all, I should say that this isn’t just a normal book review, but this is going to be a campaign, because the idea in this story cause an extreme fear within me that I hope will not going to happen in the real world. For that, I hate most part of this book, the part when the author drives me crazy to know the end of the story. But he also gave me a warning about what could happen in the future with the innovation of technology. Our future could become something terrifying.

Mae Holland got hired by the Circle, the most powerful internet company of the world. I portrayed it like a Google. The workplace has so many enchanting things that makes Mae and me as a reader felt so excited, and performance not only being measured by how good Mae did her job but also how often he participated in the community on the workplace. Yes, the circle has a concept of balancing between the technical job and our life as a human being. Mae was so thankful to Annie, her best friend and one of the top 40 people at the company, who gave her this opportunity. She began in the customer experience and she has a good performance in her first week and soon will getting notice from many more people at the circle which led her to become one of the ambassador of the circle transparancy idea, the beginning of the problem.

Previously, Mae has a bad job and she hates it, so being one of the circle employee, which is she thought working at the centre of the world, encourage her to do more for the company and it changes her slowly from the inside. Talking about the transparancy idea, she was agreed to wear some kind of camera everyday. So everyone from all over the world can watch her movement, see from her eyes and listen to everything she heard or said, even gave a feedback comment real time. Mae enjoys doing it, but it took her family and friends away, because they’re not comfortable with it. Mae has active online life, millions followers, but she lost privacy, for her privacy is a theft and everyone has a right to know everything.  Along with that, the author also presented a story about Mae personal interest and struggle with her family and herself, even with some other guy.

The basic idea, Dave Eggers presented in this book was very possible to become a reality. It scarces me that social media and the internet took away our personal life, our options and invaded our privacy. Don’t get me wrong, I am not a traditional people who hates technology. I studied information technology and still working at the same field for years now. But I think there should be a limitation, a clear and bold line between technology and us. Some task is better be done without technology. Dave Eggers portrayed a battle between conventional world and a totally new world driving by a super power technology leader, the intersection where we are now. Can you imagine being watched every second in your life by a total stranger?  

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Under Category "Something Borrowed"

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