The Age of Extraction: How Tech Platforms Conquered the Economy and Threaten Our Future Prosperity

One of the world's foremost exponents of anti-monopoly law explains how Big Tech is strangling our economies and how to stop it Today's tech platforms are some of history's most advanced tools for extracting as much as possible - data, attention, profit-margins - from everyone else. As they become essential, we are at risk of building an economy that is perpetually unfair for much of humanity. Places and spaces where people can exchange information and goods have been at the heart of every economy and every civilization in history, but today's global platforms - as provided by Amazon, Google, Apple, Meta and others - are different- instead of providing value they extract it, creating vast disparities in wealth and power between the haves and have-nots. For the first time in history, we have the ability to create sustainable prosperity for all, but currently that wealth is concentrated in a tiny number of hands. It isn't abundance that's the problem; it is distribution. In this brilliantly engaging, frequently surprising account, Tim Wu, one of the world's foremost experts on anti-monopoly law, draws on fascinating case studies in the history of technology's explosive rise to demonstrate emphatically that breaking monopolies will ultimately unleash creativity and growth - and reduce the vast inequality that inevitably leads to social upheaval and political chaos. Wu also sets out an alternative blueprint that preserves the economic flourishing that platforms catalyze, allowing tech platforms to play a major role in creating and sustaining an economic model of prosperity not just for the few but for the many.

About the Author :
Tim Wu is Julius Silver Professor of Law, Science and Technology at Columbia Law School. He worked in the White House as special assistant to President Biden for technology and competition policy, and is the author of The Master Switch and The Attention Merchants. He currently splits his time between New York City and Oxford.

Review :
Tim Wu is a titan in the world of competition policy in digital markets … [His] record of insight, indeed prescience, makes his new book, The Age of Extraction, a must read A manual to the oligarchic takeover of the internet as well as the broader economy that now depends upon it . . . [whose] proposed solutions for fixing the internet provide hope, not least because of how simple they are The paradox of the platform: without middlemen, we’d all be stuck, but those same middlemen are forever working to declare themselves to be our bosses. Wu’s characteristically insightful book cuts to the core of these world-consuming, usurping enshittifiers, and tells us how to stop them The magic of Tim Wu’s The Age of Extraction is its simplicity. Wu deftly breaks down one of the greatest challenges of our age - the unaccountable power of tech platforms - into such digestible pieces that the solutions for what to do become dead obvious. Essential reading for anyone looking for the recipe to rebalance the vast inequality in our society and to create a thriving economy that works for everyone Large tech companies are set to be the main beneficiaries of a new economy based on data and artificial intelligence. But neither the lopsided present of tech nor the future direction of technology is our destiny. Tim Wu's readable, passionate call is for a fairer economy where the benefits of AI can be for all of us, and he proposes principles, laws, and regulations about how to achieve this Tim Wu’s The Age of Extraction is a how-to book on how we can achieve liberty once again. Wu describes why so much in our society feels unbalanced, that the convenience and scale of platforms masks a hidden creeping power over our lives and communities. But he also shows how platforms in one form or another have always been part of human society, and the key is to govern them properly Tim Wu’s The Age of Extraction is a must-read. This is a book for anyone—from senator to student—who seeks to understand our digital economy and why we need common sense rules of the road. Wu shows us how to protect consumers, workers, small businesses, and even our democracy from dominant platforms that have inserted themselves into nearly every aspect of our lives The Age of Extraction is remarkably astute and timely. Wu brilliantly analyzes platform power with great clarity, insight, and moral force, laying out the material stakes for people's lives as well as a roadmap for achieving broad prosperity and economic fairness. A vital book for these troubled times