The Circle (2013)My God, Mae thought. It's heaven. That first sentence of this novel is revelatory, for Mr. Eggers here resorts to an archetypal literary form of the Anglosphere: the dystopian fiction. The heaven that our narrator, Mae Bailey, thinks she has found is a Google-esque tech company called The Circle, which has innovated a unique way to maintain just one identity and password across the entire Web, immeasurably simplifying the lives of customers. As a result, it is cornering the market on internet users and garnering ever more as it brings new technologies under its umbrella. To use any of the Circle's tools, and they were the best tools, the most dominant and ubiquitous and free, you had to do so as yourself, as your actual self, as your TruYou. The era of false identities, identity theft, multiple user names, complicate passwords and payment systems, was over. Anytime you wanted to see anything, use anything, comment on anything or buy anything, it was one button, one account, everything tied together and trackable and simple, all of it operable via mobile or laptop, tablet or retinal. Once you had a single account, it carried you through every corner of the web, every portal, every pay site, everything you wanted to do." Of course, it's not enough that every purchase you make can be done via The Circle, it also wants to help you track your kids, read your vital signs, document your past, and more. The more is what the author, in the style of George Orwell and Aldous Huxley, wants to warn us about. The literal trackers placed in today's kids will eventually reside in all of us; even the stuff we wish hidden in our pasts will be exposed; and via first a system of passive surveillance cameras and then wearable ones everyone on Earth will be able to observe every moment of our lives. In initial presentation this tech is always rather benign, even attractive: “Hello, everyone. My name is Eamon Bailey,” he said, to another round of applause that he quickly discouraged. “Thank you. I’m so glad to see you all here. I know you’re used to hearing from one of our engineers or developers, but today, for better or for worse, it’s just me. For that I apologize in advance. But what I have to show you today, something we’re calling SeeChange, I think it’ll knock your socks off.” Mae is seduced by not just this corporate cant but by the perks of office life on The Circle campus and by benefits, like the medical coverage that her father needs to care for his MS. So after a she makes a few mistakes at work, she agrees to become one of the guinea pigs who will constantly wear a camera to record her own life. Eventually a billion people are following her but also following her interactions with family and friends who never consented to give up their privacy. One old boyfriend, in particular, tries to make her see that the technology is taking her over and granting her life online priority over real life, even displacing real life entirely. And, frighteningly, she's a willing, even eager, collaborator in the process: Here though, there are no oppressors. No one's forcing you to do this. You willingly tie yourself to these leashes. And you willingly become utterly socially autistic. You no longer pick up on basic human communication clues. You're at a table with three humans, all of whom are looking at you and trying to talk to you, and you're staring at a screen! Searching for strangers in Dubai! Mae herself is seemingly responsible for the next big step in the The Circle's totalitarian quest when she proposes that all voting could be done via their apps and that, therefore, all citizens could be required to be part of The Circle. Meanwhile, a mysterious gray-haired stranger at The Circle is giving her the same warnings and trying to get her to speak out before "the circle closes." This is certainly not a great novel, maybe not even a good one, but it's still worth reading. For one thing, I just find it amusing that Mr. Eggers, a pretty standard issue progressive, sounds like such a Puritan here. His hostility to the utopian promise of technology and distrust of human nature is straight out of every conservative writer in the English-language from Jonathan Swift to Tom Wolfe. It's delicious. In this vein, he raises some important considerations about our relationship to technology, to each other and to the modern workplace. One of the key components of The Circle is that it requires users to continuously register approval and disapproval of ideas and communications. It is driven by Tweets (zings), likes (smiles) and dislikes (frowns), to the point where failure to register them frequently enough results in crisis intervention. Indeed, the most effective aspect of the whole book may be just how annoying the Human Resources staff are, being personally offended if you don't participate and provide feedback on every corporate inanity they dream up. Nor is it just them, if you've ever failed to respond quickly enough to a text or email from one of your needier friends or relatives you'll enjoy the neediness of Mae's petulant followers, for whom liking a post seems to obligate her to help obtain a job or a business deal. But, here's the thing, these downsides of the technology seem like the easiest to handle. As her employers saddle Mae with more and more screens and social media streams and opportunities to interact, the reader is left to wonder why she doesn't just say, no, it's too much. Meanwhile, the core services The Circle provides seem rather valuable, if--and sometimes because--intrusive. Personally, I really like the fact that websites I visit know enough to render ads that are pertinent to me and serve up suggestions based on my past consumption. I wear devices that measure my physical activity and can check my vitals. In fact, I earn money at work by showing that I'm doing fitness activities and would gladly share the data with an insurer to get a rate reduction. I don't always complete customer surveys, but do participate in a couple online surveys that pay me for my opinion. I share photos of businesses with Google Maps that make it easier to identify locations when you travel. I don't use aliases online and find it unobjectionable that an easy Google search will tell you where I live and give you my phone number. I agree with the science that shows that if people know (or even just feel like) they are being observed they behave better. And while I don't really want to be able to watch every minute of every congressman's day, I've long though that the government ought not classify anything and that crowd-sourcing Intelligence would be more effective than our current regime of secrecy. Furthermore, consider what is going on at the precise moment I'm writing this. This kind of technology is helping us to track Covid-19, to see where people are and aren't social distancing, and to monitor people's health status. Meanwhile, the fact of recording and sharing interaction with the police is exposing the ill-treatment of black Americans and allowing the citizenry to organize against it. And public surveillance is revealing who at rallies is actually misbehaving, so that everyone is not tarred with a broad brush. All that happens is not known, but what we know is proving awfully important and worth knowing. If Mr. Eggers book is a useful warning about not closing the circle it also radically underestimates the value of the more circular society we inhabit. (Reviewed:) Grade: (C) Tweet Websites:-WIKIPEDIA: Dave Eggers -AUTHOR SITE: DaveEggers.net -MAGAZINE: McSweeneys -WIKIPEDIA: The Circle -BOOK SITE: The Circle (Penguin Random House) -EXCERPT: from The Circle: We Like You So Much and Want to Know You Better -EXCERPT: from The Circle -EXCERPT : First Chapter of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius -REVIEW : of The! Greatest! of! Marlys! By Lynda Barry (Dave Eggers, NY Times Book Review) -REVIEW : of Adopting Alyosha A Single Man Finds a Son in Russia. By Robert Klose (Dave Eggers, NY Times Book Review) -EXCERPT: The True Story of American Soccer (Dave Eggers, From The Thinking Fan’s Guide to the World Cup) -ESSAY: Why Donald Trump could win again (Dave Eggers, 2 Mar 2019, The Guardian) -ESSAY: Dave Eggers: why we should listen to teenagers speak about climate crisis (Dave Eggers, 11 Aug 2019, The Guardian) -INTERVIEW: If You’re Reading About “The Circle” on Facebook, It’s Already Too Late: Novelist Dave Eggers and director James Ponsoldt tackle technology’s dark side. (Clive Thompson, MAY/JUNE 2017, Mother Jones) -INTERVIEW: Q&A with Dave Eggers: The author of “The Circle” discusses groupthink, healthy skepticism and the value of weirdness in education (Tom Gresham, Aug. 11, 2014, VCU News) -INTERVIEW: ‘The Circle’ author Dave Eggers thinks the internet is getting creepier (Kai Ryssdal and Robert Garrova, Apr 25, 2017, Marketplace) -INTERVIEW: A BRIEF Q&A WITH DAVE EGGERS ABOUT HIS NEW NOVEL, THE CIRCLE (McSWEENEY’S, SEPTEMBER 27, 2013) -INTERVIEW: Dave Eggers: ‘Being around young people is the balm to all psychic wounds’ (Lisa O'Kelly, 3/16/19, The Observer) -INTERVIEW: ‘I always picture Trump hiding under a table’ Paul Lait, 6/22/18, The Guardian) -INTERVIEW: An American Nightmare: The Millions Interviews Dave Eggers (Zoë Ruiz September 16, 2020, The Millions) -INTERVIEW: Four Questions for Dave Eggers (Sally Lodge, Sep 13, 2018, Publishers Weekly) -PROFILE: On Dave Eggers, Author of 'The Circle,' and His Second Career as a Visual Artist (Will Fenstermaker, APRIL 20, 2017, ArtSpace) -REVIEW : of Trail Fever by Michael Lewis (David Eggers, Salon) -INTERVIEW : Dave Eggers on creativity in the wake of tragedy. (KAREN E. STEEN | December 2001, Metropolis) -Dialog : Of Editors and Adding Machines André Schiffrin's new book argues that an army of statisticians and business men is killing publishing. We've invited him, John Donatich and Dave Eggers to conduct an autopsy (FEED) -INTERVIEW : Brother Knows Best : Dave Eggers talks, with some reluctance, about the staggering work of being a genius parent. (Amy Benfer , Salon) -PROFILE : Cracking Eggers (Douglas Wolk, Village Voice) -PROFILE : A Wry Survivor of a World That Fell Apart Finds a Quick Celebrity (SARAH LYALL, 2/10/2000, NY Times) -PROFILE : Dave Eggers Turns His Memoir Upside Down (DAVID D. KIRKPATRICK, February 14, 2001, NY Times) -ARTICLE : Bestselling Author Dave Eggers Assails New York Times Writer Over Profile : The writer of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius airs his complaints by publishing his entire e-mail correspondence with a reporter. He also says that off-the-record comments were used without his permission. (PJ Mark, Inside.com) -ESSAY : Culturebox Rules: Dave Eggers vs. David Kirkpatrick Who's right, the wounded memoirist or the exposed journalist? (Eliza Truitt, Slate) -ESSAY : When the tiff gets going... A hissy feud between novelist Dave Eggers and a New York journalist highlights the love-hate relationship of celebrity and press (Peter Conrad, March 11, 2001, The Observer uk) -PROFILE : Eggers Surprised By Success (James Sullivan, SF Chronicle) -PROFILE : A man of the people : He refuses to meet with the media, but Dave Eggers invites fans to write poetry at his readings and buys them all drinks afterward (KIM CURTIS, April 25, 2001, Globe & Mail) -PROFILE : The agony and the irony : He's the hottest literary star in America and he's written a best-selling memoir about raising his kid brother after his parents' death. Is Dave Eggers for real? (Stephanie Merritt, The Observer) -PROFILE : Bedsit genius charms US : A reclusive publishing sensation is being hailed as the new William Burroughs (Ed Vulliamy, The Observer) -PROFILE : Searching for the real Dave Eggers : Author of bestseller A heartbreaking work of staggering genius, Dave Eggers is notoriously distrustful of the media, refusing all telephone and in-person interview requests, It is a policy that gives rise to some unusual rumours. Who is the real Dave Eggers? (Kim Curtis, The Age) -ESSAY : The Null Set : Is the postmodern fiction of Dave Eggers and David Foster Wallace a literary dead end? Or is there a way out of the funhouse? Keith Gessen looks for clues. (FEED) -ESSAY : A staggeringly post-modern work of literary trickery : Stephen Moss assesses the critical reaction to Dave Eggers's A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (The Guardian) -ESSAY: How Dave Eggers gets Silicon Valley wrong (Felix Salmon September 30, 2013, Reuters) -ESSAY: What Dave Eggers' 'The Circle' gets wrong about millennial culture (MARGARET EBY, OCT 14, 2013, NY Daily News) -ESSAY: Demoxie: Reflections on digital democracy in Dave Eggers’ novel The Circle (Kathrin Maurer and Christian F. Rostbøll, 4 May 2020, First Monday) -ESSAY: Circle Jerks: Why Do Editors Love Dave Eggers? (Nitasha Tiku, 10/02/13, Gawker) -ESSAY: 'The Circle' Movie Vs. Book Shows How Big Versions Delve Deep Into Tech & Surveillance (OLIVIA TRUFFAUT-WONG, April 27, 2017, Bustle) -ESSAY: The Posthuman Turn in Dave Eggers’ The Circle (Marina Ludwigs, Fall 2015, Anthropoetics) -ESSAY: Social Media Marketing in a Dystopian Novel: Dave Eggers' "The Circle" (Sarah Snow, June 8, 2015, Social Media Today) -ESSAY: MERCER’S CRUCIAL ROLE AS “LIFESAVER” IN DAVE EGGERS’ THE CIRCLE (Lively Take on Life) -ESSAY: Big Other: Surveillance Capitalism and the Prospects of an Information Civilization (Shoshana Zuboff, 17 Apr 2015, Journal of Information Technology) -ESSAY: The Despotic Imperative: From Hiero to The Circle (Bülent Diken, 2019, Cultural Politics) -ESSAY: Seven technologies predicted in Dave Eggers’ dystopian new novel that already exist (Leo Mirani, October 18, 2013, Quartz) -ESSAY: Facebook Is Watching You: And they want to watch you more closely than you could have imagined. Will people be comfortable with it? (PAUL WALDMAN, OCTOBER 31, 2013, American Prospect) -ESSAY: 6 ways that 'Big Brother' technology in 'The Circle' is already happening (Andrea Mandell, 4/24/17, USA TODAY) -ESSAY: A Brutal Murder, a Wearable Witness, and an Unlikely Suspect: Karen Navarra was a quiet woman in her sixties who lived alone. She was found beaten to death. The neighbors didn't see anything. But her Fitbit did. (LAUREN SMILEY, 09.17.2019, Wired) -ESSAY: Algorithm calls Dave Eggers’s The Circle the ultimate bestseller, despite its not being a bestseller (Chad Felix, June 28, 2016, Melville House) -ESSAY: The bestselling book of fiction all big data analysts & digital health gurus should read: If you dug George Orwell’s 1984 or Animal Farm (or the Where the Wild Things Are […] (LINDSEY ALEXANDER, Nov 12, 2013, Med City News) -ESSAY: Dave Eggers, The Circle and Why I’m Leaving the Bay Area (Lizzy Acker, Oct 25, 2013, KQED) -ESSAY: A Reasonable Expectation of Transparency: Dave Eggers’s The Circle (TAMARA TABO, Dec 5, 2013 , Above the Law) -ESSAY: Privacy or security? - How we are ending up, step-by-step, in The Circle (Dick Dekkers, 5/15/16, Digidentity) -PODCAST: 01: The Box That A.I. Lives In (The Secret History of the Future, Slate) -ESSAY: Against Transparency (Lawrence Lessig, October 9, 2009, New Republic)) -ESSAY: Deliberative Democratic Theory (Simone Chambers, June 2003, Annual Review of Political Science) -ARCHIVES: "dave eggers" (Melville House) -ARCHIVES: "dave eggers" (American Prospect) -ARCHIVES: "eggers" (Slate) -REVIEW ARCHIVES: Dave Egger (Kirkus) -ARCHIVES: Dave Egger (The Guardian) -REVIEW: of The Circle by Dave Eggers (David Moran, Tor) -REVIEW: of The Circle (Lionel Shriver, Financial Times) -REVIEW: of The Circle (Edward Docx, The Guardian) -REVIEW: of The Circle (Graeme MCMILLAN, Wired) -REVIEW: of The Circle (Ellen Ullman, NY Times Book Review) -REVIEW: of The Circle (Dennis K. 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Try writing. Adam Begley on Dave Eggers' disarming talent for self-publicity . 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