Asserts the preeminent role of research in digital media and commerce. Search transparently indicates the user’s intent, which trumps content as a locus for advertising or efficient transactions. The premise is explicated through the tale of Google’s phenomenal rise. The are significant errors of commission and omission, chief among them the presumption that users always efficiently and effectively judge query results. This devalues almost to the point of dismissal the role of editorial expertise. Battelle makes a parallel mistake in stating that the content is merely a vehicle for advertising, as if the purpose of content always is popularity. The author does redress the damage done to news gathering by online classified in of course contextual advertising, though nowhere is it acknowledged the Google’s cost structure is subsidized by content producers. Despite presenting himself as a journalist — there are numerous, tedious references to Wired and the Industry Standard, two publications beloved by marketeers — it is clear that Battelle’s instincts lie with advertisers (intent over content). The syntax is grating and it seems the author enjoys poststructuralism, or at least the fashionable leanings of a college anthropology professor. The book is presently viewed as a paradigm of wisdom in the digital domain, but will it endure?
(Postscript: one wonders whether search would have been shown by Battelle to have contributed to the rise of ‘fake news’, seen as a dynamic factor in the Trump’s presidential win?)