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Augmented  By  cover art

Augmented

By: Brett King,Andy Lark,Alex Lightman,JP Rangaswami
Narrated by: Steven Jay Cohen
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Publisher's summary

The Internet and smartphone are just the latest in a 250-year-long cycle of disruption that has continuously changed the way we live, the way we work, and the way we interact. The coming Augmented Age, however, promises a level of disruption, behavioral shifts, and changes that are unparalleled. While consumers today are camping outside of an Apple store waiting to be one of the first to score a new Apple Watch or iPhone, the next generation of wearables will be able to predict if we're likely to have a heart attack and recommend a course of action. We watch news of Google's self-driving cars, but don't likely realize this means progressive cities will have to ban human drivers in the next decade because us humans are too risky. Following on from the Industrial or Machine Age, the Space Age and the Digital Age, the Augmented Age will be based on four key disruptive themes - Artificial Intelligence, Experience Design, Smart Infrastructure, and HealthTech. Historically, the previous "ages" brought significant disruption and changes, but on a net basis, jobs were created, wealth was enhanced, and the health and security of society improved. What will the Augmented Age bring? Will robots take our jobs and AI's subsume us as inferior intelligences? Or will this usher in a new age of abundance?

Augmented is a book on future history, but, more than that, it is a story about how you will live your life in a world that will change more in the next 20 years than it has in the last 250 years. Are you ready to adapt? Because if history proves anything, you don't have much of a choice.

©2016 Brett King (P)2017 Tantor

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All Headlines

It read as if it were a bunch of headlines, but didn't feel like it was of much substance. I wanted to like it, but I can say, save your money. summary - everything in the future will be subscription based and individually customized and connected.

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27 people found this helpful

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All the authors need is a couple of pom poms

I was quite excited to listen to this book, but was quickly disappointed.

It's basically a long list of technical innovations of the past with the authors cheerleading whatever *might* happen ... There is very little actual reflection on what the trends might mean, other than that the millennials and subsequent generations will deal with any disruptions incredibly well because they are uniquely (surprise-surprise) adept and adaptable, having been raised in a digital world.

The narrator was good.

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12 people found this helpful

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1/3 of this book is hilariously naive

Books like this get annoying when you know that corporations don't do things that are in your best interest or to improve your life. They do things for ONE reason. When he began gushing about allowing every aspect of your body and life to be data that's up for grabs, all so that you could be monetized and offered instant credit I nearly passed out.

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7 people found this helpful

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Read by an AI.

I'm starting to like forwarding thinking books like this, Flash Foresight, and Humans Need Not Apply. So while the content was ok, it really did drone on from the uninterested narration.

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7 people found this helpful

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Lots of examples

Not sure how I really feel about this book. It have A LOT of examples on how technology will intertwine with daily life in the future. I appreciate that. But it was almost as if the whole book was put together from thousands of news articles. The audible version was also read in a way that was rather uninspiring.

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5 people found this helpful

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Must read for people over 50

If you are 50 or older you must listen (not read) this book as your first step in training your brain for the massive changes coming as you move into your senior age. You must not fear or resist the changes for they literally can impact your life by extend it.

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4 people found this helpful

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Our Augmented self

The author makes bold predictions about how technology will change us in ways we can't even imagine right now.

This book puts into context the type of change that modern technology of information abundance can have on our psyche and how this will bring our an explosion in innovation.

Realistic in its projections, and fascinating with its predictions, an all round enjoyable book Looking at near future possibilities and their ramifications to society and civilisation.

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3 people found this helpful

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Hypnotizing

It's a fairly good summary of prognostications of the time of writing. But, the reading tone is sooooooo way-cool california breezy laid back with a constant sense of suspense ... with hardly a slight breath or pause for the whole mind-bending 12 hours of 'this is really really cool' and 'this is really happening' and this is what is going to kill this or that industry and we arent even going to break a segue or anything just keep on going and going. This book should really be read online, with links to the multitudes of references, and all the visual graphs contributing.
In the ultimate, augmented really speaks of the interweaving of our entire existence into virtual worlds, social networks, commerce networks, health networks ... war networks. It does not, of course, speak of the world past the singularity, since we have no possible idea of what that will entail (thus summarized Superintelligence and 'Our Final Invention'). Thus, the key take-away is the summary of competing technologies, market drivers and disruption effects. This really needs a rigorous study by real economists who can predict the impacts in stages, and guide policymakers in keeping society from disintegrating.

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Aggressive Coverage of a Broad Future

I was impressed with this book. It was unrelenting in the way it approached the future and diligent to chase every relevant technology rabbit. Like most books in this genre, it probably suffers a bit from being overly optimistic in how rapidly we will adopt technology. But the book makes a good point where our preferences will become less and less important and why.

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Fresh Voices, Good Observations

The young narrator was a good fit for the forward thinking, which was also in touch with current and upcoming technology. It is not philosophically enlightened, but I did not penalize the book for that, considering continued universal human cluelessness, and that they were not philosophers or deep thinkers outside of technology.

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1 person found this helpful