Fragmentation

This is exactly the book we needed right now. The author doesn't just describe the fragmentation happening—they show you *why* it's happening through specific examples like OpenAI's health initiative and Midjourney acquiring an astrology app. The chapter on how cybersecurity researchers are being locked out of essential tools genuinely disturbed me, but that's the point. Urgent, meticulously reported, and a genuine wake-up call about what we're sacrificing in the AI rush.

Good reporting, solid premise about how AI is breaking the old platform model. My issue is that the book spends a lot of time mourning the loss of the 'integrated internet' when that internet was never actually democratic—it was just democractically *accessed*. The author acknowledges this briefly but doesn't lean into it enough. Still worth reading for the data, but I wanted more nuance on whether the old deal was ever actually worth defending.

The opening chapter about Facebook and Google's rise is brilliant—really makes you see how contingent that whole model was. But the book assumes readers understand enough about LLM economics to care about why they can't run for free. I found myself googling terms halfway through. If you're already tech-literate you'll love this. If you're not, you'll struggle. Good book, just maybe not as accessible as it thinks it is.

Connects dots I've been seeing scattered across my work in tech policy for years. The accounting of what's being lost in healthcare, creative industries, and research is devastating—and the author backs it all up with actual reporting, not speculation. This should be required reading for anyone making decisions about AI regulation. Finally, someone's asking the right questions about walled gardens and what comes after advertising-supported abundance.

The diagnosis here is sharp, but I finished the book wanting answers more than I wanted another problem statement. Yes, the internet is fragmenting around AI. Yes, that's concerning. But the 'what now?' section feels thin compared to the 300 pages of 'here's everything we're losing.' Still a necessary read, just incomplete as a guide for what actually comes next.

As a creative professional, the sections on how AI is fragmenting access to tools in my field hit different. The Midjourney astrology acquisition example sounds random until you read why it matters for ecosystem lock-in. The author gets that this isn't just about technology—it's about power and who controls what we can build. Extremely well-researched and impossible to put down once you start seeing the pattern.

This book reframed my entire understanding of what's happening online right now. I thought the platforms were just adapting to AI. Instead, the author shows how AI fundamentally breaks their business model and is forcing a complete restructuring of the internet into silos. The historical context—comparing it to the pre-platform fragmentation of the 90s—is genius. Absolutely essential reading.

Excellent reporting and genuinely important analysis about how AI is rewiring digital power structures. My only real criticism is that some of the case studies (the healthcare one especially) could've gone deeper before moving on. But the central argument about moving from 'free and monopolistic' to 'expensive and fragmented' is solid and well-supported. Definitely recommend this to anyone who cares about where the internet is headed.