Want a free copy of THE INTERNET WILL DIE, AND SO WILL YOU? Well, there's a Goodreads giveaway through the end of August for fifteen copies of it! (Don't worry, you're still welcome to purchase a copy, even if the Goodreads gods fail you.) www.goodreads.com/giveaway/sho...

Book giveaway for The Internet Will Die, and So Will You: On Learning to Live in Our Digital Age by John West Aug 03-Aug 28, 2026

Enter to win one of 15 free copies available. Giveaway dates from Aug 03-Aug 28, 2026. From a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist.

goodreads.com

I've listened to PJ Vogt's podcasts ever since TL;DR, through REPLY ALL, and all the way to SEARCH ENGINE. Here's what he said about my book, THE INTERNET WILL DIE, AND SO WILL YOU. You can preorder it here: bookshop.org/p/books/the-...

A weird part of writing a book is cold-emailing people you admire and asking them to say something nice. I've long admired @anildash.com for his willingness to go against the grain in a field that rewards group-think masquerading as contrarianism. Here's what he said. bookshop.org/p/books/the-...

The first review of THE INTERNET WILL DIE, AND SO WILL YOU is out from Publishers Weekly: "His wide-ranging meditations, which touch on everything from Bach to TikTok, will appeal to readers who want to search for meaning rather than scroll for distraction." www.publishersweekly.com/9780802885425

I can’t remember who said this, but it’s true: the LLM future looks a lot like endlessly communicating an idea by inflating and deflating it with computers—at great cost.

Robert Evans (the Only Robert Evans)@iwriteok.bsky.social · last mo.

"i have 100 times the output i did before" somehow never seems to show up in actual profits or sales or anything, it's more a measurement of how people feel based on the number of emails they have a bot send

this is an incredible story (and my colleagues are incredible reporters).

Caitlin Ostroff@ceostroff.bsky.social · 2mo ago

1/ After seeing a lot of Polymarket videos on social media, my @WSJ colleagues and I wanted to understand Polymarket’s marketing. After watching a bunch of videos, we noticed that the website featured in them was almost, but not quite, identical to Polymarket’s actual platform.

Novel sentence alert

MY BAD: A PERSONAL HISTORY OF THE QUEER 90S AND BEYOND comes out in one week and I am certainly not freaking out about it! There's still time to get 20% off the hardcover by preordering from Hachette with the code MYBAD20. All my June tour dates are below! www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/hugh-...

My Bad

A powerful and hilarious personal history that tells the true story of the queer ’90s and how it transformed queer life in the decades that followed.“Dee...

hachettebookgroup.com

The Internet Will Die, and So Will You by @johnwest.bsky.social ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ First! too much internet, not enough death :) www.netgalley.com/book/824047/...

The Internet Will Die, and So Will You

I just reviewed The Internet Will Die, and So Will You by John West

netgalley.com

RETVRN to computers with integral bench seating

Attention is precious. The Internet Will Die, and So Will You (by John West) #HereBelowBooks #CoverReveal

This is what journalism is supposed to be about.

MPR News@mprnews.org · 3mo ago

The first thing the editor in chief of the Roosevelt school newspaper did when she got home was hug her father. Then she opened her computer and started to type. Her article went viral. Lila Dominguez said running the newspaper during the ICE surge showed her “the power of truth.”

I went to the Met (for the first time ever!). My partner and I decided to pick a piece to sit and stare at for at least 15 minutes. We picked “Old Woman Cutting Her Nails” by someone who isn’t Rembrandt. It was wild to feel how rusty my attention is—and to see how applying it still drives wonder.

I have escalated my aversion to Spotify.

Karen K. Ho@karenho.bsky.social · 3mo ago

what if I go back to buying albums on iTunes and using an iPod from 20 years ago out of spite

This is incredible reporting from my colleague @georgiawells.bsky.social www.wsj.com/us-news/chat...

ChatGPT Wrestles With Its Most Chilling Conversation: How Do I Plan an Attack?

OpenAI’s chatbot dispenses advice on weapons and role-plays mass shootings. The carnage is raising scrutiny on when and how companies intervene.

wsj.com

1. I'm working on EPITAB: a browser extension that helps you memorize poems. If you add poems to your browser, it quizzes you on lines each time you open a new tab. Here, for example, after I opened a new window in Firefox, it's asking me for the line "The season's ill—" I have an ask though...

1. I'm working on EPITAB: a browser extension that helps you memorize poems. If you add poems to your browser, it quizzes you on lines each time you open a new tab. Here, for example, after I opened a new window in Firefox, it's asking me for the line "The season's ill—" I have an ask though...

Hello. I’m writing a novel. @editrixemma.bsky.social @alexbrownwrites.bsky.social

I’ve been practicing again. Here’s a sarabande from one of the perfect Bach cello suites played imperfectly on the recorder. (Also pictured: my 3D-printed recorder gun rack.)

I blogged again: this-republic-of-letters.fly.dev/posts/5/toge.... This time, on the many uses and abuses of poor Walter Ong.

1. In the aughts and early teens, I'd fire up Google Reader and check my blogs—and maybe even write one. Pardon the earnest-posting (-maxing?), but it was often the highlight of my day. And, well, I'm blogging again: this-republic-of-letters.fly.dev/posts/3/we-s....

The birds are in motion today.

John West@johnwest.bsky.social · 4mo ago

I set up a Raspberry Pi with a webcam and pointed it at my bird feeder, and I have a local ML model tell me if there's a bird every 10 minutes. I'm pretty sure this one is GLARING at my set up.

millennial: iykyk plato: NOT SO FAST

My six-year-old daughter is in her Lion King moment, and I'm meme-ing through it.

Oh, every one is always nostalgic for the geocites era web but when somebody actually makes a platform that crashes every 10 minutes, suddenly everybody wants future technology, I see how it is.

A little post from my social media neetwork/web-based performance piece, HOMER at internaut.club

John West@johnwest.bsky.social · 5mo ago

Inspired by a perfect post from @marcusjmerritt.com, I built a art piece masquerading as a social media app called Homer. It uses an LLM to recursively summarize every post, again and again, until everything becomes nothing: internaut.club. Sign ups are now fully open, capped at 100!

It's Seamus Heaney's birthday! In 2019, I wrote on his last text, "Noli timere." Now, the page is so dark-patterned that I can't read it. My book, THE INTERNET WILL DIE, AND SO WILL YOU—out in Sept—came from it. Article: www.fastcompany.com/90311664/wha... Book: herebelowbooks.com/978080288542...

I set up a Raspberry Pi with a webcam and pointed it at my bird feeder, and I have a local ML model tell me if there's a bird every 10 minutes. I'm pretty sure this one is GLARING at my set up.

Whenever you open a new tab, wouldn't it be nice—before you make your way to some fresh patch of internet—to practice memorizing a poem? Enter EPITAB! With it, you can add poems to your library, check off lines once you've got them down cold, and drill with "flashcards." github.com/jswest/epitab

We’re raising our voices for a fair contract. 🎤 Join us in solidarity in our fight for layoff protections, AI guardrails and a clear disciplinary process: actionnetwork.org/petitions/te...