{"id":1051,"date":"2018-03-21T15:00:14","date_gmt":"2018-03-21T21:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/?p=1051"},"modified":"2018-03-18T15:27:25","modified_gmt":"2018-03-18T21:27:25","slug":"book-the-circle-2013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/2018\/03\/21\/book-the-circle-2013\/","title":{"rendered":"BOOK: The Circle (2013)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"TheThe Circle
\n<\/u><\/strong>Year: 2013
\nAuthor: Dave Eggers
\nLength: 822 minutes \/ 13.70 hours<\/p>\n

When I saw the movie adaptation of this book<\/a>, I felt like the presentation of this somewhat interesting idea was already dated by about five years. This made me curious if the book was any better. As is probably no surprise to anyone, the book was\u00a0much<\/em>\u00a0better. Sure, the movie cut a few things from the book that I thought were a bit too unnecessary (all the \u201csex,\u201d that is) or underutilized (the \u201cCalvin\u201d character), but the book really hits at the intensity of the internet-addicted generation. I would even go so far as to say\u00a0The Circle<\/em>\u00a0is the modern version of\u00a01984<\/em>.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m somewhat torn when it comes to the message presented here. I understand how trying to stay on top of millions of e-mails, and thousands of social media updates can be utterly overwhelming. I also agree that a lot of ideas that seem to be beneficial to society will have the removal of personal privacy as an adverse side effect. However, the vehemence that people participate in the world does bring up a good point about apathy. Granted, I don\u2019t think we should be nearly as extreme in our \u201coversharing\u201d on social media, but if the majority of success is just showing up, then why do so many people find themselves too busy to even participate? Do they not want to engage with their fellow humans?<\/p>\n

I did appreciate how the transition from utopia to dystopia went almost entirely unchecked. The main character\u2019s journey really helped to show how the addicting nature of online interactions and instant feedback can get out of hand. From documenting our lives to searching for information to even searching for love (of which internet dating wasn\u2019t included in the movie), the internet is a powerful place. If anything\u00a0The Circle<\/em>\u00a0highlights how dangerous a true democracy can really be, particularly if the minority opinions are known at each decision point.<\/p>\n

A terrifying look into our digital mirror, I give\u00a0The Circle<\/em>\u00a04.5 stars out of 5.<\/p>\n

\"255px-Five-pointed_star_svg\"\u00a0\"255px-Five-pointed_star_svg\"\u00a0\"255px-Five-pointed_star_svg\"\u00a0\"255px-Five-pointed_star_svg\"\u00a01\/2<\/strong><\/h2>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Circle Year: 2013 Author: Dave Eggers Length: 822 minutes \/ 13.70 hours When I saw the movie adaptation of this book, I felt like the presentation of this somewhat interesting idea was already dated by about five years. This made me curious if the book was any better. As is probably no surprise to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,54],"tags":[121,1226,1229,55,1224,1228,315,1005,1225,8,653,1227],"class_list":["post-1051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-4-5-stars","category-book","tag-121","tag-addiction","tag-analog","tag-book","tag-dave-eggers","tag-digital","tag-dystopian","tag-internet","tag-obsession","tag-review","tag-the-circle","tag-utopia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1051"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1051\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1054,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1051\/revisions\/1054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benjamin-m-weilert.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}