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Everything Bad is Good for You Paperback – May 2, 2006

by Steven Johnson (Author)
4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 340 ratings
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Tune in, turn on and get smarter ...The Simpsons, Desperate Housewives, The Apprentice, The Sopranos, Grand Theft We're constantly being told that popular culture is just mindless entertainment. But, as Steven Johnson shows, it's actually making us more intelligent.Here he puts forward a radical alternative to the endless complaints about reality TV, throwaway movies and violent video games. He shows that mass culture is actually more sophisticated and challenging than ever before. When we focus on what our minds have to do to process its complex, multilayered messages, it becomes clear that it's not dumbing us down - but smartening us up.
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  1. Language
    English
  2. Publisher
    Riverhead Trade
  3. Publication date
    May 2, 2006
  4. Dimensions
    5.35 x 0.73 x 8.12 inches
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Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B000O17CYM
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Riverhead Trade; First Edition (May 2, 2006)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 8 ounces
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.35 x 0.73 x 8.12 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 4.2 out of 5 stars 340 ratings

About the author

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Steven Johnson

Steven Johnson

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Steven Johnson is the best-selling author of seven books on the intersection of science, technology and personal experience. His writings have influenced everything from the way political campaigns use the Internet, to cutting-edge ideas in urban planning, to the battle against 21st-century terrorism. In 2010, he was chosen by Prospect magazine as one of the Top Ten Brains of the Digital Future.

His latest book, Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation, was a finalist for the 800CEORead award for best business book of 2010, and was ranked as one of the year’s best books by The Economist. His book The Ghost Map was one of the ten best nonfiction books of 2006 according to Entertainment Weekly. His books have been translated into more than a dozen languages.

Steven has also co-created three influential web sites: the pioneering online magazine FEED, the Webby-Award-winning community site, Plastic.com, and most recently the hyperlocal media site outside.in, which was acquired by AOL in 2011. He serves on the advisory boards of a number of Internet-related companies, including Meetup.com, Betaworks, and Nerve.

Steven is a contributing editor to Wired magazine and is the 2009 Hearst New Media Professional-in-Residence at The Journalism School, Columbia University. He won the Newhouse School fourth annual Mirror Awards for his TIME magazine cover article titled "How Twitter Will Change the Way We Live." Steven has also written for The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Nation, and many other periodicals. He has appeared on many high-profile television programs, including The Charlie Rose Show, The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, and The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. He lectures widely on technological, scientific, and cultural issues. He blogs at stevenberlinjohnson.com and is @stevenbjohnson on Twitter. He lives in Marin County, California with his wife and three sons.

Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
340 global ratings

Customers say

Customers find the book wonderful to read and humorous. They also find the content thought-provoking.

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Entertainment valueContentWriting style
20 customers mention "Entertainment value"17 positive3 negative

Customers find the book entertaining, interesting, and well-written. They also say the title is humorous.

"...As a general reader, it is a very good book. As a position book, it really makes the author's point of view...." Read more

"...Its an interesting and engaging read while also giving you a new side to pop culture you may not have thought about before...." Read more

"...arguments he put forth, and overall this book was a well-written and fun read.However, I was a little disappointed by the depth of it...." Read more

"This is a great book, especially to all of those who think that TV, videogames and other media create "brain damage"...." Read more

10 customers mention "Content"10 positive0 negative

Customers find the book thought-provoking, refreshing, and fun to read. They also say it has an interesting point of view and is fun to think about.

"...Its an interesting and engaging read while also giving you a new side to pop culture you may not have thought about before...." Read more

"This is a provocative book which warrants serious consideration...." Read more

"...Johnson raises several salient points. I'm not yet sure how much of it I agree with, as some of the generalizations don't fit in my own household...." Read more

"...It makes you question the world around you, all while laughing at the witty comments. I greatly enjoyed it." Read more

3 customers mention "Writing style"3 positive0 negative

Customers find the writing style of the book good and brave.

"...The book was well-written and the idea of the "Sleeper Curve" well-argued and supported by empirical as well as culturally anecdotal evidence." Read more

"A more positve view of technolgies use. Good writer,brave writer." Read more

"Very intersting Point of View, clearly articulated & fun to read." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

Geraldo XEXEO
5.0 out of 5 stars This is good for you too
Reviewed in the United States on September 22, 2007
Verified Purchase
The writer's style feels like a a conversation, where he tells about his ideas and some supportive research made by other persons. The lack of references in the text is compensated by a last chapter with comments about hte origin of the data he used to support his claims.
This informal text is what makes the book an easy and enjoyable reading. However, as a scientific result, the book is not completely sound, since his conclusions are based only on what he think is happening and the supportive that is not necessarily correlated with his findings.
Parents, researchers and educators will find the book provocative. Actually, it defends that beyond content, form is also important, and maybe more important when we are talking about the new media (basically TV and games).
As a general reader, it is a very good book. As a position book, it really makes the author's point of view. However, scientific oriented readers will feel something is missing.
7 people found this helpful
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Alli
5.0 out of 5 stars amusing and informative
Reviewed in the United States on February 21, 2011
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The usual thought on popular culture is that its bad for your mind, that its a waste of time, and other negative preconceptions. This book goes through different parts of pop culture, including video games, TV, and the internet, and how they are good for your brain. Its an interesting and engaging read while also giving you a new side to pop culture you may not have thought about before.

I had to read this for English class which usually turns me off of a book, but this one is so appealing that it keeps my full attention.
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Gurudev
4.0 out of 5 stars Very good, but a bit thin
Reviewed in the United States on July 26, 2006
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This book has a great concept behind it: the idea that all our modern pop culture isn't destroying our minds, but rather making us smarter and teaching us problem solving and social skills.

I found it to be pretty good, although not fantastic. The early parts in which Johnson describes his childhood experiences with baseball games and D&D closely mirrored my own, and I found myself pleasantly reminiscing about those days. I had no real disagreements with any of the arguments he put forth, and overall this book was a well-written and fun read.

However, I was a little disappointed by the depth of it. Johnson goes through modern video gaming and reality TV, and although it's all interesting stuff, I started to feel that he spent a lot of his time repeating myself. That is, he gave examples of the same ideas over and over. While all the examples were effective, it became a tad redundant, and by the end, I was wishing that the book was just denser and deeper, a heavier exploration. Of course, with this subject matter, perhaps it is self-limiting with regards to depth.

It is a good book, but there's just not enough to it to be totally satisfying. This would've probably been better a large essay in a compilation of futurist and modern thought papers. Still, it is a worthwhile read.
3 people found this helpful
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Byron
3.0 out of 5 stars NOT QUITE
Reviewed in the United States on July 6, 2005
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Johnson is spot on about computer and video games and how they are fundamentally changing the way an entire generation thinks, learns, works, shares, etc. and raising IQ scores and cognitive abilities in the bargain. But he should have left well enough alone by sticking with exploring the gaming phenomenon. Instead, he throws gaming in the same grab bag as other "entertainment," notably television. Once he wrote about The Sopranos and inane shows like Survivor and The Apprentice in the same sentence, he lost me. "Reality television provides the ultimate testimony to the cultural dominance of games in this moment of pop culture history..." Give me a break. This is yet another example of a potentially great full-length magazine article that never should have been turned into a book. A well-edited 5,000 words max would have covered it all.
15 people found this helpful
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Tony
5.0 out of 5 stars Great!
Reviewed in the United States on July 19, 2006
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This is a great book, especially to all of those who think that TV, videogames and other media create "brain damage". Johnson demonstrates the virtues of our pop culture, that is actually making us smarter in certain areas.

As a high school teacher, it's demonstrated the importance of the popular media consumed by our modern adolescents and given me a lot of ideas to be able to use the modern mass media in my classroom, and the importance of it's use.

If you think pop culture is damaging our "classic" culture, line Postman (Amusing us to death) or Sartori (Homo videns), read this book.
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Brian G. Morin
5.0 out of 5 stars Great analysis of the complexity of pop culture and how we are drawn to it
Reviewed in the United States on May 1, 2016
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The book categorized some things that were intuitively known to me but I had not systematized. That video games are more complex,and doing complex things makes us smarter. That tv shows were the same. That interactive challenging screen time is better and more challenging than hours of Facebook. I like it and feel justified in my geekhood.
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nini
5.0 out of 5 stars good quality and service!
Reviewed in the United States on January 31, 2022
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came early and threw in freebies! really nice and recommend this seller.
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Top reviews from other countries

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Mike Lutz
4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting
Reviewed in Canada on February 3, 2016
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My first time reading anything from this author and I have to say he presents and very interesting angle on new media, I rather enjoyed this work.
One person found this helpful
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Mando
5.0 out of 5 stars SEHR empfehlenswert
Reviewed in Germany on March 30, 2016
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Klasse Buch für jeden, der bereit ist, den "bösen neuen Medien" auch mal etwas Gutes beizusteuern. Nicht nur perfekt für Kulturliberalisten.
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Siriam
5.0 out of 5 stars My best non-fiction read in 2005!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 14, 2006
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I read this book at the end of 2005 and found it one of the best eye openers in challenging a lot of my simple misconceptions regarding computer games, TV and the benefits of the internet (as an education/social interaction tool as opposed to a tool I use at work every day).
I no longer look at my children's fascination with playing computer games with such concern; it has not increased my viewing of TV (a medium I actually think too many people view with rose tinted historic spectacles given it formed such a key part of their early lives) but it has helped me appreciate the wider benefits of how TV series now operate and are structured versus the versions I saw as a child; plus the internet and its wider social impact is put into context with the end coverage that IQs are given these changes getting higher in the middle and lower zones of society if not so clearly helping the top intellectual end are well made even if you do not wholly agree everything.
The book is US centric but given the author's life, location and background that seems inevitable and indeed the beauty of the arguments presented for consideration is that you find yourself applying them to local UK TV programmes given the main messages are universal.
While the style is too academic at the start, once the writer warms to his subjects he does present well and in a very creative structure that interlocks across the book. Finally, the end section on summarising areas for further reading on the different topics is one of the best I have seen in such a small book.
9 people found this helpful
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Peggy McKay
4.0 out of 5 stars Four Stars
Reviewed in Canada on September 4, 2016
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thanks
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Raven
3.0 out of 5 stars Gift
Reviewed in Canada on February 11, 2016
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Gave as gift. No complaints.
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