![Uncanny Valley: A Memoir by [Wiener, Anna]](https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41WOfLIIXHL._SY346_.jpg)
This book had such an interesting premise: Young woman who is not very tech-proficient gets job in Silicon Valley, witnesses the start-up tech culture from inside.
Alas, this is not a person who can stop talking about herself, examining her own thoughts and habits, dissecting herself in broad daylight, and being self-consciously superior to the 'bros' long enough to really see them.
She endlessly flaunts her liberal arts/lit degree, and whines that tech culture does not have enough of the literary about it. Her responses to the sexism of this culture (well-known) are weak and ambiguous. She seems sarcastically ashamed of the perks of her job - trips, snacks,$$$ salary, lenient work from home policy, happy hours, etc. But she never stops indulging them. She is proud, on the other hand, that she comes to work in grungy clothing and is off-putting to face-to-face clients for that reason. Her alienation is palpable and, after the book lasts far too long (editors: where have you gone?); 25% of the way through it just becomes grating.
She reminds me of that grumpy private-U college student who has a lot of privilege, a lot of resentment, self-righteousness, and a soupcon of Marx.
I finished it and I regret it. Won't get those hours back. And it actually made me like tech bro culture better, if this is what passes for critique.
- File Size: 1118 KB
- Print Length: 279 pages
- Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0374278016
- Publisher: MCD (January 14, 2020)
- Publication Date: January 14, 2020
- Sold by: Macmillan
- Language: English
- ASIN: B07QYHLP97
- Text-to-Speech:
Enabled
- Word Wise: Enabled
- Lending: Not Enabled
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Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#1,585 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #2 in Biographies of Scientists
- #2 in Computer & Technology Biographies
- #2 in High-Tech Businesses
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