One of Michiko Kakutani's (New York Times) top ten books of 2016 A funny thing happened on the way to the digital utopia. We've begun to fall back in love with the very analog goods and ideas the tech gurus insisted that we no longer needed. Businesses that once looked outdated, from film photography to brick-and-mortar retail, are now springing with new life. Notebooks, records, and stationery have become cool again. Behold the Revenge of Analog.
David Sax has uncovered story after story of entrepreneurs, small business owners, and even big corporations who've found a market selling not apps or virtual solutions but real, tangible things. As e-books are supposedly remaking reading, independent bookstores have sprouted up across the country. As music allegedly migrates to the cloud, vinyl record sales have grown more than ten times over the past decade. Even the offices of tech giants like Google and Facebook increasingly rely on pen and paper to drive their brightest ideas.
Sax's work reveals a deep truth about how humans shop, interact, and even think. Blending psychology and observant wit with first-rate reportage, Sax shows the limited appeal of the purely digital life-and the robust future of the real world outside it.
"In this spirited book, David Sax has found story after story of entrepreneurs, artisans, and creators who make real money by selling real things. And they're not just local craftspeople, either. As paper is supposedly vanishing, Moleskine notebooks--a company founded in 1997, the same year as the first dot-com boom--has grown into a large multinational corporation. As music supposedly migrates to the cloud, vinyl record sales were up over 50 percent in 2015, and generated almost $350m in sales. And as retail was supposedly hitting bottom, star Silicon Valley companies like Apple and Amazon are investing in brick-and-mortar stores. Sax's work reveals not just an underreported trend in business but a more fundamental truth about how humans shop, interact, and even think. He captures what you're missing when you can't find a good song in a vast iTunes library, or can't recall the details of an ebook you read: any simulation of a sight or smell or activity you experience in the real world is just that--a simulation. As you read this enlightening book (preferably on paper!) that seemingly simple observation gathers ever more weight. The success stories in this book are eye-opening, even inspiring. You'll come away from this book with a renewed sense of what it means to work, live, and shop. It is the perfect gift for a book lover--something you can unwrap and hold. And for anyone who has grown weary of overnight billionaires and social media market-disruptors, it is proof positive that there's another side of the story"--Publisher's description.
