Bøger af Andrew Blum

From the acclaimed author ofTubes, a lively and surprising tour of the infrastructure behind the weather forecast, the people who built it, and what it reveals about our climate and our planetThe weather is the foundation of our daily lives. Its a staple of small talk, the app on our smartphones, and often the first thing we check each morning.Yet behind these quotidian interactions is one of the most expansive machines human beings have ever constructeda triumph of science, technology and global cooperation. But whatisthis weather machine and who created it?InThe Weather Machine, Andrew Blum takes readers on a fascinating journey through an everyday miracle. In a quest to understand how the forecast works, he visits old weather stations and watches new satellites blast off. He follows the dogged efforts of scientists to create a supercomputer model of the atmosphere and traces the surprising history of the algorithms that power their work. He discovers that we have quietly entered a golden age of meteorologyour tools allow us to predict weather more accurately than ever, and yet we havent learned to trust them, nor can we guarantee the fragile international alliances that allow our modern weather machine to exist.Written with the sharp wit and infectious curiosity Andrew Blum is known for,The Weather Machinepulls back the curtain on a universal part of our everyday lives, illuminating our relationships with technology, the planet, and the global community.

Tubes: Behind the Scenes at the Internet by Andrew Blum is...'Utterly engrossing. The year's most original and stimulating 'travel' book. Even the most geek-wary of readers will enjoy' Independent'Entertaining and illuminating. Excels at rooting the Internet in real-world locations. Full of memorable images that make its complex architecture easier to comprehend' ObserverThe Internet. Home to the most important and intimate aspects of our lives. Our careers, our relationships, our selves, all of them are out there - online. So ... where is that exactly? And who's in charge again? And what if it breaks?In Tubes Andrew Blum takes us on a gripping backstage tour of the real but hidden world of the Internet, introducing us to the remarkable clan of insiders and eccentrics who own, design and run it everyday. He uncovers the secret data warehouses where our online selves are stored, peels back the wires that transport us across the globe, reveals its mammoth hubs and surprising alley-ways, explaining what the Internet actually is, where it is, how it got there - and, yes, what happens when it breaks.'An engaging reminder that, cyber-Utopianism aside, the Internet is as much a thing of flesh and steel as any industrial-age lumber mill or factory. An excellent introduction to the nuts and bolts of how exactly it all works and a timely antidote to oft-repeated abstractions about "e;cyberspace"e; or "e;cloud computing"e; Economist'Makes hard-to-grasp concepts easy to understand, even obvious. The history, in particular, is one of the best and most memorable I have ever read' New Scientist'A Quixotic and winning book with a knack for bundling packets of data into memorable observations. This valuable book leaves you with its share of unsettling visions, but there are comic ones too' The New York Times'For a full understanding of the Internet on every level, this book is a must-read' Techzone'A great, playful, wondrous read' ArsTechnica'Blum is perhaps the millennial generation's John McPhee, chronicling an arcane journey of deep relevance to everyday life. For non-techies, the book is a very accessible revelation' Forbes'All too awesome to behold. Andrew Blum's fascinating book demystifies the earthly geography of this most ethereal terra incognita' Joshua Foer, author of Moonwalking with Einstein'Compelling and profound. You will never open an e-mail in quite the same way again' Tom Vanderbilt, author of Traffic'One of our best writers. A compelling story of an altogether new realm where the virtual world meets the physical' Paul Goldberger, New Yorker'The Internet really IS a series of tubes! Who knew?' David Pogue, The New York TimesAndrew Blum writes about architecture, infrastructure and technology for many publications, including the New Yorker, The New York Times, Bloomberg Businessweek, Slate and Popular Science. He is a correspondent for Wired, a contributing editor to Metropolis and lives in his hometown of New York City.