In his 2010 book The Shallows, Nicholas Carr argues that the internet is changing the way we think and act - for the worse. Shocker! I don’t think anyone would argue differently, given the prevalence these days of garbage timesink sites like TikTok and news stories about how literature students these days can’t read books, let alone the average person!
It’s a convincing and well-researched book, although it’s already quite dated in some regards and the points it makes become repetitive from about the halfway point on, providing in detail case study after case study to prove things I suspect most people today will already be conscious of but may not have been 15 years ago.
I enjoyed the journey through history Carr takes us on, showing us how at different points in human development, inventions have changed the way we think. From the creation of alphabets, to paper and pens, to the printing press, and so on. I learned that Friedrich Nietzsche got his hands on the earliest typewriter - a Malling-Hansen Writing Ball (look at that bad boy below!) - and presciently noted that the machine changed the way he wrote.
I also learned that Johannes Gutenberg made no money from his invention, going bankrupt and selling the Gutenberg press to a better businessman who improved the press and made it the world-changing success it became.
There’s also encouraging proof that our brains are extremely plastic, and remain so for life, not just in childhood or up to a certain age, ie. 25 years old. Although it does mean that our brains can be remoulded to think differently at any age, for better or worse, which might explain why so many older people lose their minds on social media.
There are numerous studies on the neural benefits of reading and how reading for sustained periods of time linearly - ie. without distractions - allows for greater comprehension and memory.
Where the book starts to feel a bit dated is in chapters 5 and 6 which speculate about the future of artistic mediums. Chapter 5 - A Medium of the Most General Nature - talks about how movie studios have begun implementing internet accessibility during movies to allow audiences to interact and talk during films. I remember hearing about that around 2010 and thinking what a shitty idea it was then - and it’s never taken off. Similarly, there’s mention of incorporating social media into live orchestral and theatrical performances, which also never happened, or if it did it doesn’t anymore - if anything, the opposite has happened, with some theatres insisting the audience leave their phones in the lobby, to be collected after a performance (definitely a positive development).
Chapter 6 - The Very Image of a Book - is the silliest chapter here. Carr talks about the future of the book, based on what was being discussed by industry “experts” at the time. How cell phone novels that were popular in Japan for a spell were going to take off here (they didn’t); how “vooks” (e-books with videos embedded in them) were going to take over (they haven’t - this might even be the first time you’ve heard of such a thing; it certainly was for me!); how writers will have to think of incorporating search terms in their books to make their books more visible to people (nobody does this besides copywriters who have to use SEO); how there will be live chats within books (...); and how e-books will be constantly updated by its author after its been published, encouraging the release of unfinished books (never heard of this practice).
E-books being “updated” though is something that’s sort of happened - Amazon did bizarrely delete copies of Nineteen Eighty-Four from peoples’ accounts that one time - which shows the fragility of the technology. It’s not the reason why I gave up on reading digital books after 15 years, though it does show how you don’t really “own” the books you’re buying digitally. I just got fed up with having to look at another screen to read a book - and physical books are so much better in all regards to digital copies.
Carr even makes the incorrect statement that listening didn’t replace reading (regarding Victorian critics of the phonograph who believed it would replace print) because, for a growing number of people today (2025), audiobooks are how they experience reading. These people are unable to read books anymore - digital or otherwise - and can only listen to them, mostly via services like Audible. For those people then, listening has replaced reading (and it is listening, not reading - you don’t read a podcast!).
The book starts to feel repetitive halfway through as Carr mentions study after study to back up his claims. I appreciate that it's good practice and necessary for the kind of book he’s writing, but it’s still tedious to read, especially as I bought into his broader arguments - the internet and computers are making us stupider - from the first couple of studies.
It’s not all doom and gloom - hand-eye coordination and reflexes have been strengthened with the prevalence of the internet. But as we delegate tasks like memorisation (which takes time and effort to be of use to us) and allow ourselves to be distracted by constant notifications and permanent online connection, Carr’s contention that people today are getting dumber and it’s because of things like heavy smartphone usage feels introvertible.
Speaking personally, I know how difficult it is to settle down after hours at work on a computer - answering email after email, taking meeting after meeting - and then trying to read for a couple of hours. It takes some time to disconnect and feel grounded enough to even attempt a reasonable shot at reading a book for any length of time. And that’s me - someone who cherishes reading; for less committed would-be readers? There’s no chance.
I enjoyed reading about how technology through the ages has changed humanity’s destiny and found Carr’s arguments largely convincing, albeit somewhat depressing. But I also found his conclusions unsurprising - social media companies are nefarious, social media in general is deleterious to people - repetitive in their provenance, and some of his examples hopelessly outdated. It’s amazing that in just 15 years a book like this could seem like a relic, but that’s what’s happened.
The first half is more compelling than the second, but The Shallows was an enjoyable enough read to explain (partially - I suspect there’s more to people’s inability to engage in deep learning or study than simply social media; perhaps contemporary teaching methods?) how we got to where we are. Ironically, those who need to hear this message of less online time the most are the least likely to hear it given The Shallows is a book and not a 10 second TikTok.
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