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The premise of Earthweb is that every five years or so, a giant plot device enters the solar system from interstellar space and causes massive character development. The first such plot device also destroyed everything annoying on Earth, resulting in the establishment of a Web-based libertarian world culture in which all the men are strong, all the women are gorgeous, and all the geeks are rich and sexy. Political problems are solved by sending in teams of strong men and gorgeous women to capture and overthrow any sufficiently corrupt government (as determined through the utterly impartial and rational judgement of the geeks, via the Web).
Despite, or maybe because of, that premise, the book is great fun to read (especially if you're a geek who already spends all too much time on the Web). It's a little over three hundred pages long, and I read it in like two days elapsed time (and it wasn't even a weekend) (and I slept and everything). It's tech-optimism taken to a risible extreme, but heck we need that now and then, if only to remind us what that end of the spectrum looks like.
Our heroes are going to defeat the evil plot device and die and/or live nobly ever after, worldwide computer mediated communication and the idea futures market are going to save humanity yet again, the strong men will bed the gorgeous women (and, to be fair, the strong women will bed the gorgeous men), but it's okay.
And who knows; even in the absence of giant alien plot devices, maybe technology really will make the world a better place. It's done a pretty good job so far.
This web page is licensed under a
Creative Commons License.