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Tools and Weapons
- The Promise and the Peril of the Digital Age
- Narrated by: Brad Smith, Carol Ann Browne
- Length: 11 hrs and 11 mins
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Publisher's Summary
The instant New York Times best seller
From Microsoft's president and one of the tech industry's broadest thinkers, a frank and thoughtful reckoning with how to balance enormous promise and existential risk as the digitization of everything accelerates.
"A colorful and insightful insiders’ view of how technology is both empowering us and threatening us. From privacy to cyberattacks, this timely book is a useful guide for how to navigate the digital future." (Walter Isaacson)
Microsoft President Brad Smith operates by a simple core belief: When your technology changes the world, you bear a responsibility to help address the world you have helped create. This might seem uncontroversial, but it flies in the face of a tech sector long obsessed with rapid growth and sometimes on disruption as an end in itself. While sweeping digital transformation holds great promise, we have reached an inflection point. The world has turned information technology into both a powerful tool and a formidable weapon, and new approaches are needed to manage an era defined by even more powerful inventions like artificial intelligence. Companies that create technology must accept greater responsibility for the future, and governments will need to regulate technology by moving faster and catching up with the pace of innovation.
In Tools and Weapons, Brad Smith and Carol Ann Browne bring us a captivating narrative from the cockpit of one of the world's largest and most powerful tech companies as it finds itself in the middle of some of the thorniest emerging issues of our time. These are challenges that come with no pre-existing playbook, including privacy, cybercrime and cyberwar, social media, the moral conundrums of artificial intelligence, big tech's relationship to inequality, and the challenges for democracy, far and near. While in no way a self-glorifying "Microsoft memoir", the audiobook pulls back the curtain remarkably wide onto some of the company's most crucial recent decision points as it strives to protect the hopes technology offers against the very real threats it also presents. There are huge ramifications for communities and countries, and Brad Smith provides a thoughtful and urgent contribution to that effort.
Critic Reviews
"A clear, compelling guide to some of the most pressing debates in technology today." (Bill Gates, from the foreword)
“Taming Big Tech will not be easy, but this book...shows where to start.” (The Financial Times)
“Smith’s book is not the typical vanity project churned out by so many Fortune 500 leaders, the generic tomes on leadership and teamwork stocked at airport bookstores near the neck pillows. Tools and Weapons is a glimpse behind the curtain as Microsoft reckoned with the Snowden revelations, defended against the vicious cyberattacks, and took both the Obama and Trump administrations to court.” (Rolling Stone)
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What listeners say about Tools and Weapons
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
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Performance
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- UDI B
- 11-14-19
Informative, not captivating. Not about technology
Whether you know everything or nothing about the technologies this book speaks of, the book itself will teach you nothing on that.
The book is about technology's interactions with business, law and government. Which is what you can expect given its authors.
The storytelling isn't one bit captivating. This is more a long factual account of legal issues around technology, told from a very specific Microsoft executive perspective.
Having finished it with considerable effort, I'm not sure what my takeaway from it is, if there is one.
The facts are interesting to learn though, due to the unique insider perspective that's hard to find elsewhere.
2 people found this helpful
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- Sterling
- 12-28-19
Informative and Relevant
For anyone that is in business, investment or technology, I recommend listening to this book. It is very informative and addresses current issues. Despite a small portion content that was based on opinion, I definitely gained some understanding by listening to this book.
1 person found this helpful
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- Clint Watts
- 08-06-22
Excellent summary of all the dimensions of technology law and a changing world
What I appreciated most about this book was its breakdown of the many complex legal regulatory and global issues and how technology can be used for a good or bad depending on how democracies respond
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- Tim
- 11-11-21
Good book … but …
… boy did he cringe every time a Republican did something right. Constantly trying to phrase it as an excuse if something was not done with Democrats. Geez … this does not instill confidence that MS will treat everyone the same.
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- BillS
- 08-12-21
Relevant
Very interesting presentation of a number of very relevant and important technology topics. Gives some insights and perspectives we don't usually get.
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- Michael W Robertson
- 05-31-20
Learn more
A good read to learn about the future. It is worth your time to the idea brought forward.
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- MikeM
- 03-16-20
Excellent Book On The Cutting Edge
This is an important book for technology leaders and world leaders alike. It is the “Inconvenient Truth” of the AI era, and a sobering call to action for all who care about the future of humanity.
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- Guest
- 12-10-19
eye opening details about the tech world
this was a great behind the scenes view of the challenges within the digital age. I enjoyed reading about the ins and outside of washington and AI .
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- Cedars
- 10-29-19
Educational, though a MSFT puff piece
I respect the challenge in pulling something like this together given the thorny, politically charged topics that are raised. That said, references to Letters from a Birmingham Jail may be a step too far.
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- Gam Gamus
- 10-18-19
A glimpse from where we come to where we go
Past and future perspectives from a former legal Microsoft employee, nice reading good executed book!