Towards a Digital Renaissance

An authoritative but readable examination of the digital sector in both the UK and US, Towards a Digital Renaissance traces the excitement and optimism of the early internet, the outsider cyberpunk ethic and open access. But it also monitors the more complex but ultimately more commercialised online world of today, a world dominated by corporate business in which many feel that surveillance has become overwhelming.

The author’s involvement in various start-ups, both as CEO and investor, led to him being invited to lead Digital Catapult, the UK authority on advanced digital technology, and the book examines the interplay between state and private financing in the digital sector. It also argues for the internet’s potential to transition from a ‘medieval’ world of the GAFA big four (Google, Amazon, Facebook and Apple), closed and walled up like
medieval city states, to a ‘digital renaissance’ based on the free exchange of ideas and an enabling metaverse made up of virtual reality and artificial intelligence that deepens our experience of reality rather than restricting or monitoring it.