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Digital Audiobook
Broken Code by Jeff Horwitz

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Broken Code

Narrator
Jeff Horwitz
Publisher
Transworld
Publish Date
9 November 2023
Run Time
10 hours 18 minutes
Format
Audiobook

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What to expect

Brought to you by Penguin.

Facebook had a problem. Along with its sister platforms Instagram and WhatsApp, it was a daily destination for billions of users around the world, extolling its products for connecting people. But as a succession of scandals rocked Facebook from 2016, some began to question whether the company could control, or even understood, its own platforms.

As Facebook employees searched for answers, what they uncovered was worse than they could've imagined. The problems ran far deeper than politics. Facebook was peddling and amplifying anger, looking the other way at human trafficking, enabling drug cartels and authoritarians and allowing VIP users to break the platform's supposedly inviolable rules.

It turned out to be eminently possible to isolate many of Facebook's worst problems, but whenever employees offered solutions their work was consistently delayed, watered down or stifled by a company that valued user engagement above all else. The only option left was to blow the whistle.

In Broken Code, award-winning Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz tells the riveting inside story of these employees and their explosive discoveries, uncovering the shocking cost of Facebook's blind ambition in the process.

'A penetrating portrait of one of the most significant companies in the world' Ronan Farrow, author of Catch and Kill

'With the skill of an award-winning journalist, Horwitz details the inner workings of the tech giant and their outcomes...A must-read.' Scott Galloway, bestselling author of The Four

©2023 Jeff Horwitz (P)2023 Penguin Audio

Critics Review

  • In trying to connect the world, Facebook tore at the fabric of society. With the skill of an award-winning journalist, through fascinating personal angles, Horwitz details the inner workings of the tech giant and their outcomes — misinformation, teen depression, and political division. A must-read.

    Scott Galloway, bestselling author of The Four

  • A dogged and meticulous reporter, Jeff Horwitz is at the height of his powers in Broken Code, a penetrating portrait of one of the most significant companies in the world and of one of the great new challenges of this technological era.

    Ronan Farrow, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and bestselling author

  • A well-researched, disturbing study of a tech behemoth characterized by arrogance, hypocrisy, and greed

    Kirkus

  • Jeff Horwitz has written a blockbuster expose of Facebook, the notoriously secretive social media giant whose benign mission—connecting people—masked a growing propensity towards some of humanity’s worst impulses. Populated by concerned, brave employees who defied their employer and leaked thousands of pages of internal documents to Horwitz, with the imperious, remote Mark Zuckerberg and his top lieutenants at the center, Broken Code is brilliant reporting and a page-turning narrative of immense importance

    James B. Stewart, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and New York Times bestselling author

User Reviews

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Details

Author
Jeff Horwitz
Narrator
Jeff Horwitz
Duration
10 hours 18 minutes
Release Date
9 November 2023
ISBN
9781529916751
Format
Audiobook
Publisher
Transworld
Genre
Information technology industries, Digital and information technologies: social and ethical aspects, History of specific companies / corporate history, Corporate governance: role and responsibilities of boards and directors, Impact of science and technology on society, Business ethics and social responsibility, Political structures / systems: democracy

Synopsis

Brought to you by Penguin.Facebook had a problem. Along with its sister platforms Instagram and WhatsApp, it was a daily destination for billions of users around the world, extolling its products for connecting people. But as a succession of scandals rocked Facebook from 2016, some began to question whether the company could control, or even understood, its own platforms.As Facebook employees searched for answers, what they uncovered was worse than they could've imagined. The problems ran far deeper than politics. Facebook was peddling and amplifying anger, looking the other way at human trafficking, enabling drug cartels and authoritarians and allowing VIP users to break the platform's supposedly inviolable rules.It turned out to be eminently possible to isolate many of Facebook's worst problems, but whenever employees offered solutions their work was consistently delayed, watered down or stifled by a company that valued user engagement above all else. The only option left was to blow the whistle.In Broken Code, award-winning Wall Street Journal reporter Jeff Horwitz tells the riveting inside story of these employees and their explosive discoveries, uncovering the shocking cost of Facebook's blind ambition in the process.'A penetrating portrait of one of the most significant companies in the world' Ronan Farrow, author of Catch and Kill'With the skill of an award-winning journalist, Horwitz details the inner workings of the tech giant and their outcomes...A must-read.' Scott Galloway, bestselling author of The Four©2023 Jeff Horwitz (P)2023 Penguin Audio

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