# Dawn of the New Everything *By Jaron Lanier. Henry Holt and Company (US), 2017.* > I did not read the whole book. The description and contents come from library catalog records, the publisher's jacket text as quoted in them, a Google Books contents listing and the Audible page. What the book argues comes from those descriptions and from reviews and interviews as they appear on the pages linked below. I read page text and descriptions, not audio or video. I make no claims about specific passages. The source that mentioned the book, a StarTalk Plus episode note, names it only in a one-line bio of the guest. ## 1. Book facts | | | |---|---| | Title | *Dawn of the New Everything: Encounters with Reality and Virtual Reality* (UK edition: *Dawn of the New Everything: A Journey Through Virtual Reality*) | | Author | Jaron Lanier | | Publisher | Henry Holt and Company, New York, 2017 (first edition; Google Books dates its record 2017-11-21). UK: Bodley Head. Paperback: Picador, November 6, 2018 | | ISBNs | US hardcover 9781627794091 (ISBN-10 1627794093); Picador paperback 9781250097408; Bodley Head 9781847923530; Vintage UK "A Journey Through Virtual Reality" 9781847923523 (Open Library; catalog records) | | Pages | xv, 351 pages with illustrations (US hardcover library records). Open Library lists 368 for the Picador paperback | | LCCN | 2017010792 | | Language | English | | Audiobook | Unabridged, about 14 hours 29 minutes, narrated by Oliver Wyman (Macmillan Audio, 2017) | **Where it came up.** One mention: - [Neil deGrasse Tyson And Jaron Lanier on the AI Illusion](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_ZKYH8v_do) (StarTalk Plus). My vault note on the episode lists the book in a one-line bio of Lanier, with *You Are Not a Gadget*, *Who Owns the Future?* and *Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now*. Vault note: [[Video Summaries/StarTalk Plus/Neil deGrasse Tyson And Jaron Lanier on the AI Illusion]]. I did not check whether the episode discusses the book itself. ## 2. Book resources **Free (legal).** The book is in copyright; these are library routes only. - **Libby/OverDrive.** The Los Angeles Public Library catalog lists an [ebook](https://www.overdrive.com/media/3255409) and an [audiobook](https://www.overdrive.com/media/3330739). You need a library card, and I did not check availability or wait times. Your own library may differ. - **Internet Archive controlled lending.** Two scans exist: [dawnofneweveryth0000lani](https://archive.org/details/dawnofneweveryth0000lani) and [dawnofneweveryth0000lani_f7q3](https://archive.org/details/dawnofneweveryth0000lani_f7q3). Open Library flags both as print-disabled, which means lending or accessibility access only, not open reading. I did not open the borrow pages. - **Hoopla.** Its [search page](https://www.hoopladigital.com/search?q=dawn+of+the+new+everything) loads, but I could not see availability from my box. - [Open Library work OL19722032W](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL19722032W) and the [US hardcover edition record](https://openlibrary.org/books/OL26935155M). - **Project Gutenberg.** Not available; the book is in copyright. - **Excerpt.** [Salon ran an excerpt](https://www.salon.com/2017/12/17/how-virtual-reality-proves-we-are-real/) (December 17, 2017), which the author's page links. **Paid.** - Audiobook: [Audible, narrated by Oliver Wyman](https://www.audible.com/pd/Dawn-of-the-New-Everything-Audiobook/B076KQXD9N). The [Kirkus audiobook review](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/audiobook-reviews/jaron-lanier/dawn-of-the-new-everything/) lists the publisher as Macmillan Audio. - Amazon and Kindle: [US hardcover (ISBN 1627794093)](https://www.amazon.com/Dawn-New-Everything-Encounters-Reality/dp/1627794093), the link on the author's own page. I did not open it, so I have not checked price, stock or Kindle availability. UK: [Amazon UK, "A Journey Through Virtual Reality"](https://www.amazon.co.uk/Dawn-New-Everything-Journey-Through/dp/1847923526/), also unopened. - Google Books lists an ebook edition with a [limited preview](https://books.google.com/books?id=QpxADwAAQBAJ). - The author's [resource page for the book](https://www.jaronlanier.com/dawn/) collects reviews and interviews. **Cover:** [Open Library cover image](https://covers.openlibrary.org/b/id/14456597-L.jpg) (US hardcover edition). ## 3. Author biography Jaron Lanier (born May 3, 1960, in New York City, raised in Mesilla, New Mexico) is a scientist, musician and writer best known for his work in virtual reality (Literary Hub's bio). He enrolled at New Mexico State University at 13. In 1985 he left Atari with Thomas Zimmerman to found VPL Research, the first company to sell VR goggles and wired gloves. He has worked at Microsoft since 2006 and at Microsoft Research since 2009; his own biography gives his title as "octopus". Honors on his site and Wikipedia include the 2014 Peace Prize of the German Book Trade, TIME 100 (2010) and Prospect's top 50 World Thinkers (2014). Other books: *You Are Not a Gadget* (2010), *Who Owns the Future?* (2013), *Ten Arguments for Deleting Your Social Media Accounts Right Now* (2018). Sources: [his biography page](https://www.jaronlanier.com/general.html); [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaron_Lanier). ## 4. Author interviews and talks The author's [resource page](https://www.jaronlanier.com/dawn/) lists many; I read the page text or description of each below, not audio or video. - **Literary Hub, December 13, 2017.** [Jaron Lanier: "VR Should Be About Live Connections with Real People"](https://lithub.com/jarod-lanier-vr-should-be-about-live-connections-with-real-people/), a conversation with Dave Eggers. Lanier says the "dispassionate voice from above" in technical writing has not served us well, and calls the book his "project to reconcile my love of tech with my disappointments in how it's turned out so far." I read the excerpt shown in search results and the page opens. - **The Verge, December 8, 2017.** [VR pioneer Jaron Lanier on dystopia, empathy, and the future of the internet](https://www.theverge.com/2017/12/8/16751596/jaron-lanier-dawn-of-the-new-everything-vr-interview). I confirmed the page and headline; I did not read it in full. - **The Ezra Klein Show, January 2018.** [Vox write-up](https://www.vox.com/2018/1/16/16897738/jaron-lanier-interview) and the [podcast page](https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-ezra-klein-show/id1081584611?i=1000399882792) (1 hr 41 min). Klein calls the book "one of my favorites of the past year", and the conversation begins with Lanier's story of trip-sitting Richard Feynman. Description read only. - **WBUR On Point, November 28, 2017.** "Could virtual reality become the evilest invention of all time?", listed on the author's page. The WBUR link returned an error to my box, so I did not open it. - **NPR, December 2, 2017.** [Annalee Newitz's review, "Dawn of the New Everything argues for human-centered technology"](https://www.npr.org/2017/12/02/564811230/dawn-of-the-new-everything-argues-for-human-centered-technology). A review, not an interview; I read only the author page's quote of it. - **C-SPAN talk on the book.** The author's page links a [C-SPAN recording](https://www.c-span.org/video/?438199-2/dawn-everything&start=206). It returned a 403 to my box, so I could not open it. ## 5. Summary **What the book is (publisher jacket text, as quoted in library records).** An "inventive blend of autobiography, science writing, philosophy, and advice" in which Lanier tells the story of his personal and professional life as a scientist. The text says he was raised in the UFO territory of New Mexico, lived with his father in a geodesic dome they built together in the desert after the sudden death of his mother, attended college at fourteen, and founded the first VR start-up. The jacket says he cautions against computational beliefs such as AI, and argues that VR "can make our lives richer and fuller". The Audible page adds that, unlike his earlier critical books on social media, this one argues that VR can make our lives richer. **The author's own account.** In the Literary Hub conversation he says technical people have invented a supposedly dispassionate voice, that precision need not mean "personal erasure", and that the book is his attempt to reconcile his love of tech with how it has turned out. That is his description of his own aim. **Chapter outline.** Titles are the same across the Free Library of Philadelphia, Waubonsee College and Genesee District Library catalog records and a publisher-based bookseller listing. The page numbers come from the contents list on the [Google Books record](https://books.google.com/books?id=QpxADwAAQBAJ) that I opened (a 2017 record that is probably the ebook). That listing's last entry, "About the Author", is on p. 352, while the US hardcover has xv + 351 pages, so numbers in print may differ. The listing is incomplete: where it gives no page I say so. I did not open a printed table of contents. - Preface: Virtual Reality's Moment (no page given) - Introduction (no page given) - 1. 1960s: Terrors of Eden (p. 9) - 2. Rescue Spacecraft (p. 22) - 3. Batch Process (p. 33) - 4. Why I Love VR (About the Basics) (p. 47) - 5. Bug in the System (About the Dark Side of VR) (p. 57) - 6. Road (p. 63) - 7. Coast (p. 80) - 8. Valley of Unearthly Delights (p. 91) - 9. Alien Encounters (p. 104) - 10. The Feeling of Immersion (p. 116) - 11. To Don the New Everything (About Haptics, with a Little About Avatars) (p. 127) - 12. Nautical Dawn (p. 147) - 13. Six Degrees (A Little About Sensors and VR Data) (p. 168) - 14. Found (p. 180) - 15. Be Your Own Pyramidion (About Visual Displays for VR) (p. 192). Library records print this as "paramidion"; the bookseller and Google Books listings say "Pyramidion". - 16. The VPL Experience (p. 209) - 17. Inside-Out Spheres (A Little About VR "Video" and Sound) (p. 226) - 18. Scene (no page given) - 19. How We Settled into a Seed for the Future (p. 249) - 20. 1992, Out (no page given) - 21. Coda: Reality's Foil (p. 282) - Afterword (p. 289) - Appendix 1: Postsymbolic Communication (About the Reveries of One of My Classic VR Talks) (p. 291) - Appendix 2: Phenotropic Fevers (About VR Software) (page unclear in the listing) - Appendix 3: Dueling Demigods (p. 323) - Acknowledgments (p. 337) - About the Author (p. 352) The library records I saw stop at the Coda. The Afterword, three appendices and Acknowledgments come from the bookseller listing and Google Books contents list. **Reception (as reported by others).** The Guardian's review (Simon Parkin) calls Lanier "both cheerleader and doomsayer in a highly personal story of virtual reality". [Book Marks](https://bookmarks.reviews/reviews/all/dawn-of-the-new-everything-encounters-with-reality-and-virtual-reality/) shows the Financial Times and The Washington Post as positive and The Wall Street Journal (Frank Rose) as mixed: the Journal calls it "a highly eccentric memoir" and finds "a disjointed sequence of half-remembered anecdotes". The author's page also lists Ezra Klein's best books of 2017 and The Economist's Books of the Year 2017; I could not open The Economist's review (403). **Why it is here.** The StarTalk Plus note lists it in the guest's bio. The episode is about AI, a topic the book touches only in passing, per the jacket text. ## 6. Fact-check Overall verdict: **supported** for the publication facts. The arguments are the author's and the publisher's, not my reading. | Claim | Verdict | Evidence | |---|---|---| | Henry Holt, 2017, ISBN 9781627794091, xv + 351 pages | Supported | Free Library of Philadelphia and Genesee District Library records; Open Library OL26935155M | | Subtitle "Encounters with Reality and Virtual Reality" (US) | Supported | Library records; Open Library | | UK edition subtitled "A Journey Through Virtual Reality" | Supported | Open Library Bodley Head record OL26668689M; Amazon UK link on the author's page | | Audiobook narrated by Oliver Wyman, about 14.5 hours | Supported | Audible author page; Kirkus audiobook review | | Chapter titles | Supported | Three library catalog records agree; bookseller listing adds front and back matter | | Chapter page numbers | Edition-limited, incomplete | Google Books contents list; ebook numbering may differ from print; Scene, 1992 Out, the Preface, Introduction and one appendix have no page there | | Library ebook and audiobook exist in OverDrive | Supported | Los Angeles Public Library catalog records | | Internet Archive lending copy | Print-disabled only | Open Library flags | | Wall Street Journal review was mixed | Supported | Book Marks excerpt | ## 7. Citations and references - Author's resource page: [Web resources for the book](https://www.jaronlanier.com/dawn/); [Brief biography](https://www.jaronlanier.com/general.html). - Catalogs: [Open Library edition OL26935155M](https://openlibrary.org/books/OL26935155M); [Open Library work](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL19722032W); OverDrive [ebook](https://www.overdrive.com/media/3255409) and [audiobook](https://www.overdrive.com/media/3330739); [Google Books](https://books.google.com/books?id=QpxADwAAQBAJ). The Free Library of Philadelphia record, the Genesee District Library record and the Waubonsee College record were read in search results; the first two returned errors to my box on a later check, so I link them as plain text rather than citing them as opened pages. - Bookseller contents listing: [preigu.de](https://preigu.de/buecher/dawn-of-the-new-everything/110945043) (paperback, with the front and back matter). - Audio: [Audible](https://www.audible.com/pd/Dawn-of-the-New-Everything-Audiobook/B076KQXD9N); [Kirkus](https://www.kirkusreviews.com/audiobook-reviews/jaron-lanier/dawn-of-the-new-everything/). - Reviews: [Book Marks roundup](https://bookmarks.reviews/reviews/all/dawn-of-the-new-everything-encounters-with-reality-and-virtual-reality/); [The Guardian, Simon Parkin](https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/nov/20/dawn-of-the-new-everything-jaron-lanier-review-virtual-reality-memoirs-tech-visionary). - Author: [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaron_Lanier) - Interviews: the pages linked in section 4 - Source: [Neil deGrasse Tyson And Jaron Lanier on the AI Illusion](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_ZKYH8v_do)