Author: Cass S. Sunstein

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Comments:As we become ever more sorted into groups of like-minded people by increasingly sophisticated social media companies, we live in “echo chambers” that merely amplify our own views. We no longer communicate with people of different political horizons, in fact we often cannot understand them anymore. According to Cass Sunstein, professor at Harvard Law School, and best-selling author, we need to rethink the critical relationship between democracy and the internet. “Cybercascades” and “confirmation bias” are two elements of the current online world which assist “polarization entrepreneurs” to exploit online fragmentation which endangers the shared conversations, experiences, and understandings that are the lifeblood of democracy. It might be argued, following his line of thought, that the holy grail of personalisation in retailing will eliminate serendipity in shopping and indeed put an end to shopping itself.