Palo Alto by Malcolm Harris

Read Palo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the World by Malcolm Harris ( )

The first comprehensive, global history of Silicon Valley, from railroad capitalists to microchip assemblers, showing how Northern California created the world as we know it

Palo Alto is nice. The weather is temperate, the people are educated, rich, healthy, enterprising. Remnants of a hippie counterculture have synthesized with high technology and big finance to produce the spiritually and materially ambitious heart of Silicon Valley, whose products are changing how we do everything from driving around to eating food. It is also a haunted toxic waste dump built on stolen Indian burial grounds, and an integral part of the capitalist world system.

I forced myself to not take any notes or highlights when reading this book, and ended up with three (3) highlights on a 700+ page book, which I consider a win. Palo Alto was a really good book at some points, and felt like a chore at others. I think the images and narratives are…