Our Biggest Fight

Reclaiming Liberty, Humanity, and Dignity in the Digital Age

By: Frank H. McCourt Jr., Michael J. Casey - contributor

Narrated by: Frank H. McCourt Jr., Michael J. Casey, Jonathan Beville

NATIONAL BESTSELLER

The internet as we know it is broken. Here’s how we can seize back control of our lives from the corporate algorithms and create a better internet—before it’s too late.

“In the spirit of Thomas Paine’s Revolution-era Common Sense, this manifesto challenges us to create new digital architectures to safeguard democracy.”—Walter Isaacson, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Elon Musk

It was once a utopian dream. But today’s internet, despite its conveniences and connectivity, is the primary cause of a pervasive unease that has taken hold in the U.S. and other democratic societies. It’s why youth suicide rates are rising, why politics has become toxic, and why our most important institutions are faltering.

Information is the lifeblood of any society, and our current system for distributing it is corrupted at its heart. Everything comes down to our ability to communicate openly and trustfully with each other. But, thanks to the dominant digital platforms and the ways they distort human behavior, we have lost that ability—while, at the same time, we’ve been robbed of the data that is rightfully ours.

The roots of this crisis, argue Frank McCourt and Michael Casey, lie in the prevailing order of the internet. In plain but forceful language, the authors—a civic entrepreneur and an acclaimed journalist—show how a centralized system controlled by a small group of for-profit entities has set this catastrophe in motion and eroded our personhood.

And then they describe a groundbreaking solution to reclaim it: rather than superficial, patchwork regulations, we must reimagine the very architecture of the internet. The resulting “third-generation internet” would replace the status quo with a new model marked by digital property rights, autonomy, and ownership.

Inspired by historical calls to action like Thomas Paine’s Common Sense, Our Biggest Fight argues that we must act now to embed the core values of a free, democratic society in the internet of tomorrow. Do it right and we will finally, properly, unlock its immense potential.

©2024 Frank H. McCourt, Jr. and Michael J. Casey (P)2024 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“In the spirit of Thomas Paine’s Revolution-era Common Sense, this manifesto challenges us to create new digital architectures to safeguard democracy. Frank McCourt and Michael Casey’s Our Biggest Fight is an important book as we enter the era when artificial intelligence meets social media.” —Walter Isaacson

“The Internet has reshaped our economies, societies, and personalities—and AI is about to do it again. And so it’s a perfect moment for Our Biggest Fight, McCourt and Casey’s impassioned manifesto about how to build a human-centered digital future. Everyone who cares about the changes and the challenges that lie ahead should read this book.” —Nicholas Thompson, CEO, The Atlantic

“By illuminating the perverse incentives in Big Tech’s business models, Frank McCourt demonstrates just how unacceptable our current predicament is. Our Biggest Fight is a powerful call to arms to demand something different—for our society, and for ourselves.” —Tristan Harris, cofounder of the Center for Humane Technology

We can make Ai work for us by starting to claim our own data!

AI can either be a disaster for us if left in the hands of the companies that are using it to make money . Or AI can be used to give us many important tools to improve our lives.