From revolution on Twitter to romance on Tinder, we live in a world constructed of code – and coders are the ones who built it for us.In Coders, acclaimed tech writer Clive Thompson offers an illuminating reckoning with the most powerful tribe in the world today, computer programmers, asking who they are, how they think, and what should give us pause. Along the way, Thompson ponders the morality and politics of code, including its implications for civic life and the economy, and unpacks the surprising history of the field, beginning with the first coders – brilliant and pioneering women, who were later written out of history. To understand the world today, we need to understand code and its consequences. With Coders, Thompson offers a crucial insight into the heart of the machine. ‘By breaking down what the actual world of coding looks like . . . [Thompson] removes the mystery and brings it into the legible world for the rest of us to debate.’ New York Times‘Masterful . . . [Thompson] illuminates both the fascinating coders and the bewildering technological forces that are transforming the world in which we live.’ David Grann, author of The Lost City of Z

Fascinating. Thompson is an excellent writer and his subjects are themselves gripping . . . Many books have covered this territory, but Coders is bang up to date in a fast-moving world., [Thompson] is a brilliant social anthropologist. And, in this masterful book, he illuminates both the fascinating coders and the bewildering technological forces that are transforming the world in which we live., [Thompson] outlines [coders’] different personality traits, their history and cultural touchstones . . . By breaking down what the actual world of coding looks like . . . he removes the mystery and brings it into the legible world for the rest of us to debate., With his trademark clarity and insight, Thompson gives us an unparalleled vista into the mind-set and culture of programmers, the often-invisible architects and legislators of the digital age., Coders is an engrossing, deeply clued-in ethnography, and it’s also a book about power, a new kind: where it comes from, how it feels to wield it, who gets to try – and how all that is changing.

Clive Thompson is a longtime contributing writer for the New York Times magazine and a monthly columnist for Wired. He is the author of Smarter Than You Think: How Technology is Changing Our Minds for the Better.