A couple of years ago, Douglas Rushkoff, a professor of media and digital economics in New York, was asked to give a speech at a swanky resort in a remote American desert. Rushkoff presumed he would be talking to investment bankers about a book he had written about the internet. When he arrived at the venue, however, he was shocked to find himself in front of half a dozen ultra-rich tech and hedge fund luminaries, instead of a conferenc.
The men — yes, they were all men — were collectively torn, they said, over a particular choice: New Zealand or Alaska? They feared the world was heading for what they termed “The Event” — some kind of “environmental collapse, social unrest, nuclear explosion, solar storm, unstoppable virus or malicious computer hack that takes everything down”, Rushkoff says. And they wanted to know which region would be safest to retreat to.
Other questions that preoccupied them included: was climate change scarier than biological warfare? How long would they likely need to remain in a bunker for anyway? And, crucially, how could they stop their own security forces from murdering them? They sought these answers from Rushkoff because he had previously written Present Shock, a well-regarded book about the future of tech.