Programme Index

Discover 11,128,835 listings and 279,850 playable programmes from the BBC

The Third Information Crisis by Naomi Alderman

The Most Useful Thing

Duration: 14 minutes

First broadcast: on BBC Radio 4 LWLatest broadcast: on BBC Radio 4 FM

In this wide-ranging series, award-winning novelist Naomi Alderman, author of The Power and The Future, argues we are living through the third great information crisis. Following the invention of writing, and then printing, we now have digital communications technology. In what she describes as a 'speculative historical project', Naomi traces the parallels between these moments, asking if we can learn from the past to help us cope with the ‘enormous wave of information’ from the internet and social media that we are all faced with today. Drawing on the work of philosophers and historians, she explores the way new technologies open up new ways of thinking and their enormous impact on our society.

Written and read by Naomi Alderman
Produced by Di Speirs. Show less

About this data

This data is drawn from the data stream that informs BBC's iPlayer and Sounds. The information shows what was scheduled to be broadcast, meaning it was/is subject to change and may not be accurate. More