I've read a few of Brynjolfsson's early papers in Management Science on how the Internet affects pricing of goods and early descriptions of what we now call 'information goods'. Pretty good stuff for the mid '90s. 
 So our authors' main idea here is that recent technological advances will lead to massive shifts in the economy on the scale of the first Industrial Revolution after the introduction of the steam engine. The changes of the past twenty years in telecommunications, publishing, manufacturing, shipping, etc., are only the beginning of what the authors term as the 'second machine age'. 
 There are three trends in computing technology which will drive this change: First, the continual exponential growth in computing power; second, the digital storage and transfer of information; and third, 'combining' technology from different fields or using non-traditional forms of expertise to conduct research. These are not just speculative ideas - the middle of the book describes practical examples like self-driving cars, additive manufacturing, and 'massive open online courses' or MOOCs. 
 Now all this sounds good. The main problem here is how will this affect our economy as a whole? The authors advocate a 'new class' will need to develop which is not dependent upon technology, but uses it to augment their analytic capabilities. The jobs of the future will trend towards designers/engineers, inventors, those with advanced education, and so forth. 
 Now this means that the majority of income will be directed towards those individuals best suited for the new economy. But what happens to those left behind by automation? Our authors term this problem 'spread', but that's just a mild euphemism for 'inequality'. Their partial solution is the establishment of a basic income or negative income tax. But then what are these people going to do all day? 
 In the near term, there is a list of bland and sensible policies. These including investments in infrastructure, patent law reform, raise carbon taxes, the sort of stuff which is so agreeable that it should have been implemented years ago. The most reasonable part for me is a complete overhaul of the education system, and a shift from reciting facts to critical analysis and how to use technology to research and supplement your own ideas. 
 The authors are right in noting that recent technology is unleashing new forces of creative destruction which will have global implications. The question here is how much technology advances at the expense of the previous human condition, and what happens if there is a substantive pushback at the revaluation of human labor.