-> THE CIRCLE: BOOK VS MOVIE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_oBX... 
 I had to write a paper on this book for my lecture at uni. I wrote about the main themes of this novel and how our perception of privacy and public spheres change when we interact on the internet. Why is it that we as content creators and consumers feel so safe in the World Wide Web? Most of us don't have problems with sharing private informations like our full name, bank account, CV online, even though we wouldn't share these with strangers on the street. Why is that? 
 The Circle follows Mae Holland, an ambitious woman, who starts working for the Circle - the biggest media company in the United States of America. So Dave Eggers is providing us with a dystopian look on the future. At first Mae is quite impressed and amazed by the new technology and how the Circle is all for progress and invention and perfecting the online experience. 
 Mae knew that she never wanted to work - never wanted to be - anywhere else. Her hometown and the rest of California, the rest of America, seemed like some chaotic mess in the developing world. Outside the walls of the Circle, all was noise and struggle, failure and filth. But here, all had been perfected. The best people had made the best systems and the best systems had reaped funds, unlimited funds, that made possible this, the best place to work. And it was natural that it was so, Mae thought. Who else but utopians could make utopia? 
 The reason why the Circle could gain the absolute monopoly is because of their invention of the TruYou account - an online profile that enables the user to combine all their online accounts and passport into one account. Every information is stored in this profil (social media, banking, voting, mail - literally everything). In the remainder of a series a TruYou account gets obligatory for US citizens... that's just crazy!!! 
 The Circle controls everything and supervises everything. They don't delete - ever. Even if the user deletes pictures or other data, the Circle saves it in a cloud. 
 The only person in Mae's environment who is somewhat critical towards her new job is her ex-boyfriend Mercer who notes that Mae is solely communicating via social media and that talking face-to-face with others has become a rarity. 
 "It's not that I'm not social. I'm social enough. But the tools you guys create actually manufacture unnaturally extreme social needs. No one needs the level of contact you're purveying. It improves nothing. It's not nourishing. It's like snack food. [...] You're not hungry, you don't need the food. It does nothing for you, but you keep eating these empty calories. This is what you're pushing. Same thing. Endless empty calories, but the digital-social equivalent. And you calibrate it so it's equally addictive." 
 The Circle deals with many interesting themes and is a truly frightening outlook on our future. I personally don't think it's that far fetched because monopolies are already a thing and being anonymous online is already impossible due to IP searches and other technologies. 
 I mean how often have you heard that sentence, for instance: If you aren't transparent, what are you hiding? And to everyone thinking that there's some truth in that statement, just keep in mind what Edward Snowden said: Arguing that you don't care about the right to privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say. 
 This whole theme of transparency and how it was explored was just fascinating and frightening at the same time, same goes for Mae becoming more and more brain-washed throughout the story. I can apply this to my own behaviour online as well. I don't want to know everything that goes on behind closed doors because it's easier not to know. Did you know for instance that facebook hired thousands of people in Manilla (for 1$ an hour) to delete child porn and beheadings off their social platform? These workers have to watch horrible videos 10 hours a day and don't even get psychological treatment. I mean how fucked up is that? This really makes me want to delete my social media accounts (content moderation of this form is also carried out by Instagram, Twitter & Co). 
 Overall, a very realistic dystopia that'll make you think. (Unlike the movie, which is a clusterfuck!)