Brian Merchant

Writer

Expertise

Science and Technology

Education

UC Santa Barbara

Introduction

 

Brian Merchant is a writer, editor, and producer based in Los Angeles. He writes about technology, and artificial intelligence and automation. His first book,“The One Device” was described in the New York Times as “A stunning book. You will never look at your iPhone the same way again.”

 

Experience

 

Merchant wrote for TreeHugger from 2008 to 2012 and his work has also appeared in the LA Times, the Guardian, Slate, VICE Magazine, Fast Company, Fortune, Motherboard and Gizmodo. He is currently the senior books editor for OneZero, Medium’s tech publication. He also runs Terraform at VICE, an online fiction site. He once spent a month living on nothing but Soylent and says “Today, I spend most of his time investigating the myriad ways humanity is attempting to survive itself.”

Publications

  • The One Device was shortlisted for the Financial Times best business book for 2017, and has been translated into a dozen languages.
  • He is currently writing 'Blood in the Machine,' which will examine the disruptive power and toll of automation through the lens of the Luddite uprisings.
  • Merchant wrote “Klick here to kill”, the cover story for the January, 2020 issue of Harpers magazine.

 

Education

 

BA in English and Philosophy from UC Santa Barbara.

 

Treehugger and Dotdash

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Read more from Brian Merchant