A review by candystripelegs
Technogenesis by Syne Mitchell

2.0

This was a really quick read and I liked a lot of the ideas explored, but the characters left something to be desired and the ending made me kind of angry. Jaz stumbles upon a horrible truth, that the net has given rise to a metamind, an artificial intelligence that has made mankind complacent. It keeps its existence secret for fear of rejection. Jaz feels this is a huge breach of privacy, and so wants to work against it.

It ends with her joining up with another metamind that robs her of privacy, but for some reason she really likes this one, probably because it's hooked up to fewer people. But her initial grievance never gets resolved. Sure, she joins it willingly, but why is that one so good and the original so bad? She gets found out as a spy and thrown into a sensory deprivation tank to be used as a processor for the new AI. It ends with her leaving her newfound true wuv to go to the moon with the psychopathic assholes who threw her into the tank and fried her brain because she felt really bad about it. Until then she was just kind of a horror movie level of stupid, like "Oh, don't go in there." sort of dumb. But why ruin her life to go to the moon with people who want to kill her? Why not send other naturals to do the exact same thing? Why did she feel like it was so important to have a metamind?

Until the end I liked the book fine enough, but ugh I had bad endings.