What We Are Reading Now! Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet by Andrew Blum

Publication Date: 2012-05-29

When you send an email to a friend in another state, how does it get there? We all know that Google keeps track of our search history, but where is that information stored? This book answers those questions, and many more, about the actual physical structure of the Internet. We talk about storing photos and documents "in the cloud," but the "cloud" is earth-bound and tangible, composed of enormous data centers that, together, use 3% of the world's electricity. Mr. Blum explains the structure of the internet, following messages from the modem behind his sofa to the glass fibers that transmit them across oceans. It's a fascinating book!