First Light of Day

"An expansive trip into our future and the technology to take us there." -Tom Wheeler, author, From Gutenberg to Google: The History of Our Future; former chairman, Federal Communications Commission London, 2045: Technology has changed everything from travel and work to government and even personal relationships. Society is segregated between knowledge workers who enjoy all the benefits of life in the new digital cities and the majority of the population, so-called Zeroids, who have been rendered economically superfluous. Mikhail Ivanovich Vasiliev is a model "high value citizen," a top AI engineering architect for Lloyd's Taiping Group, the world's premier financial services company. He leads a perfectly ordered life, with his routine optimized by his team of AI agents, but as he nears the creation of the world's first sentient being, forces converge seeking to prevent or exploit the advent of this new technology. Mikhail and his cohorts and enemies alike struggle with the invention's potential intellectual, philosophical, and spiritual impacts and the possibility of losing control of their lives to their own creations. This gripping narrative is followed by an overview of the real-life technologies that play crucial roles in the story and that are shaping our world today. As one of today's leading experts on technology innovation, Michael Steep is uniquely qualified to describe the impact of unchecked technology development currently underway.