Interface Frictions

“Honing its attention on design features, rather than the sprawling scale of platforms or software, this brilliant book points the way to a new media studies. Neta Alexander offers critical theories of refresh, playback speed, autoplay, and Night Shift, foregrounding the ways these seemingly transparent media functions configure and debilitate their users. The book does not end with this diagnosis—rather, Alexander delves into the ‘interface frictions’ experienced (and sometimes encouraged) by disabled and other edge users, finding at this juncture further sources of critique and ‘alternate imaginings of digitality.’” - Mara Mills, Director, New York University Center for Disability Studies

“Our bodies are breaking from the strain of being always online. But our debility, Interface Frictions shows, is no accident; it is the intentional result of design decisions to extract profit from us. Neta Alexander’s book is both a passionate manifesto and an incisive history of streaming media retold from the impaired or ‘nonaverage’ user’s perspective. It points us to the ways that access and disability can be reimagined and to the creative strategies by which we might steal back the time to rest and survive.” - Tung-Hui Hu, author of Digital Lethargy: Dispatches from an Age of Disconnection

"The false promise of the internet has yet to be fully exposed, because there is simply too much profit tied up with tech. However, a searing, deeply personal book like Interface Frictions chips away at the veneer of equity, free choice, and intimate personalization that for too long has been the bait-and-switch tactic of the rapacious platforms that have eluded regulatory scrutiny in both the United States and Europe. . . . [A]  brave and well-argued manifesto. Essential. All readership levels." - Choice