The new paperback edition of my book The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google has been published and is available at Amazon, B&N, Powell’s, and your local independent bookstore. The new edition has an afterword that brings the story of the cloud up to date (and also reveals the fate of Samuel Insull). Here’s how the afterword begins:

On the night of June 29, 2012, a Friday, the Internet flickered like a loose lightbulb. Thousands of Netflix movies, streaming through the screens of TVs and computers around the land, froze in midscene. The Instagram apps installed on millions of smartphones and tablets refused to upload or download snapshots. The popular online scrapbook Pinterest disappeared entirely, replaced by a simple white page bearing a curt and unhelpful legend: Server Not Responding. For Web-loving Americans, it was an irritating start to the weekend. …

Here’s what some reviewers have said about the book:

Financial Times: “The best read so far about the significance of the shift to cloud computing.”

Fast Company: “Future Shock for the Web-apps era … Compulsively readable – for nontechies, too.”

Salon: “Magisterial … Draws an elegant and illuminating parallel between the late-19th-century electrification of America and today’s computing world.”

Wall Street Journal: “Mr. Carr’s provocations are destined to influence CEOs and the boards and investors that support them as companies grapple with the constant change of the digital age.”

Christian Science Monitor: “Widely considered to be the most influential book so far on the cloud computing movement.”

Times Higher Education: “Lucid and accessible … [Carr’s] account is one of high journalism, rather than of a social or computer scientist. His book should be read by anyone interested in the shift from the world wide web and its implications for industry, work and our information environment.”

New York Post: “The Big Switch is thought-provoking and an enjoyable read, and the history of American electricity that makes up the first half of the book is riveting stuff. Further, the book broadly reinforces the point that it’s always wise to distrust utopias, technological or otherwise.”