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A quick rundown of this product’s key features:
A “devastating” (Nation) examination of how a cabal of tech-billionaires is colluding with once-idealistic journalists to create an entirely new media landscape
Owned is the story of the underreported and growing collusion between new wealth and new journalism. In recent years, right-wing billionaires like Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, and David Sacks have turned to media as their next investment and source of influence. Their cronies are Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi—once known as idealistic and left-leaning voices, now beneficiaries of Silicon Valley largesse. Together, this new alliance aims to exploit the failings of traditional journalism and undermine the very idea of an independent and fact-based fourth estate.
Owned examines how this shift has allowed spectacularly wealthy reactionaries to pursue their ultimate goal of censoring critics so to further their own business interests—and personal vendettas—entirely unimpeded while also advancing a toxic and antidemocratic ideology.
A rich history of the decades-long rise of this new right-wing alternative media takeover, Owned follows the money, names names, and offers a chilling portrait of a future social media and news landscape. It is a biting exposé of journalistic greed, tech-billionaire ambition, and a lament for a disappearing free press.
Our Top Reviews
Reviewer: M. B. Wright
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Highly Relevant Reading
Review: Higgins starts from asking how and why the career trajectories of Matt Taibbi and Glenn Greenwald took the turn they did in the past decade or so, and goes from there into an analysis of the ideological development of Silicon Valley Technofeudalists and their rightward turn to explain that change. As Higgins himself has admitted on Twitter, the book has taken on horrifying relevance in the early days of the second Trump administration.A particular strength of the book is the history of Silicon Valley’s political development, focusing on Marc Andreessen, Peter Thiel, and (to a somewhat lesser extent) Elon Musk. These chapters are vital reading. I was surprised that he was able to have such an in-depth interview with Greenwald, as those chapters make clear, while equally unsurprised the prickly Taibbi blew him off when asked for comment.As DOGE rampages through the government, this book makes for timely reading. Higgins writes judiciously of his subjects, in a limpid, engaging style.
Reviewer: NYC Reader1
Rating: 4.0 out of 5 stars
Title: An important book on how formerly leftist journalists poison the well of public discourse.
Review: The book addresses an important topic, but understates the relentless mendacity of Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi, who both act like shills for Putin in their Substack pages. Greenwald recently offered up an hour long valentine to Putin’s muse, Alexander Dugin. Taibbi offered up a torrent of lies about the current state of affairs in the Ukraine War. You could write a book just dissecting Taibbi’s falsehoods in his Twitter files rants.
Reviewer: thomas haver
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: The most relevant book to explain today’s political climate
Review: What are you hearing? Eoin Higgins does a superb job of explaining our current predicament in great detail. We can all see the changing narrative but Higgins helps us understand the WHY.
Reviewer: Phillip Quinn
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Owned: How Tech Billionaires on the Right Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left | Book Review
Review: I had a great time reading Owned: How Tech Billionaires on the Right Bought the Loudest Voices on the Left by Eoin Higgins. It was a very informative and entertaining book that I highly recommend.Do you want to see two dead bodies? Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi are here.Higgins using writings and interviews from Greenwald and Taibbi as the evidence against their rightward shift shows two things.The first is that they weren’t really that “left” to begin with. Both are a conflagration of positions and ideas that sometimes overlap with the left but also, just as frequently if not more, have positions that are way to the right.Then, as they started receiving their paychecks from the billionaire employers, they became vocal defenders of the right.This book is really bad for them. They suck.This book was just more reinforcement to the idea that tech companies have created anything useful in nearly two decades.The inability of tech companies to build anything positive for society over the last two decades has been pathetic. They’ve built value on garbage subscription services and inflated valuations in the stock market mostly based on the idea that “one day they’ll get there” and do something good.Billionaires shouldn’t exist.There is zero reason for billionaires to exist. Tax them out of existence. Use that money for good.
Reviewer: rlsine
Rating: 1.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Progressive Sactimony
Review: North Korea level smear of a real journalist.
Reviewer: Mitch Samuels
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Excellent
Review: Excellent book about some truly horrible and immoral people.I graduated and started working in the startup world at peak Musk/Thiel popularity. My first boss gave me Zero to One along with my laptop when I started. The weird “hustle & grind” culture made me start to think most of those “leaders” were just sociopaths that got lucky once. This book helped confirm that.
Reviewer: Tardigrade
Rating: 2.0 out of 5 stars
Title: Disappointing
Review: I remember Glenn Greenwood from his role in the famous Snowden leak, so I was shocked to learn of his conservative turn. That’s why this book piqued my interest, but I found it a bit disappointing. Sure, there are some interesting facts about the connections between the media and tech moguls (yes, Elon Musk included) described here, but it’s a bit chaotic and not very engaging. And the process of radicalization itself is much better analyzed in Naomi Klein’s brilliantly insightful “Doppelgänger”.Thanks to the publisher, PublicAffairs, and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this book.
Reviewer: user
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Excellent book. Gives much needed context to understand the newly formed media landscape of the last 10 years or so, and how some voices who grew out of the occupy/anonymous/wikileaks movements ended up being bought by the far right only to help usher a new fascist movement that is, in all essence, against the people. A must-read that unfortunately will be ignored by the ones who should be reading it the most.
Reviewer: Lee
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: Owned by Eoin Higgins is a sharp and incisive exploration of the internet’s troubling shift to the far right under the guise of free speech protection. Through the lens of Greenwald and Taibbi, Higgins dissects how billionaires have manipulated the digital landscape to serve their own interests, pushing an agenda that often masks extremism as a defence of freedom. For anyone concerned with the cultural rightward shift and eager to understand the mechanics behind it, this book is an essential read. Higgins not only critiques the current state of online discourse but also offers insights into how we might counter this alarming trend. It’s troubling stuff, but necessary to know about, especially if those of us on the left want to find any ways to stop it.
Reviewer: Roger Larry
Rating: 5.0 out of 5 stars
Title:
Review: FOr those wondering how some of the leading progressive voices in American journalism became handmaidens to the Brologarchs and fascists, this is the book for you. Well argued and nicely paced it is both a pleasure and a revelation.
Price effective as of Jun 28, 2025 05:32:20 UTC
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