Lurk More

The first rule of the internet used to be “lurk more.” Observe before participating. Understand the culture before contributing. Read the FAQ.

The internet abandoned this rule and replaced it with “post immediately, learn nothing, get mad when corrected.” Lurk More is the corrective.

Written from a digital native’s perspective — not an outsider’s survey, not a journalist parachuting in — this book covers the communities (Something Awful, 4chan, Reddit), the operations (Anonymous, the hackers, the trolls who learned to code), and the consequences (platform death, AI-generated content, the post-evidence era).

Every chapter has an implicit structure: what was reported vs. what actually happened. The academic literature got it wrong. The journalism got it wrong. This book sets the record straight.