Francine Berman at the Harvard Science Center

RSVP is required for this event.

Harvard Book Store, the Harvard University Division of Science, and the Harvard Library welcome Francine Berman—founder and head of the Public Interest Technology Initiative at UMass Amherst, co-chair of the Berkman Klein Center Working Group on Public Interest Technology, and the 2019–2020 Katherine Hampson Bessell Fellow of the Harvard Radcliffe Institute—for a discussion of her new book, Better Tech: Putting People First in Cyberspace. She will be joined in conversation by Alyssa Goodman—Robert Wheeler Willson Professor of Applied Astronomy at Harvard University. The presentation will take place in Hall D of the Harvard Science Center, located at 1 Oxford Street, Cambridge.

RSVP for free to this event or choose the "Book-Included" ticket to reserve a copy of Better Tech and pick it up at the event. Following the presentation will be a book signing.

Note: Books bundled with tickets may only be picked up at the venue the night of the event, and cannot be picked up in-store beforehand. Ticket holders who purchased a book-included ticket and are unable to attend the event will be able to pick up their book at Harvard Book Store up to 30 days following the event. This offer expires after 30 days. Please note we cannot guarantee signed copies will be available to ticket holders who do not attend the event.

How to fix the tech we depend on to empower, rather than endanger, the people who use it.

Technology powers our world. But we often give it the upper hand, treating tech solutions as right by default and accepting online risk as the price we have to pay. Rampant security breaches, unwanted surveillance, predators, and misinformation are just a normal part of cyberspace. But what if tech was designed and managed to empower and protect the people who use it? In Better Tech, Francine Berman explores this question and argues that for society to advance and humanity to thrive, technology must put people first.
Berman focuses on the riskiest and most essential technologies—social media, AI chatbots, search engines—all of which serve as digital critical infrastructure. She argues that the risk-mitigation strategies for critical infrastructure like roads, bridges, food systems, and the electrical grid can also be used for cyberspace because we should be able to expect that our technology is similarly safe, dependable, and trustworthy. Better Tech goes beyond identifying the problems of technology and provides an actionable playbook of responsible design, development, use, and regulatory strategies that can be used by everyone from policymakers to students and general readers to reduce technology’s risks and advance the public good.

Francine Berman is founder and head of the Public Interest Technology Initiative at UMass Amherst, co-chair of the Berkman Klein Center Working Group on Public Interest Technology, and the 2019–2020 Katherine Hampson Bessell Fellow of the Harvard Radcliffe Institute. A pioneer and community builder in public interest technology, Berman’s new book, Better Tech: Putting People First in Cyberspace, focuses on the societal impacts of technology and explores how we can better build, use, and manage technology to increase its benefits and reduce its risks for the people it serves. Berman is the former head of the San Diego Supercomputer Center and was appointed by President Obama to the National Council on the Humanities, where she served from 2016 to 2025. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and serves as a Trustee of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Alyssa Goodman is the Robert Wheeler Willson Professor of Applied Astronomy at Harvard University. Her work explores the structure of the Milky Way, star formation, data visualization, and how scientists make predictions. She co-founded The Prediction Project, an interdisciplinary initiative examining forecasting across science, history, and everyday life.

The Harvard Science Book Talks series is a collaboration between the Harvard University Division of Science, the Harvard Library, and Harvard Book Store. The series features talks by the authors of recently published books on a variety of science-related topics and is open to both the Harvard community and to the general public. Learn more and watch recordings of past talks here.