Futurist Alvin Toffler, author of Future Shock, died on June 27 at age 87. Toffler received an English degree in 1950 from New York University, where he met his wife and later co-author, Heidi. The Tofflers, both aspiring writers, set out for experiences to write about. They spent the first five years after graduation studying mass production by taking blue-collar jobs on factory assembly lines. Alvin's labor experience got him a position at a union newspaper, leading to other journalism jobs, including labor columnist for Fortune and interviewer for Playboy. In the mid-1960s, Toffler conducted research and consulted for IBM, Xerox and AT&T, sparking the five years of work that would lead to Future Shock in 1970.
The title Future Shock refers to the social effects of rapid technological change, a type of confusion and breakdown of established decision-making processes called "information overload," a phrase coined by the book. Toffler foresaw many of the issues created by the shift from industrial to post-industrial society: wasteful disposability in manufactured goods, quickening technological obsolescence, upheavals in employment and other market forces, and the creation of a semi-nomadic class of service workers moving from job to job, fraying most meaningful social bonds. Future Shock was followed by The Third Wave (1980) and Powershift (1990). Toffler's ideas influenced a generation of political and business leaders, including the founder of AOL, Steve Case, whose recent book's title (The Third Wave: An Entrepreneur's Vision of the Future) pays tribute to Toffler. Future Shock has sold six million copies worldwide, and was last published in 1984 by Bantam ($7.99, 9780553277371). --Tobias Mutter
