"don’t presume the benevolence of your leaders"

This is actually a terrifyingly realistic depiction of what could so seriously happen. A few years ago, people worried that Facebook could dominate in the way of the Circle as shown in this book, and there are still concerns about Google's monopolistic tendencies. Apple had an extreme share of the mobile market at one stage, and it only takes one company with enough pull and vision to tilt us into a single provider world.

This is explored superbly here, and although the reactions from people like Alistaire, Nanci, and Helena and Edward are utterly out-of-proportion and neurotic, they show the absolutism of the social world. The Circle's insistence that out-of-hours "social" activities aren't optional yet are so necessary is a dichotomy brilliantly juxtaposed, and the final paragraph, those hundred words or so, are chilling to the marrow.