Fuckup Almanac. Volume 1: Foundations of the Digital World

Fuckup Almanac #1

by Adam Korga

Modern technology looks solid. Polished. Reliable.
Until it suddenly isn’t.

Fuckup Almanac, Volume I: Foundations of the Digital World is a guided tour through the invisible foundations of our digital civilization — and the surprisingly small mistakes that have brought them down. From timekeeping bugs and protocol design flaws to storage failures and cascading outages, this book explores how complex systems fail not because of dramatic disasters, but because of ordinary assumptions quietly baked into their design.

This volume focuses on the deep digital plumbing we rarely think about: how computers represent time and numbers, how networks coordinate across the globe, how data is stored, replicated, and lost — and why “the cloud” is far less abstract than marketing would have you believe. Each chapter combines real, documented incidents with clear explanations that translate engineering failures into human language.

You won’t find hero narratives or motivational slogans here. Instead, you’ll find nearly a century of hard lessons showing why resilience is fragile, why redundancy often fails, and why many outages were predictable long before they happened. The stories range from early computing mishaps to modern large-scale digital failures that affected millions of users worldwide.

Written with dry humor and systems-thinking perspective, Foundations of the Digital World requires no technical background — only curiosity. It is the first volume of The Fuckup Almanac, a series dedicated to understanding failure as a structural feature of complex systems, not a personal flaw.

If you’ve ever wondered how a single wrong assumption can ripple through global infrastructure, this book shows exactly how — and why it keeps happening.

489 pages, Hardcover

Expected publication March 15, 2026

About the author

Adam Korga made his debut with IT Dictionary — a satirical survival manual for tech workers. He describes himself as a walking BS detector with a mission to translate academic, corporate and IT jargon into plain human language (his exact motto is probably not safe for public quoting 😉).

With nearly 20 years of experience in the tech industry — from engineering and release management to leadership — he has seen enough acronyms, rituals, and “game-changing” initiatives to last several lifetimes.

His upcoming projects take a more educational turn: still packed with sarcasm and humor, but focused on what we can actually learn from the mistakes of others.

Reviews

[Michał Żak · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just like the author’s previous work, this book is an incredible look at how the digital world actually works and why it often breaks. It isn't a boring textbook; instead, it offers a funny and painfully honest look at the small mistakes that crash major systems (my favorite part). The writing perfectly captures the dark humor of the tech industry, making anyone who works with computers (but not only) feel like the author truly understands their daily struggles. Every chapter feels like a shared inside joke that admits how chaotic and absurd technology can be. It is an essential survival guide and a therapy session for anyone curious about why global apps and websites fail. By focusing on hidden systems like how time is tracked or how the cloud actually functions, it uses real-life accidents to explain complex engineering failures in everyday language. You don't need to be a computer expert to enjoy it because the book skips the hero stories and shows the simple truth: big outages usually happen because of small, ordinary human assumptions. Can't wait to order my own physical copy!

[Sławek Kapłoński · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had access to the ARC copy of this book. It seems to be really good for someone who is interested in IT. I can't wait to read the entire series.

[Jorge Bo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just started my ARC copy — every failure tells a story about how digital systems actually work.