Bloomsbury has announced the release of Never Logged Out: How the Internet Created India’s Gen Z, a debut by writer Ria Chopra that captures what it means to grow up in a country that has been online for three decades.

India first logged on to the internet on 15 August 1995. For today’s Gen Z, that moment wasn’t just a technological shift — it became the backdrop of their lives. Chopra’s book traces how the generation that once marvelled at having the world at its fingertips now negotiates everything from anonymity and online hate to digital intimacy and viral fame.

Across eight essays, Chopra examines the many ways the internet has shaped young Indians — how they love, learn, remember, shop, and build identity. The book moves through early-internet nostalgia, Bollywood’s clumsy attempts to depict youth culture, the rise of tote-bag aesthetics, and the noisy, chaotic churn of trending micro-communities. It also reflects on how platforms like Ask.fm defined teenhood and how AI is rewriting the rules of ambition and selfhood.

What holds it all together is Chopra’s voice — funny, observant, and unmistakably “extremely online”. Drawing from her own experiences, she offers a close look at the generation that doesn’t just use the internet but has been shaped by it at every turn.

Chopra, whose writing on youth culture has appeared in Vogue, VICE, BuzzFeed, The Hindu, The Indian Express, and Refinery29, among others, has built a body of work that often goes viral on the very platforms she writes about. She also serves as a Youth Advisor to Google through Canvas8. Her eclectic career has taken her from a leadership summit at Google HQ in California to the University of Michigan, and even to the hot seat of Kaun Banega Crorepati.