From: technews <technews@ou.edu>
To: "'it-fyi@listserv.ou.edu'" <it-fyi@lists.ou.edu>
Subject: it-fyi: Top 10 CyberCulture Titles for 1999 (Amazon.com)
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 1999 09:10:46 -0600
The editor of "Amazon.com Delivers Cyberculture" selects the top 10 titles
for 1999:
1. "NetSlaves" by Bill Lessard and Steve Baldwin
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0071352430/ref=ad_b_cy_2
Authors Bill Lessard and Steve Baldwin neatly summarize the operating
principle behind "NetSlaves": "People are nuts, no matter what profession
they're in, but people forced to work like dogs with the carrot stick of
stock options and "untold" wealth dangling under their noses are especially
nuts." If all you know about the Internet business is what you've read in
the financial press, "NetSlaves" will give you a cold slap of reality. For
every headline-making company like Yahoo! or Amazon.com, there are hundreds
or perhaps even thousands more like the ones Net vets Lessard and Baldwin
have worked for.
2. "User Friendly" by Illiad, J.D. Frazer
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1565926730/ref=ad_b_cy_2
Yes, it's a cliche, but it's true enough to be worth repeating: "User
Friendly" is to the open-source world what "Dilbert" is to swarming hives of
Windows cubicles. Set in an ISP company that keeps getting bought and sold,
the constant remains a team of cynical, hilarious techies. M.B.A.s and
marketers drift in and out, as do CEOs, often making statements like, "I
can't surf the Web. I think the Internet is broken." For anyone who's dealt
with similar situations, "User Friendly" is the ultimate in-joke.
3. "The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence"
by Ray Kurzweil
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0670882178/ref=ad_b_cy_2
How much do we humans enjoy our current status as the most intelligent
beings on earth? Enough to try to stop our own inventions from surpassing us
in smarts? If so, we'd better pull the plug right now, because if Ray
Kurzweil is right, we've only got until about 2020 before computers outpace
the human brain in computational power. Kurzweil, artificial intelligence
expert and author of "The Age of Intelligent Machines," shows that
technological evolution moves at an exponential pace.
4. "The Whole Internet: The Next Generation" by Kiersten Conner-Sax and Ed
Krol
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1565924282/ref=ad_b_cy_2
For a snapshot of something that is mutating as quickly as the Internet,
"The Whole Internet: The Next Generation" exhibits remarkable
comprehensiveness and accuracy. It's a good panoramic shot of Web sites,
Usenet newsgroups, e-mail, mailing lists, chat software, electronic
commerce, and the communities that have begun to emerge around all of these.
This is the book to buy if you have a handle on certain aspects of the
Internet experience--e-mail and Web surfing, for example--but want to learn
what else the global network has to offer--say, Web banking or mailing-list
management.
5. "Being Digital" by Nicholas Negroponte
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0679762906/ref=ad_b_cy_2
As the founder of MIT's Media Lab and a popular columnist for "Wired,"
Nicholas Negroponte has amassed a following of dedicated readers.
Negroponte's fans will want to get a copy of "Being Digital," which is an
edited version of the 18 articles he wrote for "Wired" about "being
digital." Negroponte's text is mostly a history of media technology rather
than a set of predictions for future technologies. In the beginning, he
describes the evolution of CD-ROMs, multimedia, hypermedia, HDTV
(high-definition television), and more.
6. "Where Wizards Stay Up Late: The Origins of the Internet" by Katie Hafner
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0684832674/ref=ad_b_cy_2
Considering that the history of the Internet is perhaps better documented
internally than any other technological construct, it is remarkable how
shadowy its origins have been to most people, including die-hard
Net-denizens! At last, Hafner and Lyon have written a well-researched story
of the origins of the Internet substantiated by extensive interviews with
its creators who delve into many interesting details such as the controversy
surrounding the adoption of our now beloved "@" sign as the separator of
usernames and machine addresses. Essential reading for anyone interested in
the past--and the future--of the Net specifically, and telecommunications
generally.
7. "Coercion: Why We Listen to What 'They' Say" by Douglas Rushkoff
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1573221155/ref=ad_b_cy_2
In 1994's "Cyberia: Life in the Trenches of Hyperspace," Douglas Rushkoff
extolled the democratic promise of the then-emergent Internet, but the
once-optimistic author has grown a bit disillusioned with what the Net--and
the rest of the world--has become. His exuberantly written, disturbing
"Coercion" may induce paranoia in readers as it illuminates the countless
ways marketing has insinuated itself not just into every aspect of Western
culture but into our individual lives. Rushkoff opens with a series of
pronouncements: "They say human beings use only ten percent of their
brains.... They say Prozac alleviates depression." But "who, exactly, are
'they,'" he asks, and "why do we listen to them?"
8. "E-Topia: Urban Life, Jim--But Not As We Know It" by William J. Mitchell
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262133555/ref=ad_b_cy_2
E-topias are defined as "cities that work smarter, not harder" in this
analysis of cyberculture and urban life by William J. Mitchell, " E-Topia:
Urban Life, Jim--But Not As We Know It." Consider it a sequel to his popular
"City of Bits," where now he examines the urban infrastructure built around
the global digital network and what it all means for our future day-to-day
lives. To plan for smarter urban landscape dwellings, Mitchell calls for a
change in how we architect and plan to architect virtual constructs within
physical ones.
9. "The Power of Identity: The Information Age--Economy, Society and
Culture" by Manuel Castells
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1557868743/ref=ad_b_cy_2
In the second volume of his Information Age trilogy, Manuel Castells
examines the threat posed to the nation-state by the rise of collective
"resistance identities," which may over time develop into "project
identities" with specific socially transformative goals in mind. His scope
is broad, encompassing everything from Mexico's Zapatista movement to the
rise of militias in the United States to broader antipatriarchal projects
launched by feminists, gay communities, and environmental activists.
Castell's dry academic style may be distancing to some readers; Benjamin R.
Barber's "Jihad vs. McWorld" provides a similar argument (with equal
intellectual rigor) in slightly more accessible prose.
10. "The Soul of a New Machine" by Tracy Kidder
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/038071115X/ref=ad_b_cy_2
The computer revolution brought with it new methods of getting work
done--just look at today's news for reports of hard-driven, highly-motivated
young software and online commerce developers who sacrifice evenings and
weekends to meet impossible deadlines. Tracy Kidder got a preview of this
world in the late 1970s when he observed the engineers of Data General
design and build a new 32-bit minicomputer in just one year. His thoughtful,
prescient book, "The Soul of a New Machine," tells stories of 35-year-old
"veteran" engineers hiring recent college graduates and encouraging them to
work harder and faster on complex and difficult projects, exploiting the
youngsters' ignorance of normal scheduling processes while engendering a new
kind of work ethic.
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