books tagged “technology”

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The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computer Exceed Human Intelligence
by Ray Kurzweil

ISBN 0140282025 (0-14-028202-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
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. Further, he asserts, in a sort of swirling postulate, time speeds up as order increases, and vice versa. He calls this the "Law of Time and Chaos," and it means that although entropy is slowing the stream of time down for the universe overall, and thus vastly increasing the amount of time between major events, in the eddy of technological evolution the exact opposite is happening, and events will soon be coming faster and more furiously. This means that we'd better figure out how to deal with conscious machines as soon as possible--they'll soon not only be able to beat us at chess, but also likely demand civil rights, and might at last realize the very human dream of immortality.
The Age of Spiritual Machines is compelling and accessible, and not necessarily best read from front to back--it's less heavily historical if you jump around (Kurzweil encourages this). Much of the content of the book lays the groundwork to justify Kurzweil's timeline, providing an engaging primer on the philosophical and technological ideas behind the study of consciousness. Instead of being a gee-whiz futurist manifesto, Spiritual Machines reads like a history of the future, without too much science fiction dystopianism. Instead, Kurzweil shows us the logical outgrowths of current trends, with all their attendant possibilities. This is the book we'll turn to when our computers first say "hello." --Therese Littleton [via]
More editions of The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computer Exceed Human Intelligence:
- The Age of Spiritual Machines : When Computers Exceed Human Intelligence: ISBN 0670882178 (0-670-88217-8)
  Hardcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
- The Age of Spiritual Machines: When Computer Exceed Human Intelligence: ISBN 0140282025 (0-14-028202-5)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Ambient Findability
by Peter Morville

ISBN 0596007655 (0-596-00765-5)
Softcover, Oreilly & Associates Inc

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Book summary:
How do you find your way in an age of information overload? How can you filter streams of complex information to pull out only what you want? Why does it matter how information is structured when Google seems to magically bring up the right answer to your questions? What does it mean to be "findable" in this day and age? This eye-opening new book examines the convergence of information and connectivity. Written by Peter Morville, author of the groundbreaking Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, the book defines our current age as a state of unlimited findability. In other words, anyone can find anything at any time. Complete navigability.
Morville discusses the Internet, GIS, and other network technologies that are coming together to make unlimited findability possible. He explores how the melding of these innovations impacts society, since Web access is now a standard requirement for successful people and businesses. But before he does that, Morville looks back at the history of wayfinding and human evolution, suggesting that our fear of being lost has driven us to create maps, charts, and now, the mobile Internet.

The book's central thesis is that information literacy, information architecture, and usability are all critical components of this new world order. Hand in hand with that is the contention that only by planning and designing the best possible software, devices, and Internet, will we be able to maintain this connectivity in the future. Morville's book is highlighted with full color illustrations and rich examples that bring his prose to life.

Ambient Findability doesn't preach or pretend to know all the answers. Instead, it presents research, stories, and examples in support of its novel ideas. Are we truly at a critical point in our evolution where the quality of our digital networks will dictate how we behave as a species? Is findability indeed the primary key to a successful global marketplace in the 21st century and beyond. Peter Morville takes you on a thought-provoking tour of these memes and more -- ideas that will not only fascinate but will stir your creativity in practical ways that you can apply to your work immediately.

""A lively, enjoyable and informative tour of a topic that's only going to become more important.""

--David Weinberger, Author, "Small Pieces Loosely Joined" and "The Cluetrain Manifesto"

""I envy the young scholar who finds this inventive book, by whatever strange means are necessary. The future isn't just unwritten--it's unsearched.""

--Bruce Sterling, Writer, Futurist, and Co-Founder, The Electronic Frontier Foundation

""Search engine marketing is the hottest thing in Internet business, and deservedly so. Ambient Findability puts SEM into a broader context and provides deeper insights into human behavior. This book will help you grow your online business in a world where being found is not at all certain.""

--Jakob Nielsen, Ph.D., Author, "Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity"

""Information that's hard to find will remain information that's hardly found--from one of the fathers of the discipline of information architecture, and one of its most experienced practitioners, come penetrating observations on why findability is elusive and how the act of seeking changes us.""

--Steve Papa, Founder and Chairman, Endeca

""Whether it's a fact or a figure, a person or a place, Peter Morville knows how to make it findable. Morville explores the possibilities of a world where everything can always be found--and the challenges in getting there--in this wide-ranging, thought-provoking book.""

--Jesse James Garrett, Author, "The Elements of User Experience"

""It is easy to assume that current searching of the World Wide Web is the last word in finding and using information. Peter Morville shows us that search engines are just the beginning. Skillfully weaving together information science research with his own extensive experience, he develops for the reader a feeling for the near future when information is truly findable all around us. There are immense implications, and Morville's lively and humorous writing brings them home.""

--Marcia J. Bates, Ph.D., University of California Los Angeles

""I've always known that Peter Morville was smart. After reading Ambient Findability, I now know he's (as we say in Boston) wicked smart. This is a timely book that will have lasting effects on how we create our future."

--Jared Spool, Founding Principal, User Interface Engineering

""In Ambient Findability, Peter Morville has put his mind and keyboard on the pulse of the electronic noosphere. With tangible examples and lively writing, he lays out the challenges and wonders of finding our way in cyberspace, and explains the mutually dependent evolution of our changing world and selves. This is a must read for everyone and a practical guide for designers.""

--Gary Marchionini, Ph.D., University of North Carolina

""Find this book! Anyone interested in makinginformation easier to find, or understanding how finding and being found is changing, will find this thoroughly researched, engagingly written, literate, insightful and very, very cool book well worth their time. Myriad examples from rich and varied domains and a valuable idea on nearly every page. Fun to read, too!"

--Joseph Janes, Ph.D., Founder, Internet Public Library
[via]
More editions of Ambient Findability:
- Ambient Findability: ISBN 0596007655 (0-596-00765-5)
  Softcover, Oreilly & Associates Inc
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Being Digital
by Nicholas Negroponte, Marty Asher

ISBN 0679762906 (0-679-76290-6)
Softcover, Vintage Books

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Book summary:
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. The section on interfaces is informative, offering an up-to-date history on visual interfaces, graphics, virtual reality (VR), holograms, teleconferencing hardware, the mouse and touch-sensitive interfaces, and speech recognition.
In the last chapter and the epilogue, Negroponte offers visionary insight on what "being digital" means for our future. Negroponte praises computers for their educational value but recognizes certain dangers of technological advances, such as increased software and data piracy and huge shifts in our job market that will require workers to transfer their skills to the digital medium. Overall, Being Digital provides an informative history of the rise of technology and some interesting predictions for its future. [via]
More editions of Being Digital:
- Being Digital: ISBN 0679439196 (0-679-43919-6)
  Hardcover, Knopf Publishing Group
- Being Digital: ISBN 0679762906 (0-679-76290-6)
  Softcover, Vintage Books
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Cathedral, Forge, and Waterwheel: Technology and Invention in the Middle Ages
by Frances Gies, Joseph Gies

ISBN 0060925817 (0-06-092581-7)
Softcover, Perennial

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Book summary:
Historians, write Frances and Joseph Gies, have long tended to view the Middle Ages as a period of intellectual and scientific stagnation, a long era of backwardness, ignorance, and inertia. Many scholars of the Renaissance era, however, thought otherwise; the mathematician Jerome Cardan, for one, held that three medieval inventions--the magnetic compass, the printing press, and gunpowder--were of such significance that "the whole of antiquity has nothing equal to show."
In their lively history of medieval technology, the Gies team writes of such advances as the heavy plow, the Gothic flying buttress, linen undergarments, water pumps, and the lateen sail. During the medieval millennium, they suggest, a great technological and social revolution occurred "with the disappearance of mass slavery, the shift to water- and wind-power, the introduction of the open-field system of agriculture, and the importation, adaptation, or invention of an array of devices, from the wheelbarrow to double-entry bookkeeping." Many of those inventions or adaptations, brought into Europe from China and the Middle East, have scarcely been improved on today.
The medieval technological revolution, the authors conclude, came at a cost: much of Europe was deforested to make room for cropland and to fire kilns and furnaces, and mechanization made obsolete many handicraft skills. Yet, they add, the workers and inventors of the Middle Ages "all transformed the world, on balance very much to the world's advantage." --Gregory McNamee [via]
More editions of Cathedral, Forge, and Waterwheel: Technology and Invention in the Middle Ages:
- Cathedral, Forge, and Waterwheel: Technology and Invention in the Middle Ages: ISBN 0060165901 (0-06-016590-1)
  Hardcover, Harpercollins
- Cathedral, Forge, and Waterwheel: Technology and Invention in the Middle Ages: ISBN 0060925817 (0-06-092581-7)
  Softcover, Perennial
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Connections
by James Burke

ISBN 0316116726 (0-316-11672-6)
Softcover, Little Brown & Co

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You can make all the plans you will, plot to make a fortune in the commodities market, speculate on developing trends: all will likely come to naught, for "however carefully you plan for the future, someone else's actions will inevitably modify the way your plans turn out." So writes the English scholar and documentary producer James Burke in his sparkling book Connections, a favorite of historically minded readers ever since its first publication in 1978. Taking a hint from Jacob Bronowski's Ascent of Man, Burke charts the course of technological innovation from ancient times to the present, but always with a subversive eye for things happening in spite of, and not because of, their inventors' intentions. Burke gives careful attention to the role of accident in human history. In his opening pages, for instance, he writes of the invention of uniform coinage, an invention that hinged on some unknown Anatolian prospector's discovering that a fleck of gold rubbed against a piece of schist--a "touchstone"--would leave a mark indicating its quality. Just so, we owe the invention of modern printing to Johann Gutenberg's training as a goldsmith, for his knowledge of the properties of metals enabled him to develop a press whose letterforms would not easily wear down. With Gutenberg's invention, Burke notes, came a massive revolution in the European economy, for, as he writes, "the easier it is to communicate, the faster change happens." Burke's book is a splendid and educational entertainment for our fast-changing time. --Gregory McNamee [via]
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Cryptonomicon
by Neal Stephenson

ISBN 0060512806 (0-06-051280-6)
Softcover, Harpercollins

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Book summary:
Neal Stephenson enjoys cult status among science fiction fans and techie types thanks to Snow Crash, which so completely redefined conventional notions of the high-tech future that it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. But if his cyberpunk classic was big, Cryptonomicon is huge... gargantuan... massive, not just in size (a hefty 918 pages including appendices) but in scope and appeal. It's the hip, readable heir to Gravity's Rainbow and the Illuminatus trilogy. And it's only the first of a proposed series--for more information, read our interview with Stephenson.
Cryptonomicon zooms all over the world, careening conspiratorially back and forth between two time periods--World War II and the present. Our 1940s heroes are the brilliant mathematician Lawrence Waterhouse, cryptanalyst extraordinaire, and gung ho, morphine-addicted marine Bobby Shaftoe. They're part of Detachment 2702, an Allied group trying to break Axis communication codes while simultaneously preventing the enemy from figuring out that their codes have been broken. Their job boils down to layer upon layer of deception. Dr. Alan Turing is also a member of 2702, and he explains the unit's strange workings to Waterhouse. "When we want to sink a convoy, we send out an observation plane first.... Of course, to observe is not its real duty--we already know exactly where the convoy is. Its real duty is to be observed.... Then, when we come round and sink them, the Germans will not find it suspicious."
All of this secrecy resonates in the present-day story line, in which the grandchildren of the WWII heroes--inimitable programming geek Randy Waterhouse and the lovely and powerful Amy Shaftoe--team up to help create an offshore data haven in Southeast Asia and maybe uncover some gold once destined for Nazi coffers. To top off the paranoiac tone of the book, the mysterious Enoch Root, key member of Detachment 2702 and the Societas Eruditorum, pops up with an unbreakable encryption scheme left over from WWII to befuddle the 1990s protagonists with conspiratorial ties.
Cryptonomicon is vintage Stephenson from start to finish: short on plot, but long on detail so precise it's exhausting. Every page has a math problem, a quotable in-joke, an amazing idea, or a bit of sharp prose. Cryptonomicon is also packed with truly weird characters, funky tech, and crypto--all the crypto you'll ever need, in fact, not to mention all the computer jargon of the moment. A word to the wise: if you read this book in one sitting, you may die of information overload (and starvation). --Therese Littleton [via]
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Cuckoo's Egg
by Clifford Stoll

ISBN 1416507787 (1-4165-0778-7)
Softcover, Pocket Books

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A sentimental favorite, The Cuckoo's Egg seems to have inspired a whole category of books exploring the quest to capture computer criminals. Still, even several years after its initial publication and after much imitation, the book remains a good read with an engaging story line and a critical outlook, as Clifford Stoll becomes, almost unwillingly, a one-man security force trying to track down faceless criminals who've invaded the university computer lab he stewards. What first appears as a 75-cent accounting error in a computer log is eventually revealed to be a ring of industrial espionage, primarily thanks to Stoll's persistence and intellectual tenacity. [via]
More editions of Cuckoo's Egg:
- Cuckoo's Egg: ISBN 0743411463 (0-7434-1146-3)
  Softcover, Pocket Books
- Cuckoo's Egg: ISBN 1416507787 (1-4165-0778-7)
  Softcover, Pocket Books
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The Cuckoo's Egg: Inside the World of Computer Espionage
by Clifford Stoll, Julie Rubenstein

ISBN 0671726889 (0-671-72688-9)
Softcover, Simon & Schuster

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A sentimental favorite, The Cuckoo's Egg seems to have inspired a whole category of books exploring the quest to capture computer criminals. Still, even several years after its initial publication and after much imitation, the book remains a good read with an engaging story line and a critical outlook, as Clifford Stoll becomes, almost unwillingly, a one-man security force trying to track down faceless criminals who've invaded the university computer lab he stewards. What first appears as a 75-cent accounting error in a computer log is eventually revealed to be a ring of industrial espionage, primarily thanks to Stoll's persistence and intellectual tenacity. [via]
More editions of The Cuckoo's Egg: Inside the World of Computer Espionage:
- The Cuckoo's Egg: Inside the World of Computer Espionage: ISBN 0385249462 (0-385-24946-2)
  Hardcover, Doubleday Publishing
- The Cuckoo's Egg: Inside the World of Computer Espionage: ISBN 0671726889 (0-671-72688-9)
  Softcover, Simon & Schuster
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Digital Fortress
by Dan Brown

ISBN 0312335164 (0-312-33516-4)
Hardcover, St. Martin's Press

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Book summary:
In most thrillers, "hardware" consists of big guns, airplanes, military vehicles, and weapons that make things explode. Dan Brown has written a thriller for those of us who like our hardware with disc drives and who rate our heroes by big brainpower rather than big firepower. It's an Internet user's spy novel where the good guys and bad guys struggle over secrets somewhat more intellectual than just where the secret formula is hidden--they have to gain understanding of what the secret formula actually is.
In this case, the secret formula is a new means of encryption, capable of changing the balance of international power. Part of the fun is that the book takes the reader along into an understanding of encryption technologies. You'll find yourself better understanding the political battles over such real-life technologies as the Clipper Chip and PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) software even though the book looks at the issues through the eyes of fiction.
Although there's enough globehopping in this book for James Bond, the real battleground is cyberspace, because that's where the "bomb" (or rather, the new encryption algorithm) will explode. Yes, there are a few flaws in the plot if you look too closely, but the cleverness and the sheer fun of it all more than make up for them. There are enough twists and turns to keep you guessing and a lot of high, gee-whiz-level information about encryption, code breaking, and the role they play in international politics. Set aside the whole afternoon and evening for it and have finger food on hand for supper--you may want to read this one straight through. [via]
More editions of Digital Fortress:
- Digital Fortress: ISBN 0312335164 (0-312-33516-4)
  Hardcover, St. Martin's Press
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Digital Fortress: A Thriller
by Dan Brown

ISBN 0312263120 (0-312-26312-0)
Softcover, Griffin

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Book summary:
In most thrillers, "hardware" consists of big guns, airplanes, military vehicles, and weapons that make things explode. Dan Brown has written a thriller for those of us who like our hardware with disc drives and who rate our heroes by big brainpower rather than big firepower. It's an Internet user's spy novel where the good guys and bad guys struggle over secrets somewhat more intellectual than just where the secret formula is hidden--they have to gain understanding of what the secret formula actually is.
In this case, the secret formula is a new means of encryption, capable of changing the balance of international power. Part of the fun is that the book takes the reader along into an understanding of encryption technologies. You'll find yourself better understanding the political battles over such real-life technologies as the Clipper Chip and PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) software even though the book looks at the issues through the eyes of fiction.
Although there's enough globehopping in this book for James Bond, the real battleground is cyberspace, because that's where the "bomb" (or rather, the new encryption algorithm) will explode. Yes, there are a few flaws in the plot if you look too closely, but the cleverness and the sheer fun of it all more than make up for them. There are enough twists and turns to keep you guessing and a lot of high, gee-whiz-level information about encryption, code breaking, and the role they play in international politics. Set aside the whole afternoon and evening for it and have finger food on hand for supper--you may want to read this one straight through. [via]
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Engines of Creation
by K. Eric Drexler

ISBN 1872180469 (1-872180-46-9)
Hardcover, Fourth Estate

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This brilliant work heralds the new age of nanotechnology, which will give us thorough and inexpensive control of the structure of matter. Drexler examines the enormous implications of these developments for medicine, the economy, and the environment, and makes astounding yet well-founded projections for the future. [via]
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The Evolution of Useful Things
by Henry Petroski

ISBN 0679740392 (0-679-74039-2)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:
This surprising book may appear to be about the simple things of life--forks, paper clips, zippers--but in fact it is a far-flung historical adventure on the evolution of common culture. To trace the fork's history, Duke University professor of civil engineering Henry Petroski travels from prehistoric times to Texas barbecue to Cardinal Richelieu to England's Industrial Revolution to the American Civil War--and beyond. Each item described offers a cultural history lesson, plus there's plenty of engineering detail for those so inclined. [via]
More editions of The Evolution of Useful Things:
- The Evolution of Useful Things: ISBN 0679412263 (0-679-41226-3)
  Hardcover, Knopf Publishing Group
- The Evolution of Useful Things: ISBN 0679740392 (0-679-74039-2)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
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Faster
by James Gleick

ISBN 067977548X (0-679-77548-X)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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From the bestselling, national book award-nominated auhtor of genius and chaos, a bracing new work about the accelerating pace of change in today's world.most of us suffer some degree of "hurry sickness." a malady that has launched us into the "epoch of the nanosecond," a need-everything-yesterday sphere dominated by cell phones, computers, faxes, and remote controls. Yet for all the hours, minutes, and even seconds being saved, we're still filling our days to the point that we have no time for such basic human activities as eating, sex, and relating to our families. Written with fresh insight and thorough research, faster is a wise and witty look at a harried world not likely to slow down anytime soon [via]
More editions of Faster:
- Faster: ISBN 067977548X (0-679-77548-X)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
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Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock down Culture and Control Creativity
by Lawrence Lessig

ISBN 1594200068 (1-59420-006-8)
Hardcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated

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From "the most important thinker on intellectual property in the Internet era" ("The New Yorker"), a landmark manifesto about the genuine closing of the American mind.
Lawrence Lessig could be called a cultural environmentalist. One of America's most original and influential public intellectuals, his focus is the social dimension of creativity: how creative work builds on the past and how society encourages or inhibits that building with laws and technologies. In his two previous books, Code and The Future of Ideas, Lessig concentrated on the destruction of much of the original promise of the Internet. Now, in Free Culture, he widens his focus to consider the diminishment of the larger public domain of ideas. In this powerful wake-up call he shows how short-sighted interests blind to the long-term damage they're inflicting are poisoning the ecosystem that fosters innovation.
All creative works-books, movies, records, software, and so on-are a compromise between what can be imagined and what is possible-technologically and legally. For more than two hundred years, laws in America have sought a balance between rewarding creativity and allowing the borrowing from which new creativity springs. The original term of copyright set by the Constitution in 1787 was seventeen years. Now it is closer to two hundred. Thomas Jefferson considered protecting the public against overly long monopolies on creative works an essential government role. What did he know that we've forgotten?
Lawrence Lessig shows us that while new technologies always lead to new laws, never before have the big cultural monopolists used the fear created by new technologies, specifically the Internet, to shrink the public domain of ideas, even as the same corporations use the same technologies to control more and more what we can and can't do with culture. As more and more culture becomes digitized, more and more becomes controllable, even as laws are being toughened at the behest of the big media groups. What's at stake is our freedom-freedom to create, freedom to build, and ultimately, freedom to imagine. [via]
More editions of Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock down Culture and Control Creativity:
- Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock down Culture and Control Creativity: ISBN 1594200068 (1-59420-006-8)
  Hardcover, Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
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Free Culture: The Nature And Future Of Creativity
by Lawrence Lessig

ISBN 0143034650 (0-14-303465-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
Lawrence Lessig, the most important thinker on intellectual property in the Internet era (The New Yorker), masterfully argues that never before in human history has the power to control creative progress been so concentrated in the hands of the powerful few, the so-called Big Media. Never before have the cultural powers- that-be been able to exert such control over what we can and cant do with the culture around us. Our society defends free markets and free speech; why then does it permit such top-down control? To lose our long tradition of free culture, Lawrence Lessig shows us, is to lose our freedom to create, our freedom to build, and, ultimately, our freedom to imagine.
[via]
More editions of Free Culture: The Nature And Future Of Creativity:
- Free Culture: The Nature And Future Of Creativity: ISBN 0143034650 (0-14-303465-0)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Guns, Germs & Steel: The Fates of Human Societies
by Jared Diamond

ISBN 0393317552 (0-393-31755-2)
Softcover, W W Norton & Co Inc

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Book summary:
With a new chapter. The phenomenal bestseller; over 1.5 million copies sold; is now a major PBS special.Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Guns, Germs, and Steel is a brilliant work answering the question of why the peoples of certain continents succeeded in invading other continents and conquering or displacing their peoples. This edition includes a new chapter on Japan and all-new illustrations drawn from the television series. Until around 11,000 BC, all peoples were still Stone Age hunter/gatherers. At that point, a great divide occurred in the rates that human societies evolved. In Eurasia, parts of the Americas, and Africa, farming became the prevailing mode of existence when indigenous wild plants and animals were domesticated by prehistoric planters and herders. As Jared Diamond vividly reveals, the very people who gained a head start in producing food would collide with preliterate cultures, shaping the modern world through conquest, displacement, and genocide.The paths that lead from scattered centers of food to broad bands of settlement had a great deal to do with climate and geography. But how did differences in societies arise? Why weren't native Australians, Americans, or Africans the ones to colonize Europe? Diamond dismantles pernicious racial theories tracing societal differences to biological differences. He assembles convincing evidence linking germs to domestication of animals, germs that Eurasians then spread in epidemic proportions in their voyages of discovery. In its sweep, Guns, Germs and Steel encompasses the rise of agriculture, technology, writing, government, and religion, providing a unifying theory of human history as intriguing as the histories of dinosaurs and glaciers. 32 illustrations [via]
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Guns, Germs, and Steel Reader's Companion
by Jared Diamond

ISBN 1586638637 (1-58663-863-7)
Softcover, Sterling Pub Co Inc

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Book summary:
Scholar and professor Jared Diamond made a huge splash with this fascinating but controversial book, which argues that geography and environment have almost singlehandedly determined the course of human history. Dig deeper into his contentions with the information inside this invaluable reader's handbook:
- Why did Europe colonize Africa and Asia rather than the other way around?
- Why is geography the most important factor in human history?
- How has the rest of the scientific community received Diamond's theory?
[via]
More editions of Guns, Germs, and Steel Reader's Companion:
- Guns, Germs, and Steel Reader's Companion: ISBN 1586638637 (1-58663-863-7)
  Softcover, Sterling Pub Co Inc
How Things Work

ISBN 1561733210 (1-56173-321-0)
Hardcover, Pubns Intl

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Book summary:
Questions and answers provide information about how cameras, elevators, car engines, tops, yo-yos, and other devices work. Includes charts, diagrams, and an activities section. [via]
More editions of How Things Work:
- How Things Work: ISBN 0809448734 (0-8094-4873-4)
  Hardcover, Grand Central Pub
- How Things Work: ISBN 1561733210 (1-56173-321-0)
  Hardcover, Pubns Intl
How Things Work
by Donald J. Crump

ISBN 0870444301 (0-87044-430-1)
Softcover, Natl Geographic Soc Childrens books

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- How Things Work: ISBN 0870444301 (0-87044-430-1)
  Softcover, Natl Geographic Soc Childrens books
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How Things Work
by National Geographic Society (U.S.)

ISBN 0870444255 (0-87044-425-5)
Hardcover, National Geographic Society

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Book summary:
Uses such familiar objects as a bicycle, neon sign, calculator, and hot air balloon to introduce the field of physics. [via]
More editions of How Things Work:
- How Things Work: ISBN 0870444255 (0-87044-425-5)
  Hardcover, National Geographic Society
How Things Work: The Universal Encyclopedia of Machines
by C. Van Amerongen, Bibliographisches Institut (Mannheim, Germany)

ISBN 0586080953 (0-586-08095-3)
Hardcover, Paladin

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- How Things Work: The Universal Encyclopedia of Machines: ISBN 0586080953 (0-586-08095-3)
  Hardcover, Paladin
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In the Beginning...Was the Command Line
by Neal Stephenson

ISBN 0380815931 (0-380-81593-1)
Softcover, Harpercollins

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Book summary:
Neal Stephenson, author of the sprawling and engaging Cryptonomicon, has written a manifesto that could be spoken by a character from that brilliant book. Primarily, In the Beginning ... Was the Command Line discusses the past and future of personal computer operating systems. "It is the fate of manufactured goods to slowly and gently depreciate as they get old," he writes, "but it is the fate of operating systems to become free." While others in the computer industry express similarly dogmatic statements, Stephenson charms the reader into his way of thinking, providing anecdotes and examples that turn the pages for you.
Stephenson is a techie, and he's writing for an audience of coders and hackers in Command Line. The idea for this essay began online, when a shortened version of it was posted on Slashdot.org. The book still holds some marks of an e-mail flame gone awry, and some tangents should have been edited to hone his formidable arguments. But unlike similar writers who also discuss technical topics, he doesn't write to exclude; readers who appreciate computing history (like Dealers of Lightning or Fire in the Valley) can easily step into this book.
Stephenson tackles many myths about industry giants in this volume, specifically Apple and Microsoft. By now, every newspaper reader has heard of Microsoft's overbearing business practices, but Stephenson cuts to the heart of new issues for the software giant with a finely sharpened steel blade. Apple fares only a little better as Stephenson (a former Mac user himself) highlights the early steps the company took to prepare for a monopoly within the computer market--and its surprise when this didn't materialize. Linux culture gets a thorough--but fair--skewering, and the strengths of BeOS are touted (although no operating system is nearly close enough to perfection in Stephenson's eyes).
As for the rest of us, who have gladly traded free will and an intellectual understanding of computers for a clutter-free, graphically pleasing interface, Stephenson has thoughts to offer as well. He fully understands the limits nonprogrammers feel in the face of technology (an example being the "blinking 12" problem when your VCR resets itself). Even so, within Command Line he convincingly encourages us as a society to examine the metaphors of technology--simplifications that aren't really much simpler--that we greedily accept. --Jennifer Buckendorff [via]
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- In the Beginning...Was the Command Line: ISBN 0380815931 (0-380-81593-1)
  Softcover, Harpercollins
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Information Architecture for the World Wide Web
by Louis Rosenfeld, Peter Morville

ISBN 1600330150 (1-60033-015-0)
Hardcover, Oreilly & Associates Inc

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Book summary:
Today's web sites have moved far beyond "brochureware." They are larger and more complex, have great strategic value to their sponsors, and their users are busier and less forgiving. Designers, information architects, and web site managers are required to juggle vast amounts of information, frequent changes, new technologies, and sometimes even multiple objectives, making some web sites look like a fast-growing but poorly planned city-roads everywhere, but impossible to navigate. Well-planned information architecture has never been as essential as it is now.
Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, 2nd Edition, shows you how to blend aesthetics and mechanics for distinctive, cohesive web sites that work. Most books on web development concentrate on either the graphics or the technical issues of a site. This book focuses on the framework that holds the two together.
This edition contains more than 75% new material. You'll find updated chapters on organization, labeling, navigation, and searching; and a new chapter on thesauri, controlled vocabularies and metadata will help you understand the interconnectedness of these systems. The authors have expanded the methodology chapters to include a more interdisciplinary collection of tools and techniques. They've also complemented the top-down strategies of the first edition with bottom-up approaches that enable distributed, emergent solutions.
A whole new section addresses the opportunities and challenges of practicing information architecture, while another section discusses how that work impacts and is influenced by the broader organizational context. New case studies provide models for creating enterprise intranet portals and online communities. Finally, you'll find pointers to a wealth of essential information architecture resources, many of which did not exist a few years ago.
By applying the principles outlined in this completely updated classic, you'll build web sites and intranets that are easier to navigate and appealing to your users, as well as scalable and simple to maintain. Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, 2nd Edition is a treasure trove of ideas and practical advice for anyone involved in building or maintaining a large, complex web site or intranet.
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Information Architecture for the World Wide Web : Designing Large-Scale Web Sites
by Louis Rosenfeld, Peter Morville, Linda Mui

ISBN 1565922824 (1-56592-282-4)
Softcover, O'Reilly Media, Incorporated

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Book summary:
In Chapter 6 of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, the authors discuss the details of good search-engine design. In a bitingly humorous segment, they analyze a Web site's search-page results: "Let's say you're interested in knowing what the New Jersey sales tax is.... So you go to the State of New Jersey web site and search on sales tax. The 20 results are scored at either 84% or 82% relevant. Why does each document receive only one of two scores?... And what the heck makes a document 2% more relevant than another?"
With a swift and convincing stroke, the authors of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web tear down many entrenched ideas about Web design. Flashy animations are cool, they agree, as long as they don't aggravate the viewer. Nifty clickable icons are nice, but are their meanings universal? Is the search engine providing results that are useful and relevant? This book acts as a mirror and with careful questioning causes the reader to think through all the elements and decisions required for well-crafted Web design. --Jennifer Buckendorff [via]
More editions of Information Architecture for the World Wide Web : Designing Large-Scale Web Sites:
- Information Architecture for the World Wide Web : Designing Large-Scale Web Sites: ISBN 1565922824 (1-56592-282-4)
  Softcover, O'Reilly Media, Incorporated
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The Media Lab: Inventing the Future at Mit
by Stewart Brand

ISBN 0140097015 (0-14-009701-5)
Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)

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Book summary:
Personalized newspapers, life-sized holograms, telephones that chat with callers, these are all projects that are being developed at MIT's Media Lab. Brand explores the exciting programs, and gives readers a look at the future of communications. [via]
More editions of The Media Lab: Inventing the Future at Mit:
- The Media Lab: Inventing the Future at Mit: ISBN 0670814423 (0-670-81442-3)
  Hardcover, Penguin USA
- The Media Lab : Inventing the Future at MIT: ISBN 0140097015 (0-14-009701-5)
  Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)
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Microserfs
by Douglas Coupland

ISBN 0060987049 (0-06-098704-9)
Softcover, Harpercollins

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Microserfs is not about Microsoft--it's about programmers who are searching for lives. A hilarious but frighteningly real look at geek life in the '90's, Coupland's book manifests a peculiar sense of how technology affects the human race and how it will continue to affect all of us. Microserfs is the hilarious journal of Dan, an ex-Microsoft programmer who, with his coder comrades, is on a quest to find purpose in life. This isn't just fodder for techies. The thoughts and fears of the not-so-stereotypical characters are easy for any of us to relate to, and their witty conversations and quirky view of the world make this a surprisingly thought-provoking book.
" ... just think about the way high-tech cultures purposefully protract out the adolescence of their employees well into their late 20s, if not their early 30s," muses one programmer. "I mean, all those Nerf toys and free beverages! And the way tech firms won't even call work 'the office,' but instead, 'the campus.' It's sick and evil." [via]
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- Microserfs: ISBN 0060391480 (0-06-039148-0)
  Hardcover, Harpercollins
- Microserfs: ISBN 0060987049 (0-06-098704-9)
  Softcover, Harpercollins
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The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story
by Michael Lewis

ISBN 0140296468 (0-14-029646-8)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
Michael Lewis was supposed to be writing about how Jim Clark, the founder of Silicon Graphics and Netscape, was going to turn health care on its ear by launching Healtheon, which would bring the vast majority of the industry's transactions online. So why was he spending so much time on a computerized yacht, each feature installed because, as one technician put it, "someone saw it on Star Trek and wanted one just like it?"
Much of The New New Thing, to be fair, is devoted to the Healtheon story. It's just that Jim Clark doesn't do startups the way most people do. "He had ceased to be a businessman," as Lewis puts it, "and become a conceptual artist." After coming up with the basic idea for Healtheon, securing the initial seed money, and hiring the people to make it happen, Clark concentrated on the building of Hyperion, a sailboat with a 197-foot mast, whose functions are controlled by 25 SGI workstations (a boat that, if he wanted to, Clark could log onto and steer--from anywhere in the world). Keeping up with Clark proves a monumental challenge--"you didn't interact with him," Lewis notes, "so much as hitch a ride on the back of his life"--but one that the author rises to meet with the same frenetic energy and humor of his previous books, Liar's Poker and Trail Fever.
Like those two books, The New New Thing shows how the pursuit of power at its highest levels can lead to the very edges of the surreal, as when Clark tries to fill out an investment profile for a Swiss bank, where he intends to deposit less than .05 percent of his financial assets. When asked to assess his attitude toward financial risk, Clark searches in vain for the category of "people who sought to turn ten million dollars into one billion in a few months" and finally tells the banker, "I think this is for a different ... person." There have been a lot of profiles of Silicon Valley companies and the way they've revamped the economy in the 1990s--The New New Thing is one of the first books fully to depict the sort of man that has made such companies possible. --Ron Hogan [via]
More editions of The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story:
- The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story: ISBN 0393048136 (0-393-04813-6)
  Hardcover, W W Norton & Co Inc
- The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story: ISBN 0140296468 (0-14-029646-8)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World
by Kevin Kelly

ISBN 0201483408 (0-201-48340-8)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group

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Book summary:
In many ways, the 20th century has been the Age of Physics. Out of Control is an accessible and entertaining explanation of why the coming years will probably be the Age of Biology -- particularly evolution and ethology -- and what this will mean to most every aspect of our society. Kelly is an enthusiastic and well-informed guide who explains the promises and implications of this rapidly evolving revolution very well. [via]
More editions of Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World:
- Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World: ISBN 0201483408 (0-201-48340-8)
  Softcover, Perseus Books Group
Out of Control: The Rise of Neo-Biological Civilization
by Kevin Kelly

ISBN 0201577933 (0-201-57793-3)
Hardcover, Perseus Books Group

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- Out of Control: The Rise of Neo-Biological Civilization: ISBN 0201577933 (0-201-57793-3)
  Hardcover, Perseus Books Group
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The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance
by Henry Petroski

ISBN 0394574222 (0-394-57422-2)
Hardcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:
Like most other human artifacts, the common pencil, made and sold today by the millions, has a long and complex history. Henry Petroski, who combines a talent for fine writing with a deep knowledge of engineering and technological history, examines the story of the pencil, considering it not only as a thing in itself, but also as an exemplar of all things that are designed and manufactured.
Petroski ranges widely in time, discussing the writing technologies of antiquity. But his story really begins in the early modern period, when, in 1565, a Swiss naturalist first described the properties of the mineral that became known as graphite. Petroski traces the evolution of the pencil through the Industrial Revolution, when machine manufacture replaced earlier handwork. Along the way, he looks at some of pencil making's great innovators--including Henry David Thoreau, the famed writer, who worked in his father's pencil factory, inventing techniques for grinding graphite and experimenting with blends of lead, clay, and other ingredients to yield pencils of varying hardness and darkness. Petroski closes with a look at how pencils are made today--a still-imperfect technology that may yet evolve with new advances in materials and design. --Gregory McNamee [via]
More editions of The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance:
- The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance: ISBN 0394574222 (0-394-57422-2)
  Hardcover, Random House Inc
The Road Ahead
by Bill Gates, Peter Rinearson, Nathan Myhrvold

ISBN 1568953062 (1-56895-306-2)
Hardcover, Wheeler Pub Inc

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What is the information highway? How will the new technology change our lives? The Road Ahead is Bill Gates' vision of the future. In it he describes how he thinks the revolution of the information age will change the way we buy, work, learn and communicate with each other. Bill Gates has built the Microsoft Corporation into one of the most successful companies in the world. His book is an optimistic look at how new technologies will transform the way we live. [via]
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The Road Ahead : Completely Revised and Up-to-Date
by Peter M. Rinearson, Bill Gates, Nathan Myhrvold

ISBN 0140260404 (0-14-026040-4)
Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)

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Book summary:
Love him or loathe him, Mr. Microsoft is certainly an influential voice in the modern business world and The Road Ahead is definitely an important addition to any business library. Gates' description of the beginnings of the information age, while somewhat over-emphasizing his own contributions and downplaying those of his competitors, is nonetheless as clear and enlightening as any in print today. Likewise, his view of the digital future--from hardware to software and education to entertainment--should be read and studied by all who use technology in their business today or plan to use it on the road ahead. [via]
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- The Road Ahead : Completely Revised and Up-to-Date: ISBN 0140260404 (0-14-026040-4)
  Softcover, Penguin Group (Canada)
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The Rosary: Chain of Hope
by Benedict Groeschel

ISBN 0898709830 (0-89870-983-0)
Softcover, Ignatius Pr

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Book summary:
Responding to the Pope's Apostolic Letter on the Rosary, his five new "Luminous Mysteries", and declaration of 2003 as "The Year of the Rosary", Fr. Groeschel presents this book of meditations on all 20 mysteries of the rosary. Drawing on his vast personal experiences as well as the grand traditions of the Church, he takes us on a spiritual journey that will inspire us to greater depths of prayer. This special book includes: The Pope's Letter on the Rosary, Rosarium Virginis Mariae, and lavishly illustrated with 20 classic color paintings. [via]
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- The Rosary: Chain of Hope: ISBN 0898709830 (0-89870-983-0)
  Softcover, Ignatius Pr
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The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture
by John Battelle

ISBN 1591841410 (1-59184-141-0)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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Book summary:
What does the world want? According to John Battelle, a company that answers that question -- in all its shades of meaning -- can unlock the most intractable riddles of both business and culture. And for the past few years, that's exactly what Google has been doing.
Jumping into the game long after Yahoo, Alta Vista, Excite, Lycos, and other pioneers, Google offered a radical new approach to search, redefined the idea of viral marketing, survived the dotcom crash, and pulled off the largest and most talked about initial public offering in the history of Silicon Valley.
But The Search offers much more than the inside story of Google's triumph. It's also a big-picture book about the past, present, and future of search technology, and the enormous impact it is starting to have on marketing, media, pop culture, dating, job hunting, international law, civil liberties, and just about every other sphere of human interest.
More than any of its rivals, Google has become the gateway to instant knowledge. Hundreds of millions of people use it to satisfy their wants, needs, fears, and obsessions, creating an enormous artifact that Battelle calls "the Database of Intentions." Somewhere in Google's archives, for instance, you can find the agonized research of a gay man with AIDS, the silent plotting of a would-be bombmaker, and the anxiety of a woman checking out her blind date. Combined with the databases of thousands of other search-driven businesses, large and small, it all adds up to a goldmine of information that powerful organizations (including the government) will want to get their hands on.
No one is better qualified to explain this entire phenomenon than Battelle, who cofounded Wired and founded The Industry Standard. Perhaps more than any other journalist, he has devoted his career to finding the holy grail of technology -- something as transformational as the Macintosh was in the mid- 1980s. And he has finally found it in search.
Battelle draws on more than 350 interviews with major players from Silicon Valley to Seattle to Wall Street, including Google cofounders Larry Page and Sergey Brin and CEO Eric Schmidt, as well as competitors like Louis Monier, who invented AltaVista, and Neil Moncrief, a soft-spoken Georgian whose business Google built, destroyed, and built again.
Battelle lucidly reveals how search technology actually works, explores the amazing power of targeted advertising, and reports on the frenzy of the Google IPO, when the company tried to rewrite the rules of Wall Street and declared "don't be evil" as its corporate motto.
For anyone who wants to understand how Google really succeeded -- and the implications of a world in which every click can be preserved forever -- THE SEARCH is an eye-opening and indispensable read. [via]
More editions of The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture:
- The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture: ISBN 1591840880 (1-59184-088-0)
  Hardcover, Portfolio
- The Search: How Google And Its Rivals Revwrote the Rules of Business And Transformed Our Culture: ISBN 1591841410 (1-59184-141-0)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology
by Ray Kurzweil

ISBN 0143037889 (0-14-303788-9)
Softcover, Penguin Group USA

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The great inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil is one of the best-known and most controversial advocates for the role of machines in the future of humanity. In his latest book, he envisions an eventthe "singularity"in which technological change becomes so rapid and so profound that our bodies and brains will merge with our machines.
The Singularity Is Near portrays what life will be like after this event a human- machine civilization where our experiences shift from real reality to virtual reality and where our intelligence becomes nonbiological and trillions of times more powerful. In practical terms, this means that human aging and pollution will be reversed; world hunger will be solved; our bodies and environment transformed by nanotechnology to overcome the limitations of biology, including death; and virtually any physical product can be created from information alone. The Singularity Is Near also considers the social and philosophical ramifications of these changes, and is certain to be one of the most widely discussed and provocative books of 2005. [via]
More editions of The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology:
- The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology: ISBN 0670033847 (0-670-03384-7)
  Hardcover, Penguin Group USA
- The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology: ISBN 0143037889 (0-14-303788-9)
  Softcover, Penguin Group USA
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Small Pieces Loosely Joined: A Unified Theory of the Web
by David Weinberger

ISBN 0738208507 (0-7382-0850-7)
Softcover, Perseus Books Group

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Book summary:
David Weinberger's Small Pieces Loosely Joined does not merely celebrate the World Wide Web; it attempts to make a case that the institution has completely remodeled many of the world's self-perceptions. The book does so entertainingly, if not convincingly, and is a lively collection of epigrammatic phrases (the Web is "'place-ial' but not spatial"; "on the Web everyone will be famous to 15 people"), as well as illustrations of these changes. There are intriguing assertions: that the Web is "broken on purpose" and that its many pockets of erroneous information and its available forums for disputing, say, manufacturers' hyperbole, let people feel more comfortable with their own inherent imperfections. At other times the book seems stale: it declares that the Web has disrupted long-held axioms about time, space, and knowledge retrieval and that it has dramatically rearranged notions of community and individuality. Weinberger's analysis, though occasionally facile and too relentlessly optimistic and overstated, is surely destined to be the subject of furious debate in chat rooms the cyber-world over. --H. O'Billovich [via]
More editions of Small Pieces Loosely Joined: A Unified Theory of the Web:
- Small Pieces Loosely Joined: A Unified Theory of the Web: ISBN 0738205435 (0-7382-0543-5)
  Hardcover, Perseus Books Group
- Small Pieces Loosely Joined: A Unified Theory of the Web: ISBN 0738208507 (0-7382-0850-7)
  Softcover, Perseus Books Group
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Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution
by Howard Rheingold

ISBN 0738208612 (0-7382-0861-2)
Softcover, Basic Books

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Book summary:
From Tokyo to Helsinki, Manhattan to Manila, Howard Rheingold takes us on a journey around the world for a preview of the next techno-cultural shift-a shift he predicts will be as dramatic as the widespread adoption of the PC in the 1980s and the Internet in the 1990s. The coming wave, says Rheingold, is the result of super-efficient mobile communications-cellular phones, personal digital assistants, and wireless-paging and Internet-access devices that will allow us to connect with anyone, anywhere, anytime.From the amusing ("Lovegetty" devices in Japan that light up when a person with the right date-potential characteristics appears in the vicinity) to the extraordinary (the overthrow of a repressive regime in the Philippines by political activists who mobilized by forwarding text messages via cell phones), Rheingold gives examples of the fundamentally new ways in which people are already engaging in group or collective action. He also considers the dark side of this phenomenon, such as the coordination of terrorist cells, threats to privacy, and the ability to incite violent behavior.Applying insights from sociology, artificial intelligence, engineering, and anthropology, Rheingold offers a penetrating perspective on the brave new convergence of pop culture, cutting-edge technology, and social activism. At the same time, he reminds us that, as with other technological revolutions, the real impact of mobile communications will come not from the technology itself but from how people use it, resist it, adapt to it, and ultimately use it to transform themselves, their communities, and their institutions. [via]
More editions of Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution:
- Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution: ISBN 0738206083 (0-7382-0608-3)
  Hardcover, Perseus Books Group
- Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution: ISBN 0738208612 (0-7382-0861-2)
  Softcover, Basic Books
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Snow Crash
by Neal Stephenson

ISBN 0553380958 (0-553-38095-8)
Softcover, Bantam Dell Pub Group

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From the opening line of his breakthrough cyberpunk novel Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson plunges the reader into a not-too-distant future. It is a world where the Mafia controls pizza delivery, the United States exists as a patchwork of corporate-franchise city-states, and the Internet--incarnate as the Metaverse--looks something like last year's hype would lead you to believe it should. Enter Hiro Protagonist--hacker, samurai swordsman, and pizza-delivery driver. When his best friend fries his brain on a new designer drug called Snow Crash and his beautiful, brainy ex-girlfriend asks for his help, what's a guy with a name like that to do? He rushes to the rescue. A breakneck-paced 21st-century novel, Snow Crash interweaves everything from Sumerian myth to visions of a postmodern civilization on the brink of collapse. Faster than the speed of television and a whole lot more fun, Snow Crash is the portrayal of a future that is bizarre enough to be plausible. [via]
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The Soul of a New Machine
by Tracy Kidder

ISBN 0316491977 (0-316-49197-7)
Softcover, Little Brown & Co

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Book summary:
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.
These days, we are used to the "total commitment" philosophy of managing technical creation, but Kidder was surprised and even a little alarmed at the obsessions and compulsions he found. From in-house political struggles to workers being permitted to tease management to marathon 24-hour work sessions, The Soul of a New Machine explores concepts that already seem familiar, even old-hat, less than 20 years later. Kidder plainly admires his subjects; while he admits to hopeless confusion about their work, he finds their dedication heroic. The reader wonders, though, what will become of it all, now and in the future. --Rob Lightner [via]
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The Technological Society
by Jacques Ellul

ISBN 0394703901 (0-394-70390-1)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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More editions of The Technological Society:
- The Technological Society: ISBN 0075441586 (0-07-544158-6)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
- The Technological Society: ISBN 0394703901 (0-394-70390-1)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
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Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology
by Neil Postman

ISBN 0679745408 (0-679-74540-8)
Softcover, Random House Inc

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Book summary:
Neil Postman is one of the most level-headed analysts of education, media, and technology, and in this book he spells out the increasing dependence upon technology, numerical quantification, and misappropriation of "Scientism" to all human affairs. No simple technophobe, Postman argues insightfully and writes with a stylistic flair, profound sense of humor, and love of language increasingly rare in our hastily scribbled e-mail-saturated world. [via]
More editions of Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology:
- Technopoly : The Surrender of Culture to Technology: ISBN 0394582721 (0-394-58272-1)
  Hardcover, Knopf Publishing Group
- Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology: ISBN 0679745408 (0-679-74540-8)
  Softcover, Random House Inc
The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century's On-Line Pioneers
by Tom Standage

ISBN 0802713424 (0-8027-1342-4)
Hardcover, Walker & Company

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"A fascinating walk through a pivotal period in human history."--USA TodayFor many people, the Internet is the epitome of cutting-edge technology. But in the nineteenth century, the first online communications network was already in place--the telegraph. And at the time, it was just as perplexing, controversial, and revolutionary as the Internet is today. The Victorian Internet tells the story of the telegraph's creation and remarkable impact, and of the visionaries, oddballs, and eccentrics who pioneered it. With the invention of the telegraph, the world of communications was forever changed. The telegraph gave rise to creative business practices and new forms of crime. Romances blossomed over its wires. And attitudes toward everything from news gathering to war had to be completely rethought. The saga of the telegraph offers many parallels to that of the Internet in our own time, and is a remarkable episode in the history of technology.* Illustrated throughout* A masterful, lively blend of science and history, in the bestselling tradition of Longitude"Fascinating...If you've ever hankered for a perspective on media Net hype, this book is for you."--Wired"Sparkling."--Forbes"Essential reading for those caught up in our own information revolution."--Christian Science Monitor [via]
More editions of The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century's On-Line Pioneers:
- The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century's On-Line Pioneers: ISBN 0425171698 (0-425-17169-8)
  Softcover, Berkley Pub Group
- The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century's On-Line Pioneers: ISBN 0802713424 (0-8027-1342-4)
  Hardcover, Walker & Company
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The Way Things Work
by David Macaulay

ISBN 0395428572 (0-395-42857-2)
Hardcover, Houghton Mifflin

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Book summary:
David Macaulay has made it his business to demystify science and technology for children (and certainly one or two surreptitious adults) with his worldwide bestseller, The New Way Things Work. Packed with information on the inner workings of everything from the World Wide Web to windmills, the remarkable and humorous book guides readers through the fundamental principles of machines. And now Macaulay and his trusty mammoth sidekick are back, ready to make science even more fun and comprehensible. The Way Things Work Kit is a hands-on, fully interactive kit, equipped with everything needed to perform over 50 activities, including the construction of 12 working models. A handy cardboard carrying case opens to reveal a guidebook, a CD-ROM with instructions on how to build your own pinball games, activity cards, and more than 100 basic components that fit together to make models from a balloon-powered car to a robot arm to a fairground ride. Children will be absorbed for hours as they learn about levers and hydraulics, winches and friction, inertia and pneumatics. Future engineers--not to mention just regular humans--couldn't have a better introduction to the way things work. (Ages 8 and older) --Emilie Coulter [via]
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- The Way Things Work: ISBN 0395428572 (0-395-42857-2)
  Hardcover, Houghton Mifflin
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Way Things Work: An Encyclopedia of Modern Technology
by Ritchie

ISBN 0671210866 (0-671-21086-6)
Hardcover, Simon & Schuster

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More editions of Way Things Work: An Encyclopedia of Modern Technology:
- Way Things Work: An Encyclopedia of Modern Technology: ISBN 0671226215 (0-671-22621-5)
  Hardcover, Simon & Schuster
- Way Things Work: An Encyclopedia of Modern Technology: ISBN 0671210866 (0-671-21086-6)
  Hardcover, Simon & Schuster
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The Way Things Work: An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Technology
by C. Van Amerongen

ISBN 0000913154 (0-00-091315-4)
Hardcover, Simon & Schuster

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Book summary:
From the ball point pen to the computer, from the Polaroid Camera to the Atomic clock, with 1071 two-color drawings and diagrams [via]
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- The Way Things Work: An Illustrated Encyclopedia of Technology: ISBN 0000913154 (0-00-091315-4)
  Hardcover, Simon & Schuster
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Why Things Bite Back: Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences
by Edward Tenner

ISBN 0679747567 (0-679-74756-7)
Softcover, Vintage Books

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Book summary:
To the Hopi Indians in America's Southwest, our existence will soon become koyaanissqatsi or "a world out of balance." Some doomsday theorists, like historian Edward Tenner, argue we are already there. But unlike many of his colleagues, Tenner doesn't believe technology is causing the world's demise--rather, it is carrying us, as individuals, to our own koyaanissqatsi more quickly. Technological "breakthroughs" such as X-rays and computers have their immediate benefits, but their long-term consequences in terms of health and environmental risks, lost time, and disintegration of traditions set us back further than where we started in the first place. While Tenner doesn't damn technology, he cautions for modest and skeptical acceptance of it. [via]
More editions of Why Things Bite Back: Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences:
- Why Things Bite Back : Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences: ISBN 0679425632 (0-679-42563-2)
  Hardcover, Knopf Publishing Group
- Why Things Bite Back: Technology and the Revenge of Unintended Consequences: ISBN 0679747567 (0-679-74756-7)
  Softcover, Vintage Books
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The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century
by Thomas L. Friedman

ISBN 0312425074 (0-312-42507-4)
Softcover, Picador USA

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The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century [Paperback] [via]
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- The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century: ISBN 0312425074 (0-312-42507-4)
  Softcover, Picador USA
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The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century
by Thomas L. Friedman

ISBN 0374292795 (0-374-29279-5)
Hardcover, Farrar Straus & Giroux

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Book summary:
When scholars write the history of the world twenty years from now, and they come to the chapter "Y2K to March 2004," what will they say was the most crucial development? The attacks on the World Trade Center on 9/11 and the Iraq war? Or the convergence of technology and events that allowed India, China, and so many other countries to become part of the global supply chain for services and manufacturing, creating an explosion of wealth in the middle classes of the world's two biggest nations, giving them a huge new stake in the success of globalization? And with this "flattening" of the globe, which requires us to run faster in order to stay in place, has the world gotten too small and too fast for human beings and their political systems to adjust in a stable manner?In this brilliant new book, the award-winning New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman demystifies the brave new world for readers, allowing them to make sense of the often bewildering global scene unfolding before their eyes. With his inimitable ability to translate complex foreign policy and economic issues, Friedman explains how the flattening of the world happened at the dawn of the twenty-first century; what it means to countries, companies, communities, and individuals; and how governments and societies can, and must, adapt. The World Is Flat is the timely and essential update on globalization, its successes and discontents, powerfully illuminated by one of our most respected journalists. [via]
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