Authors: Steven A. Johnson.
Paperback, 272 pages
Publisher: Basic Books
Publication Date: 1999-10-07
Edition: Rep Sub

Reviews :

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    Steven Johnson turns the tables on the way we consider our computer interfaces. While many discussions focus on how interfaces help us work by adapting to our ways of thinking and our real-world metaphors, Johnson jumps from there to look at how our thinking and world view are altered by our computer interfaces.

He begins with the simple: The mouse improved the spatial nature of our computers by letting us move, by the proxy of our pointers, within the screen. The windows metaphor made cyberspace a 3-D space. And while we tend to think about the graphical nature of interfaces, Johnson also explores the textual side and how it has changed the way we work with the written word.

Interface Culture then goes on to show how, with each advance in technology, the interface shapes our perceptions in new ways. Where mice and windows turned the computing world into cyberspace, agents have created a perception of software as personality. On the larger scale, Johnson sees these tools, originally built on noncyber metaphors, as creating, in their turn, a new set of metaphors for looking at the rest of the world. And while he finds it exciting, he spends considerable time on such shortcomings in our approach to interfacing: what he considers the excessive emphasis on graphics elements at the cost of anything textual. Johnson, who is the editor of the cerebral Feed Web site and whom Newsweek called one of the most influential people in cyberspace, has written an intelligent book about interface design, its relationship to the real world, and how it affects our perception of worlds both cyber and physical....

Authors: Erik Davis.
Hardcover, 353 pages
Publisher: Harmony
Publication Date: 1998-10-13
Edition: 1

Reviews :

    Exploring the mystical impulses behind our obsession with information technology, TechGnosis presents a fascinating and passionately original perspective on technoculture.
        
Today we often assume that the triumph of technological rationality has condemned the spiritual imagination to the trash heap of history. But as Erik Davis explains, religious impulses and magical dreams permeate the history of technology, and especially information technology. Ranging from the printing press to the telegraph, from radio to the Internet, Davis peels away the utilitarian shell of technology to reveal the mystical and millennialist fervor that attends each new communications breakthrough.
        
As he unveils the hidden history of technomysticism, Davis shows how the religious imagination continues to feed the utopian dreams, apocalyptic visions, digital phantasms, and alien obsessions that populate today's technological unconscious. From shamanism to alchemy, evangelism to Buddhism, TechGnosis probes our virtual future through the visionary lenses of the past. In these pages, Davis offers a lucid, playful, and astonishingly erudite journey through our hyper-mediated environment. Anyone grappling with the morphing boundaries and terminal speed of our present moment will want to take the ride....

    The gap between the technological mentality and the mystical outlook may not be as great as it seems. Erik Davis looks at modern information technology--and much previous technology--to reveal how much of it has roots in spiritual attitudes. Furthermore, he explores how those who embrace each new technological advance often do so with designs and expectations stemming from religious sensibilities. In doing so, Davis both compares and contrasts the scientific attitude that we can know reality technologically and the Gnostic idea of developing ultimate understanding. Although organized into reasonable chapters, there's a strong stream-of-consciousness component to Davis's writing. His expositions may run, for example, from information theory to the nebulous nature of Gnosticism to the philosophical problem of evil-­all in just a few pages. It's as if there are so many connections to make that Davis's prose has to run back and forth across time and space drawing the lines. But the result, rather than being chaotic, is a lively interplay of wide-ranging ideas. His style is equally lively and generally engaging--if sometimes straying into the hip. In the end, he succeeds in showing the spiritual side of what some may see as cold, technological thought. --Elizabeth Lewis...

Authors: D. Micah Hester. Paul J. Ford.
Paperback, 498 pages
Publisher: Prentice Hall
Publication Date: 2000-07-06


Reviews :

    For Introduction to Ethics and Computer Ethics courses. Designed to fill the need for a diverse classroom-based approach to computer ethics, this anthology of essays presents thought-provoking perspectives on the proliferation of computers in our lives. Topics range from privacy, copyright, and computer crime issues to the global impact of computers, online communities, and virtual reality. Essays are contributed and compiled by experts in a variety of disciplines. The breadth of scope allows students to begin to understand and evaluate the social and ethical issues raised by computer technologies....

Authors:
Hardcover, 575 pages
Publisher: Ashgate Publishing
Publication Date: 2003-12


Reviews :

    This volume focuses on the information and communication (ICT) revolution and its impact on economic growth. Even though the emergence of the knowledge economy is at the center of attention by media and is often a subject of economic policy debate, economic research on the issue is still relatively underdeveloped and many aspects of it are still awaiting proper theoretical and empirical scrutiny. One important question is whether, as many economists and opinion leaders maintain the knowledge economy and the new information technologies have fostered the birth of a "new economy" which by inducing a strong productivity growth in most sectors, is behind the impressive growth of GDP experienced by the US economy. Empirical research has in fact been unable to provide a conclusive answer to this question. This book debates this issue and provides the opportunity to discuss the economic and social effects of the ICT revolution. It also focuses on the functioning and the micro-economic structure of the ICT sector, as well as on its impact on various industries, on the financial system and on the labor market. It analyses the role of the ICT revolution on regional development and it addresses important policy issues such as its consequences for antitrust legislation and government regulation....

Authors: Thomas Georges. Thomas M. Georges.
Hardcover, 288 pages
Publisher: Basic Books
Publication Date: 2003-03


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Authors: Timothy Leary.
Paperback, 192 pages
Publisher: Ronin Publishing
Publication Date: 2008-09-28


Reviews :

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Authors: John R. Vacca.
Paperback, 512 pages
Publisher: Prentice Hall PTR
Publication Date: 2002-09-12


Reviews :

    This book was designed to help consumers and institutions ward off this ever-growing threat and to react quickly and effectively to recover from this type of crime. It is filled with checklists on who you should notify in case you become a victim and how to recover your identity. As well as, different levels of security on the Internet and what to watch out for, prevention methods for ISPs and methods of testing these prevention techniques. It asks which employees and customers are most at risk and what are your cyber-liabilities if you are a financial institution or employer and answers the questions through deployment of security technologies including biometrics, digital signatures using smart and optical cards, and encryption. Identity theft is one of the fastest growing crimes in the US. This past March, Secret Service agents and Jacksonville County Sheriff's officers arrested a 30-year-old Florida man who authorities allege was trying to sell 60,000 names and personal information of The Prudential Insurance Company of America employees. This is just one of many cases highlighting the extent to which everyone faces the threat of having their identity stolen. Yet, few publications deal with this topic - leaving most people vulnerable. Worst of all, they don't fully recognize the threat....

Authors:
Paperback, 156 pages
Publisher: Hardwired
Publication Date: 1996-09
Edition: 1st

Reviews :

    Mind Grenades serves as a high-caffeine coffee table book that captures the new spirit of the era by linking message with award-winning design. John Plunkett is one of the creators of the look and feel of Wired and HotWired, the first Web-based cyberstaion. Louis Rossetto is the founder and publisher of Wired magazine. 8-color artwork throughout....

Authors: Richard Stivers.
Hardcover, 208 pages
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication Date: 2004-02-28


Reviews :

    In this incisive and controversial book, Richard Stivers rejects genetic explanations of psychological problems, arguing instead that the very organization of technological societies is behind the pervasive experience of loneliness. In its extreme form, loneliness assumes pathological dimensions in neurosis and schizophrenia, which reflect the contradiction between power and meaninglessness that characterizes modern life. Loneliness, in its many manifestations, seems to be the price we must pay for living in a technological world. Yet nurturing family, friend, and community ties can mitigate its culturally and psychologically disorganizing power. This book is a clarion call for a renewal of moral awareness and custom to combat the fragmentation and depersonalization of our technological civilization. Visit our website for sample chapters!...

Authors: Ian Graham.
Paperback, 320 pages
Publisher: Wiley
Publication Date: 2008-12-15


Reviews :

    Many software developers often confuse requirements engineering with software specification and, as a result, build unusable systems, despite meeting specifications. Bringing together all the techniques needed by the modern software developer, here is a practical handbook to requirements engineering and systems specification for developers building systems within a service oriented architecture. It introduces the concepts of SOA and relevant standards and technology, such as Web services and ESBs, and then presents a range of modern requirements engineering techniques....