Monthly Archives: September 2011

Book review: ‘Wikileaks, Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy’

Jacobo Corujeira | 22 September 2011, 11:51 am | 1 comment | tags: , , , , ,

Wikileaks has become, in the last years, the symbol of transparency in the 21st Century. The efforts of the organization founded by Julian Assange to offer public access to relevant information about politicians, bankers and rulers of the world are reshaping not only journalism, but also democracies and dictatorial regimes. Wikileaks, Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy (Guardian…


What cultural policy in the era of globalization and electronic media?

Natalia Miszczak | 21 September 2011, 5:24 pm | 1 comment | tags: , , ,

Cultural revolution has already taken place. What has changed is not only participation in culture, but cultural environment itself, characterized by such slogans as “culture 2.0” or “culture of participation”. Changes in forms of participation in culture (following the development of new communication technologies) and the changes of civilization cause that in the near future, almost everyone will provide themselves…


Book review: Enfoldment and Infinity by Laura U. Marks

Stijnie Thuijs | 21 September 2011, 5:23 pm | 1 comment | tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

What are the parallels and relations between Islamic art and New Media art? That is the main question Laura U. Marks poses in her book ‘Enfoldment and Infinity. An Islamic Genealogy of New Media Art’. The title of her book is just as alluring and bold as her topic. During the first two chapters her motivation of the…


Book Review: ‘Cyber War’ by Richard A. Clarke and Robert K. Knake

Maarten Jansen | 21 September 2011, 3:12 pm | tags: , , , , , , , ,

Richard A. Clarke has worked for the U.S. government for 30 years. In the White House he served Presidents Ronald Reagan, George W.H. Bush, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. Under Clinton and W. Bush, he worked as National Coordinator for Security, Infrastructure Protection, and Counterterrorism. He ended his career at the government as the Special Advisor to George W.…


Book review: Tactical Media by Rita Raley

Yeun Au | 21 September 2011, 1:28 pm | 1 comment

In december 2004, an alleged spokesmen of Dow Chemical named ‘Jude Finisterra’ appeared on television to apologize for the Bhopal disaster, a 1984 industrial disaster in India that resulted in thousands of deaths. Two hours (an a lot of uproar) later, Dow Chemical released a press statement where they stated that an interview with one of their employees never occured.…


Book Review: KINGPIN by Kevin Poulsen

Mario Gesteira | 21 September 2011, 12:41 pm | 1 comment | tags: , , , , , ,
If you like police stories with persecution, infiltration and investigation KINGPIN may be just the right book for you. Written by Kevin Poulsen, it is an exciting story of the rise of  one hacker to the control of the biggest crime forum on the internet.

Kevin Poulsen is a former black hat hacker (a hacker that acts as a…


Book Review ‘Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other’ by Sherry Turkle (Part 1)

Roos van Tongerloo | 21 September 2011, 12:00 pm | tags: , ,

About 30 percent of the Dutch are unhappy about the social support they get from their fellow citizens. A third of those wish they would get more visitors, for the occasional small talk, and 28 percent wish they would get invited to party’s for dinner a bit more. More that a million Dutch people feel lonely; 50 percent of the…


Book review: Precarious Rhapsody. Semiocapitalism and the pathologies of the post-alpha generation by Franco “Bifo” Berardi

Martijn Dorresteijn | 20 September 2011, 9:30 pm | 1 comment | tags: , , , , , , , ,

Precarious RhapsodyAn infinite series of bifurcations, forking paths, choices (to be) made. Every choice made rules out other possibilities. But do we make these choices, or are they made for us? Is there a real choice? In Precarious Rhapsody, Franco Berardi traces back these chains of bifurcations and unravels the many (psycho)pathologies that accompany them. How have the social, economic and…


Book review: In the Plex by Steven Levy

Demet Dagdelen | 20 September 2011, 9:08 pm | tags: , , ,

“I wanted to write a book that got the reader inside Google and learned about its thought process, the way it planned and built products, its visions for the future, and the way it struggled with issues like China, competitive challenges, regulation, and the (perhaps) inevitable inertia that plagues companies as they get big. To do that I needed unprecedented access, and Google took a risk and gave it to me. “


Book review: Good Faith Collaboration: The Culture of Wikipedia by Joseph Michael Reagle Jr.

Liselotte Doorduijn | 20 September 2011, 4:30 pm | tags: , , ,

With 19 million articles Wikipedia is the biggest and most popular encyclopedia that has been written collaboratively by volunteers around the world. Since its launch in July 2001 it has been the object of research. In 2010 computer scientist Joseph Reagle wrote a book named the Good Faith Collaboration: The Culture of Wikipedia in which he examines the unique collaborative community culture of Wikipedia.