Imagining the Internet: Personalities, Predictions, Perspectives

by Janna Quitney Anderson, Lee Rainie (Foreword by)

Overview

In the early 1990s, people predicted the death of privacy, an end to the current concept of 'property,' a paperless society, 500 channels of high-definition interactive television, world peace, and the extinction of the human race after a takeover engineered by intelligent machines. Imagining the Internet zeroes in on predictions about the Internet's future and revisits past predictions—and how they turned out—to put that imagined future in perspective. Interlaced with revealing analysis, this compendium of thoughts from stakeholders and skeptics, from George Orwell, Marshall McLuhan, and Isaac Asimov to Bill Gates, Bruce Sterling, Nicholas Negroponte, Al Gore, and many others, combines history and biography with future visions and a look at the social, political, and economic consequences of new communication technology. It also gives the history of communications in a nutshell, illustrating the serious impact of pervasive networks and how they will change our lives over the next century. Visit www.elon.edu/predictions/ to view a comprehensive database that forms the investigative basis for this book.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780742568662
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	07/21/2005
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	256
File size:	1 MB

About the Author

Janna Quitney Anderson is the director of Internet projects and assistant professor of communications in the School of Communications at Elon University, North Carolina.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction
Chapter 2 1 The Internet at the Forefront
Chapter 3 2 From Bonfires and Bongos to the Web
Chapter 4 3 Web Gems
Chapter 5 4 The Highway Metaphor
Chapter 6 5 Knocking the Net
Chapter 7 6 Saddam, O.J., and the Unabomber
Chapter 8 7 Nothing is Certain but Death and Taxes
Chapter 9 8 Aristotle, Jefferson, Marx, and McLuhan
Chapter 10 9 Supporters Crow about 500 Channels and Everyone Warns about Infoglut
Chapter 11 10 Voices of the Net
Chapter 12 11 The Threat to Freedom; to the Earth
Chapter 13 12 The Future of Networks
Chapter 14 13 Nobody Knows You're a Dog
Chapter 15 14 Hmmm...Will it Happen?
Chapter 16 Appendix A: Wired Inspired
Chapter 17 Appendix B: Recording the Data
Chapter 18 Suggested Readings
Chapter 19 Bibliography

Editorial Reviews

Janna Anderson offers a great perspective on the history and future of the Internet based on Elon University/Pew Internet & American Life Project's extensive prediction collection. Good books come from thorough research. Starting with the earliest communications systems, such as the telegraph, is a useful bonus. Being a part of and having the last word in this fine past-and-future Internet chronicle is a real honor....

Gordon Bell

Anderson provides a variety of perspectives on contested issues such as privacy on the Internet, personal identity online, and 'information overload.' Anderson's knowledge is encyclopedic, and her accessible, jargon-free style will engage professors and researchers without alienating undergraduates. Highly recommended.

Choice Reviews

[Imagining the Internet] looks at the future through an analysis of the past. It is somewhat difficult after becoming immersed in these insights to remember that Internet communication began with the utmost diffidence. Indeed the first events involved a computer crash and unmemorable twaddle.. .. We hope that this material will be useful to scholars who wish to assess the distance we have come; journalists who are trying to figure out where we are now; government, industry, and nonprofit officials who want to build the Internet of the future; and people of all walks of life who must learn to recognize the coming complexities of their networked world.

Lee Rainie

There are many books on the Internet and cyberculture—part hype, part gloss, sometimes solid technology criticism. Anderson's book is valuable because it helps sort out differing viewpoints and puts them in a historical context, recreating many of the ups and downs of the 1990s, before things got really crazy. She has an amazing database of predictions, collected over time, and selects from it well. This book is never dense reading, but it is packed with interesting facts and milestones to jar my memory, to help me recreate what that time was like, because the subtle changes are what have worked us over so thoroughly. My favorite part in these excursions into the words of technology prophets and critics is picking out the threads that had an influence—that helped shape the larger visions of what this massive commons has become.

Christine Boese

Janna Anderson illuminates with great clarity the history, dreams, and challenges of the Internet, which allow the reader to see glimpses of the future. A wonderful and important contribution.

Tiffany Shlain

Anderson provides a variety of perspectives on contested issues such as privacy on the Internet, personal identity online, and 'information overload.' Anderson's knowledge is encyclopedic, and her accessible, jargon-free style will engage professors and researchers without alienating undergraduates. Highly recommended.

Choice

[Imagining the Internet] looks at the future through an analysis of the past. It is somewhat difficult after becoming immersed in these insights to remember that Internet communication began with the utmost diffidence. Indeed the first events involved a computer crash and unmemorable twaddle. . . . We hope that this material will be useful to scholars who wish to assess the distance we have come; journalists who are trying to figure out where we are now; government, industry, and nonprofit officials who want to build the Internet of the future; and people of all walks of life who must learn to recognize the coming complexities of their networked world.--Lee Rainie, director, the Pew Internet & American Life Project, from the Foreword

There are many books on the Internet and cyberculture--part hype, part gloss, sometimes solid technology criticism. Anderson's book is valuable because it helps sort out differing viewpoints and puts them in a historical context, recreating many of the ups and downs of the 1990s, before things got really crazy. She has an amazing database of predictions, collected over time, and selects from it well. This book is never dense reading, but it is packed with interesting facts and milestones to jar my memory, to help me recreate what that time was like, because the subtle changes are what have worked us over so thoroughly. My favorite part in these excursions into the words of technology prophets and critics is picking out the threads that had an influence--that helped shape the larger visions of what this massive commons has become.--Christine Boese, cyberculture columnist, CNN.com; writer, CNN Headline News

Janna Anderson illuminates with great clarity the history, dreams, and challenges of the Internet, which allow the reader to see glimpses of the future. A wonderful and important contribution.--Tiffany Shlain, founder and chair, the Webby Awards

From the Publisher

Anderson provides a variety of perspectives on contested issues such as privacy on the Internet, personal identity online, and 'information overload.' Anderson's knowledge is encyclopedic, and her accessible, jargon-free style will engage professors and researchers without alienating undergraduates. Highly recommended.

CHOICE