- Paperback: 294 pages
- Publisher: Cornell University Press (Sep 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0801475090
- ISBN-13: 978-0801475092
- Product Dimensions: 22.6 x 15 x 1.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 687,807 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
Format:Paperback
Alex Wright explains that in this volume, he approaches the story of the information age "by squarely looking backward" and along the way, he (and his reader) will "traverse a number of topics not usually brought together in one volume: evolutionary biology, cultural anthropology, mythology, monasticism, the history of printing, the scientific method, eighteenth-century taxonomies, Victorian librarianship, and the early history of the computer, to name a few." It is an especially exciting journey during which he explores separate but related subjects such as these:
o Creation and subsequent development of language and information
o Corresponding increase of information sources and documentation (e.g. papyrus, codex, printing press)
o Corresponding increase of difficulty with managing information (i.e. accessing, processing, organizing, updating, and distributing it)
o Emergence of communities that accelerate communication, cooperation, and collaboration
o Process by which the human race has reached a "precipice" between "the near limitless capacity of computer networks and the real physical limits of human comprehension"
Wright challenges his reader to ask: Have the nature and extent of information (i.e. its scope, depth, and volume) exceeded our ability to process it, much less manage it? Here's a related question: If so, will the need for hierarchical control systems preclude man's "deepest rooted social instincts"? Wright asserts -- and I agree -- that those instincts are returning to the fore, "as people adapt new technologies to invoke the ancient emotional circuitry that carried us through the age before symbols. The future of memory may lie not in our heads but in our hearts." I prefer to think that what we have is not a glut of information but, rather, a glut of as-yet unrealized potentialities. By reading Alex Wright's book, we gain a much deeper understanding of where we have been and thus are better prepared for what has yet to be achieved.
o Creation and subsequent development of language and information
o Corresponding increase of information sources and documentation (e.g. papyrus, codex, printing press)
o Corresponding increase of difficulty with managing information (i.e. accessing, processing, organizing, updating, and distributing it)
o Emergence of communities that accelerate communication, cooperation, and collaboration
o Process by which the human race has reached a "precipice" between "the near limitless capacity of computer networks and the real physical limits of human comprehension"
Wright challenges his reader to ask: Have the nature and extent of information (i.e. its scope, depth, and volume) exceeded our ability to process it, much less manage it? Here's a related question: If so, will the need for hierarchical control systems preclude man's "deepest rooted social instincts"? Wright asserts -- and I agree -- that those instincts are returning to the fore, "as people adapt new technologies to invoke the ancient emotional circuitry that carried us through the age before symbols. The future of memory may lie not in our heads but in our hearts." I prefer to think that what we have is not a glut of information but, rather, a glut of as-yet unrealized potentialities. By reading Alex Wright's book, we gain a much deeper understanding of where we have been and thus are better prepared for what has yet to be achieved.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
10 reviews
21 of 21 people found the following review helpful
excellent look at information
7 Nov 2007
Format:Hardcover
I am a graphic designer working on a thesis in information graphics. This book is easily the best book I have read in the course of my research. The style is quick and engaging. The information moves from a biologic look at how evolution may have driven the way we separate and categorize information - To historic looks at how information has been used. It is not specifically targeted at designers like Tufte's work, but I would recommend it for anyone interested in an overview of how information is used.
20 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Fascinating
28 Jan 2008
Format:Hardcover
Alex Wright is an information architect and a self-styled generalist. He uses biology, neurology, culture, mythology, history, library science, and information science to trace information from the Ice Age to What is wrong with today's Internet and he does this in 252 pgs. (+notes, appendicies, and index)!
The book never makes the reader feel pressured by it's condensed nature. Instead the pace allows for a tapestry of colorful characters and events. There is plenty of material for the average reader to have familiarity with and lots of interesting new facets of information to discover.
The appendicies: John Wilkin's Universal Catagories, Thomas Jefferson's 1783 Catalog of Books, The Dewey Decimal System, and S.R. Ranganathan's Colon Classification, give some idea of the range and depth of the topics covered. An error on pg. 188 lists Appendix E for the current Universal Decimal Classification. This appendix does not exist. This still did not deter me from rating the book 5 Stars. This was the most interesting book that I read in 2007!
The book never makes the reader feel pressured by it's condensed nature. Instead the pace allows for a tapestry of colorful characters and events. There is plenty of material for the average reader to have familiarity with and lots of interesting new facets of information to discover.
The appendicies: John Wilkin's Universal Catagories, Thomas Jefferson's 1783 Catalog of Books, The Dewey Decimal System, and S.R. Ranganathan's Colon Classification, give some idea of the range and depth of the topics covered. An error on pg. 188 lists Appendix E for the current Universal Decimal Classification. This appendix does not exist. This still did not deter me from rating the book 5 Stars. This was the most interesting book that I read in 2007!
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
The history of information
18 Mar 2008
Format:Hardcover
Alex Wright is a journalist and an information architect who argues that networked information systems are derived from monasticism, mythology, print technologies and computers. All information systems are either nondemocratic and top-down (a hierarchy) or peer-to-peer and open (a network).
"An organization chart is a kind of hierarchy in which employees are grouped into departments. Other types of hierarchies include government bureaucracies, biological taxonomies, or a system of menus in a software application.... A network, by contrast, emerges from the bottom up; individuals function as autonomous nodes, negotiating their own relationships.... Democracy is a kind of network, so is a flock of birds, or the World Wide Web."
Wright argues that networks and hierarchies collide, spawn, and reinforce one another constantly. The Gutenberg printing press allowed for the wide dissemination of previously exclusive information. Today, publishing houses disseminate information hierarchically.
"Internet users continue to congregate in small groups that often take shape outside traditional institutional containers. While this tendency toward self-organization might seem like an effect of the Internet's democratic architecture, such behavior also harkens back to our deepest-rooted social instincts.... On the scale of evolutionary history, institutions remain a short-lived hypothesis. For tens of thousands of years, human beings have interacted as social animals, following unwritten norms strengthened by kinship, reinforced by the limbic responses that strengthen our personal relationships, and transmitted through the spoken word. Today, we are seeing those instincts returning to the fore, as people adapt new technologies to invoke the ancient, emotional circuitry that carried us through the age before the dawn of symbols."
Wright is a very clear writer, who covers a vast amount of ground in a very interesting manner. His "aim in writing this book is to resist the tug of mystical techno-futurism and approach the story of the information age by looking squarely backward. ... From the vantage point of the digital age, we can approach the history of the information age in a new light. To do so requires stepping outside of traditional disciplinary constructs, however, in search of a new storyline. ... I traverse a number of topics not usually brought together in one volume: evolutionary biology, cultural anthropology, mythology, monasticism, the history of printing, the scientific method, eighteenth-century taxonomies, Victorian librarianship, and the early history of computers, to name a few."
For a generalist reader like myself, this is an absolutely fascinating book. Of course, Alex Wright cannot be an expert in every single field he discusses. He provides a superb bibliography which, even better, he maintains on his personal website, so that a reader can check not only his sources, but updates as new information becomes available.
I wish other authors would maintain their bibliographies on line. This book is worth buying simply to reward Wright's initiative.
Robert C. Ross 2008
"An organization chart is a kind of hierarchy in which employees are grouped into departments. Other types of hierarchies include government bureaucracies, biological taxonomies, or a system of menus in a software application.... A network, by contrast, emerges from the bottom up; individuals function as autonomous nodes, negotiating their own relationships.... Democracy is a kind of network, so is a flock of birds, or the World Wide Web."
Wright argues that networks and hierarchies collide, spawn, and reinforce one another constantly. The Gutenberg printing press allowed for the wide dissemination of previously exclusive information. Today, publishing houses disseminate information hierarchically.
"Internet users continue to congregate in small groups that often take shape outside traditional institutional containers. While this tendency toward self-organization might seem like an effect of the Internet's democratic architecture, such behavior also harkens back to our deepest-rooted social instincts.... On the scale of evolutionary history, institutions remain a short-lived hypothesis. For tens of thousands of years, human beings have interacted as social animals, following unwritten norms strengthened by kinship, reinforced by the limbic responses that strengthen our personal relationships, and transmitted through the spoken word. Today, we are seeing those instincts returning to the fore, as people adapt new technologies to invoke the ancient, emotional circuitry that carried us through the age before the dawn of symbols."
Wright is a very clear writer, who covers a vast amount of ground in a very interesting manner. His "aim in writing this book is to resist the tug of mystical techno-futurism and approach the story of the information age by looking squarely backward. ... From the vantage point of the digital age, we can approach the history of the information age in a new light. To do so requires stepping outside of traditional disciplinary constructs, however, in search of a new storyline. ... I traverse a number of topics not usually brought together in one volume: evolutionary biology, cultural anthropology, mythology, monasticism, the history of printing, the scientific method, eighteenth-century taxonomies, Victorian librarianship, and the early history of computers, to name a few."
For a generalist reader like myself, this is an absolutely fascinating book. Of course, Alex Wright cannot be an expert in every single field he discusses. He provides a superb bibliography which, even better, he maintains on his personal website, so that a reader can check not only his sources, but updates as new information becomes available.
I wish other authors would maintain their bibliographies on line. This book is worth buying simply to reward Wright's initiative.
Robert C. Ross 2008
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