ideasasylum's review against another edition
5.0
An invaluable read for anyone developing a social website these days. It won't give you the recipe for success but will give you plenty of ideas by looking at the successes and failures of others. A really worthwhile read for anyone interested in the future of media, collaboration, group action and communities.
alexander0's review against another edition
1.0
This book argues through stories what people thought technology was going to do back in 2010, but it never exactly did. It utilizes a lot of really useful theories, but it takes a lot of liberties in interpreting them into a heuristic for how people use technology (or don't) often using anecdotal evidence in a really formulaic pattern:
(1) anecdote to support a future claim -> (2) social theory -> (3) unpacking of social theory in context of the anecdote, usually with extreme liberties -> (4) several small anecdotes which support loose ends of liberties taken.
I find myself wanting better justification for almost every claim made in the book even though I have already read significantly about many of the subjects here and largely know what is accurate and not.
(1) anecdote to support a future claim -> (2) social theory -> (3) unpacking of social theory in context of the anecdote, usually with extreme liberties -> (4) several small anecdotes which support loose ends of liberties taken.
I find myself wanting better justification for almost every claim made in the book even though I have already read significantly about many of the subjects here and largely know what is accurate and not.
nocto's review against another edition
3.0
I thought this would be an interesting read because it's all about stuff I know quite a lot about, basically people using the internet and other 21st century technologies to organise themselves and make things happen that would never have happened before. In the beginning though I found it a bit on the boring side. Mostly this was because I know quite a lot about the subject. A good proportion of the examples used in the text were already familiar to me. And I've read the blogs of practically everybody thanked by the author, many of whom are also quoted in the book.
In the end though I gained something from reading this in book form rather than as a lot of little stories on the net. There were plenty of examples here that I hadn't heard about and plenty of extra elucidation about things I thought I understood. A worthwhile and entertaining read.
sweeneysays's review against another edition
3.0
I thought I'd pick this up because it's one of those major comms texts that I was just never assigned in grad school and it seemed light enough to tackle on my own. While I could, indeed, read it alone, it made me miss grad school something fierce because there's still enough meat there to warrant dissection.
There's a lot of digital utopianism here and I'd like to do a quick Shirky v. Morozov type deal. He falls short in picking apart the way nefarious actors can use these tools. Still, on the whole, it's a salient argument and while I think it's important to temper discussion like this with a quick reminder of the Morozov argument, in the hypothetical sparring of ideas I've just conducted in my head, I think this analysis of the way social tools affect social organization to be pretty solid.
There's a lot of digital utopianism here and I'd like to do a quick Shirky v. Morozov type deal. He falls short in picking apart the way nefarious actors can use these tools. Still, on the whole, it's a salient argument and while I think it's important to temper discussion like this with a quick reminder of the Morozov argument, in the hypothetical sparring of ideas I've just conducted in my head, I think this analysis of the way social tools affect social organization to be pretty solid.
nhusain14's review
4.0
Shirky has written an easy-to-read, well-researched explanation of why social networks work the way they do. This is a staple for anyone that wants to understand the logic and power that drives online communication and brings about success stories like Facebook and Twitter. An essential for students of media.
rachelsayshello's review
4.0
An impressive and persuasive analysis of the impact of technology on organizing. Wait, that sounds really boring. Shirky isn't boring--nor are his arguments and examples. Definitely accessible for the uninitiated, and full of brilliant insights for anyone already a little in the know.
leepydumpling's review
4.0
A fascinating insight into the changes in communication, social behaviours and technology in our world. Easy to read, relevant to the everyday person and thought provoking, it's well worth giving a try.
dehowell's review
5.0
The most thoughtful book about technology and social change I've read. I'll definitely recommend it the next time I argue with a Twitter skeptic.
shehab's review
3.0
lay is a great social web commentator. He’s part of an elite circle of thinkers and influencers alongside Seth Godin, Sree Sreenivasan, John Battelle. He’s often able to distill some of the great web-enabled transformations taking place into amusing tidbits like this one on cognitive surplus: how this era of participation is replacing the social surplus ( of TV).
The book sets out to explain some of the massive changes that have contributed to the contemporary successes of linux, wikipedia and the stay at home mums meetup group that seem to run counter to the tragedy of the commons expectations.
It brings together several arguments that will be familiar to most web2.0 observers:
The internet has (in many instances) reduced transaction and managerial costs below the cosean floor enabling previously latent groups to assemble and coordinate (online).
Technology is now available, invisible and cheap enough to allow for these groups to emerge (individuals to find each other and then interact) and to scale (via Small World networks and connectors familiar from Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point).
Big is not just bigger, it’s different.
The internet (often) translates to an economy based on abundance not scarcity (familiar from Chris Andersen’s The Long Tail) and the value of a network increase exponentially with its size (Metcalfe’s Law + Reed’s Law).
These factors make organizing accessible and affordable where it often wasn’t which helps explain the stunning successes of Linux and Wikipedia (with the seemingly omni-present ‘long tail’ power law usually describing the participation levels of these open, open-source initiatives).
A Promise, a Tool, and a Bargain.
Success seems to depend on bringing together a plausible promise, an effective tool, and an acceptable bargain.
As Clay says, all the examples in his book are a hybrid of tool and community.
Success seems to depend on bringing together a plausible promise, an effective tool, and an acceptable bargain with users. Although these factors do not translate into automatic success. Chance and viral social effects play a part in igniting a project until self-sustaining momentum is achieved. Even then, these organizations may develop erratically in unpredictable ways
Mass Amateurization.
As the cost of publishing has plummeted to zero or thereabouts traditional media is now threatened by new types of competitors, entirely new eco-systems (Craigslist, ebay etc).
We are moving from an era of publisher as gatekeeper: filter -> publish to one where we publish everything -> and filter later, often via crowd-sourcing (DIGG, etc).
This obviously has significant ramifications for media businesses based on pre-digital economics:
“We’ve long regarded the newspaper as a sensible object because it has been such a stable one, but there isn’t any logical connection among its many elements…
What holds a newspaper together is primarily the cost of paper, ink and distribution…”
It’s a quick, easy read that is recommendable to those non-geeks who are not familiar with the subject matter (think Gladwell for the web), but it won’t add much more than perfectly distilled sound-bites to the rss users out there.
http://shehabhamad.com/blog/2009/06/16/cognitive-surplus-latent-groups-and-the-cosean-floor-a-clay-shirky-book-6-review/
The book sets out to explain some of the massive changes that have contributed to the contemporary successes of linux, wikipedia and the stay at home mums meetup group that seem to run counter to the tragedy of the commons expectations.
It brings together several arguments that will be familiar to most web2.0 observers:
The internet has (in many instances) reduced transaction and managerial costs below the cosean floor enabling previously latent groups to assemble and coordinate (online).
Technology is now available, invisible and cheap enough to allow for these groups to emerge (individuals to find each other and then interact) and to scale (via Small World networks and connectors familiar from Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point).
Big is not just bigger, it’s different.
The internet (often) translates to an economy based on abundance not scarcity (familiar from Chris Andersen’s The Long Tail) and the value of a network increase exponentially with its size (Metcalfe’s Law + Reed’s Law).
These factors make organizing accessible and affordable where it often wasn’t which helps explain the stunning successes of Linux and Wikipedia (with the seemingly omni-present ‘long tail’ power law usually describing the participation levels of these open, open-source initiatives).
A Promise, a Tool, and a Bargain.
Success seems to depend on bringing together a plausible promise, an effective tool, and an acceptable bargain.
As Clay says, all the examples in his book are a hybrid of tool and community.
Success seems to depend on bringing together a plausible promise, an effective tool, and an acceptable bargain with users. Although these factors do not translate into automatic success. Chance and viral social effects play a part in igniting a project until self-sustaining momentum is achieved. Even then, these organizations may develop erratically in unpredictable ways
Mass Amateurization.
As the cost of publishing has plummeted to zero or thereabouts traditional media is now threatened by new types of competitors, entirely new eco-systems (Craigslist, ebay etc).
We are moving from an era of publisher as gatekeeper: filter -> publish to one where we publish everything -> and filter later, often via crowd-sourcing (DIGG, etc).
This obviously has significant ramifications for media businesses based on pre-digital economics:
“We’ve long regarded the newspaper as a sensible object because it has been such a stable one, but there isn’t any logical connection among its many elements…
What holds a newspaper together is primarily the cost of paper, ink and distribution…”
It’s a quick, easy read that is recommendable to those non-geeks who are not familiar with the subject matter (think Gladwell for the web), but it won’t add much more than perfectly distilled sound-bites to the rss users out there.
http://shehabhamad.com/blog/2009/06/16/cognitive-surplus-latent-groups-and-the-cosean-floor-a-clay-shirky-book-6-review/