Thursday 28 February 2008

Free online book: the Future of Reputation, enter the dark side of the Web


Digital content creation is of course really great! But what with the trail of information that is left by each and everyone of us?

Surf to The Future of Reputation by Daniel Solove published by Yale University Press in October 2007 and get into the dark side of the Web...

Or to boldly state what Amazon wrote about the book: Teeming with chatrooms, online discussion groups, and blogs, the Internet offers previously unimagined opportunities for personal expression and communication. But there’s a dark side to the story. A trail of information fragments about us is forever preserved on the Internet, instantly available in a Google search. A permanent chronicle of our private lives—often of dubious reliability and sometimes totally false—will follow us wherever we go, accessible to friends, strangers, dates, employers, neighbors, relatives, and anyone else who cares to look. This engrossing book, brimming with amazing examples of gossip, slander, and rumor on the Internet, explores the profound implications of the online collision between free speech and privacy.

Daniel Solove, an authority on information privacy law, offers a fascinating account of how the Internet is transforming gossip, the way we shame others, and our ability to protect our own reputations. Focusing on blogs, Internet communities, cybermobs, and other current trends, he shows that, ironically, the unconstrained flow of information on the Internet may impede opportunities for self-development and freedom. Long-standing notions of privacy need review, the author contends: unless we establish a balance between privacy and free speech, we may discover that the freedom of the Internet makes us less free.

I am looking forward to read this book because sometimes I wonder how the digital realm effects my future life.

2 comments:

  1. thanks for the link.

    Will you blog a summary once you read it? The topic is interesting, but currently I have no time to read it...

    ReplyDelete
  2. hi Ullrich
    I will publish a summary as soon as I have read it.

    ReplyDelete