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Excellent written book, with extensive information (little too dense somethimes).
Writer is able to articulates his points very well and in doing so creates a nice picture of the present state of things in media, internet and group life.
He gives some sneek peaks into the future but stays focused on what is happening now.
Good read.
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This well-written book is a pleasure to read. It provides a good overview of the changes that the Internet and social media have made to the way people interact. Shirky has interesting things to say about community, media, publishing, and social media software. However, he rarely says anything about any of these topics in much depth.
There are two areas where I found this particularly frustrating. He demonstrates that power law distributions (of which the Pareto Principle, or the 80/20 rule, is one example) describe all sorts of Internet/people situations, but fails to develop the idea. And near the end of the book he introduces the intriguing idea that successful social tools meet three rules: a plausible promise, an effective tool, and an acceptable bargain for users. But again, this is not fully developed.
Despite this, I recommend this book as a fine overview of the interesting new world opened up by widespread adoption of the Internet.
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Finally finished this one. It took longer as it's on paper, not Kindle so only read at home.
Shirky rocks. 99% of the About the New Ways of things type books are either repetitive, weak or otherwise simply suck. Other reviewers have pointed out places where he's missed a couple of references or been repetitive of other work. This is usually true of any non-fiction which has research within it's basis. Shirky's themes and concepts though, are truly well presented and add something to the perspective on today's social media. If you've ever heard Clay Shirky speak, you can tell fairly quickly he's the real deal. I especially like the way he weaves in Transaction Cost Theory, (from Ronald Coase's Theory of the Firm in 1937), as related to Social Media. I've always liked this theory for other general business reasons, but it makes solid sense here. Here's a favorite passage from the book. (This one doesn't have to do with transaction costs, but rather, helps frame the 'why' around why what's going on now may be a confusing sort of change.
"The social urge to share information isn't new. Prior to e-mail and weblogs, we clipped articles and published family newsletters. Recalling these older behaviors, it's tempting to conclude that our new tools are merely improvements on existing behaviors; this view is both right and wrong. The improvement is there, but it is an improvement so profound that it creates new effects. Philosophers sometimes make a distinction between a difference in degree (more of the same) and a difference in kind (something new). What we are witnessing today is a difference in the degree of sharing so large it becomes a difference in kind."
So here's the thing... I think people do get confused by these sorts of things. They don't necessarily see the fundamental aspects of certain changes because they may think they've already happened. (Kind of like the proverbial frog who doesn't get out of the pot as due to the slowly rising temperature, he doesn't realize the water is boiling.)
There is a fair amount of anecdotal filler in the book. But that could just be me since I work in the industry and already knew a lot of the stories. But in general, if you're someone who doesn't quite understand why people contribute in social media, this is a book you should read. If you're in any kind of business doing any kind of online marketing at all and you don't get this stuff yet, it's a book you need to read.
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This book is a must read if you want to understand the social implications of social media. This book helped me understand why newspapers are obsolete, and how the newspaper business missed the opportunity to own on-line classified advertising. Even more profound, this book shows how social media in the hands of ordinary people has shifted the power in journalism, and in some cases has shifted the power relationship between government and the governed. Social media is facilitating profound changes in what we do and how we do it, and this book articulates why this is so in clear, compelling language. A thoroughly enjoyable read if you are interested in a deeper perspective on what is going on in the world today.
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The best book I've read on the social impact of technologies.
Not too academic but thorough and scientific enough.
I recommend it!
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