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From the University of California Press:

Vaidhyanathan_Googlization.jpg

Siva Vaidhyanathan

The Googlization of Everything

(And Why We Should Worry)

In the beginning, the World Wide Web was exciting and open to the point of anarchy, a vast and intimidating repository of unindexed confusion. Into this creative chaos came Google with its dazzling mission--"To organize the world's information and make it universally accessible"--and its much-quoted motto, "Don't be Evil." In this provocative book, Siva Vaidhyanathan examines the ways we have used and embraced Google--and the growing resistance to its expansion across the globe. He exposes the dark side of our Google fantasies, raising red flags about issues of intellectual property and the much-touted Google Book Search. He assesses Google's global impact, particularly in China, and explains the insidious effect of Googlization on the way we think. Finally, Vaidhyanathan proposes the construction of an Internet ecosystem designed to benefit the whole world and keep one brilliant and powerful company from falling into the "evil" it pledged to avoid.

Siva Vaidhyanathan, Professor of Media Studies and Law at the University of Virginia, is the author of Copyrights and Copywrongs: The Rise of Intellectual Property and How It Threatens Creativity and The Anarchist in the Library: How the Clash between Freedom and Control is Hacking the Real World and Crashing the System.

Advance Praise:

"A powerful and gripping tour de force. Siva Vaidhyanathan uses Google
to examine our capacity for blind faith and to worship innovation as
an end in itself. You cannot read this book and remain unstirred."
-- Tim Wu, author of The Master Switch and Professor, Columbia Law School

"This is a critically important book because it's really about the
Googlization of All of Us. This is a brilliant meditation on
technology, information, and consumer inertia, as well as an ambitious
challenge to change how, where, why, and what we Google. Vaidhyanathan
forces us to think long and hard about taking responsibility for what
we all know and how we know it."
-- Dahlia Lithwick, Slate Magazine

"Vaidhyanathan is everything you could want in a cultural critic:
funny, fantastically readable, and insightful as hell. It's always a
treat when a new Vaidhyanathan comes out."
-- Cory Doctorow, co-editor of Boing Boing (boingboing.net)

"Siva Vaidhyanathan's lively, thoughtful, and wide-ranging book makes
clear, in detail, how Google is reshaping the way we live and work. He
finds much to admire, but also challenges us to not only use Google's
services, but to go beyond them to create a new and genuinely
democratic information order."
-- Anthony Grafton, author of Codex in Crisis

"This is an important and timely topic, and Vaidhyanathan's head and
heart are in the right place to guide the public through the thickets
of 'googlization.'"
-- Paul Duguid, co-author of The Social Life of Information

"Finely written and engaging, this is a book for anyone who has used Google."
-- Toby Miller, author of Makeover Nation: The United States of Reinvention


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Comments (1)

Many congrats on the book, looking forward to reading it.........

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A book in progress by

Siva Vaidhyanathan

Siva Vaidhyanathan

This blog, the result of a collaboration between myself and the Institute for the Future of the Book, is dedicated to exploring the process of writing a critical interpretation of the actions and intentions behind the cultural behemoth that is Google, Inc. The book will answer three key questions: What does the world look like through the lens of Google?; How is Google's ubiquity affecting the production and dissemination of knowledge?; and how has the corporation altered the rules and practices that govern other companies, institutions, and states? [more]

» Send links, questions and ideas:
siva [at] googlizationofeverything [dot] com

» To reach me for a press query, please write to SIVAMEDIA ut POBOX dut COM

» To reach me for a speaking invitation, please write to SIVASPEAK ut POBOX dut COM

» Visit my main blog: SIVACRACY.NET

» More about me

Topics

Like the Mind of God (57 posts)

All the World's Information (75 posts)

What If Big Ads Don't Work (20 posts)

Don't Be Evil (16 posts)

Is Google a Library? (84 posts)

Challenging Big Media (46 posts)

The Dossier (49 posts)

Global Google (26 posts)

Google Earth (6 posts)

A Public Utility? (37 posts)

About this Book (28 posts)

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