Over the Christmas break I read
Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organising Without Organisations by
Clay Shirky. (ISBN: 978-1-84614-137-9)
In his book, Shirky investigates the effect of technology on our culture and social behaviour, with a look to past technology innovations that have shifted how the world communicates and behaves (in particular the printing press). In particular he focuses on social networking and Web2.0 technology as well as the proliferation of mobile phones.
On the surface it seems like a bit of a dry topic, but his easy to read writing style and plentiful anecdotes keep it moving and kept me interested in the points he was making. It would be easy to write off the internet and Web2.0 technology as the latest fad, but with this book he draws the comparison of previous technological advances that we take for granted today (printing press, telephone, radio, television) and how they affected our culture when they were new, to those technologies that we are seeing take off now, like mobile phones and laptops.
I enjoyed reading this book as well as having a few lightbulb moments go off as I read, where I understood the power of social networking, the difference in methods of broadcasting vs communication over time and the ease of access to information we enjoy today.
As someone in the library industry, I can highly recommend this book for a thought provoking and discussion raising read for all library staff. It's an excellent companion piece for 23 Things and we have it in our collection!
