Smart Mobs by Howard Rheingold

Smart Mobs by Howard Rheingold

How the convergence of mobile communications and computing is driving the next social revolution-transforming the ways in which people meet, mate, work, buy, sell, govern, and create. When Howard Rheingold sneaks off down an untrodden trail, everyone else follows. He is always onto something marvelous no one has seen before. An ever-considerate guide, he navigates this new world with ease, compassion, and grace, and gives you the inside story, with no punches pulled. Tech talk? Howard could get your mother to understand. }From Tokyo to Helsinki, Manhattan to Manila, Howard Rheingold takes us on a journey around the world for a preview of the next techno-cultural shift-a shift he predicts will be as dramatic as the widespread adoption of the PC in the 1980s and the Internet in the 1990s. The coming wave, says Rheingold, is the result of super-efficient mobile communications-cellular phones, personal digital assistants, and wireless-paging and Internet-access devices that will allow us to connect with anyone, anywhere, anytime. From the amusing ("Lovegetty" devices in Japan that light up when a person with the right date-potential characteristics appears in the vicinity) to the extraordinary (the overthrow of a repressive regime in the Philippines by political activists who mobilized by forwarding text messages via cell phones), Rheingold gives examples of the fundamentally new ways in which people are already engaging in group or collective action. He also considers the dark side of this phenomenon, such as the coordination of terrorist cells, threats to privacy, and the ability to incite violent behavior.Applying insights from sociology, artificial intelligence, engineering, and anthropology, Rheingold offers a penetrating perspective on the brave new convergence of pop culture, cutting-edge technology, and social activism. At the same time, he reminds us that, as with other technological revolutions, the real impact of mobile communications will come not from the technology itself but from how people use it, resist it, adapt to it, and ultimately use it to transform themselves, their communities, and their institutions. }

Howard Rheingold

Howard Rheingold is author of Tools for Thought, Excursions to the Far Side of the Mind, They Have a Word For It: A Lighthearted Lexicon of Untranslatable Words and Phrases; coauthor of Higher Creativity and The Cognitive Connection; and editor of Whole Earth Review. He is multimedia columnist for Publish magazine and has been consultant to the US Congress Office of Technology Assessment. He has written for the New York Times, Esquire, Psychology Today, Playboy, The San Francisco Chronicle, and Omni.

SKU	Unavailable
ISBN 13	9780738206080
ISBN 10	0738206083
Title	Smart Mobs
Author	Howard Rheingold
Condition	Unavailable
Binding Type	Hardback
Publisher	INGRAM PUBLISHER SERVICES US
Year published	2002-10-16
Number of pages	288
Cover note	Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.
Note	Unavailable