Blown to Bits: Your Life, Liberty, and Happiness After the Digital Explosion

For the non-technical, this book offers essential explanations which are concise and comprehensive without being dumbed down, covering cryptography, computers, radio, and information theory. For the technical expert, it offers a unified view of how their field fits together with others, and the resulting implications.But what sets this book apart from similar introductions is its timelessness. One of the best sections of the book discusses "the koans of bits", paradoxical principles about digital information that prevent us from reasoning about it effectively in our existing social and legal frameworks.This effort to grasp and communicate the fundamentals, those things which will still be true about digital information after every individual piece of our present technology has changed, is the reason I would recommend this book. Chapter 8, on radio, is excellent, as is the Appendix, "The Internet as System and Spirit".In contrast, the weaker parts of the book can read like op-ed pieces, dwelling on specific laws (e.g. copyright, net neutrality) and having more off a tone of urgency and outrage. It's not as though the authors are wrong in these cases; I agree with them. In fact, the authors were prescient: this book was written seven years ago and these issues are more relevant than ever. It's simply a change in tone from the rest of the book.I recommend it, and look forward to rereading it in the years to come.

Think of this book not as "Internet Policy for Dummies" but as "Internet Policy for the Educated Layman." Abelson, Ledeen, and Lewis survey a broad swath of tech policy territory -- privacy, search, encryption, free speech, copyright, spectrum policy -- and provide the reader with a nice history and technology primer on each topic.The authors aren't really seeking to be polemical in this book by advancing a single thesis or worldview. To the extent the book's chapters are guided by any central theme, it comes in the form of the "two basic morals about technology" they outline in Chapter 1:(1) "The first is that information technology is inherently neither good nor bad -- it can be used for good or ill, to free us or to shackle us.(2) Second, new technology brings social change, and change comes with both risks and opportunities. All of us, and all of our public agencies and private institutions, have a say in whether technology will be used for good or ill and whether we will fall prey to its risks or prosper from the opportunities it creates."Mostly, what they aim to show is that digital technology is reshaping society and, whether we like or it not, we better get used to it -- and quick!Like John Palfrey and Urs Gasser's excellent book Born Digital, Blown to Bits is very accessible and each chapter contains a great deal of useful information to bring you up to speed on the hottest tech policy debates under the sun. You can find my full review of Blown to Bits on the Technology Liberation Front blog.

This is an important book to read because of the perspective it provides. "Blown to BITS" clearly describes a future of information systems and their users when they get trapped in Cyberflatland. Just like the now well known book Flatland, the people and systems of Cyberflatland are challenged to even imagine the extra dimensions.The authors are very accomplished and I happen to know and respect them and their work. I gave the book a 5 star rating because it provides a context for imagining the extra dimensions that it would take, and that actually exist, to escape Cyberflatland.The Computer Science community and the associated industrial base has the capacity to break out of Cyberflatland and enable an alternative future.

This is a very interesting book and gives good information on this digital age and the nuances, problems and benefits that comes with all the convenience of this technology age. I recommend it.

I have no issues with the book itself. My disappointment was with the format.It was irritating, to find sections of text which were unreadable because they ran off the right margin. Also, the text contains many illustrations. All of these were too small to read. These errors occurred on both the Kindle and Nexus 7.These are simple format errors which detracted from the experience.I also have the hard copy, which is quite readable. I note here that the Kindle version costs only a little less than the hard copy. This make putting up with the formatting even more exasperating.

Most people have no clue what information they have made available, to whom it is available and what the people who get it can do with it. Abelson gives a lot of clues and does it in fine style.If you do online banking, shopping, stock trading, email, social media, or just live in the 21'st Century you need to read this. Even if you don't own a computer or other device (although you won't be reading this review if you don't) you ought to know what the people who do own computers can do to you because even if you are not online your personal information is.

This is a very important book. Many of us, in this digital age, blithely use email and Facebook and texts and all the other modern communications tools. Reading Blown to Bits, is an eye opening experience. They discuss our privacy, or lack thereof, and the thousands of implications regarding IP and the laws supposedly intended to preserve it. The authors discuss the history of economic and political forces and the often lobby shaped legislation that has brought us to our current state.