The Control Revolution

The Control Revolution PDF Author: James Beniger
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674020764
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 512

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Book Description
Why do we find ourselves living in an Information Society? How did the collection, processing, and communication of information come to play an increasingly important role in advanced industrial countries relative to the roles of matter and energy? And why is this change recent--or is it? James Beniger traces the origin of the Information Society to major economic and business crises of the past century. In the United States, applications of steam power in the early 1800s brought a dramatic rise in the speed, volume, and complexity of industrial processes, making them difficult to control. Scores of problems arose: fatal train wrecks, misplacement of freight cars for months at a time, loss of shipments, inability to maintain high rates of inventory turnover. Inevitably the Industrial Revolution, with its ballooning use of energy to drive material processes, required a corresponding growth in the exploitation of information: the Control Revolution. Between the 1840s and the 1920s came most of the important information-processing and communication technologies still in use today: telegraphy, modern bureaucracy. rotary power printing, the postage stamp, paper money, typewriter, telephone, punch-card processing, motion pictures, radio, and television. Beniger shows that more recent developments in microprocessors, computers, and telecommunications are only a smooth continuation of this Control Revolution. Along the way he touches on many fascinating topics: why breakfast was invented, how trademarks came to be worth more than the companies that own them, why some employees wear uniforms, and whether time zones will always be necessary. The book is impressive not only for the breadth of its scholarship but also for the subtlety and force of its argument. It will be welcomed by sociologists, economists, historians of science and technology, and all curious in general.

The Control Revolution

The Control Revolution PDF Author: James Beniger
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674020764
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 512

Get Book Here

Book Description
Why do we find ourselves living in an Information Society? How did the collection, processing, and communication of information come to play an increasingly important role in advanced industrial countries relative to the roles of matter and energy? And why is this change recent--or is it? James Beniger traces the origin of the Information Society to major economic and business crises of the past century. In the United States, applications of steam power in the early 1800s brought a dramatic rise in the speed, volume, and complexity of industrial processes, making them difficult to control. Scores of problems arose: fatal train wrecks, misplacement of freight cars for months at a time, loss of shipments, inability to maintain high rates of inventory turnover. Inevitably the Industrial Revolution, with its ballooning use of energy to drive material processes, required a corresponding growth in the exploitation of information: the Control Revolution. Between the 1840s and the 1920s came most of the important information-processing and communication technologies still in use today: telegraphy, modern bureaucracy. rotary power printing, the postage stamp, paper money, typewriter, telephone, punch-card processing, motion pictures, radio, and television. Beniger shows that more recent developments in microprocessors, computers, and telecommunications are only a smooth continuation of this Control Revolution. Along the way he touches on many fascinating topics: why breakfast was invented, how trademarks came to be worth more than the companies that own them, why some employees wear uniforms, and whether time zones will always be necessary. The book is impressive not only for the breadth of its scholarship but also for the subtlety and force of its argument. It will be welcomed by sociologists, economists, historians of science and technology, and all curious in general.

The Control Revolution

The Control Revolution PDF Author: James R. Beniger
Publisher: Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press
ISBN:
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 524

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Book Description
Beniger traces the origin of the Information Society to major economic and business crises of the 1800s. Inevitably the Industrial Revolution, with its ballooning use of energy to drive material processes, required a corresponding growth in the exploitation of information.

The Control Revolution

The Control Revolution PDF Author: James R. Beniger
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780674169869
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 493

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Book Description
Beniger traces the origin of the Information Society to major economic and business crises of the past century. In the U.S., applications of steam power in the early 1800s brought a dramatic rise in the speed, volume, and complexity of industrial processes, making them difficult to control. Inevitably the Industrial Revolution, with its ballooning use of energy to drive material processes, required a corresponding growth in the exploitation of information.

The Control Revolution

The Control Revolution PDF Author: James Ralph Beniger
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Communication
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description


The Control Revolution

The Control Revolution PDF Author: Andrew L. Shapiro
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 310

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Book Description
Shapiro shows how the Net allows individuals to take power from institutions, causing hierarchies to unravel in politics, commerce, and social life, and that the result is not as ideal as cyber-utopianists would have us think.

The Fourth Industrial Revolution

The Fourth Industrial Revolution PDF Author: Klaus Schwab
Publisher: Currency
ISBN: 1524758876
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 192

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Book Description
World-renowned economist Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman of the World Economic Forum, explains that we have an opportunity to shape the fourth industrial revolu­tion, which will fundamentally alter how we live and work. Schwab argues that this revolution is different in scale, scope and complexity from any that have come before. Characterized by a range of new technologies that are fusing the physical, digital and biological worlds, the developments are affecting all disciplines, economies, industries and governments, and even challenging ideas about what it means to be human. Artificial intelligence is already all around us, from supercomputers, drones and virtual assistants to 3D printing, DNA sequencing, smart thermostats, wear­able sensors and microchips smaller than a grain of sand. But this is just the beginning: nanomaterials 200 times stronger than steel and a million times thinner than a strand of hair and the first transplant of a 3D printed liver are already in development. Imagine “smart factories” in which global systems of manu­facturing are coordinated virtually, or implantable mobile phones made of biosynthetic materials. The fourth industrial revolution, says Schwab, is more significant, and its ramifications more profound, than in any prior period of human history. He outlines the key technologies driving this revolution and discusses the major impacts expected on government, business, civil society and individu­als. Schwab also offers bold ideas on how to harness these changes and shape a better future—one in which technology empowers people rather than replaces them; progress serves society rather than disrupts it; and in which innovators respect moral and ethical boundaries rather than cross them. We all have the opportunity to contribute to developing new frame­works that advance progress.

The Control Revolution How The Internet Is Putting Individuals In Charge And Changing The World We Know

The Control Revolution How The Internet Is Putting Individuals In Charge And Changing The World We Know PDF Author: Andrew L. Shapiro
Publisher: PublicAffairs
ISBN: 9781891620867
Category : Technology & Engineering
Languages : en
Pages : 308

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Book Description
Dissidents around the world use the Internet to evade censorship and get their message out.

Access Controlled

Access Controlled PDF Author: Ronald Deibert
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262290731
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 635

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Book Description
Reports on a new generation of Internet controls that establish a new normative terrain in which surveillance and censorship are routine. Internet filtering, censorship of Web content, and online surveillance are increasing in scale, scope, and sophistication around the world, in democratic countries as well as in authoritarian states. The first generation of Internet controls consisted largely of building firewalls at key Internet gateways; China's famous “Great Firewall of China” is one of the first national Internet filtering systems. Today the new tools for Internet controls that are emerging go beyond mere denial of information. These new techniques, which aim to normalize (or even legalize) Internet control, include targeted viruses and the strategically timed deployment of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks, surveillance at key points of the Internet's infrastructure, take-down notices, stringent terms of usage policies, and national information shaping strategies. Access Controlled reports on this new normative terrain. The book, a project from the OpenNet Initiative (ONI), a collaboration of the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto's Munk Centre for International Studies, Harvard's Berkman Center for Internet and Society, and the SecDev Group, offers six substantial chapters that analyze Internet control in both Western and Eastern Europe and a section of shorter regional reports and country profiles drawn from material gathered by the ONI around the world through a combination of technical interrogation and field research methods.

Mao's Last Revolution

Mao's Last Revolution PDF Author: Roderick MACFARQUHAR
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674040414
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 742

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Book Description
Explains why Mao launched the Cultural Revolution, and shows his Machiavellian role in masterminding it. This book documents the Hobbesian state that ensued. Power struggles raged among Lin Biao, Zhou Enlai, Deng Xiaoping, and Jiang Qing - Mao's wife and leader of the Gang of Four - while Mao often played one against the other.

The Revolution that Failed

The Revolution that Failed PDF Author: Brendan Rittenhouse Green
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108489869
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 291

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Book Description
A theoretical analysis and historical investigation of the Cold War nuclear arms race that challenges the nuclear revolution.