The social life of avatars

Born Digital: Understanding the First Generation of Digital Natives

John Palfrey, Urs Gasser

Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide

Henry Jenkins · 322 pages

Outstanding Academic Title Convergence Culture maps a new territory: where old and new media intersect, where grassroots and corporate media collide, where the power of the media producer and the power of the consumer interact in unpredictable ways.Henry Jenkins, one of America's most respected media analysts, delves beneath the new media hype to uncover the important cultural transformations that

Dataclysm: Who We Are (When We Think No One's Looking)

Christian Rudder · 302 pages

An irreverent, provocative, and visually fascinating look at what our online lives reveal about who we really are--and how this deluge of data will transform the science of human behavior. Big Data is used to spy on us, hire and fire us, and sell us things we don't need. In Dataclysm, Christian Rudder puts this flood of information to an entirely different use: understanding human nature. Drawing

Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations

Clay Shirky · 334 pages

An examination of how the rapid spread of new forms of social interaction enabled by technology is changing the way humans form groups and exist within them, with profound long-term economic and social effects--for good and for ill. Our age's new technologies of social networking are evolving, and evolving us, into new groups doing new things in new ways, and old and new groups alike doing the old

Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now

Douglas Rushkoff · 296 pages

"An award-winning author explores how the world works in our age of "continuous now". Back in the 1970s, futurism was all the rage. But looking forward is becoming a thing of the past. According to Douglas Rushkoff, "presentism" is the new ethos of a society that's always on, in real time, updating live. Guided by neither history nor long term goals, we navigate a sea of media that blend the past

The Metaverse: And How It Will Revolutionize Everything

Matthew L. Ball · 352 pages

So You've Been Publicly Shamed

Jon Ronson · 313 pages

"From the internationally bestselling author of The Psychopath Test, a captivating and brilliant exploration of one of our world's most overlooked forces. For the past three years, Jon Ronson has been immersing himself in the world of modern-day public shaming-meeting famous shamees, shamers, and bystanders who have been impacted. This is the perfect time for a modern-day Scarlet Letter-a radicall

The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future (Or, Don't Trust Anyone Under 30)

Mark Bauerlein · 264 pages

This shocking, lively exposure of the intellectual vacuity of today's under thirty set reveals the disturbing and, ultimately, incontrovertible truth: cyberculture is turning us into a nation of know-nothings.Can a nation continue to enjoy political and economic predominance if its citizens refuse to grow up?For decades, concern has been brewing about the dumbed-down popular culture available to y

Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other

Sherry Turkle · 400 pages

Technology has become the architect of our intimacies. Online, we fall prey to the illusion of companionship, gathering thousands of Twitter and Facebook friends and confusing tweets and wall posts with authentic communication. In "Alone Together," MIT technology and society professor Sherry Turkle explores the power of our new tools and toys to dramatically alter our social lives. It's a nuanced

The Dark Net: Inside the Digital Underworld

Jamie Bartlett

Modern Romance

Aziz Ansari, Eric Klinenberg · 288 pages

From NYU Wagner: At some point, every one of us embarks on a journey to find love. We meet people, date, get into and out of relationships, all with the hope of finding someone with whom we share a deep connection. This seems standard now, but it’s wildly different from what people did even just decades ago. Single people today have more romantic options than at any point in human history. Wit

Code Dependent: Living in the Shadow of AI

Madhumita Murgia · 320 pages

Ready Player One

Ernest Cline · 384 pages

In the year 2044. reality is an ugly place. The only time teenage Wade Watts *really* feels alive is when he's jacked into the virtual utopia known as the OASIS. Wade's devoted his life to studying the puzzles hidden within this world's digital confines--puzzles that are based on their creator's obsession with the pop culture of decades past and that promise massive power and fortune to whoever ca

It's Complicated: The Social Lives of Networked Teens

danah boyd · 296 pages

What is new about how teenagers communicate through services such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram? Do social media affect the quality of teens' lives? In this eye-opening book, youth culture and technology expert danah boyd uncovers some of the major myths regarding teens' use of social media. She explores tropes about identity, privacy, safety, danger, and bullying. Ultimately, boyd argues th

The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains

Nicholas Carr · 300 pages

Examines the influences computer-delivered information may have on human cognition using Marshall McLuhan as the hook, the history of communication as the trajectory, and brain science as the tool.

Public Parts: How Sharing in the Digital Age is Revolutionizing Life, Business, and Society

Jeff Jarvis · 267 pages

Argues that the growth of social networking and increased openness online is beneficial in the digital age and can lead to increased collaboration and changes in the way people organize, govern, teach, and learn.

The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom

Yochai Benkler · 528 pages

American Girls: Social Media and the Secret Lives of Teenagers

Nancy Jo Sales · 410 pages

erudite descriptions of very young ladies ( 9 thru 18 ) who use social medias .

Tubes: Behind the Scenes at the Internet

Andrew Blum · 304 pages

A travel book exploring the physical places and connections of the infrastructure of the Internet. Along the way, he explores data warehouses, meets some of the historical figures in the creation of the Internet and the people who keep everything humming along so we can get on with our virtual lives.

The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We've Lost in a World of Constant Connection

Michael Harris · 243 pages

"Only one generation in history (ours) will experience life both with and without the Internet. For everyone who follows us, online life will simply be the air they breathe. Today, we revel in ubiquitous information and constant connection, rarely stopping to consider the implications for our logged-on lives. Michael Harris chronicles this massive shift, exploring what we've gained--and lost--in t

Play Like a Fangirl

Kristine Ask, Ashley Guajardo, Tanja Sihvonen, and Jess Tompkins

Trick Mirror: Reflections on Self-Delusion

Jia Tolentino · 303 pages

The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture

John Battelle · 323 pages

How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and Transformed Our Culture• The Wall Street Journal and BusinessWeek Bestseller• Finalist for the Goldman Sachs/FT Business Book of the Year AwardWhat does the world want? According to John Battelle, a company that answers that question—in all its shades of meaning—can unlock the most intractable riddles of business and arguably of human cul

What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions

Randall Munroe · 312 pages

Millions of people visit xkcd.com each week to read Randall Munroe's iconic webcomic. His stick-figure drawings about science, technology, language, and love have a large and passionate following. Fans of xkcd ask Munroe a lot of strange questions. What if you tried to hit a baseball pitched at 90 percent the speed of light? How fast can you hit a speed bump while driving and live? If there was a