James Baxter reviews two books about the internet: Rewire by Ethan Zuckerman, and Untangling the Web by Aleks Krotoski. Open a street map of any city and you see a diagram of all the possible routes one could take in traversing it. Superimpose on the street map the actual traffic flows one of flows. Zuckerman is excited by the possibilities of the web coming genuinely cosmopolitan. As Anthony Appiah puts it, true cosmopolitanism 'challenges us to embrace what is rich, productive and creative' about differences. Rewire demonstrates that the internet, and our use of it, fails that test.

'We shape our tools and afterwards they shape us' -this adage is corroborated every time most of us go online. We've built tools that often embody our biases. They do not necessarily give us information we might need. In fact we were better having serious mainstream media outlets charged with professional duty to 'curate' the flow of news and editorial gate keeping.

Zuckerman provides an instructive contrast, of excessively optimistic narratives about the transformative power of networked technology. Where he runs out of steam somewhat is in contemplating possible solutions to escape from filters that limit search and networking systems.

Aleks Krotoski is a keen observer of our information ecosystem, which is two parts art installation and one part teaching tool. Untangling the Web is a collection of 17 thoughtful essays on the impact of comprehensive networking on our lives. They cover the spectrum of stuff we need to think about- from the obvious to topics which don't receive enough attention. Which, in a way, brings us back to Zuckerman's thoughts about the difference between what networked technology could do and what it actually does.

MCQ: 87

Practice

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