Review of The Making of a Digital World

The Making of a Digital World has a very promising subtitle: The Evolution of Technological Change and How It Shaped Our World. It sounds like a more academic version of Thomas Friedman's 'The World is Flat' – and in many respects it is. To be more precise,

The central question of this book can be … formulated as follows: do the past patterns of global system development still hold true for its current transformation or are we witnessing a structurally different development, whether technologically induced or the result of its increased complexity?

The book is certainly detailed: the wealth of historical data and the breadth of literature cited are impressive.

Unfortunately, however, I found the book to be almost unreadable. Now I realise that some may protest that academic books are not meant to be readable: they are there to be consulted, which is not quite the same thing. I would have to disagree: the best written work is always gripping, even if it is intellectually alien. For example, I sometimes read Scientific American. The technical terminology used in some of the articles renders large parts of them effectively inaccessible – but that does not prevent my enjoying the bits I do understand.

Not so with this book. Long and complex sentences (such as the one quoted at the beginning of this review) do not make the reading easy. But it's not just that: the book is also – there is no nice way of saying this – poorly written. Take the following sentence, for example, which I do not think is atypical of the book as a whole (although it is one of the worst examples):

This process is nested in the process in what Modelski terms the active zone process, defined as the spatial locus of innovation the world system, representing the political process driving the world system evolution, and unfolding over a period of roughly two thousand years (again separated into four phases).

Dorothy Parker once said, in reviewing a book,

This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.

I dread to think what she would have done with this book.

So, is there anything positive I can say about it? Well, there is the enormous amount of data it contains, along with references for further reading. The author has done an impressive job of drawing together many disparate sources into an overarching conceptual framework. I have to say that the price is somewhat alarming, but if you can persuade your local library to stock it you might use it for source material for assignments and discussions.

Bottom line:

Try to persuade your nearest library to buy it.

Review of The Edge of Madness

In What would happen in a national cyber attack? 23 suggestions for tackling this issue in the classroom I looked at ways in which teachers wishing to explore the idea of cyber-warfare, ie the possibility of one country waging war on another by attacking its computer infrastructure, might go about doing so. A terrifying thought, if you think about it, and possibly something that has already happened to Estonia.

Interestingly enough, The Economist ran a story about this subject, and the outlook is not good. The biggest threat comes from small groups or individuals, much like the terrorists threat with which we're already familiar. In such a scenario, there would be no clear target to attack, even if one could, so the best option is to beef up the defence against such an occurrence.

Frankly, the UK's record of even such a simple thing as looking after people's data when it's in a digital form (see Dealing With Data Loss: A Look at the Problem and a Possible Solution for a summary of the problem) is so appalling that I can't imagine there are enough people in the corridors of power who would even to begin to have a sufficient grasp of the issues. The problem isn't necessarily with the people at the top, but the administrators. As I said in a talk I gave at the Westminster Forum:

[There needs to be] ... An insistence that all teachers become computer literate to some extent. Why is it acceptable for people to remain ignorant about technology basics in this day and age?

This is getting to be a hot topic. Information Age ran an article on Gary McKinnon, a hacker fighting extradition to the USA because of his activities. In it he said:

We do need to be prepared for cyber-economic warfare: I know that sounds futuristic and alarmist, but it is coming. There will be attacks on financial centres.

The Edge of Madness is author Michael Dobbs' attempt to explore the cyber-warfare scenario through fiction. Now, I'm not a techie when it comes to what's possible or not in this area, so whilst reading the book I was constantly wondering about that. My worst fears were not much alleviated by the author informing us, after the end of the book, that the stuff in the book was only slightly exaggerated. He states that:

I have taken dramatic licence with much of what they [two experts] have told me, although in truth it seems difficult to exaggerate the potential for cyber skulduggery.

Dobbs has a facility for touching a nerve. Everyone in Britain remembers his House of Cards even if they don't even realise it. The expression "You may say so, but I couldn't possibly comment" has entered the language as the verbal equivalent of the nudge and wink in the world of realpolitik.

This his latest book is no disappointment in that regard. The title might just as well have been "Edge of your seat", because there are two terrifying scenarios unfolding at once. On the one hand, China is in the process of wreaking havoc without sending a single soldier or missile anywhere. On the other hand, the leaders of Russia, the USA and the UK are attempting to devise a solution to the problem when they can't even be in each other's company for five minutes without trying to score points off each other.

In a sense, that's the real worry. When you watch films like Independence Day, you're invited to believe that in the face of a terrible external threat erstwhile mortal enemies would put their differences aside and fight the common foe. Hmm, well, we can but hope.

I think a particularly skilful characteristic of the book is the way Dobbs weaves in real life events, like Chernobyl. So all the time you can't help wondering: does the author know something I don't?

I would definitely recommend this book. Buy it for yourself, and order it for your school library (if there still is one!). If you do decide to explore the possibility of cyber warfare as part of your approach to considering the effects of technology on society, it will be good to make this one of the reference sources. You can order it via this website.

And if the film of the book ever appears, order your students to go see it!



The Well-Fed Writer, by Peter Bowerman

Reviewed by Terry Freedman

The Well-Fed WriterWhat's a book on writing doing in a publication about educational ICT? Looked at from one point of view it's completely out of place. However, that is not the only perspective available. Much of the ICT curriculum centres on the concept of audience. Whether it's preparing a presentation for a particular audience, or responding to user feedback, the work requires an attention to someone other than oneself, and something other than the technology. Peter Bowerman, the author of TWFW, has managed to forge a living out of writing. It follows, therefore, that he may be able to teach us something about audience, and have some useful web resources up his sleeve into the bargain.

The book is, in effect, a marketing manual for the would-be serious freelance writer. Thus there is much about how to choose products and services (free is not always second-rate compared to exorbitant, it turns out), and how to approach potential clients. There is good advice about website design and what you should provide on the site, a wealth of websites to explore, and guest sections by other writers (including a few I've come across in the blogosphere, and whom I respect as writers).

There are a couple of niggling things. One is that although Bowerman makes it clear that social networking is very important in today's economy (schools that ban them, please take note), he admits that he himself isn't a member of any of them. That is disappointing because he may have been able to distil into a few bullet points the best way of making contacts in such spaces from his own first-hand experience.

As far as I can tell, there is no information about print-on-demand. Given that writers can be their own publishers these days, a section on that would not, I think, have gone amiss. There was a section about it in his companion book, The Well-Fed Publisher, in which he disparages the use of PoD (although at that time Lulu had only just appeared on the scene, and Bowerman himself had not used it yet).

However, given the readability of the book, such annoyances can be overlooked. Although the jocular (in parts) tone can start to sound a bit forced occasionally, it more often has the effect of making you want to look up that website or read such and such a blog.

Bottom line:

Perhaps not the most obvious choice for an ICT department in a school, but full of hidden gems and a cornucopia of resources. Buy it.

Related article: The case for print-on-demand.

Teaching Yourself Chinese Through the Internet

We are all aware that the “sleeping dragon” has awoken, and that in the foreseeable future people and businesses will have much more interaction with their Chinese counterparts. It will then be sensible – perhaps even necessary – for Mandarin to be one of the Modern Languages studied in school. In the meantime, over the next few days Adrienne Blaser evaluates some websites for teaching yourself the language. These reviews were originally published in Computers in Classrooms.

With various parts of the world changing, language has become a vital exchange between cultures. Bilingualism, the ability to speak two languages, is becoming a common trend. Although many say that Mandarin Chinese is a difficult language, truly the biggest challenge is finding the right place to learn. Since there are so many great sites out there to learn Mandarin, picking the select few was definitely a challenge.

Livemocha

Livemocha has become one of my quick favourites as a free site unless you decide to buy one of their Travel Crash Courses.

When you first come onto the site, its warm coffee colours greet you. Livemocha is simple, clear, and without advertisement for other sites or products. What makes this site special is that it doesn’t just teach you one language; it’s a site for multiples such as Japanese, Korean, English, Spanish, and Portuguese and each having at least a 101 (beginner) and 102 (intermediate) program. Not only are they brain testers, but each course consists of 3 units with 5 or 6 lesson in each unit. That might sound easy, but in a single lesson you must learn phrases, including the pinyin (pinyin is the name for the system that makes it possible to read and write Mandarin Chinese without characters, by using the Roman alphabet), characters, proper pronunciation, and the English meanings, review them, write them, and then speak them.

Speak you say? Yes, this site expects you to practice speaking, by recording it on your computer microphone, then putting it out to the Livemocha public for reviewing. Sure, it might seem like no big deal but once you get a bad review about your tones, you go right back to the lesson to review each sentence, and then do it again.

What truly helps besides seeing the language in its different forms is the pictures. Each phrase has a picture, or in some cases pictures with bubbles to show who is speaking. I find that overall this site is for those starting from scratch who don’t want to be babied and plan to work diligently to learn their selected language. It takes lots of time and hard work because really this is like a college course, you don’t start out from numbers and colours, instead you start from nouns and go to negatives.  

Adrienne explained what this meant, in an email to me. Unfortunately I was unable to reproduce the Chinese characters in HTML, so I have taken a screenshot of her explanation instead:

For each lesson besides the required exercises, there are optional exercises for even more practice. In case you’re still looking for options to study, you can make your own flashcards or use ones made by others. Livemocha also offers chatting between language learners, with a handy dandy translator conveniently located on the side. Making friends comes with learning a new language, cultures are blended and bonds are made. I don’t know if I’ll ever meet any of my friends face to face but I can still say that I have friends that live across the world.

This site takes all the methods of learning and puts them together in a manageable way, and I know they are still expanding their site. The opportunity to teach is planned to be going to be available soon. Not only will future teachers be able to practice but they could earn credits or money. Although you must be invited to become a Livemocha teacher, consistently leaving instructive reviews or making helpful flashcard sets boost your teaching score and increase your chances.

Web address: http://www.livemocha.com/

Rating: 5

Adrienne Blaser is 14 years old. She plays tennis, the violin and loves to read. She one day hopes to learn many languages, hopefully one being Chinese, which she is currently teaching herself.