When I was selecting my book I considered several options. The first books that I looked at focused on health care technology because this is an area that I find interesting. The first set of books that I tried were:
Rethinking the Electronic Healthcare Record, Innovation with Information Technologies in Healthcare, and
The Guide to the Future of Medicine: Technology AND The Human Touch. I looked up these books in google books, Library Thing, and World Cat and found very little so I decided to look for more books on Amazon. I started by going to the author page for Simon Head who is the author of one of the articles that we read for class and then started looking at the suggested books section. Using this method I found:
The Impulse Society: America in the Age of Instant Gratification, and
The Glass Cage: Automation and Us. I looked up both of these books and found two reviews for each one on ProQuest. After reading through the reviews I decided that
The Glass Cage would be an interesting read and chose that one.
Review citations
Hays, C. (2014). The glass cage: Automation and us. The Booklist, 110(22), 21. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/docview/1551195310?accountid=465
THE GLASS CAGE. (2014). Kirkus Reviews, LXXXII(14) Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.library.wisc.edu/docview/1544513560?accountid=465
I also found myself stumbling upon the book "Impulse Society", but choose a different one instead. For me, I choose the other book because the review I found on "Impulse Society" was pretty negative towards the author Paul Roberts. It was continuously referred to as a "rant", so I opted against choosing that book. I felt like it would have been similar to Versey's rant on Daniel Bell, so I choose a book that has a less rigid argument called "The Information Diet: A Case for Conspicuous Consumption". I thought you did a good job of referencing authors we've read in class in order to help you find a book! "The Glass Cage" sounds interesting, hope you enjoy it!
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that you chose this book as "The Glass Cage" and its author, Nicholas Carr, are often cited in digital studies and information studies courses. He does a really great job of explaining the relationship between the use of information technologies and some of their potential cognitive effects. I think you'll really enjoy his book and it's definitely a great groundwork for further studying the information society in terms of IT!
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