The Wired Neighborhood [Paperback]

Stephen Doheny-Farina (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0300074344 | ISBN-13: 978-0300074345 | Publication Date: January 21, 1998

In this eloquent exploration of the nature of cyberspace and the increasing virtualization of everyday life, Stephen Doheny-Farina argues that electronic neighborhoods should be less important to us than our geophysical neighborhoods. He Speaks in favor of civic networking, a movement that organizes local information and culture, and shows how new technologies can help reinvigorate our troubled communities.

"The Wired Neighborhood punctures most of the inflated myths about the wondrous Net. Its author also points to one small corner of this datasphere that might build, not erode, community. If you absolutely must remain plugged-in, take his advice about where to aim your mouse". -- Bill McKibben

"Lucid and precise ...invaluable to a nuanced understanding of the technologies now transmogrifying the meaning of community and even reality". -- Utne Reader

"The dilemma Doheny-Farina addresses is a real one that is unlikely to go away, and his book is a useful contribution to the debate.... He writes with an inviting fluency rare in academic Net discourse". -- Charles Shaar Murray, Daily Telegraph

"Doheny-Farina, a shrewd observer of encroaching mediation, makes a number of important points". -- Sven Birkerts, Prevention

"Nowhere online can you find all of these issues summarized or explicated.... I am confident that The Wired Neighborhood will remain an important early analysis of the effects of the Net on our towns and our lives". -- Steve Cisler, Community Networking Currents

"A brave little volume that dares to discuss both sides, fiddling with thought and reason, in an honest quest for insight". -- Burke Campbell, Toronto Globe & Mail

"If Doheny-Farina isn't the first towrite about the Internet with an eye critical to its assumptions and implications, he might well be the most level-headed". -- Paul Maliszewski, Business Journal

"An absorbing work on an important topic". -- Library Journal

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

A level-headed analysis of the nature of community in the online world, and the effect of the online world on real-world communities. Contains some of the best discussions I have encountered about the substantive qualitative value of projects such as the National Public Telecomputing Network, which, to my mind, could serve the same balancing service for the future of the Internet that National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service have served for radio and television in the U.S., Recommended --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

In his book about how computer technology affects our relationship to our geophysical communities, Doheny-Farina, an associate professor of technical communications at Clarkson University in upstate New York, offers excellent discussions on telecommuting, virtual education and also on community nets (locally based networks that serve as town hall, bulletin board, etc.) as the most recent version of early public-access cable TV. The problem is that much of his often wistful discussion is about a community that has already been thoroughly, perhaps fatally, compromised by the telephone and the car. Admitting that requires one of two responses?either expanding the argument to include these other earlier technologies, or else admitting that we have accommodated to that technology and (aside from the few lost netsouls) will accommodate to this. His discussion of possible alternatives are generally logged-in suggestions about community-based CMC, like Ottawa's National Capital FreeNet. But one of the most important parts of community building is the unplanned encounter?not the convergence of common interests but the chance meetings that make for a more generalized neighborliness. Doheny-Farina hints at the importance of this kind of interaction at several places but doesn't address it in his solution. Then again maybe this is just an acknowledgment of the computer's basic function. Computers were designed to make it easier to get what we know we want, not to find what we never knew we needed.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Yale University Press (January 21, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300074344
• ISBN-13: 978-0300074345
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.5 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,809,105 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars excellent, level-headed, and thought-provoking, October 12, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The Wired Neighborhood (Hardcover)

a very well-considered look at the realtionship between digital communications technology and local communities, with particularly good treatment of public access, education, and attempts to use computers to enhance, rather than undermine, neighborhood and community relations. Highly recommended.