Play Between Worlds: Exploring Online Game Culture Review

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Play Between Worlds: Exploring Online Game Culture ReviewIn her book on the MMO gaming world, Taylor brings an ethnographic approach to the game Everquest. Through interviews and personal experience, she gives an insight into the gaming world that portrays it for the rich, complex, social world that it is. A gamer herself, Taylor does an excellent job shining new light on the "frowned upon" gaming world. She also goes beyond the gaming world to show how things are connected through the internet and "in real life" to things within the game.
As far as this being too "basic" in covering the genre - this wasn't aimed to be a book only for advanced gamers. For those of the academic world, who have no experience whatsoever with games, the chapters provide sufficient information about the games to allow understanding. The summary/analysis is as comprehensive as it is rich. There are parts that she could have gone further and I do hope she does write a second book (although she does have articles on this topic as well).
All in all, this is an absolutely fantastic book for academics (or just interested people) who want an ethnographic approach to the gaming world that treats it not as a deviant, subersive "alternate" reality. Gamers and academics alike can appreciate it. Think Jenkins' Textual Poachers (written about the fan world) for gamers.
I sincerely hope this is the tip of the iceberg for this serious academic research into the community, social aspects of MMOs.Play Between Worlds: Exploring Online Game Culture Overview

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The Unincorporated Man (Sci Fi Essential Books) Review

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The Unincorporated Man (Sci Fi Essential Books) ReviewImagine this: Asia is obliterated. Space travel is possible. Cars fly (finally!). There is no war. There is no unemployment. And while you are imagining all of this, add in the fact that you are incorporated at birth, and that in order to get a job or an education, you must trade stock of yourself. Imagine also that you likely do not own the majority of your own stock, thus your investors decide where you can work and even where you can live.
Is this slavery? Or does it encourage a person to invest in others as a way of improving the whole? That is the question raised in THE UNINCORPORATED MAN.
Justin Cord is a brilliant businessman in the early 21st century, and his success is only matched by his sorrow to hear that he has cancer. Using his vast wealth, Justin constructs a cryogenic tomb and freezes himself.
When he awakens, slowly coming to realize that the cryogenic act was a success, Justin finds himself 300 years into the future. Although there are cosmetic and some technological changes as one would expect, he is more concerned by the future incorporation of mankind. After being bullied (but refusing) to sign an incorporation agreement, thereby no longer owning himself, Justin becomes a central figure in a sinister and complex political machine in the new incorporated world.
THE UNINCORPORATED MAN is a stunning debut. Truly. Forget the genre clichés of laser guns, spaceships, and journeys through black holes and the like. This book is part Heinlein, part Bradbury, and part Asimov. This is no space adventure but a socio-economic envisioning of the future. As such, it would easily fit alongside, say, 1984 or BRAVE NEW WORLD as a chilling and thought-provoking treatise on possible futures.
Brothers Dani and Eytan Kollin have crafted a world here that is at times technologically stunning and exciting and sometimes frightening. Throughout the pages of this novel, you will encounter well-detailed environs peopled with wholly lifelike people --- some are wonderful, others are downright villainous. They have deftly designed a book that will have you questioning the economic principles and the very nature of personal freedom and individuality.
Even if you are not a fan of science fiction per se, THE UNINCORPORATED MAN stretches beyond that genre and brings a hauntingly possible future to life.
--- Reviewed by Stephen Hubbard
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Rewired: Understanding the iGeneration and the Way They Learn Review

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Rewired: Understanding the iGeneration and the Way They Learn ReviewI haven't written a book review on Amazon in over 8 years, but I am motivated to come out of retirement for this one. Please don't waste your time on this book. It does offer some good gems of info, such as the teacher who couldn't get his students to discuss a book in English class, so he created a Facebook group for the class, and asked them to post their thoughts on the book there. These useful anecdotes are unfortunately hidden in a wash of manure. The book is full of gross generalizations about today's youth and their media and technology habits. You've read these facts in a number of news publications, or you probably know enough from kids you spend time with. We get it. Kids use technology. So does everyone else. Kids use it more. Got it.
The author makes a federal case out of multi-tasking, as if no previous generation has had the TV on and been gabbing on the phone while doing their homework. He actually wastes paper defining what an avatar is, and describing how Wikipedia works. At one point he even states that youth "use all capital letters to denote strong emotions such as I AM ANGRY AT YOU." If you're really that clueless, maybe this is the book for you.
The book also discusses how much kids like shallow bursts of information, and states that "even Sesame Street now has more cuts than ever before." Problem is, the article he cites is from 1980. He doesn't disclose this, but I knew this example was outright false, so I took the time to find the referenced article on Google Scholar. The truth is, Sesame Street has been using longer segments, and making fewer cuts per hour episode since about 2003. In another chapter, he shows video and audio podcasts as examples of technology that are more immersive than books. Really? That's so incredibly subjective to the content. I know he wants to push technology, and I do too, but the medium is largely irrelevant there. Just look at how many kids became immersed in Harry Potter books. You can craft an immersive experience in many ways, with many tools and mediums. A great teacher could craft an immersive experience with no physical resources at all.
Those aren't the only instances in this book where he's just making things up.
You could read much better education and technology information on the internet. Please do.Rewired: Understanding the iGeneration and the Way They Learn OverviewLook around at today's youth and you can see how technology has changed their lives. They lie on their beds and study while listening to mp3 players, texting and chatting online with friends, and reading and posting Facebook messages. How does the new, charged-up, multitasking generation respond to traditional textbooks and lectures? Are we effectively reaching today's technologically advanced youth? Rewired is the first book to help educators and parents teach to this new generation's radically different learning styles and needs. This book will also help parents learn what to expect from their "techie" children concerning school, homework, and even socialization. In short, it is a book that exposes the impact of generational differences on learning while providing strategies for engaging students at school and at home.

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