Great leaps forward in scientific understanding have, throughout history, engendered similar leaps forward in how we understand ourselves. Now, the new hybrid disciplines of evolutionary biology and social physics are making the next leap possible -- and fundamentally altering our notions of individual identity. If identity is a fact not derived from within the individual, but conferred on an individual by a group, or network, a host of assumptions about how governments work, how conflicts...

The online economy offers challenges to traditional businesses as well as incredible opportunities. Chris Anderson makes the compelling case that in many instances businesses can succeed best by giving away more than they charge for.Known as "Freemium," this combination of free and paid is emerging as one of the most powerful digital business models. In Free, Chris Anderson explores this radical idea for the new global economy and demonstrates how it can b...

A powerful investigation into the chances for humanity's future from the author of the bestseller The World Without Us.In his bestselling book The World Without Us, Alan Weisman considered how the Earth could heal and even refill empty niches if relieved of humanity's constant pressures. Behind that groundbreaking thought experiment was his hope that we would be inspired to find a way to add humans back to this vision of a restored, healthy planet...

From the author of the New York Times bestseller The Inevitable— a sweeping vision oftechnology as a living force that can expand our individual potentialThis provocative book introduces a brand-new view of technology. It suggests that technology as a whole is not a jumble of wires and metal but a living, evolving organism that has its own unconscious needs and tendencies. Kevin Kelly looks out through the eyes of this global technological system ...

"A marvelous job of exploring first hand the implications of storing our entire lives digitally."-Guy L. Tribble, Apple, Inc.Tech luminary, Gordon Bell, and Jim Gemmell unveil a guide to the next digital revolution. Our daily life started becoming digital a decade ago. Now much of what we do is digitally recorded and accessible. This trend won't stop. And the benefits are astonishing.Based on their own research Bell and Gemmell explain the ever- incr...

If you can't trust those in charge, who can you trust? From government to business, banks to media, trust in institutions is at an all-time low. But this isn't the age of distrust -- far from it.In this revolutionary book, world-renowned trust expert Rachel Botsman reveals that we are at the tipping point of one of the biggest social transformations in human history -- with fundamental consequences for everyone. A new world order is emerging: we might have lost fai...

After a decade designing technologies meant to address education, health, and global poverty, award-winning computer scientist Kentaro Toyama came to a difficult conclusion: Even in an age of amazing technology, social progress depends on human changes that gadgets can't deliver.Computers in Bangalore are locked away in dusty cabinets because teachers don't know what to do with them. Mobile phone apps meant to spread hygiene practices in Africa fail to improve health. Executives in...

Greg Cootsona puts a spiritual spin on the classic business strategy for setting priorities in this valuable guide to finding personal fulfillment in an increasingly frantic world. At age thirty-eight, Cootsona, a physically fit minister busy with his growing congregation and his young family, had a scare with heart trouble. The unexpected and frightening news proved providential. Cootsona realized that he was juggling too many roles, saying yes to too many commitments.In SAY YES T...

Mr. Well's essays on the future are a little like his novels on the future; they present an interesting picture of mechanical devices, but leave out of account the human equation almost as completely as the most profound political economist would leave it out.

A fascinating look at the future, as you’ve never seen it. Ten years from now, will we have a tiny personal computer surgically inserted in an earlobe, capable of connecting to phone lines and the internet? Fifty years from now, will atomic-sized robots replace surgeons? A hundred years from now, instead of taking the bus, will we simply teleport to work? It all may sound like impossible science fiction, but not too long ago, so did walking on the moon. Journalist Jonathan Margolis intervi...

Few books have attempted to contextualize the importance of video game play with a critical social, cultural and political perspective that raises the question of the significance of work, pleasure, fantasy and play in the modern world. The study of why video game play is "fun" has often been relegated to psychology, or the disciplines of cultural anthropology, literary and media studies, communications and other assorted humanistic and social science disciplines. In Utopic Dreams and ...