Capitalism and the Information Age: The Political Economy of the Global Communication Revolution

Rating:
Summary: Uninformative Essays about the Information Age
Review: In such a fast-moving field like information technology, it is not fair to criticize a five year-old book for being outdated. That is an issue for some of the essays here, such as the submission by Nicholas Baran from the mid-90's, in which some inaccurate predictions about the development of the Internet are made, like an incorrect perception of how wireless access technologies would develop. While that's an issue that can be mostly forgiven in hindsight, this book suffers from a more timeless problem of lack of usefulness. The most successful essay here is the introduction from editor Robert McChesney, with serious ideas about the future salience of capitalist markets in light of the cyber revolution. This is purported to be the focus of the other essays in the book, but the results prove otherwise. Submissions range in an uninspired fashion from ivory-towered theoretical exercises (Ellen Meiskins Wood) to non-analytical economic or technological histories (Jill Hills and the aforementioned Baran). A conversational lecture from Noam Chomsky is out of place, while his colleague Edward Herman merely summarizes his book that should be read in its entirety for any true insights. The submission from Michael W. Apple on the Channel One network in school classrooms comes quite close to a very important analysis, but ends abruptly with a diversion to the author's previously published works. In the end, a few informative essays on globalization issues (Peter Golding) and grassroots politics on the Web (Ken Hirschkop) can't save this book, as it does not accomplish the goals implicit in its title and introduction. [~doomsdayer520~]