Rating: 
Summary: Strained analogies but interesting reporting and commentary
Review: "The interface came into the world under the cloak of efficiency," Johnson writes, "and now it is emerging - chrysalis-style - as a genuine art form." Perhaps, although this approach slights the primary role of the interface as a means of making information more accessible. It also makes for some strained analogies, such as the likening of hypertext links between documents to the recognition of long-lost acquaintances in the novels of Charles Dickens. It does, however, provide an unusual take on the subject, and perhaps a better read than a more conventional route. Johnson is not surprised or disappointed with the failure of highly spatial and literal interfaces -- Magic Cap's office and city, Apple e-World's town square, Microsoft Bob's living room. He says a computer interface should provide a perspective that isn't possible in the analog world. It's a good point for a cultural critic, but there's not much analysis of why these spatial metaphors don't work well as tools for managing information. Johnson digs a little bit deeper into the value of spatial interfaces for mediating communication. Zeroing in on "shared experience" as the measure of success for an online community, he concludes that "there is more shared wisdom in a single thread on The Well than there is in a hundred Palace gatherings or 3-D chats." Johnson acknowledges that he is "concerned more with imaginative breakthroughs than with box-office successes". Yet it's still a little surprising that Yahoo!, a text-based window on the World Wide Web, goes without mention. Perhaps the wildly successful brainchild of Stanford University students doesn't lend itself easily to haute culture analogies.
Rating: 
Summary: Dull Overall, but Inspiring in Places
Review: A few places in this book contained quite inspiring passages -- Johnson questions a number of today's notion about interfaces, including the WIMP (Windows-Icons-Menus-Pointers), and points out that it is time we moved on to a new paradigm. He questions whether agents are the right "next" thing, and wonders aloud whether the Web is heading in the right direction -- a good deal of his thinking centers around whether we've even utilized the full potential of hypertext links. He wonders if maybe we haven't made the web just more like television (like "jamming" the web into our notions of TV, which is the closest thing society has so far).
An interesting concept of Johnson's: that "at transition points, some messages may evolve faster than their medium. [...] With hindsight we can see that classic shows weren't really great radio programs -- they were just bad television shows [...] They were a message waiting for their medium to come." Many people twist McLuhan's words to the point where one wonders if they really understood him, but Johnson's statement is perceptive and provocative. I like the fact that Johnson refers to interaction designers as if we really exist; he doesn't put scare quotes around the term, nor does he stop to make a special explanation of the role -- he just treats the profession like any other. I agree strongly with Johnson when he points out that the real value of many systems is hidden behind some of the flash and dash -- close to the "remove all the features" school of interaction design. He's right, here, and we could all learn by considering this point as we design and evaluate systems.
Rating: 
Summary: Spelunking the computer netherworld
Review: After years of multimedia and web design there is finally a book, Like Art and Design in Context by Frederick Palmer, that I find takes the artifact of design and gives it a broad cultural setting. From the humble link to divining, via elegant algorithms, the roles Shakespeare assumed in his plays Mr. Johnson does an excellent job tying the larger world to the small screen. He also gives some grounding to a profession in it's infancy.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting conceptual overview.
Review: An interesting, cerebral look at the impact of digital technology and the user interface on our culture. I enjoyed the parallels the author draws to the birth pangs experienced with the industrial age and it's impact on art and culture. This is a very intro/retrospective title dealing with the big picture impact that technologies have on the society and the rate and style with which a technology is folded into our daily lives. If your looking for a design guide, then look to other titles like "The art of human-computer interface design" or "About face". If on the other hand you are looking for a book that examines the big picture impact with a historical perspective than this is a good book for you.
Rating:
Summary: Doctoral Student. Gonzaga University, Spokane WA.
Review: Before I continue with a review I would like to explain what
Rating:
Summary: Doctoral Student. Gonzaga University, Spokane WA.
Review: Before I continue with a review I would like to explain what "Interface" means in terms of the title of the book: Is the interaction between the user and the computer through soft wares and programs, in order to have a communication technology goal and meaning. This "interface serves as a kind of translator, mediating between the two parties, making one sensible to the other."(P: 14) The relationship between the computer and the human is made by meaning and expression rather than physical force.
Steven Johnson takes us from the beginning of technological discoveries; starting from the comparison of the cave painter and carver to the modern artists and engineers. The discoveries of technologies ever since then; gave way to the polishing and improvements of those technological evolutions all the way to the 21st century.
The transformation of the relationship of the user(s) and the computer has advanced rapidly in the last decade. Communication is faster, accurate and the world has become much smaller, due to the introduction of new advanced technological gadgets which enhances the information globally and that allows humans to be closer but yet physically continents apart.
The book examples Doug Englebart, who was a visionary professional that managed to breakthrough a thought and ideas; with which made possible an astounding discovery for the advancement of interface culture. Everything started while he was waiting to be shipped back to the United States after WW II ended. He was reading a book by Vannevar Bush (an Army high-ranking Scientist) whose essay was entitled "As We May Think." which explains and describes a theoretical information processor call the Memex that allowed users to "thread through" incredible repositories of data. With the idea of Bush's Memex, Engelbart discovered the "mouse" with which we are able to go anywhere in cyberspace by just the click of links and at the same time, we are able to also copy and paste information by right clicking the mouse.
Hypertexts became so useful and popular with the use of new inventions and discoveries. The WWW became a need for the world to be informed in any fields. Countries, cultures and societies are already speaking a one language in which is transmitted the need of communication, in order to gain a positive space in the cyber world. Nations are more united because of the use of the interface culture. However, the information this new culture offers to users to cyberspace can also be used to destroy, and to annihilate forces, because "we live in a society that is increasingly shaped by events in cyberspace,... for all practical purposes, invisible, outside our perceptual grasp."
Johnson clearly explains the drastic change of global societies, due to the replacement of interface culture. We can understand now that we have to report to a computer now for most of our personal and business affairs. My question is: are we going to be completely controlled by computers and cyberspace? Is the world going to depend on it 100%? What about the next decade generation? To me it is hair rising just to think.
My two year old already knows how to manipulate the mouse and knows which buttons to push in the computer. My 9 year old is already speaking a cyberspace language at home and sometimes I do not know what he means.
The book takes us to the details of "Windows" "Links" "Texts" and "Agents" and that they can intermingle somehow to get to a purpose and meaning.
This whole situation is a new century 21st culture the interface between machine and humans. Is the culture and advanced developed countries changed? Do neighbors visit each other face to face? What's going to happen with the future of Universities and students? Are they going to have a physical class setting?
It is hair rising to just think of how much more culture is going to change due to the use of advanced technology. Is it not?
Rating:
Summary: McLUHAN THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY
Review: Eye wanted to like this book. The hype was awesome. Yet the book, which wheelbarrows its best stuff from Marshall McLuhan, seems to miss McLuhan's point: that the effects of media are more important than its content. This book is primarily about the content of the cyber-media jungle. For example, Johnson ponders the potential problems of using data based analysis (agents) to spot patterns of behavior. He elaborates on the process while missing the point that agents are following the content of media. (The mystery is not how the magician pulled the rabbit out of her hat; but it is in how she hid the rabbit so well.) The fact is that we are already homogenized by the media, to the point of making agents possible, escapes his scrutiny. He misses the point that we have the mythic fear of intelligent automatons, because we have become just that already. As McLuhan pointed out 35 years ago, we have become the sex organs of machines. We help them reproduce, they keep us supplied with goodies. His book betrays his bias towards print and print's singular point of view. He has a chapter on Links, but no reference to actual www.links that we could follow. He describes the "Sucksters" and their James Joyce-like use of hypertext, but fails to recognize it for the innovation it is. His format is typical-graphically in the Gutenberg Gal-Lexical mode. Any one of McLuhan's books is typographically more interesting than this book; in which he compares his word use to the word use in an Apple users manual. (p.154) And because of his print bias, he seems to completely miss the possibilities of sound as an interface in the future. However, if you have never read McLuhan, this would serve as an introduction to some of McLuhan's basic ideas, and a great example for understanding the unconscious effects of media upon human perception. But by all means checkout "The Media is the Message" by McLuhan; it's the real deal.
Rating: 
Summary: It was a chore
Review: I chose this book to read as an out of class reading assignment. I literally had to trudge through it and forced myself to finally finish it a week before I had to make a report on it. There were times when I would wonder if he was ever going to get to the point, and alas, he didn't. This book is about everything BUT what the subject of the book is supposed to be about. I donated it to the library a week after giving my report.
Rating:
Summary: It was a chore
Review: I chose this book to read as an out of class reading assignment. I literally had to trudge through it and forced myself to finally finish it a week before I had to make a report on it. There were times when I would wonder if he was ever going to get to the point, and alas, he didn't. This book is about everything BUT what the subject of the book is supposed to be about. I donated it to the library a week after giving my report.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting, but questionable premise
Review: I think this is an Okay book that could have easily been a lot better with some good editing. Mr. Johnson's premise for the book is hazy at best. Much of the book successfully argues that the interface and web are a new medium--not too much controversy here. But throughout the book, he stretches the importance and capabilities of this technology. He claims the interface and the web are in the same league as major works of art. In his opinion, they are similar to the works of great authors such as James Joyce and Charles Dickens. I have no doubt that the web can be a medium for art, but I fail to see that the technology itself is art and the people who created it are artists. I have no doubt, as Mr. Johnson asserts, that the interface makes massive amounts of data easier to digest. But I fail to see how any of this technology alone equals the social criticism and storytelling mastery of Charles Dickens. I'm also troubled with Mr. Johnson's jumpy writing style. In the chapter about window technology, we some how end up in a discussion over the Wall Street Journal's apparent lack of ethics for cutting a deal with Microsoft. All interesting questions and facts, but how do they tie together? Mr. Johnson claims this is a book of links. He treats the book as a web browser, but unfortunately Mr. Johnson does all the clicking, and we're not really sure how or why we surfed to a particular topic. On the positive side, his chapters on links, text and the history of the interface are fascinating and make this book worthwhile reading. I've had the pleasure to attend a lecture by Mr. Johnson. He is an extremely bright and charming man who is passionate about the technology. He is extremely interesting when he focuses on a narrow topic. In his next book, I hope he finds an editor who can look him in the eye and keep him on track.
| 
