跳过导航
Digital Disconnect
Book

Digital Disconnect

How Capitalism Is Turning the Internet Against Democracy

The New Press, 2013 更多详情


Editorial Rating

8

Qualities

  • Background

Recommendation

Robert W. McChesney, author of Rich Media, analyzes the rhetoric around the development of the Internet and points out where web “celebrants and skeptics” agree and disagree. Then he explains that most people, whether they advocate for the web or not, do not understand its relationship to capitalism and the “political economic context” of the Internet revolution. He tries to wave away some of the ideological smokescreen around the way the Internet is progressing societally and economically, and he outlines the way current public policies affecting the web serve corporate interests at the consumers’ expense. While always politically neutral, getAbstract recommends McChesney’s economic analysis and societal explication as interesting food for thought for futurists, investors, entrepreneurs, and anyone interested in cyberculture, the media, democracy, a functioning public sphere, a free press – or even just a faster Internet connection.

Take-Aways

  • People who take a stand about the Internet often fall into two camps: “celebrants and skeptics.”
  • Generally, neither group analyzes the Internet’s relationship to capitalism or the “political economic context” of the Internet revolution.
  • Democracy and capitalism are not the same thing, and often work against each other.

About the Author

Robert W. McChesney is Gutgsell Endowed Professor in the Department of Communications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and author of Rich Media.


Comment on this summary or 开始讨论

More on this topic

Learners who read this summary also read