Description
Book SynopsisMark Poster considers how new media—from TiVO to digital file sharing—affects society, and he traces its implications for cultural theory and progressive political change.
Trade Review“Engaging, informative, and thoroughly enjoyable,
Information Please is a tour de force in its clear articulation of a coherent approach to the spectrum of issues arising from the penetration of information technology into every aspect of human life, from questions of global politics to the construction and protection of identities and selves in the context of digital media.”—Tim Lenoir, Kimberly J. Jenkins Professor of New Technologies and Society, Duke University
“Mark Poster has been one of the foremost scholars of global digital culture over the past decades.
Information Please, probably his best and most advanced book to date, continues his project of using contemporary theory to interrogate new media and new media to illustrate and critique certain forms of theory.”—Douglas Kellner, coauthor of
The Postmodern Adventure: Science, Technology, and Cultural Studies at the Third Millennium“This book is a welcome publication. It proposes new directions for studying the information transference mediated by digital media, and can inspire the reader to look beyond the confinement of current theories, and explore new challenges and significance in the age of digital machines.” -- Chong Han * Discourse & Society *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
I. Global Politics and New Media
1. Perfect Transmissions: Evil Bert laden 9
2. Postcolonial Theory and Global Media 26
3. The Information Empire 46
4. Citizens, Digital Media, and Globalization 67
II. The Culture of the Digital Self
5. Identity Theft and Media 87
6. The Aesthetics of Distracting Media 116
7. The Good, the Bad, and the Virtual 139
8. Psychoanalysis, the Body, and Information Machines 161
III. Digital Commodities in Everyday Life
9. Who Controls Digital Culture? 185
10. Everyday (Virtual) Life 211
11. Consumers, Users and Digital Commodities 231
12. Future Advertising: Dick’s
Ubik and the Digital Ad
Conclusion 267
Notes 269
References 281
Index 299
