The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom

The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom | Yochai Benkler | This book gave meaning to law school

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The Wealth of Netw...

	The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom Yochai Benkler Yale University Press, 2007 - 528 pages average customer review:based on 11 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

With the radical changes in information production that the Internet has introduced, we stand at an important moment of transition, says Yochai Benkler in this thought-provoking book. The phenomenon he describes as social production is reshaping markets, while at the same time offering new opportunities to enhance individual freedom, cultural diversity, political discourse, and justice. But these results are by no means inevitable: a systematic campaign to protect the entrenched industrial information economy of the last century threatens the promise of today?s emerging networked information environment.

In this comprehensive social theory of the Internet and the networked information economy, Benkler describes how patterns of information, knowledge, and cultural production are changing?and shows that the way information and knowledge are made available can either limit or enlarge the ways people can create and express themselves. He describes the range of legal and policy choices that confront us and maintains that there is much to be gained?or lost?by the decisions we make today.

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Phenomenal Book on Information Science and Peer Production

I first became familiar with Benkler after reading his paper, "Coase's Penguin" in undergraduate study. I was delighted to hear of the publication of this book. Benkler continues beautifully where he left off in his previous papers and synthesizes an excellent theory of social production in his book.

Benkler begins by describing the economic shape of information - it's non-rival and builds upon itself. He explains the challenges that face information, particularly the Babel Objection. Benkler also covers some legal background on aspects of a "liberal society", such as the role of commons versus private property.

From there, he makes his way into peer production. He touches different aspects of this type of production, from open source to distributed content production & filtering (click workers) to the results of the FCC's shift towards commons-based wireless policy. I found chapter 4, where he connects social production to the economic concepts discussed earlier, to be the most interesting chapter of the book.

He moves on to a lengthy discussion of the political effects of network distribution and social production, including a summary of the history of mass media and predictions about the future. From there, he lays down his argument that we ought to continue to encourage open networks and information sharing. He presents a discussion on current legislation and legal challenges to information and provides some examples of solutions.

I read this book coming out of an undergraduate program in Information Science and wished I had read this book perhaps my sophomore or junior year. Benkler essentially lays out, in linear form, the precise message that my professors were teaching. Because of networks, information science in the 21st century will not follow the traditional industrial-style of distribution but rather a distributed and non-proprietary model. Its impact is phenomenal, not only in the realm of economics and science but politics, culture, and interpersonal communication.

This book ought to be required reading for every undergraduate student studying Telecommunications, Media, or Information Science.

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This book gave meaning to law school

This work was assigned in my last semester of law school. For the most part, I (like many others) did not see the worth in law school other than to become a good lawyer and make money. After reading this book, I feel all of the previous courses that I took in law school (mainly the IP ones) have more value.

I would recommend this work to anyone wanting to see how copyright and patent laws effect/interact with society and culture beyond the "incentive theory" that is the primary focus of most copyright and patent law courses.

Good argumentation

I agree when some people say the book is not well edited (even not being english my first language I found some errors within it) but I think the greatest think about it is the attempt to explain something that it is easy to see that is happening today but nobody know why is happening. You know people write in Wikipedia and that most of them do that at their free time, you know that some people participate in great collaborative efforts to develop free software in the Internet, you know people keep blogs to express their point of view. But can you explain why that happens, why do they do that expecting no financial return or acknowledgment? What do they want? Perhaps you may know what you want when you do or don't some of that things but what about the rest of the world, if you care about it? What has changed or is changing or still must be changed in the societies so that happens?
The author doesn't explain it too but he tries to do it, it is an initial attempt to get some answers. His argumentation through the book covers many aspects of our lives, economic, political, social, antropological, legal and I think that at least at the end you will have some new insights on what is all that about.

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Illustrates potential of networks

A great book, even though it took Amazon nearly a month to send me the book.

An optimistic look at the ways online networks can better our society by strengthening democracy and creating more equality. A little dry in places, but an excellent resource for understanding how the Internet fits into the global economy.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3

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