Publisher's Weekly Review
While it may seem that we're in the midst of an unprecedented technological transition, Carr (Does IT Matter?) posits that the direction of the digital revolution has a strong historical corollary: electrification. Carr argues that computing, no longer personal, is going the way of a power utility. Manufacturers used to provide their own power (i.e., windmills and waterwheels) until they plugged into the electric grid a hundred years ago. According to Carr, we're in the midst of a similar transition in computing, moving from our own private hard drives to the computer as access portal. Soon all companies and individuals will outsource their computing systems, from programming to data storage, to companies with big hard drives in out-of-the-way places. Carr's analysis of the recent past is clear and insightful as he examines common computing tools that are embedded in the Internet instead of stored on a hard drive, including Google and YouTube. The social and economic consequences of this transition into the utility age fall somewhere between uncertain and grim, Carr argues. Wealth will be further consolidated into the hands of a few, and specific industries, publishing in particular, will perish at the hands of "crowdsourcing" and the "unbundling of content." However, Carr eschews an entirely dystopian vision for the future, hypothesizing without prognosticating. Perhaps lucky for us, he leaves a great number of questions unanswered. (Jan.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Carr created a huge rift in the business community with his first book, Does IT Matter? (2004), challenging the conventional wisdom that information technology provides a competitive advantage in business. Here he examines the future of the Internet, which he says may one day completely replace the desktop PC as all computing services are delivered over the Net as a utility, the Internet morphing into one giant World Wide Computer. Comparing the situation now to the massive technological shift that took place during the wide-scale adoption of electricity, Carr shows how the first power utilities allowed companies that were generating their own power to free up those resources once electricity became available cheaply and reliably over a network. A massive shakeout of the industry could occur as the delivery of computing power as a cheap utility could eliminate local hardware, software, and in-house maintenance and support completely. Carr warns that the downside of the World Wide Computer and the democratization of ideas may mean further concentration of wealth for the few, and the loss of jobs, privacy, and the depth of our culture.--Siegfried, David Copyright 2007 Booklist
Choice Review
Writer Carr compares and contrasts the evolution of early computing from mainframes, to massive information technology departments, to personal computing, to the Internet/World Wide Web, to "Worldwide Computing" (WWC), to previous revolutions like Edisonian electrification. The book clearly describes the data processing revolution beginning with Hollerith punched cards and advancing through various processes, usually of benefit to corporations and bureaucracies, with spillover to individuals. The benefits to all parties are legion and well described with the histories of Google and others recounted. The result is the global dispersal of previously centralized IT and computing functions involving every participating PC, yet ironically recentralized into a growing number of megasites such as Google. After recounting the benefits of WWC, the author describes the "Dark Side." Democratization also breeds polarization and balkanization; independence, dependence, and loss of control; privacy, security, and exposure. Jobs are threatened as never before as small staffs of entrepreneurs replace journalists, analysts, and librarians. Unlike past revolutions, no new jobs are created. Loss of control--personal, corporate, and governmental--is occurring. Carr also addresses the boon and bane of artificial intelligence. Users beware! Summing Up: Recommended. All readers/libraries. R. E. Buntrock formerly, University of Maine
Kirkus Review
A leading technological rabble-rouser prognosticates a world beyond Web 2.0. Carr (Does IT Matter?, 2004) rattled the confidence of international conglomerates with a 2003 article in the Harvard Business Review declaring that proprietary information technology is superfluous to the industries it augments. Here, he examines the burgeoning phenomenon of "utility computing": bundling data processing into a metered service not unlike the electric company. The concept immediately recalls the second-generation applications trumpeted by Wired, exemplified by Google and now infiltrating the wireless world. Indeed, the author wastes no time in holding up the multifaceted Google and its offshoots as prime examples of the new practice of employing Ethernet-linked server farms processing simultaneous data. The first section builds Carr's case using historical analogies that trace, for example, a direct line from Edison's light bulb to the "White City" of the 1893 World's Fair to the social impacts of cheap, available power in the 20th century. He makes some salient points about the duplication of efforts among IT departments guarding their own fiefdoms. A chapter titled "Goodbye, Mr. Gates" posits the rise of utility computing as a primal shift between the PC age and the new world, with a few gloomy forecasts predicting that more traditional companies (dubbed "weapons suppliers in the IT arms race") may soon find that their wellspring has dried up. The second section examines the behavior of users in this new matrix and surveys the "economic, political, and social upheaval" wrought by the change in operating models. Examining this change, Carr seesaws from the dismal fallout (the death of newspapers) to the merely curious side effects (the nontraditional "game" called Second Life). His broader sociological observations are punctuated by a pair of ominously prescient chapters about privacy issues and cyberterrorism. Carr makes some sophisticated leaps of logic tying together the causes and effects of this evolving network of information, but many of his observations are fairly old news. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
