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Recommended Readings
List of Books (alphabetical by Title, ignoring "The"):
• 101 Unuseless Japanese Inventions: The Art of Chindogu. (D. Papia, Trans.). New York: Norton. www.chindogu.com Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Editor.
• Behavior-Based Robots. Ron Arkin. 1998: MIT Press.)
• The book on the bookshelf. Henry Petroski (1999. Knopf)
• The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual. Levine, R., Locke, C., Searls, D., & Weinberger, D. (2000: Perseus Books).
• Crypto: How the code rebels beat the government -- saving privacy in the digital age. Steven Levy (2001: Penguin Books).
• Designing Web Usability: The practice of simplicity. Jakob Nielsen: (2001: New Riders)
• The Dream Machine: J.C.R. Licklider and the revolution that made computing personal. M. Mitchell Waldrop: (2001: Viking)
• Flesh and Machines: How robots will change us. Rodney Brooks. (2002: Pantheon Books)
• The Forgotten Arts and Crafts. John Seymour (2001: Dorling Kindersley)
• How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They're Built. S. Brand (1994: Viking)
• How the Mind Works. S. Pinker (1997: Norton)
• Inormation Appliances and Beyond. Eric Bergman, Editor (Morgan Kaufmann)
• Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Network Economy. Carl Shapiro and Hal Varian (1998: Harvard Business Press)
• Inner Navigation: How we get lost and how we find our way. Erik Jonsson (2002: Scribner)
• Interface Culture: How New Technology Transforms the Way We Create and Communicate. S. Johnson (1997: HarperCollins)
Multimedia: From Wagner to virtual reality. Randall Packer & Ken Jordan (2001: NY: Norton)
• The Myth of the Paperless Office. Abigail Sellen & Richard Harper (2001: MIT Press)
• The Science of Star wars. Cavelos, J. (1999). New York: St. Martin's Press.
• Secrets & Lies: Digital security in a networked world. Bruce Schneier. (2000: Wiley)
• Small Pieces Loosely Joined: A unified theory of the web. David Weinberger (2002: Perseus)
• Utopian Entrepreneur. Brenda Laurel (2001: MIT Press)
• When Things Start to Think. Neil Gershenfeld (1999: Henry Holt and Company)
• Where the Action Is: The foundations of embodied interaction. Paul Dourish (2001: MIT Press)
• Why We Buy: The science of shopping. Paco Underhill (1999: Simon & Schuster)
Book Descriptions and Ordering Information (in chronological order, most recent items on top):
The science of Star wars. Cavelos, J. (1999). New York: St. Martin's Press.
— I stumbled across the book by accident, but I found her treatment fascinating, and in the areas at which I am expert, accurate and informative. In particular, Chapter 3, "Droids" (pp. 78-125), contains an excellent review and analysis of the development, form, intelligence and emotions in robots. The emphasis is on C-3PO (Threepio) and R2-D2 (Artoo), but Cavelos does a truly excellent job of discussing the general issues and developments within AI and robotics in general. Fun reading, and informative even to experts.
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101 Unuseless Japanese Inventions: The Art of Chindogu. (D. Papia, Trans.). New York: Norton. www.chindogu.com Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Editor.
Every Chindogu is an almost useless object, but not every almost useless object is a Chindogu. In order to transcend the realms of the merely almost useless, and join the ranks of the really almost useless, certain vital criteria must be met. It is these criteria, a set of ten vital tenets, that define the gentle art and philosophy of Chindogu.
So begins the creed of Chindogu, a collection of weird and wacky inventions from japan, guaranteed to be almost practical, but useless. (Inventions that turn out to be useful are taken off the list). For me, this is the perfect accompaniment to Carelman's "Impossible Objects."
(Also see the sequel, Kawakami, K., & Papia, D. (1998). 99 more unuseless Japanese inventions: the art of Chindogu (1st American ed.). New York N Y: W.W. Norton & Co. and of course, their website.
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Rodney Brooks: Flesh and Machines: How robots will change us. (2002: Pantheon Books).
— A non-technical book by the inventor of behavior-based architectures for robots, an approach that has revolutionized the field. I believe that robots will indeed come to pass; I mean household robots, probably on wheels, perhaps with legs, and almost definitely stationary robots, built into appliances, as in the pantry/dishwasher, the coffee machine, the cooking/refrigeration unit, and the coffee machine.
Then the household robot will scamper about, finding the dirty cups and saucers to deliver to the dishwasher, so it can wash them and deliver them to the pantry. Ask for a cup of coffee and the pantry will give a clean cup to the coffee machine to fill with coffee, to give to the robot, to bring to you in your armchair. Whew.
No, that's not in this book -- that's in my next book. But it almost is in his book: his examples are just as much fun -- maybe even more fun. More importantly, if you want to know how this would ever be possible, you have to read his book(s). Rodney Brooks has done the work that will make this all come to pass.
I particularly enjoyed his discussions of what it takes to enter the toy market (pages 107 on) and his two chapters on possible applications: Chapter 5: Machines to Live With and Chapter 6: Where Am I?
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(If you want to learn about the technology behind behavior-based robots, the text I used to teach myself is Ron Arkin's Behavior-Based Robots. 1998: MIT Press.)
Steven Levy: Crypto: How the code rebels beat the government -- saving privacy in the digital age. (2001: Penguin Books).
— Steven Levy is a great science writer. First, he understands both the technical side and the human and social side of our technologies. Second, he has a light, engaging writing style that makes even the most complex topics seem simple. Crypto has all of these characteristics.
Ever puzzle over the nature of modern encryption? Levy explains how it works in nice, easy to understand manner.
This is a topic of critical importance to all of us as we move into the era of ubiquitous information. All our information is available to us whenever we want it and wherever we may be. That's the good side.
Alas, all this same information is also thereby available to everyone else, no matter who they are, no matter where they be. The bad guys. Cryptography is the protection, but it gets mired in a complex mix of arguments, legalities, and political issues.
The government is correct: it must have access to our encrypted material in order to make the world safe from terrorists. The everyday citizen is right: we need privacy of our ideas and the history of government spying and misuse of evidence is too overwhelming to give us faith that we should simply "trust the government."
After all, we have secret ballots for a reason: there is nothing illegal about voting. There is nothing illegal about selecting one candidate over another. But the ballot has to be secret to protect the whole fabric of democracy. So too must our own private thoughts and business.
A great book.
(Also see "Secrets and Lies," below).
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Erik Jonsson: Inner Navigation: How we get lost and how we find our way. (2002: Scribner)
— Erik Jonsson is a very special person: a retired engineer who has practiced and studied the ways by which people wonder about the world, finding their way -- and losing it. I confess to a very special bias for Erik and this book. I have known Erik for years. I encouraged him to put his ideas into writing and to publish the book. And I wrote the introduction. But why not? To paraphrase my introduction, "I have learned more about the science of human navigation from this witty, quirky, fascinating book of stories than from the many scientific journals I read."
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David Weinberger: Small Pieces Loosely Joined: A unified theory of the web. (2002: Perseus)
— David Weinberger writes the lively JOHO journal on the web. This book consists of deep, provocative reflections on the nature of the internet and what it means to our lives. As I said on the back jacket: the best of all combinations: deep, thoughtful commentary written as light easy reading. (Weinberger is one of the authors of "The Cluetrain Manifesto" -- see below
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Brenda Laurel: Utopian Entrepreneur (2001: MIT Press)
Sept 2001 — Here is what I said about this book for the book jacket blurb: Brenda Laurel's startup company, Purple Moon, failed, but her travails provided powerful learning experiences This engaging book, written in a style that is uniquely Brenda, tells the story. More important, it shows how to move forward to a positive, humanistic culture, where technology and media provide rich, rewarding experiences.
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M. Mitchell Waldrop: The Dream Machine: J.C.R. Licklider and the revolution that made computing personal (2001)
— I am biased, but this is the very best book I have yet read on the development of the Information processing industry -- the PC, the Internet, etc. I lived through this era and know, studied with, or am good friends of a large proportion of people discussed here. It is strange, but when you are living through a revolution, it is invisible. That's why books like this that put everything in perspective are so valuable. Sure, we knew it was exciting, but we thought that was the way things always were.
I seem to have followed just a few years behind all the events described here, so I benefited from the results, whether it was the TX-0 computer, the early PDP series, Lick himself, or the people and early Alto machines at Xerox PARC I knew Lick when he was just a psychoacoustician (the field I started in), so I am delighted to have him receive proper recognition for the seminal role he played, especially in funding the early days of time-shared computers from his vantage pint at ARPA.
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Randall Packer & Ken Jordan: Multimedia: From Wagner to virtual reality (2001: NY: Norton)
— By the way, many of the original writings that played so significant a role in developing this revolution are reprinted in the truly excellent compilation edited by Many of the papers that had profound impact upon my development -- to say nothing of that of the entire industry -- are all here: papers by Norbert Wiener, JCR Licklider, Doug Engelbart, Myron Krueger, Alan Kay, Vannevar Bush, Ted Nelson Tim Berners-Lee, and Ivan Sutherland.
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Paul Dourish: Where the Action Is: The foundations of embodied interaction (2001: MIT Press)
— Yet another book for which I wrote the book jacket blurb, but once again, because I truly believe this to be an important study. As I wrote for the book jacket: A revolution in design and the role of computer science is upon us: Where the Action Is describes the way. In the old days, the focus was upon the technology and "computing," hence the interest in the interface between humans and machines -- us versus them. Not anymore. As Dourish so elegantly explains, design should not be about tasks and their requirements, or applications or computing. Design is really about interaction, with a focus on ubiquity, tangibility, and most of all, shared awareness, intimacy, and emotions. This is a revolution badly needed. It's about time.
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Abigail Sellen & Richard Harper: The Myth of the Paperless Office (2001: MIT Press)
— An important book, not just about paper but about how people accomplish their work. Here is how I put it on the book jacket: Paper is the old-fashioned technology that refuses to die -- and for good reason. As this pioneering study by Sellen and Harper shows, paper supports many needs and work styles better than any other medium. As a result, paper is the perfect complement to electronic documents, superior at many things, inferior at many. Want to know if an organization is working efficiently? Sellen and Harper say to check the wastebaskets -- they should be full.
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John Seymour: The Forgotten Arts and Crafts (2001: Dorling Kindersley)
— If you liked "The Psychology of Everyday Things, you should love this one. It's about folk design, folk art, folk construction. I pick up the book and read at random, learning all the while, fascinated all the while. Stiles – what a marvelous set of inventions -- affording passage by humans and the anti-affordance of non-passage by animals, but requiring different solutions for different animals. How all sorts of things were made -- cider, paper, lye and soap, cheese, spinning wheels, barrels, fishnets, knives. I could go on and on.
Beautifully (and functionally) illustrated with photographs and drawings. Part of the charm of the book is the author's crustiness and utter disdain for anything manufactured as opposed to hand made. Anyway, a delight for the history, for the knowledge, and for enjoyment.
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Paco Underhill: Why We Buy: The science of shopping (1999: Simon & Schuster)
— Take human-centered design principles, especially that of ethnographic field study, and apply it to department stores, shops, and any place where people go to buy. The result is a wonderful treasure house of important observations. Underhill's results seem like common sense -- which is how you know they are both correct and very much uncommon.
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Jakob Nielsen: Designing Web Usability: The practice of simplicity (2001: New Riders)
— Jakob's latest; vintage Nielsen, with pithy, deep insights into the nature of the web -- writing for it, developing it, using it..
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Eric Bergman, Editor: Information Appliances and Beyond (Morgan Kaufmann)
— My book "The Invisible Computer" explains the "why" of Information appliances, this one explains the "how." This is an excellent collection of how to do it stories. If you are in this business, get the book. (Disclaimer: Chapter 1 is "A Conversation with Don Norman". This link goes to the Morgan Kaufmann Publishers site.)
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Bruce Schneier: Secrets & Lies: Digital security in a networked world (2000: Wiley)
— In the end, security depends upon people. You can have the most powerful encryption in the world, but the weak link is the systems, procedures, and people who implement them.
There is a nasty tradeoff between ease of use (and systems appropriate for people) and systems that are safe, secret, and secure. Practice so-called "good" security, and you end up with unlearnable passcodes. Worse, with dozens of unlearnable codes, each of which should be changed monthly. What do people do in those cases? They either change the codes to simple phrases (or their address, birthdays, or pet's name), or they write them down, tape them to their computers, and otherwise manage to survive. In other words, the more secure you make the security, the less secure the system.
This is why, end to end, only a biometric system will work. But think of the horrors there. If your retinal code is once misused or misappropriated, you may never ever be allowed to log on, or to buy anything.
Also see "Crypto," above.)
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Neil Gershenfeld: When Things Start to Think (1999: Henry Holt and Company)
— A book often paired with "The invisible Computer" by reviewers: Gershenfeld is a physicist at the MIT Media lab who develops powerful technology and then uses that technology to create a plethora of clever, creative information appliances -- ones you would never have thought of yourself, but once you see them you say, "yeah, I could use that!"
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The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual. Levine, R., Locke, C., Searls, D., & Weinberger, D. (2000: Perseus Books).
— I told them not to write it, but they did it anyway. Four weirdoes who seem to think that companies should treat their customers with respect, that software should work, that websites should deliver value. If you can stand this kind of nonsense, written with a non-stop hypnotic fervor that defies logic, reason, and emotion. Well, what can I say? Hell, I even subscribe to David Weinberger's JOHO Journal and Chris Locke's Rageboy (that's his alternative personality). And see my review of Weinberger's other book, above.
But don't say I didn't warn you. These people never read "Information Rules" (see review below): don't they realize that software is supposed to have faults -- otherwise, why would people ever buy the upgrade?
So if you do read Information Rules, then please read the Cluetrain Manifesto afterwards to get that bad taste out of your mouth. (Don't blame the authors of Information Rules --they are just reporting the facts-- telling as it is. The bad taste is because we would like it to be different.)
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S. Brand: How Buildings Learn: What Happens After They're Built (1994: Viking)
— Buildings change throughout their lifetime. This is the best of folk design: keep changing to accommodate life's changes.
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S. Pinker: How the Mind Works (1997: Norton)
— Witty, erudite, complete, opinionated. But I happen to agree with the opinions. I have only one regret about this book – jealousy. This is the book I have always wanted to write.
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Henry Petroski: The Book on the Bookshelf
(1999: Knopf - distributed by Random House)
— I always read everything written by Petroski. Erudite essays on everyday things, the pencil, bridges, engineering design, and now bookshelves. In this, his most recent work, a fascinating look at the history of bookshelves, libraries and printing practices, he describes my visit to his home and his annoyance that I was more interested in the books on his bookshelves than in the shelves themselves. Ah well.
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S. Johnson: Interface Culture: How New Technology Transforms the Way We Create and Communicate (1997: HarperCollins)
— An informed, witty essay on how the technology of computer interfaces changes the way we think. After all, it is "Things That Make Us Smart."
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Carl Shapiro and Hal Varian: Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Network Economy (1998: Harvard Business Press)
— This "new" Internet economy isn't that new: it is still governed by the standard economic principles. What is new is the emphasis on such concepts as lock-in, cost of switching (how much time, money, and effort a customer must expend to switch from one competitive product to another), the importance of intellectual property rights, standards, the impact of network effects, and positive feedback. In The Invisible Computer I distinguished between substitutable and non-substitutable goods. This book provides a richer and deeper discussion of the issues. Shapiro and Varian are economists at UC, Berkeley. This book is must reading for those who wish to understand today's business wars.
Although I find the analyses in Information Rules cogent, I felt more and more disturbed as I read the book, starting halfway through and increasing as I got to the end. The reason? The complete lack of morality. The authors are pure economists who see the interplay of companies and business strategies as economic games to be analyzed as quaint exercises for the reader. There is no sense that the customers so blithely talked about are more than economic numbers, that they are people. Customer service, treating customers properly, even the time-tested management theories of one-to-one marketing where the customer really does matter are either bypassed or analyzed solely in terms of economic impact. Whatever happened to doing right because it was right, not because the economics worked out?
Thus, if you have loyal, dedicated customers and you are about to introduce a new product that will make all their investments obsolete, what do you do? Answer-- soak them-- after all, those dummies are loyal, they will follow you no matter what you do to them. Charge your loyal customers the most, but offer discounts and other enticements to those who are not your customers to induce them to switch. (If you must, disable something so you can justify the price difference.)
This, by the way, is exactly how Apple Computer has always treated its most loyal customers. And it is the trick that IBM used in its Series E laser printers: they added a part that slowed up the printing speed of the cheaper model from 10 pages/minute to 5 so that they could charge a lot more money for the same printer that didn't have that part.
Exploit the power of lock-in to make it difficult for them to switch away. (Notice how Microsoft Office readily imports files from all of its competitors (lowering the cost of switching from them to Microsoft) but it does not offer such easy ways of writing files readable by the competitors (making the cost of switching from Microsoft high). The same story is repeated with regard to "open systems," the development of international standards, and other business tactics. There is no sense of right or wrong, only economics.
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