I Have Alot to Learn

As I read there are times, I must admit, that I am completely lost. I did not realize until I started reading this book just how unaware I am of the technology around me. I am victim of the major companies and their propoganda. As I was reading chapters five and six I was in complete agreement with Rheingold and the individuals he interviewed such as Steve Mann. It was then that I realized I am one of the people mindlessly feeding the companies who are quietly taking advantage of the public's ignorance in an effort to pad their million dollar bank accounts.

Like many other Americans who carry around the incorrect notion that our country is the center of all development, a part of me really believed that the latest cellular phones in the new Verizon or Sprint commercials were the height of all technological development so far. Well, I was very wrong. I had no idea they were so far ahead of us in countries such as Japan, building entire wireless communities and creating clothing with computers in it! Who knew? Certainly not me.

I think a part of this is due to Rheingold's comment about computers being a world of their own. Learning about computers, for the most part, requires aquiring a whole new vocabulary that can only be used in that world, and if that's a world you don't visit very often, how likely are you to maintain your new knowledge? Where in the world did they come up with words like "blog" or "podcast"? It truly boggles my mind. While I am slowely sorting out the knowledge and learning my new language, I feel as though the more I read this book the more clueless I find out I am.

In addition, I think our ignorance is due to what I have previously mentioned. The companies trying to control our knowledge of technologies. Keeping us in the dark so we go along with whatever they put in front of us. Their businesses would be completely damaged if everyone started building their own wireless phones or making improvements and challenging their ideas of buying airtime and spending hundreds of dollars a month. They are taking advantage of the public and slowely attempting to distintigrate "the commons" due to their own self-interest. As Rheingold said, "few are controlling all," and I know I don't like the thought of that anymore.

Overall, I am enjoying the awareness this book is raising in my own mind and hope it will continue.