David Hughes finished reading Walled culture by Glyn Moody
Walled culture by Glyn Moody, Glyn Moody
Walled Culture is the first book providing a compact, non-technical history of digital copyright and its problems over the last …
Grumpy Scottish late career librarian living in Dublin and working in Further Education. Open scholarship enthusiast. Shill for Big Library. Power-hungry gatekeeper. King of infinite space. He/him/his. I read a lot. I "like" (some) sport, politics, walking and my family. Happy to be here and eager to see what happens next ...with everything.
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Walled Culture is the first book providing a compact, non-technical history of digital copyright and its problems over the last …
Despite the undergraduate essay level of writing, this book is essential reading for anyone interested in the future of the Internet. Some may find the the chapter on academic publishing a real eye-opener and the discussion of the EU copyright directive terrifying. Though heavy going at times, the book is extensively referenced (with all links using the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine). It's a pity that the book's publication preceded the rise of generative AI, as the liberal use of ChatGPT and suchlike does raise some interesting questions about copyright.
Memory makes reality.
That’s what New York City cop Barry Sutton is learning as he investigates the devastating phenomenon the …
The other Crouch books I've read have been better plotted than written. Happily that isn't the case here. I wasn't expecting much, but the whole false memory premise does take very interesting and thoughtful directions. Happy to give it five stars, for the plot, the exploration of the central conceit and the open-ended... ending which is bound to disappoint all those who like things wrapped up neatly (I like to think of "Don't Stop Believin'" playing on the jukebox in the bar), but it really is a pale imitation of Ken Grimwood's 'Replay', which I heartily recommend to the two or three people who'll see this review (and to everyone else who won't).
The author of Stiff and Bonk explores the irresistibly strange universe of space travel and life without gravity. Space is …
Mary Roach hits the sweet spot of being informative and entertaining; I really love her sense of humour. It's written with a light touch that often brings through the personalities of the astronauts. As a librarian who gives classes on digital literacy, I especially enjoyed the shredding of the Enos the chimp anecdote - check the sources, people. Not sure I can use it in class though.
The eponym is a hard-boiled Canadian ex-serviceman plying his trade as a private dick in early 1950s Glasgow. He's also a gangland gopher for the three bosses who run crime in the city. When a second-tier gangster with aspirations is murdered, Lennox investigates. Femme fatales, thuggish cops, morally ambiguous heroes; the author rummages through the big bag of noir tropes to serve up a bland and convoluted tale with too high a body count. I didn't find the period setting authentic and do Canadians really play "ice" hockey? The constant dissing of Glasgow, the Scots and Scotland was very tedious and the distal good guys were not to my taste. Lennox has potential and the first in a series always suffers from the world-building that has to be done. Reading subsequent books in series might be a worthwhile journey, but not one I'll be undertaking.
Shady private investigator Lennox is a hard man in a hard city at a hard time: Glasgow, 1953, where the …
Charming, if quite anodyne, tale of life in a Glasgow tenement in the immediate post-WWII period. Outside of those - like myself - who have a link to [Glasgow] tenement life, perhaps this is more interest for its historical aspects. Yeah there's a little "poverty, religious bigotry, racism, heartbreak, lies, violence, and death" but its mostly quite ...cosy. There's a rank bad yin, whom to call one-dimensional would be to grossly overstate his depth. Potentially interesting storylines are often resolved too quickly and without any great drama. Still, it rattles along and the author provides plenty of verisimilitude. I'll happily look out for the sequels. With a little tinkering would make a decent TV miniseries.
This is an utterly charming story about twelve families and their tightly knit street in 1950s Maryhill. Following the end …
Andrew Yancy, late of the Miami Police, soon-to-be-late of the Key West Police, has a human arm in his freezer. …
When Daniel Blackland was six, he ingested his first bone fragment, a bit of kraken spine plucked out of the …
Every year, on my summer holiday, I read a lot of books; there are days where I do nothing but read. Reading so many books in such a short space of time, you get a real feel for author styles and ability to turn a phrase. Therefore I might have enjoyed this more if I'd read it more in isolation, but it suffered by being read immediately after the Connolly and Kadrey books. There's nothing particularly wrong with it, but it doesn't stand it out. It chugs along at a decent pace but is all a bit meh - doesn't transcend its tropes.
A lone astronaut must save the earth from disaster in this incredible new science-based thriller from the Sunday Times bestselling …
The hype over The Martian passed me by. If it hadn't, then I wouldn't have read this. Having read this, I shan't be reading any other Andy Weir books in the immediate future. There is the kernel of a good book in here, but it's ruined - for me - by firstly, excessive attention to detail. It's the textual equivalent of one of those less interesting Star Trek TNG episodes where the crew encounter a Problem which is eventually solved by the appliance of science. Sadly, the Enterprise crew were far more engaging than the underdeveloped protagonist here who is merely seems a frame on which to hang calculations. Secondly, Weir's problem solving is at his strongest when examining physical & engineering problems, but the biological nature of the Problem I found a bit silly. Thirdly and this is a problem that extends to a lot of science fiction, Weir's …
The hype over The Martian passed me by. If it hadn't, then I wouldn't have read this. Having read this, I shan't be reading any other Andy Weir books in the immediate future. There is the kernel of a good book in here, but it's ruined - for me - by firstly, excessive attention to detail. It's the textual equivalent of one of those less interesting Star Trek TNG episodes where the crew encounter a Problem which is eventually solved by the appliance of science. Sadly, the Enterprise crew were far more engaging than the underdeveloped protagonist here who is merely seems a frame on which to hang calculations. Secondly, Weir's problem solving is at his strongest when examining physical & engineering problems, but the biological nature of the Problem I found a bit silly. Thirdly and this is a problem that extends to a lot of science fiction, Weir's aliens are not particularly alien and the shared techbro sense of humour is risible. Not my cup of tea, but I can appreciate how other readers might find this very enjoyable.