New Releases by Clay Shirky

Almost unknown to the rest of the globe, Xiaomi has become the world's third-largest mobile phone manufacturer. Its high-end phones are tailored to Chinese and emerging markets, where it outsells even Samsung. Since the 1990s China has been climbing up the ladder of quality, from doing knockoffs to designing its own high-end goods. Xiaomi its name literally means "little rice" is landing squarely in this shift in China's economy. But the remarkable rise of Xiaomi from startup to colossus is more than a business story, because mobile phones are special. The common desiderata of the global population, mobile phones offer the kind of freedom and connectedness that autocratic countries are terrified of. China's fortune and future clearly lie with "opening up" to the global market, requiring it to allow local entrepreneurs to experiment. Clay Shirky, one of the most influential and original thinkers on how technological innovation affects social change around the world, now turns his attention to the most populous country of them all. The case of Xiaomi exemplifies the balancing act that China has to perfect to navigate between cheap copies and innovation, between the demands of local and global markets, and between freedom and control.

The author of the breakout hit Here Comes Everybody reveals how new technology is changing us for the better. In his bestselling Here Comes Everybody, Internet guru Clay Shirky provided readers with a much-needed primer for the digital age. Now, with Cognitive Surplus, he reveals how new digital technology is unleashing a torrent of creative production that will transform our world. For the first time, people are embracing new media that allow them to pool their efforts at vanishingly low cost. The results of this aggregated effort range from mind-expanding reference tools like Wikipedia to life-saving Web sites like Ushahidi.com, which allows Kenyans to report acts of violence in real time. Cognitive Surplus explores what's possible when people unite to use their intellect, energy, and time for the greater good.

Discusses and uses examples of how digital networks transform the ability of humans to gather and cooperate with one another.

"The New Normal features works made between 2001 and 2008 that draw on private information - ranging from home videos to financial data - for their raw material and subject matter. These works, and the catalogue essays, shed light on the new circumstances created by our highly technological society, in which private information has never been less private."--BOOK JACKET.

The buzz about Web Services gets louder every day. Is it just the latest hype, or is the promise of perfect interoperability, lower costs, and increased efficiency finally going to be fulfilled? Should you jump in now, or wait?Following the groundbreaking P2P Networking Overview from O'Reilly Research, Planning for Web Services guides tech executives and managers through the inflated claims, competing standards, and acronym soup to arrive at a realistic appraisal of Web Services' potential for your business.Through plainspoken, impartial analysis, Planning for Web Services maps out the current state and future prospects of this still-evolving technology, and lays out the critical technical and business issues you'll need to consider. After defining the scope of Web Services, the report looks at how they are being implemented today, and where and how they are likely to take hold in the near future. Topics include: How Web Services can replace EDI Using Web Services as middleware to create network-aware applications with RPC Advantages and hurdles to implementing Web Services on Intranet, Extranet, and public Internet sites Planning for Web Services profiles more than 30 of the key players in this emerging sector, from major tech companies like Sun, IBM, and Microsoft to startups that are driving much of the innovation in this space. The report concludes with a straightforward checklist of the strategic issues and questions every IT decision-maker should answer before committing to Web Services.

There's so much buzz about peer-to-peer these days, it's hard to separate facts from fiction. How do the peer-to-peer companies stack up? Which technologies are credible, and which will shake up our notions of how people use computers? More importantly, how do you see through the hype to the underlying architectures that yield opportunities for creating lasting value? The "2001 P2P Networking Overview" from O'Reilly Research is a comprehensive look at peer-to-peer from business and technical perspectives. We describe the state of the industry and offer our opinions about where it's going to go next, with hard data to back us up. What you will find in the report: Company profilesIn-depth explanations of the underlying technologiesP2P services: present and futureAnalysis of the hype: what the press gets wrongEstimates of mindshare and community sizeOur forecasts for the field About O'Reilly Research: In O'Reilly's book publishing business, web sites, and conferences, we've become famous for providing no-nonsense, in-depth information and insights about important technologies. We watch what leading-edge developers are doing, so we can tell when their work is about to "cross the chasm" and hit the mainstream. We provide the information that builds the bridge. O'Reilly combines extensive experience in new and emerging technologies with insider connection to the development community. At O'Reilly Research, we augment these insights with our exclusive statistical and computational techniques tailored for modeling, condensing, summarizing, and forecasting trends in software development.

Although Lee surrendered at Appomattox Court House in April, 1865, some Confederates refused to abandon their cause. Fallen Guidon, originally published in 1962 by Jack Rittenhouse's Stagecoach Press in 1962, is the gripping story of one such group of men who, rather than surrender, boldly decided to follow their cavalry flag or guidon south and transplant their imperialistic vision in the troubled soil of Mexico. This little-remembered episode of the Trans-Mississippi Civil War was written as a popular history by the late Edwin Adams Davis, a respected scholar of southern and Civil War history. General Jo Shelby had led the Missouri Cavalry Division through battles at Westport, Mine Creek, Newtonia, and elsewhere. Shelby's men were all recruits rather than draftees, fiercely loyal, and they followed the code of chivalry to a degree unusual even in the old South. While preparing to march against the Federals at Little Rock, they heard of Lee's surrender. In a meeting at Marshall, Texas, Shelby announced, "We will stand together, we will keep our organization, our arms, our discipline, our hatred of oppression . . . that this Missouri Cavalry Division preferred exile to submission—death to dishonor." Having heard that the U.S. government wanted the Habsburg emperor Maximilian out of Mexico and that Lincoln liked the idea of ex-Confederates joining forces with Benito Juarez to oust Maximilian and his French military forces, Shelby formed his plan. Shelby believed he had found a way to save their honor and at the same time spread their lost southern empire to a new land, where riches and glory surely awaited them. Shelby and his men marched through Texas, stopping in Corsicana, Tyler, Waxahachie, Waco, Austin, Houston, and San Antonio, declaring martial law and forcibly quelling local outbreaks of looting and rioting where they found it. At the Rio Grande, in a funereal memorial, they buried their Confederate battle flag in the murky waters before heading into Mexico. Shelby's men did not want to support Benito Juarez's liberal guerrillas, however. Identifying themselves as "imperialists," they wanted to fight gloriously for Emperor Maximilian. In pitched battles against the local Juaristas and isolated guerrillas and bandits, they spilled blood from Piedras Negras to Mexico City and even undertook the chivalrous and bloody rescue of a woman imprisoned in a hacienda. Once in Mexico City, Shelby's "Iron Brigade" discovered its march to have been futile, and in a bittersweet final review, Shelby said good-bye.

A tremendous way for the millions who would like to tap the resources of the Internet, but can't access it in their areas, can't afford it, or simply don't want to learn complicated protocols, this book shows how E-Mail users of MCI Mail, Prodigy, CompuServe, America OnLine, college or business E-Mail accounts, and other similar services can tap the vast resources of the Internet.