Manuel Castells: The Rise of the Network Society, 2nd ed. (2000/2009)
Filed under book | Tags: · city, economy, internet, network society, society, technology

This first book in Castells’ groundbreaking trilogy, with a substantial new preface, highlights the economic and social dynamics of the information age and shows how the network society has now fully risen on a global scale.
* Groundbreaking volume on the impact of the age of information on all aspects of society
* Includes coverage of the influence of the internet and the net-economy
* Describes the accelerating pace of innovation and social transformation
* Based on research in the USA, Asia, Latin America, and Europe
2nd Edition with a New Preface
Publisher John Wiley and Sons, 2009
Volume 1 of Information Age: Economy, Society, and Culture
ISBN 1405196866, 9781405196864
Length 656 pages
Marvin Minsky: The Emotion Machine: Commonsense Thinking, Artificial Intelligence, and the Future of the Human Mind (2006)
Filed under book | Tags: · artificial intelligence, emotion, mind, thinking

“In this book, Marvin Minsky argues persuasively that emotions, intuitions, and feelings are not distinct things, but different ways of thinking.
By examining these different forms of mind activity, Minsky says, we can explain why our thought sometimes takes the form of carefully reasoned analysis and at other times turns to emotion. He shows how our minds progress from simple, instinctive kinds of thought to more complex forms, such as consciousness or self-awareness. And he argues that because we tend to see our thinking as fragmented, we fail to appreciate what powerful thinkers we really are. Indeed, says Minsky, if thinking can be understood as the step-by-step process that it is, then we can build machines — artificial intelligences — that not only can assist with our thinking by thinking as we do but have the potential to be as conscious as we are.”
Publisher Simon & Schuster, 2006
ISBN 0743276647, 9780743276641
400 pages
PDF (updated on 2014-9-14)
HTML draft
Gerald Matt (ed.): Interviews 1-2 (2007, 2008) [English/German]
Filed under book | Tags: · 2000s, aesthetics, art, contemporary art, interview
Interviews 2
Conversations with 42 artists from Matthew Barney to Louise Bourgeois, Kunsthalle Wien, 2008.
The interviews within the “art system” presents a particularly suitable form of creating an equal platform of exchange between creator and distributor of art, a “medium”, which conveys authentic information from the artist to an audience interested in art as well as to art critique and theory. While integrating the narrative and personal, this way of self-positioning counteracts the image of the “speechless” visual artist – to a certain extent still being perpetuated today – and mirror the diversity of contemporary art production by a lively dialogue.
360 pages, 127 coloured and 10 b/w illustrations, foreword by Gerald Matt, ISBN 978-3-86560-364-7
Editor: Kunsthalle Wien, Gerald Matt
Publisher: Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Köln
Year: 2008
publisher (English)
publisher (German)
Interviews
The interviews, published in the book, are selected from a larger number of conversations with artists in the course of the recent curatorial and art publishing activities from Gerald Matt, Director Kunsthalle Wien
Over several years, he was able, in most cases, to observe these artists’ work through repeated personal encounters and as they passed through the international exhibition circuits.
356 pages, 127 coloured and 10 b/w illustrations, foreword by Gerald Matt
ISBN: 3-86560-186-3, 987-86560-186-5
Editor: Kunsthalle Wien, Gerald Matt
Publisher: Verlag der Buchhandlung Walther König, Köln
Year: 2007
publisher (English)
publisher (German)
PDF (Interviews 2, English)
PDF (Interviews 2, German)
PDF (Interviews, English)
PDF (Interviews, German)