Posted by
Riklaa on May 8, 2010 at 10:16pm
The Virtual Revolution
Twenty years on from the invention of the world wide web, Dr Aleks Krotoski looks at how it is reshaping almost every aspect of our lives.
Produced by the World Service in collaboration with The Open University
(An audio adaptation of the BBC2 TV series)
64/44/mono; 42 MB total; extracted from podcasts
1: The Great Levelling?
First broadcast 22nd February 2010
In the first in this four-part series, Aleks charts the extraordinary rise of blogs, Wikipedia and YouTube, and traces an ongoing clash between the freedom the technology offers us, and our innate human desire to control and profit.
Joined by some of the web's biggest names - including the founders of Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, Apple and Microsoft, and the web's inventor - she explores how far the web has lived up to its early promise.
The founding father of the web Tim Berners-Lee, believed his invention would remain an open frontier that nobody could own, and that it would take power from the few and give it to the many.
Now, in a provocative, strongly authored argument, presenter Aleks will re-assess utopian claims like these, made over many years by the digital revolution's key innovators - and test them against the hard realities of the emerging web today, exploring how the possibilities of the pure technology have been constrained, even distorted by the limitations of human nature.
2: Enemy of the state
First broadcast 1 March 2010
In this second part in the series, Dr Aleks Krotoski charts how, for better and for worse, the web is reshaping our relationship to authority and forging a new brand of politics.
Featuring stories from the digital front line in China, Iran and Eastern Europe Aleks presents a guide to how the web is redrawing the political landscape and unleashing a battle of ideas across the world.
Aleks tells the inside story of the how the web is being used in pro-democracy demonstrations in Iran and direct action environmental campaigning here in the UK.
She examines the effect of unmediated and interactive sites like Twitter and YouTube Ð how they can generate a flood of news and link protests in moments, prompting instant reaction from across the globe that then feeds back into events unfolding on the ground.
Yet while struggles for freedom capture the headlines, the programme also reveals how quietly in their wake the web is shifting power, sometimes menacingly, in ways we never imagined.
In China, the authorities have proved extremely skilled in censoring and spying on the quarter of a billion Chinese who use the web, employing an estimated 300,000 pro-government bloggers to bolster support for the regime.
The web has also given new voice to extremist factions like Al Qaeda and is even generating new forms of warfare.
Aleks tells the incredible story of how Estonia was brought to its knees by a string of cyber attacks launched by a handful of teenage Russian hackers.Virtual Revolution 100222-ws The Great Levelling.mp3
Virtual Revolution 100301-ws Enemy of the State.mp3
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3: The Cost Of Free
First broadcast 8 March 2010
In the third programme in the series, Dr Aleks Krotoski charts how the web has impacted businesses - and in particular the idea that people can get "something for nothing" online.
Aleks gives the lowdown on how, for better and for worse, commerce has colonised the web - and reveals how web users are paying for what appear to be free sites and services in hidden ways.
Joined by some of the most influential business leaders of today's web, including Jeff Bezos (CEO of Amazon), Eric Schmidt (CEO of Google), Chad Hurley (CEO of YouTube), Bill Gates, Martha Lane Fox and Reed Hastings (CEO of Netflix), Aleks traces how business, with varying degrees of success, has attempted to make money on the web.
She tells the inside story of the gold rush years of the dotcom bubble, and reveals how retailers such as Amazon learned the lessons.
She also charts how, out of the ashes, Google forged the business model that has come to dominate today's web, offering a plethora of highly attractive, overtly free web services - including search, maps and video - that are in fact funded through a sophisticated and highly lucrative advertising system which trades on what we users look for.
Aleks explores how web advertising is evolving further to become more targeted and relevant to individual consumers.
Recommendation engines, pioneered by retailers such as Amazon, are also breaking down the barriers between commerce and consumer by marketing future purchases to us based on our previous choices.
On the surface, the web appears to have brought about a revolution in convenience. But, as companies start to build up databases on our online habits and preferences, Aleks questions what this may mean for our notions of privacy and personal space in the 21st century.
4: Homo Interneticus
First broadcast 15 March 2010
In the fourth programme in the series, Dr Aleks Krotoski looks at how the internet is changing our very behaviour - and even our brain functions.
Joined by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Al Gore and the neuroscientist Susan Greenfield, Aleks examines the popularity of social networks such as Facebook.
How are they changing our relationships? Do they bring us together - or do they end up leaving us more isolated?
And, in a ground-breaking test at University College London, Aleks investigates how the Web may be distracting and overloading our brains.
Virtual Revolution 100308-ws The Cost of Free.mp3
Virtual Revolution 100315-ws Homo Interneticus.mp3