Briefly Noted
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Creative License: The Law and Culture of Digital Sampling, Kembrew McLeod and Peter DiCola. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2011. 325p. $23.95 (ISBN 978-0-8223-4875-7)
Creative License: The Law and Culture of Digital Sampling, serves as a scholarly companion piece to the documentary film Copyright Criminals (Indiepix Films, 2010; briefly reviewed in the January 2011 issue of portal). It looks at the history and issues surrounding musical sampling, whose freewheeling origins among rap and hip-hop artists in the 1980s gave way to an increasingly complex artistic environment as many different stakeholders challenged the terms of use of copyrighted music. Having interviewed over 100 artists, lawyers, executives, scholars, and journalists for this book, one of the most engaging elements of Creative License is that each section within a chapter begins with a relevant quote from one of the stakeholders. For librarians and administrators, the chapters on the sampling copyright clearance system, its effects on creativity, and proposals for revision will be most useful, as the legal issues have become important to creative pursuits in general. [End Page 228]
How the Page Matters, Bonnie Mak. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011. 129p. $55 (ISBN 978-0-8020-9760-6)
Bonnie Mak, who holds faculty appointments in both the Graduate School of Library and Information Science and the Program for Medieval Studies at the University of Illinois, has produced a subtle case study of manuscript, print, and digital editions (including translations) of the Controversia de nobilitate, a 1428 humanist text by Buonaccorso de Montetemagno. She traces the different social meanings conveyed through physical platform, script, layout, illustration, and paratextual elements such as headings, dedications, and prefaces. She refutes the common belief that the print and digital revolutions marked radical breaks in the design and reception of the page. Her final chapter analyzes two very different digital presentations of the Controversia, in Early English Books Online and the collection of the Royal Library of Belgium. This book is highly recommended for designers of digital libraries.
Information Users and Usability in the Digital Age, G.G. Chowdhury and Sudatta Chowdhury. New York: Neal-Schuman, 2011. 208p. $95 (ISBN 978-1-55570-807-8)
The authors of this welcome overview teach at the University of Technology in Sydney, Australia, and it is probable that the book is partly designed as an introduction to user studies, but it more than that. It is also a skillful literature review of the most important theories and models of user behavior and its assessment. Perhaps most interesting for experienced librarians will be the treatment of new and emerging issues in the age of the open Web: “uncertainty” as a key to information retrieval, increased pressure to meet the needs of a highly diverse global user community, the need for information seeking to be fun, and issues of the persistent (though often ignored) digital divide. Almost all academic librarians need to conduct usability studies from time to time, and this book would be a good place to start.
The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom, Evgeny Morozov. New York: PublicAffairs, 2011. 432p. $65 (ISBN 978-1-58648-874-1)
The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom addresses cyber-utopianism and Internet-centrism, the former the idea that the Internet will ineluctably lead to democracy and freedom and the latter that political engagement and democracy promotion begins with and centers around the Internet. Author Evgeny Morozov is a journalist with widespread international experience. He surveys the uses to which the Internet has been put in countries where citizens are struggling to open up their societies. He describes how the Internet can be used not only to spread information but also government propaganda and disinformation; how the Internet can bring concerned citizens together but also provides a wonderful vehicle for snooping and the invasion of privacy; and how the ties among activists on the Internet are often tepid and enervating. It’s a nice reminder for those interested in libraries that the Internet is just a tool that can be used for good or for ill. One thing that would have improved The Net Delusion is a...
