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Non-hierarchical patterns of relationships, distributed flow: these are the things I thought about when I saw the title of the book Olhares da Rede (Perspectives on the Net), written by students from the Cásper Líbero College. It revolves around a discussion between five international authors who develop their opinions on the themes, and it can be downloaded for free!

The other electronic book that awakened my interest is CulturaDigital.Br, written by members of the CulturaDigital community, which was created by the federal government to stimulate discussion and collaboration around the use of the Internet by everyday people in everyday life.

Cultura Digital

Organized by Rodrigo Savazoni and Sérgio Cohn, under the supervision of José Murilo Jr. and Álvaro Malaguti, members of the executive committee of the Brazilian Forum for Digital Culture, the book is a collection of provocations.

“We intend this work to stimulate the network to reflect on contemporary challenges. We try to map the main questions around digital culture via open conversations with thinkers in various fields. It’s a way to open a dialogue,” explains Savazoni. “Generally, books are published at the end of a project. In this case we published the book at the beginning, so the ideas would circulate, advance, and come together.”

• The book includes interviews with Alfredo Manevy, André Lemos, André Parente, André Stolarski, André Vallias, Antonio Risério, Bernardo Esteves, Claudio Prado, Eduardo Viveiros de Castro, Eugênio Bucci, Fernando Haddad, Franklin Coelho, Gilberto Gil, Guido Lemos, Hélio Kuramoto, Jane de Almeida, Juca Ferreira, Ladislau Dowbor, Laymert Garcia dos Santos, Lucas Santtana, Marcelo Tas, Marcos Palácios, Ronaldo Lemos, Sergio Amadeu and Suzana Herculano-Houzel.

Check out the site to download Cultura Digital.

Olhares da Rede

This book discusses the ideas of five authors who ponder the world of digital networks. It grew out of the sessions of critical readings held at Cásper Líbero, such as the activities of the Group for Research in Communications, Technology and Net Culture.

Yochai Benkler, Manuel Castells, Henry Jenkins, Lawrence Lessig and Douglas Rushkoff are part of our reflections on cyberculture, and form a group of thinkers whose ideas inspire our investigations, both graduate and undergraduate.

“We want this collection to highlight some key ideas from these five thinkers, that can contribute towards building critical theories on contemporary communicative phenomena that emerge within networks,” says Sergio Amadeu.

“The discontinuity, self-similarity, randomness and the notion of chaos present in Rushkoff’s work support our understanding of the networks and their phenomena of self-organization, collaborative practices and sharing that advance these dynamic systems beyond jargon, such as Web 2.0, Web 3.0. They exceed linear narratives that ignore their revolutionary potential.”

• Presentations: Prof. Dr. Sergio Amadeu; Contributors: Cláudia Castelo Branco, Fabrício Ofuji, Luciano Matsuzaki, Murilo Machado, Rodrigo Fonseca; Authors surveyed: Yochai Benkler, Lawrence Lessig, Henry Jenkins, Douglas Rushkoff, Manuel Castells.

Visit the site to download Olhares da Rede (e-book is in Portuguese).