Kindle Price:	CDN$ 1.29
	includes free international wireless delivery via *Amazon Whispernet*
Sold by:	Amazon.com.ca, Inc.

The Internet of Garbage by [Sarah Jeong]

Follow the Author

Sarah Jeong

The Internet of Garbage Kindle Edition

by Sarah Jeong (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

4.4 265 ratings

See all formats and editions

Amazon Price

New from

Used from

Kindle Edition

"Please retry"

$1.29

—

Kindle Edition
$1.29 Read with Our Free App

“The internet is, and always has been, mostly garbage,” argues Sarah Jeong in her book about the intractable problem of online harassment, The Internet of Garbage. First published in 2015, Jeong’s text provides an accessible look at how online harassment works, how it might be categorized and understood, and why the structure of the internet and the policies surrounding it are incapable of stamping it out. Jeong provides a clear taxonomy to better discuss the motivations behind and impact of online harassment, including doxing and SWATting. She outlines why the tactics for fighting spam and enforcing copyright laws can’t cope with harassment, especially where it intersects with issues of free speech and censorship. She argues that the marketplace of ideas is something that has never truly existed for everyone across race and gender, and suggests that architectural solutions are needed. “There are two futures for social media platforms. One involves professional, expert moderation entwined with technical solutions. The other is sweatshops of laborers clicking away at tickets.”

The stakes for getting the internet right could not be higher. As Jeong outlines in her new preface for this interim 2018 edition published by The Verge, the online harassment tactics of Gamergate have now come to shadow executive orders, court rulings, even the newly appointed judiciary.

Sarah Jeong is a journalist and lawyer who graduated from Harvard Law School in 2014 and who currently serves on The New York Times editorial board. Formerly a senior writer at The Verge, Jeong has contributed to The Atlantic, The Washington Post, The New York Times Magazine, Motherboard, and more. Her extensive reporting and thorough analysis make her a leading expert on online communities, norms, and harassment.

Print length

93 pages
Language

English
Sticky notes

On Kindle Scribe
Publication date

Aug. 23 2018
File size

7222 KB
Page Flip

Enabled
Word Wise

Not Enabled
Enhanced typesetting

Enabled
See all details

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07GT9C337
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Vox Media, Inc. (Aug. 23 2018)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 7222 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 93 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #488,614 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #409 in Social Media Guides
- #3,694 in Computer History & Culture (Books)
- #488,614 in Kindle eBooks

Customer Reviews:
4.4 265 ratings

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Sarah Jeong

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read author blogs and more

Simone Browne
97
Kindle Edition
$26.99
Martin Gurri
602
Kindle Edition
$9.99
Cixin Liu
1,723
Kindle Edition
$12.99

Top review from Canada

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Geoff

Very Good Intro to Internet Garbage

Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on September 22, 2018

Verified Purchase

I was drawn to this short book after the whole fiasco of Sarah Jeong's addition to the New York Times.

This book identifies what is more or less termed as Garbage on the Internet. Garbage is more or less defined here as SPAM, trolling, hate speech, doxing and harassment among other related actions. From this identification, there are real world examples presented of how such actions have been applied to individuals, mostly women, and how those actions were handled. The handling of such being very poor from the platforms that were being used as vehicles to relay the actions, platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc.

A takeaway I have from this is how the author assesses possibly the best way to handle this garbage which is essentially how Riot Games did it with League of Legends. Rather than engaging contractors and outsource a ticketing system to call centres in the Philippines is a more detached stance on the issue, which reflects in the apparent lack of seriousness these platforms seems to take with this issue. Riot, in contrast, engaged professionals to analyze these behaviours and work with developers to better handle the in-game issues. An example, making the chat function opt-in as well as various other "architecture tweaks and a user-run system of user accountability, designed by a dedicated team." I completely agree with the author as this being the best way to handle these serious issues.

Overall, I found this short book to be very well presented and the topic adequately discussed with very good insights. The writing style is journalistic and given that this is what the author is, a journalist, I can say it is very much on point.

I would recommend this as required reading to anyone who wants to learn more about issues of spam, harassment and various other "garbage" issues that can happen to you while engaging on the Internet.

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

G. J. Baumbach

Terrific discussion of Internet harassment

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 2, 2018

Verified Purchase

Author does an excellent job of defining what online harassment is, and how it might be dealt with. Looking forward to the updated version when it arrives.

M. T. Crenshaw

Precise, concise and sensible book on serius online issues

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 18, 2015

Verified Purchase

The Internet of Garbage is a personal reading for me because many of the issues discussed in the book have affected me personally, directly, in my online life and too often to consider them isolated incidents.

The Internet of Garbage is a short book, (or rather booklet) on different issues related to the garbage invading the Internet. The book is a very honest in-depth approach to the Internet on areas like gender harassment and vilification, doxing, SWATing, trolling, moderation, free speech and spam from a person who knows, inside out, how social networks and online platforms work and the legal and technical issues affecting them.

What is garbage? What constitutes spam? What does spam and harassment have in common? How does this garbage present itself online? What do do with it? What should we do with it? Are the procedures to control this garbage working or not, and why? Moderation or blocking? Free speech or banning? Which groups are more likely to be harassed? Which groups are more likely to take the case to the Police and Court? Is harassment gendered or coloured? Why is online harassment so scary? Does harassment occur because the Internet is too big or too small? These are some of the questions that Jeong tackles and replies to in this book.

What I like the most about this book is not the focus on issues that or great interest to me, or the knowledge on the area Jeong has, but the fact that she has a natural tendency to balance her own discourse, to see the pros and cons of anything she says, and to analyse any given aspect from different sides, never in a monolithic way. You have to praise that sort of old-school savoir fair because it is a rare thing nowadays.

Jeong offers a deep analysis that is missing from many books on the Internet, which can pinpoint and whine about the flaws of the system but aren't able to propose solutions to tackle situations for very difficult online issues. Some of the stuff Jeong discusses is very technical, with legal implications, but it is presented in an approachable language.

Jeong makes terrific points about how to deal with the crap on the Internet. She is convinced that the the architecture of the Internet and the focus on behaviour (and not content) in the codes and policies of a given site are the key to curb down the volume and nastiness of online garbage. You cannot solve the problem of harassment, threats and abuse on the Internet by focusing just on the content posted but by focusing on and addressing the behaviour that generates it. You can remove all the nasty comments manually but you aren't really creating a well-behaved online community that promotes healthy behaviour and excludes the usual mob of sociopathic misogynists and those who befriend them. She shows how functional platforms can be built and structured to promote a flow of information, code of conduct and self-regulatory rules that promote healthy behaviour and naturally mute the garbage. Banning, blocking, filtering are just small tools that won't solve the problem, just give relief to the victims. Code is never neutral, the architecture of the Internet matters enormously.

I find this very important, personally. I was recently insulted for a review that has 3.5 stars and the troll thought it was too low. He didn't uttered a swear word, but insulted me upfront, obvious to anybody with two eyes. I contacted the moderation team, as this troll is not a regular reviewer, and every time he comes to the site is to annoy me. The moderator told me that unless the comment is explicitly racist or contains profanity (something very subjective depending on your religion and culture!) they cannot erased them. I deleted his comments myself. His activity in the site is being tracked by the moderation team, though. Even if he is eventually banned, he could reappear using another email address and nick and nothing would be solved. That is so because bad behaviour is not tackled by the moderation policies of the site. I mentioned this book to the lovely guy who attended my complaint. Oh. Yes!

Although Jeong focus a good deal on well-known cases of female harassment online (Caroline Criado Pérez, Anita Sarkeesian, Amanda Hess, Zoe Quinn, Kathy Sierra), she calls the attention on the fact that not only women are targeted. independent male thinkers also are. And, of course, Afro-Americans, Latinos, gays, immigrants, and any minority who are not in the media often because, at least in the States, they think it twice before going to the Police to complain on any issue, not just about online harassment.

I love Jeon's analysis of how online sites deal with spam detection, deletion and control, ad extracts positive conclusions that could be applied to dealing with harassment. Also inspired is her discourse on the relation between discourses of free speech on the internet, banning and the USA's First Amendment to the Constitution.

Jeon is also great at showing how the inadequacy and inefficiency of the system has lead to people who had suffered from severe harassment, doxing, SWATing and physical attacks included, had to retort to intricate legal openings, like Copyright Laws to find a way to deal with their issue (García v. Google).

Despite this being a good book, the language used is dry, clinical and a bit uninspired if the target is the general public. It is jargon-free, that is great, yet, a bit aseptic. I understand that, for a lawyer or person with a legal background, the definition of what a word means is utterly important, that matters in Court, as much as the punctuation of a given text, or the tone of the text. Yet, unless you are in Court or writing and targeting a specific group of readers, you don't need to define what spam is or what garbage is. My opinion.

The title doesn't make any favour to the book as it is misleading. It seems to imply that all Internet is crap, while, in fact, the book focus on how much garbage the Internet has, and the need to clean it up and how to do this. One day Internet and garbage might be synonyms but, they are not so as yet.

Just a typo correction note - Please, write Spanish surnames with their proper accent, Pérez and García are not accented throughout the book.

The Internet of Garbage is a great reading, a very thought-provoking book with a babble-free crapola-free discourse. This is also a great book to quote when we deal with moderation teams that adduce obsolete codes of conduct that focus on content not on behaviour to leave trolls and pathological misogynists camp at will in our space.

6 people found this helpful

W. Kimeria

This is a really good book about the web that could be if we were willing to invest in making it welcome for all, and holding bad actors accountable.

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on April 2, 2019

Verified Purchase

This is a really good book about the web that could be if we were willing to invest in making it welcome for all, and holding bad actors accountable.

Anil Dash

Absolutely essential reading

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 7, 2015

Verified Purchase

I've been working in the social media industry for as long as it has existed, dealing with every kind of structural abuse, harassment and other form of "garbage" we encounter online. And this is the single best resource ever created for understanding the cultural, social, legal and technical work that must be done to keep the majority of people online safe from the small but determined bad actors that currently define and defile online culture.

11 people found this helpful

Pedro Demo

Internet is not just garbage

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on September 7, 2015

Verified Purchase

Jeong offers a lot of exemples of Internet misuse, her most explored argument to highlight cases of reputation deep damage. She discusses in journalistic jargon free speech limits – there can be no absolute freedom, because absolute freedom damages others’ freedom. “The internet of garbage” exaggerates the issue, when she suggests Internet as garbage. Misuse doesn’t eliminate use. But the examples analyzed in this book, together with the need of improving law concerning reputation damages in the Internet, are worth taking in account.

Amazon Music Stream millions of songs	Amazon Advertising Find, attract and engage customers	Amazon Business Everything for your business	Amazon Drive Cloud storage from Amazon	Amazon Web Services Scalable Cloud Computing Services

Book Depository Books With Free Delivery Worldwide	Goodreads Book reviews & recommendations	IMDb Movies, TV & Celebrities	Amazon Photos Unlimited Photo Storage Free With Prime	Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands

Warehouse Deals Open-Box Discounts	Whole Foods Market We Believe in Real Food	Amazon Renewed Like-new products you can trust	Blink Smart Security for Every Home

Follow the Author

The Internet of Garbage Kindle Edition

Product details

About the author

Sarah Jeong

Customers who bought this item also bought

Customer reviews

Top review from Canada

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries

Sorry, there was a problem.

Sorry, there was a problem.

Follow the Author

The Internet of Garbage Kindle Edition

Product details

About the author

Sarah Jeong

Customers who bought this item also bought

Customer reviews

Top review from Canada

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Top reviews from other countries