Links to reviews and critiques of Silicon Snake Oil

 

Take a look at Clifford Stoll's (author of Silicon Snake Oil) web page to get an introduction to his issues
Clifford Stoll's Page - http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~stoll/silicon_snake_oil.html

Read some of the excerpts from the book – Silicon Snake Oil
Book Listing @ Amazon (with 31 sample pages)

Reviews on Silicon Snake Oil
Book Review by Rory McGreal - http://www.ibiblio.org/cmc/mag/1995/sep/mcgreal.html

This review argues against most of Stoll’s points.


Book Review by - Jackie M. Dooley, Head of Special Collections and University Archives Main Library, Univ. of California, Irvine,
http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/1995/04/msg00137.html

Of the links on this page, this is about the only positive review of Stoll’s work.

Teacher essays that reflect on Internet issues
Reflections on Silicon - Essays by several technology teacher on the issues raised by the Stoll Article. - http://ed.tsud.edu/tcubed/reflections/reflect_silicon_snake_oil.htm

Most of these reflections argue against Stoll’s premises.

 

My opinion on five of Stoll’s premises

  • Schools, libraries, and even businesses are being sold down the river, wasting money on ineffective and counterproductive computing systems.

An excerpt from:  http://palimpsest.stanford.edu/byform/mailing-lists/exlibris/1995/04/msg00137.html

 

 
With this fear at heart, Stoll takes on the "virtual library" in
 
strong and direct terms:  "the bookless library is a dream, a
 
hallucination of online addicts, network neophytes, and library-
 
automation insiders."
 
 
 
He advances four arguments against the realization of the virtual
 
library.  First up is copyright.  Libraries don't own the rights
 
to the current material in their collections, and cannot put
 
pages online without getting sued or paying hefty fees.  This is
 
not about to change anytime soon.
 
 
 
For older material, the sheer cost of digitization is staggering.
 
He estimates $100 per book for error-corrected OCR scanning.
 
Every 10,000 books eats up $1 million.  Every million books eats
 
up $100 million, and who has got that kind of money?
 
 
 
And even if some post Newt-onian administration were willing to
 
put up several billion to digitize, let's say, the collections of
 
the Library of Congress, Stoll raises the truly devastating
 
argument of technological obsolesence.
 
 
 
"Electronic media aren't archival," he pronounces, and invites
 
the reader to contemplate the many extinct formats that dot the
 
20th century landscape:  80-column punch cards, 8-track tapes,
 
78-rpm records, 5 1/2 inch floppies, and so on.
 
 

 

 
He invites readers to consider Shakespeare's 18th sonnet, which
 
ends:
 
 
 
     Nor shall death brag thou wandrest in his shade,
 
     When in eternal lines to time thou growest,
 
     So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
 
     So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
 
 
 
The first printed edition, dated 1609, is still readable.  Had
 
Shakespeare put it on a magnetic disk, it would have deteriorated
 
completely in 10 years.  Had he used "Electric-Pencil," an early
 
word processing package, well who of us can "call up" such
 
documents today?
 
I have to agree with this first premise.  Especially in the case of libraries becoming virtual libraries.  The expense to make all books in electronic version would be astronomical and as illustrated above the storage format would be impractical.  We have moved from tape, to 5.5 floppy, to 3.25 floppy to CD in a very short period of time.  The format of storage would need to updated this would increase the expense.  Nothing beats actually being able to hold a book in your hand and thumb through the pages.  I, myself, can’t stand reading books in electronic format.  Even when working on the computer, I much prefer working from a manual that explains how something works than working from a help menu.
 
In education, I have seen plenty of wasted money on technology.  Every middle school in Montgomery County has copies of “Inspiration” software on computers.
There software gets very little usage.  “Geometer’s Sketchpad and Algeblaster are also another two examples of “garbage software”. They exist on every machine in Montgomery County with very little usage.  “CodeWarrior” a JAVA interpreter / compiler was purchased for every high school in Montgomery County Public Schools.  I fail to understand this given the availability of free downloads.

 
  • Information available over the Internet is often stale, incomplete, misleading, unreviewed, or simply wrong.

 

I agree with this premise.  There seems to be plenty of information to wade through on the internet in order to find some good information.  Taking this course has confirmed my frustration in wading through the “garbage” in order to find the “gems”.  Anyone can publish information on the internet with no one reviewing the information.

 
  • Face to face meetings are far more meaningful -- and valuable -- than disembodied network interactions.

 

I agree with this premise.  This is the second on-line course I have taken.  Nothing beats face to face meetings with an instructor.  In a face to face meeting facial cues are important.  An instructor can see by the looks on peoples faces and general reaction whether or not instructional objectives are being met. 

 

 
  • E-mail is clumsy, inefficient, and impersonal. It appears to be free, yet is actually quite expensive, and can be much slower than ordinary postal mail.

 

I agree that e-mail is impersonal.  It is an excellent way to keep in touch with someone.  E-mail is an excellent way to give parents a short synopsis of their student’s efforts.  But a better way is a face to face communication or a telephone call. 

I have never experienced e-mail being slower than postal mail. So I would have to disagree with this part of the premise.

 

 

 

 

 

 

  • The Internet is a poor place for commerce ... it's missing one critical ingredient. Hint: digital cash won't solve this problem!

This premise has proved to be somewhat true.  Many .com companies have had an initial boom then a bust.  What has been discovered is that there needs to be some concrete product or service being provided.  The web sites that are successful are the ones associated with established businesses.  Customers are concerned with security and purchasing items with a credit card.  I have made some credit card purchases on the internet with some reservation.  In general, I prefer handling the items that I would like to purchase.

One area where I think internet commerce could be successful would be in the area of grocery shopping.  I can envision automated grocery shopping.  One would only need to shop at the local grocery store several times.  Items purchased could be tracked electronically.  Each week you could open a checklist on a web page.  Check off the items that you would like for the week. Pay with a credit card.

Someone picks the items for you at the grocery store and bingo, bango, bongo your grocery shopping is done for the week.  The final step would be to pick up the order.