| Description |
1 online resource (232 pages) |
| Contents |
1. The shape of the network -- 2. Time-sharing virtualization -- 3. Data centers and data bunkers -- 4. Seeing the cloud data. |
| Summary |
We may imagine the digital cloud as placeless, mute, ethereal, and unmediated. Yet the reality of the cloud is embodied in thousands of massive data centers, any one of which can use as much electricity as a midsized town. Even all these data centers are only one small part of the cloud. Behind that cloud-shaped icon on our screens is a whole universe of technologies and cultural norms, all working to keep us from noticing their existence. In this book, Tung-Hui Hu examines the gap between the real and the virtual in our understanding of the cloud. Hu shows that the cloud grew out of such older networks as railroad tracks, sewer lines, and television circuits. He describes key moments in the prehistory of the cloud, from the game "Spacewar" as exemplar of time-sharing computers to Cold War bunkers that were later reused as data centers. Countering the popular perception of a new "cloudlike" political power that is dispersed and immaterial, Hu argues that the cloud grafts digital technologies onto older ways of exerting power over a population. |
| Note |
Print version record. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Subject |
Computer networks -- History -- Popular works.
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Internet -- Social aspects -- Popular works.
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COMPUTERS -- Computer Literacy.
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COMPUTERS -- Computer Science.
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COMPUTERS -- Data Processing.
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COMPUTERS -- Hardware -- General.
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COMPUTERS -- Information Technology.
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COMPUTERS -- Machine Theory.
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COMPUTERS -- Reference.
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Computer networks. (OCoLC)fst00872297
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Internet -- Social aspects.
(OCoLC)fst01766793
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| Genre/Form |
History. (OCoLC)fst01411628
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Popular works. (OCoLC)fst01423846
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| Other Form: |
Print version: Hu, Tung-Hui. Prehistory of the Cloud. Cambridge : MIT Press Ltd 2015 9780262029513 (OCoLC)917377231 |
| ISBN |
0262330091 (electronic bk.) |
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9780262330091 (electronic bk.) |
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9780262330107 (electronic bk.) |
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0262330105 (electronic bk.) |
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