WEB SPIN RELEASE 2.0 A Design for Living in the Digital Age By Esther Dyson Broadway 307pp $25 Esther Dyson's book on the Internet, Release 2.0, is a lot like the Internet itself. Mind-bending revelations nestle side-by-side with ho-hum chat--and you never know which you'll encounter next. Fans who have enjoyed Dyson's computer-industry newsletter, Release 1.0, or attended PC Forum--an annual event she organizes--will probably cut the writer a lot of slack. Others will give up the second or third time they bump into banalities about how the Net can be either good or bad, empower the powerless, or facilitate collaboration. The quitters will miss out. In 11 chapters covering topics from work to governance to privacy, Dyson serves up smart projections about how communities, culture, and businesses will change as the Internet evolves. There are big, complicated ideas and predictions here--even though they are voiced in rambling, somewhat leaden prose. Dyson explains how industries too new and cutting-edge for federal regulators to fathom will spawn their own regulatory agencies. The model is the existing Internet, which is overseen by ad hoc, nongovernmental committees. In the emerging world, she predicts, Netizens will choose everything from entertainment to airline tickets based on continuous, real-time appraisals by peers. This, too, is already happening, as parents rate schools for each other on specialized Web sites. Today, dozens of software companies give their products away, charging only for upgrades. From this, she extrapolates a broad model for digital business, where intellectual-property owners give their goods away but collect fees for public appearances or for other services. Tackling intractable social quandaries, Dyson comes up with free-market solutions. How, for example, can we manage abuses of the Net, such as spamming (massive E-mail ad blitzes), without crimping free speech or handicapping nascent technologies? Don't write unenforceable new laws, she replies. ''Simply enable any user to charge the sender, before accepting the E-mail.'' Dyson elucidates plenty of new-business opportunities--and along the way, weighs in on most topics that preoccupy today's digital entrepreneurs. She endorses the idea of ''data intermediaries'' who will vouch for a client's creditworthiness but will never sell private information--unlike today's credit agencies. What about ''electronic cash''? Fine, in some forms, Dyson declares, but not if you are talking about collecting fractions of pennies for all kinds of digital services. ''The vendor ends up annoying precisely his most valuable, most frequent customers,'' she writes. Dyson ranges far and writes with authority. Her gift is for thinking current trends through to the next logical stage. Unfortunately, she only occasionally anchors this stream-of-consciousness to concrete examples drawn from cyberspace frontiers. Interesting thoughts are left dangling. References to other important commentators are few. And her delivery isn't likely to wow you. But some of the ideas probably will. BY NEIL GROSS RELATED ITEMS PHOTO: Cover, ``Release 2.0''

Updated Dec. 18, 1997 by bwwebmaster
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