The Exploit: A Theory of Networks
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By Alexander R. Galloway; Eugene Thacker
Produced By University Of Minnesota Press
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As the publisher of this book might hint at, The Exploit is an academic book, rather than an easy-read tome. Written by academics, for academics the pace and tone of writing is fairly high-brow from the start. Thankfully, the authors do try to avoid the waffle, and many terms are explained clearly before they are put into continuous use.

The book is based round the concept of the network is not the great equaliser, an egalitarian construct that has, since the Internet became a powerful social force, begun to spread out into all works of life, with network-centric organisation. Instead, the authors state that the exploit ? a direct reference to the hacker term ? is a common corporate and subversive means of taking quiet control of the flow and direction of networks.

Basically a single book-length essay, this work argues for a whole new network topology, both for the internet, and the networks that are spreading through society, in order to resist exploit, and reshape the very form of networking. They propose something as different from our current peerage networks, as peer to peer is different from a hierarchy.