Talk to Address the Googlization of All

Siva Vaidhyanathan examines the ways people have used Google – and the growing resistance to its expansion - in a talk Wednesday.

LEXINGTON, Va., Nov. 5, 2012 – In the provocative book The Googlization of Everything (And Why We Should Worry), Siva Vaidhyanathan examines the ways people have used and embraced Google – and the growing resistance to its expansion across the globe.

Vaidhyanathan will address that topic in a talk in the Nichols Engineering Building auditorium at VMI Wednesday, Nov. 7, at 7:45 p.m.

Vaidhyanathan, cultural historian, media scholar, and Robertson Professor in Media Studies at the University of Virginia, exposes the dark side of our Google fantasies, raising red flags about issues of intellectual property and the much-touted Google Book Search. He assesses Google’s global impact, particularly in China, and explains the insidious effect of Googlization on the way people think. Finally, Vaidhyanathan proposes the construction of an Internet ecosystem designed to benefit the whole world and keep one brilliant and powerful company from falling into the “evil” it pledged to avoid.

The talk, which is open to the public free of charge, is sponsored by the Dean’s Academic Speakers Fund and the Department of Economics and Business.

–VMI–