Esther Dyson stands head and shoulders above other IT commentators. She presents clear explanations and elegant solutions but sometimes misses the bigger context. Release 2.0 is an invaluable read for anyone already enthusiastic and informed about the digital world. Is it a book for your less clued up relatives? Probably not. Read my review in World Link, March/April 1998.
At ther beginning of the Internet and the web and the ability to provide information freely, many tried to make sense of what would come. No one saw Facebook, the mmonolithic social media platofrm, or Google, the monolithic advertising machine.
Esther Dyson, and many others, envisioned something more positive. In retrospect, this was quaint.