Revised Introduction

Inspiration was given to me, in large part, from the mouth of a fat squirrel who walked up to me begging for food on the streets of DC. I happened to be walking back from a performance in the historic national theater stewing over what to write for an introduction to this eBook when it happened. I'm about as lost in writing as I was in DC, and trying to patchwork together the desires of classmates, teachers, and myself into one coherent thesis for a book, with only a dabbling English experience, was proving mind boggling. I knew the topics for the book, I knew the general lay out, but really, what was it all about? What was the purpose for writing an eBook and what do we want people to know?

In the midst of this inescapable mind fog, I left for DC to attend a health conference. Beforehand I spent a few hours online and researched various free activities and places to see in my downtime. When we arrived in the airport and made our way over to the metro I realized that, unlike the majority of the group who was blindly following the crowd, I could figure out the system based on my experience with Asian subways.

Because I knew what I wanted to do and had spent a little time figuring out how to get around, I had no fear of getting lost. Even when later that night I was separated from the group, I could read the maps and I knew that I could ask people around me and find my way back.

The next morning I decided to leave early and head over to a performance that I had heard of online. Maybe it was the rain, maybe it was the early hour, but for one magical half hour, I had DC to myself. I walked down the cobble stone streets, past historic monuments and buildings, and realized that I would never have had this opportunity unless I had done a little bit of personal preparation.

So when I was returning from the theater, the rain had stopped, the sun was peaking around the building tops, and I stopped in front of a statue of Colonel Stewart to watch some squirrels play. This is when the inspiration happened. One fat little squirrel looked up, eyed me, and then meandered over as if to say: "good morning".  And I felt a true sense of belonging. I had gone from tourist to local and I was connectedness to this city.

And it's that feeling that we want to convey to you, the readers. In a world of ever developing digital society it can be hard to decipher all the information and concepts that are thrown our way. How do we embrace emerging technologies that have so much potential to help while protecting ourselves from piracy, time leaches, and trolls?

We’ve walked down the streets of this digital world, taken notes, visited museums, and compiled a collection of field notes into this Digital field guide. I don't want to make the comparison too close to a field guide though, because our main purpose is not to blurt out facts, but to give a solid base of knowledge concerning topics that are evolving in our digital society, supported with historical connections, and propose actions to be taken in order to improve our society.
In this eBook we work to make digital concepts bite sized and digestible, as well as entertaining and relevant. Using historical examples to guide our suggestions for the future, and tapping into the power of social proof, we confirm and validate our ideas. We have worked tirelessly, frantically, and all too often somewhat blindly as we have attempted to find new insights, opinions, and social proofs for our ideas. 

This book is divided into six content areas: Openness, The Arts, Business, Education, Government, Inquiry, Intellectual Property & Creative Commons, and Science. These are areas that we have identified as being the mostly highly discussed and debated in relation to technology and it’s concepts of openness, control, participation and information. In this book we provide the reader with content to help them become more informed concerning many of the emerging digital concepts and concerns. 

Each section is created to allow users of all interest levels to be able to access useful information. Sections are introduced with a brief descriptive video detailing the concepts of the chapter and introducing a “tweethis” for the chapter. These chapters are then enriched with relevant images, infographs, and of course bibliographies to support our research and provide a launching pad for interested parties to learn more. In efforts to keep up with the dynamic nature of technology today, all the embedded videos, along with supporting videos, can be found on an accompanying Youtube channel.