The Laws of the Web: Patterns in the Ecology of Information

Voorkant
MIT Press, 2001 - 105 pagina's

An accessible explanation of the hidden patterns found within the seemingly chaotic World Wide Web.

Despite its haphazard growth, the Web hides powerful underlying regularities--from the organization of its links to the patterns found in its use by millions of users. Many of these regularities have been predicted on the basis of theoretical models based on a field of physics--statistical mechanics--that few would have thought applicable to the social domain.

In this book, Bernardo Huberman explains in accessible language the laws of the Web. One of the foremost researchers in the field, Huberman has established, for example, that the surfing patterns of individuals are describable by a precise law. Such findings can lead to more efficient Web design and use. They also shed light on social mechanisms whose significance goes beyond the Web. In this sense, the Web is a gigantic informational ecosystem that can be used to quantify and test explanations of human behavior and social interaction.

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Inhoudsopgave

Ecology
1
The Phenomenon of the Web
7
Evolution and Structure
19
Small Worlds
33
As We Surf
41
Social Dilemmas and Internet Congestion
55
Downloading Information
71
Markets and the Web
83
Epilogue
97
References
101
Index
103
Copyright

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Over de auteur (2001)

Bernardo A. Huberman is an HP Fellow at Hewlett-Packard Laboratories in Palo Alto, California.

Bibliografische gegevens