Excerpt: Chapter 4 – The War Over Internet and The Internet at War

One woman, Loraine Oliver, saw the problems immediately and took her male superiors aside, explaining to them that women were no longer interested in light labor and dictation, insisting that they be introduced to the heavy labor involved in Internet, just as their counterparts in warhead manufacture were no longer restricted to painting serial numbers on bullets, like so many copper fingernails.

Though it took nearly two years before the changes would be implemented by act of Congress, a woman as prominent as Eleanor Roosevelt stood behind the Women’s Information Corps as a champion of their cause, hoping for an “Irene Internet.” It was due to such support that, in 1943, President Roosevelt signed an honorary law allowing women in Internet to “work with their delicate hands.” Oliver treated the document as her passport toward workplace rights, and was shortly thereafter named head of Internet Technologies for the War Department, honorarily.

The

Share

Read More

Share

Post-Modem Excerpt: Chapter 5 – The Post-War Interweb

An excerpt from Post-Modem: The Interwebs Explained, which is released on Tuesday, November 17, 2015.  From Chapter 5, “The Post-War Interweb”:

Preferring instead to call it a “space race,” the Soviet Union then attempted to soothe strained relations with the United States by sending up a considerably more humorous satellite, in keeping with their desire to create memorable events for those most starving and freezing to death. The following month, they launched Sputnik 2, with an angle toward cuteness – this time they included an adorable dog named Laika, whose presence aboard Sputnik 2 caused a great deal of controversy.  While one camp had hoped for a kitten named Mitsa (Russian for “mittens”) to be the world’s first living being to orbit the Earth, Khrushchev insisted that a cat would be too difficult to shove in a space capsule, given their wily nature and sharp claws, an

Share

Read More

Share