Fans pick 100 books like Privacy's Blueprint

Hate Crimes in Cyberspace begins with a series of horror stories, showing in the most compelling and visceral way the harm caused by online harassment. Citron shows us that online harassment is disproportionately focused on women and marginalized people. Far from rare, the harassment is frighteningly prevalent. The harassers make vile threats of rape and murder, post nude photos, engage in doxing, and spew disturbing messages of hate. All the more terrifying is that the people seething with hatred are not in a distant faraway land. They are here among us; they are professionals, students, and others that appear polite in person. 

After opening our eyes to this harrowing shadowy world, Citron discusses how the law ought to respond. She argues that civil rights law can effectively address the problem – but the law must evolve to make this happen.  She also thoughtfully explores how protections against harassment don’t infringe… show more.

I had a hard time choosing which book by Richards to include, as his earlier book, Intellectual Privacy, is a superb discussion about how privacy is essential for our expression and consumption of ideas. In Why Privacy Matters, Richards broadens his focus to discuss other reasons why privacy is important. He debunks common myths, such as privacy is dying or privacy is about creepiness. In an eloquent and clear way, Richards explains why privacy matters for our identity, freedom, and protection. This book powerfully shows that how we think about privacy is essential to effectively safeguarding it. Richards writes in an engaging and accessible way, but his book has tremendous depth and insight. 

Anita Allen is one of the pioneers of privacy law who began exploring privacy issues long before most others. She holds a PhD in philosophy, and in all her books, she explores privacy in a rich theoretical way but also a personal way too. Deeply humanistic, her work is thought-provoking and wide-ranging. I could have listed many of her great books, but the one that stands out the most to me is Uneasy Access. One of the earliest books written about privacy, Uneasy Access discusses privacy in the most illuminating way. The book makes an enormous contribution in discussing the role that privacy plays in women’s lives, but its conceptual work on privacy provides such clarity that it makes this book one of the best theoretical discussions of privacy across all contexts. 

Ari Waldman’s Industry Unbound eviscerates many of the current privacy laws and corporate privacy programs. On the surface, we appear to be living in the golden age of privacy law. Privacy laws are being passed at a feverish rate. Many companies now have dedicated teams of individuals who build a privacy program at the company to comply with the laws, assess privacy risks, train employees, and ensure that products and services are designed in ways that are protective of privacy. Unfortunately, Waldman contends, these privacy programs are hollow. They amount to building a meaningless paper record and end up cloaking poor privacy practices with a pretty facade. Even those who do not agree with the potency of Waldman’s critique must take note of the concerns he raises. His arguments are essential to engage with.  

This book dazzles me every time I read it. It will change the way you think about files and how such humble little documents can help rule our lives. Vismann’s Files is not the easiest going, but it is filled with enough history and detail that one can just join for the ride and follow along. The late Cornelia Vismann died too young but she still managed to leave us with this truly transformative account of the relation between law and the data systems upon which all law always relies. Through a careful history that stretches from parchment scrolls to mid-twentieth-century secret intelligence files to the desktop computer, Vismann excavates the way in which the ethics, politics, and legality of social systems are highly dependent upon data designs.

This is the follow up to The Art of Innovation which describes the strategies of the world-famous design firm, IDEO, which has dissected the process of innovation and, in this book, identified the types of “personas” a CEO should attract in order to tackle big, difficult problems with novel, creative approaches.  I could definitely relate to the first persona described, The Anthropologist, who spends an inordinate amount of time with the clients, listening and observing, in order to understand what they really desire and what has prevented them thus far from achieving or obtaining it.  I also found The Cross-Pollinator interesting, which argued that you should sometimes involve people from other sectors or countries which may at first glance seem irrelevant to the job at hand but, if given the chance to be “heard”, could lead to a solution.  The author makes the case for another eight personas, who may… show more.

Have you wondered why there has been such a dramatic decline in trust in public institutions in recent years?

In The Revolt of the Public, Gurri argues that the rise of digital technology has allowed people to more easily share information and bypass traditional gatekeepers. Gone are the days from my own youth when most people relied on just a few established news sources. People today are more exposed to stories—either real or imagined—of corruption, incompetence, and misinformation from established institutions.

This has contributed to the rise of populism and political extremism, facilitated by social media where people can organize and coordinate their activities. 

Mary Roach is an absolute treasure as a science writer: not only hilarious, but often insightful. I’ll admit, when I wrote my first book, I always wondered "what would Mary Roach do?" when I came to a tricky bit. Grunt isn’t her best-known work, but it’s my favourite because it looks at something only she could do well: non-violent science in the military. The only gun, she writes, is the one that fires frozen chickens at windscreens to see if they can withstand the impact. This is a book about how to keep soldiers safe from the enemy, cool in the desert, and stop Navy SEALS from pooping their pants.

Yes, Stella is a book – but it’s really a fable about how to cut through corporate inertia and bureaucracy to drive innovation.

When I first read it, I was blown away – a story about farm animals saving their farm from bankruptcy – with lots of clear and compelling messages. And it was actually fun to read. Since I first learned about it from one of the authors (we were working with a common client), I’ve recommended it to lots of other executives, and it’s made a difference.

One of the key lessons from Stella is that truly transformative innovation often needs to be separated from the core business – with different resources, budgets, metrics, and expectations. Otherwise it’s going to be in competition with the core business – and it will end up getting the short end of the stick in terms of money and people.

Then when… show more.

While all the books listed earlier provide detailed, in-depth, case studies of public-private sector cooperation in developing selected new technologies, the last two chapters of this book provide necessarily brief coverages of the myriad ways in which this cooperation had been successfully manifested beyond encouraging specific technologies.

Although the book’s main purpose is to show how a series of important technologies have transformed economic, social, and political life over the millennia, the last two chapters show how knowledge of these transformations sheds light on the wider use of public policy to achieve economic goals.

While many public initiatives have succeeded, others have failed. The authors isolate the reasons for these successes and failures and offer their template for designing and administering policies that are more likely to succeed than fail.