Bots: The Origin of a New Species

Bots is the story of cyberspace's first indigenous species. Strings of code, bots are a software version of a mechanical robot. Originally meant to do our bidding, when unleashed by computer hackers bots can disable computing systems and engage in personal attacks, and are capable of causing nuisance and chaos all over the Internet. Bots have great potential for either organizing our lives or sabotaging them.

In telling the tale of the development of software robots, Andrew Leonard constructs a playful, fascinating, anecdote-rich history of the Internet, tracking it from the free-form ASCII-text playground of chipheads, researchers, and scientists to the sprawling, advertising-laden, cultural entity it has become. In an expert and entertaining book, Leonard makes a sophisticated subject understandable, and explores the psychology and anthropology of popular technology.