Upshot: If all ‘Big Data’ is to you are two words and you blissfully share away on Facebook…. I’ll be blunt: you need this book. Any downsides? WSJ links go nowhere. Might plod a little for lay folk as the authors decant the issues to English. Even so, stick with it.

To me, the problem with information sharing isn’t ‘the Cloud’…it’s Privacy & Big Data. Whether you’re sharing on Facebook or dealing with the Government, you’re a part in parcel of this emerging issue. Ignorance is no excuse, and you should know what to expect.

The authors do a good job of walking thru the legal privacy ramifications of the tech involved, and even better, outlining who the stakeholders are. The only real downer I found in the ePub was the use of WSJ links; all of the ones I followed led to 404 or ‘page not found’ — it seems that the Wall Street Journal doesn’t know the meaning of ‘permalink’.

Even so, this is probably the first O’Reilly book that I would recommend that you buy in paper as well as eBook form. Buy the electrons for yourself, and buy the paper for your family or friends who have accounts on Facebook, Google or elsewhere. Highly recommended.

Disclosure: I received the eBook download(s) from O’Reilly for review purposes.