While networked communications don't feature prominently in WALL-E they are a consistent part of the plot it is not a focus. There are three main ways that the book connects to WALL-E on topics of networked communications is through internet addiction, censorship, and internet interaction. 

In WALL-E internet addiction is the norm, the passengers aboard the Axiom go their whole lives without looking up from their screens. They don’t even realize that the ship has a pool until their devices are destroyed. One proposed definition of internet addiction includes these diagnostic criteria that also fit the passengers aboard the Axiom: preoccupation with the internet, an increasing need to use the internet, has stayed online longer than intended, and has used the internet to escape problems[2]. The members of the Axiom show preoccupation with their seemingly complete lack of environmental awareness until the internet is taken from them. The increasing need to use the internet is shown through their near 24/7 use of the internet, there literally is not a way they could be using the internet more. For staying on the internet longer than intended we see the original trip time was supposed to be 5 years, but they end up staying on the Axiom for 700 and increasing their time on the internet the whole time. The passengers of the Axiom use the internet to escape the boredom of being stuck on a ship their whole lives, the boredom of people can be seen with their inability to care about anything that isn’t directly in front of them. All of these together paint a picture of a society that is dysfunctionally reliant on the internet

WALL-E also exemplifies censorship as no one on the ship has any concept of Earth or society outside of the one that they have experienced. We can see that this is a very deliberate attempt by the AI on board the ship to keep people from trying to go back. When the captain does find knowledge of Earth it is treated as forbidden and dangerous information. AUTO employs digital age censorship tools in a very simple way: by controlling what children are taught and making access to information require any amount of effort a government can reduce or eliminate those who do not take an interest in the information. This is why it takes something as simple as just asking the computer to uncover information about Earth that had been lost for centuries. China does something similar, although in a less comically exaggerated way, by increasing the cost of accessing information you will decrease the number of people who are willing to put in the effort to find it [3]. Some techniques might be burying it in search results, hiding it behind a paywall, or even never mentioning it and waiting. The last one will only ever work in a closed system like the Axiom, but given the cartoonishly lazy population on board even the low barrier of needing to ask was enough to keep the information censored and lost.

Throughout the movie we see individuals interact with the internet for everything in their life. From recreation to shopping to talking to your friends there is not a single part of an Axiom inhabitant’s life that isn’t done through the internet. Of the 14 examples of internet interaction given in the book we see there are five that are applicable and present in WALL-E. Throughout the movie the passengers are seen buying food/drink online near constantly, they are also seen socializing with people exclusively through the internet. Children are shown to be learning through the internet with a large slideshow, virtual worlds are shown with the virtual driving range, and finally the internet of things is controlled by the passengers with their easy access to the chairs they sit on, the drink bots that take drinks to them and trash away, the umbrellas at the pool, and countless other things throughout the ship.

Overall WALL-E has a solid base of networked communications and our interaction with them throughout the whole movie. Every scene has an example, whether that be the internet of things or internet addiction. The whole movie ridicules our own overdependence on the internet and networks in general, taking the phenomenon of mobile phones and skewering it. It shows how easily the internet can take over our lives and distract us from the valuable things in life, throwing up walls between us and things we never could’ve imagined we would willingly give up.

[1]Stanton, A., Morris, J., Reardon, J., Burtt, B., Knight, E., & Garlin, J. (n.d.). Wall-E. 

[2]Cash H, Rae CD, Steel AH, Winkler A. Internet Addiction: A Brief Summary of Research and Practice. Curr Psychiatry Rev. 2012 Nov;8(4):292-298. doi: 10.2174/157340012803520513. PMID: 23125561; PMCID: PMC3480687.

[3]Roberts, M. E. (2018). A Theory of Censorship. In Censored: Distraction and Diversion Inside China’s Great Firewall (pp. 21–92). Princeton University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvc77b21.5