Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky, (Read Via Kindle for iPad)

This book started out a little slow but picked up dramatically. I do have to say that Shirky defiantly made me look at the modern organizing lens is a different perspective. He makes good points on how the net has changed everyone forever, and raises the valid point that it was responsible for linux more than anything else due the the large community on the net. Before this book I have grown wary of the concept of online organizing and an effective tool for large problems. Now not so much. 

Yes, Shirky does come off as a little bit of a geek, but he does have some valid points. This book reminds me of the Audible program METAtropolis, Specifically Tobias Buckell’s piece within it, read by Scott Brink (most of the other short stories were not for me, however I loved Buckell’s piece. Its worth the credit just for that 2 hours). We are working are way into a modern way of organizing, and have started to see it happen. But we are just at the beginning.

7/10 (for being a tad slow at the start)

Power Friending by Amber Mac (Read via Physical Book)

This book is about everything social media. I actually would consider it a modern introductory bible of how to build an online presence. I do admit this book is mainly geared toward businesses, but still can’t be ignored for personal use. That is the thing. Amber goes into everything from websites, to twitter. On top of that, a good potion of the book is quick case studies of some of the more famous blunders, and some success stories as well.

This books does go hand in had with Gary Vaynerchuk’s book Crush it. Both are equally as good for different reasons. You really should read Gary’s book just for the level of passion he has, and what impact that has. Then read Amber’s book and use it as a blueprint to start defining your online identity.

The only note I have is I believe that this social media world is just in its infancy. As a thinker, I am still not sold on company brand as a real person that people what to directly interact with. The key is how to you obtain personal communication from a brand? I don’t like it when a company randomly tweets me something without knowing who it’s coming from. I guess there are two types of communication. One of a mass, generic one. Where we interact in broad strokes. To continue the twitter example, it would be a generic Comcast account. Then you have a more intimate direct layer of communication were you have you technicians sending out messages directly to solve problems. On this second tier of messaging who owns these accounts? Because as a Employee, I would want to keep my following but then as company, I consider that company property. Then again how valuable is the following, they they are only following you to get support.

I guess this goes back to the classic ‘Client list’. Especially when a valuable person leaves the company as takes his clients with him. There in lies the dilemma of a suggestion Amber made. Putting all of your Social media contacts in your footer. It’s a built in conflict of interest. I can put in my linked in, twitter, and facebook. Why not my personal email address then? I have business then I have personal. This is the same thing with a Cell Phone. Who owns the cellphone number? It’s the question of ownership… Would a company allow me to put my personal Twitter ID in my Company twitter description field if I wanted to? I really don’t know how its going to balance out, but I do see it slowly changing. A person I follow with great interest is Julia Roy. She now is a senior manager at Coach and seem to be really rocking that balance well.

10/10

Medium Raw by Anthony Bourdain (Read via Kindle for iPad)

This book is really a continuation Bourdain’s journey after writing his Kitchen Confidential book. It tracks from him getting his book deal to almost today working on the travel channel. In the mean time, he bounced around the world a few times, got hired by the food network, then to leave for the travel channel, then that network got purchased by the food network. He seems he can’t get away.

The most interesting piece of the book I found (aside from ending up on a beach in some random island with some yuppie) was when he ended up on set of some food show with a bunch of food celebrities. I really appreciated how candid Bourdain talked about the scene. How these people were comparing notes on which product sponsors were better than others, and strategies and advice to go after others. All in the mean time Bourdain just stood there perplexed out of his mind, sort of feeling the odd character out.

The only minus of the book was was the brief few times he really food porned out. I do get where he was coming from, and those experiences were very well written. It was just not my cup of tea. I did enjoy the update of where everyone is at the end of the book as well.

8/10

How to Cheat at Everything by Simon Lovell (Read via Kindle for iPad)

This was a great book for the coffee table. Its a classic book of cheats. Lovell spends his entire time going through a gamut of bar games, card games, chance games and all sorts of other things that people randomly place bets on. Then loose their money. I am not that kind of gambler type, that would usually take a person up for these kind of antics. Then again, perhaps for entertainment. I always appreciate a showman who can tell a story of tricks throughout the night, all amounting up to a greater con. 

It’s perhaps is why one of my favorite movies is Revolver. The character Jake Green says it best: ‘One thing I’ve learned in the last seven years: in every game and con there’s always an opponent, and there’s always a victim. The trick is to know when you’re the latter, so you can become the former’ 

Ordered it for the coffee table,

7/10 

Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh (Read Via Kindle For iPad)

Similar to the Salesforce slight propaganda type book, Hsieh takes us thought an abbreviation of his business live starting from childhood. He describes how Zappos first started and how he eventually bet the farm on the business.

What really got me was his view on customer service. That he realized that it is a core competency of his business and you have to value it dramatically. I did not realize that he actually wants to buy out his employees with a 2k bribe after training to make sure they want to work there. Which is a great idea. The only thing that might be a problem is when you don’t pay your employees enough, then it gets interesting. Thats another thing that I have been noodling with… The value of workers compared to their output and how do you approach that. hmmm… more thinking to come.


8/10

The Myths of Innovation by Scott Berkun (Read via Kindle for iPad)

This book really resets the common perspective of how innovation happens. Most people think its a magic idea, that’s then executed. In reality it is exhausting amounts of iteration that usually very much a group effort over a vast amount of time.  The book itself is a very light read (It is long, but is not one of those books that dives deep into crazy abstract concepts), but worth the time. I really don’t have that much more to say about it.

7/10

Why New Systems Fail by Phil Simon (Read via Physical Book)

This is a great IT Book. It focuses on large enterprise projects and goes into why they epically fail. Simon give great case examples from his direct personal experience how the projects did not live up to their potential.

What I learned most about this book, is really knowing what you have, what you want, what you are buying, and who is deploying it. For example… If you are moving to a new billing system for example. You have to spend the time cleaning up the old one first and prepping it for transition before moving. The numbers in this book are sobering, more than half fail, most don’t live up to potential.

Even more, I would recommend AT&T pick up a copy of this book. It took me 12 hours to order a new iPhone today.

A must read for anyone in IT, especially above the line people (Wiki).

8/10

Why We Hate the Oil Companies: Straight Talk from an Energy Insider by John Hofmeister, Narrated by John Hofmeister (Read via Audible.com)

I got this book on an audible advanced book sale, not expecting too much. I was pleasantly surprised. Granted he does a lot of finger pointing in the book. But I do appreciate the candidness and his genuine perspective on energy policy.

I liked that he actually looked at the big picture of energy in the USA and in the world. He really explained the issue which I have not seen yet from any decent news source (That I follow anyway). The two main points he makes is that 1) current renewables are not efficient enough for a large scale once the energy cost of manufacturing is considered, and 2) there is a need for yet another oversight committee on energy.

For the first point, I would have to agree. When solar reaches a good enough efficiently and in a form factor that can made into a shingles for roofs, then everyone should replace their roofs with solar generation. If there was a law saying you have to do that, there would be dramatic impacts on the amount of energy being generated. But for that to work, you also have to modernize the energy grid, and plan on millions of homes generating for the grid, powering larger cities throughout the day. Also the United States has to dramatically invest in nuclear reactors. They have to pick an element or variant of one, standardize it and deploy it. Its not hard. If France can do it. So can the United States.

As for point number 2 in creating a new body in government… I am kind of torn. The concept is great. I do like the way he presents his idea, I would be all for the group. However, the current US government is just too broken right now and could not handle another group. Which would result in it end up doing nothing. That raises another issue entirely about the heath of current United States government. But that needs more thought on my part before a valid opinion can be made.

A solid 8/10

The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook by Ben Mezrich, Narrated by Mike Chamerlain (Read via Audible.com)

I only got this book because Leo Laporte was constantly raving about it for many months as a must read. I have to say, I was very delighted. Mezrich dives deep into the founding of Facebook, back to the Harvard days. He tells about the Harvard crew brothers and the Connect U site that was in some respects, sabotaged by Zuckerberg because he dragged his feat for months while he worked on his own competing concepts.

What was the most fascinating is how this book presents Zuckerberg. It really is a rather damming abstract picture. From the way he handled the Connect U stuff to pushing out Eduardo Saverin was very fascinating. While Mezich thinks he was a little bit more a self centered act. I would happened to disagree. From the book, my opinion would be that Zuckerberg acted a bit too privately, remember he was not the most social person in the world. Instead of learning to more follow the community pulse, he more architected his own Matrix of a social graph. This in lies the problem. It just like how Aristotle could not comprehend the crowd nature of setting monetary values on things. It is not not for one person to decide, but the community as a whole to figure it out. Which creates balance.

8/10 a must read for anyone interested the history of the big web 2.0 company.

Second Nature: A Gardener’s Education By Michael Pollan, Narrated by Michael Pollan (Read via Audible.com)

I expected that his book would contain some background on gardening… I did not expect 9 hours of complete obsession over the subject including diving deep intellectual thought over the very nature of nature of planting, zen design, seeds etc.. This book made me realize that there is definitely a book for everyone about every subject.

Don’t get me wrong I loved Omnivores Dilemma, and In Defense of Food. But this book is on a whole another level about gardening ethics and principals. It did contain a lot of good history of modern suburban agriculture and core principals that were established with the founding of the States. Its just that this book was very long. Too long. It felt like that someone could have chopped this down to 2/3’rd its size, without loosing and information. It was defiantly at 2x speed for most the book.

6/10