Book Review: Modern Monopolies: How Online Platforms Rule the World by Controlling the Means of Connection by Alex Moazed and Nicholas L. Johnson

Cover of the book Modern Monopolies: How Online Platforms Rule the World by Controlling the Means of Connection by Alex Moazed and Nicholas L. Johnson — *Modern Monopolies: How Online Platforms Rule the World by Controlling the Means of Connection*
by Alex Moazed and Nicholas L. Johnson
St. Martin’s, 2016

This review was first published by Booklist on May 18, 2016.

When we think about companies like Facebook, Google, Apple, Amazon, YouTube, and Uber, we tend to focus on the technology they innovate and how they’re changing our daily lives. But these platform businesses are some of the largest in the world today, commanding huge swaths of the modern economy. They’ve attained a scale long considered impossible by more traditional business models. Modern Monopolies analyzes platform businesses from the perspective of economics. Platform companies haven’t just beaten more traditional businesses; they’ve changed the nature of business itself, created whole new markets, and redefined what constitutes value. The authors analyze the path to success for platform companies and explore several ways that these businesses can fail. They display a strong grasp of the theoretical principles at play here but also evince a down-to-earth, nuanced, and critical view of how these companies function. Of particular importance, they suggest a fundamental reanalysis of the assumed value of “network effects.” This book is satisfying and timely, a valuable contribution to our understanding of modern business.

Book Review: The Science of Growth: How Facebook Beat Friendster—and How Nine Other Startups Left the Rest in the Dust by Sean Ammirati

Cover of the book The Science of Growth: How Facebook Beat Friendster--and How Nine Other Startups Left the Rest in the Dust by Sean Ammirati — *The Science of Growth: How Facebook Beat Friendster—and How Nine Other Startups Left the Rest in the Dust*
by Sean Ammirati
St. Martin’s, 2016

This review was first published by Booklist on April 1, 2016.

So you’ve started a business, now what? Ammirati seeks to answer this question in this sequel of sorts to the standard texts on the science of startups. In response, Ammirati offers a science of growth—a guide on how to scale your business once it’s successfully established. Why did Facebook beat Friendster? How did Tesla outdo Fisker? Why does McDonald’s boast over 35,000 locations worldwide, when White Castle has fewer than 500? Ammirati examines 26 well-known companies to discover what separates the success stories from the failures. He draws examples from diverse industries and isolates several variables: prerequisites for growth, catalysts for growth, and foundational elements to sustain it. An authority in the field of the startup economy, Ammirati teaches the subject at Carnegie Mellon and heads of the country’s most successful startup incubators, and it shows in the way his book is thoroughly researched. It’s also accessible, easy to read, and eye-opening. This is a necessary and welcome addition to the business canon.

2015: My Year in Reading

All of the data that follows was collected by me using a combination of Google Sheets and Google Calendar. Once again, I elected not to track pages read—too much discrepancy between formats to generate meaningful comparisons.

A complete list of all the books I read in 2015 is at the bottom of this post.

I read 66 books in 2015. Fiction titles outnumbered nonfiction by 2-to-1:

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Book Review: Part of Our Lives by Wayne A. Wiegand

I recently read the book, Part of Our Lives: A People’s History of the American Public Library by Wayne A. Wiegand. Rather than write a typical review of it, I want to share a letter that I sent the author.

(TL;DR version: This book is wonderful and every public librarian and public library user should read it. I think it’s important.)

Dear Dr. Wiegand,

I’d like to thank you for writing Part of Our Lives: A People’s History of the American Public Library. Before I proceed to explain why I want to thank you, I need to spend some time voicing a complaint about something you wrote in your introduction. Bear with me—the extent of my gratitude for your work won’t be clear without this context.

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Book Review: Cherokee Medicine, Colonial Germs by Paul Kelton

Cherokee Medicine, Colonial Germs by Paul Kelton is an essential challenge to the “virgin soil” thesis that has governed the standard historical narrative of the European colonization of the New World. Dr. Kelton argues that this narrative is too simplistic, and largely fails to comprehend or address the complexity of Native cultures during that period. Moreover, the “virgin soil” thesis is based entirely on the testaments left behind by European colonialists—who misunderstood Native actions and behaviors more often than not—and incorporates no significant input from Native Americans’ own historical knowledge.

Worse yet, the “virgin soil” thesis whitewashes the effects of the violence and oppression inherent in the colonization of the New World.

Dr. Kelton uses the Cherokee as an example of how the traditional narrative of colonization falls apart when asked to answer to the historical resources of a Native people. Moreover, he points out that even the reliable documentary evidence we have from the European colonists themselves doesn’t support the “virgin soil” thesis.

If you liked Guns, Germs, and Steel, this book will make you see things in a very different light. This is exactly what good history is supposed to do.

Book Review: The Story of Alice: Lewis Carroll and the Secret History of Wonderland by Robert Douglas-Fairhurst

The Story of Alice: Lewis Carroll and the Secret History of Wonderland by Robert Douglas-Fairhurst isn’t the most comprehensive biography of Lewis Carroll out there. That’s not the author’s intention. Rather, he seeks to explore the available material on Carroll and Alice Liddell—much of which has never been published—as well as their historical context, to trace these elements to the genesis, content, and legacy of Carroll’s most famous works.

This is the biography of a literary creation more than a biography of its author or his Muse.

The book is structured in three main chronological sections, beginning with Carroll’s childhood and ending with Alice Liddell’s death, along with a prologue and epilogue:

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Book Review: Information Doesn’t Want to Be Free: Laws for the Internet Age by Cory Doctorow

Information Doesn't Want to Be Free - book cover — *Information Doesn’t Want to Be Free: Laws for the Internet Age* by Cory Doctorow
McSweeney’s Books, 2014

Information Doesn’t Want to Be Free by Cory Doctorow is, as one would expect, an incisive and lively exploration of the issues surrounding copyright and enforcement in the Internet Age.

Dr. Doctorow is established as an outspoken critic of the various methods that media corporations use to try and enforce their interpretation of copyright laws on the Internet: digital locks, DRM efforts, automated “Notice and Takedown” practices, etc. He takes on each of these methods and explains clearly what they’re intended to accomplish, why they fail, and the damage they do to creative workers and Internet users in general.

Some of these methods involve pretty esoteric computer science and Dr. Doctorow is the best in the business at translating the argot of technology into terms anyone can understand. Continue reading “Book Review: Information Doesn’t Want to Be Free: Laws for the Internet Age by Cory Doctorow” →

Book Review: Chasing the Scream by Johann Hari

Chasing the Scream book cover — *Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs* by Johann Hari
Bloomsbury USA, 2015

I believe that Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs by Johann Hari is one of the most important books currently on our shelves. I think most people are aware that the war on drugs has been an abysmal failure. What this book reveals about the origins and history of that war goes a long way towards explaining why.

Essentially, Mr. Hari argues that the approach we’ve taken to drugs for the past 100 years is worse than merely a failure—the war on drugs has been just about the worst possible approach we could have taken. It’s doing tremendous damage to our society. It’s the opposite of what we should be doing. Moreover, it’s a hugely hypocritical policy that ensconces deeply racist attitudes. He backs up these claims with numerous examples from the history of the drug war.

Far more important, however, is Mr. Hari’s exploration of alternatives. There are better options available to us to deal with the problem of drug use and the violence that accompanies drug culture. We already have compelling data to show that some of these alternative options actually work—options that are based on compassion, rather than vilification; healing, rather than criminalizing.

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Infographic – 2014: My Year in Reading

My friend Bil liked my 2014: My Year in Reading post so much, he made an infographic of it:

He asked me to name an animal and I chose the three-toed tree sloth.

Bil is an amazing writer / artist / father / husband / shark lover / bland car enthusiast / SEO guru. Please read his blog. Also, if you want any fancy-schmancy infographics, drop him a line.

[AUTHOR’S NOTE added December 27, 2019: I was going through my old tracking spreadsheets and discovered an error in my original post. I had listed my longest stretch without reading as 28 days from August 11-September 8. I miscalculated this information. My longest stretch without reading in 2014 was actually 35 days from April 4-May 8. I can’t update this infographic, though.]

2014: My Year in Reading

I have a friend who posts a list of all the books they read each year on their Facebook page. This has inspired me to write my own Year in Reading posts.

All of the reading data that follows comes from my Goodreads account. A complete list of all the books I read last year is at the bottom of this post.

EDITOR’S NOTE: I realized after I posted this on February 12, 2015, that I had miscalculated some of my figures based on the data. On February 13, I recalculated all my figures to correct for my previous mistake. This post has been updated to reflect these new calculations. I added a day to my time-to-read figures.

I read 40 books in 2014. It was a nonfiction-heavy year for me.

24 nonfiction
16 fiction

Continue reading “2014: My Year in Reading” →