Colin Charles Agenda

Written Saturday, January 20, 2008, probably in Los Angeles (LAX)

I got The 4-Hour Workweek on Wednesday, and while finding out the company I work for had been acquired for a billion dollars, I proceeded to read this book to see what all the hype was about. Despite the busy schedule at the meeting, I managed to finish reading all 300 pages using in-between toilet breaks, and airport layovers. Its Saturday now, and am I any wiser?

Tim’s book is great if you’re interested in starting an online retail business. Its interesting if you get turned on by the word drop-shipping. Its definitely interesting if you’re into hiring virtual assistants in 3rd world countries.

The whole mantra that is sold in the book is to outsource your life. Hardly applicable to the career path I (or most of my open source loving hippie counterparts) can apply.

Sure, there are some good general tips on reducing information overload. Reading less email. Becoming more efficient. However, its nothing new, per se.

Would I recommend it? Probably not. But that doesn’t mean you can’t buy The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich.

Some select quotes follow.

‘What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attnetion of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.’ - Herbert Simon, recipient of Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics, and the A.M. Turing Award

A great example of perseverance: when Tim was in college, if he received less than an A in anything, he’d spend about 3 hours asking questions of his lecturers, to ensure that he understood his class, and to discourage the lecturer to ever want to provide him with a lesser grade, unless there was real reason to do so.

‘The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency.’ - Bill Gates

‘If you must play, decide on three things at the start: the rules of the game, the stakes, and the quitting time.’ - chinese proverb

‘I not only use all the brains that I have, but all that I can borrow.’ - Woodrow Wilson

Technorati Tags: books, quotes, 4-hour workweek, tim ferriss

Recently I read:

• An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth by Mahatma Gandhi - I picked this up during my trip to India in early 2007, and finally got around to reading it. Highly interesting reading, his experiments and his teachings and thought process, plain simply rock. Documenting his strategies, etc. great reading.
• The Five-Dollar Smile: An Other Stories by Shashi Tharoor - he’s a bit wordy in his fiction, and his plays aren’t fabulous (I think reading script like that is best left to Shakespearean works), but its a very compelling book with some of his earliest writings. Joining the UN at 22? Makes me feel old. I like the fact that each story has a note pre-pending it - its important to know what were thoughts in those times. I still prefer his non-fiction, so far.
• Creating Wealth: Retire in Ten Years Using Allen’s Seven Principles of Wealth by Robert G. Allen - interested in purchasing real estate and turning it around? Want to know more about good debt? Realising that you really don’t need the latest whizzbang gizmo that is a depreciating asset? Most interesting reading, especially if you’re into the real estate market or planning on getting into it. Read this on my Vietnam trip mostly.
• Lonely Planet Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos & the Greater Mekong - used this extensively to plan my trip to Hanoi. So much more to see, obviously. I also read the Cambodia section to see if it tallied with my previous trip (it did), and the Laos section, mainly because I had initially planned to go there, but forked the plans to go to Hanoi instead. No regrets, Laos can wait.

I have been reading quite a bit recently. Quite a number of them are being read online, in sporadic bits, via my O’Reilly Safari subscription, so at some stage maybe I’ll list them when I complete them. However, in a non-technical sense, here are a bunch of books I’ve read recently:

• Sperm Are from Men, Eggs Are from Women: The Real Reason Men and Women are Different by Joe Quirk - arguably, a complete waste of time, but you might just read it for humour sake. However, I’m wondering if his thoughts on sexual evolutionary biology holds weight - what he says, is actually, at many instances, quite true. Its an extremely easy read, he likes pointing out that he isn’t an expert in any field he talks about (good, I like his honesty), and if you’re a man (or woman), you’ll find out a little more about the other sex. With a surname like Quirk, this doesn’t get any quirkier.
• The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins - if I were loaded, I would buy this for every evangelical Christian with a brain, that I know. And there are a lot of them (those that don’t just listen to what the pastor says and takes it for gold). Giuseppe bought this for me as a gift in Heidelberg, and its truly a great read. Of course, there’s also a book titled the Dawkins Delusion, and at some stage I’ll find that and read it. However, if you’re of the thinking that religion is one of the major causes of problem in this world, read this book.
• The Elephant, the Tiger, and the Cell Phone: The Emerging 21st Century Power by Shashi Tharoor - Amazing book. This is highly recommended, do read it, if you want to learn more about India. Shashi Tharoor himself was the youngest under-secretary general at the United Nations, and his writing quality is just amazing. He might be a bit wordy, he is originally a Keralite, but living overseas, but his perspectives are just amazing. I really enjoy the way the stories are presented, as they’re all independent from another.

Seeing that I’m in India now, I picked up all the rest of Shashi Tharoor’s books from the bookstore the other day. You might want to do that too.

It’s been a while since I did a book’s I’ve read update. And really, the reason I do it is to ensure I don’t go out and buy doubles, because I do have a pile of “books I want to read”. Maybe I should use LibraryThing (USD$25, lifetime) or AllConsuming (free, integrates with 43things, etc.). But its nothing like walking into a physical bookstore, and whipping out your phone, and hitting the blog, to do a search ;)

• The Google Story - David A. Vise - an amazing read, about a company that started in a university. Lots of gems, not that I didn’t already know most of them, but still, useful. Explaining 20% time, Google hacks, even a recipe from the chef, just gives you a good idea of the whole Google family.
• NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming)… The new art and science of getting what you want - Dr. Harry Alder - I liked this book, but I felt it was filled with too much theory. It isn’t until past halfway through that you learn to control the situation. I think it could have focused on a more howto-styled approach, to ensure that the reader finds no hassle controlling their next subject!
• The Tipping Point - Malcolm Gladwell - great book, I only wish I’d read it earlier. Crossing the threshold is most interesting, differentiating between connectors/mavens/salesmen, how exceptional people start epidemics, stickyness factors, and so much more. I’d encourage anyone attempting to build up a community or work with an OSS community to read this.
• The Undercover Economist - Tim Harford - I love reading about economics, and this book continued fuelling my interest. I think to technology folk, what’s most interesting is how Tim put in words, how most technology nowadays is so easy to create/replicate, and since there’s a lack of scarcity, these companies move/fold quickly. There’s more to the book than just those three pages, I’d recommend this highly (in fact, I got a copy for Giuseppe in Heidelberg for just this purpose - he book-swapped with me, I got the God Delusion, which I haven’t read yet).
• Founders At Work - Jessica Livingston - Excellent read. About companies you use currently. Or used (there have been some deaths, or sites that lost out the scarcity war). A must read, because Jessica gets into the founders’ heads.
• Bella Tuscany - Frances Mayes - wanting to complete my reading interest in all things Frances Mayes, I just had to read this. And its only made me want to go to Tuscany a lot more (from what I hear, its filled with foreign tourists and not Italians nowadays, because of her books - I’m told Sardinia might be a better bet :P)
• The Year of Yes - Maria Headley - A girl from a small town in the US, moves to New York, and says “yes” to all manner of men that ask her out on dates. For a whole year. She found a partner in the end, which I found kinda ironic (but I guess this is what fairytales are made of). It left me asking the question: why would a 21-year old girl do this? Was the sole purpose to write about it?
• English as a Second F*cking Language - Sterling Johnson - While English is my first language (and realistically, my only language that I can read/write/converse fluently in), this book was too hard to not pick up. Saw this in a bookstore in Germany, and boy is it funny. Teaches you all the stuff you really shouldn’t use, but hey, its humorous!

Twitter as a micro-news outlet
The other day, I was on a train, and witnessed something interesting - 3 drunk blokes were chatting up girls, got a little violent (throwing rubbish at people, asking a bloke to vacate his seat, etc.), and the cops were called in. Then, we stopped at Parliament and stayed there for about 40 minutes. On the last train of the night. Turns out, being an underground train station, a lot of other trains were backlogged, so Ben Barren told another train driver what the situation was, all thanks to the power of Twitter. What it looked like on Twitter - thanks Cris, aka Mr. Skitch :)

Google Code for Educators
Here comes free courseware, created especially for CS educators. There are currently tutorials on AJAX Programming, and Distributed Systems with sample course content as well. Video lectures exist just as well. So if you’re a busy professor, or sitting in a CS faculty and wondering what’s new and what might be hip to teach this semester, consider the Google Code for Educators site.

The Podcast Network
Cameron Reilly is the host of an amazing show, G’Day World, and he’s also the convenor for the Melbourne Online Digital Media. The other thing he’s done is create the world’s first podcast network (The Podcast Network - TPN). An interesting interview with him in an issue of the Australian Anthill, titled 24-hour podcast people. Cam’s a really interesting bloke to chat with - from podcasting to Facebook to Second Life.

Squeezed Books
One of the things I do after reading a management book, or biographies, is write summaries of my thoughts and take notes about it in my blog in my books category. This is what Squeezed Books is all about - summaries of books. If you’re too busy, or just want a summary before reading the book, this might be the exact site for you. Take for example the summary of The Tipping Point - now, when I write my quick summary/review, I’ll have to write less text :)

Technorati Tags: twitter, micro-news, news, google code, educators, podcast network, cameron reilly, squeezed books, book summaries

Surprisingly, managed to catch quite a bit this month.

• Knocked Up - funny, good comedy, not worth the cinema ticket price, but funny (really!)
• Harry Potter & The Order of the Phoenix - long, phenomenal, as I also had just read the book before-hand. Pity they chose to make Cho a “baddie’
• Oceans 13 - loved this series, and this one’s just as excellent. Where’d they chuck Julia Roberts though?
• Blow - feel sorry for those in the drug trade. Jailed repeatedly, but what else can you expect the pusher to do? I haven’t actually noticed many movie’s with Penelope Cruz in it either
• Pride & Prejudice - interrupted a lot, but an interesting show. The book, as always, is more interesting.
• Ferris Bueller’s Day Off - funny, can’t believe it took me this long to watch! A must see.
• Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon - if anyone ever tells me Indian movies are silly because people run around trees and sing songs, you’ve got to catch this, as not only do they do kung fu, they fly when they do it! Show was enjoyed though, on a projector against a wall (so it was a very cinema-like experience, minus the sticky floors, dirty chairs and smelly environment)
• Premonition - slept half-way through, it might have been good, but all that dejavu made me doze off in the plane
• Blades of Glory - funny, if not a little gay. One of the better comedies.

In book sense, I read quite a bit, but I probably don’t have anything to note about the Harry Potter series. I read book 5, 6 and 7, all in one weekend (Friday evening->Sunday). Yes, that means I read book 7 a little late, but who cares. I did take away some quick quotes: “Greatness inspires envy, envy engenders spite, spite spawns lies.” — Voldemort, in the Half-Blood Prince; “… but perhaps those who are best suited to ower are those who have never sought it. Those who have leadership thrust upon them, and take up the mantle because they must…” — Dumbledore.

Some of the more recent books that I’ve read are: The No Asshole Rule, Confessions of an Economic Hitman.The unread pile is well, still pretty high.

The No Asshole Rule, by Robert Sutton
I picked this up, thanks to numerous RSS feeds that I read stating this was a good read. And it was - its probably the most dog-eared book I own (next to Getting Things Done). Of the things I found useful were: common everyday actions that assholes use (its important to identify them, before they get to you), constructive confrontation, a Total Cost of Assholes (TCA) measurement, the incorrect ideas that “The more often you are right and the more often you win, the bigger jerk you can be“, recruiters that are assholes tend to hire those that are similar (assholes breed like rabbits), trivial power advantages can change the way people think and act (as Lord Acton used to say, power corrupts power, absolute power corrupts absolutely), pay (i.e. salary, remuneration) is the vivid sign of power difference, how to enforce the No Asshole Rule, tips for surviving an asshole ridden environment, relentlessly responding to irate people with calmness and respect, and most importantly, negative interactions have five times the effect on mood than positive interactions.

Of interest to those that work remotely: it seems that if you work mostly through email or conference calls (rather than face-to-face), you tend to fight more and trust each other less. This is due to the fact that facial expressions, verbal intonations, posture, and “group mood” can’t be communicated. Bob suggests “the technology may be fueling the problem rather than simply protecting you from it“.

I actually recommend the No Asshole Rule as a book to be read by all open source project contributors. If you work at home, or remotely, there are also tips and tricks to help you be a better person. In fact, reading through the book, I had already identified people I’d love to give a copy of the book to! I for one can tell you how bad it is when there’s an asshole on the project - I’ve faced a few in the last five or so years.

Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, by John Perkins
I don’t know how believable this story is, but if its anything to the truth, its one of those books that a lot of people might get angered by. I learned that the American Founding Fathers had envisioned the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. He puts the thought out that slavery still exists, its just in those factories in far-away lands making your Nike shoes, and Apple iPods - economically speaking, these people, while being exploited, are economically better off by earning even a tiny minimum wage (by international standards) that allow them to live a fairly average life in their countries, no? Its better than not working. He successfully predicts that the US dollar can crash badly when the OPEC nations look for a stronger currency, say like the Euro. This was back in 2002, and today in 2007, we’re seeing exactly this happen (thus currencies like the AUD are doing so much better against the USD, while countries like Malaysia who are “basket pegged” perform worse).

At least I’ve come to learn that the US State Department has a section on their website entitled Identifying Misinformation! They ask if John dreamed up a fantasy? Possible, but unlikely - I’m of the belief that EHMs exist to this very day. Maybe never to the degree that John Perkins states…

Technorati Tags: books, the no asshole rule, economics, confessions of an economic hit man, economic hit man

Since my last foray into writing book reviews, I figured it made a little more sense to get a few more out of the bag, that I remember, since then.

• Losing My Virginity by Richard Branson

Amazing autobiography. Does things in the name of fun, has become a billionaire, over and over, and has got some really practical advice about running a company (and now, companies) on a shoestring budget. Partnnership, diversification, is clearly key.

• iCon by Jeffrey Young & William Simon

Steve Jobs, Apple, Pixar. Successes over and over, but there were pains at the start. Management mistakes to not make. Probably a good read for any Mac fan.

• Freakonomics by Steven D. Levitt & Stephen J. Dubner

Simply interesting, its a must read. Drop in violent crime, in thanks to abortion? Drug dealers who still live with their moms, because they don’t really make much money? Interesting scenarios, that will make you think, for certain. Most entertaining reading, picking the book up, makes it very hard to put it down till it was done.

• Lonely Planet: Thailand

Dodgy copy picked up while in Siem Reap, but served its purpose of giving me enough information to survive in Bangkok.

• Lonely Planet: Cambodia

Without this, I would have had no Siem Reap trip. Truly used this, plus the driver we hired, to have a good six day holiday, touring the Angkor, and the regions that most don’t visit. The book was mighty handy, and will probably serve well when writing the travelogue.

• A Year In The World by Frances Mayes

Reading this was actually inspirational, in the sense that it paved my way for last December’s travels. I actually had a passion to explore, plan to a certain extent, and leave some parts of travel to chance. I must say, I’ve never had a better amount of time, travelling, and its all thanks to her joyous sense of adventure and travel. Recommended reading if life’s feeling like a rut, and you’re just wating to escape into a holiday.

• Under The Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes
  I read this after reading A Year In The World, as I absolutely adore Frances Mayes style. The recipes are typically helpful, and the idea of living such a Bohemian lifestyle, will make you want to visit Italy.
• God’s Callgirl by Carla Van Raay

A memoir, of a Dutch girl, who’s family emigrated to Australia. What’s interesting is she grows up in a full-on Catholic environment, goes on into the convent to become a nun, is a nun, then leaves for freedom. Upon leaving, her sex drive seems to be active, and she becomes a prostitute. This is her story, about self-sabotage, and being a working girl. Probably a very useful text for women’s studies.

• Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain

I am a big fan of the series, on Discovery Travel & Adventure. When I saw the book lying at the bookstore, I had to pick it up. Its a gripping tale spanning two decades of life as a cook. Starting from the bottom, right to being a chef in his own kitchen, he paints a very interesting story, of what it’s like to be behind the scenes, at a restaurant. There’s also practical advice for those wanting to cook (at chef levels, even). What makes this book highly interesting is all the anecdotes, of life as a chef. Its definitely a recommended memoir. Now to find his other book, A Cook’s Tour.