Category: Writing

author: Isabel Wilkerson
name: Elaine
average rating: 4.31
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2013/11/11
date added: 2015/02/11
shelves: history, non-fiction, ebook
review:
A tremendous book, covering a vast scope and intimate detail at the same time. I’d been meaning to read this for a while, but then in a Metafilter thread about American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America someone mentioned this book again and it happened to be available in ebook from the library. I’m so glad I finally read it! The sense of horror, the enormity of the migration, and the degree to which this movement shaped the 20th century: I hardly contemplated it. The author moves back and forth almost effortlessly between statistics, contemporary accounts, anecdotes, and the overarching stories of her three protagonists. (It reminds me a bit of Michener James A, who I read a lot of in high school/college.) So good, I teared up a bit at the end as Robert (migrated from Louisiana to Los Angeles) and George (Florida to NYC) got sick and passed away.

author: Tim Wu
name: Elaine
average rating: 4.03
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2011/04/06
date added: 2013/09/30
shelves: economics, history, politics, non-fiction, favorites, technology
review:
As with Nothing to Envy, I should have written this review right after reading the book. It was fantastic, and I’d like to read it again. Great history of the “Information Empires” of the 20th and early 21st century, the continuing tension between openness and control. The history of television seemed particularly instructive: there was no early era of openness; instead Sarnoff (RCA/NBC) manipulated everything he could to make sure that it came out under the exact same control as radio at the time. Found myself kinda wishing for some discussion of Facebook in the closing chapters, in which there was a lot of focus on Apple & Google. It seemed to me that Facebook (or its moral equivalents) are the elephant in the room in that discussion. Very highly recommended.

author: Tim Wu
name: Elaine
average rating: 3.95
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2011/04/06
date added: 2013/09/30
shelves: economics, history, politics, non-fiction, favorites, technology
review:
As with Nothing to Envy, I should have written this review right after reading the book. It was fantastic, and I’d like to read it again. Great history of the “Information Empires” of the 20th and early 21st century, the continuing tension between openness and control. The history of television seemed particularly instructive: there was no early era of openness; instead Sarnoff (RCA/NBC) manipulated everything he could to make sure that it came out under the exact same control as radio at the time. Found myself kinda wishing for some discussion of Facebook in the closing chapters, in which there was a lot of focus on Apple & Google. It seemed to me that Facebook (or its moral equivalents) are the elephant in the room in that discussion. Very highly recommended.

author: Tim Wu
name: Elaine
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2011/04/06
date added: 2013/09/30
shelves: economics, history, politics, non-fiction, favorites, technology
review:
As with Nothing to Envy, I should have written this review right after reading the book. It was fantastic, and I’d like to read it again. Great history of the “Information Empires” of the 20th and early 21st century, the continuing tension between openness and control. The history of television seemed particularly instructive: there was no early era of openness; instead Sarnoff (RCA/NBC) manipulated everything he could to make sure that it came out under the exact same control as radio at the time. Found myself kinda wishing for some discussion of Facebook in the closing chapters, in which there was a lot of focus on Apple & Google. It seemed to me that Facebook (or its moral equivalents) are the elephant in the room in that discussion. Very highly recommended.

author: Tim Wu
name: Elaine
average rating: 3.92
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2011/04/06
date added: 2013/09/30
shelves: economics, history, politics, non-fiction, favorites, technology
review:
As with Nothing to Envy, I should have written this review right after reading the book. It was fantastic, and I’d like to read it again. Great history of the “Information Empires” of the 20th and early 21st century, the continuing tension between openness and control. The history of television seemed particularly instructive: there was no early era of openness; instead Sarnoff (RCA/NBC) manipulated everything he could to make sure that it came out under the exact same control as radio at the time. Found myself kinda wishing for some discussion of Facebook in the closing chapters, in which there was a lot of focus on Apple & Google. It seemed to me that Facebook (or its moral equivalents) are the elephant in the room in that discussion. Very highly recommended.

author: Tim Wu
name: Elaine
average rating: 3.85
book published: 2010
rating: 5
read at: 2011/04/06
date added: 2013/09/30
shelves: economics, history, politics, non-fiction, favorites, technology
review:
As with Nothing to Envy, I should have written this review right after reading the book. It was fantastic, and I’d like to read it again. Great history of the “Information Empires” of the 20th and early 21st century, the continuing tension between openness and control. The history of television seemed particularly instructive: there was no early era of openness; instead Sarnoff (RCA/NBC) manipulated everything he could to make sure that it came out under the exact same control as radio at the time. Found myself kinda wishing for some discussion of Facebook in the closing chapters, in which there was a lot of focus on Apple & Google. It seemed to me that Facebook (or its moral equivalents) are the elephant in the room in that discussion. Very highly recommended.

author: M. Mitchell Waldrop
name: Elaine
average rating: 0.0
book published: 2001
rating: 4
read at: 2005/01/01
date added: 2013/09/30
shelves: history, biography, non-fiction, technology
review:
Read this quite a few years ago (pre-Goodreads), saving now so I don’t keep forgetting the title. :\ What I remember is that it was a really good book.

author: M. Mitchell Waldrop
name: Elaine
average rating: 4.40
book published: 2001
rating: 4
read at: 2005/01/01
date added: 2013/09/30
shelves: history, biography, non-fiction, technology
review:
Read this quite a few years ago (pre-Goodreads), saving now so I don’t keep forgetting the title. :\ What I remember is that it was a really good book.

author: Colin Woodard
name: Elaine
average rating: 0.0
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2013/09/26
date added: 2013/09/26
shelves: history, non-fiction, politics, sociology
review:
I really enjoyed most of this book. It gives a different perspective on large sweeps of American history, but in a way that’s immediately intuitive for someone who’s read quite a bit of history. I especially appreciated the colonial and antebellum sections, and the early chapters on El Norte included a lot that was entirely new to me. It definitely gives me a new and useful framework for thinking about American culture and politics. (Goes well with The Big Sort, which is to some extent about individual choices reinforcing those national identities.) It was so engrossing that I really truly couldn’t put it down.

On the other hand, it didn’t feel quite as thorough or deep after the start of the twentieth century, and that was where my interest drifted. Some things I would have liked to have seen covered in more depth:

* African-American migration out of the South and Asian-American influences on the Left Coast. The coverage of non-European non-Native people wasn’t really that great, honestly. He’s strongest talking about European-derived cultures, and I think there’s a lot to explore in the black and Asian experience in particular.

* The culture of Los Angeles specifically (I’m coming to the opinion that LA is a fractal of the nation as a whole) — also, I don’t know much about Chicago, but my opinions about LA lead me to the conclusion that the other gigantic American city might be special too.

* The role of 20th century mass media (and the internet?!) in reducing and/or reinforcing the separation of the nations — this is where the research in The Big Sort could have come in handy.

* The First Nations chapter at the end might have benefited from a bit of discussion of the Native populations of the Far West & Left Coast.

A tiny thing that’s been bugging me: he described Obama as a member of the “Northern nations”, and a footnote details that although he spent his early years entirely outside of the nations in the book (Hawaii, Indonesia), he spent his adult life mostly in the Northern nations. But his mother and grandparents were from Kansas; might one look at him differently if the Midlander or Far West background (I don’t remember what part of Kansas) were taken into account? (Also: fractal America, like LA? Where he also lived as a teen IIRC.)

author: Colin Woodard
name: Elaine
average rating: 4.11
book published: 2011
rating: 4
read at: 2013/09/26
date added: 2013/09/26
shelves: history, non-fiction, politics, sociology
review:
I really enjoyed most of this book. It gives a different perspective on large sweeps of American history, but in a way that’s immediately intuitive for someone who’s read quite a bit of history. I especially appreciated the colonial and antebellum sections, and the early chapters on El Norte included a lot that was entirely new to me. It definitely gives me a new and useful framework for thinking about American culture and politics. (Goes well with The Big Sort, which is to some extent about individual choices reinforcing those national identities.) It was so engrossing that I really truly couldn’t put it down.

On the other hand, it didn’t feel quite as thorough or deep after the start of the twentieth century, and that was where my interest drifted. Some things I would have liked to have seen covered in more depth:

* African-American migration out of the South and Asian-American influences on the Left Coast. The coverage of non-European non-Native people wasn’t really that great, honestly. He’s strongest talking about European-derived cultures, and I think there’s a lot to explore in the black and Asian experience in particular.

* The culture of Los Angeles specifically (I’m coming to the opinion that LA is a fractal of the nation as a whole) — also, I don’t know much about Chicago, but my opinions about LA lead me to the conclusion that the other gigantic American city might be special too.

* The role of 20th century mass media (and the internet?!) in reducing and/or reinforcing the separation of the nations — this is where the research in The Big Sort could have come in handy.

* The First Nations chapter at the end might have benefited from a bit of discussion of the Native populations of the Far West & Left Coast.

A tiny thing that’s been bugging me: he described Obama as a member of the “Northern nations”, and a footnote details that although he spent his early years entirely outside of the nations in the book (Hawaii, Indonesia), he spent his adult life mostly in the Northern nations. But his mother and grandparents were from Kansas; might one look at him differently if the Midlander or Far West background (I don’t remember what part of Kansas) were taken into account? (Also: fractal America, like LA? Where he also lived as a teen IIRC.)