BlogSat

I finished " In The Plex " by Steven Levy over the weekend. I wasn't expecting to try to read the book, but a comment from a long-time Googler that Steven Levy "probably knows more about Google and its history than almost any Googler" was enough to get me interested. I was very, very pleasantly surprised. Even controlling for the fact that its the most recent book on Google, I do think its the best book ever written about the company (and there have been a bunch!) I read a couple just before I was going to join the company nearly four years ago, and I'd assumed that my time here and my general curiosity and pokiness (I know - not a word) meant that I knew a lot about the company, its history and a lot of our businesses but I learned a lot reading Levy's book - what helps make it extremely readable are the anecdotes and the details - little nuggets like why Scott Hassan re-wrote the crawler in Python; how Eric Veach thought about the ads system, the dy...

A post on Isaac 's blog was a reminder for me to pick up a book I'd meant to read for a while: Alan Cooper 's The Inmates are running the asylum . If you're interested in building software, I can't recommend the book highly enough. Cooper makes an incredibly compelling case for how and why so many software products are terribly broken. He goes over how the software process prevents us from building awesome products even when smart people are well-intentioned, how attention to interaction design pays off in the long run, why engineers are often exactly the wrong people to make interaction decisions, and how the introduction of a design function in the product development cycle would actually work. I was characteristically skeptical of a few things before I started on the book, but I quickly lost count of the number of times I shook my head with "oh yeah, I remember when that's happened." I'm going to avoid a typical review and summarize the points...

I finished Steve's Krug "Don't Make Me Think" a few weeks ago. I highly recommend the book for anyone interested in usability; most reactions when I told folks I'd finished it were off the "you haven't read it already?" and "you realize when that book was written!" variety. :) There are a bunch of great ideas in there. The most important one for me was really just the title of the book, i.e. when users get to websites, apps, anything really etc., they're typically looking to do something specific so: they skim; they don't really read and process everything you might put there so using minimal design and familiar patterns is critical to usability i.e. make sure they don't need to think much. But a few days later, a conversation at work reminded me of another great idea in the book, i.e. "make sure you're measuring for and optimizing for the right metric." For websites and web forms in particular for example, ...

We caught " The Social Network " last weekend, and agree with everyone else . It was pretty awesome! As an aside: part of my brain kept trying to see if they got the technical details right (they did!) and part of the wife's bigger brain kept trying to catch part of the Harvard campus that she knew (quite a bit!) Staying with the theme, I'm almost done with Hackers and Painters , and I recommend that even more; though it probably speaks much more to ...well hackers. The books is a collection of essays by Paul Graham and spans a range of topics in life/anthropology, computer science and entrepreneurship. Its hard to review it as an entire book simply because the essays are on a couple of diverse topics. I'd been reading his essays on his website for the last couple of years and really enjoyed them, but this - especially some of his earlier essays which I didn't know about, are both incredibly insightful and instantly relatable. I particularly enjoyed "Ha...

Quite simply the most fun I've had in a movie theatre in a while (how many million times have I said that this year already?? :)) Anyway, I don't find myself compelled to applaud during the middle of a movie often; and it happened twice on this one...and I had company in the theatre! The movie is ridiculously faithful to the comics (though some side-plots have been changed) but it's really the direction that makes this movie. Edgar Wright played around brilliantly with genres, breaking storytelling formats, and some really slick editing and camera work in Hot Fuzz , and even Shaun of the Dead . This story, where genre and storytelling bending material abound, was perfect for him to direct. He nails it and infuses it with tons of energy and humor to boot.

Just before I took off for vacation, I managed to finish a few books recently. Yay me! First I ended up devouring " The Girl who played with Fire " and " The Girl who kicked the Hornet's Nest" , and hence wrapping up the Millenium Trilogy . What I loved about all three books (besides the characters) are the fact that the genres are actually so different. "..Dragon Tattoo" is a mystery/thriller with a gruesome finale. "..Fire" read to me like an action novel, and "... Hornet's Nest" is at heart a journalist/courtroom drama. There's liberal doses of action, intrigue, romance, general gruesome-ness and strange relationships thrown in all three, and that just adds to the appeal. The success of the books (note the breaking eBook sales numbers) suggest there are tons of people agreeing with me. I'm holding off on watching the Swedish film versions for now. I also just finished Fault Lines: How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten...

I also ended up reading a couple of novels over the last week or two. It'd been a while since I'd read the mystery-type thingy, and so I enjoyed The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo . The writing and the plot is really solid and I was hooked right through. The setting (mostly in remote parts of Sweden) is novel and worked for me too, but its the characters that really make the story, so its a good thing they've got a bunch of A-listers contending for the Hollywood remake . :) Its a great hook-me-entertain-me-mystery. Because of all the buzz around this one, I was expecting more, so I came away a little "that was it?", but the book did enough for me to pick up the next volume in the Millenium trilogy for commute reading. I also ended up finishing Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang which I probably shouldn't admit in public. Its a set of stories from the life of Chelsea Handler . I felt about it like I do about her late-night TV show . I can't believe I watch it; I kn...

I've given up trying to say intelligent things on my blog (some would argue in real life as well.) So here are some quick movie reviews Rajneeti: Great cast, solid story. I stand by what I told my wife when we got out of the theatre in Boston. "Pretty great. It was like Sarkar Raj for dumber people." Everyone in the (large!) star cast did a great job. There were interesting but not-quite-fleshed-out references to the Mahabharata and contemporary Indian politics, but it was a little over-the-top and melodramatic. T'was a month of directors referencing the Indian classics as Raavan re-told the Ramayana set in present-dayish Madhya Pradesh. I'll show up to watch anything that Mani Ratnam directs and the NY Times got it right. As good as the actors are, its the treatment that's the star. Get Him to the Greek was fun for me, though the wife wasn't very amused. :) As much as I like him, I'm curious to see Russell Brand play anyone another than Aldous S...

Ended up seeing more movies in a week than I had in a while. Ironman 2 was better than I expected, though still not as good as the first movie. I can't think of anyone who has as much fun playing a character as Robert Downey Jr. has playing Tony Stark . Well maybe Sam Jackson playing Nick Fury . :) I also needed a Hindi movie fix. That's my excuse for going to cath: Badmaash Company . Wow! Its a standard con movie/good-guys-do-bad-but-then-things-go-sour-dude-repents-and-doed-good, but just done really, really well; and the setting (India in the mid-90s) and the details (at least in the first half) really set the movie apart. The entire cast is pretty great, and its rare that they let all the character develop so much. There's one slightly cheesy bit at the end, but other than that... Since 3 Idiots was released at the very end of last year, I might have to put this in front of my race for my favorite Hindi movie in 2010.:)

This weekend was in NYC, so the wife and I caught Mary Poppins (which actually was much more fun that I'd expected... and I was expecting it to be a lot of fun) and got a Hindi movie fix by watching Housefull (ditto..) Mary Poppins: I remember seeing the movie on VHS at least a couple of times when I was young, but it'd been long enough so that most things were hazy and I didn't remember much except for the songs and my excessive, annoying-to-others use of the word "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious', which is really perfect to watch it. The acting was great (particularly Laura Michelle Kelly as Mary Poppins) and the songs and the choreography was incredible. The wife and I left smiling and were humming the songs and tapping our feet for a few hours after. Housefull: Eh.. not much to say here. Its an Akshay Kumar/Ritesh Deshmukh comedy which Sajid Khan keeps going at a reasonable pace. There's tons of recycled jokes, slapstick and the kind of humor you...

Crazy week, but I did catch this one and loved it .:) Hit Girl steals the show, and this may be the best thing that Nicholas Cage has done in a while.:) While I'm reviewing things the WSJ app on the iPad is pretty slick, and this book (Very Nice Ways to Say Very Bad Things) isn't as funny as the title suggests. I picked it up from the library at work and stopped reading it after 5 mins. If you've read it and liked it, let me know and I may dive back in.

One of these days, hopefully sooner rather than later, I will have a magical and revolutionary device to call my own. However, I won't bother waiting till then to start reviewing the damn thing. :) I played with it for a little more than an hour at the Apple store next door to the office, and then some more when I'd visited the store again...and then again. Yes, I've heard of buying things on the Internet, but I'm determined to walk out of a store with one now. :) There are enough reviews out there and I'm joining the unwashed faithful that are buying the device to see what the hell it is. So instead, I'll list the reasons why I think I"m going to get frustrated by the device despite by plans to buy one soon; maybe I'll be proved wrong No multitasking is going to suck big time: I'm very used to music in the background while surfing. Apparently I'm going to have to wait till Fall till the update. Sigh. The screen size means I keep wanting to use...

The easy one first: Date Night : it was fun. I expected it to be hilarious in both a slapstick and smart kinda way, and it was. I wasn't expecting it to try to layer on too much emotional/romantic stuff and it did, but that was pretty good too. :) I got about a third of the way through Saatchi & Saatchi: the Inside Story before I stopped. The book's fine, but focuses more on the personalities and politics, rather than the breakthrough advertising and after a while that got less interesting. I did get through " Tuned In ", which I picked up from the library at work. Its a good book and at first glance I thought I wouldn't learn anything that I hadn't in an introductory marketing class, but the book's a great reminder on how easy it is not get the basic things wrong and how often even folks that should know better, don't; or even if they know better aren't able to act in a way consistent with that. The book goes over ways to understand your cu...

Caught this one over the weekend. Really good; funny, twisted, gritty, and very Tarantino-esque. Trailer link . Also got through about 1/5th of Wikinomics , which came highly recommended from a bunch of folks. However, I just couldn't get myself to continue beyond that point. The material was interesting, but something about the lack of continuity in the writing and ( what I perceived as) repetitiveness, made me give up on the book. Life's too short to try to finish books I'm not enjoying. :) Anyone who's read the book suggest that I persevere?

Of course one of my resolutions for 2010, was to blog more: so here goes. :) I finished two books in December. American on Purpose: The improbable adventures of an unlikely patriot which is Craig Ferguson 's autobiography. Ferguson is, in my opinion, the funniest late-night host there is today, and its not even close. I probably watch Leno more often, but no one makes you laugh as hard, and for reasons you don't even completely understand. Others need their jokes to make you laugh. Craig Ferguson can have you in splits just be being himself. He's written a novel before that was great, and the tone he employs is similar. He talks a lot very honestly about growing up, drifting, his love life, his friends, his fascinating attempts at a string of professions, passion for life and America, and struggles with alcoholism. Its simple, funny and very honest writing. It's also a great life, with some amazing stories. If you're a fan or even know him from TV, its definite...

While the excessive movie-watching had slowed a bit, its back with a vengeance over the last few weeks. First, three pieces of evidence that give me cause for concern. Wake Up Sid , Ajab Prem Ki Gajab Kahani , and Rocket Singh: Salesman of the Year , seem to suggest that Ranbir Kapoor might be around for a very long time. These movies also suggest this may not be as bad a thing.:) And by the way, when was the last time an actor had three releases in a year where the character he plays is also in the title of the movie?? "Wake up Sid" is a fun slice-of-life,growing-up,finding-himself, finding-love kinda-film that I caught on Netflix. The sort of film you're pretty sure you've seen before and know how its going to end, but the treatment is fresh enough, the characters are interesting enough, the acting is good enough, and the script is entertaining enough, to leave you with the feeling that you've had a great time. The almost same thing goes for "Ajab Prem...

Living in NYC and taking the trains now means I actually might have time to get some reading done! Woohoo! So let's start with the books: I finished " The Dip " by Seth Godin (really slim) The message (or more accurately what I remember): First, know when to quit; second, remember there is disproportionate reward for being the "best"; third, being the best requires having the will and determination to power through "The Dip". Great examples, and fun and useful read in a psychology-for-people-who-re ally-want-to-over-achieve kind of way. I definitely recommend it. I'm about two-third's of the way through Nassim Taleb 's " The Black Swan " It a very engaging read. The book goes over a number of biases we humans have and the fallacies and errors in judgement we perpetuate. Lot of great examples of how we don't really know how much we think we know, how we try to force logic and ill-fitting explanations on situations and most ...

I'd nearly forgotten why I was an avid Michael Jackson fan growing up, and would have most likely skipped this movie. As part of an event at work, I happened to go out and catch this and was soo happy that I did. Watching him dance, sing, and meticulously plan what would have been a surprising and worthy comeback brought back some great memories. It really was inspiring to see that underneath and despite all the tabloid fare, an incredible performer still existed and was able to show it. Its tragic that the world didn't get to see what he'd planned, but the film (which is really just edited footage of him rehearsing) offers Michael Jackson - the performer some redemption and those that loved his work solace that despite everything (controversies, age, health, personal issues etc.) the incredible performer was still alive and near the top of his game.

It's been a really long time since I blogged about anything I've read or seen, so this is starting to play catchup. I realized that I got so, so used to seeing Hindi movies that were really bad (after the strike , and then this brain-cell killer which was the big-budget movie that was released after it), that my expectations had been set really low. In general in the past few months, I'd come to believe that if I don't cringe too many times during a movie, and there are at least a couple of things I find amusing, that's really all I have the right to expect. So one really good movie was great, a second really great, and a third left me uncomfortable with my sense of satisfaction; I probably need to reset my expectations from Hindi films again. Love Aaj Kal was incredibly good; well-directed, perfectly cast, incredibly romantic and funny. Even the surprising casting was effective. Life Partner: It was a pretty good Govinda movie and its been a while :); nuff ...

I finally finished a book! Ignore the fact that is was a graphic novel .:) Persepolis is an autobiography, and the story of a girl growing up during a very turbulent time in Iran's history. Wikipedia helpfully tells me its not just a memoir, but a Bildungsroman . Its a powerful book and I know a litte bit more about Iranian history and culture now. You can't help being touched by the story and identifying with many of the characters. In general, across human experiences we uniformly find people that are weak, noble, stupid, capable to great love and fighting to protect their children. It reminded me a little bit of Art Spiegelman's Maus which was a lot more powerful and affected me much more deeply when I read it. In other reading news, I'm now mid-way through 3 books again . I'm going to try to get my act together and finish off a couple of them over the next 2 weeks. :)