User Profile

Ian Brown

igb@books.hccp.org

Joined 2 years ago

XML apologist. Erlang enthusiast. Currently JVMs & Performance stuff at Netflix. Previously JVMs & performative stuff at Twitter. He/him.

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Ian Brown's books

To Read

Currently Reading (View all 12)

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2025 Reading Goal

8% complete! Ian Brown has read 2 of 24 books.

Extremely Online (Hardcover, 2023, Simon & Schuster) 5 stars

Acclaimed Washington Post reporter Taylor Lorenz presents a groundbreaking social history of the internet—revealing how …

To err is human. To forfeit the battle for the shortform creative video market to TikTok is Vine.

5 stars

A fast (but, at times, suprisingly in-depth) survey of the rise of user-generated content in the age of social marketing, "Creators", and influencers.

@taylorlorenz@mastodon.social shines a light on some familiar faces but also gives a voice and shows the work done by a lot of folks forgotten or ignored by the current narratives around the landscape of attention-seeking platforms, products, and people.

What ultimately sets this book apart from so many others that have also focused on the companies and products that shape our world today is that Lorenz examines the people behind the content, not the technology.

Worth a read.

Starter Villain (2023, Doherty Associates, LLC, Tom) 4 stars

Inheriting your mysterious uncle's supervillain business is more complicated than you might imagine.

Sure, there …

Cat GIF goes here.

5 stars

Another genre-bending romp from @scalzi@mastodon.social. Fast and fun, this book was a great bit of mental floss to kick off another year of reading. As always Scalzi delivers laugh-out-loud lines with clever dialog and banter. Pick up a copy at your local bookstore or at the nearest public library ASAP.

Starter Villain (2023, Doherty Associates, LLC, Tom) 4 stars

Inheriting your mysterious uncle's supervillain business is more complicated than you might imagine.

Sure, there …

Another genre-bending romp from @scalzi@mastodon.social. Fast and fun, this book was a great bit of mental floss to kick off another year of reading. As always Scalzi delivers laugh-out-loud lines with clever dialog and banter. Pick up a copy at your local bookstore or at the nearest public library ASAP.

Capital in the Twenty-First Century (Hardcover, 2013, Éditions du Seuil, Harvard University Press) 5 stars

What are the grand dynamics that drive the accumulation and distribution of capital? Questions about …

Capital is never quiet: it is always risk-oriented and entrepreneurial, at least at its inception, yet it always tends to transform itself into rents as it accumulates in large enough amounts—that is its vocation, its logical destination.

Capital in the Twenty-First Century by  (Page 63)