Exploits Books

I picked this up for 50c at the local shops. I was quite surprised, as this is one of the best books I've ever read concerning Ollie North.

It is more than just about his involvement in the Iran-Contra affair. It is more of biography of this truly amazing man and his dedication to his country and beliefs.

If you can find this book anywhere, I would strongly recommend you get it, even if you are unfamiliar with whom Ollie North is.

Authors Galloway and Thacker--with New York University and the Georgia Institute of Technology respectively--pose a dichotomy between networks and sovereignty. Sovereignty is the longtime, historical form of government and society; often described as "hierarchic." Networks, on the other hand as any contemporary person knows, are newer, postmodern, forms of social organization--or topology--and activity. The difference between sovereignty and network is the difference between architecture and biology.

The co-authors take a "more speculative, experimental approach [resulting in] a series of marginal claims" rather than a theory to try to grasp the essential nature and actual effects of networks; all the while recognizing that "the nonhuman quality of networks is precisely what makes them so difficult to grasp". With sovereignty, leaders--i. e., persons--and laws or conventions were recognizable formative elements. With networks on the other hand, there are no permanent nor widely-accepted leaders and no code of law or centuries of convention forming or even governing them. Yet, there are businesses and services such as protocols and institutions such as Microsoft and Google which strongly influence and in some ways determine the presence and activity of networks. The belief that networks, particularly the Internet, are naturally, intentionally, or inevitably egalitarian is misleading.

The author's "speculative" approach carries them to summaries and critiques of philosophers from widely differing ages and with widely differing ideas and even worldviews; among these, Plato and Hobbes, Foucault and Guattari, Baudrillard and Virilio, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri. In accordance with their understanding that they are making only "marginal claims," they do not presume nor work to synthesize such diversified, in some cases exclusionary thoughts. The authors' wide historical and literary learning, however, with their patent familiarity with all aspects of contemporary computer and networking technology allow for continuous illumination. The play of the diversity of the content is stimulating rather than conclusive or even much suggestive.

"Nodes" and "Edges" are the two chief parts of the book within which the play occurs. Nodes (to simplify) are the businesses, or the sources, of networks; the protocols, programs, Microsofts, Myspaces, etc. These will come and go as the field of networks evolves, just like businesses have always done. While the nodes are essential, the authors see the edges are more meaningful for those involved with networks. The edges represent networks' potentials in that they indicate the human desire and choices which give shape to the networks. "What matters more and more is the very distribution and dispersal of action throughout the network, a dispersal that would ask us to define networks less in terms of the nodes and more in terms of the edges..." Yet, ever provisional in their approach, Galloway and Thacker imagine networks could be best comprehended "in terms other than the entire, overly spatialized dichotomy of nodes and edges altogether." But with this as the next-to-last sentence, they do not begin to move onto this ground.

RAIMONDO LURAGHI, University of Genoa, Italy. As clearly stated in the preface, the objective of the author is extension. In other words, he is not looking for in-depth research but for the building of a complete scene, where no episode, no personality, no ship is forgotten or overlooked, so that his book would not 'suffer from a lack of detail concerning a particular action or an intriguing personality' (pp. x). A tremendous task, indeed, one that required painstaking reading, unlimited patience, and an almost uncanny attention to details.... Now, the question is: does Campbell succeed in achieving his goal? Is the information supplied always correct and reliable? This reviewer believes that the answer to both questions should be positive. The landscape that the author wanted to build is here: wide, informative, and as complete as human effort can make it. Direct quotations are well chosen and almost always of primary interest. As for the correctness of information, one has to congratulate Campbell because mistakes are few-mainly mis-prints. Instead the book deserves high praise because of its splendid collection of illustrations. Only researchers who, like this reviewer, know how difficult and frustrating the task of locating photographs of the Confederate Navy may be, can appreciate the magnificent patrimony of illustrations that are offered here to readers. Summing up, Campbell has succeeded in putting together a very interesting and useful book that deserves careful attention from anybody interested in the tragic and glorious story of the Confederate States Navy. From the "Journal of Southern History," vol. 65, No. 2, May 1999

With this book, R. Thomas Campbell begins his series of anecdotal accounts of the Confederate Navy. While anecdotal books can be tiresome, Campbell's is well-written and entertaining, and taken with the next three books in the series, approaches epic proportions. Entertaining and informative.

The wreck of the German WW1 Cruiser SMS Emden is still found perched on top of the rocks exactly where she ran aground off North Keeling Island in 1914. What was not destroyed by enemy action, Japanese salvage in the 1950's and almost a century of pounding by the elements, still bears a remarkable resemblance to a once great ship and is a lasting testament to her once gallant crew.

Under the command of one of the most chivalrous men ever to wear a uniform, this ship went in pursuit of enemy merchant vessels and was amongst the most successful ever to do so. In one raid she sank a Russian cruiser and French torpedo boat after simply steaming into a British port and opening fire.

Such were the exploits of this ship and of the way in which her captain and crew conducted themselves, any person of any nationality would like to think that the personnel in their own navy were capable of emulating such fine behaviour - both in success and defeat, as was displayed in this particularly fine example.

The book itself is well laid out with an interesting selection of historic photographs and maps. Altogether, there is much here for those with a casual interest in the subject as well as the serious historian. Furthermore, the book itself is a very good read.

NM.

The wreck of the German WW1 Cruiser SMS Emden is still found perched on top of the rocks exactly where she ran aground off North Keeling Island in 1914. What was not destroyed by enemy action, Japanese salvage in the 1950's and almost a century of pounding by the elements, still bears a remarkable resemblance to a once great ship and is a lasting testament to her once gallant crew.

Under the command of one of the most chivalrous men ever to wear a uniform, this ship went in pursuit of enemy merchant vessels and was amongst the most successful ever to do so. In one raid she sank a Russian cruiser and French torpedo boat after simply steaming into a British port and opening fire.

Such were the exploits of this ship and of the way in which her captain and crew conducted themselves, any person of any nationality would like to think that the personnel in their own navy were capable of emulating such fine behaviour - both in success and defeat, as was displayed in this particularly fine example.

The book itself is well laid out with an interesting selection of historic photographs and maps. Altogether, there is much here for those with a casual interest in the subject as well as the serious historian. Furthermore, the book itself is a very good read.

NM.

This book is a novel, or historical fiction as the long introduction will point out. The author Smith wrote this and had the publishers say it was the journal of Davy Crockett. It isn't. Smith read some books ghost written by Crockett, and then wrote this story in a similar fashion. That being said, it is a good and entertaining read. However, it is not true, so fellow historians beware.
Crockett is a colorful figure in American history. I can't say I know much about him, but this story places him in a very favorable light. The saying much attributed to Crockett about the voters of Tennessee going to hell, but he was going to Texas is one of my favorites. This is a great short read and I much recommend it.

R. Thomas Campbell continues his series of anecdotal accounts of the Confederate Navy. While anecdotal books can be tiresome, Campbell's is well-written and entertaining, and taken with the other three books in the series, approaches epic proportions. Entertaining and informative.

The title, 'When Opportunity Knocks: How to Exploit the Unexpected in Business', is certaining very appealing when I first encountered this book on the amazon website.

The author readily shares his personal anecdotes & inspiring stories as he details the abundant variety of business opportunities around us. He even highlights the characteristics of successful opportunists as well as some blunders & unrealistic opportunities to avoid. In fact, he has identified thirty five sources of seemingly profitable opportunities. In these respects, he has done a marvellous job!

What I find lacking in this book is specific information pertaining to the process of assessing & evaluating the viability of those opportunities. Finding opportunities, in tactical terms, is not a difficult matter. Just open up all your senses, especially your eyes, to what's happening around you, is good enough.

In reality, there are already many good books covering this aspect of exploiting the unexpected in business.

Besides assessment & evaluation, some opportunities may be too raw in scope &/or depth & may need further development &/or refinement. How does one develop &/or refine such an opportunity? Any information given in this area will definitely be useful to potential entrepreneurs.

I would have expected the author, with his many 'hard-knocks', to share at least his own personal as well as business experiences in assessing & evaluating opportunities. This incorporation would have made the book more complete for readers who are looking at this book from the business development angle.

On the whole & to conclude my review, I reckon this book is still worth reading, but only from the standpoint of opportunity finding!

Readers who are interested in the assessment & evaluation as well as pursuit of new opportunities, should read Michel Robert's Innovation Formula.

A disappointing book when you see who the author is.

It is mostly about change management - he calls it the "Strategic Inflection Point".

This is by far the worst business book I have read in recent years. It is hard to believe that Andy Grove actually thought that this material was worth putting into a book. As other reviews have said, this book at most should have been a short article in Business Week...but even then it would require some actual content to make it worth reading. The best part of the book is the quotes on the cover from Steve Jobs et al. It makes me wonder if they even read the book.

Maybe I haven't read enough "management" books (though I do have an MBA), but if this is considered "great" for this genre- WOW. This entire book could have been summed up in a couple pages without losing any major points, but I guess you can't have a bestseller that way! One reviewer said it was too technical. Are you living in a cave? I found it condescendingly written- absurdly simple and dumbed down. Granted, it's over a decade old, but I doubt everyone was really that much stupider ten years ago.

Andy Grove has verbalized the mindset that we must all develop to survive in the 21st Century. While his idea of constantly looking over your shoulder has always been applicable, the speed of the Internet economy requires that we do it much more frequently and penalizes us much more quickly if we do not.

Grove does a great job of showing how one man's crises is another's opporuntity and uses the term strategic inflection points to describe these periods of 10x change.

This book is a good reminder for anyone who thinks that what made them successful to this point is any guarantee that they will be successful in the future.

This is something that any first year business student could have written. It is a fast read but it provides no new insights.