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Book description
In 1990, IBM had its most profitable year ever. By 1993, the computer industry had changed so rapidly the company was on its way to losing $16 billion and IBM was on a watch list for extinction -- victimized by its own lumbering size, an insular corporate culture, and the PC era IBM had itself helped invent. Then Lou Gerstner was brought in to run IBM. Almost everyone watching the rapid demise of this American icon presumed Gerstner had joined IBM to preside over its continued dissolution into a confederation of autonomous business units. This strategy, well underway when he arrived, would have effectively eliminated the corporation that had invented many of the industry's most important technologies. Instead, Gerstner took hold of ... Rest of this review on the detail page
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Reviews (1) and details of Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? Inside IBM's Historic Turnaround

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Book description
"I was a nerd. Geek. From fairly early on. I didn't duct-tape my glasses together, but I might as well have, because I had all the other traits. Good at math, good at physics, and with no social graces whatsoever. And this was before being a nerd was considered to be a good thing." In this witty and engrossing narrative, Linus Torvalds, the brilliant mastermind behind the latest Internet revolution, in collaboration with writer David Diamond, chronicles his transformation from a pale, skinny Helsinki college kid to an international folk hero. What began as a childhood hobby soon became the astonishing phenomenon known as the LINUX operating system. LINUX was created because Linus was curious to see if he could improve upon the operati... Rest of this review on the detail page
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Reviews (2) and details of Just for Fun: The Story of an Accidental Revolutionary

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Book description
Free as in Freedom interweaves biographical snapshots of GNU project founder Richard Stallman with the political, social and economic history of the free software movement. Starting with how it all began--a desire for software code from Xerox to make the printing more efficient--to the continuing quest for free software that exists today. It is a movement which Stallman has at turns defined, directed and manipulated with a Stalin-like flair, and the goal of the book is to document how Stallman's own personal evolution has done much to shape notions of what free software is and should be. Like Alan Greenspan in the financial sector, Stallman has assumed the role of tribal elder in a community that bills itself as anarchic and immune to cen... Rest of this review on the detail page
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Reviews (2) and details of Free as in Freedom: Richard Stallman's Crusade for Free Software

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Review:
Popular "introduction to computers" books tend to be limited in depth, breadth and understanding, if not downright inaccurate. To make up for it, at least they can be entertaining. This one is. The conceit of presentation as Starfleet supplementary course material is fairly easy to maintain: just write everything in the past tense. Most of the Star Trek illustrations and quotes are more amusing than informative, but I did find some to be actually supportive of the concepts under discussion. (Ironically, the chapter on operating systems seems to have no grasp of the idea, apart from the user interface: the whole chapter misses the point-- except for one "quote" by "Noonian Soong".) The technical material is, of course, terse and ... Rest of this review on the detail page
(Review by Rob Slade)
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Reviews (1) and details of 20th Century Computers and How They Worked: The Official Starfleet History of Computers

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Review:
Owen Linzmayer's Apple Confidential is subtitled The Real Story of Apple Computer, Inc., and while nobody will ever know the complete, "real" story about Apple, Linzmayer's is probably as close as they come. Having covered Apple news since 1980, he offers extensive insider details about Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, John Sculley, Gilbert Amelio, Bill Gates, and other major players whose lives were (and are) intertwined with Apple's history. And along the way, we also learn about lesser-known figures whose stories have remained hidden in the Apple myth: Ronald Gerald Wayne, for example, who was actually a partner with Wozniak and Jobs in the original incarnation of the company, but who sold his share when he realized he would be financially vul... Rest of this review on the detail page
(Review by amazon.com)
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Reviews (3) and details of Apple Confidential: The Real Story of Apple Computer, Inc.