Doug's Place

Why 'Wired' Seems to Have It Wrong About Amazon and Apple

The December 2011 issue of Wired is out, with a photo of the left half of Jeff Bezos' face on the cover.  I was excited about this issue, because I wanted to read about the moves Amazon.com [and my Amazon WishList] is making to be a cloud content provider in addition to seller of books and anything else you can find in a supermarket or shopping mall.

Instead, I was disappointed.

The article by longtime tech writer Stephen Levy repeated some tiresome comparisons between Amazon and Apple. Amazon is content company, right? Because it makes most of its money selling more content things, both real (like books, shoes, and DVDs) and electronic (like ebooks and streaming movies). Yep, it's not a hardware company, though its big news right now is hardware in the form of the Kindle Fire.

And Apple isn't a content company, right?
Because it makes most of its money selling hardware things, like computers and mobile tablets and smartphones. Yes, it's not a content company, even though its current big news is user content management in the form of launching iCloud.

The article also disappointed because all too soon it descends into a Q&A dialog that doesn't grab me. It doesn't talk enough about the Amazon consumer experience and what might be coming down the pike. The most I learn about consumer experiences at Amazon is that Amazon really doesn't like to talk to me on the phone, really is not proud of being a profit-making enterprise, would offer single pricing for movie streaming if, gosh, only the movie content providers would agree, and seems more head-in-the-clouds than futuristic.

There's an ethereal quality to Bezos that bothers me, and I'm trying to put my finger on why.

Mini Review: Churchill, by Paul Johnson

Just before my father contracted the illness that took his life this past fall, he was listening with my mother to an NPR show that featured Paul Johnson's new book, Churchill, from Viking Press "Give that book to Doug," Dad told Mom.

And that is how I happened to find this entirely manageable less-than-200-pages book under the Christmas tree, six weeks after Dad died.

Johnson encapsulates Sir Winston Churchill's life well, except that I think Churchill's unfortunate racism is not treated fully enough. Johnson is fortunate to have met his subject. He plainly believes that Churchill's greatest achievement was not saving Britain from Nazi domination, important though that may be, but rather living a balanced and scrupulous life that encouraged both saving his country and saving himself through application of work and relaxation, determination and a search for joy over depression, excellence in writing and thought, and generosity to others.

Many works about Churchill are lengthy, sometimes involving more than one volume. To achieve the telling of Churchill's story so briefly, and with such perspective on Churchill's mode for living sometimes make the book seem to be a morality essay. But in Churchill's life and Johnson's summary of it, I find guidance for my own life.

Seth Godin Rocks

Two reasons why author Seth Godin rocks:

First, provocative posts, like this. An excerpt:

More librarians are telling me (unhappily) that the number one thing they deliver to their patrons is free DVD rentals. That's not a long-term strategy, nor is it particularly an uplifting use of our tax dollars. Here's my proposal: train people to take intellectual initiative. Once again, the net turns things upside down. The information is free now. No need to pool tax money to buy reference books.

Second, a free book!

Captured by the Light: Photography in Indianapolis, My Former Hometown

I'm proud to be a Hoosier.

Even though I'm a New Yorker by birth, a Connecticut Yankee by upbringing, a Tar Heel by education and early adult life, and a Massachusetts Bay Stater now, there will always be in me a love for the subtle and quirky proud culture of Indiana, the state where I lived for 23 years between 1983 and 2006.

I especially love the state's history, sensibility, art, politics, and the interplay between urban and rural. It is an American microcosm.

But most of all, I love Indianapolis, the capital city. So I was pleased to come across a community-based book project by the Indianapolis Star called "Capture Indy." It's a riff on the "Day in the Life of (fill in a place)" aided by a cool web site and the help of hundreds of photographers.

I'm having a lot of enjoyment on the site. I click on a photo — any photo — and it is invariably well presented with lots of screen space for the image, contextual explanation, and a big grey "SEE ANOTHER" button that brings up another photo when clicked. It's a stream of memories of being a Midwesterner.

Yes, the book goes on my wish list!