Author Archives: Eamonn Carey

About Eamonn Carey

I like to make things people use. MD at Techstars. Board member at Lingvist, Motivii and others. Investor in Spatch, Neardesk, GamesGRABR and two yet to be released projects. I read a lot.

150-WORD REVIEW: To Save Everything, Click Here by Evgeny Morosov

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To Save EverythingI am occasionally guilty of being slack jawed when it comes to technological advancement. We’re constantly presented with Ted Talks, books and articles which lionise the tech industry as being the source of solutions for everything from healthcare to education and politics to death.

For every ying of utopian thinking, there needs to be a yang of realism and occasional cynicism. That is what Evgeny Morosov presents in his latest book. He dissects topics ranging from social media’s role in the Arab Spring to the quantified self movement – criticisng what he sees as “techno-solutionism” and “cyber-utopianism”.

You might not agree any of much of what he says (many won’t agree with any of it), but you owe it to yourself to at least read some of the counter-arguments that are out there. Read it. I guarantee it will give you pause for thought.

150-WORD REVIEW: Trust Me, I’m Lying by Ryan Holiday

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Book Cover

Some people don’t like Ryan Holiday. If you read the reviews of Trust Me, I’m Lying on Amazon, you’ll see what I mean. I’m not one of those people. This was a fantastically entertaining read about Holiday’s exploits on behalf of his clients.

The blurb on the book’s cover suggests it’s a playbook for the dark arts of exploiting the media, and while that might be a touch hyperbolic, there is no shortage of material in the book to give you ideas on how to seed stories, create a buzz and generally play the game in terms of blogs and news outlets.

Holiday is a really good writer. The book is easy to read. Even if you’re not entirely interested in the subject matter, you’ll definitely get a laugh or two out of some of the stunts he’s pulled. Trust me. I’m not lying.

 

150-WORD REVIEW: Contagious by Jonah Berger

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This post is by new contributor Eamonn Carey, who tweets here and is Head of Digital for MHP Communications

contagious-300x459Why do certain things go viral and take over the world? The reality is that there’s no one answer – no one ring to rule them all. There are so many variables at play that it’s almost impossible to predict what will work and what won’t.

What Contagious tries to do is give people a primer on the constituent parts of ideas that have ended up going viral. Berger’s thesis is that ideas that have social currency, triggers, emotion, a public element, practical value and stories are the ones that become Gangnam Style successes.

Fast Company reckons Berger wants to be the next Gladwell. The book bears that out. Simply explained and illustrated with plenty of examples, this is a pop-science book for the masses rather than a exhaustive manual for specialists. Occasional repetition is irritating, but overall, it’s well worth a read.

150-WORD BOOK REVIEW: Big Data, A Revolution

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This post is by new contributor Eamonn Carey, who tweets here and is Head of Digital for MHP Communications

04book "Contagious: Why Things Catch On" by Jonah Berger.Big data (and this book of the same name by Viktor Mayer-Schönberger and Kenneth Culderis) is one of those inescapable phrases that is bandied around nowadays. Like convergence and the use of the word sunset as a verb, it is an annoyance used by people who spend too much time talking at conferences.

The concept behind Big Data is interesting though. How can we make sense of the massive amounts of data we generate on an ongoing basis. How can we have more Google flu predictions and fewer Minority Report pre-crime nightmares?

Though occasionally repetitive, this book is at its best when discussing the potential pitfalls of this new era. More practical examples and less breathless cheerleading would have made it far better.

It’s worth a read, but don’t buy into all the hype – especially not this line: “The possession of knowledge, which once meant an understanding of the past, is coming to an ability to predict the future.”

Grim.

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