Tag Archives: Amazon

Book Review: Humanize

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Here is another Amazon book review: Humanize: How People-Centric Organizations Succeed in a Social World. Misinformation aside, this would make one great chapter in a real management book.

This book contains an ugly diatribe on strategic planning. A backlash occurs any time a best practice or process (a detailed algorithm of action for solving an abstract problem like providing organizational direction or, say, developing software solutions) is detached from its essence and then fails. The Agile SDM is experiencing something similar. The author’s intention of communicating the importance of the human element is valid (though not groundbreaking), but many readers will focus too heavily on this and other similar segments. The misinformation is unfortunate-the authors have different, better experience to share. In the second edition, ditch such padding. This book should probably have been a single punchy chapter within another book on practical modern management techniques. (Or a campy, concise guide on, if nothing else, dismissing itself in favor of whatever is next.)

On the upside, this book offers plenty of fun statistics for those who are looking for conversational fodder.

NAR – Real Estate Technology Trends

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Timing is important. The time is now?
Marketers know how important timing is. Good products and strategies can be extremely expensive when the market isn’t ready for them. Amazon was years early. It cost them millions while they waited for the market to catch up. They were in business for ten years before posting their first full-year profit.

In the early years of Amazon, people were extremely wary about submitting data online. Mint.com, a popular site used to aggregate personal banking data, could never have existed in the climate of that time. Plus, there were plenty of technical and policy challenges that prevented many businesses from exploiting the potential of e-commerce. Example: It wasn’t that long ago that companies like Apple perfected the micro payment process. We take these companies for granted today, but in the case of Amazon, plenty of smart people assumed it was an inevitable failure at the time.

But, in retrospect, even with these challenges, you have to ask yourself why companies like Best Buy and Walmart didn’t see this coming and beat Amazon to the punch. How about AOL? AOL (or even Yahoo), for example, had massive social networks long before MySpace and Facebook. How is it possible they missed out on the opportunities latent in their user base?

I think NAR (and their REALTOR® domains) share some similarities with AOL. NAR seems to be focused on maintaining its relevance through advertisements pitching the importance of the agency relationship, instead of reinventing itself as the Amazon of real estate transactions.

The timing is right!
Market conditions for residential real estate are suppressed, but this is perfect for NAR to work through the inevitable issues that affect such businesses in their early years.

Market conditions make laws malleable. People want to sell their houses. Poor market conditions put a special pressure on law makers to do what is necessary to improve industry. A good site dedicated to full-service real estate transactions (whatever that would mean) would almost certainly need a few tweaks to real estate law here and there. This is a good time to knock those out.

NAR already has a brand. They already have the domains. Changing or expanding their identity will be a lot easier than creating a new one from scratch.

The agency relationship is dying. People have lots of information today. You no longer need a stock broker to buy and sell shares. You don’t have to have a personal banker to handle your business at your financial institution. Ever heard of Turbo Tax? If you can automate taxes, you can automate the average real estate transaction.

Survival and the unknown benefits. This evolution is almost necessary for NAR’s long-term survival. If they don’t do it, someone else will. Plus, the potential for unknown benefits as other companies leverage the integration opportunities is huge. I think costs would go down, visibility would go up, and the whole market could be made more flexible.

Summary
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Book Review: Implementation Patterns by Kent Beck

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I wrote my first review of a book on Amazon today. Implementation Patterns, by Kent Beck, is one of those books that properly focuses on essence for a specific audience.

I’m not surprised to read reviews of this book claiming it states the obvious. The author writes coherently and intelligibly about the nuances of fundamental architectural element selection that many developers intuit after several years of experience and exposure. Many of the readers of this book will feel immediately familiar with these concepts. But this is a double-edged sword. Those who are looking for a succinct, intelligent explanation of how these elemental patterns affect software from a perspective that transcends a development role should be prepared for an enlightening read. Those who are looking for a catalog with detailed explanations of each respective pattern will likely be disappointed by the author’s ability to capture the essence of low-level decision-making in laconic style.

Amazon Kindle: Export Notes and Highlights

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Amazon has made the Kindle service accessible by making the software run on most modern devices. It’s still not quite as easy to annotate as a PDF — I’m not sure it will ever be as user friendly as Goodreader — but it sort of makes up for that by offering some cool stats on each book. You can see other peoples’ notes and highlights, see how the book ranks among Amazon’s most-highlighted, etc.

Kindle.Amazon.com is a companion site to the software that makes it possible to review and edit your notes for each of your books. Sign in. Select a book. Select your highlights. The only downside is that you can’t export them.

The script below is meant to be converted into a bookmarklet and added to your bookmarks toolbar, and it can then be executed on the page containing your notes. It will launch a new window containing your notes in XML format. Just copy and paste.

Source

(function() { 
    var process = function(sb) {
        /* CONTENT */
        sb = sb.toString().replace(/\[hl\]/g,'<span class="highlight">').replace(/\[\/hl\]/g,"</span>");
        sb = sb.toString().replace(/\[nt\]/g,'<span class="note">').replace(/\[\/nt\]/g,"</span>");
        sb = sb.toString().replace(/\[em\]/g,'<em>').replace(/\[\/em\]/g,"</em>");
        sb = sb.toString().replace(/\[-h1\]/g, '<h1>').replace(/\[\/-h1\]/g, "</h1>");
        sb = sb.toString().replace(/\[-h2\]/g, '<h2>').replace(/\[\/-h2\]/g, "</h2>");
        sb = sb.toString().replace(/\[-h3\]/g, '<h3>').replace(/\[\/-h3\]/g, "</h3>");
        sb = sb.toString().replace(/\[-h4\]/g, '<h4>').replace(/\[\/-h4\]/g, "</h4>");
        
        /* MARKUP */
        sb = sb.replace(/</g,"&lt;").replace(/>/g,"&gt;").toString();
        
        return sb.toString();
    };
    
    var title = jQuery('.title').text().trim();
    var book = '<?php  Header("Content-type: application/xml"); ?>'+ '<?xml version="1.0"?>' + '<?xml-stylesheet href="/xsl.php" type="text/xsl"?>';
    var sb = '';
    var o = "\n"+'<book title="'+title+'">'+title;
    var q1 = "\n"+'<quote type="highlight" >';
    var q2 = '</quote>';
    var c = "\n"+'</book>';
    jQuery('div.highlightRow div.text').each(function() {
        var note = jQuery(this).find('span.noteContent,span.highlight');
        sb = sb + q1+jQuery(note).text().toString().replace(/\n/g,"<br />")+q2;
    });
    
    sb = process(book+o+sb+c);
    
    newWindow = window.open("","","status,height=700,width=500")
    newWindow.focus();
    newWindow.document.write("<textarea>"+sb+"</textarea>");
    newWindow.document.close();
})();

Bookmarklet

In some browsers, you can simply copy the bookmarklet into the URL and press return, and it will work. (It will only do its job if you’re on the page with your notes.) Some browsers force you to first manually create the bookmark by opening up your bookmarks and adding a new one. 

javascript:(function%20()%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20var%20process%20=%20function(sb)%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20%0A%20%20%20%20sb%20=%20sb.toString().replace(/%5C%5Bhl%5C%5D/g,'%3Cspan%20class=%22highlight%22%3E').replace(/%5C%5B%5C/hl%5C%5D/g,%22%3C/span%3E%22);%0A%20%20%20%20sb%20=%20sb.toString().replace(/%5C%5Bnt%5C%5D/g,'%3Cspan%20class=%22note%22%3E').replace(/%5C%5B%5C/nt%5C%5D/g,%22%3C/span%3E%22);%0A%20%20%20%20sb%20=%20sb.toString().replace(/%5C%5Bem%5C%5D/g,'%3Cem%3E').replace(/%5C%5B%5C/em%5C%5D/g,%22%3C/em%3E%22);%0A%20%20%20%20%0A%20%20%20%20/*%20MARKUP%20*/%0A%20%20%20%20sb%20=%20sb.replace(/%3C/g,%22<%22).replace(/%3E/g,%22>%22).toString();%0A%20%20%20%20%0A%20%20%20%20return%20sb.toString();%0A%7D;%0A%0Avar%20title%20=%20jQuery('.title').text().trim();%0Avar%20book%20=%20'%3C?xml%20version=%221.0%22?%3E';%0Avar%20sb%20=%20'';%0Avar%20o%20=%20%22%5Cn%22+'%3Cbook%20title=%22'+title+'%22%3E'+title;%0Avar%20q1%20=%20%22%5Cn%22+'%3Cquote%20type=%22highlight%22%20%3E';%0Avar%20q2%20=%20'%3C/quote%3E';%0Avar%20c%20=%20%22%5Cn%22+'%3C/book%3E';%0AjQuery('div.highlightRow%20div.text').each(function()%20%7B%0A%20%20%20%20var%20note%20=%20jQuery(this).find('span.noteContent,span.highlight');%0A%20%20%20%20sb%20=%20sb%20+%20q1+jQuery(note).text().toString().replace(/%5Cn/g,%22%3Cbr%20/%3E%22)+q2;%0A%7D);%0A%0Asb%20=%20process(book+o+sb+c);%0A%0AnewWindow%20=%20window.open(%22%22,%22%22,%22status,height=700,width=500%22)%0AnewWindow.focus();%0AnewWindow.document.write(%22%3Cpre%3E%22+sb+%22%3C/pre%3E%22);%0AnewWindow.document.close();%0A%20%20%20%20%0A%7D)();