The Idea Factory

Subtitle of the this book is "Bell Labs and the Great Age of American Innovation". The book covers many decades and scientists. These include famous people such as Shannon and Shockley who worked there. Most of the story happens in New Jersey.

Bell Labs worked on serious phone company future plans. They wanted to communicate overseas. The proposal was laying cable under the sea. They needed to build in repeaters to keep up the signal. They also researched ways to use satellites.

There was research on how to transmit signal over what would become fiber optic. Some research was not necessarily specific to the phone industry. To replace vacuum tubes, they invented the transistor.

The book covered government attempts to break up the monopoly. This somehow included AT&T. Eventually some parts would be in a merger of Alcatel and Lucent.

A Girl of the Limberlost

Elnora wants to go to high school. But it is expensive. Her mom is worried about the high cost of taxes for the property she owns. Even when Elnora somehow is able to get past school tuition, things like books costs a fortune.

Elnora starts looking for paid work. There is a Bird Woman who pays handsomely for specimens from the woods. Or in this case, from the wetlands know as the Limberlost. Elnora sells things such as rare moths to the Bird Woman. She can afford books and clothes and more.

When Elnora graduates, she finds her funds have dwindled to nothing. She wants to go to college. But the costs are even higher. She is trying to finish putting together a collection of moths. She finally has the most rare one. But her mom thinks it is some predatory animal and destroys it.

Elnora's aunt finds out what happened. She then goes to Elnora's mom and tells her about the details of Elnora's father's death. Apparently he was cheating on his wife. This is why he took a dangerous route through the wetlands and dies. Eventually her mom understands everything, and reconciles with Elnora.

Elnora decided to take a year off from school. She meets Phil, a handsome Harvard grad. Phil is on rest at his uncle doctor's advice. He needs some time outdoors in the south. Phil knows a lot about moths. He assists Elnora in her collecting for a whole summer as he is recuperating from his illness. He has a fiance back home in Chicago.

Before leaving to go back home, Phil seems to express romantic in Elnora. She shuts it down. Back home, Phil breaks up with his girlfriend. He returns to the Limberlost to marry Elnora. However, Elnora is not convinced as he has been engaged for most of his life. She needs to speak with his ex-fiance. 

Joel on Software

Since getting sick, I have been on a bit of a hiatus from reading paperback fiction books. I just started reading a paper book on TypeScript. They really want that skill on the new GUI team at work. A while back, I downloaded a copy of "More Joel on Software". It is kind of a sequel. So, I decided to read the original Joel on Software book. I had a PDF copy somehow.

Joel is the founder of a software company in NYC. Their main product is FOGBUGZ, a bug tracking software. Joel himself is famous for his blog, Joel on Software, which covers software development. I think this book is mainly a collection of articles from his blog.

Joel talks about running a small company in New York. He also tells us stories from his past employers, which include Microsoft. He explains why writing most code in Visual BASIC is an advantage. His team is not afraid to write small parts in C++. Joel confesses he is not well versed in ATL.

I just finished this book. Time for "More Joel on Software".

The Spotify Play

I watched a movie based off this book. Thus, I decided to read it. The book chronicles the history of the company Spotify. Specifically it covers the CEO Daniel Ek. He started out working for another company. But he soon went out on his own. He built some company whose goal was to make him money when he sold it. After 1 year, he sold it for around $1M.

A guy who ran the company who bought Daniel's startup later invested in the starting of Spotify. Their goal was to make a great music listening experience. The needed to have their site immediately start playing any music, without lag.

Spotify had always had a problem with record labels. Spotify wanted to provide the music for free and make money off ads. The music industry was vehemently opposed to this. Eventually, Daniel and co had to get one of the major labels to agree to license their music. The label got partial ownership of Spotify, and had a lot of guarantees that they would get paid, even if users listened to music for free.

Eventually Spotify had to compete with other music vendors like Apple and such. Spotify went public on the New York Stock Exchange. They offered shares directly to the public initially. The company was worth $20B, and eventually climbed as high as $50B. Daniel became a billionaire many times over.

The Time Machine and Other Stories

I got this book due to the author. It is written by H.G. Wells, of War of the Worlds fame. The format was not what I had expected. It has a good sized story - The Time Machine. Then there are a lot of other short stories. I will only comment on The Time Machine.

There is some professor like dude. He invents a time machine. He returns to the present in bad shape. After he gets ahold of himself, he tells his story. He traveled far into the future. Initially he met these aimless little creatures. They slept at night and feared the dark. His time machine gets stolen.

He saves one of these little creates from drowning. She then follows him around. At night, the professor discovers that some monkey like beings come out from the depths underground. He figures these are the beings of industry. As the aimless creatures do not seem to do any work.

The professor goes down into a shaft. The monkey creatures attack him. They are susceptible to light. And he has some matches. He is able to climb back up to the surface. At night, they pursue him out into a forest. He eventually is able to survive a battle with them. He cracks open some statues and finds where the monkeys hide his time machine.

People in the present are not sure whether to believe him or not.

House of the Red Fish

Tomi live in Hawaii during the WW2 bombing of Pearl Harbor by Japan. He lives with his dad, mom, little sister, and grandfather. Once America becomes suspicious of any Japanese, things go bad in Tomi's world. His father is shot and failed. His father's work partner is killed. His grandfather is jailed. They lose their house.

To make due, Tomi's mom works for a wealthy man, cleaning the house. Tomi, his mom, and little sister live in a guest house on his mom's employer's property. Tomi and all other Japanese is chased by a young vigilante group. Tomi's dad's fishing boat is sunk based on suspicious of it being used to assist the enemy.

Tomi has a white friend Billy. Their family is not prejudice against Japanese. Together they make plans and enlist help to lift his dad's sunken boat. Tomi's grandfather has a stroke, and is let out of jail under care of Billy's mom, who happens to be a nurse who works at the hospital.

Tomi's dad gets a girlfriend who does tattoos for $15 each. Tomi plans to use air in tire tubes to float the boat up from the water. He also dives down with friends to pull heavy pieces off the boat. Eventually he gets the grand idea to use two huge pontoons to help lift the boat.

The son of Tomi's mom's employer is part of the vigilante group. He continues to come after Tomi. He steals Tomi's prized family sword, which Tomi had hidden. When this evil son brings some thugs to stop the boat operation, they encounter people they know on Tomi's team. Eventually Tomi calls out the bully, and beats him on a 1-vs-1 fight. The thugs back down.

Some MPs come. Tomi provides a cover story that his dad's boat sunk. And he is trying to raise it back up. Another aside is that they find the key to the truck of Tomi's dad's partner who was killed. They sell the truck for cash and give the money to his widow.

Jacob Have I Loved

Sara Louise, nicknamed Wheezie, lives on an island with her mom, dad, grandma, and twin sister. Her dad is a fisherman of sorts. He works a lot, going out to get crabs and other seafood. Louise would like to accompany him. But they don't let females on the island do that type of work. Instead, she uses a small boat with her friend Call. They also go out searching for seafood to sell. She gives all her proceeds to her parents.

Louise's sister Caroline is the golden child. She is pretty and sings very well. Initially Louise and Call try to investigate whether a captain who recently returned to the island is a spy. They befriend the man. Caroline also joins them when they visit the captain. The captain somehow cajoles Louise and Call to help repair his house. Louise tries to return a stray cat to Miss Trudy, who she finds unresponsive. Trudy is sent to the mainland for medical help. The captain, Louise, and Call then try to clean up Trudy's house.

Call is a loner. He is also fat. As we are in a war, he heads off and becomes a man at war. Meanwhile, Trudy and the captain marry. However Trudy is sick and dies. She leaves a considerable amount of wealth to the captain. The captain then uses his money to fund Caroline's musical schooling abroad. When Call returns from the war, he has become a strapping man. He asks Caroline to marry him. This infuriates Louise. Just another case of where Caroline gets everything.

When the men were away for war, Caroline dropped out of school and was able to help her father with his seafood business. Eventually she complains to the captain and her mom how unfair life is for her. The captain encourages Louise to go live her dreams. That includes leaving the island to try to go to med school. In that time, women generally did not become doctors. So she became a nurse instead. She achieves another part of her dream by moving aboard to the mountains.

Louise meets Joseph in the mountains. He is surprised about her background, and wonders why she would come out to nowhere and live there. They eventually marry and have kids.