Good books

[jon-]

SWMBO has talked me into taking a beach holiday in Malta in a few weeks and have suddenly realised I've nothing to do on the Island and nothing to read. I don't "do nothing" well so I figure I'll use the time to inspire myself.

Does anyone have any good recommendations for inspirational books? I'm most interested in B2C retail and start ups.

I'll also be taking my laptop and spending a bit of time writing up plans, but don't tell the misses!

[jon-]

ShadownINja said:

10JH said:

'BooHoo' combines both your interests.

About an online clothing retailer that went bust in the early 90s.

Well written and easy to read too, ideal for the beach!

Brilliant title. I assume it's about boo.com? Is the material (reasons for its failure) relevant today as it was riding on the dotcom boom?

I actually know the guy who bought the boo.com code when it went titsup, and it was mostly used to setup www.venda.com

I'll have to give it a read.

[jon-]

Any more? It's going to be a long 10 days, I'll need more than one book

[jon-]

Thanks guys. Any more for any more? I'm going to place the order today.

[jon-]

Posting from Malta on wifi, Boohoo was excellent. Recognised a few names from dealing with Venda too which made me smile. I can't believe how much money they wasted, it was cringe worthy at points! A great inside into that era of startups though.

Just starting "How to get rich"...

[jon-]

How to get rich was another ace book, nothing like the title suggests. Felix Dennis is a funny guy!

Half way though outliers and I'm only really reading it because I've nothing else to read. I'm finding the author is really labouring his point, for example he's taken about 50 pages so far stressing the point that having a birthday just after an age cutoff makes a difference, hardly rocket science!

[jon-]

cazzer said:

Can't believed you're on an island that has so much history to see and yer reading crappy business books.

I was in Malta for a week and didn't manage to see half I wanted to.

History is in the past

[jon-]

Asos is essentially everything Boo should have been, but without the mind share. If boo had made flight, it would be as ubiquitous as Amazon.

To summarise I really enjoyed boohoo, and am now recommending it to everyone. "How to get rich" was also surprisingly good, and the contents didn't really reflect the title. I read it as an autobiography of Felix Dennis, which is very interesting.

Outliers read more like a theses and while the lessons and stories were interesting, he took far to long to tell them.