Takeways from our trip to Japan

 

As I'm sitting in our hotel room passing time before heading out to the airport, I started thinking, what's my takeway from this trip? How do I feel? Do I recommend Japan as a place to visit?

Well, I feel rested, energized and ready to get back to the daily grind of work and daily home life. Not that I am complaining but it's nice to have a break. 

If I were to sum up the last 2 weeks in one word I would say: Impressed. 

I was delighted to experience this place, for real it was amazing. These are the 3 categories

Things I learned

Japanese Culture and History

The first thing I noticed about Japan is how clean, and orderly everything is. Their Airport, Train Stations, and Public Spaces are thought out and organized. The train station and subway stations are clearly marked so that you know where to stand when boarding and onboarding the train. People here follow the rules and it's the opposite of chaos. People are totally silent in the train, the only people making noise are the foreigners (mostly Americans) who apparently don't have the ability to read the room and be quiet. There are tons of customs and social protocols, which I got a pass for most of them since I am also a clueless American. I did make the effort to learn and respect their rules, I am a visitor after all. Whether I want to or not, I represent America to the people who see me. I was a bit peeved when I learned that tattoos are a big no-no for public pools and baths, thankfully you're fine if you are able to cover up. I had to hide my ooorah marine corp tat. 

The Japanese have an refined taste for beauty. This was the thing I enjoyed the most about this trip. The architecture, food, visual art, music they all show a deep appreciation about things beautiful. It's freaking amazing. 

World War II is somewhat taboo to bring up. The museums do mention it and their stance is to learn from the past and not deny it or hide it. 

The people here are mostly isolated, most people in Japan have never left the country, and if they did, they travel in big groups, as a result, most people (outside of Tokyo and Kyoto) have never seen foreigners. This is a double edge sword, the people here love their country and do not want outsiders to come "ruin it" for them. At the same time, declining birth rates creates a labor vacuum that gets filled with laborers from outside Japan. This is a dilemma for the country. 

Overall, I am impressed with the way things are done here, great results but the group thinking ('We' comes before 'me') has a price. Japan has one of the highest suicide rates in the world. 

The biggest take away from me is a deeper appreciation of the Japanese Art and their way of life. 

Food, Food, Food

Sushi, good fancy sushi, and cheap ordinary sushi from chain restaurants, all really good. Rice, all kinds of rice, with vinegar, spicy, aromatic, sticky. 

I did not have a bad meal here. lol

Shopping: Things I am bringing back

Snacks. So. Many. Snacks. Kit Kats all flavors, gummies, weird flavored chips, and other snacks that I don't even know what they are. 

Thanks to the USD being strong against the JP Yen, electronics are so much cheaper here. This reason alone makes the trip worth it. 

Memories to Cherish

This trip was supposed to be about our oldest daughter, she had a senior trip here a week before we arrived and this is the last time we hang out before she heads out to college. I was glad to see her go ga-ga at the Nintendo Super Mario World at Universal Studios Osaka.  I will remember walking with my wife, holding hands in Tokyo Disneyland. I will remember all the dinners and tasty snacks we enjoyed. All the majestic architecture and the subtle beauty of the forest around Mt. Fuji. The cherry blossoms, the clear streams burbling on the smooth rocks. The old shrines, the quiet walks up the mountains. The busy Tsukiji Market with their fresh fish, meat and fruit smells. The shiny, loud and bustling shopping district in Shibuya. I'm taking all those memories with me. 

What would I do differently

Our youngest daughter had to stay because she didn't want to miss important school activities. Next time she is coming, We really missed her.  Learn how things work ahead of time. We didn't know how the Disney passes work. Other than that it was pretty painless. 

Conclusion

This was an amazing trip, I have to thank my wife M for putting it together. I promise I'll be more helpful next time, but she did an awesome job coming up with ideas for things that everyone will love.  Japan was a lovely trip. 

Hiroshima Peace Memorial

 

On August 6 1945 an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima. I am writing these words less than a mile away from the center of the blast. It hard for me to believe that this bustling is standing on the site of a freaking nuclear blast. This morning we all went to the Memorial museum and it was an intense experience. The history books in the US don't show you the actual carnage. In fact, I thought that the whole city was pretty much vaporized and that the people that were killed didn't know what hit them. While that might be true for some of the victims. That wasn't the case at all for a lot of people. The victims of the bomb died slow, agonizing deaths. A lot of "survivors" died of cancer years later. This was hard to see. I felt...sad is not the word, it's something hard to describe. For me, this brought back memories of things I rather not think about. I never liked to see civilians getting hurt in Iraq and it was hard to see pictures of children burnt by the bomb. 

I like that Japan has embraced the Peace mentality and it's dedicated to nuclear disarmament. I like their statement on their museum basically saying that they will face the truth of their history and learn from it so that they don't make the same mistakes again. 

I'm glad I was able to come here. I am very impressed with the honesty in which Japan chooses to remember this chapter in history. 

JV

My review of "My Heart Is a Chainsaw" by Stephen Graham Jones on Goodreads

My Heart Is a Chainsaw by Stephen Graham Jones
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is an excellent book. I gave it four instead of five stars because I felt it was a bit too long, at four-hundred pages it felt longer than it needed.

Jade is a troubled teenager that knows everything there is to know about "slashers" horror films like Friday the 13th and Halloween. There's a killer in her little Idaho town and she immediatly realizes that she's in the middle of slasher herself, she must find the "final girl" to help her survive the imminent slaughter.

I like that the book is more than a good scary story. There's food for thought in there, commentary about social conditions of American's first people. There's also ton of slasher knowledge, you can tell the author is a slasher fan, you can totally see the Stephen King influences, specially the short story "The Raft" ...but I don't want to spoil it.

The neatest thing about the book was also the hardest for me to read. The author pulls off writing from the point of view of an slasher-obsessed teenage girl, at times her internal dialogue rambles away with forced metaphors or un-funny puns and it gets a little annoying, however it adds to the vibe of the book I suppose.

I picked up this book because I really enjoyed "The Only Good Indians" by the same author. That book gave me the heebie-jeebies for real. I was looking for a good scare. This book will give you that, but it's somehow "lighter" to read, not as horrific. If you are into that though, go ahead and read it, there's plenty of gore, blood and guts.

-JV

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Ten Years in Seattle

My wife and I fell in love with the PNW back in 2006. We went on a visit to Portland in the winter, it was literally the day I got my undergrad we went from the commencement ceremony straight to the airport, it was a nice trip. We ended up moving to Seattle in 2014 after 3 months of job-hunting, one failed interview at Amazon, a couple of false starts from Intel, finally a RFID company named Impinj gave me an offer and we haven't looked back. 

We wanted to raise our kids here, we liked that people here are educated and nicer, we love the mild weather, the mountains the tech scene. It's not perfect but we love it here. 

We lived in South Lake Union for the first five years. We wanted to know what it would be like to live in the middle of a city. Seattle in 2014 was growing fast, thanks to Amazon there were new building going up every week, and the atmosphere at the time felt exciting like Seattle was a boomtown. A new gold rush. 

Personally, we felt like this was an improvement. I was afraid that we weren't gong to like it, like it would be a big mistake. It was not. This is home now. 

We have made a life here. We bought a home in the Georgetown neighborhood 5 years ago and we want to stay. There are things about Seattle that annoy me, but I wouldn't want to live anywhere else. I do miss good Latin food and the beach, but Florida is in the past. 

I didn't realize then how this tech migration would affect the city, how the infrastructure was not ready to grow with the population influx. Home prices are inflated, Public transportation sucks (still better than South Florida) and the job market is unpredictable. If I knew then what I now know. I'd still would have moved. The PNW vibe, the laid-back culture that gave us grunge music, Starbucks and Twilight is it for me. I can never say I am from Seattle because I have lived in too many places but I definitely call this our home. 

My Review of "The Creative Act: A Way of Being" by Rick Rubin on GoodReads

The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is one of the best books I've read.

Rick Rubin gives us his philosophy for creating art. He warns us against the things that block creativity and provides wisdom and tips to foster our best work.

The books reads like daily meditations.

I liked the book so much I read it as slowly as possible because I didn't want to be done reading it. I liked to read a few pages at a time and thought about what it was saying.

I liked the author's style. His words read like taoist book of wisdom.

I liked the perspectives I gained from reading this. I can apply what I read to almost everything creative.

Excellent read

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On Writing

 I've been thinking about writing lately. 

I am going to write that book. I don't know when or what exactly will be in it but I've known for a while that my true calling is writing. Nothing gives me more joy than the simple act of creating ideas with words. I want to share my voice, my thoughts and experiences with the whole world. It really doesn't matter to me if nobody reads it, it's the act of creating that excites me. 

I haven't decided yet if I want to write fiction or memoirs. Novels or essays. Write about tech or write about politics. Why not all? Maybe, but one thing at the time and first things first. 

I have a lot to say about the war in Iraq. There are many war memoirs but there aren't any stories written from the perspective of a Venezuelan nerd with ADHD. I did my whole tour, did not leave my post, but I realized in Iraq that I am not a warrior, I freaking hate violence with all my heart. 

I have a lot to say about tech. I am fortunate to work in a place where I see the state of the art advance. I love to write code but I am not your typical tech-bro. How many Spanish Speaking people do you know work in big tech companies as engineers? Not many. 

I have a lot say about being a Dad. This is the thing that came more natural to me. Loving my kids is easy to do. Not sure I can bring anything new, but then again, maybe I should say it and write it down anyway. 

Stephen King had a quote about you are only a writer if you get paid, and use your paycheck to pay the water bill. So if you are starving, and use your words to pay the bills, then you are a writer. 

Hmm, well, I don't know. I do write at work. I write technical documents and I write software. Writing software is just another kind of writing, you have different audience, one is the machine that transform the code you write to machine instructions, but the most important audience is other programmers. When you write code, other coders will eventually go over your code when they need to change it or debug it. Well, I digress. My point is that I am writer already, but now I want to write more than software and technical docs. I want to share stories, opinions and whatever else comes to mind. 

Stay tuned. 

My Review of "Is Math Real?" by Dr. Eugenia Cheng on GoodReads

Is Maths Real? How Simple Questions Lead Us to Mathematics’ Deepest Truths by Eugenia Cheng
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

In this book the author wants to let people know that if you hate math it's more likely because of the way you were taught. In fact, if there are things that don't make sense to you and you've asked "dumb questions" then you probably think more like professional mathematicians.

I found this book through to Ali Ward's Ologies podcast

Dr. Cheng talks about many mathematical concepts with an explanation of why and how mathematicians come up with concepts. I was blown away in the section "why is 1 + 1 = 2" because it turns the question on its head. We should think about "When does 1 + 1 not equal 2" for example, when you are painting, if you have one color, adding another color gives you a new combined color, not two colors, in this case 1 + 1 = 1. So then a good definition of *when* does 1 + 1 = 2 is in order.

I like that Dr. Cheng hates it when people try to use math to make themselves sound smarter as if knowing these things makes you a better, superior person somehow (it does not, it's your character)

I liked the little commentary on current events sprinkled here and there, I suppose that some people will balk at that, that's fine by me.

I didn't like that the material for me was introductory, I didn't walk about with new mathematical theory (well, at the end she goes into her category theory research) but it's an introductory book aimed at people who don't do math.

Overall, this is an excellent book. Highly recommend it. Math if for you and for all of us.

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My Review of "The Nineties" by Chuck Klosterman on Goodreads

The Nineties: A Book by Chuck Klosterman
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This book is a collection of essays that cover different aspects of the 90's things like music, tv shows, the internet, politics, historical events of the era, etc. The author gives us his take on things and contrasts with how we see things today.

One main theme of the book is that people tend to judge the past through their current point of view. It's easy and tempting to judge history based on what we know now. He challenges that notion and tells us how we used to see and think differently.

I enjoyed this commentary, but to me, it's just that, commentary. Yeah there is some data and stats but this is a book filled with opinions and generalizations about a culture. Not that he's off the mark, but I don't know what to do with the information I just learned. Reading this felt like reading a entertaining article in a magazine...in the 90's. Fun, engaging but am I a different person after reading this? Did I gain a new perspective in life? Maybe not.

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My Review of "Exit Interview" by Kristi Coulter on Goodreads

Exit Interview: The Life and Death of My Ambitious Career by Kristi Coulter
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Exit interview covers Kristi Coulter's eleven years at Amazon. This memoir gives the reader an insider's view of the what is like to be a smart, capable woman in an the male-dominated, competitive world of Amazon corporate.

Kristi's frustrating journey comes across as honest and real. It helps that she is incredibly funny. The stories are incredible but as someone who has been at Amazon for five and half years (and counting) I believe 100% of what I read. I don't get to see sexism myself first hand because my team is mostly composed of men but I know enough to know it still happens.

A lot of the points brought up in this book resonate with me. I hate the fact that the women in tech problem is considered a "Pipeline" issue. It's also considered a women's issue or minority issue. When it should be considered a "everyone" problem. Particularly the group that can do the most to fix it: Men. (yes, myself included)

I recommend this book to anyone concerned with non-fiction current affairs. 10/10


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My Review of "I've Been Thinking" by Daniel C. Dennett on GoodReads

I've Been Thinking by Daniel C. Dennett
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

"I've Been Thinking" Is a memoir written by the philosopher, cognitive scientist and outspoken atheist Daniel C. Dennett.

This was a fun book, reading it felt like having a beer with a good, well-read friend, full of amusing stories and personal anecdotes. Did you know that Dennet's father was in the CIA? you didn't? sorry for the spoiler. Did you know that Dennet spent time living in Beirut in the 50's but ended up in a farm in Maine? Some people may find his stories pointless, but I enjoyed his description of life in Maine, his academic triumphs, intellectual curiosity and sharp, insightful questions.
I felt cringe when he called out "academic bullies" in the latter part of his book, it is petty to call out personal grievances with other famous authors out in public, even if some of them already
passed away. For some reason that didn't feel...classy.

I loved "Breaking the Spell" and "Intuition Pumps" but I was not able to get through his less political and more theoretical "Consciousness Explained" and "Darwin's Dangerous Ideas"
I say read this book for the journey, you won't be more enlightened in the philosophy of biology or know the nuances of what it means to have a conscious mind. You need to read his other books for that.

I recommend to read it in order to use his life as an example of a life well lived. When I am old, I, too want to be able to reminisce all the good times with my loved ones and my not-so-loved ones as well.



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My review of "Butts: A Backstory" by Heather Radke

Butts: A Backstory by Heather Radke
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

In this book the author tells us the history and origin of all things butt-related, particularly women's butts. What it means for many to be the owner of a woman's butt and how that relates to race and class. Heather Radke makes insightful observations in a light, funny and sometimes sobering narrative that comes off as honest and moving.

I enjoyed learning the history of many of our cultural hang-ups about this part of the body. She made connections between fashion and racism that I had never noticed or thought about but seem obvious after you see it. It made me conscious of the big difference between walking the world in a male body where I am not objectified for my body parts, I don't have my character or sexuality judged by the size of any of my visible body parts. I learned about the effect our culture and the media has on people. Specially those that don't meet the "normal body" standard, which happens to be a bunch of made up bs anyway, because there is no such thing as an "average" body since all bodies come in various shapes and sizes and there is no "wrong" way to have a body. Bodies just happen to exits, but we place meaning to body shapes and sizes in order to justify the power structures we construct.

Excellet read. 5/5.

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Reading list: 20 books about japan

 https://www.neverendingvoyage.com/books-about-japan/

I would like to learn as much as I can about Japan before April, just saying. 

Amazon's best books of 2023

 

Check out Amazon's list of best books of 2023

I have not read any of the books on that list. :(

I'll fix that next year. 

Check out the new images from Euclid

The new pictures from the European Space Agency's Euclid are amazing. Check it out!

The picture reveal galaxies never seen before. The image quality is crisp, and the range is much farther than we've ever had. Take a break from your earthly tasks and take a look at the stars. 

How to be better at arguing

 

We've all been there, a co-worker, a friend, a relative or someone you met on the internet has the audacity to not see things the same exact way you do. How dare them! So you proceed to engage in an exchange of ideas in the hopes that this other person can see the light and thank you for changing their erroneous ways. You would think that if you make your case plain, loud and simple enough the other person will just change their mind as a result of your awesome rhetoric. 

How did that work out for you?

Yeah, I didn't think so. 

So,  I thought I'd share my approach, because I actually see arguing as an opportunity to learn something new, a new perspective not considered before or a deeper understanding of a nuanced situation. 

Here is a list of things to think about next time you have a disagreement. 

1. Learn to see things their way. 

This is huge. In order to make yourself understood, you have to understand what's going on first. You must learn how to make the argument against your case better than the person you are arguing with. You need to know how to see things from a different point of view, even if you don't agree with it. Especially if you don't agree with it. This is a must because this is how you learn empathy, and having empathy is what keeps you from being a jerk.  

Making your own counter-argument makes you consider the fact that you could (gasp!) be wrong.  Changing your mind and admitting you were wrong are strong sign that you value the truth and that you are not insecure about your image. 

This is the reason debate teams make people argue and counter-argue the same topic. It's a skill worth practicing and improving upon. 

2. Don't take it personal and don't make it personal. 

Learn to separate the idea from the person.  Don't go after the person, go after the idea. Don't assume that a person that disagrees with you is going after you personally. 

3. Listen more than you talk. 

This one always applies, but when you are arguing I think that most disagreements stem from misunderstandings,  it could be that you both actually agree but were framing the argument differently. You or the other person could be making assumptions that may not be obvious. 

One technique I use is to repeat what the other person just said, in my own words. Synthesize, analyze and understand what they are saying, from their point of view, with their context and then without judgment tell them "What I am hearing is that we shouldn't run these tests in Gamma because...X,Y, Z"

When you do this successfully you can iron out most good faith misunderstandings. 

4. Pick your battles. 

If you feel the urge to always be right, you should evaluate your intentions. What are you trying to achieve? Is this the best way? 

When T***p got elected in 2016, I needed to understand how anyone could vote for that sort of person. I thought that engaging with people online would be useful, but I quickly got tired and I lost my faith in humanity a bit.  Don't feed the trolls. 

Keep the long term in mind. What is this discussion really about? What happens if I don't say anything? A new perspective can make the right choice obvious. 

Sometimes there are hills worth dying for. Know what those are and engage with the long term goal in mind. 

5. If you are wrong. Admit it right away. 

Be the grown up. People will respect you for it. Believe me. 

New post in my technical blog

 So last year I started a new technical blog titled "Yes Way Jose" in order to improve my technical writing. 

Just posted an article review for Google's SRE team's Lessons Learned

Go check it out! 

How to Grow as a Person: A personal manifesto

 You probably hear the phrase "growth-mindset" all the time. There's a $5-Billion industry out there aimed at the "wellness market" But what does that really mean? How do you grow as a person? 

I am going to tell you what growing as a person means to me. I hope that you will find this useful to your own life and purposes. I do not have everything figured out yet and I struggle with taking my own advice all the time. Yet, I am never going to stop striving, your journey may look a lot different than mine but you should hear me out. 

There are three ways to grow as a person: Your Character, Your Impact and Your Work. That's all you need to focus in order to grow. 

Your Character

There is a whole scientific area of research called "Positive Psychology" that uses evidence-based studies to figure out what sort of "thing" affects real, long term, lasting happiness. 

Personally I got a lot out of reading Martin Seligman's books TL;DR: Focus your efforts on improving the things you control, more specifically put energy into improving your character.  You don't have to buy his books or anything to benefit from his findings. You can look here to see the 24 character traits listed in his books. For convenience this is the list of character traits: Appreciation of Beauty & Excellence, Bravery, Creativity, Curiosity, Fairness, Forgiveness, Gratitude, Honesty, Hope, Humility, Humor, Judgement, Kindness, Leadership, Love, Love of Learning, Perseverance, Perspective, Prudence, Self-Regulation,  Social Intelligence, Spirituality, Teamwork and Zest. 

It turns out you can always grow your character, you can never have too much wisdom, you can not go wrong when you work on improving all the traits instead of just one. The key is finding the right balance. Too much of one thing will come at the cost of something else. 

Some of these things may come easy to you, I am naturally inclined to curiosity and I love learning new things. I have to make a conscious effort to improve my Social Intelligence, Self-Regulations and Spirituality. 

There are surveys online you can take to learn where your strengths are. I encourage you to find out for yourself where you are at. 

The Impact You Make

How does your life affect other people? Nobody is an island so your connection to the world matters. Do you inspire the masses? Your child? Are you a good spouse/parent/sibling? Are you a good friend? 

You can say that these things are also related to your character but you can think about something that is bigger than yourself. A cause that matters to you and others. What can you do to make the world a better place to not only you but the people that will come after you. 

I want to make clear that I struggle with this. I think about the things that I think I'm doing well, for example I think I could have been a lot worse parent, but then again, loving my kids came super easy to me. What about the people in my life that need help? People in my family, friends, acquaintances, and strangers. I think about what else I can do for others, for a good cause.  Conserving and restoring the environment, pushing for equality, for a more just world, for a kinder world. This is an area for growth, we can always do something.  

The Work You Do. Push for Excellence

For me this means the code I write, the work I create as an engineer should be as good as I can make it. There's always a lot of work to do with deadlines and pressure to deliver. I want to ensure that what I create is excellent. You can apply this to what you do. This sounds like it applies to artistic endeavors only but that's not the case. When you create something, that artifact (it could be a sandwich or a novel, a song) is a reflection of you. It's an opportunity to express yourself. Take your time to strive for excellence. You may not think it matters, but this makes an impact. This is also an area of work for me. What can I say about my works? What is my legacy? The good thing is, we have time, we're here, we can always do better. 

List of things that don't work

More money, more pleasure:

Money matters, a lot. Being poor is bad for your health and your happiness. It should be obvious. However, after a certain point, having more money will not make you more happy. After all your basic needs are met, things like food, shelter, health care, doubling your salary will let you buy nicer things and have more freedom but will not double your happiness.  Buying nice stuff will not bring you lasting happiness as you will adjust to it and will long for the next thing.  

A similar thing is seeking pleasure and avoiding pain. You can live a life with constant traveling, partying, feeling good and still feel a void inside. More pleasure doesn't equate to lasting happiness. 

You can learn more about this in the Hedonic treadmill

More Fame

If you seek validation from outside yourself you will never feel whole. Validation comes from within. You must learn to value and accept yourself before expecting the same for others. Side note, everyone you meet is dealing with the same thing, keep that in mind before you judge what other people do. 

Being Smart

A lot of people value "being smart" or more accurately, they value appearing smart to other people. They obsess about grades, credentials, achievements and intelligence. Comparing yourself to other people only makes you more miserable. Strive to do better for its own sake, not for what it will do to your image.  There's always people way smarter than you. Focus on the impact of your actions and improving yourself. Learn for curiosity, growth or just because, truth is, nobody cares that you are smart, they care about how you make them feel, what you do for them, to them. Being smart for its own sake is meaningless. 

Conclusion

Dear reader I hope this helps your efforts to grow as a person.  like I said, I am an imperfect person that fails all the time, but this is my north star, this is my personal guideline to growing and what it means to be excellent. 

-JV

My review of "Ludicrous: The Unvarnished Story of Tesla Motors" by Edward Niedermeyer

Ludicrous: The Unvarnished Story of Tesla Motors by Edward Niedermeyer
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This books covers the history of Tesla up to 2019, with an Afterword that includes the 2020 pandemic.

This is an honest attempt to write the story of a car company that went from 3 people in 2004 to a household name less than 2 decades later.

I liked that the author discloses his involvement with the company and makes it clear that he is not entirely outside of the events that occur in the book. The author is a blogger and he posted a story about Tesla making its customers sign non-disclousure-agreements (NDAs) in order to perform "goodwill repairs" of defective cars. This is a big no-no because it makes it really hard to report safety concerns if you are legally bound to silence. I am neither a Tesla fan or a Tesla hater, but I'm never, ever, ever going to buy a car that has a higher chance of killing me than the other cars in the market. That's just me though, maybe I'm not the target demographic for those cars.

The only issue with the book is that it needs to be updated to cover what has happened since 2020. The company is still around, but no new cars have come out (?)

Overall, very entertaining, insightful page-turner. I learned a lot about Electric Vehicles (EVs) in the process. The book debunked the myth of "Other Auto-makers are not investing in EVs" it turns out there are a lot of viable alternative to Tesla if you want a safe, tested and high-quality EV.

I don't think Tesla is going to die anytime soon, but it's overrated for sure.

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My review of "What Tech Calls Thinking" by Adrian Daub

What Tech Calls Thinking: An Inquiry into the Intellectual Bedrock of Silicon Valley by Adrian Daub
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is an exposition of the origin and history of the ideas that fuel Silicon Valley Techies. Specifically the billionaires that influence the culture of the executives, engineers, as well as the press.

I liked the non-obvious insights and learning about Mimetic theory as a tech worker myself, a lot of the content did not come as a surprise. I am aware that Silicon Valley is not dominated by liberal thought, contrary to what the right-wing media decrees, there are a lot of conservatives in tech.

The author could not hide his disdain for S.V. and the ideals they spouse. At times it felt like he was stretching things a bit. I am aware that I have my biases but still, the author errs on the side of "tech people suck" a bit too much. I get that hyper-capitalism yields inequality that hurts real people. I am not a fan of causing harm. I just think that the arguments the author makes sometimes feel like he's reaching too far. That's just me. This doesn't invalidates the main message though, the things that tech calls thinking is not a new or innovative as you may think.

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My review of "Black Friend: Essays by Ziwe"

Black Friend: Essays by Ziwe,
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a collection of funny essays from famous (?) influencer Ziwe. I didn't know who she was until I accidentally saw her interview on one of the morning shows, that and the fact that my wife knew her and thought highly of her made me get this book (Public Libraries FTW!)

If you are a white person that gets easily triggered by people of color calling out racist behavior, then maybe you should read this book, but you won't have a good time. I always learn something from these books. It was an quick entertaining read. My only issue with this book is that it was too short. I read this on a plane ride from Seattle to Boston. I am not a fast reader.

-JV

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