Blake Schwendiman's Blog and Blook

I've been interested in biographies and similar types of books lately, so when I saw a book called The Second Coming of Steve Jobs, I was intrigued. I'm not sure I'd call it a biography -- and I don't think the author did, either. It's really a view on Steve from various outside sources.

If you're a computer nerd or if you just want to understand what's the big deal with Apple, you should read this book. Steve Jobs isn't just a computer nerd, he's an icon. He's always been an icon. In fact, not too many normal people know that there was another Steve at the beginning of Apple. Personally, I've always been a big fan of the other Steve, Steve Wozniak (Woz) -- the real brains behind the original Apple computers. I read a biography of Woz when I was a kid and I've always liked him.

The Second Coming of Steve Jobs covers the period of time essentially from the ousting of Jobs from Apple until his re-emergence as its CEO. It's a travel through some of the darkest times in his life and how he pulled through it. If you're looking for an inspirational book, though, this is not it. This is a book about guts, hard work, luck and a lot of toughness, but it's not a story. You won't connect with Steve and you won't be cheering him on through the pages. It's more like a travelogue -- you see the ups and downs, but you don't get involved.

So, would I recommend it? It depends. If you're looking for a model or inspiration, probably not. If you want to learn more about one of the most important people and companies ever in Silicon Valley, then definitely yes.

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 10:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Normally I wouldn't think to write about a root canal as one of my "best experiences" in life, but yesterday it actually turned out that way.

On Sunday I started noticing some pain in one of my molars when I was eating. On Monday I had a hard time sleeping because the pain just wouldn't go away. By yesterday at lunch I couldn't concentrate on a conversation because I was anxious to take some more Advil for the pain. I called my dentist and he saw me at 3pm. He referred me to an endodontist -- a guy who only does root canals. They took me in at 4:45pm yesterday.

I've had a root canal before. Usually it's not something to write home about. But this was different. This doctor was something else. I was in the chair for about 1.5 hours. Apparently my tooth had 5 canals (normally there are 3) so it took longer than normal, but for me it seemed pretty quick anyway. Also, I had less pain than in some other, simpler dental procedures. Overall it was a phenomenal experience.

So I thought to myself that maybe if we always experienced the best in every service field, we'd never dread the things we know we ought to do.

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 03:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I hope that I'm not too late for you to change your plans and/or schedule your DVR, but tonight is the return of Heroes on NBC. It's been seven weeks since the last episode (pretty sure).

If you're a fan and need to catch up, NBC has the episodes online to help you get back in the story!

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 04:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've recently finished reading two different books about Google. The first was The Search and the second was The Google Story.

As you know, I'm a huge fan of Google. I think their technologies are some of the best, I think their goals are great and I know several of their people personally and have had a great impression of them. So, I saw these two books and thought I'd give them a try.

Overall, I'd say I liked The Google Story better of the two books, though they were both very interesting. The Search provides a lot of detail about other search engine companies contemporary to the beginnings of Google and also provides a little more detail about what was going on in the industry around the Google debut. That's cool information to contrast and compare the various technology companies. However, The Google Story is a little better written and focuses on Google and its founders.

If you want to know more about one of the most important companies of this century, then pick up The Search or The Google Story. Either way, I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 02:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you liked the Da Vinci Code and you liked the movie, then you'll probably want to put this on your calendar: Hanks is back for Angels and Demons (slated for December 2008).

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 08:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Most of my regular readers know that my wife is a blogger. In fact she is a far more popular blogger than I am. My technorati rank has fallen into the abysmal range (currently 600,000's -- down from about 20,000), but Holly's blog is up there in the 19,000's. Way to go!

Well, as of this week, my youngest brother is officially a Foreign Exchange Trading blogger. I really don't understand most of the hard words on his blog, but I do like to think about all the money he'll loan me.

My other brother is in the process of setting up a blog (in fact I should be working on that instead of posting to my blog), so we'll all be in this thing.

Ironically a few years ago while I was still working for Go Daddy, I was approached to design the specifications for an in-house blogging platform. I told them that I thought blogging was the stupidest thing I'd ever heard of and couldn't see how they could make money or attract business by offering a blog. Oops. I'm just glad I wasn't the final decision maker on that one.

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 03:27 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I don't like spam. I'm just like anyone else with an email account -- I don't like it. But for now, we have to live with it. Set up a spam filter or use a service and deal with it. However, deal with it on your end of the email. Don't deal with it by taking offense at legitimate emailers and by providing canned responses and complex instructions on how to get to the next person. Just deal with it.

I have been trying for five days to get a human response from LinkShare, a company with which I have been working for several years now. I still haven't had a single human response to a simple query.

Does your email system discourage customers? Are you sure?

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 10:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

If you live anywhere near Phoenix and you want to see Seth Godin live, have a look here: http://www.pledgebank.com/sethgodin. He hasn't committed to coming, but I think it would be great. Personally, I'd pay a lot more than $50 to hear Seth speak live, so I think this is actually a real once-in-a-lifetime type of event.

If you don't live anywhere near Phoenix, have you considered moving? ;)

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 05:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Posted by Blake Schwendiman at 04:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)