Recent reads

Have red two books recently, but would like to just do a quick summary but not thorough analysis here, as I shouldn't have put too much time on here. May re read them in the future.

1. Freakonomics by steven d.levitt and stephen j.dubner

- Peel off one layer or two of seemingly logical "common sense" by applying statistical tools of econonics to determine the direction of correlation and discover hidden links.

- Human works for incentive and that's what economist interested to figure out and model it, from micro to macro.

- Examples touched on:
a) school teachers - cheating?
b) sumo wrestlers - match rigging?
c) Ku Klux Klan - incoherence of roles exposed lead to its demise
d) real-estate agent - incentives work against you?
e) drug dealers - except the top mafias, most don't earn enough, but endure and hope to make it big one day
f) criminal rate fall - self-contradicting explains from so-called experts and hidden link with abortion legalization
g) parenting - does nurturing / parenting really matter?

2. The origin of brands by al & laura ries

- A fascinating book from marketing gurus that build its theme around the law of natural selection in business world - divergence. It argues that like natural selection, products and brands expand in such a way that split into more and more branches, instead of convergence. This book gives a lot of examples and it's definitely eye-opening even though you may not agree with the central theme 100%.

- Different technologies do not converge, but each technology split further into more sophisticated field to cater for niche market.

- Convergence may not always fail when value of convenience are created but convenience only has small roles to play in the overall business market.