Everything Paul Buchheit has bought from Amazon in the last 3 years

http://paulbuchheit.blogspot.com/2010/01/books-and-stuff-three-years-of-amazon.html

by whalesalad • 17 years ago

55 42 17 years ago

paulbuchheit.blogspot.com

kwamenum864• 17 years ago

156 items in 3 years? That is obscene. He averaged one purchase per week from amazon over this time period, which basically makes Amazon.com PB's religion.

nostrademons4• 17 years ago

If you s/Amazon.com/public library/, that is fairly typical of people who read a lot. There is a LiveJournal community called 50bookchallenge that encourages people to read 50 books a year, keep track of them, and share what they're reading with others. It has 7000+ members. My reading lists for 2003-2006:

2003: http://nostrademons.livejournal.com/24851.html

2004: http://nostrademons.livejournal.com/60579.html

2005: http://nostrademons.livejournal.com/83785.html

2006: http://nostrademons.livejournal.com/105646.html

(The part I can't imagine is spending so much money on books when the library is perfectly adequate, but I imagine that's not so much of a concern for PB.)

SwellJoe4• 17 years ago

The money isn't my primary problem with buying so many books, though it is a factor...it's the weight of having all those books. When I moved from Austin I sold 26 boxes of books and several bookshelves. I promised myself I would never collect that many books again. I'm moving into an RV this week, and so had to sell all the remaining books (and any that I'd collected since that last move), and I sold 8 boxes of books and three book shelves.

Having large piles of things, like books, makes it too easy to slip into a rut and stay in the same place doing the same thing out of mere inertia (more mass==more inertia, and books en masse are heavy).

kwamenum864• 17 years ago

...he stated that he has not read most of the books he purchased. That is what makes it obscene...they are impulse buys...

mahmud5• 17 years ago

I concurrently read 2-3 books per week; just finished one since yesterday morning. And it's not a hobby.

tfh2• 17 years ago

It depends how big the books are. How much time do you spend reading everyday?

kasterma• 17 years ago

What do you mean when you say it is not a hobby? Is it your job?

holygoat• 17 years ago

I've placed about 130 orders through Amazon in the past two years, which is more than once a week.

Having Prime (free 2-day shipping) helps a lot. They sell almost everything: I've bought books, yes, but also protein powder, grocery items, exercise equipment, notebook batteries, tools, screws, jeans, and shoes.

anApple• 17 years ago

My mother buys at least 1 book per day on average from amazon. (she can read very very fast)

zandorg2• 17 years ago

I can get through a book in on average - for a 250 page hardback - a week, so this isn't obscene.

kwamenum864• 17 years ago

...wow people downvoted the crap out of that comment. He said he has not even read many of the books he has bought. Clearly a lot of those are impulse buys. There is nothing wrong with that...we all make impulse purchases...I was just saying that is a lot of impulse purchases.

jdanndc• 17 years ago

Recommend start at '156.' and scroll upwards.

mahmud5• 17 years ago

Very little finance/investment reading. I am surprised.

pgbovine• 17 years ago

my lame speculation:

a.) once you're that wealthy, i don't think you care too much about 'get rich quick' or 'crazy investment strategies of the week' books anymore. you probably stash your money somewhere safe

b.) i'm sure paul cares a lot more about hacking than the latest fads in finance/investment

gcheong• 17 years ago

"you probably stash your money somewhere safe".

Yet unless you have a good understanding of basic investment principles (and I mean principles grounded in rigorous theories which you will likely not find in the kinds of books you mention), you won't know what "safe" means.

rms• 17 years ago

Not to mention he is an active angel investor, which is basically as risky as it can get, so that makes sense to safely diversify.

jeremyw• 17 years ago

At AngelConf, I seem to remember he said most of his money was invested very conservatively.

paul2• 17 years ago

I'm not aware of any good books on investing, other than Taleb. (which isn't to say there aren't any, just that the ones I've started to read aren't very impressive)

mahmud5• 17 years ago

Paul,

I don't know about he level of your economic and financial sophistication, but just to get your feet wet, skim the following:

The Handbook of Financial Instruments, Frank Fabozzi, editor. A bird's eye view of what is out there.

The Intelligent Investor, Benjamin Graham. The book the created the Value Investing philosophy, by Warren Buffet's teacher. Buffet was the only student in that class to get an A+.

Financial Statement Analysis, Fridson and Alvarez. How to read corporate reports and papers; whatever the CFOs want you to see,.

The Secrets of Economic Indicators, Bernard Baumohl. How to read the whole economy's report cards.

Hedges on Hedge Funds, James Hedges. Exactly what you need to know before you hand over your money to a hedge fund. Hopefully, the first book above by Fabozzi told you how many baskets you have available to put your eggs in. Hedge Funds rarely outperform the market, but that's not the whole story.

The Vital Few vs The Trivial Many, George Muzea. Good stuff :-) more geared toward active investors (even traders) but it's a good, insightful read. The mindset of "who should I listen to" is excellent. If you make a habit of reading financial statements, and scanning the market from time to time, seeing how movements in a given stock correspond with company news (a fun hobby, btw!) then you will get something from this book, specially on insider trading.

That's it for now.

tfh2• 17 years ago

  93. Rules of the Game

I thought Paul was married :)

whalesalad• 17 years ago

That's a great book, not just for getting laid ;) It teaches you a lot about the human mind. It opened my door to NLP as well (neuro-linguistic programming) which I have a few books on but have yet to really dive into. It's a fast and entertaining read.

SwellJoe4• 17 years ago

The Game is a better read. Rules of the Game feels like leftovers.

paul2• 17 years ago

Agreed. "The Game" was so amusing that I bought "Rules of the Game", but it doesn't have much substance.

brandonkm• 17 years ago

Some excellent titles throughout this list. I'm currently enjoying 'Tell Me a Story: Narrative and Intelligence (Rethinking Theory)'. Such a great read.

uuilly• 17 years ago

Love 156: "Basic Economics," Thomas Sowell is the Dr. Seuss of market economics.

JustAGeek• 17 years ago

Maybe I'm not seeing the obvious but how do you get a list with past purchases?

Er, I do know you can log into your account and check your past purchases very easily but that isn't very convenient if you want to post that list on your blog with links to the books.

Is there a convenient API call or do you have to resort to html scraping?

Can't find anything like that in the Amazon API documentation but maybe I'm just blind... :D

cwb• 17 years ago

It seems that's what Blippy, the company Paul mentions at the beginning, does: http://blippy.com/

ntoshev• 17 years ago

Just a few non-books though, and people has been sharing book lists for years. If Paul really wants to test the privacy implications of this trend and see what it feels like, he should post a history of his bank accounts, yeah by all means edit it but still.

I think real geeks can't understand the benefits of social networking because we are not really that social. We should accept it already: technology's main use in the next decade will be for ego inflation and vanity with Twitter, Blippy and the rest being on the leading edge. Triumph of empty form over substance.

nostrademons4• 17 years ago

The world has always functioned on ego inflation and vanity, though. From 500-1500, it was "You can be more righteous than your neighbors if you just believe our priests." From 1500-1900, it was "You can be more wealthy than your neighbors if you just invest in our venture." From 1900-1995, it was "You can be more attractive than your neighbors if you buy our product." From 1995-present, it was "You can be smarter than your neighbors if you visit our website."

It's interesting how this corresponds with the most idolized caste in society at the time. From 500-1500, it was the clergy. From 1500-1900, it was the financier/plantation-owner/prospector/industrialist. From 1900-1995, it was the starlet. From 1995-present, it's the geek.

Substance is nothing more than empty form that nobody likes. (Or, as the musician sometimes says it, "What does it say about classical music that its antonym is 'popular' music?")

Everything Paul Buchheit has bought from Amazon in the last 3 years

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