DeveloperZen.com - Books

I'm currently reading Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die which is a fascinating book exploring why certain ideas thrive while others die and what we have to do to convey our messages better in order to make them "stick".

I could have written a long post summerizing the ideas i the book but I just came accross, while reading some news, the perfect example that sums up what the book is trying to say.

Lets look at Ron Pauls campaign for US presidency. Take a look at this video at YouTube before you continue reading:

Fascinating right? I bet you didn't watch the whole 6 minutes and skipped to this paragraph.
To sum up the video, the guy talks about whats wrong with the current US policies etc. etc. etc...
Wouldn't a short, concrete message stick better in the mind of the voters?
Now take a look of this video (spinn on Apple's commercial) published at YouTube to support Ron Paul: 

Think of all the hidden schemas (psychology) in this short flick: War, Dictatorship, George Orwell's 1984, Apple vs. IBM...
Using all these schemas (which are basically analogies) this short flick captivates viewers and delivers a much more profound, string, and lasting message...

According to "Made to Stick", to make an idea stick the delivered message has to be Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional and conveyd using Stories (SUCCES)...

Sounds interesting?  Go read the book...

Too much interesting stuff to go over, too little time.
The following books are piled up on my desk. Some partially read, some not, but hopefully I'll be able to finish them all by the end of June:

Technorati : Books

Just finished reading a great book - The One Minute Manager.

Its a very easy-to-read story which demonstrates the three management techniques of one-minute management: clear goal setting, one minute praising and one minute reprimands.

The book is very easy to read and the ideas conveyed are simple and easy to implement. I recommend this book to anyone out there reading this post...

Read it, and then give it to your managers :)