0:00
So over the past couple of years, um,
0:02
I've read just getting on for a hundred
0:04
books. It's been a bit of a marathon
0:06
read for me. Since I'm a business
0:08
journalist, most of those books have
0:10
been business books. And I've compiled a
0:13
list of some of the favorite books that
0:15
I've read. This is a book about the
0:18
decline of the internet. And brace
0:21
yourselves, it's called nshitification.
0:23
Our experiences of the internet have
0:26
declined uh over the past decade or two.
0:29
and it sets out some of the reasons for
0:31
that and some of the potential policy
0:33
remedies for how that can be changed.
0:35
So, if you've ever felt as though your
0:38
experience of the internet, of social
0:40
media isn't anything like as good as it
0:41
used to be, this book will comfort you.
0:44
It will soothe you and it will help you
0:45
vent your anger as it did for me. Who
0:48
remembers Liberation Day? That brilliant
0:51
day Trump announced a series of massive
0:54
tariffs. Wasn't very liberating for most
0:57
of us. Well, this book by uh Ben Chu,
0:59
the former economics editor at News
1:02
Night, called Excel Economics, tracks
1:04
some of the ramifications of the huge
1:07
changes uh to globalization and trading
1:10
policy that could be brought about by
1:12
the Trump administration, looks at how
1:15
valuable global trade is and what's at
1:18
stake if we lose the kind of trade
1:20
relationships that we've had between the
1:22
the world's biggest powers over the
1:24
coming years. So my next one is an
1:27
autobiography of a business leader. It's
1:30
called uh without prejudice by Tijain
1:34
Theam who uh used to be the CEO of
1:37
Credential and Credit Swiss. And a lot
1:40
of business autobiographies are pretty
1:42
boring. Let's be honest. But this
1:45
autobiography is anything but boring.
1:46
The protagonist had a pretty crazy
1:49
upbringing where his father was a
1:51
government minister who ended up serving
1:53
time in prison. the guy himself uh ended
1:55
up in a career that spanned massive
1:58
firms and where he was ultimately ousted
2:01
from credit Swiss and only a couple of
2:03
years before that bank's collapse. It's
2:05
one in which the CEO confronts the
2:08
prejudice that he feels he's received
2:09
over his career and how he how he dealt
2:11
with that and overcame it. Take what he
2:13
says with a a pinch of salt because of
2:15
course, as I said, Credit Swiss did
2:17
collapse not long after he was ousted
2:19
from the bank, although he he doesn't
2:21
claim responsibility for that. And of
2:23
course, uh, Credit Swiss had a long
2:25
series of scandals, but nonetheless,
2:27
it's a hugely interesting tale and one I
2:30
would, uh, commend to you. Okay, so my
2:32
next book is one about global growth
2:36
policy. Uh, it's called Abundance, and
2:39
it's by New York Times columnist Ezra
2:42
Klene, and he's writing it with Derek
2:44
Thompson. I guess it's a book that comes
2:46
out of an era of low growth where people
2:49
feel as though the economy isn't working
2:52
for them, where there are stagnant
2:54
wages, where it feels as though um
2:56
governments aren't getting things done.
2:59
And it comes up with some policy
3:00
solutions to deliver more growth. things
3:03
like um overhauling the planning system,
3:06
uh reducing energy costs, making it
3:09
easier to to do business, uh improving
3:12
the uh public sector's relationship with
3:14
the private sector. And I suppose it's
3:16
it's sort of a vision for how a future
3:19
economy could look if it were unshackled
3:21
from uh regulatory challenges. And I
3:24
guess, you know, there's a lot of uh
3:25
doomerism out there, and Ezra Klein
3:28
hasn't been short of being critical of
3:29
of governments himself, but this is a
3:31
pretty optimistic book that sets out a
3:33
vision for how the economy could be in
3:36
the future in in five or 10 years. All
3:38
right. And for my next recommendation,
3:41
um there have been tons of books about
3:43
AI the past couple of years. My
3:45
experience of having read perhaps a
3:47
dozen of them now is there's really no
3:48
point uh you reading more than one or
3:50
two books about AI before you know
3:52
everything you need to know about AI. So
3:54
if you're going to read one book about
3:56
AI, I would recommend this one, Empire
3:58
of AI by Karen How. And this book uh
4:02
goes through uh the development of Open
4:05
AI, perhaps the the world's uh best
4:08
known AI firm, the company behind Chat
4:10
GPT. Karen has some exclusive access to
4:13
the company where she interviews lots of
4:15
insiders and she gives an impression of
4:18
a a company that's pretty chaotic even
4:20
at the best of times and where even if
4:22
it looks pretty polished on the outside,
4:24
it's uh there's a lot of turbulence
4:26
going on on the inside. It's a really
4:28
dramatic book, but it also helps paint a
4:30
picture of how the nason AI industry has
4:32
developed over the past couple of years.
4:34
All right. And my favorite uh business
4:36
book is perhaps one of the most sort of
4:38
revoly and dramatic that I've read. It's
4:41
by someone called Sarah Win Williams who
4:44
was a senior uh manager inside uh
4:48
Facebook now called Meta. And she
4:50
details her relationships with some of
4:52
the most powerful people inside the
4:55
company. It's called Careless People, a
4:58
story of where I used to work. And as
5:00
you can judge by the name of the title,
5:02
she doesn't have very pleasant things to
5:04
say about the company's founder, Mark
5:06
Zuckerberg, or some of the other senior
5:08
people in the company like Cheryl
5:10
>> Facebook's secret mission to get into
5:12
China was called Project Uldren and was
5:15
restricted to need to know staff. There
5:18
was no bridge too far. Meta built a
5:21
physical pipeline connecting the United
5:24
States and China. Meta executives
5:27
ignored warnings. This would provide
5:29
backdoor access to the Chinese Communist
5:33
>> It's a pretty devastating book if you're
5:35
reading this from the perspective of the
5:37
board of Meta. And I should be careful
5:40
about what I say about the book because
5:42
Meta has begun several lawsuits against
5:46
Sarah over the past year. But it's a
5:48
really fascinating book as to how this
5:50
company has been run. decisions which
5:52
are pretty jaw-dropping uh when you
5:55
compare them to the way the company
5:56
talks about itself. If you want to know
5:58
what's really going on inside Meta, this
