In sports there are lies, damned lies, and statistics. Joe DiMaggio's fifty-six-game hitting streak was magical. The three-point shot is an essential part of NBA basketball. Babe Ruth shouldn't have attempted to steal second base in the ninth inning of the 1926 World Series. Scientist and researcher Sheldon Hirsch has taken a decidedly unorthodox approach to sports history. He looks at myths, legends, conventional wisdom, shibboleths, and firm convictions of all kinds that sports lovers hold to be true, and demonstrates how analysis of facts and figures disproves what tradition - and sportswriters - would have us believe. Divided into three parts, on baseball, basketball, and football, Hot Hands, Draft Hype, and DiMaggio's Streak contains enough clear-sightedness and shocking conclusions to delight any sports lover.
The definitive account of the life and tragic death of baseball legend Lou Gehrig. Lou Gehrig was a baseball legend—the Iron Horse, the stoic New York Yankee who was the greatest first baseman in history, a man whose consecutive-games streak was ended by a horrible disease that now bears his name. But as this definitive new biography makes clear, Gehrig’s life was more complicated—and, perhaps, even more heroic—than anyone really knew. Drawing on new interviews and more than two hundred pages of previously unpublished letters to and from Gehrig, Luckiest Man gives us an intimate portrait of the man who became an American hero: his life as a shy and awkward youth growing up in New York City, his unlikely friendship with Babe Ruth (a friendship that allegedly ended over rumors that Ruth had had an affair with Gehrig’s wife), and his stellar career with the Yankees, where his consecutive-games streak stood for more than half a century. What was not previously known, however, is that symptoms of Gehrig’s affliction began appearing in 1938, earlier than is commonly acknowledged. Later, aware that he was dying, Gehrig exhibited a perseverance that was truly inspiring; he lived the last two years of his short life with the same grace and dignity with which he gave his now-famous “luckiest man” speech. Meticulously researched and elegantly written, Jonathan Eig’s Luckiest Man shows us one of the greatest baseball players of all time as we’ve never seen him before.
"Mantle’s life story has been told many times, but it’s never received as loving a treatment as this one." Booklist, Starred Review Mickey Mantle is one of baseball’s all-time greats. Playing for the New York Yankees for his entire professional career, Mantle was named to the All-Star team for 11 consecutive seasons, won three MVP awards, and was a seven-time World Series champion. He quickly became an icon who achieved hero status even while playing through injuries for most of his career. In Mantle: The Best There Ever Was, Tony Castro makes the impassioned argument that Mickey Mantle truly was the greatest ballplayer of all time. Acclaimed by the New York Times as the definitive biographer of baseball’s fabled number 7, Castro shares many of his personal conversations with Mantle, demystifying the legend and revealing intimate, never-before-published details from Mantle’s personal life. In addition, Castro offers illuminating new insights into Mantle’s extraordinary career, including the head-turning conclusion based on the evolution of analytics that the beloved Yankee switch-hitting slugger may ultimately win acclaim as having fulfilled the weighty expectation once placed on him: being even greater than Babe Ruth. Drawing from hundreds of interviews with ex-teammates, friends, and family, Castro masterfully blends Mantle’s public and private selves to present a fully rounded portrait of this complex, misunderstood national hero.
Untamed. Unsupervised. Uncontrolled. Boyhood in the 1960s and ‘70s was a time for exploration and mischief. Author Michael Tougias found more than his share of misadventures in the woods and on the water: some life-threatening but others innocently hilarious. Over time – and after reading a multitude of adventure books -- these experiences took shape in his quest to be a mountain man, owning a cabin in the forest and living off the land. Part of that dream would come true, but only after a family tragedy that shook his world and forced changes in his life. This is also a story of a complex and strained relationship between father and son, the efforts at understanding, and ultimately respect and devotion. In The Waters Between Us Tougias channels Bryson’s “A Walk in the Woods” to mix laugh out loud humor with insight into the natural world through the eyes of a curious boy. Tougias is a New York Times Bestselling author and co-author of 31 books, including There’s A Porcupine In My Outhouse (Winner of the Independent Publishers “Best Nature Book of the Year”) and The Finest Hours (inspiration for a 2016 Disney movie). He has received many writing awards.
Många självklarheter i vårt digitala samhälle är beroende av Internet för att fungera. Allt från smarta dörrar för hemtjänster, till självscanningsapparaterna på ICA, till nyare bilar, moderna tillverkningsrobotar, telefoner och affärssystem. Den här licentiatavhandlingen reder ut vad Internet är, hur det styrs och vad det har för praktiska konsekvenser. Tidigare forskning finns bland annat inom telekommunikation där Internet liknas vid andra telekommunikationstjänster, så som kabel-TV eller mobiltelefoni, och inom digitalisering både inom management och informationssystem där Internet i det närmaste tas för givet som teknisk infrastruktur. Här tar jag en ansatts där jag förklarar Internet ur ett kombinerat tekniskt och organisatoriskt perspektiv. Studien är principiellt uppdelad i tre delar. Den första delen fokuserar på att begreppsmässigt hitta ett sätt att diskutera Internet utan att essentiella aspekter faller bort, såsom styrningen eller konsekvenser av den tekniska designen. Jag landar i att Internet är både ett tekniskt och ett organisatoriskt fenomen. Tekniskt i bemärkelsen att det handlar om digital paketbaserad kommunikation (dvs att olika paket kan ta olika väg och att det inte finns ett beroende på en viss specifik väg, eller “krets”), vilket kan särskiljas från exempelvis kretskopplad kommunikation (dvs en specific väg från sändare till mottagare) eller rent analog kommunikation. I denna tekniska dimension är Internet förhållandevis likt klassisk telekommunikation såsom kabel-TV och mobiltelefoni, och förlitar sig på best-effort paketbaserad kommunikation. I den andra dimensionen, styrning och organisation, är Internet ett explicit bottom-up fenomen som styrs med andra principer och ideal än klassisk telekommunikation. Till sin utformning är denna minsta möjliga koordination som krävs för att möjliggöra koordinering av de tekniska unika identifierare som behövs för att Internet ska fungera (dvs idag DNS- och BGP-flororna av protokoll för användning av namn och nummer på Internet). Båda dimensionerna, de organisatoriska och tekniska, följer samma designprinciper, och generellt är det meningsfullt att se Internet som en ekologi av aktörer snarare än en organisation i strikt teoretiska termer (exempelvis finns ingen tydlig övergripande strategi, organisationsnummer eller löneutbetalare). Det är dessa designprinciper, som ligger väl i linje med systemarkitektursprinciper för datorsystem, som är orsaken till Internets lager-design där man (generellt) inte ska bry som om vad som händer på andra lager än sitt eget (beskrivet som “separation of concerns” eller i dubbel negation “high cohesion” i texten) samt att ha en minimalistisk ansatts till koordinering och enbart koordinera eller skapa beroenden mellan enheter (både tekniskt och organisatoriskt) när det verkligen behövs (beskrivet som “minimum coordination” eller “low coupling” i texten). Den andra delen fokuserar på hur Internet kan socialt påverkas eller förändras till något annat, eller till något med en annan funktion sett som en styrd organisation. Jag använder begreppet social robusthet, som motpol till teknisk robusthet som i hur man tekniskt kan förstöra Internet, för att diskutera dessa aspekter. Slutsatserna här mynnar ut i att Internets explicita bottom-up och problemsuppdelnings-design gör det märkbart svårt för någon att medvetet påverka Internet för att ändra dess beskaffenhet, och dessutom visar jag att även om man praktiskt lyckas ta över de formellt beslutande råden (exempelvis ICANNs och IETFs styrelser) så finns det inga formella eller praktiska hinder för att bara ignorera dem (dvs switching costs för just ICANN eller IETF är låga, om än tekniskt omständligt med att konfigurera om rötter och routing-tabeller, och betydligt enklare än att gå från IPv4 till IPv6 då utrustning kan behöva ersättas och därmed en betydligt högre switching cost). Med andra ord, det är enklare att byta ut Internets koordinerare än att byta ut Internet mot något som fungerar annorlunda. Däremot är den rådande politiska världsordningen ett hot mot Internet, eftersom den regelstyrda och koordinerade världsordningen inte längre är lika självklar som den varit tidigare. Den tredje och sista studien fokuserar på nätneutralitet, dvs rätten nätverksoperatörer har att fånga värde i andra dimensioner än trafikmängd, som en praktiskt effekt av hur Internet styrs och fungerar. Det primära praktiska bidraget är att nätneutralitet inte får ses som enbart en reglerings och lagstiftningfråga utan det är mer relevant att prata om i termer av nätneutralitet i praktiken. I den bemärkelsen är lagstiftningens vara eller inte vara mindre intressant än praktisk nätneutralitets vara eller inte vara och en tyngdpunktsförskjutning i den offentliga debatten hade fört diskussionen närmare hur Internet fungerar. Sammanfattningsvis ger Internets designprinciper att marknadskrafter, och ej direkt reglering, ska möjliggöra nätneutralitet. För att förtydliga, tanken är att det ska finnas konkurrens inom de flesta nivåer eller lager, och att det är av vikt att det finns konkurrens rakt igenom så att en kundvilja för paketneutralitet på tjänstenivå även påverkar nätägar- och infrastrukturnivå, så att det är användarnas efterfrågan som leder till nätneutralitet (om den användarviljan finns). Dock kan det mycket väl vara så att man som användare inte är intresserad av nätneutralitet och då ska tjänsteleverantörer, nätägare och infrastrukturoperatörer inte heller tvingas vara neutrala genom lagstiftning då det går stick i stäv med designprinciperna. Inte heller ska en grupps vilja kring nätneutralitet påverka andras möjligheter att välja. Genomgående identifierar jag två kolliderande världsbilder, den distribuerade regelstyrda och koordinerade ordningen i sitt perspektiv med sina förkämpar, och den mer integrerande och suveräna världsordningen med sitt perspektiv och sina förkämpar. Rent praktiskt uppfyller Internet en önskad funktion i den tidigare men ej i den senare, då Internet designmässigt är byggt för att tillåta snarare än kontrollera och bestämma. Exempelvis finns det inte inbyggda (tekniska) mekanismer i Internet för att till exempel möjliggöra statlig övervakning eller kontroll av material som finns tillgängligt, och då ligger det mer i statens intresse att ha kontrollerade telekommunikationstjänster, såsom kabel-TV, mobiltelefoni och liknande lösningar där man inte helt enkelt kan lägga på ett “extra lager” för att uppnå kryptering, anonymitet eller tillgång till andra tjänster. I texten använder jag perspektiven tillsammans med teknologi, marknader och byråkrati för att fånga upp dynamiken och strömningarna i Internet-ekologin och jämför med tekniska samhällsförändringar, som exempelvis järnvägsnät, postverk och finansiella marknader. Jag konstaterar att Internet har varit styrt av teknologiskt baserade värderingar, till skillnad från de andra exemplen som i huvudsak har utformats av dynamiken mellan byråkrati och marknad. I denna mån förelår jag att teknologi kan användas som strömning och motperspektiv till den klassiska uppställningen med byråkrati och marknad för att beskriva fenomen i digitaliseringens tidsålder. Avhandlingen sätter även pågående trender i ett bredare perspektiv mot både organisation och teknik, och trycker på vikten av att förstå delarna var för sig och tillsammans för att på ett rikare sätt måla upp helheten. The modern society is to a large extent Internet-dependent. Today we rely on the Internet to handle communication for smart doors, self-scanning convenience stores, connected cars, production robots, telephones and ERP-systems. The purpose of this thesis is to unbundle the Internet, its technology, its coordination, and practical and theoretical consequences. Earlier research has, in telecommunications, focused on the Internet as one of many potential telecommunications services, such as cellphones or cable-TV, and the management and information systems field has by and large treated the Internet as black-boxable infrastructure. This thesis explains the Internet from the combined perspectives of technology and coordination. This text contains three empirical studies. The first is focused on conceptualizing and discussing the Internet in a meaningful way using both technology and coordination frameworks. I unceremoniously conclude that the Internet is both a technological and a coordination phenomenon and neither of these aspects can be ignored. The Internet is technological in that it concerns digital packet switched digital communication (as opposed to circuit switched) or purely analog communications. The technological dimension of the Internet is similar in its constituency to classical telecommunications networks, and has best-effort mechanisms for packet delivery. In the other dimension, coordination, the Internet is an explicit bottom-up phenomenon minimally coordinated (or governed) by other ideals than classical telecommunications networks and systems. At its core this least necessary coordination concerns technical unique identifiers necessary for inter-network communication (in practice today manifested as naming with the DNS protocol suite, and numbering with the BGP protocol suite). Both dimensions follow similar design characteristics; the design of the technical Internet is similar to the design of the coordination of the Internet. These design principles, which are well aligned with software design principles, is the cause of the Internet’s layered design (“separation of concerns” in practice) and minimal view of coordination (the “least coordinated Internet”). In general terms it is fruitful to view the Internet and involved actors as an ecology, rather than one organization or entity in need of governance or control. The second study looks at the social resilience of the Internet. That is, is it possible through social means to change what the Internet is or can be viewed as. I use social resilience as a counterpart to technical resilience, i.e. resilience to technical interference. In essence, the bottom-up and separations of concerns design of the coordination aspect of the Internet minimizes possible influence of actors intent on mission disruption. I also practically show that even a take-over of the central councils have little effect the constituency of the Internet, since these councils are not invested with formal powers of enforcement. This thesis suggests that the cost of switching from ICANN and IETF to another set of organizations is quite low due to the nature of the coordination of the Internet, compared to for example, switching all equipment to IPv6 capable equipment. However, the current political situation is a threat to the current Internet regime, since an international and rule-based world order is no longer on all states’ agendas. The final empirical study focus on the practical and theoretical implications of the Internet on the case of net neutrality. The primary contribution is that de facto and de jure net neutrality differ in practice, and as such de facto net neutrality deserves more attention. Also, I suggest that any regulation, either for or against net neutrality, is problematic, since such regulation would interfere with the inherent coordination mechanisms of the Internet. As such regulation should focus on providing the necessary markets for Internet function given the coordination and design of the Internet. As a net neutrality example, net neutral Internet access options should exist as part of a natural service offering if wanted by customers, not due to direct regulation. Throughout the thesis I identify two colliding world orders, both in terms of digital communication networks and terms of organizing society in general: the rule-based and coordinating order with its champions, and the integrated or sovereign order with its champions. In practical terms, the Internet can be considered a want in the former (the distributed perspective), but not the later (the integrative perspective), since the Internet lacks inherent (technical) controls for surveillance and content control which are necessary in a world order where borders are important. Regardless of if that importance stems from state oversight or intellectual property rights legislation. I use these perspectives together with technology, markets and bureaucracy to catch the dynamics of the Internet ecology. I then compare these dynamics with other technological and societal phenomena, such as railway networks, postal services and financial markets. And conclude that the Internet (as conceptualized in this thesis) can best be explained by technological values, in opposite to the other examples which can best by explained by the dynamics of markets and bureaucracies without any real influence of the values of technology. As such, I suggest that the classical frame of markets and bureaucracy can fruitfully be expanded with technology to better explain the Internet and similar digitization phenomena. This thesis puts current trends in a broader perspective based on technology and organization, where the two perspectives together better can draw the full picture in a rich fashion.
From the New York Times bestselling author of The Glass Sentence, a lightly speculative, relevant puzzle box with undertones of Never Let Me Go. The time is now. The place is San Francisco. The world is filled with adults devoid of emotion and children on the cusp of losing their feelings--of "waning"--when they reach their teens. Natalia Peña has already waned. So why does she love her little brother with such ferocity that, when he's kidnapped by a Big Brother-esque corporation, she'll do anything to get him back? From the New York Times bestselling author of The Glass Sentence comes this haunting story of one determined girl who will use her razor-sharp wits, her martial arts skills, and, ultimately, her heart to fight killers, predators, and the world's biggest company to rescue her brother--and to uncover the shocking truth about waning.
The third in Robert Greene's bestselling series is now available in a pocket sized concise edition. Following 48 Laws of Power and The Art of Seduction, here is a brilliant distillation of the strategies of war to help you wage triumphant battles everyday. Spanning world civilisations, and synthesising dozens of political, philosophical, and religious texts, The Concise 33 Strategies of War is a guide to the subtle social game of everyday life. Based on profound and timeless lessons, it is abundantly illustrated with examples of the genius and folly of everyone from Napoleon to Margaret Thatcher and Hannibal to Ulysses S. Grant, as well as diplomats, captains of industry and Samurai swordsmen.
Unbored is the book every modern child needs. Brilliantly walking the line between cool and constructive, it's crammed with activities that are not only fun and doable but that also get kids standing on their own two feet. If you're a kid, you can: -- Build a tipi or an igloo -- Learn to knit -- Take stuff apart and fix it -- Find out how to be constructively critical -- Film a stop-action movie or edit your own music -- Do parkour like James Bond -- Make a little house for a mouse from lollipop sticks -- Be independent! Catch a bus solo or cook yourself lunch -- Make a fake exhaust for your bike so it sounds like you're revving up a motorcycle -- Design a board game -- Go camping (or glamping) -- Plan a road trip -- Get proactive and support the causes you care about -- Develop your taste and decorate your own room -- Make a rocket from a coke bottle -- Play farting games There are gross facts and fascinating stories, reports on what stuff is like (home schooling, working in an office...), Q&As with inspiring grown-ups, extracts from classic novels, lists of useful resources and best ever lists like the top clean rap songs, stop-motion movies or books about rebellion. Just as kids begin to disappear into their screens, here is a book that encourages them to use those tech skills to be creative, try new things and change the world. And it gets parents to join in. Unbored is fully illustrated, easy to use and appealing to young and old, girl and boy. Parents will be comforted by its anti-perfectionist spirit and humour. Kids will just think it's brilliant.
Breathtaking tales of climbers and hunters, runners and racers, winners and losers by the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter. New York Times reporter John Branch’s riveting, humane pieces about ordinary people doing extraordinary things at the edges of the sporting world have won nearly every major journalism prize. Sidecountry gathers the best of Branch’s work for the first time, featuring 20 of his favorites from the more than 2,000 pieces he has published in the paper. Branch is renowned for covering the offbeat in the sporting world, from alligator hunting to wingsuit flying. Sidecountry features such classic Branch pieces, including “Snow Fall,” about downhill skiers caught in an avalanche in Washington state, and “Dawn Wall,” about rock climbers trying to scale Yosemite’s famed El Capitan. In other articles, Branch introduces people whose dedication and decency transcend their sporting lives, including a revered football coach rebuilding his tornado-devastated town in Iowa and a girls’ basketball team in Tennessee that plays on despite never winning a game. The book culminates with his moving personal pieces, including “Children of the Cube,” about the surprising drama of Rubik’s Cube competitions as seen through the eyes of Branch’s own sports-hating son, and “The Girl in the No. 8 Jersey,” about a mother killed in the 2017 Las Vegas shooting whose daughter happens to play on Branch’s daughter’s soccer team. John Branch has been hailed for writing “American portraiture at its best” (Susan Orlean) and for covering sports “the way Lyle Lovett writes country music—a fresh turn on a time-honored pleasure” (Nicholas Dawidoff). Sidecountry is the work of a master reporter at the top of his game.
"The Victorian cup on my shelf--a present from my mother--reads 'Love the Giver.' Is it because the very word patronage implies the authority of the father that we have treated American women patrons and activists so unlovingly in the writing of our own history? This pioneering collection of superb scholarship redresses that imbalance. At the same time it brilliantly documents the interrelationship between various aspects of gender and the creation of our own culture."--Judith Tick, author of Ruth Crawford Seeger: A Composer's Search for American Music "Together with the fine-grained and energetic research, I like the spirit of this book, which is ambitious, bold, and generous minded. Cultivating Music in America corrects long-standing prejudices, omissions, and misunderstandings about the role of women in setting up the structures of America's musical life, and, even more far-reaching, it sheds light on the character of American musical life itself. To read this book is to be brought to a fresh understanding of what is at stake when we discuss notions such as 'elitism, ' 'democratic taste, ' and the political and economic implications of art."--Richard Crawford, author of The American Musical Landscape "We all know we are indebted to royal patronage for the music of Mozart. But who launched American talent? The answer is women, this book teaches us. Music lovers will be grateful for these ten essays, sound in scholarship, that make a strong case for the women philanthropists who ought to join Carnegie and Rockefeller as household words as sponsors of music."--Karen J. Blair, author of The Torchbearers: Women and Their Amateur Arts Associations in America
