The Shallows. What the internet is doing to our brain. Nicholas Carr. 2010. ISBN 9780393072228.  This is a provocative and very important book.  Its genesis was the author noticed his inability to focus and not be distracted as he used the Internet more and more.  As befits the author of Does It Matter?  and The Big Switch , he looked at the impact on many technologies on thinking/the brain  along with the commentators of the time. This included the advent of clocks, writing (clay to parchment) , printing press ,  telephone, phonograph and now the World Wide Web.  Along the way he talks about the evolution of the brain, using eBooks, how interruptions affect learning, how he unplugged to write this book, is Google good or evil,  and general comments about writers on these and many subjects,.  By the end the writing of the book seems to have allowed him to rationalize where the Web can and will fit and where we need to be careful.  He even notes that our attention deficits may be rooted in pre web learned behaviors and we will learn new ways of sorting information.  I read this almost in one sitting – it is very well done, thoroughly researched and annotated, with lots of further reading noted. Great four hour coast read.

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microMarketing. Get big results by thinking and acting small. Greg Verdino. 2010 ISBN 9780071664868.  This is more of a guidebook to making sure what you do in marketing is in sync with the way things work today. Mass no longer matters, it is better to to be everything right to the right someone rather than something for everyone.  E.g.  Why are Maxwell House and Folgers coffee in such a deadgrowth  zone compared to  specialty coffees?  Many great points here but just like the movie the Jone$es, Verdino reminds you to connect with  masses of communicators, not mass communications. (So if you sell to advertisers, you better be very smart)   Too much to detail here, but this is a good statement of the state of the art today. Its all about being heard.  Concise easy read.

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