Powerful lessons in forward-thinking leadership from the global business pioneer who turned IDG into a $3 billion technology media and venture capital empireLike Steve Jobs, Patrick McGovern created a worldwide multibillion-dollar industry by thinking differently, disrupting old business models, and embracing new global trends. He drove the future forward and never looked back. His company, International Data Group (IDG), quickly became a global powerhouse with information technology publications in markets around the world. IDG broke new ground in the 1980s by opening offices in China, the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and other markets deemed off-limits. IDG thrived across a series of technology and media industry shifts—from mainframe computers to minicomputers to personal computers, from print to digital, and through into the age of the Internet and smartphones—that upended many rivals. Living at the intersection of these classic disruptions, McGovern never missed a beat. And he understood well before most that a revolution in information technology was underway and not only was there money to be made but that this business would soon become the world’s largest industry. His leadership in the creation of one of the world’s leading brain research institutes at MIT only served to cement his legacy. His bold vision and fearless risk-taking made McGovern a legend among leaders. In today’s ever-changing global marketplace, his leadership lessons are more timely and important than ever.In Future Forward, leaders will find 10 essential lessons that can be easily applied to any business, from small startups to giant corporations. These include: “Let’s try it. Encourage entrepreneurial behavior and back it up with serious commitment.” “Decentralize. When building a global empire, every market is local.” “Love your employees. Adore your customers.” Leaders at every level will discover outside-the-box approaches to employee engagement, entrepreneurial commitment, and radical innovation. These are the lessons of a true visionary. This is how successful leaders take risks, take charge, and take the future by storm.

Richard Dawkins, bestselling author and the world’s most celebrated evolutionary biologist, has spent his career elucidating the many wonders of science. Here, he takes a broader approach and uses his unrivaled explanatory powers to illuminate the ways in which the world really works. Filled with clever thought experiments and jaw-dropping facts, The Magic of Reality explains a stunningly wide range of natural phenomena: How old is the universe? Why do the continents look like disconnected pieces of a jigsaw puzzle? What causes tsunamis? Why are there so many kinds of plants and animals? Who was the first man, or woman? Starting with the magical, mythical explanations for the wonders of nature, Dawkins reveals the exhilarating scientific truths behind these occurrences. This is a page-turning detective story that not only mines all the sciences for its clues but primes the reader to think like a scientist as well.

All who lived in the early 1950s remember the fear of polio and the elation felt when a successful vaccine was found. Now David Oshinsky tells the gripping story of the polio terror and of the intense effort to find a cure, from the March of Dimes to the discovery of the Salk and Sabin vaccines--and beyond.Here is a remarkable portrait of America in the early 1950s, using the widespread panic over polio to shed light on our national obsessions and fears. Drawing on newly available papers of Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin and other key players, Oshinsky paints a suspenseful portrait of the race for the cure, weaving a dramatic tale centered on the furious rivalry between Salk and Sabin. Indeed, the competition was marked by a deep-seated ill will among the researchers that remained with them until their deaths. The author also tells the story of Isabel Morgan, perhaps the most talented of all polio researchers, who might have beaten Salk to the prize if she had not retired to raise a family. As backdrop to this feverish research, Oshinsky offers an insightful look at the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, which was founded in the 1930s by FDR and Basil O'Connor. The National Foundation revolutionized fundraising and the perception of disease in America, using "poster children" and the famous March of Dimes to raise hundreds of millions of dollars from a vast army of contributors (instead of a few well-heeled benefactors), creating the largest research and rehabilitation network in the history of medicine. The polio experience also revolutionized the way in which the government licensed and tested new drugs before allowing them on the market, and the way in which the legal system dealt with manufacturers' liability for unsafe products. Finally, and perhaps most tellingly, Oshinsky reveals that polio was never the raging epidemic portrayed by the media, but in truth a relatively uncommon disease. But in baby-booming America--increasingly suburban, family-oriented, and hygiene-obsessed--the specter of polio, like the specter of the atomic bomb, soon became a cloud of terror over daily life.Both a gripping scientific suspense story and a provocative social and cultural history, Polio opens a fresh window onto postwar America.

The bestselling author of Collapse and Guns, Germs and Steel surveys the history of human societies to answer the question: What can we learn from traditional societies that can make the world a better place for all of us?“As he did in his Pulitzer Prize-winning Guns, Germs, and Steel, Jared Diamond continues to make us think with his mesmerizing and absorbing new book." BookpageMost of us take for granted the features of our modern society, from air travel and telecommunications to literacy and obesity. Yet for nearly all of its six million years of existence, human society had none of these things. While the gulf that divides us from our primitive ancestors may seem unbridgeably wide, we can glimpse much of our former lifestyle in those largely traditional societies still or recently in existence. Societies like those of the New Guinea Highlanders remind us that it was only yesterday—in evolutionary time—when everything changed and that we moderns still possess bodies and social practices often better adapted to traditional than to modern conditions.The World Until Yesterday provides a mesmerizing firsthand picture of the human past as it had been for millions of years—a past that has mostly vanished—and considers what the differences between that past and our present mean for our lives today.This is Jared Diamond’s most personal book to date, as he draws extensively from his decades of field work in the Pacific islands, as well as evidence from Inuit, Amazonian Indians, Kalahari San people, and others. Diamond doesn’t romanticize traditional societies—after all, we are shocked by some of their practices—but he finds that their solutions to universal human problems such as child rearing, elder care, dispute resolution, risk, and physical fitness have much to teach us. Provocative, enlightening, and entertaining, The World Until Yesterday is an essential and fascinating read.

Jim Grant was a visionary leader on a global scale. As Executive Director of UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund, from 1980 to 1995, he launched a worldwide child survival and development revolution. The practical result was that by 1995, 25 million children were alive who would otherwise have died. Millions more were living with better health and nutrition. The eight stories in this volume, each one written by a close colleague of Jim Grant, celebrate this achievement. They also draw out the lessons on Grant's vision and leadership - lessons relevant in many other contexts.

From Pulitzer Prize winner Amanda Bennett comes a moving, eye-opening, and beautifully written memoir—a love story of two unusual people, their complex marriage and deep devotion, and finally, Bennett’s quest to save her husband’s life. When Wall Street Journal reporter Amanda Bennett meets the eccentric, infuriating, yet somehow irresistible Terence Bryan Foley while on assignment in China, the last thing she expects is to marry him. They are so different—classic and bohemian, bow ties and batik, quirky and sensible. But Terence is persistent. “You are going to be somebody,” he tells her. “You’re going to need somebody to take care of you.” Though initially as combative as their courtship, their marriage brings with it stormy passion, deep love and respect, two beloved children, and a life together over two decades. Then comes illness, and the fight to win a longer life for Terence. The Cost of Hope chronicles the extraordinary measures Amanda and Terence take to preserve not only Terence’s life but also the life of their family. After his death, Bennett uses her skills as a veteran investigative reporter to determine the cost of their mission of hope. What she discovers raises important questions many people face, and vital issues about the intricacies of America’s healthcare system. Rich in humor, insight, and candor, The Cost of Hope is an unforgettable memoir, an inspiring personal story that sheds light on one of the most important turning points in life.

In the 20th century, the United States was the world leader in education--the first country to achieve universal secondary education and the first to expand higher education beyond the elite class. Now other countries are catching up and leaping ahead--in high school graduation rates, in the quality and equity of their K-12 education systems, and in the proportion of students graduating from college. It is not that American education has gotten worse so much that education in other parts of the world has gotten so much better, so fast.Designed to promote conversation about how to educate students for a rapidly changing and increasingly borderless and innovation-based world, this comprehensive and illuminating book from international education expert Vivien Stewart is not about casting blame; it is about understanding what the best school systems in the world are doing right for the purpose of identifying what U.S. schools--at the national, state, and local level--might do differently and better. Here, you'll consider* How the U.S. education system fares against emerging international standards of excellence.* The policies, practices, and priorities of the world's best-performing systems, along with specific ideas for adapting these approaches for U.S. schools.* The common factors characteristic of high-performing and rapidly improving systems.* New models of 21st century teaching and leadership and ways to modernize curriculum, instruction, and assessment.* How technology and international exchange can help the United States close performance gaps and reach new levels of excellence and equity.Learning goes both ways, Stewart writes. Other countries have learned a great deal from the United States, and now it is time for American educators to open their eyes to other nations' globally-minded and future-focused practices, leverage existing assets, and create a truly world-class education system for this generation of students and generations to come.

It’s no wonder American higher education is facing a crisis.While low-income students can’t find a spot in their local community colleges for lack of funding, public four-year universities are spending staggering sums on luxurious residence halls, ever-bigger football stadiums, and obscure research institutes. We have cosseted our most advantaged students even as we deny access to the working adults who urgently need higher education to advance their careers and our economy. In Change.edu: Rebooting for the new talent economy Andrew S. Rosen clearly and entertainingly details how far the American higher education system has strayed from the goals of access, quality, affordability, and accountability that should characterize our system, and offers a prescription to restore American educational pre-eminence.To change, our system will have to end its reflexive opposition to anything new and different. Rosen describes how each new wave of innovation and expansion of educational access— starting with the founding of Harvard in 1636, and continuing with the advent of land-grant colleges in the 19th century, community colleges in the 20th century and private sector colleges over the last two decades—has been met with misunderstanding and ridicule. When colleges like the University of California, Cornell and Purdue were founded, they were scorned as “pretenders to the title of university” – language that tracks later criticisms of community colleges and most recently for-profit colleges.Avoiding that condescension is just one of the reasons colleges have come under the sway of “Harvard Envy” – schools that were founded to expand access feel an inexorable tug to become more prestigious and exclusive. Even worse, the competition for the best students has led universities to turn themselves into full-fledged resorts; they’ve built climbing walls, French bistros and 20-person hot-tubs to entice students to their campuses.How can America address an incentive system in higher education that is mismatched to the challenges of the years ahead? In Change.edu, Rosen outlines “seven certainties” of education in the coming 25 years, and presents an imperative for how our system must prepare for the coming changes. He proposes a new “playbook” for dealing with the change ahead, one that will enable American higher education to regain its global primacy and be a catalyst for economic growth in the 21st century.

Foreword by Bill GatesLinkedIn cofounder, legendary investor, and host of the award-winning Masters of Scale podcast reveals the secret to starting and scaling massively valuable companies.What entrepreneur or founder doesn’t aspire to build the next Amazon, Facebook, or Airbnb? Yet those who actually manage to do so are exceedingly rare. So what separates the startups that get disrupted and disappear from the ones who grow to become global giants?The secret is blitzscaling: a set of techniques for scaling up at a dizzying pace that blows competitors out of the water. The objective of Blitzscaling is not to go from zero to one, but from one to one billion –as quickly as possible.When growing at a breakneck pace, getting to next level requires very different strategies from those that got you to where you are today. In a book inspired by their popular class at Stanford Business School, Hoffman and Yeh reveal how to navigate the necessary shifts and weather the unique challenges that arise at each stage of a company’s life cycle, such as: how to design business models for igniting and sustaining relentless growth; strategies for hiring and managing; how the role of the founder and company culture must evolve as the business matures, and more. Whether your business has ten employees or ten thousand, Blitzscaling is the essential playbook for winning in a world where speed is the only competitive advantage that matters.

Fitzgerald war der literarische Wortführer des "Jazz Age". Er hat das glitzernde New York der Zwischenkriegsjahre, das sich für die Rhythmen von Duke Ellington und Louis Armstrong begeisterte, eingefangen, ohne die Frage auszublenden, ob dieser Glanz trügerisch sei. Seine Helden, kaum verhüllte Selbstporträts, strotzen nur so vor Selbstbewusstsein und leiden zugleich an ihrem Ausbeuten der eigenen Seele. Ungekürzte und unbearbeitete Textausgabe in der Originalsprache, mit Übersetzungen schwieriger Wörter am Fuß jeder Seite, Nachwort und Literaturhinweisen. Mit Seitenzählung der gedruckten Ausgabe: Buch und E-Book können parallel benutzt werden.

'The most important invention in the whole of the Industrial Revolution was invention itself.'Those words are at the heart of this remarkable book - a history of the Industrial Revolution and the steam engine, as well as an account of how inventors first came to own and profit from their ideas and how invention itself springs forth from logic and imagination.Rocket. It was the fortuitously named train that inaugurated steam locomotion in 1829, jump-starting two centuries of mass transportation. As William Rosen reveals, it was the product of centuries of scientific and industrial discovery. From inventor Heron of Alexandria in AD 60 to James Watt, the physicist whose 'separate condenser' was central to the development of steam power - all those who made possible the long ride towards the Industrial Revolution are brought to life. But crucial to their contributions are other characters whose concepts allowed their invention to flourish - John Locke and intellectual property; Edward Coke and patents. Along the way, Rosen takes us deep into the human mind, explaining how 'eureka' moments occur - when the brain is most relaxed.

A comprehensive account of how energy has shaped society throughout history, from pre-agricultural foraging societies through today's fossil fuel–driven civilization."I wait for new Smil books the way some people wait for the next 'Star Wars' movie. In his latest book, Energy and Civilization: A History, he goes deep and broad to explain how innovations in humans' ability to turn energy into heat, light, and motion have been a driving force behind our cultural and economic progress over the past 10,000 years.—Bill Gates, Gates Notes, Best Books of the YearEnergy is the only universal currency; it is necessary for getting anything done. The conversion of energy on Earth ranges from terra-forming forces of plate tectonics to cumulative erosive effects of raindrops. Life on Earth depends on the photosynthetic conversion of solar energy into plant biomass. Humans have come to rely on many more energy flows—ranging from fossil fuels to photovoltaic generation of electricity—for their civilized existence. In this monumental history, Vaclav Smil provides a comprehensive account of how energy has shaped society, from pre-agricultural foraging societies through today's fossil fuel–driven civilization. Humans are the only species that can systematically harness energies outside their bodies, using the power of their intellect and an enormous variety of artifacts—from the simplest tools to internal combustion engines and nuclear reactors. The epochal transition to fossil fuels affected everything: agriculture, industry, transportation, weapons, communication, economics, urbanization, quality of life, politics, and the environment. Smil describes humanity's energy eras in panoramic and interdisciplinary fashion, offering readers a magisterial overview. This book is an extensively updated and expanded version of Smil's Energy in World History (1994). Smil has incorporated an enormous amount of new material, reflecting the dramatic developments in energy studies over the last two decades and his own research over that time.

Почему мы боимся вакцин? Провокационное исследование, проведенное Эулой Бисс.Став матерью, Эула Бисс страдает от паранои. У неё появляется страх перед правительством, медицинскими учреждениями и тем, что находится в воздухе вашего ребенка, еде, матрасе, лекарствах и вакцинах.

"The Rosie Result" - роман австралийского писателя Грэма Симсионса, изданный в 2019 году. Работа была впервые опубликована 5 февраля 2019 года издательством Text Publishing. Это третий и последний роман в трилогии «Дон Тиллман», следующий из «Проекта Рози» и «Эффекта Рози»

«Облачный атлас» подобен зеркальному лабиринту, в котором перекликаются, наслаиваясь друг на друга, шесть голосов: нотариуса середины девятнадцатого века, возвращающегося в США из Австралии; молодого композитора, вынужденного торговать душой и телом в Европе между мировыми войнами; журналистки в Калифорнии 1970-х, раскрывающей корпоративный заговор; мелкого издателя — нашего современника, умудрившегося сорвать банк на бандитской автобиографии «Удар кастетом» и бегущего от кредиторов; клона-прислуги из предприятия быстрого питания в Корее — стране победившего киберпанка; и гавайского козопаса на закате цивилизации. Впервые на русском — новый монументальный шедевр от автора знаменитого «Сна №9», также вошедший в шортлист Букеровской премии.

Леон Хессер написал книгу о человеке, который спас от голода миллионы людей. Норман Борлаг — американский агроном, получивший в 1970 году Нобелевскую премию за выведение уникальных сортов пшеницы, устойчивых к болезням. Героя книги еще называют «спасителем мексиканцев». Летом 1945-го по поручению благотворительных фондов Форда и Рокфеллера он отправился на юг Мексики, чтобы вывести новые сорта пшеницы. В том районе, на высоте 2,5 километра над уровнем моря, на протяжении трех лет — с 1939 по 1942 год — прошли три эпидемии, которые уничтожили все урожаи. Вредоносные грибы, распространившиеся по Мексике, стали самыми главными губителями посевов, с которыми никто не мог справиться. В книге подробно описывается, как Борлаг проводил свои эксперименты. Его коллеги из разных концов земного шара прислали ему несколько тысяч видов семян. Его задачей было совершить перекрестное опыление, над которым он работал вместе с местными учеными. В итоге удалось вдвое сократить срок выведения устойчивых к паразитам семян. Он засеял два экспериментальных поля — одно на севере, второе — на юге, и когда на юге вырастал урожай — он пересаживал его на север, чтобы ускорить там появление урожая. Таким образом агроном вывел новый экспериментальный «челночный метод» выведения сортов — shuttle breeding. Они оказались уникальными — устойчивыми к паразитам, высокоурожайными и приспособленными к разным климатическим условиям. Помимо научных описаний, автор также уделяет время бытовым историям — например, рассказывает, как ученые готовили еду на кострах и спали в палатках.

В среднем каждый из нас тратит примерно 40 дней в году, чтобы вспомнить те или иные события, факты или имена. Только представьте, насколько выше была бы ваша производительность, если бы вы сумели улучшить свою память так, как это удалось Джошуа Фоеру. Всего за год он превратился из человека, вечно забывающего о дне рождении своей девушки, в победителя чемпионата США по запоминанию, а вскоре — в автора мирового бестселлера, посвященного памяти. В книге рассказывается о 12 месяцах, которые автор провел, пытаясь постичь свою память — ее внутренние механизмы, естественные способы защиты, скрытый потенциал — и натренировать ее. Это, в сущности, рассказ о том, какое место память занимает в жизни всего человечества и каждого из нас. Как менялась функция памяти в течение тысячелетий? Какова роль техник запоминания в прошлом и настоящем? Может ли любой человек развить свою память до совершенства? И надо ли это? Вы узнаете, как нужно тренировать память и каким образом методики запоминания могут быть полезны в повседневной жизни.

Бестселлер по версии THE NEW YORK TIMES , от талантлтвого и эпатирующего комика.