A thoughtful and enthusiastic analysis of how more and more people are inventing and creating truly remarkable products and...
The story behind modern tinkerers, inventors, and creators of all sorts of good stuff.
In a consumer culture, people are often passive, purchasing items that they may or may not need and becoming defined by what they own. However, a new movement is sweeping across the globe: people are experimenting, inventing, and creating primarily for the pleasure it brings them. Dougherty (co-author: Maker City Playbook: A Practical Guide to Reinvention in American Cities, 2016, etc.), the founder of MAKE: Magazine and organizer of the first Maker Faire as well as a co-founder of O’Reilly Media, analyzes the creativity and grass-roots projects that comprise this new trend. “The Maker Movement signals a societal, cultural, and technological transformation that invites us to participate as producers, not just consumers,” he writes. “It is changing how we learn, work and innovate. It is open and collaborative, creative and inventive, hands-on and playful.” Thanks to the internet and open-source software, people can learn how to do anything online, and with the generosity of donations accumulated through sites like Kickstarter, anyone can see his or her ideas become something tangible. Dougherty closely examines several startups, taking readers through the initial bursts of creativity to the nitty-gritty details of finding manufacturers to produce their products to the satisfaction of having created a useful item, often at a fraction of the cost of similar products. He studies how maker workshops have sprung up across the country, providing people with access to tools, supplies, and training so they can invent whatever comes to mind, and he discusses how schools can incorporate maker activities into the curriculum. As he notes, hands-on learning is ideal for the young, inquisitive mind, combining play with the learning of new skills. Dougherty’s enthusiasm for the maker movement is evident, and it will push readers toward finding their own creative outlets.
A thoughtful and enthusiastic analysis of how more and more people are inventing and creating truly remarkable products and services.Pub Date: Sept. 27, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-62317-074-5
Page Count: 250
Publisher: North Atlantic
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
An intriguing meditation on the nature of the universe and our attempts to understand it that should appeal to both...
Italian theoretical physicist Rovelli (General Relativity: The Most Beautiful of Theories, 2015, etc.) shares his thoughts on the broader scientific and philosophical implications of the great revolution that has taken place over the past century.
These seven lessons, which first appeared as articles in the Sunday supplement of the Italian newspaper Sole 24 Ore, are addressed to readers with little knowledge of physics. In less than 100 pages, the author, who teaches physics in both France and the United States, cogently covers the great accomplishments of the past and the open questions still baffling physicists today. In the first lesson, he focuses on Einstein's theory of general relativity. He describes Einstein's recognition that gravity "is not diffused through space [but] is that space itself" as "a stroke of pure genius." In the second lesson, Rovelli deals with the puzzling features of quantum physics that challenge our picture of reality. In the remaining sections, the author introduces the constant fluctuations of atoms, the granular nature of space, and more. "It is hardly surprising that there are more things in heaven and earth, dear reader, than have been dreamed of in our philosophy—or in our physics,” he writes. Rovelli also discusses the issues raised in loop quantum gravity, a theory that he co-developed. These issues lead to his extraordinary claim that the passage of time is not fundamental but rather derived from the granular nature of space. The author suggests that there have been two separate pathways throughout human history: mythology and the accumulation of knowledge through observation. He believes that scientists today share the same curiosity about nature exhibited by early man.
An intriguing meditation on the nature of the universe and our attempts to understand it that should appeal to both scientists and general readers.Pub Date: March 1, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-399-18441-3
Page Count: 96
Publisher: Riverhead
Review Posted Online: Dec. 7, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A zesty, energetic history, not only of a building, but of more than a century of American culture.
A revealing biography of the fabled Manhattan hotel, in which generations of artists and writers found a haven.
Turn-of-the century New York did not lack either hotels or apartment buildings, writes Tippins (February House: The Story of W. H. Auden, Carson McCullers, Jane and Paul Bowles, Benjamin Britten, and Gypsy Rose Lee, Under One Roof In Wartime America, 2005). But the Chelsea Hotel, from its very inception, was different. Architect Philip Hubert intended the elegantly designed Chelsea Association Building to reflect the utopian ideals of Charles Fourier, offering every amenity conducive to cooperative living: public spaces and gardens, a dining room, artists’ studios, and 80 apartments suitable for an economically diverse population of single workers, young couples, small families and wealthy residents who otherwise might choose to live in a private brownstone. Hubert especially wanted to attract creative types and made sure the building’s walls were extra thick so that each apartment was quiet enough for concentration. William Dean Howells, Edgar Lee Masters and artist John Sloan were early residents. Their friends (Mark Twain, for one) greeted one another in eight-foot-wide hallways intended for conversations. In its early years, the Chelsea quickly became legendary. By the 1930s, though, financial straits resulted in a “down-at-heel, bohemian atmosphere.” Later, with hard-drinking residents like Dylan Thomas and Brendan Behan, the ambience could be raucous. Arthur Miller scorned his free-wheeling, drug-taking, boozy neighbors, admitting, though, that the “great advantage” to living there “was that no one gave a damn what anyone else chose to do sexually.” No one passed judgment on creativity, either. But the art was not what made the Chelsea famous; its residents did. Allen Ginsberg, Bob Dylan, Andy Warhol, Janis Joplin, Leonard Cohen, Robert Mapplethorpe, Phil Ochs and Sid Vicious are only a few of the figures populating this entertaining book.
A zesty, energetic history, not only of a building, but of more than a century of American culture.Pub Date: Dec. 3, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-618-72634-9
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
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