Non-fiction 08 Aug 2005 17:22

Amazonia

coverAmazonia
James Marcus

“The rise and fall of the Amazon.com editorial department” would be a good subtitle for this book. James Marcus, employee #55 at Amazon.com, was hired primarily to write book reviews and to be an editor. Slowly, though, little by little, the editors start to lose space to automated tools and metrics and, soon enough, there’s not really any space for an editorial voice at the company’s website.

It is very much a personal book. In between stories about developments at Amazon, we read about the author’s financial and personal problems, and of how some were resolved by the Internet bubble of 1999, while some were not.

The book is filled with interesting and funny stories that should look familiar to anyone who has worked for an Internet company in the bubble years, and also for people who worked (or still work) for companies that survived the bubble and outgrew their “childhood” years. Coming to think of it, this is a story about Amazon growing into adulthood: from a company where people were able to avoid unwanted work assignments by simply doing something else to a company where numbers and MBAs are king.

There are also many anecdotes about Jeff Bezos, and this book is a good way to know more about the way he (as well as Amazon) works.

The book ends in mid-2001, right after the September 11 events, when the author left Amazon (right after his stock options vested) and moved to NY. This is also at a time when it becomes clear that Amazon is to be one of the survivors of the 2000 crash, and it is establishing itself as a serious company in a serious line of business. But definitely as a less fun place to work in.

Buy from Amazon.com

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