Basically: two thumbs up. Buy it and read it. Now.
You’re still here? Fine, I’ll expound… but first, a short story:
Recently Daniel Lyons, aka “Fake Steve Jobs,” noted that ThinkSecret.com has gone away. This was a popular site that leaked Apple product info, and it appears the author shut it down for a presumably generous sum of money. So what did Fake Steve do? Soon he posted that he received a similar offer from Apple, which then prompted a series of posts about being in trouble with Apple lawyers for even mentioning the offer. Subsequent posts were coined the great FSJ shutdown drama.
And then came a little Christmas Day note. A “Ha, ha, just kidding, folks” post. Which served an incredible point: through a very personal narrative Mr. Lyons demonstrated how scary it must have been for Nick Ciarelli of Think Secret, and how a company that touts itself as “Think Different,” and even used Ghandi (i.e., “truth”) in their ads, is actively censoring people who love their products. Do you see the extreme inanity of such actions? “You love our stuff? Great, now shut the hell up.”
The stunt that Mr. Lyons pulled is small example of the incredibly incisive, bitterly sarcastic, laugh-your-ass-off comedy that fills “oPtion$” from cover to cover. Not only is he able to deliver a story that makes you laugh at almost every turn of page, he also takes Washington, the media, and Silicon Valley CEO’s to task, while throwing in erudite business lessons concerning the rapidly-changing field of content distribution.
Set around the recent options scandal in which Steve Jobs is currently embroiled, the author examines a (parody of) one of America’s beloved execs. Lyons is adept at creating a complex character that you love, laugh at, and thoroughly hate, all at the same time.
My only disappointment was that although the book is new material and not a collection of blog posts, as constantly mentioned on the Fake Steve blog, some (very short) chapters are directly from the FSJ archive (such as the great Hillary Clinton shakedown, as well as a reworking of the Brad Grey aka “Do we have a problem here?” post).
Otherwise, this was a great Christmas present to myself, and it should be the same for you… er, well, even if it is late. Whatever.
Where can you get it? Go here to the FSJ blog and scroll down; on the sidebar to the right is the “Achieve Enlightenment – Order My Friggin’ Book” section. I’m sure Mr. Lyons will be happy to show the publishers that people are going from his blog directly to the Amazon checkout register. And it’ll help a great author have a little extra cha-ching! in his pocket (assuming he’s using the affiliate program…).
Branding Me 