Discover books about everything from Sander Hofman

This book traces the evolution of the chip industry, elegantly describing the economic, technological and geopolitical forces at work in the 75 years since the invention of the transistor. The story flows around the industry’s key characters (it’s a colorful bunch to say the least!) and their decision-making, both commercial and technological. Must-read if you’re keen to understand how chips ended up in almost every aspect of life in 2022.

Ik zag de Netflix-docu Stutz en wilde graag meer te weten komen over de verschillende ‘tools’. Het boek werkt de verschillende concepten verder uit op een net zo toegankelijke manier als je in de docu ontdekt.

De kat als muze! 🐱 De pluizenbol van Hemingway heette Cristóbal Colón, die van Stephen King heette Smucky, en Haruki Murakami had Croquette. 😊

The Economist zet de boeken op een rijtje die een accuraat kijkje geven in de hedendaagse spionnenkeuken. 👌

Tim Urban van het fantastische blog Wait But Why pluist het credo “Everything is amazing and nobody is happy” uit, onderzoekt hoe dat komt en wat we kunnen veranderen. Een belangrijk thema in het boek is de strijd tussen “truth and tribe”. Doordat we tegenwoordig stelselmatig voor onze stam kiezen in plaats van voor het zoeken naar de waarheid, brengen we de mensheid in de problemen.

Een toekomst door de ogen van een ‘Artificial Friend’ (of AF) met de naam Klara. 🤖 In dit boek van Nobelprijswinnaar Ishiguro is Klara de verteller en dat geeft een bijzondere stijl en tone of voice: observerend, zoekend, vragend, maar niet veroordelend. Terwijl het gedrag van de mensen om haar heen toch wel erg…menselijk is. 😬 Liefde en eenzaamheid zijn centrale thema’s.

This week, the world lost Kevin Mitnick (59). Dubbed “the most dangerous hacker in America” back in the 1990s, he was a legendary blend: half hacker, half con man. An incredibly smart cookie with the wit and audacity to get anything done. When he was 12 years old, Mitnick convinced a bus driver to tell him where he could buy his own ticket puncher, and was then able to ride any bus in the greater Los Angeles area using unused transfer slips he found in a dumpster next to the bus company garage. When he was a young adult in the 80s and 90s, he got obsessed with exploring telephone and computer systems. The way he hacked was about much more than infiltrating and exploiting computer systems—he was a gifted "social engineer", someone who could con people into doing things to unwittingly compromise a system. As he honed the arts of phreaking (phone hacking), social engineering and hacking, he broke into the systems of Sun Microsystems, NEC, Motorola, Nokia, and even got access to the switch access services of Pacific Bell (which could be used to wiretap phone lines). He also got himself a prime spot on the FBI’s Most Wanted list. He was hunted down and jailed in 1995. He spent 5 years in federal custody, of which 4 in solitary confinement out of fear that he could "start a nuclear war by whistling into a pay phone”. After his release, he became a speaker, white hat hacker, security consultant and author.

When I was a kid coming online in the mid 90s, I vividly remember being enthralled with the FREE KEVIN campaign that was all over the internet. The campaign was run out of the hacker mag “2600 Magazine” during Mitnick’s time in jail. It was a trigger for me to dive headfirst into the online hacker scene of the 90s and I was in awe of what I discovered. Mitnick was one of the pioneers. Later, his 2003 book “The Art of Deception” became a bible on my desk—and on the desks of an entire generation.