Life After Google by George Gilder | A Book Review

Last year I listened to George Gilder’s revised edition of “Wealth & Poverty”. Soon after I finished that book he released “Life After Google” which primarily focuses on blockchains and advertising-subsidized freemium service models. It addresses their relationship with dives into computational resource distribution, telecom networks, and the politics of money.

This book is titled similarly to Gilder’s early 90’s release “Life After Television” which addressed the rise of the Internet in that decade. As that book addressed the technology that changed lives around the world in the decade that followed, the writer believes token and blockchain-based distributed ledgers are preparing to do the same.

Notes & Quotes

“how many more breaches and false promises of repair will it take before the very idea of the network will become suspect?”

“Newton’s modern critics fail to appreciate how his alchemical endeavors yielded crucial knowledge for his defense of the gold-based pound”

There is no free lunch: Net Neutrality

Cryptocosm

Robert Mercer: “We are the Oracle with respect to problems involving the question: What does the history of past market reactions in the presence of then-known information about the then-known currency state of the market tell us about the future of the market?”

Kurzweil: semantic search is an “extension of human intelligence”

“kaleidoscope Brain”

OSI Layers = finite physical limitations to fiber/”last-mile” networks with definitive costs operating in the face of government-influenced price structures and rising bandwidth demands due to content resolution

Monolith (physical) & Metaverse (conceptual)

“In practice, the only factor that makes any serious difference for Internet Neutrality is investment in bandwidth”

BTC OP_RETURN has 83 bytes of text storage

This book makes for a fantastic explainer of the early years of bitcoin as well as token and blockchain technology. I highly recommend reading it if you are technology savvy and want a broad understanding of what is happening in the cryptocosm.

Gilder has incredible access to many high-level personalities in Silicon Valley, with financiers, and those with their finger on the pulse of politics. It is a well-rounded look at this sector from a number of angles that many folks would benefit from reading.

Watch this review as a video:

Thanks for taking a look!