"Nerds 2.01" - a great read/watch for any era
If there was one single book I'd want to keep if all my other books were to be taken away, it would be “Nerds 2.01“. Well, that and “ASP.NET Unleashed“.
I remember one night after jamming out a paper while in graduate school, I was senselessly channel flipping and caught “Nerds 2.01 - A Brief History of the Internet” on PBS. It was a timeless classic, profiling the people, places and processes that helped to bring the Internet and the subculture its spawned into the mainstream.
It's an amazing production - and I've got 2 copies of the book at home. Greapet interviews and accounts of the trials (courtroom and otherwise) and tribulations of industry giants like Microsoft, Sun, Intel, AOL, 3COM and Cisco are all there, so it's a must see. I've almost likened it to a bible of sorts for IT people, both on the business and engineering end, a “learn from whence you came“ guide of sorts. And you'll come away from it wanting to schedule a meeting with the nearest venture capitalist. Or not.
At the time (circa 1999), it fit perfectly with everything that was going on, and the rise of the e-industry before the bubble burst. And trust me - if you're a student now, it is THE ultimate helpguide for getting quotes, factoids and dates about the industry to which we cling so dearly. Now, those of you who are geographically closed than I to Silicon Valley may disagree with the film, but it's an educational piece either way.
And even though it came out before the next evolution of the Internet - with the eBays, Amazons, and the like, making it somewhat dated, it's still a great read, and an essential one at that if you're working in IT.
Undoubtedly many of you reading this will have seen it and formulated an opinion. What's yours?