I just completed reading a fantastic book called 50 Great E-Businesses and the Minds Behind Them by Ross & Holland published by Random House Australia (more details).
Here is my video review of the book (press play) -
This book features 50 stories of successful Internet businesses and the people behind them, including Australian successes Wotif.com, CarSales.com.au, Seek, RealEstate.com.au, big names like Facebook, College Humor, Hot or Not, Skype, YoutTube, Google, Paypal, and a section I was very pleased to see – bloggers! – including Engadget, PerezHilton, Treehugger, Gizmodo and Gawker, and some very web 2.0 sites like Pandora, Digg and Flickr.
Update: I’m going to give this book away at random to one person who leaves a comment on this post. For a chance to win, just leave a comment that is at least two sentences or longer.
Thanks for pointing this out. I love reading success stories as it inspires me to keep going and this book sounds like something I would love to read.
Your video review is a great idea BTW.
Monika
Have you seen Clear Blogging?
From the contents on Amazon it looks a good book for beginners.
Great review – you’ve definitely made me want to check it out.
Thanks Yaro for the book review!
We do love to read about people who were successful on the Internet. It certainly does give one inspiration!
Hi Yaro,
I just watched your video review before go to lunch and on my way back I went to the Dymocks North Sydney and I got the book.
Looking forward to read it. Thanks for the review introducing the book.
Cheers,
Antonio
Wow , Nice review Yaro…BTw.
@All
Could you give me that book, pleaseee…I could’nt find that at Indonesia..
Hey Yaro,
I just happened on your site through your signature from a comment you made on another site. The review you did on 50 Great e-Businesses was great! The book sounds very, very interesting. I look forward to reading more of your blogs. Thanks so much!
Cindy
Great Review Yaro,
For someone just beginning His own Internet Entrepreneurial Journey I look forward to reading it, seeing how others have gone before in the quest to make a living online. Thankyou so much for reviewing this book.
Thank you for sharing what you are learning.
I would also like to a chance to win this book.
Thanks again for the great website.
Hi Yaro, what a good discovery. I am sure you will understand how well this fits into the modelling scene for people to discover how successes were made. 50 examples of where stuff started, how it was progressed and what result came about will be inspirational to the online community I will promote this book on my site too.
Keep up the good work!
Yaro – great review of this book and these business stories and it’s good to hear about some Aussie content for a change. It’s amazing how some concepts take off and others wither on the vine. I also admire the capacity of some people to read the signs and anticipate trends and global interest. If only we could see what the visionaries seem to see with such clarity – as if the future is present today.
Ron
Brisbane
Very interesting review. I am definitely going to read that book very soon as I’m starting my own online business at the moment.
it would be great if this book also shed a lot of light on how these “minds” make their decisions..
I mean every business imo would have faced some troubled times and they might have had an option to shut shop instead of taking a risk by continuing (or is there not in these 50 ventures?).. and secondly when they get these multi million offers of buy out.. how do they decide the time is and price is right…
for instance when hotmail was bought by microsoft, they initially declined the offer quoting the price as too low.. and it was in the range of 20-50 million.. finally it was sold for 400 million. They held on knowing that the value of the product in the future will be much more and they got paid for it… does this book cover such stuff?
I love reading books like this as you always come away with ideas that you can use on your own blog, even if you have to think outside the box to find them.
I’d particularly like to read about Treehugger, that seems more of an information channel than a bog standard blog, there’s a ton of info over there.
Beat the system,
Two lines comment.
BTW. Nice review.
There is this movie I taped and then downloaded maybe 10 years ago: Michael Jordan His Airness. You might want to call it a documentary. What it is, what or who it’s about is not the question.
I would watch the movie and become pumped up to do whatever I had my mind on at the time. It still does the trick. To me, the movie is incredibly inspiring, and it is the only movie I never delete from my hard drive.
I haven’t read “50 Great e-Businesses and the Minds behind them” yet, but if it’s as inspiring as Yaro seems to put it, it sure sounds worth the read. Again, those who have read the book can comment, but maybe it’s more how the book will drive some of its readers, than what is actually learnt from the content itself, that might make the book a worthwhile read.
There are so many inspiring things out there. I feel it’s tough to find our own inspiring “thing” that will follow us day in and day out.
I kind of feel like watching my “Michael Jordan His Airess” movie.
Nice review Yaro with the video. Something I’m hoping to learn not only from the book but from my own research, is efficient e-business marketing, and how you need to change your marketing tactics and plans depending on who you’re advertising to, and the product that you have.
Very nice review. The video is great and I understood everything although my English is not very well. I think it must be very interesting reading so if I don’t win the book I will probably buy it
Hey Yaro, this is quick video review from you and i must say i have read the review through amazon and some other community, this is the book that i everyone should own to know the stories behind their success.
Hi
your review is great man. i loves to read success stories that enspires me….
Great find Yaro… I saw the video up on Facebook and decided to check back in on the blog.
I know many people out there are always looking for the *how* in regards to getting a website from idea to launch, to success (whether that be based on sheer popularity, revenue or the ever-sought-after-but-rarely-achieved quick sale).
Good stuff, give us more videos!
cheers
Nathan
Yaro, please can you find out how we can get this book in UK? I looked on Amazon, not there. I love the concept and execution in a readable format. Is it available electronically?
Thanks
Yaro, sounds like a good book, but I don’t think that it is available on this side of the pond yet. I didn’t see it come up in any searches for being available this way.
One suggestion on the video: You might want to put your link to E-J at the top of the video, or else make it a little smaller, since the YouTube overlay blocks out the end.
That won’t matter for us so much, but if somebody sees your video somewhere else it would make it easier for them to get to your site.
Yaro, one of my readers, John, has written a similar post: http://www.disassociated.com/2007/10/12/kirk/
He covered the 6 methods that turned out to be successful ideas based on his extensive knowledge in the online world. I’m sure its worth a read – its an excellent article.
Your review was good but your delivery needs to be tweaked some. You are just too even. No enthusiasm. That said, I like the position of the book in the video review and your points were good ones. It is the kind of book that interests me. I, like one fellow who commented before me, want to know the depth of the information. The idea, the struggle and how they recognized the idea was worth it are points I would want to know. Who started what business and what they got paid is a simple Google search away. What is the rest of the story? (you did this on the artist membership site) I wasn’t sure about the others when you finished. If the “rest of the story is there, then it is worth spending money on it for a first edition. If it is merely interesting, I would wait until I could get a used one.
Great Blog. The book looks fantastic. rEading from others who are successful can have a huge benefit on anyones business or self development. Learning how successful people handle diversities helps to achieve online success.
Enjoyed your reveiw as well. Great job
http://www.PassportMentors.com
Hi Yaro,
Good idea doing the review as a video post. I think that videos are a great format for doing a review, as it is often hard for the nuances to come across in how we feel about a product in plain text.
And it’s different, so that is always good.
Awesome thing about the Internet is that if you’ve got a great product, it’s so easy for people to get the word out about you, whereas in person messages travels so much slower. I would love to read about some of these web pioneers’ stories. Pick me, random number generator, pick me!
I saw this in the book store and thought about buying it for my birthday… but decided to get 4 Hour Work Week instead.
I might get it now after all.
Thanks for the review.
Cheers,
Carlo
Sounds like a good book, Yaro, i’d love to give it a read. It’s always amazing how varied the backgrounds of such folks are.
-Mike
I just came up with a new idea and I am looking for a book like this. If you haven’t given it away already, please consider me. I’ve got a lot of questions and I think that this book would give me answers by example. It’d be nice to see how some of the big hitters got started.
Thanks,
Mike
Hey Everyone – I’m not sure if this book is available overseas yet, perhaps it’s Australia only.
I have heard there is a similar book floating around the USA though, I remember Mike Filsaime mentioned it in a DVD I watched recently but I can’t remember the name.
I’ll roll the dice for the winner of my copy of the book very soon!
Yaro
Nice review Yaro.. I buy myself a different book each week on entrepreneurship and associated genres, business etc.. but they are usually always focussed on US/UK businesses, great to see one focusing on the Internet.. and in particular Australia..
Thanks for the review Yaro. The last 6 books I read were recommendations I read on industry blogs and not ONCE was I disappointed. I have already ordered the book so no need to include me in the competition.
Nice review Yaro!
I selected the winners for the free books. The publisher kindly offered me three new copies to give away.
I picked three numbers randomly and found the appropriate commenter and sent an email. If you won a book then you should have received an email from me.
hm, Yaro, where is my post?