Hacker News Books

Will Snowden write a book?

Im curious about an in depth story of his leaks and him. Citizen 4 didn't provide a lot.

> his first and only masterpiece, Citizen Kane

Only masterpiece? What about The Magnificent Ambersons? Touch of Evil? Chimes at Midnight? Calling his first film his only masterpiece gives the article a better story arc, but it's not true.

> Casablanca is widely remembered as one of the greatest films of all time, coming in at #2 on the AFI’s top 100 list ...

  1. CITIZEN KANE (1941)
  2. CASABLANCA (1942)
  3. THE GODFATHER (1972)
  4. GONE WITH THE WIND (1939)
  5. LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962)

I just don't enjoy CITIZEN KANE anymore. It's like a film school movie. I watched it maybe 10-15 times when I was younger and I just don't enjoy it anymore. Like so what? GONE WITH THE WIND is the pinnacle of Lost Cause propaganda. I enjoyed when I didn't understand it. (I'm sure glad I didn't watch Triumph of the Will when I didn't understand it.) I damn sure don't enjoy GONE WITH THE WIND now that I understand it.

But I can watch CASABLANCA, THE GODFATHER and LAWRENCE OF ARABIA over and over. And this was a good article telling me things I didn't appreciate and still I can go back and watch CASABLANCA again.

I read a lot this year, so I'll just point out some highlights:

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante - The highlight of the year. I'm now partially through the 3rd book in the series. And amazing portrait of the friendship between 2 girls as they grow up and try to escape the violence and poverty of their small town in Naples.

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel - My guess is that plenty of people here have read it. Great read about the fall of civilization due to a massive flu outbreak.

Room by Emma Donoghue - Beautiful, heartbreaking, troubling and uplifting.

The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood - A classic, glad to finally read it.

The Room by Jonas Karlsson - Absurdist take on corporate life about a man who finds a room in his office building that shouldn't be there.

Welcome To Night Vale by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor - For fans of the podcast. I highly recommend both.

Uglies/Pretties/Specials by Scott Westerfeld - YA trilogy about a future in which everybody is made pretty once they reach a certain age. Not great literature, but a fun read. Although the second one is a little blah.

Get In Trouble by Kelly Link - Excellent collection of fantastical yet mundane short stories.

Citizen: An American Lyric by Claudia Rankine - Powerful exploration of race in America. I feel like I need to read it a few more times.

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman - Still one of my favorite authors. Story of a baby whose family is brutally murdered and ends up being raised by spirits in a graveyard.

Some poetry serves the "higher" meaning of discussing political ideas like Claudia Rankine's Citizen: An American Lyric.

Some poetry is made to make you laugh like Billy Collins' Another Reason Why I Don't Keep A Gun in the House.

Some poetry is purposefully inscrutable and difficult because the author wants you to work to understand them. A good example of this might be r-p-o-p-h-e-s-s-a-g-r by E.E. Cummings.

Each of these examples is meaningful in its own different way. I think trying to decide what has meaning is hard because you might automatically discard a work of art that is "just for fun". Isn't play meaningful?

I suggest glancing at the Citizen Lab report[0], I've read Citizen Lab research before and I generally find it high quality.

I think the takeaway here isn't that TikTok is good for privacy but that it's unlikely to be wielded in a manner similar to malware. Yes, it collects data. No, it isn't going to randomly activate your phone's microphone and spy on personal conversations without your knowledge.

[0] https://citizenlab.ca/2021/03/tiktok-vs-douyin-security-priv...

If you struggle to get diverse voices inside your field, maybe you should read from diverse voices outside your field. I understand it is hard and I also gravitate towards comfortable reading, usually meaning from people that look like me. This is the problem. Start being accountable to yourself about it.

2 of 19 the books in the list are by female authors (both recommended by women). Looking for some good books from women? Check out these:

Nonfiction:

* Radical Acceptance, Tara Brach

* The Death and Life of Great American Cities, Jane Jacobs

* Freedom Is a Constant Struggle, Angela Davis

* Rising Strong, Brené Brown

* Cleopatra, Stacy Shiff

* The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander

Fiction:

* Anything by Ursula Le Guin

* Ancillary Justice, Ann Leckie

* Too Like the Lightning, Ada Palmer

* Citizen: An American Lyric, Claudia Rankine

... so many more