My Life at Aol

Rating:
Summary: A Real Insiders View
Review: I worked with Julia at AOL and she offers tales from a perspective I guarantee you haven't read anywhere else.

Kara Swisher's "AOL.COM" told the story from the executive level. Julia's "My Life At AOL" tells it from the perspective of the regular employees who made the service run on a day to day basis. It's a look at things that happened when AOL was a wacky little company; very different from today's media behemoth.

Rating:
Summary: Great Writing by a Great Writer
Review: This book is a lively read--a brisk account of the energetic, imaginative and bright young people at the birth of AOL. It's enlivened by Ms. Wilkinson's breezy and engaging "voice." She mangages to give a sense of the atmosphere in the offices of the growing company with descriptions of brainstorming sessions illustrated with lots of colorful quotes. She presents well-thought out examples of the Internet as a powerful double-edged sword. While acknowledging its potentially negative aspects, she makes a strong case for it as a positive and highly beneficial tool. Being technologically challenged, I esepcially enjoyed the Appendix--A Cyber-Lingo Glossary:How To Speak AOL and the list of "smilies" and "emoticons," those wacky little lighthearted symbols that are shorthand ways of expressing emotions.

Rating:
Summary: An Insider's Tale
Review: This book is a lively read--a brisk account of the energetic, imaginative and bright young people at the birth of AOL. It's enlivened by Ms. Wilkinson's breezy and engaging "voice." She mangages to give a sense of the atmosphere in the offices of the growing company with descriptions of brainstorming sessions illustrated with lots of colorful quotes. She presents well-thought out examples of the Internet as a powerful double-edged sword. While acknowledging its potentially negative aspects, she makes a strong case for it as a positive and highly beneficial tool. Being technologically challenged, I esepcially enjoyed the Appendix--A Cyber-Lingo Glossary:How To Speak AOL and the list of "smilies" and "emoticons," those wacky little lighthearted symbols that are shorthand ways of expressing emotions.

Rating:
Summary: Great Writing by a Great Writer
Review: This book is great for anyone interested in finding out about how it feels to work at a small iffy start-up company. The author lets us climb on for the rollercoaster as the company goes through the initial ups and downs, on its way to becoming the largest internet provider in the world. It's filled with interesting facts and spiced up with enough personal accounts to make the reader feel like a real insider. Bravo!