Best Science Books 2010: Richard Nash & Joshua Kim

Another couple of lists for your reading, gift giving and collection development pleasure.

I've tended not to highlight individual people's blog lists or whatever that much here, just for the sake of my sanity and so as not to go too crazy with the number of posts, but I thought that these two list were very interesting from the point of view of understanding the impact of technology on education and publishing.

Between them, these are a couple of very good places to start reading about where the media/education industrial complex is headed, for good or ill.

I'll include every item on their two lists, not just the scitechy ones.

Richard Nash

• Cognitive Surplus: Creativity and Generosity in a Connected Age by Clay Shirky
• Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value (and How to Take Advantage of It) by William Poundstone
• The Shock of the Old: Technology and Global History since 1900 by David Edgerton
• From Betamax to Blockbuster: Video Stores and the Invention of Movies on Video by Joshua M. Greenberg
• The Merchants of Culture: The Publishing Business in the 21st Century by John B. Thompson

Joshua Kim

• The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires by Tim Wu
• The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee
• The Rational Optimist: How Prosperity Evolves by Matt Ridley
• Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation by Steven Johnson
• Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error by Kathryn Schulz
• False Economy: A Surprising Economic History of the World by Alan Beattie
• Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
• Sonic Boom: A Guide to Surviving and Thriving in the New Global Economy by Gregg Easterbrook
• I Live in the Future & Here's How It Works: Why Your World, Work, and Brain Are Being Creatively Disrupted by Nick Bilton
• At Home: A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson

I'm always looking for recommendations and notifications of book lists as they appear in various media outlets. If you see one that I haven't covered, please let me know at jdupuis at yorku dot ca or in the comments.

I am picking up a lot of lists from Largehearted Boy.

Earlier entries in this year's list of lists can be found here and the 2009 summary post here.