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Alibaba's world : how a remarkable Chinese company is changing the face of global business / by Erisman, Porter.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."In September 2014, a Chinese company that most Americans had never heard of held the largest IPO in history - bigger than Google, Facebook and Twitter combined. Alibaba, now the world's largest e-commerce company, mostly escaped Western notice for over ten years, while building a customer base more than twice the size of Amazon's, and handling the bulk of e-commerce transactions in China. How did it happen? And what was it like to be along for such a revolutionary ride? In Alibaba's World, author Porter Erisman, one of Alibaba's first Western employees and its head of international marketing from 2000 to 2008, shows how Jack Ma, a Chinese schoolteacher who twice failed his college entrance exams, rose from obscurity to found Alibaba and lead it from struggling startup to the world's most dominant e-commerce player. He shares stories of weathering the dotcom crash, facing down eBay and Google, negotiating with the unpredictable Chinese government, and enduring the misguided advice of foreign experts, all to build the behemoth that's poised to sweep the ecommerce world today. And he analyzes Alibaba's role as a harbinger of the new global business landscape--with its focus on the East rather than the West, emerging markets over developed ones, and the nimble entrepreneur over the industry titan. As we face this near future, the story of Alibaba--and its inevitable descendants--is both essential and instructive"--"What is as powerful as Google, more popular than Facebook, and more economically disruptive than Amazon and eBay combined? Alibaba operates the world's biggest online shopping mall, with 600 million registered users (Amazon has roughly 200 million). It executes about 80% of China's e-commerce transactions and generates nearly 70% of all packages in China, making up close to 2% of China's GDP. And its marketplaces include another 60 million small and medium-size business users spread over 200 countries. This Chinese company is poised to make its global debut with an IPO that could be the largest in history. But what is Alibaba? How does it work? And why should we be paying attention? Porter Erisman shows how Jack Ma, a charismatic Chinese schoolteacher, rose from obscurity to revolutionize commerce in China, and now the world. He shares stories of weathering the dotcom crash, facing down eBay and Google, negotiating with the Web-phobic Chinese government, and enduring the misguided advice of foreign experts, all to build the behemoth that's poised to sweep the ecommerce world today. And he analyzes Alibaba's role as a harbinger of the new global business landscape--with its focus on the East rather than the West, emerging markets over developed ones, and the nimble entrepreneur over the industry titan. As we face this near future, the story of Alibaba--and its inevitable descendants--is both essential and instructive"--
Subjects: Ma, Yun, 1964-; Alibaba (Firm); Electronic commerce; Internet marketing;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Hatch / by Oppel, Kenneth,1967-;
"First the rain brought seeds. Seeds that grew into alien plants that burrowed and strangled and fed. Seth, Anaya, and Petra are strangely immune to the plants' toxins and found a way to combat them. But just as they have their first success, the rain begins again. This rain brings eggs. That hatch into insects. Not small insects. Bird-sized mosquitos that carry disease. Borer worms that can eat through the foundation of a house. Boat-sized water striders that carry away their prey. But our heroes aren't able to help this time--they've been locked away in a government lab with other kids who are also immune. What is their secret? Could they be... part alien themselves? Whose side are they on?"--Google Books.LSC
Subjects: Science fiction.; Teenagers; Extraterrestrial beings; Human-alien encounters;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Don't be evil : how big tech betrayed its founding principles and all of us / by Foroohar, Rana,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."A penetrating indictment of how today's largest tech companies are hijacking our data, our livelihoods, our social fabric, and our minds-from an acclaimed Financial Times columnist and CNN analyst. Rana Foroohar tells the story of how Big Tech lost its soul-and ate our lunch. Through her skilled reporting and unparalleled access-won through nearly thirty years covering business and technology-she shows the true extent to which behemoths like Google, Facebook, Apple, and Amazon are monetizing both our data and our attention, without us seeing a penny of those exorbitant profits. Finally, Foroohar lays out a plan for how we can resist, by creating a framework that fosters innovation while also protecting us from the dark side of digital technology"--
Subjects: Business and politics; Corporate power; Information technology; Internet industry;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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150 years of Stats Canada! : a guide to Canada's greatest country /
"Want to know what the hottest new Canadian apps are? Need a handy chart to help you decide what Canadian music to listen to? How about the top Google searches across the nation? In this handy guide to Canada, the tireless experts at |stats_canada reveal all the must-know quirks from coast to coast to frigid coast. From the Tim Hortons ettiquette quiz to the "Discover How Canadian You Are" check list; from tips on the Vancouver housing market to the ultimate bachelor party in Montreal, this all new book will have you laughing on every page. With crucial updates about Canada on its big birthday, and all the stats, charts, and graphs to back them up, 150 Years of Stats Canada! is the perfect way to celebrate everything we love about this hilarious country. Disclaimer: still 100.6% not affiliated with Statistics Canada."--
Subjects: Satirical literature.; Twitter.; National characteristics, Canadian;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Simon sort of says / by Bow, Erin.;
Ask Simon O'Keeffe why his family moved to tiny Grin And Bear It, Nebraska, and he'll tell you they were driven out of Omaha by alpacas. In Simon's version of the story, a blessing of the animals went sideways, his dad got fired from his church job, and the whole family moved to the National Quiet Zone, where the internet and cell phones are banned so astronomers can scan the sky for signs of alien life. But there's another story too -- a story about a locked classroom, an active shooter, and a media cycle that refuses to let Simon go, even years later. To everyone who knows what happened, Simon is either a miracle or a sob story. But Simon just wants to be Simon: a twelve-year-old in high tops and a Minecraft hoodie. Moving to the last town in America where no one can Google you is a chance for Simon to start fresh. To rewrite the narrative. And with the help of two new friends, a puppy, and a giant radio telescope, he's determined to say something new.
Subjects: Post-traumatic stress disorder in children; School shootings; Friendship; Life change events;
Available copies: 0 / Total copies: 2
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Shmutz : a novel / by Berliner, Felicia,author.;
"An arranged marriage is expected for Raizl, but she's not like the other young women in her Hasidic sect in Brooklyn. Raizl has a college scholarship to study accounting, a part-time job that supports her family, and a hidden computer making it all possible. That's where she finds the porn, through the slippery slope of an innocent Google search. As Raizl dives deeper into the world of porn at night, her daytime life begins to unravel. The porn is thrilling, cracking open a world of desire and experience that is becoming irresistible to Raizl--but it also threatens to tear her away from the family she loves. As the novel moves between Raizl's combative visits to the shrink she requested, arranged dates, and loving but complicated exchanges with her family, readers will be drawn to confront their own paradoxical sexuality and the trade-offs we all make for the sake of stability and familial love. A singular, compulsively readable debut, Shmutz explores what it means to be a fully-realized sexual and spiritual being amidst the contradictory messages of both the traditional and modern world"--
Subjects: Bildungsromans.; Jewish fiction.; Novels.; Jews; Hasidim; Internet pornography; Jewish families; Self-realization in women; Women; Young women;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Getting us to Grandma's / by Hohn, Nadia L.; Grooms, TeMika.;
No one knows maps like Nikki - but can she get her family to Grandma's house in time? Nikki's family is preparing for a long road trip from Toronto to the Bronx to attend Uncle Travis's wedding. They pack their suitcases, boxes of Jamaican black cake, and most importantly to Nikki, the big map book! Nikki loves geography and enjoys tracing the routes to all the places her relatives live - her Grandpa in Florida, her cousins in Atlanta, DC, and Boston. She daydreams of England, where other family lives, and Jamaica and Africa, where her roots run deep. Her attention comes back to the road trip when it's clear that Daddy's taken a wrong turn. "I can help!" says Nikki, who proves to be an excellent navigator. She guides them back to the Bronx Expressway, under the elevated subway tracks, onto a street of brown row houses and safely to Grandma's. Inspired by the childhoods of author Nadia L. Hohn and illustrator TeMika Grooms, Getting Us to Grandma's is full of fun historic details - a world before Google Maps! - and authentic cultural moments shared by diasporic families, whose stories can be traced across continents. A fantastic representation of Black girls in STEM.
Subjects: Picture books.; Automobile travel; Map reading; Maps; Weddings;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Your brain on art : how the arts transform us / by Magsamen, Susan,author.; Ross, Ivy,1955-author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."Have you ever gotten chills while listening to a particularly gorgeous piece of music? Or felt a sense of calm while gazing at a painting of a serene landscape? We have experiences like those every day, but rarely stop to consider what's happening internally to cause them. In Your Brain on Art, founder of the International Arts + Mind Lab at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine Susan Magsamen and Google designer Ivy Ross explain how, by understanding how we biologically react to aesthetic experiences, we can not only heal as individuals but thrive as communities. Using the new science of neuroaesthetics, which explores our physiological reactions to art, Magsamen and Ross show us how, for instance, gardening can help a person heal from trauma or listening to a major fifth interval can snap the body out of a fight-or-flight response. Beyond enjoyment and abstraction, art can change the way we operate on a daily, practical level. And, in addition to helping each of us heal from stress, anxiety, burnout, and other malaises of modern life, neuroaesthetics can effect major change in society writ large, whether through public art murals in high-crime areas or music and dance therapy for patients experiencing neurodegenerative disorders"--
Subjects: Aesthetics; Arts;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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The perfectionist's guide to losing control : a path to peace and power / by Schafler, Katherine Morgan,author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."From psychotherapist Katherine Morgan Schafler, an invitation to every "recovering perfectionist" to challenge the way they look at perfectionism, and the way they look at themselves. We've been looking at perfectionism all wrong. As psychotherapist and former on-site therapist at Google Katherine Morgan Schafler argues in The Perfectionist's Guide to Losing Control, you don't have to stop being a perfectionist to be healthy. For women who are sick of being given the generic advice to "find balance," a new approach has arrived. Which of the five types of perfectionist are you? Classic, intense, Parisian, messy, or procrastinator? As you identify your unique perfectionist profile, you'll learn how to manage each form of perfectionism to work for you, not against you. Beyond managing it, you'll learn how to embrace and even enjoy your perfectionism. Yes, enjoy! Full of stories and brimming with humor, empathy, and depth, this book is a love letter to the ambitious, high achieving, full-of-life clients who filled the author's private practice, and who changed her life. It's a clarion call for all women to dare to want more without feeling greedy or ungrateful. Ultimately, this book will show you how to make the single greatest trade you'll ever make in your life, which is to exchange superficial control for real power"--
Subjects: Perfectionism (Personality trait);
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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Meganets : how digital forces beyond our control are commandeering our daily lives and inner realities / by Auerbach, David(David B.),author.;
Includes bibliographical references and index."David Auerbach's exploration of the phenomenon he has identified as the meganet begins with a simple, startling revelation: There is no hand on the tiller of some of the largest global digital forces that influence our daily lives. From corporate sites such as Facebook, Amazon, Google, YouTube, Instagram, and Reddit--to the burgeoning metaverse encompassing cryptocurrencies and online gaming--to government systems such as China's Social Credit System and India's Aadhaar. As we increasingly integrate our society, culture and politics within a hyper-networked fabric, Auerbach explains how the interactions of billions of people with unfathomably large online networks have produced a new sort of beast: ever-changing systems that operate beyond the control of the individuals, companies, and governments that created them. Meganets, Auerbach explains, have a life of their own, actively resisting attempts to control them as they accumulate data and produce spontaneous, unexpected social groups and uprisings that could not have even existed twenty years ago. They constantly modify themselves in response to user behavior, resulting in collectively authored algorithms none of us intend or control. These enormous invisible organisms exerting great force on our lives are the new minds of the world, increasingly commandeering our daily lives and inner realities"--
Subjects: Internet governance.; Metaverse.; Internet;
Available copies: 1 / Total copies: 1
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