This blog post seems to start off with the premise that you understand what's going on, which I don't. Is the author summarising his own impressions of Sapiens (surely acceptable), or literally lifting the original text of the book and taking it as his own, as this quote seems inadvertently to suggest?
From the top of the blog post:
> The goal? Future-me should be happy to read this once future-me forgets how we evolved.
The post isn’t for you, but a reference for the author. It seems to be one of those “I’m making this for me, but if it’s useful for anyone else, so much the better” cases.
> I spent over 25 hours building a cut-down version of Sapiens.
Unless OP is on HN and added that after comments here.
Because however many hours were spent making it is irrelevant as to why it was made, which was the point.
> Is the author summarising his own impressions of Sapiens (surely acceptable), or literally lifting the original text of the book and taking it as his own [...]?
The first sentence about cutting it down answers that.
No, I was not, I was replying to the section I quoted (hence quoting it, that’s how that works).
And for the other comments, no, I didn't update that right now. :)
Given that, and seeing as the blog post author was upfront about it, I don’t see a problem with it unless the book’s author objects. Affiliate links don’t even steal credit — they give an author’s work more visibility to people who might be interested in it without cutting into their revenue. A commission is an incentive to share work you enjoy.