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Quite simple actually. These books contain big meaty subject matter. Not fucking glossed over topics like a ted talk or wiki entry.

The laws of thermodynamics cannot be condensed down into a 14 minute video.

The internet has cheapened both the access and depth of knowledge. There are a lot of internet commentators out there who barely grasp a briefly summarized topic yet assume an expert position.

Many of them browse hacker news even ;-)

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So true. The amount of dross one has to wade through on the internet to find something worth the reading can be huge. Whilst being printed in paper format at the end of a chain of editors, proof-readers, financial outlay and vast amounts of effort on the part of the original author (generally quite qualified, and even then you can double check this yourself before you read) doesn't guarantee a good result, the odds are much better.

They picked some good authors to start with; Ha-Joon Chang's previous book for the general audience was a good read from a good writer.

After slogging through _A People's Tragedy_ I'm interested in Figes book on an expanded time frame of Russian history.

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