Ricky’s Quickies: Book Reviews!
Thinking Strategically by Dixit and Nalebuff
This book looks like a self-helpish or business strategy book, but it’s really just a book about game theory. I’ve been into game theory for a while and the case studies were really interesting. Book came reccommended by a friend who does strategy for a big media company. He told Josh that it reads “like a thriller.” I wouldn’t agree with that, but worth checking out if you’re competing in business or interested in logic problems.
The examples it gives of different types of strategic thinking and their corresponding results are fascinating. For example, Nick Russo, the man who wanted to lose weight and put a bounty of $25,000 to anybody who caught him eating.
Or the chicago suburb of Oak Park, which in order to combat white flight (white people moving out of a neighborhood when the percentage of black people reaches 30%), offering insurance to homeowners that guarantees they will not lose the value of their homes if the percentage of whites falls under that threshold.
Amir Blumenfeld would probably like the problems in this book.
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