
Life on the hedonic treadmill - fogus
http://www.gigamonkeys.com/blog/2009/09/30/hedonic-treadmill.html
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boredbystander
That was the most boring thing I've read all day, just more hype for his book?

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sp332
It's repetitive, but that's the point. No matter how his book is doing, it
doesn't really make a lasting difference to his emotional state. He always
goes back to the same attitude soon after every change in his book's ranking.

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jacquesm
I assume this is about 'coders at work', it's a great book.

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listic
How well has the Practical Common Lisp sold?

I find it interesting the way that Western printing tradition differs from
Russian (that's where I am) - you don't have number of copies mentioned in the
release information. Here in Russia - if I feel curious - I can always look at
the book and see how many copies of it have been printed and i.e. assess how
mainstream the book is. In the internet book stores number of copies is
mentioned as well. If it is an additional printing, it is also stated.

On the other hand, I'm amazed at how wide (long-tail) the Western book market
is: I could readily buy "ANSI Common Lisp" which was 10 years out of print at
that moment, and seems like I still can today! Here in Russia, you generally
have trouble finding a book 2 years after it is out of print. Early this year
I wanted to find a copy of "The C Programming Language" which was last printed
in 2006 and I couldn't find any. I borrowed one from the library until I found
one in the online store; luckily they seem to have made a new printing.

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jacquesm
I take it Amazon does not want to ship to Russia ?

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listic
Why, it does. In this case, I just wanted a Russian translated version of the
book which I knew was good, and cheap also.

Although, Amazon only ships new books to countries such as Russia (not used
books, CDs/DVDs, etc.) and delivery can be expensive as they discontinued all
delivery methods except the most expensive, Priority International Courier.
Cheaper methods were slow, on the other hand, and probably unreliable, though
I personally didn't have problems with them. I guess I can understand why they
discontinued them (Russian post sucks)

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jacquesm
Ah ok :) I took the english title to mean that you were trying to buy the book
in English.

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hegemonicon
Happiness is different from pleasure. Pleasure is closely related to the
reward system in our brains, something specifically designed NOT to provide
long-term emotional changes (otherwise we would stop seeking rewards).

