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| Author: Michael Heller
Publisher: Basic Books
Category: Book
List Price: $26.00
Buy New: $11.65
You Save: $14.35 (55%)
New (44) Used (14) from $10.68
Avg. Customer Rating:  20 reviews
Sales Rank: 20648
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 9.4 x 6.2 x 1.3
ISBN: 0465029167
Dewey Decimal Number: 330.17
EAN: 9780465029167
ASIN: 0465029167
Publication Date: July 7, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Great read September 16, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I enjoyed reading this book. A lot. I've worked in the high-tech business and can vouch for many of the things presented throughout the pages. I did find that the book repeated many points, seemingly unnecessarily, and I do wish that more time would have been spent on ideas for how to solve the problems that exist.
 Changes the way we see the world July 31, 2008
4 out of 6 found this review helpful
Every once in a while a gifted academic writes a book about a technical subject that changes the way the lay public sees the world. Michael Heller has written such a book. The Gridlock Economy illuminates by giving language to a phenomena that is all around us but we've had no word for. The stories he tells are chilling and heart wrenching. But he gives us hope as well. By describing gridlock and why it happens - the word he coins is "anticommons" - Professor Heller lead the way to creative problem solving. This book is a must read for policy makers in all fields.
Heller's Gridlock July 28, 2008
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
Michael Heller's Gridlock Economy is this year's must-read popular economics book. As reviewers at Slate, Time, and elsewhere have noted, Heller's book compares well to 2005's mega-hit Freakonomics, as well as Malcolm Gladwell's Blink, James Surowiecki's (of The New Yorker) The Wisdom of Crowds, and Chris Anderson's The Long Tail.
Gridlock Economy shares two important characteristics with those books: a compelling central organizing idea and great writing. The central organizing idea is that "too much ownership" can stifle economic innovation. By "too much ownership," Heller is referring to the kind of situation that arises with increasing frequency across all the key sectors of the new economy including biotechnology, software, computer hardware, music, movies, and finance. Our efforts to promote innovation by granting patents and copyrights (and other government-sponsored forms of intellectual property protection) can often come back to bite us.
Heller provides dozens of interesting examples across the entire range of the new economy. His lead example involves the difficulties that a researcher at a big drug company is having pursuing a promising cure for Alzheimers. To make headway, the researcher needs to purchase or license a host of patents held by a not small number of competitors. Our current patent system gives --for better and, in this case, for worse-- gives each patent holder involved the capacity to hold up this important research. If we're lucky an entrepreneurial "patent bundler" will come along and piece together the necessary patents and licenses. Meanwhile, we're stuck in Heller's gridlock.
Essential reading for IP scholars July 24, 2008
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
I teach university courses on Copyright and Intellectual Property. In the past, I've assigned Heller's Science article explaining how the "anticommons" has prevented new and important pharmaceuticals from being developed. However, this book offers an infinitely more readable, entertaining, and nuanced argument. I will certainly be adding it to my syllabus this Fall, and recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading the works of Lessig, Gladwell, and the like.
 The Gridlock Economy July 23, 2008
0 out of 42 found this review helpful
I'll give you an example of a gridlocked economy. How about eliteist university presses who think their e-books are worth double the price of most others. Ironic to say the least.
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