Chaos Monkeys - Revised Edition

Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley

By: Antonio Garcia Martinez

Narrated by: Dan John Miller

Length: 16 hrs and 13 mins

Publisher's Summary

The instant New York Times best seller, now featuring a new afterword from the author - the insider's guide to the Facebook/Cambridge Analytica scandal, the inner workings of the tech world, and who really runs Silicon Valley.

Imagine a chimpanzee rampaging through a datacenter powering everything from Google to Facebook. Infrastructure engineers use a software version of this “chaos monkey” to test Online services’ robustness - their ability to survive random failure and correct mistakes before they actually occur. Tech entrepreneurs are society’s chaos monkeys. One of Silicon Valley’s most audacious chaos monkeys is Antonio García Martínez.

After stints on Wall Street and as CEO of his own startup, García Martínez joined Facebook’s nascent advertising team. Forced out in the wake of an internal product war over the future of the company’s monetization strategy, García Martínez eventually landed at rival Twitter. In Chaos Monkeys, this gleeful contrarian unravels the chaotic evolution of social media and online marketing and reveals how it is invading our lives and shaping our future.  

©2016, 2018 Antonio Garcia Martinez (P)2018 HarperCollins Publishers

Critic Reviews

“Incisive... The most fun business book I have read this year... Clearly there will be people who hate this book - which is probably one of the things that makes it such a great read.” (Andrew Ross Sorkin, New York Times) 

Best audio book I’ve listened to in a while!

Really loved the book. Narration was great, loved the unflinching honesty. Really recommend it . Probably will listen to again !

Best Non-fiction (and entertaining frolic) I’ve listened to in years!

Like others have already said, AGM’s candidness (including his unabashed criticism of himself) is a breath of fresh air and his ability to explain things with fabulous metaphors makes it even that much better.

Very interesting book by a surprisingly super-smart author

I am adding this book to must-reads along with “Hard thing about hard things” and others. It fills the gap in guidance for mid-career periods of life without bullshit and with a lot of truth and thought provoking.

Entertaining and informative

Keep in mind that the author has his right to subjectivity.
AGM delivered a deftly written dissection of the life of a tech scene officionado that was easy to digest and highly informative.

Exquisite Escapade Enveloping Entrepreneurship

While I bought the physical 📖 at a library sale in Los Altos, I barely cracked the cover. When Antonio (who does not sound like Pus In 👢 from Shreck) was let go by 🍎 because 🍎 apparently couldn't find and read this international best selling book before hiring Antonio, I decided to buy his audiobook so I could listen to it as I pedaled to work. Having lived in Silicon Valley from my birth at Stanford to high school graduation, I must say Antonio's biography is accurate or even a cleaned up view of Silicon Valley life. The audiobook was extremely excellent. Please buy it ASAP!

What the SJW Cancel Culture idiots are doing...

to you IS NOT RIGHT!! When are people going to come together and stand up to these Mentally Ill Tyrants?!?!?

A bit brazen, and non - technical.

Delves into personal life of author, and does not go into the technicalities of digital marketing

A broad overview of a bro's Silicon Valley exp

This memoir follows a Wall Street quantitive analyst's journey into Silicon Valley as a modern ad man. It's bite, angsty, and aggressive.
I could see this as a good intro to Silicon Valley and the world of startup tech in the 10s for the non-technical reader, but for anyone with any experience in the field it's just a brogrammer's rant.

Insightful, honest, informative

Garcia writes from a wealth of personal experience, a richness of creative expression, and a profundity of honest evaluation. The text is extremely informative, and pulls the curtain aside indulging the reader in perspectives not commonly known. A great read! Thank you!

Entertaining Look into Silicon Valley

This book serves as a blend into the past of Antonio, his life at Goldmansachs, his startup, and life at Facebook. While the entire story is entertaining and quite funny, apparently the whole thing is true albeit a few name changes here and there and conversations being scrounged from past memories. Due to being non-fiction, it is good insight into the life at Silicon Valley startups and powerhouses - and for some, it may be the life they dream of, but is not always sunshine and rainbows.

Interesting worth a listen

Good personal account based insight into silicon valley, startup culture and the inner workings of Facebook a few years back.