Book about phreaking is coming - preorder now

[Havoc 2]

just got this email from Phil Lapsley

I am delighted to announce that Exploding the Phone: The Untold Story of the Teenagers and Outlaws Who Hacked Ma Bell will be published by Grove/Atlantic in February 2013. It will be available in both hardback and ebook form at that time. The official web site is at http://www.explodingthephone.com.

Steve Wozniak was kind enough to contribute a really cool foreword and early reviews of the book have been wonderful. I'm particularly proud of this one:

"The definitive account of the first generation of network hackers … At turns a technological love story, a counter cultural history and a generation-spanning epic, Exploding the Phone is obsessively researched and told with wit and clarity. It captures a moment in time that might otherwise have been lost forever."—Kevin Poulsen, Wired news editor and author of Kingpin

As we ramp up to the book release in February, here are a couple of things you can do:

Pre-order it from either Amazon, Barnes & Noble or Books-A-Million, or ask your local bookseller (maybe via Indiebound) to pre-order it for you.

Spread the word however you like – like us on Facebook (I'd very much appreciate it if you'd click "like" on that page), follow us on Twitter, post something about the book on your blog, forward this note to somebody you think might like it, or talk it up the old fashioned way, face to face over coffee or a beer.

I will be doing a nationwide book tour in February and will update this email list and my blog when I have dates and places.

[_ThEcRoW 1]

Interesting!. Will be getting the kindle version if it's available!

[Deception 0]

I just pre-ordered mine. If you haven't seen his video/speech from HOPE in the link above, it's definitely worth checking out.

[Shad01ite 0]

This book looks way cool. Checked out the http://www.explodingthephone.com

Looking forward to reading this book. I added you guys on Facebook.

The book sounds fun and informative, from what I saw on the website.

[rbcp 8]

I'm really looking forward to this one. Hope you guys will remind us all when it's available so I can get it on Kindle.

[Havoc 2]

I walked into Diesel Bookstore in Oakland on Thursday and was pleasantly surprised to find they actually had copies of Exploding The Phone on display. (Proof: http://bit.ly/XZQt9R) And people are sending me emails most every day saying that they are receiving copies from Amazon.

 

I guess that means it's real! :-)

 

In other news:

 

For those of you who don't care for paper, Grove/Atlantic informs me that the Kindle and Nook editions will be out February 5.

 

I'm delighted to report that IEEE Spectrum will be running an excerpt from the book in their February issue. It's already up on their web site at http://spectrum.ieee.org/telecom/standards/phreaking-out-ma-bell.

 

As a reminder, here's a quick summary of the book tour dates and places:

 

Los Angeles, CA 2/11 at Skylight Books, 7 pm

Menlo Park, CA 2/13 at Kepler's, 7:30 pm

Oakland, CA 2/15 at Diesel, 7 pm

Portland, OR 2/19 at Powell's Burnside, 7:30 pm

Seattle, WA 2/20 at Town Hall, 6 pm

Bellingham, WA 2/22 at Village Books, 7 pm

San Francisco 2/25 at Book Passage (Ferry Building), 6 pm

Washington, DC 2/27 at Politics and Prose, 7 pm

Cambridge, MA 2/28 at Harvard Book Store, 7 pm

Denver, CO 3/6 at Tattered Cover, 7:30 pm

 

We continue to work on a venue in NYC and will post something here when we have it nailed down. The most up-to-date details on the book tour can always be found at http://explodingthephone.com/tour.php.

 

Finally, a favor: once you've read the book, if you liked it, I would be grateful if you would post a brief review on amazon.com. Just visit the amazon web page (http://www.amazon.com/Exploding-Phone-Untold-Teenagers-Outlaws/dp/080212061X) and scroll down to the "Write a customer review" button.

 

As always, thank you for your support!

 

Phil

[Y0ungBra1n 4]

I just bought this book a couple weeks ago and have been making my way though the first few chapters. It has been a great read, transporting me back to a technical age for which I was not present, helping me catch a glimpse of the lives of the phreaking forefathers. I'd definitely recommend it, especially for the younger enthusiasts who were not present during the evolution of the telephone inter-network. It motivates me to continue going out and exploring!

 

[edit]Here's a link for anyone looking to buy.[/edit]

Edited August 14, 2013 by Y0ungBra1n

[dmine45 21]

The "famous" phone phreak Evan Doorbell (yes, the same Evan Doorbell of Phone Trips fame) has worked with the book author Phil Lapsley to narrate the book. It has been released through Audible.com - the audio book division of Amazon.com.

 

I just got done listening to the book and it is OUTSTANDING!

 

Here is the link to the audio version of the book:

 

http://www.amazon.com/Exploding-Phone-Untold-Teenagers-Outlaws/dp/B00DWH5CN8/ref=tmm_aud_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=&qid=

[ThoughtPhreaker 174]

by Phil Lapsley (Author), Johann North (Narrator)

 

Awesome, Johann's simply outdone himself!

 

Seriously, I'm with dmine45. Evan/Johann/whatever he prefers to be called now is quite a fantastic narrator. It's a little strange to hear him with what I'm guessing is someone with different tastes engineering the recording session. His voice sounds so much thinner.

[JmanA9 13]

Awesome, Johann's simply outdone himself!

Agreed!  I'd like to know how many hours of work were put into this.

 

I too am not happy with the audio experience from Audible but I have not found alternative sources.  It was produced by Audible so I'm not expecting anything other than what's available now.

[dmine45 21]

 

Awesome, Johann's simply outdone himself!

Agreed!  I'd like to know how many hours of work were put into this.

 

I too am not happy with the audio experience from Audible but I have not found alternative sources.  It was produced by Audible so I'm not expecting anything other than what's available now.

 

 

He told me he worked on it for a few hours a day for 2 1/2 weeks at a recording studio near where he lives.

 

As for Audible - I'm not a fan of it either, especially with their proprietary format. Found a conversion engine to convert to MP3s and sliced them up into one hour segments.

 

When there's a will, there's a way!