Johnna Cee's Reviews > Going Infinite: The Rise and Fall of a New Tycoon

2.5 stars. On the plus side, I learned a lot about the crypto world, more than I ever wanted to know. That's not a mark against the book, it was interesting to know even if I don't plan on learning anymore. The rest of the book.... I still don't get Sam Bankman-Fried's hold on everyone including the author, at no point in this story does he seem competent, pleasant to be around or charismatic in any way, yet the author and others faun over this man. The companies he runs are a mess from day one, he treats everyone like s***, expects long hours from his workers, while he himself spends all his time playing video games. The author seems to think all of this as a sign of Sam's specialness, I just see it as the guys mediocrity. I just really don't get it, the author seems to feel that Sam got a bad rap when he had no criminal intent while I think there are only two options: malicious intent or incompetence so aggressive it becomes malicious intent. The author seems to buy hook line and sinker into Sam's effective altruism nonsense even though he NEVER does anything altruistic for anyone or anything. Supposedly the inner circle at FTX were these starry eyed do gooders known as effective altruists looking to help the most people by become obscenely rich and then donating money. But at no point do any of them do anything even remotely helpful, to anyone, with Sam the biggest a-hole of the lot, he spends money to influence elections and fund other tech bros like himself. Frankly I think the author needs rehabilitation after living in a cult ( maybe I'm exaggerating but good lord), he shouldn't have been the one to write this book. I learned nothing except that some people will swear the Emperor has clothes when he's clearly buck ass naked.