By Janus Boye
As the year winds down, I’m realising how much my thinking in 2025 has been shaped not by feeds or hot takes, but by books.
Six in particular stayed with me. Below, I’ve shared a short reflection on each of them.
Further down, I’ve also included reading recommendations from a few members of our community, books that shaped their thinking in different ways this year.
Careless People
Sarah Wynn-Williams (2025)
A sharp, unsettling look at power, culture, and what we quietly normalise when growth becomes the only story. It also sharply reduced my appetite for so-called social media, Facebook and Instagram in particular. Once you see certain dynamics clearly, it’s hard to unsee them.
How to Do Nothing
Jenny Odell (2019)
There’s an irony to the title. This is not a book about disengaging, but about choosing where and how to pay attention. It’s a thoughtful critique of the attention economy and a reminder that presence, care, and noticing what’s around us are active choices, not passive ones.
If There Is a Will, There Is a Way
Here’s the notes from the member’s call on Jasmin’s book:
How to leave the doubt and excuses behind
Jasmin Guthmann (2025)
A thoughtful take on getting big things done, whether in business, life, or sports. It resonated with me because “dreaming big” has gone out of shape, often turning into abstraction rather than action. I know the feeling of being stuck and working on leaving self-doubt behind, and Jasmin’s ideas help tackle excuses, turn doubt into something useful, and move through challenges with more clarity.
I’ve valued the conversations with her this year and I’m looking forward to continuing them next month in Düsseldorf, where TYPO3 is hosting the CMS Experts community.
How to Resist Amazon (and Why)
Danny Caine (2022)
This one is very much about Amazon. It’s direct, specific, and persuasive, and it made me delete my Amazon account. I haven’t shopped there since. Danny writes not as an abstract critic, but as the co-owner of The Raven Book Store in Lawrence, Kansas, grounding the book in lived experience and making a compelling case for local economies, fair labour, and more deliberate choices.
How to Know a Person
David Brooks (2023)
A book about listening, presence, and the discipline of paying attention to others. Bill Gates describes it as a guide to better conversations and a blueprint for a more connected and humane way of living. What stayed with me most was Brooks’ writing about seeing another person’s struggle, not trying to fix it or rush past it, but recognising it and making space for it.
This Is for Everyone
Tim Berners-Lee (2025)
Part history, part warning, part unfinished manifesto. A reminder that the web was built on generosity, openness, and collaboration, but has drifted towards concentration, extraction, and loss of agency. Tim writes candidly about the problems created by today’s dominant social media platforms and makes a strong case for digital sovereignty, for people having real control over their data, identity, and online lives. I met Tim Berners-Lee many years ago at WWW7 in Brisbane, and this copy was gifted to me by Simon Jones from Studio 24 in Cambridge, who built the website for the book. It felt less like a souvenir and more like a prompt to take responsibility for the digital spaces we shape and inhabit.
None of these offered easy answers. All of them slowed me down in useful ways.
From the community
A few people in our community also shared books that shaped their thinking this year. Different topics, different angles, but the same sense that reading still helps us pause and reframe.
On Fire: The Case for the Green New Deal
Naomi Klein
Recommended by Antonia Fedder, who shared:
“Though a bit older, in light of this year’s challenges I re-read this one and can only recommend it big.”
How Big Things Get Done
Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner
Recommended by Sten Vesterli, who highlighted it as one of the most relevant reads of the year for understanding how complex initiatives actually succeed.
If you’ve read something this year that shaped how you think or act, I’d love to hear about it. What would you recommend next? Let me know by posting a comment below.
Thanks for everything this year, and
Happy New Year ✨