Anyone tried philosophers notes?

[hawkal]

I am thinking of getting philosophers notes by Brian Johnson PhilosophersNotes - Get Your Wisdom On.

Has anyone else bought it and would they recommend it over buying the books?

It's just not only would it save a lot of money but also a lot of time.

[Savage]

I read some of Brian's summaries, so I can share my opinion about them. I've subscribed to other book summaries in the past, and in general I'm not a fan of book summaries. You miss a lot of good info when you try to reduce a book to sound bites, and you don't grasp the material nearly as well when you read a summary. Too often a summary turns a good book into shallow info-crack that has zero impact.

In the case of PN, I honestly didn't like Brian's summary style. I felt he was injecting too much of his own voice/bias into the summaries, so they weren't always reflective of the original author's key points. (I had previously read the books he was summarizing.) Brian would include his own personal stories too if I recall, and his style is a little rah-rah for my tastes. His summaries read more like a personal book review than an accurate book summary.

That said, if you like Brian's style (i.e. you love self-help rah-rah), you might find PNs useful. I'd suggest you use it to get an overview of books you may someday want to read instead of as a substitute for reading them.

Personally I think Brian does a much better job writing his own content as opposed to summarizing someone else's ideas. In some ways I think he's using PN as a way of expressing himself w/o fully putting himself on the line. He shares his message through the summaries, which is a little weird IMO. I genuinely think Brian belongs on a stage of his own and that this path is too timid for him. In fact, I told him so when he first launched this service.

[hawkal]

Thank you for the review Steve. I haven't read any of his own words but I have listened to some of his free audio and I get the impression he would make a good public speaker.