Executive summary
The conceit: “Getting Real is a smaller, better, faster way to build software.” Actually, it’s a snapshot of what 37signals has learned and how they operate circa 2006 - fascinating and valuable if you’re in a position to weaponize that information. It’s a clear, brisk read. Four stars out of five.

I support your experiment
37signals released their first (sort of mediocre - sorry dudes) book via conventional paper means and decided to bring out the second one as a $19 PDF directly purchasable from their site. I’m not sure what their targets are, but so far it must be a success - they had a $33,000 first day, and readers will surely keep buying it. It will never go out of print, and the bookstore will never run out of copies. It will eventually get out on P2P networks, but so what? Serious people will buy copies anyway, knowing that they’d want other serious people to buy their work and not rip it off. It’s all good. Paul Ford is all for it, and Sony’s awesome hardware reads PDFs. Great.

However for now
this strategy probably works best when your reading audience is a bunch of techie nerdlingers.

ANYWAY
I like 37signals. I read their blog, I like their designs. I don’t use any of their products, although I bet Basecamp is killer if you need it, and I played around with Backpack before deciding that I was just too committed to OmniOutliner Pro to switch. (OO and Backpack are totally different, but I could see putting my whole life in Backpack like I currently do with OO.)

The thing that MADE me buy this book
was reading the comments on the book announcement post. You’d think it would be 130 people congratulating them on their achievement - getting a book out is a big deal. No: there was jealousy of their reputation in the field, cockriding, backbiting, arrogance. The fact that it stirred up so much shit made me really want to read the thing.

I happen to be building a web deal right now
I’m not writing the underlying software (thank christ) but I do want it to turn out a certain way and be used by people I don’t know, so now is a perfect time in my life for some guidance.

There’s an appealing sentiment in the introduction that I’d like to highlight
(You can download the whole thing.)

Getting Real delivers better results because it forces you to deal with actual problems you’re trying to solve instead of your ideas about those problems.

This is cognitive-behavioral therapy. Don’t blow things out of proportion with timelines, specs, roadmaps, just get on your idea and build it, but don’t build out too much, and I agree.

I’m not going to regurgitate every point in the book
If it appeals to you, buy it. I’ll skip to my conclusion:

It’s not a bible
I found the experience of reading it to be akin to having an “I’m going to impart what I’ve learned to you” talk with someone I respect. I found that many of their arguments appealed to me, reinforced unfounded suspicions I had about how things should work. It’s more polemical about how things should be done, but that’s good - one need not agree. It’s high grade process porn. Four stars, like I said at the top.