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The World Is Flat [Updated and Expanded]: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century (Audio CD)
by Thomas L. Friedman
| Category:
Non-fiction, Globalization, Outsourcing, Business |
| Market price: ¥ 598.00
MSL price:
¥ 558.00
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| Stock:
Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
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MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
A thought-provoking read on globalization and the future of our world. |
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AllReviews |
1 2   | Total 2 pages 13 items |
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Joseph E. Stiglitz (The New York Times) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
(An) exciting and very readable account of globalization…One mark of a great book is that it makes you see things in a new way, and Mr. Friedman certainly succeeds in that goal…In his provocative account, (he) suggests what this brave new world mean to all of us. |
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Warren Bass (The Washington Post Book World) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
Captivating (and) engrossing…This book showcases Friedman's gift for lucid dissections of abstruse economic phenomena (and) his genius for trend-spotting…An enthralling read…Friedman embraces much of his flat world's complexity, and his reporting brings to vibrant life some beguiling characters and trends…Lively, provocative and sophisticated…We've no real idea how the 21st century will unfold, but this terrifically stimulating book will certainly inspire readers to start thinking it all through. |
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A. C. Grayling (The Independent) (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
As the world's best newspaper columnist, (Friedman) has in bucket-loads the quintessential journalistic knack of finding telling ways of bringing facts and their implications into sharp focus…He brings home the speed, closeness, complexity and deep mutual engagement of the world economy by relating in detail a plethora of truly amazing facts about how it works…Friedman's book is an essential read for anyone interested to know where the next lightning-fast passage of travel over the surface of our ever-more-flattened earth is going to take us. |
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C. Hunter (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
The first half of this book is dedicatd to explaining the ten major causes of the flattening of the world. This part is pretty dense and will bore most. I personally spent a long time on this first half and was tempted to give up on the whole thing. Luckily I didn't.
If you can get through the first half, you'll be rewarded with very interesting and insightful interpretations of what the flattening process will mean for the world. Friedman is an optimist, and makes a good case for the benefits that increased global competition and cooperation will bring. While I think he considers himself a progressive (and doesn't shy away from a bit of Bush-bashing), he is a free-market capitalist at heart. His conclusions stress the need for deregulation of businesses, personal responsibility, and free trade between nations.
Especially appealing to me is Friedman's assertions (which have proven true time and again) about encouraging people and countries to help themselves. Economic incentive is the strongest driving force for the betterment of individual's lives and world peace. Countries involved in world supply chains will be much less likely to incite disruptions and their people will be enriched (best example = China). Countries and people that have enough to survive (through oil revenues or welfare checks) are less likely to join the economy and improve their lots.
There is too much interesting information in this book for me to rehash much, so I'll just say that some very interesting and logical assertions are made here that will help you know what to expect in the future. I'd reccomend this book to anyone interested in world economies and relations, and who can get through a [at times] fairly dense book. |
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D. Ogawa (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
Thomas Friedman, a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter from the New York Times, has put together a well-written and thought-provoking book on globalization in the twenty-first century. Though the topic of globalization has been widely covered in recent years, I found the approach of this book both entertaining and provocative.
The World Is Flat looks at globalization (past, present and future) and contains fascinating anecdotes and stories from companies around the world to support the author's views. Additionally, Friedman's clear writing style makes these concepts very accessible for most readers, though some readers may disagree with the author's opinions on politics, business, and education.
This book is targeted at popular mainstream readers, so if you are looking for a strictly academic analysis of globalization, you may be disappointed. If you are interested in reading short and interesting stories concerning globalization, technology and world business trends, then I recommend this book. |
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George Thomas (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
The main argument of The World Is Flat is that in today's flat world work, knowledge, collaboration, etc. can flow from place to place and person to person anywhere on the earth without friction. Because the world is flat, brains and mind power across the globe can innovate like never before to produce innovation and fuel economic growth. Friedman jokes that all of this happened while he was sleeping, but, you really have had to been asleep for the last decade if you don't already realize that this has been happening and that the world is indeed flat. As I was reading this, I kept saying to myself, "Tell me something that most people don't already know." This sort of "so what" thesis is my main criticism of the book.
Despite such an obvious argument, there is a lot of good content to be found within the book. Friedman does an excellent job at highlighting and breaking down complicated (and often politicized) topics such as outsourcing and global supply chaining so that people of all educational levels and professional backgrounds can understand. Hopefully people will walk away with a better understand of how the US and the rest of the world can benefit from integrating their economies and fostering more in-depth collaboration. For this fact alone the book is a worthwhile read.
Besides the sections on outsourcing and international trade, I found the chapter that discusses how the flat world affects America to be the most interesting. Friedman rightly highlights that the US has not been doing a good enough job to adapt to a growing India and China, which seem determined to continue to innovate and become the center of the global economy. True, both China and India have a way to go, but the US must show a more steadfast determination to make sure it does not fall behind in the race to innovate or produce knowledge.
For the above mentioned reasons the book is well worth your time to read. However, if you are even vaguely familiar with IT, or international economics, there is not a whole lot of "value added" to this book. |
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John Lipp (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
This is a better book than the author's previous, The Lexus and the Olive Tree. As many reviewers have noted, the topic is how the world has become economically interconnected. This conversation starts with the rise of the internet. Here, I don't agree with all of Friedman's comments. Having grown up at the same time as the internet, I feel like I was there, and Friedman wasn't. Friedman also uses his typical style of quoting others, many of them CEOs. Their comments and observations are too self-serving in many cases when it comes to how they helped create the internet.
After being turned off by the first part, I didn't have high hopes for the remainder of the book. I was pleasantly surprised. Friedman discusses a number of interesting ways the international economy is changing and how that is having influence in the US. Think the person taking your order at the fast food restaurant works there? Maybe not - that is a job that can be outsourced!
An intriguing section for me was the discussion of what is happening in the parts of the world that are not becoming more economically interconnected. They are feeling more and more humiliated. The US witnessed one of the side-effects of this humiliation on Sep 11th, 2001. This is not a new observation - I read this previously in The Pentagon's New Map - yet I enjoyed Friedman's analysis and insight.
I have to deduct a star for the use of too many self-serving CEO quotes, and for being long winded at times. |
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An American reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
This book is well researched and well written. This book gives information, in detail, about today's globalization. The book has offered a framework for how to think about the rapid flattening process and manage it to our maximum benefit. The author first discusses how he discovered that the world is flat and the ten forces that made the world flat. The author talks about triple convergence (how all the ten flatteners converged and work together, the new way of doing business, and how people collaborated with the tools that the flat world offered).
The message to the people in America and Western Europe is to constantly upgrade their skills and to be skillfully and socially adaptable. Message to parents is to prepare their children well to compete in the flat world. Otherwise in this flat world, one person's economic liberation could be another's unemployment. I really liked the author's idea of putting every American on a campus to compete in this flat world (similar to how JFK wanted to put a man on moon to compete with Soviet then).
The message to companies in the flat world is to sort out what to keep, what to discard, what to adapt, what to adopt, where to redouble the efforts, and where to intensify focus. Instead of resisting the flattening process try taking advantage of it. To compete better in the flat world the author points to the proposal of portable health-care program in the US (something like the immobile Gratuity system prevailing in India) for making employees more mobile and to grab the opportunities that is offered by this flat world and move up the ladder.
The message to developing countries it to provide a regulatory environment that makes it easy to do business to get the most of the flattening process and ask people to stick to the context rather to the culture of disintegration. The author has given some pointers to the economic success (reform wholesale and reform retail). The author has clearly explained the notion that the fewer natural resources a country has, the better off it will be in the flat world.
The author then discusses about the forces that might unflatten this world (like diseases and lack of empowerment in the rural part of developing countries, terrorist outfit-like Al-Qaida) too taking advantage of this flat world, possible energy issues for too many people entering this flat world) and how to collaborate better to overcome them. Finally the author discusses how to achieve full potential through collaboration.
Overall, this book is very interesting. The bulk of this book is justified to present the facts and figures and seem to flow well. This book is worth reading |
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Albert Kendrick (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
I found The World Is Flat to be inspiring, frightening and eye-opening, mixed in with a lot of common sense. The World Is Flat is all about encouraging you, the reader, to look at the world differently, and while the book offers a lot of guidance from that perspective, it is most valuable as a starting point. From a business perspective, I found the book very helpful. I see more options now, and I can often look at a problem from a completely different perspective than before. I find myself regularly recommending the book to anyone with ten or more years left in his or her career, and I want to just give a copy to some of the young professionals that work for me who expect success to just come their way with little effort on their part.
The World Is Flat is about the world that is coming, whether you are ready or not. Billions of new competitors from China, Eastern Europe and China are entering the marketplace, creating opportunities and competition like we have never known before. You need to understand what is happening, so that you can prepare yourself and make yourself valuable in this new world. I like the big picture, and The World Is Flat is all about the big picture.
Despite its strengths, The World Is Flat is longer than it needs to be, and at times you feel that Mr. Friedman is trying to address all of the world's problems in one book. Understandably, his primary topic is interrelated with everything else that is happening in the world, but many of the topics he addresses are very complex issues that he treats as short asides that he wants to wrap up quickly and neatly. I was also frustrated by his invention of new terms every time he wanted capture a critical theme. But these criticisms are minor compared to the enjoyment and value that I got from The World Is Flat. |
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Ryan Chu (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-19 00:00>
At some point, I too came to realize that the world is flat. Now I know why. Thomas Friedman eliminates any doubts of such a phenomenon with an abundance of evidence and case studies. Even his own theories and ideas are not free from the scrutiny of the data gathered by his research.
What makes this book different from many other books that "report" the current state of affairs is that Friedman actually provides answers to problems that he identifies. He does a comprehensive job containing the idea of globalization in its current stage along with providing reasonable steps in dealing with and facilitating the inevitable flattening of the world.
The World Is Flat offers a wealth of information that I think satisfies a much required calibration of many of our sights to improve the clarity and accuracy of the way we perceive the world. Hence, allowing us understanding and perhaps benefit from a flattening world. |
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1 2 | Total 2 pages 13 items |
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