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Microserfs by Douglas Coupland
Nine out of 10
Microserfs is included on The Guardian 1,000 Books Everyone Must Read list - https://www.theguardian.com/books/200... - that I find very interesting for most of the books I have read recently come from it and have been entertaining, captivating, rewarding and worthwhile.
Douglas Coupland is an excellent, modern, imaginative, amusing – in fact, looking to see where the book is placed on the aforementioned list, I thought it could be in the comedy section, but found it under the State of the nation label, which it deserves.
Microserfs deals with one of the most – if not the most – important issues faced by millennials and all the rest of the world, in our journey towards Singularity, the way we deal with technology, the tech giants FANGs and their Chinese rivals, the BATs, seeing as the novel is about the relationship employees have with these new colossus, satirized and evident in the title- Serfs of Microsoft...
Going beyond this title, the figure of Bill Gates, only called Bill in the book, does not strike the reader as the mean, villainous character who is oppressing the multitudes that work for him – although this was first published in a short story format and this reader writes about an abridged version of the novel by the way – and the contrast between the generous, benign multibillion donor that tries to solve problems like malaria and disease in the world is not so blatant.
Daniel is the narrator who works for “Bill” as one of the Microserfs and he is a nerd, an employee that has to climb on the ladder, is much younger than the average age at the company – which is at the time of the plot of about 31 – and he is very entertaining with his jocularity that mocks the fact that for instance they can no longer mention death, for while once there where only very young on campus, a vice president has had cancer and died recently.
The main character – and so many other geeks like him – is mainly concerned with the “product”, being hired to test the software and identify bugs and breaks, a sort of preliminary stage, but with a lot of potential – Abe, one of the members of the initial team, would point out the brilliant perspectives offered by the company that has been listed only very recently as the biggest independent firm in the world, only to be surpassed by Apple and amazon later.
When Michael, a talented, entrepreneurial, brave, creative, intrepid programmer launches what is called today a “startup”, a new technology company, he invites all the members of his Microsoft team to join him and benefit from a higher pay package – one is surprised to hear figures which are as low as twenty five thousand dollars for…a whole year, when today that is not enough for a month, in Silicon Valley, but we have to think about inflation and more importantly, the rocketing costs in the region – The Economist has had an article in which they argued that more companies will use other regions, given the prohibitive, stratospheric prices in that paradisiacal – in the past – technological dreamland.
All the team joins him, with the exception of Abe, more conscious than the rest of the benefits of working for the Feudal Landlord as serfs and the perils of launching into the unknown, however promising the new code written by Michael could be and the attraction of working with Susan, Todd, bug Barbecue, Karla – people who share a passion for writing code, but with different personalities, sexual orientation and tastes.
Daniel starts a relationship with Karla, which experiences the inevitable ups and downs – he forgets the one month anniversary once, then they have other disagreements, but this is one sunny side in the life of the hero, who has some other, bigger problems connected with his parents – in the first place, his father, who has worked for IBM – a company with a rather negative image it seems, at the time when this story takes place – and is losing his job at the age of fifty and is offered a bizarre position by Michael, who shares a hobby with the older man, involving toy trains.
Bug Barbecue has a nickname based on his occupation at Microsoft, and he lives in the same “geek house” like the others, where he has an outré worshipping altar for Elle Macpherson, with sufficient photos and paraphernalia to make the supermodel freak if she were ever to see it, but later in the narrative, the same man gathers the group to say he had been “inning it for too long and he now has to out it, for he is…gay, contrary to what that religious construction would have said.
Susan seems to be one other peculiar character, in that she seems to be very determined, perhaps exaggerating a certain aggressiveness to hide weaknesses and a feeling of uncertainty, only to find a vocation when she launches a feminist group destined for women code writers – members of this community would have to have a vagina and a number of shared beliefs and traits – and she is invited on CNN and becomes a celebrity.
While hearing the abridged audio version of this novel. I was wondering how much inspiration the creators of Silicon Valley could have had from Microserfs, because even after just a few episodes seen, it looks like the community in there shares many traits with the group that worked as serfs and then launched into the wilderness in Microserfs.
The book is excellent and contains many interesting facts, political commentary, references to Apple, Nintendo and others, including the revelation that humanity has reached the point where the books, information available has surpassed the total brain capacity of mankind, one vital step towards what the nerds know better and call Singularity.
Nine out of 10
Microserfs is included on The Guardian 1,000 Books Everyone Must Read list - https://www.theguardian.com/books/200... - that I find very interesting for most of the books I have read recently come from it and have been entertaining, captivating, rewarding and worthwhile.
Douglas Coupland is an excellent, modern, imaginative, amusing – in fact, looking to see where the book is placed on the aforementioned list, I thought it could be in the comedy section, but found it under the State of the nation label, which it deserves.
Microserfs deals with one of the most – if not the most – important issues faced by millennials and all the rest of the world, in our journey towards Singularity, the way we deal with technology, the tech giants FANGs and their Chinese rivals, the BATs, seeing as the novel is about the relationship employees have with these new colossus, satirized and evident in the title- Serfs of Microsoft...
Going beyond this title, the figure of Bill Gates, only called Bill in the book, does not strike the reader as the mean, villainous character who is oppressing the multitudes that work for him – although this was first published in a short story format and this reader writes about an abridged version of the novel by the way – and the contrast between the generous, benign multibillion donor that tries to solve problems like malaria and disease in the world is not so blatant.
Daniel is the narrator who works for “Bill” as one of the Microserfs and he is a nerd, an employee that has to climb on the ladder, is much younger than the average age at the company – which is at the time of the plot of about 31 – and he is very entertaining with his jocularity that mocks the fact that for instance they can no longer mention death, for while once there where only very young on campus, a vice president has had cancer and died recently.
The main character – and so many other geeks like him – is mainly concerned with the “product”, being hired to test the software and identify bugs and breaks, a sort of preliminary stage, but with a lot of potential – Abe, one of the members of the initial team, would point out the brilliant perspectives offered by the company that has been listed only very recently as the biggest independent firm in the world, only to be surpassed by Apple and amazon later.
When Michael, a talented, entrepreneurial, brave, creative, intrepid programmer launches what is called today a “startup”, a new technology company, he invites all the members of his Microsoft team to join him and benefit from a higher pay package – one is surprised to hear figures which are as low as twenty five thousand dollars for…a whole year, when today that is not enough for a month, in Silicon Valley, but we have to think about inflation and more importantly, the rocketing costs in the region – The Economist has had an article in which they argued that more companies will use other regions, given the prohibitive, stratospheric prices in that paradisiacal – in the past – technological dreamland.
All the team joins him, with the exception of Abe, more conscious than the rest of the benefits of working for the Feudal Landlord as serfs and the perils of launching into the unknown, however promising the new code written by Michael could be and the attraction of working with Susan, Todd, bug Barbecue, Karla – people who share a passion for writing code, but with different personalities, sexual orientation and tastes.
Daniel starts a relationship with Karla, which experiences the inevitable ups and downs – he forgets the one month anniversary once, then they have other disagreements, but this is one sunny side in the life of the hero, who has some other, bigger problems connected with his parents – in the first place, his father, who has worked for IBM – a company with a rather negative image it seems, at the time when this story takes place – and is losing his job at the age of fifty and is offered a bizarre position by Michael, who shares a hobby with the older man, involving toy trains.
Bug Barbecue has a nickname based on his occupation at Microsoft, and he lives in the same “geek house” like the others, where he has an outré worshipping altar for Elle Macpherson, with sufficient photos and paraphernalia to make the supermodel freak if she were ever to see it, but later in the narrative, the same man gathers the group to say he had been “inning it for too long and he now has to out it, for he is…gay, contrary to what that religious construction would have said.
Susan seems to be one other peculiar character, in that she seems to be very determined, perhaps exaggerating a certain aggressiveness to hide weaknesses and a feeling of uncertainty, only to find a vocation when she launches a feminist group destined for women code writers – members of this community would have to have a vagina and a number of shared beliefs and traits – and she is invited on CNN and becomes a celebrity.
While hearing the abridged audio version of this novel. I was wondering how much inspiration the creators of Silicon Valley could have had from Microserfs, because even after just a few episodes seen, it looks like the community in there shares many traits with the group that worked as serfs and then launched into the wilderness in Microserfs.
The book is excellent and contains many interesting facts, political commentary, references to Apple, Nintendo and others, including the revelation that humanity has reached the point where the books, information available has surpassed the total brain capacity of mankind, one vital step towards what the nerds know better and call Singularity.
