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List Price: $16.00
Our Price: $8.50
Your Save: $ 7.50 ( 47% )
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 303.4833
EAN: 9780312425074
ISBN: 0312425074
Label: Picador
Manufacturer: Picador
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 672
Publication Date: 2007-08-07
Publisher: Picador
Release Date: 2007-07-24
Studio: Picador
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: It Is Your Responsibility as a Human Being to Read this Book and Make a Difference in The World
Comment: Thomas Friedman brilliantly shows how the forces of globalization have connected the world in ways never possible before. The walls, ceilings, and even floors that once separated people, societies, and countries have been flattened out. Now, a single individual has more power than any other time in history.
We must make use of all these new possibilities to succeed in a world that is more competitive and more challenging than ever before.
You have to establish a competitive advantage that differentiates you from the rest of this world. If you don't, you can't survive.
This next 50 years are the most crucial time in the history of our time. We have the opportunity to end poverty, diseases, wars, ignorance, greed, and hunger.
If we don't succeed in creating a NEW world where people live in harmony with nature and with each other, we don't have a chance as a species.
It is your responsibility as a human being to be accountable for yourself and your world.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Simplifies the complex, much to its undoing
Comment: Over a thousand reviews posted for a single book are bound to reflect a variety of opinions. But few books can elicit the repetitive and inconsistent nods present here. Most of these reviews fall into two groups: the first classifies this book as well-written and highly informative; the second classifies it as too verbose and oversimplified. I have to say, both groups are right.
They are right because I found myself reflecting both sentiments as I read the book.
The first four chapters of the book recount the rise of globalization and the forces behind it. This accounts for about the first third of the book's pages, and I found its packaging of the complex forces behind globalization to be highly informative and easy to understand.
The remaining two thirds of the book attempts to use the first third to put the world's actors into context. More specifically, it attempts to describe how globalization is affecting individuals, the companies they work in, and the countries they live in. Then it outlines what the author sees as necessary changes for keeping them all competitive. It was in this part where the author's simplified approach to globalization undermined his purpose. Recognizing this effect, the author likely felt he needed to buttress his proposals with more support. Unfortunately, his effort to do so droned on without adding much substance. Here is where the book's packaging fell apart.
And hence, this is why the reviewers here feel the way they do. For those who liked the author's proposed solutions, the momentum of the first part of the book likely carried them through to the end. For those who didn't, their enthusiasm likely waned and they quickly lost interest.
Which will you be? I don't know. Take the time to read the first four chapters, but don't feel guilty if you set the book aside long before you reach the end.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The globalism he praises may bite us all in the a**.
Comment: Now that the US is going through a terrible recession, we are going to regret that we outsourced all our production to other countries just to save a buck (NOT out of the kindness of our hearts to help India or China), leaving an anemic service industry that isn't going to be enough when the dollar weakens and imports become expensive.
Then we will have to start making our own stuff, and by then we will be starting out from scratch, and it will take years to recover.
Thanks a lot, globalization.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A Book That Will Prepare You For The New World
Comment: Whether you are a newly college grad, a cashier from Wal-Mart or you just got laid off by CitiGroup, take some time and read this book. It will give you a brand new perspective of how companies run their business today; it will probably make you realized how incompetent you actually are in a flat world. But at least you will finally be able to have a intellectual talk with your friends while you are in a bar.
In "The World Is Flat", Friedman talks about how he realized that the world is actually flat on a trip to Bangalore, India. From the fall of Berlin Wall to the raise of search engine and personal digital devices, Friedman explains how each major events and inventions from the nineties to the twenty-first century contributed to the flattening of the world. Friedman also talks about how government, companies, and individuals should deal with this flat world. The last part of the book, Friedman examines the impact of globalization on cultures and countries, ending the book with a strong emphasis on imagination as the key to survive in this new world.
Be prepared, "The World Is Flat" might come as a shock to many readers. Friedman is revealing a side of business we, as ordinary shoppers, have never seen or even imagined before. Freidman makes many great points in this book, and for every points, he also backs it up with real life examples. The most interesting examples I find is how UPS is actually running the backroom operation for many big companies, repairing computers for Toshiba and fulfilling shoe orders for Nike. The structure of the book is very clear and understandable; it follows the path of cause, effect, and response. While reading the book, my suggestion is always take some time to reflect what Friedman says with your own experience; this will make the book a lot more interesting and enjoyable. After all, it is 600+ pages long.
Friedman makes a lot of good points in this book; but bewares, some of his points are very subjective. When reading a book, never take the author's points or opinions as given; think them over in your own mind, reflect them to your own experience. Writers are not always right. When Friedman talks about one point, and you come up with a counterfactual, you just doubled the learning and acquired a broader perspective. Also, Friedman often provides excessive examples in this book. He often goes on and on about one thing and the whole reading experience could be jeopardized. Sometimes one example is enough, why tell us three more. If you understand what he's talking about, skip to the next topic, or else you will never be able finish the book.
In conclusion, "The World Is Flat" is a great book to read, especially at this time. With the current speed of technological breakthrough, people need to be on their toes and always be prepared for the unimaginable. A flat world means more people are competing with you, but it also means more opportunity to thrive. Whoever can adapt the fastest gets ahead.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Approachable for all readers, essential for understanding our flat world. This book should be on everyones "must read" list
Comment: I found the first section (263 pages) difficult to plow through - I come from a software / engineering background and found the techie speak in the first section dry. Understandably this book was written for a broad audience, and this section was a prerequisite for the remainder of the book as it brings the reader up to speed on globalization and the events that have contributed to today's flattened world. Once through the first section the text picks up it's pace, and reads like a novel as Friedman's prose weaves experiences, concerns, research, and philosophy together.
Globalization effects everyone and everyone should read this fantastic book.
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Editorial Reviews:
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 A New Edition of the Phenomenal #1 Bestseller
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"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," the Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz wrote in The New York Times reviewing The World Is Flat in 2005. In this new edition, Thomas L. Friedman includes fresh stories and insights to help us understand the flattening of the world. Weaving new information into his overall thesis, and answering the questions he has been most frequently asked by parents across the country, this third edition also includes two new chapters--on how to be a political activist and social entrepreneur in a flat world; and on the more troubling question of how to manage our reputations and privacy in a world where we are all becoming publishers and public figures.
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The World Is Flat 3.0 is an essential update on globalization, its opportunities for individual empowerment, its achievements at lifting millions out of poverty, and its drawbacks--environmental, social, and political, powerfully illuminated by the Pulitzer Prize--winning author of The Lexus and the Olive Tree.
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