ALVINREID.com

Here is my second try on my first book :-). A little long so sorry…
The World Is Flat
Thomas L. Friedman

A while back we had David Wells at SEBTS for a lectureship. He mentioned this intriguing book, so I got it post haste. This fascinating book examines how communication and information technology has flattened the world, giving individuals a level playing field in the global economy. [Note: my comments/analysis will be in brackets like this.]
The flattening began when money was put into broadband communications worldwide. TF gives a great e.g.: in Bangalore 500 yrs after Columbus sought to find India, he is now in Bangalore where he learned the world is as flat (the ground is level). India can compete with US.
[Application: Theology today is not only taught in the seminary classroom by PhDs, it is learned on blogsites by a variety of people from experts to novices. The downside is a danger of a sense of history and the big picture, focusing too much on the here and now. The upside: ideas are always challenged, and status quo will be decreasingly defensible.]
Computer geeks and technos now have more power than ever. But, Al Qaeda could also not have its success without the flattening. Techno-terrorism. P. 8: “The playing field is not being leveled only in ways that draw in and superempower a whole new group of innovators. It’s being leveled in a way that draws in and superempowers a whole new group of angry, frustrated, and humiliated men and women.”
[App: An amazing opportunity for the typically disenfranchised.]
3 eras of globalization:
1) p. 9 1492-@1800. Globalizaton 1.0, shrank world from large to medium. About countries and muscles (Reformation and Renaissance). Key agent of change was power, often driven by imperialism or religion. Your power depended on how much muscle), power you had or found (steam engine, power of pen, etc).
[App: He misses the obvious parallels with the Reformation, but he is with the NYTimes, not Oxford ]
2) 2.0 @1800-2000: size medium to size small: key agent of change was multinational companies. This began with falling transportation costs, with the rise of trains and steam ships, and continued with falling communication costs, with telegraph and telephone, then the PC, internet, etc.
[App: The 19th century was also the Great Century of missionary expansion worldwide. Again, one cannot understand the tremendous missions work accomplished without seeing the economic and technological advances. Question: what are the implications of this for the instances of modern, great awakenings?]
Almost no one had email when Clinton was elected in 92. The world has changed.
3) 2000 on: 3.0 from small to tiny flattening playing field. 1.0 countries globalized, 2.0 companies globalized, in 3.0 individuals are now globalized.
Now individuals can communicate globally. Also the West has far less influence as individuals around the world become empowered.
[App: paradigms must change: how denominations work, how churches work, how ministry happens. Jesus did this by switching the category on Messianic hope, on how to fulfill the law, on so much. I talk to people in England about the Jesus Movement and missionaries around the world.]

Ex. Pp.11-14 on how taxes are done. P 16 CAT scans to India. 16-17 Reuters downsizing.
Reuters requires higher level of journalism.
[APP: Denominational workers will require people skills and analytical skills more than ever. Less salesmen to promote programs, more ambassadors to represent Jesus. P. 19-20 how Reuters downsized.]
P 20 Reuters memo from David Schlesinger:
“Change is hard. Change is hardest on those caught by surprise. Change is hardest on those who have difficulty changing too. But change is natural; change is not new; change is important.”
[App: Might be a good point of contact for any denominational downsizing.]
P. 21f GREAT example of India call center. Longest a person stayed on one call—11 hours! P. 24 BIG: “I’ve had lots of customers who call in [with questions] not even connected to the product that we’re dealing with. They would call in because they had lost their wallet or just to talk to somebody. I’m like, ‘Okay, all right, maybe you should look under the bed [for your wallet] or where do you normally keep it,’ and she’s like, ‘Okay, thank you so much for helping.’”
Another: “One of the customers asked me to marry him.”
These call centers are 24/7/365. Better than church!
[App: Despite technology, advances, people are still lonely, still want someone to talk to, etc.]
p. 31: outsourcing power point with Brickworth.
p. 36f JetBlue’s use of housewives. “Homesourcing”
[APP: less conferences, more personal contact. (like coaching)]
p. 39 Ill of military drones. P. 40 McD’s in MO
p.45-6 implications for faith.
TWO: 10 forces that flattened the world:
1. 11-9-89 Walls Came Down/Windows Came Up Berlin Wall—unleashed forces that liberated most of E Europe. This opened way for a “global” policy. Now European Union, euro as common currency etc. @ same time Windows was emerging for PC technology.
p. 55-relates 11-9 to 9-11.
2. 8-9-95 Netscape went public. Move from PC base to Internet base, allowing individual, global communication. This made Bangalore a suburb of Boston.
Browser technology is “one of the most important innovations in modern history.” (p. 58)
3. Work flow software. Applications that talk to other apps, like using PayPal for internet orders, moving from paper transactions to purely electronic forms (that we take totally for granted now). This saves much time and resources.
4. Open-Sourcing. Self-organizing, collaborative communities. E.g.: a bunch of geeks talking online created “Apache,” an underlying web server that makes all sorts of normal internet apps work. While IBM, Microsoft, and others were spending millions trying to develop something like this, a group of people created it and made it available as a free download. So, IBM, Microsoft, etc use it. So, individuals can talk to other individuals and create technology without having to go through the layers of bureaucracy involved in major corporations [see the app for ministry??]. “Open source is nothing more than peer-reviewed science.” P. 83. This is seen now with Indie music via Myspace and many other ways individuals gain influence without corporate or media backing.
2-3ds of the Websites in the world now use Apache. Not because it was marketed well, but because it works and it is free.
E.g. in media p. 93: Dan Rather’s report on Bush’s Natl Guard Service was exposed not by serious journalists but by bloggers on the internet.
p. 94 e.g. Wikipedia online encyclopedia. Just went there yesterday on my smartphone .
5. Outsourcing (y2k). The Y2K fright caused every pc on earth to be reviewed, which opened the door for India to step up and become a technological player, using young computer techies to help. This jump started India as the player it is now in everything from computer repairs to new technology. Now much can be outsourced to them at a fraction of the cost in US dollars.
Pasteur (p 111) “Fortune favors the prepared mind.” India was ready.
6. Offshoring.
p.l114 African proverb:
Every morning in Africa a gazelle wakes up.
It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion of it will be killed.
Every morning a lion wakes up.
It knows it must outrun the slowest gazelle or it will starve to death.
It doesn’t matter whether you are a lion or a gazelle.
When the sun comes up, you better start running.
Talks about China coming into the World Trade Organization 12-11-2001, and implications from that. We cannot sit around and be lazy as a nation anymore.
[App. Nor as a church! This is our problem—we are fat and lazy and act like we are entitled to people coming to Christ and our churches.]
Book: The United States of China by Ohnae. In 2001, 400 of Fortune 500 invested in China.
[App: we can learn from other nations and other ethnic groups as much as we can teach them @ reaching others].
7. Supply Chaining. Remarkable summary of Wal-Mart’s growth, impact, and red flags. Bottom line: collaborating suppliers, retailers, customers, in a massive, rapid manner (400,000 HP computers sold in ONE DAY at Christmas time through WalMart!).
Note: Corporate HQ are modest, a la Wal mart [Compare to my son’s reaction to looking at NAMB’s building: “missions is doing mighty good!”]
8. Insourcing. Again fascinating, this time on UPS. When they pick up your Toshiba laptop to get repaired, they do not take it to Toshiba. They take it to UPS HQ where trained techies fix it! Insourcing takes care of some needs in house without the need to send it elsewhere.
This dramatically changed inventory. P. 148: “When our grandfathers owned shops, inventory was what was in the back room. Now it is a box two hours away on a package car, or it might be hundreds more crossing the country by rail, …”
9. In-forming. Google, Yahoo, MSN search. How did we live before Google? This has really flattened the world. # 2 searched term on google: God. (First is sex). Third was jobs. Fourth was professional wrestling (yikes).
[App: Google is the total equalizer. My 13 yr old daughter can find things faster than her PhD dad on google. In-forming is an individual’s ability to find things for himself. App: How do we help pastors and others find for themselves what to do? This is where linking seminary education and NAMB can be vital.]
P. 156 BIG: “Companies like Google . . . have learned to thrive not by pushing products and services on their customers as much as by building collaborative systems that enable customers to pull on their own, and then respond with lightning quickness to what they pull.”
[APP: presenting the gospel, not merely giving info today (I Thessalonians 1:5 approach to evangelism). Helping people find for themselves how the gospel MATTERS where they live.]
p. 157: “It is the antithesis of being told or taught. It is about self-empowerment; it is empowering individuals to do what they think best with the information they want. It is very different than anything else that preceded it. Radio was one-to-many. TV was one-to-many. The telephone was one-to-one. Search is the ultimate expression of the power of the individual, using a computer, looking at the world, and finding exactly what they want—and everyone is different when it comes to that.”
10. The Steroids: digital, mobile, personal, virtual. Here is where we all live. The way blackberries, smartphones, etc have performed like steroids, juicing our ability to use 1-9 above. [I regularly google on my cell phone!]
[App: why doesn’t NAMB, for example, use videoconferencing more in relating to state conventions?]
p. 168: “your desk goes with you everywhere you go.” True that. I am sitting on a couch at my house. I have no office here. I gave my office to my wife (our 4th bedroom actually) so she could finally have her own craft room. I don’t need an office at home. I have a laptop, a smartphone, and a bag full of books. Office in a bag.
CHAPTER THREE The triple convergence:
1. All ten flatteners begin to work together.
2. The global, flat field created changed the way business works—less vertical, (i.e. silo) more horizontal.
3. At the same time billions from China, India, Russia, etc joined this movement.

NOTE: Most of the rest of the book gets tedious in my mind, focusing mostly on business and economics. I am merely henceforth pulling out a few gems:
p. 234 and following: we used to say “eat your food, people in China and India are starving.” Now: “people in China and India are starving for your jobs.”
Untouchables: people whose jobs cannot be outsourced.
[APP: we will ALWAYS need pastors. We will always need missionaries.]
4 categories of untouchables:
1. Special people: Michael Jordan, Bill Gates. They have a global market for their goods. Ministry: Graham, Warren, etc.
2. Specialized people: knowledge workers: brain surgeons, etc. [APP: profs who train ministers, catalytic leaders (hypothetically state convention leaders NAMB etc?)]
3. Anchored people: most people—jobs that will always be here: waitresses, plumbers, teachers, etc. We will always need them. But, we will need less of them (the key to downsizing).
4. Really adaptable people: constantly upgrading skills, growing to relate to a changing culture.

p. 250ff “The Quiet Crisis.” Uses USA Olympic Basketball to illustrate. We are the best, invincible. Now we don’t win the gold. Why? We have not improved, but the world has, and it has caught us.
[APP: Evangelism: we have not improved, we have lost our godly ambition for souls, while competing “gospels” have caught up.]
Talks about dirty little secrets: 1. the numbers gap—far less scientists and engineers today. APP: are we really challenging youth to call to ministry, etc). 2. The Ambition gap—poor work ethic of younger people. 3. The education gap.

This entry was posted on Friday, June 30th, 2006 at 9:04 am and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.