The language is good… too good. Some of Dicken’s endless run-on sentences border on literary wanking. There’s a great little story about redemption hidden in this lengthy book. Given a suitably ruthless editor, it could have been a sharp little thriller. As it is, it’s too many words for too little content.

I haven’t been so enthralled by a work of young-adult fantasy since the Narnia books. Just… wow.

I wasn’t sure what to expect when I rented “A Streetcar Named Desire”. I didn’t know anything about the story, I just had vague associations about Marlon Brando being a hearthrob. I guess I figured it was some kind of romance, possibly a musical, what with the the goofy name.

What I definitely didn’t expect was this bleak, wrenching, noirish film. Which is not to say that I didn’t like it. I could barely look away. Wow. What an intense movie.

Turns out men (for the most part) are randy bastards, and women (for the most part) aren’t. Who knew?

Is it possible to give a film negative stars?

In this movie which almost wasn’t a Batman ripoff, Ben Affleck almost wasn’t irritating and I almost cared.

God I love Wim Wenders. This is not a very accessible movie; it’s deeply into art-house territory. But if you have the patience for it it’s a beautiful meditation on the city of Berlin.

Wenders’ unique focus on music is in full effect here. Where other directors use nightclub scenes as backdrop, Wenders puts us front-row at a Nick Cave concert in a cramped Berlin club, and lets the characters do what real people do at a concert… close their eyes and get into the music.

I can’t bring myself to write a proper review… if you like sympathetic meditations on cities, people, and human details, then see this movie. It’s as simple as that.

I only got partway through this book before disappointedly returning it to the library. The premise, is decent, I guess; it’s a book about how technology and circumstances have conspired to “flatten” the world, such that individuals anywhere in the world have an unprecedented ability to communicate, collaborate, and trade with other individuals and with corporations on a relatively equal footing.

My problem with this book is twofold. First of all, as an under-30 software engineer working in the 21st century, most of the “revelations” Friedman presents were blatantly obvious to me. Of course you can collaborate with anyone, anywhere, on practically any project. Of course work performed is becoming more and more disconnected from the location where it is accomplished. Of course Open-Source software has changed the topography of the software industry. Is this news to anyone?

My guess is that it is. It certainly was to Friedman: he titles one of the earlier chapters “While I was Sleeping”. And his wording suggests to me that he is writing more for the benefit of older executives, who need the new, flattened world explained to them in small words. For me, though, it was a succession of tediously drawn-out expositions of painfully obvious modern truths.

And this brings me to the second flaw: this book badly needed an editor with a strong hand. It is at least twice as long as it needs to be. It’s redundant: characters are introduced multiple times. And it’s needlessly detailed. For instance, Friedman spends several paragraphs explaining the inner workings of fiber-optic data communications, which could have easily been summed up in a phrase (“fiber-optic cable, which uses light instead of electricity to transmit data…”). Friedman is no Neal Stephenson; he doesn’t have the knack for making technical descriptions riveting. And in a book that’s more about the implications of technology than the underpinnings, these lengthy, mind-numbingly dull digressions are out of place.

This book is not without insights, and for a busy executive struggling to keep up with the information age,k it could be a real eye-opener. Unfortunately, that executive would never have the time to read it.