I was given a copy of JPod by Douglas Coupland for Christmas, now I will not be adding anything to the range of reviews to say it is very much Microserf V2.0 - similar story but it is just that people seem not to work as hard (but are still in the office as they have little life outside work) and the strange things that occur to them are very strange indeed. In Microserf you could believe it could happen, but JPod, well it is going a bit far. Also I agree with the comments that this book it is rather self referential.
But that is not my point….
After reading JPod I decide to re-read Microserfs and what a strange experience that was. I was struck by the number of items touched on in this 1995 book as ‘hip and new’ that are now so main stream. In 1995, if my memory serves me, they were completely left field ideas, or at least were in the UK, I cannot speak for the west coast of the USA.
It did seem Douglas Coupland really had his finger on a the pulse - especially over the comment that Apple was in trouble as it had no Bill Gates type visionary at the helm - this was in the period before Steve Jobs came back to reinvent the company.
Anyway both books are great reads for you Geek book groups, see what you think about the historic cultural relevant of Microserfs for the 90s (that is assuming you can remember the 90s!) and whether JPob will be as account for the 00s?