Microserfs

Rating:
Summary: GR8 BK 2 RD!
Review: Couplnd cvrs th unqly gky bt ncrdbly humn aspcts of a bnch of "nerds." Brllnt humr (ok, enough! ;-) ) interspersed within various descriptions of the thoughts and emotions that these nerds go through. I'd recommend this book to ANYBODY! You don't have to be a nerd/geek/dweeb/etc to enjoy this book and learn from it. I really enjoyed the heck out of this book!

Cheerio!

Rating:
Summary: You may have lived this.
Review: Chances are you'll get that feeling when you read Microserfs. That warm feeling of nostalgia you get when a book so successfully transports you to a time when life was full of surprises which you thought of as mere routine, and things were more exciting than they seemed, and you were happy and clueless about everything.

Years have gone by, and looking back you can see how strange routine was, and how the cynicism of then was tame when compared to the cynicism of now. Being transported back to then gives you hope for the now, and the comfort of open arms that will hold you, and of a mouth that will whisper into your ear "There are things that you must remember." It's almost supernatural. My skin crawls.

I'm not a coder, never was. Never worked in the Silicon Valley. Lived there during the time this book takes place, but never was friends with people that remotely resembled the people this book tries to characterize. But, ah, the zeitgeist! As said elsewhere...this IS the zeitgeist. It is the zeitgeist made flesh through words. Coupland is less talented than this book allows us to conclude, but Microserfs is just sublime, and one of my favorite pieces of writing ever.

It reminds me of old videogames; empty outlets in the middle of the desert; sleepwalking through part of a technological revolution; warm microwave ovens; trashy sci-fi TV shows and Saved by the Bell reruns; clever toys that time forgot; Taco Bell restaurants; ancient DOS manuals; dusty floppy disks; healthy junk food; slow days; the golden age of Vallco Mall in Cupertino; riding Bus 81 in San Jose, and the Caltrain from Santa Clara to San Francisco; buying Lucasarts games at Fry's Electronics...All of these things, which are particular to me but might be common to you, come together along with others I'm not brave enough to mention, when I'm reading Microserfs. So this really IS the zeitgeist. The feeling of being there again takes over me so violently it's physically noticeable, even though I shared only very few of the characteristics of the people pictured in this book. But I was there, and felt what Coupland has put on paper.

Microserfs is a powerful, touching, sad, happy, wonderful time machine. Read it along with Game Over, by David Sheff. If you're anything at all like me, you'll probably cry and wish it was 1993 all over again.

Rating:
Summary: I am in love with this book!
Review: Coupland's Microserfs is a touching, tender, hilarious, real, and yes... geeky, look into the 20-something Techie culture of mid-1990s America. Those who came before us will forever be daunted by technology; those who came after take it for granted. Only my generation embraced technology with a passion that became a lifestyle, and Microserfs may well be one of the first book to take into account the extent to which our professional and personal lives were impacted by this force. Through Microserfs, Coupland has breathed life into the cold, isolated, socially-inept stereotypes that dominated the worldview of techno-buffs. Yes, we may be awkward and more comfortable coding than throwing parties, but by god we have fun doing it!

I was recommended this book by a friend who lives half the world away whom I met on an online message board. I was reading it through my long-distance, internet-inspired courtship with my now fiance. And through it I see my friends, my job and my life.

Coupland certainly can sling the geek, but he can also inspire tight, warm knots of nostalgia through his many pop-culture references. Coupland also has a knack of writing incredibly human characters, rivaling Robbins in the quirky details department, through occasionally some characters (such as the body-building duo Todd and Dusty) feel more like caricatures. But what I probably appreciated most from this book was the topic of "Geek Love", as some reviewers have described it. Coupland definitely struck out new territory on this topic, which was probably good news for some of the geeks out there who were in need of a handbook on the subject!

Reading Microserfs is like having a conversation with a really good friend - warm, comfortable and easy. Think up some Jeopardy! categories for yourself and settle into this extremely lovable book.

Rating:
Summary: Silicon Valley (circa 1980)
Review: Consists of a journal by of a fictitious employee at Microsoft who moved on to greener pastures in Silicon Valley when the boom was at its highest.

At the latter part of the book the reader finds himself/herself sharing their worries and aspirations. 5 stars for making me feel that I am not alone in having these reflections.

Rating:
Summary: Love and Geeks -- who can resist?
Review: Ah, what a lovely geek book. First, I've always loved Douglas' writing.

Microserfs was the first book I read by him, and judging from his other works it's one of the few that actually makes a real 'book' Generation X & Shampoo planet (two of the writers other, early works) are just a bunch of stories strung together.

Microserfs is the story of a bunch of young 20 something geeks who work at Microsoft, all with aspirations of doing something more and finding out about their lives. A perfect allegory for young people of this generation who grew up weaned on computers.

The characters quit Microsoft to form their own start up, with dreams of making it rich (almost a modern day parable for gold rush and other explorers/entrepreneurs of the past
century).

Along the way, they each come to learn something about themselves. While this is mostly a coming-of-age story that's been done so many times before. Coupland writes it differently.

Giving each character their top 5 Jeopardy categories, making them each so individually nuanced (one's obsessed with Xerox, etc) yet instantly relatable and understandable.
They're weird and quirky, but in the same way that any geek is. And they're not ashamed of this, reading this book if you are technically inclined, geeky, weird, etc, makes you feel less alone, part of something.

Like most Coupland books the ending is brief and abrupt, suddenly everyone's problems are solved, and they've all come to realize something about themselves. It feels more like the writer just ran out of story ideas, rather than a natural conclusion.

But the conclusion isn't the important part, it's the journey. And experiencing this very readable (yet still importantly different, with it's random computer quotations pasted in at times), and identifiable novel lets any techo-nerd feel at ease as they pass along for the ride.

Also recommended: THE LOSERS' CLUB by Richard Perez

Rating:
Summary: Geeks, and heart
Review: On the surface this book is about a buncg of "geeks" and the early-mid 90s computer culture. Bellow the surface is a stroy about true friendship.

The book is funny, laugh out loud funny, but also very gentle, and touching.

The relatinships between the charecters are very true and strong. As a member of generation X I appreciate Coupland's portryal of what us 20 and 30 something are about, frindship and our interdependence on one another. The money and sucess of the company in the story start to fade, and it the commitment to each other that is left in the end.

And, its funny as hell.

Rating:
Summary: An endearing time capsule of 90's geek life
Review: In many ways, I'm the kind of person that Coupland tries to write about here. I've been a computer geek since childhood and have worked at dot.com startups and videogame companies. I've experienced both the highs and the lows of this realm: from the elation of being part of a hit product to the lonely, grinding monotony of twelve-hour days in front of a computer screen in interminable crunch mode. It's clear that Coupland has some personal experience with the demographic he's writing about, the young, brilliant, socially compartmentalized 90's tech worker (AKA geek) trapped in an unfufilling career, trying to invent a better existance. Via the journal of the central character, Dan, he lovingly brings to life the geek mind, with all its ideosyncracies, obsessions, and tangential ponderings, and frames it with an abundance of 90's pop culture references.

The characters are fun, quirky, and bear more than a passing resemblance to people I've known in real life. Coupland engineers enough drama, friendship, and events among the close-knit cohorts to keep the reader turning the pages, as well as plenty of thoughtful, apparently off-the-cuff musings about the effects of technology on modern life, and the book is really a breeze to read. I suggested Microserfs to several non-geek friends, and they enjoyed it greatly.

The book does have its weaknesses, though. For one, it's obvious that Coupland is an outsider when it comes to computer technology, which gives some of the book's plot points a false ring. The average reader probably won't notice, but the average Wired reader just might. Also, he sometimes tries to invest his characters with a little too much geek cred, which makes them unconvincing at times (or hard to tell apart). Maybe I don't know enough female techies, but Dusty and Amy seemed particularly unlifelike.

Still, I give Microserfs a thumbs up. It's an easy, fun read, and captures the overall spirit of a particular subculture (as well as its angst) at an unique moment in history. It would be interesting if Coupland wrote a "ten years later" sequel and we could find out where his characters are in their mid-30s, in the present day (their Lego project probably would have been a failure in the real world).

If you like this book (or if you are a geek who was disappointed with it), I highly recommend "Hackers" by Steven Levy, a spirited account of the real life computer geek world from the 60s through the early 80s. Levy brings the early computer industry alive in a way that's even more fascinating than fiction.

Rating:
Summary: take a walk on the geek side
Review: Coupland's "mircroserfs" was a switch from the what I normally read, yet the change was not an unwelcome one - rather refreshing! It is written by Douglas Coupland, the Canadian author best known for coining the term Generation X.

The novel is narrated in the form of a journal (which in itself is appealing to me) penned by the main character, Dan Underwood (26). To set the scene, the journal starts in the fall of 1993. Underwood serves as a computer programmer for Microsoft. The entertaining plot revolves around the misadventures of he and his fellow code-crunching computer whizzes. These self-professed 'geeks', obsessed with lego, and who often lament their lack of a social life, board together at a Microsoft "dorm".

Otherwise known as "microserfs", they spend 16-hour days coding, eating "flat" foods (ie. Kraft singles or fruit rollups, which are often passed underneath closed doors), and checking/sending email. Seizing the chance to be innovators and wanting to escape their Bill-run world, this intrepid bunch of quirky coders strike out on their own, as they form a high-tech gaming software company named Oop! located in Silicon Valley.

Spanning about 2 years, the novel lends us the complex and often hilarious story of what it's like for these coders, living together in a sort of digital flophouse as they desperately try to "get a life" and find love amid the dislocated, subhuman whir and buzz of their digitally-driven world.

I find Coupland's wit modern, funny, to-the-point and often thought-provoking. The novel itself is comical, illuminating and ultimately poignant. Indeed, literal tears welled up at the conclusion, which was an unexpectedly touching one. Admittedly, it is not a novel I would recommend to just anyone. Yet it is definitely a novel I personally wouldn't want to do without.

Rating:
Summary: Geek pride
Review: "SPACE!... Not your final frontier in this instance, but there's lots of it here and its not a bad deal."

They are a subspecies of the homo sapiens. They're weird, wacky and wonderful: the geeks. Douglas Coupland (he who wrote "Generation X" and "Polaroids of the Dead") introduces us to a gang of geeks (like a flock of birds or pride of lions) known as "microserfs."

It's in diary form (interspersed with big quotes, web addies, and bits of code), by a young man named Dan. He and his pals work for Microsoft, and their jobs dominate most of their lives (despite this, he does get a girlfriend). Despite the machine-dominated jobs they have, these "microserfs" decide that they want personal lives and reinvent themselves.

If you own a computer and use it for something other than solitaire or checking the football scores, you might like "Microserfs." Certainly if you talk about Legos, eat flat foods, and ask questions like "Is our universe ultimately digital or analog?"

One thing that might put off some readers is that Coupland sprinkles the diary entries with seemingly random stuff -- aPzroc, burnt arborite, Champaign-Urbana, countless ones and zeros, two pages filled with the word "money." But it's cute, funny, and somehow it adds to the real feel of the geekiness of this novel. But it isn't just cute -- the characters are pleasantly well-rounded and likable, and while Coupland's books often have a sort of sad feeling, this one is relatively cheerful. Even so, while pointing out the problems with a geek's life, he shows that they're people too, and the poignant moments are among the best in the book.

Geek pride! I enjoyed reading about the "Microserfs," a unique facet of Douglas Coupland's vision of the world. Entertaining, geeky, and thought-provoking in little spurts.

Rating:
Summary: For the Tech nerd in all of us
Review: I have to say that I first came across this while browsing my college's class-required books [I attend Georgia Tech]. The title caught my eye and reading the back, I thought it was a cute idea, so I bought it. I never expected what I got: A witty, silly, sometimes depressed but always hopeful, heartwarming story. Centered around a group of friends who decide to leave the security of Microsoft to follow another friend to Silicon Valley, the book follows them not only as they progress to their new home, but to their new lives. It's the story of computer nerds who decide, quite out of the blue [ as nerds tend to do] that they want to try something new and end up reinventing themselves in the process.

As a female computer nerd, I found this book charming and eerily one-the-nose. It's a must for anyone at a Technical college or who's really a geek at heart. The writing style is amazing and the characters are people you probably know in your life.