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8W8 - Global Space Tribes: a post-modern journey through globalization in the internet age powered by the world modeling engine 8W8
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8W8 - Global Space Tribes: a post-modern journey through globalization in the internet age powered by the world modeling engine 8W8

Fifteen of globalization's children collaborate to design a piece of software that renders visible the invisible networks of the Internet Age.

Readers should be warned at the outset that this is no novel in the conventional sense, but a Socratic dialogue for the early 21st century of globalization. That dialogue is sparked when Oskar Feller, an IT journalist and international jet-setter, gazes out of an airplane window at the nighttime lights of the cities of Belgium far below. Oskar, or "OK Fellow" as his friends call him, feels a sense of frustration that those city lights can't tell him much about the people they serve: What are their incomes? Where do they work? What do they believe in? How many are BMW-motorcycle enthusiasts like him? To get answers to questions like these on a global scale, Oskar enlists help from his 14 fellow members of the Golden Sky, a loosely coalesced think-tank whose membership represents various economic, political, scientific and cultural professions. At the palatial Hawaiian home of Internet entrepreneur Winston Chee, the 15 "Golden Skyers" collaboratively give birth to the computer-modeling program dubbed "8W8" (a strange-seeming choice of name, until they explain that "eight" is an auspicious number in Chinese numerology and "W" stands for "world people"). The notional 8W8 program allows the user to enter the cockpit of a virtual helicopter and tour a dynamic landscape representing not Earth's geography, but its invisible demographic, economic, environmental and even religious characteristics. The author's decision to present this intriguing concept as a novel is an idiosyncratic one, making the book feel at times like a tug-of-war between an inventor and a novelist.

At its best, 8W8-Global Space Tribes provides a gentle, relatively harmless way to introduce the reader to a bevy of interesting new terms and concepts; at its worst, it comes off as the novelization of a software user's manual.

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Product Details:
Author: Ralf Hirt
Paperback: 334 pages
Publisher: BookSurge Publishing
Publication Date: January 21, 2008
ISBN: 0979954908
Package Length: 8.9 inches
Package Width: 5.98 inches
Package Height: 0.87 inches
Package Weight: 1.23 pounds
Average Customer Rating: based on 7 reviews
 
 

Customer Reviews:
Average Customer Review:5.0
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5Volumizing Green Awareness - Hook me up, baby!   Jun 19, 2008
I have lived in difference places as a student and working adult across three continents and I was lucky enough that I could also live in NYC for a few years. The longer I live in busy cities and traveled the largest mega-centers on this planet the more I got into the sustainable, holistic view of life and needless to say the ultimate appreciation of environmental awareness.

I am not an Internet geek or professional, but understand the impact of the Net, at least I had thought so far. 8W8 - Global Space Tribes has made me feel part of something bigger, something global, and something total- and given me a certain sense of connection. In the past I surfed more like I read. Now I surf like I create and innovate. Hirt's story is developing comprehensively and comes from so many angles that it is hard to believe it does not get lost on its journey. The answer to this phenomena is 8W8, the world modeling engine envisioned and programmed by the fabulous members of the Internet think tank The Golden Sky. Understanding marketing a little from my business administration course - so far so good what the segmentation and fragmentation of the digital age is concerned, but embedding this in subjectively defined formulas allowing to quantify whatever I want to visualize has blown my mind away. I surf and I do. I model and I see. I see and I act. I act and I create. Thing is after having read and in fact enjoyed 8W8 - Global Space Tribes I do many things in a more thought through way and more powerfu. Everyone participating in the world of the Global Space tribes is part of this great evolution of moving the action up to where we connect and build. I have hooked up, baby! I want to create green awareness. Yes, we can.

Fantastic. Highly recommended.

from the i-tribe generation.



5From Chicken Soup To Total World View  Jun 17, 2008
It needed me a little while to figure out where this book actually fits in right from the beginning, but some how I was curious to get a copy as the promise was tempting. I liked it a lot, especially that in theory a very abstract topic has been embedded in a story that actually could be true. I have been to quite some think tanks myself and obviously traveled. You always come across interesting characters and Hirt's Golden Sky reflects those very nicely. The background of the individuals hardly leaves any diversity missing. Whether they are from business, finance, medicine or a musician, from the US, Germany or Brazil, male or female, gay, parents, singles, entrepreneurs or non-profit, Hirt packed it all in. He had to I reckon ... Thus the Golden Sky could develop this world modeling engine 8W8 that I wonder nobody before has considered doing or at least not to my knowledge. The location the event is happening, EA-RA, seems to be the best I could imagine. What a place and I would have loved to be a guest there, too, not only to enjoy Madam Chee's cooking and creatively designed menus. Frankly, it needed me some thinking to arrive from chicken soup to the volumized world of 8W8 - Global Space Tribes, but now I have arrived at the books destiny of a totally fragmented world, broken down to the personal DNA's and elements of the world, all connected, then visualized for each unique participant and beholder. This is much better than any conventional business, Internet or globalization book. It is a comprehensive read and good fun. What else do you want?

4Pretty Amazing  Apr 21, 2008
Awesome. Love it! Well, this was quite an interesting read. I am not sure if I had ever read a book before that takes so many aspects of current hot topics into account by at the same time bringing it all together. I have to admit I had to think quite a bit when reading it, but the more I got into the concept of the world modeling engine 8W8 and how the Golden Sky internet think-tank developed it, the more I got excited about seeing the invisible state of the world and subsequent scenarios. Living in New York City myself I appreciate the diversity of the characters involved. Actually, I will read this book on the plane again. Wanna see what OK Fellow can see!


5Amazing Story about the Future   Apr 08, 2008
As an entrepreneur in the field of information technology I was absolutely stunned and excited after reading this novel written by Ralf Hirt: with his very clear picture of what's next and the impact of web business and each online users participation 8W8 - Global Space Tribes goes much beyond the "World is Flat" idea. Therefore I would rate this book as the eligible successor, which also is the unique crystal ball for all those who want to visualize today and the near future.
I wish I could play around with the Golden Sky's 8W8 web application combining Hirt's ideas with a HUUGE user & data network on the backend as well as my own views and opinions...


5Crash course on Web 3  Mar 30, 2008
Wow! For someone like me who could never get into technical articles and books about the Internet, Ralf Hirt's 8W8 Global Space Tribes is as refreshing as a cool breeze in Death Valley.

I found myself thinking I was one of the characters in the novel waking up in EA-RA and sitting down for breakfast wondering what new insights digital or otherwise waited to be revealed to me that day. It made me think what different ideas I might have come up with if I had been sitting down at the table with the Golden Skyers.

I read 8W8 on a flight from New York City to LA. I was doing the Okay Fellow trip in reverse. It was almost spooky as when I began looking down and trying to put myself in his position. I began wondering what it was that I was seeing. All of a sudden, I realized that I had always had a nagging feeling that what I had been seeing wasn't really what it appeared to be. By the time we circled in from the ocean into LAX, I had stopped thinking LA as a basin and, instead, I was seeing it as a huge mountain with a large base rising higher than Everest. I remember thinking it was a good thing that the pilot was back in Web 2, because we might have crashed right into that mountain.

Before 8W8, I had never understood the future of the Internet so clearly and what it meant to me personally or the world in particular.

R. Arnold


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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