The Makers (Cory Doctorow)

Thank you Mr Doctorow.

Doctorow, co-editor of Boing Boing and Copyright activist, released The Makers back in 2009, (or technically 2001 depending on which revision you reference)and i have been itching to read it. I never had the 25 bucks to go buy the hardback book though. i mean, i HAD the money, but getting 3 books for 25 bucks is always a hard thing to beat, so it just never came to fruition.

I had never read a Doctorow novel before this, and am glad that i made this my first.

When i finally got my Kindle2 (yes, i broke down and bought one) i was searching out some free (non-pirated) books to put on the device and came across The Makers. The novel was published simultaneously through Tor Books as well as Creative Commons for e-distribution. Cory’s only request is that if you enjoy the book, dont send him cash, buy a copy of the book and donate it to an organization or library in need.

Prior to sale, Doctorow also published a Serialized version directly on the Tor Blog, with thrice weekly updates. Unfortunately, i dont really care much for reading expansive text on computer screens.

Doctorow quotes a friend of his, Tim OReilly in the foreword of the ebook,? “[his] problem isn?t piracy, it?s obscurity”. Well, keep writing books like this and harnessing off-norm publishing and you have zero chance of that.

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The Makers is chronicled by ex-San Jose reporter Suzanne Church, watching and describing the story of the “new Work” movement. New Work being a generation of people (1 out of 5 americans) who decide to up and participate in a way of thinking that revolutionizes then destroys the world as we know it. Read as consumerism eats and recreates consumerism with a new form of the same old same old. rebirth via duplication. its the fall of the roman empire all over again, but with technology that would make xerox pee their pants a little bit.

newly bought out and merged KodaCell (Kodak and Duracell). Taking two companies that are basically dinosaurs of the pre-digital age and reallocating their resources, KodaCell hires ingenuous people and gives them the start up money needed to make forward progress, Lester and Perry are two such people.

The Makers covers the lives of Perry and Lester, avant-garde tech artists in florida. They are hanging out in a Florida junk yard creating art out reclaimed garbage. Whether it be synchronized dancing elmo dolls voice controlled and driving junk electric cars in a never ending race, or giant toasters covered in mechanized seashells, they are pleasantly ensconced in tech joy.? (i never would have guessed how much advanced tech was inside a simple garbage elmo doll)

Side note: I have never been a fan of the Disney Corporation, and this book did not help. It did however help me reinstate ol’ Walt as the engineer and visionary that all of us big-corp haters often forget.

I recommend this book to anyone who reads the below quote (by rapper/poet Aesop Rock) and has any portion resonate with their core. I assume this will be greater than 90% of you.

I tend to underestimate my average
Just another bastard savage
Someday you’ll all eat out of my cold hand
Cuz every dog has its day
At which point, I’ll pull it away

Now we the American working population
Hate the fact that eight hours a day
Is wasted on chasing the dream of someone that isn’t us
And we may not hate our jobs
But we hate jobs in general
That don’t have to do with fighting our own causes

We the American working population
Hate the nine-to-five day-in day-out
When we’d rather be supporting ourselves
By being paid to perfect the pass times
That we have harbored based solely on the fact
That it makes us smile if it sounds dope

–Aesop Rock, 9 to 5er’s Anthem

this novel epitomizes succulence for the word and idea starved.

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Tor Books (2009)
• ISBN-10: 0765312794
• ISBN-13: 978-0765312792