I've been reading extracts from Dave Eggers 55 short short stories for something that I'm doing on Thursday. They are all roughly one-pagers and are written in a compressed and non-paragraphed style which isn't that easy on the eye.
I can see what he's doing with some of them, with a thought-bomb wrapped up in homely or comical descriptions, and I've found some of the characters and voices particularly exasperating.
But that is part of his point and reminds me of reading Egger's technical futures novel called 'The Circle' a few years ago.
The novel included a few extrapolations about where technology was headed and the kind of things that could occur as by-products. I suppose many people who read these kind of novels will generally be tech-savvy and so the experience is more one of confirmation of thoughts rather than genuinely zinging ideas.
In the The Circle, the main protagonist (Mae) joined a hi-tech company (The Circle) and we see the enthusiastic, jovial, well-sounding company people building ever more intrusive gadgets to keep an eye on things.
"Yay, claps, awesome!"
It does remind me somehow of that new google camera thingy (Clips) that I mentioned recently to help
The novel plays with ideas around being liked, participation "Secrets are Lies" and the all-embracing nature of some modern tech companies. It doesn't directly mention the FANG factor (Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Google), which I suppose should really be the FAAA Factor (Facebook, Amazon, Alphabet, Apple). However, it is all about what they represent.
And then late yesterday evening, I noticed the 2017 movie of The Circle was up on Netflix, so I took a look at its somewhat condensed version of the idea. Netflix have thrown some serious money at the production, made in collaboration with Abu Dhabi, and with Emily Watson playing Mae and Tom Hanks as the 'Steve Jobs' style company evangelist.
The movie reminded me of my time working for American organisations, with sleek campuses, the passive aggressive lifestyle immersion and the big shindigs where everyone on deadlines would still be seen to be having fun. I can honestly say that the company events were quite true to life based upon my own experiences.
It probably turned this somehow mis-firing movie into something that I could watch, despite a kind of fairy-tale startup, superficial handling of life off-campus and some crowbarred in third act moments.
Don't tell anyone, but I might watch it again.
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