The prose is pretty dense and so they’re not exactly for the fainthearted, but great reads all the same. In many ways it is remarkable how Gibson foretold of a massively internetworked world and it was he who is responsible for the term cyberspace (as well as ‘the matrix’ please note). Although I can’t quite visualise what Gibson’s cyberspace looks like, it doesn’t seem all that distant in some ways from virtual worlds such as Second Life.

One of the aspects that I find interesting is the way in which AIs (artifical intelligences) are born and evolve in cyberspace, appearing as voodoo gods to some, as well as the consciousness of people being captured in in a biochip so that they survive beyond death, questioning the nature of existence.

A couple of things that date the novels somewhat – Neuromancer was written 25 years ago to be fair – is the number of times that faxes are mentioned, the amount of smoking that goes on (although in a post-WW3 scenario perhaps smoking in public has become accepted again), and that nobody seems to use a mobile phone.

Thoroughly recommended, if you haven’t read the trilogy yet go and buy on Amazon now.

Technorati Tags: cyberspace, william gibson, neuromancer

I read the book straight through when it first arrived and although it seems to set the reader up for a big fall, the author really does live up to his promise; he actually does only work 4 hours a week and checks his email just… once a week.

In fact I ended up agreeing with much of what he has to say. Although I would HATE to work just 4 hours a week, his point is that in todays world you can make a good living which is location independent because of the internet and other communications media and outsource your labour to low cost countries such as India, which frees up your time to do what you want. And If you’ve wondered why I’m suddenly blogging like mad all the time it’s because I have been applying some of Ferriss’s principles to do some more of the things I like doing – playing with technology and seeing what it can do.

In fact one of the reasons I agree with so much of what he says is because I’ve experienced it, although not as radically as he has done. Some personal examples:

• Six years ago I gave up a £45,000 ($90,000) job in London for no job in Barcelona, which reduced my cost of living immensely and also focused my mind on what I was going to do next. I started my internet marketing business, earning mainly from UK clients, another of the author’s points – he talks about earning dollars, living on pesos and paying rupees or something similar.

• I also go on holiday for the whole of August every year – in fact it usually extends to around 5 weeks – and check email just to keep on top of things. I may outsource that to a virtual PA this year and see how it goes, but I don’t get that much work email in August anyway.

• 2 years ago we spent 6 weeks in Puerto Rico and I worked maybe 1-2 hours a day while I was there via a laptop and broadband. None of my business contacts was any the wiser, and even if they had been it was no big deal.

• I usually go to the gym/swim in the morning. It’s much better for me as I have more energy and its not so busy.

And there are some other great take outs from the book:

• don’t check your email 200 times a day, switch off Outlook and reply to all your emails at once – you’ll save a ton of time.

• Don’t bother with unimportant tasks – this is a great one as if they’re really important you’ll do them anyway when they need to be done.

• Don’t start a task until it needs to be done – you’ll be focused on getting it done right first time.

There are many, many more and you’ll have to read the book to find out everything else. So, is it all ok?

To be honest I found some of the exercises to try and push your comfort zone rather dumb and I have no intention of doing them as a result; one of them is lying on the ground in a public place for 10 seconds (you’d be driven off in a straight jacket) and another is asking 2 members of the opposite sex for their phone number every day, whether you mean it or not – his advice is to disgard the number if you don’t want it.

Well, no thanks, I’m happily spoken for and just don’t want to have the hassle. The other side of this is that you’re potentially playing with someone’s feeling; what if the girl whose number you’re going to throw away is really hoping that you’ll call? No, that’s just mean.

So, all in all a great book with some good advice. I’m particularly looking at outsourcing more work at the moment and have been doing so gradually; 2007 seems to be the year of outsourcing and so in that respect this book came along at exactly the right time.

Pick up a copy next time you see it or order it from Amazon or Amazon.co.uk.

Now, one of the ingredients in the Vesper is Kina Lillet and author Kinsley Amis took Ian Fleming to task about this. Amis’s take on it (in The Book of Bond) was that the quinine content of Kina Lillet was too high and the drink would be too bitter and what Fleming really meant was Lillet vermouth. It is interesting to note that the film makers cock a snoot at Amis because Vesper mentions at one point that the drink has a bitter aftertaste.

However, Kina Lillet is no longer available – the name was changed long ago to plain a simple Lillet and later Lillet Blanc (when they introduced a red version). Finally in the 1980s the recipe was altered to make it much less bitter, so the film makers decided to go with Fleming on this rather than fact. Anyway, I recently saw an article that mentioned adding quinine powder or bitters to the drink to give it that genuine Fleming touch, so decided to give it a go. Lillet isn’t easy to find, but you can order it online to do this test and no, vermouth won’t do.

So which version of the drink wins, with or without the bitterness? No contest actually, the version with a couple of drops of bitters included does make a better drink, the bitter-less version is powerful but missing something, so my take on this is that Fleming did get it right after all.

Here’s the recipe:

3 measures of Gordon’s gin
1 measure of vodka
½ measure of Kina Lillet (buy it in the UK or US)
2 drops bitters (optional)

Shake until ice cold and serve in a deep champagne goblet with a large thin slice of lemon peel

What do you think?

Links:

The James Bond Cocktail Bar ebook

Kina Lillet – UK supplier

Kina Lillet – US supplier