Bachiller

Felipe Aspiazu
Dr. Jim Whitman
GEB1011
10/19/12
Opinion Essay “The World is Flat”
I found the book very interesting with enough examples well described and analyzed to understand the point of the author, which is about globalization and how the world has become more horizontal and more flat than ever before. Although at the beginning I found it difficult to grab my attention and followthe author´s purpose because it started with an analogy of Columbus finding the new world by accident and today´s reality of how the new world has become the next world. It definitely became clear to me the author´s intention by page 6 when Friedman cited Nilekani, who is the founder of Infosys, saying that ¨We could be sitting here, somebody from New York, London, Boston, San Francisco, alllive. And maybe the implementation is in Singapore, so the Singapore person could also be live here . . . That's globalization".

Soon after I read this, the author mentioned outsourcing, which is a new term for me, and it caught my attention. It became pretty clear to me, after reading several pages more, that according to Friedman outsourcing, which takes place principally in India, Russia, andChina, can be done on any part of the business that can be digitalized and send abroad to other countries, to other people that are either smartest or the cheapest producer. This outsourcing considerably decreases costs and is in many cases more effective and adds value to it. I found it very interesting but at the same time it worries me.

To find out that today when I call for anyinformation about how to make my new camcorder work, or how to pass a certain level of my Play Station game, or to ask for a reservation, that I am been served by an Indian, who is thousands of miles from Ecuador, who I don´t know and he or she doesn´t know me either, and who maybe haven´t been to Ecuador ever, can give me information of what I bought in my country better than my fellow countryman, isamazing to me and even hard to believe at the beginning. But Friedman gave so many examples of outsourcing that really almost vanish my disbeliefs and I asked my uncle, who lives in USA, that what I read from Friedman´s book is true.

What frightens me is that if any Indian can do the work of an Ecuadorian, cheaper, more efficient, and more politely than us, then It worries me because it meansthat I have to fight to get a job, to keep a job, or to start a new business or keep my business not only against people of my own country but from any other country that has cheaper hand labor, or are smartest or have better schooling and better technology and technology transfer than in my country. This makes my new world or next world very hard and very competitive. Maybe now I understand whymy parents always were emphatic on getting the best education possible and to keep excellent grades and put on me all that pressure. Maybe my new world, which is getting flatten according to Friedman, is harder than of my parents or grandparents world. Although they would say the same of their world compared to his forefathers.

This takes me to another interesting part of Friedman´s bookchapter one where he describes the eras of globalization. I found this description very enlightening and precise. The era of the horsepower related to the steam machine and the trains. The era of the hardware related to computers, electronics, television, radio, and communications. Today, the era of software related to internet, call centers, programs, fiber optics, etc, that gives each one of usaccess to be in touch with people from far away places and to access to information of almost any kind. Here we have wikepedia and wikileaks. The last one is a current issue around the world because of the infiltration to reserved and confidential information, which today involves my country because it gives haven to wikileaks´head. Another example of how easy is t keep in touch with people...