The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman

Write an article on The World is Flat by Thomas Friedman. It needs to be at least 1500 words. The method followed by the author is a mix of an empirical and logical process. As described in the sections above, the empirical process is followed by listing out the different parameters of a “Flat World” and these are listed in a logical fashion.The title of the book is drawn from a conversation that the author has with the CEO of an Indian software company (Infosys) where the CEO (Nandan Nilekani) describes how his company is taking advantage of the flattening out of the barriers and capitalizing on the numerous opportunities thrown up by globalization. As Nandan puts it to Friedman, the world is indeed flat.The ten flatteners are the major political events, innovations and companies that made the world sit up and take notice. (p. 48). These ten flatteners opened up nee possibilities in the sphere of a globalized world and ensured that the world was not the same again. The ten flatteners are described below:The fall of the Berlin Wall: This event is not only symbolic but also brought masses of people who were hitherto in the communist regimes to participate in the opportunities thrown up by globalization. Netscape going public: This event made the internet accessible to anyone with a computer and allowed the widespread acceptance of the web as a medium of exchange. The introduction of workflow software: This relates to the adoption of the open standards that let applications talk to each other. Self-organizing collaborative companies: This gave rise to the practice of collaborative projects bringing together developers from all countries in contact with each other. The Y2K outsourcing phenomenon: The outsourcing of work related to the Y2K bug allowed countries like India to get a toehold in the software outsourcing industry. This was then leveraged to provide high-quality services at low cost to the western countries.