25 April 2002

Ozzy as manager. Rob Thomas takes the Mickey out of management books. This is tricky as it is impossible to exagerate how banal and stupid they acutally are. I remember reading a book about McDonalds when I was doing my MBA. It was written in an extraordinary breathless style as if it was all terribly exciting. I particularly remember the chapter about the development of the Chicken McNugget. This involved a renegate McDonald's executive who was brought back from internal exile to rescue the project and demanded to use a hand pick team of charismatic, loony outsiders. It was written as if it was the Dirty Dozen. I can't remember the exact title, but if its the book I think it is, the latest edition (!) has 5 stars in the reviews in Amazon. 2:10:08 PM

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Simple Forms From an Umberto Eco book review: "In 1930 Andre Jolles published a book entitled Einfache Formen [The Simple Forms], which analysed certain literary types, for the most part typical of popular culture. They were characterised by their brevity, but more so by the simplicity of their structure. They were - and always have been - governed by certain rules that their authors (sometimes entire communities rather than individuals) followed faithfully". This relates in an intriguing way to yesterday's post on the practical benefits of literary forms. Do clarity and freedom in expression comes from not despite the discipline, even if the discipline is almost arbitrary?   7:19:31 AM

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© Copyright 2002 Nick Browne.