'The Spoonfeed' Vs 'Manufacturing Consent'

Its been a really lazy start in 2007 - just 2 working days between 30(dec 2006!) and 9th. Add to that the quashing of my plans to tour Nikko (it was a holiday for the ticket counter!) and its a really sleepy-lazy week in Tokyo.

Nevertheless, i did manage to find some really good stuff around my house. First, a bookstore which has a shelf, full of english books (trust me, its really a rarity in Japan, even in Tokyo). Second, the Minato ward sports centre with an annual memebership of just Y400. Its another matter that i found it the day after I bought dumbbels for Y7,500. Last, the Hanamasa discount store (an apple costs Y150. Its cheaper nevertheless!).

The bookstore has been the most needed revelation. And obviously I wanted to buy almost everything that vaguely seemed interesting. However, these days, my work doesn't allow me such a luxury. Atleast the weekend's are free, and i have to squeeze the magazine reads and the books in them.

Coming to magazines, Economist is one thats just different. First, the cover is always awesome ! Second, the content has a Platonic feel to it. You can't question it and after reading there are more questions than answers!

But the most interesting thing about economist is it makes you 'smart' err... 'look smart' - 2 very different things. Most of what's in the economist seems like an opinion (atleast to me). And since the evidence is more often than not incontrovertible, the reader (atleast me) starts to opine the same. See, its spoonfeeding of opinions.

Sometime ago I got obsessed with Noam Chomsky's work and got hold of a documentary of his - 'Manufacturing consent'. Its about how the media (and the people who 'run' it) controls people's choices by selectively portraying the facts. Now, thats bad. All I wanted to say is this differs from what economist does. Economist is not bad. It doesn't (seems so) hide anything and atleast makes you 'look smart'.

After a not-so-interesting book, I'm onto a really good one. Its called 'Redesigning the kaisha'. More on it next week. And hopefully, the internet guy would've fixed the problems by then.