Customer Reviews

The Millennium Whole Earth Catalog: Access to Tools & Ideas for the Twenty-First Century

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The Whole Earth Catalog was an revolution when it was first published around 1970. This latest book, now out nearly 5 years, continues the tradition but I wonder if it represents the last of its kind due to the explosion of new knowledge is the past decade and the rise of the Internet as a source of general and specific information on any topic imaginable. The fact that no one else has reviewed it on Amazon as I write this seems to indicate the shift of interest from this excellent resource to other more immediate or specific sources of information.

But in the final analysis, I think everyone should have and use the WEC as it represents and contains the seeds of this information explosion and, though the references it contains may become dated, the ideas, inspiration and permanence it provides are valuable in this day of instant changes.

Perhaps the point of such books is simply to inspire us to change. When I first read the Whole Earth Catalog,and The Whole Earth Epilog (?)I was looking for something.

Thirty years later I am on a different path,leading who knows where.

It wasn't the information in those books that changed me.It was the message that change was possible,and highly probable.

That message I read between the lines,not from the sentences.

In comparison to "Whole Earth Catalog:Access to Tools" the Millenium Edition was - at least to my tastes - horrifyingly bad. "Access to Tools" presented information to solve problems. The Millenium Edition seemed to be more about winning arguments, and how to repair your local <insert tedious political problem here.>

Reading about how aging yuppies want to fix a neighborhood block to their tastes isn't worth 1 dime of my money. I feel disappointed and deeply cheated that I bought this tawdry book.

I don't know how useful this book actually is to anyone, but it makes for interesting reading, if for no other reason than because it shows that an organized grass roots countercultural "underground" is as alive and well in America today as it was when the first of these books came out back in the days of hippiedom's original flowering two generations ago.

If you enjoy browsing the WEB for interesting IDEAS,then.. you will love this catalog. Why ? Because it's the only BOOK I know that gave me the same *magical* feeling, as if I am ONLINE. It gives you the FEELING that YOU could CHANGE SOMETHING in this WORLD.. and this just be reading descriptions of TOOLS and BOOKS for the 21st Century.

One of these and a 50-cal S&W handgun w/ 2000 rounds should help 0ne survive the coming crisis.
;-)