Микросерфы: Роман о поколении компьютеров

Novel by Douglas Coupland

Microserfs, published by HarperCollins in 1995, is an epistolary novel by Douglas Coupland. It first appeared in short story form as the cover article for the January 1994 issue of Wired magazine and was subsequently expanded to full novel length. Set in the early 1990s, it captures the state of the technology industry before Windows 95, and anticipates the dot com bubble of the late 1990s. The novel is presented in the form of diary entries maintained on a PowerBook by the narrator, Daniel. Because of this, as well as its formatting and usage of emoticons, this novel is similar to what emerged a decade later as the blog format. Coupland revisited many of the ideas in Microserfs in his 2006 novel JPod, which has been labeled "Microserfs for the Google generation".

The plot of the novel has two distinct movements: the events at Microsoft in Redmond, Washington, and the move to Silicon Valley and the "Oop!" project. The novel begins in Redmond as the characters are working on different projects at Microsoft's main campus. Life at the campus feels like a feudalistic society, with Bill Gates as the lord, and the employees the serfs. The majority of the main characters—Daniel (the narrator), Susan, Todd, Bug, Michael, and Abe—are living together in a "geek house", and their lives are dedicated to their projects and the company. Daniel's foundations are shaken when his father, a longtime employee of IBM, is laid off. The lifespan of a Microsoft coder weighs heavily on Daniel's mind. The second movement of the novel begins when the characters are offered jobs in Silicon Valley working on a project for Michael, who has by then left Redmond. All of the housemates—some immediately, some after thought—decide to move to the Valley. The characters' lives change drastically once they leave the limited sphere of the Microsoft campus and enter the world of "One Point Oh". They begin to work on a project called "Oop!" (a reference to object oriented programming). Oop! is a Lego like design program, allowing dynamic creation of many objects, bearing a resemblance to 2009's Minecraft (Coupland appears on the rear cover of the novel's hardcover editions photographed in Denmark's Legoland Billund, holding a Lego 777.). One of the undercurrents of the plot is Daniel and his family's relationship to Jed, Daniel's younger brother who died in a boating accident while they were children.

Coupland lived in Redmond, Washington for six weeks and Palo Alto, Silicon Valley for four months researching the lives of Microsoft workers. "It was a 'Gorillas in the Mist' kind of observation What do they put in their glove compartments? What snack foods do they eat? What posters are on their bedroom walls?" Friends from Microsoft and Apple also helped him with research. Coupland first noticed that his art school friends were working in computers in 1992.

Coupland's research turned up links to the themes of Life After God. "What surprised me about Microsoft is that no one has any conception of an afterlife. There is so little thought given to eternal issues that their very absence make them pointedly there. These people are so locked into the world, by default some sort of transcendence is located elsewhere, and obviously machines become the totem they imbue with sacred properties, wishes, hopes, goals, desires, dreams. That sounds like 1940s SF, but it's become the world." Coupland's interest in the world of Microsoft and technology workers began with the publication of a short story in Wired magazine in 1994. The story would later be expanded into the novel. Shortly before the publication of Microserfs, Coupland began to distance himself from his label as spokesperson for Generation X.

Coupland's novel anticipated the outcome of the late 1990s dot com bubble with his depiction of the Oop! project's search for capital. The abridged audiobook for Microserfs was read by Matthew Perry.