Rule 1: When the world goes flat, and you are feeling flattened, reach for a shovel and dig in yourself, not build walls.
Rule 2: the small must act big to take advantage of the tools of collaboration to reach farther, faster, wider and deeper
Rule 3: the big shall act small to enable their customers to act big
Rule 4: the best companies are the best collaborators.
Rule 5: in a flat world, the best companies stay healthy by getting regular chest Xrays and then selling the results to their clients.
Rule 6: The best companies outsource to win, not to shrink.
Rule 7: Outsourcing is also for idealists.

nevertheless, i disagreed with friedman on his point about dreams and memories. he was arguing that in general, when memories outweigh dreams, what you get is what is happening in the middle east. while i can tell that he is sort of pushing this argument abit too far, and that he is generalising, the main reason why i disagree is that i feel that memories and dreams are not entirely distinct entities: there is a sort of overlap. memories can serve as fodder for achievement. it all depends on how we manipulate memories or dreams. this is where the means determine the ends. friedman gave the example of the arab world as memories causing stagnation. but look at china: the memory of the glorious history sort of empowers them to achieve, to bring back the glory. so you can see that at the end of the day, it's really how we react to memories and dreams, which, i ahve come to believe, are a big part of anyone's life.