Maybe it’s the recession. I don’t know. There was a time when those most revered in our society, its most respected and benighted members, were those men and Women with a vision. People to whom we all aspired. Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, The Dalia Lama, Jimi Hendrix, Muhammad Ali, Janis Joplin; all icons, artists and agents of change. Just a generation ago, an idol was a hero, somebody of outstanding artistic talent or superhuman desire for peace and progress (often both). Today, our icons are those with more money in the bank than us. Maybe that’s why the steve jobs biography book leaves me with a funny taste in my mouth.

Like the great tides, the zeitgeist shifts, the heroes of our movies are now far more likely to be un-problematically privileged twenty and thirty-somethings, who occupy glamorous jobs and live lives of uncomplicated wish-fulfilment. Edward Lewis, the male protagonist of 1990’s ‘Pretty Woman’ represented a major shift in the pop culture landscape. From that day forward, we no longer looked to the rich as if they were the top-hat sporting caricatures of an Eisenstein epic or Chaplin pastiche, we no longer saw ‘Old Man Potter’ from Frank Capra’s glorious ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ as a “warped, frustrated old man” but as an object of aspiration. Ever since Richard Gere’s formerly heartless corporate raider climbed the fire escape of Julia Robert’s prostitute-pauper apartment, we’ve all been reaching out, looking to him to save us, too. Prior to the 1980’s, our heroes were likely to be everyday people who lived simple lives, only ever one (or, in special cases, two) paycheques removed from destitution. In the 1930’s children idolized Superman, protector of the downtrodden. Now, it seems we look up to Ritchie Rich or the steve jobs biography book, a kid with more money than sense.

That’s why I can’t get behind this steve jobs biography book thing. Don’t get me wrong; I’m sorry the bloke died. As CEO of Apple he was responsible for some of the most amazing consumer technology ever developed. I treasure my MAC (and thank whatever passes for God these days that I don’t have to put up with a PC crashing all day) and I adore my iPod that allows me to store almost 60GB of music and play it at any time I choose. Apple products have enriched my daily life and Mr. Jobs was right there guiding them as they did so. My heart goes out, very earnestly, to the man’s friends and family. By all accounts he was a good man and I have no desire to slander him in any way whatsoever. However, I can’t help but notice the outpouring of sentiment towards a man who, though he donated to charity on occasion, was principally concerned with making himself, and his company, very, very rich. Steve Jobs was a restless inventor and a business genius, but Apple products were still made in foreign sweatshops by workers who worked for next to nothing, all while the company soared on Bush administration tax breaks and its executives became obscenely wealthy. All while American workers struggled to find gainful employment.

The steve jobs biography book is a heartfelt and expertly-crafted bildungsroman of the CEO. It offers a tidy insight into Jobs the employer, the businessman and the man. Indeed, there’s a lot to admire about him, and for those of you that do, the steve jobs biography book is at once the definitive story, eulogy and touching celebration of a life spent at the forefront of technological innovation and at very pinnacle of the corporate world. My overall point is this; when you read the steve jobs biography book, ask yourself what it is that you admire about this man. Ask yourself why shows like ‘Dragon’s Den’, ‘X-Factor’ and ‘America’s Next Top Model’ are so enormously popular. Why is it that the attainment of material wealth has overcome that of spiritual enlightenment, artistic endeavour, or advancement of scientific knowledge? Are corporate CEOs the new rock stars?  is steve jobs biography book that you absolutely must read.

I can get behind pretty much anything that opens with the irony-free opening salvo of “In a time after oblivion…” nothing but sheer awesomeness can come of a braggadocio boast like that, surely? Actually yeah, you’re pretty much right in that assumption. So begins the elder scrolls skyrim, the latest in the venerated fantasy game series, before warning us of an ancient prophecy contained within the titular scrolls and then having a massive dragon come to life and go looking to incinerate a bloke in a silly helmet. So far so good, then…

The elder scrolls skyrim, we’re told, is targeting a new audience by relying less heavily on continuity and choppy plot hangovers from previous games. This might alienate the more hardcore fans of the series, but I suspect that, if successful, the elder scrolls skyrim will not only crack open a huge market for their own future titles, but also the fantasy genre in general.

Lets be clear about this, people like fantasy. People like Sci Fi, there’s something about both that offers escapism, fun and the promise of unbridled adventure. I have yet to meet a single person who didn’t enjoy some form of escapist storytelling, whether it was pulp novels, super heroes, space ships or dragons. It’s only really the obsessives who spoil it for the rest of us. I’m talking about the guys who dress as The Joker or Harley Quinn at the San Diego Comic Con to protest the DC comics reboot whilst pretending tobe the characters themselves, the web-forum warriors who argue against any and all new development in long-running series, yet conversely complain that the continuity has become ‘stale’, or the vacuous trendy kids with an interest only in ironic piss-taking before moving on to the next big thing.

As an unapologetic, lifelong geek (who was a comic book devotee long before it became Hollywood-approved and has a list of reasons as long as your arm to boycott J.J Abrams’ Star Trek reboot/abomination) its nice to see stuff like the elder scrolls skyrim finally going overground. With imagery that picks up where the massive cinema success of Lord Of The Rings left off (despite the fact that those flicks were, lets face it, a bit sh*t), it’s clear that the elder scrolls skyrim is tapping into an audience already primed for fantasy and adventure. You want dragons? Warriors? Villagers on the run, Golden Axe chutzpah and drop-dead gorgeous fantasy landscapes, then look no further, the power of the scrolls compels you. And, if not that, then they leave it to the endless appeal of dragons to do the job…

The elder scrolls skyrim looks impossibly cool, in an impossibly nerdy sort of way. The producers even wrote a special runic ‘Dragon language’ for gamers to enjoy, sort of a halfway house between Elvish and Klingon which will no doubt have net forums buzzing in the months to come (especially when some bright spark releases the symbols for use on your desktop). That level of attention to detail, far from being over-the-top-nerdy, helps the game to become immersive and helps the world of the elder scrolls skyrim to feel lived in, real. In a world where our own lives often feel like we’re stranded on Planet Hollywood, it’s nice to see games designers investing fantasy with care and attention. As the old aphorism goes, if there’s a job worth doing…

The elder scrolls skyrim game can be found in all good shops for £39.99, at Amazon.co.uk you can get it for less than £20.00

Web giants Amazon.com first released their portable e-book reader, the new Kindle, in 2007. For those of you who, like me, are not up to date with the latest trends and gadgets, I may need to explain what it is the new Kindle actually does.

The new Kindle stores e-books for you to read. Plain and simple. The current model (a best seller) also includes an Internet feature that allows for access to online literary sources (e-books), which are downloaded and stored to the device’s memory. Portability and ease of use, then, are the main features of the new Kindle e-book reader.

In much the same way that an iPod can store your entire music collection, the new Kindle can become a sort of portable library. You can take almost every scrap of reading material you want with you wherever you go. This makes it both practical and space-saving when travelling (especially considering new weight/baggage restrictions currently the bane of air travellers worldwide!) Also useful if, like me, you tend to go through a small library’s worth when on holiday!

Will the new Kindle replace the book? A more apt question should be why would it even attempt to? The new Kindle is simply a useful gadget, aimed at making travel and research easier. Imagine you are a student with a trolley-load of books to carry with you when you undertake the arduous journey home for Uncle Fred’s birthday. The train, the replacement bus service, the delays. Now imagine it was all there, at the touch of a button. Like your MP3 player, and like an MP3 player, slipped easily into your hand luggage when the ticket checker comes over just as the phone goes off in your pocket (I hate that!).

Those of us self-appointed connoisseurs, who care about such things, will always have preferred formats. The feel, smell and texture of a book will always surpass the impersonality of a glowing screen; the new Kindle is no threat to the sanctity and earnest humanity of book reading, it is no substitute and nor does it pretend to be. It does, however, perfectly combine the joy of a good book with the rigours of modern life, travel and work.

Available from Amazon online store, the new kindle is priced at just £88.99