It's the season of new growth, all around me, as colors, shapes, smells, and sounds emerge to fill the landscape that had been emptied by fall and winter.
Into this mix comes MyWire , with its bold red and ambitious reach to embrace the entire world of content.
One day soon, if all goes well, anyone anywhere can do what those few of us who are editors at MyWire currently do -- browse the world's great publications on a daily basis, and create collections of material on any topic we choose.
The product itself is based on the premise that, now we have entered the global information age, many people will be motivated to use the powerful new IT tools we have been developing in Silicon Valley to get involved in bettering the world.
Why do I say that? Perhaps an example will help. Scientists and a few writers were warning about global climate change and other planetary disasters 30 years ago. Those of us doing that work then often had to travel to distant points of the globe to gather the evidence to support our case.
Today, all you need to do is enter a few keyboard strokes. I don't think it is surprising that now we can communicate globally, we are starting to think globally. Thus, issues long simmering in obscurity now have burst into full view, front and center.
Sharing information and contacts and creating networks of concerned global citizens -- this is the work of the 21st century -- and the only way that humanity will save itself.
Twenty years ago I attended conferences with titles such as "The Fate of the Earth." There were those who scoffed at such notions, as if even contemplating these types of questions was folly.
Today, the scoffers have for the most part been silenced. The political results of their apathy, however, have saddled this country with a Do-Nothing administration that remains hostile to environmental issues.
The next election may seem to be between candidates, parties, money and power. But what hangs in the balance is whether Americans are willing to join the world community and get to work on the real issues while there still may be time.
That whisper you hear in the wind is the voice of nature: "Will you survive?"
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1 comment:
I cannot help being struck by irony here, the very technological civilisation that has brought about a threat to our survival also provides tools like greater forms of global communication and unity to help us solve the problem. It is almost as though we are testing ourselves by doing our worst and living without a care, and then having to find our best to survive the folly of our misspent, blind arrogant youth.
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