there is news.

we have mastered new forms of power, & formed a material production revolution around them. 

& now, later, material productions are doing everything & more agriculture did for hunter-gatherers: turning mass productions into automated operations which require less man-hours & produce more goods.

too, we have devised a huge advancement for the trade routes of information: The Internet.

we have even begun fashioning simple information tools; these leaf-&-stick waterwheels of information are the beginning of un-understandably great semantic tools of the future.

this report is not just to tell us that these things are happening, but to respond, too.

first, for our material production developments, what fates held for the agricultural revolution – the exploitation of the common people by large landowners – we must keep vigilant against with the corporations in ours:

the fruits of industry & automation technology ought to be divided fairly, rather than greedy owners keeping all profits to themselves.

we can do this by subsidizing co-operated factories & upcomingly, automated factories, so that the profits of mass productions of cheap & valuable products can be shared among all participating, rather than most of the money going to a plump few, as is often the case;

more positively, with the automated production revolution we should start seeing a new society taking foothold; one where products are abundant & inexpensive, just like when farms made crops & meat widely accessible, & there should no serious two-ways-about who can afford basic things & who can not; & the playing field should be leveled bothways, so that everyone has comparable basic goods in this life.

as long as the distribution of the fruits of the automated revolution are well-divided – say in a employee-owned automated factory co-op sharing profits evenly – then all of our myriad of products should become cheaper as automated production replaces human hands; at the same time freeing us from work’s drudgeries, & giving us more free-time for what matters most to us —

if the fruits of that labor are kept well-divided.

for the revolution in information trading that the internet is bringing, i propose a system by The People, of The People, & for The People, containing all the myriad [] {to be continued – Ed.}

third, we should pour our research funds into information tools; not into weapons research, not into experimental substances research: into information tools. deductive applications, inference engines, expert systems, maybe even into philosophy programs, & put these powerful items in The People’s hands; in The Government’s hands, in the Non-Profits’ hands, & level the playing field against runaway advancement in commercial areas, where the conflicts of interest are too strong for optimal growth. 

at the same time, we should remove software patents, because it slows our civilization’s progress & boosts commercial advancement out of step with the rest of The World.

let’s do these things so that we may REACH the stars of higher culture thru information technology, & also, so the cultural advancement of powerful corporations *does not* outpace the government’s culture or what the average person has access to: because, for the optimum civilization progress to be made, fundamental insights using information technology should be accessible by all, with the basic required information-infrastructure ready to use, rather than too-powerful of corporations having all the tools & fundamental insights they provide, & the average person being the victim of their advances; & again because we should ALL enjoy the fruits of bounding information technology, & because commercial culture should not become overgrown, we should make these tools public & free, or at least affordable, like other basic utilities are – water, garbage, & electricity – so that everyone has great access to the fountains of culture.

one concrete step to do this is for the government to make a public search engine that is the analog of a public library for all the world’s websites, so that no one company becomes too powerful with information, & then too powerful with money, & then plays the role of a library or government department compounded with conflicted interests, making poor choices poor experiences for the citizens. we should make a public search engine that is the best at what it does, just like the city makes maps of the roads & houses & businesses, & also make applications that help people do basic things, like communicate & share files thru ftp, & provide & maintain them for free or few & affordable dollars.

too, we should subsidize culture itself, & give access to what the low-income kids *want* culturally, to help them grow via their favorite music & books & movies & lectures & pictures & documentaries, etc. this is a civilizational blessing, because we effectively use powerful technology to thrive our culture immensely, improving the actual people, rather than just constant technology improving, which will only pass on thru the generations.

why not help pay for people’s culturation, just like we help pay for their bodily nourishment; food for thought is also important, & we want the most advanced culture we can, really.

& on that note, how about contributing to the greater good of The World, & picking up the tab on getting India electricity & reasonable access to computers; & then when Egypt – a 2nd great historical culture – coalesces into a more stable entity again, we can upgrade this great culture’s computer infrastructure as well, alike ‘civilizational security’, to get them contributing more of their legendary cultures to the global dialogue that is The World Wide Web.

with the changes coming from automated production, the nearly vertical growth in information exchanging, & the new area of making information tools, it is best to have a plan. i hope these thoughts serve as some early ideas in our navigating these revolutions.

thanks.

– joe