Note : Ideas not in flow. Don’t read words inside brackets. They are tangential conversations.
In 2001, Jimmy ‘Jimbo’ Wales came up with a concept. A concept, which defied the economics of money. The idea was to share knowledge for free. Imagine a magician or a doctor doing that. Knowledge got you money. Quite ludicrous. It would be shot down for sure.
Creedy: [desperately shooting at the approaching V] Die! Die! Why won’t you die?… Why won’t you die? V: Beneath this mask there is more than flesh. Beneath this mask there is an idea, Mr. Creedy, and ideas are bulletproof.Imagine a world without ORS (it saves many lives in africa), Micro-Finance, Beatles, Non-Violence, Wal-Mart… Ideas are powerful weapons. Every generation falls under a single ‘IDEA’. Since 1600, the barrage of scientific ideas meant the decentralization of Science from Religion, of Thought from Belief and of Reason from Faith.
With Industrial Revolution and Colonization came ideas of capitalism, free-markets and transportation. World Wars gave berth to Hitler, Israel, Nuclear Bombs and Cold War.
At that time in India, 1947 gave us meaning to lost lives, democracy, Sovereignty, Nehru and Freedom.Then consumerism took centre stage with cars, television, clothes and refrigerators. Newton, Churchill, Ambani….
So what is today’s idea? Internet is not an idea it is technology. My take: Wikipedia.
Free-market economics is based on value-based trading. Most of us work (in broader sense study, live, eat….) to buy capital, i.e. to earn money. Wars were fought for land, resources and people, which is capital. Money was the final answer. Try questioning every answer and see where it leads? The last meaningful answer would be ‘I want to be happy’. Happiness is equated with capital, which is quite true. Simple equations, with simple human solutions.
But, Jimbo believed that people thought of knowledge, not as a licensed commodity which could be marketed at a premium, but as free goods which can be given readily upon asking. This grew alongside FOSS (Free and Open Source Software).
Today, Wiki is a success. Britannica, which is edited by committed professionals who work for money, is struggling to compete. Imagine making this jump. 
You need a rope from the sky or you need a run-up. Stimulus plan. (On that front, rope from the sky is similar to a tax-cut). Wiki needed a push. Why?
Because.
As, the second-law of Thermodynamics (Without bhaav or scene: Any system becomes more chaotic as the days go by) fails in this case.
Any system grows chaotic as it moves away from origin (that’s why we have bubble bursts, which facilitates in creative destruction, which I vaguely think can be correlated to Darwinism). As the editors and pages in Wikipedia grew, it became less chaotic and more precise. It worked on a concept called the ‘Economies of scale’, which means that for Wiki to be a success it needs to happen in a massive scale, massive is not just ‘Wal-mart’ massive or China massive, much bigger than that.
Assume you want to make software, immaterial of the demand population (1 or 1 million) you have the ability to churn out a decent software.Wiki defies all this.
So how did Wiki work? How did it grow to a massive scale when it was implemented at the mini-scale where it needed a set of people to work with a commitment without expecting any returns? What was the ’stimulus package’?
There answer lies with…
Al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda has its ‘terror network’ operating from Manila to Manhattan. They voice their opinions through various communication channels. Training cells, operation modules, modus operandi, agendas and more. They work like an organization without regional barriers towards one cause. Terrorize humanity. The concept of ‘Terror-States’ are no more. Just like wiki, interested people can gather and participate on a sound platform. Terrorists don’t receive a salary slip. What was the ‘rope from the sky’, they got?
JAAGORE, was an innovative campaign headed by Jasmine Shah. I was a little skeptical about this. But, i heard him speak about this. These are ideas which need the rope from the sky. What is that rope?
You see this rope in Blogging, You tube and Citizen Journalism and many more. People are writing not for pay-checks, people are making films not for the box-office, people are turning into reporters not for the salaries. Fame? Maybe. But I guess the answer is that the tools to express oneself have been democratized.
So, don’t turn a blind eye to your urges. Why can’t we wage a war against poverty in spite of corruption? Why can’t we give educate every child if we all form communities and fight it with modern tools and technology? Why can’t we lower emissions? If terrorism can create an impact with so many barriers, why can’t all these other communities create an impact.Yes, the roads are bad, the poor are hungry, there is blood on the streets of Gaza, there is AIDS, but Al-Qaeda has taught me that a small, well-k’net’ community of people, deeply motivated by a common goal, are able to work efficiently against all odds, and create a huge impact on the global map.
Tools to express ($$)
Filed under: Uncategorized , Al-Qaeda, Open source, Poverty, Stimulus, tax-cuts, Terrorism, Wiki, Wikipedia
