Co-founder and Executive Director of the Sunlight Foundation
Participant: We Media Miami ’10

Ellen S. Miller

SeeClickFix has been sitting in the cross-hairs of two very hot buzzwords recently: Gov20 and HyperLocal.

Both movements are being brought on by the great disruptor that is the Interwebs and both movements are faced with similar questions: What does it mean to have more participants? What value do those participants have and is the value of the original participant (journalist and public official) compromised by greater participation?

At the intersection of Gov and Media is Media’s responsibility to hold government accountable.  The way that responsibility is enacted shifts as Media is forced to be more resourceful and Gov is forced to be more transparent.  As the organism of traditional media is weekend financially by the growth of on-line news one of Journalism’s key functions, being a check on government,  faces a disruption as well. When more and more reporters are losing their jobs how can media properties maintain their function as a 4th branch of government?  Less Journalists means less people doing the investigation and collecting the news. This means that if media wants to continue to hold gov accountable they have to stay resourceful.

Below is a case study of how SeeClickFix is being used by Hyper Local Journalists to maintain their role in a Gov20 world.

Our Partner Doug Hardy, at the Journal Inquirer, has been using a SeeClickFix Pro account to acknowledge and track issues like speeding, downed power lines and unsafe pedestrian areas in the Hartford, CT region. Not only does the Journal Inquirer embed the SeeClickFix map, but Doug also follows up on issues himself and makes sure that they are being listened to by officials.

The Journal Inquirer introduced SeeClickFix to much of the Hartford region adding a layer of accountability to local gov that previously did not exist. Doug now uses the citizen reports to scoop stories on issues like traffic safety and other community concerns.

This kind of accountability has more back-up than a pen and a delivery route though. Doug’s new posse is a crowd of users that can speak and vote publicly on the issues he is reporting. Doug can not only report on the issue but he can display the raw data of citizen voices on SeeClickFix.

In East Hartford, CT it appears that this new form of accountability is quite effective at creating fixes. Doug was kind enough to let me post his article(The Journal Inquirer is participating in another experiment: a Paywall) on East Hartford and SeeClickFix below.

SEECLICKFIX: Problems getting solved in East Hartford
By Doug Hardy
Journal Inquirer
Published: Monday, October 26, 2009 11:52 AM EDT
Some good things have been happening as a result of your reports on the SeeClickFix portion of the Journal Inquirer’s Web site. Three issues have been solved recently in East Hartford, where Mayor Melody A. Currey and public works personnel have taken an active approach and decided to monitor SeeClickFix for your reports. This is a good thing for everyone, as you’ll see below.

“EH Citizen” reported that there has been a deer crossing sign covered in graffiti for more than five years on Oak Street near Farnham Drive.

“It’s an eyesore and you can’t even see the photo on the sign in an area where deer often cross to access Porter Brook. Is this fixable?” EH Citizen wrote, adding that the town had been notified years ago but the sign had yet to be scrubbed clean or replaced.

Fortunately, the East Hartford Public Works Department has built its own watch area on SeeClickFix — which you also can do for free if you want to get involved in solving problems in your community. Within 15 days of reporting the graffiti online, EH Citizen returned and posted this message: “Thanks so much this issue has been fixed. The sign was replaced and looks great now! Thank you!”

You can thank East Hartford for being on the ball. We didn’t need to ask on your behalf. Meanwhile, across town at Main Street and Silver Lane, the pedestrian crossing signal was reported to be too fast, leaving slow-moving folks at risk.

“For pedestrians and bicyclists crossing Main Street at Silver Lane, the time from when the icon turns white and the audible beep starts is barely 10 seconds,” ROC wrote. “This is a wide street, and even on a bike you barely make it. This traffic light should be lengthened so people can cross without fearing for their lives. It’s called a crosswalk for a reason, should favor the crosser.”

After suggesting that the state Department of Transportation be contacted directly, within about a month ROC reported that the signal time had been lengthened appropriately. Kudos for your effort, ROC.

A third issue that was closed in East Hartford was reported by Bob Hobbs — a dead tree was menacing the power lines on Bodwell Road near Burnside Avenue. He provided a photo. Hobbs posted the issue directly on East Hartford’s Web site — which is always advisable if you want anything to get done — and got a response from Public Works Director Billy G. Taylor:

“The tree is privately owned,” Taylor wrote. “Consequently, the town cannot simply lawfully remove it. Under authority given to me by town ordinances, I sent a letter to the owner of record ordering the tree’s removal. The letter has just been returned by the USPS marked ‘undeliverable.’ Having never removed a tree on private property without delivering the owner the notice required by ordinance, I do not know what authority I have to remove it. In any case, the Public Works budget is insufficient to allow removal of trees on private property and I do not have the authority under the town charter to overexpend the budget.”

So no progress there. Town records list three names on the property card, but I was told all three were renters.

Then we got some help from Jon Searles, an East Hartford resident whose brainflation.wordpress.com blog describes him as both a concerned citizen and chairman of the 6th District Committee of the East Hartford Republican Town Committee. He also is a Town Council candidate in the municipal election.

Searles either reported the tree directly to Connecticut Light & Power himself or he found an existing report. He provided a report number for CL&P’s Web site, and we then found that the utility company visited in September and noted that the tree was “overhanging the lines,” But the report then said, “RESOLUTION — No Trouble Found.”

Based on that, it didn’t look like CL&P was going to take action.

But about two weeks ago — and after more than 20 comments and e-mails between residents, town officials, and myself — Hobbs reported that the tree had been cut back and the lines were no longer threatened.

Somone had taken it upon themselves to chop off the top of the dead tree. Whoever you are, thanks for helping to improve the community.

Doug Hardy is an associate editor of the Journal Inquirer. He can be reached at dhardy (at)journalinquirer.com or 860-646-0500, ext. 305.
This is a true testimony to the magic of a system that allows for open communication and collaborative problem solving around public concerns. You can really see how media, industry, government and private citizens can work together to improve their communities:

Back in the September, I wrote that “one of the fundamental tasks of design and business is to stand between revolutions and life, to help people deal with change.” That was the premise of The Right Brain Rules, a strategic vision and a portfolio of assets for creating value into the future.

Allison Arieff goes beyond  by proposing a national design policy. “Design touches all sectors of our daily life, and increasing awareness of that reality can result in tremendous benefit for all,”  Arieff writes in her New York Times blog.  “Our entire economic system could do with a redesign. which would help bolster American competitiveness at a time when we can use all the help we can get and enable the government to properly promote and measure the (only) remaining competitive advantage of American goods and services: their design.”

DC designers have taken the lead in  a DC Magazine competition organized by Richard Smith. The entries, shown below, should get you excited about currency again.

There’s a media and technology feeding frenzy in Washington. Failing U.S. newspapers are looking for a bailout from the government; nonprofits, telecoms and policy wonks are scrambling to have their say and get their piece of the economic stimulus action – a few billion dollars – to expand broadband networks AND create more content and services to justify it. Talk about sharks and chum. Meanwhile, in case you missed it, Bizjournals reported on the poorest and wealthiest cities in the U.S.. It takes seven families in Camden, New Jersey, to match the median household income of one family in McLean, Virginia. A 25-year-old war in Sri Lanka is said to be winding down – but the government there won’t let journalists into war zones to see for themselves. So we observed, quietly, fleetingly, remotely, another World Press Freedom Day this week. One day of freedom and remembrance for the dead seemed somehow – sad? prophetic? – against years of decline, layoffs, bankruptcies. Who’s on the local freedom beat in your community? Simple question, no? Makes you wonder why the world’s press doesn’t champion freedom every day. Ah, right, because some days there’s other business to attend to.

Over on my Fast Company Experts blog, I have issued a challenge.

Here is what I wrote:

I have come to the conclusion that most (maybe all) business and strategy books are useless. They over-generalize. They offer little value. I go in with such high expectations, based on reviews and descriptions, and am almost universally disappointed.

For a project that I am working on, I want to be find the business and strategy books that do help, that really deliver value.  I want to find the must reads.

I want books that offer guidance and support on how to start and run a effective businesses and organizations.  I’m looking for authors who really understand how to change people’s minds or understand their behavior.  I know there must be a book out there that can help me (and others) to be organized and efficient, creative, and successful. And of course, I want to find a book that offers really good advice on how to break through and make a difference/impact in today’s connected society.

I have been trying for years, with nothing to show for it.  So now, I am asking for help.

If you are an author, a publisher, or just a reader — you can help.  Read the full post and send me your suggestions.  C’mon WeMedia community, this seems right up your alley.

I will share everything that people send me and try, through my blogging and other outreach, to help others figure out what to read. So please, help me find the must reads.

Technology and the internet have given us greater control over our own media experience – what information we get and share, how we spend our time, and to whom we are connected.  We are more diverse as a society, more informed as individuals, and more involved as communities.  So what?

This morning I read a column from Media Post about Heather and Mike Spohrs, whose daughter, Madeline, passed away suddenly of respiratory syncytial virus, complicated by her premature birth just 17 months earlier.  My wife, Karen Dahl, and I spent a couple of hours the other night, after reading about their story on a blog, reading the twitter updates and blog posts that detailed Madeline’s illness and watching videos and slide shows remembering her short life.  My wife cried.  I ran upstairs to look in on our 17-month old son, Henry, who was sleeping, and put my hand on his back to feel him breathe, just because I could.

The column was about marketing, but the larger message was that social media gives us the power to change the world — something we have been talking about in the context of WeMedia for years.  But more than anything, social media reflects the way we are as people.

As the author, Kristi Faulker, noted:

Let there be no more doubt that the on-line community is, in fact, a community in the truest, human sense. Social media is the uber-gathering space — better than a beauty shop, supermarket, diner, church, pub, firehouse, school, and town square rolled into one. The scale of Facebook or Twitter is global. Yet, when a human story touches our hearts, we react as intently as we would to a crisis in our own neighborhood.

But she also identified a major challenge that comes up in the context of marketing, and really how organizations communicate generally:

As marketers, we seek to quantify the power and penetration of nascent social platforms. What percentage of the target audience is engaged in Twitter? How many women 34-55 are on Facebook? How many eyeballs does this blog get compared to that one? And for heaven sakes, what’s our ROI?

Too many organizations look at social media only as a tactic, another channel, or an opportunity to expand their relationship with the audience for the purpose of increasing sales.  All of those things are true about social media — these new tools and communities that form through them have seemingly unlimited potential from a branding and marketing standpoint.  But if that is your only focus, or your only understand how what social communities online represent, you are missing out on quite a bit.  And by missing out, I mean you are failing to recognize the reasons why people join these communities in the first place, what their expectations are for how the companies and groups they engage should act, and their desire to have an impact in the world that is larger than just one purchase or action.  Not only will that limit what you can achieve from a branding and marketing standpoint, in short time, it might take you out of the conversation completely.

When I forwarded the column to my wife, a nonprofit professional and part-time marketer, she wrote back “If only more companies did TRUE good things to take advantage of the communities they could SERVE instead of just using their ‘good’ deeds to SELL stuff to us. We’re not just connected, we care and we’re not idiots who can’t see through to the true intentions.”

As usual, Karen said it better than I ever could.

Take heed marketers (and everyone else) – you have more tools and opportunities available to you in a connected society than ever before, but more is expected of you as well.  Everything about how you operate, communicate, educate, engage, and activate people must change.  You must change as well, on the inside.  Don’t believe me?  Keep doing what you are doing… I’ll be here waiting when the audience figures you out.

Google announced this week that they were creating a venture capital arm whose main objective will be to turn a profit.  The group, called Google Ventures, is expected to invest up to $100 million in the next 12 months.

The New York Times article on the announcement notes that “Google will tap the connections of its employees and its ties to the venture capital world to find promising startups in areas like the Internet, clean technology and life sciences” and that “the venture unit comes as Google is rethinking the mission of Google.org, its corporate philanthropy, which has invested in areas like clean energy. Some of those investments will now be made by the venture unit.”

Good idea, Google… but you can do better.

First, I would argue that if you want to launch a successful venture fund, and invest in ideas that will make your company money, you have to do things differently than the rest of the VC community (or most of them anyway).  Second, because you are Google, you actually have the resources to be able to do that — if you are willing.

What am I talking about?

1) You should look at funding companies that use of technology in new and innovative ways while also having the potential for a social return. There will always be new technologies to deploy — but in most/all cases, technology is not what will drive real change in our society.  And real change is what drives the potential for profit.  I challenge you to invest in process, curriculum, and training for people across the sectors where you are most interested (energy and the environment) — and not just in tools.  If you do, you can help people learn how to use these new technologies that are developed and apply them to have a real impact in the world.  You can also change the way we think about technology and its role in solving problems in our society (just have you, through Google, have changed the way we think about access to information).

2) You should do more than just invest in companies.  New startups are created every day, and some of them are very good. Most of them, however, are going to fail — because the people behind the ideas don’t understand the massive changes that are underway in our society, the expectations of the public (or how to meet them), nor the community’s willingness (or in some cases ability) to change behaviors and embrace new things.  I challenge you to teach startups how to operate differently, and to demand new and creative ways of running organizations that ensure sustainability (not in the environmental context, though that is nice) and long-term impact.  Whether that’s a new balance sheet (as we talk about at WeMedia), a double bottom line, or a new way of driving something bigger and better than our out-dated ways of running companies, by doing so you will be acknowledging that the key to success going forward is going to be about more than a good product or widget (and that is important). If you do, you can change the entire marketplace – and everything that feeds it (like business schools, and how the media assesses success).

3) You should ask the community for help and be transparent. Venture capital firms tend to operate in secrecy… when the goal is to invest in a successful company that will result in huge financial benefits for investors, everyone wants to have an advantage. Competition is fierce.  But today’s economy is driven by collaboration and cooperation.  The best ideas aren’t going to come out of Silicon Valley alone or from within the rolodexes of your best employees.  The community, online especially, can help you to find great ideas and great companies — or where a need exists, help to create a company or a solution worth investing in.  I challenge you to ask for help, to allow a larger group of people to contribute ideas and help you to determine where to invest.  Don’t make it impossible to get a meeting or pitch an idea.  Invest early on, not just when a team has build a group of MBAs and other entrepreneurial veterans to lead their effort.  Open your doors to the world, show us your thinking, and encourage everyone to join you in the projects that you believe are worth pursuing.  If you do, not only can you find better ideas, and end up making more money, you can help more than just Google succeed.

The world is changing, in part because of the work that you do every day at Google. There is nothing wrong with making money, and I wish you the best of luck.  Whether you take my challenge(s) or not, recognize that there is more than you can do.  And the more you do, I believe, the better you will do as well (i.e. make more money).  Don’t settle for Google Ventures being just be one of the biggest funders in the world, make it one of the best as well.

I owe you an apology.  Part of my role is to help manage the blog and keep the conversation among those in the WeMedia community going strong.  I dropped the ball in a big way. I haven’t posted since the WeMedia conference at the end of February.  I haven’t followed up on many of the ideas that were shared in Miami or with the people who helped launch those ideas.  And I haven’t kept you apprised as we plan for the future, or had a chance to ask for help.  I promise you, I will do better.

I don’t want you think that I haven’t been doing anything over the past month.  Quite the opposite.  I have been doing a lot of thinking, writing, and connecting — trying to make sense out of everything that came out during WeMedia and what role I can play to help keep things moving forward.  This is an going process for sure, but some things are becoming clearer to me.

Here is where my head is on two big things (today):

• We need a complete reset… a new approach to just about everything we are doing.  Dale introduced the concept of the new balance sheet at WeMedia, but that is just one part of the whole equation.  I wrote a post for my Fast Company blog about this idea this morning – and how everything needs to change.   The short version goes something like this: the challenges that we are facing in our society, and the opportunities that we want to pursue, require more than just an update to our existing plans or a tweak to the models that we are currently using.  We keep talking about how individual groups are succeeding or how one piece of action is going to spark the kind of global transformation we all know is possible. I think that’s too narrow a view.  Big challenges require big changes to the way we think and act.

• There is something about being a ‘must-read’… and that something holds the key to the future of media (and everything else too).  I am doing some writing about what makes something worth reading (or watching, listening to, etc), and have had some incredible conversations with people about this subject in the past few weeks.  What I know is that being a ‘must-read’ is more about about the quality of the information or experience, and less about the format or mechanism for delivery.  That seems obvious, but it re-affirms my belief that media isn’t the only way that ideas are communicated or influence is applied, and that technology doesn’t completely answer the question of why people do, or do not, get and share information the same way they used to.  You see, if something achieves that must-read status, people will pay for it, pass it around, make time to consider it, and the like — at least enough people to create a marketplace, or shift thought, or drive changes in behavior.  That’s a big deal.

These are just two of the thoughts bouncing around in my head — there are many more, and I hope some clarity about each of these hiding somewhere as well.  I promise to use this blog, and the WeMedia community to help figure them out, instead of trying to keep all those details inside.  I can’t do it without you, but together I feel confident we can do some real damage (in a good way).

I need your help though – your thoughts on what makes something a must read, or your ideas on how a complete reset my be applied to your work (whether its business, or social change, education, politics and government, or anything else).  Post a comment, drop me a note [ brian [at] wemedia dot com], craft a post and send it to us to share, etc. We have a lot of work to do coming out of WeMedia, and it all begins (again) now.

My daughter Amanda took the above photo in Nepal. The picture on the right is of my new granddaughter, Elizabeth Jane. I thought of them as I discovered The Girl Effect, a project from the Nike and UN Foundation that stunned global leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

The big idea: unlocking the potential of adolescent girls in all parts of the world could have tremendous social and economic impact.

Two flashpoints for the consideration of every father and grandfather: (1) For every development dollar spent, girls receive less than one-half of one percent. (2) A woman or a girl will reinvest 90% of their income on family, a man 30-40%.

The Girl Effect is the powerful change that occurs when girls have the opportunity to participate in their society. Starting now, “Learn, Change, Share” joins the lexicon of We Media’s “End of Apathy.”

Watch the video that is spreading the story.

At last week’s We Media Miami conference we introduced an agenda for smart capitalism in the New Now. Our economic stimulus package: reboot capitalism with a fresh look at people, outcomes, connections and creativity. We also presented a better balance sheet for companies and organizations to express their stories and report results.

20th Century capitalism was dumb: unfairly distributed, mortgaged and borrowed, destructive to communities, toxic, shallow, filled with air, and ultimately unsustainable. It came crashing down in the lost, first decade of the 21st Century.

21th Century capitalism must be smarter. We must grow and create a new economy by making capitalism attainable, equitable, resilient and sustainable. To achieve this we must make all citizens smarter, healthier, happier, and wealthier. Capitalism must be accessible to all. We believe that media, technology and a connected society – the Power of Us — are the mechanisms for change. Our agenda:

Income to Outcomes: Economics that merely measure financial numbers represent a weak story. We’ve learned the hard way that it’s the wrong story: a misleading mythology, except to the quants among us. The new story: tangible human outcomes and an authentic value proposition. The right outcomes drive the new income. The old question: Are we richer today than we were yesterday? The new question: What makes us rich?

Transactions to Connections: Creating a marketplace for transactions is so 20th Century. Control access, distribution and flow of goods, services and information. Thrive by dominating or controlling the channels. What happens when almost everyone has their own channel, their own marketplace, or free and immediate access to one? The flow becomes the currency. The quality of connections becomes the differentiation. 21st Century capitalism is powered by the quality of connections. The goal is not merely to trade, but to amplify connections and community, co-create and collaborate.

Products to people: Dumb capitalism is powered by capital seeking the lowest cost of production. It disappoints with products and services that meet the lowest expectations – or unrealistic ones — or occupy the shortest shelf life. Smart capitalism empowers people to seek the capital to create, invent and innovate. It rewards skill, dedication, execution, craftsmanship and service – people investing in people.

Productivity to creativity: Creativity is hard to measure, manage and model, so the quants focus on productivity instead. The result is dumb: we’re producing more and more of the same stuff and its worth less and less. Smart capitalism focuses on economic creativity, because creativity establishes new value, instead of just shifting the old value around. So smart growth is creative, not merely productive.

Many We Media participants embraced the agenda, which has brewing for some time. Leaders attending the World Economic Forum in Davos addressed these and other ideas with considerable disagreement. Several participants at We Media, as well as members of the We Media Community, have suggested that the original agenda was extreme.

We’ve modified some of the original language at We Media for clarity of intention. For example, “outcomes, not income” has become “income to outcomes” as a way of expressing the transition from dumb capitalism to smart capitalism, rather than implying — either incorrectly or inadvertently – that income no longer matters. Of course it does; as capitalists, we’re all for income. The point is that in 21st Century capitalism, income will derive from tangible, human outcomes. The same thinking applies to the transitions in transactions/connections, products/people, and productivity/creativity.

We’re looking to the creativity and connections of people for more advanced outcomes around the agenda. Send us your thoughts and ideas. Smarter is a better choice than the dumb legacy we’ve been given.

The sky is falling! Newspapers aren’t going to survive. They’re declaring bankruptcy en masse. The Seattle Post Intelligencer is the latest considering going digital-only, I was told last night at We Media, along with the San Francisco Chronicle. Others already have given up some or all of their print editions. TV networks are bleeding, book publishers are laying off hundreds, magazines are shuttering. Even Web advertising is down for the big guys.

And, yet, it’s a time of incredible creative foment, when tools of creation, distribution and connection — and the ability to make money from it all — have been given to more of us than ever. When multi-billion-dollar companies can be created in a few years on the back of a search algorithm or by using the Web’s distributive power to sell books and the Kindle electronic book reader. When solo bloggers can make fine livings with nothing more than a laptop, energy and a few writing and coding skills. And connections  the technology gives us all the ability to make. (Witness Ushahidi’s ability to save lives using open-source tools avaialble to all)

Last night at the We Media conference opening reception, I asked keynoter John Zogby, the noted pollster (who was flogging his new book , “The Way We’ll Be”), about this dissonance, about what he finds in his survey of America, this odd mix of hype and near-hysteria about the economic downturn against the more than half-full part of the glass I also see.

He, like many , cited Schumpeter’s creative destruction. And he said that while the American people get it (they have adjusted to lower pay and expectations, and realize what’s happening, and have been realizing it lo these past 15 years), it seems our institutions haven’t, that they don’t realize what’s happening to them. (That in a way is a quick definition of Schumpeter’s thesis: that the big don’t get it and fall as the upstarts come in to disrupt them.) He also framed much of his remarks  in terms of his findings that apparently form the foundation of his book: 18-29 year-olds are part of a new, international world citizenry, more interested in making friends and connection via interest than geography, able to travel widely and easily, expecting to have 10 or more places of employment in their lives, expecting to feel personally empowerd.

It is odd, though, that the institutions are ultimately a combine of the people who presumably “get” what Zogby says they do. Zogby and We conducted a poll that supports the assertion of distrust in institutions: “Americans are deeply dissatisfied with the leadership currently provided by large companies, government and traditional media – and they are not confident the leadership from these groups will improve in the future.”  The poll found much more confidence in small business, entrepreneurship and science. In the words of We Media co-founder Andrew Nachison, it’s “a historic, global shift in human behavior and organization. A new era.”

(An aside: I remember the feeling of disorientation I felt in 1997 in Hong Kong, having gone there for Handover of the territory back to China from Britain. It was early days of the Web. I was the founding international producer of ABCNEWS.com, and was there on my first international assignment for the site. It was me, my camera, and a reporter’s notebook, shooting video of artists, dissidents, shoppers, businesspeople, politicians, and putting it up for all to see, combined with a bunch of writing and still photos. Total cost: airfare, hotel room, and some telecommunications and videotape. In the hotel, the news anchors like Peter Jennings and Ted Koppel had taken over a floor, running thick cable, established large editing suites and lit studios, spending, I would guess, hundreds of thousands of dollars to put together their broadcasts. Of course, the order of magnitude was incomparable, as was the quality. But I felt, then, the beginnings of a gulf between the solo and institutional practitioner — even though I was part of the institution — that is now coming home to roost more strongly.)

Download this thinking paper (PDF)

Most Americans believe small business, science and tech leaders will lead the U.S. to a better future – not the news media, government or large corporations. That’s the key finding from a new We Media/Zogby survey released today in conjunction with the 2009 We Media Miami conference. You can find and discuss the findings here.

Like all surveys, this one is a snapshot in time – and given the times, not that surprising. The world is in a world of mess made worse by failing big businesses and inept governments. Big media is tumbling too.

But it correlates with what Dale and I have been forecasting for nearly a decade: a historic, global shift in human behavior and organization. A new era.

The New Now

While the marketers and lords of commerce were playing with our futures, the future itself was emerging in ways that broke dramatically from the past. Technology, economics and human creativity converged to shape the post-collapse era, the connected and empowered culture we call the New Now.

In the connected culture we can no longer claim ignorance, innocence
or powerlessness. Great forces of authority, perception and commerce
compete for our attention and submission. What’s changed is that we
can compete back. And we are.

Something big is emerging – a culture broadly redefined and organized around individuals, creativity, empowerment and responsibility – and enriched, as we’ve long anticipated, by the continuous flow of information through ubiquitous digital networks. In his book The Way We’ll Be, John Zogby writes optimistically of what he sees in today’s 20-somethings – global, digital natives, diverse and accepting of differences, and hungry for solutions. We see that too in our work at iFOCOS: an emerging culture of passion and purpose – in business, in life, in everything.

The public’s sense of who will lead us to a better future reflects the failures of the 20th Century’s biggest and most influential institutions.  Dissatisfaction with the news media, corporations and government runs deep. So in The New Now Americans look elsewhere. They reflect a business imperative for leadership and social responsibility, and an opportunity for all of us to inform, define and provide that leadership. If big business, government or the media won’t lead, we’ll lead ourselves. We’ll create our own businesses and our own media to build a better future.

No matter where you sit or what you do, that’s a call to action to participate, to inspire hope and bring prosperity to more people. It’s an agenda for everyone: Lead us to a better future.

Here’s a longer thinking paper on the End of Apathy. This is a new and expansive agenda for us, our new album – and it’s a work in progress. We’d love your feedback and input as we aim to fill in the details in the next few months. We’re also eager to bring The New Now and The End of Apathy into companies and organizations that want to learn more about the agenda and how to apply it. If you’d like to follow up, contact me via the We Media Community.