The World is Flat!

[Free Digital Universe]

Thomas Friedman in his book "Globalization 3.0," contends people from far-flung places will become principal players in the global marketplace. I completely agree, the poor will develop out of poverty by gaining access to the Global Village existing around nation states, in a realm of wireless space dubbed "Cyber," it is very exciting times to be living in, one in which the world is again Flat. I suggest you prepare.

In his latest book, The World is Flat, Friedman describes the unplanned cascade of technological and social shifts that effectively leveled the economic world, and "accidentally made Beijing, Bangalore and Bethesda next-door neighbors."

Today, "individuals and small groups of every color of the rainbow will be able to plug and play." Friedman's list of "flatteners" includes the fall of the Berlin Wall; the rise of Netscape and the dotcom boom that led to a trillion dollar investment in fiber optic cable; the emergence of common software platforms and open source code enabling global collaboration; and the rise of outsourcing, offshoring, supply chaining and insourcing.

Friedman says these flatteners converged around the year 2000, and "created a flat world: a global, web-enabled platform for multiple forms of sharing knowledge and work, irrespective of time, distance, geography and increasingly, language." At the very moment this platform emerged, three huge economies materialized -- those of India, China and the former Soviet Union --"and three billion people who were out of the game, walked onto the playing field."

A final convergence may determine the fate of the U.S. in this final chapter of globalization. A "political perfect storm," as Friedman describes it -- the dotcom bust, the attacks of 9/11, and the Enron scandal -- "distract us completely as a country." Just when we need to face the fact of globalization and the need to compete in a new world, "we're looking totally elsewhere."

[Peace Portal]

It is absolutely possible, I would say even ultimately inevitable that every individual fits into and is passionately participating in a future where everyone's identities, narratives, and belief systems are mutually enhancing and complementary.

What this will take is a evolution from our current industrial socio-economic model based on competition between countries, cultures, and individuals to an information age model that reflects the Global Village in which we live. If peoples passions can become the basis of creating value, then they will simultaneously be able to grow out of poverty, be happy, and reduce the need for use of natural resources to create wealth via manufacturing - all this is possible in a knowledge market now made common due to communications technology like the Internet.

The use of technology alone is not enough, as important to development of a prosperous knowledge (passion) global village is a common legal jurisdiction or set of rules, common unencumbered currency, and a means for exchange of that currency at local levels. An association I belong too that includes charities, corporations, and non-governmental organizations are currently working to implement this plan; the participants and some of the projects are explained at www.peaceportal.mobi, the global village law forum is at www.freedigitaluniverse.com, and the common banking/money system earned in the virtual universe is at www.epaycafe.com - feel free to look further into this complex legal arrangement and you'll find a flat world, waiting for a common flat currency that allows those left behind in the accumulation of industrial age wealth to finally join in global prosperity.

Furthermore, a healthy community requires a healthy planet with enough physical resources to meet the needs of local populations; the industrial model of wealth coming from extraction of natures resources is no longer viable, instead a system where wealth is based on peoples creative passions such as music, literature, art, software development, marketing, consulting, and videos (collectively "knowledge products") must replace nature as the basis of wealth. It is coming, we have no choice, and we do have the technology. What humanity needs to understand is that we are in the process of an Age Change, and that ages are defined by their "economic models" more than anything else; although we have information technology we have yet to develop a new economic model, the time has come to embrace something new, the time has come for humanity to play a new game.