3/30/2004 01:02:00 PM

{capturing comments for my later use}

I am in contact, embodied and disembodied, with more people directly due to the new communication platforms now available than in all of the "good old days" before widespread adoption of digital social augmentation.

I think that concerns of this nature, that are widespread in the literature and in the generalized social consciousness of the post-industrial world, speak more to the fear of losing certain social patterns, tools and customs than they do to any inherently "dehumanizing" danger in the new social configurations chosen by individuals and communities due to the their enabling technologies.

Toni's point is well taken nevertheless. We need the dissenting voices and cautionary dystopias of our artists and authors, our scientists and technologists, our prophets and priests, as much as we need their revolutions and utopias. This is part of the reason we need to earnestly protect the values that underlie and drive the emerging processes and structures that make up our digital age. Examples of this at this moment are the potential loss of the end-to-end principal of the Internet, the destruction of innovation through incumbent sponsored copyright law misuse, Digital ID initiatives and their privacy ramifications... and the list could go on for longer than the character limitation on this comment will allow.