[11198] in Public-Access_Computer_Systems_Forum
FINS
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Public-Access Computer Systems For)
Tue Apr 8 21:33:04 1997
Date: Tue, 08 Apr 1997 13:47:37 -0500 (CDT)
From: Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <LIBPACS@UHUPVM1.UH.EDU>
To: Multiple recipients of list PACS-L <PACS-L@UHUPVM1.UH.EDU>
Reply-To: Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <PACS-L@UHUPVM1.UH.EDU>
1 Message; 122 Lines
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From: Vigdor Schreibman - FINS <fins@access.digex.net>
Subject: The People--a fool
-------Republication is Authorized Only When Message is Kept Intact-------
FINS: Communicating the Emerging Philosophy of The Information Age
FEDERAL INFORMATION NEWS SYNDICATE
Vol V, Issue No. 7 (120 lines) April 7, 1997
CLOSING THE "VALUES-GAP":
The People--a fool
By Vigdor Schreibman
Half-century into the reality of the information/knowledge
age, with minds still filled with the wondrous vision of
possibilities, one must, nevertheless, conclude that this
experiment is--for the People--a profound disaster.
It is a bizarre information/knowledge age, in which the
organization of knowledge itself, remains stuck--without any
meaningful improvement. The traditional Library Science model
key topic index is largely where it was half-century ago at
the beginning of the post-modern period--in a grand muddle.
This is the lessons, I draw, in "KNOWLEDGE ORGANIZATION FOR
BETTERMENT OF HUMANKIND," a 7000 word article, written for a
special edition of Systems- Transdyscyplinary Journal of the
Polish Systems Society released online March 30. Republication
rights to the article have been granted to the International
Federation of Library Associations (IFLA), Universal Dataflow
and Telecommunications Core Programme (IFLA UDT Occasional
Paper), at the request of Terry Kuny, IFLANET Administration.
However, the period has been a boon to the super rich, who
in the last 15 years or so have doubled their share of wealth
and income through the devices of, "downsizing," "clean
engineering," "restructuring," and "globalization." Government
has also contributed to corporate welfare during the same
period, with almost a third of a trillion dollars of
appropriated funds for information technology, which has been
"thrown away," without any improvement in government service.
With the massive wealth "mined" out of the economic
marketplace and public treasury, State chartered corporations
have unfairly subverted the political marketplace to severely
undermine the sovereign democratic powers of the People.
What we have found on the Net is chaos, rendering--the
People--a fool. Librarians are fretting over the strategies
for adaptation, fearful that Constitutional resistance to
massive pollution of the marketplace of ideas will be labeled
censorship. When Robert Finch sent a message to the Public
Library discussion list <publib-net@sunsite.berkeley.EDU>,
April 4, brilliantly (I thought) urging resistance to the
demand that they now, "defend the worst along with the best,"
there was silence in response. Public interest organizations
are sulking over the collapse of public confidence in their
pathetic leadership. They are willing to do just about
anything to reach the people, but not by working to empower
the people to take control of their own destiny.
Democratic and Republican loyalists are doing their best to
explain in patient terms why everything is nice. Last week
Public-Access Computer Systems Forum <PACS-L@UHUPVM1.UH.EDU>,
featured Jim Warren and Ridley Kessler doing a loving slow
dance to subtly avoid the real issues that their super rich
clients would prefer to make undiscussable. It was priceless!
Meanwhile, Federal and local police are working, "to keep
poor people in their place," as Mario Cuomo observed, flush
with the success of increasing the population of American
prisons by 100% during the past decade. They are now trying
to keep close watch on the growing class war against the
technological civilization, which is following the central
thesis of the Unabomber. Trial of the Oklahoma bomber, only
exacerbates this concern, since it is obvious that the
defendant is no "mad bomber," but appears to be one very angry
citizen aggrieved by Ruby Ridge and the Branch Davidian, Waco
Holocaust, much like many others Americans angered by an array
of harsh and inequitable conditions.
The secret to sustaining social peace in a democracy is in
facilitating the collective exercise of democratic power
through a technique for democracy or people science, which is
now available [Fins-PS-01]. Corporations can be expected to
act in their own interests. But what about public interest
organizations?
In response to my denunciation of the cowardness and
lethargy of public interest organizations, one advocate
observed, "I think I agree with this, *but* what is it that
you are advocating??? To coin a phrase, What Is To Be Done?"
[Peter Franck, San Francisco, CA National Lawyer's Guild
Committee on Democratic Communications, Cultural Environmental
discussion list, Apr 5]. Peter Franck's question underscores
the tragic/comic situation. There is frustration that no one
seems to hear anything that is not in resonance with their own
empowerment. I have addressed the question raised by Franck
for years, lately with the explicit support of renown scholars
and practitioners of people science, but without positive
response from the public interest community, no probing
exploration, no meaningful dialogue, no nada!
What is to be done, indeed. When I suggest once again last
week that public interest organizations should creatively
adapt to the crisis of democracy by working to democratically
empower the people, the discussion stopped dead in its tracks.
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