[posted in blatant violation of Jorn's (odd) stricture against
politics]

>>>>> "Dave" == Dave Winer <dave@...> writes:

Dave> Kendall, I think it's great that you're doing this. When I
Dave> was on the other side of the fence of the protestors at
Dave> Davos, I wondered what they were saying, and I went looking
Dave> on the web for it, and found nothing.

Yeah, I remember hearing you say that. I *suspect* that it wasn't that
there isn't stuff out there, but that Web geeks like us (whatever our
politics may be) expect certain 'givens' in Web material, and those
are often at odds with activists who use the Web enthusiasitically
but, often, sloppily.

That is, there's a bit of sociological pre-selecting that happens even
on the Web, at least for most folks.

Dave> I didn't feel safe asking them personally because there army
Dave> troops with guns with real bullets and a barricade, and the
Dave> demonstrators were screaming and throwing snowballs with
Dave> firecrackers in them.

Yeah, sure, a protest isn't the place for thoughtful conversation;
typically at these big protests there will be the street activity but
also *lots* of conferences at night as well, and it's there you'll get
the intellectual justification for the street action.

That didn't happen at Davos, as you might guess, because it was such a
remote and relatively isolated place; many activists either had to
stay away or had to prioritize their energies and focused someplace
else.

There were many such conferences during Seattle, many of which were
sponsored and organized by Nader.

Dave> http://scriptingnews.userland.com/stories/storyReader$187

Dave> Not a forum for thoughtful conversation.

Nope, but then, it wasn't meant to be. :>

If you are *really* interested, keep your eyes on the
a16.monkeyfist.com site; I'll be posting news of similar conferences
held in DC during the next month; off the top of my head, there will
be:

- Jubilee 2000 conference (cancelling i18n debt)
- conference on special problems of L. America
- conference from the '50 years is enough' group

Best,
Kendall Clark
--
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