Quotes

DISUNION – One-hundred-and-fifty years ago, Americans went to war with themselves. Disunion revisits and reconsiders America’s most perilous period – using contemporary accounts, diaries, images and historical assessments to follow the Civil War as it unfolded.

It seems an unlikely marriage — the hard-line Communist state and wealthy Christian capitalists — and it remains to be seen how well the match has been made.

21st Century institutions aren’t about bigger government, it’s about smarter government

It seems that open government initiatives are still more fueled by principles than by evidence of actual value. So the question is: how long will the fuel last?

In the developing world, partially connected and still-connecting states will face a different set of opportunities and challenges.

organizing is a skill that thus far software can only enhance, not replicate…

SPOILER ALERT: Season 05, Episode 01: Setting: 1968. Political climate: Nixon, Humphrey, Wallace election. Henry’s in Nixon’s boat and brings Sterling, Draper, Price on to manage the ad campaign. Megan and Don have an infant son. Will this relationship fizzle after its 15 minutes of fame, only to see Don off to selling tomato soup cans for Nixon’s mug? Season 5 theme: loss of innocence. Vietnam, as the first televised war, brings a loss of innocence to a nation. Sally loses her virginity. Ultimately, Watergate and the demise of the presidency twists the knife in the collective wound. Side stories: Peggy and Ken find their way to each other? Joan’s a widowed mom, Roger doesn’t step up to the plate, though he’d love to taste the food. Advertising struggles with the new evolving individuality and counter-cultural ethos of the anti-establishment generation. A commercializing conundrum: how to market mass production to a culture that rejects conformity? More Madison Avenue ad campaign candy strewn throughout season 5 shows us shifts in the ad and media industries. Season opener song: America by Simon and Garfunkel.
Also featured: Lonely Little Girl by Frank Zappa; Mah nà mah nà by Piero Umiliani
Finale song: Elton John’s Tiny Dancer. It hurts already

“Small Change” dismisses leaderless, self-organizing systems as viable agents of change. A flock of birds flying around an object in flight has no leader yet this beautiful, seemingly choreographed movement is the very embodiment of change. Rudimentary communication among individuals in real time allows many to move together as one–suddenly uniting everyone in a common goal. Lowering the barrier to activism doesn’t weaken humanity, it brings us together and it makes us stronger.

It is very likely they will make some kind of profit on this, and you have to bear in mind that London Transport makes a loss on every single bus and tube journey. So this is a good value transport investment.