June 15, 2010 10:28 AM | by JACQUES ATTALI

Let's hope for once, that a disaster can be turned into good news.
Certainly, BP deepwater oil spill leak in the Gulf of Mexico is a disaster
for the ecosystem; it is also for the local economy, which will have to
interrupt uncountable activities; for President Obama, who has allowed the
drilling in deepwater for another 28 wells in operation in the Gulf of
Mexico, threatened to be shut.

 

For shareholders of BP (with millions of
British pensioners) whose assets lost $ 50 million, and should receive nothing
next June 27, while 10 billion dollars were due to be distributed. For the
company, which may have to spend 40 billion dollars to pay all the damages,
to borrow more than the U.S. $ 20 billion which its balance sheet allows to
easily find on the markets and even be threatened with political bankruptcy,
like Yukos in its time, in a context where no insurance company will accept
to cover, except at a prohibitive price and for the British government,
whose international image is tarnished by a company which does not though 
carry the name of the country since 1998; for deeply affected Transatlantic
relations, whereas in a symmetrical situation, in 1998, the British had not
accused the United States for the deaths of 167 people on a well in the
North Sea operated by an American company sorely deficient; finally, bad
news for Europe, which once again has no strategy, while its energy
independence is threatened by the reduction in investment of one of its
biggest companies, for the greatest financial and political benefit of the
Gulf countries and their national oil companies.
Yet the disaster could turn into good news if it was an opportunity to
 understand that as the subprime crisis, the root cause is not in the
specific negligence of the oil companies (after that of the bankers), but in
the collective unconscious to risk, in the absurd desire for Americans to
consume more than they can afford: as they have mortgaged the future by
going into debt, they are consuming 20% of the world's oil, while they
produce only 2% and they represent only 5% of the world population. And as
they yielded to their bank lobby, they obeyed their oil lobby.

We can then dream of seeing America and Europe understand that they cannot
leave to their energy producing companies, so fundamental to the future of
our countries, the whole weight of the repair of the negligent acts that
their governments asked them to commit. And they should initiate a radical
action to consume much less oil, and very quickly. In any case, this crisis
is like a final warning before the peak oil (expected by some in 2015, and
whose occurrence is accelerated by the slowdown in drilling in deepwater),
puts an end to cheap oil, making the fortune of oil companies and
precipitates the ruin of nations.

Source: http://blogs.lexpress.fr/attali/

 

Folowing up my last post about the way the internet (and therefore IT) is changing YOUR life. I want to talk to you about an intersting project that will probably change the next generation relationship with the machine.
In order to have access to the "Matrix", you need an interface, a machine. Thats where problems start! We're obviously not equal in terms of material and knowledge even in western countries.

What is XO: The Children's Machine
The XO is a potent learning tool designed and built especially for children in developing countries, living in some of the most remote environments. It’s about the size of a small textbook. It has built-in wireless and a unique screen that is readable under direct sunlight for children who go to school outdoors. It’s extremely durable, brilliantly functional, energy-efficient, and fun. 

The laptop was designed collaboratively by experts from both academia and industry, bringing to bear both extraordinary talent and many decades of collective field experience in every aspect of this non-profit humanitarian project.

 

 

XO Laptop Handout

The result is a unique harmony of form and function; a flexible, ultra low-cost, power-efficient, responsive, and durable machine with which nations of the emerging world can leapfrog decades of development—immediately transforming the content and quality of their children’s learning.

Free software

To enhance performance and reliability while containing costs, The laptop is not burdened by the bloat of excess code, the “feature-itis” that is responsible for much of the clumsiness, unreliability, and expense of many modern laptops. We intend for laptop to start up in an instant—faster than any commercial laptop now available—and move briskly through its operations.

The laptop is an open-source machine: free software gives children the opportunity to fully own the machine in every sense. While we don't expect every child to become a programmer, we don't want any ceiling imposed on those children who choose to modify their machines. We are using open document formats for much the same reason: transparency is empowering. The children—and their teachers—will have the freedom to reshape, reinvent, and reapply their software, hardware, and content.

http://laptop.org/en/vision

As always, feel free to leave a comment.

Hi dear reader,

welcome back, it's been a while since the last post on my blog.
For those who don't know, the website has been closed for few weeks due to a travel in Japan and a hack that I didn't have time to fix because of this travel.

In fact,  I wanted to upgrade my website a long time ago because it was getting old (started in 2006). This event has definitely pushed me to do it.

 

The reflection inspired with this is that things happens when they're mean to happen of course but most of that, our relation with the concept of "time" and change.

I guess it's more precise to say things happen WHEN we're ready to let them happen.

I wasn't probably ready to change the version of website or let the former version of this site go, this means that I wasn't ready for the "detachment".

I found out that I was actually attached to the old version of my website amongst other things and stuff...so what is the link with the time?

Well I think this demonstrate how we become old, the boundary between a conservative attitude for consistency and tradition and non-evolution is really tiny.

 

The fact that someone hacked my website, forced me to move and be ready to do something that I wanted and had to do for a while but was refusing in the same time because of attachement.

Therefore there is a time factor for evolution and adaption to new and to change...I suppose that we all have our internal "clock of change", it's a matter of listen to this clock to be in harmony with yourself and the rhythm of each of us evolution cycle according to external factor...!?

The reason why I choose to write about this topic to re-open the new version is because my life has changed (probably like yours), and therefore my focus. I guess that the change that Obama has promised during a year of campaing is how happening!!!!
Everything is about change now including this website: climate change, government change, economical change etc...it seems to happens faster and faster in western socity.

Beside, my position of web consultant in Sydney pushes me to analyse the web 2.0 differently and how the change happens due to new social network concept.

The majority of Web 2.0 site now are sort of "alive machine" that evolves with users and their content.

I'll talk more about this concept soon and explain how it is affecting people's life and therefore push their "change clock".

 

Anyway,  now it's a new digital tools for us!

I hope you like the new version of this website, it's more user friendly and probably more structured.

I will progressively improve the usability according to the content and visitor's content.

 

Enjoy :)