Published February 23, 2000 in the Park County Weekly Newspaper
(upgraded 10-7-2007 with new links)

 

What Happens When the Global Internet Matures Fully:
Connecting our Talents and God-Given Gifts?
Disrupting the status quo?
Or both?

"If you're not everywhere... (open-minded / globally connected)
You're nowhere."  (close-minded / locally limited)

By Christopher Rudy

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 Feel like you’ve been left out of the Computer Revolution?

Get on board!  The “E-train” is leaving the Depot!

For those who feel like you have somehow missed the computer/Internet revolution, you’re not alone.  Over the last year there has been open meetings at the Railroad Depot where the Chamber of Commerce meets.  Plus bi-weekly meetings at the Public Library. 

Those who are serious about catching the wave of unprecedented Internet FREEDOM (to know better) and OPPORTUNITY (to do better) have had public forums to "cuss and discuss" the pitfalls and potential.

Some in attendance have been very successful expanding their business through the Internet. There are extraordinary examples of e-commerce success here in our own backyard not to mention phenomenal home-business success stories nationwide.

There's no excuse anymore for ignorance.  Free public access to Internet computers are available at the Library if you don't have one of your own.  Anyone who wants to can "link, lurk and learn", connecting with user groups globally if not locally that are answering any question one might ask on "how to do it". 

And that’s the point.  If you now have the tools and techniques to fulfill your destiny... ask yourself: 

"What is the greatest service you can offer God and man?

How do you apply practical spirituality for optimal gain"

Where is the Internet revolution going if you are to catch the wave"

The best way to answer this is to first get the big picture;  how this global communications has evolved and where you fit in the grand scheme of trends right now.


Understanding the Computer/Internet Revolution

Just as clothes are an extension of the skin and cars are an extension of the feet, so is TV the extension of the eyes and ears… and computers are an extension of the brain.  Now we have the Internet which is like the neural networking of all the brain cells on the planet.

Getting “connected” online has become more than a technical event; it’s like a right of passage to “global thinking” much as getting a driver’s license has been a right of passage to adulthood.

To understand this movement to “global” thinking is to understand the computer/Internet revolution.

The world as we know it today is largely a product of the shift of everyone’s “world view” as we have move from “local” to “global” ways of thinking both individually and collectively.  This paradigm shift is also a power shift.  The shift of technology has shifted paradigms and power.  This is the key to the big drama that is right now transpiring as the instant/everywhere Internet defines the biggest change event in earth’s evolutions since the Enlightenment brought us out of the Dark Ages.

The First Wave of Computing (60’s-70’s) was defined largely by massive hardware for information storage characterized by IBM mainframe computers.  Following World War II, the military mindset reinforced the Industrial Age paradigm of top-down command-and-control management that dominated this first wave of the Information Age.  Corporate America had numerous layers of middle management that served a highly linear corporate structure with narrowing opportunity at the top as one climbed the corporate pyramid.  This first wave was highly compartmentalized and specialized with an emphasis on degree credentials that defined one’s role as a “cog in the corporate machinery”; rules were followed without question.  Respect for hierarchy was implicit, following the predominant mind-set of “old-line” managers - the last generation whose formative years were conditioned almost exclusively by print-media with the consequent linear thinking along logical “lock-step” left-brain letter-of-the-law lines that honored the pecking order.  Going “global” during this 1st wave meant “big is better” and “might is right” which translated to aggressive warring of the military-industrial complex on the other side of the globe - Vietnam.

The Second Wave of Computing (80’s) shifted the emphasis to disc operating systems and the graphical “user friendly” software interface characterized by the Macintosh and Microsoft windows.  Corporate culture followed the downsizing of the computer from mainframe to desk-top, empowering upper management to replace layers of middle-management white collar workers by the millions. Personal empowerment with specialized PC software created a booming home-computing industry as baby-boomers discovered this Information Age power-tool of choice.  Word processing and desk-top publishing went mainstream for the masses.  The home office came of age as millions of displaced or dissatisfied corporate workers leveraged their sweat equity with the power of a mainframe computer on their home desk-top.  As business guru Tom Peters said in his best seller, LIBERATION MANAGEMENT, “It’s over, d’ya hear? Over. Over. Over. (Corporate largesse) Build your own firm. Create your own network. It’s that or bust.” The Network Marketing industry experienced explosive growth during the 80’s, defining a whole new paradigm of low-risk turn-key business whereby you start “at the top” as President/CEO of your own home business that has expanding opportunity as your network expands. This was quite the opposite of the old paradigm of narrowing opportunity as you work towards the top of the corporate pyramid.  Now going global meant the little guy could use his fax, phone and computer to manage a business half way around the globe, which is what I did in the 80’s with an import business.

The Third Wave of Computing (90’s) shifted emphasis to the Internet and by the mid-90’s, browser netware made it possible to surf the net by connecting effortlessly to computers all over the world as though they were in the next room.  Business relationships and customer service took on new emphasis with the mantra “everything is connected”.   Corporate culture followed the decentralizing influence, giving rise to “virtual corps” whereby small, highly flexible teams are reconfigured on a project basis to exploit fast-changing market opportunities.  With time and space eliminated on the Net, all the rules of the old corporate paradigm assumed almost mystical transparency as new rules of a new economy based on abundant information set new standards that made the old economics of scarcity an oxymoronic contradiction of terms (value of scarcity). Going global now became an effortless way of communicating with anyone of like interest anywhere on the globe through newsgroups, e-mail, live “chat” or Internet teleconferencing with an interactive graphic “whiteboard” for hand notes or video images through a small $90 video cam that sits on your computer.

With all knowledge-power now at one’s fingertips, the implications for owning one’s own life, learning, health and business became quite profound -- a “can do” if only you "want to".  "Wannabes" became a common word in the lexicon of net workers.  And  "fake it till you make it" became the standard for rapid website development that starts with something and "reconfigures on the fly" until everything works. 

Welcome to the "virtual reality" mode of operating with highly flexible "mobility consciousness" that quickly adapts to fast changing markets!  Fact is, many of these new rules of the New Economy are a direct challenge to tried and true business rules of the old... like having everything planned, test-marketed and perfected before going to market.

The new rules for increasing your "Net worth" aren't rocket science.  But it takes a wholly different way of looking at business that most businesses are not yet used to.  Anyone can apply these rules to "trend-fit" their business and catch the wave as this powerful new media goes mainstream. But common sense of the "new rules" is uncommon, and the most powerful old paradigm special interests in the world have a vested interest in "holding the line" of the status quo against change.  And the mainstream media is too often a mouthpiece of this old paradigm that feels threatened by the new, emphasizing the problems with the Internet more than the breakthrough solutions with their full implications. 

Success truly begins between your ears.  If you suffer "stinking thinking" as "paradigm paralysis" regarding the extraordinary opportunity for optimizing your business on the Internet, it's time to get a check up from the neck up!

There's no question that the computer/Internet revolution has challenged everyone's ability to learn what is virtually a new language and way of thinking about everything.  As an extension of the brain, one's computer network can virtually expand consciousness globally, confronting our cherished illusions, territorial imperatives and self-limiting belief systems.  Too often we have the “only human” sense of limitation that embraces a little (or a lot) of the “victim dictum” that holds on to the sense of separation from the empowering sense of ownership and "response ability" that the Net empowers us with. Truly we are all products of our own self-fulfilling prophecies whereby, “If you think you can or can not, you’re right!”

Anyone who wants to understand the “global” Internet revolution must first understand how this instant/everywhere telecomm technology has set into motion forces that challenge not just one’s own self sabotaging “stinking thinking” but also the design of our core social, political and economic institutions that are still deeply entrenched in vertical, top-down Industrial Age command-and-control paradigms that take orders from the same power elite who made a killing on Vietnam and every major war of the century.  These “powers-that-be” have repeatedly resorted to the dialectic (thesis, antithesis, synthesis) to create and manage ultimate scarcity (war, death and hell) in order to consolidate their power-to-control the physical and human resources of the planet.

It’s important to realize that the I-Net Revolution disrupts and erodes the power elite top-down hierarchies that still dominate our mainstream social, political and economic institutions. The Net is a horizontal diffusion and redistribution of power, often to the benefit of weaker and smaller actors in direct challenge to elite power trips.  It crosses borders, redraws the boundaries of offices and responsibilities, and generally compels closed systems (power elite monopolies) to open up.

In short, the Internet is like David taking a shot to the 3rd eye of the power elite Goliath (and Congress lackeys) who value scarcity through monopoly controls within mainstream media, medical, management and marketing institutions that have been bought off by the perks of prestige, profit and power-to-control above all.  This Goliath feels extremely threatened by the freedom and opportunity on the Net that "levels the playing field" and challenges the old money-is-power rules that have usurped, co-opted or otherwise subverted our individual and collective sovereignty in order to keep self-governing accountability FROM the people rather than “of, by and for the people”.

Moving Towards Global WholEness via Ecommerce

The accelerating rate of change is quickly moving us to a global “New World Order”.  The driving force is global markets and global commerce that are developing at breakneck speed due the instant/everywhere capabilities of the Net. 

A whole New World of freedom and opportunity GLOBALLY has been discovered in a way that parallels the “New World” of America with its promise of freedom and opportunity after its discovery.

And there are direct parallels between the power elite forces of the old world that tried to tax and suppress the American colonists into submission… as can be seen in power elite forces today that are trying to tax and limit the abundance of freedom and opportunity on the Internet to further their agenda of global control.

 The question is what “Law & Order” will prevail in the “New World Order”.

The tension is now very high between the new paradigm economy that values abundant information-power and thus challenges the old paradigm forces that have historically created and managed scarcity, crisis and war as their means of consolidating their power and control of public institutions.  For a better understanding of self-sabotaging "economics" (value) of scarcity, go to www.heartcom.org/scarcity.htm .

 The deeply entrenched forces that value scarcity and control more than freedom and opportunity feel extremely threatened by the Internet and are looking at ways to limit it’s liberating influence through taxation, censorship, or a “national emergency” (terrorism, war, etc.) that would suspend the Constitution and all of our basic rights thereby.  These are the forces that consistently demonize the Internet, highlighting every abuse, so they can justify some law to limit its power.  

 
The Fourth Wave of Computing  

What is emerging now in the Millennium is a "critical mass" of people worldwide waking up to the shift of paradigms and power via the Net.  This is far more true of the business community that, according to Forrester Research predictions, will conduct more than $3.2 trillion in business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce by 2003.  And the cutting-edge of this mass-movement is the "high touch" high tech that personalizes information for the client/customer with customized computing with what I call HEARTware™.

The " model" that frames this concept of HEARTware™ is introduced through numerous frames of reference at www.heartcom.org/LoveModel.htm .

Fact is that the #1 problem of the Information Age created by hardware, software and netware has been info-glut, info-overload and the consequent "future shock" whereby people "shut down" in their cognitive abilities just as surely as sensory overload will jam the survival circuits of any living organism.  It follows logically that the #1 solution of the Information Age will organize information IN FORMATION along more enlightened "lines" that frame the non-linear/spherical/whole (holy) spirit of common sense "between the lines".  In essence, this is what  HEARTware™(LOVE ) actually does. 

Truly, the more information we have, the greater is the need to get it all in order (in formation).  The ultimate meaning of "survival" may thus be understood as the survival of ultimate meaning, value and purpose of "God" as "Love".  Truly, an individual or civilization can rise no higher than their concept of "God is Love" and is "for-giving" (70 x's 70, etc.). 

In this regard, HEARTware™(
) outlines a unique non-sectarian metaphor for universal laws that are virtually modern day "parable" for conscientious common sense at the heart of the 4th wave drama on the leading edge of the computer/Internet revolution.  It is bringing the highest "e"valuation criteria to e-commerce.  This global business revolution is arguable the most powerful force now shaping social, political and economic institutions worldwide.  And as the great spiritual leader Mahatma Gandhi once said, "Commerce without morality is a sin."

All our social, political and economic problems are at heart communication problems.  The Next Big Thing in the computer/Internet revolution will thus define the gateway from cyberspace to the innerspace of virtually divine, untapped potential for personal and organization growth and development. And move us from the Information Age to the "TeLeCom Age" where in-formed choice --with LOVE -- is the highest virtue embraced at the heart of all information exchanges.

Higher vision of universal HEARTware™ e-values will thus qualify self-perfecting database models for "in-formed" (LOVE -centering) CHOICE with higher consciousness at the heart of e-learning (education).  Likewise will they qualify and embrace holistic principles at the heart of e-care (health care).  And global netizens will also look to the Constitution of LOVE as the framework of universal law and order for worldwide e-governing (government).. 

The spirit of God-Love is universally considered the heart of the most valued personal virtues governing civility as well as the heart of the most valued planetary virtues governing civilization. Obviously you can't legislate this spirit any more than you can morality.  All you can do is create an environment in which it can thrive. 

As the interface for information interaction, HEARTware™ frames a pattern re-cognition process that optimizes the healthy, whole and otherwise holy spirit of LOVE -in-action at the nexus and heart of person-to-person or mass-to-mass TeLeCom.

HEARTware™ as an interactive interface for global telecom provides critical checks and balances for private rights in the public sphere.  With global accelerating change bringing ancient rivalries, conflict and lock-step, local, letter-of-the-law limitation into the public arena... conflict management in the spirit of cooperation and collaboration becomes a survival priority.  Now is the time to define a working model for global "unity-in-diversity" that can harmonize the power struggle between old and new paradigms as abundant knowledge-power on the Net -- promising the abundant life -- challenges the disruptive oxymoronic "value" of scarcity economics. 

HEARTware™ optimizes the best of both worlds with new rules for not just the New Economy, but also, the New Health Care, New Education and New Government  "of, by and for the people"... worldwide.

Now that the Internet has accomplished the neural networking of the global brain, the Next Big Thing will be the synaptic “gateways” from cyberspace to the "innerspace" (inner sense) of those first principles of cosmic/universal law framing all creation as well as the creative process (co-creation with GOD-LOVE ), the learning process (higher knowledge of GOD-LOVE ) and the processes of consciousness at the very foundation of our individual and collective Self Government (GOD-LOVE  Government). 

And just as Thomas Paine's COMMON SENSE was the most successful political pamphlet in history which ignited the fiery spirit of freedom that sparked the American Revolution and the Great Experiment of Self Government-under-God, so will the inner sense of HEARTware™ nurture the common sense of a new innocence that honors a Higher Power within us... and provides global Netizens with an electronic upgrade of our horse-and-buggy representation system, fulfilling the rEVOLUTION -- emphasizing 90% of the word -- that U.S. Founding Fathers began.  

This is how we move towards whole"e"ness as "One Earth, One People under GOD-LOVE "... and begin linking up our e-talents with the "e"nlightened self interest that liberates and leverages our God-given gifts... by centering and connecting relationships of relevance via ultimate "reverence" that is, at heart, the fully present "E-Presence" of GOD~LOVE .  

This will begin the global culturing of civility consciousness at the heart of civilization... nurturing network communities with this cultural DNA that centers and connects our individual and collective consciousness along more enlightened lines~. This  HEARTware™ will thus embrace Innernetworking with the universal Laws/Golden Rule of G-O-D (Geometry Of Divinity) that is also the Language of the Angels of LOVE ... positioning the "nexus" (gateway) where all paths converge at that centered and connected place of GOD-LOVE  in the heart... where the name and "flame" is the same.

In the fall of 1974 on the eve of the Bicentennial, I gave a presentation to ten agencies of the Federal Government on Capitol Hill regarding this concept of HEARTware™ for celebrating the spirit of Revolution in America during the Bicentennial Era from '76 to '89, the 13 years from Declaration of Independence to ratification of the Constitution.  But that was before the Internet... and the subject for another article [see www.heartcom.org/CapitolHill.htm ].

 “More powerful than standing armies is a vision that has found it’s time” --Victor Hugo

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Christopher Rudy is Founder/CEO of HEARTcom Services, and can be reached at geonotes@mcn.net