Adhocracy 2

I’m picking up the comments from Francotirador and from Carlos.

As Godo would say in his sarcastic tone, it’s good for the ego to know people are reading you :).

It’s true that we have to change the somebody has to into we have to. But since a blog is a historical record, I won’t change it in the original; I’ll fix the mistake in this post instead.

I’m not talking about going out to protest with our laptops in front of La Moneda, the presidential palace, because I don’t think that’s the smartest way to get attention.

I have a confession to make. A few days ago I met Carlos Alvarez, undersecretary of economy, our national CIO, on the occasion of an award I received. The context and the timing weren’t right to bring up the subject. I’m not a friend or an acquaintance of his, but he doesn’t strike me as someone with bad intentions or eager to cut deals with the big department stores or microsoft. I think it’s a problem of not knowing, of wanting to do something quick and flashy. I don’t know his motivations, but from the little I got to talk with him (it was about another subject, entrepreneurship), he is an economist very much driven by figures, by achieving numerical impact. I may be wrong, but your profession ends up warping you.

This whole problem probably starts from the belief, mistaken in my view, that the digital divide shrinks if we have more people using PCs and connected to the internet. (I’ll talk about this later)

I think the kind of action we need to take in the "unconnected world", or real world, is to build ties with the decision makers, get to talk with them and explain why we believe they’re making the wrong decisions. There are two paths: we go out and burn buses in the streets, comrades, or we make use of whatever first- or second-degree contacts we may have with the authorities.

I know people who know Carlos Alvarez, and I think my recent meeting with him would let me approach him, so as a concrete action I propose trying to set up an appointment with him.

I don’t think the MPPC project should be killed, because there are people who will only get access to a computer by using their store credit card, but I do think the program has to be complemented and expanded, following the guidelines of the digital agenda itself. People have to be given options. If they want to use Microsoft, fine, XP isn’t bad, but XPLE is an abomination :). But let’s show them they can save some CLP 50,000 by using other operating systems. That they can even buy better hardware with that money. How many small and medium-sized businesses that import and assemble PCs would benefit if they had the advertising support the big stores get from the MPPC program.

Some of you probably already have first-degree access to Carlos Alvarez. I’m offering to try on my side, but maybe we should coordinate an effort to meet with the authorities. This movement has no head, and nobody is trying to be the leader or anything, but if a bunch of us show up in front of Alvarez, with the backing of this adhocratic group that has formed, with the specific weight each of us carries, I think we can get something done.

Finally, if we aren’t heard, nobody will be able to accuse us of never having left the glass towers that are our blogs.

If I get a contact, I’ll let you know.

Although my faith in the government of the ex-socialist Ricardo Lagos is low at the moment:http://actualidad.terra.es/nacional/articulo/conmutanpartepenamilitarcondenado_452741.htm