A PERSONAL VISION
by David Hughes



All of my work has been directed toward one general goal: the establishment of operating principles and the development of practical community models for the restoration in America--at the dawning of the Information Age--of what largely has been lost (or was never properly gained) through the excesses and imperatives of the late, great Industrial Age. I envision that, through the use of computers and communications, we will be able to attain the benefits of economies of scale without requiring huge companies, huge governments, huge cities--and huge everything else.

CHARIOT, a powerful telecommunications tool that Louis Jaffe and I are about to make available to the public, borrows from the best of all systems--and goes well beyond most of them. CHARIOT will break new ground toward the realization of the following ends:

* Using microcomputers with associated, parallel
communications systems to empower the Individual.

* Promoting equality of economic opportunity.

* Encouraging cultural and social diversity.

* Totally redefining the meaning and practice of
education as a lifelong, self-actuated, low-cost
access to knowledge and to the development of skills.

* Reducing the dependence on--and therefore the power
of-- centralized media (replacing "broadcast" with
"dialogue").

* Diffusing--rather than concentrating--economic,
political, and governmental power and scale.

* Balancing the power of money with the power of
information.

* Reducing the importance of physical "place" to
individual success in America.

* Ensuring that "ordinary" people--not just economic,
institutional, or educational elites--will be able to
use the principal tools of our age (computers) for the
betterment of their lives and communities.

* Returning craftsmanship and interest in (maybe even
"love of") our chosen work to the center of the work
ethic.

* Truly connecting and passing on the values of the
old (knowledge, experience, and maybe a little wisdom)
to the persons and characteristics of the young
(energy, vigor, and creativity), to complement the
roles of the middle-aged (power, influence, position,
and self-preoccupation) in our society.


If CHARIOT is a success, I will consider undertaking the creation (or, more precisely, the phoenix-like rise from the glorious, Victorian-building ashes of an old gold-mining town) of a Colorado mountain community along the lines inferred from the above. The community, which will be called "The Colorado Center for Information Studies," will be:

- inhabited by networked minds,
- powered by information economics,
- governed by an intelligent consensus,
- surrounded by an appealing natural setting, and
- built by the new pioneers.

Do you want to join?

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Editor's note: David Hughes (a.k.a. "Sourcevoid Dave") refers to himself
as "an electronic communications populist and an independent microcomputer
activist." He has plumbed the depths of many general telecommunications
services (including Compuserve, Delphi, EIES, and The Source) for the last
six years, and was the originator of User Publishing on The Source. David
still runs his popular Old Colorado City Electronic Cottage BBS System;
with Louis Jaffe, he now also runs the new CHARIOT system.

This article was adapted from David's self-introduction in the
"Symposium" conference in PARTI on The Source.