🖋️ LongForm
Want to reduce the noice and just focus on things with a little more meat - the this category is for you. Like so much on this site we have a ‘WIP’ as i take some out - and put some in - but safe for at least starting in 2026.
The People First Community
Community mind you ... not Network - is a yet to be developed space/application that will serve to provide a fabric that wraps so many people, organizations, books, papers, applications etc. My observation is that in any initiative you find parallel organizations that seem to relate and compete and yet essentially are discussing the same topic. Think 'not-for-profits' fighting each other for the same funding to solve the same problem.
People First is not the only organization in this space - so in one sense we are another node on the network. No argument. BUT. What [peoplefirst.community](https://peoplefirst.community) will do is provide a network map of anybody and everybody related to and working with the challenges we are identifying.
No need to click through by the way - nothing there - yet - move along. It for the moment remains the vision.
DigLife and Generative Identity
Once such organization, lead by Philip Sheldrake is The DigLife Collective - of which yours truly is a founder member. Their observation says it all;
COOPERATING AT GLOBAL SCALE IS HUMANITY'S PRIMARY CHALLENGE
DigLife Collective
DigLife has in turn recently spawned another initiative that explores Generative Identity. It's new thinking that I wanted to capture now. It's an important message. To me the first time that I am aware of the world of technology that in talking about identity, they are not just talking about the 'ID' - but also starting to think of the 'entity' of Identity.
For those keeping track, you will recall that it is a significant stone in the People First canon.
Whenever we contemplate human dignity and well-being, social inclusion and equity, economics, education, democratic process, peace and justice, whenever we contemplate many of the sustainable development goals and corresponding targets, we inevitably contemplate the question of human identity in the digital age.
Anyone who has worked on projects in areas such as these will vouch that questions of identity are integral to their research, their analyses, and their designs.
The term generative identity is used to refer to research and thinking and designs that prioritise psychological, sociological, and ecological health in their approach to digital identity. The interdisciplinary working group on generative identity exists to encourage such work and, by corollary, to highlight the innate dangers of approaches to digital identity that do not qualify as generative.
https://generative-identity.org/about-generative-identity/
Funny, just today, I published the weekly newsletter referencing a quote from Douglas Adams. There must be something in the ether. Over on the DigLife site, I found this image of dolphins.
🚧 Navigation
Some Useful Tips To Navigate The Articles
The RSS feed is here.
Article Navigation
Like any good WordPress blog, searching by category is of course possible. We have also work hard to only have a single category per article.
We then refine the indexing of the article with free form tags.
We have also introduced a second layer of article - which is 'post type' ... using this filter you can find posts, asides, videos etc
Combine the two look for
- category = work
- post kind = video
Hit 'filter' and back comes the list of all posts that contain 'videos' categorized as 'work'.
And then, of course, you have search!
The Journey
People First has been a winding journey for the last four years. Most recently, I find it has been coming together in my mind very clearly and with that clarity I have been encouraged to talk about what is going on in a more open manner. The interesting thing is that as I have become more open about what I am doing, more questions are being asked.
A year ago, asking someone to sign up for the newsletter resulted in them either signing up for the newsletter - or not. No questions. No debate.
Today, I still have the newsletter , added a podcast, the book is coming out shortly and now we are beginning to create community - the questions are beginning to flow.
I still don’t understand. What is the mission/goal of the group(s)?
a newsletter reader
and
What would you say, in three or so sentences, is the hard objective of People First? Not the vague, all singing all dancing "unleashing human potential" nor the activity based "bringing like minds together" etc. What are you (and other participants) trying to tangibly accomplish? This isn't rhetorical. I am just trying to understand what will change/improve at the coal face as a result of your combined efforts.
a newsletter reader
This post is not to answer the questions ... yet. I touched on it in this weeks newsletter - and was specific about that, but here’s the good news. One takeaway for the recurring question is that people are sitting up, listening, they are interested ... which from where I sit is all good news.
As one reader wrote ...
I believe you are on the verge of an overnight success!!!
I hope he's right!
People First Is Not Political
Though it might well be political.
I am writing this post, which is extracted from an email I had cause to write this week when someone questioned a stance I had taken in a newsletter that Pink Floyd was a punk band.
I know - right?
To quote the writer ...
"And Pink Floyd a punk band, WTF!!???)"
an email correspondent
I often take a contrary stance on things to elicit a response. But when I take that stance, it isn't uninformed, just different. So 'Pink Floyd is a punk band' had the desired effect, it elicited response - but no logical argument back, just a preconceived notion that they are a rock/progressive band - which cant possibly be punk. Me - I still say YES. I mean if Malcolm McLaren can produce an album that fuses opera and R&B has he lost his punk? Rigid classification just doesn’t work - I think that also goes some way to explaining how databases have transitioned over time from hierarchical to relational to graph. But back to Punk Floyd.
A Collection of Links you might enjoy - if not - read on
- MTO 21.2: Cohen, Expansive Form in “Dogs”
- Pink Floyd’d Animals pulls no political punches 40 years later
- There is actually a punk band called Punk Floyd
- Punk Floyd : Were Pink Floyd one of the biggest influences on punk?
The point of it all being that if Punk is only about the music / style / genre … then no, Pink Floyd is not a Punk Band
BUT
If Punk is all about anti-establishment commentary and political action - then absolutely yes, they are ... and Roger Waters specifically is the original punk.
Have you seen his Mexico concert?
The desire of the article and a lot of what I write is to take a non obvious stance to make people sit up and either respond "right, I never thought about it that way" or "the guys talking crap” … and I look forward to that debate … always seeking to learn.
Thinking Allowed
This is a People First post that was originally on the People First domain. It has been moved here as part of my domain consolidation program. It’s a steady and slow WIP as I check each entry, so do please bear with me.- More about People First
- Other People First Posts
(not just from the ‘other domain’ … all of them.)
What Drives Us
StoweBoyd
Interesting read, questioning the relevance of Maslow in this new century. I think he is onto something.
Trust
CX in the age of privacy and trust, part 3: Can we rebuild trust?
Tim Walters
Fits nicely into something I read recently from Union Square Ventures .... Trust is offence (trust gaps create opportunities for startups) as well as defence (trust is a moat).
Skills
Soft skills ... wooly, fluffy, comfortable ... not like ' real, hard, proper skills are they?
Soft skills, bendy, malleable, unmeasurable ... nothing like ' real, hard, proper skills ...
.. and yet
I often talk about vocabulary and language .... here's another one ... because if you list all the skills that people are highlighting as important in the future - it's close identical to the soft skill list.
My advice ... get into that cuddly warm blanket and embrace those soft skills -- you can always learn the other skills as and when you need them ... despite the name ... they're not that hard.
Character
I was really taken by these words that came in an email from one of my newsletter readers. Capturing it for posterity ... because it is important.
Character may be something you are born with and largely in place by age 5 but surely it is something that is developed and refined in many ways through a thousand experiences in both good and bad directions. Right?
Since a zillion years ago I have ALWAYS subscribed to "hire character, teach skills". It has never let me down and the boneheaded moves I have made here and there were when I deviated from this.
The Future of Work
First, there are many possible futures - it is not yet clear what the future is, so we should be asking what is ...
A Future of Work?
Second, what the hell is ‘work’ - why do we care about it?
If you ask most people if all their creature comforts were taken care of - would they continue to do what they are doing? More than likely they will answer ’no’ - the question then is what is ...
The/A Future of Income?
Third, the future is already here, so let's call it
The Present of Work
…. and by the 'Present of Work' - your life, labour, time to do your work is not a gift, not a present. You should be paid fairly and equitably for your contribution.
Thinking Allowed
This is a People First post that was originally on the People First domain. It has been moved here as part of my domain consolidation program. It’s a steady and slow WIP as I check each entry, so do please bear with me.- More about People First
- Other People First Posts
(not just from the ‘other domain’ … all of them.)
Technology
Technology is one of the eight pillars of People First ... with a single, solitary 'stone’, a mighty 'Sarsen' reaching to the sky that is that pillar.
Technology ... OMG ... Technology
- Owned
- Managed
- Governed
... not by you - by others.
'A' Future - Not 'The' Future
Is it really a dimension if you can't travel in the opposite direction?
The Things We Say
The Persistence of Memory - 1931
Sometimes we get so caught up in working out how to communicate across national boundaries, we forget that we can barely communicate within them. That’s why language is one of the eight tenets of People First.
Our language slowly became invested with mechanical metaphors: We needed to grease the wheels, crank up the business, dig deeper, or turn a company into a well-oiled machine. Even everyday phrases, such as “fueling up” for eating lunch or “he has a screw loose” for thinking illogically, conveyed the acceptance of humans as mechanical devices.
Douglas Rushkoff
How The Future Works - The Arrogance!
In fairness, the full title was
How The Future Works:
Why your ultimate job is to be HUMAN.
Well yes. Couldn't agree more ... but that opening line - that suggests that it is all pre destined. This ... is how .... it is ... going to work ... Surely the Future hasn't yet been decided?
Always Stay In Your Own Movie
One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest and Sometimes A Great Notion
A High Tech Dystopia - coming to a city near you!
[Under Cover of Mass Death, Andrew Cuomo Calls in the Billionaires to Build a High-Tech Dystopia](https theintercept.com 2020 05 08 andrew-cuomo-eric-schmidt-coronavirus-tech-shock-doctrine) … including Eric from Google (who has now left)
Google owns Sidewalk who were doing something similar in Toronto … but, well that was cancelled just two days ago
So, now what? Oh this;
“The tech companies to which Schmidt has deep ties, and which populate the influential advisory boards he chairs, have all repositioned themselves as benevolent protectors of public health and munificent champions of “everyday hero” essential workers (many of whom, like delivery drivers, would lose their jobs if these companies get their way). Less than two weeks into New York state’s lockdown, Schmidt wrote an op-ed for the Wall Street Journal that both set the new tone and made clear that Silicon Valley had every intention of leveraging the crisis for a permanent transformation.
