Matthew Cashmore.
Development Producer, BBC Future Media & Technology

The first thing I remember on arrival, after the coffee was being ushered into a room, with about 25 other people. The BBC staff introduced themselves and we introduced ourselves. We then went almost directly into a series of role playing games, to break the ice a little, and to invoke a little group cohesion.

This is the Lake Country House in Llangammarch Wells, Powys.

Though the society foreseen is still emerging, with the dramatic transitions of the past two decades (e.g. Cell Phones, Internet, the rise of non-national and super-national powers, etc.), several distinguishing features were posed as characteristic of this new society. Among others, these included:

The rolling back of the Industrial-Era creed of “standardization”, as exemplified in the one-size-fits-all approach typical of institutions of this era, such as the education system, factories, governments, mass media, high volume mass production and distribution, etc.

The attack on the nation-state from above and below and progressive obsolescence of the nation-state, itself.

The eclipsing of monetary wealth by knowledge and information as the primary determinant of power and its distribution.

A transformation of the very character of democracy, itself, from rule-by-periodic polling at the election booth, toward a more direct interaction between the government and its populace. To a large extent, this has already emerged with the rise of the Internet, though it has not yet congealed in the form of a fundamental revision of the constitution of any state. The trend toward on-line voting in the United States, following the election crisis of 2000, may be seen as a first step in this direction.

A Watt steam engine, the steam engine that propelled the Industrial Revolution in Britain and the world

Second Wave is the society during the Industrial Revolution (ca. late 1600s through the mid-1900s).

The Second Wave Society is industrial and based on
mass production,
mass distribution,
mass consumption,
mass education,
mass media,
mass recreation,
mass entertainment
and
weapons of mass destruction

A Philosopher giving a Lecture on the Orrery in which a lamp is put in place of the Sun, is a painting by Joseph Wright of Derby depicting a lecturer who carries a possibly intentional similarity to Sir Isaac Newton giving a demonstration of an orrery to a small audience.

Orkney island of Papa Westray, a Neolithic farmstead has been wonderfully well preserved, and is claimed to be the oldest preserved stone house in northern Europe, with radiocarbon dating showing that it was occupied from 3500 BC to 3100 BC

The first wave was the agricultural revolution which began more than 10,000 years ago by the planting of the first seed.

There, the economic property was land – exhaustible, unable to be shared. Social structures included various groupings that stayed where they worked, feudal states, etc.

The American Civil War (1861-1865) was not only a war to end slavery. It mirrored the rising industrial wave in the north conflicting with the slave-based agrarian power of the south – the economic collision of increasing tariffs and cheap labour. In Japan, the revolution was less bloody. Yet it concerned the samurai feudal elite conflicting with the rifles of the emperor – a first versus second-wave conflict. Today, many conflicts close to us can be analyzed with wave analysis. Take Sarajevo, where the traditional religious folk are pitted against the modern thinking of the city – again a first/second wave conflict, albeit with other things happening at the same time. In Northern Iraq, where there is a large Kurd population, we find another example of first/second wave conflict as the city-based parties fight tribal interests. Similar conflicts may be seen in Turkey, China and South Africa. In South Africa, the city-based ANC conflicts with the rural Inkatha. In the Ukraine, the agriculturally dependent west conflicts with the industrialized east. First and second waves are still playing themselves out as conflicts arise between the elites of different systems.

Countries moving from the first to the second wave became very nationalist. Those moving from the second to the third wave have a looser perception of sovereignty.

A survey by Samsung Telecommunications America (Samsung Mobile) suggests that many teens and their parents across the U.S. would rather vote by text message on their cell phones in the next election rather than go to the polls.

BYE-BYE POLLS

• More than six in ten (61%^a) of respondents of legal voting age, age 18 and older, would be open to voting by text.
• Eight in ten (80%) teens, ages 13-17, say that if they were allowed to vote in this year’s Presidential election, they’d do it by text message instead of going to the polls.

BIPARTISAN SUPPORT

• More than half of all Democrats, Republicans and Independents surveyed say that if allowed, they’d text in their Presidential vote.

The survey, commissioned by Samsung Mobile, was conducted by Kelton Research and included 300 American teens ages 13 – 19 and 500 American parents with children ages 13 – 19.

^a All decimals are rounded to the nearest percentage point. This may result in certain numerical totals adding up to slightly more or slightly less than 100%.

Via Businesswire

The history of technology is the history of the invention of tools and techniques. Background knowledge has enabled people to create new things, and conversely, many scientific endeavors have become possible through technologies which assist humans to travel to places we could not otherwise go, and probe the nature of the universe in more detail than our natural senses allow

First Wave is the society after agrarian revolution and replaced the first hunter-gatherer cultures

Second Wave is the society during the Industrial Revolution (ca. late 1600s through the mid-1900s).
The main components of the Second Wave society are nuclear family, factory-type education system and the corporation. Toffler writes: “The Second Wave Society is industrial and based on mass production, mass distribution, mass consumption, mass education, mass media, mass recreation, mass entertainment, and weapons of mass destruction. You combine those things with standardization, centralization, concentration, and synchronization, and you wind up with a style of organization we call bureaucracy.”

Third Wave is the post-industrial society.
Toffler would also add that since late 1950s most countries are moving away from a Second Wave Society into what he would call a Third Wave Society. He coined lots of words to describe it and mentions names invented by him (super-industrial society) and other people (like the Information Age, Space Age, Electronic Era, Global Village, technetronic age, scientific-technological revolution), which to various degrees predicted demassification, diversity, knowledge-based production, and the acceleration of change (one of Toffler’s key maxims is “change is non-linear and can go backwards, forwards and sideways”).

The BBC sponsors and covers numerous events every year from the large (The Olympics, Glastonbury) to the niche (Radio 1’s One Big Weekend, local sporting matches). Future Media & Technology is looking for new formats that allow for interactivity around events and event-based programming, using mobile devices.

These interactions can include telephony and non-telephony based service and may use any technology widely available on mobile phones (though we do not currently use Flash Lite). You may want to use: location-based services, messaging, use of BBC Big Screens, semacodes, small-screen to big-screen interactions (and vice versa), video calling, RFID, wifi hotspots. The interactions should be re-usable so that while you may model and create them around a specific event, the BBC should be able to use them for a variety of events.

The interactions should enhance the offering of the event and associated programming, ideally extending reach and appreciation with audience members who are at the event and those watching or listening to it. The interactions may also lengthen or extend the event before and or after the physical event. Strong ideas will also make the audience see the BBC as innovative.

BBC mobile services are always provided at the lowest possible cost to the user, so this should be kept in mind when making proposals.

Proposals for projects that are solely art installations will not be selected for developments in the Lab

Application

Category: Mobile

Title: Open Source Voting

Approach:
Construction of technological network using wi-fi, Internet, web pages, interactive TV, stand alone booths and telephone that allows members of the public to vote on decisions taken by the Government in both the house of commons and the house of lords.

Each person would have a unique ID and password.

User Need:
Governments have reached their limits of centralized political institutions.

People need to feel they are taking some sort of role within the democratic process.

Benefits:
Although (obviously) not legally binding, allowing the public to vote on matters of National importance (such as the decision to goto war) would be useful to gauge the relative differences in decisions made by the government and it’s population.

Participation in mainstream electoral politics is at an all time low, this would use technology in a participatory, bottom up structure.

(No more sexed up dossiers and no more illegal wars.) The use of the BBC is primarily for it’s unique public funding.

Competition:
The Government.