@John: The point isn’t that everything is just all of a sudden going to be hunky dory. The point is that this generation, not really by any purpose but rather by circumstance, does have a new way of approaching life and work. I see it myself, every day, where I’m at as a defence contractor. The point is that we are going to change the way the world works, and we are going to make it better in the process. Is everyone going to get in on it? Of course not. Being hopeful and optimistic does not automatically equate to being a hippy on drugs who thinks that we’re going to make the world perfect. We just want to make it better Draw the distinction.

@Buzzcut: Greg already handled you, so I won’t team up. But you’re all kinds of wrong.

@Zoe B: Email was really only just the beginning. Wikis, brainstorm modeling, and a whole suite of other collaborative software can take you a lot further than email can. Also, live meetings are useful for something things…including getting to know your co-workers. But they are NOT as efficient for collaboration as some of the other tools available. Even if you’re in the same building as some of the people you work with. It’s why myself and one of my younger co-workers are pushing hard to get a wiki to replace our current word document based documentation system at work…because it’s a lot more efficent.

@Wil: I like it. Give me more.

@Jake: The argument that Grown up digital makes is that the boomers will learn from us, and the ones that don’t will fail in business (and, therefore, life

Anyway…fun post. Thanks all!

One thought about the clustering of “net generation” people in certain “spiky cities”: Is a new establishment, composed of people who think alike , being created? A rejection of group think was what the cultural explosion of the 1960s was all about.

On average long distance academic collaborations have a more flexible timeline than business ones, and may have a smaller budget. While researchers might not have met their partners on a given project, most research academics can find daily face-to-face conversations with professional peers in the same institution. Frequent face-to-face meetings may matter more in the beginning of a career. Lots of excellent academic departments are located in smaller cities and towns.

I think the full potential of long-distance collaboration has yet to be explored. I am hopeful that the long-distance model can give professionals the flexibility to also meet their childrens’ needs. This is important. While you can do a top-notch project long distance, you should not raise a child that way.

Now I’m not going to stand here and defend the federal government-favorable bailouts and inefficient bureaucratic machines are problematic. But I will defend Obama. He has produced a cabinet that is pragmatic and bipartisan. Differing political, military, and economic opinions will deliver prudent policies that do not pander to lobbyists or an evangelical ideology but to the well being of America. To Speculate a McCain cabinet isn’t a very convincing argument, but if his VP pick was any indication I feel more comfortable with Obama’s.

I also think net-geners would be offended to think their knowledge of Government was limited to the 80’s and 90’s. History professors would probably feel the same. I’d like to see how well the economy would have faired over the last few months without the government, and how it would do moving forward without proper regulatory oversight.

Lastly to suggest D.C as unproductive is ludicrous. Some of the brightest minds gather within the beltway: World-class think tanks, NGO’s, The World Bank, IMF, The National Gallery of Art, The Smithsonian’s, Global Media Outlets, the list goes on…

The worst thing about Obama is that he is so inspiring. He makes people think that government has the answers.

The net generation wasn’t around in the ’70s. It doesn’t know that government is the problem, not the answer. Maybe the farce of “Bailout Nation” will give them a quick education. Maybe Obama’s disappointing cabinet (as conventional center-right and Washington insider as any, and not much different than a McCain cabinet would have looked) will give them some insight into how D.C. really works.

Rober — please give us more…. what about spiky world? = diversity, innovation, creativity, learning, commerce, opportunity?

thanks Alex and all

Flat world = narcissism, egotism, vanity, profit-seeking, self-indulgence, self-promotion, greed.

As someone who has gone to school in Nova Scotia for 5 years now, I can safely say that it is a dying part of our nation that will need more than than a series of tubes to revive it.

The net generation is a farce. Perhaps a fraction of a percent of the world’s elite will benefit from the technological revolution while the rest of the choking masses will slide further into oblivion as the degree of global inequality increases indefinitely.

I like technology as much as the next guy, but it is something that the vast majority of the world will never experience to the same degree as rich white kids who grew up in Rosedale.