Hi everyone,
Well, I had a busy week in the real-world job. We did a one-hour special at the Cannes Film Festival. Among the guests were Harvey Weinstein and Michael Moore. If you ever wanted to know what 800 lbs of cholesterol sitting on a beach looked like, your curiousity was assuaged. Then followed a brief discussion among four multi-multi-millionaires about how people like you and me need to pay for everyone else's health care, including, presumably, their own. The education one gets in this business…
But I digress.
"Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world." —Walt Disney
What we are trying to do right now is to get a functional version of Ejectia! up and running as soon as possible. Whatever we have in place on Day One will simply be a starting point for the improvements we are planning on Day Two. Ejectia! — like every city — will be built on the foundations of what it was yesterday. It will never be finished. And so, with dedication and continued hard work, even the most glittering version will be, in the words of our Tech leader, Paul, merely "the ruins of the Ejectia! of tomorrow." That's a thought for the ages.
So on behalf of everyone currently working their butts off for free, I would like to simply state that we are trying to get something fun and interesting opened as soon as possible to deliver the core elements of self-improvement. There is so much more we have planned, and all of you will be able to contribute things I can never imagine. All that will come in good time.
The first wave of volunteers I called for, the IT and web specialists, have been doing an incredible job. I am privy to the flurry of e-mails they send to each other daily, and I stare at them with much the same expression as your dog has when he watches TV.
Here's what's been happening:
Our tech Army of Darkness has defined the initial platform, and some of the modules we hope to have working at the opening are being written. We should start testing some of them in a few days. We have a domain name, a web host, and more. I have gotten some of the software I personally need to render the landscapes and the buildings.
So, I have waited until we reached this point to open a new comment thread, and here it is:
We have the tech wheels well underway. I think, at this point, we can proceed to a new phase. So I would like to call on you again, you magnificent and talented people. What we need next is twofold:
First, I would like to ask anyone who is a graphic designer to email me at [email protected] (and put DESIGN in the header) if you would be interested in helping with the overall look of the place for Phase 1. I would like to limit this to people who are professionals, and who are willing to volunteer their talents along with the rest of us.
As I mentioned in YOU ARE NOT ALONE, the key to the enterprise is expertise. I can assure you that everyone will have a chance to contribute in turn. But for the moment we need people with graphic design experience and a portfolio.
That is the narrow call. Here is a broad one:
In the near future, we will be calling for submissions to this vast Library of Experience that we all hold in our heads: a Library that will never be filled, but which must start somewhere. In order that we don't ask for mountains of work that we may not be able to use right away, we will be calling for proposals. Again, this will happen in a few days, but for now, I thought I'd put a bug in your ears: if you are one of those inclined to contribute, could you begin to think about a two-paragraph proposal for a University of Ejectia! Library entry?
The first paragraph should be a brief outline of what you want to write about, and how it is useful to other people. The second paragraph should be about why you are qualified to write on the subject.
Here's an example that I personally plan to submit:
I would like to write an entry on what happens behind the scenes on a commercial jet flight. In it, I hope to show what is happening in the airplane, on the flight deck, and in the air traffic control centers as the flight proceeds from Orlando to Los Angeles. I will discuss what the engines are doing, how the navigation systems work, what the pilots are preparing to do next, how they are being handled by ATC, and what all of this looks like as you view it out the window. I hope to give the reader an appreciation of all the work that goes on behind the scenes in order to keep them safe and comfortable.
I'm a 500 hour instrument-rated pilot who has taught ground school for the private pilot exam. I have spent many hours in radio contact with Air Traffic Control in the Los Angeles basin, and I have an excellent understanding of basic aircraft systems, radio and GPS navigation, and the national airspace system.
That's really all we need.
I'd like to stress that while I thought I'd get you thinking about this, we are not quite ready for the actual proposal just yet…probably by the end of the week, and I will mention when in a new post when we are ready. We'll take a look at the proposals, and while I cannot promise that all will be approved right away, I CAN promise that we will carefully read and respond to every one we receive.
Remember, we are trying to open as soon as possible, so that limits just how many of these we can get ready. If we initially have to defer your proposal to a later time, I hope you will not take it personally.
Anyway, that's the immediate progress. Things are happening rather quickly behind the scenes. By the end of the coming weekend I will have a new update, and we'll be able to talk more about some of the amazing ideas we are having for further downstream.
A final, and very important note:
I and several others have read, and continue to read, every comment left by all of you. They have provided incredibly valuable ideas which have been and continue to be incorporated backstage. But they have done something much more important than that.
They continue to show all of us that there is a community of very bright, friendly, decent and honorable people out there who deserve nothing less than the best we can deliver. Your comments and continued words of support — to say nothing of the mind-boggling generosity you have shown in terms of volunteering time and ideas — are making us all better people before any of this gets officially off the ground.
On behalf of those already working behind the scenes, and the many more to come, I want to thank you for providing us with an example of how good people can behave. We hope and expect to live up to the example you are setting for us daily.
Keep those comments coming! Every single one of them matters. Even the simplest sentence of support from you has unimaginable power to encourage and motivate this process.
More soon. I think we are on to something VERY big.
Bill
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