The Notion Virtual Safe Places

Virtual Safe Places would be — virtual level playing fields for concerted action, global issue management and the augmentation of physical meeting events, without the inherent risk and cost of physical assembly.

In a world where we are constantly under viral and political attack, where travel advisories are issued daily for everything from H1N1 Flu concerns, weather and physical catastrophes around the globe, the concern for how and when humans physically come together is being brought into question.

Increasing the notion of gathering in a physical space to plan an action, to build teams, or to share key messages will no longer be our first or best course of action. In addition, traditional modes of meeting and collaboration are slower and more costly (think of the cost of the G20 for example) as an approach and may have increased risk to key individuals or groups of the population.

There is an opportunity to create a new, more global, highly integrated and collaborative place — a seven by twenty–four hour safe place for group and individual action within our national digital infrastructure. This may even be a resource we can offer to other countries and global organizations.

I propose that we embark on an effort to vision, design and create a common virtual safe place, replete with basic connection mechanisms, collaboration spaces, simulation/visualization models and all necessary tools required as an integrated service over both private and public digital infrastructure.

Suggested URL: Smarter Cities