Specifically, I mentioned that

It is not going to be fought over territory, or politics, or religion. It will be an economic war, a cultural war, a global war, and one in which the civil populations those beliefs support the power base of the status quo will shake those institutions to their very core. Issues over DRM are not the opening shots fired. They are a wake-up call that something radical needs to change – that the fundamental nature of how we value and distribute knowledge and ideas will, in the long run, not be subject to the traditional economics of today’s society.

SOPA is the next round in that battle and is evident proof that the wake-up call has not been heeded. In a nutshell, SOPA is an attempt to reinforce traditional values of copyright and ownership on a system that doesn’t want to be forced in that direction. Rather than trying to work within the direction the socio-informatics wants to naturally go, large corporations are trying to bring those values back in line with the establish processes because that is what they know. Laws, policy, policing.

What is missing is the human element. It is also what makes SOPA so dangerous as a framework from which individuality and the expression of ideas could eventually be eradicated.

Legacy is the essential problem.

The way you keep populations in control is by ensuring that their needs within a society are being met. Let’s take the simple example from Maslow. Those core needs being, in order of importance, physiological, safety, belonging, esteem, and self-actualization. To this list one has to add an additional more primal basic need that supersedes all of these others and that is the need to propagate.

The philosophical statement, cogito ergo sum, represents only half of what it is to be human. It is the rational side of the equation and doesn’t address this idea that within human culture it is not simply enough ‘to be’, one must have prove of one’s existence. That is, we define ourselves not just in terms of how we perceive the world rationally (a priori) but we need to have verifiable proof through external means that we exist (a posteriori).

Up until now, copyright has provided some measure of proof of our existence through the assignment of ownership to physical objects and the definition of legacy that it provides. But what happens in a virtual world where the right to create derivative works is superseded by mega-corporations whose only interest is the next fiscal quarterly report to their shareholders? When you no longer have the right to create works that provide proof of your existence? Or when you as an individually can be wiped out simply for not paying your ISP?

These may seem like extreme examples until you consider that most of what we say and do in the developed world now revolves around some type of electronic exchange of knowledge. The ability to express oneself to society is predicated not just simply on the physical expression of thoughts and ideas but also on their persistence. The creation of physical forms of self-expression be it a book, a record, a painting, a house, a chair, were easy to assign copyright to. The uniqueness of such self-expression was contained within definable geographic constraints. And even with mass production, copyright infringement through the development of substantially similar or derivative works was constrained.

There are only so many different ways you can mill a table leg. After awhile with 7 Billion people on the planet, people in various parts of the world are going to come up with similar solutions to similar problems irrespective of blatant intellectual property theft. So what do you think is going to happen once we add another 2.5 billion people to the planet between now and 2050?

In the last 20 years we have gone from a society in which the persistence of knowledge was predicated on activities that were understood to be one of two types, physical or vapor-ware, to a society which now has a reasonable right and expectation to every word they say lasting generations. Our root belief system has been fundamentally altered such that legacy is no longer about what you physically leave behind but what you virtually leave behind as well.

That is no small paradigm shift. And it’s not localized. It’s global.

Consider by 2050 9.5 billion people all wanting to establish a legacy of their own and wanting to have proof of their existence.

SOPA doesn’t account for this. The players behind SOPA don’t want to account for this. They don’t see it as their responsibility to speak to the future. They only seek to protect an economic system which is no longer viable in an information age.

So here is the fundamental problem: what happens in a society when its sense of self is under attack by those seeking, albeit maybe unintentionally, to eradicate proof of their existence?

Usually its revolution.

Unfortunately we are like the frog in the frying pan where the heat is being turned up slowly. Our hierarchy of needs is being eroded piece by piece under the guise of improved quality of life. The powers behind SOPA likely feel that so long as there are no signs of imminent collapse that all will be right with the world. But as any good doctor can tell you, to look after the care of a patient you need to also pay attention to the symptoms even if there are no outward signs of disease.

We could very easily take a page out of the medical handbook of practicing physicians as to the how to evaluate and assess a law’s ability to influence and improve the social condition. Unfortunately that hasn’t been done here. Which is a shame because an OPRQST assessment against the human hierarchy of needs is exactly what is called for here.

If SOPA passes, and mega-corporations start to use this to assault an individual’s innate ability of self-expression, regardless of what form that self-expression may take, then it will simply be a matter of time before the revolution starts. Similar to DRM, SOPA won’t be the shot heard around the world, but it’s definitely a sign that the musket is being loaded. SOPA is a very badly structured piece of legislation that should never become law.

That’s not to say that there aren’t legitimate issues at stake here. However, we need to start by realizing that our economic system needs a major overhaul. Any legislation needs to accommodate the way society functions today – not the way the nuclear-aged society functioned 60 years ago. That is going to require a heck of a lot more work than a quick fix solution created by the group of people that are at the root cause of many of these issues in the first place.

Revolutions don’t need to take place at the point of a gun. The transformation in society between 1979 and 1999 is ample proof that revolutions can be both transformative and peaceful. I just hope the transformation that needs to happen between 2019 and 2039 will be one of cooperation and not confrontation.

– Kevin Feenan

An educational or not-for-profit institution that is currently under contract with us will be able to renew early (or purchase additional regions) and continue to receive the current 50% discount on land maintenance provided that the renewal takes place prior to the December 31, 2010. You will be able to select contract renewal options of 6, 12, 18 or 24 months under these terms. If your organization renews and enters into a contract no later than December 31, 2010, it can lock in the current discounted rate for up to 24 additional months

To put this into perspective, Edu/NPs always had the option to switch between 6 month and 12 month terms. So that really isn’t an offer to try to meet Edu/NPs in the middle of their concerns. The second piece to this totally misses the point of why Edu/NPs are mad about the price increase in the first place.

Two Words: CASH FLOW

Offering an 18 month or 24 month locked in term is certainly a nice perk. Don’t get me wrong on that account. But some of the essential issues that Edu/NPs are complaining about is that they don’t have the budget TODAY to handle this type of a price increase. Not only is the offer ingenuous in terms of trying to work with Edu/NPs but it belies the fact that Linden Lab is absolutely on a cash hunt for some reason only known to themselves and their investment backers. If the lab was genuine about this offer it would have extended it to people’s renewal dates rather than December 31. Instead what we have is a transparent attempt to generate substantial amounts of cash in the shortest time frame possible.

If Education and Non-Profit organizations don’t have the cash they don’t have the cash. Multi-year budgets don’t suddenly come up with extra funds just because you are giving someone a good deal today on moneys that will not be able until 2012. Any real solution by the Lab has to recognize that the financial issues being complained about are all related to cash flow. Offering a solution that both doesn’t address that issue AND forces an accelerated timetable from their original proposed pricing policy is no solution at all.

The only benefit this proposed counter-offer provides to Education and Non-Profits is that it gives them an opportunity to reset their anniversary date to December under the assumption that the funds for paying for the extention are still available in this year’s budget. Something that for schools and universities typically are based on the school year calendar not the fiscal calendar that most for-profit organizations run on.

If there was ever any doubt that Linden Lab doesn’t understand their customer base – that doubt has certainly been put to rest with the latest attempt by the Lab to smooth things over. The only thing that is going to make this situation better is to re-instate the Educational / Non-Profit discount in such a way as to acknowledge the fact that you just can’t raise prices 100% to this market segment and expect it to shallow that type of cash flow hit.

More so than this – this letter is making the Lab look desperate for cash which is not a good thing to be promoting out in the market place. It would be nice if the Lab finally came clean as to why they need so much cash all of a sudden as the Second Life user community would probably rally behind the company in ways that they can’t even imagine. Again it comes down to an issue of trust.

Our Community helps its own – Linden Lab is a part of that. But whoever is running Linden Lab doesn’t seem to want to see it that way which is unfortunate because they are missing obvious strategic opportunities to strengthen the brand and drive more lucrative profitability avenues down the road. One can only hope that whatever is driving this insanity comes to an end shortly before they have no customers left to alienate.

– Kevin Feenan

Somewhere between 2007 and today Linden Lab has lost perspective. Up to about the fall of 2007, Linden Lab was fostering a community based approach to content development. They put programs in place to help education, government, and healthcare. There were mentoring communities which supported the introduction of new people into the Second Life environment. Linden Lab appeared to be focused on two major initiatives: platform tools to support the user community and information telecommunication communication convergences.

The success of the approach was to a certain extent its downfall when you have a group of investors however that are intent to push an aggressive pricing policy on an unfinished platform that is aimed more towards national and multi-national firms rather than grassroots organizations. In 2008-2009, changes at Linden Lab appear to be focused on this very thing: the monetization of the platform to large corporate entities. While the potential of the platform was certainly there, the reality of its popular acceptance wasn’t.

Innovative concepts in human interaction require at least two generations in order to establish a beach-head from which business process innovation can thrive. We’ve seen this in almost every ubiquitous technology which has been developed since the later part of the 19th century. New ideas take time to take hold in the general population. It is only once the value proposition is overwhelmingly in favour of the new paradigm that societal change takes place. You can’t push a society faster than it is prepared to go otherwise what you get is a backlash against those ideas which, at best, delay their introduction and, at worst, bury them for decades if not longer.

The “game” is not played by aggressively pursuing a dictatorial winner take all approach to the market. The game is played by being strategically positioned so that once that social change begins to happen, your organization can leverage the best in technological, social, and business processes to meet the needs of the emergent customer base. The secret to surviving in business for the long haul is, and always has been, about developing deep personal connections with your customer base to satisfy their needs.

Once you lose that – you’ve lost.

Linden Lab’s fatal flaw is not a desire to increase its revenue stream. It is that it lost focus with its customer base in trying to achieve that aim.

Case in point:

1. Introduction of VAT with 1 day’s notice;
2. Removal of the Second Life Mentor’s group with little to no warning;
3. Layoff of +30% of staff, including Enterprise & Education evangelist/coordinators, and closure all International offices with little or no warning;
4. Layoff of Commerce Director just before a scheduled release of a new online Marketplace;
5. Elimination of the Enterprise business product without warning;
6. Reduction of both premium and standard support to US business hours, outsourcing of helpdesk staffing, increase in wait times for live support to 1/2 hour or more, and handling of tickets to 8+ weeks;
7. Elimination of the Teen Grid at the start of the school year with 2 weeks’ notice;
8. No transparent or visible plans for addressing an official policy of allowing minors on the grid;
9. Termination of Community Gateways with less than 24 hours notice;
10. Elimination of discounted pricing for Universities and non-profits, with insufficient notice for budget planning;

There are far more issues coming out of the Lab that just these. But at its core is a fundamental pattern of behaviour where Linden Lab is assuming the role of a dictatorship rather than a social governing body which works in partnership with its citizens. And while the Lab may not like to hear this – they are responsible for the citizenship since they were the ones that created it.

I hate to bring in the old clique but you can’t have your cake and eat it too. What made Second Life a social Mecca for virtual collaborative environments is not what makes ROI’s in the 50%, 100%, or 500% category. Its fate by nature of the social change it is leading is (or was) to become a commodity service which means high volumes and low mark-ups.

• That takes time
• That takes vision
• That takes balls

It also takes a backbone to stand up to your investors and get them onside with a future that is still 4-6 years away.

The non-profits and educational customers of Linden Lab which are now disenfranchised with having watched so much of these draconian measures are in all likelihood going to take that negative message out into the greater business community. You don’t get that type of brand loyalty back once you have broken trust with your customer base.

More so than that, the Lab is now going to have to wait for a new crop of middle and senior managers to take positions of spending authority before they will be able to build that brand loyalty back up. Existing organizations that were skittish to begin with may continue to look at virtual worlds for enabling business process innovation but after the past 18 months of bad decisions by the Lab, there is a good bet that they will be pointing to Second Life not as the model to follow, but the one to avoid, despite its obvious advantages over other comparable 3D-VCE platforms.

The damage has been done. Even if the Lab back-tracks they have finally alienated the one group of customers that could have helped them salvage their bruised reputation.  Whatever it is they think they are hoping to accomplish it better be beyond spectacular because nothing short of a complete re-invention is likely going to help them for the next 4 years after this.

– Kevin Feenan

Net neutrality is about fair and equal access to information free of undue influence by governments and corporations regardless of race, creed, colour, economic status, etc. Wikipedia also puts it as follows, “Network neutrality is a principle proposed for user access networks participating in the Internet that advocates no restrictions by Internet Service Providers and governments on content, sites, platforms, on the kinds of equipment that may be attached, and no restrictions on the modes of communication allowed.” 

The issue has never been about the prioritization of TCP/IP services. In fact, voice over IP (VOIP), is generally given higher priority in most networking applications due to the requirement that data needs to be transmitted in “real-time” compared to other services. For example, if an image on a web page fails to load due to a transmission error, the router simply calls for that piece of information over again and if it takes an extra 300ms (milliseconds) for that to happen then its really no big loss. Further, if the image arrives out of sync with the rest of the web page it again is no big loss as the image is simply rendered at the point in time all the information becomes available. However the same type of delay on a VOIP call doesn’t work because all the data has to be streamed in a very specific order in order to be understood.

It would be like trying listen to a conversation to all words where the are randomly mixed.

See? – Doesn’t fly. So VOIP phone calls are given higher priority than data and for very good reason. In fact the same logic can and does apply to other types of applications and in general there is consensus as to which pieces of Internet traffic should be allocated to the fast lanes compared to slower lanes. The fact that this is controlled more by the hardware applications on each end of the transmission line is also of major benefit because it means the ISPs are not really in control of this but rather it is a function of specific types of data and the industry standards by which that type of data is agreed to be streamed at.

One of the core problems however is this idea of bandwidth throttling, which is controlled at the ISP level. Bandwidth throttling is a process whereby the ISP can control how much data, what types of data, and how fast that data is transmitted through their network. So while the industry may agree that VOIP traffic should be given priority over other types of traffic, an ISP can elect to “throttle back” the speed, or in some cases to block that type of traffic altogether.

Now this is really where net neutrality people really get their backs up. The expectation by people connected to the Internet is that if you are paying for a high-speed connection to the Internet (say 6 Mb/s download and 1 Mb/s upload), then there should be no restrictions on what you put on either end of that connection. Further if you are paying for a given amount of bandwidth (50 Gb/mth) then so long as you are under your cap again there should be no restrictions. Herein comes the rub. If everyone were to max out their connections all the time then essentially it would overload the network of most ISPs. While we sign contracts saying this is what we are suppose to be getting, quite often an ISP will either cut back or cancel an account that is actually using the connection to its maximum potential all the time. This is because ISPs rarely build capacity in accordance to what they are contracted to provide, but rather to what the aggregate usage is across all users of the system. That could be in some cases as low as 20% of the total contracted service levels.

Since an ISP is under no obligation to identify how large their network is, rather than put in more capacity, an ISP may elect to use other mechanisms first to address the increase usage of their system before purchasing more capacity.

Bandwidth throttling is one way to do this. In principle, what it allows an ISP to do is to narrow the amount of traffic going to each customer during peak periods so that, while you may not get your maximum allowable bandwidth, at least what bandwidth you do get will be stable and less error prone. All well and good. However a number of ISPs are using this same technology to restrict certain types of traffic all the time. Bit torrents for example where people have the opportunity to download large files (movies, music, etc) over an extended period of time. P2P file sharing is another.

ISPs are making these decisions not out of any real necessity to control bandwidth but rather are essentially “taxing” those services, which have both legitimate and illegitimate purposes, in order to upsell their services or to develop additional revenue streams for something that should be ”neutral” access.

The situation becomes worse when you add in the fact that content on the Internet is also being policed to the point where people do not have the right to choose what content they access. Anyone from Canada knows, for example, that Hulu is not accessible and yet it is a free service to anyone connect to an IP address based in the US. Similar thing with some content provided by the BBC.

The problem with this type of policing is that it is the slippery slope of creating classes of people who have or don’t have access to specific information and services. People that support net neutrality argue that information in any form should be accessible and that governments and ISPs should not have the right to tell us what we can or cannot see based on geography, economic status or any other type of profiling mechanisms. It is a form of censorship which no longer has a role in a world where one can go from Toronto to London in 6-8 hours. It is a means of trying to establish boarders where none should exist.

Look at it this way – Cable companies may have a monopoly in specific markets that they don’t want Hulu or the BBC intruding on by offering free services across the Internet. However there is nothing illegal about me travelling to the UK or the US and watching non-Canadian TV while I’m there. In fact there is nothing being broadcast, for the most part, that is illegal or morally reprehensible about any of this content nor is it against the law in Canada. So if technically I’m legally entitled to view this material, and if the copyright owners want to provide this material free of charge, then why should I not be allowed access in Canada?

The answer is I should be allowed. If the cable companies up here cannot provide services I want then I should be free to access those services wherever they exist in the world if they are being streamed to the world wide web without restriction by the copyright holders. However that choice isn’t mine. I have no input into that choice. I have no reprentation as to influcing future choices of this type. And the same goes for people around the world. It doesn’t matter wether you are in Canada, US, UK, or the EU – the ability to influence these choices is completely out of your control.

Which is why the principle of net neutrality is so critically important. It establishes the world wide right to freedom of thought and freedom of expression regardless of the media used to convey those ideals. There is nothing more basic that being able to have freedom over where your thoughts and ideas may take you independent of any government or corporate entity and ensures that such freedoms are free of undue taxation or limitation without representation. It is as fundamental a right as breathing. When there is no mechanism available to provide representation to people to influence outcomes associated with fundamental human freedoms, then it is contingent on everyone to establish an open systems approach least we abdicate our rights as individuals to a series of fractured dictatorships for which we will have no recourse when it really matters. (okay you can inhale now)

No one is really losing sleep over not being able to access Hulu or slow bit torrents. It is what the implications of these restrictions mean as a culture which should keep you up at night.

- Kevin Feenan

So who is lying? M and Philip can’t both be right. If M was correct in 2009 then after all these cuts Second Life is definitely in a very solid financial picture at this point in time. It also means that a lot of these cuts to staff and programs were not necessary. If Philip is right however and we are in a good financial position now (compared to then) then we, as a community, were lied to in 2009 which begs the question what else is Linden Lab not telling people.

For example, in the last week Linden Lab has dropped the bomb of closing down the SL Teen Grid in the middle of the school year. 3 days later they just sent an email with 24 hours notice to all community gateway owners that they are shutting down the community gateway program effective immediately.  In both case no substitution was offered for the replacement of the existing service.  In fact the closure of the teen grid, which isn’t that surprising, in the middle of the school year showed remarkable insensitivity to the teachers and educators which have been working all spring and summer to prepare their curriculum only to have the core of that program yanked with 2 weeks to prepare substitute course materials.

I’m sorry as this is not going to be PC BUT —- how dumb do you have to be to think that yanking the teen grid in the middle of the school year is a good idea. (notice that isn’t a question) And we don’t even deal with the teen grid at Rockcliffe. Even I’m mad about this not because it impacts us but because it is a symptom of what Linden Lab has been doing all year long.  That is, making unilateral decisions that impact a very broad community without community input. And driving customers away as a result.

From a strategy stand point this is very bad. One of Second Life’s core assets is the user community. While a good brand can get away with the occasional hit to their reputation, establishing a pattern of behaviour that clearly shows a move away from being customer-centric to being investor-centric is a sure fire way to erode that brand loyalty to the point where any competitive product will drive masses of people away from your core product lines.

Fortunately for Linden Lab there is no such product currently on the market however there are several in development which will be in power positions within the next two years if the Lab doesn’t stop shooting themselves in the foot, stem the bleeding, and start repairing relationships. By the time they are ready to do that it may be too late as OpenSim, Blue Mars, Unity3D and others may have caught up with Second Life at which point it will be game over.

Personally I was really hoping that Philip’s re-introduction as CEO was going to be a sign that calmer heads are ready to prevail. But in continuing these 1980’s MBA-style draconian tactics without involving the community has simply served to erode whatever linguistic capital he had to trade in stepping back up to the plate. In fact, this is exactly the type of thing he should be divorcing himself from as every subsequent announcement of this type drives his personal image away from being the poster boy for 3D collaborative environments.

Anyone new that is brought in to repair all this damage being done is going to have their job cut out for them over the first 2 years of their mandate. Philip was someone who could have repaired that damage in less than half that time and instead he’s just being set-up to look like every other high-paid executive out there which is good for being put in-front of a group of investors but extremely bad if it results in him losing all his identity capital with the customer base supporting Second Life and where it potentially can go. As any business owner can tell you, it’s easy to spend an investor’s money on a business – getting and keeping a loyal customer base is hard and it’s even more difficult if you start with a culture that is ready and willing to walk for a comparable value proposition.

It is an open avenue for any competitive company, like Unity3D, to walk in and pander to the existing client base to say “we care – they don’t”. And people will believe them even if the value proposition isn’t as robust as what Linden Lab can offer simply because the pattern of behaviour established over the last 8 months by Linden Lab has been screaming “we don’t care about you and to prove it we are about to cut another relationship or product or service that is important to the community without offering something better in exchange other than empty promises”.

People are short sighted. In general, long term means “next week” en mass when it comes to decision making and every hole that Linden Lab leaves in their tactical plan is one more hole that leaves their customer based feeling unhappy and unfulfilled. Short of firing their strategists, the Lab should at this point develop a dedicated PAID community strategy group under NDA to knock some sense into them before the community at large just decides that enough is enough and better to move to OpenSim. They may not get everything they want but at least they don’t have to worry about the Lab cutting them off at the knees without compassion, consultation, due warning, and alternative solutions.

Don’t get me wrong – I’m still dedicated to building Rockcliffe up and Second Life is a very large part of that strategic and tactical plan. But that only goes so far. If the Lab continues to alienate the user base all the way to Blue Mars and back then there is no point in staying with a sinking ship. We are nowhere close to that point right now but for the sake of the community I am really hoping that this is the end of the bone-headed manoeuvres that have done nothing but erode Linden Lab’s brand identity and services over the past year.

Somehow I doubt it though. Who knew they had so many shoes.

What the BP Executive Lamar McKay should have done was establish the framework which would lead towards greater accountability in the field (no pun intended) for the future. That being that each of these organizations, and more, each potentially has some measure of responsibility in what was probably a preventable accident.

The problem is one where there is no direct line of accountability within complex systems. Very large projects require that a large number of autonomous activities each perform at peak efficiency. Essentially the assumption is that failures in one system will not cascade across other systems for which there is no proper oversight and management. Add to this the Bush Administrations to push for energy independence at a rate which likely has exceeded the ability of government oversight groups to effectively monitor and control, and companies which are trying to both recoup from financial losses due to the financial market’s meltdown and increase profitability on their balance sheets.

A single point of failure in a project which is suppose to have multiple levels of oversight essentially means a cascade failure among all the parties involved that share responsibility to various degrees. Halliburton for example cannot renege on their responsibilities for capping the well if they are supposed to be experts in this field. If the removal of the mud prior to insertion of a cement plug is not something they do on a regular basis then someone from Halliburton should have been aware of the safety concerns and halted the procedure when a non-standard technique was about to be employed.

I’m not suggesting that this was or was not the direct cause of the explosion and sinking of the oil rig. Rather what I am suggesting is that this type of behaviour where unsafe practices are not identified and corrected because “that is not my job” or “that is someone else’s responsibility” is representative of the type of systemic issues that plague large projects.

Problems like this are often far too easy to recognize but are stopped mid-stream in the escalation process because eventually the communication of these issues hit the ‘pay-grade ceiling” – that is, the attitude that nothing can be done because the decision to take corrective action is “above my pay-grade”. Similarly, when there is a lack of communication across multiple organizations each having responsibility for a specific aspect of a project, communication can also be stopped because “that is not our area of responsibility”. There is an expectation that an individual’s span-of-control goes only so far and when safety or other concerns branch beyond that perceived span-of-control then they are forced through peer pressure to not make waves and let people do their jobs.

Unfortunately, for a number of projects that type of attitude isn’t good enough. In part because no one wants to be the outcast for saying that the “sky is falling”. In part because those people whose job it is will in general take exception to other people poking their noses into their job.  We can look to a number of instances such as the multiple NASA space flight failures, Chernobyl, Seveso, and Bhopal. Time and time again what we find is that even though it may be the actions of a few which have cause the actual catastrophe, it is the social culture which surrounds those individuals which leads to the pattern of behaviours that make such catastrophes inevitable.

So what should the Chairman and President of BP America said to the congressional hearing?

Every day around the world BP is engaged in hundreds of thousands of decisions related to the quality and safety of their global operations. Influencing those decisions are hundreds of thousands of other voices including local, federal, and regional government agencies, global business partners, environmental groups, and non-governmental organizations. And underlying all of those voices are thousands of risks and circumstances which cannot be anticipated, predicted, or mitigated.

The exploration for oil is one of the riskiest ventures that humans can for reach and accomplish. Companies like BP are expected to take every conceivable precaution but the bottom line is that no industry can uniquely provide a 100% iron clad guarantee that ever possible situation will be controlled to the point where failure is impossible. It just doesn’t happen as much as we would like it to.

So long as our culture has a thirst for petroleum, humans will continue to do stupid things like stick a hair thin straw into that 8000 mile wide orange we call the Earth and hope to heck nothing goes wrong.

What needs to happen is the culture from Government to BP and its partners need to be looked at to identify why the culture allowed safe practices to be compromised. Then engage in changes to the system which both support the culture through education, technology, and policy. And then it needs to be made into best practice around the globe with all organizations engaged in similar activities.

You can’t do that however in an environment in which is focused on assigning blame to the few organizations that are in the best position to be leaders of that change. Are they at fault – sure – but now that we’ve just invested $30 Billion dollars or more in their education why would we deliberately put them out of business and in so doing create a culture in which the rest of the players in this industry drive their bad practices further underground.

We need these practices out in the open in order to fix them and we need solid leadership to drive that point home to all the other competitors in the field that the status quo isn’t good enough anymore. It’s not going to be a quick fix. But if handled correctly by all parties it could prove the stimulus for substantive change in the industry towards better accountability and safety while the need for petroleum is still a major factor in the economies of the world.