The
previous blog described an experiment by Stewart Brand in the late
1980s to publish an open unedited column for his regular Whole Earth
Review magazine. It was a brilliant idea to see what hidden material
was in the vast human mind that was not making it into the public
domain.
In my recollection there was nothing particularly interesting in the published material. I don't have a copy to check on but it should be of some historic value. The inherent problem is two fold.
First, ideas, reports and views that are important but truly outside the domain of public consideration, simply can't be recognized and appreciated because they are outside. Example: a number of European Jews reported on the Holocaust starting in 1941 to the NYTimes, Manchester Guardian and Washington Post and never got more than a few inches of press.
Second, many ideas, reports and views that are important are too slow moving for the public to appreciate their importance. That applies often to technology such as the Xerox process, the DNA double helix research reports, FM radio and gene splicing. It also applies to social change such as the impact of political conventions covered on TV that lead to open primary voting and the introduction of the VW auto that lead to the fall of the American auto industry.