That's you, Brad. That's our #webdev #webdesign #a11y #opendata #openGov #openSociety #OPEN and authentic core community. That's the true heart that we have still beating but has been seemingly lost in the cacophonic roar in large part caused by the very work we've done. ❤️💚💙

Yes, there’s a lot of howling winds outside these days, but the world has been much worse over before and still came out the other side. Spring still came. Maybe not for us now, but eventually.

Every age hopes their new technology (books, newspapers, radio, etc) will fundamentally change human nature; perhaps it does in small course corrections over time, but an idealist will always be disappointed. Despite that, I still believe the web is a modern miracle.

I’m still proud to have been a small part of a large community of people creating the web. Ignorance may be bliss but I’d rather have a global, intertwingled hypertext medium than not.

And that’s what we have. Rather than a locked down AOL or MSN we have an amazing, kaleidoscopic, terrifying and brilliant web. I’d rather have Ian Banks “The Culture” than a perfect, impossible vision.

We can be proud of what we’ve created, while remaining vigilant and humble of addressing new issues the best we can (hateful speech, attempting to surface truth online the best we can, foreign actors using disinfo campaigns, etc.)

And in the end, even if there are mobs raging we can still attempt to be open, respectful, tolerant, and authentic, even if it might have fallen out of fashion for now.