I’ve gotten several emails in my box today requesting donations for other deserving organizations. This is just a note to remind you that The Smokey Wire needs donations as well, for the upkeep of our site, as well as any improvements we would want to make.
The Smokey Wire is a place for: 1) Asking questions and learning from a variety of folks with different backgrounds and experiences.
2 ) Discussing disagreements civilly, with the intent of mutual understanding.
3) Trying to figure out the truth or truths from scientific studies and news stories.
4) Networking with knowledgeable people for your own work.
As in the NYT article shared by Som Sai:
“As Erika Hall pointed out, we have centuries of experience designing real-life spaces where people gather safely. After the social media age is over, we’ll have the opportunity to rebuild our damaged public sphere by creating digital public places that imitate actual town halls, concert venues and pedestrian-friendly sidewalks. These are places where people can socialize or debate with a large community, but they can do it anonymously. If they want to, they can just be faces in the crowd, not data streams loaded with personal information.
That’s because in real life, we have more control over who will come into our private lives, and who will learn intimate details about us. We seek out information, rather than having it jammed into our faces without context or consent. Slow, human-curated media would be a better reflection of how in-person communication works in a functioning democratic society.”
In our own humble way, we are contributing to knowledge about forests from a diversity of perspectives, and modeling civil digital public places.
Note: currently donations are not tax deductible. We hope to change that next year.
I just made a small donation. If all 595 followers of this blog did the same, we’d be in great shape. Thank you, Sharon, for shouldering most of the burden to date.