[Foundation-l] Chapters, deductibility and donation profiles (was Wikimania 2006 - host city contest to open onSeptember 1st 20)

[Lars Aronsson]

Kelly Martin wrote:

> IIRC, The American branch of the Red Cross has specific enabling
> legislation for it in US federal law and enjoys a federal charter.
> [...]
>  Obtaining the same status for Wikimedia would require a massive
> lobbying effort.

The [[International Red Cross]] was established in 1863 followed 
in 1864 by the first [[Geneva Convention]] that recognized the red 
cross symbol in warfare.  This happened at the same time as 
warfare got mechanized, in the decades immediately after the 
innovations of steam railroads ([[Stephenson's Rocket]], 1829), 
steam propeller ships ([[USS Monitor]], 1862) and machine guns 
([[Gatling gun]], 1861).

Supposedly, a "Red W" (Wikinews: neutral reporting) can be adopted 
as soon as we have a fully developed information war.  The current 
wars (against terrorism, and in Afghanistan and Iraq) are not of 
this kind, because of the overwhelming information supremacy of 
the winning (western) side, which makes the information aspect of 
the current conflicts look more like a minor colonial uprising.  
For the nearest decade, it seems unlikely that the Arab world, 
Africa or communist China would be able to catch up with the 
western information supremacy.  It seems more likely that the 
first real information wars will be fought within the current area 
of supremacy.

If we just add 150 years, the Gatling Blog will be invented in 
2011, the "Red W" could be adopted in 2013, at the height of the 
U.S. civil information war, followed in 2021 by the 
Franco-Prussian information war, and World Information War I would 
be scheduled to take place in 2064-2068.


-- 
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se