Based on current trends and human values, i have always believed that collaborative efforts towards building peaceful and constructive systems should always be the top priority for many individuals, organizations, and nations.

Collaboration systems have a much wider and more positive impact on global societies than systems that are designed to cause harm or destruction, like intelligence operations, military technologies and surveillance. Investing in systems that promote cooperation and collaboration can lead to a more prosperous, harmonious, and peaceful future, whereas investing in military, surveillance and intel garbage has the potential to lead to devastating consequences for individuals and communities, especially as humans now have access to information. You can’t put your herd of citizens atop some mound of primacy to the detriment of others, eventually you too will plummet from your perch. I’m amazed at just how dimwitted and unintelligent these proponents are, in fact, in my own home country, we spend a total of $1.2T per year, that’s $400,000,000,000 every 90 days for this stuff. I’m wondering how many people, departments and divisions are actually working on building collaborative infrastructure and systems to bring countries together instead of manipulation and deceitful campaigns? I would wager it approaches zero. Ultimately, it is up to society to decide how to allocate resources and what values to prioritize when investing in technologies and systems. If we look at nation state resource allocation, in my lifetime, we see that priorities are clear: we value human deceit, manipulation, and violent aggression, sabotage and surveillance.

—August Ritchie