For those of us who've been around for two decades or more, it should come as no real surprise that the past ten years are seen as the worst decade in 50 years.
According to a recently released set of poll results from the Pew Research Center, a full half of the people surveys say their perception of the oughts was negative (in comparison, only 12 percent saw the 80s as negative).
Yeah, it's been kind of a crappy decade by a lot of standards. But it's also had some pretty amazing things happen.
Our technology and ability to share ideas with one another has continued to expand at a ridiculously fast rate. If at the end of 1999 you had described a service like Twitter to someone, they probably would have laughed at you. If you had shown them an iPhone or Droid (seriously, check out the latest augmented reality stuff), they'd surely tell you it was a prop from some sci-fi film.
And the ways in which people can get together to do good? Mind blowing. Just this month I watched Alyssa Milano raise over $75,000 for a charity in the space of two weeks. Almost all small donations from myriad fans who follow her on Twitter or other webby ways.
In the coming decade, there's nothing to stop any of us from reaching out and making a difference. The barriers for that have dropped to almost nothing. Worst case scenario? You go to a library or a friend's place and use a computer there to throw together a quick website using Google Sites and get the word out through any number of social networking tools.
There is no excuse for not working toward the change you want to see.
Go out and do it. Don't just hope the next decade will be better. Make it that way.
