The internet is in the running for this year's Nobel Peace Prize.
You may think this is very Scandinavian concept because this week Finland residents will have the right by law to access a broadband connection at a mandated speed (at least 1 Mbps, with a goal of 100 Mbps by 2015.)
Yet the Nobel nomination actually follows a campaign by the Italian edition of Wired magazine.
Following the Dynamite-inventor’s will, Alfred Nobel's Peace Prize is to go to whoever "shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses."
Riccardo Luna, Wired Italy's editor in chief, says (quoting Tim Berners Lee, the biological father of the internet): "Internet is not a network of computers anymore, but a network of people."
Luna adds: "It is the greatest social interface humanity has ever had. It is a weapon of mass construction. As we have put out in the official manifesto of the campaign, 'digital culture is promoting a new kind of society through communication and education'. And communication and education are the roots of a peaceful world."
TIME Magazine has its famous MAN OF THE YEAR award. In 2007, the cover showed the Award winner as a computer with a mirror for a screen and the text “You. You control the Information Age.”
I think that qualifies us to claim (if we win the Nobel in October) that we are multiple award winners.
The prize money shoud be about $1.4 million. If they give to us internet people, by my calculation, you’ll get your check for $0.00025.
These days, thanks to internet making it so easy to share what’s on your mind, you can’t even get a full penny for your thoughts.