The tween years are turbulent, and ReadWrite, which turns 12 years old today, has been no exception. In the past year, we’ve gotten a new publishing system, a new office, and new owners and colleagues.
What has not changed is our commitment to exploring the new world of technology and making its complexities accessible for everyone who wants to reap its benefits.
As I wrote a year ago, on the occasion of ReadWrite’s 11th anniversary, just making it this far in the fast-moving world of digital publishing is its own accomplishment. Now that we’re part of Wearable World, with new resources behind our mission of democratizing technology, I feel like it’s time to lift our sights and not just chronicle the effects technology is having on our world, but dive into the maelstrom of change ourselves.
Respecting History, Celebrating The Future
ReadWrite began life as ReadWriteWeb, with a special focus on the newly open world of Web publishing. Having largely won the battle to make the Web both readable and writable, we saw something happen that broadened the ambit of our journalism and the intensity of the challenge we faced: The Web has become the world.
The simple protocols advanced by Sir Tim Berners-Lee to link together documents have now become the basis of the Internet of Things. Connected devices speak to other machines through application programming interfaces that run on what are, in essence, Web servers. It is now the world that we must make readable and writable, and hence open to all who seek opportunity and the realization of their creative potential.
See also: Should We Crowdfund ReadWrite?
I am convinced we can’t do this alone. We need to rally our community of readers. We’re now building some tools which I hope will connect our readers far more intimately into our process of reporting and storytelling. Here, too, we have an opportunity to take something that is presently broadcast-oriented—our own digital publication—and make ReadWrite itself far more read-write in nature.
We’re on the brink of announcing more details about this. If you want to stay informed, you can follow us on Twitter or Facebook or subscribe to our email newsletter. In the meantime, I’d love to hear your ideas on how we can let our community participate in ReadWrite’s next chapter. Tweet at @owenthomas or leave a comment here to tell me what you think.
Photo by pagedooley
