[Myplanet2]

Hello, Avalonians.

The research team has been working at creating the Avalon Library.

It now has some 280 items in it, including many full books.

We plan to release it as a work in progress in the very near future.

There have been many hurdles to overcome in the area of getting the software working the way we need it to, as a data management system. There are still bugs, but the basics are there and we are able to use it as we intended. None of us are programmers.

Now, we can really use some help in gathering and editing down much of the excellent content in the more than 90,000 posts here, by the almost 6,000 very bright individuals we proudly call members.

And we need help as well in going out beyond the confines of this forum to look for information which may not already be present here, but that we need for the library.

The consensus amongst us is that we may very well have a window of opportunity within which to pull this off. It may not happen that way, as there have already been several instances of predicted and foreseen situations failing to materialize. But I don't want to count on that, anymore than any other prudent person would.

I don't expect the worst case scenario to arrive, but neither will I be left saying "I should have done something while I had the chance".

So this is our chance to do something to make sure we've prepared to the best of our ability for any but the most unthinkable situations.

The global economy is headed for some very challenging new lows. Some, or perhaps a lot, of social unrest is expected to follow the economic troubles. There is a good chance that many aspects of our taken for granted infrastructure could face interruption or even collapse. War is in danger of spreading, and that would be by design, not accident. Several unrelated forecasts call for increased weather disturbances and a potential coastal problem. And while all of this potential mayhem is underway, several of the worlds governments, under the control of the "you know who's" show the evident intention of continuing to put us under ever tighter control and suppression.

How we make out under any or all of the above challenges depends on our attitude in approaching them, and what preparations we've had the foresight to make.

The library we have been working on, is meant to be the "how to" manual for avoiding as much of this trouble as possible, and repairing any damage done in areas which we could not avoid.

We mean for it to have everything a person would need to know to survive and rebuild, even if the worst came to pass.

But we need more than a half dozen working on this if we're to get it substantially done while the window is open.

We have several carefully prepared lists of categories of information, sub categories, and individual subjects for articles and other issue types which we are working from.

Since we've only had the software in useable form for a short time, we've been uploading what we have on hand as quickly as possible. But as you'd expect, what we have on hand reflects our personal tastes and interests. Few have a well rounded sampling of all the various categories of knowledge and technology we have identified as being needful of inclusion in the library. We therefore have some categories with dozens of articles, and others with none.

The help we need, is in converting certain portions of the accumulated knowledge already posted here at Avalon, into a form that is concise, and relatively complete, and having it posted here in a thread we'll call the Avalon library Drop Box. The researchers will then copy that post, convert it to pdf, our chosen format for library articles, and post it in the library, with a nod of acknowledgement to the honorary researcher who compiled/wrote the piece.

Since we are working to balance the categories across the spectrum of topics, and because we have a priority of topics we feel we need to include, we will be asking for certain subjects or threads to be prepared from a list of most needed and wanted.

We'll post the list, and as volunteers step forward to help, we'll assign topics to volunteers with priority going to those who have shown interest and expertise in those areas by posting history. Don't be intimidated. We're all just doing the best we can without any specific qualifications or credentials. Just so long as the knowledge survives intact.

The researchers will help all they can within their personal availability.

We're not afraid of what could come our way. We just want as many as possible to have the best chances of coming out the other side in good shape.

And after attitude, preparation seems like the winning ticket on that account.

You can post any interest you have in helping this project in this thread.

And as soon as I can get it copied, I'll post the lists of what we have and what we need.

I choose to treat this as an adventure to rival any in history. Proactive involvement in our future is the best chance of having it turning out the way we want it to.

We're not just doing this for us, but for all of us.