Elsewhere we've seen shit hit the fan: in England, in Spain, in Egypt, in China, and recently in Wisconsin. Whatever this is, it may still be small, and it's just starting, but it's the beginning of our thing, or it could be. In a way it's promising that people are not accepting that this is happening. Even in New York, people float right past it. The media dismisses but it continues to grow.

There are lots of signs. Technology is mobilizing us like a galaxy of data bats and bugs crawling out of the manhole and into the cloud. Suddenly it’s more than Wall Street being occupied, and for a generation that never imagined it would have any conflict to contemplate besides: do I want the Jetta or Tuareg? New York or Silicon Valley? After studying hard to be successful-- doing all the tough things we were told would pay off, the proverbial yawning chasm between reasonable expectation and reality seems to be widening.  Next to the debt of our nation's young, dystopia perhaps seems viable? Or at least preferable a future of sliding hope in unemployment offices, in cubicles with fluorescent light, in mall jobs, and repossessed cars, in empty inboxes.

This time somehow, it seems that it's not only the radical underground and disgruntled outcasts who find themselves carrying signs, but it’s also the honor students of bumper sticker fame. It’s the professionals and academics who bought into the system earnestly and never imagined that they themselves would be the ones fighting for their own right for a fair share of normal.

If you know me, you know that I’m not all that political-- that I’m obsessed with art, technology, and brands, but no brand, technology, or art can inspire like what might be happening right now within the collective itself. The truest art is watching in real time as my generation taps the nascent potential of technology to breed a new kind of (h)activism. Maybe the new brand is authenticity, and the shiny new technology feature set to announce is milk and vinegar to take the sting of mace out of a stranger’s eyes.