HOPE. So O. So much a part of the 2008 Obama message. There's something resonant about the ring of Obama's name, O-land, the O era, the O-Ring, the land of Open Source networks, web 2.0, the land of Opportunity, and Open door policies.
The cover of the post election cover of The New Yorker of November 17, 2008 featured the ‘O” in The New Yorker illuminated, hovering over Washington, D.C.’s Lincoln Memorial like a full moon beacon, a halo, a wedding ring. It’s as if the American public collectively married Obama’s message. This O-ring represents the inner circle and the outer circle and all the rippling circles in between. It says, “We’re all in this together, this “Yes We Can” moment of change that joins hands with MLK’s “I Have a Dream” and transforms the operative pronoun from “I,” a singleton hero of social change, to the collective ‘we’. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech broadcast on August 28, 1963 from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. projected forward to a possibility, a future not yet seen. “I Have a Dream that one day…” and this dream rested on the booming voice of one man, a leader, a singular visionary leader.
Obama’s “Yes We Can” exists in the present tense of possibility, like a mantra of hope, an incantation that transcends the jaded visions of the previous generation. Led by a “we,” the statement is less fragile than “Yes I Can” would have been. A We emerged in the 2008 election as a Grassroots collective, a we enhanced by Internetworks. That We transcends a nation of "I" and "me" to a wikiworld of "we" communities. It is the transitional viral meme of 2008, ushering in a new era of Hope.
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