I’m delighted to hear you’re working with all of those folks, some of whom I myself am not aware of but the balance of whom I know and admire. I guess part of my frustration has to do with my sense that using Tumblr means you’re not fundamentally serious about dialogue – both due to the limitations of the platform itself, and because (regardless of user demographics) that simply isn’t where the conversation around these issues is happening.

I don’t doubt that you are personally sincere, but the whole way this has been framed feels like a somewhat clumsy attempt to channel discourse into a container that you own and manage. My personal preference would have been (and still would be) to see you participating as a voice in the existing spaces for dialogue, rather than trying to enlist everyone to participate on your terms.

I don’t mean to sound hostile, or foreclosed to dialogue, when I assure you that I am not. But I simply don’t believe that the strategy IBM has adopted is the best way to go about being a responsible participant in a discussion I agree very much does need to be happening. Whether or not I believe in “smarter cities” (and as it happens, I find that very framing problematic), it’s clear that the public good would be powerfully served by a broader exploration of what’s going on in this domain, technically, socially, and politically.

Your point on bringing the conversation where its already going on is well taken. Two takes on that:

The first is that we partnered with Tumblr as the context and platform for the SmarterCities Scan — http://smartercities.tumblr.com — because that is one of the places where several million digitally savvy, and urban-minded, young adults have already set up shop for a new style of content creation and sharing. To make this collaboration as open as possible, we’ve tapped into the new Submit feature that Tumblr has developed which enables anyone could share their ideas, visions and insights, no Tumblr account or previous experience required.

These factors are two of the ways to lower the bar to participation and enable the most open access for all comers, including IBMers.

Secondly, one reason for creating a new SmarterCities context for this idea sharing is so that IBM can — if we attract sufficient quantity and quality of contributed posts — analyze and process that multimedia data in order to create a public good — a Smarter Cities Open Model.

If your sincere desire is to contribute to this discussion (as opposed to stamping a big ol’ IBM brand over the domain), believe me, I applaud you. I’m sure any number of sites and blogs dealing with the question would be thrilled to have your perspective – mine absolutely among them. I look forward to seeing your thoughts on Speedbird, and elsewhere.