J.R. Johnson

I came across this sentence a while back: 

“Please bear in mind that Somaliland has no Postal Service” 

Think about that.

Forget complaints about the cost of stamps rising by however many cents, or the extra day it took for your first class letter to reach Hawai’i. There are places on Earth with no postal service at all.

Want to mail a letter? Too bad. Want to send in your rent or mail tax forms or vote? Sorry. And if you want to do something crazy like send in a patent application or submit to Fantasy & Science Fiction, you are out of luck.

“Talent is equally distributed, opportunity is not.”

— Harvard, Stanford, and MIT Researchers Study 1 Million Inventors To Find Secret To Success, And It’s Not Talent

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I’ve mentioned my love of the mail system and other vital public infrastructure before. 

Adventure, Past and Future | J.R. Johnson

Even beyond the immediate usefulness, I find the concept of a system that ties us all together inspiring. Sure, the internet is obviously taking up a lot of that space (in ways both good and bad) but I also believe that there is also real value in its physical equivalent. 

I mean, Owl Post is great and all, but consider the Muggles.

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