PS21: The First 100 Days

10919048_10153007657422457_4600505066675778782_n — The first PS21 event in London in January – a discussion on cyber security

It may be hugely overshadowed by the UK election but I’m delighted to say that PS21 is exactly 100 days old today.

We’ve come a remarkably long way since we launched in London on January 28^th with an event in London and another in Washington the following day. Depending on how you count, we’ve done fifteen or so events since then in both cities. We’ll shortly be announcing our first in New York. And work is underway on expanding further in several other cities and on at least one other continent.

Our inaugural piece of research – into global conflict death tolls published in March – won worldwide media coverage. We have plans to follow that up with some further interesting data later in the year. Watch this space…

We’ve published literally dozens of posts on the PS21 website, thanks both to some truly excellent contributors and some equally fantastic back room work by the assorted volunteer blog editors. We’ve had half a dozen columns published on Reuters.com as well as other media. In the next few months, we’ll begin to publish some seriously interesting longer form pieces on Amazon, building on the success of our first Kindle single last year. This is another seriously exciting opportunity as we position ourselves as one of the leading publishers of short form pieces on the changing century.

It’s hard to believe that only a year ago, PS21 was nothing more than a single word document. Our first ever meeting of interested parties took place in late May 2014. Even in August, there wasn’t much more to us than me and company secretary Tom Beazley, a single intern and some curious/interested onlookers.

It’s all rather humbling, we couldn’t have done this without the truly excellent people who’ve agreed to join us as global fellows and even more importantly the network of largely very young volunteers based mainly in London and Washington. In particular, I’d highlight Elyse Warren, Carrie Cuno, Jinwoo Chong, Alexander Mattes, Anske Venter, Christopher Stephens and Connor Hennessy in DC. And in London, Claire Connellan, Zahra Hdidou, Emmanuel Akinwotu, Holly Mortimer, Lucy Moloney, Amitha Rajan, Helene Trehin and Thomas Hall. We have some great new people joining as well so I can only see this list getting longer from here. And also, of course, my various PAs in that time, Gabrielle Redelinghuys, Melanie Gomez, Anna Kovacs and Therese Persson.

We will also shortly be announcing our new expanded board.

And, of course, thanks to Thomson Reuters and Editor in Chief Stephen Adler in particular, for giving me a year’s paid sabbatical to see if this would work. I think it is.

Incidentally, throughout this entire period, I’ve irritatingly found myself not merely still paralysed, but also heavily stuck having to lie down horizontally for most of the day and week. So all in all, I guess this has been a remarkable testimony to what on semi-bed bound quadriplegic and a relative handful of inspired, committed volunteers can do.

I look forward to seeing what happens next.

All the best,

Peter

Please find below a list of all the postings on our website since our launch in January.

06/05/2015 Event Takeaways: The Middle East in Flux

06/05/2015 What now for Libya? – Patrick Bury

04/05/2015 I Don’t Know You, I Don’t Like You – The Rise of Anti-immigrant Movements in Europe – Sandy Schumann,

03/05/2015 What does this election tell us about modern Britain? – Peter Apps

April 2015

30/04/2015 DC and London UK Election Discussions: Key Takeaways and Media

29/04/2015 What Russia really thinks on Ukraine – Vassily Kashin

28/04/2015 A Migrant’s Short Story – Emmanuel Akintwu