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So let me start by taking you back,

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back into the mists of your memory

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to perhaps the most anticipated year in your life,

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but certainly the most anticipated year

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in all human history:

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the year 2000. Remember that?

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Y2K, the dotcom bubble,

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stressing about whose party you're going to go to

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as the clock strikes midnight,

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before the champagne goes flat,

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and then there's that inchoate yearning

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that was felt, I think, by many, that the millennium,

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that the year 2000, should mean more,

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more than just a two and some zeroes.

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Well, amazingly, for once, our world leaders

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actually lived up to that millennium moment

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and back in 2000 agreed to some

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pretty extraordinary stuff:

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visionary, measurable, long-term targets

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called the Millennium Development Goals.

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Now, I'm sure you all keep a copy of the goals

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under your pillow, or by the bedside table,

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but just in case you don't,

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and your memory needs some jogging,

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the deal agreed then goes like this:

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developing countries promised to at least halve

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extreme poverty, hunger and deaths from disease,

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alongside some other targets, by 2015,

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and developed nations promised to help them

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get that done by dropping debts,

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increasing smart aid, and trade reform.

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Well, we're approaching 2015,

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so we'd better assess, how are we doing on these goals?

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But we've also got to decide, do we like such global goals?

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Some people don't. And if we like them, we've got to decide

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what we want to do on these goals going forward.

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What does the world want to do together?

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We've got to decide a process by which we decide.

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Well, I definitely think these goals are worth building on

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and seeing through, and here's just a few reasons why.

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Incredible partnerships between the private sector,

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political leaders, philanthropists

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and amazing grassroots activists

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across the developing world,

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but also 250,000 people marched in the streets

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of Edinburgh outside this very building

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for Make Poverty History.

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All together, they achieved these results:

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increased the number of people on anti-retrovirals,

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life-saving anti-AIDS drugs;

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nearly halved deaths from malaria;

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vaccinated so many that 5.4 million lives will be saved.

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And combined, this is going to result

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in two million fewer children dying every year,

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last year, than in the year 2000.

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That's 5,000 fewer kids dying every day,

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ten times you lot not dead every day,

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because of all of these partnerships.

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So I think this is amazing living proof of progress

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that more people should know about,

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but the challenge of communicating this kind of good news

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is probably the subject of a different TEDTalk.

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Anyway, for now, anyone involved in getting these results,

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thank you. I think this proved these goals are worth it.

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But there's still a lot of unfinished business.

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Still, 7.6 million children die every year of preventable,

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treatable diseases,

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and 178 million kids are malnourished

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to the point of stunting, a horrible term

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which means physical and cognitive lifelong impairment.

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So there's plainly a lot more to do on the goals we've got.

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But then, a lot of people think there are things

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that should have been in the original package

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that weren't agreed back then that should now be included,

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like sustainable development targets,

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natural resource governance targets,

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access to opportunity, to knowledge,

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equity, fighting corruption.

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All of this is measurable and could be in the new goals.

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But the key thing here is,

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what do you think should be in the new goals?

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What do you want?

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Are you annoyed that I didn't talk about gender equality

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or education?

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Should those be in the new package of goals?

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And quite frankly, that's a good question,

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but there's going to be some tough tradeoffs

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and choices here, so you want to hope

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that the process by which the world decides

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these new goals is going to be legitimate, right?

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Well, as we gather here in Edinburgh,

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technocrats appointed by the U.N. and certain governments,

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with the best intentions, are busying themselves

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designing a new package of goals,

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and currently they're doing that through pretty much the same old

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late-20th-century, top-down, elite, closed process.

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But, of course, since then, the Web and mobile telephony,

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along with ubiquitous reality TV formats

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have spread all around the world.

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So what we'd like to propose is that we use them

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to involve people from all around the world

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in an historic first: the world's first truly global

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poll and consultation, where everyone everywhere

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has an equal voice for the very first time.

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I mean, wouldn't it be a huge historic missed opportunity

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not to do this, given that we can?

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There's hundreds of billions of your aid dollars at stake,

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tens of millions of lives, or deaths, at stake,

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and, I'd argue, the security and future

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of you and your family is also at stake.

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So, if you're with me, I'd say there's three essential steps

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in this crowdsourcing campaign:

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collecting, connecting and committing.

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So first of all, we've got to ground this campaign

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in core polling data.

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Let's go into every country that will let us in,

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ask 1,001 people what they want

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the new goals to be, making special efforts

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to reach the poorest, those without access

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to modern technology, and let's make sure that their views

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are at the center of the goals going forward.

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Then, we've got to commission a baseline survey

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to make sure we can monitor and progress the goals

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going forward. The original goals didn't really have

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good baseline survey data,

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and we're going to need the help of big data through all of this process to make sure

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we can really monitor the progress.

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And then we've got to connect with the big crowd.

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Now here, we see the role for an unprecedented coalition

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of social media giants and upstarts,

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telecoms companies, reality TV show formats,

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gaming companies, telecoms, all of them together

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in kind of their "We Are The World" moment.

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Could they come together and help

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the Millennium Development Goals get rebranded

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into the Millennial Generation's Goals?

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And if just five percent of the five billion plus

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who are currently connected made a comment,

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and that comment turned into a commitment,

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we could crowdsource a force of 300 million people

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around the world to help see these goals through.

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If we have this collected data, and this connected crowd,

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based upon our experience of campaigning

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and getting world leaders to commit,

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I think world leaders will commit

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to most of the crowdsourced recommendations.

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But the question really is, through this process

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will we all have become committed?

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And if we are, are we ready to iterate, monitor

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and provide feedback, make sure these promises

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are really delivering results?

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Well, there's some fantastic examples here to scale up,

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mostly piloted within Africa, actually.

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There's Open Data Kenya, which geocodes

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and crowdsources information about where projects are,

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are they delivering results.

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Often, they're not in the right place.

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And Ushahidi, which means "witness" in Swahili,

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which geocodes and crowdsources information

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in complex emergencies to help target responses.

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This is some of the most exciting stuff

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in development and democracy,

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where citizens on the edge of a network

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are helping to force open the process

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to make sure that the big global aid promises

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and vague stuff up at the top really delivers for people

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at a grassroots level and inverts that pyramid.

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This openness, this forcing openness, is key,

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and if it wasn't entirely transparent already,

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I should be open: I've got a completely transparent agenda.

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Long-term trends suggest that this century

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is going to be a tough place to live,

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with population increases, consumption patterns increasing,

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and conflict over scarce natural resources.

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And look at the state of global politics today.

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Look at the Rio Earth Summit that happened just last week,

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or the Mexican G20, also last week.

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Both, if we're honest, a bust.

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Our world leaders, our global politics,

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currently can't get it done.

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They need our help. They need the cavalry,

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and the cavalry's not going to come from Mars.

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It's got to come from us, and I see this process

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of deciding democratically in a bottom-up fashion

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what the world wants to work on together

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as one vital means by which we can crowdsource

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the force to really build that constituency

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that's going to reinvigorate global governance

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in the 21st century.

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I started in 2000. Let me finish in 2030.

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Many people made fun of a big campaign a few years ago

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we had called Make Poverty History.

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It was a naive thought in many people's minds,

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and it's true, it was just a t-shirt slogan

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that worked for the moment. But look.

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The empirical condition of living under a dollar and 25

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is trending down, and look where it gets to by 2030.

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It's getting near zero.

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Now sure, progress in China and India

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and poverty reduction there was key to that,

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but recently also in Africa, poverty rates are being reduced.

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It will get harder as we get towards zero,

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as the poor will be increasingly located

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in post-conflict, fragile states,

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or maybe in middle income states

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where they don't really care about the marginalized.

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But I'm confident, with the right kind of political campaigning

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and creative and technological innovation combined

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working together more and more as one,

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I think we can get this and other goals done.

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Thank you. (Applause)

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(Applause)

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Chris Anderson: Jamie, here's the puzzle to me.

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If there was an incident today where a hundred kids

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died in some tragedy or where, say, a hundred kids

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were kidnapped and then rescued by special forces,

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I mean, it would be all over the news for a week, right?

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You just put up, just as one of your numbers there,

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that 5,000 -- is that the number?

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Jamie Drummond: Fewer children every day.

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CA: Five thousand fewer children dying every day.

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I mean, it dwarfs, dwarfs everything

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that is actually on our news agenda, and it's invisible.

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This must drive you crazy.

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JD: It does, and we're having a huge debate in this country

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about aid levels, for example, and aid alone is not

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the whole solution. Nobody thinks it is.

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But, you know, if people saw the results of this smart aid,

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I mean, they'd be going crazy for it.

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I wish the 250,000 people who really did march

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outside this very building knew these results.

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Right now they don't, and it would be great to find a way

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to better communicate it, because we have not.

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Creatively, we've failed to communicate this success so far.

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If those kinds of efforts just could multiply their voice

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and amplify it at the key moments, I know for a fact

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we'd get better policy.

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The Mexican G20 need not have been a bust.

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Rio, if anyone cares about the environment,

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need not have been a bust, okay?

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But these conferences are going on,

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and I know people get skeptical and cynical

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about the big global summits and the promises

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and their never being kept, but actually,

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the bits that are, are making a difference,

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and what the politicians need

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is more permission from the public.

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CA: But you haven't fully worked out the Web mechanisms, etc.

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by which this might happen.

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I mean, if the people here who've had experience

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using open platforms, you're interested to talk with them

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this week and try to take this forward.

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JD: Absolutely. CA: All right, well I must say,

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if this conference led in some way

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to advancing that idea, that's a huge idea,

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and if you carry that forward, that is really awesome,

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so thank you. JD: I'd love your help.

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CA: Thank you, thank you.

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(Applause)