We are a civilisation of freeloaders. OK, this is a recurrent theme with me (and even semipermanent), but once in a while I get peeved over the board of my patience. What tickled me this time is a video of a presentation Microsoft did a few days ago at TED, about its new bing maps technology. I don't have anything against the technology or the obvious bloody competition with Google. But just look at the last 5 seconds of the video, to see the audience become lustful and almost perceivedly greedy. We absolutely love our hypertech toys. We despise the creators, we even physically molest them sometimes (think of the invetor of the blue LED), we bask in emotional and superstitious behavior, all the more enhanced by all the tech. But we forget to honestly realize that we are mostly freeloaders. That such near-magic requires efforts, and brains, and high quality education. We completely overlook the potential for even more wonderful (and actually useful) magic that could be created with the help of a thoughtful revival of social collaboration. We still allow wonderful brains to be lost through our awful economic predatory behavior. And all is a-OK as long as we get our freeloading toys.