How would you answer the question What is the future we will make? Here’s my answer, and here’s how you can share your own answer with TEDxChange and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

In our future, passion and purpose pays.

What do I mean?

In our future, doing good is good business, because …

… a business without a “social good” is not a sustainable business. And I’m not talking about environmentally, culturally or morally sustainable, but strategically, economically and financially sustainable.

I’ve written and talked about the role of humanity, meaning, ethics, passion and purpose repeatedly over the past year or so, heavily influenced by John Hagel and Umair Haque.

These principles span many of the Millennium Development Goals. An economy that allocates returns based on meaning, ethics or purpose directs attention, effort and money towards things that matter: it promotes gender equality, it allocates food and basic services better to eradicate extreme hunger, reduces child mortality, values environmental sustainability, and creates a strong base for countries and organizations to partner on economic development goals.

Think about the work you do: Is passion or purpose a source of a competitive advantage for you and your company? Are profits tied to passion? Is the purpose of your job or company aligned with the source of revenues or profits? Is passion a valued asset at your company? Can you true back your work to supporting a larger purpose?

No? Why not?

In our future, to create a thriving, sustainable economy, passion and purpose have to pay. Meaning, passion and purpose have to play a meaningful role in allocating profits, as important as access to inputs like land, labor and capital, as important as the level of education, knowledge and information, as important as product/market fit, as important as any other input in a business’s equation.

And how does that happen? To start, we have to care. We create a demand for products and services through what we buy, talk about, read about and do. Our individual consumption decisions create market demand; companies create products and services to fit markets demand. If enough of us demand passion and purpose, then companies will have to find a way to embed humanity, passion, ethics, meaning and purpose into what they do.

“When we have low-quality demand, we have low-quality jobs.” It starts with us. Care about what you buy. Invest your time, money and attention in things you believe in. Talk with your friends and colleagues about things you’re passionate about. Invest in yourself. Make the decision to reward passion and purpose, and passion and purpose will pay.

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View this photo on Flickr, and view the rest of the submissions to the project in the Flickr group pool.

Highlighted photos from TEDxNOLA, a one-day conference that addressed the question: how can creativity save a community? View all the photos on Flickr and Facebook.

TEDxNOLA was a local, self-organized conference convened in New Orleans to explore the pivotal role that crisis plays in the development of groundbreaking ideas. On August 27th, 2010 during the week of remembrance of the 5th Anniversary of Katrina, Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carre hosted intellects and achievers to examine how crisis forces us to rethink, reinvent and reinvest. How can creativity save a community?

View all the photos from TEDxNOLA on Flickr and Facebook.

Mitch Landrieu, Mayor of New Orleans

James Carville

Gary Solomon, Jr., The Solomon Group

John Besh, John Besh Restaurants

Lisa P. Jackson, EPA

Matt Wisdom, Turbosquid

Eight questions, and answers, from me, about me.

Observed and Observing, Brooklyn, NY

Two of the eight questions and answers, from EDGE Tech Corp Blog Ask A Photographer: Taylor Davidson

Where do you get your creative inspiration from?

I’m an observer. I may not notice everything, but then again, I’m not trying to notice everything. My inspirations come from the intersections of the physical and the human environments, but usually without any people present. I tend to pay more attention to what has come and gone than what is there at the moment, and thus most of my pictures are of spaces created by humans, lived in and molded by humans, but temporarily abandoned by humans. That’s what tends to catch my eye, mind and soul.

Any advice or tips for someone wanting to become a photographer or to improve their photography?

Learn all the rules so you can break them completely.

And just shoot what you want to shoot. Because photography is for you.

I’m suffering from a bit of voting fatigue.

A Clandestine Meeting, Brooklyn, NY

Yes, I currently have a Pepsi Refresh Project and three SXSW panel proposals up for voting. And I’ll probably write blog posts about them soon. But I’m torn.

Wait, don’t get me wrong; I love supporting friends’ projects. Send them over, I’ll take a look, and vote, donate and help promote if it’s meaningful, valuable, and can change lives (yours, mine, everyone).

I like the players. But I dislike the game.

I understand why we (online digital strategists) create these contests. We tap into the naked human desire to win contests and their rewards, provide people a way to market and promote their own cause / reason / project, and help them directly promote themselves, driving traffic, attention and money indirectly to us, the creators of these contests. Inexpensive marketing, tapping into other people’s time, passion and self-interest, to support our underlying business goals.

That’s not underhanded or duplicitous, it’s just how it is. Tapping into people’s self-interests to drive your own self-interest is simply smart business, marketing and product strategy.

That’s the game.

And it always has been. The difference, and this is where we’re feeling the pressure, is driven by the fact that everyone has the potential for a larger voice on a larger platform than ever before. More content, information and voices? We need more context, more filters, more curators. More contests, more clamour for votes and money? We need better ways for us to signal what we care about and track the impact my votes and money had. More context, more filters, more curators.

As Sloane has told me before, contests can be tricky strategies for fundraisers to pursue, because votes don’t mean money. And when the votes don’t add up to money (meaning, you don’t win), you have to go back to your supporters for money. But in your supporter’s mind, they’ve already helped you. In their mind, they’ve already given you something. And they have, even thought you many not have received the benefit. That’s the problem.

Not all contests and fundraising platforms are equal, mind you. Mechanics matter. Kickstarter, for example, is as much of a market-testing and fan management platform as a project fundraising tool. Each platform and contest embeds its own game, a bounded set of social interactions that promote and incent gestures, behaviors and actions.

That’s why game theory matters here. All contests are games, a set of interactions, incentives, moves, risks and rewards. Yes, it know most of these contests come from a place of good. The intent is good. But the game simply creates too many opportunities for the execution to fail, to misplace the rules, incentives and rewards for everyone involved. And we’re left with a bad taste in our mouths, a lingering dissatisfaction in our heads, and a hole in our hearts.

Thus, as Mike would say, we need to change the game.

But I’m first to admit I don’t have the answer. Simply ending all contests isn’t the answer. At first, I didn’t want to just say “this sucks”, without proposing a solution. But perhaps, by raising the issue, we can start to problem-solve this one out. I’ll certainly be paying attention.