Excerpt from a speech @London _2001/4/25 Fantastically "future" Think the Earth is a project designed to marry ecology and economy. We can raise awareness for issues related to the earth via good business practice. The first product to support the project is "watch". As you know, the word "watch" has a double meaning. One is to observe, as in this case, to observe the earth, and the other is a watch, a device to tell time. The concept behind this watch is very simple and it's based I had 5 years ago. At the beginning, it was about a small globe, which you could carry in your pocket. It would be fun to see white clouds moving around just as they are over the sky of London. It would be great if it was turning around like the earth. You could walk around with the earth! I thought these things were fantastically "future". In 1961 a Russian astronaut Yurii Gagarin first saw the earth from space. Although that was only 40 years ago, people in my generation take this image of the earth for granted. All of us here are the first generation to have been exposed to this image over and over again since we were born. The astronauts who saw the earth sent some great messages from space. I was immensely impressed and influenced by simple words such as "there is no boundary on the earth if looked from space". We start thinking about protecting this precious place called the earth, so beautiful, covered with a thin and fragile layer of air. We must pass it on to the future generations. Unfortunately, not everyone can become an astronaut. But maybe it is possible to at least share what he or she sees and feels without flying to space. So, that's the idea behind this watch; watch from space for everyone. On your wrist, there is a little globe turning, just like you would see the earth from space thousands of miles away. The other important point is "time". We, humans decided that a year is 365 days, a day is 24 hours, and an hour 60 minutes. Yes, human time is convenient, but don't you sometimes feel, give me a break, I need space in my life? Animals and plants' lives are not dictated by time, or what WE call time. Don't you sometimes feel that there is a huge gap between the human rhythm and the natural rhythm of the earth? I think that this is the fundamental cause for the environmental problems. I want this watch to remind us of a more natural rhythm of life, rhythm of the earth. Why not bring that back into our lives? That's why we chose a system where time is dictated by the speed of the rotation of the earth on your wrist. I think, if we want to solve the environmental problems, imposing regulations on carbon dioxide emission isn't really the answer. Each individual could pay a little more attention to the earth. If you love something, you want it to last. If you love the earth and want to pass it on to the next generations, it HAS to come from within, not be imposed on you. WN-1 was born to make people aware of the earth. How many times in a day do you think about the earth? Let me explain briefly about the watch, "wn-1". I'm going to talk about this watch as a kind of tool to make you feel the earth and space. Firstly, as you know by now, the watch is dome-shaped. It's the Northern Hemisphere. WN-1 rotates once a day, anti-clockwise. It rotates in the same direction and at the same speed as the earth, looking from the north pole. Do you ever think about which direction the earth is turning? By wearing this watch, you will feel it close. Also, when you look from space, we all live in one place, at one point of time with no boundaries. It's just that people are doing different things at one time. We are here together now in London, friends in New York may be sipping coffee in the afternoon, and my families and friends in Tokyo are sleeping. The diameter of this globe is about 2cm, a bit less than an inch. If you look at it like this, this is pretty much what the earth looks like from the moon. The packaging was designed, not just to physically package the watch, but to carry some messages as well. It was very important for us to have the right packaging. We knew it had to be low in cost, light in weight but strong, but above all, we also wanted to make the whole process of receiving, opening, and touching the product a real experience. Something that makes you smile when you open. The concept is that the earth is in the middle of geologic strata. When you open the box, you don't see a watch, but you see a globe. We've also made 20 different graphic cards. There are lots of interesting messages on them. One card, for example, shows many people are born and die while the earth rotates once. You can also use the watch as a desk clock by using the cards and card board pieces. Finally, I'm going to talk about Think the Earth Project itself, which I have mentioned at the beginning of my talk. The idea is ecology and economy can coexist. Towards the end of the 20th century, we realized that economic development had a lot to with the environmental damage. Economic development and ecology are thought by many to be impossible to co-exist. But WE believe that there MUST be ways to contribute to ecology and environment by pursuing economic growth. We MUST be intelligent enough to come up with the ideas. It's a challenging task, but we will keep on working. Think the Earth is a newborn baby. It needs feeding, caring, and supporting before it starts walking on its own. We need more people to understand it and join us in our movement. Soichi Ueda, Think the Earth Project