You said this was around the year 2000.
If you're 74 now, that would have made you around 50 years of age back then.
That's old enough for an intelligent man like yourself to have KNOWN how niggaz are....lol.
Like that old Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes song, "If You Don't Know Me By Now".
You should have KNOWN better than to even TRY to have a serious and productive dialog with niggaz.
Many of our people tend to be petty about SERIOUS subject, but far too often serious when it comes to PETTY subjects.
Or as Neely Fuller Jr. puts it: "Majoring in minors, and minoring in majors."
No....
What you do is find other intelligent Black folks who you KNOW are intelligent and industrious minded and have a meeting with THEM and present that idea to THEM to get something going.....while the niggaz wait outside keeping the cars warm.
The only thing you should be talking to the rest of the niggaz about is making sure the restaurant and hotel reservations are set and confirmed for yall to go to after the meetings are over.
MAYBE they can handle that.....lol....maybe.
But no innovative technological discussions such as the one you were attempting to initiate.