Physical distancing makes personal transportation a necessity. When public transport risks infection, cars & bikes become our safe spaces. Co-host Sally Dominguez looks at the sudden reframing of the automobile as self-contained ‘safe space’ during the pandemic. Special correspondent Drew Smith rhapsodises about the Renault Espace, the first MPV designed – to carry people.
1984 Renault Espace
Be sure to sign up for Drew Smith’s “Looking Out” newsletter – grab it here.
We saw more change in March & April of 2020 than in the rest of our lives. How has the pandemic accelerated our journey into the future? We ask four guests from series 2 and 3 – John Robb talks about the ‘black swans’ revealed within the pandemic; Fiona Kerr explores the ways we need technology to connect – and the price we’re paying for our lack of physical contact; Ramez Naam looks at how the crash in the price of crude oil has accelerated the transition to a decarbonised economy; and Tiffany Shlain reminds us that in a world where we all want to be connected, a ‘Digital Sabbath’ is more important than ever!
John Robb is the author of “Brave New War” and shares his thoughts on the more-vital-than-ever ‘Global Guerillas‘ blog.
For a century, public health officials have contained pandemics by tracing outbreaks. COVIDsafe promises to do this – can we trust it?
How does contact tracking work? And did host Mark Pesce almost accidentally invent Bluetooth contact tracking during some experimenting back in 2005?
Dr. Genevieve Bell offers insights into the history of contact tracing – and how old ideas about sickness can be baked into the newest of our technologies.
Toward the end of 2005, Mark Pesce did some ‘pinging’ of Bluetooth devices from his mobiles, and learned that a lot of other Bluetooth mobiles would answer his pings. He wrote it up in a paper:
The following year, working with artist John Tonkin, they created ‘Bluestates‘ – using Bluetooth contact tracking to generate ‘social graphs’ – maps of who associated with who – for ISEA 2006 in San Jose California. It got a fair bit of attention at the time, including a review in The New YorkTimes. Here’s a short movie of how John Tonkin visualised the contact tracking data Mark Pesce gathered:
Banks are not like other businesses. Starting them, funding them and running them – it’s all quite different from your run of the mill software-as-a-service technology startup. In a live event at Stone & Chalk Sydney, co-hosts Andrew Davis & Mark Pesce talk to four neobank founders about what it takes to launch a neobank – and succeed.
Can a digital-only ‘neobank’ offer a better experience? Co-hosts Mark Pesce and Andrew Davis ask Brett King, the prophet of neobanking, what a better bank might look like.
Digital devices have come to rule our lives – could a 3000 year-old practice help us tame them? Tiffany Shlain reminds us that a look to the old could help us manage the new.
We see superheroes on cinema screens – but what about our technological superpowers? Naming these new powers helps to understand them, and the amazing Aaron Z. Lewis has given us a pantheon of seven ‘new gods‘ – that we seem to believe in. Now that we know the shape of these new ‘gods’, does that mean we’re not as beholden to them?
This was all sparked by Aaron’s original essay “Metaphors We Believe By: The pantheon of 2019” – it’s a great read, find it here.