🦠✨The Nexialist #0062
Resilience Tech | Re-perception | Cosplaying as Poor | The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity | Slow Song | Dreamcatching
Welcome to my cuddly and chaotic weekly content list, The Nexialist
So, in the third year of covid-19 in our world, my turn has arrived. On Tuesday I got my positive test, so I’m quarantining and resting since then, which means also the content this week will be more chill. I hope you enjoy it.
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💪🏼Resilience Tech
John Maeda’s CX reports are one of those keynotes that we wait for every year, and this year it felt more relevant than ever, with the Resilience Tech theme. Not only did I identify with John Maeda’s flu-sounding voice but loved to see this 10-minute summary.
This year, John Maeda manages to go even further into intertwining design and actual real-world challenges. What stood out for me: detectability, or the ability to measure data, is a superpower when we talk about resilience (and therefore resilience tech). He talks about risks for companies, but also risks that we face as a society: he brings a list of natural hazards (which are being aggravated by climate change), and human-made (intentional and accidental).
You can find the PDF and more content here.
👁Re-perception
Another one of those reports we wait all year long, Amy Webb’s Emerging Tech Trend Report. I haven’t actually watched it, but I’ll leave it here for you to check it out. I have to say the theme already stood out for me. Many of these reports went into fast-mode, always looking for the next thing, and this invites us to look at what’s already available and find new perspectives.
The theme for this year is "re-perception," which is the ability to see, hear, or become aware of something new in existing information. Trends and scenarios help you notice what others miss –– and it's vitally important to explore white spaces now, the volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity we're all still facing.
Read: FTI Trends Report 2022
🤡Cosplaying as Poor
Now, as I was reading this post, my jaw dropped. Joy Anelisiwe pinpoints this kind of fetishization of poverty aesthetics, appropriated by influencers and expensive brands like Yeezy and Balenciaga. I took out some quotes for her article, which you can read here.
The term ‘high peasant’ is a fashion term derived colloquially from sociology which is understood to mean an aesthetic or style that visually presents itself as low quality (poor) or of low economic and social status but has come to be through the use of high resources.
As artistic director Akili Moree puts it, this is also known as “cosplaying as poor”.
Using signifiers associated with poverty to complete a high monetary value aesthetic romanticises actual reality which further puts people who live in poverty on the margins of society — therein the unequal suffering and pain appears to be less harsh or detrimental as it is.
Read: Aesthetics of today: ‘high peasant’ fashion and what it means, by Joy Anelisiwe Mahamba | Bubblegum Club
🥴The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity
Italian economic historian, Carlo M. Cipolla, wrote in 1976 a famous essay: The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity. When I saw this video, I had to press play. “Cipolla identifies two factors to consider when exploring human behavior: Benefits and losses that an individual causes to him or herself; Benefits and losses that an individual causes to others.”
Of course, I like to believe that people are not inherently stupid, but they (we) do stupid things. At the same time, this framework helps to put a lot of powerful people in the bandit category, including some world leaders and billionaires.
Stupid people are seen as a group, more powerful by far than major organizations such as the Mafia and the industrial complex, which without regulations, leaders, or manifesto nonetheless manages to operate to great effect and with incredible coordination.
1. Always and inevitably, everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.
2. The probability that a certain person (will) be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.
3. A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.
4. Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular, non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places, and under any circumstances, to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.
5. A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.
🧑🎤Slow Song
One of my favorite slow songs/videos released recently. Nice to see Dragonette coming back, and always proud to see our queer community making art. In the video, you see Aquaria, RuPaul’s Drag Race season 10 winner, dancing and interpreting the song so beautifully.
💭Dreamcatching
This music video looks so different from others that have come out recently. I love the dream-pop vibe and just added their album, Mercurial World, to my “listen later” list. I felt there was some kind of AI involved, then I read in the credits: AI Artist - Max Kreis. I really hope to see more and more art like that.
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