I never knew. A blog by Patrick Tanguay. Autodidact. Generalist. Synthesist. Writes Sentiers, a carefully curated weekly newsletter on the futures of technology, society, and culture. ◌ Feed.
Ouch!
This new England will be remarkably like the one I grew up in during the 80s: mean, greedy, racist and cruel. This is the country that invented capitalism, remember: the country that invented the poorhouse and the limited-stock company. England, going back to doing what it does best — namely eating its young.
100% percent in agreement with Kai here and I’m always wondering the exact same thing for Sentiers and in the past for any other project I’ve started.
I always wonder how I can reach new readers without pushy sales techniques and trite advertising lingo. Very few companies manage to advertise in a respectful, creative way and connect with me like a real human, not some marketing persona. Thoughtful, intentional marketing is hard – and probably doesn’t scale well. In many ways it follows the exact opposite approach of the typical growth hacker mindset. For me that means: limiting the amount of promotional emails, not participating in the mass hysteria of Black Friday and similar events, and not throwing more ad dollars at Big Tech.
Source: Dense Discovery – Issue 65
Writing an email newsletter brings me back to the original days of email lists, Majordomo, and the Anarchives. After all email is one of the pillars of the Internet. One of the original protocols that allows us to bypass all of the algorithms save for the anti-spam filter, and get back into the kind of relationships that inspired many of us to invest time online in the first place. Not only does writing this newsletter make it easier for me to reach and build a community of fellow travelers who are interested in learning as I learn, but it also allows for a body of thought and knowledge to be developed collectively.
Source: The newsletter that CBC doesn’t want you to read, via Michèle Champagne.
““The problem with the internet,” Firth explained, “is that our brains seem to quickly figure out it’s there – and outsource.” This would be fine if we could rely on the internet for information the same way we rely on, say, the British Library. But what happens when we subconsciously outsource a complex cognitive function to an unreliable online world manipulated by capitalist interests and agents of distortion? “What happens to children born in a world where transactive memory is no longer as widely exercised as a cognitive function?” he asked.” People will come to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think https://thoughtshrapnel.com/2019/10/07/internet-and-thinking/ via Instapaper
I have a strategy of reading children’s books to gain knowledge. I’ve found that in an adult reference book, if it’s not a subject I’m interested in, I just can’t get into it.I was thinking, what is the place in the library I can go to to get books tailored to make things interesting for uninterested readers? Boom. The children’s section.
Source: Want quick knowledge? Visit the children’s section - Austin Kleon
I wrote the following in No.101 of Sentiers: — Douglas Coupland: How a 24/7 world destroyed time One of a number of “time” pieces in the last few weeks, like The 2010s Have Broken Our Sense Of Time and On TikTok, There Is No Time. Honestly, I didn’t read all of them thoroughly and it seems a bit like overthought hand wringing. Perhaps I’ll revisit since some people I respect loved the Buzzfeed News piece. I’m including this Coupland editorial though because the quotes below have more to do with the formats of our (work)days than the supposed compression of our perception of time, which is more relevant and useful to me.
We inhabit the temporal ruins of an agrarian economy long made obsolescent, in which productivity can be tweaked by changing the nature of time itself. […] This swing-shift is where I first felt personally conflicted about the industrial time-for-labour relationship: it wants to colonise your sleep, not just your waking time. This was disturbing to me … that someone, or a thing, could annexe my sleeping life, and do so in a manner that left no room for rebuttal or flexibility. […] I sometimes wonder if the reason we all go to school until our late teens isn’t so much to gain knowledge or for society to keep kids off the street — rather, it’s a way of enculturating future adults into the entirely artificial nine-to-five workweek.
— Then I found this by Paul Raven, he liked the Buzzfeed piece and finishes with this quote I really liked and I think it’s a nice framing to keep in mind:
I feel like the missing word in this piece is delamination: time hasn’t shattered so much as peeled apart, the shear layers shearing off of one another under the centrifugal force…
"Recently, at an event, I was asked to name what I considered to be the most profound challenge facing young people today. In an era defined by profound challenges - many of which have dire consequences if not faced head on - I found this an easy question to answer in part because I also think it’s the most profound challenge facing people of all ages. The hard truth is, we are at war with disinformationists. And we are losing. The other challenges we face: climate change, racism, poverty, income inequality, terrorism, etc., are all fueled by disinformation. We live in a time when it’s never been easier to access information. In the time it took me to compose this post, more information was created and distributed than in any other moment in human history. And while the technology used to share and access that information continues to advance, so too does the practice of shaping that information in ways that trigger our most base instincts. We are no longer a public to be informed. Rather, we are a mob to be outraged, influenced and controlled. The disinformationists create stories that act as online boogeymen: pitting us against one another, as we dig ourselves deeper and deeper into the trenches of rigid belief that will eventually serve as our graves. And what’s most frustrating is that the answers to this, to what I’ve just named as the biggest challenge facing us all, aren’t really that elusive. Let’s be clear, the answer is NOT sitting children in front of screens to complete a few online modules on digital citizenship. The answer is NOT quizzing them on boolean search techniques. The answer is NOT taking away their devices or warning them against the perils of the PNW Tree Octopus. The answer, as with so many other big problems, lies in helping kids grow authentic reading lives, which have the profound ability to transform empathy and understanding into action. The answer is in making sure ALL KIDS have access to degreed school librarians, who are both reading and information specialists. And, above all, the answer lies in being brave, unabashed warriors for truth - because facts matter. Because facts are not controversial. Because science is real. And because someday our kids will look back on this time and wonder why we didn’t do anything. We are at war with disinformationists. And we are losing. But we don’t have to lose. We can choose to win." — Thread by Library Girl.
Pas mal exactement le Québec, non?
Here is the truth about the seasons: Spring is May and June. What could be springier than May and June? Summer is July and August. Really hot, right? Autumn is September and October. See the pumpkins? Smell those burning leaves? Next comes the season called Locking. November and December aren’t winter. They’re Locking. Next comes winter, January and February. Boy! Are they ever cold!
Source: Kurt Vonnegut: “There Are Six Seasons Instead of Four”
Question your maps and models of the universe, both inner and outer, and continually test them against the raw input of reality. Our maps are still maps, approximating the landscape of truth from the territories of the knowable — incomplete representational models that always leave more to map, more to fathom, because the selfsame forces that made the universe also made the figuring instrument with which we try to comprehend it.
Source: 13 Life-Learnings from 13 Years of Brain Pickings – Brain Pickings
The dream of a peaceful society to me is still the dream of a potluck supper. The society in which all can contribute, and all can find friendship. Those who bring things, bring things that they do well. [We must] create conditions under which a potluck is possible.