The Smoke That Betrayed The Wind
The Smoke That Betrayed The Wind
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Another Sunday, Another Naive Weekly - Observations From The Internet Wilderness.
The first bonfire came after only 20 meters. I wasn’t surprised when I saw the couple, sitting in front of the fire, preparing what I assume was dinner. The smell of the smoke had already betrayed them, even before I left the suburban bicycle road and entered the quasi-wild park on the outskirts of Copenhagen.
I was out jogging so it was a short moment I shared with the couple. And hardly had the thick smoke from the bonfire left the air before another entered my lungs. And then another. Three bonfires in a few hundred meters. I have run in Copenhagen for many years, at all times of the year, and never have I seen anything like this, not even during the annual witch firing of Sankt Hans.
In many ways, I feel related to these people exchanging their vertically stacked rental boxes with the lurking dance of bonfire flames. There is something universally magical about staring at the fire. And there is something universally magical about cocooning inside your sleeping bag, outside. Falling asleep to the noises of the night, and waking up with the sun.
Approximately one year ago I started reading about permaculture. Searching for a rhythm in my technology filed life, the promise of holistic systems, of seasons, diversity, and non-extractive doing allured me to dream of being less dependent on the modern thrill of productivity. A dream very much about taking back the control of life’s pace.
Many people are aware of the Internet’s military roots. Of how it came to life as a desire to communicate across distances by the Americans during the Cold War. This story is of course contested, but were you aware of the computer’s roots in weather prediction?
Today I can go to our local supermarket and buy food from across the world. Not even a global lockdown keeps me from topping my morning oats with a banana in the early spring in Copenhagen. It is a privilege humans only recently have gained.
Go outside, stare at the flames, but remember that there is no outside. Nature, like technology, is already inside us. And we are already inside it. So pick up that dandelion flower. Taste how bitter it is. Make sirup from its yellow flower while you still can. Soon the dandelion will, like you, be someone’s wish drifting for new soil to turn roots.
Internet Black Hole
Paths I Went Along Until It Was Time For Dinner
This should have been an April Fool’s Day prank, but it isn’t. I checked. Instead it is an actual robot driving around in Tunisia telling people to stay inside. Unfortunately, I am not sure if it is worse than Dahir Insaat’s drive-in supermarket or Yelp’s automatically generated fundraisers. If I say What-Tech-F***, what are then the examples you wish were April Fools?
Unfollow everyone on Twitter was something I finally managed to do this week after discovering that +70% of the people I follow were male. Obama had a rule at his press conferences that every other question had to be from a woman. I’ll apply the same logic when I start to follow people again. Thanks to Antal for the help setting up t to make it easy and to Mikkel for pointing me to t in the first place. (Ps. did you read Tim Berner Lee’s annual letter to the web?)
Roadside Flower
Delightful Surprises From The Information Superhighway
Marbula One might be the only sport that isn't cancelled. As a season ticket holder to my local football team, these days I miss the thrill of sport. Fortunately, I discovered the YouTube channel called Jelle's Marble Runs. Give it a spin.
Special.Fish is the only social network that lets you become a mushroom or a leaf. I’m yet to really understand what is happening here, but I’m intrigued and created my own profile. The project is made by Elliott Cost, who you might remember from Empty Day.
Get Well Soon! is a massive e-card comprised of over 200,000 unique messages of well wishes. Another project by Tega Brain and Sam Lavigne, the artists behind The New York Apartment. This project was my favourite from the WE=LINK: Ten Easy Pieces exhibition that Chronus Art Center just released to the web.
Speculating Futures Club is an online syllabus for envisioning the years ahead. It is a few years old, but the readings are evergreens. If you are working with storytelling, innovation, foresight or anything related, I believe you’ll find this to be a goldmine. It was developed by The New Inquiry for their Science/Fiction issue, the editorial note is worth a read too.
Society Centered Design is a manifesto for designing for the broader context of systems that we impact and shape. It is hard not to sympathize with the principles and it made me think that I should soon update my Naive Principles.
Ana provides the first image to this newsletter, every week. I’m grateful for having her in my life, and always turn happy when I see a new post from her in my Instagram feed. I wish I could write how she photographs.
Understory
Rich Nutrients For Your Passive Consumption
Running Dog released their first digital magazine. It is beautiful and it is about automation. Rob Horning’s Automatic For The People is a good test if this is your style. And if you are looking at new formats online, then check out the playful poetry of Gift Game, (not mainstream).
Book Club
Banana Yoshimoto - Asleep. One of the last books we brought back from our Japan trip that I still hadn’t read. Asleep is a collection of three short stories, overlapping in plot, and feel, and without noticing it, suddenly I had reached the final page. Ana had already read it before me, she said it resembles Murakami’s writing. I second that.
Naive Weekly
Hi, I’m Kristoffer and you have just read Naive Weekly - Observations From The Internet Wilderness.
Last week this newsletter was sent to 543 subscribers. Twelve people are crazy enough to chip in every month/year to support me making time to write this newsletter: Nikolaj, Antal, Søren, Dries, Mikkel, Tina, Aydo, Lukas, Hans, Csongor, Ida Marie & Angela!
Photograph by Ana Santl from the North Sea.
<3
Kristoffer