New Week Same Humans #4
Kim K goes cold on Instagram. The Great Reset is cancelled. Zoom meetings will never be the same again.
Welcome to the Wednesday update from New World Same Humans, a newsletter on trends, technology, and society by David Mattin.
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💡 This week’s Sunday essay was about how our world models humans as rational choice machines, and why it’s time for a new model. Go here to read A Design for Life. 💡
This week, another glimpse inside the wild world of QAnon, the far-right online conspiracy theory.
Meanwhile, Kim Kardashian and a host of other celebrities banish Instagram for a day. Consumers worldwide reveal they ‘don’t care’ about climate change. And Slack goes to war with Zoom over the future of remote work.
Also featuring a Kpop band comprised entirely of video game characters.
Let’s do this.
👀 QAnon goes phishing, and Kim K goes cold
A massive text message phishing scam is targeting US citizens; the messages falsely purport to be from the US Postal Service, and ask recipients to enter a credit card number. Now, QAnon believers are spreading claims that the scam is a ‘new sex trafficking method’. They say the messages covertly install location tracking software on the phones of recipients, who are then at risk of kidnap. Numerous official agencies have stated that there is no link between the messages and human trafficking.
Meanwhile, celebrities led by Kim Kardashian, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Katy Perry have pledged to freeze their Instagram accounts for one day – yes, a whole day – today. The move is to protest, ‘the spreading of hate, propaganda and misinformation’ by Facebook.
And all this in the wake of a coruscating memo this week by former FB employee, Sophie Zhang. The note details, ‘multiple blatant attempts by foreign national governments to abuse our platform’. Zhang says FB has ignored the problem.
⚡ NWSH Take: The latest text message claims are a minor part of the QAnon crazyverse. But they’re a reminder that, two months away from an election for the world’s most powerful human, significant numbers of voters are in the grip of some dangerous ideas. // Analysts rightly point out that conspiracy theories are nothing new. Indeed, QAnon itself is a rehash of past examples. But the context here is new, and dangerous: social media is rocket fuel for mad ideas, and this has destabilised our public conversation in ways we don’t fully understand yet. // The 24-hour Insta-freeze is a piece of virtue signalling that’s easy to mock. The harder truth? FB and other social giants amassed their vast power via all of us, and so far we’ve done even less than Kim K to redress the balance. We need to act as a collective; and that means politics.
🌳 The Great Reset is cancelled
Google announced that it has now eliminated its entire carbon legacy. The company says it has purchased enough offsets to compensate for all the carbon it has created since its inception in 1997.
Meanwhile, Lego invested $400 million in sustainability initiatives, including a move from plastic to paper bags for bricks. And Kaiser Permanente became the first healthcare system in the US to go carbon neutral.
Sounds positive? Get ready for a dose of cold water.
When the pandemic hit in March there was much talk of a sustainable Great Reset. Is it going to happen?
Global consulting giant Kantar published new data this week that offers a first glimpse at an answer. They interviewed 80,000 people across 19 countries about their attitudes and behaviours around sustainable consumption. ‘Eco Dismissers, who have little or no interest in the environmental challenges facing the world’ were the largest single group, at 41% of respondents.
⚡ NWSH Take: Kantar are keen to point to the good news: those who dismiss concern for the environment fell by eight percentage points in a year. But their report is still a reminder that a Great Reset remains some way off. Many consumers don’t care, to the extent that they’re not even trying to pretend they do. They’re literally just: ‘I don’t care’. // As the implications of a heating planet bite – huge migrations, resource scarcity, new taxes – it’s hard to see how we avoid a monumental showdown between those who want to change and those who don’t. Will the protests of 2020 come to be seen as only the precursor to a far greater upheaval? // My bet?In the end, we’ll adapt to a heated planet. But it will involve socio-political shocks comparable to those that occurred when we moved from the age of steam to that of electricity and motor cars. You are blessed to live in interesting times.
👨💻 How to be a remote work genius
Software company GitLab have successfully run an all-remote team of 1,300 people since 2014. This week, the Harvard Business Review laid out the three key principles on remote work that GitLab say have fuelled that success. One crucial rule? Every communication must be in public. Sorry, office gossips.
Meanwhile, this genius invented an AR camera lens for video calls that uses hand gestures to prompt on-screen speech bubbles. There are gestures for ‘yes’, ‘no’, ‘awesome’, ‘be right back’ and more. No more unmuting just to say one word!
⚡ NWSH Take: During the pandemic, businesses were forced to improvise new modes of remote working. Now, a deeper question is emerging: how does a business forge a great internal culture when many employees are remote? // This shift is intersecting with another that also amplifies the importance of internal culture: automation. In a world where much is automated as standard, businesses will increasingly seek to differentiate themselves via happy, enthusiastic staff. To do that, those businesses will need a great culture. // The race is on to be the trillion dollar business that owns this space; The Information reports that Zoom is working on a major upgrade to messaging features in a bid to challenge Slack (£). Meanwhile, Facebook Workplace is looming in the wings.
🗓️ Also this week
🎵 A Kpop song by a group comprised entirely of video game characters went to the top of the Billboard charts. Video games are becoming global culture; expect more of this.
🇸🇪 Sweden isn’t seeing the same coronavirus surge as the rest of Europe. The country did not implement a typical lockdown during the first wave: bars, restaurants and schools stayed open and social distancing was voluntary.
✈️ Gamers are coming together in Twitch chatrooms to co-pilot planes in Microsoft Flight Simulator. One group even pulled off an impressive barrel roll over the ocean.
🏨 Hotel chain CitizenM launched a new service for businesses which turns CitizenM hotels into co-working spaces. Meanwhile, this Radisson Blu is offering accommodation to students in Dublin.
😷 UK think tank Demos says the pandemic is now a more divisive issue than Brexit among UK citizens. A new report shows 58% of British mask-wearers have severely negative attitudes towards non mask-wearers.
💃 TikTok’s most popular star, Charli D'Amelio, has joined rival app Triller along with the rest of the D'Amelio family. Charli’s Dad has 7 million TikTok followers.
📺 Ben Horowitz of VC firm Andreessen Horowitz spoke to Netflix CEO Reed Hastings about building corporate culture. Hastings says he ‘farms for dissent’ by asking key executives, ‘what would be different if you were CEO?’
🌍 Humans of Earth
Key metrics to help you keep track of Project Human.
🙋♀️ Global population: 7,812,268,575 and counting
🌊 Earths currently needed: 1.7677418473
🗓️ 2020 progress bar: 71% complete
📖 On this day: On 16 September 1620 the Pilgrims set sail from England to North America on the Mayflower.
Now is the time
The Great Reset isn’t really cancelled.
Kantar’s new report is a reminder of the work that needs to be done to change attitudes and build new and sustainable modes of life. But this moment still represents a near-unique opportunity to redouble our efforts.
At New World Same Humans, we’re building a community dedicated to the idea that together we can build a better shared future. Right now, there’s one thing you can do to help: invite more people inside!
So if you found today’s instalment valuable, why not take a second to forward this email to one person – a friend, relative, or colleague – who’d also enjoy it? Or share New World Same Humans across one of your social networks, and let others know why you think it’s worth their time. The more people who join us, the stronger we become.
I’ll be back on Sunday. Until then, be well,
David.
P.S Huge thanks to Nikki Ritmeijer for the illustration at the top of this email. And to Monique van Dusseldorp for additional research and analysis.