What is innovation? — it is not so much about having ideas as it is about connecting and nurturing ideas. “History tells us that innovation is an outcome of a massive collective effort — not just from a narrow group of young white men in California.” —Mariana Mazzucato Markets do not work in isolation from… Read more »
Posts Categorized: Democracy
in spite of the stupid
I have frequently said that leadership today is helping make our networks smarter. Much of what we are is a direct effect of who we know and interact with. Our social networks have significant influence on who we are. “Most of us are already aware of the direct effect we have on our friends and… Read more »
paying for online freedom
Back in 2007 I suggested that the first step to take in online sensemaking is to free your bookmarks. Social bookmarks reside online, not in your browser, so they can be accessed from multiple devices and easily shared. My own journey went from Furl, to Magnolia, to Delicious, and most recently to Diigo. Today I… Read more »
the internet and democracy
I got off Facebook about 10 years ago. I know that this has had no impact on the company or its business model. When I saw in 2007 that Facebook was selling user information, I knew I could not stay on the platform much longer. But the lure of network effects, where it takes almost… Read more »
countering populism
I would say that populism is the first refuge of a scoundrel and a literate, engaged, and networked citizenry gives no such refuge. But education alone is not the answer to the constant outrage we are witnessing as many societies polarize on political lines. Even highly educated people can be bigots, racists, and misogynists. Society’s… Read more »
cracking the chambers
Thi Nguyen, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Utah Valley University describes two related but distinct phenomena of collective human behaviour — bubbles and chambers. An epistemic bubble is what happens when insiders aren’t exposed to people from the opposite side. An echo chamber is what happens when insiders come to distrust everybody on the outside…. Read more »
free cities attract creative individuals
Why have certain cities fostered creativity over time? “First, the protection of personal and economic freedoms changed the local culture, making it more receptive to innovations and new ideas. Second, the new institutions also changed incentives, through a more meritocratic and inclusive social environment, but also by encouraging works of art and innovations that would… Read more »
sensemaking in a liquid world
The printing press changed the world. It introduced new forms of expression and enabled better and faster information sharing. Print enabled individual interpretation of the bible and resulted in the questioning of the established Christian church and later the Protestant Reformation. Written manuscripts became obsolete luxury items. A new public discourse was enabled by print… Read more »
confronting the post-truth machine
post-truth (adjective) Relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief. —Oxford Dictionaries On Twitter, Tim Dickinson described four different types of distributed ‘fake news’. ‘Fake news’ is lazy language. Be specific. Do you mean: A) Propaganda B) Disinformation C) Conspiracy… Read more »
beyond a binary society
Binary thinking is a lower level form of cognitive understanding, as put forward by Kieran Egan, which he calls Mythic Thinking. More complex forms of thinking are: Romantic, Philosophic, and Ironic. But binary, or mythic thinking, is an easy sell. It appeals to our emotions which we developed as children. Binary thinking blinds us. It’s… Read more »
January 2020
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