As the mainstream media attempts to create a simple narrative from hugely complex events, much is obviously lost in the translation—mo
Oh Dearism
As the mainstream media attempts to create a simple narrative from hugely complex events, much is obviously lost in the translationâmost often purposefully. This short film attempts to contrast the character of this narrative in the 1990s, where events were almost universally portrayed as âthe little guy versus the big guyâ to the post Rwanda narrative of âscattered terrible things happening everywhere, Oh Dear.â It is not that we canât actually do anything about these events, it is only that mainstream media presents these events within a framework that makes it seem that way and that in itself is a very powerful way to control society. -- 2009
Something to keep in mind while watching the news of late.... It's not that simple.
106. The Story Of Stuff: How Our Modern Markets Economy Is Destroying Our Planet
19 important takeaways from this documentary:
00:00:25 Have you ever wondered where all that stuff you buy comes from, and where it goes after you throw it out? Standard economics says that your stuff moves through the materials economy; a linear system of:Â
Extraction > Production > Distribution > Consumption > Disposal
The problem with this system is that humans are currently confined to living on Earth, which is a finite planet; and you cannot run a linear system on a finite planet indefinitely. In every step of this linear process, waste is created which diminishes the systemâs efficiency, and subsequently, the Earthâs sustainability.
00:01:50 The governmentâs role and reason for existence is to be âof the people, by the people, and for the peole,â and to protect the citizens which give that government its authority, but over time corporations have become so much larger than the government that the goverment has slowly switched priorities from protecting its citizens to catering to corporations.
Extraction Stage
00:02:45 Extraction - natural resource exploitation - is the mining and stripping of minerals and resources from the planet in the production of goods, thus undermining our very ability to inhabit the earth.Â
Production Stage
00:04:50 We then use energy and toxic chemicals to make toxic, contaminated and contaminating products. As of 2007, there were over 100,000 synthetic chemicals used in commerce today. Very few have been tested for their long term impact on humans and the environment, and none of these chemicals have been texted for their synergistic impact - the consequences of all those chemicals interacting.
00:05:20 Brominated Flame Retardants (BFRs), for example, are super-toxic, neuro-toxins which have been proven to negatively affect the human brain; yet these BFRs can be found in common, everday household items such as computers, couches, matresses, and even our pillows, which we lay our heads on for at least 8 hours per day.
In addition to these toxins leaving the production process as products, they also leave as by-products - the pollution which clogs our skies and seeps into our oceans, rivers, skin...Â
00:06:05 Over time, these toxic chemicals build up within our own bodies. So much so that a motherâs breast milk has been found to be the food with the highest level of toxic contaminants.Â
00:06:45 Those who bear the biggest brunt of these toxins are the factory workers who spend 40+ hours per week, many of whom are women of reproductive age, working with and handling these carcinogens. The only sane person who would knowingly expose themself to such harmful toxins is a person who has no other option.
00:07:50 Who wants to look at and live with such chemical pollution? Definitely not the productâs consumers; and brands donât want their image directly associated with the destruction of their consumerâs plant, which is why businesses choose to move their dirty factories overseas.
Distribution Stage
00:08:15 Distribution is the selling of all the products produced during the previous step, and as quickly as possible by keeping the prices down, keeping the people buying, and keeping the inventory moving.
00:08:37 Cost externalization is the process of cutting costs and recuperating profit through means other than the price made visible to consumers. In fact, at such low prices, you arenât actually paying for the product. All along this materials economy system other humans unwittingly pitched in so you could purchase the product as such an âunbelievably low price.â
00:10:30Â In this linear markets economy, consumer spending is the key holding this entire model together. In this measure, a humanâs value is measured primarily by their capability to consume. As of 2007, roughly 1% of all products purchased were still being used six months after the purchase date; meaning 99% of all the materials which are extracted, produced, distributed, and then sold are thrown into the trash within six months of being purchased.
00:11:57 To ramp up the economy following World War Two, retail analyst Victor Lebow created the credence that âOur enormously productive economy... demands that we make consumption our way of life, that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals that we seek our spiritual satisfaction, our ego satisfaction, in consumption... we need things consumed, burned up, replaced and discarded in an ever-accelerating rate.â
00:12:40 Most consumer goods fall under two life cycles:
Planned obsolescence involves creating products specifically designed for the dump; created with the intention of being useless as quickly as possible whilst leaving the consumer with the belief that they are getting a good deal. Products ranging from plastic bags to take-away coffee cups, DVDs, cameras, computers and smartphones...
Perceived obsolescence involves convincing consumers to discard products which are still perfectly usable. Products ranging from the newest fashion trend to the latest iphone model...
Advertising, branding, and media communications play a huge role in consumer spending and perceived obsolescence. Whatâs the point of an advertising except to make us unhappy with what we currently have? Media communications also aid in hiding the extraction, production, and distrution parts of the markets economy.
00:16:52 At our current rate of consumption, all the stuff we purchase cannot possibly fit in our homes, so where does it all go? We throw it away.
Disposal Stage
00:17:01 Disposal is one of the most obvious effects of our markets economy because it is us who have to haul our junk out to the sidewalk ourselves. Our disposed waste is then picked up by garbage trucks and dumped at a landfill and/or is burned in an incinerator - which pollutes the environment as all those toxins injected into the product during the production stage are released into the air - and then left in a landfill. All of the disposal options pollute our air and land.
0017:42 Dioxin is the most toxic, man-made environmental pollutant known to science. The incinerators which turn your waste into ash are the number one source for dioxins.
[EDITORâS NOTE: For more on where your stuff goes after you throw it out, watch the news report How Your Technological Waste Destroys The Planet & Compromises Your Security.]
00:18:10 Recycling helps reduce the amount of disposed garbage as well as the pressure to extract to create new products, but household recycling doesnât even begin to scratch the surface and address the core problem:
Household waste is just a very miniscule percentage of the waste created on the planet. 70+ times as much garbage is created during the extraction and production stages to create the product you recycled.
Much of our waste cannot be recycled because it either contains too many toxins or because brands didnât see the need to create a product which was designed to be recyclable in the first place.
00:19:06Â There are people and organizations committed to cleaning up the process at each of the above stages in the markets economy, but all their hard work can only be truly effective once humans, and the government they permit to have authority over them step back, see the big picture and acknowledge that the current system does more damage than good.
00:19:50 It is possible to re-align our markets economy which can replace - or at least diminish - the disposal stage. Sustainability is the process of âenabling the earth to continue supporting human life.âÂ
[EDITORâS NOTE: For more interesting information as to the state of the world, read the article The 9 Limits Of Our Planet... And How Weâve Raced Past 4 Of Them by John Carey]
101. Transcendent Man: When Humans Merge With Technology & Transcend Biology
18 important takeaways from this documentary:
00:05:20 Singularity is a future period which technological change will be so rapid and its impact so profound that every aspect of human life will be irreversably transformed and there wonât be a clear distinction between humans and machines. Technology feeds on itself and it gets faster and faster.
In the future this change will be so quick that humans will not be able to keep up with the pace unless we enhance our own intelligence by merging with the intelligent technology we are creating. By then, technology will be small enough to be inside our bodies and brains, and weâre going to be a hybrid of biological and non-biological intelligence. - Ray Kurzweil
00:07:00 If you put things together in just the right way you can create transcendent effects. Most inventors fail not because they donât get their gadgets to work, but  because the timing is wrong. People donât start a project when the hardware and the technological capability doesnât exist yet to support it; but in fact you should do that.
00:08:04 Information technology follows relatively predictable trajectories, and you can use this as a planning tool. Meaning I canât just take projections for just 2, 3, 4, or 6 years, but 10, 20, 50 years from now and invent with the technologies of the future. I canât build those devices yet, but I can describe them and write about them.
00:11:44 People routinely underestimate what is achievable in long periods of time because they leave out the radical implications of exponential growth.
People can see, even in their own lifetimes, how much more quickly technology moves today than it did five years ago.
The law of accelerating returns argues that the nature of technological progress is exponential. If I count linearly (1, 2, 3, 4...), if I take 30 steps, I get to 30. If I count exponentially (2, 4, 8,16...), Â 30 steps later Iâm at 1.07 billion.
00:12:30 Mooreâs Law observes that basically every two years, we can fit twice as many components onto a chip. And because theyâre closer together they run faster. And so computers get twice as capable overall for the same price every year.
00:13:30 Information technology grows exponentially because we are constantly using the latest technology to create the next.
This is true in general of an evolutionary process. In fact even biological evolution long before humans even evolved shows the same phenomenom.
Major paradigm shifts such as search engines evolved with the past few years. The reason we get to the point of singularity is because the time of evolution will continue to decrease.
00:18:00 There will come a time when having sight or not (or any other handicap for that matter) will not really matter. Today we can communicate to one another by sending thoughts over the internet. Itâs certainly possible that computers embedded in our brain and bloodstream would allow us to communicate directly.
00:19:10 We only have to capture 1/10,000th of a sunlight that falls on the earth to meet all of our energy needs. So, barring any copyright and patent fights from lobbying industry leaders, we could actually replace fossil fuels with nano-engineered solar panels.
[EDITORâS NOTE: For more information on the modern state of the industrial industry, watch the documentary End:CIV - How Our Indstrial Society Is Leading Towards An Ecological Apocalypse.]
00:19:45 Intelligence is the most powerful force on the planet. All the problems we struggle with today - the environment, energy, health, disease, poverty... - weâll be able to solve those problems - in fact well before the singularity - just through the increasing power of information technology.
80% of disease in the world comes from polluted water, and there are very inexpensive technologies emerging to clean polluted water.
00:21:00 The three great overlapping revolutions (GNR) are in:
Genetics (bio technology) - We will eventually be able to program biology away from disease and aging.
Nano-technology -Â Blood-cell sized devices that can go inside your body to keep you healthy from the inside and allow us to merge with non-biological elements.
Robotics (AI) - Arguably the most significant revolution of all, machines will be able to match, and surpass, human intelligence, giving us super-human intelligence and enable us to solve problems impossible to solve today. At this point, our brains would be mostly non-biological machines, so we would theoretically be able to  back up our brains, stop aging and live indefinitely.
00:27:00 A lot of people today are racing with the hopes of singularity before they die, perhaps even being able to escape death through singularity. Perhaps immortality yes, some day... but maybe not in this lifetime.
00:35:10 A thousand years ago, life expectancy was around 25 years. Whereas biology and health medicine used to be hit or miss, today weâre able to reprogram it just like youâre able to reprogram a computer.
âIn genetics, there arenât âgoodâ genes and âbadâ genes; there is a balance. We could do a lot of foolish things to try and alter human beings; to improve them. The net result of that might be tragedy.
Ray Kurzweil is an interesting, entertaining visionary. But heâs not a biologist. Were he a biologist, he would be more moderate in his extensions and extrapolations of the uses of our technology.
Engineering a better human being is going to be a daunting task. After nearly 5 million years of field-testing, the modern human being is who he is because of this field-testing - creating an organism atuned to survive in a range of environments with a range of talents and a range of possibilities. To upset this balance by exaggerating some feature will cost us something. We shouldnât just arrogantly think we have transcended the wisdom of 1,000s of years of human experience.â Â -Dr. William B. Hurlbut, Neuroscience Professor at Stanford University
[EDITORâS NOTE:Â In his lecture Critical Thinking: Keys To Critical Thinking & Thinking About Dubious Claims, James Randi posits that intelligent people can fall victim to critical thinking mistakes because being competent in one field of study in no way guarantees being competent in another field of study.]
00:40:20 Artificial Intelligence (AI), in terms of broad general intelligence, is more closer to Artificial Stupidity in that the brain sciences still have yet to accurately identify and explain what exactly intelligence actually is. Neuro-science is still in its elementary stages. -Â Hugo de Garis, Professor of computer science and mathematical physics at Xiamen University
00:47:40 What would happen if in 40 years Ray Kurzweil passes away and his predictions havenât come true? He would be known for being right about some things, but the precursers of the technologies necessary for Ray Kurzweilâs idea of future technology to exist simply are not here today.
00:52:25 Itâs an outrageous hypothesis to think humans will be able to maintain control over AI once it has been created and set free. Once AI has become 10,000 times smarter than humans, whose to say it doesnât figure out a way to reprogram itself, or even humans? Or capable of communicating with aliens the next universe over?
00:53:42 The Artilect War (artificial intellect) coined by Hugo de Garis is the idea that these AI machines may wipe out humanity; there is always that risk. De Garis posits that sometime around the end of the 21st century there will be a war between two human groups: those who believe AI is important for the survival of the human race, and those who believe AI will lead to the extinction of the human race.
00:57:00 âI predict we will eventually arrive at the Terminator scenario: intelligent machines calling the shots while humans become some subservient slave.Â
Consider humans as we are now, I donât think the future is good. If you are a human after the singularity, forget it.
Once you link a human brain to a computer network, not only can you improve communication and sensory input, you can think in many more dimensions and have extra memory, of course.â - Kevin Warwick, Professor at the University of Reading, UK who carried out several human implant experiments on himself.
00:59:50 âAs we merge with machines, and I think it is inevitable that we will, we will transform into something new... Anyone resisting this progress forward will be resisting evolution, and fundamentally they will die out. Itâs neither good nor bad, itâs inevitable.â Â - Peter Diamandis, Chairman of The XPrize Foundation
83. How Your Technology Waste Destroys The Planet & Compromises Your Security
6 important takeaways from this video:
00:00:18 Many manufacturers have lead us to believe that our used TVs, computers and consumer waste is being safely recycled in Australia. But a staggering amount of the worldâs e-waste is ending up being burned in open dumps in impoverished Ghana, creating an environmental and health-nightmares, and breaking a myriad of laws and conventions.
00:01:47Â Ever since the illegal shipments of illegal e-waste from industrialized countries began arriving in Ghana eight years ago (approx. 2004), the cancerous toxic waste and fumes from these burning technological components are billowing up into the river and atmosphere destroying the water and air quality and settling onto the fruits and vegetables sold in the local markets, which detrimentally and irreparably affect the health and development of the local population.
00:05:11 Nearly 500 containers loads of illegal waste are brought into Ghana from the industrialized countries each month. Companies avoid e-waste shipping without permit laws by falsely declaring the e-waste as âworking second-hand goodsâ to make them disappear. Those âworking second-hand goodsâ that can be repaired are re-sold in the local markets. All else it burned.
00:08:30 Environmentally-safe recycling from transporting the waste, purifying it from the lead content, and recycling the used goods back into the market place is an expensive process. And so this waste builds up, and unscrupulous transporters offer to remove the waste for a price.
00:12:25 Many of these computers and e-waste likely contain your personal and confidential information. If hard drives arrive still in tact, workers recover all possible data and copy the information they contain before they are re-sold or destroyed.
00:13:40 One of the only tradeoffs of having your neighborhood used as a global e-waste dumping ground and the damaging heath problems? Cheap access to out-dated, second-hand technology.
All those selfies you take and post on Instagram helped that company to sell for over a billion dollars.
Send a tweet, and you help raise the value of Twitter to around $30 billion. Facebook is valued at around $140 billion.
Title: Generation Like | By: Douglas Rushkoff | Length: 53:04
74. Generation Like: How your quest for identity & connection is subtly manipulated
24 important takeaways from this documentary:
00:10:01 "The icons of this generation are the 'Like' button, the 'Tweet' button, the 'Rebog' button. This is the biggest transformation that we've had in terms of communicating with consumers in our lifetime, and to not learn how to participate in those channels is outrageous; to stand on the sidelines is not an option." - Bonin Bough, VP of Global Media, MondelĂŞz Int'l
00:12:48 "All those selfies you take and post on Instagram helped that company to sell for over a billion dollars. Send a tweet, and you help raise the value of Twitter to around $30 billion. Facebook is valued at around $140 billion. Those numbers aren't based on profits, those prices are based on the number of likes they can generate; and likes don't generate themselves." - Douglas Rushkoff
00:13:10 "Likes don't generate themselves. Thats why companies need kids to stay online clicking, and liking, and tweeting. They do that by giving kids the chance to be a part of the game: fame by association. Reach out to anybody, and there's an implied promise that they might reach back." - Douglas Rushkoff
00:15:50 "Social media is all about sharing; and that includes sharing the wealth. When kids with large audiences work together, everyone benefits."Â - Douglas Rushkoff
00:16:15 "There's no point in not wanting all of us to help each other be successful and rise together." -Â Tyler Oakley
00:17:57 "It used to be that if a kid didn't have any connections, hardwork and talent were the only path to fame; and even that was no guarantee. But today you can build and leverage a social network." - Douglas Rushkoff
00:18:45 "(You might) have genuine talent, but that's beside the point. To get ahead you need to attach yourself to others who have mastered the game of 'likes.' It's basically just merging all the fan bases together. - Douglas Rushkoff & Liam Horne
00:20:50 "You need to stop worrying about your followers and start worrying about the money." -Â Steven Fernandez
00:23:04 Lots of people can do what you do. What you need is a way to cut through the clutter. - Douglas Rushkoff
00:25:50 If you don't have a zillion hits, then you generally won't get noticed by a sponsor.
00:30:18 If you're connected to a person and that person likes a brand, and then you like the person and then as a result you like the same product, then now you've got a double-endorsement to your friends. - Oliver Luckett, CEO of the Audience
00:30:58 Get social media, then use social media to promote your career, brand, product, etc so that you get to the point where you have a social media network that you can sell. That is every SMART person's goal with social media. You are your own media company. - Douglas Rushkoff and Oliver Luckett, CEO of the Audience
00:31:47 Start with the research and strategy phase where you really dig into who your audience is, and then figure out how your audience uses social media to communicate... The challenges would be using that audience in the way that you want to use them in order to see the results you're looking for. Instead of selling the product to the audience, get the audience to sell your product for you. Â - Kendra Campbell-Milburn, Sr. Director for TGVLAÂ & Douglas Rushkoff
[EDITOR'S NOTE: For more information on how brands collect and sort through your data, check out my interview with Data Consultants Samantha Bilodeau and Thomas Palugan]
00:34:04 What's designed to look like a grass roots wave of excitement is actually a meticulously planned marketing strategy. It may be catching fire, but it was doused with gasoline beforehand. - Douglas Rushkoff
00:34:16Â Day-by-day, hour-by-hour; absolutely nothing is left to chance. Your goal is to create a controlled brush-fire online to the point where the fans are convincing each other. All the little tid-bits you give them serves as fuel for the fire you're trying to create... That is how brands both keep interest up and prep for the next one.Â
From the beginning to the end, every bit of the marketing strategy is being manipulated; a year out. - Brooks Barnes of The New York Times
00:34:45 Consumers aren't just being marketed to, they're actually part of the marketing campaign itself. - Douglas Rushkoff
00:37:02 Your consumer is your marketer. That is a real shift because it used to  be a one way conversation of the marketer to the consumer, and now your consumer is doing as much as the marketer is and getting the message across; consumers are wanting to be as much a part of the process as the company will let them be. -Jane Buckingham, President of Trendera
00:41:10 Surprisingly, consumers can always tell when you're 'pushing' something. So try to keep it transparent and honest because consumers know it's your job and they know that you have to pay bills. - Tyler Oakley
00:41:55 'Selling out' is not selling it anymore; it's sort of getting the brass ring. If you get a brand to send you stuff, that brand realizes that you're important enough that you're an importance audience to reach. -Jason Calacanis, Founder of Insider.com
00:42:17 'Selling out' doesn't even exist as a term anymore. You don't hear young people talking about selling out; I'm not even sure that they know what it means. - Alissa Quart, Author of Republic of Outsiders
00:43:17 Can you really win when you don't make the rules? Maybe that's why some of them are opting to become the game makers themselves. - Douglas Rushkoff
00:45:07 A seamless blend of marketing, media and everyday life; every moment of your consumer's life can be turned into a branding opportunity. There are nuances in how you present things that create different psychological responses. Don't even call yourself an 'ad' to consumers: call yourself 'rewards' and 'moments.' As consumers go out and experience the world, the things that make the most impact are the things that seemingly come up serendipitiously. Serendipity by design. -Brian Wong of Kiip and Douglas Rushkoff
00:49:50 Kids take the very marketing techniques that have been used on them, and use them on one another; all in pursuit of the same prize. -Â Douglas Rushkoff
00:50:30 Getting likes feels good; at least in the moment. - Douglas Rushkoff
A library of films to inform, inspire and provoke action on a wide range of topics surrounding modern society, industrial civilisation and globalisation.
