Plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose

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A report in the newspaper today that a seventy-year-old woman (Dawn Sword) had died alone and lay at home for six months until her decomposed body was discovered. Reminds me of the opening lines of my book, Future Files, which was written back in 2006. Some things don’t change it seems.
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Early in 2006 a middle-aged woman called Joyce Vincent was discovered in her flat in London. She was dead. Nothing remarkable about that, except for the fact that she had been dead for more than two years and her television was still on. How could this happen? Where was everyone? The answer, of course, was that everyone was somewhere else. London, like most major cities, no longer has neighbourhoods; it has collections of individuals leading increasingly isolated, selfish and narcissistic lives. Neighbours keep to themselves and people don’t ask questions or volunteer information. In an age where everyone is increasingly connected to everyone else through the Internet nobody really knows anyone anymore. We have lots of friends but few of them dig deep to understand our hopes and fears. The general feeling is that you’ll live longer if you keep yourself to yourself.

In Japan there is a social phenomenon called ‘Hikikomori’. The phrase roughly translates as ‘withdrawal’ and refers to boys who retreat into their bedrooms and rarely, if ever, come out. In one case a young man in his early twenties shut his bedroom door and played video games, watched television and slept for fourteen years. Food was supplied by his mother who lived downstairs, virtually alone.

The phenomenon is a particularly Japanese condition although nobody can quite understand who or what is to blame. According to experts there are somewhere between one hundred thousand and one million Hikikomori in Japan, caused by everything from absent (always-working) fathers to over protective mothers.

There are a number of simple explanations for problems like these and most are wrong. Some people blame individualism; others point the figure at urbanisation, technology, education or even government. The reality is it’s all of these but ultimately we have nobody to blame but ourselves. We, and only we, have let this happen. And if it’s like this now what will it be like in another fifty years? This might be a strange way to start what is essentially a business book but I think that it’s important to first understand the bigger picture.

Inspiration strikes!

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Typical. I’ve just spent half a day drafting some material for a TEDx talk in Poland next month and had to junk the whole thing. I was planning, yet again, to talk about how architecture influences thinking when I suddenly thought no. I want to talk about gardening. This was probably a result of a briefing sheet urging people to talk about what they were most passionate about. Therefore the choice was essentially new ideas, old cars, wine, greenhouses or gardening.

Then the strangest thing happened. Out of nowhere it occurred to me that what I really want to talk about is libraries! So, librarians of Lodz, get yourself down to the conference center at the Technical University on Sept 9.

Help Yourself Culture & the Future of Policing

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I’ve been away from computers for a week so I’ve had no chance to comment on the London riots, which is probably a good thing because, as usual, most people seemed intent on publishing without really thinking first. So, with the benefit of some distance, what was it all about? Was it a politically inspired demonstration or just shopping with attitude?

There are no simple explanations in my view. It certainly seems that while the death of Mark Duggan was the spark, combustible material had been lying around for a while. Hence, when things kicked off it caught the imagination of certain people with nothing better to do (school holidays and warm weather helped) and when it appeared that people where getting away with things (literally) this prompted many others to join in. Social media had lots to do with this (and the resultant clean up), but there were obviously riots long before Twitter was around to fan the flames.

Interestingly, various happenings in central London were either under-reported or not reported at all, I suspect because the authorities worst fear was contagion across tourist hot spots or prime real estate. Hence, a group invading a Michelin started restaurant in Notting Hill (the Ledbury) to rob customers at knife point was not widely reported, certainly not on the TV news. The fact that the Prime Minister lives in the immediate vicinity is, I’m sure, purely coincidental.

My main observation, however, is that while what happened was connected to poverty and race this wasn’t the primary cause. If it were, then surely this type of thing would have been going on for ages and would have a long history stretching back half a century or more (OK, it does, but I’m sure you get my point). People were stealing Blackberries not bread remember. Poverty and unemployment were issues in the 1930s and 1950s, but people didn’t fire bomb local department stores to steal Nike trainers or 42-inch plasma TV equivalents.

In my view, it wasn’t entirely due to a lack of parental discipline either, although this was a contributory factor. The fact of the matter is that many adults nowadays are afraid of their kids and afraid of what might happen to them if they try to instill some respect. I’m not sure if locking a kid in their room for a day would be breach of the child’s human rights, but a smack is quite likely result in a call from social services who, more likely than not, will side with the child. Teachers face much the same problem and, as a result, many kids act with impunity.

The main cause of the riots, in my view, is what I’d call a help yourself ethos that permeates many aspects of life in Britain and many other Western cultures. This is the idea that anyone can be anything or get anything and that you can do more or less what you like so long as you don’t get caught. It is connected to greed, selfishness and a culture of self-entitlement and instant gratification, where people expect to get rich or famous without really trying.

It is a direct consequence of rampant individualism and materialism and can be seem everywhere from mainstream television (take MTV’s My Sweet Sixteen as a primetime example) to city greed (Southern Cross being the latest episode, but the actions of certain investment banks shouldn’t be forgotten). The short-term gains are always private, but the long-term consequences are usually spread throughout society.

As for the politicians give me a break. How, for instance, can opportunists like Hazel Blears MP be taken seriously when she comments that such actions are wrong. This is the woman, remember, who was at the centre of the recent MPs expenses scandal. So it’s OK for her to steal things, but not anyone else? Making up expenses is OK, but stealing a bottle of wine isn’t. She’s hardly alone either.

One final thing that seems to be connected is community, David Cameron’s so-called Big Society (BS for short). It was interesting that in areas with strong Turkish connections, for example, the local community instantly rose up and defended what they had built, whereas in other areas the estate agents’ much romanticised local ‘villages’ were instantly evaporated by the heat of the flames.

So, apart from pointing out truisms like there are no simple remedies, what have we learned from recent events? Here’s my thinking:

1. This isn’t the first time sand it won’t be the last.

2. It is not a uniquely British problem. Widening social inequality is a global issue and heaven knows what will happen when one side (or both) add guns into the mix. Note, for example, that spending on guns and ammunition in the US rose by 10% during the year to April 2011 and that Wal-Mart is re-introducing gun sales into some of its American stores.(Do they know something we don’t?).

3. If people do not feel safe or feel threatened they will take things into their own hands. This applies to both sides (see above).

4. This has next to nothing to do with government cuts and everything to do with opportunism mixed with a lack of respect for authority and a feeling that perpetrators will probably get away with it. Having said that, if you remove hope from people, either through poor education or a lack of employment, you will sow the seeds of rebellion and revolt. Given trends like automation and the power shift eastwards we are likely to see higher unemployment in Europe and the US, so I would expect to see more of this type of action and I suspect that Britain may need more, not less, prisons in the future.

5. You cannot fight flash mobs and fluid networks, especially ones that attack more than one target simultaneously, with rigid hierarchical command structures. Current discussions about policing seem to be about police numbers, but bigger isn’t always better. Small units can be highly effective, especially when they are connected with other small units. The police should re-organise themselves around a ‘hider-finder dynamic’ and act more as a ‘sensing organization.’ A bit more open-intelligence would be useful too.

Why is anger all the rage?

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Why is everyone so angry? Why is grim survivalism the current zeitgeist? To quote a leader in the Financial Times a while back, it might be that “The nice decade (for non-inflationary continuous expansion) may be behind us”.

In other words we are entering a nasty period where western economic anxiety is becoming a catalyst for all kinds of attitudinal and behavioural shifts. For example, the real issue might not be peoples’ anger per se but the increasing number of people and events that provoke this anger. This can range from traffic jams and bad customer service to falling house prices, increasing food and energy costs or someone getting shot in the head in north London.

You can see this anger already in the form of ‘Wrath Lit’ on the shelves of your local bookstore. But is the world really getting more angry or is it simply that mobile communications and social media are making more of us aware of incidences of anger?

Put slightly differently, the way to create an epidemic of something like anger is simply to use the word in politics or the media. Another explanation for the rage trend is that in many societies anger is a badge of honour. It is seen as a virtue. It is the individual being true to themselves and expressing their feelings.

The Future of Libraries

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Quite a fun article on public libraries by Alan Bennet in the current issue of the London Review of Books. The best bit – the hardest hitting bit – is at the end and echoes the library work I did a while ago in Sydney.

“I have been discussing libraries as places and in the current struggle to preserve public libraries not enough stress has been laid on the library as a place not just a facility. To a child living in high flats, say, where space is at a premium and peace and quiet not always easy to find, a library is a haven. But, saying that, a library needs to be handy and local; it shouldn’t require an expedition. Municipal authorities of all parties point to splendid new and scheduled central libraries as if this discharges them of their obligations. It doesn’t. For a child a library needs to be round the corner. And if we lose local libraries it is children who will suffer…..the business of closing libraries isn’t a straightforward political fight. The local authorities shelter behind the demands of central government which in its turn pretends that local councils have a choice. It’s shaming that, regardless of the party’s proud tradition of popular education, Labour municipalities are not making more of a stand. For the Tories privatising the libraries has been on the agenda for far longer than they would currently like to admit.”

Map of Digital Distractions.

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I really wish I had done this. It’s a map showing the hierarchy of digital distractions by David McCandless. At the very top of the pyramid is “Device failure” with “iPhone” underneath. At the bottom of the pyramid is “Any kind of actual work'” Brilliant.

You can see it at MoMa in New York.

Thanks to Lynda Koster for pointing this out to me.
More on the map here.

Adults and teens “highly addicted” to smart phones

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A research study by OfCom, the UK communications regulator, says that children and adults are becoming addiction to smart phones. Apparently, 27% of teens use phones in areas where they’re not supposed to while about 20% of adults admitted to using phones when they’d been asked directly or indirectly to switch them off. 25% of adults and 50% of teens now own a smart phone in Britain.

The report also says that smart phones (as opposed to regular mobiles) are raising a series of questions about social etiquette and manners and are also altering work-life balance. About 16% of adults admit to talking calls on holiday while 33% of teens will use a smart phone during family meals. 40% of teens would also answer a phone at night even if they were asleep. Most worrying is the impact of reading – something I write about in Future Minds. 15% of teens say they are reading fewer books due to the use of smart phones.

Full report here.

Future of the Internet

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Having recently read The Future of the Internet by Jonathan Zittrain, a Futurist Update link to a post by Lisa Donchak caught my eye this morning. She has identified 3 trends (the three Rs) concerning the future of the internet and social media.

1. Real Names

Part of the allure of the internet has been the ability to browse sites anonymously. However, as Donchak comments: “the internet is shifting towards a model based more on individual accountability. Facebook has algorithms that attempt to detect whether or not you’ve put in a real name. Google+ is asking users to input their real names, too.” Confirmation of identity is likely to be a next step in the evolution of the internet, because without it secure transactions, accountability and reputation metrics will not work.

Links: Trust, transparency, authenticity, data security, reputation, provenance.

2. Regulation

In the future the internet is likely to be much more regulated than it is today and this will impact the behaviour of both individuals and organizations. Interestingly, Donchak cites an EU discussion of a “Right to be Forgotten” (i.e. do not track me) law, whereby websites would be forced to respect user privacy and delete user data after a specified period. One real possibility not discussed in the post, but which features strongly in Zittrain’s book, is the idea that the internet could be locked down so that it is no longer generative or that national governments could replace the internet with a series of highly regulated and censored national intranets.

Links: Privacy, censorship, trust, data security, secrecy, control,

3. Reputation
Not surprisingly, internet users are increasingly thinking about the reputation of organisations before they put their personal data into those organisations’ websites.
Facebook, for example, has got into numerous scrapes because it is no totally transparent (to people with no time to find out) about what it does with its data. Google+ is pulling people away from Facebook, not because it offers a superior product, but simply because it isn’t Facebook.

Links: Trust, privacy, spam,

How to disconnect from your online life

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Feeling out of control? No time to think nowadays? Fed up with people you don’t know asking to be your friends? Try these five simple steps.

1. Switch your mobile – or computer – off after 6.30pm or 7.30pm each night. It’s interesting to me that we try to set boundaries around screen use for our kids, yet we do not restrict our own usage.

2. Have two phones rather than one. Keep one for business calls and use the other for family and friends. At weekends – or when you go on holiday – switch the work phone off or leave it in a drawer at home.

3. Once you have done 1 or 2, go to places where calmness and serenity can find you. In my experience scale seems to be important. You need to feel physically small to relax or reflect. Perhaps this is why so many people like empty beaches, mountains and cathedrals. In such situations our minds seem to expand to fill the available space. Seeing a distant horizon also appears to help in that our thinking is projected forward.

4. Create the time and space to think. When, for instance, was the last time that you told someone in the office that you were going off “to do a bit of thinking.”

5. If all else fails visit the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine, a website that enters all your online accounts and deletes all of your data. Privacy restored.