What mushrooms, ghosts, NASA, and a 19th century economist can show us about hidden labour
Ideas borrowed from mycology, aerospace, economics, and agriculture to explore the issue of hidden labour
Topic
digital working
A collection of 13 issues
This week's best things
Why artists matter to tech, the unexpected power of boredom, and a new AI tool made for the heritage sector. Plus: trees, cybersecurity, detox camps, and chocolate bar nostalgia. I read Wired, Heffernan, and Turnbull so you don’t have to. Also I saw a play and bought more books.
This week's best things
Influencer-led accessibility stories, the end of onedayism, hoarding pre-AI content, mobile vs TV, quitting wisely, AI’s brain impact, hybrid theatre, monopoly inertia, team tools, digital readiness, arts pay, and a brutal 1910 Tour de France, plus books, podcasts, and Anohni.
Thinking about a new community for people doing digital work
Is there value in an interdisciplinary digital community for the cultural sector? I hosted a session to find out. Here’s what we learned and where it might go next.
This week's best things
Every world language in one place, 200 paintings and reframing old content, a 'software poem', AI that’s actually good, Zoomquilt, finding time to prototype, the power of meetings, cooperation as a skill, and a request for summer reading recommendations.
This week's best things
A new NGA.gov, art in hard times, fresh ways to frame digital, ancient oranges, guarding teams from strategy fatigue, Japanese tree moving, bot farms and info literacy, quick sketching, AI dev hurdles, London Underground Live, and robot arms.
Beyond the promise - when digital falls short: Let's talk about failure
I’m running a short, anonymous survey to gather real experiences of digital projects that didn’t go as planned. The aim isn’t to dwell on what went wrong, but to understand why so we can share lessons that help the whole sector make digital work better.
This week's best things
A history of online messaging, more on Chinese deepfakes of deceased loved ones, Digital Works Conference catchup, Chief Digital Officers in 2014, Apple missing the mark, burnout pushing workers to use AI tools, weird Simpsons, and goats.
This week's best things
Dopamine addiction and the end of being 'extremely online', Amazon's Wizard of Oz approach to AI, the cost of interrupted work, a haunted Discord server, AI being used to revive the dead, and The Makedonium Band
This week's best things
The social media success of the Sacramento History Museum, the design of the Angostura bitters label, AI font pairing, the impact of generational communication preferences, the battlefields of Ukraine are the world's biggest R&D lab, the early internet, and Christopher Tin.