(Source: deliriumserum, via icanseeinthedark)

poptech:

2012: Toward Resilience

After a freewheeling, decade-long “vacation from history” at the tail end of the 20th century, the opening decade of the 21st abruptly returned us to a world fraught with fragility and surprise. And this new context is here to stay.

Each week, it seems, brings some unforeseen disruption, blooming amid the thicket of overlapping social, political, economic, technological and environmental systems that govern our lives. They arrive at a quickening, yet erratic pace, from unexpected quarters, stubbornly resistant to prediction. The most significant become culture touchstones, referred to in staccato shorthand: Katrina. Haiti. BP. Fukushima. The Crash. The Great Recession. The London Mob. The Arab Spring. Other nameless disruptions swell their ranks, amplified by slowly creeping vulnerabilities: a Midwestern town is undone by economic dislocation; a company is obliterated by globalization; a way of life is rendered impossible by an ecological shift; a debt crisis emerges from political intractability. If it feels like the pace of these disruptions is increasing, it’s not just you: it took just six months for 2011 to become the costliest year on record for natural disasters*, a fact that insurance companies tie unambiguously to climate change. Yet nobody can be sure where the next disruption will come from: in our densely and globally interconnected world, the ‘black swans’ are baked in.

In the face of such unavoidable volatility, what factors cause some communities, individuals, ecosystems, institutions and economies to break down, and which enable them to bounce back?

That simple, and increasingly central question is at the heart of a new field, and an important new strategic conversation, centered on resilience.

Read more…

Image via Thai Flood Hacks

curiositycounts:

In a special episode of Design Matters, Debbie Millman talks to Malcolm Gladwell and collaborators about the design of the new illustrated boxed set of three Gladwell classics.

curiositycounts:

Trailer for Bond 50, the epic Blue-ray release of the complete collection of 22 James Bond films.    (via)

herochan:

The Masters of the [Entire] Universe - Anthony Petrie

anchordivision:

“When Nigel Cabourn found some vintage British Army combat boots from World War I he immediately wanted to replicate those boots, carefully made to exacting quality standards and he knew Red Wing Shoes was the only manufactory who could do such a thing.” - Red Wing Shoes

Photos via Redwing1905