“ I owe my livelihood to technology and I love the raw capability it offers us as a tool, but I fear it a bit more than most people do. It’s a tool, but it’s not quite a hammer, because a hammer doesn’t seduce you into sitting around lonely in your underwear for 6 hours at a stretch clicking on youtube videos and refreshing Twitter. I fear technology because I fear that bad feeling I get after a three day XBox binge I go through every year around the holidays. I fear technology not because I think it’s evil, but because it’s too easy to start clicking and never stop, even if the stream of data starts to go from meaningful to useless after the top 5%.”
What is 'the social graph'?
What is this thing that we call ‘the social graph’ ? How do we understand human relationships and communities? Maybe it was never a graph in the first place.
I want to be alone: the rise and rise of solo living - The Guardian
“In theory, the rise of living alone could lead to any number of outcomes, from the decline of community to a more socially active citizenry, from rampant isolation to a more robust public life. “
If living alone is becoming the norm, shouldn’t our cities provide for them?
FIVEFOOTWAY goes free
FFW is truly a living organism that has evolved so much over the past few years. This time, we destroy the paywall and let it run free.
A year ago, we settled on experimenting with digital subscriptions as a revenue stream for FIVEFOOTWAY to ensure sustainability of the project. The bold experiment sent us into new territories and saw us adjusting our rudder a few times along the way as we listened to the feedback that we received from all of you.
Over the past few months, the team has taken all of these information, surveyed the ground and have been charting a course for the future of FIVEFOOTWAY and a few weeks ago, we announced the setting up of our research studio as part of this new strategic direction.
Today, we are pleased to share with you one more thing,FIVEFOOTWAY Magazine will now be completely free!
All our articles, past, present and future can now be accessed without the hassle of any paywall and we think a lot of you out there will appreciate this. We believe that the removal of this wall will encourage a spread of the ideas that we are exploring at FIVEFOOTWAY and allow more people to get involved in the conversation.
There will be no change to the monthly publishing schedule that we have at the moment and we will continue our commitment to creating a pleasant reading experience, which means that you will not be seeing ugly ads on the site any time soon. The studio and our other partnerships will provide the revenue stream that we need and we will be making out pro-rated refunds to current subscribers.
So what are you waiting for? Go check out the magazine and read it to your heart’s content!www.fivefootway.com/magazine
Everything also 'content'
Publishers have stopped referring to their products as journalism, writing, literature, photography, or art. Today, everything is simply “content” - Drew Breunig
“ Cities force us to interact with strangers and with the strange. They pry the mind open. And that is why they are the idea that has unleashed so many of our new ideas.”
“ Everyone should carefully observe which way his heart draws him, and then choose that way with all his strength.”
“ On the one hand, I’m constantly surprised by how many people settle for so little fulfilment in their lives, who endure their lives rather than enjoy them. On the other, I know people who simply love what they do and couldn’t imagine doing anything else.”
This is how big the Universe is.
Mindblow. You will see how small and insignificant we humans are.
