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An anthropology perspective on the spread of Covid-19 virus in Hong Kong:

Tracing the spread of the Covid-19 virus requires following many kinds of transmissions and contagions, from infectious numbers to populist mobilizations, viral rumors to affective atmospheres. These forces course along multiple material-semiotic networks at different speeds and intensities, unsettling and transforming the city as they circulate. And yet, as literary scholar Priscilla Wald (2008) has shown, such complexities are often distilled and fixed into a familiar narrative of outbreak–spread–containment. Ethnographic, interdisciplinary, and publicly-engaged scholarship all have a crucial role to play in complicating such reductive narratives and bringing other stories to light. As the everyday experiences of Hongkongers reveals, the form and significance of this epidemic is still anything but settled. The virulent transmissions of Covid-19 may yet remake this city—and the world—in profound and unforeseeable ways.

Read the full article here.

The artist Simon Weckert made a fantastic art project using a guerrilla tactic to disrupt Google Maps algorithms. See more information about the project here.

99 smartphones are transported in a handcart to generate virtual traffic jam in Google Maps.Through this activity, it is possible to turn a green street red which has an impact in the physical world by navigating cars on another route to avoid being stuck in traffic.

A striking photography essay from Jo Tuckman with photography by Diana Bagnoli at The Guardian about an area in Mexico where “Coke has become a key part of indigenous ceremonies as well as a staple source of hydration”. Read the full essay here

The story of how Coca-Cola became so deeply embedded in this verdant land of age-old traditions and minimal disposable income goes back to the 1960s when local indigenous leaders, with state backing, began accumulating power in religious, social and economic spheres. This included taking control of the concessions for the distribution of Coca-Cola and, initially, Pepsi too.

(Via Kottke)

Zoey Poll writes at Eye On Design how “For Decades, Cartographers Have Been Hiding Covert Illustrations Inside of Switzerland’s Official Maps”. She argues that these hidden drawings are a kind resistance of Swiss cartographers and their mission to draw as accurate as possible:

These barely-perceptible apparitions aren’t mistakes, but rather illustrations hidden by the official cartographers at Swisstopo in defiance of their mandate “to reconstitute reality.” Maps published by Swisstopo undergo a rigorous proofreading process, so to find an illicit drawing means that the cartographer has outsmarted his colleagues.

(Via Kottke)

DW Documentary about skiing during times of climate change at a low altitude ski station in Germany, Winterberg.

Fisnished watching a documentary from DW Documentary, “The Big Bang that created today’s world”. The two part documentary gives an overview of important events in 1989 that still shape our world today. See the video part 1 and part 2 on Youtube.

1979 was a year that still shapes our world even today. That was when three fundamental forces - the collapse of communism, neoliberalism, and politicized and radicalized religion, fused into a single potent force.

From a No Tech Magazine post, a quote from Bruce Schneier on a halted FOSS project for e-voting:

“I’ve spent much of my limited time and energy trying to persuade people (and the UK government in particular) that a Free Software voting system is the only realistic way a trustworthy voting system could be created. But they are culturally set in their ways and always need to deal with companies, no matter how fragile their security actually is. Governments don’t even have the skills to assess the reliability of the people let alone the technologies these companies sell.”

Quote from the book “Soul Mountain” by Gao Xingjian. The protagonist is trying to find ancient forests and follows some biologists who are tracking and studying pandas. He asks what scientific value there is in trying to save the giant panda:

“It’s symbolic, it’s a sort of reassurance – people need to deceive themselves. We’re preoccupied with saving a species which no longer has the capacity for survival and yet on the other hand we’re charging ahead and destroying the very environment for the survival of the human species itself. Look at the Min River you came along on your way in here, the forests on both sides have been stripped bare. The Min River has turned into a black muddy river but the Yangtze is much worse yet they are going to block off the river and construct a dam in the Three Gorges! Of course it’s romantic to indulge in wild fantasy but the place lies on a geological fault and has many documented records of landslides throughout its history. Needless to say, blocking off the river and putting up a dam will destroy the entire ecology of the Yangtze River basin but if it leads to earthquakes the population of hundreds of millions living in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze will become fish and turtles! Of course no-one will listen to an old man like me, but when people assault nature like this nature inevitably takes revenge!” (p. 48)

The video series “Dissolving Realities” by digital artist Ruben Fro are disturbing, yet fascinating. Via @Kottke.

AT Spui25 in Amsterdam for the book launch of “Secrecy and Methods in Security Research”. The pannelists gave presentations about their chapters in the book and discussed how they deal with secrecy in research. One common idea that the authors in this book tackle is to see secrecy not as an obstancle, but as a way to understand an organisation. In this way secrecy becomes productive or a research object of itself.