remote working

Remote: Office Not Required
by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
Published 29 Oct 2013

Stop managing the chairs Meetups and sprints Lessons from open source Level the playing field One-on-ones Remove the roadblocks Be on the lookout for overwork, not underwork Using scarcity to your advantage LIFE AS A REMOTE WORKER Building a routine Morning remote, afternoon local Compute different Working alone in a crowd Staying motivated Nomadic freedom A change of scenery Family time No extra space at home Making sure you’re not ignored CONCLUSION The quaint old office The Remote Toolbox Acknowledgments Epigraph Dedication Copyright Thank You for Reading Our Book About 37 Signals AUTHORS’ NOTE When we started writing this book in 2013, the practice of working remotely—or telecommuting, as it’s often referred to—had been silently on the rise for years. (From 2005 to 2011 remote work soared 73 percent in the United States—to 3 million workers total.*) The silence was loudly broken at the end of February 2013, though, when Yahoo! announced that they were dismantling their remote-work program, just as we were finishing this book. All of a sudden, remote work moved from academic obscurity to a heated global conversation. Hundreds, if not thousands, of news articles were written, and controversy was in the air. Of course, we would have appreciated Yahoo!’

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In companies of all sizes, representing virtually every industry, remote work has seen steady growth year after year. Yet unlike, say, the rush to embrace the fax machine, adoption of remote work has not been nearly as universal or commonsensical as many would have thought. The technology is here; it’s never been easier to communicate and collaborate with people anywhere, any time. But that still leaves a fundamental people problem. The missing upgrade is for the human mind. This book aims to provide that upgrade. We’ll illuminate the many benefits of remote work, including access to the best talent, freedom from soul-crushing commutes, and increased productivity outside the traditional office.

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And we’ll tackle all the excuses floating around—for example, that innovation only happens face-to-face, that people can’t be trusted to be productive at home, that company culture would wither away. Above all, this book will teach you how to become an expert in remote work. It will provide an overview of the tools and techniques that will help you get the most out of it, as well as the pitfalls and constraints that can bring you down. (Nothing is without trade-offs.) Our discussion will be practical, because our knowledge comes from actually practicing remote work—not just theorizing about it. Over the past decade, we’ve grown a successful software company, 37signals, from the seeds of remote work. We got started with one partner in Copenhagen and the other in Chicago. Since then we’ve expanded to thirty-six people spread out all over the globe, serving millions of users in just about every country in the world.

Remote Work Revolution: Succeeding From Anywhere
by Tsedal Neeley
Published 14 Oct 2021

Between 2000 and 2015, U.S. multinational companies alone hired 4.3 million employees domestically versus 6.2 million employees overseas—that means millions of people who need digital technology if they are to communicate with the United States, not to mention the millions of domestic workers who work virtually from home over a distance of a few miles. McKinsey Global Institute predicts that the global labor workforce will reach 3.5 billion people by 2030. Remote work is increasingly here to stay. The future is in remote work. None of these trends or predictions, however, accounted for a global pandemic that would require the wholesale migration of nearly entire companies to remote work in a matter of weeks. The remote work revolution, long in coming, was accelerated by the sudden and severe coronavirus outbreak. Chances are you are part of the massive transition that has forced companies to rapidly advance their digital footprint including cloud, storage, cybersecurity, and device and tool usages to accommodate their new virtual workforce.

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Through the experience of working together, team members can develop strategies that enhance coordination, develop collective skills, and maximize the team’s efficiency. REMOTE WORK INCREASES PRODUCTIVITY Here’s the good news: the fears that inform some managers’ gut reaction to use surveillance tools are unfounded. Studies show that remote work does not pose a threat to productivity; in fact, remote work actually increases it. Managers who adopt policing strategies miss a central fact about productivity, namely, that it comes from the trifecta of team results, individual growth, and team cohesion. As I will illustrate in the rest of this chapter, the features of remote work align with this trifecta in multiple ways—when it comes to the connection between team results and individual growth, for example, working from home affords employees more flexibility in arranging schedules, gives them more autonomy over their work environment (no more thermostat wars), and saves time on commutes.

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The desire for autonomy at work is a consistent and striking pattern that we see, and one for which remote work is particularly well suited. REMOTE WORKERS NEED AUTONOMY The hallmark of remote work success is the ability to self-direct and capitalize on the gift of managing your own work processes. Hackman’s insight on the importance of individual growth extends to remote workers’ need to choose where and how they work. In fact, a through line across decades of studies into remote work identifies autonomy as pivotal to job satisfaction and performance. By autonomy, I mean the ability to self-govern. In remote work, this translates to flexibility in the timing and location of work.

Age of the City: Why Our Future Will Be Won or Lost Together
by Ian Goldin and Tom Lee-Devlin
Published 21 Jun 2023

Still, for all its flaws, the London system is far superior to car-centric cities in the US like Los Angeles or Atlanta, where a distinctive lack of public transit options acts as a poverty trap for any resident unable to afford a car. In the next chapter, we ask if and how this story might change as a result of the surge in remote working following the coronavirus pandemic. Are we at the start of a new cyclical process of well-off workers fleeing urban centres for greener pastures? 5 Remote Work: The Threat to Cities Enthusiasm for the idea of remote working is nothing new. The first to systematically explore its potential in the modern world was the US physicist Jack Nilles, who in 1976 published a book titled The Telecommunications–Transportation Tradeoff.1 Writing against a backdrop of soaring oil prices and growing excitement about the personal computer, Nilles argued that society was approaching a tipping point.

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That is why we advocate in this book for a holistic approach to economic revival that harnesses the power of cities, rather than trying to resist it. The impact of the recent surge in remote working on the geography of our economy also demands answers, which this book seeks to provide. Without a doubt, the collapse of commitment to offices and commuting is proving to be highly disruptive for cities, particularly in the US and Europe where rates of remote work remain high. Commercial real estate is suffering, municipal taxes are declining and the viability of businesses that depend on intense footfall – from barbers to buskers – is being challenged.

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The rapid growth of the internet in the 1990s further fuelled the belief that a large-scale transition to remote working was just over the horizon. In 1993, management guru Peter Drucker declared that ‘It is now infinitely easier, cheaper and faster to do what the nineteenth century could not do: move information, and with it office work, to where the people are.’3 When communication is instant and free, and all the world’s information is a click away, what need is there for the office? And in a knowledge economy, if there is no need for the office what need is there for the city? The growth of remote work in subsequent decades was far more modest than anticipated.

The Future Is Analog: How to Create a More Human World
by David Sax
Published 15 Jan 2022

Two months later a dozen academics published a massive study in the Nature of Human Behaviour that looked at the effects of remote work on over sixty thousand Microsoft employees. It found that shifting to remote work cut ties across business units and reduced collaboration between them. “We expect that the effects we observe on workers’ collaboration and communication patterns will impact productivity and, in the long term, innovation,” the report noted, urging caution. “Yet, across many sectors, firms are making decisions to adopt permanent remote work policies based only on short-term data.” Firms deciding to make remote work permanent (like Twitter, Shopify, Facebook, Nationwide, and, yes, Microsoft) “may put themselves at a disadvantage by making it more difficult for workers to collaborate and exchange information.”

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Each day she woke up, ate a quick breakfast, and sat down for eight straight hours of video calls, back to back to back. Her job was ostensibly the same, and the fund’s investments were stable, but the shift to remote work made it absolutely relentless, and relentlessly boring. Most days, she barely had time to run downstairs and eat a yogurt before the next call. She could not even recall the last time she left her house. Lauren had become a prisoner of her laptop. Several weeks into the shift to remote work, the term Zoom fatigue began to circulate, which hinted at something greater going on. Though the software worked remarkably well, each Zoom meeting (or its equivalent on Google Meet, Microsoft Teams, Cisco Webex, or other videoconferencing platforms) seemed to take something visceral from its participants, the way a trip to Ikea sucked the love out of a young couple.

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One study by Microsoft, which took in data from tens of thousands of employees across the world, including emails and chat threads, LinkedIn posts, and other digital interactions, showed a clear decline in human connection across organizations once the workforce moved exclusively online. “The shift to remote work, however, has changed the nature of social capital in organizations, and not necessarily for the better,” wrote the report’s authors, Nancy Baym, Jonathan Larson, and Ronnie Martin, in Harvard Business Review. While employees report more meetings than ever, they also report more isolation and less connection… One of the biggest and most worrisome changes we saw across these studies was the significant impact that a year of full-time remote work had on organizational connections—the fundamental basis of social capital.

The Year Without Pants: Wordpress.com and the Future of Work
by Scott Berkun
Published 9 Sep 2013

Once you have two or three like-minded people, a culture forms that attracts more people with similar values and repels those that don't. Remote work is merely physical independence, and the biggest challenge people who work remotely face is managing their own psychology. Since they have more independence, they need to be masters of their own habits to be productive, whether it's avoiding distractions, staying disciplined on projects, or even replacing the social life that comes from conventional work with other friendships. The hire-by-trial approach Automattic uses filters out people not suited for remote work for whatever reason. It's fair to say many talented people aren't suited to remote work, but many are. While few established companies can choose to become completely distributed, the distribution of Automattic, among its other interesting attributes, begs the question: What assumptions do you have about your organization that hurt you?

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As I pointed out earlier in the book, remote work, and many other perks Automattic used, will work or fail because of company culture, not because of the perk itself. Since by now you know how my team functioned, in this chapter I'll explore the general challenges with working distributedly and without e-mail. I'm certain of the following: Self-motivated people thrive when granted independence. Managers who want better performance must provide what their staff needs. Remote work is a kind of trust, and trust works two ways. Recently Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer banned remote work from her company, claiming it made people less productive.1 She might have been right: in her company, people may have abused the trust that remote work grants employees.

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It was the Heisenberg uncertainty principle applied to remote work. If I Skyped someone to say, “How are you doing?” and he said, “Fine,” and then I said, “No, really, how is everything?” even if he volunteered more, it'd be an answer I forced, different in nature from something I observed by being around them. Automatticians had to know themselves well and be outgoing online. Many were. They couldn't depend on coworkers' catching their mood or a boss recognizing something different in their behavior unless it was visible in how they expressed themselves through the narrower, text-dominant channels of remote work. Some of this might not matter or might be a boon.

The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich
by Timothy Ferriss
Published 1 Jan 2007

Also, very helpful to give baby something to sip or munch on during take off and landing so yours isn’t the baby screaming from ear pain. Happy travels! —KARYL PRE-EMPTING THE BOSS: COMMON CONCERNS ABOUT REMOTE WORK In the linked article, Cisco acknowledges that remote work arrangements are “here to stay” yet lists a set of security issues. It makes sense to preemptively research solutions so that you are armed and ready if your employer raises these concerns. http://newsroom.cisco.com/dlls/2008/prod_020508.html. —Contributed by RAINA 58. If you’re an entrepreneur, don’t skip this chapter. This introduction to remote working tools and tactics is integral to the international pieces of the puzzle that follow. 59.

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Step 3: Prepare the Quantifiable Business Benefit Third, Sherwood creates a bullet-point list of how much more he achieved outside the office with explanations. He realizes that he needs to present remote working as a good business decision and not a personal perk. The quantifiable end result was three more designs per day than his usual average and three total hours of additional billable client time. For explanations, he identifies removal of commute and fewer distractions from office noise. Step 4: Propose a Revocable Trial Period Fourth, fresh off completing the comfort challenges from previous chapters, Sherwood confidently proposes an innocent one-day-per-week remote work trial period for two weeks. He plans a script in advance but does not make it a PowerPoint presentation or otherwise give it the appearance of something serious or irreversible.61 Sherwood knocks on his boss’s office door around 3 P.M. on a relatively relaxed Thursday, July 27, the week after his absence, and his script looks like the following.

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This expanded and updated edition contains more than 100 pages of new content, including the latest cutting-edge technologies, field-tested resources, and—most important—real-world success stories chosen from more than 400 pages of case studies submitted by readers. Families and students? CEOs and professional vagabonds? Take your pick. There should be someone whose results you can duplicate. Need a template to negotiate remote work, a paid year in Argentina, perhaps? This time, it’s in here. The Experiments in Lifestyle Design blog (www.fourhourblog.com) was launched alongside the book, and within six months, it became one of the top 1,000 blogs in the world, out of more than 120 million. Thousands of readers have shared their own amazing tools and tricks, producing phenomenal and unexpected results.

Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout
by Cal Newport
Published 5 Mar 2024

GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “Stop treating us”: AppleTogether, “Thoughts on Office-Bound Work,” appletogether.org/hotnews/thoughts-on-office-bound-work.html. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT A full year after Cook’s: Jane Thier, “Tim Cook Called Remote Work ‘the Mother of All Experiments.’ Now Apple Is Cracking Down on Employees Who Don’t Come in 3 Days a Week, Report Says,” Fortune, March 24, 2023, fortune.com/2023/03/24/remote-work-3-days-apple-discipline-terminates-tracks-tim-cook. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “They’re at the vanguard”: Cal Newport, “What Hunter-Gatherers Can Teach Us about the Frustrations of Modern Work,” New Yorker, November 2, 2022, newyorker.com/culture/office-space/lessons-from-the-deep-history-of-work.

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GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT Consider Isaac Newton working: Cal Newport, “Newton’s Productive School Break,” Cal Newport (blog), March 23, 2023, calnewport.com/blog/2020/03/23/newtons-productive-school-break; and Cal Newport, “The Stone Carver in an Age of Computer Screens,” Cal Newport (blog), October 27, 2020, calnewport.com/blog/2020/10/27/the-stone-carver-in-an-age-of-computer-screens. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT As I’ll elaborate later: Cal Newport, “What If Remote Work Didn’t Mean Working from Home?,” New Yorker, May 21, 2021, newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/remote-work-not-from-home. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT CHAPTER 3: DO FEWER THINGS The author’s name was not: Claire Tomalin, Jane Austen: A Life (New York: Vintage Books, 1999), 220. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT only forty-one years old: Two additional Jane Austen novels, Persuasion and Northanger Abbey, were published after her death.

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GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “The digital intensity”: Work Trend Index Annual Report: The Next Great Disruption Is Hybrid Work—Are We Ready?, Microsoft, March 22, 2021, microsoft.com/en-us/worklab/work-trend-index/hybrid-work. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “and decisions start to drag”: Cal Newport, “Why Remote Work Is So Hard—and How It Can Be Fixed,” New Yorker, May 26, 2020, newyorker.com/culture/annals-of-inquiry/can-remote-work-be-fixed. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “Here was a problem”: Simon Singh, Fermat’s Enigma: The Epic Quest to Solve the World’s Greatest Mathematical Problem (New York: Anchor Books, 1997), 6. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “I was electrified”: Singh, Fermat’s Enigma, 205.

The Survival of the City: Human Flourishing in an Age of Isolation
by Edward Glaeser and David Cutler
Published 14 Sep 2021

Natalia Emanuel and Emma Harrington, two former PhD students in the economics department at Harvard, analyzed data from a major online US retailer. In early 2018 the retailer allowed more remote work because it was running out of space in some of its call centers. Emanuel and Harrington compared the call volume for workers who were allowed to work at home before and after they switched to remote work. They found that “at the time of the transition to remote work, hourly calls rose by 7.5%,” despite finding no change in the composition of calls. There was a reduction in unexcused absences, and little change in the ratings customers gave the workers for their calls.

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In 2020, when “all workers were remote due to COVID-19,” they found that “those who were hired into remote jobs were 12% less productive than those hired into on-site jobs.” Thus, “remote work attracts unobservably less productive workers.” This “selection effect” is one obstacle limiting the widespread persistence of remote work post-COVID. If firms attract more engaged, ambitious people when they make them come into the office, then firms that value internal drive are going to keep their office space. Moreover, many people don’t have adequate workspaces at home. One quarter of Americans do not have residential broadband, and even when they do, it is often too slow for remote work. Working at home may also involve more interruptions from lonely children or other distractions.

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Remote Productivity before and during the Pandemic How has productivity been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic? There is not a single story. We noted earlier the finding of Emanuel and Harrington that remote working was associated with improved productivity in call centers. That holds up in randomized trials as well. Stanford economists Nicholas Bloom and John Roberts, along with colleagues in China, analyzed data from a Chinese travel agency that conducted an experiment with working at home. Among workers who were interested in remote work, the firm randomized some to work at home and some to continue coming to the office. The workers who were allowed to work from home were 13 percent more productive than the workers who had to commute.

The Nowhere Office: Reinventing Work and the Workplace of the Future
by Julia Hobsbawm
Published 11 Apr 2022

eid=CiL0qOwTVIfQWziIWqM6INZlBg6D8JOL%2BNZOb88wOzoxGQ%2FPSsFldoOrC8FwbwFelpHsyMm48GqbPS8Yy%2B8wam7Y7uMPTQOt18Hgv52B0ygfnYK4 3. ‘Number of Freelancers in the United States from 2017 to 2028 (in Millions)’, September 2017, Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/921593/gig-economy-number-of-freelancers-us/; PwC US Remote Work Survey, 12 January 2021, https://www.pwc.com/us/en/library/covid-19/us-remote-work-survey.html 4. ‘Number of Smartphones Sold to End Users Worldwide from 2007 to 2021 (in Million Units)’, Statista, February 2021, https://www.statista.com/statistics/263437/global-smartphone-sales-to-end-users-since-2007/ 5. 2021 Work Trend Index: Annual Report, The Next Great Disruption is Hybrid Work – Are We Ready?

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Zoe Schiffer, ‘Apple Employees Push Back Against Returning to the Office in Internal Letter’, Verge, 4 June 2021, https://www.theverge.com/2021/6/4/22491629/apple-employees-push-back-return-office-internal-letter-tim-cook 24. ‘11.8% CAGR, Employee Communication Software Market is Emerging with $1,780.09 Million by 2027’, Industry Today, 8 June 2021, https://industrytoday.co.uk/it/11-8--cagr--employee-communication-software-market-is-emerging-with--1-780-09-million-by-2027 25. See https://grooveapp.io/community 26. McKinsey Global Institute, ‘What’s Next for Remote Work: An Analysis of 2,000 Tasks, 800 Jobs, and Nine Countries’, McKinsey, 23 November 2020, https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/future-of-work/whats-next-for-remote-work-an-analysis-of-2000-tasks-800-jobs-and-nine-countries 27. ‘Quality of Life at Home, Exploring People’s Perceptions of Where They Live Before and During Lockdown’, Quality of Life Foundation, August 2020, https://www.qolf.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/QOL_QualityOfLifeAtHome_August2020_5MB.pdf 28.

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There is no uniform model or agreement. The case for going into an office regularly is having to be made to the workforce and many are rejecting it – risking a huge rise in underused corporate space.2 In addition, up to half of America’s jobs are projected to be freelance by 2030 and two-thirds of employers now regard some form of remote work or hybrid work as ‘the new norm’.3 Many companies are declaring themselves ‘fully remote’, meaning they have a competitive edge over those requiring presenteeism. Offices will need to appeal to people differently now they can use a computer anywhere, and nearly everyone has experienced working from home during the lockdowns.

The Lonely Century: How Isolation Imperils Our Future
by Noreena Hertz
Published 13 May 2020

It is likely the take-up of remote working will now accelerate. 33 Erica Dhawan and Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, ‘How to Collaborate Effectively If Your Team Is Remote’, Harvard Business Review, 27 February 2018, https://hbr.org/2018/02/how-to-collaborate-effectively-if-your-team-is-remote. 34 Bryan Robinson, ‘What Studies Reveal About Social Distancing And Remote Working During Coronavirus’, Forbes, 4 April 2020, https://www.forbes.com/sites/bryanrobinson/2020/04/04/what-7-studies-show-about-social-distancing-and-remote-working-during-covid-19/. 35 Hailley Griffis, ‘State of Remote Work 2018 Report: What It’s Like to be a Remote Worker In 2018’, Buffer, 27 February 2018, https://open.buffer.com/state-remote-work-2018/. 36 See original tweet at https://twitter.com/hacks4pancakes/status/1106743840751476736?

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It is likely the take-up of remote working will now accelerate. 33 Erica Dhawan and Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, ‘How to Collaborate Effectively If Your Team Is Remote’, Harvard Business Review, 27 February 2018, https://hbr.org/2018/02/how-to-collaborate-effectively-if-your-team-is-remote. 34 Bryan Robinson, ‘What Studies Reveal About Social Distancing And Remote Working During Coronavirus’, Forbes, 4 April 2020, https://www.forbes.com/sites/bryanrobinson/2020/04/04/what-7-studies-show-about-social-distancing-and-remote-working-during-covid-19/. 35 Hailley Griffis, ‘State of Remote Work 2018 Report: What It’s Like to be a Remote Worker In 2018’, Buffer, 27 February 2018, https://open.buffer.com/state-remote-work-2018/. 36 See original tweet at https://twitter.com/hacks4pancakes/status/1106743840751476736?s=20. 37 Ryan Hoover, ‘The Problems in Remote Working’, LinkedIn, 19 March 2019, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/problems-remote-working-ryan-hoover/?trackingId=KaDtuFRVTiy7DDxgnaFy5Q%3D%3D. 38 See original tweets at https://twitter.com/hacks4pancakes/status/1106743840751476736?s=20; https://twitter.com/SethSandler/status/1106721799306244096?s=20. 39 See original tweet at https://twitter.com/john_osborn/status/1106570727103348738?

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Wolfman beard and all.’40 Most alarming, though not unsurprising given our ‘use it or lose it’ propensity, was that several of the respondents had noticed the impact of remote working creeping into their daily lives. ‘When I stay alone in front of the laptop for a long time and then go out somewhere – I feel like I forgot how to talk and communicate with people properly for a couple of hours until recovered,’ posted Ahmed Sulajman, a software engineer and start-up CEO in Ukraine. ‘I find it’s hard to switch between messages and real-world communication.’41 Remote working is not fundamentally bad. Many remote workers cherish the autonomy and flexibility it provides, subscribe to the ‘I’ll work where I want, when I want’ ideal and benefit from avoiding a long commute.

Futureproof: 9 Rules for Humans in the Age of Automation
by Kevin Roose
Published 9 Mar 2021

(I enjoy a good hot take, but telling people to pack into crowded offices during a pandemic felt a few degrees too toasty.) It’s clear, now, that remote work is here to stay, and that virtual collaboration is going to be part of how many white-collar professionals operate. A July 2020 survey by Gartner found that 82 percent of corporate leaders plan to allow their employees to work remotely at least part-time after the pandemic, and nearly half of respondents said that they planned to allow full-time, indefinite remote work. Shifting to remote work was clearly the right call during the pandemic, and it will continue to make sense for many workers with flexible remote work options to relocate away from high-cost cities.

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A July 2020 survey by Gartner “Gartner Survey Reveals 82% of Company Leaders Plan to Allow Employees to Work Remotely Some of the Time,” Gartner, July 14, 2020. Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen complained Kevin Stankiewicz, “Adobe CEO Says Offices Provide Some Boost to Productivity That Remote Work Lacks,” CNBC, August 11, 2020. Reed Hastings, the chief executive of Netflix, called remote work a “pure negative” Joe Flint, “Netflix’s Reed Hastings Deems Remote Work ‘a Pure Negative,’ ” Wall Street Journal, September 7, 2020. Studies have found that groups of people located Jerry Useem, “When Working from Home Doesn’t Work,” The Atlantic, November 2017. co-authors of academic papers who are located closer Kyungjoon Lee, John S.

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They were also very, very tired from trying to juggle childcare and navigate virus precautions, and from staring at the same screens all day. Executives were frustrated, too. Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen complained that remote work was taking a toll on the company’s ability to get new initiatives off the ground. “When you’re trying to create a new project,” Narayen said, “you want people around that water cooler.” Reed Hastings, the chief executive of Netflix, called remote work a “pure negative” in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. Asked when he planned to bring his team back to the office, Hastings replied, “Twelve hours after a vaccine is approved.”

Restarting the Future: How to Fix the Intangible Economy
by Jonathan Haskel and Stian Westlake
Published 4 Apr 2022

In 1968, computer scientist Douglas Engelbart demonstrated videoconferencing and simultaneous collaborative document editing.16 Three decades later, the journalist Frances Cairncross coined the term “the death of distance” to describe a world in which these technologies would free the economy from the vulgar constraints of place.17 At the beginning of 2020, place remained at least as important as ever: to the extent that people invoked the death of distance, they did so as an example of the naive optimism of yesteryear, alongside flying cars, the paperless office, and the end of history. COVID-19 offered a new hope for remote working. With nearly half of all workers forced to stay at home in many countries, firms were faced with a compulsory experiment. Many workers and some employers found that remote working was not as bad as they thought. Few people missed their commute, people learned to use videoconferencing and collaboration software, and many businesses that would have never considered a wholesale move to remote working found that it was possible to do business without everyone in the office. FIGURE 6.1: Percentage Intending to Use Increased Home Working as a Permanent Business Model.

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But our planning systems make it painfully hard to build new office space and new housing in and around the most dynamic cities, like San Francisco and London. COVID-19, which enforced remote working for many people, temporarily removed some of these planning issues, but it introduced its own problems, depriving knowledge workers of the face-to-face contact that at least some of them feel is important for their work. Both congested cities and a haphazard shift to remote working make it harder to invest in intangibles, likely slowing down long-term investment relative to what it might have been. We examine this issue, and potential solutions to it, in chapter 6.

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At the same time, because there is not a consistent or reliable recipe for success, it is important for politicians to be realistic in their expectations for local growth. Speeding the Death of Distance We observed earlier that the rise in remote working occasioned by COVID-19 would not make the problems of place go away, but it may help address them at the margin. Shifting some employees to remote working will not reverse the Triumph of the City, but it will weaken it and offer an opportunity for some left-behind places to catch up, if they can formulate an attractive offer for remote workers. But making working from home work well raises its own institutional questions, which we will look at now.

The Globotics Upheaval: Globalisation, Robotics and the Future of Work
by Richard Baldwin
Published 10 Jan 2019

Most of today’s applications use smartphone or tablet screens, but there are also specially made headsets that allow hands-free communication.14 It is also being used for group meetings. These new forms of communication make videoconferencing and video Skype look positively Neanderthal. They are going a long way toward taking the remote out of remote work. To date, most of the uses have been in situations where it is almost impossible to have workers side by side. And most applications have involved domestic remote work. For example, Dutch police are using AR to help first responders deal better with crime scenes they walk into as part of their job. DUTCH POLICE AND GAZA STRIP SURGERY Firefighters, and paramedics are often the first ones to arrive at a crime scene.

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But at least as important is that fact that we and our companies are rearranging things to make telecommuting easier. To date, most of this telecommuting takes place domestically but it doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see that domestic telecommuting can easily become international telecommuting. Domestic remote work is the thin edge of wedge that is opening the service sector to telemigration. And it is astounding how many jobs are already being done remotely. DOMESTIC REMOTE WORK PAVING THE ROAD FOR TELEMIGRANTS David Kittle is an industrial designer who feels strongly about his creations. Products should be functional and aesthetically interesting—an approach that has helped him develop winning designs for just about everything from rugged electric lanterns and plastic playground equipment to motorcycle cup holders and roller-coaster seats.

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All these things are creating snowball effects. As more workers work remotely, companies adjust their work practices and team structures to make this easier, and as it gets easier, more workers do it. This in turn has stimulated digital innovations that facilitate remote work. The snowball has created a hundred-billion-dollar business sector for the technology and services that grease the wheels of remote work. There is, in a sense, the equivalent of a “reverse industrial revolution” going on in offices. In the first phase of industrialization, textile work moved from cottages to large mills. Now office work is moving from large offices to the twenty-first-century equivalent of cottages.

The Heart of Business: Leadership Principles for the Next Era of Capitalism
by Hubert Joly
Published 14 Jun 2021

In the end, I decided to scrap remote working, which, as you might suspect, was not a unanimously popular decision. Some people, including those who designed the system, thought I was a management dinosaur, more interested in having people clock in than in results. I received e-mails that cited scenarios involving sick children and elderly parents—when no one had ever suggested there would be no sick leave or exception. As a coincidence, Yahoo’s CEO, Marissa Mayer, had just scrapped the company’s own version of remote working. In today’s world, after Covid-19 made remote working necessary, including at Best Buy, this choice seems outdated.

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But back then, without the public health considerations that have now made remote work a necessity, I reached that decision for practical and philosophical reasons. From a practical standpoint, Best Buy was on the brink of death. It was an emergency situation, which meant that we had to work together, act fast, stay synced, and keep information flowing. All that required having people in the same place at the same time. A patient dying on the table is best served by a medical team all in the room. In addition, remote working did not apply to everyone. Having different rules for different parts of the company was breeding tension and resentment.

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See businesses Cook, Tim, 196 Covid-19 (coronavirus) pandemic agile work methods in, 176 business tied to community health in, 72 capitalism challenges in, 4 challenges as opportunities during, 202–203 human connections in, 149, 156 leadership during, 223, 227–228 purpose focus during, 204, 223 remote working in, 177 work-life balance in, 229 crisis response, 138–140, 223–224, 227. See also turnarounds Crow, Sheryl, 147 customers challenges creating opportunities for, 202–203 customer service for, 14–15, 21, 31, 34 delighting of, 83–85 employee incentives benefiting, 124 environmental and social issue importance to, 59–61, 74 expectations for businesses, 4 human connections with, 27, 71, 149 loyalty development among, 64, 67–68, 71–72, 74 mystery shoppers, 13–15 profit focus antagonizing, 59–61 purpose driving, 66, 66f retail experiences for, 13–15, 21, 23, 34, 106 Deci, Edward, 243n4 decision making, employee, 47, 170–173 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), 90–91 De La Salle Spartans, 181–182, 183 Descarpentries, Jean-Marie, 63–65, 82–83, 93, 104–105, 112, 182 Descartes, René, 152 Dickens, Charles, 97 Dimon, Jamie, 242n14 Discovery, 82 disengagement, employee, 4, 15–17 diversity and inclusion, 159–164 Dreamers, support for, 90–91 dreams, connecting articulation of people-first philosophy for, 136–137 business purpose connecting to employees’, 133–145 crisis response for, 138–140 exploring driving forces for, 137–138 framing business purpose for, 142–144 recording important events for, 140 role modeling for, 141 spreading meaning for, 144–145 storytelling for, 141–142 Durchslag, Scott, 102 Dweck, Carol, 45, 191 Ebbers, Bernie, 214 Electronic Data Systems (EDS) France autonomy at, 172–173 challenges as opportunities at, 201–202 human connections at, 148, 151 incentives at, 128, 130 Joly’s departure from, 61, 228 leadership at, 61, 65, 93, 148, 182 performance assessments at, 188 purpose at, 143–144 turnaround at, 28 work views at, 18 Ellison, Ralph, 152 employees articulating people-first philosophy to, 136–137 autonomy of, 167–179 of Best Buy, 13–16, 21, 32–34, 57, 61–62, 98–117, 123–125, 133–145, 147–164, 170–179, 184–193 commissioned, 124–125, 127, 128 crisis response for/by, 138–140 cutting positions of, 97, 103, 104–105, 108–110 development and fulfillment of, 64, 182 disengagement of, 4, 15–17 dreams of, 133–145 energy generation among, 110–117 engagement of, 15, 17, 20–21, 32, 57, 61–62, 74, 121, 128, 148–151, 160 environmental and social issue importance to, 60–61 expectations for businesses, 4 fringe benefits for, 99, 108, 113 human connections with (see human connections) human magic of (see human magic) incentives for, 99, 123–131, 199, 243n4 mastery achievement by, 181–193, 245n3(ch 12) minority, 90–91, 152, 159–164 positive environment creation for, 114–115 productivity of, 15, 16, 17, 185 profit focus antagonizing, 59–61 purpose driving, 32–34, 61–62, 65–68, 66f, 74, 133–145 role modeling for/by, 141 storytelling about/by, 141–142 (see also personal experiences, sharing) strategic plan role of, 46–47, 110–112 transparency with, 115–116, 153–154 treating as individuals, 67, 131, 151–152 turnarounds tied to, 57, 98–117 turnover of, 15, 17, 31, 109, 163, 237n6 work by (see work) workplace injuries, 16–17, 19 engagement diversity and inclusion fostering, 160 employee, 15, 17, 20–21, 32, 57, 61–62, 74, 121, 128, 148–151, 160 financial incentives not focused on, 128 human connections driving, 148–151 human magic driving, 121 profit and, 15, 17, 57, 61–62 with purpose, active incorporation of, 79–95 purpose and meaning encouraging, 32, 74 Enron, 56, 59, 214 environmental issues business purpose addressing, 72, 74, 75–76, 88–91, 92, 94, 142–143 business sustainability tied to, 72 capitalism critiques and, 4, 53–54 climate change as, 54, 59–61, 76, 88–89, 241n12 customer, employee, and shareholder focus on, 59–61, 74, 241nn11–12 metrics to account for, 94 profits not reflecting environmental costs, 56 sustainability standards and, 60, 235 Expedia, 102 extrinsic motivators, 128 failure allowance for, 192–193 perfectionism and fear of, 44, 45 Fashion Pact, 89 Federer, Roger, 191 feedback performance assessments as, 188–191, 235 positive improvements with, 41–42, 155 requests for, 116, 155 struggle with critical, 39–41, 155 team dynamics and candid, 158 Fields, Mark, 43 finances Best Buy’s, 2–3, 58–59, 74, 91–92, 103, 109, 192 bonuses, 99, 124, 127, 129–131, 199 commissions, 124–125, 127, 128 cost cutting in turnarounds, 97, 104–105, 106–110 disengagement affecting, 15–16 engagement affecting, 17 financial incentives, 99, 124–131, 199, 243n4 profits (see profits) shareholder value, 6, 51, 54–62, 63–65, 74, 192 turnarounds of (see turnarounds) Financial Stability Board, 241n12 Fink, Larry, 60, 74–75 Forbes, 164 Ford, 42–44, 115, 153–154 Fradin, Russ, 226 Frankl, Viktor, 27 Friedman, Milton/Friedman doctrine, 4, 51, 55, 61, 72 Furman, Matt, 114, 214 Gallup, 28, 148, 149, 189 Gandhi, 217 General Electric, 28, 81, 189, 213 George, Bill, 29, 142, 217 Ghosn, Carlos, 214 Gibran, Gibran Khalil, 23, 24 Gladney, Laura, 162 Glassdoor, 164 Glint, 237n6 Goldman Sachs, 215 Goldsmith, Marshall on coaching vs. training, 187 feedback on leadership with, 116, 155 lifelong learning with, 191 perfectionism release with, 38–39, 40, 41, 46 on self-awareness, 218 on stakeholders as customers, 225 on women in leadership, 160 Goodall, Ashley, 190 Google, 86–87, 163 Grange, Maurice, 167–168 GreatCall, 31 growth challenges as opportunities for, 200–203 growth mindset, 45, 191 human magic unleashed with, 195–205 possibilities and, 197–200 purpose central to, 203–204 strategy pursuing, 45, 46, 75, 81, 157, 170, 193, 196–205 Harvard Business School, 216, 218, 236 Hayes, Neil, 183 HEC Paris, 236 Helgesen, Sally, 160 hero-leader model, 4, 5, 157, 209, 213–215 Higgins Victor, Kathy, 3 Highland Superstores, 123, 125 Hobson, Mellody, 162 Honeywell Bull, 63, 167, 185–186 human connections business purpose to foster, 65–77, 66f creating safe environments fostering, 150–151, 153–154 developing for human magic, 147–164 diversity and inclusion improving, 159–164 engagement driven by, 148–151 as heart of business, 4–5, 7 (see also purposeful human organizations) perfectionism effects on, 38, 42, 45 performance driven by, 148–151 personal experience sharing for, 147–148, 155–156 team dynamics and, 157–158 transparency for, 153–154 treating all as individuals for, 67, 131, 151–152 trust development for, 153–154 turnarounds founded in, 98–117, 149–150 vulnerability encouraged for, 115–116, 153, 154–156, 229 work as opportunity for, 27 human magic autonomy fostered for, 167–179 connecting dreams for, 133–145 environment supporting, 131 growth unleashing, 195–205 human connection development for, 147–164 incentives and, 123–131 ingredients for, generally, 131–132 irrational performance with, 6, 117, 181 mastery achievement and, 181–193, 245n3(ch 12) overview of, 6, 121 in turnarounds, 117 Hurricane Maria relief, 138–140 IBM, 116 Ignatius de Loyola, 29 Imagine, 89 incentives bonuses as, 99, 124, 127, 129–131, 199 financial, 99, 124–131, 199, 243n4 promotion as, 124 purpose of, 129–131 industry sector leadership, 234 innovation autonomy breeding, 169, 179 failure tied to, 44, 193 financial incentives hampering, 127 perfectionism impeding, 44 profit focus stifling, 58 purpose leading to, 80 inspiration leader’s role in, 224 purpose providing, 70–72 interdependence, 66f, 68 intrinsic motivation, 243n4 investors.

Transport for Humans: Are We Nearly There Yet?
by Pete Dyson and Rory Sutherland
Published 15 Jan 2021

There are plenty of ways we can improve the user experience, but that’s only half of it: the experience cannot be considered without wondering about the purpose and the impact of travel. The way people travel is completely intertwined with the dimensions of a good life: equality, sustainability, urban living, remote working and policy goals like ‘levelling up’. Our intended destination should sound familiar to most readers: people being freer to choose public transport when it makes sense, more people able to walk and cycle, less dependency on cars as the only option, adoption of cleaner and greener new technologies, and more investment where it creates more jobs and opportunities.

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That means investing in psychological research, creative idea generation and scientific methods to solve everyday problems that technological innovation and economics cannot solve entirely on their own. As we write, many of us are travelling less than at any time in our lives, trapped indoors in the middle of the Covid-19 epidemic, and many of us are facing a future in which we will decide more carefully how, and how often, we move about. We are increasingly using videoconferencing and remote-working technologies, such as Zoom and Microsoft Teams, and wondering if we really want to commute in future. Some of us have had those choices made for us. From healthcare workers to posties, millions have continued to travel to work at some personal risk. Transport operators and their staff have gone to considerable lengths to keep countries moving, even adapting train and bus timetables to sync with hospital shift patterns.

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Rail passenger numbers between 1990 and 2019 grew not just in the UK (following privatization) but also in France (which saw a 50% increase), Spain (61%) and Germany (129%).19 From the traveler’s perspective, this wave of innovation effectively sped up journeys by compressing time and space, thereby maximizing the value of time spent travelling.20 But we might now be entering a new wave, where technology is used not to book and plan more travel but instead to replace some journeys entirely. New jobs exist that can be performed exclusively from home, while traditional jobs are increasingly being done more flexibly and remotely. In 2019, 63% of workers in the United States already had access to remote working, and 70% of the UK workforce had some form of flexible working pattern.21 People were already working early or late, doing four-day weeks or seven-day ‘always on’ ones.22 A great deceleration Fossil records show that the evolution of species is not a steady and gradual process. Crises precipitate major transitions.23 Covid-19 has been a crisis that will speed up the changes in the way we live and work.

Breaking Twitter: Elon Musk and the Most Controversial Corporate Takeover in History
by Ben Mezrich
Published 6 Nov 2023

“Most of our people work in a hybrid model. About 1,500 people work remotely full-time. You’ve sent communications to Tesla executives on remote work. Can you share what your point of view is on remote work and specifically for Twitter?” Elon shifted perceptibly in his seat, but then offered a little wisp of a smile. Yeah, so Tesla makes cars and obviously you cannot make cars remotely… the bias needs to be strongly towards working in person, but if someone is exceptional, then remote work can be okay.… The bias is very much toward in-person work. It would obviously be insane if someone is excellent at what they do but can only work remotely to then fire them.

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Thousands were being fired, but she was leading something cool and real, had leapfrogged up the chain of command, and was now one of the few people working with Elon face-to-face. When, one day before her own fateful tweet, on Wednesday, November 1—at three a.m.!—Elon’s team had sent out an email ending remote work, except under extreme conditions, pretty much demanding that people return to their offices the next day—Thursday!—she’d certainly balked at the suddenness of the demand. By now many Tweeps didn’t live anywhere near an office, and all of them had been promised that remote work would be a part of the Twitter landscape forever. But still, Esther herself couldn’t really complain; by that point she was imbedded so deep in the office working on Twitter Blue, she was about to become a meme.

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Some people were even more productive in the comfort of their home offices, not having to deal with commutes, unnecessary face-to-face meetings, wasted time in elevators, cafeterias, smoothie bars. But on the whole, Mark had found the shift to “distributed work” a gateway drug toward the weakened work culture at Twitter, which had made it harder and harder to get things done. From remote work, Leslie moved right into a question that was central to her audience’s concerns: “Can you speak to how you’re thinking about layoffs at Twitter?” Mark doubted Elon’s response put anyone listening at ease: “Well, I think it depends, the company does need to get healthy. So right now the costs exceed the revenue so that’s not a great situation to be in…” But in a roundabout way, he at least tried to be optimistic: “Anyone who is a significant contributor should have nothing to worry about.

Shorter: Work Better, Smarter, and Less Here's How
by Alex Soojung-Kim Pang
Published 10 Mar 2020

“We’re more efficient, we deliver more to our clients, and we’re earning more money,” Lorraine says. People have more time to go to the doctor, exercise, or simply recover from the week; sick days have dropped to “practically zero, which is unheard of in the call center world.” Clients posed no objections. Many of them have their own flexible or remote work systems and understand the need to experiment with working hours to maximize productivity while accommodating employees’ needs outside work. They also had little reason to complain: Patrick estimates that Pursuit’s efforts contributed $2.1 billion to their clients’ sales pipelines in 2018 and generated sales in thirty-four countries.

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They look like similar options, and both offer employees greater autonomy and time management, but in practice they work quite differently. Companies that have successful flexible hours programs can build on their experience to ease the transition to a four-day workweek. “We’ve always had flexible working hours or remote working” at ELSE, Warren Hutchinson says, so by the time the entire company started its first trial of a four-day week, “we’d already sort of been experimenting with it, so we knew we could do it. It was just a question of changing the format and making it so that everybody could participate.” For other companies, coordinating teams working in different cities and time zones gives them a level of expertise with scheduling that helps them redesign the workday.

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For other companies, coordinating teams working in different cities and time zones gives them a level of expertise with scheduling that helps them redesign the workday. At the Hong Kong offices of talent development consultancy atrain, for example, “because we have flexible time and remote work,… self-managed work [is] quite the norm in the organization,” Grace Lau says. As a result, “moving to four days was not a big jump for us.” But there are important differences between how flexible work and shorter workweeks play out for people and organizations. Flexible hours place the burden of scheduling, and coordinating with colleagues who are working to different schedules, squarely on the individual.

Exponential: How Accelerating Technology Is Leaving Us Behind and What to Do About It
by Azeem Azhar
Published 6 Sep 2021

The tools that allowed Sid and his team members to work from home (or the beach) were wide-ranging – and where possible they took advantage. This kind of unregulated, arm’s-length management is as far away from Taylorism as one could imagine. And it only accelerated during the coronavirus lockdowns, when internet-enabled remote work became the norm for most white-collar workers. But not every employee works for a firm which provides the freedom to work how and where they like. And the same technologies that enable remote work – from a beach, a mountain or by a lake – can also be turned against employees. Many readers might be familiar with the ‘panopticon’. Imagined by the early-nineteenth-century philosopher Jeremy Bentham, the panopticon is a type of prison in which every prisoner is constantly visible from a guard tower in the middle of the complex.

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The emphasis we place on countries erases the fact that cities have long been the engine of wealth creation, scientific discovery, trade and culture. In the Exponential Age, this trend will not just continue but accelerate. At first glance, exponential technologies might seem to erode cities’ significance. They may allow for new forms of remote working. Such remote work, the theory goes, could give a greater online voice to people based away from urban areas. But this is only one side of the story. As we progress through the Exponential Age, cities will become more important, not less. The key cause is, once again, the rise of the intangible economy – and the effect it has on labour markets.

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But, as so often in the Exponential Age, there is only a few years’ gap between the technological vanguard and the rest of us. And the process is further along than you might think. A 2018 Gartner report found that half of 239 large corporations were monitoring the content of employee emails and social media accounts. The move to remote work during Covid-19 only accelerated this transition, particularly in white-collar sectors that were previously office-based. A report by the UK’s human resources trade body, CIPD, found that 45 per cent of employees believe that monitoring is currently taking place in their workplace.70 The issue is not just surveillance, but wider forms of automated management.

Travel While You Work: The Ultimate Guide to Running a Business From Anywhere
by Mish Slade
Published 13 Aug 2015

From what we've seen, they have a wealth of experience in their particular industry but had to step off the corporate ladder when having kids – and now they're extremely keen to have a part-time or full-time remote job doing something they love. A similar website in the US is Hire My Mom (www.worktravel.co/hiremymom). Specialised "remote work" job boards are currently most useful if you're looking for techie or customer-support-related employees or contractors (although there are a few other jobs on there too). When more companies start to become remote, this will change. In the meantime, it's well worth posting a job if you have an opening for something like a programmer or designer – or if you're looking to fill a helpdesk role.

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What sort of person do you need to be if you want to work well in a distributed team? This is a toughie! To be completely honest, I don't think that you have to be anything in order to work well in a distributed team. I think there are some things that you have to learn to be, which is an important distinction. I wasn't a natural at remote work at first. I went a bit crazy with the lack of interpersonal interaction in the first few weeks. (We now have tons of video chats but in those days we didn't. We might have one video chat a day, and without any roommates or pets, I sometimes didn't speak unless I went out of the house. I quickly became a regular at the local coffee shops!

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The other one that comes to mind is: set up all of your 2-factor authentication* either though Authy (www.worktravel.co/authy), Google Authenticator (www.worktravel.co/authenticator), or with a Google Voice (www.worktravel.co/voice) (or similar) phone number. I had my US phone number saved for 2-factor auth for a few sites, and that slowed me down a bit while traveling. Good lesson to learn! "How I learned to balance work, family, and life through remote work": www.worktravel.co/buffer8 The highs and lows of 11 cities in 3 months: www.worktravel.co/buffer9 *[Two-factor authentication is a simple security feature that requires both "something you know" (like a password) and "something you have" (like your phone). For example, if you enable two-factor authentication on your Google account, you'll have to enter your password as usual, and then you'll be asked for a verification code that will be sent to your phone via text, voice call, or the Google mobile app.

The Great Wave: The Era of Radical Disruption and the Rise of the Outsider
by Michiko Kakutani
Published 20 Feb 2024

GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT A February 2023 report: Emma Court and Donna Borak, “Remote Work Is Costing Manhattan More Than $12 Billion a Year,” Bloomberg, February 12, 2023, bloomberg.com/​graphics/​2023-manhattan-work-from-home/#xj4y7vzkg. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT “For all of human history”: Columbia Business School online, “New Research Shows Prevalence of Remote Work Spurred by COVID-19 Continues to Effect Residential and Commercial Real Estate Values,” January 25, 2023, business.columbia.edu/​real-estate-news/​columbia-news/​new-research-shows-prevalence-remote-work-spurred-covid-19-continues. GO TO NOTE REFERENCE IN TEXT Stuck at home during the pandemic: Stephanie Pagones, “Americans Spending Coronavirus Quarantine Streaming 8 Hours of TV per Day,” Fox Business, Apr. 16, 2020, foxbusiness.com/​lifestyle/​americans-coronavirus-quarantine-streaming-services.

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As a result, the pandemic heightened the rage that had been building for years among members of the working and middle classes, who found that stagnating wages and vanishing social mobility had put the tent poles of the American dream (a steady job, a house, college for the kids) increasingly out of reach. COVID would unleash a torrent of changes—some immediately apparent; others that continue to unfurl, triggering side effects of their own. For instance, the adoption of work-from-home protocols during the pandemic led to the embrace of remote work models, and the decision of many businesses, post-crisis, to implement hybrid systems with employees returning to their office cubicles only three or four days a week. This made the suburbs more alluring and dealt cities a serious blow—tanking commercial real estate, and depriving local businesses of foot traffic and regular customers.

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This made the suburbs more alluring and dealt cities a serious blow—tanking commercial real estate, and depriving local businesses of foot traffic and regular customers. A February 2023 report from Bloomberg.com found that workers coming into New York City were spending $12.4 billion less a year than they did before COVID. Columbia Business School professor Stijn Van Nieuwerburgh compared the disruptions associated with remote work to those produced by the Industrial Revolution: “For all of human history, the place where you live and the place where you work were intricately tied to each other. Now we’ve severed that relationship, and it’s a revolution which will impact not only the value of real estate, but how we organize society.”

Ten Lessons for a Post-Pandemic World
by Fareed Zakaria
Published 5 Oct 2020

Prophets of cities’ inevitable decline have pointed to Zoom and other tools that allow work from home. But it is becoming increasingly clear that remote work is a fantastic tool but an imperfect substitute for actual human contact. To be sure, colleagues with established relationships can continue working together smoothly by chatting online. Yet bringing on new coworkers, and establishing trust and teamwork with them, is extremely hard to achieve on video. Not to mention that remote work leaves out all the spontaneous water-cooler conversations and accidental meetings that ultimately create greater productivity and innovation from the collision of minds.

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Others, especially those with means, moved to country houses, or rented or even bought them. An analysis of smartphone data found that between March 1 and May 1 as many as 420,000 people moved out of New York City. Wealthy neighborhoods such as the Upper East Side, the West Village, and SoHo saw residential population declines of 40% or more. Remote work has made this option more feasible, but only for professionals. California cities are facing a similar exodus on the horizon: Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, remarked that, since the pandemic, three-quarters of his employees have signaled some level of interest in leaving the Bay Area. Reports from France suggested a similar trend, with Parisians decamping to rural regions they once scorned as “the provinces”—with many locals suspicious of these unwelcome, potentially infected visitors.

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US music industry revenue = $11.1 billion in 2019, see: Dan Rys, “US Recorded Music Revenue Reaches $11.1 Billion in 2019, 79% from Streaming: RIAA,” Billboard, February 25, 2020, https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/8551881/riaa-music-industry-2019-revenue-streaming-vinyl-digital-physical. 100 100,000 brick-and-mortar stores: Suzanne Kapner and Sarah Nassauer, “Coronavirus Finishes the Retail Reckoning That Amazon Started,” Wall Street Journal, May 14, 2020. 101 data as the new oil: Carl Benedikt Frey, The Technology Trap: Capital, Labor, and Power in the Age of Automation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2020), 304. 101 smartphones now connect the majority: “Percentage of Mobile Device Website Traffic Worldwide from 1st Quarter 2015 to 1st Quarter 2020,” Statista, https://www.statista.com/statistics/277125/share-of-website-traffic-coming-from-mobile-devices. 101 “only 20 million Indians”: Ravi Agrawal, India Connected: How the Smartphone Is Transforming the World’s Largest Democracy (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 3. 102 Over 550 million: McKinsey Global Institute, “Digital India,” 2019, https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Business%20Functions/McKinsey%20Digital/Our%20Insights/Digital%20India%20Technology%20to%20transform%20a%20connected%20nation/MGI-Digital-India-Report-April-2019.ashx. 102 155th in the world: Mukesh Ambani, in conversation with India Today, “India is now world’s top mobile data consuming nation: Mukesh Ambani,” October 25, 2018, https://www.indiatoday.in/technology/news/story/india-top-mobile-data-consuming-nation-mukesh-ambani-1375253–2018–10–25. 102 more mobile data: Ibid. 102 hundreds of millions more Indians: McKinsey Global Institute, “Digital India,” 6. 102 staggering $37 billion: Mobis Philipose, “Why Reliance Jio’s Big and Bold 2021 Vision Doesn’t Make Sense,” LiveMint, March 7, 2017. 102 triggered mob killings: Geeta Anand and Suhasini Raj, “Rumors on WhatsApp Ignite 2 Mob Attacks in India, Killing 7,” New York Times, May 25, 2017. 103 about a third of Americans: “Of those employed four weeks earlier, 34.1% report they were commuting and are now working from home”: Erik Brynjolfsson et al., “COVID-19 and Remote Work: An Early Look at US Data,” MIT Sloan School of Management, https://mitsloan.mit.edu/shared/ods/documents/?PublicationDocumentID=6322. 104 “25% of our workforce”: Sonal Khetarpal, “Post-COVID, 75% of 4.5 Lakh TCS Employees to Permanently Work from Home by ’25; from 20%,” Business Today India, April 30, 2020. 104 issued a correction: Saunak Chowdhury, “TCS Refutes Claims of 75% Employees Working from Home Post Lock-Down,” Indian Wire, April 28, 2020. 104 450,000 employees: Tata Consultancy Services, “About Us,” https://www.tcs.com/about-us. 106 up one billion: Jeff Becker and Arielle Trzcinski, “US Virtual Care Visits to Soar to More Than 1 Billion,” Forrester Analytics, April 10, 2020, https://go.forrester.com/press-newsroom/us-virtual-care-visits-to-soar-to-more-than-1-billion/. 106 “greatest contribution to mankind”: Lizzy Gurdus, “Tim Cook: Apple’s Greatest Contribution Will Be ‘About Health,’ ” CNBC Mad Money, January 8, 2019. 107 97% accuracy: “Using Artificial Intelligence to Classify Lung Cancer Types, Predict Mutations,” National Cancer Institute, October 10, 2018, https://www.cancer.gov/news-events/cancer-currents-blog/2018/artificial-intelligence-lung-cancer-classification. 107 up to 11% fewer false positives: D.

Super Founders: What Data Reveals About Billion-Dollar Startups
by Ali Tamaseb
Published 14 Sep 2021

And, of course, some startups have opted to go fully distributed, and that can certainly work too. Given the expense of living and operating a business in Silicon Valley, recent shifts in remote work culture and distributed teams, and evolving startup ecosystems in other metros, more billion-dollar companies will likely be started outside Silicon Valley or as fully distributed in the next decade or so. Companies like Facebook, Twitter, Square, and Shopify now allow remote work, which will slowly but surely distribute senior talent outside Silicon Valley, accelerating this impact. Examples abound of billion-dollar startups founded outside the United States that were still able to create a strong presence in the country.

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Although Silicon Valley has historically been the “right” location for technology startups, that doesn’t mean all billion-dollar startups need to come out of Silicon Valley, and it certainly doesn’t mean things are going to remain the same in the future, especially with the ever-growing shift to remote work. It’s true that Silicon Valley is home to the largest number of billion-dollar startups in the United States. Just over half of the billion-dollar startups in my study were headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area, compared to about a third in the random group. This may suggest historically higher odds of reaching billion-dollar valuations for Silicon Valley–based companies.

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I think more founders should be connecting their place with their product, the way we have. It will lead to far bigger businesses, but more importantly, far more impactful missions. For Carlson and Stich, moving out of Silicon Valley turned out to be a great decision. For many, moving to Silicon Valley might be the right decision. With the ever-changing landscape of work and the remote-work and work-from-home cultures, many characterizations of where a company is based may be irrelevant soon, if not already. Guild Education was able to create a product that has helped many American workers. In the next chapter, we will focus on the importance of product on the success of billion-dollar startups. 8 PRODUCT VITAMIN PILL VERSUS PAINKILLER Startup founders are short of many things: sleep, investment, and customers.

Career and Family: Women’s Century-Long Journey Toward Equity
by Claudia Goldin
Published 11 Oct 2021

The journey from Jeannette Rankin has cleared the air and revealed why highly educated and trained women continue to struggle to progress as far as their male counterparts. Childcare, elder care, and family care are disproportionately performed by women. Work is greedy, and the person who does the most gets the most. Couples with children optimize in a world of gendered norms. Has our experiment with remote work been the shot in the arm that will drive down the price of work flexibility? The shift to remote work was more seamless than had been imagined, and most workers claim they would like to continue working remotely. Half of those with school-aged children had difficulty working without interruptions, but that should change as schools fully reopen.

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In 2016, Amazon, in search of an “environment tailored to a reduced schedule that still fosters success and career growth,” announced that it was allowing a 25 percent reduction in the hours of tech employees, including managers, at a 25 percent reduction in salary. Workers were being docked, essentially, on a per hours basis. The COVID world has led many firms, including those in the tech sector, to extend the work-from-home period. The acceptance of remote work may have long-lasting beneficial effects on all workers, especially parents. But, as we will see, the impact of partially open offices and on-again-off-again schools and daycare may accentuate previous gender disparities as one parent must be available at home even more so than in the pre-COVID era.

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No nation today, certainly not the US, can restart its economy until its children can return to schools and daycare. Women are half of all workers, whereas in the last Great Depression women were but a small fraction. The economy can’t run on half its cylinders. Almost all employers today are grappling with how to make remote work more productive and how to factor in flexibility while maintaining efficiency. They are trying to make certain that Isabel doesn’t leave the workforce, and that Lucas can be as productive at home as he was in the office. They are trying to get both of them back into safe and secure offices while remaining cognizant of the needs of their families.

Financial Freedom: A Proven Path to All the Money You Will Ever Need
by Grant Sabatier
Published 5 Feb 2019

Whether you love your full-time job or can’t wait to get out, you should use it strategically to make more money today and as a launching pad to make a lot more money in the future. I’ll show you how to calculate your market value and your value to your company, and negotiate a raise to ensure you’re making as much money as possible. I’ll also show you how to maximize your benefits, including the best remote-work options possible; increase your skills; find a higher-paying job; and maximize the opportunities to use your nine-to-five to reach financial freedom as quickly as possible. Step 6: Start a profitable side hustle and diversify your income streams. It’s never been easier to start a profitable side hustle and make extra money, but the problem is, most people don’t do it right.

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For example, if you’re an assistant, you likely won’t be able to work from home that often, if at all, unless, say, your boss also works remotely or is out of the office. But if you are in sales or marketing and perform well, you might be able to negotiate a really sweet deal. The stronger your performance and the greater your value to your company, the more likely your supervisor will be open to your working remotely. If you want more flexible remote-work privileges, don’t be afraid to ask. This benefit costs your employer nothing, and given the research into how work flexibility improves engagement, it may even increase your productivity and value to the company. Brandon, who walked away at thirty-four, was able to negotiate the ability to work remotely full time as a web developer, allowing him to travel and have almost unlimited flexibility while still having a full-time salary with bonuses and benefits.

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The more in demand your skills are, the more flexibility you are likely to get, but even if you are new or young, you can still negotiate for flexibility benefits. As long as you are doing a good job and your company wants to keep you, they will likely be willing to work out an arrangement that keeps you happy and working for the company. Work remotely and bank the extra money and extra time! Not all remote-work opportunities are equal. Most jobs that will allow you to work remotely are salaried positions, although there are some hourly jobs, like customer service or virtual assistant jobs, that you can do remotely. But if you’re working a salaried job, your boss won’t be measuring how many hours you work, just whether you get the job done and do it right.

Tomorrow's Capitalist: My Search for the Soul of Business
by Alan Murray
Published 15 Dec 2022

But increasingly it seems that flexible options are going to be on the table in the coming years—responding to needs that existed long before the pandemic. For some, that flexibility was seen as providing an improvement in workforce opportunity. Now, you could work from anywhere. You didn’t have to be in Silicon Valley to join a big tech company, or in Manhattan to go into high finance. But CEOs also worried that increased remote work would cause a dangerous fraying of corporate culture. Workday CEO and cofounder Aneel Bhusri told me he was eager to get his employees back to the physical office. Workday makes cloud-based software used by other companies’ human resources and accounting departments. Bhusri is a member of the Business Roundtable and his company is ranked fifth on Fortune’s 2020 list of the 100 Best Companies to Work For.

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As McKinsey’s Bill Schaninger told CEOs meeting virtually at Fortune’s Leadership Roundtable, “Now that you have let the genie out of the bottle, all sorts of things are going to come into question.… This has been a real opportunity for people to question their own purpose, and whether what they are doing is what they want to do.”7 In March 2021, Dov Seidman, who had been with us at the Vatican in 2016, released a survey of one thousand professionals in the United States who moved to remote work during the pandemic. His primary interest was in the matter of connectedness, which he had previously explored in his book, How: Why How We Do Anything Means Everything.8 “Humans are social animals,” Seidman said. “For human organizations to thrive, connections between and among individuals need to be meaningful and rooted in common purpose.”9 One survey response was surprising and actually encouraging—that a feeling of connection to direct supervisors and organizations actually went up during the pandemic.

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“But my duality went beyond growing up in two cultures; it was also about being a mom and an executive trying to balance short term and long term in my business dealings, performance, and purpose. It was duality all through my life—balancing and juggling. And the thing that surprised me while I was in my final years at PepsiCo, and most certainly now, post-PepsiCo, is all the talk about the future of work, the future of offices. Everyone talks about hybrid work, automation, remote work, technology, disruption. But the word family and helping young families and women balance family and work seems to be absent.” This pains Nooyi because we need women in the workforce. “Women are getting all the top degrees—they are wicked smart. They are graduating in larger numbers. They want economic freedom, and the country needs their talents.

Lab Rats: How Silicon Valley Made Work Miserable for the Rest of Us
by Dan Lyons
Published 22 Oct 2018

Los Angeles Times, January 29, 2016. http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-mh-ibm-s-ceo-writes-a-new-chapter-20160129-column.html. Isidore, Chris. “IBM Tells Employees Working at Home to Get Back to the Office.” CNN Money, May 19, 2017. http://money.cnn.com/2017/05/19/technology/ibm-work-at-home/index.html. Kessler, Sarah. “IBM, Remote-Work Pioneer, Is Calling Thousands of Employees Back to the Office.” Quartz, March 21, 2017. https://qz.com/924167/ibm-remote-work-pioneer-is-calling-thousands-of-employees-back-to-the-office. Kozlowski, Rob. “IBM Computes $500 Million Contribution for Non-U.S. Pension Plans This Year.” Pensions and Investments, March 1, 2017. http://www.pionline.com/article/20170301/ONLINE/170309978/ibm-computes-500-million-contribution-for-non-us-pension-plans-this-year.

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The Register, December 22, 2017. https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/12/22/ibm_bernstein_analysis. Ladah, Sam. “Building IBM’s Workforce of the Future.” IBM Think Blog, July 12, 2017. https://www.ibm.com/blogs/think/2017/07/workforce-of-the-future. Simons, John. “IBM, a Pioneer of Remote Work, Calls Workers Back to the Office.” Wall Street Journal, May 18, 2017. https://www.wsj.com/articles/ibm-a-pioneer-of-remote-work-calls-workers-back-to-the-office-1495108802. Chapter 6: Money: “Garbage at the Speed of Light” Allen, Katie. “Technology Has Created More Jobs than It Has Destroyed, Says 140 Years of Data.” Guardian, August 18, 2015. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/aug/17/technology-created-more-jobs-than-destroyed-140-years-data-census.

Neurodiversity at Work: Drive Innovation, Performance and Productivity With a Neurodiverse Workforce
by Amanda Kirby and Theo Smith
Published 2 Aug 2021

What expertise have you in-house or will you need professional expertise to help you, eg occupational psychology, workplace assessment or strategy coaching, specialist support organization? How much time, on average, will interns or placements spend in the workplace and where will that be? Is this remote working or at a fixed place of work, or a mix of the two, and what is the actual structure of a working week? Is this flexible and may it change over time? How will the interns/placements be selected? What criteria will you use? Are you going to be specific that this is people with autism for example, and if so will you require them to be diagnosed?

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In the placement How will workplace adjustments be put in place for each intern in a timely manner? Will they have a work coach to support the person (in addition to the line manager)? Introducing the person to the team and how everyone works together and communicates is helpful especially if this is remote working. We forget how much we pick up about people if we are in the same place as them. We see micro-gestures and movements that provide information. When you first start in a new place you may be reticent to ask for help. You usually look for clues when it seems OK to do so. Is your line manager looking so busy that it’s hard to approach them or is it the right time because they are chatting to others?

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Discuss specific support needs and arrange an assessment if necessary – check adjustments have been put in place and are working for the person. It is important to discuss sensitive handling of disclosure with the person so that there is an agreed plan of what is told to peers (if anything). Regular review meetings are important but even more so if the person is remote working as they may be reticent to ask for help. What is the job and what are the rules? Clarity is important. What does a typical workday in your organization look like? Can the person shadow someone in a similar role? Is flexible working allowed and how flexible is this? Be explicit. If assistance is needed by the person can you explain the process and agree times that are convenient or a process to ask for help (eg email with a specific header)?

The Equality Machine: Harnessing Digital Technology for a Brighter, More Inclusive Future
by Orly Lobel
Published 17 Oct 2022

According to a 2019 McKinsey Global Institute report, women spend more than 1.1 trillion hours a year on unpaid care work, compared with less than 400 billion hours annually for men.19 While governments can help by subsidizing maternity and parental leave and childcare, technological change can introduce newfound flexibility into women’s working lives. A 2018 survey of close to 40,000 employers in forty-three countries found that only 23 percent of employers offered flexible or remote working options.20 However, the Covid-19 pandemic has shown that companies can provide flexible options via teleworking, and many employees are now demanding the option of remote work. Alleviating the burden of women’s invisible work can be a step toward closing the gender pay gap, and this is where AI comes into play. Jobs that have traditionally been women’s work are key targets for robotics.

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Yet even during some of our darkest times (and perhaps especially so)—recently, the Covid-19 pandemic and the social upheavals of 2020, with so many confined to their homes or protesting in the streets against brutality and discrimination—we saw how technological advancements served as a positive force. Technology connected us during isolation, provided care and interaction for the elderly and the sick, assisted the transition to remote work, helped mobilize civil rights activism, kept live records of systemic abuse by law enforcement and private corporations, and made those records known. The mobile capture and widespread social media dissemination of the video of George Floyd’s murder at the hands of a Minnesota police officer are but one example.

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The first reaction to correct this bias might be to exclude the distance between applicants’ homes and employer location, yet companies can do far more than that. They could expand the socioeconomic pool of applicants by in fact valuing the distance a worker must travel and helping with commute time by offering compensation for commuters or more flexible and remote work schedules. When the pool is expanded and new screening and oversight processes are developed, companies committed to diversity can specifically request to search for the top candidates in a particular category—for example, displaying all the highly ranked women at the top of the list. Ultimately, the more we know about candidates, the more we can do when we’re truly committed to diversifying the workplace.

The London Problem: What Britain Gets Wrong About Its Capital City
by Jack Brown
Published 14 Jul 2021

The capital’s public transport system quickly emptied too. London saw a bigger reduction in commuting to workplaces than its global competitors.5 It is unclear whether this was a sign of strength or weakness: were Londoners more afraid of their city’s public transport network, or just more able to adapt to remote working? Either way, London’s transport was thrown into crisis. Transport for London’s finances, heavily reliant on the fare box, were so badly hit that it required a series of central government bailouts, which came with substantial strings attached. Two government appointees were forced onto Transport for London’s board as observers, reasserting central government’s involvement in the city’s transport.6 While spending in Central London’s shops and restaurants collapsed, some of the capital’s ‘local’ town centres actually saw an increase in consumer spending during the first lockdown.7 Still, approximately 30 per cent of Londoners were furloughed at some point during the first wave of the pandemic, a similar figure to the rest of the UK, and those workers were disproportionately located in the boroughs with higher proportions of low-income residents.

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As politicians encouraged workers back to the office to support grab-and-go eateries, others wondered if the ‘Pret economy’ – whereby well-paid service-sector workers paid over the odds for sandwiches served by their low-paid, often overseas-born equivalents – was such a good thing in the first place.9 London now faced existential questions about its future. Would remote working finally lead to the ‘death of distance’ predicted decades ago when technology first enabled working from home? In turn, would the agglomeration benefits provided by cities cease to matter? Would those residents, suddenly free of regular commuting obligations, flee the city for more affordable, more spacious accommodation in the suburbs and beyond?

How to Prevent the Next Pandemic
by Bill Gates
Published 2 May 2022

Some companies will decide that time in the office is required only one week a month. This will allow employees to live farther away, since a long commute is easier to tolerate if you aren’t doing it most days. Although we’ve seen some early signs of this transition, I think we’ll see a lot more of it in the decade ahead as employers formalize remote-work policies. If you decide that employees are required to be in the office less than 50 percent of the time, you can share your workspace with another company. Office space is a significant expense for businesses, which could be cut in half. If enough companies do this, the demand for expensive office space would be reduced.

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Structures that we thought were essential to office culture have begun to evolve, and the changes will only intensify in the years to come as businesses and employees settle into new permanent ways of working. I think most people will be surprised by the pace of innovation over the next decade now that the software industry is focused on remote working scenarios. Many of the benefits of working in the same physical space—like running into people at the water cooler—can be re-created with the right user interface. If you use a platform like Teams for work, you’re already using a much more sophisticated product than you were in March 2020.

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You don’t realize how unusual it is to have meeting audio only coming from your computer’s speaker until you try something else. In the metaverse, you’ll be able to lean over and have a quiet side conversation with a coworker just as if you’re in the same room. I’m particularly excited to see how metaverse technologies will enable more spontaneity with remote work. This is the biggest thing you lose when you’re not in the office. Working from your living room isn’t exactly conducive to having an unplanned discussion with your manager about your last meeting or starting a casual conversation with your new coworker about last night’s baseball game. But if you’re all working together remotely in a virtual space, you’ll be able to see when someone is free and approach that person to chat.

Essential: How the Pandemic Transformed the Long Fight for Worker Justice
by Jamie K. McCallum
Published 15 Nov 2022

She never took them. “That’s the way we improve healthcare,” she said. “That’s the way we stay alive. You live fighting or die working.” The pandemic has profoundly affected the way we work, and with it, the working class. The three-dimensional nature of the pandemic-induced labor crisis—mass unemployment, remote work, and dangerous in-person work—uprooted our most dearly held assumptions about what employers and employees do, how they do it, and what they owe each other. All these factors contributed to a care crisis, too, both in the home and within the caring professions. In 2020, the category of “essential worker” became a synecdoche for our risk-intensive economy.

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Early on, proximity to risk was the minimum price of entry into the class of real frontline workers, as well as the basis for excluding those who didn’t share that proximity. Those who worked from home enjoyed a much lower risk of catching COVID and were typically in white-collar industries that might have marked them as members of a different class anyway. Remote work has been a response to previous disasters. There were telework spikes following anthrax attacks in the wake of 9/11 and after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Testifying before a 2004 House committee hearing assessing the benefits of telework “in the post-9/11 world,” Congressman Tom Davis stated, “We now realize that telework needs to be an essential component of any continuity of operations plan.

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“Risking your life so some rich guy can eat his beef tartare and not tip you during a pandemic isn’t really worth it,” he told me. As it turns out, a lot of people weren’t eager to jump back on the hamster wheel. Even those who are ready to go back to work now understand that jobs don’t have to look the way they did before the pandemic, having witnessed the possibility of remote work and flexible schedules. In mid-2022, even many low-income workers were also more financially stable than they were before the pandemic, giving them more leverage to be picky about the conditions on which they reenter the labor force. Maybe some people, in other words, just don’t want to work anymore.

Smart Cities, Digital Nations
by Caspar Herzberg
Published 13 Apr 2017

Additionally, women from all classes face the threat of sexual harassment in the streets. This is a serious deterrent to women who must travel to work. Digital employment opportunities can play an important role in pulling women into the workforce. Digital remote work centers could be a useful bridge technology between old and new. Close to schools and residential neighborhoods, they would dramatically reduce working women’s commuting needs. A pilot program could consist of a few family-friendly remote work centers—“office space as a service”—with broadband connectivity, IP and video capabilities, and a supervised space for children to play while their mothers work. Even the initial introduction of three or four centers, jointly financed by the government, regional suppliers, and a technology firm, could become a social demographic game-changer.

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Downtown Cairo, with its now famous Tahrir Square, may never quite be a paragon of order and efficient flow. Then again, cities like Rome and Paris are also criticized for their traffic patterns. But if progress is made on all fronts, the pressure that comes from untenable practices and inefficient delivery systems can be brought down to manageable levels. Remote work locations for women are an example of a concept that can play an important role both in traffic avoidance and in dealing with unemployment. A 13 percent unemployment rate is troublesome enough, but unemployment among Egyptian women stands at 29 percent. This represents a severe drain on the GDP, as even educated women are often discouraged from taking jobs.

Paint Your Town Red
by Matthew Brown
Published 14 Jun 2021

As the pandemic took hold in the UK, the government’s lack of preparation and inefficient provision of protective equipment forced NHS staff to engage in frontline care without adequate protection, while those in precarious and gig-economy jobs which offered no pay for time taken off for illness, shielding or self-isolation were forced to either risk lives by continuing to work or go without a wage. Responses to lockdown — from the UK government pouring billions into the economy after decades of decrying and denying the possibility of increased state spending, to the revelation that remote working rather than costly, exhausting and environmentally damaging commuting is possible for millions, to the networks of mutual aid which developed spontaneously in many neighbourhoods — showed that previous economic and social certainties were never set in stone. During the initial organising of mutual aid groups, many participants expressed the need and willingness for collective organising that went beyond checking up on vulnerable neighbours, and complemented this by preparing to help with the variety of economic and social problems likely to confront individuals as lockdown progressed — from self-isolating while on a zero hours contract to problems paying rent — as well as focusing on solidarity for healthcare workers, transport workers, carers, cleaners and others facing the brunt of the pandemic’s effects.

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If an active democratic economy in areas like North Ayrshire depends on improvements in rural broadband, it need not depend on larger national infrastructure projects for delivery — Cullinane notes that the community on the Isle of Arran have taken their own steps to improve local connectivity, and that local development trusts are also showing interest in community-led solutions to problems with connectivity. However, tackling digital exclusion remains a pressing need beyond democratic participation. This is particularly the case under lockdown as a greater emphasis is placed on remote working and online education; as Cullinane observes: “It’s one thing giving a child a device to do homework/blended learning on, but it’s useless if they have no internet connection.” Service Speed-Dating: What Is Participatory Budgeting? North Ayrshire has also trialled an initiative known as participatory budgeting, a process designed to increase the participation of local communities in the allocation of funds, rather than merely dispensing them in a top-down manner.

Rule of the Robots: How Artificial Intelligence Will Transform Everything
by Martin Ford
Published 13 Sep 2021

These technological trends will intertwine with other important ramifications of the pandemic. For example, the wholesale adoption of remote work among white collar workers has decimated the business ecospheres that surround concentrations of office buildings. It seems very likely that the shift toward telecommuting will, at least to some extent, be permanent. Facebook, for example, has already announced that many of its employees will be able to opt for remote work indefinitely.24 In these once teaming business districts, jobs at restaurants, bars and other businesses that cater to office workers may never return to previous levels.

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Ferris Jabr, “Cache cab: Taxi drivers’ brains grow to navigate London’s streets,” Scientific American, December 8, 2011, www.scientificamerican.com/article/london-taxi-memory/. 24. Kate Conger, “Facebook starts planning for permanent remote workers,” New York Times, May 21, 2020, www.nytimes.com/2020/05/21/technology/facebook-remote-work-coronavirus.html. 25. Alexandre Tanzi, “Gloom grips U.S. small businesses, with 52% predicting failure,” Bloomberg, May 6, 2020, www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-05-06/majority-of-u-s-small-businesses-expect-to-close-survey-says. 26. Alfred Liu, “Robots to cut 200,000 U.S. bank jobs in next decade, study says,” Bloomberg, October 1, 2019, www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-10-02/robots-to-cut-200-000-u-s-bank-jobs-in-next-decade-study-says. 27.

Imaginable: How to See the Future Coming and Feel Ready for Anything―Even Things That Seem Impossible Today
by Jane McGonigal
Published 22 Mar 2022

Stories about the previously unimaginable impacts of a pandemic: health care systems collapsing, hundreds of millions of “nonessential” jobs vanishing overnight, the average life expectancy dropping by years on the global scale. Stories about the previously unthinkable changes we made to survive the pandemic: border lockdowns, stay-at-home orders, school closures, mask mandates, remote work, remote everything. Stories about unprecedented weather events and their toll on our towns and bodies: record-breaking heat, flooding, extreme storms, relentless wildfires, toxic air pollution. Stories about strange things we’d never seen before: An apartment building eroded by climate change collapsing in the middle of the night.

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Some futurists have gone so far as to suggest that Californians with the means to do so will become a kind of migratory species, relocating to another part of the world for a couple of months every year to avoid the annual nightmare. I’ve tried to envision an annual migration. So far we haven’t come up with any ideas that feel realistic for our family, and we’re not sure we could convince our extended family to migrate with us. We’ll keep imagining. Perhaps with remote work and remote school, we could make it work. In the meantime, we are advocating for things that will make it possible to stay here in the wildlife-urban interface, like increasing road access in and out of town so more people can safely evacuate if need be. We vote for political candidates who want to adopt and fund aggressive fire-mitigation strategies, such as controlled burns that create a buffer zone between high-risk land and people’s homes.

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He described how he was ready to jump into action when the real pandemic started, volunteering to project-manage his employer’s COVID-19 emergency response. He worked with the Ministry of Business, Innovation, and Employment to launch an innovation accelerator fund to support New Zealand businesses that had ideas to fight COVID-19. And he helped deliver rapid training to support New Zealand organizations pivoting to remote work and remote collaboration, so they could move into full lockdown without laying off or furloughing any staff during what was one of the most stringent lockdowns anywhere in the world. “I had been through the queasiness and uncertainty caused by thinking about pandemics already, so when COVID-19 started emerging, I had already thought about what skills I might have to help.

Laziness Does Not Exist
by Devon Price
Published 5 Jan 2021

Point to evidence of it in your own workplace—remind leadership of times when employees were happy and effective because they weren’t being pushed too hard. If you don’t have the power to influence a boss, educate your coworkers and friends about these facts, and consider organizing a union. The more informed people are, the more they can move toward an “evidence-based” workplace. 2. Ask for Flex Time and Remote Work Options The outbreak of COVID-19 left many people working from home for the first time in their careers. The shift online was a drastic and sudden change for a lot of organizations, but it demonstrated in a stark way that flexible schedules and telework can be just as effective as coming into the office.

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See also white supremacy Rachel (transgender woman): and achievements are not self-worth, 109 reading active, 150–51 See also information Rebekah: and relationships, 168 relationships balance in, 40, 157–59, 162, 174 boundaries/limitations in, 159, 163, 164, 176–82 break-ups in, 38–41 and broken-record technique, 164–65 and chores, 165–67, 168, 169, 171–72 and communicating experiences, 119–20 confrontations in, 159 as damaging, 159 and emotions/feelings, 158, 159, 160, 161, 163, 178, 181 as exhausting, 157–82 “good enough,” 174, 175 and how you spend your time, 168–69 and information overload, 152 and laziness as warning, 55, 56 Laziness Lie and, 15, 16, 159, 160, 167, 168, 169, 172, 173, 177, 179, 205–6, 210, 214 and learning about laziness, 5 and living your own life, 175–76 and lying, 163 and mistakes, 174–75 and priorities, 37–41, 169, 170 pulling back from, 162, 163 pushing back in, 159, 164–65 questions about, 178 and responsibilities, 157–82 and rethinking laziness, 38–41, 55, 56, 69–70 and rewards for inappropriate behavior, 180–82 See also type of relationship or specific person or topic religion, 24, 25, 126, 210 remote work, 79–80, 97–98 respect, 2, 27, 41, 106, 152, 192 responsibilities and relationships, 157–82 taking on, 98–99, 180–82 rest/relaxation, 8 retirement, 18, 27 Rhythms Within, 101–2 Rich (Julie’s husband): and rethinking laziness, 38–41 Rick: and information overload, 136, 138 Ricky: and gig economy, 80 Riley: and relationships, 165–67, 171–72 roommates: relationships with, 160, 167 Roy, Michael (artist), 33–34, 35 S Sadblock, 145 Sam: and information overload, 152 Sandoval, Xochitl, 201, 202, 210 saving the world, 196–203 savoring, 114–16, 118, 119–21, 123, 130 saying no Laziness Lie and, 16, 17, 19, 212 and learning about laziness, 3 relationships and, 158–59, 160–61, 162, 164–65, 171 and rethinking laziness, 40, 41, 42, 43, 70 and working less, 94 “second shift,” 166–67 “secondary trauma,” 144 self advocating for, 94, 95–99, 103, 164 being gentle with, 214 and burnout, 91 child’s sense of, 172 compassion for, 207, 214 hiding true, 106 holistic look at, 99–100 identity of, 16, 18 judging of, 14–15 knowledge of, 103 Laziness Lie and, 206, 207, 212–14 motivation of, 95 objectification of, 191 and “shoulds,” 186 and working less, 91, 94, 95–96, 98, 99, 103 See also self-care; self-esteem; self-image; self-worth self-care, 68–69, 121–22 self-esteem, 127, 172, 191, 194 self-image, 10, 56, 98, 194 self-worth achievements/accomplishments and, 86, 90, 96, 99, 103, 105–30 and body, 187–88 depression and, 108, 114, 116, 124, 125, 128 and documenting your life, 124–30 expectations and, 106, 109, 123, 124, 130 and experiences, 114–18 failure and, 123–24 and fear, 106, 110, 117, 127 and gamification of your life, 110–14, 126, 129 goals and, 107, 118, 123, 124, 129 and guilt, 128, 129 happiness and, 114–18, 119–21 hard work and, 106, 108, 109, 113 and healing, 71 and health/illness, 107, 108, 113, 116 Laziness Lie and, 9, 10, 15, 16–19, 106, 107, 109–10, 112, 113, 116, 117, 118, 123, 129, 206, 212–14 limitations and, 128 and mental health, 106, 125, 126, 128 and motivation and, 113 and overextended, 109 perfection and, 117 and priorities, 107, 123, 124, 125 productivity and, 15, 16–19, 112, 117, 118, 120, 123, 126–27, 129, 130, 212–14 and reframing life’s value, 118–24 relationships and, 107, 110, 120, 160, 179 and rethinking laziness, 71 shame and, 105, 108 “shoulds” and, 187–88 and social media, 111–12, 113–14, 117, 118, 124–26, 127, 129 and stress, 118, 120, 127, 128 success and, 106, 107–8, 114, 129 working less and, 86, 90, 96, 99, 103 Seranine: quality work of, 86 sex/sexism, 165–67, 183, 184.

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See gig economy surrender (tattoo), 41, 42 Swift, Taylor, 30 Sylvia: Grace’s relationship with, 157–58, 159, 164 T Tamms Correction Center, 199–200 Taylor (coder): and achievements are not self-worth, 110–11, 112–13 technology and increase in workday/workweek, 76 and influence/prevalence of Laziness Lie, 26, 32–33 remote work and, 79–80 and why you feel lazy, 35 working less and, 76, 79–80 See also digital age/tools; gig economy; Internet; social media Thompson, Rickey, 29, 196 TikTok, 33 time how you spend your, 168–69 See also cyberloafing Tobia, Jacob, 186 Tobias, Andrew, 105–6 Tom (Riley’s husband): and relationships, 165–67, 171–72 Towler, Annette, 56, 73–74, 78, 82, 85–86, 94, 96, 103 transgender people, 109, 137, 168, 186 TV shows: and influence/prevalence of Laziness Lie, 28–29 Twitter, 113, 118, 125, 129, 136, 144, 145, 147, 153 U unemployed people, 13 Upswing Advocates, 62–63 V vacations, 64, 212 values clarification of, 169–71 definition of, 169 and origins of Laziness Lie, 23 ranking of, 170 and relationships, 169–71, 182 Van Bavel, Jay, 84 veterans: healing of, 68 visual arts: and why you feel lazy, 33–35 W warning signs/system ignoring of, 20–21 and influence/prevalence of Laziness Lie, 36 and rethinking laziness, 49–57 and tenets of Laziness Lie, 20–21 and working less, 75, 96 See also specific sign wasting time.

A World Without Email: Reimagining Work in an Age of Communication Overload
by Cal Newport
Published 2 Mar 2021

After working with Pivotal for several years, he brought the XP methodology with him to every company he’s helped managed since. Here are some (but not all) of the core ideas behind XP. Programmers who are working on a big project are divided into smaller development teams, typically consisting of no more than ten individuals. In an era where remote work is increasingly common, XP development teams work in the same physical room, where face-to-face communication is prioritized over digital alternatives. “We rarely check email throughout the day,” Woodward told me, discussing the development team he currently manages. “Sometimes my developers will literally go days without checking emails.”

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During this period, she read my 2012 book, So Good They Can’t Ignore You, which suggests among other things that once you have made yourself valuable to your organization, you should use this career capital as leverage to remake your position into something more satisfying. Inspired but nervous, Amanda proposed to her bosses that she shift into a more strategic role, where instead of fielding random questions and helping with individual projects, she would work on technology strategy for whole regions. In this role, she would be entirely remote, working on a small number of long-term projects at a time. Amanda assumed her bosses would turn down her request, and she was prepared to leave the company to offer a similar service as a consultant. To her surprise, they agreed to give the new arrangement a trial. “Since I’m remote, I can no longer rely on ‘showing up’ functioning as a measure of my value to the company,” Amanda explained.

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To elaborate on my use of part-time assistants, I do not, at the moment, have a permanent assistant. I tend instead to bring on assistants temporarily to help during particularly busy periods, such as those surrounding book launches. This would not have been possible in an age before web-based part-time remote work platforms. 9. Cal Newport, “A Modest Proposal: Eliminate Email,” Harvard Business Review, February 18, 2016, https://hbr.org/2016/02/a-modest-proposal-eliminate-email. 10. Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson, It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work (New York: Harper Business, 2018). 11.

The End of Jobs: Money, Meaning and Freedom Without the 9-To-5
by Taylor Pearson
Published 27 Jun 2015

http://mjperry.blogspot.ca/2011/02/caplan-and-lindsey-and-very-slight.html Whether on an individual level or a societal level, as we have more and more access to resources, we have to choose what to do with them. It’s clear that one of the ways we choose to allocate that wealth is towards a greater expression of freedom. It’s common for people to take significant salary cuts to move into flexible or remote work arrangements. Presented with a clear cut case between more money and more freedom, they opt for more freedom. I spent two years working with a small entrepreneurial company starting in a position that, at the time, meant a 50% pay cut, and a demotion from project management to grunt work. When I told my former boss I was leaving, he came back the next day and said he wanted to make me a counter offer, including a raise.

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I’ve seen hundreds of applications come from highly educated, affluent individuals fighting for an opportunity to dump their six-figure corporate salary for an entry level one that dramatically cuts their salary, but gives them more freedom and meaning in their work. The Silent Revolution of the 20th Century Over time, as the West has advanced and more wealth has been created, more and more people have claimed that wealth in the form of freedom. Remote working may be the latest incarnation, but it’s certainly not the first. Martin Luther led the Protestant Revolution, which gave substantially more freedom to Christians compared to the Catholic Church. The freedom to interpret religious scripture was no longer left to a single man, but distributed to individuals.

Binge Times: Inside Hollywood's Furious Billion-Dollar Battle to Take Down Netflix
by Dade Hayes and Dawn Chmielewski
Published 18 Apr 2022

In 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic forced a widespread rethink of office spaces in many business sectors, Netflix announced a major expansion to a building across the street. That new structure is to be called “Epic.” The company also has leased several floors of office space in “Cue,” another nearby building. It is hard to predict the future of the U.S. workplace, though Netflix founder and co-CEO Reed Hastings has called remote work during COVID-19 a “pure negative” and only part-facetiously vowed to summon employees back to the office “twelve hours after a vaccine is approved.” Regardless of how many workers are inside, Netflix’s offices convey its core brand values. In 2016, speaking at a Hollywood Chamber of Commerce event, content chief Ted Sarandos said of Icon, “A building like this is a statement of who you are, what you believe, and what you want to do.”

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Arthur Miller is quoted in Jean Stein’s oral history West of Eden: An American Place (New York: Random House, 2016), which also contains details about Jack Warner’s estate. The chapter relies on an article by Scott Markus, “Los Angeles Ghosts—the Spirit of Hollywood’s First Sex Symbol Rudolph Valentino” on AmericanGhost Walks.com; Joe Flint, “Netflix’s Reed Hastings Deems Remote Work ‘a Pure Negative,’” Wall Street Journal, September 7, 2020; Brooks Barnes, “‘The Town Hall of Hollywood.’ Welcome to the Netflix Lobby,” New York Times, July 14, 2019; Marc Randolph, That Will Never Work (New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2019); Dawn Chmielewski, “How Reed Hastings Rewrote the Hollywood Script,” Forbes, September 7, 2020; Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer, No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention (New York: Penguin Press, 2020); Stephen Armstrong, “Has TV Gone Too Far?”

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Kong, 285, 286, 305 Goldblum, Jeff, 243 Golden Globes, xv, 6, 13, 32, 61, 246, 293, 295 Goldman Sachs, 112, 171 Goncalves, Tony, 224, 225, 253 Go Network, 90–91 Gone with the Wind, 254, 291 Gooden, Tahirah, 41–42 Goodman, John, 293 Goodman, Tim, 215 Good Morning America, 9, 176 Good Place, The, 197, 296 Good Shepherd, The, 259 Goodwin, Betty, 125 Google, 71, 139, 141, 144 Gordon, Emily V., 185 Gordon, Mark, 52 Gortimer Gibbon’s Life on Normal Street, 293 “Gower Gulch,” 30 Grainge, Lucian, 180 Grant, Hugh, 282 Graves, Michael, 29 Gray Man, The, 266 Great, The, 151–52 Great Depression, 83 Greenblatt, Bob, x, 77 background of, 213–14 HBO and, 65, 74, 211–15, 220, 221–22, 250–51, 252, 255 Seeso and, 130 GreenCine, 27 Greenfield, Rich, 85–86 Greyhound, 246–47, 257–60 Grey’s Anatomy, 75, 88, 143, 231–32, 234 Grove, Andy, 236 Guthrie, Savannah, 200 Gyllenhaal, Maggie, 11 Hackett, Isa, 296 Hahn, Don, 273 Haines, Billy, 28–30 Hale, Mike, 245 Hamilton, 260, 274–75, 279, 280, 284, 302, 304 Hammer, Bonnie, x, 127–28, 197–98, 201–2 Hancock, John Lee, 288–89 Handmaid’s Tale, The, 151, 159, 168, 258, 300 Hanks, Tom, 246–47, 257–60 Harmon, Dan, 114 Harrelson, Woody, 182 Harris, Maurice, 190–91 Harry Potter, 70, 284 Hart, Kevin, 113, 118 Hastings, Reed, x, 13, 235–36, 237 background of, 38 competition against Netflix, 74–75, 229–30, 280 at Consumer Electronics Show (2016), 56–57 early years of Netflix, 38–40 founding of Netflix, 32–36 on remote work, 31 streaming, 47–48, 49 Hatcher, Teri, 79 Hawkins, Corey, 187 HBO, 1–5, 61–77. See also specific shows creative risk-taking of, 68–69 founding and early years of, 65–70, 121–22 logo of, 215–16 Netflix and, 64–65, 71–72, 74–75, 159–60, 164, 256 original programming, 2, 48, 54, 68–69, 111, 161–64, 252, 280–90, 302–6, 313 subscribers, 69, 161, 210–11, 288 HBO Go, 72, 75, 215, 216, 225–26 HBO Max, xviii, 6, 65, 69, 74, 135, 140, 186, 207–26, 249–56, 280–90, 302–7 COVID-19 and, 249–50, 251, 284–85 launch of, 235, 249–51, 253–55, 260, 317 logo of, 215–16 naming of, 214–15 Project Popcorn, 285 subscribers, 253–54, 281 technology infrastructure, 75, 216–17 WarnerMedia Day, 207–12, 215, 221, 224–26 HBO Max Originals, 222–23, 250–51, 313 HBO Now, 69–70, 95, 156, 185, 210, 215, 225–26, 281 Hearst, William Randolph, 28 Heller, Cody, 114 Hemsworth, Chris, 230, 267 Hemsworth, Liam, 110, 118 Hercules, 268 Hewlett-Packard, xviii, 111 Hiddleston, Tom, 168 Highland Capital Partners, 299–300 Hildegarde, 125 Hill, Dulé, 204 Hillbilly Elegy, 75 Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, The, 152 Hodulik, John, 158–59 Holland, Cindy, x, 51–56, 182, 232, 236–38, 261 Hollywood, 28–30 Hollywood (miniseries), 29 Hollywood Reporter, 115–16, 215, 286, 296, 318 Holt, Lester, 200, 205 Hope, Ted, 265 Hopkins, Anthony, 170 Hopkins, Mike, ix, 144, 146, 151, 300 Hot Drop, The, 117 Hotstar, 174, 317 House, 145, 146 House of Cards, 13, 53–56, 183, 258, 293, 317 Howard, Ron, 75, 103, 195 Howdy Doody, 138 How to Get Away with Murder, 231 Huffman, Felicity, 79 Huggins, Roy, 46 Hughes Aircraft Company, 170 Hugo, 15 Hulu, 63, 71, 84, 127, 128, 145–52, 248, 318 deal with Disney, 63, 88, 95, 131, 145, 150–53, 168, 318 Netflix and, 149–50, 151, 152, 159 Super Bowl ad, 148–49 Hunt, Neil, x, 42, 44–46 Hurley, Chad, 70, 144 Huxley, Aldous, 198, 249 iCloud, 179 Iger, Bob, xi, 50, 121, 126, 231, 272, 274, 318 alliance with Apple, 78, 79–81, 83–84 digital wake-up call, 78–84, 87, 89–90 Disney+, 167, 168, 169, 171, 172–73, 178, 241, 277 Hulu and, 150, 151 sports licensing, 136 Imagine Entertainment, 195 IMDb TV, 139, 140, 293 Inception, xiii, 283 “innovator’s dilemma,” 70 Instagram, 71, 104, 109, 118, 277, 282 Integrity QA, 32 Intel, 44, 236 Intertainer, 24–25, 27 In the Heights, 285, 302–10 Inzerillo, Joe, 241, 242–43 Iovine, Jimmy, 101–2 Irishman, The, xviii, 10–12, 13–16, 75, 310 Isaacson, Walter, 7, 99 It: Chapter Two, 283 Ive, Jony, 100 Ives, Dan, 205 Jack and Jill, 262 Jackson, Samuel L., 186 Jaman, 27 James, LeBron, 113 Janedis, John, 231 Jassy, Andy, ix, 242–43, 301 Jaws, 15 Jazz Singer, The, 30 Jefferson, Thomas, 28 Jenkins, Patty, 284, 305 “Jerry Maguire manifesto,” 150 Jobs, Laurene Powell, 99 Jobs, Steve, ix, 7, 79–81, 99–100, 103, 173, 178, 180, 314 Johansson, Scarlett, 276–77 Johnson, Dwayne “the Rock,” 264 Joker, 263, 283 Jonas, Joe, 113 Jones, Jasmine Cephas, 290 Jonze, Spike, 247 Jordan, Michael B., 266 Joshua, Anthony, 135 JPMorgan Chase, 112 Jumanji, 182 Jurassic Park, 24, 248 Justified, 174 Kaling, Mindy, 6–7 Kapor, Mitch, 22 Katzenberg, Jeffrey, x, xviii, 114, 290 Quibi, xviii, xix, 107–19, 187–88, 190, 191–95, 290 Kavanaugh, Brett, xiv Keane, Glen, 235 Keaton, Diane, 295 Keeping Up with the Kardashians, 202 Keitel, Harvey, 11 Kendrick, Anna, 109, 114, 243, 250, 251 Kerkorian, Kirk, 298–99 Kerman, Piper, 56 Kessler, Thomas, 20–21 Key, Keegan-Michael, 2 Khan, Nick, 142 Kidman, Nicole, 282 Kilar, Jason, x, 146–48, 150–51, 254–56, 281–85, 287, 289, 303–4, 313–14 Kilar, Maureen, 147 Killers of the Flower Moon, 260, 310 Kimmel, Jimmy, 191 Kisseloff, Jeff, 21 Kissing Booth, The, 264 Kohan, Jenji, 56 Kornhaber, Spencer, 190 Kotb, Hoda, 258–59 Kozmo, 52 Krakowski, Jane, 104 Kubitz, Andy, 88 Kubrick, Stanley, 286 Laipply, Judson, 143 La La Land, 313 Lanzone, Jim, 51, 236 Lars and the Real Girl, 222 Lasseter, John, 273 Last Ship, The, 85–86 Last Waltz, The, 24 Late Night, 265 Lauer, Matt, 9 Lava Bear Films, 41 Law & Order, 146, 204, 248 Lawrence, Ernest, 38 Lawson, Mark, 105 Lear, Norman, 36–37, 140 Leder, Mimi, 10 Lee, Jennifer, 278–79 Lee, Miky, 112 Lee, Spike, 11, 264, 294 Leftovers, The, 10, 222 Legally Blonde, 308 Legendary Entertainment, 72, 286 Legg, Jeremy, x, 216–17, 250 LEK Consulting, 171 Leon, Richard J., 63–64 Leonard, Franklin, 316 Leto, Jared, 288 Letterman, David, 31 Levinsohn, Gary, 52 Levinsohn, Peter, 99 Levinson, Barry, 52 Levy, David, 134, 217 Lewis, Juliette, 182 Lil Yachty, 113 Lilyhammer, 55–56, 75 Lincoln Center, xv–xvi, 6–7 Lion King, The, 109, 167, 168, 170, 175, 223, 273, 275 Lionsgate, 5, 25, 49, 56, 131 Little America, 185–86 Little Fires Everywhere, 152 Little Mermaid, The, 109, 235, 278 Little Things, The, 288 Little Voice, 103, 223 Liu, Simu, 277 Lizzo, 245 Loeb, Daniel, 280 Lonergan, Kenneth, 294 Longoria, Eva, 79 Loomis, Alfred Lee, 38 Lopez, Jennifer, 113 Los Angeles Lakers, 109 Los Angeles Plays Itself, 30 Lost, 80, 82, 222 Lotus, 22 Lotz, Amanda D., 138–39 Loup Ventures, 191 Lourd, Bryan, 276, 305–6 Lovato, Demi, 113 Love Is Blind, 237 Love Life, 250, 251 Lucas, George, 278 Lucasfilm, 82, 89, 278 Luce, Henry, 155 Luna, Diego, 167–68 Lunden, Joan, 7 Lupin, 233 Luther, 252 Ma, Yo-Yo, xv McCarthy, Christine, 175–76 McCord, Patty, x, 40, 42 McGrath, Katie, 223 McGregor, Ewan, 243, 278 McKellen, Ian, 170 Mackie, Anthony, 186 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, 153 Madison Square Garden, 66 Mad Men, 88, 140, 296 Madrone Capital Partners, 112 Mag Rack, 122 Maker, Jacob, 20 Maker Studios, 91, 92 Malek, Rami, 288 Malone, John, 66, 307 Maltese Falcon, The, 308 Manchester by the Sea, 264, 294–95 Mandalorian, The, 168, 175, 223, 242, 251, 252, 278, 280 Man in the High Castle, The, 295, 296 MapQuest, 71 Marriage Story, 15 Martin, Steve, 195 Marvel, 50, 82, 92, 95, 137, 159, 168, 170, 173, 266, 272, 274, 277, 279 Marvelous Mrs.

Everyday Utopia: What 2,000 Years of Wild Experiments Can Teach Us About the Good Life
by Kristen R. Ghodsee
Published 16 May 2023

In addition to the growing acceptance of queer relationships, polyamory, and passionate friendships, some youth are reimagining housing, education, and kinship relations in ways that loosen the grip that patriarchy holds on our social relations.39 Even without radical politics, coliving buildings, coworking spaces, and the rise of remote work fuel trends that undermine the old ways of marking the transition to adulthood and redefine the traditional roles of the “head of household” or the “boss.” Some gravitate toward planned communal living while others avoid marriage and single-family home ownership altogether, both trends which have the effect of lessening the burdens of care work that women often bear in the private sphere.

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A 2019 study found evidence that buying less stuff makes people happier than buying “green” stuff, and it’s easier to buy less stuff when you’re sharing things with a wider group of people.94 “After we left Two Echo and moved to Florida, one of my new neighbors went out and bought a wheelbarrow when we already had a wheelbarrow. I couldn’t understand why he didn’t just ask to borrow ours,” explained the woman who lived with her family at Two Echo for two years. “It just makes so much more sense for everyone to share.” Cohousing arrangements also mitigate the isolation that results from more remote working and the migration of our public spaces from the material to the digital world. As brick and mortar stores give way to Amazon fulfillment centers, we have fewer reasons to leave our homes to interact with others. With new technology, you almost never have to wait in a line anymore, and while I realize that in most cases this is a good thing, some of my fondest memories are of the shared excitement and effusive conversations I had with other fans while queuing for hours to get tickets for live concerts or midnight premieres of highly anticipated films.

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More’s idea of free and lifelong education has found various outlets online, particularly in projects like Wikipedia, TED Talks, Duolingo, the original edX courses offered by Harvard and MIT, and other attempts to democratize knowledge. Although many people would still rather binge a streaming series than take an online course after a long day at work, a potential future of shorter hours, or, with the rise in remote work, fewer hours lost in commutes, might free up time to engage in more self-directed learning. By liberating education from its credentialing functions, knowledge can become a public good and a shared pleasure, rather than an investment that reinforces the divide between blue-collar and white-collar laborers and forces young people into debt.

Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World
by Cal Newport
Published 5 Jan 2016

For many workers, this lag predicts bad news. As intelligent machines improve, and the gap between machine and human abilities shrinks, employers are becoming increasingly likely to hire “new machines” instead of “new people.” And when only a human will do, improvements in communications and collaboration technology are making remote work easier than ever before, motivating companies to outsource key roles to stars—leaving the local talent pool underemployed. This reality is not, however, universally grim. As Brynjolfsson and McAfee emphasize, this Great Restructuring is not driving down all jobs but is instead dividing them. Though an increasing number of people will lose in this new economy as their skill becomes automatable or easily outsourced, there are others who will not only survive, but thrive—becoming more valued (and therefore more rewarded) than before.

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The fact that Hansson might be working remotely from Marbella, Spain, while your office is in Des Moines, Iowa, doesn’t matter to your company, as advances in communication and collaboration technology make the process near seamless. (This reality does matter, however, to the less-skilled local programmers living in Des Moines and in need of a steady paycheck.) This same trend holds for the growing number of fields where technology makes productive remote work possible—consulting, marketing, writing, design, and so on. Once the talent market is made universally accessible, those at the peak of the market thrive while the rest suffer. In a seminal 1981 paper, the economist Sherwin Rosen worked out the mathematics behind these “winner-take-all” markets.

Company of One: Why Staying Small Is the Next Big Thing for Business
by Paul Jarvis
Published 1 Jan 2019

There’s nothing wrong with finding the right size and then focusing on being better. Small can be a long-term plan, not just a stepping-stone. Is the Traditional Way of Doing Business Broken? Traditional ways of working—in offices with strict rules and corporate hierarchies—are giving way to gig-based, remote work with more autonomy. The business world is constantly being disrupted with new automations and technologies, and this is a good thing. Changes in how we work give us a chance to scale with the bare minimum in investments, people, and time. Traditionally, having a small business was thought of as a good starting point, or as what happens when a business finds only limited success.

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In effect, hiring more people ended up not being the solution; instead, introducing more processes and structure helped fewer people accomplish more—while allowing them the autonomy to solve problems in their own way, using a common tool set. Autonomy can also be badly abused. The problem is not so much employees taking advantage of perks like flex hours or remote work, but leaders assuming that they need to give less direction. A leader’s job is to provide clear direction and then get out of the way. Even companies of one require direction and set processes—it’s this common constraint that allows creativity to thrive and goals to be met. This alignment has to be carefully orchestrated, not as binary autonomous/non-autonomous decisions, but as a balance between guidance and trust.

The New Nomads: How the Migration Revolution Is Making the World a Better Place
by Felix Marquardt
Published 7 Jul 2021

Some of the attendees had been chatting online for years without having actually met face to face. ‘He looks different to his Slack photo,’ one mentioned jokingly. The person in question blushed. Prior to the coronavirus, remote working was already becoming increasingly feasible for increasing numbers of people, and a new class of global worker had emerged. As I write this in the summer of 2020, during the midst of the pandemic, remote working has expanded exponentially, becoming a necessity to millions of workers. As with many things, the pandemic served to accelerate a trend that was already nascent: the location of an office matters less now than it did in the pre-internet age.

Elon Musk
by Walter Isaacson
Published 11 Sep 2023

“They thought that I was asking for trouble,” he says. They were, of course, right. They also knew that their father actually liked asking for trouble. * * * That trouble began a week later, on May 6, when he strode into Twitter headquarters in San Francisco to meet with its management. Despite his tweets disparaging remote work, the lavish Art Deco headquarters was still almost empty when he got there. Even Agrawal wasn’t there. Having tested positive for COVID, he joined the meeting remotely. The meeting was led by Twitter CFO Ned Segal, who rubbed Musk the wrong way. In its public disclosures, Twitter estimated that bots and fake accounts made up about 5 percent of its users.

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Dhaval processed this information and agreed. “Me and James and the people on our Autopilot team are always sitting together, and the ideas flow real fast, and what we do as a team is better than what any one of us could do,” he said. Andrew noted that was why Musk favored in-person rather than remote work. Again, Ben was willing to disagree. “I believe in coming in, and I do,” he said. “But I’m a programmer and can’t be good if I get interrupted every hour. So sometimes I don’t come in. Perhaps hybrid is best.” In charge In the halls of Twitter, as well as at Tesla and SpaceX and on Wall Street, there was talk about whether Musk would tap someone to help him run the company.

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Success would require a complete change in the company’s mellow, easygoing, and nurturing culture. “The road ahead is arduous and will require intense work.” Most notably, this meant reversing Twitter’s policy, announced by Jack Dorsey early in the pandemic and reaffirmed by Parag Agrawal in 2022, that employees could work at home forever. “Remote work is no longer allowed,” Musk declared. “Starting tomorrow, everyone is required to be in the office for a minimum of 40 hours per week.” His new policy was partly motivated by his belief that being together in an office facilitated the flow of ideas and energy. “People are way more productive when they’re in person because the communication is much better,” he told a hastily gathered employee meeting in the ninth-floor café.

Being Geek: The Software Developer's Career Handbook
by Michael Lopp
Published 20 Jul 2010

, The Sanity Check, Negotiating Roles, Spend an Hour a Day on Each Req You Have cold calls from, The Itch hiring process, Spend an Hour a Day on Each Req You Have phone screening process with, The Sanity Check salary negotiations and, Negotiating Roles relationships, Your People, Big Fat Toxic Assumptions, No one knows what we actually do to build the software, so they assume it's easy, No one knows what we actually do to build the software, so they assume it's easy, A Matter of Perspective bits vs. human beings, No one knows what we actually do to build the software, so they assume it's easy changes when team members leave, A Matter of Perspective toxic coworkers, Big Fat Toxic Assumptions Your People, Your People reliability, as remote working skill, Are they self-directed? remote, working, The Pond repetition in game play, Discovery: From Confusion to Control repetitive motion, removing, My Tools Do Not Care Where My Work Is reputation, Delivery, Wanderlust, On Excuses, Question #2: Industry and Brand, Question #2: Industry and Brand company, and career moves, Question #2: Industry and Brand hits to, On Excuses low priority work and, Wanderlust maintenance of, Delivery requisitions for hiring (reqs), Wanted research, prior to phone screens, The Sanity Check resignation of team members, Mind the Gap respect for management, A Hint of an Insane Plan response to fuckups, Management Transformations, The Prioritizer, The Randomizer, The Illuminator, The Illuminator, The Enemy Enemy, The Enemy Illuminator, The Illuminator Interrogator, Management Transformations Prioritizer, The Prioritizer Randomizer, The Randomizer responsibility for issues, Partial Information resumés, during phone screens, Stalk Your Future Job Reveal, the, The Reveal revenge, and the Screw-Me scenario, You Might Be Lying reviews, yearly, No Surprises Rolodex and work relationships, Who are you leaving behind?

The Precariat: The New Dangerous Class
by Guy Standing
Published 27 Feb 2011

This is precariatisation, isolating employees and limiting their space and opportunity for collective action. In 2009, 24,000 Spanish civil servants – 10 per cent of the total – were labouring partly from home, on condition that they had to come to the office for 50 per cent of their labour time. Remote working has also been introduced in Italy, where the public sector is notorious for absenteeism. An innovator in the United Kingdom was Winchester City Council, which consolidated its four office locations into two and installed a web-based booking system to let employees reserve desk space or meeting rooms as they saw fit.

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(Maltby) 138 Canada 79, 114 capital funds 176–7 Capitalism and Freedom (Friedman) 156 care work 61, 86, 125–6 careers, leisure 129 cash transfers 177 see also conditional cash transfers (CCTs) CCTs (conditional cash transfer schemes) 140 Cerasa, Claudio 149 Channel 4, call centre programme (UK) 16 charities 53 children, care for 125 China 28 and contractualisation 37 criminalisation 88 deliberative democracy 181 education 73 immigrants to Italy 4–5 invasion of privacy 135 migrants 96, 106–9, 109–10 old agers 83 191 192 INDEX China 28 (Continued) Shenzhen 133, 137 and time 115 wages 43 youth 76 see also Chindia China Plus One 28 Chindia 26, 27–9, 83 see also China Chrysler Group LLC 43 circulants 90, 92 Citizens United vs Federal Election Commission (US) 152–3 civil rights 14, 94 class, social 6–8, 66–7 Coase, Ronald 29 Cohen, Daniel 57, 66, 69 collaborative bargaining 168 collective attention deficit syndrome 127 commodification of companies 29–31 of education 67–72 and globalisation 26 labour 161–2 of management 40 of politics 148–53 re- 41–2 conditional cash transfers (CCTs) 140 see also cash transfers conditionality 140, 175 and basic income 172–3 and workfare 143–5, 166–7 connectivity, and youth 127 contract status 35, 36, 37, 44, 51, 61 contractors, independent/ dependent 15–16 contractualisation 37 counselling for stress 126 Crawford, Matthew 70 credit 44 crime 5, 129–30 criminalisation 14, 145, 146 crystallised intelligence 85 cultural rights 14 de Tocqueville, Alexis 145 de-industrialisation 5, 37–8 debt, and youth 73–4 Delfanti, Alessandro 78 deliberative democracy 180–1, 182 denizens 14, 93–102, 105, 113, 117, 157–8 Denmark 150 dependent/independent contractors 15–16 deskilling 17, 33, 40, 124 developing countries 12, 27, 60, 65, 105–9 disabled people 86–7, 89, 170 discrimination age 84–5 disability 81 gender 60, 123 genetic profiling 136–7 and migrants 99, 101–2 disengagement, political 24 distance working 38, 53 dole (UK) 45 Duncan Smith, Iain 143 Durkeim, Emile 20 economic security 157, 171, 173–6 The Economist 17–18, 33, 52, 137 economy, shadow 56–7 education 10, 67–73, 135–6, 159–60 Ehrenreich, Barbara 21, 170–1 elites 7, 22, 24, 40, 50 criminality 152 and democracy 181 ethics 165 Italian 148 and the Tea Party (US) 151 empathy 22–3, 137 employment agencies 33 employment security 10b, 11, 17, 36, 51, 117 Endarkenment 70 Enlightenment 24, 70 enterprise benefits 11, 12 environmental issues 167 environmental refugees 93 Esping-Andersen, G. 41 ethics 23–4, 121–2, 165 ethnic minorities 86 EuroMayDay 1, 2, 3, 167 European Union (EU) 2, 39, 146, 147 and migrants 97, 103, 105 and pensions 80 see also individual countries export processing zones 105–6 Facebook 127, 134, 135 failed occupationality 21 INDEX family 27, 44, 60, 65, 126 fear, used for control 32 fictitious decommodification 41 financial capital 171, 176–7 financial sector jobs 39–40 financial shock 2008-9 see Great Recession Financial Times 44, 55, 121, 155 firing workers 31–2 Fishkin, James 180 Fletcher, Bill 170–1 flexibility 18 labour 23–4, 31–6, 53, 60, 61, 65 labour market 6, 120–1, 170 Ford Motor Company 42, 43 Foucault, Michel 88, 133 Foxconn 28–9, 43, 105, 137 see also Shenzhen France criminalisation 88 de-industrialisation 38 education 69 leisure 129 migrants 95, 97, 101–2, 114 neo-fascism 149 and old agers 85 pensions 79 shadow economy 56 Telecom 11 youth 65–6 fraternity 12, 22, 155 freedom 155, 167–70, 172 freelance see temporary employment freeter unions 9 Friedman, Milton 39, 156 functional flexibility 36–8, 52 furloughs 36, 50 gays 63–4 General Motors (GM) 42, 43, 54 genetic profiling 136 Germany 9 de-industrialisation 38 disengagement with jobs 24 migrants 91, 95, 100–1, 114 pensions 79 shadow economy 56 temporary employment 15, 35 wages 40 and women 62 youth and apprenticeships 72–3 193 Glen Beck’s Common Sense (Beck) 151 Global Transformation 26, 27–31, 91, 115 globalisation 5–7, 27–31, 116, 148 and commodification 26 and criminalisation 87–8 and temporary employment 34 Google Street View 134 Gorz, Andre 7 grants, leisure 180–2 Great Recession 4, 49–51, 63, 176 and education 71 and migrants 102 and old agers 82 and pensions 80 and youth 77–8 Greece 52, 56, 117, 181 grinners/groaners 59, 83–4 Habermas, Jürgen 179 Haidt, J. 23 Hamburg (Germany) 3 happiness 140–1, 162 Hardt, M. 130 Hayek, Friedrich 39 health 51, 70, 120, 126 Hitachi 84 Hobsbawm, Eric 3 hormones 136 hot desking 53 Howker, Ed 65 Human Rights Watch 106 Hungary 149 Hurst, Erik 128 Hyatt Hotels 32 IBM 38, 137 identity 9 digital 134–5 work-based 12, 15–16, 23, 158–9, 163 Ignatieff, Michael 88 illegal migrants 96–8 In Praise of Idleness (Russell) 141, 161 income security 10b, 30, 40, 44 independent/dependent contractors 15–16 India 50, 83, 112, 140 see also Chindia individuality 3, 19, 122 informal status 6–7, 57, 60, 96, 119 inshored/offshored labour 30, 36, 37 194 INDEX International Herald Tribune 21 internet 18, 127, 139, 180, 181 surveillance 134–5, 138 interns 16, 36, 75–6 invasion of privacy 133–5, 167 Ireland 52–3, 77 isolation of workers 38 Italy education 69 neo-fascism 148–9 pensions 79 Prato 4–5 and the public sector 52, 53 shadow economy 56 and temporary employment 34 youth 64 Japan 2, 30 and Chinese migrants 110 commodification of companies 30 and migrants 102, 103 multiple job holding 119–20 neo-fascism 152 pensions 80 salariat 17 subsidies 84 and temporary employment 15, 32–3, 34–5, 41 and youth 66, 74, 76, 77 job security 10b, 11, 36–8 Kellaway, Lucy 83–4 Keynes, John Maynard 161 Kierkegaard, Søren 155 Klein, Naomi 148 knowledge 32, 117, 124–5, 171 labour 13, 115, 161–2 labour brokers 33–4, 49, 110, 111, 167, 168 labour flexibility 23–4, 31–45 labour intensification 119–20 labour market flexibility 6 labour security 10–11, 10b, 31 Laos 112 lay-offs see furloughs Lee Changshik 21 legal knowledge 124–5 legal processing 50 Legal Services Act of 2007 (UK) (Tesco Law) 40 leisure 13, 128–30 see also play lesbians 63–4 Liberal Republic, The 181 Lloyds Banking Group 50–1 localism 181–2 long-term migrants 100–2 loyalty 53, 58, 74–5 McDonald’s 33 McNealy, Scott 69 Malik, Shiv 65 Maltby, Lewis 138 Manafort, Paul 152 management, commodification of 40 Mandelson, Peter, Baron 68 Maroni, Roberto 97 marriage 64–5, 92 Martin, Paul 141 Marx, Karl 161 masculinity, role models for youth 63–5 Massachusetts Institute of Technology 68–9 Mayhew, Les 81 Mead, Lawrence 143 mergers, triangular 30 Mexico 91 Middle East 109 migrants 2, 13–14, 25, 90–3, 145–6 and basic income 172 and conditionality 144 denizens 93–102, 157–8 government organised 109–13 internal 105–9 and queuing systems 103–5 and recession 102–3 Mill, John Stuart 160 Morris, William 160, 161 Morrison, Catriona 127 multinational corporations 28, 92 multitasking 19, 126–7 National Broadband Plan 134 near-sourcing/shoring 36 Negri, A. 130 neo-fascism 25, 147–53, 159, 175, 183 Netherlands 39, 79, 114, 149–50 New Thought Movement 21 New York Times 69, 119 News from Nowhere (Morris) 161 Niemöller, Martin 182 INDEX non-refoulement 93 Nudge (Sunstein/Thaler) 138–9 nudging 138–40, 155–6, 165, 167, 172, 178, 182 numerical flexibility 31–6 Obama, Barack 73, 138–9, 147, 148 Observer, The 20 occupations associations of 169–70 dismantling of 38–40 freedom in 162–4 obsolescence in 124 offshored/inshored labour 30, 36, 37 old agers 59, 79– 86, 89 old-age dependency ratio 80–1 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) 27 origins of the precariat 1–5 outsourcing 29, 30, 33, 36, 37, 49 Paine, Thomas 173 panopticon society 132–40, 142–3 Parent Motivators (UK) 139–40 part-time employment 15, 35–6, 51, 61, 82 Pasona 33 paternalism 17, 29, 137, 153, 178, 182 nudging 138–40, 155–6, 165, 167, 172, 178, 182 pensions 42, 51, 52, 76–7, 79–81, 84–6 PepsiCo 137 personal deportment skills 123 Philippines 109 Phoenix, University of 71 Pigou, Arthur 117, 125 play 13, 115, 117, 128, 141 pleasure 141 Polanyi, K. 163, 169 political engagement/disengagement 24, 147 Portugal 52, 56 positive thinking 21, 86 Prato (Italy) 4–5 precariat (definition) 6, 7–13 precariato 9 precariatisation 16–18 precarity traps 48–9, 73–5, 114, 129, 144, 178 pride 22 prisoners 112, 146 privacy, invasion of 133–5, 167 private benefits 11 productivity, and old age 85 proficians 7–8, 15, 164 proletariat 7 protectionism 27, 54 public sector 51–4 qualifications 95 queuing systems 103–5 racism 97–8, 101, 114, 149 Randstad 49 re-commodification 41–2 recession see Great Recession refugees 92, 93, 96 regulation 23, 26, 39–40, 84, 171 Reimagining Socialism (Ehrenreich/ Fletcher) 170–1 remote working 38, 53 rentier economies 27, 176 representation security 10b, 31 retirement 42, 80–3 rights 14, 94, 145, 163, 164–5, 169 see also denizens risk management 178 Robin Hood gang 3 role models for youth 63–5 Roma 97, 149 Rossington, John 100 Rothman, David 88 Russell, Bertrand 141, 161 Russell, Lucie 64 Russia 88, 115 salariat 7, 8, 14, 17, 32 Santelli, Rick 150 Sarkozy, Nicolas 69, 97, 149 Sarrazin, Thilo 101 Schachar, Ayelet 177 Schneider, Friedrich 56 Schwarzenegger, Arnold 71 seasonal migrants 98–100 security, economic 157, 171, 173–6 self-employment 15–16, 66, 82 self-esteem 21 self-exploitation 20, 122–3 self-production 11 self-regulation 23, 39 self-service 125 services 37–8, 63 195 196 INDEX Sex, Drugs and Chocolate: The Science of Pleasure (Martin) 141 sex services 63 sexism, reverse 123 shadow economy 56–7, 91 Shenzhen (China) 133, 137 see also Foxconn Shop Class as Soulcraft (Crawford) 70 short-time compensation schemes 55–6 side-jobs 119–20 skill reproduction security 10b skills 157, 176 development of 30, 31, 40 personal deportment 123 tertiary 121–4 Skirbekk, Vegard 85 Smarsh 138 Smile or Die (Ehrenreich) 21 Smith, Adam 71 snowball theory 78 social class 6–8, 66–7 social factory 38, 118, 132 social income 11–12, 40–5, 51, 66 social insurance 22, 104 social memory 12, 23, 129 social mobility 23, 57–8, 175 social networking sites 137 see also Facebook social rights 14 social worth 21 sousveillance 134, 135 South Africa, and migrants 91, 98 South Korea 15, 55, 61, 75 space, public 171, 179–80 Spain BBVA 50 migrants 94 and migrants 102 pensions 79 and the public sector 53 shadow economy 55–6 temporary employment 35 Speenhamland system 55, 143 staffing agencies 33–4, 49, 110, 111, 167, 168 state benefits 11, 12 status 8, 21, 32–3, 94 status discord 10 status frustration 10, 21, 63, 67, 77, 78, 79, 89, 114, 123, 160 stress 19, 126, 141, 141–3 subsidies 44, 54–6, 83–6, 176 suicide, work-related 11, 29, 58, 105 Summers, Larry 148 Sun Microsystems 69 Sunstein, Cass 138–9 surveillance 132–6, 153, 167 see also sousveillance Suzuki, Kensuke 152 Sweden 68, 110–11, 135, 149 symbols 3 Taking of Rome, The (Cerasa) 149 taxes 26 and citizenship 177 France 85 and subsidies 54–5 Tobin 177 United States (US) 180–1 Tea Party movement 150–1 technology and the brain 18 internet 180, 181 surveillance 132–6 teleworking 38 temporary agencies 33–4, 49, 110, 111, 167, 168 temporary employment 14–15, 49 associations for 170 Japan 9 and numerical flexibility 32–6 and old agers 82 and the public sector 51 and youth 65 tertiarisation 37–8 tertiary skill 121–4 tertiary time 116, 119 tertiary workplace 116 Tesco Law (UK) 40 Thailand, migrants 106 Thaler, Richard 138–9 therapy state 141–3, 153 Thompson, E.P. 115 time 115–16, 163, 171, 178 labour intensification 119–20 tertiary 116, 119 use of 38 work-for-labour 120–1 titles of jobs 17–18 Tobin taxes 177 Tomkins, Richard 70 towns, company 137 INDEX toy-factory incident 108–9 trade unions 1, 2, 5, 10b, 26, 31, 168 and migration 91 public sector 51 and youth 77–8 see also yellow unions training 121–4 triangular mergers 30 triangulation 34 Trumka, Richard 78 trust relationships 8–9, 22 Twitter 127 Ukraine 152 undocumented migrants 96–8 unemployment 145 benefits 45–8, 99, 104 insurance for 175 voluntary 122 youth after recession 77 uniforms, to distinguish employment status 32–3 unions freeter 9 yellow 33 see also trade United Kingdom (UK) 102–3 benefit system 173 Channel 4 call centre programme 16 company loyalty 74–5 conditionality 143–5, 166–7 criminalisation 88 de-industrialisation 38 disabled people 170 and education 67, 70, 71 financial shock (2008-9) 49–51, 71 labour intensification 119 Legal Services Act (2007) (Tesco Law) 40 leisure 129 migrants 91, 95, 99, 103–5, 114, 146 neo-fascism 150 paternalism 139–40 pensions 43, 80 and the public sector 53 public spaces 179 and regulation of occupational bodies 39 shadow economy 56 and social mobility 56–8 and subsidies 55 197 temporary employment 15, 34, 35 as a therapy state 142 women 61–2, 162 workplace discipline 138 youth 64, 76 United States (US) care for children 125 criminalisation 88 education 69, 70–1, 73, 135–6 ethnic minorities 86 financial shock (2008-9) 49–50 migrants 90–1, 93, 94, 97, 103, 114 neo-fascism 150–1, 152–3 old agers 82–3, 85 pensions 42, 52, 80 public sector 52 regulation of occupational bodies 39 social mobility in 57–8 subsidies 55, 56 taxes 180–1 temporary employment 34, 35 volunteer work 163 wages and benefits 42 women 62, 63 youth 75, 77 universalism 155, 157, 162, 180 University of the People 69 University of Phoenix 71 unpaid furloughs 36 unpaid leave 50 uptitling 17–18 utilitarianism 88, 132, 141, 154 value of support 11 Vietnam 28, 111–12 voluntary unemployment 122 volunteer work 86, 163–4 voting 146, 147, 181 Wacquant, L. 132 wages 8, 11 and benefits 41–2 family 60 flexibility 40–5, 66 individualised 60 and migrants 103 and temporary workers 32, 33 Vietnam 28 see also basic income Waiting for Superman (documentary) 69 Wall Street Journal 35, 163 198 INDEX Walmart 33, 107 Wandering Tribe 73 Weber, Max 7 welfare claimants 245 welfare systems 44 Wen Jiabao 105 Whitehead, Alfred North 160 Williams, Rob 62 wiretapping 135 women 60–5 and care work 125–6 CCTs (conditional cash transfer schemes) 140 labour commodification 161 and migration 92 multiple jobholding 119–20 reverse sexism 123 work 115, 117, 160–1 and identity 158–9 and labour 13 right to 145, 163, 164–5 security 10b work-for-labour 120–1, 178 work-for-reproduction 124–7 work–life balance 118 worker cooperatives 168–70 workfare 143–5, 166–7 working class 7, 8 workplace 116, 122, 130, 131 discipline 136–8 tertiary 116 Yanukovich, Victor 152 yellow unions 33 youth 59, 65–7, 89, 156 commodification of education 67–72 connectivity 127 and criminality 129–30 generational tension 76–7 and old agers 85 precarity traps 73–5 prospects for the future 78–9 and role models 63–5 streaming education 72–3 zero-hour contracts 36 

Net Zero: How We Stop Causing Climate Change
by Dieter Helm
Published 2 Sep 2020

There would be lots of decentralised renewables generation, possibly some nuclear power stations (both large and small), smart meters, smart devices, interconnected homes and the internet-of-things, autonomous electric cars and perhaps hydrogen-powered vehicles and electric trains. Travel, especially by air, would be much reduced, and holidays would be much more local, as would quite a lot of food production. There would probably be more remote working, including from home using video links, as many people had to do during the Covid-19 lockdowns. Confronted with transitioning to this low-carbon world, now think about the existing network infrastructures. The electricity system is designed around ever-larger power stations (coal, nuclear and now gas) transmitting electricity to the local distribution networks and then your home.

…

acid rain 25, 194 Africa xiv, xv, 2, 25, 30, 38, 44, 45, 47, 48, 51, 137, 229 agriculture 2, 6, 12, 13, 14, 23, 35–6, 43, 44–5, 70, 76, 86, 87–8, 95, 100, 102, 109, 116, 146–7, 149, 159, 163–80, 181, 183, 192, 197, 198, 206, 220 baseline, the 164–8 biodiversity loss and 2, 5, 100, 164, 165, 168, 169, 171, 172, 174, 180 biofuels and 197–8 carbon emissions and 2, 12, 13, 35–6, 76–7, 146–7, 163–80 carbon price and 167–70, 171, 172, 173, 180 China and 28–9, 35, 45, 180 economics of 76, 165, 166–7, 171, 174 electricity and 13, 166, 168, 174, 178, 180 fertiliser use see fertiliser lobby 14, 110, 164, 165, 169, 170, 197 methane emissions 23, 84, 177, 178, 179 net gain and 172–4 net value of UK 76, 166 new technologies/indoor farming 87–8, 174–9, 180, 213 peat bogs and 2, 179 pesticide use see pesticides petrochemicals and 166 polluter-pays principle and 76, 168–70, 172, 173 pollution 36, 86, 163, 165–6, 168–70, 172, 173, 177–8, 230 public goods, agricultural 170–4, 180 sequestering carbon and 12, 95, 163, 166, 168, 169, 170, 171, 172, 173–4, 177, 179, 180 soils and 2, 146, 163, 164, 165, 166, 168, 169, 171, 172, 175, 179 subsidies 14, 76, 102, 109, 116, 164, 165, 166, 167, 169, 170, 172, 180, 228 25 Year Plan and 179–80 Agriculture Bill (2018), UK 170 air conditioning 135–6, 224, 233 air quality xiii, 13, 25, 46, 52, 61, 70, 135, 153, 177, 180, 201, 216, 230, 232 air transport 3–4, 6, 11, 13, 22, 50, 53, 73, 87, 88, 92, 107, 125, 128, 129, 132, 133, 134, 149, 156–7, 186, 195, 201, 203–5 aluminium 7, 117 Amazon rainforest 2, 34, 35, 95, 145, 149–50, 151, 155, 229, 230 ammonia 35, 137, 191 anaerobic digesters 35, 165, 230 animal welfare 167, 177 antibiotics 93, 165, 174 Arctic 26, 46, 114, 178 artificial intelligence (AI) 32, 175, 220, 231 autonomous vehicles 13, 129, 132, 175, 189–90, 231 Balkans 137–8 Bank of England 121 batteries 6, 31, 131, 135, 141, 183, 184, 185–90, 191, 199, 204, 213, 214, 219, 220, 221, 225, 231 beef 5, 95, 116, 117, 167, 230 Berlin, Isaiah 104 big 5 polluter products 117–18, 120 bin Salman, Mohammad 27 biocrops 36 biodiversity xiv, 2, 5, 12, 13, 28, 35, 51, 76, 94, 100, 148, 149, 152, 153, 158, 159, 164, 165, 168, 169–70, 171, 172, 174, 180, 227, 233 bioenergy 31, 34–5, 36 biofuels 21, 35, 49, 50, 67, 70, 95, 135, 183, 184, 197–8, 210, 230 biomass 32, 34, 49, 50, 67, 69, 109, 146, 147, 151, 210, 217 bonds, government 220 BP 27, 149, 187, 199 Deepwater Horizon disaster, Gulf of Mexico (2010) 147 Brazil 2, 35, 38, 44–5, 47, 95, 145, 149–50, 155, 198 Brexit 42, 47, 56, 117, 165 British Gas 102, 139 British Steel x, 194 broadband networks 6, 11, 90, 92, 125, 126, 127–8, 130–1, 132–3, 135, 140–1, 199, 201, 202, 205, 211, 214, 231, 232 Brundtland Commission 45 BT 127–8, 141 Openreach 214 Burn Out (Helm) ix, xiv Bush, George W. 36, 48, 53, 103 business rates 76, 165 Canada 52, 191, 193 capitalist model 26, 42, 99, 227 carbon border tax/carbon border adjustment xii, 11, 13, 60, 80, 115–20, 194–6, 204 carbon capture and storage (CCS) xiv, 12, 75–6, 95, 109, 146, 147–8, 149, 154, 159, 203–4, 207, 209, 222, 223 Carbon Crunch, The (Helm) ix, xiv, 221 carbon diary 4–5, 8, 10, 11, 64–6, 83, 86, 116, 143, 144, 155, 156, 167, 180, 181, 185, 203, 205 carbon emissions: agriculture and see agriculture by country (2015) 30 during ice ages and warm periods for the past 800,000 years 21 economy and 81–159 electricity and see electricity global annual mean concentration of CO2 (ppm) 19 global average long-term concentration of CO2 (ppm) 20 measuring 43–6 since 1990 1–14, 17–37 transport and see individual method of transport 2020, position in 36–7 UN treaties and 38–57 unilateralism and 58–80 see also unilateralism carbon offsetting xiii–xiv, 4, 5, 12, 34, 45, 72, 74, 79, 94–6, 97, 105, 143–59, 192, 201, 203, 207, 214, 222, 223, 234 for companies 148–50 for countries 151–5 for individuals 155–7 markets 71–2, 110–13, 117, 144, 157–9, 208 travel and 156, 201–3 see also sequestration carbon permits 71–2, 79, 110–13, 117, 144, 208 carbon price/tax xii, xiii, xv, 8, 11, 12, 13, 26, 60, 61, 71, 72, 77, 79, 80, 84, 85–6, 102–3, 105, 106–24, 134, 143, 146, 147, 150, 151–4, 157, 159, 192, 197, 198, 199, 203, 227–30, 232, 234 agriculture and 167, 168, 169–70, 171, 173, 180 domain of the tax/carbon border adjustment xii, 11, 13, 60, 80, 115–20, 121, 124, 192, 194–6, 197, 204, 227 electric pollution and 216–18 ethics of 107–10 floor price 115, 117, 208 for imports 11, 13 prices or quantities/EU ETS versus carbon taxes 110–13 setting 113–15 transport and 192–9 what to do with the money 121–4 where to levy the tax 119–20 who fixes the price 120–1 carbon sinks 2, 5, 166, 169, 203 carboniferous age 34 cars 1, 3, 4, 7, 20, 22, 36, 44, 70, 73, 114, 129, 181, 182, 183, 184–5, 190, 191, 193, 196, 197, 198, 199 see also electric vehicles cartels 39, 40, 43, 45, 46, 47, 56 cattle farming 35, 36, 95, 150, 166, 167, 173, 177, 198 Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) 102, 139, 218 cement 6, 7, 26, 29, 34, 87, 117, 171 charging networks, electric vehicle 91, 129–30, 141–2, 184, 185–90, 199, 200, 202, 219 Chernobyl 78 China xi, xv, 1–2, 5, 8, 18, 42, 46, 47, 48, 64, 66, 74, 101, 180, 229 Belt and Road Initiative 28, 45 coal use 1–2, 8, 23–4, 24, 28, 31, 38, 117, 154, 206, 208 Communist Party 2, 27, 42, 46 demand for fossil fuels/carbon emissions 1–2, 8, 18, 20, 22, 23–4, 24, 25, 27–31, 36, 38, 51, 73, 117, 154, 206, 208 export market x–xi, 5, 9, 64, 66, 117, 155, 194 fertiliser use 35 GDP xv, 27, 29 nationalism and 42 petrochemical demand 22 renewables companies 9, 32, 73, 74, 77, 79 Tiananmen Square 42 unilateralism and 58, 59 UN treaties and 46, 47, 48, 53, 54, 55, 58, 59 US trade war 56, 118 Churchill, Winston 183 citizen assemblies 99–101 climate change: carbon emissions and see carbon emissions 1.5° target 38, 57 2° target 1, 10, 22–3, 28, 30, 38, 39, 45, 47, 54, 55, 57, 108, 122, 155, 206 see also individual area of climate change Climate Change Act (2008) 66, 74–7 Clinton, Bill 40, 48 Club of Rome 98 coal 1–2, 5, 8, 13, 20, 23–5, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 34, 36, 38, 50, 52, 53, 60–1, 67, 72, 77, 78–9, 101, 109, 112, 116, 117, 119, 134, 136, 145, 147, 148, 151, 154, 155, 182, 183, 194, 196, 206–9, 210, 212, 214, 216, 217, 218, 229, 230 coastal marshes 146, 159 colonialism 45 Committee on Climate Change (CCC), UK x–xi, 7, 74–5, 120, 164, 166, 169, 217, 235 ‘Net Zero: The UK’s Contribution to Stopping Global Warming’ report x–xi conference/video calls 6, 129, 156, 202, 205 Conference of the Parties (COP) xii, 10, 48, 50, 53–4, 55, 59, 205 congestion charges 198 Copenhagen Accord 48, 53–4, 59 Coronavirus see Covid-19 cost-benefit analysis (CBA) 71, 108, 110, 114, 138 cost of living 116 Covid-19 x, xi–xii, 1, 3, 6, 9, 18, 19, 22, 25, 27, 30, 37, 44, 46, 50, 57, 65, 69, 80, 89, 93, 129, 135, 148, 171, 201, 202, 204, 232 CRISPR 176 crop yields 172, 177 dams 2, 36, 52–3, 179 DDT (Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane) 100 deforestation 2, 5, 34, 35, 36, 38, 43, 44, 47, 55, 87, 95, 145, 146, 149–50, 155, 172–3, 179, 197–8, 229 Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) 170 deindustrialisation x, 29, 46, 52, 54, 59, 72–4, 218 Deng Xiaoping 27 Denmark 69–70, 136–7 desalination 135–6, 179 diesel 4, 20–1, 70, 76, 86, 109, 119, 121, 129, 132, 164, 165, 166, 174, 175, 178, 179, 181, 182, 185, 186, 191, 192, 196–7, 208, 217, 230 ‘dieselgate’ scandal 196–7 digitalisation 1, 8, 11, 13, 33, 92, 117, 136, 174, 175, 180, 206, 211, 215, 221, 228–9, 231 DONG 69 Drax 147, 151, 154, 218 economy, net zero 10–12, 81–159 delivering a 96–103 intergenerational equity and 96–7 markets and 103–5 net environmental gain see net environmental gain political ideologies and 98–101 polluter-pays principle see polluter-pays principle public goods, provision of see public goods, provision of technological change and 98 EDF 139, 218 Ehrlich, Paul 98 electricity 1–2, 4, 6, 11, 12, 13, 23, 31, 32, 49, 53, 61, 65, 66, 68, 70, 73, 77, 78, 79, 91, 92, 101, 102, 109, 117, 125, 127, 128, 129–30, 131–2, 134, 135, 136, 137, 139, 140, 141, 149, 158, 166, 168, 174, 178, 180, 182, 183, 228, 229, 231, 232, 234, 235 coal, getting out of 206–7 electric pollution and the carbon price 216–18 electric vehicles 4, 6, 13, 20, 23, 49, 61, 91, 92, 94, 121, 125, 128, 129–30, 131–2, 134, 141, 183–92, 193, 194, 197, 200, 201, 202, 206, 219, 228 equivalent firm power auctions and system operators 210–16 future of 206–25 gas, how to get out of 207–9 infrastructure, electric 185–90, 218–20 low-carbon options post-coal and gas 209–10 net gain and our consumption 222–5 R&D and next-generation renewables 220–2 renewable see renewables Energy Market Reform (EMR) 219 equivalent firm power (EFP) 212–16, 217, 220 ethanol 35, 71, 95, 197 eucalyptus trees xiv, 152 European Commission 60, 71, 72, 112 European Union (EU) xiv, 2, 7, 8, 9, 37, 42, 44, 46, 47, 117, 137, 165, 166, 197; baseline of 1990 and 51–2 Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) 76, 165 competition regime and customs union 56 deindustrialisation and 46, 52, 54, 59, 72–4 directives for 2030 66 Emissions Trading System (EU ETS) 71–2, 73, 79, 110–13, 117, 144, 208 importing carbon emissions 59 Internal Energy Market (IEM) 68, 71 Kyoto and 9, 51, 59, 66–7 Mercosur Agreement 44, 95 net zero target for 2050 66, 115, 143, 155, 167, 180 Paris and 54 Renewable Energy Directive 68–71, 73, 109 2020 targets signed into law 66 2020–20–20 targets 67, 69, 74 unilateralism and 59, 66–71, 80 Eurostar 133 externalities 104, 170, 180, 196 Extinction Rebellion 6 farmers 14, 26, 35, 36, 43, 71, 76, 86, 95, 102, 109, 110, 146–7, 164, 165, 166, 169, 170, 174, 175, 196, 197, 198 fertiliser 4, 6, 7, 26, 29, 35, 61, 73, 86, 87, 116, 117, 119, 163, 165, 169, 174, 175, 178, 179, 191, 194, 197 fibre/broadband networks 6, 11, 90, 92, 125, 126, 127–8, 130–1, 132–3, 135, 140–1, 201, 202, 205, 211, 214, 231, 232 financial crisis (2007/8) 1, 19, 69 first-mover advantage 75 First Utility 199 flooding 13, 77, 149, 152, 153, 159, 170, 233 food miles 167 food security 170–1 food waste 178, 180, 231 Forestry Commission xiv Formula One 186, 196 fossil fuels, golden age of 20–5 see also individual fossil fuel France 46, 47, 52, 56, 73, 78, 101, 113, 130, 136, 138 free-rider problem 39–40, 43, 62–4, 106, 119 fuel duty 121, 195–6 fuel efficiency 197 fuel prices 26, 112–13, 209 fuel use declaration 195 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster (2011) 52, 78 Fukuyama, Francis: The End of History and the Last Man 40–1 gardens 6, 43, 143, 156 gas, natural ix, 2, 5, 8, 20, 23, 24, 25, 26, 29, 31, 32, 36, 50, 52, 68, 69, 79, 102, 109, 117, 119, 129, 136, 137, 146, 147–8, 149, 183, 190, 193, 194, 207–9, 210, 211, 214, 216–17 G8 47 gene editing 172, 176, 231 general election (2019) 121 genetics 98, 172, 174–6, 231 geoengineering 177 geothermal power 137, 178 Germany 9, 30, 47, 52, 59, 60, 62, 66, 67, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 75, 77–80, 83, 91, 101, 112, 136, 137, 138, 144, 206, 208, 209 Energiewende (planned transition to a low-carbon, nuclear-free economy) 59, 69, 77–80, 112, 144, 208 Gilets Jaunes 101, 113 GMOs (genetically modified organisms) 176, 177 Great Northern Forest, Britain 151 Green and Prosperous Land (Helm) xiii, xiv, 165, 169, 234 greenbelt 173 greenhouse effect 17 green new deal 90, 102, 234 green parties/green votes 69, 77, 78 green QE (quantitative easing) 102–3 green walls 153, 231 greenwash 156 gross domestic product (GDP) xii, xv, 1, 25, 27, 29, 41, 57, 59, 73, 76, 83, 93, 98, 103, 133, 165, 207, 227, 229, 233 growth nodes 133 G7 47 G20 47 Haber-Bosch process 35, 163 Hamilton, Lewis 186 ‘hands-free’ fields 175 Harry, Prince 6 Heathrow 133, 134 hedgerow 76, 166, 167, 172 Helm Review (‘The Cost of Energy Review’) (2017) ix, 120, 141, 200, 210, 212, 215, 217, 220, 238 herbicide 163 home insulation 102 House of Lords 170 housing 101, 223–4 HS2 92, 125, 132–4, 138, 202 Hume, David 49 hydrogen 13, 49, 92, 125, 128, 135, 137, 183, 184, 190–2, 199, 200, 204, 206, 213, 228 hydro power 31, 35, 36, 50, 52–3, 70, 136, 137, 191 Iceland 137, 178 imports x–xi, xiii, 5, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 62, 68, 70, 117–18, 155, 167, 178, 173, 180, 196, 227 income effect 72, 111 income tax 121, 122, 232 India xiv, xv, 25, 30, 31, 38, 43, 44, 47, 48, 51, 54, 55, 57, 154, 229 individuals, net zero for 155–7 Indonesia 2, 35 indoor farming 87–8, 177–8, 180, 213 indoor pollutants 223, 232 Industrial Revolution 1, 18, 19, 25, 47, 116, 145 INEOS Grangemouth petrochemical plant xi information and communications technology (ICT) 117, 202, 231 infrastructures, low-carbon xiii, xiv, 11–12, 14, 28, 60, 62, 65, 66, 90, 91–4, 96, 105, 109, 123, 125–42, 143, 147, 151, 154, 159, 171, 184, 186, 187, 190, 199–200, 214, 218–20, 228, 230, 231–2, 234–5 centrality of infrastructure networks 128–30 electric 125–41, 218–20 making it happen 141–2 net zero national infrastructure plan 130–6 private markets and 125–8, 141–2 regional and global infrastructure plan 136–7 state intervention and 126, 127–8, 141–2 system operators and implementing the plans 138–41 inheritance tax 76, 165 insects 164, 177, 231 insulation 102, 224 Integrated Assessment Models 114 intellectual property (IP) 75 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 17–18, 47, 55, 57, 108, 172 internal combustion engine 13, 22, 181–2, 183, 184, 200, 221, 228 Internal Energy Market (IEM) 68, 71, 138 International Energy Agency (IEA) 25, 207 International Monetary Fund (IMF) 51 internet banking 131, 213 internet-of-things 128, 175 Iran 27, 42, 113, 137 Iraq 56, 192 Ireland 43, 157 Italy 137, 182 Japan 27, 28, 30, 52, 73, 78, 101, 185 Jevons Paradox 224 Johnson, Boris 89–90 Kant, Immanuel 104 Keynes, John Maynard 89, 102, 103, 105 Kyoto Protocol (1997) xii, 2, 7, 9, 13, 17–18, 37, 38, 39, 40–1, 47–8, 49, 51, 52–3, 59, 66–7, 119 laissez-faire 104, 138, 188 land use 35, 61, 95, 172, 237 LED (light-emitting diode) lighting 87, 178, 179, 180, 213 liquefied natural gas (LNG) 136, 183 lithium-ion battery 185 lobbying 10, 14, 33, 69, 71, 109, 110, 111–12, 115, 121, 157, 169, 170, 187, 197, 209, 223, 227, 228 location-specific taxes 194 maize 35, 165, 197 Malaysia 2, 229 Malthus, Thomas 98 Mao, Chairman 27, 42 meat xi, 65, 164, 177, 180, 232 Mekong River 2, 28, 179, 229 Mercosur Agreement 44, 95 Merkel, Angela 78 methane 4, 23, 84, 177, 178, 179, 216 microplastics 22 miracle solution 49–50, 55, 209 mobile phone 5, 125, 185 National Farmers’ Union (NFU) 110, 164, 165, 169, 170, 171 National Grid 139, 141, 189, 200, 211, 214, 219 nationalisations 101–2, 126–7 nationalism 41, 43, 55, 56, 138 nationally determined contributions (NDCs) 54–5 natural capital xiii, 14, 33–6, 51, 85, 86, 88, 90, 94, 97, 154, 158, 168, 171, 173–4, 236 Nature Fund 123, 169, 234 net environmental gain principle xiii, xiv, 10, 12, 62, 84, 94–6, 105, 143–59, 169, 172–4, 192, 201–3, 222–5 agriculture and 169, 172–4 carbon offsetting and see carbon offsetting electricity and 222–5 principle of 94–6, 143–4 sequestration and see sequestration transport and 192, 201–3 Netherlands 138 Network Rail 214 net zero agriculture and see agriculture defined x–xv, 3–14 economy 10–12, 81–159 see also economy, net zero electricity and see electricity transport and see individual method of transport 2025 or 2030 target 89 2050 target x, xi, 5, 59, 66, 74, 75, 115, 120, 135, 143, 155, 167, 169, 180, 184, 216, 217, 222, 226, 230, 231, 232 unilateralism and see unilateralism NHS 65 non-excludable 91, 93, 126, 170 non-rivalry 91, 93, 126, 170 North Korea 42 North Sea oil/gas 9, 40, 75, 97, 102, 137, 139, 147, 148, 193 Norway 130, 137, 191 nuclear power 5, 9, 12, 18, 23, 52, 60, 73, 77–9, 109, 125, 128, 129, 136, 140, 178, 194, 199, 206, 207, 208, 209–10, 212, 214, 216, 218, 219, 222, 228 Obama, Barack 48, 53, 54, 59 oceans 2, 14, 22, 33, 85, 86, 88, 148, 163, 231 offsetting see carbon offsetting offshore wind power 31, 69, 75–6, 208, 212, 219, 221 Ofgem 220 oil ix, 2, 20, 22–3, 25, 26, 27, 31, 32, 33, 36, 39, 40, 50, 67, 69, 86, 97, 117, 119, 129, 136, 137, 146, 147, 148–9, 150–1, 152, 181–3, 184, 185, 187, 189, 190, 192–4, 196, 197, 199, 206, 209, 210, 216–17, 229 OPEC 39, 40, 193 Orbán, Viktor 41, 42 organic food 61, 87, 178 Ørsted 70 palm oil 2, 5, 6, 35, 36, 66, 71, 167, 173, 197–8, 230 pandemic see Covid-19 Paris Climate Change Agreement (2015) xii, 2, 10, 13, 18, 30, 37, 38, 39, 48, 49, 54–5, 56, 57, 58, 66, 80, 105, 106, 118, 119, 227 peat bogs xiv, 2, 13, 14, 33, 35, 36, 43, 109, 146, 169, 179 pesticides 4, 26, 61, 163, 165, 169, 174, 178, 231 petrochemicals xi, 7, 8, 20, 22–3, 29, 73, 80, 86, 117, 166, 182 petrol 4, 86, 119, 121, 129, 185, 186, 187, 191, 192, 199 photosynthesis 34, 197 plastics 1, 22, 28, 35, 43, 66, 86, 87, 119, 143, 166, 184, 231 polluter-pays principle xiii, xv, 84–90 agriculture and 76, 168–70, 172, 173 carbon price and see carbon price/tax generalised across all sources of pollution 86 identifying polluters that should pay 86 importance of 10–11, 13, 61, 62, 65 intergenerational balance and 96–7 net environmental gain and 94 sequestration and see sequestration, carbon sustainable economy and 96–7, 105, 106 transport and 192–5, 198–9 see also individual type of pollution population growth 93, 97, 177, 178, 179, 232 privatisation 127, 140, 218–19, 220 property developers 94 public goods, provision of xiii, 10, 11–12, 62, 75, 84, 90–4, 96, 104, 105, 109, 122, 123, 126, 128, 141, 147, 151, 153, 159, 164, 168, 173–4, 180, 192, 199–200, 202, 218, 229, 230 agricultural 170–4, 180 low-carbon infrastructures see infrastructures, low-carbon research and development (R&D) see research and development (R&D) Putin, Vladimir 27, 41, 42, 89 railways 11, 13, 13, 87, 91, 92, 94, 125, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132–3, 138, 139, 156, 182, 183, 187, 202, 212, 214, 232 rainforest 2, 5, 34, 35, 36, 38, 44, 47, 55, 87, 95, 145, 149, 155, 173, 179–80, 197, 229 rationalism 40–1 Reagan, Ronald 103 red diesel 76, 109, 164, 165, 196 regulated asset base (RAB) 127, 141, 215, 220 remote working 128, 156, 201–2, 205 renewables ix, 6, 8, 9–10, 18, 19, 21, 26, 31–5, 36, 49, 50, 55, 61, 67, 72, 77, 79, 85, 86, 109, 110, 112, 123, 125, 128, 131, 135, 138, 140, 144, 149, 178, 188, 191, 194, 197, 199, 207, 209–10, 211, 212, 213, 214, 215, 216, 217, 219, 220–2, 224, 228 Chinese domination of market 9, 32, 73, 74, 77, 79 cost-competitiveness of 9–10, 49, 51, 61, 68 failure of, 1990-now 19, 31–3, 36 modern global renewable energy consumption measured in TWh per year 32 miracle solution and 49–51 Renewable Energy Directive 68–71, 73, 109 subsidies ix, 9, 10, 50, 68–9, 71, 79, 80 see also individual renewable energy source Renewables UK 110 research and development (R&D) xiv, 12, 13, 14, 62, 65, 66, 90, 93–4, 104, 109, 123, 165, 172, 192, 200, 218, 220–2, 223, 228, 234 reshoring businesses 8, 204 rivers 2, 22, 28, 86, 128, 152, 165, 169, 179, 214, 230 roads 11, 28, 45, 91, 92, 125, 129, 131–2, 140, 165, 182, 189, 194, 198, 202, 232 robotics 32, 175, 204, 206, 231 Rosneft 26 Royal Navy 183 Russia 26, 27, 30, 40, 42, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 50, 52, 55, 56, 192, 193 RWE 139, 218 Ryanair 156–7 rye grass 35 salmon 169, 177 Saudi Arabia 26, 33, 40, 42, 50, 137, 192, 193 Saudi Aramco 26, 50 seashells 34 sequestration, carbon xi, xiv, 12, 61, 66, 85, 90, 95, 143–59, 228, 229, 231, 232 agriculture and 12, 163, 166, 168, 169, 170, 171, 172, 173, 176–7, 179, 180 baseline definition and 146–7 biofuels and 35, 146, 217 carbon capture and storage (CCS) xiv, 12, 75–6, 95, 109, 146, 147–8, 149, 154, 159, 203–4, 207, 209, 222, 223 companies, net zero for 148–51 countries, offsetting for 151–5 electricity and 222, 223 gas and 207 individuals, net zero for xi, xiv, 155–7 markets, offsetting 157–9 natural capital destruction and 2, 19, 33–6, 44, 45, 51 natural sequestration xi, xiii, 2, 7, 12, 14, 33–6, 37, 45, 52, 66, 85, 90, 94–6, 105, 143–59, 163, 168, 171, 173, 176–7, 179, 180, 203, 206, 207, 222, 223 net gain principle and 143–4, 146, 149–50 offsetting principle and 143–5 peat bogs and see peat bogs principle of xi, xiii, 2, 7, 12–13 soils and see soils transport and 185, 190, 203 tree planting and see trees, planting/sequestration and types of 145–8 wetlands/coastal marshes and 146, 159, 233 shale gas 8, 208 Shell 27, 149, 199 shipping 8, 13, 22, 28, 36, 49, 114, 125, 137, 181, 182–3, 191, 194–5, 203–5, 217 Siberia 2, 46 smart appliances 128, 129, 132 smart charging 11, 13, 128, 129, 130, 139, 214, 219 soils xiii, 2, 5, 7, 12, 14, 33, 35, 36, 43, 55, 76, 109, 146, 149, 152, 156, 159, 163, 164, 165, 166, 168, 169, 171, 172, 175, 179, 203, 228 solar panels/solar photovoltaics (PV) 5, 6, 9, 12, 13, 21, 31, 32, 33, 49, 53, 68, 69, 71, 74, 79, 87, 91, 135, 136, 137, 178, 179, 188, 204, 207, 208, 209, 210, 211, 213, 214, 216, 217, 221, 222, 223, 224–5 Sony 185 Soviet Union 18, 40, 52, 67–8, 89 soya 95 Spain 69, 130, 137 sport utility vehicles (SUVs) 106, 121, 192 spruce xiv, 152, 170 standard of living xv, 1, 5, 8, 10, 11, 14, 229, 233 staycations 201 steel x–xi, 6, 7, 8, 26, 28, 29, 53, 66, 73, 80, 87, 116, 117, 118, 119, 171, 184, 194–5 Stern, Nicholas: The Economics of Climate Change 41, 63 subsidies ix, 9, 10, 14, 32, 50, 51, 52, 53, 69, 71, 76, 79, 80, 89, 102, 109, 110, 113, 116, 123, 140, 154, 164, 165, 166, 167, 169, 170, 172, 180, 193, 196, 198, 209, 215, 221, 222, 228, 230 sugar cane 35, 71, 95, 197, 198 sulphur pollution 22, 25, 28, 78, 191, 194, 197, 230 sustainable economic growth xv, 10, 12, 14, 61, 83, 92, 94, 97, 98, 105, 227, 233 Taiwan 42 taxation xii, 11, 62, 71, 72, 76, 80, 87, 89, 90, 91, 92, 97, 101, 102, 103, 106–24, 126, 127, 130, 133, 147, 150, 151–2, 153–4, 157, 159, 165, 169, 170, 192–6, 197, 198, 199, 203, 232, 234 technological change 98, 127, 141, 174–5, 221 Thatcher, Margaret 17 Thompson, Emma 6 3D printing 175, 204 Thunberg, Greta 6, 205 tidal shocks 159 top-down treaty frameworks 13, 38–57, 80, 110, 119 tourism/holidays 6, 22, 36, 88, 94, 107, 114, 128, 156, 201, 204–5 transport, reinventing 181–205 aviation 195, 201, 203–5 see also air transport batteries and charging networks 185–90 biofuels 196–8 electric alternative 183–5 hydrogen and fuel cells 190–2 innovation, R&D and new infrastructures 199–200 internal combustion engine 181–2 net gain and offsets (reducing travel versus buying out your pollution) 201–3 oil 183–4 polluter pays/carbon tax 192–6 shipping 203–5 urban regulation and planning 198–9 vehicle standards 196–8 see also individual type of transport Treasury, UK 120–2 trees, planting/sequestration and xi, xiii, xiv, 2, 7, 13, 14, 33, 34, 45, 76, 85, 94–6, 146, 148, 149–51, 152–3, 155, 156, 157, 158, 159, 168, 169, 172, 179, 203, 231 trophy project syndrome 133 Trump, Donald 2, 8, 41, 42, 48, 89, 99, 103, 121 25 Year Environment Plan xiii, 153, 170, 179–80 UK 47, 69 agriculture and 164, 166, 167, 173 carbon emissions (2015) 30 carbon price and 115, 120 Climate Change Act (2008) 66, 74–7 coal, phasing out of 24–5, 60–1, 77, 208 Committee on Climate Change (CCC) x–xi, 7, 74–6, 120, 164, 166, 169, 217, 235 deindustrialisation and 72–4 80 per cent carbon reduction target by 2050 74 electricity and 206, 208, 218, 219, 224 Helm Review (‘The Cost of Energy Review’) (2017) ix, 120, 141, 200, 210, 212, 215, 217, 220, 238 infrastructure 125, 132–3, 134, 137, 139–40 net zero passed into law (2019) 66 sequestration and 145, 150, 153, 154, 155, 156 transport and 195–6, 197, 198 unilateralism and 58–9, 60–1, 65, 66, 69, 72–7, 80 unilateralism xi, 8, 10, 11, 25, 58–80, 83, 105, 106, 119, 125, 143, 144, 155, 164, 167, 197, 203, 227 in Europe 66–80 incentive problem and 58–60 morality and 62–6 no regrets exemplars and/showcase examples of how decarbonisation can be achieved 60–2 place for 80 way forward and 80, 83 United Nations xi, xii, 6, 10, 17, 37, 38, 118 carbon cartel, ambition to create a 39–40, 43, 45, 46–7, 56 climate treaty processes xi, 6, 10, 13, 17–18, 36, 37, 38–57, 59, 80, 110, 118, 119, 204–5 see also individual treaty name Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 17–18, 36, 38, 59 miracle solution and 50–1 origins and philosophy of 41 Security Council 46, 47, 57 United States 8, 74, 139, 206 agriculture in 175, 176, 197 carbon emissions 8, 29, 30 China and 27–8, 42, 118 coal and 2, 24, 28, 29, 208 economic imperialism 45 energy independence 50 gas and 8, 20, 23, 24, 29, 50, 208 oil production 40, 50, 193 pollution since 1990 29 unilateralism and 58, 59, 74 UN climate treaty process and 38, 40–1, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 53, 54, 56 universal service obligations (USOs) 92, 126, 131, 202 utilitarianism 41, 63–4, 108, 110 VAT 117, 119–20, 121, 122, 232 Vesta 69 Volkswagen 196–7 water companies 76, 214, 230 water pollution/quality xiv, 12, 22, 61, 76, 152, 153, 165, 169, 170, 171, 172, 175, 177, 178, 179, 180, 232 Wen Jiabao 53, 59 wetlands 159, 233 wildflower meadow 164, 184 wind power 5, 9, 12, 21, 31, 32, 33, 49, 53, 68, 69–70, 71, 74, 75, 76, 78, 79, 91, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 178, 188, 191, 207, 208, 209, 210, 211, 212, 213, 214–15, 216, 217, 219, 221, 222 wood pellets 67, 217, 230 Woodland Trust 156, 158 World Bank 51 World Trade Organization (WTO) 52, 56, 118 World War I 183 World War II (1939–45) 78, 90, 92, 101, 106, 171 Xi Jinping 27, 41, 42 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS So much is now discussed, written and published about climate change that it is impossible to keep track of all the ideas and conversations that have influenced my understanding of the subject.

How to Work Without Losing Your Mind
by Cate Sevilla
Published 14 Jan 2021

You should also never feel that, if someone goes to your manager with some gossipy tittle-tattle, they will take it as gospel and put you in a position of having to defend yourself. Managing in a crisis As the coronavirus pandemic gathered pace, the businesses and companies impacted were sent very quickly into full-blown crisis mode across every aspect of their business. From ill members of staff to remote working to IT issues with everyone working remotely to furloughing or laying off staff and closing entire departments or completely shutting down – managers and those in leadership positions were very quickly forced to deal with issues and situations that most had never had to tackle before – and certainly not all at once, during something as intense and as threatening as a global pandemic and threatened economic collapse.

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Doing a thorough read-through of your company’s parental leave policies, and checking on your government’s website what you’re legally entitled to. If you need a more flexible working schedule and your current employer is against it, this might now be a deal-breaker for you in your current role. I know it’s daunting to switch jobs, but there are more progressive companies out there that do offer flexible or remote working, and job shares. (Again, not nearly enough, but they do exist.) Have you considered self-employment or going freelance? Would this provide you with the flexibility you need? Being open with your co-parent or partner about the mental load you’re carrying, and asking for help when you need it.

The Singularity Is Nearer: When We Merge with AI
by Ray Kurzweil
Published 25 Jun 2024

BACK TO NOTE REFERENCE 150 For more on this shift and its probable long-term impacts, see Rani Molla, “Office Work Will Never Be the Same,” Vox, May 21, 2020, https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/5/21/21234242/coronavirus-covid-19-remote-work-from-home-office-reopening; Gil Press, “The Future of Work Post-Covid-19,” Forbes, July 15, 2020, https://www.forbes.com/sites/gilpress/2020/07/15/the-future-of-work-post-covid-19/#3c9ea15e4baf; Nick Routley, “6 Charts That Show What Employers and Employees Really Think About Remote Working,” World Economic Forum, June 3, 2020, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/06/coronavirus-covid19-remote-working-office-employees-employers; Matthew Dey et al., “Ability to Work from Home: Evidence from Two Surveys and Implications for the Labor Market in the COVID-19 Pandemic,” Monthly Labor Review (US Bureau of Labor Statistics), June 2020, https://doi.org/10.21916/mlr.2020.14.

Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity
by Devon Price
Published 4 Apr 2022

Legal protections that expand access to short- and long-term disability leave at work would also improve quality of life for many disabled people, including Autistics who are at an elevated risk of extreme burnout. It would mean we’d experience less pressure to mask any pain or despair we are experiencing. Legally requiring employers to provide flextime and remote work options without proof of disability would also immensely benefit Autistic employees (both diagnosed and self-realized), and make work more accessible to parents, people with elder care responsibilities, and many others. In these and many other ways, accommodating the needs of Autistics would create a more forgiving world for everyone, in addition to freeing us from the obligation to mask.

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See anatomy of a mask outbursts, 54, 55, 66, 136, 260 outgoing Autistics, 67–72, 206 overexcitability, 10, 31, 60, 114, 125 overlapping conditions, 72–81 P panic attacks, 29, 130, 165 parallel play, 203 “passing,” 137, 186, 220, 253 people pleasing (friendliness), 17, 20, 42, 97, 104–5, 106, 112, 133–38, 193–94, 200 Piper, Reese, 175, 213–14, 224–25 Poehler, Amy, 165 police shootings, 65, 246–47 post-traumatic growth, 254–55 post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), 20, 25–26, 28–29, 31, 73–74, 101, 117–18, 140 Daan’s experience, 73–75 Prahlad, Anand, 49, 53, 65–66, 67 praise, 203, 204 prison reform, 246–47 processing styles, 23–25 productivity, 81–82, 85, 174, 175 professional education, 241–42 proprioceptive system, 26–27 prosopagnosia, 22 protecting other people, 157–59 public accessibility, 227, 234–38 public education, 241–44 purging, 111, 120, 121 Queen’s Gambit, The (TV series), 39, 116, 117 “quiet hands,” 101, 141 R racial disparities, 36–37, 61–62 racism, 61–63, 92, 197, 240, 241, 246–47 radical visibility, 183–90 daily challenges of, 189 Sky Cubacub’s experience, 183–84, 186–87 Rain Man (film), 19 r/AutismTranslated, 86, 141, 226 reading facial expressions, 26, 183, 206–7 Rebirth Garments, 183–84 reclaiming passions and special interests, 150–55 redemptive self, 254–56, 255 rediscovering values, 155–59 Regan, Ruti, 5, 143 rejection-sensitive dysphoria, 78–79 relationships. See Autistic relationships, cultivating remote work, 127, 175, 238 repetitive behaviors, 26–27, 33 Rick and Morty (TV series), 37, 133, 134 rigid rules, adherence to, 112, 129–33 Andrew’s experience, 129–30 warning signs of high-control groups, 132–33 risks, 28–29 Rock, Chris, 62, 67 Rose Marta, 168–70, 171, 173, 177–78 Rowling, J.

It Doesn't Have to Be Crazy at Work
by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
Published 1 Oct 2018

The important part isn’t really whether you can afford to pay salaries based on the top city in your industry or at the top 10 percent of the market, but that you keep salaries equal for equal work and seniority. This gives everyone at the company the freedom to pick where they want to live, and there’s no penalty for relocating to a cheaper cost-of-living area. We encourage remote work and have many employees who’ve lived all over the world while continuing to work for Basecamp. We don’t pay traditional bonuses at Basecamp, either, so our salaries are benchmarked against other companies’ salaries plus bonus packages. (We used to do bonuses many years ago, but we found that they were quickly treated as expected salary, anyway.

Rush Hour: How 500 Million Commuters Survive the Daily Journey to Work
by Iain Gately
Published 6 Nov 2014

According to a spokesperson, ‘we believe there are significant tangible and intangible benefits when employees are working under the same roof. We also recognize that every so often it’s important to be able to work remotely, and we allow for that flexibility.’ Google, meanwhile, seems not to want to encourage its employees to work from home. CFO Patrick Pichette knocked remote working on the head in a February 2013 speech: ‘The surprising question we get is: “How many people telecommute at Google?” And our answer is: “As few as possible”’. In Pichette’s opinion, employees would both stunt their creativity and miss the wonder of sharing if they stayed at home: ‘There is something magical about spending the time together, about noodling on ideas… These are [the] magical moments that we think at Google are immensely important in the development of your company, of your own personal development and [of] building much stronger communities.’

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CHAPTER XIV All Change Democratic nations care but little for what has been, but are haunted by visions of what will be; in this direction, their unbounded imagination grows and dilates beyond all measure. Alexis de Tocqueville Democracy in America, 1835 If even the tech industry, which has made remote working a possibility instead of a dream, is insisting its workers are physically present on corporate premises, it seems there is little chance of commuting vanishing in the near or distant future. Even in the absence of compulsion, there are good reasons to expect it to persist. It empowers people to separate their work and home lives, and both require face time to function.

Pandemic, Inc.: Chasing the Capitalists and Thieves Who Got Rich While We Got Sick
by J. David McSwane
Published 11 Apr 2022

Nancy Messonnier, the director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, housed under the CDC. She warned that many Americans would become sick and that “disruption to everyday life may be severe.” “We expect we will see community spread in this country,” she said. On warnings from a top CDC official that schools might close and businesses might move to remote work, the Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 879 points and the S&P 500 dropped 3 percent. In four trading days, U.S. stocks on the whole lost some $2.1 trillion in value. It was now official: The virus was the biggest economic and political challenge Trump would ever face. The next day, February 26, Trump announced he was replacing HHS secretary Azar with Vice President Mike Pence as the head of the White House Coronavirus Task Force.

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When his folks arrived, we greeted and boarded the jet as members of Stewart’s extended family watched and said goodbye from behind a chain-link fence. “I paid for it!” Stewart announced to the cabin. “Eat all the snacks.” (Narrator voice: He didn’t pay for it.) Also with us was Dawn Lockhart, Stewart’s childhood friend and remote-working human resources director. “This is the first time I’ve worn heels and a skirt in probably three years,” Lockhart said. “Most days I work at home in my sweatpants.” She, like me, had been told by Stewart that everyone on board would have access to an N95 mask, but there were none. So I sat about as far away from the other guests as I could, nearing the cockpit.

Invention: A Life
by James Dyson
Published 6 Sep 2021

Where Western economies contracted by 5.8 percent between December 2019 and December 2020, the figure for Asia was just 1.7 percent and, according to the IMF (International Monetary Fund), these are expected to grow by an average 5.9 percent by mid-decade, well above what can be expected of Western countries. It was not an easy time to be in business. Some businesses seem to have resigned themselves to remote working. We have found working remotely deeply unsatisfactory as we make physical things that exist in a matter-of-fact world. These require physical interaction and specialist equipment, so lockdown has brought significant challenges and delays to some of our projects. The years of training, research, design, and testing behind all our products just cannot be done from home; they require labs and equipment, and progress slows without access to these or without face-to-face discussion and interaction between engineers looking at prototypes.

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Freedom shop, Kensington 27 Muranka, Tony 114 Musk, Elon 226 Myers, Bernard 26 Nahlin (1930s yacht) 293 NASA 67 Nasmyth, James 262 National Grid 249, 251, 257, 258 National Health Service 262 National Union of Students 274 Needham, Richard 118 Newcomen engine 123 Nicholas Hare Architects 281 Nocton estate 245–53, 254 Norio Ohga 54 Norman, Torquil 33 Notre-Dame du Raincy 232 O’Connor, Jim 27 Ofgem 251 oil crisis 65 oleo struts 41 Omni-glide, Dyson 194 Op Art 20 Orion Orchestra 141 Osborne, George 228, 271, 284 paddle wheel 35 Page, Katie 183 Page, Mike 107–8 PAM (Philippines Advanced Manufacturing) 197 paper towels 160, 162 Paris Motor Show (1955) 55 Paris October fashion event (2002), JD designs show for Issey Miyake 139–41, 140 Paris store, Dyson 174, 184–85 Patent Office 91, 102 patent system Ballbarrow, JD losses patent 78–79 cyclonic vacuum and 89–90, 91, 100–1, 101, 102–4, 105 Digital Slim vacuum cleaners and 158–59 Dyson Digital Motor and 156 inventors keeping hold of, JD on importance of 53, 57, 78, 79 renewal fees 102, 159 system overhaul 158–59 particle counter, aerodynamic 210 Patten, Chris 95, 274 Paxton, Joseph 257, 262 Péchot, Prosper 246 PEEK (polyester ether ketone) 150 Perret, Auguste and Gustave 232 Peter Jones 117, 118 Peugeot 55 Philippines 125, 149, 190, 193, 195, 196, 197, 281 Philip, Prince 283 Phillips, Andrew 70, 79 Phillips, Derek 137, 138, 186 Phillips Plastics 109, 110–11 Pike, Jeff 97 Pink Floyd 27 plagiarism 78, 158–59, 193 planning permission 32, 58, 120, 189, 225, 269, 311 Planté, Gaston 213 pollution 131, 165, 177, 193–94, 203, 210–11, 226 Porsche, Ferdinand 42, 255 Power Jets 57 Preece, Cardew and Rider 200 PricewaterhouseCoopers 109 Prime Minister’s Business Advisory Group 273 Prior Art 159 private company, Dyson as 79–80, 292 Prototypes Ltd. 90 Pure Hot + Cool, Dyson 165, 166 Purser, Toby 142 Race Against Dementia 288 Raleigh 53 Range Rover 67, 216, 217, 223 Ransome, Arthur: Swallows and Amazons 9, 16 Raspberry Pi microcomputer 142 recruitment, Dyson Brexit and 203–4 Dyson Institute and 298–99 Malaysia and Singapore 189–90, 191, 196, 225 Malmesbury factory and 122, 124, 182 Modern Languages graduates 183–84 motor and motor drive experts 148, 150 Peter Gammack and Simeon Jupp 98–99 problems with 182, 225 RCA Design Engineering course and 283 recruitment agencies and 185 Reliance Controls 30 remote working 240 Renault 5 67, 94 Rennie, John 247 Richardson, Tony 33 Rickaby, Caroline 18 Riley, Bridget 20 Rizzuto, Lee 100 “Roadie” boxes 268 Robb, Douglas 290 Roberts, James 288 Roberts, Tommy 27 Robinson, Derek 65 robotics 179, 201, 228, 241, 243, 257, 259, 261, 265, 274, 290 DC06 vacuum cleaner 135, 175, 176–78 factory production lines and 196–97 360 Eye robot vacuum cleaner 176–77, 176, 178 360 Heurist robot vacuum 177 Roche, David 143 Rogers, Richard 26, 30, 120, 263 Rolls-Royce 29, 30, 56–58, 122, 151, 233, 282 Aero Engines 122 Merlin piston engine 56 Nenes 58 RB.23 Welland 56 Ronald Ward and Partners 32 Rootes Group 267 rotational, or blow-molding 70 Rotork 64, 67, 184, 268 JD takes job at 32–34, 310 licenses Dyson vacuum cleaner 89–90, 95 Sea Truck 33–36, 37–63, 47, 48, 49, 62, 72, 90–92, 120, 123, 125, 202, 303 Wheel Boat and 35, 90–2 Roundhouse, Chalk Farm 33 Rover 57 Royal Academy 28 Royal Air Force (RAF) 7, 9, 56–57, 58, 72, 121, 122, 125, 228, 229, 230, 232, 233 Royal College of Art (RCA) 2, 14, 17, 98–99, 120, 127, 262, 266, 281, 282–83, 304 James Dyson Building 283 JD as Provost 28, 283 JD attends 21, 25–36, 37, 38, 46, 76, 74, 283, 310 Innovation RCA Board 283–84 Royal Fine Art Commission 230 Royal Navy 48 Royal Society 54 Royal Yacht Britannia 48 rubber suspension 50–52, 54 Rubinstein, Leopold 24 Rumbelows 113, 115 Rutter, Mike 89 Saab 50, 233 Safdie, Moshe 277 Sakti3 215 Sason, Sixten 50, 233 Saturday Night Live 188 Sausmarez, Maurice de 20–21, 25 Sayer, Malcolm 224 Scanning Electron Microscope and Hair Mapping Analysis 193 Scarfe, Gerald 17 Schrader valve 68, 70 Science Museum 262, 264, 282 Scott, Ridley 27 Scottish Hydro 116 Scottish Power 116 Sea Truck, Rotork 47, 48, 49, 50, 60, 61, 63, 125, 303 JD and sales of 47–50, 70, 72, 91, 120, 202, 303 JD asked to engineer 33–36, 37–38, 46–47, 123–24 origins of 33–36 Wheelboat and 90–91 Sears 98 Sebo 116–18 Second Law of Thermodynamics 26 Second World War (1939–45) 6, 8, 9, 13, 21, 27, 40, 41, 42, 52, 58, 59, 65, 73, 121, 191, 199, 229, 230, 252, 262, 263, 282, 293 Sedgeley, Peter 20 seed drill 248 semi-anechoic chambers 168, 170, 195 Shiffer, Isis 288 Siemens 89, 282 Silver Seiko Ltd 96–97 Singapore 39, 51, 125, 149, 170, 177, 179, 190–2, 207, 215, 224–25, 234, 235, 278, 281 Alexandra Technopark, Dyson premises at 196–98 Dyson global headquarters move to 198–201, 200–1 SAM (Singapore Advanced Manufacturing) 197 Singapore Technology Centre 197–98 St James Power Station campus 125, 199–201, 200–1 vacuum cleaner production, Dyson moves to 188–92, 194–95 Smith, Paul 97, 300 Smith’s Crisps 246–47 Snow, C.

Reactive Messaging Patterns With the Actor Model: Applications and Integration in Scala and Akka
by Vaughn Vernon
Published 16 Aug 2015

That is, the RemoteActorRefProvider must understand whether an actor is requested on the local system or a remote system and create an appropriate ActorRef for each. Thus, internally there is both a LocalActorRef and a RemoteActorRef, but you only need to know about and use the ActorRef abstraction. With this basic understanding of how remoting works, let’s consider two ways to use remoting. • Remote creation: An actor on your local system creates a child actor on a remote system, as illustrated in Figure 2.3. It seems to me that the best mind-set to have with this approach is that of work offloading. On the local system your actor knows what work must be done, but it chooses not to create a child actor locally to do the work.

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First, you don’t want to create many, many actors under /remote. That could cause scalability problems because scanning a lot of collection elements can be costly. Second, perhaps the best kind of actor to remotely create is a kind of work supervisor, such as you have with riskManager1. Design the remote work supervisor, again like riskManager1, to create any number of child actors local to itself. The work supervisor is able to rapidly delegate work to its worker children. Then when the remote parent, as in riskWorkManager, stops its remote child, as in riskManager1, then all the children (grandchildren of riskWorkManager) are also stopped.

Modern Vim: Craft Your Development Environment With Vim 8 and Neovim
by Drew Neil
Published 2 May 2018

You can specify flags to make nvr open a file in another window or tab page, as this table summarizes: CommandEffect nvr <file> Open file in the current window nvr -l <file> Open file in the last active window nvr -o <file> [<file> ...] Open file(s) via :split nvr -O <file> [<file> ...] Open file(s) via :vsplit nvr -p <file> [<file> ...] Open file(s) via :tabedit Using a Shell Alias to Prevent Accidental Nesting Now that you know how neovim-remote works, you’re going to start using it all the time, right? But first you have to train your fingers to type nvr. If you accidentally type nvim, next thing you know you’ll be looking up StackOverflow to find out how to quit a nested Neovim. You could set up a simple alias like this: terminal/alias-nvim-echo.sh ​ ​if​ [ -n ​"​$NVIM_LISTEN_ADDRESS​"​ ]; ​then​ ​ ​ ​alias nvim=​'echo "No nesting!"'​ ​ ​

Inventor of the Future: The Visionary Life of Buckminster Fuller
by Alec Nevala-Lee
Published 1 Aug 2022

More recently, the venture capitalist Paul Graham defined it as “the increasing tendency of physical machinery to be replaced by what we would now call software,” noting that phones and tablets “have effectively drilled a hole that will allow ephemeralization to flow into a lot of new areas.” The same trend can be seen in cloud computing, the invention of the blockchain, and the inexorable integration of technology into everyday life. Before they became part of our collective future, Fuller independently arrived at the principles of online education, remote working, and universal access to data, which he developed without any computers at all. On a more pragmatic level, Fuller used ephemeralization to sustain his virtual company, which he ran for years as a perpetual start-up. He made most of his money from lecturing, and, as the original digital nomad, he minimized his physical needs.

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He hoped that clothes could be designed to eliminate “ironing drudgery,” which later led John Marquand, his cousin, to express amusement toward his ideas: “The trouble is the shirts never come out pressed.” A generator and sewage tank would allow the house to be located off the utility grid, with telecommunications equipment for what we now call remote working and education. Fuller wrote that this decentralized approach would revolutionize the housing industry itself, which would use calculating machines to route orders between departments: “The operator of all this may be anywhere in the world.” Fuller was largely silent on cost, but he combined ideology and engineering in a memorable aphorism: “Philosophy to be effective must be mechanically applied.”

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The greatest test of Fuller’s philosophy was the coronavirus pandemic, which initially seemed like a definitive moment of emergence through emergency. Fuller blamed his daughter’s death, which changed his life, on the conditions that contributed to the Spanish flu, and his views on decentralization, efficient manufacturing, online education, and remote working are more relevant now than ever. He advocated replacing doorknobs with sensors to reduce contact with germs; hoped to eliminate “seventy percent of local commuting” by the eighties; and produced ideas of immense value for the challenge of building a more dispersed and flexible society. At the same time, the ephemeralization of lean manufacturing damaged supply chains and caused shortfalls of essential materials, and in the United States, the pandemic was politicized at once.

Vagrant: Up and Running
by Mitchell Hashimoto
Published 29 May 2013

It is also possible to mimic much more advanced production environments, since the remote machines can be much more powerful than a typical development machine. The disadvantage here is that this approach requires an Internet connection, and it can have a much higher financial cost associated with it. If your organization is at the point where they have enough automation to support this sort of remote work, it is generally quite easy to make the switch to Vagrant, if possible. Setting Up Vagrant After learning about Vagrant, what it can do, the benefits it has to offer, and a small history behind it, it’s time to actually install it so we can get up and running with our first virtual machine!

Mastering Ansible
by Jesse Keating

The plugin, among other things, will render the template locally before copying the content to the remote host. Because actions have to happen locally, the work is done by an action plugin. Another action plugin we should be familiar with is the debug plugin, which we've used heavily in this book to print content. Creating a custom action plugin is useful when trying to accomplish both local work and remote work in the same task. [ 198 ] Chapter 8 Distributing plugins Much like distributing custom modules, there are standard places to store custom plugins alongside playbooks that expect to use plugins. The default locations for plugins are the locations that are shipped with the Ansible code install, subdirectories within ~/.ansible/plugins/, and subdirectories of the project root (the place where the top-level playbook is stored).

Shutdown: How COVID Shook the World's Economy
by Adam Tooze
Published 15 Nov 2021

In the UK, the crisis exposed the fact that 9 percent of children did not have a computer, laptop, or tablet at home.14 According to UNICEF, more than two-thirds of children worldwide were without access to home internet connections—830 million young people.15 In India, the IT and outsourcing industry struggled to adjust. Employees often lacked home internet connections, and tight security rules demanded by Western clients limited remote working. High-end software developers set up secure connections for their staff. The business process outsourcing (BPO) industry with its 1.3 million workers resorted to arguing that their operations belonged to the essential financial service industry and were thus exempt from the lockdown.16 Western clients, facing an avalanche of complaints about long wait times, were only too happy to endorse the claim.

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See also travel restrictions and slowdowns Quito, Ecuador, 167 racial divisions and conflict, 29, 167, 216–17, 226–27 Ramaphosa, Cyril, 12, 252, 253–54, 260–61 Reagan, Ronald, 15, 20 Re David, Francesca, 86 refugee crises, 2, 185. See also migration and mobility Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), 207–8, 209, 296 remittances, 103, 161, 251 remote work, 98–99, 117 Renzi, Matteo, 284 repo market (repurchase market), 114–17, 121–22, 148, 165, 179 Republican Party, 20–21, 89, 219, 221–22, 225–27, 229, 269–70, 290, 299 Reserve Bank of Australia, 126 retail industry, 101 Rieder, Rick, 124 Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 86–87 Romania, 104 Roosevelt, Franklin Delano, 20 Ross, Wilbur, 68 Rotary International, 32, 33 Russia: arms sales to Turkey, 267; and Chinese pandemic aid, 197; and development lending programs, 264; and early responses to pandemic, 11, 82–83; and emerging market debt crises, 159, 163, 165; financial crisis of 1998, 156; and lessons of 2020, 295; oil and gas resources, 18; and oil price war, 79–80; and vaccine development, 247–49; and WHO funding, 33 Ryan, Mike, 69 Sagasti, Francisco, 248 Salvini, Matteo, 285 Sanders, Bernie, 11, 21, 146, 201, 219, 224, 227, 270–71, 273, 284, 288, 291, 299 SARS-CoV-2 virus: characterization of, 4; “flattening the curve” efforts, 41–42, 75, 233, 250; historical perspective on, 27; infectivity of SARS-CoV-2, 51; mortality rates, 28, 36–37, 37–41, 169, 171; mutation/variants, 17, 44–46, 250, 266, 285; and second wave of pandemic, 223, 292; and social distancing measures, 10, 43–44, 45, 74–75, 80, 83–85, 89, 96, 107, 220, 233, 289 SARS epidemic (2003), 3–4, 34, 46, 52–53, 56, 62, 66–67, 238 Saudi Arabia, 33, 71, 79–80, 267, 295 Schäuble, Wolfgang, 134 Schnabel, Isabel, 180 Scholz, Olaf, 134, 185 Schumer, Chuck, 12, 272 Secondary Market Corporate Credit Facility (SMCCF), 127 semiconductor industry, 211–12 September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, 46 Serum Institute, 237, 246, 251 service sector, 100–101 sex workers, 98 Shanghai, 57, 59–60, 274 Shanghai Accord, 291 Shanghai Stock Exchange, 55 Shingrix vaccine, 236 shipping industry, 106, 274 short-time working, 103–4, 137 Siberia, 189 Singapore, 206 Sino-American relations, 50 Sinopharm, 248 Sinovac, 248–49 smallpox, 30 Snyder, Timothy, 228 social contract, 11, 16, 131, 137, 141, 149–50 Social Democratic Party of Germany, 184–85 social distancing, 10, 43–45, 74–75, 80, 83–85, 89, 96, 107, 220, 233, 289 social safety net, 20, 135–36, 298 Solomon, David, 228 Songwe, Vera, 261, 262 Sonnefeld, Jeffrey, 228 South Africa: budget consolidation, 268; and debt relief programs, 251, 266; and early responses to pandemic, 88; and emerging market debt crises, 157–58, 166; and fiscal responses to pandemic, 132; and global vaccine rollout, 242, 243–44, 245; safari industry shutdown, 102; and scope of 2020 challenges, 12; and spread of pandemic, 233; and virus variants, 250 South African Reserve Bank, 266 South Asia, 103 South China Sea, 18, 206 South Korea: and China’s growing influence, 205; and climate agenda, 194; and early responses to pandemic, 66, 71, 73–74, 74–75, 78, 90; and emerging market debt crises, 165; and financial market turmoil, 125; and fiscal responses to pandemic, 133, 140; and global market stabilization efforts, 122; and global spread of Covid, 80; and history of epidemic diseases, 47; and testing technology, 74, 75; and Trump’s pandemic rhetoric, 77; and WHO funding, 33 Soviet Union, 30.

Startupland: How Three Guys Risked Everything to Turn an Idea Into a Global Business
by Mikkel Svane and Carlye Adler
Published 13 Nov 2014

And for the engineering team, that quickly turned into “Working from Home Wednesdays.” For some it works well. For some it just becomes an excuse to go out drinking on Tuesday nights. We have people in our organization who are great at working from home. And we have some who are great at working remotely. Working from home is really hard, especially when you have a family. It takes a lot of self-discipline and focus. Some people are good at it. Some aren’t. If you want to be good at it, you need to: • Have a proper home office that both you and your family consider more “office” than “home.” • Let go of the fact that the garage needs to be cleaned up, even though you look at it all day.

How to Diagnose and Fix Everything Electronic
by Michael Geier
Published 6 Jan 2011

You just might find the spot where the signal disappears and zero in on the bad component. Your Wish Is Not My Command Let’s take a case and work through it without a diagram. This will be a nice little LCD TV that refuses to respond to its remote control. It functions fine with the front-panel buttons, but the remote does nothing. Is the remote working? How can we tell? If only we could see infrared light! Got a camcorder or a digital camera? Those can see infrared. Even though they have filters to block it, some IR light gets through. Point the remote at the lens and hit one of the buttons while looking at the camera’s display screen. If you see a flashing Chapter 8 Roadmaps and Street Signs: Diagrams 167 light, the remote is working.

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Yes, theoretically, but I’ve never seen it happen, except in the case of a universal remote set up to operate the wrong device. That’s user error, not a repair problem. If the remote’s IR LED lights up when you press a button and stops when you let go, you can assume it is working properly. In this case, the remote works. So, why can’t the TV see it? Something in its remote receiver circuitry is out, and we’re going to hunt that problem down. Naturally, this newer product has no available schematic, so we’re on our own. The first thing to find is the photodetector that picks up the remote’s signal. Most products use a prefab remote receiver module containing a photodetector and a preamp.

Playing With FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early): How Far Would You Go for Financial Freedom?
by Scott Rieckens and Mr. Money Mustache
Published 1 Jan 2019

That sounded more like the people I had been reading about: FIRE converts who lived in low-cost rural areas and smaller Midwest towns. It made sense: Career opportunity was one of the biggest benefits of living in a larger city, and once someone reached financial independence, they wouldn’t need that benefit. Plus, the prevalence of remote work opportunities means it’s never been easier to earn a big-city salary while living in a cheaper location. I sent Taylor a link to an article about the cities with the lowest cost of living in the country. “Anything look good?” I asked her. No reply. Instead, Taylor sent me links to rundown apartments in California for $400,000, and I replied with links to beautiful modern $400,000 homes in other cities.

The Age of AI: And Our Human Future
by Henry A Kissinger , Eric Schmidt and Daniel Huttenlocher
Published 2 Nov 2021

And, as previously noted, individuals have come to trust certain AI-driven network platforms with information that they would hesitate to show to a friend or the government—such as comprehensive records of where they have gone, what they did (and with whom), and what they searched for and viewed. The dynamic enabled by access to such personal data puts network platforms, their operators, and the AI they employ in newfound positions of social and political influence. Particularly during a pandemic-influenced era of social distancing and remote work, societies have come to rely on some AI-enabled network platforms as a kind of essential resource and social glue—a facilitator of expression, commerce, food delivery, and transportation. These changes have unfolded at a scale and speed that, thus far, have outpaced a broader understanding and consensus about the roles of these network platforms in society and on the international stage.

Let's Explore Diabetes With Owls
by David Sedaris
Published 22 Apr 2013

Maybe, though, that’s just me being a cultural elitist, assuming that his life must go from bad to worse. Isn’t it just as likely that he got promoted or, better still, that he left the call center for greener pastures? That’s it, I tell myself. Once he settles into the new job and moves into that house he’s been eyeing, after his maid has left for the day and he’s figured out which remote works the television and which one is for the DVD player, he’s going to need someone to relate to. Then he’ll dig up my number, reach for his cell phone, and, by God, call me. Loggerheads The thing about Hawaii, at least the part that is geared toward tourists, is that it’s exactly what it promises to be.

The Purpose Economy: How Your Desire for Impact, Personal Growth and Community Is Changing the World
by Aaron Hurst
Published 31 Aug 2013

A sense that after they have done their work, be it a project, a job, or a career, the world is different in a way that is meaningful to them. Mastery. A deepening of skills, strengths, and talents that they feel help define them and their identity. This includes the increasing responsibility that comes with expertise and experience. Freedom. They want to get paid what they are worth, but they value things like remote work, flexible hours, and great benefits more than the actual size of their paycheck. Nathaniel saw that the economic landscape of the last decade has led to an ongoing state of uncertainty within established organizations as well as start-ups, dimming the prospects of long-term job security. As careers continue to fragment, jobs are more often viewed as stepping stones along a much longer career “journey,” which also explains the shift in priorities.

The Gig Economy: The Complete Guide to Getting Better Work, Taking More Time Off, and Financing the Life You Want
by Diane Mulcahy
Published 8 Nov 2016

Even if a Maker’s Schedule would be a better fit for the work that you do, it can be difficult to implement if you work full-time for a company. Source: medium.com/@DanielleMorrill/warming-up-to-the-manager-s-schedule-e3ec18c7408e#.mkhds7o74 (Used with permission) Most companies are incredibly poor stewards of their time. They obsessively track and limit employee hours out of the office—vacation time, paid time off, and even remote work time—yet once the employee is physically in the office there are virtually no cost controls, limits, or oversights to manage employee time. Corporate time sucks like email, conference calls, and meetings aren’t monitored or tracked (despite the availability of technology to do so), so they freely multiply and expand to fill the vacuum of the workday.

Free to Focus: A Total Productivity System to Achieve More by Doing Less
by Michael Hyatt
Published 8 Apr 2019

Instant Messaging Apps Invade the Workplace,” ReportLinker, June 8, 2017, https://www.reportlinker.com/insight/instant-messaging-apps-invade-workplace.html. 4. I first started thinking about the distinctions between instant and delayed communication in 2017 when noticing the negative effect of instant communication on my own team. See Allan Christensen, “How Doist Makes Remote Work Happen,” ToDoist Blog, May 25, 2017, https://blog.todoist.com/2017/05/25/how-doist-works-remote; Amir Salihefendic, “Why We’re Betting Against Real-Time Team Messaging,” Doist, June 13, 2017, https://blog.doist.com/why-were-betting-against-real-time-team-messaging-521804a3da09; and Aleksandra Smelianska, “Asynchronous Communication for Remote Teams,” YouTeam.io, https://youteam.io/blog/asynchronous-communication-for-remote-teams. 5.

Clean Agile: Back to Basics
by Robert C. Martin
Published 13 Oct 2019

See also Simple Design Circle of Life practices, 34 expectation of continuous improvement, 50 expectation of inexpensive adaptability, 50 expectation of stable productivity, 50 overview of, 123–124 Red/Green/Refactor cycle, 124–125 remedy for shipping bad code, 45 Software Craftsmanship practices, 176, 179–180 Refactoring (Fowler), 123, 183 Regression tests, 92 Releases. See also Small Releases Agile hangover and, 169 defined, 87 expectation mismatch, 171 Remote work, 95–96 Repository tools, for Agile developers, 148 Responsibility for Acceptance Tests, 93 developer bill of rights, 60–61 expectation of team sharing, 54 Return on investment (ROI), estimating stories, 71–72 Revision Control System (RCS), 86 Royce, Winston, 5–6 Runaway Process Inflation, 22 RUP (Rational Unified Process), 2, 168 S Scalability, of Agile, 160 SCCS (Source Code Control System), 85–86 Schedules changes to, 28 impact of changing quality, 29–30 impact of changing scope, 30–31 impact of staff addition, 28–29 Schwaber, Ken, 8, 11 Scientific Management, 4, 6–7 Scope, changing to meet schedules, 30–31 Scripts, core tools for Agile developers, 148 Scrum Agile synonymous with, 172 comparing ideology with methodology, 174 growing the Agile adaptation, 163 history of Agile, 8 Product Owner, 94 representatives at Snowbird meeting, 11 Scrum Master as coach, 143 Scrum Master certification, 144 selecting Agile methods, 136 Sharon, Yonat, 8 Shirt Sizes approach, estimating stories, 76 Simple Design Circle of Life practices, 34 expectation of continuous improvement, 50 expectation of inexpensive adaptability, 50 expectation of stable productivity, 50 refactoring and, 125 remedy for shipping bad code, 45 rules of (Beck), 125–126 Software Craftsmanship practices, 176, 179–180 SOLID principles, 165 weight of design and, 127 Simplicity, Agile values, 135–136 Sleep, Sustainable Pace and, 104 Small, INVEST guidelines for stories, 75 Small Releases Circle of Life practices, 33 disks and SCCS in source code control, 85–86 driving team to shorter and shorter release cycles, 87 Git and, 87 overview of, 82–83 SOLID principles, 164 source code control, 83–84 subversion in source code control, 86 tapes in source code control, 85 Smalltalk, 8 Snowbird meeting goal of, 2 healing divide between business and development, 96 overview of, 10–13 post-Snowbird, 13–14 starting the Agile momentum, 183 Software Craftsmanship Agile and, 181 conclusion/summary, 182 discussing practices, 177–178 focusing on value and not practice, 176–177 ideology vs. methodology, 174–175 impact on companies, 180–181 impact on individuals, 178–179 impact on industry, 179–180 overview of, 173–174 practices, 175–176 Software development/project management Agile addressing problems of small teams, 146–147 Agile as religion, 189 Agile promising fast delivery, 168–169 Agile use, 187 Analysis Phase of Waterfall approach, 19–20 charts for data presentation, 15–18 comparing Agile with Waterfall approach, 23–24 comparing Agile with XP, 180 dates frozen while requirements change, 18 Death March Phase of Waterfall approach, 22 dependence of contemporary society on, 39–42 Design Phase of Waterfall approach, 20–21 Design Phase of waterfall approach, 19–20 Implementation Phase of Waterfall approach, 21–22 Iron Cross of, 15, 27 The Meeting beginning Waterfall approach, 18–19 overview of, 14 potential dangers, 42–43 SOLID principles overview of, 164 Software Craftsmanship practices, 176, 179–180 Source code control disks and SCCS in, 85–86 Git for, 87 history of, 83–84 subversion in, 86 tapes in, 85 Source Code Control System (SCCS), 85–86 SpecFlow, automated test tools, 89–90 Specialization, Collective Ownership and, 105 Specification, as tests, 88 Speed.

Generations: The Real Differences Between Gen Z, Millennials, Gen X, Boomers, and Silents—and What They Mean for America's Future
by Jean M. Twenge
Published 25 Apr 2023

The Boomer dominance of politics and business persisted longer than usual due to the slow-life strategy and technology facilitating healthier aging. The 2020s are clearly the decade when that changes. Generational and cultural changes point to seven trends that will shape business and investing in the coming years. 1. Remote work. For all of its challenges, the COVID-19 pandemic introduced many Americans to the advantages of ditching their commutes. Gen X’ers and Millennials with children appreciated the greater flexibility and family time, and Gen Z—used to the convenience of doing everything online—adapted easily. It appears that the work-from-home trend is here to stay.

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This also has implications for sick days and flexibility—Gen Z expects to be able to make their own choices about whether they feel well enough, or safe enough, to go to work. The days when in-person attendance can be required no matter what, with penalties for not showing up, may be gone. Managers will increasingly be balancing the need for sick leave with the need for employees to be present. In office jobs this can be solved with remote work in some cases, but in service sector, manufacturing, and health care jobs the solutions are not as clear. The shift toward working at home will have implications for investing and city planning as well. Remote areas will need better cell and broadband service as people can live and work far away from city centers—if there’s solid internet access.

Think Like an Engineer: Use Systematic Thinking to Solve Everyday Challenges & Unlock the Inherent Values in Them
by Mushtak Al-Atabi
Published 26 Aug 2014

Stakeholder’s Potential for Support/Threat to an Organisation Stakeholders can also be scored based on their power, proximity and urgency. The stakeholders can be ranked based on the total score, the higher the score the higher the importance of a stakeholder. Power 1: Cannot cause much change. 5: Has the power to stop the project or activity. Proximity 1: Remotely working with the project or activity. 5: Directly working with the project or activity. Urgency 1: Little action outside the routine is required. 5: Action needs to be taken immediately. Stakeholders Engagement After classifying the stakeholders based on their importance and whether they are supportive, non-supportive, marginal or mixed-blessing, an engagement strategy can be drawn out.

Team Topologies: Organizing Business and Technology Teams for Fast Flow
by Matthew Skelton and Manuel Pais
Published 16 Sep 2019

We bring teams together for cross-tribe learning by holding regular guild learning sessions and evening meetups. The virtual environment is increasingly important as many organizations adopt a remote-first policy. The virtual environment comprises digital spaces such as a wiki, internal and external blogs and organization websites, chat tools, work tracking systems, and so forth. Effective remote work goes beyond having the necessary tools; teams need to agree on ground rules around working hours, response times, video conferencing, tone of communication, and other practical aspects that, if underestimated, can make or break a distributed team, even when all the right tools are available. In their 2013 book Remote: Office Not Required, Jason Fried and David Heinemeir Hansson go through how to address these and many other important aspects for remote teams.36 From an efficient-communication perspective, the virtual environment should be easy to navigate, guiding people to the right answer quickly.

The Decline and Fall of IBM: End of an American Icon?
by Robert X. Cringely
Published 1 Jun 2014

Customer satisfaction is still important; we'll bend over backwards make the customer happy. But often there is no time to 'do it right'. Yes, some customers need to be let go because they demand more than what is in the contract, and thus it is not profitable. We have been offshoring for a long, long time, but in reverse. The U.S. workers have been doing remote work for India, Asia-Pacific and EMEA. Now this is starting to change, often with cultural difficulty. The good techs are being burned out. There is no longer a reason to work for IBM vs. some other tech company, no longer a place for a career (i.e. lifetime employment), no longer the best benefits.

Working Identity, Updated Edition, With a New Preface: Unconventional Strategies for Reinventing Your Career
by Herminia Ibarra
Published 17 Oct 2023

We make the wrong move just to change. When we see change as requiring “big, bold strokes,” we amplify our fear of it; we overcome this fear by putting one foot in front of the other, in a series of safer steps. Small wins are also great ways to learn and to enlist supporters. Negotiating both a good fee and mostly remote work on her first consulting contract, for example, helped Susan discard barriers and discover resources that were invisible to her before. One small win in itself may not seem like much; a series of them increases the likelihood of serious change by setting in motion a dynamic that favors a next step and makes the next solvable problem more visible.

Thinking Machines: The Inside Story of Artificial Intelligence and Our Race to Build the Future
by Luke Dormehl
Published 10 Aug 2016

(TV show) 135–9, 162, 189–90, 225, 254 Jobs, Steve 6–7, 32, 35, 108, 113, 181, 193, 231 Jochem, Todd 55–6 judges 153–4 Kasparov, Garry 137, 138–9, 177 Katz, Lawrence 159–60 Keck, George Fred 81–2 Keynes, John Maynard 139–40 Kjellberg, Felix (PewDiePie) 151 ‘knowledge engineers’ 29, 37 Knowledge Narrator 110–11 Kodak 238 Kolibree 67 Koza, John 188–9 Ktesibios of Alexandria 71–2 Kubrick, Stanley 2, 228 Kurzweil, Ray 213–14, 231–3 Landauer, Thomas 201–2 Lanier, Jaron 156, 157 Laorden, Carlos 100, 101 learning 37–9, 41–4, 52–3, 55 Deep 11–2, 56–63, 96–7, 164, 225 and email filters 88 machine 3, 71, 84–6, 88, 100, 112, 154, 158, 197, 215, 233, 237, 239 reinforcement 83, 232 and smart homes 84, 85 supervised 57 unsupervised 57–8 legal profession 145, 188, 192 LegalZoom 145 LG 132 Lickel, Charles 136–7 ‘life logging’ software 200 Linden, David J. 213–14 Loebner, Hugh 102–3, 105 Loebner Prize 102–5 Lohn, Jason 182, 183–5, 186 long-term potentiation 39–40 love 122–4 Lovelace, Ada 185, 189 Lovelace Test 185–6 Lucas, George 110–11 M2M communication 70–71 ‘M’ (AI assistant) 153 Machine Intelligence from Cortical Networks (MICrONS) project 214–15 machine learners 38 machine learning 3, 71, 84–6, 88, 100, 112, 154, 158, 197, 215, 233, 237, 239 Machine Translator 8–9, 11 ‘machine-aided recognition’ 19–20 Manhattan Project 14, 229 MARK 1 (computer) 43–4 Mattersight Corporation 127 McCarthy, John 18, 19, 20, 27, 42, 54, 253 McCulloch, Warren 40–2, 43, 60, 142–3 Mechanical Turk jobs 152–7 medicine 11, 30, 87–8, 92–5, 187–8, 192, 247, 254 memory 13, 14, 16, 38–9, 42, 49 ‘micro-worlds’ 25 Microsoft 62–3, 106–7, 111–12, 114, 118, 129 mind mapping the 210–14, 217, 218 ‘mind clones’ 203 uploads 221 mindfiles 201–2, 207, 212 Minsky, Marvin 18, 21, 24, 32, 42, 44–6, 49, 105, 205–7, 253–4 MIT 19–20, 27, 96–7, 129, 194–5 Mitsuku (chatterbot) 103–6, 108 Modernising Medicine 11 Momentum Machines, Inc. 141 Moore’s Law 209, 220, 231 Moravec’s paradox 26–7 mortgage applications 237–8 MTurk platform 153, 154, 155 music 168, 172–7, 179 Musk, Elon 149–50, 223–4 MYCIN (expert system) 30–1 nanobots 213–14 nanosensors 92 Nara Logics 118 NASA 6, 182, 184–5 natural selection 182–3 navigational aids 90–1, 126, 127, 128, 241 Nazis 15, 17, 227 Negobot 99–102 Nest Labs 67, 96, 254 Netflix 156, 198 NETtalk 51, 52–3, 60 neural networks 11–12, 38–9, 41, 42–3, 97, 118, 164–6, 168, 201, 208–9, 211, 214–15, 218, 220, 224–5, 233, 237–8, 249, 254, 256–7 neurons 40, 41–2, 46, 49–50, 207, 209–13, 216 neuroscience 40–2, 211, 212, 214, 215 New York World’s Fair 1964 5–11 Newell, Alan 19, 226 Newman, Judith 128–9 Nuance Communications 109 offices, smart 90 OpenWorm 210 ‘Optical Scanning and Information Retrieval’ 7–8, 10 paedophile detection 99–102 Page, Larry 6–7, 34, 220 ‘paperclip maximiser’ scenario 235 Papert, Seymour 27, 44, 45–6, 49 Paro (therapeutic robot) 130–1 patents 188–9 Perceiving and Recognising Automation (PARA) 43 perceptrons 43–6 personality capture 200–4 pharmaceuticals 187–8 Pitts, Walter 40–2, 43, 60 politics 119–2 Pomerlau, Dean 54, 55–6, 90 prediction 87, 198–9 Profound Hypothermia and Circulatory Arrest 219–20 punch-cards 8 Qualcomm 93 radio-frequency identification device (RFID) 65–6 Ramón y Cajal, Santiago 39–40 Rapidly Adapting Lateral Position Handler (RALPH) 55 ‘recommender system’ 198 refuse collection 142 ‘relational agents’ 130 remote working 238–9 reverse engineering 208, 216, 217 rights for AIs 248–51 risks of AI 223–40 accountability issues 240–4, 246–8 ethics 244–8 rights for AIs 248–51 technological unemployment 139–50, 163, 225, 255 robots 62, 74–7, 89–90, 130–1, 141, 149, 162, 217, 225, 227, 246–7, 255–6 Asimov’s three ethical rules of 244–8 robotic limbs 211–12 Roomba robot vacuum cleaner 75–7, 234, 236 Rosenblatt, Frank 42–6, 61, 220 rules 36–7, 79–80 Rumelhart, David 48, 50–1, 63 Russell, Bertrand 41 Rutter, Brad 138, 139 SAINT program 20 sampling (music) 155, 157 ‘Scheherazade’ (Ai storyteller) 169–70 scikit-learn 239 Scripps Health 92 Sculley, John 110–11 search engines 109–10 Searle, John 24–5 Second Life (video game) 194 Second World War 12–13, 14–15, 17, 72, 227 Sejnowski, Terry 48, 51–3 self-awareness 77, 246–7 self-driving 53–6, 90, 143, 149–50 Semantic Information Retrieval (SIR) 20–2 sensors 75–6, 80, 84–6, 93 SHAKEY robot 23–4, 27–8, 90 Shamir, Lior 172–7, 179, 180 Shannon, Claude 13, 16–18, 28, 253 shipping systems 198 Simon, Herbert 10, 19, 24, 226 Sinclair Oil Corporation 6 Singularity, the 228–3, 251, 256 Siri (AI assistant) 108–11, 113–14, 116, 118–19, 125–30, 132, 225–6, 231, 241, 256 SITU 69, 93 Skynet 231 smart devices 3, 66–7, 69–71, 73–7, 80–8, 92–7, 230–1, 254 and AI assistants 116 and feedback 73–4 problems with 94–7 ubiquitous 92–4 and unemployment 141–2 smartwatches 66, 93, 199 Sony 199–200 Sorto, Erik 211, 212 Space Invaders (video game) 37 spectrometers 93 speech recognition 59, 62, 109, 111, 114, 120 SRI International 28, 89–90, 112–13 StarCraft II (video game) 186–7 story generation 169–70 strategy 36 STUDENT program 20 synapses 209 Synthetic Interview 202–3 Tamagotchis 123–5 Tay (chatbot) 106–7 Taylorism 95–6 Teknowledge 32, 33 Terminator franchise 231, 235 Tetris (video game) 28 Theme Park (video game) 29 thermostats 73, 79, 80 ‘three wise men’ puzzle 246–7 Tojan Room, Cambridge University 69–70 ‘tortoises’ (robots) 74–7 toys 123–5 traffic congestion 90–1 transhumanists 205 transistors 16–17 Transits – Into an abyss (musical composition) 168 translation 8–9, 11, 62–3, 155, 225 Turing, Alan 3, 13–17, 28, 35, 102, 105–6, 227, 232 Turing Test 15, 101–7, 229, 232 tutors, remote 160–1 TV, smart 80, 82 Twitter 153–4 ‘ubiquitous computing’ 91–4 unemployment, technological 139–50, 163, 225, 255 universal micropayment system 156 Universal Turing Machine 15–16 Ursache, Marius 193–7, 203–4, 207 vacuum cleaners, robotic 75–7, 234, 236 video games 28–9, 35–7, 151–2, 186–7, 194, 197 Vinge, Vernor 229–30 virtual assistants 107–32, 225–6, 240–1 characteristics 126–8 falling in love with 122–4 political 119–22 proactive 116–18 therapeutic 128–31 voices 124–126, 127–8 Viv Labs 132 Vladeck, David 242–4 ‘vloggers’ 151–2 von Neumann, John 13–14, 17, 100, 229 Voxta (AI assistant) 119–20 waiter drones 141 ‘Walking Cities’ 89–90 Walter, William Grey 74–7 Warwick, Kevin 65–6 Watson (Blue J) 138–9, 162, 189–92 Waze 90–91, 126 weapons 14, 17, 72, 224–5, 234–5, 247, 255–6 ‘wetware’ 208 Wevorce 145 Wiener, Norbert 72–3, 227 Winston, Patrick 49–50 Wofram Alpha tool 108–9 Wozniak, Steve 35, 114 X.ai 116–17 Xbox 360, Kinect device 114 XCoffee 70 XCON (expert system) 31 Xiaoice 129, 130 YouTube 151 Yudkowsky, Eliezer 237–8 Zuckerberg, Mark 7, 107–8, 230–1, 254–5 Acknowledgments WRITING A BOOK is always a bit of a solitary process.

Java: The Good Parts
by Jim Waldo

But if there is a more complex network between them, this call might take some time. A different approach would be to build a class within the StatReporterImpl object that can be used to make the remote calls in a separate thread while the StatReporterImpl object does something else. We will make this class extend the base class Thread, and do all the remote work that we had been doing in the StatReporterImpl object. The class looks something like: /** * A private inner class that can be used to obtain the * roster of a team. This class can be started on its * own thread and left to do its work. When the results * are needed, you can find out if the work is done by * checking the results of {@link isDone}.

Humans as a Service: The Promise and Perils of Work in the Gig Economy
by Jeremias Prassl
Published 7 May 2018

Its app offers customers (‘riders’) multiple types of service (such as UberX at the econ- omy end of the spectrum and UberLUX for premium cars), depending on location.8 Other platforms, such as TaskRabbit, offer a much broader range of services. Accessed through an app or website, the company advertises help with jobs ranging from moving home and furniture assembly, to clean- ing and small repair works, in nearly 40 US cities, as well as London.9 Digital remote work, finally, is the third gig-economy archetype. MTurk was one of the earliest operators in this field, connecting consumers and businesses (‘Requesters’) with workers (‘Turkers’) across the globe. Despite the variety of services on offer, each platform operates as a digital labour intermediary: matching consumer demand with workers from its pool—and exercising close control over the entire relationship.

Work Optional: Retire Early the Non-Penny-Pinching Way
by Tanja Hester
Published 12 Feb 2019

Looking at the priorities you mapped out in the last exercise, write down everything that’s different from how you’re currently living. Then go through your list and do the following: • Circle what you could change now. For example, when Mark and I figured out that being able to get out into the mountains was our top priority, we decided to take advantage of the opportunity we had to move to Tahoe then, thanks to our remote work arrangements, and not put it off until some potentially far-off future date. But the things you could change now don’t have to be as big as a move. If you dream of gardening more in the future or learning Spanish, what’s to stop you from doing that now? • Cross out things that aren’t realistic.

How Boards Work: And How They Can Work Better in a Chaotic World
by Dambisa Moyo
Published 3 May 2021

In some cases, companies and employees are also embracing technology that allows for more flexible work environments. GitLab, a technology company that hosts and manages coding projects for businesses, describes itself as all remote, with employees of all levels spread across sixty countries and no centralized headquarters. GitLab’s founder and CEO, Sid Sijbrandij, is so confident that remote working is the way of the future that the company has published a publicly accessible guide to managing and operating a remote workforce. The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic made it clear that working from home may be the most effective option for millions of workers across virtually all sectors. Government requests for people to shelter in place accelerated boardroom discussions around remote workforces, which centered on several important questions: how managers can best manage workers from afar, how to maintain workforce productivity, how best to mitigate cyber risk and ensure data privacy, and how to oversee health concerns including the mental well-being of all employees.

Death Glitch: How Techno-Solutionism Fails Us in This Life and Beyond
by Tamara Kneese
Published 14 Aug 2023

Some transhumanists fantasize about data detached from bodies, but such dreams are quite different from the day-to-day experiences of the average user or platform worker. The ongoing Covid-19 pandemic has brought this disconnect into sharp relief. During the pandemic, tech billionaires, who account for eight of the ten richest people on planet earth, have doubled their wealth.1 Remote work, learning, and even highly mediated final good-byes and mourning rituals through FaceTime and Zoom have made people more dependent on platforms than ever before, while exacerbating inequalities. Platforms, too, have shifted to accommodate a period of mass death. GoFundMe updated its UX (user experience) design to make mourning users feel more at ease while they are raising money for funerals and memorials.

The Power Law: Venture Capital and the Making of the New Future
by Sebastian Mallaby
Published 1 Feb 2022

In 2018, nine years after Pat Grady had first addressed his partners on the shift of software to the cloud, the hedge funders noticed something strange: most types of code had completed the predicted migration, but communications software was lagging. This anomaly seemed bound to end. The increasing acceptance of remote working would make video calls and messaging systems part of everyday life. The recent bankruptcy of a hardware-based communications software company, Avaya, suggested that the cloud’s moment was arriving. The hedge funders duly made three cloud-communications bets: Twilio, RingCentral, and the videoconferencing company Zoom.

…

The biggest beneficiaries have been the traditional financial centers, Boston and New York. But money has also flowed to strong industrial cities, such as Los Angeles and Seattle, and even to more surprising locations: Drive Capital, led by two Sequoia alumni, manages venture funds worth $1.2 billion from its base in Ohio. With the advent of remote working during the coronavirus pandemic of 2020–2021, a parade of tech royalty has abandoned the traffic jams of Silicon Valley in search of lower taxes and rents, with Austin, Texas, and Miami, Florida, emerging as two buzzy destinations. Joe Lonsdale, the leader of a partnership called 8VC, cast his move to Austin as a wager that innovation could take place anywhere.

The Great Fragmentation: And Why the Future of All Business Is Small
by Steve Sammartino
Published 25 Jun 2014

It may also be that we have to invest more in housing because all the offices are aggregated in the same city locations. With everyone working in the city in relatively high-paid, white-collar jobs, the demand for housing is impacted, bidding up prices. Ironically, nowhere has been more affected than San Francisco, the home of the inventors of the technology that make remote working possible. These are all pure market inefficiencies based on the realities of yesteryear technology that can be removed by reconfiguring the office as we know it. History repeats If the technology of the day has decided where we work in the past, I can’t see why it won’t do that in the future.

Brave New Work: Are You Ready to Reinvent Your Organization?
by Aaron Dignan
Published 1 Feb 2019

unearth the greatness within: Ed Catmull, “How Pixar Fosters Collective Creativity,” Harvard Business Review, September 2008, https://hbr.org/2008/09/how-pixar-fosters-collective-creativity; “Pixar,” Box Office Mojo, www.boxofficemojo.com/franchises/chart/?id=pixar.htm. gatherings of their global membership: Oliver Staley, “The Creator of WordPress Shares His Secret to Running the Ultimate Remote Workplace,” Quartz at Work, May 29, 2018, https://work.qz.com/1289444/automattics-secret-to-successful-remote-work-is-having-everyone-meet-in-person. instructions for how to facilitate them: Henri Lipmanowicz and Keith McCandless, The Surprising Power of Liberating Structures: Simple Rules to Unleash a Culture of Innovation (Seattle, WA: Liberating Structures Press, 2014); “Liberating Structures,” accessed September 1, 2018, www.liberatingstructures.com.

Nuts and Bolts: Seven Small Inventions That Changed the World (In a Big Way)
by Roma Agrawal
Published 2 Mar 2023

Bringing together the principles of civic engineering, conscious consumption, and knowledge of how our stuff works can only be a good thing, but we also need manufacturers themselves to get on board, as well as policy and government. Overall, Danielle is optimistic. During the last few years, she’s seen a rise in community repair hubs, where people help each other fix things, and an increase in advertising for refurbished phones and second-hand tech. Lockdowns in response to the global pandemic forced remote working and study for people who may not have had the tools they needed, so there has been a leap in creating affordable electronics. By breaking things down and delving into the small, hopefully I’ve illustrated that far from being overwhelming and cold, engineering – past, present, and future – is stimulating, empowering and human.

Seeking SRE: Conversations About Running Production Systems at Scale
by David N. Blank-Edelman
Published 16 Sep 2018

Open office plans can make this challenging, but you can make a difference even if you’re stuck with one. You’re best off asking your employees what they need from their office space, but likely requests include requiring meetings to be held in noise-isolated rooms, avoiding bells or gongs, and banning Nerf-gun fights. Flexible scheduling and remote work can make anyone’s life better, but they can be particularly important for people with mental disorders. A person with agoraphobia (the fear of being in situations where escape might be difficult or help wouldn’t be available) might find it very draining to leave the house, or in a severe case, might be unable to; someone in a depressive episode might spend hours just mustering enough energy to face their commute.

…

queues, ticket-driven, Silos Get in the Way-Silos Get in the Way R Rabenstein, Björn, How to Apply SRE Principles Without Dedicated SRE Teams, How to Apply SRE Principles Without Dedicated SRE Teams-Further Reading Rampke, Matthias, How to Apply SRE Principles Without Dedicated SRE Teams, How to Apply SRE Principles Without Dedicated SRE Teams-Further Reading Rasmussen, Jens, Navigating Complexity for Safety Rau, Vivek, Toil, the Enemy of SRE reactive phase of SRE execution, Phase 1: Firefighting/Reactive real-time dashboards, Real-Time Dashboards: The Bread and Butter of SRE Real-User Monitoring (RUM)SLIs informed by, RUM informs SLIs third-party integrations and, Indirect impact, Uses for RUM recovery time (see Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR)) recovery/recoverability of datachampioning recovery reliability, Championing Recovery Reliability considerations for, Considerations for Recovery database reliability engineering and, Recoverability-Championing Recovery Reliability detection of data loss/corruption, Building Block 1: Detection-Operating system and hardware errors diverse storage, Building Block 2: Diverse Storage full physical backups, Full physical backups incremental physical backups, Incremental physical backups logical backups, Full and incremental logical backups object stores, Object stores testing, Building Block 4: Testing varied toolbox for, Building Block 3: A Varied Toolbox recurrent neural networks, How and When Should We Apply Neural Networks? Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID), Window of Vulnerability redundant systems, Redundant systems Reinertsen, Donald G., Ticket-Driven Request Queues Are Expensive release engineering, Release Engineering remote work, Working Conditions Rendell, Mark, Replies repair debt, Repair Debt replication techniquesdata durability, engineering for, Replication-Estimating durability estimating durability, Estimating durability-Estimating durability reporting APIs, Polling API informs SLIs, Uses for RUM, Logging Republican National Convention protests (2008), Principles of Organizing request pausing, Case Study: Intermission-Case Study: Intermission request queues, Silos Get in the Way-Silos Get in the Way respect, team culture and, Make respect part of your team’s culture resumes, blind review of, Biases roles, formal assignment of, Formal role assignments rollbacks, Rollback testing rolling release, blue/green release vs., Disadvantages root access, Bringing Scalability and Reliability to the Forefront root causingprivacy engineering, Find and address root causes Root, Lynn, SRE Without SRE, SRE Without SRE: The Spotify Case Study-The Future: Speed at Scale, Safely Rosenthal, Casey, In the Beginning, There Was Chaos, In the Beginning, There Was Chaos-Conclusion Rother, Mike, Start by Leaning on Lean routing, shard-aware (see shard-aware routing) Russek, Johannes, SRE Without SRE, SRE Without SRE: The Spotify Case Study-The Future: Speed at Scale, Safely Ryan, Andrew, Production Engineering at Facebook S sacrifice decisions, Sacrifice Decisions Take Place Under Uncertainty St.

Can't Even: How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation
by Anne Helen Petersen
Published 14 Jan 2021

And Slack, like work email, makes workplace communication feel casual, even as participants internalize it as compulsory. Granted, only a fraction of the workforce currently uses Slack—as of April 2019, around 95,000 companies paid for its services.9 But many other workplaces use similar programs, or will soon; given the unabated rise of remote work, its influence feels inescapable. There were remote workers before Slack, but unlike email, or phone calls, or Gchat, Slack is able to digitally re-create the workplace, complete with standards of decorum, and participation, and “presentism,” however unspoken. It was intended to make work easier, or at least more streamlined, but like so many work optimization tactics, it just makes those who use it work more, and with more anxiety.

The Man Who Broke Capitalism: How Jack Welch Gutted the Heartland and Crushed the Soul of Corporate America—and How to Undo His Legacy
by David Gelles
Published 30 May 2022

As Bezos was accumulating wealth at a rate of $13.4 million an hour, his newest employees were joining a company that has long been accused of mistreating workers, skimping on benefits, and suppressing organized labor. Even white-collar workers were in jeopardy during the pandemic. Many of the technology companies that benefited from the rise of remote work also felt the need to downsize at a time of record unemployment, casting millions of people into a historically bad job market. Microsoft, Oracle, Comcast, and AT&T all enjoyed rapid rises in their sales, profits, and stock prices during the pandemic, and all of them laid off office workers in 2020.

Hacking Exposed: Network Security Secrets and Solutions
by Stuart McClure , Joel Scambray and George Kurtz
Published 15 Feb 2001

The nfsshell package provides a robust client called nfs. Nfs operates like an FTP client and allows easy manipulation of a remote file system. Nfs has many options worth exploring. [tsunami]# nfs nfs> help host <host> - set remote host name uid [<uid> [<secret-key>]] - set remote user id gid [<gid>] - set remote group id cd [<path>] - change remote working directory lcd [<path>] - change local working directory cat <filespec> - display remote file ls [-l] <filespec> - list remote directory get <filespec> - get remote files df - file system information rm <file> - delete remote file ln <file1> <file2> - link file mv <file1> <file2> - move file mkdir <dir> - make remote directory rmdir <dir> - remove remote directory chmod <mode> <file> - change mode chown <uid>[.

The Corruption of Capitalism: Why Rentiers Thrive and Work Does Not Pay
by Guy Standing
Published 13 Jul 2016

This allows for the historical reality that, in every professional service, today’s conventional wisdom can become tomorrow’s obsolescent practice. What might seem odd today often becomes a new norm tomorrow. Whatever the impact of online labour contracting, professions are being fragmented. On one estimate, ‘the connected work marketplace’, including forms of freelancing, professional networking sites such as LinkedIn and remote work apps such as GoToMyPC, will reach $63 billion globally by 2020, up from $10 billion in 2014.32 The UK freelancers’ association IPSE estimated that by 2015 there were 1.88 million ‘independent professionals’ in the UK, up by more than a third since 2008. IPSE claimed there was a major shift from ‘having a job’ to ‘working for clients’.

Masters of Scale: Surprising Truths From the World's Most Successful Entrepreneurs
by Reid Hoffman , June Cohen and Deron Triff
Published 14 Oct 2021

If you’re in a distributed situation unexpectedly because of an office closure, or deliberately, such as working from home one day a week, Matt suggests using this as an opportunity to do a personal pivot, by rethinking the way you work. “So much of our lives, we live by default,” he says. “Any chance you have to zoom out, reimagine, look at it with a beginner’s mind or fresh eyes, I think could have a huge impact on any person’s life regardless of the work situation.” When a change like remote working is forced upon a company, Matt advises asking the positive question, “Okay, what is actually enabled by us being distributed?” You may decide a remote meeting over videoconference is a lot better than conducting the meeting over the phone, so you invest in headsets and maybe even better cameras, so people look and sound professional wherever they might be.

Amazon: How the World’s Most Relentless Retailer Will Continue to Revolutionize Commerce
by Natalie Berg and Miya Knights
Published 28 Jan 2019

By 2020, there are expected to be more than 26,000 shared office spaces in the US, hosting 3.8 million people – which is phenomenal considering the trend was virtually unheard of as recently as 2007.11 ‘In cities, we have been paying particular attention to the new ways space and time are used, which are radically changing consumer behaviours. The lines between work, culture and fun are being blurred, creating a new way of living.’ Jean Paul Mochet, CEO of convenience banners at Casino Group, 201812 The rise in remote working, co-working spaces, hot-desking and third spaces is transforming consumers’ lives – and creating opportunities for retailers in the process. As with the Real example, major European food retailers have been becoming more hospitable in a bid to increase dwell time, offering free Wi-Fi and device-charging points while enhancing their foodservice options.

A Year of Living Danishly: My Twelve Months Unearthing the Secrets of the World's Happiest Country
by Helen Russell
Published 14 Sep 2015

I’m surprised to learn that the country with the best work-life balance in the world also has a stress problem. But just as there are no definitive statistics on how many Danes are signed off with stress, there’s little consensus about why workers are suffering. Danish workplace happiness expert Alexander Kjerulf of woohooinc.com believes that the increased prevalence of smartphones, laptops and remote working may be to blame. ‘It’s becoming more common to have to check messages in the evenings,’ says Alexander, ‘which isn’t good, as you never relax and recharge.’ This is backed up by some unions, with the Danish Association of Lawyers and Economists even reporting that 50 per cent of its members work when they’re supposed to be off on holiday.

The Pyramid of Lies: Lex Greensill and the Billion-Dollar Scandal
by Duncan Mavin
Published 20 Jul 2022

Lex increasingly turned to an inner circle, a kind of Star Chamber of favoured Greensill executives, including his chief legal counsel Jonathan Lane, chief operating officer Chris Bates, and vice president Sean Hanafin. It was a dysfunctional group. They were loyal to Lex but had varied knowledge of the business as a whole. Hanafin had only joined recently. The others had been there from the start. As the world moved to remote working, information – which had always been concentrated in and around Lex – dried up almost completely. For the most part, internal communication was reduced to weekly Zoom meetings. Lex would usually show up late, give a rosy view of the business, and end the meeting. Even as the problems mounted, Lex was presenting a very optimistic picture of the future to senior management and investors alike.

Digital Empires: The Global Battle to Regulate Technology
by Anu Bradford
Published 25 Sep 2023

Quant, https://businessquant.com/microsoft-revenue-by-segment (last visited Oct. 14, 2022). 32.Dave Tracey, Who’s Using Microsoft Azure? [2020], Contino (Feb. 20, 2020), https://www.contino.io/insights/whos-using-microsoft-azure-2020. 33.Jared Spataro, Remote Work Trend Report: Meetings, Microsoft (Apr. 9, 2020), https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2020/04/09/remote-work-trend-report-meetings/?wt.mc_id=AID2409697_QSG_SCL_424041&ocid=AID2409697_QSG_SCL_424041. 34.David Curry, Microsoft Teams Revenue and Usage Statistics (2022), BusinessofApps (Sep. 6, 2022), https://www.businessofapps.com/data/microsoft-teams-statistics/; Number of Daily Active Users (DAU) of Microsoft Teams Worldwide as of April 2021, Statista (Feb. 14, 2022), https://www.statista.com/statistics/1033742/worldwide-microsoft-teams-daily-and-monthly-users/. 35.Number of Office 365 Company Users Worldwide as of June 2022, by Leading Country, Statista (Feb. 23, 2022), https://www.statista.com/statistics/983321/worldwide-office-365-user-numbers-by-country/. 36.David Curry, Amazon Statistics (2022), BusinessofApps (Aug. 11, 2022), https://www.businessofapps.com/data/amazon-statistics/. 37.Jasmine Enberg, Amazon Around the World: “Primed” for International Expansion, but Faces Challenges from Alibaba, MercadoLibre, Flipkart and Others, Insider Intel.

Capitalism, Alone: The Future of the System That Rules the World
by Branko Milanovic
Published 23 Sep 2019

The decline in trade union membership, which has occurred in all rich countries and has been especially strong in the private sector, is not only the product of inimical government policies. The underlying organization of labor has also changed. The shift from manufacturing to services and from enforced presence on factory floors or offices to remote work has resulted in a multiplication of relatively small work units, often not located physically in the same place. Organizing a dispersed workforce is much more difficult than organizing employees who work in a single huge plant, continuously interact with each other, and share the same social environment and same interests regarding pay and working conditions.

Filterworld: How Algorithms Flattened Culture
by Kyle Chayka
Published 15 Jan 2024

A kind of turbo-gentrification was happening as New York City’s population rushed northward, occupying the already low housing stock. Homes were selling for more than 20 percent over asking, according to one Realtor. It wasn’t just upstate New York; those suddenly able (and forced) to work at home could work from anywhere. The options included popular remote-work destinations like Mexico City, Lisbon, and Bali, which saw influxes of new long-term visitors. These were “digital nomads”—people who hold down lucrative remote jobs or freelance gigs while traveling, working from their laptops in picturesque, relatively affordable locations. This pandemic migration would have still happened without Airbnb, of course, but the platform accelerated and exacerbated it by making it so easy for a renter to find exactly the space they were looking for, and by motivating owners to put their homes on the marketplace to begin with.

Fodor's Seoul
by Fodor's Travel Guides
Published 29 Nov 2022

HVer’s Garden $ | CAFÉ | Both a flower shop and cafe, Ver’s Garden is a green oasis owned and operated by plant-lover Kim Sung-soo. While floral design changes with the seasons, the two-story space is a constantly growing home to monsteras, ivies, and pilea that offers coffee, herbal teas, and desserts. Known for: coconut milk coffee and teatox tea; ideal remote working space; lots of greenery. DAverage main: ₩5,000 E44, Seongmisan-ro 23-gil, Mapo-gu, Hongdae wwww.instagram.com/vers_garden CClosed Mon. mHongik University Station. HYri Cafe $ | CAFÉ | Though Yri Cafe offers little of the minimalist design and photogenic, colorful drinks that hip, new cafes in the area have begun to specialize in, the venue is one of the few places to encapsulate the independent, down-to-earth spirit of the neighborhood.

Human Frontiers: The Future of Big Ideas in an Age of Small Thinking
by Michael Bhaskar
Published 2 Nov 2021

Another feature of the convergence is the continuing growth of cities. Since their earliest days cities have been the creative locus of our most important ideas, home to accumulations of knowledge and capital, auto-catalytic centrifuges for serendipitous linkages, agglomerations of trades and crossfertilisations. Despite some signs that remote working may dent their importance, they remain the world's recombinant factories, its engines of idea diffusion. Clusters within cities (think Silicon Valley or the City of London or Hollywood) are the key sites for knowledge spillovers, a central plank of the theory that ideas underwrite economic growth: inventors are, for example, more likely to cite patents from inventors in the same city.36 Without urban clustering, the US would produce around 11 per cent fewer patents per year.37 In 1800 only 2 per cent of the population was urbanised.

Super Thinking: The Big Book of Mental Models
by Gabriel Weinberg and Lauren McCann
Published 17 Jun 2019

Suppose that, like many companies in recent years, you are considering ending a policy that has allowed your employees to work remotely because you believe that your teams perform better face-to-face. As a manager, it may be easy to imagine changing the policy from your perspective, especially if you personally do not highly value remote working. The veil of ignorance, though, pushes you to imagine the change from the original position, where you could be any employee. What if you were an employee caring for an elderly family member? What if you were a single parent? You may find that the new policy is warranted even after considering its repercussions holistically, but putting on the veil of ignorance helps you appreciate the challenges this might pose for your staff and might even help you come up with creative alternatives.

Them and Us: How Immigrants and Locals Can Thrive Together
by Philippe Legrain
Published 14 Oct 2020

Importing the digital services of Filipino workers would doubtless be beneficial for them and generate hefty savings for companies and consumers in richer countries. Even though wages in the Philippines would doubtless rise if such trade took off, the economic disruption to workers in rich countries from such remote working would be far greater than that from immigration, which does not tend to depress local wages or jobs. While technology may sometimes substitute for people moving, it is unlikely to do so completely even when it theoretically could. Videoconferencing has not eliminated business travel because face-to-face meetings are still often crucial.

Chokepoint Capitalism
by Rebecca Giblin and Cory Doctorow
Published 26 Sep 2022

Google, 200 O’Reilly, 27 Oremus, Will, 236 organizing, 178–79, 248–49 Oron, Gadi, 67 orphan works, 189, 192–94 OverDrive, 241, 242 Pandora, 217 Pascal, Francine, 187 payola, 82 PCs (personal computers), 201 Pelly, Liz, 67, 80, 81, 241, 244 Penderecki, Kyzysztof, 66 Penguin, 35 Penguin Random House, 2, 34–35 The People’s Platform (Taylor), 14 Perry, Katy, 64 Peters, Marybeth, 185 Phoenix Computers, 201 Platform Capitalism (Srnicek), 230 Platform Cooperativism Consortium, 229 platforms, 14–15 playlists, music streaming, 78–84, 143–44 podcasting, 84–88 policy, corporate influence on, 94 Polone, Gavin, 107 Postmates, 166–67 poultry processing, 96 press publishers’ right, 233–34 Prince, 52, 62, 187 print-on-demand, 181 privacy, 137 private equity, 91–93, 249–50 producer cartels, 173 productivity gains, 253–54 Proposition 22, 249 Public Enemy, 62 public interest, 14 public ownership models, 242–44 Rabble, 240–41 radio broadcast industry: about, 89; local content, 90; ownership concentration, 90; private equity and leveraged buyouts, 91–93; regulation, 93–95; revenues, 90–91, 93 Random House, 32, 33, 34, 35 RapCaviar, 78 RealMedia, 26 reciprocity, 93 Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), 55, 64, 185–86 recoupment, 53, 59, 69, 163, 169, 219, 221–22 regulation: antitrust, 146–51; costs, 137, 144; decline of systems of, 145–46; EU mandates, 257–58 regulatory capture, 92–93 remote work, 15 rentiers, 118–21 rent-seeking, 119 residual remuneration rights, 173–77, 214–16 Resonate, 237–38 Reuters Institute, 236 reversion rights, copyright, 183–95 right-wing radio culture, 94–95 Rimes, LeAnn, 55 Robinson, Joan, 10, 173 Robinson, Nathan, 233 Rodgers, Nile, 54, 164 Rolling Stone, 47 Rosen, Hilary, 185–86 Ross, Orna, 157 Rowdy (Joshua Rowsey), 241 royalties, streaming, 66, 68–69, 221–28 RSS, 86, 122 safe harbor laws, 125–27, 134 sampling, music, 61–63 Sanctuary, 57 Sarbanes-Oxley Act, 163 Sargent, John, 30 Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act, 185 Saudi royal family, 102 Scheiner, Bruce, 122 Scholz, Trebor, 237 Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, 161–62, 212–13 Science Fiction Writers of America, 159 Screen Actors Guild, 16 self-publishing, 32–33, 215–16 Shatzkin, Mike, 35 Shazam, 73 Sheeran, Ed, 64 Sherman, Cary, 55 Shirky, Clay, 44–45 Shockley, William, 165–66 Shuster, Joe, 180 Siegel, Jerry, 180 Simon & Schuster, 34–35 Simson, John, 71, 93, 225–26 SiriusXM, 56 Slack, David, 108 Smashwords, 22 social media, and music industry, 56 Social Security Act, 150 Softbank, 102 songwriting, 69–70 Sony Music Entertainment: and artist mistreatment, 79, 221; and copyright, 188; dominating position of, 56; and recoupment, 59; and Spotify, 73, 75, 161; Spotify contract, 70–73 SoundCloud, 72–73 SoundExchange, 71 South Africa, 189 Spotify: about, 2, 11, 12, 18, 56; and Epidemic Sound, 81–82; and major labels, 73–75, 181; market share and profit, 83; Marquee initiative, 82; model, 67; and music licensing, 218; playlist culture, 79–84, 143–44; podcasting, 86–88; Sony contract, 70–73 Srinivasan, Dina, 43 Srnicek, Nick, 230 Stafford, Bill, 62 Statute of Anne (1710), 182–83 statutory licensing, 220–28 Stiehm, Meredith, 105 Stocksy, 229–30 Stoller, Matt, 34–35, 46 Stone, Brad, 21 streambait, 80 Stringer, Rob, 79 Stross, Charlie, 28 structural remedies, 148–49 StubHub, 101 Superman, 180 surveillance capitalism, 36 Swift, Taylor, 76, 169–70 switching costs, 7, 18, 26, 28, 31, 92, 119, 144, 249–50 synchronization rights, 219 tacit collusion, 31 talent agents and agencies, 104–9, 175–76 Taylor, Astra, 14, 229 Teachout, Zephyr, 149 Telecommunications Act (1996), 90 television media, back end financials, 109–11 Tencent Music Entertainment, 83, 84 Thicke, Robin, 63–64 third-party cookies, 231–32 This Is Spinal Tap (film), 188 Ticketmaster, 98, 100, 101 Tidal, 160, 239 TikTok, 136 Timberg, Scott, 47, 110–11 TLC, 55 Towse, Ruth, 16 Tracks, 240–41 transparency rights: Audible, 154–59; audit power, 164–65; data disclosure, 161–63; enforceability of regulatory transparency, 163–67; Kindle Unlimited, 159–60; music streaming, 160–61; Netflix, 160; normalization of, 164 Turner, David, 67, 68, 80, 164, 224 21st Century Fox, 2 Uber, 48–49, 102, 166–67, 171, 249 UK Competition and Markets Authority, 43, 45, 50 UK Musicians’ Union, 68 unions, 173–74, 248–49 United Talent Agency, 104, 106 universality, 198–99.

Paved Paradise: How Parking Explains the World
by Henry Grabar
Published 8 May 2023

A surprising number of Americans already lived within half a mile of a retail cluster of more than twenty-five establishments, even in drive-alone cities. The share was 31 percent in Las Vegas, 40 percent in Atlanta, 55 percent in Los Angeles, and 67 percent in Miami. That number would grow if parking could be decoupled from housing and retail. Meanwhile, the rise of remote work, e-commerce, and small electric vehicles like e-bikes and scooters made car-light living easier than ever. There was another thing: the root cause of 2021’s hockey-stick home price appreciation, escalating rents, overcrowding, and homelessness was that the country was millions of homes short.

San Fransicko: Why Progressives Ruin Cities
by Michael Shellenberger
Published 11 Oct 2021

“These institutions keep them insulated from much of the world, and the next thing you know, they’re a senior person in their field,” noted one entrepreneur. “They have resources. They have influence. But they’ve never actually worked outside of a pretty sheltered context.”49 Now, with the rise of remote work and delivery apps, many of us do not even need to go into the office and can live like only the superrich a generation ago could live, with workers delivering groceries, meals, and consumer products to our doorstep. The culture of coddling contributed to the opioid epidemic, some believe. Patients suffering pain felt more confidence demanding opioids while refusing to accept responsibility.

Invisible Women
by Caroline Criado Perez
Published 12 Mar 2019

The vast majority of American homemakers (97% of whom are women) in a recent poll110 indicated that they would go back to work if they could work from home (76%) or if the job offered flexible hours (74%) – rather suggesting that while the majority of US companies claim to offer flexible working,111 the reality is somewhat different. In fact the number of flexible workers in the US fell between 2015 and 2016 and several major US companies are rescinding their remote work policies.112 In the UK half of employees would like to work flexibly, but only 9.8% of job ads offer flexible working113 – and women in particular who request it report being penalised. Companies also still seem to conflate long hours in the office with job effectiveness, routinely and disproportionately rewarding employees who work long hours.114 This constitutes a bonus for men.

Greater: Britain After the Storm
by Penny Mordaunt and Chris Lewis
Published 19 May 2021

NOTES 1 https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uks-creative-industries-contributes-almost-13-million-to-the-uk-economy-every-hour 2 https://budstars.com/martinprosperity/Global-Creativity-Index-2015.pdf 3 https://www.culturepartnership.eu/en/article/global-creativity-index-2015 4 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-01-18/germany-breaks-korea-s-six-year-streak-as-most-innovative-nation 5 https://www.legit.ng/1368477-uk-tops-list-top-5-countries-a-career-in.html 6 https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/indyventure/uk-one-best-places-world-start-business-a6717886.html 7 https://www.oecd.org/social/soc/Social-mobility-2018-Overview-MainFindings.pdf 8 https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/business/salad-growers-hail-success-of-pick-for-britain-campaign-1551484 9 https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20200710-the-remote-work-experiment-that-made-staff-more-productive 10 http://www3.weforum.org/docs/GCR2018/05FullReport/TheGlobalCompetitivenessReport2018.pdf 11 https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/labourproductivity/articles/ukproductivityintroduction/julytoseptember2019 12 https://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/job-skills-jobs-councils-local-government-association-lga-careers-a9285371.html 13 https://www.cityam.com/skills-shortages-continue-to-hit-growth-as-uk-employers-struggle-to-find-the-right-talent/ 14 http://www.oecd.org/education/skills-beyond-school/41529765.pdf 15 https://www.wired-gov.net/wg/news.nsf/articles/5+million+adults+lack+basic+literacy+and+numeracy+skills+30082016131500?

Pro Git
by Scott Chacon and Ben Straub
Published 12 Nov 2014

Server and local repositories after cloning If you do some work on your local master branch, and, in the meantime, someone else pushes to git.ourcompany.com and updates its master branch, then your histories move forward differently. Also, as long as you stay out of contact with your origin server, your origin/master pointer doesn’t move. Figure 3-23. Local and remote work can diverge To synchronize your work, you run a git fetch origin command. This command looks up which server “origin” is (in this case, it’s git.ourcompany.com), fetches any data from it that you don’t yet have, and updates your local database, moving your origin/master pointer to its new, more up-to-date position.

Seven Crashes: The Economic Crises That Shaped Globalization
by Harold James
Published 15 Jan 2023

The withdrawal of workers from some occupations, including many office jobs seen as routine or overdemanding (or both), looked like a longterm shift. In rich countries, some workers, especially older ones, left the labor market in order to pursue new strategies of self-development, often connecting with new ideas and new spiritualities from other countries. Elsewhere, the possibility of remote work allowed individuals to withdraw from crisis-ridden national markets and work internationally and virtually, for foreign currency, rather than in local occupations. Particularly tech workers saw Covid as a new possibility for entering a global labor market. Thus as Turkey hit an inflationary crisis and the value of the currency fell, young Turks shifted to working for foreign companies in a virtual brain drain, or a new form of globalization of the labor market.60 Addressing the issue of a permanently transformed labor market as simply one of overall wages and prices, or overall unemployment, made little sense.

Children of Ruin
by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Published 13 May 2019

Now that kit had been in place long enough for the cracks to show and he was frantically trying to get everything repaired or replaced before whole sections of the planet stopped reporting to him. ‘Ha, yes. Half-fixed, the rest on their way, so that’s all right.’ Senkovi had obviously worked out that a noncommittal noise was all he was getting. ‘That’s good.’ Senkovi really must be in a manic mood. ‘Does that mean you don’t need Rani to help with the remote work?’ And then, speaking over Senkovi’s response as the delay tripped him up, ‘Does that mean your mollusc diagnostics worked out?’ Senkovi was silent for longer than the signal gap as he worked out what to answer, and then silent a little longer, so that Baltiel was already cued to pick up the twitchiness in his voice when he finally spoke.

Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire
by Brad Stone
Published 10 May 2021

A week after that, Amazon canceled all in-person interviews and moved to virtual conversations with most job candidates using its in-house video conferencing software, Amazon Chime. The moves underscored a sharp divide and one of Amazon’s biggest challenges; it was allowing white-collar workers to transition to safe, remote work, while deeming its warehouse employees essential to the business and exposing them to greater risk. By early March, a subgroup of the S-team was gathering virtually every afternoon at 4 p.m. Seattle time to discuss their response to the crisis. The meetings were run by human resources head Beth Galetti and included Jeff Wilke, Andy Jassy, operations chief Dave Clark, and Bezos.

Beyond the Wall: East Germany, 1949-1990
by Katja Hoyer
Published 5 Apr 2023

He then made himself useful to the Soviets by churning out their propaganda in various media outlets as a journalist. A second way to escape Stalin’s henchmen was to have been young enough during the time of the purges so as not to be perceived as a serious threat. While many German teenagers were also dragged off to remote work camps or simply vanished forever under different names, a fair proportion of children were transferred to Russian schools or workplaces where they quickly assimilated. By the time the Great Terror began to fizzle out, they had shown that their lifelong indoctrination had borne fruit. They had become true communists, perhaps even true Russians.

Ghost Train to the Eastern Star: On the Tracks of the Great Railway Bazaar
by Paul Theroux
Published 9 Sep 2008

She was in her mid-thirties and, she said, from a noble family, large landowners, their ancestral home in Ratja. Both her grandfather and great-grandfather had spent time in Soviet prisons, thirteen years in her grandfather’s case, for being members of the Georgian aristocracy and therefore counter-revolutionaries. One prison, part of the gulag in Kazakhstan, was a remote work camp near the city of Karaganda. Later, I read that Solzhenitsyn had spent a year in the same camp. ‘You’re a writer,’ Marika said. ‘You’re lucky to be an American. Our writers were put into a prison in Mordva. It was a terrible place but had a nice name – White Swan Prison.’ In 2001, Marika worked for a while at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tbilisi, earning 30 lari a month.

The Social Life of Money
by Nigel Dodd
Published 14 May 2014

When the finance minister of the euro’s core state—its major surplus state—argues that another state ought to be “allowed” to go bankrupt, he implies that bankruptcy is a necessary precondition for withdrawal of a state from the Eurozone.45 This bankruptcy would mean the state’s downgrade not from core to periphery but from inside to outside, to marginal status—its relegation to the economic hinterland of the Eurozone, but perhaps not of the EU. An extreme version of this interpretation would be to imagine Eurozone membership as a revolving door, granted and withdrawn according to regular measures of good behavior—this is not something that was ever envisaged, not anything that could remotely work. Schäuble (2010) surely did not mean this—but his logic implied it. In narrow terms, the euro has threefold significance for what Balibar has to say. First, it is often pointed out that the entailed monetary integration without any other kind of integration—cultural or political, for example—would be something like an integration of fiscus but not of Bildung.

The Singularity Is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology
by Ray Kurzweil
Published 14 Jul 2005

And perhaps it is conscious. Searle is just declaring ipso facto that it isn't conscious and that this conclusion is obvious. It may seem that way when you call it a room and talk about a limited number of people manipulating a small number of slips of paper. But as I said, such a system doesn't remotely work. Another key to the philosophical confusion implicit in the Chinese Room argument is specifically related to the complexity and scale of the system. Searle says that whereas he cannot prove that his typewriter or tape recorder is not conscious, he feels it is obvious that they are not. Why is this so obvious?

Lonely Planet Washington, Oregon & the Pacific Northwest
by Lonely Planet

Beer is brewed on-site with water from the artesian well in the basement. 6Drinking & Nightlife Batdorf & BronsonCAFE (Capitol Way S; h6am-7pm Mon-Fri, 7am-6pm Sat & Sun) S Olympia’s most famous coffee outlet stands out, even in the caffeine-fueled Pacific Northwest. If you like your morning brew fair-trade, shade-grown and certified organic, this is the place to come. Its shopfront houses a vast, comfy, high-ceilinged room ideal for remote working, too. For travelers with an insatiable caffeine addiction, head down to the company’s roasting house for expert banter. Dillinger’sCOCKTAIL BAR (www.dillingerscocktailsandkitchen.com; 406 Washington St SE; h4-10pm Mon-Thu, 4pm-midnight Fri & Sat, 4-8pm Sun) This upscale Prohibition-style cocktail bar inhabits a 1927 bank building – you can even drink in the vault.

Seveneves
by Neal Stephenson
Published 19 May 2015

This wasn’t the first time Dinah had been nudged in recent weeks about her failure to spend more time in the simulated gravity field of T2. “It’s just hard to go back and forth between gravity and no gravity,” Dinah said. “It makes me barf. And none of my stuff is in T2.” She was referring, as Ivy would know, to the shop where she worked on her robots. “But isn’t that mostly remote work? Writing code?” “Yeah, I just like to be where I can see them out the window.” “Don’t they have little cameras on them?” Dinah had no answer for that. “Whatever you’re doing here,” Ivy continued, “you could do from a cabin in T2, where the gravity would build your bones.” “It’s also Rhys,” Dinah admitted.