SHIFT

Time Blur

Drivers of
Change

Archiving happens automatically without our conscious control over it. Everything that we do, wherever we are, whoever we connect with is stored digitally. We get reminders of birthdays and ‘this year that time’ albums to refresh our memories. We get perspective, context and sense of our being. Now we observe transitions of days, moments and months for creating fresh memories and new meanings.

Digging From the Past

Arvind could not find a selfie he took with the frontman of the metal band Children of Bodom, Alexi Laiho. He got the news of his passing away and looked into his facebook archives and was glad to find that photograph from 12 years back. If it wasn’t for the digital archives, this would be a fading distant memory without proof.

Homage 2020

Pranab Mukherjee, former Indian president, Ram Vilas Paswan, former food and consumer affairs minister of India, Jaswant Singh, former union minister of India, Soumitra Chatterjee, the legendary Bengali actor, SP Balasubramanyam, legendary playback singer, Saroj Khan, well known Bollywood choreographer, Irrfan Khan, legendary international actor, Sushant Singh Rajput, Bollywood actor, Rishi Kapoor Bollywood actor, Diego Maradona, football legend, Kobe Bryant, basketball icon, Chadwick Boseman of Black Panther fame, Sean Connery, legendary actor, Joe Ruby, creator of Scooby-Doo – all of them passed away one after the other during the lockdown year of 2020.

When we look back, it is only the media and technology that is helping us remember and honour personalities who have passed away. We are scooping nuggets of time into a collage of reminders and making sense of reality.

Creating an Edge

The edginess of time is gone, that is why people are setting reminders almost everywhere to have a sense of time, day and season. Keeping plants inside homes is a way of sense making of the time. More and more people are creating indoor garden spaces to reconnect with natural sense of time transitions.

STORIES THAT CAUGHT OUR EYE

The Year of Blur

For Kate Baer, a poet in Harrisburg, Pa., 2020 feels like a time warp. She compared it to when she and four friends escaped to a woodsy cabin in Maryland and tried cannabis edibles.

The New York Times

2020 is perfect vision – but the year has so far been a shortsighted blur

As the machinery of the EU winds down for the summer, it’s important to reflect.

Friends of Europe

Coronavirus: People spending record amount of time online during lockdown

A new report by communications regulator Ofcom reveals people are spending record times online during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sky News

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The New Reality