Future State #8: A pause for some Ukraine-relevant reading

I was going to write this week about pictures and the way we visualise the exponential age. But after reading the news this all felt less than relevant so instead I thought I’d share some writing that relates to Ukraine.

Three of the pieces below are from the archive of the ever-brilliant The Browser, which is still IMHO the best curation of writing on the internet.

• What does cyber-war look like? TL;DR it’s not an online version of traditional warfare. It’s messier than that.
• How does SWIFT work? A simple explainer with nice historical vignettes. Before SWIFT there was Telex. Senders had to describe transactions in sentences for receivers to execute, leading to widespread human errors.
• Who is Putin? Aspects of this piece from 2016 now feel quite dated, which in itself I find interesting, and there are some timeless insights too.
• Are we at (financial) war? A useful state of play from Adam Tooze on financial measures vs Russia. Contains some great links including to this briliant thread from General Theorist: where are Russia’s reserves?
• Can pigeons help? Some light relief. Pigeons can’t be hacked, they don’t speak under pressure, and they blend in with civilian birds. So could they make a comeback in a world of cyber-war?

Next week I’ll get back to our year-long exploration of how we govern the future with that post about how we visualise the exponential age.

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