#ResilienceTech Briefing / August 2022

John Maeda
3 min readAug 17, 2022
The word ‘resilience’ spinning upside down to reveal the word ‘adversity’

This is a regular (delayed) re-post of my plaintext #nolinks monthly #ResilienceTech briefing that you can sign up for here 👉 http://eepurl.com/c9OjRX

Four Things That I’m Thinking About #ResilienceTech

* Modern neuroscience tells us how we store and process information depends upon our emotional state, which easily triggers the “fight or flight” response.

  • Technologies that are designed to empower our understanding of events at hand, as well as to respond quickly, ultimately depend upon our personal fortitude.
  • We can either overcome a calamity or get overcome by it. The likelihood that we’re able to take on inevitable failures correlates to our confidence in self-renewal.
  • “I can tell you that for renewal, a tough-minded optimism is best. The future is not shaped by people who don’t really believe in the future.” — John W. Gardner

Three Things I’ve Noticed In The Last 30 Days

  • Wildfires in France have been trending this month — triggered by rising drought conditions. Reminder: Rain not only stops fires but also prevents fires by keeping plants wet. Drought dries out vegetation and turns plants into an optimal fuel source for fires. The scientific term “Fuel Moisture Content” (FMC) captures this phenomenon as an important indicator for where wildfires are likely to occur. So although wet is annoying, dry can get a bit dangerous.
  • Atlantic hurricanes usually start landing with full force in August, but surprisingly the Atlantic storms thus far have been of a mild variety in the US. That said, meteorologists caution that the unusually cooler La Niña this year suggest that hurricane behavior will be severe. Reminder: Hurricanes have two key ingredients: 1/ a large body of water, and 2/ a water heating method. When we over-warm the oceans and air pressure displacements happen at scale, we expect hurricanes to result.
  • Last week in Seoul, one of the most digitally-advanced cities in the world, record torrential rainfall resulted in catastrophic flooding conditions. This week Las Vegas has been hit hard by heavy rain fall as well — resulting in casinos flooding. Reminder: Urban areas are prone to
John Maeda

John Maeda: Technologist and product experience leader that bridges business, engineering, design via working inclusively. Currently VP Design and A.I. at MSFT.