Dear Fellow Trend Curator,

Today is National Siblings Day—a day to celebrate your siblings. The history of the holiday is a combination of gratitude and grief, as the day was created for all of us to celebrate what for most of us will one day become our longest life relationship. So if you have a brother or sister, reach today and wish them a Happy Siblings day too!

For the stories this week you’ll read about the emerging science of chrono-nutrition and how Google used outpainting to remaster a nearly hundred year old film and may usher in a new era of remakes for Hollywood. Also this week a few stories about the good and bad of using VR technology on prisoners, an exhibit reimagining funeral urns at the Milan Design Show, a new children’s book that can help diagnose color blindness earlier and an expansion of the first sports bar dedicated to women’s sports.

Enjoy the stories and stay curious!

Rohit

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How “Chrono-Nutrition” Could Use Metabolism Science To Change When We Eat Anything

If there is an optimal time to eat a particular type of food, then there are suboptimal times to have it too. The problem is, we don’t usually know this sort of detail about the things we consume. Yet scientists already know that “nutrient sequencing—the act of eating fiber-rich vegetables first during a meal, followed by protein and fats, and then carbohydrates—is becoming a recognized way for people with Type 2 diabetes to better manage their blood-sugar levels. Now there is a startup called Cycle.me that is testing out a new line of “circadian snacking” products for sale to Japanese consumers. Each item features a list of ingredients as well as an optimal time (morning, afternoon or evening) for consumption.

As this idea starts to gain momentum, it’s possible this new element of timing could start to show up on more food packaging as a way to remind (or educate!) all of us on everything from the best time to eat a banana to the right sequence we should use to consume a meal. Perhaps with this metric, people can also minimize some of the negative impacts food can have on their bodies and get healthier as well.

Google Uses AI to Reimagine The Wizard of Oz (and Maybe The Future of Hollywood)

This past week, a closed group of attendees at a private Google event got a first look at an ambitious project that has been in the works for nearly a year to digitally remaster the original 1939 footage from the film The Wizard of Oz and somehow make it fit onto the 16k digital screens of The Sphere in Las Vegas. While show doesn’t officially open to the public until late August, the fascinating backstory of how the team of technologists and artists managed to do it was just shared on Google’s blog:

“For all the powerful new technology at play, one of the biggest breakthroughs comes from following the traditions of cinema: having plenty of extra material to work with. In addition to old footage, the team scoured archives to build a vast collection of supplementary material, such as the shooting script, production illustrations, photographs, set plans and scores.

The Google teams and their partners developed an AI-based “super resolution” tool to turn those tiny celluloid frames from 1939 into ultra-ultra-high definition imagery that will pop inside Sphere. Then, the teams perform AI outpainting, to expand the scope of scenes to both fill the space and fill in the gaps created by camera cuts and framing limitations. Finally, through performance generation, they’re incorporating composites of those famed performances into the expanded environments.”

The potential of this “outpainting” technique is more than just upscaling past content to be see on a new screen in a sort of remastering exercise. What’s really interesting is how technologists might partner with creators and the movie studios to access never-before-released footage and utilize that to truly enhance the original films to make them something new, different and immersive. As long as they get permission, involve the original creators and don’t steal the content—this could be a win for everyone.

The Beautiful and Destructive Potential of Using VR on Prisoners In Jail

This week there were a few stories of questionably ethical uses for virtual reality headsets that raised some new questions about how it can and should be used. In one example, a California-based prison used VR on prisoners placed into solitary confinement as part of a general population reentry program, where incarcerated people “visualize scenarios like their first steps outside the prison walls, before working through their emotional and physical response with volunteers.” It is also being tested as a way to offer prisoners who are placed in solitary confinement a mental break and reward of sorts by letting them experience riding a rickshaw through Thailand, for example. Which raises new questions as the article also notes: “does VR represent a tool to give them a little respite, or is it just a buzzy band-aid on a cruel practice?”

In another story this week, there is a VR program researchers are testing that puts domestic abusers into the position of their victims in an effort to activate their empathy and make them feel regret for what they put someone else through. Early results of the program show that it may be effective in helping to rehabilitate and change the attitudes of domestic abusers. As the technology continues to get better, the potential for using it with captive audiences like prisoners (no joke intended) will continue to grow. In the positive case, it could help with everything from skills development and training to prepare them for re-entry to using it as an empathy machine to help offenders see the impact of their actions from another perspective. The downside, of course, is that VR becomes a Matrix-like tool of control to manipulate prisoners and addicting them to technology that keeps them in a fantasy world unable to emerge back into real life when the time finally comes to be released.

“The Last Pot” Exhibit Reimagines Funeral Urns For Milan Design Week

At Milan Design Week (Salone del Mobile,) you might expect to see new designs for chairs or reimagined interior living spaces. A category that rarely receives any design attention from the most elite European design teams is the funeral urn. This year The Last Post exhibit, a project curated by Alberto Alessi, “explores the funeral urn as a final container — an object surprisingly overlooked by the design world despite its significance.” As one critic goes on to write, “The Last Pot reflects broader societal shifts toward death positivity — a movement seeking to normalize discussions around mortality and reclaim death as a personal, cultural and aesthetic experience.”

Perhaps these conceptual urns and the exhibit curating them together can do all that. At the very least, it’s offering a new visual way to honor those who have passed away and creating a potentially powerful piece of art to remember them.

The Non-Obvious Media Recommendation of the Week

Luxury Daily

Industry daily media sources are so valuable because they are truly an insider’s look at a particular industry. That’s why most are only read by people working in that industry. Luxury Daily is one that I have had on my reading list for many years. Part of the reason is because I’ve done luxury brand marketing several times for clients and it’s interesting. Sometimes, the luxury industry can also be a first mover on a broader trend that will gain traction outside the luxury market as well. So reading about shifts, campaigns, new products and initiatives in luxury might help inspire ideas for you to consider no matter what industry you work in. For these reasons, Luxury Daily is my pick for the Non-Obvious Media of the Week.

The Non-Obvious Book of the Week

The Sibling Effect by Jeffrey Kluger

As part of the celebration for National Siblings Day, I chose to resurface The Sibling Effect this week—a book written several years ago about the impact that birth order and our siblings have on our personalities and trajectory. Reading this book, you may not agree with some of the theories inside or you may feel a bit uncomfortable at just how accurately they describe your relationships (either past or present) with your own siblings. Regardless, there is plenty of research today about the science of siblings and what role that plays in our own development. Similarly, this research delves into what impact this has when someone grows up with no siblings, or loses a sibling. So today, in honor of National Siblings Day … The Sibling Effect is my pick for the Non-Obvious Book of the Week.

About the Non-Obvious Book Selection of the Week:

Every week I will be featuring a new “non-obvious” book selection worth sharing. Titles featured here may be new or from the backlist, but the date of publication doesn’t really matter. My goal is to elevate great books that perhaps deserve a second look which you might have otherwise missed.

Even More Non-Obvious Stories …

Every week I always curate more stories than I'm able to explore in detail. Instead of skipping those stories, I started to share them in this section so you can skim the headlines and click on any that spark your interest:

• This Children’s Book Can Spot Color Blindness Quickly & At No Cost

• Ad of the Day: Autism campaign uses humor to dispel myths and tropes

• Inside the top-secret area of Disney World that theme park visitors and cast members never see

• Climate Violence Is Coming for Rich Countries, and They’re Not Ready

• The Sports Bra, the First Bar Dedicated To Women’s Sports, Starts Franchising

How are these stories curated?