the first nation to fully incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) into military decision-making will shape the history of the 21st century Humanity is entering a new era of “agentic warfare” in which we will see some of the world’s strongest armies beaten by rivals that are better at harnessing AI agents—autonomous intelligent systems that can perform a multitude of tasks Paul Dans argues that the system needed smashing and rebuilding The historian says attempts to restrain tyrants are often futile: for them it’s all or nothing The historian on commemorating the shock and horror of concentration camps, 80 years on The former Liberal leader on the threats that come not from Washington but from within It starts with Germany realising that it’s stronger than it feels, argue Thomas Enders and Hans-Peter Bartels Black Mirror dropped its seventh season last week, and while several of the new episodes share themes of love and romance, there are very few happy endings The one entry that does offer last-act uplift is “Hotel Reverie,” which introduces a Hollywood star (Issa Rae) whose desire for meatier roles leads her into an AI world where she encounters… an entirely different sort of desire The episode’s complex tech elements imagine that Rae’s character is inserted into a vintage black-and-white movie—a sort of Casablanca-ish tale titled Hotel Reverie—as a way to “remake” the film with a contemporary star Though it’s really just her consciousness that’s linked into the virtual recreation thanks to cutting-edge AI Brandy’s experiences feel real Clara (played in Hotel Reverie by tragic starlet Dorothy Chambers and played in “Hotel Reverie” by Emma Corrin) feels extremely real “sentient with a soul and capable of falling in love” real A new interview in the Hollywood Reporter with episode director Haolu Wang as well as Rae and Rae’s co-star Awkwafina (who plays the head of the AI start-up behind the Hotel Reverie experiment) digs into the futuristic yet startlingly human emotional territory the episode penned by Black Mirror creator Charlie Brooker “The story is fundamentally about two people finding a genuine connection and themselves in an entirely artificial setting,” Wang explained “That contrast is really interesting and it’s very moving because it talks about someone from now and someone from the past both actors trapped in different ways who otherwise would have never met They find each other in a similar boat and find themselves being able to be their true selves for the first time with each other is what actors are going through right now and if this could actually happen to an actor that tried to reenact a role and emotional implication for somebody who has just been used for two hours?” “The Brandy character in the end wants to keep a certain connection or longing The more it feels real that Clara is there the more we also know that it’s impossible what if we use that technology on real people What would the implication of that be?” “Hotel Reverie” comes up with a way for Brandy and Clara to keep in touch even though Brandy is in the real world and Clara is entirely digital how would that work exactly?” involved in the twist That’s what stays with you that will never go away even though you’ll never quite have your person ever again It’s about what kind of feeling you want to leave the audience with and You can watch “Hotel Reverie” and the rest of Black Mirror on Netflix ' + scriptOptions._localizedStrings.webview_notification_text + ' " + scriptOptions._localizedStrings.redirect_overlay_title + " " + scriptOptions._localizedStrings.redirect_overlay_text + " Enter your email to receive editorial updates, special offers and breaking news alerts from Vogue Business. 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Please see our privacy policy for more information Vera Wang is selling her namesake brand after 35 years in business Management group WHP Global has acquired the IP of the brand Wang will stay on as founder and chief creative officer of the label The group also owns fashion labels including Rag & Bone Terms of the Vera Wang deal were undisclosed “It was the right combination for me and at the right time and there’s such an energy within what they’re doing and their ambition and I really feel very fortunate that they believe so much in me and my brand.” We are honoured to partner with Vera Wang and look forward to building on the brand’s remarkable legacy with new business opportunities around the world,” said Yehuda Shmidman got her start in fashion with a job at Vogue and also spent time at Ralph Lauren before deciding to launch a bridal line The Vera Wang brand has been independently owned since its founding in 1990 with Wang as the sole owner and reporting more than $700 million in annual sales What started as a single bridal salon in The Carlyle hotel grew to a fully fledged lifestyle brand fragrance and shoe categories and partnered with Kohl’s and David’s Bridal on diffusion lines Her bridal looks are a celebrity favourite: she’s designed wedding dresses for a long list of star clients and is a private equity-backed firm created to license and grow consumer brands WHP is creating a premium fashion vertical with the likes of Rag & Bone The company’s portfolio does over $7 billion in global sales Wang says her primary focus is to expand geographically as well as in the Middle East and Latin America — all opportunities she identified but said she couldn’t move on herself condos and “experience businesses” she plans to explore to build out her lifestyle portfolio why WHP and what advice she has for young designers That’s important to stress because as a brand I haven’t been able to partake in many of the concepts and strategies that I’ve wanted to and it will give me the chance to participate in their company and help govern and steer where we go with my brand — and that’s a special combination I have the right partner at the right stage and very important emotionally and in terms of business: it was my 75th birthday my brand’s 35th anniversary and my 55th year in fashion Vogue: I’m sure you’ve had many suitors over the years I studied the arc of where they’re going and how fast they’ve done it They also really believed in me as a human being a brand and a partner and that’s very important — the trust in me and what I’ve built It’s a unique deal in that I was able to participate myself It makes me feel as though I have a say and that’s not typical WHP has people on the ground in 50 countries — we don’t have that and joining a company; it’s a new exciting experience for me and hopefully I bring some value to them other than just the brand Vogue: How did you manage to stay independent for so long I’ll tell you something: I went against my dear father I asked him to pay for design school and he said no — he told me to go get a job I began to create everything in my bridal store so that it was 100 per cent us how they translate the clothes and the sketches but as hard as it was to found the company Bit by bit we built synergistic licensees for everything This was brick by brick and bride by bride Vogue: What advice do you have for young designers starting out today I’m very involved with young designers, I have so much passion for them and other designers. I am, after Polly [Mellen, the long-time Vogue editor who recently passed] new ideas and that is the future of our industry I always say to them: get a job and work for someone before you start your own company you can see what opportunities present themselves to you I never dreamt I would own a fashion company — at the ripe old age of 40 I’m not of the school that everyone should start with their own company To work your way up is the most important experience you can have I’m talking about the gruelling work of sewing a garment Comments, questions or feedback? Email us at feedback@voguebusiness.com Carmen Busquets knows how to get luxury e-commerce back on track Gap Inc CEO Richard Dickson on staging an American comeback Altuzarra’s next chapter begins with a rental launch Sign up to our newsletter for a truly global perspective on the fashion industry Suggestions or feedback? some of the country’s top memorizers converged on MIT’s Kresge Auditorium to compete in a “Tournament of Memory Champions” in front of a live audience The competition was split into four events: long-term memory in which competitors must memorize the exact order of two decks of cards MIT faculty who are experts in the science of memory provided short talks and demos about memory and how to improve it Among the competitors was MIT’s own Claire Wang a sophomore majoring in electrical engineering and computer science Wang has competed in memory sports for years a hobby that has taken her around the world to learn from some of the best memorists on the planet she tied for first place in the words-to-remember competition The event commemorated the 25th anniversary of the USA Memory Championship Organization (USAMC) USAMC sponsored the event in partnership with MIT’s McGovern Institute for Brain Research the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences MIT News sat down with Wang to learn more about her experience with memory competitions — and see if she had any advice for those of us with less-than-amazing memory skills Q: How did you come to get involved in memory competitions I read the book “Moonwalking with Einstein,” which is about a journalist’s journey from average memory to being named memory champion in 2006 My parents were also obsessed with this TV show where people were memorizing decks of cards and performing other feats of memory I had already known about the concept of “memory palaces,” so I was inspired to explore memory sports I convinced my parents to let me take a gap year after seventh grade and I travelled the world going to competitions and learning from memory grandmasters I got to know the community in that time and I got to build my memory system I did a lot less of those competitions after that year and some subsequent competitions with the USA memory competition Q: What was the Tournament of Memory Champions like A: USAMC invited a lot of winners from previous years to compete It was nice seeing a lot of people I haven’t seen in years I didn’t compete in every event because I was too busy to do the long-term memory which takes you two weeks of memorization work I helped a bit with the brainstorming beforehand because I know one of the professors running it We thought about how to give the talks and structure the event which is when they give you 300 words over 15 minutes and the competitors have to recall each one in order in a round robin competition A lot of other competitions just make you write the words down The round robin makes it more fun for people to watch I tied with someone else — I made a dumb mistake — so I was kind of sad in hindsight Since I hadn't done this in a while (and I was coming back from a trip where I didn’t get much sleep) I was a bit nervous that my brain wouldn’t be able to remember anything and I was pleasantly surprised I didn’t just blank on stage a lot of my loci and memory palaces were forgotten so I had to speed-review them before the competition The words event doesn’t get easier over time — it’s just 300 random words (which could range from “disappointment” to “chair”) and you just have to remember the order Q: What is your approach to improving memory A: The whole idea is that we memorize images and emotions much better than numbers or random words The way it works in practice is we make an ordered set of locations in a “memory palace.” The palace could be anything It could be a campus or a classroom or a part of a room but you imagine yourself walking through this space and in every location I place certain information This is information related to what I’m trying to remember I have pictures I associate with words and I have specific images I correlate with numbers you translate that back to the original information Doing memory sports really helps you with visualization and being able to visualize things faster and better helps you remember things better You start remembering with spaced repetition that you can talk yourself through Allowing things to have an emotional connection is also important Doing memory competitions made me want to study neuroscience and computer science at MIT The specific memory sports techniques are not as useful in everyday life as you’d think because a lot of the information we learn is more operative and requires intuitive understanding sometimes you have to initially remember things before you can develop a strong intuition later since I have to get really good at telling a lot of stories over time I have gotten great at visualization and manipulating objects in my mind This website is managed by the MIT News Office, part of the Institute Office of Communications Massachusetts Institute of Technology77 Massachusetts Avenue Click here to read our spring 2025 issue, featuring Caught by the Tides' Jia Zhangke and Zhao Tao, our annual spotlight on locations and more... Writer/Director Lulu Wang has been shooting film and TV overseas since her debut feature Posthumous (2014) The American-German co-production tells the story of a Berlin-based artist who finally finds his audience when the media mistakenly reports him dead The themes and plot of that film—in which the obstinate individualism of a Chinese-American writer (Awkwafina) abrades her family’s collective sense of responsibility when she reunites with them in northern China—is reflected in the film’s co-production model for which an American and Chinese cast and crew converged coupled with Wang’s experience as a producer—who has started production companies like Flyingbox Pictures featuring a first-look TV deal with Amazon—prepared her to show run and direct all 6 episodes of Expats a sprawling series about a solipsistic ensemble of rich Hong Kong expats who begin to toxically intermingle after a tragedy plunges them into each other’s prickly webs the series also sees Wang expand her explorations of cultural difference into attendant class contradictions Many diasporic filmmakers aspire to shoot where they or their families originate from the level of Wang’s power to consistently make feature films and TV abroad I inquire about the practical moves that led her to such a rare position in the industry; as well as Wang’s insistence on story and not compromising your vision in the process of producing it; and maintaining collaborators to sustain a sense of continuity across projects and locations you’ve started your own production companies Is remaining directly involved in that ecosystem a way for you to maintain creative agency as you take on larger projects Writers and directors have to be entrepreneurs by nature because no one’s handing you a path to walk down With every project you are starting an enterprise: you have to decide who’s going to be part of it and how you’re going to protect it I like the idea of not starting from scratch every time There’s a snowball effect where one project can roll into another with the people that you’ve worked with before For me it’s really about maintaining a sense of family because writing and directing is incredibly lonely That community is grounding and helps to maintain continuity as you go from project to project was an American-German co-production and your sophomore feature was a co-production between the US and China You’re in a pretty rare position as an American director to produce films and series abroad Was it challenging to make your debut feature an international co-production It was a challenge just because it’s a bigger project than I probably should have started with there’s no should or shouldn’t—it is what it is; but it definitely put me in the shoes of producing first and foremost Because I didn’t go to film school and because it was this international production Independent directors are all producers on some level; we’re always producing But for those early films it’s really important to be able to take creative risks and have that protection around you—where you’re not the person driving the vehicle from a practical standpoint Co-productions actually feel really natural to me because I’ve grown up navigating cultural differences and language differences—which [is a theme of The Farewell] itself—and being an outsider no matter where I am AH: A lot of diasporic filmmakers aspire to make work abroad But it’s difficult to get to a place in your career where you can do that LW: Don’t start with the producer’s hat first because it’s almost like trying to build the bones of the house before you know what kind of home you want And I think it’s more important to figure out how you want the home to feel That’s really important because [story ideas] were always thrust upon me when I was trying to make The Farewell I had a very specific story to tell but every time I would pitch it to a producer they would go Because if it’s this market then you have to change it in this direction And if it’s for that market you have to change it in that direction.” I don’t know about the marketplace but it’s neither A nor B direction; it’s somewhere in the middle and I understand that that doesn’t exist right now – there aren’t a lot of great comps that I can use—but that’s actually the essence of the entire story: being in between I really believe that if you have a great story and you wait and for the people who see it they’ll find a way; they’ll find a way to connect what works in both places There’re all of these practicalities and ways to create a formula That’s where a creative producer is really valuable there are so many labs that can connect you with mentors who have creative [production] ideas that won’t change the fundamental essence of the story that you’re trying to tell AH: How did you arrive at the right formula for The Farewell like maybe there’s a larger broader comedy version of The Farewell to be made at a bigger studio But maybe in order to maintain what you’re trying to do you have to go smaller Are you gonna find a cheaper location that could work just as well or potentially better Are you gonna change the race of the cast or the language of the story Where you draw the line is very personal to each filmmaker I did a podcast about the true story of The Farewell and I didn’t know the podcast would turn into an opportunity to make the film But I knew the podcast gave me an opportunity to tell the story in a way that I believed in and I could test it that way with lower risk and no budget You want to give yourself the opportunity to bring the purest form of your vision to the early stages Because it’s a lower cost way of really solidifying your vision so people understand exactly what you’re trying to do Then you can partner a short film with the feature-length script or a really extensive pitch deck AH: Are there any specific experiences from Posthumous or The Farewell that prepared you to shoot in Hong Kong for Expats—and were there things you experienced on the shoot of Expats that those prior films could not have prepared you for LW: You prepare for frustrations due to the assumption that people work differently and you have to figure out how to navigate communication among teams because we always hire local crew Who are the key members and department heads like the gaffer and key grip who have to be bilingual because they’re also translators [for the rest of the crew] but we had that issue in Changchun [for The Farewell] You have to break down what the communication lines are within each department Where can we be strategic about placing bilingual speakers Sometimes my department heads don’t speak the local language so you have to create a different system of communication AH: How did you approach casting the Filipino actors who play overseas domestic workers in the feature length episode LW: My casting director in Hong Kong reached out to a casting director in Manila and there was a wider search She had sent in the tape and the second I saw her I knew… We talked via Zoom and she said that she had been a nanny in Canada when she was younger because financially that would have been more cost-efficient but we also wanted to support the local people economically but we quickly realized that would be impossible They have very strict visas that only allow them to do the job they came to the country to do because that kind of system that these women have to go through is exactly what we’re interrogating [in that episode] The family that hires them brings them over and has their visa; it’s basically a kind of ownership because they hold on to their ability to be there So we needed people who were there on other visas that allowed them to do other jobs But many of the women we cast had previously been domestic workers who were somehow able to shift their visa a caretaker who witnesses her employers’ affairs and scandals] is a singer in Hong Kong They didn’t necessarily need to have acting experience so the casting director Rosanna Ng reached out to the Hong Kong music community where there are a lot of incredible Filipino musicians Her husband was also incredibly helpful in recording—we had done a lot of rehearsals with the choir for that scene and pre-recording the music and things like that; and Amellyn’s incredible in it AH: How does the production length of a series affect that international ecosystem because Nicole Kidman recommended her First AD And there is like this link between Hong Kong and Australia so there are a lot of Australians in Hong Kong especially at the length we were working together really empowered me to execute this show in my vision and gave the studio the confidence to let me choose a team that I really trust even if they didn’t have the kind of experience that one might [typically] look for I empower my department heads to do the same: If there’s somebody you love and trust then let me fight to make sure you get that person because sometimes that history and that shorthand is more valuable than a resume Maybe sometimes you do need somebody who has the resume and can lead you in ways you never thought about There’s always the fear of hiring someone who is condescending to us there’s the fear that they don’t want to respect me or listen to me because I’m a woman so I know it’s a risk to work with somebody new I try to find that balance of growing with new people but also fighting for older relationships where it’s important when you’re a filmmaker and making a studio film you’ll look around and see all these people you’ve known for a really long time I don’t think climbing up alone is the way to go This story is taken from the Spring/Summer 2024 issue of AnOther Magazine: “I keep this photograph by Ren Hang on my screensaver as inspiration because it speaks to me about dreams It’s the image of a naked woman casually lying in the middle of an empty road smoking a cigarette and it sums up the life that I want – an ownership over my body and when I discovered his photography it felt so startling It’s the gaze of a new youth – a new generation I left China when I was six so I never experienced what it is like to be an adolescent coming of age there I’ve always thought of China as culturally very conservative and it was so refreshing to see this gaze that emphasises nature and intimacy and honesty It’s hard not to look at Hang’s work through the lens of his death and the depression that he suffered – he died in 2017 “In China his work was often censored and misinterpreted as crude and pornographic but to me it has so much charm and humour – he finds the magical in the mundane I looked at a lot of photography when I was defining the visual language of my series Expats Hang travelled to Hong Kong quite a bit – he loved Cantopop – and he shot against the city’s lush greenery That lushness was one of the things I really wanted to capture in the show – the jungle and the ocean right up against this metropolis make it feel tropical and exuberant but also quite mysterious Born in China, raised in Miami and now a Los Angeleno, Lulu Wang is drawn to stories that grapple with identity and belonging — most recently Expats, a six-part series based on Janice YK Lee’s bestselling novel The Expatriates, which brims with secrets, lies and knotty power dynamics. Executive produced by and starring Nicole Kidman the show delves into the lives of a handful of entitled foreigners whose sleek existence on Hong Kong’s airy Peak is breached by an unspeakable tragedy Kidman invited Wang to helm the show after seeing the director’s bittersweet Sundance hit The Farewell which found comedy and heartache in the schisms of cultural and geographical distance a loaded title she approaches by telling the stories of both the privileged westerners and the maids nannies and chauffeurs hired to smooth their paths panoramic portrait of the rain-soaked city that upends easy caricatures and finds humour in pitch-dark places “Maybe that’s my cultural background,” she says often because of so many hardships and generational trauma I’m always seeking the edge and pushing it further because that line is different for everybody.”  Make-up: Aaron Paul at Exclusive Artists using CLÉ DE PEAU BEAUTÉ This story features in the Spring/Summer 2024 issue of AnOther Magazine, which is on sale internationally now. Order here Jackson Wang was recently in Malaysia to attend the opening of Louis Vuitton's new store at Pavilion Kuala Lumpur Jackson Wang exudes a different aura about him today The 30-year-old Chinese artiste is dressed in a tweed But as the punishing afternoon sun streams through the floor-to-ceiling windows revealing his signature look: a black tank top The larger-than-life celebrity appears smaller in person showcasing a lean and toned physique that suggests a single-digit body fat percentage After a relentless work schedule over the past decade Wang has decided to stop and smell the proverbial roses He mentions he’s been on an extended vacation to reset I wanted to take my time to prepare for my next output You can’t rush art,” Wang says as we are seated in the sprawling living-dining room of a presidential suite at a five-star hotel in the heart of Kuala Lumpur Wang is taking time out from his vacation to attend the opening of Louis Vuitton’s new store at Pavilion Kuala Lumpur as the brand’s House Ambassador highlighting his commitment to the French label He has been known to be a consummate professional when it comes to work Jackson Wang started his music career as part of the seven-piece boy band GOT7 Wang has won fans worldwide with his rapping and dancing skills he’s released a couple of hit albums and has collaborated with top artistes – from Hong Kong’s Sammi Cheng and Nicholas Tse to Indonesia’s Afgan and US singer Ciara Wang has founded Team Wang Design where he serves as creative director and designer To say he’s an overachiever would be an understatement “all work and no play makes Jack(son) a dull boy” rings true which is why Wang is currently on a sojourn After wrapping his successful Magic Man World Tour (which lasted 14 months) in early January He says he has immersed himself in new environments like Japan I wanted to see what the locals are really doing rather than following typical tourist recommendations travelling means experiencing a place as locals do It’s like in China – we have the Great Wall asking people on the street for food recommendations,” Wang says Jackson Wang and US singer Ciara collaborated in the 2023 release He waxes lyrical about the food he has tried so far naming his top two favourites – nasi lemak and shaved ice dessert what stood out to me in Malaysia is how sincerely every restaurant treated their food Wang gets personal and shares his thoughts on several key topics his complex relationship with fame and why he buys many light bulbs The interview has been edited for length and clarity This year marks Wang’s 10th year in the music industry He made his debut with the K-pop group GOT7 in 2014 when he was just 20 years old the seven-piece boy band went on to achieve success globally including the United States when it became the first K-pop group to make it into the Billboard Artist 100 chart He has since released two solo studio albums Congratulations on hitting your 10th year in showbiz But take me back to 2014 when you made your debut What aspirations did you have for Jackson Wang then and do you think you have achieved them today I wanted to be seen musically in many ways Think of GOT7 as a rainbow with seven colours I only started doing exactly what I wanted to do about three or four years ago but it’s just a different stage of the journey Jackson Wang celebrating his 30th birthday with his parents This year also marks a special occasion for you I realised the last few years of my 20s were intense to some point that I thought I was gonna die the next day sprinting in all directions and constantly bumping into walls When you’re in the dark for a while and keep bumping into walls you eventually get a sense of the room’s size everything comes with a lot of responsibilities and discipline What’s the legacy you want to leave behind I think I’m just honoured and grateful for the life I live at the moment Not everyone can wake up and do what they love or even dream about doing what they love As he sits perched on a chair in the dining room overlooking the Petronas Twin Towers we can’t help but notice the numerous tattoos Wang sports One catches our eyes: A small ink of a fencing sabre on his left forearm just beneath another tattoo of the logo of the 2010 Summer Youth Olympics These two are reminders that Wang was a sportsman before becoming an idol Born in Hong Kong to parents who were athletes (dad was a fencer while mum was a gymnast) it wasn’t surprising that Wang followed in their footsteps He started training in fencing when he was 10 and quickly rose up the ranks which led him to compete in the first Summer Youth Olympic Games in Singapore in 2010 Jackson Wang is celebrating his 10th year in showbiz this year He also trained to represent Hong Kong for the London Olympics and was even offered an athletic scholarship to study at Stanford University in the US when presented with the opportunity to become a trainee with JYP and pursue a career as an idol Do you think your background in sports is why you’re so laser-focused and always have your eye on the prize with both of my parents being athletes as well has instilled in me the mindset of that “failure is normal and winning is a bonus” The values of sportsmanship have greatly influenced me When you look at these big sporting events Even though I left the sports community when I became a trainee at JYP in 2011 while my fellow athletes were competing in the London Olympics in 2012 and it’s fascinating to follow their journeys I have imagined what it would have been like (if I had stayed on) the fencing and Olympics tattoos on your arm serve as remembrance given that your career spans several countries I spend like two to three months out of the year in Shanghai where I live with my parents I heard that you leave a light on in your house in South Korea because you don’t like returning to an empty home And that the light symbolises someone greeting you when you come back And the person who cleans my house knows that if the bulb is faulty Jackson Wang has been known to be a consummate professional when it comes to work We would love to keep you posted on the latest promotion If having your first feature premiere at the Sundance Film Festival is an accomplishment being nominated for an Academy Award the same week is pretty much unheard of that’s what writer-director Sean Wang experienced last January when his coming-of-age narrative feature premiered to glowing reviews (and a distribution deal with Focus Features) while his nonfiction portrait of his two grandmothers was nominated for the Oscar for Best Documentary Short Wang’s career has skyrocketed over the past year and now Dìdi “younger brother” in Chinese) opens in theaters riding a wave of strong press and audience reactions California in 2008 with his mother (Joan Chen!) and hoping to get in with local skateboarders who seek a videographer to help film their stunts The film is somewhat autobiographical: Wang was heavily influenced by the early work of Spike Jonze grew up in suburban Fremont and made skateboarding videos for online consumption Wang’s grandmother who was the co-subject of his Oscar-nominated documentary short appears in Dìdi as Chris’s grandmother too I spoke with Wang about personal filmmaking recruiting Spike Jonze to lend his voice to the film Filmmaker: There was something you mentioned during a recent Q&A that I found very interesting about how your filmmaking has allowed you to bring up and ask your family about topics that you may not have been comfortable asking them in other contexts I was curious about this idea of needing a purpose to ask these questions and the potentially awkward uncomfortableness that may come with it Wang: One of the great things about filmmaking as an artform is that it’s an artform driven by questions while you may not necessarily have the answers you’ve been seeking the process allows for the exploration of the feeling you had and what you stumble upon in the process so much of making something good is forcing yourself to be vulnerable and allowing yourself to “go there” and ask the hard questions and question why things are the way things are which prior to Dìdi is where I did most of my work In my day-to-day life [amongst] my friends I’m a pretty open book and I think I’m trying to be more like that in other parts of my life too Filmmaking is both a [means of] expression and a tool to help with that Filmmaker: Would it be right to assume that setting Dìdi in 2008 with a lead character [the age you would have been at that time] was your way of looking more personally inward [Journalists] are always grappling with trying to identify what’s personal [in a director’s work] versus what’s fictionalized and when me and my friends reminisce about that time in our lives Wasn’t this or that [event] big and loud and funny?” It’s easy to reminisce about the funny stuff But when I first looked back and began mining through the funny memories I had while also knowing that I wanted to tell a personal story I was quickly confronted with the notion that “if I’m going to write a personal story about an Asian-American boyhood that takes place in 2008 (which was a different cultural time than today) I’m inevitably going to be writing a story that confronts the way that shame manifests itself within this young boy’s life.” Whether or not I knew it at the time that was a defining feeling for me [at that age] and it ultimately became the defining theme of our movie whether it’s explicitly talked about or just something I [internally] felt but now that I’m in my 20s and have more distance removed from those adolescent years and can look back on those feelings and define them in words and intellectualize and recontextualize them and figure out what they did not just to me but to my friends and hopefully for an entire generation of Asian-American kids I’m able to look back and dissect those memories a bit more Filmmaker: Speaking of recontextualizing ofthings you’ve said that in using the technology that was available in 2008 you wanted the viewer to view it from the perspective not of nostalgia but of a knowingess of what [these tools meant to us] a great example of this in the film is hearing a door loudly slam shut whenever somebody logs off AOL Instant Messenger (AIM) It gets a laugh because many of us instantly recall what that sound signifies even if we’ve memory-holed it in the years since it brings some kind of feeling immediately back to us I’m curious about the ways in which you thought about portraying that accurately while maintaining a knowing eye on the “period-piece nature” of the film that attempts to resist nostalgia our movie is going to be inherently nostalgic but the hope was that it wasn’t just this nostalgic “museum piece”: “Wow The hope was that people would get a kick out of what you just said the sound of a door slamming shut on AIM or the look and feel of someone’s personal MySpace page I forgot about all of that.” But once you get over the novelty of it to just use these websites and their user interfaces as parts of a story as we lived (or at least partially lived) online during that time—I felt that none of the movies made during that period that [claimed to] capture adolescence utilized it The filmmakers were always trying to work around it once people get past the nostalgia-based dopamine hit then we can just use this [technology] as how it would be used as a storytelling tool.” Those user interfaces still have meaning in our lives they remind us of a time that’s now distant we also associate those interfaces with the friendships that were both forged and broken on the internet Friendships were made over Facebook Messenger There’s so much meaning in all of these chatboxes and it all depends on the context and how you frame it The hope was that once the viewer gets past the nostalgia of it all it just becomes part of the characters’ world We’re not trying to showcase it in a way that is more than what it is a little mundane and just a part of his domestic life It’s not the internet “with a capital I,” it’s not “we are now in the Internet.” It’s just there Filmmaker: I know you didn’t want to write necessarily an Asian-American story but rather a story about an Asian-American kid that was true to your version of growing up did you ever feel any push and pull in dealing with what other people wanted from you as a writer in the many lab programs this project has gone through over the years did you have to deal with less than helpful feedback that [threatened] your goal of staying true to your vision it ended up exploring adolescence through a first generation Asian-American lens All my friends just happened to be of that intersection of identity and that was the thing that I was trying to calibrate with Dìdi which was admittedly a harder experience because you’re the one writing [the screenplay] so it’s a bit more like you’re conjuring things as opposed to taking something and reframing it the story [began] steering into trying to make it feel more authentic It always felt like we were leaning into some trope that had already been done in some other movie Anytime I felt like I was [veering in] that direction I have to recalibrate whatever my writing brain is and not make it ‘more Asian-American,’ but to just think of how to make it more personal and more honest to whatever my lived experience was or at least some version of that.” When I did the script automatically became ‘more Asian-American’ as I was diving more into “I am this but I never felt like people were trying to sway me in any one direction It always came from my own sort of personal calibration and the only reason that came about was because no one cared about what I had to write Filmmaker: After working on the project for a number of years of the film become real and knowing that you and your team were ready to go I think it’s bigger than Summertime but smaller than [López Estrada’s’ first feature] Blindspotting let’s chat and see.” He was like I want to do this with you and help you get it made.” That’s how Carlos came on board and we went out with the script for about a year while I continued to develop it Wang: Everybody passed on it. A lot of people loved it, but everybody passed. They were like, “It’s just too small.” It was all just industry stuff. Then, in 2023, a short I made, Nǎi Nai & Wài Pó, was accepted into South by Southwest and the script for Dìdi had just gotten into Sundance’s Screenwriters Lab and Screenwriters Intensive I want to shoot this in the summer of 2023.” By that point “We’re shooting July 2023.” At this point it felt like we really had momentum We were talking to a bunch of people who were excited about it but still had no financing I can remember back on March 1st of 2023 thinking a lot has to happen in the next week for us to realistically make this movie” and in the span of 24 hours I have good news: we got our first drop in the bucket This investor wants to invest a little chunk of money into the movie but it’s the first drop and it’s enough to go and tell people that ‘Hey someone believes in Sean with their wallet.’”  Filmmaker: I wanted to ask about the blending of some of the nonfiction elements of the film with the narrative you’ve written. For instance, Chris’s bedroom in the film was your actual childhood bedroom, and, of course, your grandmother appears in the film as Chris’s grandmother. While on set, did you have any out-of-body experiences where those memories of your very real childhood came back while you were directing this film? Filmmaker: And hopefully your grandmother will continue to be cast in these small, on-screen roles. Wang: They were trying to get her signed! Agencies have hit us up. She’s gotten offers and people have reached out to ask, “Hey, will your grandma audition [for us]?” And I’ve asked her: “Grandma, are you interested in this thing? It’s over four weeks in New York City.” And now she’s like, “oh, I’ve got to read the script first. I’m not going to do it if it’s a bad script.” [laughs]. I’m like, “OK, grandma.” Filmmaker: “Attention CAA, she does not do cold reads.” Wang: No, exactly [laughs]. It’s funny because big casting directors have contacted me about having both my grandmas audition in the future and I’m like, “No, no, they’re mine.” and married to an American man applies for a green card you were born in China and lived in Canada for a period before moving to the U.S Did you draw on personal experience for the story I did draw on the experience of waiting for the right papers My father left China first; my mother and I stayed behind until we got our visas to join him in Australia For a period of time after we left Australia my mother and I lived in Ontario while my father worked in the States He crossed the border to see us every few months until we were allowed to join him Citizenship has made many things easier for me and my family Nor does it mean that I feel American through and through many have come from places like Canada or Europe or China to work in the States Some are on very restrictive visas (and plan to go back) Some have green cards and have decided to stop there Some have married citizens and begun the citizenship process I wonder about an individual’s decision to stay and naturalize (or not) or has that decision already been made for you The process of applying for a green card while living in the U.S during the time that the application is being processed Did that bureaucratic Catch-22 make it an especially appealing subject for the story the more nebulous and convoluted it became A fitting scenario for a protagonist undergoing an internal identity shift that manifests in an external way I also don’t think the permanent-resident process is written about much Probably because most people don’t think about it unless they’ve gone through it or know someone who has Gaining citizenship in a country you weren’t born in is meant to be a tedious process because the point is to prove yourself at the highest and most-detailed legal level so that the government will accept you When the process also requires you to renounce your citizenship of birth you’d gained something legitimate on paper by surrendering an inherent piece of yourself Why did you set “Status in Flux” in the third year of the pandemic This was the year when everyone I knew seemed to be travelling or talking about travel So I imagined what it would be like for a person who could not travel during this period based on a technicality The first time I had to go somewhere after the pandemic restrictions subsided I kept telling him that I did not want to be in this cab While the narrator of the story is not allowed to leave the country her friends—are travelling to exotic places or is her ambivalent reaction due to feeling trapped by the U.S but she is more preoccupied with whether her decision to naturalize is simply a decision of convenience or whether it has a larger impact on her identity Her parents are immigrants who have proudly settled in Canada but she has chosen to live in the States with her husband There is the additional layer that her husband is white and comes from a white American family the displacement—and replacement—she feels is twofold Like your previous stories in the magazine, “Omakase” and “The Trip,” “Status in Flux” revolves around a couple in which the woman is Asian American and the man is white American What keeps drawing you back to this territory in fiction the practical reason is that I know the territory well The craft reason is that I do find the clash of cultures and issues generative for tension the couple’s mixed marriage is already different from that of their parents The narrator’s parents would not know what marrying into a white American family is like Matt’s parents probably had not envisioned a foreign-born Asian woman for a daughter-in-law Matt has not needed to assimilate in the way that the narrator had to The narrator has no idea what it’s like to have grown up in America or as part of the majority there are multiple learning curves happening all at once and that kind of friction in trying to make a marriage and family work is great for storytelling (though perhaps less straightforward in real life) Why Bishop Mariann Budde wanted to speak to Donald Trump Lena Dunham’s change of pace Tim Walz might run for President in 2028 if you ask him nicely Maya Rudolph is ready to serve Sarah McBride wasn’t looking for a fight on trans rights The liberated life of Colman Domingo Support The New Yorker’s award-winning journalism. Subscribe today. Reading"“A legendary woman warrior”:..." More fromWork Contact Advertising Opportunities Newsletters Insights + Opinion Creatives + Projects Advice + Resources Culture + Lifestyle Nicer Tuesdays The View From... POV Forward Thinking Review of the Year Jenny Brewer Olivia Hingley Ellis Tree Elizabeth Goodspeed Liz Gorny Extra Search Augustina reappropriates traditionally masculine and racist motifs in art The fusion between classical and contemporary painting motifs feels beautifully synthesised in the work of New York-based painter Augustina Wang. Initially it was her fantastical fairytale piece The Stare of Cio Cio (Madame Butterfly as Fairy Queen) on display at The View We Seek exhibition at Anthony Gallery that caught our eye but rather a pastel drawing that highlights the artist’s unique talent “I think of this piece as a way to re-empower Cio Cio a character from the 1904 opera Madame Butterfly,” she tells It’s Nice That “The opera is cited as one of the premier early examples of both the ‘white saviour’ complex and the systemic fetishisation of Asian women as docile Augustina first reckoned with the opera and its yellowface when she was a teenager “It was a tumultuous time back then– my body was changing and now I had come to realise that the way people looked at me on the street was not my own eyes deceiving me but actually part of a long canon of what it meant to be an Asian woman in a post-colonial Western nation,” she explains The Stare of Cio Cio empowers this character and she has been promoted from geisha into Fairy Queen– ruler of a realm of magic and spells untethered from her troubled canonical form or the lovers she was forced to have,” Augustina says Augustina Wang: The Stare of Cio Cio (Madame Butterfly as Fairy Queen) (Copyright © Augustina Wang Augustina’s first solo exhibition earlier this year “For that exhibition I was interested in the idea of ‘power’ and all of its forms,” she explains “I settled between the dichotomy of outer and inner strength.” This exhibition in particular was a cathartic one for Augustina as it was born from a place of pain that transformed into a healing process “I felt intense pain coming out of a sexually abusive relationship I felt this strange strength well up in me where I had a deep urge to call my rapist out on social media,” Augustina tells us someone who was going to be thrown into fire and torn apart.” Despite the mixed concoction of emotion and protruding muscle on femme characters cropped up in Augustina’s work “That very experience of myself as a legendary woman warrior somewhat dramatic and borderline delusional inspired a lot of the imagery for For Glory and For Love,” she explains “I was fascinated by my strength to endure and my strength to grow as well as my fixation on the idea of ‘roleplaying’ as a method of healing.” The phallic sword is reappropriated into beautiful and adorned weaponry Augustina looks back as the ultimate reconnection to her “inner child” from yesteryear “I hope that I made her proud knowing all of the things she was teased for would pave the way for a voice in the future.” Augustina Wang: Opal Knight Guarding Mother (Copyright © Augustina Wang Augustina Wang: Poet (Copyright © Augustina Wang Augustina Wang: Titans I: Washing Wounds (Copyright © Augustina Wang Augustina Wang: Titans II: Vored (Copyright © Augustina Wang Augustina Wang: Reckoning (Copyright © Augustina Wang Augustina Wang: Poiesis (Copyright © Augustina Wang Augustina Wang: Untitled (Copyright © Augustina Wang The Ultimate Weapon”) (Copyright © Augustina Wang Further Infoaugustina.worldinstagram.com/owo_soldier Joey Levenson Joey is a freelance design They were part of the It’s Nice That team as editorial assistant in 2021 Joey worked as a writer for numerous fashion and art publications Fancy a bit of It's Nice That in your inbox Sign up to our newsletters and we'll keep you in the loop with everything good going on in the creative world Instagram TikTok LinkedIn Facebook Twitter Pinterest About Careers at It’s Nice That Privacy Policy Insights Residence Creative Lives in Progress If You Could Jobs © It’s Nice That 2024 · Nice Face Logo © It’s Nice That Joey is a freelance design the museum reaffirms its mission to defy the erasure of trans non-binary and intersex lives from history with a show-stopping collection of hundreds of objects from the community Tempo Bello – meaning ‘good weather’ in Italian – traces Cecilia Pignocchi’s move from the grey skies of Amsterdam to a slower lifestyle and an important period of self-reflection in Italy reframing the violence with curiosity and care the publication merges multiple perspectives putting the magic of collaborative publishing on show The photographer’s portraits are seeped in symbolism carefully curated to tell layered cultural narratives the London-based designer crafted a tactile look with a four-way colour palette that creates “structure” With illustrated type and a healthy sprinkle of nostalgia this London-based filmmaker has made a fascinating documentation of a karate-chopping micro-community the Margate-based photographer was dedicated to not only capturing the physicality of Tam’s transition this surreal and serene animation brings patriarchal structures sharply into focus This New York-based analogue photographer is going against the dominant gaze on trans identity with expansive and expressive depictions of gender and queerness This design network’s open-source type library exclusively presents inclusive non-binary and post-binary fonts under construction Tasked with uniting the football club under one clear vision Studio Dumbar/DEPT® opted for a more “stout” version Jacob Wise’s Skrappa as the hero type Koto NYC leans into the act of scanning QR codes – weaving a brand narrative of stitches To launch Nike’s latest shoe by NBA star Ja Morant the Copenhagen-based creative studio takes from the world of scrapbooks and family albums The studio’s pupil-led identity champions community and visibility – ensuring Soho’s only primary school is impossible to overlook After another sell-out event last month we are raring to go with a shiny new line-up May’s speakers are sure to get your creative juices flowing providing a peek into the worlds of graphic design The new look brings together contrasting typography and nostalgic illustration to forge an identity that honours tradition while welcoming a new generation to the table the studio looked to the slow and quiet processes of the natural world for inspiration developing a distinct design philosophy that combines research The New York-based creative studio embodies the fishing brand’s uniquely high standards by carefully balancing illustration The new identity for Saintly is Renaissance-inspired John Saint Michel’s experimental practice engages with the symbolic and emotional weight of objects augustina.worldinstagram.com/owo_soldier The fusion between classical and contemporary painting motifs feels beautifully synthesised in the work of New York-based painter Augustina Wang. Initially it was her fantastical fairytale piece The Stare of Cio Cio (Madame Butterfly as Fairy Queen) on display at The View We Seek exhibition at Anthony Gallery that caught our eye Brian Kenny’s vast array of mediums come together at TW Fine Art in Brooklyn to create powerful pieces of queer art Tapping into some painful experiences of the past About Contact Advertising Opportunities Newsletters Insights + Opinion Creatives + Projects Advice + Resources Culture + Lifestyle Nicer Tuesdays The View From... POV Forward Thinking Review of the Year Jenny Brewer Olivia Hingley Ellis Tree Elizabeth Goodspeed Liz Gorny Instagram TikTok LinkedIn Facebook Twitter Pinterest Careers at It’s Nice That Privacy Policy Insights Residence Creative Lives in Progress If You Could Jobs Janet Wang leads Alibaba’s Tmall Luxury Pavilion platform Fresh from the Watches and Wonders fair in Geneva she talks to Vogue Business about the Chinese market rebound top-performing categories and harnessing new technology to engage consumers the retail market in China faced several challenges — including the Chinese market is extremely resilient and Chinese consumer confidence has already gradually returned after the situation was contained That has been reflected not only in an increase in travel bookings and visa applications but also in the online search volumes on the luxury products We’ve seen luxury products searches quickly rebound compared to the last quarter of last year Female consumers had the strongest year-on-year growth in the first two months in particular those aged 25 to 34 had a higher increase than other age brackets all this indicates that the consumption confidence is already returning The difference between us and pure e-commerce platforms is that we are a combination of transactional commerce and media Consumers see Tmall Luxury Pavilion as a destination but also to learn about and experience the brands can also become important intelligence for the brands to develop their future overall strategies We provide data intelligence in the brand’s backend so that they can use it to formulate their communications Vacheron Constantin hosts exhibitions in its beautiful historical house in Shanghai and we offer online luxury shoppers the opportunity to gain a pass to the in-person exhibitions Brands utilise our platform also because we have a very broad range of potential customers Vacheron Constantin on Tmall Luxury Pavilion Tmall Luxury Pavilion is constantly introducing innovative new ways to engage luxury consumers We have 3D displays for thousands of products short videos (from 30 seconds up to three minutes) and live-streaming sessions we have seen from one-to-many sessions evolve into one-to-one connections have already used these individualised video consultations through live-streaming technologies Through these intimate and personalised interactions brands are also able to build a stronger connection with their consumer and sell products at a higher price point I was able to attend Watches and Wonders in Geneva in person There is so much interest in China around new models that will be released We built a 3D space on our platform during Watches and Wonders and worked with partner brands to make several models available via pre-order It typically takes a long time to assemble watches and then ship them to consumers in China but the demand is immediate so we wanted to help the brands capitalise on that interest brands can build a seamless digital experience where consumers can see in detail the craftsmanship We have many categories that are growing very fast including lifestyle (homeware and tableware are popular gifting categories for example) Many brands have developed pet accessories as a category There are certainly exciting innovations at the intersection of retail and technology today and we have always been at the forefront of building new digital experiences for our partner brands We started two years ago to create digital collectibles and we are also exploring blockchain for product certifications The new buzzword is artificial intelligence but we still believe that the metaverse continues to be crucial especially for brands looking to expand their storytelling elements We are still very young — five years old — compared to the maisons that have hundreds of years of history how their craftsmanship and their philosophy can be perfectly translated to audiences through technology it's more an ambition and opportunity Metrics details Visionary leader of China's BGI tells Nature why he is stepping down to build a health-monitoring system based on a million genomes Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout Download references Reprints and permissions Download citation DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature.2015.18091 Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content: a shareable link is not currently available for this article Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Translational Research newsletter — top stories in biotechnology Subscribe or login to read the rest. A podcast about the turbulent relationship between the world's two superpowers, the two men who run them, and the vital issues that affect us all. Home Complete your personal information for a more tailored experience for the best life sciences journalism in the industry By Ambar CastilloNov has two separate health care systems: one for people who aren’t incarcerated physician and researcher Emily Wang has been working to integrate the two no connection between these health care systems,” Wang said “When you have two million individuals cycling in and out of two disparate health care systems your first thought — and I was a young physician at the time — is how do you create a program to bridge that transition of care?” To find out, Wang, along with internist Clemens Hong and formerly incarcerated civil rights leaders in San Francisco, spoke with incarcerated and formerly incarcerated health advocates and their families. Those interviews prompted Wang to co-found the first of many clinics under the Transitions Clinic Network which hires formerly incarcerated people as community health care workers who help those newly released from prison navigate new health care and social service systems The community health workers serve as trusted guides “someone where there wouldn’t be any issues of explaining what had gone on inside any issues of understanding how hard it is to transition home,” Wang said That clinic was the first of what are now 48 community-based primary care programs across 14 states and Puerto Rico. Last month, Wang was awarded one of 25 MacArthur “genius” grants in recognition of her work STAT spoke with Wang over Zoom about the biggest barriers to health care access for people who’ve been in prison and how these issues affect a lot more people than those who have been incarcerated Was there a particular moment when your interests in racial disparities and the U.S I have a very vivid memory of my first time walking into a correctional system in Botswana In the middle of that correctional facility was what appeared to be a correction officer sitting in the middle with a person who is incarcerated People were walking in and out of the correctional facility with large bowls of food juxtaposed to what was my experience in the North Carolina Correctional Institute for Women This was [Botswana’s] maximum security prison and the primary function that a prison serves there is the deprivation of one’s liberties You’re interacting with correctional officers there In this women’s prison [in North Carolina] There’s certainly restrictions on music [and] entertainment The officers interact with incarcerated people in totally different ways the correctional systems in the United States are not just for the deprivation of liberty after having committed a civil or criminal crime but really about exerting a certain level of punishment that inevitably You often speak about the lack of agency people who are incarcerated face Could you speak to the role of agency and control when these folks are released from prison So much of pre-incarceration is largely dictated by conditions of poverty … Once they come home Getting into an educational system to increase your opportunities or abilities to get a job is that much harder You’re turning to the same communities in which you were living before It’s not like miraculously your circumstances have changed The hope would be that once you’ve served your time you have the ability to then rejoin the workforce and practices that really constrict what men and women can do post-release that it’s incredibly hard to then get back onto a road In certain states, depending on where you live and if you’ve been convicted of a drug felony, then you have a lifetime ban of getting food stamps, getting access to housing. Those laws are still on the books in a few states. They are residual … under the Clinton welfare act [The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996] Most states have eliminated those restrictions “Fifty percent of all Americans have had an immediate family member who has been incarcerated.” Even where the laws don’t exist in practice many communities still kind of enforce those restrictions how punitive the laws are — even after you’ve served your time There’s long-term health consequences and economic consequences for families and communities that have been impacted by mass incarceration. There was a huge study led by researchers at Cornell that showed that 50% of all Americans have had an immediate family member who has been incarcerated and not just on those individuals that have been incarcerated What particular policies are you focused on at the Transitions Clinic Network Depending on where one lives and the health system’s policy there’s real restrictions to having individuals that have criminal records work in health systems Our work shows that people with a history of incarceration can be real benefits to their communities When you have community health workers that are integrated within primary care […] it builds new alliances between patients and providers like myself our studies have shown that it actually reduces unnecessary use of the emergency department and actually reduces the cost to the state It reduces cost to the criminal justice system by preventing future interactions with [the system] So the policy arena that we’ve made significant strides in across our network is really trying to interrogate why it is that there are large barriers to people with criminal records working in the health system The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission federally has found that having people with criminal records encounter barriers to working in certain industries given the disproportionate incarceration of people of color It’s important to think about what are these barriers to hiring capable individuals into our health system to work alongside physicians like myself Your daily dose of news in health and medicine looks into whether there’s something about incarceration itself that leads to worse health outcomes in individuals What have been your most important or surprising findings so far Our research program here at the SEICHE Center [at the Yale School of Medicine] has focused on incarceration’s health impacts on cancer What we have found was that the transition home from a carceral system to the community is where the risks are the highest a high risk of worsening of these chronic health conditions those that cycle in and out of the carceral system have worse health outcomes But much of the work [being done] is focused on what happens behind bars especially when they return home from a correctional system Could you give a concrete example of why that’s the case particularly for individuals with chronic disease Let me give you an example, and this isn’t from our work, but a study that was done among [approximately] 2,000 individuals with HIV in the Texas Department of Correctional System People are released from a carceral system back into the community There’s not smooth communication between the health care providers The transition in care between two health systems even when there are certain systems set up there’s barriers to people finding housing So their chronic health conditions — even something as important as taking care of their HIV disease — is lower on their priorities if they don’t have a place to stay about 40 percent of individuals are newly diagnosed with a chronic condition while they’re incarcerated So their experience of that chronic health condition is really affected by how they took care of their disease behind bars Every morning a correctional officer is waking you up for the med line You have to pop it in your mouth in front of her or him You don’t need to figure out how to call a refill so adherence is much better when you’re incarcerated “If you are a person that lives in a community where the rates of incarceration are high you have a higher risk of poor health outcomes.” So you’re unable to make that transition home and it’s in those settings that people have worsening of their chronic health conditions like HIV where their CD4 [white blood cell] counts get worse and they’re in the emergency department with a diabetic emergency or hypertensive emergency These are the sorts of conditions that we see post-release and some of the structural explanations for why people don’t do well coming out The other surprising thing is that this story of how mass incarceration has impacted health is one that But increasingly what we’re seeing is also [that] its impact is pervasive and its health harms are experienced not just by those that are incarcerated If you are a person that lives in a community where the rates of incarceration are high — even if you’ve never been incarcerated yourself —  you have a higher risk of poor health outcomes you can see that mass incarceration is one of the greatest health challenges of our time You’ve said that “to achieve health equity we have to attend to health inequities within the criminal justice system.” Why you can imagine that if your loved one has been incarcerated it can lead to fewer resources in the home the cost of calling is so exorbitant that it depletes your family home And the stress of having a loved one incarcerated All those are paths by which women in particular have a higher rates of heart disease higher rates of obesity — independent of their own behaviors Studies have shown that they have a higher risk of reporting poor health and higher rates of cardiovascular risk factors For community members that live in heavily policed stress is a reported pathway by which living in those communities independent of your own risk of incarceration These same communities are ones where — because of the laws and practices that are tied to mass incarceration — where there aren’t strong neighborhood ties where there aren’t strong community resources that create parks And these pathways really affect these large health outcomes of whole communities Ambar Castillo is a 2022-2023 Sharon Begley Science Reporting Fellow at STAT To submit a correction request, please visit our Contact Us page Reporting from the frontiers of health and medicine By 2019-12-19T17:34:00+00:00 A well-intentioned deception inspired Lulu Wang to make her indie comedy-drama The Farewell The filmmaker talks to Wendy Mitchell about going back to her Chinese roots Lulu Wang and cinematographer Anna Franquesa Solano on the set of ‘The Farewell’ One of Lulu Wang’s biggest fans has not seen her hit film The Farewell “I don’t think we’re going to show her,” Wang explains That makes sense once you know The Farewell’s premise — inspired by Wang’s own life — about Billi a Chinese-American woman in her twenties who revisits China when her grandmother is diagnosed with terminal lung cancer her family decides to keep the diagnosis a secret from ‘Nai Nai’ As the film’s opening text — and poster — declares when her grandmother’s cancer story was unfolding Wang was finishing her debut feature: art-world romantic comedy Post­humous She knew immediately that her family’s true-life drama would make a great film “I felt like this was a perfect scenario that had so many emotions — it was funny I would wake up in the middle of the night and write down these excerpts Getting those moments into script form was relatively straightforward but financing the film proved to be more difficult the difficulty was financing the film Wang knew she wanted to make — shot partially in China “When I couldn’t get any US producers to come on board it’s a Chinese film.’ So I went to a Chinese investor and they said the film was too American for the Chinese market.” After Wang told her family story in 2016 on a 30-minute episode of National Public Radio show This American Life producer Chris Weitz (Columbus, A Single Man) sought her out and came on board to produce The Farewell through his company Depth of Field and was joined almost immediately by Peter Saraf and Daniele Tate Melia at Big Beach whose credits include Little Miss Sunshine The authenticity of the director’s vision was important to the producing team ‘Why would we want to have you change the textures that are so important to the story?’” Lulu Wang and Akwafina on the set of ‘The Farewell’ Finding the right actress to play Billi was also crucial Wang was initially sceptical when her casting director suggested Awkwafina — at the time known mostly for her music career but soon to impress in scene-stealing roles in Ocean’s 8 and Crazy Rich Asians.  “Someone can be passionate about the role but you don’t know how they come across on screen,” Wang explains of her initial reluctance to cast Awkwafina (real name Nora Lum) in her first lead dramatic role “I didn’t know if she could do a dramatic part I felt like I saw Billi on screen.”  Wang was clear that Billi had to become Awkwafina’s creation even though the character is partly autobiographical your feelings about family.’” Awkwafina has said growing up with her own Chinese grandmother helped her relate personally to the story Making a US independent film on a modest $3m budget was a challenge in China — it shot in New York and then for 24 days in Changchun the real home of Wang’s family — including her grandmother “It was difficult because there’s not many people who have done it,” she says of western filmmakers working in China on a low-budget production Wang pays credit to Big Beach producer Melia and Chinese producer Jane Zheng as well as the hard-working and mostly Chinese crew (director of photography Anna Franquesa Solano and production designer Yong Ok Lee came over from the US).  Casting 75-year-old Zhao Shuzhen as the grandmother was another key decision we cast her just before the first day of production She didn’t audition — Diana Lin who plays Billi’s mother sent me some of her work so I had to beg her to do it.” On set she was referred to as “Teacher Zhao” Wang’s grandmother visited the set in Changchun and she figured out that the film was about her family’s relationships but everyone still kept the cancer plot secret from her.  Even though Netflix put a lucrative worldwide offer on the table after the world premiere at Sundance Film Festival in January Wang and her team knew they wanted to have a territory-by-territory theatrical release That decision was not just about screen size “I knew strategically the theatrical roll-out would require a different kind of attention It’s a miracle it exists — I wanted people to know about it.”  earning $17.7m since opening in July. The Farewell is also making a good showing in the early stages of this awards season actress and screenplay at the Gotham Awards and for feature and supporting female (for Zhao) at the Independent Spirit Awards Wang has enjoyed meeting her audience around the globe and hearing their responses “It’s really eye-opening when people laugh in different spots,” she says “Sometimes an Asian audience will come up to say to my culture.’ They feel like non-Asian people aren’t going to get it ‘My grandmother is exactly like that!’ I made the film so specific not knowing if those things were going to resonate with everyone It’s amazing to me how much it translates.” The film was released on November 22 in China by Tianjin Maoyan Media Let’s hope Nai Nai’s friends know how to keep a secret The extended version of Anselm Chan’s ‘The Last Dance’ also picked up two awards ’The Piano’ composer will receive his award in October  The Hong Kong star will introduce screenings of ‘Project A’ and ‘Police Story’ at the festival The updating list includes titles’ sales agents and key deals The Barcelona producer’s credits include Carlos Marqués-Marcet’s They Will Be Dust Warner Bros./Legendary video game smash passed $720m at the global box office through April 20 Screen International is the essential resource for the international film industry access to the Screen International archive and supplements including Stars of Tomorrow and World of Locations Site powered by Webvision Cloud Subscribe or login to read the rest A podcast about the turbulent relationship between the world's two superpowers Step into the realm of the unseen with Robin Wang, CEO of Living Optics. The startup cofounder discusses the power of hyperspectral imaging with AI Podcast host Noah Kravitz in an episode recorded live at the NVIDIA GTC global AI conference. Living Optics’ hyperspectral imaging camera which can capture visual data across 96 colors reveals details invisible to the human eye Potential applications are as diverse as monitoring plant health to detecting cracks in bridges The startup aims to empower users across industries to gain new insights from richer more informative datasets fueled by hyperspectral imaging technology Living Optics is a member of the NVIDIA Inception program for cutting-edge startups Stay tuned for more episodes recorded live from GTC 1:45: The Living Optics camera’s ability to capture 96 colors 3:36: Where is hyperspectral imaging being used 7:19: How are hyperspectral images represented and accessed by the user 9:34: Other use cases of hyperspectral imaging 13:07: What’s unique about Living Optics’ hyperspectral imaging camera challenges during the technology’s development 23:27: What’s next for Living Optics and hyperspectral imaging DigitalPath’s Ethan Higgins on Using AI to Fight Wildfires – Ep. 211 DigitalPath is igniting change in the golden state — using computer vision generative adversarial networks and a network of thousands of cameras to detect signs of fire in real time In the latest episode of NVIDIA’s AI Podcast host Noah Kravtiz spoke with DigitalPath system architect Ethan Higgins about the company’s role in the ALERTCalifornia initiative a collaboration between California’s wildfire fighting agency CAL FIRE and the University of California MosaicML’s Naveen Rao on Making Custom LLMs More Accessible – Ep. 199 Startup MosaicML is on a mission to help the AI community enhance prediction accuracy and save time by providing tools for easy training and deployment of large AI models In this episode of NVIDIA’s AI Podcast host Noah Kravitz speaks with MosaicML CEO and co-founder Naveen Rao about how the company aims to democratize access to large language models Peter Ma on Using AI to Find Promising Signals for Alien Life – Ep. 191 an undergraduate student at the University of Toronto about how he developed an AI algorithm that outperformed traditional methods in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence Make the AI Podcast better: Have a few minutes to spare? Fill out this listener survey Then came Everything. Since making its debut at SXSW last March, the sci-fi action dramedy has grossed $104 million at the global box office en route to its Academy Awards triumph. By tracking the multiverse adventures of Yeoh’s downtrodden Chinese-American laundromat owner Evelyn Wang as she ricochets between alternate versions of reality, Everything Everywhere All at Once became 2022’s most spectacular indie film success story. Wang, who splits his time between Los Angeles and New York, talks about the importance of good vibes, details the filmmakers’ takeover of an abandoned bank, and recalls how the Daniels maverick choices helped catapult a former child actor into the Academy Awards race. You’ve obviously forged a fruitful relationship with Dan Kwan and Daniel Scheinert. What makes your collaboration work? I’m in a cultural meld with the Daniels. Whether it’s global warming or the attention economy, I read the same books and we speak the same language. When it’s time to make a movie like Everything, we’re in lockstep on how to make it, and we do it with kindness and love. Daniel Scheinert likes to joke that we’re summer camp counselors and I’m the vibes police, so it’s my job to make the set feel very free, playful, kind, and open. How does that translate to practical situations? The pandemic affected virtually every movie that came out last year. How did Covid impact Everything Everywhere All at Once? The biggest bummer is that we still haven’t had a wrap party! We had two more shoot days to go on Friday before the pandemic shut down the world. The beauty of it is that we had more time to edit the movie. [Studio] A24 kept the coffers open, and we edited for essentially a year until the movie finally sang at a fever pitch. Everything has earned Oscar nominations for Michelle Yeoh, Ke Huy Quan, Stephanie Hsu, and Jamie Lee Curtis. How did The Daniels go about assembling this phenomenal cast? We always wanted Michelle in the movie as Evelyn, but originally she was going to play the [supportive spouse] role that Ke played. Then they got gender-swapped and Michelle became the lead. The whole movie blossomed because Michelle’s character is loosely based on Dan Kwan’s mom, who’s very similar to Evelyn. Dan was able to write from a much deeper place of truth and unlock the mother-daughter relationship. The other person in that mother-daughter relationship, Joy, is portrayed in such a dynamic way by Stephanie Hsu. Where did you find her? You guys went off the beaten path to cast former child star Ke Huy Quan as Evelyn’s seemingly mild-mannered husband Waymond. How did that happen? Jamie Lee Curtis kills it as the initially hard-nosed IRS agent Deirdre. Jamie works off intuition and gut feelings. She makes snap decisions with such confidence. Jamie read the script, saw Michelle was attached, and just jumped in the deep end. At SXSW, with tears streaming down her face, Jamie walked up to us and said, “Now I get it.'” The chemistry between actors translates really well on screen. Whatever we had going with Michelle, Stephanie, Ke, and Jamie, that kindness and love were felt by the audience because it was so real on set. Everything presents a lot of multiverse environments. Where did you film the movie? On the business end of things, can you talk a bit more about making this budget work in terms of agents and studio execs? When you talk to an agent about fees on a movie of this size where nobody’s going to get rich, it’s about explaining the vision and how important it will be for their actors to be a part of this. And with the studio, it’s about working together to solve a problem. It’s like I have a big shield on my back that encapsulates the set, and then all the agency and studio relationships hit me, but I don’t view them as being adversarial. Everything Everywhere All at Once struck a chord within the culture. When did you first have a feeling that this movie might be something special? I was in Romania making a film with William Dafoe when the trailer came out. I started reading the responses, and they were all positive. There was kindness on YouTube for the first time in the history of YouTube! I was like, wow, I think this is going to hit. Why do you think Everything landed in such a big way with audiences? Everything Everywhere All At Once is available for streaming on Hulu and elsewhere. Featured image: Michelle Yeoh is Evelyn Wang in “Everything Everywhere All At Once.” Courtesy A24. Keep up with The Credits for the latest in film, television, and streaming. To stay up to date with the The Credits, subscribe to our newsletter. Did you base the restaurant on a real place How did the art of omakase lend itself to this particular narrative but there are certainly sushi restaurants in Harlem My first omakase experience was downtown at a restaurant called Domo Domo It was refreshing to have a series of small dishes to taste But Domo Domo also serves other things and is a big restaurant where customers are not seated near the chef my husband and I found a few other places that served only omakase and we liked the experience of sitting at the bar Now there is a wonderful omakase place on Seventy-second and Broadway which we have gone to a few too many times I knew that the entirety of the narrative would be set in the restaurant Omakase usually doesn’t take more than an hour and is a nice setup for conversation The rice has to be at a specific temperature And the chef can add more or less wasabi (always fresh and ground from the root in front of the guests) more or less rice (cooked with a touch of vinegar) The narrative I chose to write is meant to seem deceptively simple as well A couple goes out to dinner and nothing really happens between them struggles to believe that his interest in her is not racially motivated Why is that the fallback assumption for her This woman is more preoccupied with race than the man is because race has permeated more aspects of her life She is reminded by friends and family that she also cannot forget that she is Chinese The friends and family believe that they are helping her by telling her a truth And it is a truth—she is Chinese—but as a result and the woman has become incredibly skeptical of the world The woman does not want to be made to look like a fool so she assesses all possible reasons for the man’s interest in her starting with the most obvious and perhaps the most hurtful one A friend of mine once told me that there was a reason he was always the first in the room to bring up the smallness of his eyes He did it so that no one else could beat him to punch and the most obvious reason that he is interested in the woman is that he is interested in her that statement—race has nothing to do with it—seems somewhat naïve or idealistic She doesn’t want to think about race so often She wants to be idealistic but she doesn’t necessarily have that luxury She feels close enough to the man to move cities and live with him Why this nagging feeling that she may have made a mistake The sentiment that she got lucky stays with her But is anyone telling him that he is lucky to have found her Neither character is extremely likable or unlikable and to say that she got lucky tilts the playing field to his advantage One could say that it is not a playing field—it is love But aren’t all relationships also about power and who has it To say that she got lucky takes away part of her agency that probably led her to be single in the first place These two characters are referred to in the story only as “the woman” and “the man.” Why did you choose not to name them The chef is unlikely to know the names of the customers I also thought it would make for a nice contrast that the three of them have a friendly but somewhat abnormal conversation without knowing one another’s names Spoiler alert: the story ends with the man patting the woman on the head and telling her not to overthink things How do you think we should ultimately read this relationship The woman does overthink and the man is trying to comfort her But the woman is also struggling with the unanswerable question of what is considered overthinking on the topic of race and culture the comment might not have seemed so patronizing the woman is questioning how much he really understands She is up against thousands of years of history and the experiences of her parents She overthinks because she is not just thinking for herself this goes back to my original point that being able to think solely for yourself is a luxury But I don’t know if the man and the woman will ever change I don’t know if the woman will come out and say everything she is thinking because A persistent stereotype is that Asians tend to be people-pleasers So then is the woman staying with the man to keep the peace I have to believe that pleasing others is a common human trait Even if the woman explains everything she is thinking to the man While the couple has moments of irritation with each other He may not recognize all the intricacies of race Yet what is considered glaring differs from person to person I can tolerate him patting me on the head and telling me that I overthink because some of his other qualities outweigh it Do you think that your work in those fields brings something to your fiction writing I would have trouble writing fantasy or genre fiction as I don’t know how to make up something that technology or science doesn’t do one’s goal in writing is to be as clear as possible and to sound like everyone else in the field I do think about structure and clarity a lot A collection of stories would be nice, but, truthfully, I need more time. I can see putting together a collection a bit later—I like reading collections that cover a longer period in a writer’s career, as the stories then tend to be more different from one another. Currently, I am writing a second novel. When I get frustrated with it, which is frequently, I work on stories, or I don’t work on anything and just read. We don’t flood you with panic-inducing headlines or race to be first We focus on being useful to you — breaking down the news in ways that inform We rely on readers like you to fund our journalism Will you support our work and become a Vox Member today tells a story about identity that’s more than skin-deep by Alissa Wilkinson It’s a family drama centering on a young Chinese-American woman named Billi (played by rapper and actor Awkwafina) and her grandmother When Nai Nai is diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer and given only three months to live the family — following Chinese tradition — chooses not to tell Nai Nai they hatch a plan to hastily throw a wedding for Billi’s cousin in China so that the family can gather to see Nai Nai one last time; they’re saying goodbye Wang’s own Nai Nai was indeed diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer and the family gathered in a similar fashion But finding the financial backing to tell a story like this — a quiet family drama about a Chinese American woman that’s set in China and is mostly in Chinese — proved complicated I met Wang in New York to talk about why it was a struggle to get the film financed how she stuck to her guns about telling the story she wanted to tell Our conversation has been edited for length and clarity Note: Spoilers for some aspects of The Farewell The Farewell is a story about a family mixing truth and fiction but it’s also a fictionalized version of a thing that really happened to you What was it like taking that personal story and turning it into a movie so immediately I started to think that this could be a great story for a film when it happened to me in real life But working in Hollywood has trained me to always think what would I need to change in order to sell it to make [producers] actually want to tell the story?” I started pitching the movie around town and I always got the same question: “Is this an American film or a Chinese film?” Which is kind of like asking me “Are you American or are you Chinese?” I would say with Chinese and Chinese American actors.” I wanted people to speak the language that they actually speak because those are the textures that form my very American life It won’t work for the American market.” So then I would pitch it to Chinese investors but then the main character can’t be Billi because a Chinese audience won’t resonate with her perspective.” And I was like So I just decided if I couldn’t make the film the way I wanted to make it then it wasn’t worth it to make it at all But maybe I could tell the story in some other way in the future So I wrote the details down as a short story — just a very early draft and it was such a pure experience — I got to really dig into how I felt because these are the stories I want to tell That’s not the medium through which I can tell these kinds of stories within 48 hours producers started calling saying that they did want to make it into a film I was much more empowered to say to the producers I’m not going make it with you unless you agree to the terms in which I want to make the film as well as [the production company] Big Beach and we want you to have your vision.” So they ultimately were all very supportive They completely supported how I wanted to tell the story I feel like a marker of big-budget Hollywood filmmaking is that it’s often very generic hoping to make their money back through broad appeal but the end result can feel like it’s not true to anyone’s experience at all But it seems as if audiences really respond to specificity in storytelling I set out to tell a story about a granddaughter I wasn’t setting out to make an “Asian movie” any more than a white male director sets out to make a “white movie.” They’re just telling their own family story it’s a very American thing to think about identity on a surface level — like that if you’re a person of color and it has to be based on what you look like because that’s what the mainstream sees in you but it’s more about what happens when you leave home What are the values that you bring from the home that you left and what are the values that you leave behind Those are questions about identity that go much much deeper than the color of your skin and what you look like It’s also a fish-out-of-water story about somebody in an Asian country who isn’t blonde and blue-eyed but actually looks like everyone else We’re living in a world now where I think everyone can relate to that because who actually looks exactly the way that they feel on the inside And the film is very unapologetic about being the story of a fish out of water people will comment on one another’s accents had no idea till anyone pointed the accents out but other audience members certainly would have picked up on them The movie just asks me to follow along and accept that I’ll sometimes be in the dark It’s a story about knowing you’re on the outside is very comfortable before she finds out about her grandmother She’s joking and laughing with her friends when we go home for Thanksgiving or Christmas don’t feel entirely at home or even part of our family Especially if it’s extended family beyond the people that you just know “I’m told that person’s my aunt but I’m not exactly sure how we’re related.” People who live in New York City — even if you’re Caucasian and you were born and raised in America — still have plenty of times where they feel out of place I also just didn’t want to overly explain things throughout the movie for people I wanted them to be immersed in the experience of it “Do you guys understand who this character is and what her relationship in the family is?” And some people would say that’s confusing.” But then some would be like I don’t always know what’s going on Half the time I go back and I don’t know who my relatives are I’ll go to a Chinese wedding and be like “It doesn’t look like a wedding that I’ve been to I guess that was the wedding.” You learn as you get thrown into it I wanted the audience to have that same experience it’s more engaging if they’re asking these questions and they’re trying to catch up and figure it out It’s a much more immersive experience than if the audience is way ahead and knows everything I think that’s part of what I so appreciate about it — it doesn’t feel like a film that’s trying to pander to me at all about what I do and don’t know It respects me enough to trust that I’m smart enough to keep up But that’s interesting, too, because it’s clearly a movie set in China and about Chinese people, and yet it’s not really a movie that could be eligible for Best Foreign Feature [now called Best International Feature Film] at the Oscars Which makes you think about what counts as a “foreign” movie but it’s 100 percent not a Chinese movie everyone at [our distributors] A24 and our producers at Big Beach have been asking that question [about whether or not this is a “foreign” film] I think that’s what’s so interesting with a film like this: We are breaking a lot of new ground That’s in contrast to Roma which was a “foreign film.” It was very much a Mexican film It was Alfonso [Cuarón] making a film as a Mexican man So it was such a great statement when Sundance programmed The Farewell in the US dramatic competition Yeah. Ironically, the other big film that came out of Sundance was The Souvenir which was in the foreign competition — it was made in England — but it’s all in English That just challenges people’s notions about what foreignness even means Another big thread in your movie is the passage of time Billi is experiencing a place she remembers from her childhood But it’s clearly changed a lot since then I know some of the places where you shot were actually part of your own life Did you have the same experience as Billi when you returned to them Is that an experience that you had going back and filming as well It’s sort of like when you look in the mirror — if you look at yourself every day you may not necessarily see things that change But people who don’t see you for a long time really see the difference but I didn’t go back that often before I feel that way sometimes about New York City another Circle Fitness where there used to be that little ...” I think of that as ghosts — memories I have of other places and times and people that crop up when I walk past a corner or an old store no longer as familiar as they once were to me But the corner and the store have always changed And then you’re just trying to find something familiar to hold on to I passed by a restaurant recently that was like indoor-outdoor space “Did that used to be that bar?” I got very My memories of China are just that much more extreme because my childhood was there And so I’m always looking: Where was my grandma’s house But I don’t know what actually existed and which parts of it grew in my imagination even if that house existed and sunflowers existed they’re really small.” It’s just because I was so tiny that they looked giant; they’re just normal-sized sunflowers How many of the places are actually from your real life we shot it in my grandma’s actual neighborhood Those orange buildings are actually from her neighborhood And then there were two major coincidences One was that we scouted a bunch of cemeteries because I didn’t want my [director of photography] to be limited by the facts we’ve got to find what’s best for the movie No one’s going to know when they’re watching the film what’s real or not We’re in Changchun and that’s good enough.” we picked my grandfather’s cemetery to show because logistically we couldn’t get permission to shoot at anyone else’s grave “I’m on a tech scout with this entire crew at my grandfather’s grave” — my grandfather who I hadn’t seen since I was 6 Some of his friends and other family members would tell me that I was continuing his dream the wedding banquet hall was where my cousin really got married The actual wedding took place in the same hotel you have a lot of extra layers of memory attached but I don’t know why you would make this movie Why are people giving you money to make this?” For him I made this decision [to keep Nai Nai in the dark about her diagnosis] because I’m not a movie star.” So to be able to show her that she is a movie star it’s really meaningful in terms of what they think of themselves and the value of our unique stories My great-aunt is here [in New York] for the premiere today “We’ll just tell her that movies are fiction and none of it actually happened The Farewell opened in theaters on July 12 Understand the world with a daily explainer plus the most compelling stories of the day Here’s why your potentially romantic meetup actually sucks. A new prosecutor, a surprising defense team addition, and a whole lot of controversy. Candace Owens and Joe Rogan are the latest frontier of the Me Too backlash. Advice author Lysa TerKeurst has a devoted audience, a dozen bestselling books — and she’s divorced. For The Wild preserves Earth's natural communities through land conservation Register: Earthly Reads Book Study \u2192 We use cookies to track visits to our website and to help our website run effectively Photo by Noemí García Reimunde; Artist Unknown Predatory lending and parasitic governance are propelling our society into a condition of extreme instability In the wake of the initial economic fallout from the coronavirus pandemic we are already seeing local governments authorize austerity measures like increased policing and incarceration to fill revenue gaps Coupled with the dramatically heightened police presence in our communities at this moment we find ourselves standing at the precipice of an even more militarized To resist the conjuring of this hostile future we need to engage in some serious social visioning we are joined by Jackie Wang to discuss the function of the carceral state amidst late-stage capitalism and the pervasiveness of the debt economy Jackie calls us to disrupt what we’ve normalized and reallocate our collective resources in the name of taking care of our communities.  and Assistant Professor of Culture and Media at the New School’s Eugene Lang College She received her PhD in African and African American Studies at Harvard University and was recently a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study She is the author of Carceral Capitalism (Semiotexte and technological dimensions of the US carceral state She has also published a number of punk zines including On Being Hard Femme and a collection of dream poems titled Tiny Spelunker of the Oneiro-Womb In the course of our conversation with Jackie our temporal and spatial understandings of prisons and the technological dimensions of surveillance and incarceration We ask how we can resist the accession of predictive policing and what can digital carceral infrastructure reveal about the state’s growing surveillance apparatus We close in conversation by discussing Jackie’s scholarship in the dream state exploring how dreams can act as a conduit for respite ♫ Music by Jackie Wang You can follow Jackie on Twitter @LoneberryWang, listen to her album The Brain Flower Tapes here, or follow her Tumblr Why Mitch McConnell Wants States to Go Bankrupt The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein Race for Profit by Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor Neoliberalism and the City by David Harvey Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments by Saidiya Hartman Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination by Robin D.G Skins of Columbus: A Dream Ethnography by Edgar Garcia Support #FreeThemAll4PublicHealth Campaigns: COVID Bail Out NYC: https://www.covidbailout.org  PayPal: paypal.me/COVIDBailOutNYC  *501c3 Deductible Solely to Bail Out: https://secure.actblue.com/donate/rikers-covid  You can also Tweet at  #FreeThemAll4PublicHealth and tag your governors Plugin with Critical Resistance For The Wild is a slow media organization dedicated to land-based protection We are rooted in a paradigm shift away from human supremacy As we dream towards a world of grounded justice and reciprocity our work highlights impactful stories and deeply-felt meaning making as balms for these times All Rights Reserved © document.write(new Date().getFullYear()) For The Wild™ View upcoming auction estimates and receive personalized email alerts for the artists you follow Hazelhurst Arts Centre will hold a major and ambitious exhibition which will bring together 41 important Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists in Australia VERSeFEST Canadian poet and critic Phoebe Wang will be presenting at VERSeFEST as part of the Arc Poetry discussion panel at 3pm on Sunday The poetry reading will take place at Knox Presbyterian Church on Lisgar St and will also feature the voices of Jill Jorgenson Wang frequently explores themes about identity and belonging in her writing she said she’s always done so since she began writing as a child “When you write about the world around you you feel more like you belong,” Wang explained so writing about my landscape or writing even just nature poems – they usually make me feel more of a sense of belonging in the place I am.” Wang was born in Ottawa and attended Canterbury High School before her family eventually moved to Vancouver Her parents raised her and her sister with connections to their heritage celebrating Chinese holidays even while they themselves were trying to adapt to life in Canada Writing about the fluidity of her identity came naturally because writing in itself is a fluid form of expression “Identity is something that you’re forced to explore when you’re an immigrant because you have so many people asking where you’re really from,” Wang said and they always kind of – people step back We don’t have to assume that because you’re not Caucasian So that always made me think about ‘What is Canadian?’” She tackles that question in her upcoming book Admission Requirements (McClelland and Stewart) The book is about “Canada as a kind of Eden,” Wang explained she writes about how Canada is “a garden that we try to enter And the whole idea sometimes of the Western World is kind of like that really lucky to be born inside this garden and also what do we do with all the people wanting to clamber in or get into the garden Who makes the rules about who gets to go in That became the back thought of the book.” and her reviews have appeared in publications including Arc organization’s report on the gender breakdown among reviewers at established literary periodicals “The numbers were just appalling,” Wang recalled “There are some cases and certain publications where men were writing about 75 per cent of the reviews and 50 percent [of all of the reviews] were [men] reviewing other men’s books… And that has a trickle down effect.” Reviews are significant because they can translate into visibility and cultural prestige for the authors and poets She decided to focus her reviews on books by women who frequently weren’t being afforded the same opportunities “I have to read [these books] otherwise no one else will Wang will be presenting some of her garden poems from her upcoming book as well as other poems she’s written about diaspora and identity She hopes the variety of the different poets who are presenting will make for an enjoyable afternoon “It’s a treat for the audience to just be able to hear and enjoy poets and we kind of almost need it more than ever right now with what’s happening in the news,” Wang said [they can] come and sit and hear and hopefully [they] will see something that will be good for their soul.” VERSeFEST tickets can be purchased online. Tickets are $18 for a weekday pass or $25 for a Saturday or Sunday pass. The schedule of poets presenting throughout the festival can also be found online at www.versefest.ca Canadian poet and critic Phoebe Wang will be presenting at VerseFest as part of the Arc Poetry discussion panel at 3pm on Sunday This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks The action you just performed triggered the security solution There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase You can email the site owner to let them know you were blocked Please include what you were doing when this page came up and the Cloudflare Ray ID found at the bottom of this page ShareSaveDrone Overlord Frank Wang On DJI's Milestones, Miscarried GoPro Partnership & Corporate EspionageByHeng Shao ShareSaveThis article is more than 9 years old.At age 34 Frank Wang Tao is leading the global consumer drone industry with Dajiang Innovation (DJI) a Shenzhen-based manufacturer that he founded out of his dorm room nine years ago On track to do about $1 billion in revenue in 2015 DJI pioneered the popular market for flying robots largely with its signature Phantom pre-assembled drone that can be flown almost right out of the box But unlike other Chinese technology giants such as Alibaba and Xiaomi which grew big mainly by tapping into the enormous consumer market in their home country DJI derives about 70% of its sales from outside of Asia It is the first Chinese company to lead a global tech revolution Below are selections from Wang’s interviews with FORBES Forbes: When did you first become interested in flying robots Frank Wang: There was a comic book in the 1980s called "Dong Naojin Yeye” (Grandpa Think-Hard) which featured a red helicopter I imagined that I’d make a plane like that that could follow me when I’m hiking or on the train Actually at the time I didn’t even know the concept of a camera Even though I couldn’t turn myself into a plane I was happy to just make a small plane and watch it fly FW: I completed [a helicopter flight control college project] in 2005 At the time I made a video of the helicopter and the people who watched it thought it wasn’t bad I thought it was a good deal because I sold it for RMB 50,000 (about $6,000) while it cost RMB 15,000 (about $2,000) to make F: What were the challenges you faced in the early days FW: Almost all of the first group of employees left after two years They may have felt the future was a question mark… I was a perfectionist and was abrasive when it came to interacting with other people To give you one example: I believed that whoever contributed more should be given more shares At the time we had three to four employees and I wanted to give each of them shares but I thought the share amounts shouldn’t be equal Whoever contributed more should be given more I pissed off the person who was given fewer shares But I also pissed off the person who was given more [because] he asked if he could gift his shares to the other person you have to take more shares.” We had some arguments and my tone was insensitive and I said something like “At this company I am in charge.” When he left the company F: You began with making flight control systems for helicopters but later moved onto making quadcopters FW: A New Zealand distributor told us that she sold 200 gimbals a month and 95% of the customers installed the gimbals on multirotors Initially we thought light of multirotors because they couldn’t carry much weight or fly for long But when the dealer told us this information we thought about seriously making a [flight controller for quadctopers.] In fact most of the stuff was the same and we could use our software on multirotors with some small changes… The hardware hardly needed any changes and so we made our first flight control for a multirotor in just a few months selling for RMB 6000 to RMB 7000 (about $700 to $800) The main players in the multirotor market back then was an open source company from Germany called MikroKopter and you had to find your own components and download your own code We were the first one to provide a commercial-use The multirotor market was rather primitive back then and I believe we had 70% of the market at the time just like we do now F: How did you market your products at the time FW: We were mainly just going to exhibitions and putting ads on hobbyist websites We didn’t have any advertisement for the mass consumer market yet… The first time we went to an exhibition at Nuremberg Germany we were placed in the China section right next to stuffed animals…We were not even in the model section People thought it was amazing because it was the first time that anyone used "direct drive technology" in aerial imaging and we moved up the industry standard by tens of times That was when we felt that a lot of people in the industry began paying attention to our company F: The biggest success has been the Phantom FW: At the time we thought we should make an entry-level product to prevent competitors from waging a price war We wanted to make a product that was cost-effective ready-to-fly and didn’t need [to be built by users.] But the consideration was really to prevent our competitor from entering the low-end market But the Phantom turned out to be the product that brought in the highest sales had a good market share and the profit margin was alright Our entry-level phantom surpassed our professional products F: Who were your main competitors back then FW: We had only two competitors from China There was a Beiing-based company called Zero UAV which competed with our high-end product line and X-Aircraft [based in Guangzhou) competed with our entry-level product Flamewheel…[Outside of China,] there was maybe 3D Robotics F: The latest Phantom series releases carry their own cameras but when the original Phantom came out Did you have GoPro in mind when you built the first Phantom The first generation of the Phantom didn’t have its own camera GoPro is a relatively good off-the-shelf camera that you could install on the Phantom But we’ve had our own camera from Phantom Vision on and of course we still have products that are compatible with GoPro cameras It will be like this in the future: we have better and better cameras but customers can still choose to use a GoPro F: But was the first Phantom designed specifically for the GoPro camera FW: We are not willing to be someone else’s accessory but a lot of our customers had the need [to use a GoPro camera for aerial footage] we never wanted to be in the shadow of someone else The camera on our Inspire is already better than GoPro’s best camera it wasn’t like we couldn’t make good cameras and only sold us the second-grade chips because we were not big enough our camera was one generation behind GoPro’s… But our newest camera is better than GoPro’s because we convinced the supplier to sell us the newest generation of chips F: If I were GoPro I’d be pretty pissed off They could have partnered up with you had you not made a product with your own camera Initially [GoPro and DJI] wanted to make a product together for GoPro to sell but the negotiation never came to fruition….They treated us like the original equipment manufacturers (OEM) The deal came out to roughly this: GoPro would make two points of profit They dealt with us like how they dealt with Taiwanese OEMs so we never had a successful official partnership F: In previous interviews you said you always felt aggravated as a Chinese national because China doesn’t have good products FW: Chinese people learn English from a young age Chinese people think imported products are good and made-in-China products are inferior You can’t despise your mom for being ugly because you have her genes too I’m unsatisfied with the overall environment F: We often hear comments that say DJI doesn’t seem like a Chinese company Have you tried to project a non-Chinese image on purpose FW: We thought of setting up a shell company in Germany but ultimately decided not to...we mostly felt it was unnecessary and it also made us uncomfortable from an integrity point of view Could you pretend to be something you’re not F: DJI’s growth has benefited a lot from technological breakthroughs with each of your new products What happens when you reach a point where you can only make marginal improvement in the technology instead of breakthroughs Will your competitors have the chance to beat you then FW: The stage you described will come in three years Our competitors had better survive until then If DJI wants the industry to be low-margin then that will remain the case for a big longer We must be extremely aggressive going forward F: What was the most memorable moment for you as an entrepreneur FW: The most memorable moment for me was when our helicopter automatically hovered in the air [for our senior class project] in January 2006 Nowadays so much of what I do is management… like catching spies I have to depend on my colleagues to make them Sometimes they churn out products slowly and I wonder if I was wrong in criticizing them I wonder whether they are doing something stupid or being lazy or if they are doing things right and trying hard FW: We found out that someone was stealing our code The Shenzhen Police registered the case and the Shenzhen government has been supportive too…We also had an employee who collected blueprints before leaving and later sold them the one that left [because he didn’t get enough shares] He was betrayed by his customer who wanted to get a deal with us by betraying him And you know how the employee made the copycat product He employed someone who was still working for us and used facilities inside the company This [incident] is a microcosm of the society DJI would not have taken off without wings.. we can ignore those people and can still move on Foreigners are born in better environments and may do things with more openness you can make your code open source without worrying that someone might copy you F: It sounds like you face quite a bit of managerial challenge I heard the purchasing department is one of the most difficult departments to deal with at DJI FW: The most serious issue with the supply chain is kickbacks… Each month our purchase amount is tens of millions in RMB so even if the purchasing staff was taking just 1% kickback We had a supplier who sold us products at very high prices but later on decided to discontinue our partnership they were earning more money than if they had sold to others that if our purchasing staff were not pampered well enough they’d make things hard for the suppliers they would give suppliers an order to be fulfilled immediately or give suppliers a hard time in quality inspection Almost all the staff in the department were let go last year It was a department of more than 10 people We now have a competitive mechanism set in place for the purchasing department but I can’t talk about what it is exactly F: What’s the next step for DJI and what’s your vision for the drone industry FW: Nowadays we are still focused on doing well in making flying cameras We’re enabling other applications with our software development kit such as agriculture and government functions so we will see how things go as we move along Our goal is to maintain 100% growth in sales in the next two years… If we can do that Flying cameras should become at least as popular as DSLR cameras Families with the need for DSLR would at least buy a drone In the end the drone will become a toy for the adults Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly stated that DJI's monthly purchase amount was tens of billions rather than tens of millions Essaying the pop culture that matters since 1999 Awkwafina and Shuzhen Zhao in The Farewell (2019) (trailer screengrab) Why don't we have more immigrant stories in film Lulu Wang talks with PopMatters about fighting to tell her story and how that came to fruition in her latest film Chinese-American Billi (rapper-actor Nora Lum, a.k.a. Awkwafina, in a stunning performance) faces an impossible dilemma in The Farewell the sophomore effort by writer-director Lulu Wang and the family has decided to keep the truth from her in an attempt to spare her from emotional suffering in her final days They’ve arranged a staged wedding in China as a rouse to give everyone in the family a last chance to say goodbye but Billi finds it difficult to keep the earth-shattering secret from her beloved Nai Nai Film Strip by joseph_alban (Pixabay License / Pixabay) Can you walk me through how the movie came to be I was in post-production on my first feature My parents told me about how we couldn’t tell [Nai Nai] and about how there was going to be a wedding I wanted to make it into a film to explore some of the feelings I was experiencing but nobody wanted to make it the way that I wanted to make it I don’t know… am I Chinese or am I American and they have to live in the US and they shouldn’t go back to China.” They wanted to cast white people as the family “I don’t think it can be…” It’s a specifically first-generation immigrant story So then I started talking to some Chinese investors but the main character can’t be Billi Chinese people won’t resonate with Billi because her perspective is too American It has to be about her relationship with a Chinese cousin she realizes that the Chinese are great and they’re the best and everything they said was right That what the movie’s about.” And I was like That’s not what the movie is about.” And then they were like “Then she’ll bring home her white boyfriend.” My movie is something else that I can’t just put on a paper and say “These are the comps,” because there aren’t a lot of comps How did you react when these investors insisted on making the movie their way is the story contingent on how I was raised There are some stories where you can cast anybody and it’s not contingent on [race or culture] I thought about it for literally one second to realize that [casting white people] wouldn’t work and the cultural differences are so specific for this story that I don’t know that it would apply [to other cultures] I knew how much work it takes to make a movie and I knew that this film was going to be something special that was culturally specific but universal at the same time I wasn’t going to spend the next five years of my life on something else and it’s great that there are filmmakers like you who are uncompromising in that way Is it difficult to be uncompromising in those situations It’s definitely difficult to be uncompromising it’s much more difficult to be compromising If you’re uncompromising and something doesn’t work at least you stuck to your guns and you know what you’re working towards But there are so few of us [Asian American filmmakers] that if I did compromise and it didn’t work I wouldn’t be able to live with myself The chances of success for us are [so low] that you might as well take the risk you have no one to blame but yourself because you didn’t go all the way Is it hard to struggle and fight for all of these little details those battles actually embolden me because it challenges me to really think about what I want and why it’s important It helps me to formulate and communicate why something is important to me Maybe I haven’t fully gotten a grasp on what I want to do or say particularly who are not from the culture that you are from and you’re making a culturally specific movie there’s a lot of difficult communication You have to explain more than maybe another filmmaker who isn’t Asian who is maybe from the same background as the producers But as a first-generation immigrant who’s constantly negotiating between two cultures trying to negotiate between my family and their culture and my independent life as an American my family asked me to maintain a similar lie I wasn’t familiar with the concept of withholding dire information as an act of mercy Have you found that these kinds of lies are specific to Asian cultures or are they common in any other cultures as well I’ve had people from Middle-Eastern cultures Egyptian… it tends to be older cultures that are very based on the family unit as a collective that really relies on that structure Less so modern societies that are more about the individual It’s been really surprising how common it is what struck me was… you needed to cast an actor with an interesting face A lot of the best moments in the film are of Billi sitting still Were you cognizant of that when you cast Awkwafina I knew that Billi would not be able to express her [true feelings] in the movie I didn’t want to cheat and use voiceover It’s a very simple setup once you know where she is emotionally but it takes a very special actor to be able to pull off all of those emotions on their face and sustain the entire film going from scene to scene in a way that doesn’t feel repetitive She has such an expressive face that can play both the grief and the humor That’s what I loved about her performance This is Awkwafina’s first dramatic turn as an actor Based on her own relationship with her own grandmother she had a very personal relationship to the story She didn’t know if she would be able to cry and she didn’t know if that would feel real There were definitely a lot of challenges and times when I really had to encourage her I knew as soon as I saw her audition tape that she would be great Sometimes I had to steer her away from comedy because she naturally leaned toward comedy in her acting so I oftentimes had to strip all of that away who loves her grandma and doesn’t want to lose her there’s a purity and innocence there that’s so lovely Shuzhen Zhao as Nai Nai (trailer screengrab) Does your grandma know that the movie is about her but she doesn’t know what it’s about But I got to spend time with her during production Did filming in her town and spending time with her while you were in production inform your work and it was very meta that we shot in my grandma’s neighborhood Every day that we were shooting was tinged with this level of emotion and personal connection that is intangible but I’m certain it infused itself into all of the scenes The movie seems to hinge on tone quite a bit If it was too sad it would feel like some kind of dirge and if it was too funny perhaps the humor would undermine the drama Tell us about navigating the movie’s tonal shifts from scene to scene That’s just not the kind of director or writer I am I’ll write a serious scene that reveals something about the characters I look for ways to find that tone within the scene whether that’s through production design That’s the way that I find the humor the actors don’t even know I’m doing it They’ll later watch the movie and say I had no idea it was so funny.” That’s intentional because I don’t want them to feel that they’re in a comedy How have non-Asian people reacted to the film A woman who is white and young said to my friend “I’ve just never felt so represented in a film before.” He was like You have plenty of representation because you’re white This isn’t for you to feel represented.” She was like Sometimes we make assumptions about people so you must relate to all white people on the screen maybe even white stories deserve more specificity Why don’t we have more immigrant stories Whatever color you are…it’s about the specificity of the story [the woman] connected to She hadn’t felt that represented on screen before Things you buy through our links may earn Vox Media a commission It’s difficult to even fathom the number of lines she has Hats have been on Wang’s mind lately. Her spring 2018 ready-to-wear collection was inspired by Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale and included view-restricting bonnets like the ones in the story She says she’d started working on her fall her collection in May but when she read the book over the summer “I would only let myself read half a chapter at a time because I didn’t want it to go by too quickly and then I started to watch the TV series,” she says “I only have been through four episodes but I’m a huge fan of Elisabeth Moss I think she’s one of the most brilliant actors.” The collection wound up incorporating not just bonnets but also lingerie styling and power suiting making a statement about freedom and control and treated really without identity or any kind of rights,” she says shooting a bridal video campaign in Paris with renowned photographer Patrick Demarchelier Wang says she likes video because it provides a more profound emotional experience for the viewers — and she has a penchant for movement in clothes I always want to convey the body in movement,” she says not just the front or the back — in fact most brides are viewed from the back far more than they are from the front.” She was also preparing to show her latest wedding collection at Bridal Fashion Week With a vast wedding customer base internationally “This season we went an almost hyper-conservative collection,” she says “I felt this from a lot of the brides that we see all over the world so that influenced how I was thinking about this next collection but it harkens back to that kind of thing.” How do you thank people for a gift?I like to write people thank-you notes myself, handwritten. (I also have my own stationary line.) And always flowers Color or no color on your nails?I didn’t wear color for many years so I needed my hands — they weren’t decorative And then for years I also sketched everything and also worked very hard at crafting clothes so suddenly I can actually wear nail polish and experiment with color I love a French manicure more than anything. The polish can be Chanel; it can be lots of different things I’m not even sure if they don’t mix when they give me a manicure I don’t get home from work until pretty late mood lighting is a great alternative to make me feel better But I think what was most amazing to me was the respect that people have for the history and the craftsmanship and the fact that Dior as a brand has survived well in to the 21st century What would you never wear?I’m not a girl that wears a lot of color and a lot of big prints I have nothing against them; it’s just that I personally don’t wear them What’s your favorite song on your playlist right now?“Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?” All versions of that song: Amy Winehouse My own car is a Mercedes G-Wagon — it’s like a truck It’s a fun car to be in because it makes me feel tall when I drive around in it I waited about 25 years to be able buy one I’m much more aware of that because I also was always such an athlete and ski — all sports that involve tremendous amounts of skin protection I don’t think I protected myself nearly enough but I wasn’t going to give up on doing those sports so better now than never A young Japanese woman name Mayumi Nakashima who works with me in New York She comes to my house and she is extremely delicate with my hair but she’s so gentle to avoid hair loss and ripping my hair out of my head What’s another decade you’d like to live in and why I would say I’m more excited about fashion right now then I have been in a very long time I’ve lived through most of those decades; I think I’ve seen bell bottoms come back seven different times with different names But now women can dress more freely than ever I’ve always felt that women should use fashion to express their own creativity and for that reason now is one of the best times to be in fashion What’s the secret to throwing a good party because most people tend to congregate around the bar I just think we all have such frantic schedules that if people can feel comfortable when they go out And what’s your guilty pleasure?Shopping. Shopping for anything. Not just clothes: art, food, books. I love reading. Right now I’m reading about Phil Knight and Nike I want to know what made them who they are and what motivated them What are your favorite accounts to follow on Instagram Other than my daughters and some of my close friends I’m not a huge Instagram follower of people in general But I’m always curious about the creativity of people in our industry and how brave everybody is to put themselves out there and I want to do anything I can to try and help American fashion What’s the last show you binge-watched? Only The Handmaid’s Tale What’s your favorite pair of jeans?I’m a leggings girl because I need comfort, but I do love jeans. We make pretty cool jeans at Kohl’s: cropped jeans T-shirt?To be really honest, I often wear the ones that come in 3-packs from Fruit of the Loom. You can buy V-necks with short sleeves or ribbed tank tops And I find that roses have so many different scents but there’s a classicism to a rose that’s just so beautiful Fragrance?I have a lot of fragrances. I’m going to be really commercial here and say that I’ve worked very hard on all my fragrances for over two decades. I like many of the scents that we all love: tuberose, mandarin orange, coconut mixtures. Right now I love my Vera Wang Men’s I seem to really feel for it heading into winter Linens?I myself sleep in solid linens. I’m beginning to sound like a guy, aren’t I? Solid sheets and ribbed tank tops. We do great linens for Kohl’s, for Bloomingdale’s, and for Bed, Bath, and Beyond Lip balm? I actually don’t use lip balm. Sometimes I will use a colorless lipstick that is almost nude Password must be at least 8 characters and contain: you’ll receive occasional updates and offers from New York Whether or not you agreed with his routines on race and gender politics Patrice O’Neal was an incredibly funny and fearless standup Patrice O’Neal presents a challenge to the liberal comedy fan. Many of his views on women were indefensible – and yet they were delivered by a comedian with extraordinary charisma who was extremely funny. This realisation was intensely exciting to me, that the first thing that matters in a comedian is “funny”. “You don’t know funny. I know funny,” O’Neal proclaims in countless interviews on the subject of taste and offence. And he’s right. You don’t need to agree with a comedian. You don’t need to think they’re a good person. You should laugh. You should be surprised. You should think about something differently, from an angle you wouldn’t normally entertain or a perspective you’d usually reject. And O’Neal made you do that with more skill and passion than any other comedian. Read moreHe was leagues beyond the shock tactics and contrived political incorrectness of lesser comics He voiced difficult and honest opinions about race and gender politics with arresting eloquence and logic as he appeals desperately to women: “Why can’t I … harass you In his improvisation, he demonstrated the importance of being playful and unapologetic on stage. For my money, the greatest track on his posthumously released album, Mr P, is a five-minute riff (a riff!) about a man in the audience named Tolu O’Neal bounds off on a delightful tangent about his African American “goofy-ass aunts” who gave him the middle name of Lumumba (after the hero of Congolese independence) before making a spectacular observation about the patronising reverence with which white people treat such names he is always “in the room”: he speaks intimately and honestly with his crowd the same jokes never worded in quite the same way Phil Wang performs Philth at the Pleasance Upstairs “I’m still working my ass off to become the best” Jackson Wang has opened up about why his hectic work schedule and what motivates him to keep working hard On July 29, the Hong Kong-born GOT7 member sat down with radio show host Big Reid for an interview, where he revealed why he is always motivated to constantly keep busy. Elsewhere, Wang also discussed his new English-language single, ‘Drive You Home’ and was set to leave the city the following morning I’m still working my ass off to become the best “This is my mindset.” Big Reid then joked that Wang could consider becoming a motivational speaker to which the singer responded that he might “when I retire and no one wanted to listen to my music anymore” Elsewhere in the interview, he also discussed his new collaboration with Internet Money Wang revealed that while writing the song with his team they had decided to take a more romantic approach to the track hence the shoutout to San Francisco’s Geary Boulevard in its opening line The world’s defining voice in music and pop culture: breaking what’s new and what’s next since 1952.