Rio de Janeiro is making a digital map of one of Brazil’s largest favelas

How megacities could lead the fight against climate change

Sponsored by IBM The Download Your daily dose of what's up in emerging technology Mapping the favelas 05.05.21 Good morning! Today: Rio de Janeiro is going to map one of its biggest favelas for the first time using 3D scanners, and how megacities could be at the forefront of the fight against climate change. Get your friends to sign up here to get The Download every day. Rio de Janeiro is making a digital map of one of Brazil’s largest favelas   Finding your way through Rocinha in Rio de Janeiro is not easy. The buildings are densely arranged, without traditional identification systems like street names and numbers. Rocinha is one of the biggest favelas in Brazil, with 100,000 people living there.   The challenge of navigating Rocinha has birthed creative solutions, such as the “friendly mailman” program: companies deliver parcels to a central drop-off point, and a team of Rocinha residents—the only couriers familiar enough with the area to navigate its maze-like streets—take them the rest of the way.  Much has been made of the dizzying growth of the world’s cities, but few people are aware of what most urban growth actually looks like. For all our futuristic reveries, the city of tomorrow probably will not look much different from Rocinha. And that means we need better tools to navigate them.  Today, the city of Rio de Janeiro and MIT’s Senseable City Lab are working together to digitally map the entirety of Rocinha for the first time using 3D scanners. It’s an approach that could be replicated around the world—working with, rather than against, the way cities naturally spring up, and thus enabling citizens to access public services like water, waste collection, and plazas. Read the full story. —Fábio Duarte, Carlo Ratti, and Washington Fajardo How megacities could lead the fight against climate change In 2050, 2.5 billion more people will live in cities than do today. As the world grows more urbanized, many cities are becoming more populous while also trying to reduce carbon emissions and blunt the impacts of climate change. In the coming decades, cities will be engines of economic growth. But they must also play a key role in confronting climate change; the world’s 100 most populous cities are responsible for roughly one-fifth of global carbon emissions.  Some of the world’s biggest cities are rising to this challenge. However, these urban areas vary greatly in how efficient they are and how much they will grow. Seeing how they stack up can help us identify where our greatest opportunities are to reduce emissions. Check out our explainer. The two stories above both come from the latest edition of MIT Technology Review, which is all about cities. Check out the full magazine, and if you haven't yet, subscribe! It's only $50 a year for a digital subscription. We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun and distraction in these weird times. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or tweet 'em at me.)   + What a cute lamb.   + A new cut of a video of Prince doing a face-meltingly good guitar solo to While My Guitar Gently Weeps.    + Let Jacques Pepin teach you how to cook.    + In a reading rut? These books might help to pull you out (I can recommend Hamnet.)   + Only in Canada would a war be this polite and friendly.   + An Irish man who was hunting for a dolphin found a medieval boat instead.   + There's a stunning new national park in Mozambique's Chimanimani Mountains. (NYT $) Sponsor Message Join MIT Technology Review and IBM live on May 25 Discover how the latest developments in AI, cloud, 5G, and Edge Computing are driving digital transformation. Designed as two complementary one-hour virtual programs, the Innovation Leaders Summit is a free online event series curated for academic, research, and industry professionals to examine the exponential technologies impacting businesses today and explore what’s on the horizon. Register now and join us online to learn about cutting-edge advancements and get your questions answered by the experts. The must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology. 1 Covid is ravaging poorer countries as rich ones spring back to life The "split screen" inequality of the pandemic has never been so stark. (NYT $)   + It also doesn't bode well for the world's ability to tackle climate change. (NYT $)   + India, Brazil, and the human cost of sidelining science. (Nature)   + Inside India's covid surge. (New Yorker $)  2 Biden wants 70% of US adults to have had one covid shot by July 4 💉 This is going to be a major challenge. (Axios)   +  How we persuade the anti-vaxxers. (The Atlantic $)   + Pfizer is making hundreds of millions from its covid vaccine. (NYT $)  3 The people who just can't let go of lockdown Spring 2021 is very different in the US from spring 2020—but some people haven't got the memo. (The Atlantic $)    4 Major airlines use a deeply flawed carbon offsets program, say experts If we're going to rely on these projects, they need to use rigorous and accurate methodologies. (The Guardian)   + The climate solution actually adding millions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. (TR)   + The US is hotter than it's ever been. (Earther)  5 Trump has launched a blog With giant buttons that say "CONTRIBUTE" (for what?!) prominently displayed everywhere. (CNET)   6 Facebook's banning process is somewhat Orwellian You've been suspended. No, we can't explain why. And you can't appeal either. (WSJ $)   + Facebook is going to announce if it's going to reinstate or permanently ban Trump today. (NPR)  7 We're still doomscrolling. We're just doing it on our desktops. 👩‍💻 On the flipside, we're reading more deeply. (Axios)   + Can't stop checking your phone? Maybe you're just trying to blend in. (The Guardian)  8 They revealed everything to their therapists. Then hackers leaked it all. The Vastaamo scandal in Finland is a nightmare scenario for anyone seeking mental health treatment. (Wired $)   + There's increasingly strong evidence for MDMA to help treat PTSD. (NYT $)   9 A court has ruled that Snapchat can be sued for its role in a fatal car crash This seems tenuous at best to me. (NPR)   10 You can have more than 150 friends Though I'm really not sure why you'd want that many. (Gizmodo) Do you see hype in tech when others see hope? Or vice versa? MIT Technology Review wants contrarians for our Global Panel. Join today. Quote of the Day “This is one of the craziest life cycles of any creature on the planet.” —Michael Raupp, entomology professor at the University of Maryland, tells the Associated Press what Americans can expect as trillions of "Brood X" cicadas emerge from their 17-year isolation underground.  Top image credit: Washington Fajardo Please send new friends to hi@technologyreview.com. Follow me on Twitter at @charlottejee. Thanks for reading! —Charlotte Was this newsletter forwarded to you, and you'd like to see more? Sign up today Don't settle for half the story. Subscribe to MIT Technology Review for paywall-free access to our journalism. Subscribe now   Follow us: MIT Technology Review One Main Street Cambridge, MA 02142   *Unsubscribe *Update preferences This email was sent to Webmaster220 Bible Study Blog  *the blog owner has deleted the hyperlink intentionally