Just don’t do it: everything you are is a message.

I dare say, we have seen a preview of the future. It's just that I didn't know it was the future at the time. I thought it was just a small change that appeared briefly, or an unfamiliar trend. However, after witnessing numerous processes in which changes accumulate, influence each other, and create greater changes, I have come to understand that there is a mechanism in the world that connects like an organism and agrees on the direction of change. So to speak, what we saw in the past was a future that came in advance.
As such experiences were repeated, I developed a sentence that was like a kind of mantra.
'What's going to happen happens.'
The reason things happen is not because they are fatalistic or because a certain outcome is predestined. Because we prefer it and we want it. The point where each member of the human species, whose fate is to live in groups, wants to live, the point where each individual's desires are agreed upon, is exactly where what will happen will happen. Our future is a melting pot of greater desires where each person's desires collide, meet and drive each other, and are created.
-Prologue It has been less than 20 years since dogs became pets, objects of cuteness, and companions in our lives again. If you think about it, the very creation of the keyword ‘companion’ is evidence that consideration for others has begun. Recently, people sometimes refer to themselves as ‘companion people.’ Could it be that humans, who reigned as the lord of all creation, laid down their position and began to recognize themselves as beings who coexist with all things in nature? Humans are beings who fight even among members of the same species, and the keyword 'companion' seems to contain a broader and longer view of the narrow concept of community. It also means that we have become humble.
We can also accurately measure when this meaningful change occurred. The expression ‘companion animal’ nearly doubled between 2016 and 18, and the term ‘companion plant’ increased nearly four-fold. Even if it is not just big data, the rise of companion animals can be inferred from the fact that non-marriage/non-birth has continued for over 2 years. Fundamentally, humans are lonely beings and need someone to be with.
– Chapter 1 ‘Déjà vu: A pulled future’

Just working hard is not the answer. If you work hard in the wrong direction, you will burn out. According to a newspaper article, telemarketing was a promising job in 2002. However, in 2015, it was selected as the number one occupation that will disappear. Someone in 1 might have risked their life on what would become a dying industry less than 2002 years later.
You need to think about the direction first, and then stick to it. It's not difficult. You just have to think first. Because what’s going to happen will happen. Don't just try it and then think about it, don't do it and then verify it, think about it first. It should be ‘Think first’ rather than ‘Just do it’.
– Chapter 1 ‘Déjà vu: A pulled future’

In Korean society, working from home was a word that practically did not exist until the fourth quarter of 2019, that is, right before COVID-4. Here, non-existent means a word that exists in the dictionary but has no substance. Like a unicorn, for example. At most, it came out with words like ‘Bitcoin’, ‘small capital’, and ‘investment’. Working from home was mainly used in articles such as illegal multi-level marketing. Conversely, as soon as the term 'working from home' was mentioned, we believed and filtered the article. That's a dangerous method and you'll be in trouble if you get caught.
As such, many healthy companies have been the first to introduce telecommuting, which had not been accepted in our society. Even when the coronavirus pandemic is over, large companies overseas are showing signs of maintaining work from home rather than having a physical headquarters building. While working from home during the pandemic, my performance did not drop.
– Chapter 2 ‘Change: Liquidization of values’

If the assumption we have had so far, that is, the common belief that one must go to work, is eliminated, the imagination of pursuing efficiency can advance endlessly. What will happen in the future if working from home is accepted in our society? If you don't have to go to work, do you need an office? Furthermore, some companies provide assistance with lease funds or monthly rent for employee welfare, but is that really necessary? Many companies support transportation costs to and from work, but you're starting to question whether it's really necessary. Furthermore, if you don't have to work face-to-face, there's no need to hire someone from the same country. In this way, your thoughts continue to expand.
At first, many people said this. Working from home is a temporary emergency measure, so once the coronavirus is over, things will go back to the way they were before. However, I think the debate surrounding working from home will intensify in the future, not only from an economic perspective but also from a welfare perspective. Even the metaverse has emerged as a powerful alternative. If the principle of the starting line is broken, the standards at each stage change, so we must continue to pay attention to changes as innovation spreads.
– Chapter 2 ‘Change: Liquidization of values’

Those who define their job as monitoring, supervising, and directing what their employees do are bound to be taken aback by the current changes. You can monitor people if they are within a short distance that you can see with your eyes, but since you cannot check if they are all scattered out of sight, it creates a kind of impatience or fear. There are posts saying that they don't trust whether their employees are doing a good job, but are worried that if they do a good job, they won't need me as a manager. So, I end up in an ambiguous state where I want my employees to work hard, but I also want them to loosen up a bit so I have room to encourage them.
In normal times, this mentality manifested itself in office inspections, such as walking around behind the scenes and looking at employees' monitors, but when working from home, it has changed to constantly checking. I keep getting asked questions through a great channel called Messenger. “Deputy Kim, what are you doing now?” “I’m writing three pages of the report.” At this time, I would be suspicious if Assistant Manager Kim's response is late. He is away and playing.
The company messenger has a feature that changes the green light to yellow or red if no input is made on the computer for a few minutes. As soon as the color changes, the manager starts talking, and Assistant Manager Kim, exhausted and angry, closes the app. The name is 'Zarianbium'. This is an app that shakes the mouse periodically to prevent it from being displayed as away on the other party's messenger. It is truly a tremendous battle of spears and shields.
The reason such tricks are rampant is because they are selling the process, not the result. Isn't it okay for employees to get results, whether they drink tea or listen to music? However, this is what happens when you demand diligence from employees and try to manage the process.
– Chapter 2 ‘Change: Liquidization of values’

Employees who had been working from home due to social distancing returned to work for the first time in weeks. It's nice to see you after a long time. So the manager speaks. “Oh my, how have you been? It's nice to see people from our department after a long time. “How about we all have a beer later after work?”
Then a team member says: “Manager, we want to do that too, but it’s better to be careful for now, so let’s have a company dinner later when the coronavirus is over.” That's why the manager was disappointed, and as he passed by the restaurant on his way home from work, he saw that all the team members were gathered there except for him. This is a sad story.
Many people call the change brought about by Corona ‘non-face-to-face,’ but as I said before, I would like to express it as ‘selective face-to-face.’ Even if it is just a gathering of people from the company, my inner feelings have come out that I don't like vertical gatherings with the manager, but I like horizontal gatherings where team members can hang out informally with each other. In this case, the coronavirus was used as an excuse to get rid of the manager who was making a bombshell and forcing a toast.
– Chapter 2 ‘Change: Liquidization of values’

In addition, various policies and ideas were mobilized, such as Taiwan's real-name mask system and Korea's drive-through. These were all new attempts made by each country's wisdom. The results that follow will explain the success or failure of these attempts, so once the coronavirus is over, a white paper will be created for each country. And wouldn’t there be a ‘white paper of white papers’ that synthesizes these white papers? If the white paper describes all the environmental factors and causes of the coronavirus, the response and the resulting results, then each country has made different attempts, so the white paper is a compilation of each country's trials and errors. In this way, humanity will become wiser. Many types of new attempts were made simultaneously, the results were observed in real time, and a collective evaluation of the results was made, so if we are at least mature enough to not repeat the same mistakes, we can use the lessons learned from these to improve human life. Wouldn’t it be useful? I hope so.
– Chapter 3 ‘Adaptation: Actualization of Thoughts’

A professor I know told me to come into the Metaverse lab by 9 a.m. and sit down because he was guiding the thesis and giving presentations to graduate students one by one. The students' reactions to it were interesting. Normally, I would be a little late and could sit roughly during presentations, but when I saw my avatar and the professor in the metaverse space, I came on time and sat straight on my chair. There was cognitive confusion between virtual space and real space.
Not only that, but since you can see what each person is doing in that space, there is a high possibility that you will lose the freedom to do other things in your free time while working in the office. If this happens, the company may take the lead in introducing the metaverse.