Reykjavík Grapevine - 10.05.2013, Síða 6

It’s Not Just An Anti-Incest App
The Book of Icelanders goes mobile
by Larissa Kyzer
No Lifeguard At
The Gene Pool?
by Anna Andersen
Iceland | DNA
So then let’s get this out of the way early: two random
Icelanders have about as much in common as second
cousins, once removed, according to Dr. Kári Stefansson,
CEO and co-founder of deCODE Genetics. That might
sound like a lot, but accounting for the vast possibilities
for genetic recombination in each generation, it really
isn’t. Breaking it down in very, very simple terms—call
it ‘genetics for literature students in five minutes’— Kári
says, two Icelanders share a lot of DNA, but only in tiny
bits and pieces.
If it seems strange that one of the world’s more promi-
nent neurologists would be taking the time to parse basic
genetics for a freelance journalist with a high school level
understanding of DNA, then well, you can see just how
far the joke has really gone.
NEW BÖMP TECHNOLOGY
In early 2013, deCODE Genetics and the University of
Iceland’s School of Engineering and Natural Sciences
challenged the nation’s university students to design a
smart phone app for the 10th anniversary of the online
genealogical database Íslendingabók.
The database takes its name from the Book of Ice-
landers, a 12th century historical text which details the
Icelandic settlement. Currently, the database contains
810,000 genealogical records of the inhabitants of Ice-
land, dating more than 1,200 years back. It is viewable
only by Icelandic citizens and permanent residents, about
200,000 of who have sought access to the site.
A collaborative venture between deCODE and soft-
ware engineer Friðrik Skúlason, the Íslendingabók site
developed as a corollary to deCODE’s genealogical re-
search. “The reason why we have been able to lead the
world in genetic research,” Kári Stefansson says, “is be-
cause we understand the structure of Iceland’s population
so well.” DeCODE has an advantage over “the big guys
in human genetics” because the organisation has intimate
understanding of Icelandic genealogy, he says. “Our his-
tory is mapped in our DNA.”
DeCODE has attracted no small amount of interna-
tional press over the years, but it is unlikely that its stu-
dent app competition would have created such fervour
now were it not for one of the novelty features of the
winning ÍslendingaApp: the Sifjaspellspillir or “Incest
Spoiler” alarm. It alerts the user if the person he or she
plans on going home with is a near relation. Using the
app’s “new bömp technology,” users can tap their phones
together and see how closely they are related. It will either
erupt with a discouraging siren, or issue a gleeful “No
relation: go for it!” message, while a Barry White-esque
voice urges you on with a subtle “Oh, Yeeeaaah.”
SAD ENGINEERS WITH
A SENSE OF HUMOR
The winning “ÍslendingaApp” was submitted by Alex-
ander Annas Helgason, Arnar Freyr Aðalsteinsson and
Hákon Þrastar Björnsson, three student software engi-
neers at the University of Iceland who collaborate un-
der the business moniker Sad Engineer Studios (SES).
The Sad Engineers are, by their own account, “actually
rather jolly” and they have good reason to be. In winning
the ÍslendingaApp competition, they’ve not only made
headlines around the world, but they’ve also received
1,000,000 ISK (just under 8,500 USD) for their app con-
cept, as well as the possibility of further development op-
portunities with deCODE.
In addressing the “incest alarm,” and resulting jokes
about dating risks in Iceland, many people involved in
administering the app competition expressed a surprising
amount of incredulity that it has garnered so much atten-
tion from the international media. For their part, SES can
laugh about it: “it is a running joke in Icelandic culture,”
Hákon Þrastar says, though he and his collaborators had
“no knowledge of anyone actually accidentally sleeping
with a relative.”
CONNECTING WITH
YOUNGER GENERATIONS
While this is obviously all rather amusing, the “Incest
Spoiler” feature, which SES says is “purely for fun,” does
perhaps belie the sincerity and creativity which they and
other participants put into designing their apps, which
primarily focused on finding inventive ways to connect
Icelandic youth with their genealogical heritage.
“I considered the competition a wonderful opportu-
nity to create a fun app with a positive societal purpose,”
said Hlín Leifsdóttir, a humanities student with an inter-
est in entrepreneurship. She’s part of the design team
Skyldleikur whose app placed second in the competition.
“The fact that the app would be based on Íslendingabók
really sparked my interest,” she said. “I believe that
awareness of one's own historical roots can contribute to
one's general historical awareness.”
The Skyldleikur app is an all-ages game which uses
the information archived in Íslendingabók to gener-
ate personalized questions about the player’s ancestors:
When did they live; where were they born? From graph-
ics down to the soft colour palette, Skyldleikur’s central
image—a tree whose branches blossom and fill with
birds as you answer more questions correctly—was spe-
cifically designed to “spark interest in genealogy among
the youngest generation,” says one of her teammates,
Björn Þór Jónsson, “while still appealing to the older gen-
erations.” In the future, the Skyldleikur team can imagine
all sorts of possible expansions for the app, such as users
writing in their own advanced questions which could be
integrated into family games.
A NATIONAL INTEREST
IN GENEALOGY
“It has often been said that there is a national interest in
genealogy here,” SES member Hákon Þrastar remarked.
All three SES engineers readily shared their own prior
experiences using the Íslendingabók website. Arnar
Freyr, for instance, thought that the website had always
been a fun tool to use when you make a new friend, and
you find out that you are fifth cousins. It was their interest
in these unexpected personal connections which inspired
the bömp tapping feature in the first place—they thought
it would be great to be able to quickly find out if you and
a friend had any shared ancestors.
Aside from the bömp feature, the ÍslendingaApp also
allows users to search for any name in the database to
see how they are related to that individual. While per-
sonal details about people listed in the registry are only
viewable by close relatives—you can’t sift through Jónsi
or Vigdís Finnbogadóttir’s family tree, for instance, if
your only relation to them is 12 generations back—it is
possible to look through and see how close your family
connections really are. Additionally, the ÍslendingaApp
includes compiled statistics, popular names, a calendar
of relatives’ birthdays, and reminders so that you “never
forget grandma’s birthday again.”
In reaching out to student designers in this app com-
petition, Ingi Rafn Ólafsson, the University of Iceland’s
marketing and community director, said the organisers
were “tapping into the vast creativity and spirit of the
generation that is currently in the Universities” and look-
ing for new ideas for highlighting the wealth of informa-
tion contained in the Íslendingabók database. They have
certainly accomplished this, as evidenced by the vastly
different approaches that the top placing teams took
in their app designs, while still having similar goals in
mind. "Older generations tend to be more interested in
learning about their roots," says Skyldleikur's Hlín. "I
think this has everything to do with how the information
is presented, and that a more youth friendly approach
would most certainly spark the interest of the younger
generations."
Perhaps fascinating the foreign press with the “In-
cest Spoiler” will have its side benefits, too. Comments
sections around the web may now be chock full of crass
suggestions about the services that foreign tourists might
render in Iceland’s gene pool, but the Sad Engineers keep
their sense of humour about this: “If it actually does ex-
pand tourism, that’d be fantastic.”
Iceland’s gene pool sure has been under heavy
scrutiny this last month. Thanks to a joke taken a
little bit too literally by the international media, a
whole bunch of people are probably now under
the impression that Icelanders are so related
that they need an app to prevent incest. Now,
we are a pretty homogenous nation, as founder
of deCODE Genetics Kári Stefánsson says, but
we’re not THAT homogeneous.
DeCODE Genetics “has discovered key risk
factors for dozens of common diseases”
due in part to Iceland’s small, homoge-
neous gene pool. So just how homoge-
neous are we?
We are homogeneous in the sense that all of us
are rooted in a relatively few individuals who
lived many, many centuries back. This means
that two random Icelanders will share more
of the genome than two Americans, but they
share just tiny little pieces of DNA because the
genome has been broken up by recombination
over many generations. There is the so-called
Founder Effect in our population meaning that a
few individuals who lived in the past are respon-
sible for a large percentage of the population.
This makes it much easier for us to find rare mu-
tations that cause diseases.
According to a chapter on impediments
to marriage in Iceland’s Law in Respect of
Marriage No. 31, “Persons related by direct
descent may not intermarry, and the same
shall apply to siblings.” This, however,
means that Icelanders can marry their
second cousins. You must have data on
this; is this practice prevalent today?
Was it in the past?
We published a paper [“An Association Be-
tween the Kinship and Fertility of Human
Couples,” SCIENCE VOL 319] a few years back
which showed that the more closely related par-
ents were, the more children they had, which is
sort of counterintuitive. Then when we looked
at whether there was a relationship between
how closely related the parents were and how
many children their children had, it was still the
case that the more closely related the parents
were, the more children their children had, ex-
cept when the parents were first cousins. This
means, if the first cousins had children, those
children were probably handicapped. So that’s
an indirect answer to your question.
So it’s okay for second cousins
to procreate?
Second cousins will have healthy children,
at least that is what our data indicate. So bio-
logically it is fine. Also, keep in mind that our
definition of a species is a group of individuals
who are closely enough related to each other
to be able to have offspring. So implicit in our
definition of a species is a relationship between
individuals. I’m not at all promoting or recom-
mending that second cousins procreate; I’m just
saying that our data do not indicate that there
will be biological disasters, though there may
be social disasters. It is definitely frowned upon
and probably should be.
The law also states that, “Examination
of impediments to marriage shall be per-
formed by persons empowered to perform
marriage ceremonies…” Do priests actually
need to consult Íslendingabók to verify that
they are not marrying off persons related
by direct descent?
I have no idea what the priests do in general. I do
not know whether they consult Íslendingabók.
I do not know if they like movies, I don’t know
what they like to listen to, I don’t know what they
like to eat. I know nothing about priests. I don’t
go barhopping with priests. I know nothing.
How does the incest alarm work? How
closely related do you have to be to set it
off? How as this determined?
You know, the incest alarm on this app was just
a joke. On the tenth anniversary of our Íslend-
ingabók database, we launched a competition
to create a mobile version of the site, which
was won by computer nerds who put together
an app that was visually appealing and easy to
use. When they got the award, they created this
tongue-in-cheek part, but they were just joking.
The international press was fooled.
What do any two random Icelanders have in common, genetically? If this sounds
like the beginning of a bad knock-knock joke (or Jimmy Kimmel sketch), that’s
probably because by now you’ve read at least some of the pun-heavy headlines pop-
ping up everywhere from Bloomberg Businessweek and NBC to the BBC and The
Huffington Post. A quick sampling if you haven’t: “App Aims to Keep Cousins from
Kissing,” or “Icelanders Avoid Inbreeding Through Online Database.”
…it will either erupt with
a discouraging siren, or
issue a gleeful ‘go for it!’
message, while a Barry
White-esque voice urges
you on with a subtle ‘Oh,
Yeeeaaah.’
“
„
Photo: Alísa Kalyanova
6The Reykjavík Grapevine Issue 5 — 2013