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The Many Flavors of “Okay” | When ‘k’ isn’t okay…
It’s 2016, when ‘k’ is no longer ‘okay’ or even okay. We’ve all been texting long enough now to know good texting is all about showing effort, so anything too short comes off as snippy. Text ‘k’ to someone and be prepared for anything.
For those of you who aren’t fluent in the many flavors of ‘okay’, you might want to read on.
How someone reads your single word ‘k’, ‘ok’, ‘okay’ or ‘okay..’ text usually depends on the person. So firstly, know your audience. Generally, the younger the person you’re texting, the worse things sound. Same rule applies the closer that person is to being a girl you’re wooing. So, text “k” to a college-aged girl making date plans, and you could expect an internal diatribe like the one above. On the other hand, text that to your middle-aged father and he’ll probably appreciate your succinctness.
There’s no surefire route through this minefield of potential miscommunication. Much depends on personality and context, like what the exchange leading up to this conversation killer looked like. But below are some rough translations…
That’s all for today’s lesson…mmkay? | https://medium.com/@CrushhApp/the-many-flavors-of-okay-77836b61d3b2 | [] | 2016-11-18 17:41:49.043000+00:00 | ['Texting', 'Conversations', 'Messaging'] |
Will Fifty Shades of Grey lead to a ‘babymoon’ boom? | Following record-breaking sales of the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy, island resorts, B’n’B’s and hinterland cottages across Queensland are anticipating an influx of expectant parents wanting to take a ‘babymoon’ holiday before their bundle of joy arrives.
Back in the day, baby booms might have been credited to a blackout or a particularly celebratory New Year’s Eve, but with millions of sales worldwide it seems erotic fiction is now spicing up bedroom antics.
As a result Professor Ellis Cashmore, expert in culture at the UK’s Staffordshire University, has predicted an increase in the number of newborns early next year.
He told the Daily Mail that in previous years there had been a spike in pregnancies during football World Cups but now, thanks to Fifty Shades of Grey, women were being inspired to get into the bedroom more often.
With the baby boom set to begin, we’ve listed some of the best Queensland babymoon holidays mums and dads-to-be can indulge in before bub arrives.
FREESTYLE ESCAPE, SUNSHINE COAST
Choose from either the Arthouse or the Escape House overlooking the rolling hills of the Sunshine Coast hinterland and simply relax, or take part in one of their cooking classes in the Outdoor Kitchen, or an art class.
QUALIA, THE WHITSUNDAYS
Go on an uber luxe island babymoon by escaping to Hamilton Island’s six-star boutique resort, qualia. Indulge in pamper treatments at spa qualia or enjoy some of the culinary classes and tastings on offer at the resort.
WITCHES FALLS COTTAGES, GOLD COAST
Tucked away in the beautiful and tranquil Gold Coast hinterland, parents-to-be can put their feet up and relax at Witches Falls Cottages with a specialised babymoon package that includes daily gourmet or BBQ breakfast, a pamper session and cuddly companion for your baby from the Teddy Bear Shop.
SPICERS BALFOUR HOTEL, BRISBANE
A luxury hotel set in the inner-city fashionable suburb of New Farm, Spicers Balfour Hotel offers expecting couples a city getaway with a touch of extravagance. Choose from the variety on experiences on offer such as high tea, Pregnancy Yoga or Art Balfour — Brisbane’s newest art space.
HERON ISLAND, SOUTHERN GREAT BARRIER REEF
Before your bundle of joy arrives, see other babies being born when the green and loggerhead turtles hatch on Heron Island. The island is a significant nesting and hatching location for the two vulnerable turtle species. | https://medium.com/@hirecoachhulltoady/will-fifty-shades-of-grey-lead-to-a-babymoon-boom-d1cb53c1f3e0 | ['Coach Hire Hull'] | 2020-03-25 10:40:30.563000+00:00 | ['Sales', 'Baby'] |
Are Humans Dumb? | You can read her article here. I’ve quoted her word-for-word (italics). My responses are in between. Imagine if you will eavesdropping on this conversation in a deli somewhere.
Humanity isn’t ready for aliens. That was the thought expressed by a former Israeli space security chief, 87-year-old Haim Eshed. A man was quite credible with 30 years of experience in Israel’s space program. He admitted that aliens are real, and Trump knows about them, but the “Galactic Federation”, which is like an alien network, thinks that revealing that aliens exist would cause “mass hysteria”. You can read more in this article: Former Israeli space security chief says aliens exist, humanity not ready — The Jerusalem Post (jpost.com) Are we really shocked by the existence of aliens?
We shouldn’t be. What I was shocked about was that recently the US government released evidence of otherworldly crafts (UFOs) and declared them to be real. So, if UFOs are real, wouldn’t that equate to aliens being real, unless the government is behind all those flying crafts? Who knows? Nothing makes sense anymore.
Right you are! Things have not been making sense for quite some time now. There have always been what is called “aliens”. They’ve been around longer than we have. Ergo we’re the aliens but that’s a whole other topic. There is artwork all over the world depicting what these “aliens” look like not to mention how they travel. From cave drawings on up. Yes, even in the Bible. Their presence in the universe would also be an explanation for so many other things that are, currently, “unexplainable”. Take the pyramids in Egypt for one example. And why there have been giant leaps forward in technology to name two.
I have been down so many rabbit holes from listening/reading/watching stories about Antarctica, the inner earth theory, alien bases on Mars, multi-dimensions and universes, UFOs in the Bible, the dark side of the moon, etc. There are so many rabbit holes to get lost in and at this point, I am tired, and I just want the truth. Trust me, Galactic Federation, we humans can handle it.
If you’ve ever watched any of those ancient alien shows on the History channel or maybe it’s the Travel channel…and really listen to how they describe aliens. It should all sound familiar if you’ve ever attended church or studied the Bible. What they are describing is God himself. It shocks me that people think that the two are mutually exclusive. “Beings” that they refer to are exactly what angels are taught to us growing up in the church. Scientists however will be damned before they admit that they believe in a higher being let alone to refer to said being as God. A lot of them are atheists. Yet they believe in the same things we do. Go figure.
The Galactic Federation, as I understand it, is the equivalent to our U.N.
What is the truth?
Lately, there have been so many missions to space. Donnie T (Trump) recently created the Space Force, do we really think that they are doing this for fun? Obviously, something is happening in space and Donnie T is well aware, just like most, if not all, of the other presidents prior to him. I don’t know exactly what they know, and I am tired of assuming, so please save me, save us the time and energy, and just tell us what is happening.
Like all things in life, we don’t need to wait for someone else to give us anything. There is a way to get that information for ourselves. It involves ascending to the 5D.
We should be a little offended that the aliens don’t think that humanity is ready for the truth because we have not evolved enough as a race. But for years, versions of the truth have been revealed to us, so what are they afraid of?
Offended? Good golly no! I’d be PISSED if they gave us all the intel that they have! Stupid is a harsh word but if it quacks like a duck…We can’t handle homelessness, starvation, or even a presidential election. There’s no way the average Joe Schmoe on the street would be able to wrap their heads around this. You’ve got one side of the aisle showing up with guns in camo to protect rights while the other side is looting and burning down entire cities. If I were a being watching this crap show on Earth, you wouldn’t be able to get me in the same universe with it. We are knowingly and intentionally polluting the planet and killing its inhabitants — humans, animals, and plants. We haven’t earned the right to know anything else as we have yet to put to good use the knowledge we already have. “Cast not your pearls before swine.”
Are they afraid that by revealing the truth that would mean automatic admission to the lies that we have been told about our world? News flash, we already know that we have been lied to. Or are they afraid that people will lose faith in government and realize that the Universe is bigger than us and we are just a small part of a vast system that does not revolve around us? Or worse yet, could the truth reveal that we were an experiment that went terribly wrong? Come on aliens, give humanity some credit. The information is out there in some form, it has been hidden in plain sight for us to see. Stop holding it hostage.
We the people lost faith in our government some time ago. Thus, the rush on Area 51. Project Bluebook was a hit show for a reason. People are hungry but then hand them food and they still won’t eat. Our government has been willfully killing us and using us as lab rats for years. Between giving the US military LSD to see what the side effects would be to injecting blacks in the south with STDs again all in the name of science.
My plea to the aliens.
Aliens, Galactic Federation, the government, if you could please relieve us of the additional time that we will be wasting going down more rabbit holes of misinformation, we would appreciate it. We are intelligent beings, with amazing abilities, and we would like to understand it all. Some of us humans are willing to listen and absorb the knowledge, as long as it is the truth. People are tired and ready for change, so please stop holding the information hostage and…wake up humanity to the truth.
As most women can attest to if you want something done and done right, do it yourself. Watch this guy’s video and then try it yourself. As soon as I’m on the road trust and believe I intend to do just that! They even have a group you can work with, so your energy isn’t drained trying to fly solo. Although solo is how I plan to begin. I want to have complete control over the situation to insure to my comfort level that things are going in a direction that won’t cause an intergalactic war. | https://medium.com/illumination/are-humans-dumb-4f2259cc2a8f | ['Terry L. Cooper'] | 2020-12-14 17:45:18.159000+00:00 | ['UFO', 'Ufos And Aliens', 'Science', 'Space Exploration', 'Aliens'] |
10 Reasons You Have To Quit Your Day Job | Then he said, “Don’t quit your day job”.
This is supposed to be a funny way of saying, “You shouldn’t get out of your comfort zone. You shouldn’t try to better yourself. You shouldn’t strive for more. Don’t try to be rich.”
This is supposed to be a cruel way of saying, “Let other people be great. You stick with your job.”
So many people simmer with chronic despair, stuck in a job for five years, 20, 30, and they think they are too late.
But you aren’t. You never were. And you aren’t now.
We are here to explore. We are here to be curious. Not to argue at a 9:15 meeting. Not to cry in your cubicle.
This is what a job really is:
You are being paid MONEY in exchange for your UNHAPPINESS.
It’s a price on your unhappiness. Not your services. You decide what that price is.
Or you can take the red pill.
Some things I realized about a day job:
A) MONEY IS NOT A REWARD.
Money is a ceiling. It’s a bribe to stop you before you reach your potential as a human.
“Take this money so you can do what we want you to do and not what you want to do. Money is compensation for less happiness.”
And then they put in a false rewards system. A promotion. A raise. The false praise of a boss who has been a veteran prisoner only a few years more than you’ve been.
I get it. We need money. I need money. But…
The money is there to delay you from living your life’s potential.
B) FRIENDS DON’T LIKE YOU
I had a cubicle at my job. Depending on how close your cubicle was to mine, that usually meant you were a better friend.
Cubicle mates are forced friends. When cubicles are moved, I’d often lose touch. And when I left the job, I lost touch with everyone.
Now I had new friends.
If a friend got promoted, I’d get jealous. Maybe they got an office instead of a cubicle. Often that was the end of the friendship.
And where were my real friends? I don’t know. I was too busy with my forced friends to find real ones.
C) YOU SOLD YOUR DREAM
Nine to Five is a myth. It doesn’t start at 9. It doesn’t end at 5.
It’s 6am wake up. Shower, clean, breakfast, then commute. Then quick stop at the coffee cart. Then work by 8:45. First meeting of the day at 9:15.
Counting down the minutes to five. Commute (watching the men and women looking down to the muddy floor on a subway).
I want to tell stories. I want to create. I want to make stuff up.
The subway is the underground animal kingdom. A shadow of what hell might be like. Filled with mysterious strangers all inches from dangerous intimacy.
I would wonder almost every day: what if the Apocalypse happened right now, outside of the subway car, everyone dead except us travelers through this one cave of hell. What a coincidence we were here!
Now I’d have to spend the rest of my life only knowing them. Would that woman be my new wife? Would that man try to kill me or eat me? Suddenly the homeless man, practicing for this new reality for the prior 12 years, just went from the Omega male on the subway to the Alpha male.
I’d better be his friend.
Fantasy over, commute over, get dinner, now I have to relax and de-stress. Because the 9–5 is chronic stress on a “low simmer”. Nothing can quite get cooked but everything is hotter than comfortable. And it never stops.
Now it’s 8, or 9. My favorite show. Read a few pages of a book. Fall asleep.
Where did the time go? The time I had set aside to play. Where did I leave the sandbox? When?
D) THE MONEY IS FAKE
On one side is the money. On the other side is this month’s bills.
Like a junior high school dance, the boys and girls start on their own side of the gym. Then by middle of month they rush to meet each other. Hoping for one dance, maybe a feel, or a kiss, by the end.
And then it’s over. By the end of the month (because the US savings rate is 0) the dance begins again, the money and bills still anxious to meet. Afraid to touch.
For every dollar you make, 40% goes to taxes. At least 16% of those taxes goes to support wars. Or…somewhere…a bridge to nowhere.
30% on average goes to rent or mortgage. Some percentage might go towards student loans or credit card debt (100 million workers, $5 trillion in student loan debt or credit card debt equals a big % of monthly salary in interest payments).
Now: a tiny bit left for a few books. A Netflix subscription and Verizon payment plan. Maybe a few date nights. A suit. A car payment. One night of poker where you lose a little too much, too early in the evening. Throw some in the 401k which may go up or down. And if you live to 65 (or 59), you might get some of it back.
Nothing left over. The dream postponed one more month.
E) YOU’RE BEING HYPNOTIZED AND ROBBED
The “lowest rung” on the corporate ladder is actually the person who creates the product that is sent to the customer.
The lowest rungs do the work. The guy who makes the fries, makes all of McDonald’s profits.
I was the lowest rung at my first big corporate job. I had a boss’s boss’s boss’s boss’s boss’s boss’s boss’s boss. Who then reported to a board of directors who reported to shareholders.
The shareholders have to make most of the money or they fire the CEO. The CEO makes a lot of money. And all the bosses in between me and him all made A LOT more than me.
But I’m the one who created value.
Out of every one dollar of value I created, I estimated I made about 1/10 of a penny in salary.
I call my mom and my dad. Did you enjoy your day at work?
Yes, I did, I say. I loved it.
Because I hated myself.
F) MILLIONAIRES DON’T HAVE JOBS
I’ve been rich and I’ve been broke.
Some years I’ve made my money from having a job. Some years from being an entrepreneur. Some years from being an investor. And some years I made no money at all (or lost it).
According the IRS, the average millionaire in the United States has at least five different sources of income.
I remind myself of this every day. No one source will control my net worth. Ever.
A job, which is basically from 6am (wakeup) to 9pm every day, is only one source of income. And pays you less than 1% of the value you create.
And you have no time for anything else.
Every successful investor/entrepreneur in the world knows that diversification, taking calculated chances, and having the time necessary to be creative and unique is the key to making enormous amounts of money.
Ideas are the currency of the 21st century.
Ideas are where you have no ceiling on what amount of money you can make.
If you have a job, you have only one source of income, you’re prevented from taking risks, and you have no time.
So you don’t get the key. And the door is never opened.
G) ZERO LOYALTY
“I was at GM for 40 years,” a man told me. “I was middle management. So I wasn’t making the big bucks of upper management. And I wasn’t protected by a union like the blue collar guys.
“The company went out of business. So I had no job, little savings, no union, and too old to get a new job.”
“What will you do?” I asked.
“I don’t know,” he said. He laughed. “Nothing wrong with bagging groceries for awhile.”
H) WHAT HAPPENED TO THE LAUGHTER?
The average child laughs 300 times a day.
The average adult…5 times a day.
I don’t know why this is. I asked a therapist who works with hundreds of people. He said…responsibilities.
But why is it sad to have a family and a home and the bills to pay for the things you enjoy? It can’t be responsibilities.
It’s because when we were kids we loved to laugh. And at a regular job, the laughter is stripped away by meetings and bosses and office politics and drudgery work.
“Can you get this spreadsheet done by 2pm?”
I guess I have to.
I) JOBS ARE GOING AWAY
I don’t know. They say jobs are going up. But I don’t believe it.
I went to NYU one day and interviewed students about their student loans. But I ran into some recent graduates. One guy said, “I wish I hadn’t gotten the degree. Now I work in an eyeglass store selling glasses to pay off over $100,000 in loans. I majored in filmmaking.”
The next generation is being stripped of it’s hustle. It’s creativity. They are crushed into round pegs to fit the meaningless holes waiting for them.
There are real jobs out there. But they are getting fewer.
I look at my friends who are happiest. They have created their own jobs. If they wanted a TV show, they started a YouTube channel and grew it.
If they loved health, they made their training business scalable with videos and online courses and scaled it.
Even worse, you have to go to the bathroom next to your boss. Nothing is more disgusting and humiliating. But we think we have to take it.
Energy is about movement, curiousity, passion, love. Use it or lose it.
I need to move, Move, MOVE!
J) DON’T QUIT YOUR DAY JOB
I quit.
I had started a company on the side.
I built it up for 18 months while I still had my full time job. I had to learn so many things. Particularly how to sell a service and how to delegate some of the work I did.
I had to learn to balance a double-life. I had to work day and night for awhile.
Maybe I was too conservative. I was so scared to quit my job.
But I had my EVIL PLAN. I started my company, I built it up slowly, and finally I quit my day job when I felt ready.
Do you have your evil plan? | https://medium.com/the-mission/10-reasons-you-have-to-quit-your-day-job-7710642dffd5 | ['James Altucher'] | 2018-03-02 15:52:56.152000+00:00 | ['Career Paths', 'James Altucher', 'Quit Your Job', 'Daydream', 'Life'] |
The Power of the Gut, Outside of the Gut | The Power of the Gut, Outside of the Gut
“The gut is not like Las Vegas. What happens in the gut does not stay in the gut.”
- Dr. Alessio Fasano, Gastroenterologist
There was once a time in the nutritional realm that gut function was considered to solely impact upon digestive disorders, like bloating and constipation. However, the times they are a-changin’, as emerging research begins to highlight the fascinating ways the gut can influence the functioning of the entire body. A run down of influence of the gut in immune function, body weight and mental health only adds to the ever-growing list of reasons why 2016 is the year of gut health (sorry Kanye).
Immunity
Over 80% of body’s immune cells reside in the gut. The microbes living alongside these immune cells are vital to the introduction, training and functioning of a kick arse immune system. If you haven’t yet learnt about the somewhat disgusting, somewhat amazing world of bacteria currently within you, refer here.
Your gut microbes provide information regarding the ingestion of harmful substances (for example the flu virus, or, the bacteria living within a 6 day old burrito), in order to stimulate the immune system as needed. When fed the right foods, gut microbes also produce molecules that regulate immune function and reduce inflammation, such as Short Chain Fatty Acids (SCFAs).
Given the large importance of these very little microbes to immunity, it is logical that abnormal gut microbe composition (a condition known as “dysbiosis” in the land of gut health) has been linked with lowered immunity and autoimmune disease. It is hypothesized that the rise antibiotic use, cesarean births, poor dietary habits and hyper-sanitation (shout out to you Dettol) in high income countries have resulted in gut compositions which lack the strength and diversity to establish balanced immune responses.
Research has identified striking differences between the microbiomes of western children to those of rural Africa, where modern autoimmune diseases such as allergies and asthma are essentially nonexistent. African children, eating a very high fiber diet, have greater gut microbe diversity and produce significantly more SCFAs, both of which are critical for immune function.
The power of the gut-immune relationship has also been demonstrated in a recent review that found the composition of microbiome can influence the effectiveness of vaccines in the body. Vaccines were shown to be less effective in individuals with gut dysbiosis, because the immune system was already preoccupied with dealing with existing gut inflammation. This discovery has exciting implications for future research projects that will investigate if the gut can also influence the effectiveness of other medications, supplements and even food.
Weight
The gut is also thought to exert powerful effects on metabolism and resultantly, body weight. We know that the bacterial gut compositions of normal weight vs obese people are very different. Fecal transplant studies (yes, that is what you think it is) in rats have provided fascinating data of the power of the microbiome to influence weight. A 2013 study published in Science, transplanted gut bacteria from obese and lean pairs of twins into germ free mice. The results showed mice injected with bacteria from fat twins grew fat; while those injected with bacteria from lean twins stayed lean. Furthermore, another study in Nature demonstrated that mice injected with obese gut microflora actually extract more calories from the exact same food than mice with lean microflora. This research provides not only reasoning for the observed changes in these rats, but potentially reasoning for why humans do not lose even when following a calorie restricted diet.
Recent research is showing these results are applicable among humans. Researcher Max Nieuwdorp has completed double blinded fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) on Type 2 diabetics with lean donors. The study found FMT from Lean male donors into males with metabolic syndrome resulted in a significant improvement in insulin sensitivity in conjunction with an increased intestinal microbial diversity. Scientific America explain recent findings in saying;
“the wrong mix of microbes, it seems, can help set the stage for obesity and diabetes from the moment of birth.”
It is a powerful idea for future health intervention that changing the microbiome may change the way food is metabolised, the occurrence of obesity and development of chronic disease.
Mind
While it is well established the brain signals the gut to exert effects over the Gastrointestinal Tract (GIT), it has recently been shown this relationship goes both ways. The gut can effect the brain too. Mark Lyte in Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology explains:
“The bidirectional interaction [of the gut-brain axis] is important not only in normal gastrointestinal function but also plays a significant role in shaping higher cognitive function such as our feelings and our subconscious decision-making.”
When considered physiologically, this idea is actually quite intuitive. The gut produces many molecules that inevitably end up in the brain, and can effect on mental state of an individual. For example, 90% of serotonin, the body’s feel good neurotransmitter, is produced in the gut. It therefore makes sense that a healthy gut environment is vital in facilitating a healthy mental state. Likewise, it is no surprise that dysbiosis is beginning to be associated with many neurological disorders, from Autism to Alzheimer’s.
For a deeper insight, check out Neuroscientist David Perlmutter explaining some of these recent findings about the gut-brain connection:
[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucAJ0U5Veis[/embed]
Or, if you prefer your gut information delivered in a Scottish accent, I can offer you a Ruari Robertson Ted Talk.
Obviously, the presented information is classified as emerging knowledge. There is still much more to learn. Although mechanisms are unclear, the idea that the gut can change the brain, immune response and body weight is too powerful to ignore. We have known for a long time now that plant foods, fiber, probiotics, mindful eating habits, and the limitation of antibiotics are all good things. Now, with the impact of such gut health practices having the potential to extend far beyond the bathroom, there has never been a better time to start lovin’ your gut. | https://medium.com/the-isthmus/the-power-of-the-gut-outside-of-the-gut-92e071e308f3 | ['The Isthmus'] | 2016-05-22 01:05:54.924000+00:00 | ['Health', 'Microbiome', 'Gut Health'] |
How to Concentrate While Studying — NADYACORSCADDEN.COM | *As an Amazon Associate, I get commissions for purchases made through links in this post.
There are three key areas to focus on that will help you concentrate while studying:
Set up your workstation for productivity Learn how to trick YOUR brain into paying attention Back off before mental exhaustion sets in
Let’s look into each of these in more detail, shall we?
1) Set up your workstation for productivity
While sometimes you can just sit down anywhere and work, that’s not necessarily helping you…and if you’re having trouble concentrating, you probably need all the help you can get! Set up your workspace for success with the following:
Find a quiet place to study
Wherever you’re working should be free of as many noise distractions as possible. If your only option is out in the open where all the hubbub of your house is, then some noise cancelling headphones might be a good investment.
Mute everything that beeps, blips, blings, dings and rings
While you may occasionally have things that are really pressing time-wise, there aren’t THAT many things that can’t wait half an hour. Do yourself a favour by turning off all of the notifications around so you don’t have an easy distraction.
There are apps that can help you do this easily. Check out the Offtime app for smartphones or Freedom for multiple devices.
Have a handy place for “distracted notes”
While you can’t necessarily prevent those stupid little “oh — I need to remember to do that” thoughts, you can certainly still address them. If you don’t do SOMETHING, you’ll try to keep reminding yourself of them by thinking of them all the time…and that’s just wasted brainpower! Keep a little notepad around to jot down all those little distractions that you DO want to remember for later. Deal with them on your breaks instead of during your study time.
Play music without words
While some people appreciate silence, others are distracted by the deafening nothing. If you’re one of those people who need music, opt for something without lyrics.
Why are words such a big deal, you may ask? Either you know them really well, and your brain will be busy finishing the lines in your head instead of concentrating on your studies…or you don’t know the words well enough, and your brain will be busy trying to figure out what they are.
Classical’s always a good choice if that’s your style, but there are certainly other options out there. Check out the following albums for inspiration:
Have some other great suggestions? Tag me on insta with your faves!
Have a source of natural light
Windows are always a fantastic choice to have nearby if you can…partially because it reminds you that there’s life on the other side of the glass, and partially because natural light gives off a therapeutic energy.
If you don’t have access to a window, it may be worth investing in a daylight lamp.
2) Find your best “study tricks”
Most humans have a certain learning method that works best for them. Some people are auditory and they need to hear information. Some people are visual and they need to see information. Some people are kinetic and they need to physically use information. Some people need a mix of all three.
This means that there are going to be a million and one “study tricks” out there, but some of them are certainly going to work better for you than others. None of this has any bearing on how “smart” you are, though; it’s all a matter of how your brain likes to function.
Figure out what works best for you and focus on using those methods whenever your concentration levels drift.
Here are some actionable techniques that can be extremely useful for kick-starting your concentration if it’s drifting:
Move around
This can mean pacing while reading, making up big actions or something as small as chewing gum. If you’re a kinetic learner, sitting and reading can be one of the hardest ways to learn anything. Adding movement to the learning process doesn’t have to mean sophisticated exercises, though. You can always try one of these ideas.
Speak things out loud
While some people are fine with reading in their head, other people find that speaking things out loud is way more useful. For the advanced version, take your eyes off the page and explain what you just learned to an imaginary friend.
Re-write and condense your notes
MANY times. You may also find that taking hand-written notes is better for your brain than typed notes. If you’re worried about going through too much paper, check out this cool note-writing tablet. The future IS digital, after all.
Make Flashcards
Whether you’re in the early stages or late stages of learning something, the process of whittling down information into a shorter form is always useful. By making flashcards yourself, you are using and re-writing the information…and it’s also super easy to test yourself once they’re done.
If you want to take the digital way out, check out Cram.com or Brainscape.com They have a HUGE selection of user-uploaded flashcards, and you never know — there might just be a set that’s useful! You can also make your own flashcards, so you’re certainly not limited to what you see!
Shuffle your flashcards/notes often
While there is definitely some merit to keeping certain categories together, it is supremely useful to recall information in a different order than the last time you used it. The brain is good at memorizing patterns, and it’s important to not let it fall into ruts of only being able to recite things in the same order. Shuffling topics will help prevent this rut from forming.
Decrease the video/audio volume
If you need to hear to pay attention to something, why not try making yourself really have to listen. By turning the volume down, you make it harder to hear and therefore harder to drift off.
Think about it: we’re hard wired to pay less attention to those ads that blare at 150x volume…so why should your studies be any different?
Adjust playback speed
If you’re having trouble concentrating, it may simply be that your brain wants to travel at a different pace than what’s given. Try speeding up or slowing the playback speed of any video/audio and see if that makes a difference. My sweet spot is usually 1.5x or even 2x if there’s also a transcript to follow along with.
Review before sleeping
Sleep has this weird trait of putting the pieces of your entire day back together over night. If you want to read more about it, check out this fascinating article HERE.
In a nutshell, anything that’s covered right before bed seems to have the highest rate of being able to be recalled.
If you’re the type of person who tends to spend the first half hour of “bed time” going over your study notes, do use some caution with this one. You might find you need to do a study session, then watch something funny, and THEN go to bed.
Colour-code your notes
Adding colour to the page will help break up any long, boring passages of notes. It also helps your brain make associations easily…which will therefore make them easier to stare at for long periods of time.
When you make your notes visually appealing, it’s going to help you WANT to look at them…which will make them even easier to focus on.
Want the best way to add colour to your notes? Check out The Best Coloured Pens for Note Taking ( newsflash I now also OWN the pens, and they’re as amazing as my friend said they were!!)
Accept when you need help
If you’re truly struggling with something, sometimes you DO need an external voice to explain things to you. If your lack of concentration is because things are hard to understand, this might be the tip for you!
It’s always good to wait a day or so before asking for help, so don’t run for assistance at every frustration. Give yourself a chance to have a completely independent breakthrough! When something’s challenging, you may need to give your brain a day to process things behind the scenes and also let your frustrations cool.
Sometimes a break isn’t enough to make all the pieces fit together, though, so it’s best to seek external help when you’re at this point.
Variety is key
Whenever your brain is starting to drift, take it as a cue to do something else. This doesn’t have to mean switch to a different subject (though it certainly COULD); it may just mean shaking up your routine.
Maybe you’re usually great at sitting and reading quietly, but today’s not your day. If that’s the case, maybe jump up, shake off and try reading out loud instead. There’s no shame in having a day where your brain just doesn’t want to cooperate.
Whenever your concentration is wandering, it’s a sign that there is too much monotony in your studying routine and it’s time to change things up!
3) Back off before mental exhaustion sets in
While “studying longer” may sound more impressive, long study sessions don’t do you any good if you’re working at less-than-optimal brain capacity. Make sure to quit while you’re ahead, especially when it comes to long, potentially frustrating study sessions.
Now, how long of a break am I recommending? Am I giving you permission to spend half of your “work” time NOT studying? Nope….sorry. You still have a lot of work to do.
I’m saying to have a 5-minute break at LEAST every 30 minutes
One of the simplest study methods to follow is the Pomodoro Technique. It has a rotation of 25 minute work segments with a 5 minute break. Then, every 4 segments, you take a 30 minute break.
What is a break?
Ok, it MAY seem like an obvious answer, but I just need to clarify for all of those “trying super duper hard at all times” people in the front. (Yes, I’m talking to YOU, Nadya)
A break is a period of time where you’re not working on the thing you were working on. This should be treated as official “me time”. It’s as much about stopping the spiral into madness as it is about being able to come back in a positive, refreshed mindset. It is imperative that this time is guilt-free time spent not going over things.
This means that getting up to go make tea can be a break, but not if you’re simultaneously going over a section of your notes in your head over and over again.
Going to put on a load of laundry isn’t really a break if you loath it, but it CAN be if you enjoy it.
Essentially, you are giving your brain a quick little nap to put some pieces together on its own without you and your stress interfering. You brain will do some catch-up work behind the scenes, and you can focus on coming back to work in a positive headspace.
What sort of things CAN be a break? Here are some fun ideas to get you started.
puzzle
game
walk
snack/lunch
craft
write
draw
exercise
sing
dance
…………..laundry?
BUT — Don’t forget the most important part of any break!
A break must end…within a reasonable timeframe. 5 minutes should only be 5(ish) minutes…not a full episode of Riverdale. A 25 minute break CAN hold an episode of Schitt’s Creek, though, so that’s a legitimate option for a longer break!
If you’re like the average mortal, you’re going to find it so much easier to stay mentally in the task at hand (whether that’s working or not working) if you’re not checking the clock every few minutes. Set timers for breaks and work times so you don’t even have to think of it.
*DING* — time to work — *DING* — Woo, time to play! — *DING* — Here we go with studying again — *DING* — Sweet, it’s break time!
Whenever you find your concentration is drifting, remember that it all comes down to these three things:
workspace
variety
breaks
Once you nail these three things for yourself and are good at changing up your tactics whenever necessary, you’ll have conquered one of the first major hurdles of independent learning!
If you want to keep reading, check out one of my other posts! | https://medium.com/@nadyacorscadden/how-to-concentrate-while-studying-nadyacorscadden-com-ba7de00219f9 | ['Nadya Corscadden'] | 2021-01-16 15:02:14.411000+00:00 | ['Learning', 'Focus', 'Elearning', 'Studying', 'Remote Learning'] |
The 4 Questions Product & Venture Executives Must Focus On | Getting a decision made to fund the next step for a new product or a new venture is usually a messy affair in most companies. Having been through my fair share of approval decisions on both sides of the fence, as the executive making the decision or the team pitching for a decision, I can see that as an industry and discipline, we product and venture folks need to get better at getting to a decision.
Companies, big and small (but mostly big), have a way of over complicating a decision or getting lost and diverted when a decision needs to be made on taking the next step to further fund a new idea. Decision-makers can chime in with additions and tangential thoughts. Sometimes they’ll add parameters to a variable rather than a new variable or risk that doesn’t fundamentally change whether to proceed or not.
What is needed are some key questions that, I posit, can be commonly applied across to decision making for any new product or venture. Questions that executives and teams pitching can bring people back to in order to get better, faster and more consistent decisions made (especially in Investment Committees, SteerCo’s, etc).
These key questions are:
Do we want to be in this space? Is this a good enough idea in the space? What’s the single biggest assumption that needs to be validated right now? Can we afford to bet on validating this assumption?
The order of the questions can be crucial. Each one builds into the next, operating like a yes ladder (if you’re pitching), or a quick filter (if you’re making the decision). That being said, with some audiences, you may want to bring the risk/bet/budget question to the top.
Let’s go through the questions themselves.
Key Questions
#1 Do we want to be in this space?
This question is about whether the new product or new venture fits with the strategy of the business. Businesses need to pick their strategy and their priorities to filter opportunities and ideas.
In many cases, this may already have been addressed prior to the decision needing to be made. For instance, the fact that you’ve been funded to research an idea and pitch means there is already a commitment to the area you are researching. In cases like this, it’s a simple yes.
In other cases, as if the idea is a new one or not within the usual strategic focus of the company, then answering this question might just need some additional discussion and thought. You will need to put some more effort into articulating this and understanding it in order to work out if it is a yes/no.
Sometimes it might be that the methods, model, new process or lessons are strategically relevant, but the customer/product/market isn’t. So work carefully on how you define “space”.
#2 Is this a good enough idea in the space?
The emphasis on a good enough idea is key. There is such high uncertainty around new products and new ventures that companies, especially big ones, will never find perfect ideas that tick all the boxes.
It’s essential to explicitly bring executives and team members together around this concept of good enough.
Good enough might be “better than the others we’ve had”. Good enough might be just enough to start building some learning momentum.
Generally speaking, new products and ventures that have made it to consideration from an executive or investment committee have been reasonably worked on and followed enough process to be good enough.
I’ve purposefully not included technical sub-questions that look at whether an idea is good like “ is the market big enough?” or “ who is the customer?” — because these need to have been dealt with by the team and stakeholders before it’s crunch time on a go/no-go decision. These types of questions are/can be somewhat methodical or objectively defined (e.g. we will only go after things with a market size above X).
If bad concepts are making it this far, then the process, people and practices need to be improved. A key way to know if you need to improve it is if your go/no-go or investment committee meetings are messy and distracted by technical detail style questions.
#3 What’s the single biggest assumption that needs to be validated right now?
With any new product or venture, there will be a large number of assumptions being made of varying significance. The trick for the executive or the team is surfacing the single biggest assumption that needs to be made right now.
The emphasis on “single biggest” and “right now” must be underscored and re-emphasized. You need to draw on your experience as well as the knowledge available on where to focus. For example, the somewhat standard way of thinking about product and venture lifecycle would have you consider product/market fit or validating the customer need as the first biggest assumption to resolve — because every other subsequent step in a business relies upon it being true.
A technique I’ve seen used to great effect here is argument mapping, a visual way of representing reasoning.
#4 Can we afford to bet on validating this assumption?
At the end of the day, a new product or new venture is a bet. Rather than disguise this and act with bravado thinking it will convince others of your idea, lean into the approach of Thinking in Bets to validate an assumption. This will help with thinking about the budget component of going ahead.
There are some further questions that can help you arrive at an answer to this question:
Is this the cheapest and most effective way to validate the biggest assumption? If we spend this, can we afford to make follow up bets on this idea? If we spend this, can we afford to make bets on other ideas?
In my mind, if you’ve answered yes to all of the above then, from a portfolio/risk point of view, you have nothing to lose. Establishing this “nothing to lose” and “everything to gain” framing can sometimes be the keyframing to help an idea progress.
You need to use this approach to shift the conversation away from the more familiar “will we get a return?” type of language, especially in big companies, because the reality is new concepts will only ever give uncertain returns (that anyone can poke holes in to shoot an idea down).
Finally, if your company or executives are struggling with the word “bet” or the concept, then you have an education and cultural change to work on if you’re ever going to make real progress on new concepts. | https://medium.com/agileinsider/the-4-questions-product-venture-executives-must-focus-on-28e7d572a94d | ['Scott Middleton'] | 2021-01-18 13:00:38.968000+00:00 | ['Decision Making', 'Product', 'Investment', 'Venture', 'Corporate'] |
Why You Need 1 Million Fans | Why You Need 1 Million Fans
Photo by Fab Lentz on Unsplash
The prevailing podcast wisdom says find your niche — your little sliver of the podverse — and eke out a nice living by serving that small, well-defined audience. I say you should aim higher…way higher. Why settle for 1,000 listeners when you should try for 1 million. It’s an audacious goal, I know, but it’s easier than it sounds. Let me explain.
Let's break down some popular shows
First, you have the current big daddy of podcasting: Joe Rogan. As of this writing, Rogan has about 200 million monthly listens. That equates to about 12 million listens per episode. Do you actually listen to every Joe Rogan episode? You probably pick and choose the guests you find interesting. So his core audience — the ones who listen to almost every episode — is much smaller than his total audience. I’d say it’s around 1 million people.
(Note: I’m using round numbers and approximations in this article to make a point. Don’t overthink the math. It’s close enough.)
Another example. The Flagrant 2 is a show that ranks among the top earners in Patreon. They currently have 19,000 people paying at least $5 per month. Patreon patrons are a great gauge of a show’s loyal fanbase. I call them the raving, paying fans. These 19,000 fans pay for an otherwise free show. The raving, paying fans should be the focus of your efforts.
A show’s casual fanbase is slightly different. They are the raving (not paying) fans. For a popular show, I would estimate this number is 5 to 10 times larger than the paying fanbase. For Flagrant 2, it would be about 200,000 people. Their total reach can be 5 to 10 times larger still. So I’m estimating Flagrant 2 has about 1 to 2 million podcast listens per month.
The takeaway: a popular show’s casual fanbase can be 10x larger than its core audience (the raving, paying fans), and the total reach — the number of individuals who have heard at least a few episodes — can be up to 10x larger than the casual fanbase. Your total reach also includes viewers on YouTube as well as social media followers. So to reach 1 million people, you only need a base of 10,000 raving, paying fans.
It’s getting easier every day
Just find 10,000 fans; easy right? I know it’s a lofty goal. If you find 10,000 fans, you’re already a big success in the podcasting world. Yes, this is still a monumental task. But what if you made this your goal over the next 5 years? It becomes attainable.
It takes just as much effort to reach 10,000 people as it does to reach 1,000. It will just require more time and different strategies. I advise you set your sights on the larger audience because it forces you to scale your thinking and approach.
The global podcast audience is growing every day, therefore reaching 10,000 people is becoming easier all the time. According to Libsyn, the top approximately 4% of podcasts on their platform receive over 10,000 listens per episode. Can you be a top 4–5% podcaster? Sure you can. It doesn’t take more talent or luck; it takes persistence.
So how do you build a fan base of 10,000 listeners? They are out there. Just find them. They already listen to other podcasts, read blogs, and interact on social media. Join the conversation. Get creative. Be a guest on other shows with the same target audience, write a blog on a platform that your audience already reads, participate in relevant trending topics on social media. While you do this, continue to hone your message.
Why aim for 1 million when you can be successful with a smaller audience?
For starters, you’ll make more money, but it isn’t about the money, is it? It’s about impact. If your message is compelling, your fans, who already think like you, will spread the word to others in their network — those who think slightly differently. Now your message has grown beyond its core audience. It gains momentum and shapes minds. It influences opinions. It challenges preconceived beliefs and biases. Do it enough times and you’ll eventually reach 1 million minds. That’s enough to spark a movement and create change on a global scale.
I want to reach as many people as possible through my podcast and online content. My goal is to empower my listeners to be more self-reliant and to have more freedom and mobility in their lives. I want to help fellow creatives reconnect with their voice and fulfill their destiny. The money is just a byproduct of providing value. It’s all about showing people a better way to live.
No matter if you’re an experienced content creator or just starting out, I hope you will think bigger. It’s great to give value to a small audience. This is how we all begin our journey, but the end goal is to help as many as possible. Don’t play small when you can play big. It doesn’t take more effort, just a different way of thinking. Now go reach 1 million people and make the world a better place! | https://medium.com/@brandonbeeyard/why-you-need-1-million-fans-3f49da84725f | ['Brandon Beeyard'] | 2020-12-08 21:06:13.185000+00:00 | ['Content Strategy', 'Podcasting', 'Content Creation', 'Showmaking', 'Podcasting Strategies'] |
Hip Hop Artist SHAH33D and Meaning In His Music | SHAH33D
Detroit’s SHAH33D grew up in a musical household that gave him his passion for it at an early age. And though he credits his parents for making sure he was always taken care of, he attributes his current place in life to dedication and consistency. He revealed, “I got to where I am today because I always found ways to create my own opportunities instead of waiting for people to do things for me.” This hard work has led to over a million legit streams on Spotify, Apple Music, and the other platforms within his musical catalog.
SHAH33D is inspired greatly by his real-life experiences and relationships with people, among other things, and hopes that people will take an important message away from his music. He states, “understand that it is ok to be your authentic self. No need to create an image or personality that is not you because there is only one you in this world, so embrace that.” One of his recent releases entitled “Pushhh” drives home this idea and features Witnezz.
A personal interview also gave SHAH33D the opportunity to talk about the challenges of being an artist. He explains the difficulty of “finding people you can trust and companies that are legit. The music business is filled with corrupt people to prey on independent artists.” SHAH33D understands this as being independent himself, though he works with producers such as Cay Caleb and Penacho Beats. Finally, he described the balance between managing his music career and his job as a registered nurse. He says, “My day always starts with affirmations and meditation followed by a brief workout. If I am not working in the hospital caring for my patients, I am sitting on my patio writing songs. If I am not writing songs I am playing with my son. The pandemic has really slowed a lot of things down, so I stay home most of the time now unless it is necessary for me to go places.”
Follow SHAH33D:
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/528Q2ERxpaj3SHA464h0Xs?si=9ZNsCxf9Q56o8ux3ZjbkKA&dl_branch=1
Instagram: @Shah33dworld | https://medium.com/the-wrapper/hip-hop-artist-shah33d-and-meaning-in-his-music-acc84252a698 | ['The Wrapper Staff'] | 2021-07-15 00:16:17.239000+00:00 | ['Music', 'Lyrical Trap', 'Shah33d', 'Meaning'] |
‘The Equality Education’: Inspiring Greatness in Kids in New York City | ‘The Equality Education’: Inspiring Greatness in Kids in New York City
A New York City small business’s mission to help kids “discover their greatness” through social-emotional learning.
Arianna Silver (left) and Soleil Laurent (right) stand within their Union Square Holiday Market vendor booth displaying their business’s empowering products on Monday, November 29, 2021. Equality Education, a business that began only last year, sits among over 160 others in the market in New York City, NY. (Photo courtesy of Equality Education).
As Soleil Laurent and Arianna Silver walked the mile from their neighborhood in Bushwick, Brooklyn to Blink Fitness — a routine that began after they met by chance in spring 2019 and became friends— they discussed the usual: personal development, growth, and vulnerability.
After enduring physical and emotional bullying from grade five through high school, Laurent and Silver connected on their journeys growing from those and other negative experiences. Laurent, a musician and student of psychology and neuroscience, and Silver, a life coach who studied sociology, strode down Bushwick’s Knickerbocker Avenue, discussing their knowledge from their educations, a myriad of self-improvement books, and their commitment to understanding emotions.
“As we got deeper into these conversations, we realized that a lot of the stuff that we were talking about at this age in our lives were things that would have been totally transformational if we had learned them as kids,” said Silver. “Basically, if you had taught me in school how to deal with my emotions the same way you taught me math, I would be a totally different person.”
The “stuff” Silver mentioned is defined as social-emotional learning, or the process through which individuals “acquire the knowledge, attitudes, and skills to: recognize and manage their emotions, set and achieve positive goals, demonstrate caring and concern for others, establish and maintain positive relationships, make responsible decisions, and handle interpersonal situations effectively,” according to the Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, a nonprofit leader in social-emotional research. This sort of education is proven to be successful for children, with several studies of both short-term and long-term effects demonstrating improvements in interpersonal skills and feelings of personal growth while lowering emotional distress and conduct issues.
When the COVID-19 pandemic swept over the globe and a national reckoning with systemic racism came to the forefront of public consciousness in 2020, dealing with emotions and processing emotional distress could not have been more necessary for youth in the minds of Laurent and Silver. They began having conversations on Instagram Live in July 2020, reflecting on issues of the pandemic and racial injustices like the murder of George Floyd. The positive response to their conversations paired with their personal passion for social-emotional learning led to the beginning of Equality Education, a small-business with the goal of providing a 60-module social-emotional and diversity-centered curriculum as well as empowering merchandise to children and schools.
“The world shook,” said Laurent, “and people, especially kids, need a better foundation within themselves. And that foundation can be built with the tools we create for them to access.”
Equality Education’s curriculum, which launches in mid-2022, is coming to fruition at a time when schools across New York City are implementing social-emotional learning practices. The city’s Bridge to School initiative, which received an almost two million dollar investment by the Department of Education and Fund for Public Schools, provides trauma-informed training to educators and social-emotional and mental health support for the city’s nearly 1.1 million students.
Chirlane McCray, First Lady of New York City, said in the 2021-2022 Bridge to School plan that “preparing our young people for success means helping them deal with the social, emotional, and academic challenges of their lives. It means teaching them ways to process their many emotions and showing them how to build healthy relationships and resolve conflicts in a constructive way. That is how we help them flourish into happy, healthy adults.”
Equality Education’s goal is to be a resource for schools, particularly ones in underfunded communities where research finds that funding differences are inequitable between schools with highest and lowest needs based on students living in poverty. According to the New York City Council, the schools in need of equitable funding and adequate resources — including social-emotional pratices — are in communities of color.
“We are looking to take funds from schools that can afford our almost $2,300 institutional membership to the curriculum and use that money to give the program to people and schools who might not have the funds to be able to access it themselves,” said Silver.
“We're big-hearted people that just want the best for others,” said Laurent, explaining their motivations. “Life is going to have a lot of challenges, but we want to provide resources and tools for kids to move forward and grow, especially kids who may be in tougher situations than others.”
At its core, Equality Education’s curriculum focuses on the “development of human consciousness through mental health awareness, emotional intelligence, and perception of others,” according to its official website. The program covers topics from positive self-talk, gratitude, and decision-making to valuing individuality and diversity, communication techniques, and growth from failure. It contains animated teaching episodes, writing prompts, a neuro-linguistic programming series, child-parent exercises, and more, catering to any type of learner (whether visual, auditory, or kinesthetic). While the curriculum will be available for individuals to subscribe to for about $20 a month, its primary goal is to be bought and distributed within schools, which is why it is geared towards children ages 2 to 18.
The co-founders explained that as they develop the curriculum, the concepts will be the same across the spectrum, but the material will vary depending on the age group. “With a kid who's being introduced to it as a two year old, it's a little different than something that we might teach 18 year old,” said Silver, explaining that younger age groups will have simpler activities that engage their attention like animated videos and coloring activities, while older kids will have more complex journaling activities or discussion prompts.
“Being human is human. That's really the basis of what we're teaching,” said Laurent, summarizing the curriculum.
Laurent and Silver invested a large amount of their own money to start the business, a number they cannot even begin to estimate. “When it comes to investing in Equality Education, it's almost automatic,” said Laurent. “We essentially send $500, send $1000, send this, send that. And we've been doing that for a year, all because we have faith in this for children.”
As the curriculum awaits its launch, the business sells empowering merchandise like posters, art, clothing and accessories in order to fund the production of the 60-module program. The best-selling product is the “I AM” affirmations coloring book with hand-drawn images and affirmations ranging from “I am worthy, abundant and grateful,” to “I am in control of my emotions.” The hands-on resource represents the power of their coming curriculum. By coloring the pages and repeating the affirmations, kids and people of all ages begin to practice a sense of self confidence and believe in the words they say, explained Silver.
Equality Education’s “I AM” affirmations coloring book sits front and center at the vendor booth on Monday, November 29, 2021. It can be bought for oneself or donated to a local charity the small business partnered with this season called “Sheltering Arms,” which helps foster social equity in New York City’s challenged communities. (Photo by Kasia O’Brien).
Equality Education’s curriculum takes this concept of practicing self-empowerment and social-emotional awareness and expands it into multiple modalities.
“I’m so excited,” said Laurent loudly, reflecting on their passing $20,000 in sales and their curriculum’s quickly approaching launch. “My whole body is in flames because it’s like, I wish I had this when I was a kid,” she continued, smiling from ear to ear.
Equality Education is currently undergoing a licensing process to become a Department of Education vendor with the ability to offer its curriculum to New York City schools. In the meantime, the business takes every opportunity to spread its message and products, from operating an Etsy shop and vending booths to conducting workshops.
This winter season, in a sea of over 160 vendors making up the tightly packed winding aisles of New York City’s Union Square Holiday Market, Laurent and Silver sit inside booth C34. Illuminated by suspended twinkling lights, the colorful bubble-lettered words on their products declaring that “love creates love,” and “powerful people empower other people,” jump out from the booth’s neutral walls. Holiday Market goers stop and flip through the coloring book. “No age is too young for kids to get introduced to this,” says Silver to a few customers gathered around their booth, “it’s never too young to learn unconditional love within ourselves and how to give it to others.” | https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/the-equality-education-inspiring-greatness-in-kids-in-new-york-city-7a23f1f2170 | ["Kasia O'Brien"] | 2022-01-24 22:59:49.088000+00:00 | ['NYC', 'Small Business', 'Social Emotional Learning', 'Empowerment', 'Curriculum'] |
Are You More Like Google, or Amazon? | It’s occurred to me that there are three big driving-the-way-the-Internet-works companies left (for now) to talk about. Maybe four if you count Facebook. Who are these companies? You’ve guessed it; Google, Amazon, and Apple control the world.
And honestly, Apple is slipping; let’s limit the influency-moving-forward conversation to Google and Amazon.
There’s a lot to dislike about the way Google is doing business, lately. While it would be naïve to think Google was going to keep giving away everything they make forever and ‘subsist’ on the revenue they derive as the world’s largest-and-there-is-no-second-place advertising agency, acts like the killing of Google Reader are unsettling — and driving most discussions about the delivered-right-after-Google-Reader-was-axed Google Keep.
It’s easy to argue that if a product is failing to deliver enough revenue something to justify its continued support you should discontinue it. And Google is a for-profit company; they have no obligation to keep resources attached to under-performing products just because a few tens or hundreds of thousands of people use them.
On the other hand: Google is so big, and has so many people who — I’m sorry Google, but let’s face it — aren’t productive anywhere near 100% of the time, it wouldn’t really cost anything measurable to keep popular-but-not-their-main-focus products running, if only to avoid public opinion hailstorms.
Then again, Google said long ago that they don’t really understand how their own infrastructure works.
I’m not sure whether Google is losing focus or intentionally ignoring the public relations and influency issues surrounding their actions, and I’m not even sure which issue would be worse; Google has enough critical mass to do pretty much anything and thrive. But when I look at Amazon.com I realize that it doesn’t matter. Amazon.com ‘gets’ long-tail marketing.
And that’s the issue. Large or small, entrenched or not, long tail marketing matters. You need to keep pushing your message in as many places and in as many ways as you can (afford), because otherwise, you will (eventually) disappear. Amazon understands this.
I don’t always agree with Amazon’s business methods, by the way. I hate that if you want to take advantage of Amazon’s free app of the day program, for example, you must both install the Amazon App for that purpose on your SmartPhone and keep it installed or your Amazon-acquired apps will stop working. Isn’t the fact that you side-loaded the Amazon-sponsored apps, bypassing the Google Play Appstore that so many people think of as “the” app store enough Influency for Amazon?
But in general, Amazon understands when to create business change. They seem to understand coopetition. And so, while Google makes a fortune on advertising and certainly needs to protect that revenue can they really think that banning Ad-blocking software from Google Play will make it go away? Who’s naïve now, Google?
Influency is about both understanding what to do to get yourself noticed, and understanding what not to do. And Amazon understands. Even when they got caught in a censorship kerfuffle, Amazon came out looking like good guys.
We make you the good guy. Want to talk about how we do it? Contact me here. | https://medium.com/business-change-and-business-process/are-you-more-like-google-or-amazon-a75363872203 | ['Jeff Yablon'] | 2016-12-19 00:22:14.756000+00:00 | ['Google', 'Marketing', 'Advertising', 'Amazon', 'Influency'] |
Musings by Sateesh | Twist in the story!
I was in my twenties and I had attended the workshop. This was a Management Development Workshop( MDP).
The trainer started a story as follows.
“There were two stones near the river and one day, a sculptor started carving both the stones to build a temple. Stone A could not bear the pain and prayed the god to stop the pain. God agreed and instructed the sculptor, not to carve stone A. After several years, one day, the same sculptor came near the river to wash his legs, and stone A asked about stone B. The sculptor said that stone B is no more a stone but a god. He added that people worshiped stone B. Stone A felt bad about its situation but what to do, NO PAIN, NO GAIN.
During the MDP, I thought “ Yes, to come up in life, you have to be carved with problems and tough times”.
After 25 years, I thought of meeting the same stones. I met stone A and found that it does not have any regrets that it could not become a god. It is enjoying the company of villagers who wash the animals, and the cool breeze.
I met stone B and it seems to be dis-illusioned. It is feeling lonely at the top as a god and fed up with the tight schedule of prayers and events at the temple.
Alas, stone B wants to go back to the riverside again.
I am literally confused. | https://medium.com/@sateeshh/musings-by-sateesh-78d60d2efe24 | ['Sateesh Hegde'] | 2020-12-17 04:55:22.834000+00:00 | ['Marketing', 'Growth', 'Sales', 'SaaS', 'Business'] |
How I Lost 35 Pounds in 4 Months: My Exercise-Free 5 Step Plan | The Elephant in the Room (me)
Before we begin, a bonus life-lesson for you: don’t move to China if you can’t handle the truth.
“You have got so fat.”
The above quote came from one of my female employees. Her face pinched down in mock pain as if the mere sight of me was like having cobra venom spit in her eyes.
Obviously, the whole body-positive movement hasn’t made it this far East yet.
In China, it’s common for people who “care about you” to regularly critique everything from your waistline to your complexion.
Having lived in China for almost 5 years now, things like this usually don’t bother me. I’ve learned to accept many cultural differences, this one being no different.
And yet, this time, it stung.
My face got hot, and my heart stuttered a bit.
I suddenly felt each and every pound I’d piled onto my skeleton over the past two years of undisciplined and careless living. I could feel the cotton in my shirt straining across the expanse of my gut. And how that gelatinous roll chaffed against my belt as it spilled over the leather.
Her comment came on an already stressful Monday morning. I was dealing with the crisis du jour and juggling multiple inbound questions from other colleagues.
To say her comment didn’t go over well was an understatement.
Maybe it was my mood, lack of sleep, or perhaps the above-mentioned stress, but either way, her comment got under my skin.
Wormed its way into my consciousness.
Got into my bones and stirred the marrow.
It pissed me off.
Big time.
And thank God it did. | https://medium.com/@michaelbmast/how-i-lost-35-pounds-in-4-months-my-exercise-free-5-step-plan-b5677308ae92 | ['Michael Mast Nomadic Thrive'] | 2020-06-15 03:48:20.006000+00:00 | ['Weight Loss Program', 'Health And Fitness', 'Weight Loss Tips', 'Weight Loss', 'Lose Weight Fast'] |
Ficus Macrophylla | Ficus Macrophylla
Flash fiction
Photo by Jeremy Bishop on Unsplash
The couple sat beneath the towering Moreton Bay Figtree canopy, limbs entwined.
She pulled away and drew a pen out of her pocket.
“Let’s write our names,” she said.
As they scratched KE 4 LN 4 EVA into the bark, the tree swirled its leaves as it thought to itself, “I was here long before you and I will be here long after you.” | https://medium.com/afwp/ficus-macrophylla-3028562cd17e | ['M Ainsley Blackman'] | 2020-08-15 15:31:01.419000+00:00 | ['Short Story', 'Fiction', 'Time', 'Flash Fiction', 'Trees'] |
All Things Made New | All Things Made New
Including me and you, no matter how badly we screw up
But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands; so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him — Jeremiah 18:4
photo credit: Thomas Pedrazzoli on Pixabay
The pot he was shaping was marred. Perhaps it was cracked or uneven or otherwise not quite what it could have been. But rather than toss it aside in favor of a better vessel, the Potter reforms it, reshaping it as seems best to Him. And so it becomes perfect.
I don’t know about you, but sometimes I feel like the pot that is marred and as such I feel so far from perfect. Actually, I don’t feel so much marred as broken, pretty much unusable.
In fact, today was one of those days. After getting up early enough to spend time with God and doing my Morning Pages, which were pretty much a pouring out of my heart in prayer, this day hurt my heart in unexpected ways.
Today, I didn’t do the right thing soon enough because I stumbled in advocating for my 11-year-old autistic daughter during a counseling session. Today, I experienced moments of regret for weakness, weakness that had me feeling like a marred vessel.
But God doesn’t see me that way. Not even in my what I deem my worst moments, God does not see me as a vessel that cannot be reshaped. He doesn’t cast me aside or give up on me. Even if I give up on myself, He never does.
Instead, He reminds me I am created in His image and I bear His likeness in this world. Then, He takes me in His hands and begins His perfect work, reshaping and reforming me. He smooths out the rough places and mends the cracks, including the ones created by me as well as those inflicted upon me by the world.
This is not a quick or simple process.
It can involve grief (for what we thought we would be or do or accomplish) or pain (from our failure or someone else’s) or anger (because I thought I’d be in a better place at this point in my life and sojourn of faith), and too often I don’t believe I’m worthy of His efforts.
Clearly He should be focused on those who are doing so much more — and better — for Him and His kingdom and His children. But, let’s face it. God chooses and uses the broken ones, the screw ups. He uses me. He calls those of us from the fringes and invites into His intimate circle.
God’s more interested in our hearts than our plans. — Bob Goff
photo credit: Pexels on Pixabay
Because of this truth, God shapes and reshapes me again, and again, and again. He never fails to see my potential in my brokenness. God takes the crooked, marred vessel we sometimes become and He shapes us as seems best to Him.
Friends, what could be better?
God designed me for good works and even when I am slower to do them than I wish I’d been, God celebrates my efforts. He sees my heart and creates plans to fit my heart’s desires (given to me by Him) and the gifts with which He designed me.
There is in each of us a beauty placed there by God Himself. Do you see the beauty in you that God sees? Do you see the beauty in your weakness, the beauty in your vulnerability, and the incredibly beauty in your brokenness? It’s there. It’s why He chooses to reshape us over and over.
photo credit: Peter H on Pixabay
In His hands our brokenness becomes more than enough rather than less than. God knows our potential because He created us and knows the gifts He’s placed within us and the good works awaiting us to complete.
We are not tossed aside in spite of our flaws and broken pieces. God takes that which is broken and declares it beautiful and restores it, reshapes it, refines it, and redeems it.
We are not defined by our yesterdays or by our mistakes. We are defined by His grace and His love, and we are made into our best in His hands.
How will you let God use your brokenness today? | https://judyheaneymckee.medium.com/made-new-9ab844e2e222 | ['Judith Heaney'] | 2019-08-06 02:06:34.618000+00:00 | ['Faith and Life', 'Christianity', 'Living With Purpose', 'Faith', 'Unconditional Love'] |
What I learned from Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) | What I learned from Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS)
Photo by Cytonn Photography on Unsplash
I have been applying to jobs in many different ways and one was by entering to the company’s website and going to their careers’ section. Seems like all of them work the same: you enter your data, your resumé and your motivation letter. Easy as it is, I hardly ever got an answer from any of these applications, but how many applications they receive for each offer?
Companies on Linkedin receive for a data scientist/analyst job an average of 300 applications. If the company has several open positions the number of CVs can rise easily. That’s a lot of eyes reading at speed of light (they spend skimming them 7.4 seconds only) when they could spend their time doing other tasks.
And that’s when ATS appear! ATS or Applicant Tracking Systems are algorithms that make easy filtering to resumés that are most appealing to recruiters. They can choose the experience of the candidates, their expertise in different tools, location, etc. With ATS the job is easier for them, but harder for job seekers like me.
It standardizes the hiring process, at least the first step which is applying to the job. Fortunately, there are ways to beat it. The key is keeping your curriculum vitae as simple and clear as you can. That means that formatting is everything. I used to have a lovely 2 columns CV that I thought was easy to read, but I never thought of machines reading it. ATS dislike information distributed in columns, charts, sophisticated writing styles and symbols. The program basically doesn’t understand any of these things. Do you still doubt if your CV is readable when submitting it into a platform? Try this interesting tool created by Jafer Haider. It shows you how recruiters see your work history when uploaded into one of them.
Once you see how bad your CV is read you start wondering how you can improve it. Traditional curriculums are the ones who have a higher score of readability. That means using Arial or Times New Roman and using key words according to the job you are interested in. Those documents with an 80% of accuracy or higher are more likely to be more attractive. Key words are spread all over the offer and sometimes are difficult to spot. A tool that can help with this is Job Scan. You only need to upload the job offer and your resumé. It ranks your accuracy and tells you the specific words you should include in order to have a better score. Free version allows you to scan 5 offers per month so be careful!
Another thing I saw using Jafer Haider’s tool was my work history could show soft skills that Lever and other ATS are able to detect even if you didn’t mentioned those on it. This being said, I think it’s good to know what our natural speech says about us. Again there’s a tool that can help you learn how you are according to how you express yourself.
Crystal is used by headhunters who want to hire a specific person and don’t know how he/she/them is apart from their Linkedin profile. It also adds information about how people should and should not approach in order to get a yes from that individual. We can use this software the other way around and learn what our profile says from us. This interesting tool is a Chrome extension and allows to scan 10 profiles for free. It’s a task that will help you understand how people see you, something that might change with time and of course can be trained.
As you might already know, looking for a job is already a job and I think this example is one of the evidences. It took time to understand the dynamic of the ATS, but now I feel more comfortable with the steps I take through my goal of finding a job. It’s a long journey that should be done little by little, understanding how AI is helping recruiters daily in order to find the best candidates. This tips will only help you on the first step which is knocking at the company’s door after you will have to show how suitable you are for the position.
I hope this recommendations can help you build more confidence in your search and more luck towards what you do. Are there more tools I should take into account? I would be glad to read your comments below and try your suggestions. | https://medium.com/@oyidiyaoji/what-i-learned-from-applicant-tracking-systems-ats-20daa4dae171 | ['Oyidiya Oji'] | 2020-12-05 11:56:29.603000+00:00 | ['Job Hunting', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Applicant Tracking System', 'Recruiting', 'Human Resources'] |
Software Developer, Problem Solver: My Experience Interning at Procurify | Software Developer, Problem Solver: My Experience Interning at Procurify Cynthia Follow Dec 16 · 3 min read
“To attain knowledge, add things everyday. To attain wisdom, remove things every day.” ― Laozi
Before interning as a software developer at Procurify, I envisioned a FinTech startup to be a Hackathon in its corporate incarnation. My work at Procurify proves this vision right and wrong. While technical proficiency is key to programming, software development is by no means equivalent to coding thousands of lines with a foreseeable deadline. At Procurify, I had the privilege to work with a team solving problems around payments and customer onboarding―an awesome group of individuals that have encouraged my personal growth beyond being busy. With their tremendous trust and support, I was able to grow quickly in technical proficiency and problem solving.
In the Procurify developer blog series, the engineering team members have introduced programming techniques, remote work, and company culture. In this post, I focus on my takeaways on problem solving.
A meme representing my team at Procurify. Work with them to find out the story behind it.
Takeaway 1: understanding a problem to solve and planning the right strategy can be just as rewarding as actioning on a task immediately. An unforgettable experience was the first time I helped drive product development and build a solution to a problem from beginning to end — building an audit log for a key piece of account configuration. During the initial analysis, the project may take 2–3 months to complete. However, through problem analysis meetings, we were able to identify the root cause for the issue and ship out a central portion first. Through a much shortened iteration, we achieved three goals:
1. Adding values to customers two months in advance.
2. Eliminating related support tickets 100%.
3. Collecting data for future iterations.
Working on the project motivated me to execute ownership with a customer-centred vision.
This winter, Procurify Pay Card is on the way
Takeaway 2: Identifying urgency and prioritizing is key to good problem solving. With the rise of remote work during the COVID-19 pandemic, I helped the team drive a project related to credit card shipment. This was a time sensitive issue as it affected customer onboarding. Meanwhile, as the service targets the entire customer base, an important work is to tailor the service to high demands. By identifying both urgency and priority, we were able to exceed the expectation with a one-week-faster turnaround. The time we saved allowed us to improve the API performance by 4–5 times. Through the work, I gained invaluable experience on how to exceed expectations while anticipating and taking into account client needs.
In a fully distributed world, working with a good team allows you to flatten your learning curve as an individual. The internship at Procurify has sped up my growth as a software developer and as a problem solver. | https://medium.com/procurify-engineer/software-developer-problem-solver-my-experience-interning-at-procurify-202ee4e46717 | [] | 2020-12-16 03:05:47.008000+00:00 | ['Co Op', 'Procurify', 'Software Development'] |
Peach QE: Making GraphQL Queries Just… Peachy | PeachQE is a feature-packed tool for developers using Relay. But before we introduce it, there are a few questions we have to answer.
What is GraphQL?
GraphQL is a query language that simplifies requests to a database or API. By exposing data at a single endpoint and allowing you to declaratively request and receive only the data you need, GraphQL reduces waterfall requests and over-fetching. This brings an end to the tiresome process of cycling through a never-ending list of routes for different data, centralizing your entry point, and saving you time in the process.
And because your queries only ask for what you need, GraphQL is self-documenting. Your components can be concisely co-located with their data-dependencies.
There are several popular, powerful, and user-friendly GraphQL clients on the market. We’re going to focus on one of the most sophisticated and performant: Relay.
What is Relay?
Relay is a powerful, opinionated GraphQL client designed for performance at scale. Under the hood, it handles caching and state management while fetching GraphQL data in React applications. Relay emphasizes maintainability, type safety, and runtime performance with a “render-as-you-fetch” design pattern.
Relay is deeply tied to React and the company that created it — Facebook. It was built for Facebook’s specific needs: complex applications with a lot of moving parts and many rapidly updating data dependencies. Components declare what data they need, and Relay figures out how to efficiently fetch it while managing state and caching for you behind the scenes.
If Relay is so powerful, what’s the problem?
Relay can be like jet fuel to a project. It is incredibly powerful and delivers data fast. But, when not properly tracked and managed, it becomes cumbersome, confusing, and may feel like it is more trouble than it is worth. Getting a clear view of what is going on with Relay under-the-hood can be difficult without the availability of up-to-date dev tools.
Meanwhile, you have to manage and test your GraphQL queries. There are several popular query explorers on the market: GraphiQL and Apollo Explorer are perhaps the most popular. But no Relay-specific query explorer exists.
Think about it: with all that Relay handles under-the-hood — caching, state-management, fetch-or-store policy — and all the complexity that comes from working with such a highly-opinionated tool, wouldn’t you want a Relay-specific tool?
And given that Relay is built for managing applications at scale, you probably don’t want to be entering your queries one at a time. In fact, developers have been filling GitHub with requests for features that would allow them to upload multiple queries at a time.
And with all those queries, wouldn’t you want a way to keep track of them? A way to save and step back through the history of your queries as your project grows?
If only there were a tool to track, manage, and edit your queries on the fly in an environment that displays all the information you need about what’s going on behind the scenes…
Can you guess where this is going? You’re right: there is a solution. That solution is PeachQE.
The Solution PeachQE
Peach QE is an all-in-one Query Explorer built for Relay. PeachQE assists you in parsing, organizing, editing, and creating new GraphQL queries. This feature-rich application uses the Relay framework to compile your queries with precision and speed guaranteeing accurate responses and real-time variable input updating.
It’s everything you expect from a Query Explorer, plus some Relay-specific tools and features that make working with Relay easier and faster.
Want to upload dozens or even hundreds of queries? You can render them all with a button click in PeachQE.
Want to save the history of your queries for multiple GraphQL schema and endpoints? PeachQE comes with a built-in history for your queries and conveniently stores references to the GraphQL Schema and endpoints you work with.
Have another query file to test? No problem! Peach QE allows for drag and drop query files so you can test and use any GraphQL query you want!
All this, plus a visualizer for the Relay Store that you can save and revert as you explore and edit your updated queries. It’s a one-stop shop for your Relay application.
Come Git some PeachQE!
Built With
Node.js
Electron
Relay
React
Getting Started
Fork and Clone the Repo:
git clone https://github.com/oslabs-beta/peach.git
Prerequisites
Install the dependencies:
[ npm i ]
npm install
Run the Electron App locally
npm start
Deployment
In order to build the executable file (aka, the desktop client) you will need to run specific commands for your OS:
Mac:
npm run package-mac
Windows:
npm run package-win
Linux:
npm run package-linux
Look for the directory Release-builds in the root folder where you cloned this Repo. (created automatically by the previous command) Find the specific folder for your OS. (e.g., peachQE-win) The file peachQE.exe (in Windows) will launch the app on your machine.
In every case, you will need to add the file schema.graphql to the root directory and the file imported.js to the directory src>relay. For example:
.
├── (Root) # Installed Root folder
├── schema.graphql
├── src
├── relay # Create both folders
├── imported.js
│
└── ...
User Manual
Once you have the application running, you will notice that PeachQE operates in two different “modes”:
Relay Proper
When the application first opens, the window will by default display “Relay Proper” mode, which contains much of the core functionality of the application:
The left section of the window is reserved for the Schema Display. Here, you can:
View your current schema and type into the search bar to find specific fields.
Import a new Schema, updating the contents of the schema display to contain the newly imported schema.
Update the GraphQL API urlendpoint. This determines what API PeachQE is interacting with.
Below the Schema Display, you will find the Variable Input. Here you can:
Manually enter variables as JSON objects.
The Variable Input will interact with the Query Input to set the response in the Response Display.
The central section is reserved for the Query Input. Here you can:
Manually type in valid GraphQL queries.
Select previous queries from the Query History dropdown. Once clicked the selected query will populate the Query Input Field.
Submit your query.
The right section is the Response Display which, upon clicking the Submit Query button, will display the responses to any submitted query.
Peach Mode
By clicking the yellow button titled Peach Mode at the top right corner of the window, or simply by scrolling down, you will find our designated UI for Relay-specific functionality.
While the Response Display functions entirely the same, the central and left sections have been altered to accommodate for Relay-specific functionality.
The left section still contains a Variable Input with two additional fields:
The Query File Uploader simply directs you to the “Peaches” dropdown from the menu bar, where you can “Start a New Peach” by uploading a file containing a list of GraphQL Queries.
The Store Display offers you a direct visual of the Relay Store, a Relay-specific functionality that stores all the data sent by your GraphQL Queries, and all the data sent back from the responding GraphQL API. It is effectively a log of your interactions with a given GraphQl API, and it is made available with PeachQE!
The central section contains 2 new components:
The Query Editor where you may copy/paste or manually type in multiple GraphQl Queries. Upon clicking Save Edited Query , the user inputted text will be saved and rendered as Relay queries, which will be displayed in the New Query Selector .
where you may copy/paste or manually type in multiple GraphQl Queries. Upon clicking , the user inputted text will be saved and rendered as Relay queries, which will be displayed in the . The New Query Selector will contain a list of queries matching the queries inputted in the Query Editor. You may then toggle between these queries, and the Response display will update with the currently selected query.
Enjoy!
Downloadable App
Or if you don’t want the codebase. Simply download our App! https://peachqe.io/
Enjoy a simplified way to pick your peachy queries!
License
Distributed under the MIT License. See LICENSE for more information.
Acknowledgments to the PEach QE team: | https://medium.com/@hopefelixn/peach-qe-making-graphql-queries-just-peachy-afb1f70f891 | ['Nakami Hope-Felix'] | 2021-06-17 20:50:01.544000+00:00 | ['Fullstack Development', 'Peach', 'Developer Tools', 'Relay', 'GraphQL'] |
Playbook for Cellular IoT Connectivity | Businesses have the freedom to now choose the connectivity that suits their use of cases arising from user need, rather than industry specificity. With any IoT project, trade-offs must be made when selecting how to connect your device. Factors to consider include latency, battery life, coverage, mobility, and throughput. From a mobility perspective, cellular may seem like the clear winner-providing much better transportability of devices than WiFi-however, not all cellular technologies are designed for devices that move around frequently.
This article will help you choose the right connectivity for your needs. Key Takeaways:
Common functionality of high-performance cellular connectivity
Common functionality of Low-Power Wide-Area Networks (LPWAN)
For high-performance cellular a review of LTE Cat-4 and LTE Cat-1
A look at two leading cellular LPWAN technologies: Long Term Evolution for Machines (LTE M) and Narrow Band IoT (NB-IoT)
Why Twilio Programmable Wireless is the connectivity provider for IoT
In this article, we compare wide area networks (WANs), including high-performance cellular and Low-Power Wide-Area Networks (LPWAN) alternatives, to help you choose the right connectivity for your specific needs. With any IoT project, trade-offs must be made when selecting how to connect your device. Factors to consider include latency, battery life, coverage, mobility, and throughput. From a mobility perspective, cellular may seem like the clear winner-providing much better transportability of devices than WiFi-however, not all cellular technologies are designed for devices that move around frequently. Rely on this article to give you a clear picture of the different cellular IoT connectivity options available, including licensed LPWAN connectivity.
Table of contents
Introduction
Building for Wide Area IoT
The IoT Landscape: High-Performance Cellular vs. Low-Power Wide Area Networks
Critical IoT — High-Performance Cellular
Massive IoT — Low-Power Wide Area Networks (LPWAN)
Your Connectivity Provider for IoT
Introduction
The explosive growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) in our homes, across cities, and in commercial buildings, means developers can build IoT solutions like never before. It’s estimated that by 2020 there will be nearly 26 billion IoT-connected devices.
At each layer of the IoT stack, industry standards define how components should interact, and yet deploying a functional solution remains prohibitively difficult. In contrast to software application development, where best practices for building and deploying a global app are well known, there is no comparable playbook for IoT. There are several universal challenges with IoT that account for this:
Every IoT device has its own unique hardware features.
For most people, manufacturing is a total black box, with unpredictable costs and timelines.
There are different options for connectivity to suit different IoT use cases.
Historically, consumer demand for handsets drove the density and capacity of networks. Today, there’s enough demand for the IoT that there are new lenses through which we can look at Wide Area Networks. The first is known as Critical IoT; the continued development of consumer-grade, high-throughput advanced solutions. Critical IoT applications have very high demands for reliability, availability, and low latency with high data throughput.
The second lense is Massive IoT: large-scale, mostly low-power deployments.
Massive IoT applications are the tens of billions of devices that require ubiquitous connectivity and report sensor data to the cloud on an intermittent basis. Their requirements are high connection volumes, small data packets, low-cost devices, and low energy consumption. Critical IoT applications have very high demands for reliability, availability, and low latency with high data throughput.
Building for Wide Area IoT
With any IoT project, trade-offs must be made when selecting how to connect your device. Factors to consider include latency, battery life, coverage, mobility, and throughput. From a mobility perspective, cellular may seem like the clear winner-providing much better transportability of devices than WiFi-however, not all cellular technologies are designed for devices that move around frequently. In particular, Narrowband IoT is a cellular technology that uses ‘active mode mobility,’ which means it can move around and report in new locations but it can’t ‘stream’ constant information as it does so.
Businesses have the freedom to choose the connectivity that suits their use of cases arising from user need, rather than industry specificity. The introduction of IoT to businesses and consumers alike has the potential to create value in new ways and to transform how we live and work.
The IoT Landscape: High-Performance Cellular vs. Low-Power Wide Area Networks
There are several factors to consider when choosing the right connectivity for your IoT use-case. In this guide, we compare wide area networks (WANs), including high-performance cellular and Low-Power Wide-Area Networks (LPWAN) alternatives, to help you choose the right connectivity for your specific needs.
IDC expects the global market spend for IoT connectivity to reach $224.7 billion by 2021, at a 13.8% CAGR.
Critical IoT — High-Performance Cellular
In the past twenty years, mobile phone adoption laid the foundation for 3G and LTE networks globally, providing connectivity for more data and faster speeds. However, 2G, 3G, and high-speed LTE consume too much power and don’t suit applications where only a small amount of data is transmitted infrequently. Plus, the continuous evolution of new protocols means that as a generation of radio technology is phased out, devices are discontinued and must be replaced at a heavy cost.
Critical IoT applications have very high demands for reliability, availability, and low latency-all of which LTE or 5G capabilities can fully realize.
Let’s take a look at some common functionality of high-performance cellular connectivity
Built to handle massive volumes of data traffic
High consumer handset demand
Battery life directly correlates to usage and consumption
Limited propagation deep indoors and underground
Best for high bandwidth and power-hungry applications
The volume and scope of Critical IoT applications and solutions will be much smaller than for Massive IoT, but the business value will be much higher. There is more at stake when a connection goes down. For example, if you are performing a medical procedure remotely, a patient’s life depends on the connection being reliable.
When looking at high-performance cellular for your project, there are a number of options
LTE Cat-4: The proliferation of smartphones and apps led to the standardization of Cat-4 devices, which support 150 Mbps downlink peak rates and 50 Mbps uplink peak rates-most suitable for higher data consumption use cases, like video.
LTE Cat-1: A cellular IoT option that represents an early push towards connecting IoT devices using existing LTE networks. Use cases include IoT applications that require a browser interface or voice, such as ATMs, kiosks, video surveillance, vehicle telematics. Experts predict Cat-1 will replace 3G when it sunsets.
Massive IoT — Low-Power Wide Area Networks (LPWAN)
Massive IoT applications are typically low-cost devices that have low energy demands and require broad coverage-and Low-Power Wide-Area Networks (LPWAN) is the best fit to satisfy the scale and density required.
LPWAN is a category of wide-area wireless technology designed to optimize four main application needs of IoT: cost, battery life, coverage, and network. By 2025, it’s expected that four billion IoT devices will rely on LPWA networks.
Let’s take a look at some common functionality of LPWAN
Low Power: An LPWAN connected device doesn’t need to draw as much power to send and receive data because it has a slower throughput and lower bitrate.
Lower Cost Devices: The cost of LPWAN modules (the components inside sensors that transmit and/or receive radio signals) is expected to drop over the next several years as the market grows. Also, the low power requirements of an LPWAN modem means smaller batteries are needed.
Low Maintenance Costs: LPWAN sensor batteries can last ten years or more, depending on the application, and longer battery life means longer replacement cycles.
For low bandwidth and low-power applications
When looking at the technical specifications for LPWAN the differences are small but important. Let’s take a more in-depth look at Cellular LPWAN:
Cellular LPWAN networks, offered by mobile network operators, complement and extend conventional WANs that make use of 2G, 3G, and 4G LTE cellular technologies. The main advantage of cellular LPWAN technologies is that in many cases they only require a simple software update to the providers existing infrastructure-no new radio hardware is required.
Cellular LPWAN technologies have significant advantages over their non-cellular counterparts
Strong support from the telecommunications ecosystem
Can operate across the existing cellular infrastructure
Scalability for deploying new IoT solutions
Unlicensed vs. licensed spectrum. Wide Area Networks can use licensed or unlicensed radiofrequency spectrum. Many cellular network operators, already own licensed spectrum that can be ‘refarmed’ for use in IoT.
When looking at cellular LPWAN for your project, their area number of options
There are two leading cellular LPWAN technologies: Long Term Evolution for Machines (LTE M) and Narrow band IoT (NB-IoT)
LTE Cat-0: Eliminates the features that supported high data rate requirements for Cat-1 and are expected to replace 2G in the future.
NB-IoT: A standard adopted by over 20 cellular operators around the world, NB-IoT features all of the safeguards and security associated with operating in a licensed spectrum. This is fuelled by fast-growing demand in China where NBIoT is set to replace 2G in mass-market applications as the country’s preferred LPWAN technology. In fact, NB-IoT device shipments worldwide will reach 613.2 million units by 2023. NB-IoT is a good choice for applications that don’t need frequent communication or high data throughput.
LTE M: LTE M (or LTE Cat-M1) relies on legacy networks and can be considered low power because maximum system bandwidth is capped at 1.4 MHz. LTE M targets LPWAN applications where only a small amount of data transfer is required. LTE M supports half-duplex mode (the same as NB IoT), which allows data to travel in only one direction at a time. The advantage of half-duplex mode is that it requires less power for situations where there is no need to both send and receive at the same time. Cat-M1 has a slightly higher data rate than NBIoT, so it can be used for applications such as wearables, security cameras, and automotive use cases. Unlike NB-IoT, Cat-M1 can be configured for low latency communication for use cases where data must be transmitted immediately.
Your Connectivity Provider for IoT
For the majority, the IoT is not a point solution. You’ll need to work with many organizations and vendors to stitch together a coherent end-to-end system. As part of your Wide Area IoT project, you will need to deal with a connectivity provider, and that’s where Twilio’s APIs can make building solutions easy.
Twilio Programmable Wireless is the connectivity provider for IoT. With Twilio Programmable Wireless, devices can be connected to the internet quickly and Twilio’s API-first approach means all aspects of SIM management are fully automated: | https://medium.com/@pupuweb/playbook-for-cellular-iot-connectivity-c3ac7fdaa04e | ['Alex Lim'] | 2020-12-05 05:32:26.953000+00:00 | ['Connection', 'IoT', 'Internet of Things', 'Technology', 'Networking'] |
Is Cannibalism Ever Okay? | Is Cannibalism Ever Okay?
Photo by Andrew Bowyer on Unsplash
It was the summer of 1884 when a violent change in weather forced four English sailors to abandon ship a thousand miles from land. This misfortune left the sailors on a small lifeboat with nothing but two tins of turnips to eat. In the middle of the South Atlantic, things were looking bleak for Tom Dudley, Edwin Stephens, Edmund Brooks, and Richard Parker.
The crew’s worsening circumstances
Dudley, the captain, managed to make an improvised sea anchor that kept the lifeboat stable. On the first night, the men fought off sharks with oars from the boat. And after the three days, the crew ran out of turnips.
Stephen, the first mate, was lucky enough to spot and capture an approaching sea turtle. The crew nourished themselves by drinking the turtle’s blood and eating its meat. When that ran out, they even consumed some of the animal’s smaller bones. At this point, the crew had been stranded for ten days.
They ate nothing for the next eight days of the ordeal. When they were thirsty, crew members drank their urine. They did this because most sailors knew about the dangers of drinking seawater. But the young and desperate cabin boy, Richard Parker, refused to believe and fell ill for doing so.
Cannibalism or death
Photo of the crew’s lifeboat from Simpson, A. W. B. (1984) Cannibalism and the Common Law: The Story of the Tragic Last Voyage of the Mignonette and the Strange Legal Proceedings to Which It Gave Rise, Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons
On the 19th day of the ordeal, Dudley proposed that the crew members draw lots to determine who would be cannibalized by the others. A heated argument among the men ensued, so nothing came of it.
By the 20th day, Richard Parker was lying on the boat, more dead than he was alive. The crew thought that he was in a coma. It was then that Dudley and Stephens decided that Parker had to be killed.
Dudley offered a prayer and told the dying boy that his time was up. Using his penknife, the captain stabbed the boy in the jugular vein, and Parker passed away.
Despite his protest against killing Parker, Brooks joined the two killers in feasting over the boy. The survivors ate his body and drank his blood for the next four days and were miraculously rescued by a passing ship soon after.
Crime and punishment
When they arrived in England, authorities immediately placed Dudley and Stephens on trial for the murder of Richard Parker. While the duo admitted to killing the boy, they posited the defence of necessity from the circumstances. But the court did not find their argument as valid from a legal standpoint.
But would you find their actions permissible purely from a moral perspective? Was it justified to kill one to save three? Public opinion at the time was reportedly for the “cannibals.”
Remarkably, even Parker’s brother forgave Dudley and Stephens in open court.
Regardless, the court sentenced Parker’s assailants to death. Fortunately for them, their government considered their unique situation and commuted their sentences to six months. Brooks was acquitted because he disapproved of Parker’s killing.
Epilogue
Richard Parker’s grave by Hethurs at English Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons
When Dudley and Stephens got out, they discovered that Brooks was already out at sea for another voyage. Stephens settled in a quiet town doing odd jobs to sustain himself. Terrorized by the events from the lifeboat, he eventually went mad.
Dudley, on the other hand, moved to Australia, managing to keep his past a secret. According to one report, he dealt with the trauma of the incident with frequent use of opium.
As for Richard Parker, his family planted a tombstone for his memory with these passages engraved: | https://historyofyesterday.com/is-cannibalism-ever-okay-4e82c4c5d60b | ['Ben Kageyama'] | 2020-09-13 01:46:17.724000+00:00 | ['History', 'Cannibalism', 'Philosophy', 'Law', 'Morality'] |
Knackit — A Talent Marketplace, Make in India Initiative | There has been a growing trend among people today for using online platforms which cater to their appetite for entertainment and Talent Development.
However, the recent developments in geo-politics have showcased that these platforms are breaching privacy norms and in turn imposing a threat to the internal security of the nation.
This has led to the banning of various foreign applications and most recently bulk ban of Chinese apps. One of the video app that has caused the most uproar was ‘TikTok’ which had over 114 million active users in India.
Thus there remains a need to provide for a locally created alternative to such apps which can win back the trust of the Indian user. Apart from just being an alternative a platform that can provide monitory benefits to people. That will be a game changer.
Knackit is one such video app which is proving itself to be not just a viable alternative to various Short Video App but lot more. Knackit is an Indian Talent Marketplace Platform. Users can showcase talent in the form of videos.
Now here comes the differentiator. Knackit is not just another short video app. Its a Talent App providing opportunities to monetize the skills of users. So apart from entertainment platform its also a freelancing App. Not only is it providing them the opportunity to showcase their talent online but at the same time is also ensuring that the privacy of its users and his data is not put at risk which today is of utmost importance.
Apart from focusing only on Talent, Knackit is proving to be the destination for Artist background people who are looking to take their talent to next level and make it a profession.
Live Events & Jobs, Knackit plans to provide a single video platform for all the talented artists to not only show skills but also coach others at the same time.
I would say Knackit is not just a replacement of Tiktok like apps but its much more with a vision of providing jobs in India. | https://medium.com/@pranjal-k/knackit-a-talent-marketplace-make-in-india-initiative-290464f68813 | ['Pranjal Kumar'] | 2021-01-18 05:12:49.299000+00:00 | ['Extracurricular', 'Freelancing', 'Apps', 'Made In India', 'Jobs'] |
Designing for Empathy and Retention | “We need to understand what will delight people, and then go out and find the technology or business model to make that happen.” — Blaise Bertrand
Partner and Industrial Design Director, Blaise Bertrand, explains it’s a designer’s responsibility to “Zoom In and Zoom Out,” viewing problems from “the millimeter to the kilometer”
IDEO wants everything from chairs to cellphone accessories to connect with their audience on an emotional level. What makes IDEO such a successful product development firm lies in the difference between “Tech Push” and “Tech Pull.”
Tech Push:
“Many companies invent the technology, and then try to push it into the world regardless of the market or users.” — Blaise Bertrand
Tech Pull:
Only after IDEO designers fully understand and empathize with a problem do they investigate the software and hardware necessary to create an effective solution.
Understanding the problem always starts with researching the audience, but it’s not about “just talking to people.” IDEO designers go to extreme lengths to experience problems firsthand before they start concepting solutions.
How far are they willing to go? Once, an IDEO designer researching how to improve hospital visits, admitted himself into the ER and recorded the entire experience. The resulting video showed how much time patients spend looking up at boring ceiling tiles — a unique perspective you wouldn’t think of until experiencing the environment for yourself. “Experiencing it develops empathy,” Blaise explained, “which leads to innovation.” | https://medium.com/salesforce-ux/designing-for-empathy-and-retention-c8f69b22ddf1 | ['Ryan Scott'] | 2015-12-18 18:25:49.009000+00:00 | ['Design', 'Ideo', 'Events'] |
Boosting Creativity | Boosting Creativity
Is it possible to nurture creativity or is it just a part of the casual conversation to brag about?
If creativity can be nurtured, then how do we do so? Should we spend a lot of time trying to learn how to be creative? Is it restricted to only some people? Can we nurture children, too?
These and so many other questions become redundant the moment we start using creativity. We are being creative for the fun of it. The enjoyment it provides is incomparable to anything else!
So, rather than asking and answering superfluously, let us dive into finding out how we can foster creativity in 11 different ways.
1. Postpone Evaluation
Evaluation is good when you have two sides. You just have to see which side has greater strength and lean towards it. But you can’t do that when you have no sides. As it is, you are creating something new. When no sides are present, which side will you take? So, wait for the sides to emerge and then start evaluating.
Rejecting an idea takes little time Considering an idea leaves little time
2. Avoid Negative Thinking
Saying not possible or difficult are ways of avoiding to become creative. When certain problems need innovative solutions, we must get on with it to attempt.
Creativity lives in defying And not in denying
3. Suspend Critical Judgment
Critical thinking has to continue until the solution is successfully found. Even after the problem is solved, it is always necessary to continue with the critical analysis. Who knows, there could be problems within the solution!
When jumping to conclusions Don’t jump short of the goals
4. Generate Different Possible Solutions
The solution that looks fantastic may not work at all due to many unpredictable reasons. Rather than coming back to the problem afresh, it is always better to gather different possible solutions.
If one solution doesn’t always work Then the other one will work
5. Manipulate Objects and Ideas Mentally
Some creative solutions cannot be simulated beforehand. There are cases where the solution has to be executed in the first attempt itself, and the failure may cost heavily. In such instances, it is better to think of what all can go wrong.
We usually conform to ideas But rarely confront ideas
6. Record Ideas on Paper
Creativity happens at two simultaneous but opposing parameters. To ensure that one parameter does not overtake another, it is important to record the ideas on paper, so that there is no need to remember our thought processes.
Creativity is a balance between Divergent and Convergent Thinking Not a competition between them but a harmonious exchange within them
7. Do not Sensor Ideas
During the brainstorming, all ideas need to be entertained. Some ideas may look superfluous, or ridiculous, or preposterous, or meticulous. We may not know which of these ideas work. We need to tolerate ourselves and rush to conclusions.
Several individuals can come out with one idea One individual can come out with several ideas
8. Do not Hesitate
Throw ideas as if they are stones. The ideas do not have value until one of the stones hit the target. Then that stone becomes omnipotent. Wait till then and keep making attempts with all the vigor and vitality.
Obstacles to the goals should be seen as opportunities And not as hindrances to achieving success
9. Borrow Ideas from Anywhere and Everywhere
You can learn physics, for instance, in a classroom, or a laboratory, or a playground. What you learn becomes more important than where and when you learn it. So, keep your mind open for ideas and entertain them without questioning its source. However, there is a caution to be kept in mind. In case you borrow someone’s idea, please give them credit and acknowledge their contribution.
Someone’s innovation maybe our creativity Our innovation maybe someone’s creativity
10. Avoid Habitual Set and Functional Fixedness
We are made to believe that facts are ultimate and irreplaceable. What was once a fact has become a myth now, and vice versa. Ideas are not in a vacuum. They keep floating around everywhere and by putting a boundary to them we are defeating the purpose of creativity.
Structured Learning Kills creativity Institutionalized Indoctrination buries creativity
11. Find Similarities between the Problem and Other Systems
No system of learning is finite. Interchangeability and mutual acceptance should become the highlight of every system developed on earth. That is when creativity grows and innovation prospers. | https://medium.com/@sujendraprakash/boosting-creativity-7131ed13d5a5 | ['Sujendra Prakash'] | 2020-12-07 22:48:48.466000+00:00 | ['Creativity', 'Thinking', 'Development', 'Skills', 'Personal Development'] |
Unmade: The Legend of Mulan | Mulan and Xianniang jump down from the rooftops into the imperial gardens. Their battle continues among colorful, perfectly arranged flowers. Xianniang again tries to get Mulan to join her as the pair’s fight moves to atop a pond. Mulan refuses, and with a quick movement, buries her sword in the witch’s chest. The emperor holds the Khan’s head up and tells the Rourans their leader is dead. They scatter, wanting nothing to do with a fight without their Khan. The imperial defenders cheer and celebrate.
Mulan is before the emperor in the throne room. He wants her to stay and take command of all his forces, but she wants to go home. He understands and instead gives the position to Honghui. Mulan goes to the stables, where Gaius is loading stuff on a horse. He wants her to come with him. She’d like to, but she can’t. She has money to pay him for helping her earlier, but he doesn’t want it. She leaves it on the floor and walks away. Lucius walks out of the shadows and teases Gaius.
Mulan is walking on the road back to her village when she hears hoofbeats behind her. But it’s not Gaius, it’s Black Wind. She swings on top of him and they ride for her village. When she gets there, it’s been mostly rebuilt and the villagers are all aware of what she’s done. They cheer her and ask her questions about the war. She spots Hop’s father and gets off Black Wind to give him Hop’s dog tag and to tell him Hop died with honor. Mulan continues walking through the village until she sees her mother, standing alone. Then her father hobbles out from around a corner. Mulan runs over to them and goes to bow, but they pull her in for a hug.
Later, Mulan is in the yard behind her parent’ house, feeding Black Wind, when Gaius appears. They flirt a little before kissing.
THE END.
Thoughts
After reading this, it was not hard to see it as the first step in the final film. A lot of stuff that is in the movie is also here: Chi/wu-shu stuff, the witch, Mulan being trained as a fighter by her father. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if Disney bought this script just so they could have the chi and witch from it without having to worry about any legal challenges from the writers. The movie handles things better, but it’s not great itself.
This script is… not great. It’s a story about Mulan, but she’s not the most interesting character in it. She barely has a personality. Gaius is a charming rogue, though. Which is a big problem. The invented white guy shouldn’t be in the script in the first place and he definitely shouldn’t be the most engaging character. And there are problems with both their arcs. Mulan basically doesn’t have one. She starts off as a good fighter who doesn’t doubt herself and ends as a better fighter who doesn’t doubt herself. The entire theme of finding who you are from the animated film is gone. The fact that she’s hiding that she’s a woman barely registers. Several times someone finds out and all but once they accept it on the very same page. The one exception doesn’t carry as much weight as it could because it’s a subordinate and he never gets the chance to tell anyone who might care. A battle immediately interferes.
Gaius fares better, but his arc is still not great. He begins the story as a selfish arms dealer selling to both sides and ends as someone who has seemingly picked a side. But I don’t really know why he picked that side. Sure, the Khan killed his friend, but that was during an ambush of the Rouran camp. The Khan was just defending himself. There’s lip service paid to Gaius’ friends thinking poorly of the Rourans, but it happens early, is over quickly, and never comes up again. Gaius never gets any kind of “I finally found something to fight for” speech and his turn is so vague and underexamined that I can’t be sure he won’t just go right back to selling arms to everyone.
There is some good stuff. The action is pretty good thanks in part to the physics-defying chi stuff. The end battle has a pleasant ramp up, some beautiful staging, and clever moments. And as much as I hate to say it, because he and his friends shouldn’t exist, but darn it, Gaius and pals are frequently fun. That’s also kind of a problem, though, because moral-less arms dealers shouldn’t be fun. | https://medium.com/@Oozer3993/unmade-the-legend-of-mulan-16f17e638f58 | ['Andrew G.'] | 2020-12-21 00:16:31.548000+00:00 | ['Live Action Remake', 'Disney', 'Mulan', 'Unmade'] |
Harassment Stories Break at CBS and FEMA | Harassment Stories Break at CBS and FEMA
Why It’s Not Yet Time to “Move On”
Image by tooFab
It’s been a long year, and it hasn’t even been a full year yet, since the allegations against Harvey Weinstein unleashed a tsunami of other women (and some men) coming forward with tales of horrendous behavior that they too had been subjected to in the workplace and in society at large. The #MeToo was used more than 12 million times across Facebook alone in the first 24 hours after it sparked a nerve in the collective consciousness and the tide hasn’t slowed yet. It seems like each new week brings fresh allegations of wrong-doing, abuse, and cover-up.
The entertainment industry was revealed to be particularly rife with these stories, but there has been a near-continuous stream of industries or companies exposed as being havens for the serial predators and bullies who had systematically made those workplaces a toxic hell for the women who wanted nothing more than a chance to do a good job there.
Companies like Nike and Pixar, which previously had enjoyed a positive public image, were exposed as places with cultures of institutionalized abuse and cover-up. In November 2017, more than 220 women who work in our country’s national security agencies, including diplomats, service members, and those who do development work, signed an open letter detailing the culture of sexual harassment that they had faced.
“This is not just a problem in Hollywood, Silicon Valley, newsrooms or Congress,” reads the letter, which was shared with TIME. “These abuses are born of imbalances of power and environments that permit such practices while silencing and shaming their survivors.” “Assault and harassment are just as much as a problem for women working on the night-shift cleaning offices as it is for diplomats,” says retired Ambassador Nina Hachigian, who co-authored the letter with former State Department official Jenna Ben-Yehuda.”
All of this has ignited a long-overdue national conversation about the power dynamics that are underlying cultures that support this kind of behavior, as well as various opinions about what we, as a nation, should do next. Even within the first few months, some were saying that enough was enough. No more perp walks, no more public outing of high profile predators. Some of this came from the inevitable backlashers who just wanted it all to quiet down and go away, but some of it came from feminist quarters. The backlashers wanted to pretend that it’s not really all that bad and that the women coming forward are opportunists and whores who asked for it in some way. But some feminists and others simply believe that the continued sea of allegations was ultimately hurting or undermining the cause of justice or eventual healing.
But today, two new stories broke. One about recently resigned FEMA personnel chief, Corey Coleman, who is alleged to have had a long time practice of hiring friends and fraternity brothers, as well as women he met in bars and on dating sites, many with no qualifications for the jobs they were hired for. A preliminary investigation, which was completed on Friday, revealed all sorts of unsavory behavior that was covered up time and again on an institutional level. According to the Washington Post
“Coleman then transferred some of the women in and out of departments, some to regional offices, so his friends could try to have sexual relationships with them, according to employees’ statements during interviews with investigators.”
Additionally, Ronan Farrow’s detailed story about 6 women who have come forward to accuse CBS CEO Les Moonves of sexual harassment and intimidation, has just been published in The New Yorker. Dozens more women gave similar accounts of abuse and misconduct, in what is frankly, a quite shocking and harrowing read.
In light of these continually breaking stories, I do not believe that it is time to stop and move on. You cannot put icing over mud and call it cake. Anyone who has actually read even one of these accounts would have no doubt that there is not only smoke, but there is fire — fire that systemically traumatized women and in many instances, curtailed their careers. These are not tales of flirting gone awry, but of outright assault and intimidation. Anyone who tries to dismiss them as lies or of no consequence has ulterior motives.
I do not claim to have all the answers to how we begin to heal from these horrors, but I do firmly believe that the wounds must be thoroughly debrided before any true healing can take place. If we, as a nation, become desensitized to the pain that has been inflicted, then that is on us but we owe it to the survivors to hear their stories and to bring their assailants to justice if at all possible. Those organizations that supported and covered up such behavior need to be restructured and do some self-examination.
We are in a moment of catharsis and until we have a more thorough understanding of how we got ourselves here, and what we intend to do to move into a better place, we need to let the stories continue to unfold and our collective houses to be continued to be swept out.
© Copyright Elle Beau 2020
Elle Beau writes on Medium about sex, life, relationships, society, anthropology, spirituality, and love. If this story is appearing anywhere other than Medium.com, it appears without my consent and has been stolen. | https://medium.com/inside-of-elle-beau/harassment-stories-break-at-cbs-and-fema-756503623368 | ['Elle Beau'] | 2020-09-02 19:25:06.128000+00:00 | ['Society', 'CBS', 'Women', 'Metoo', 'Sexual Harassment'] |
The Refiner’s Fire | Photo via flickr.com
The other day my friend was going through a thing with one of their parents. It was just the usual and fairly regular parent-child dynamic. It featured the familiar refrains of “I have a better idea”, “you could do it this way”, and “what the hell is wrong with you” circulating in the air. It also contained the pretty typical mix of recrimination, guilt, frustration, years of history and every single button being pushed by the ones who installed them (i.e. this person’s parent). Needless to say, my friend was upset, both, at themselves for exposing themselves to such familiar criticism and, then, for getting upset by the criticism. They were also upset at their parent for not seeing them as the adult that they are. An adult who is capable of making choices that, while imperfect, and not those that their parent would make, are still very much okay decisions.
My friends upset carried over from one day to the next and as we were discussing it I found myself missing my own father’s recriminations, judgments and criticisms while simultaneously being reminded to be grateful for my mother’s recriminations, judgments and criticisms which remain ongoing. As my friend and I were talking, I said to them, “enjoy it all while you have it. My Dad could be super harsh and angry and weird. His last — I think? — words to me were ‘you talk too much’ and even though I hated it then I’d kill to have him criticize me now. I miss it! LOL! So that’s the approach I’m trying to take now. Just take it all in gently, accept it, don’t get amped and let it slide off because someday it’ll, oddly enough, be missed.”.
Author’s note: my Dad was right as I do in fact talk too much. Another author’s note: this is in fact how I am now trying to live my life and engage in my relationships. Soften, accept where I am and where other people are too. Especially other people because if I don’t like where someone is or how they are being there, so what? None of my business. My business is to be loving and supportive, keep a safe distance where needed and to be grateful I’m not walking in their — at least as they seem to me — really clunky and really uncomfortable shoes. It is not my job to dissect or separate one part of a person from another part of that person. My job is to accept their whole being and, when framed in that light, the gig actually seems pretty easy.
Don’t get me wrong, I wish my Dad had been…..a little softer, more forgiving and less critical of himself and others. I also wish that not nearly every one of our conversations had included the phrase “I have a better idea.”. But, our conversations did often include that much maligned phrase and my Dad was who he was: exacting, tough, angry, complicated, critical, sensitive, free spirited, curious and, at the bottom of it all, very, very loving especially toward me. He was the one who taught me to hear my own voice the loudest and to not get swayed by the immaterial opinions of others. Yes consider things from those who matter, but, at the end of the day, make your own choices and then be prepared to live with those choices.
My Dad adulted me even when I was a kid. He was not explicit with his lessons and didn’t sit me down for the ‘talks’ I longed for as Danny Tanner might have with his kids on “Full House”. But, as my friend Anne-Marie reminded me: Lou was Lou. He wasn’t Danny Tanner, and, while my Dad wasn’t a subtle man overall, his teaching style was subtle. So while the lessons weren’t explicit neither were the lectures. He wouldn’t ever sit me down for a shaming but he’d Dad me and criticize and correct me in more casual conversation. Pretty regular casual conversations but, for right now, I digress.
The story that best exemplifies my Dad’s ‘teaching style’ involves a communion dress. In my family’s culture communions were a big deal. Even though I attended communion classes I kind of lost focus with what was going on (probably thinking about “Full House” or something). So, while I was going through the ritual I didn’t really know the reason. Had I known the reason I probably would have taken a pass but, again, I digress. All I knew was that there was a costume. Fashion was the light at the end of this First Communion tunnel and I was there for it. What can I say, I have always been into the lewks.
Anyway, as we all know any good lewk begins with a mood board and mine centred on my Aunt Sue who had just married my Uncle Al the previous August and, as far as I was concerned, had exemplified the height of 80’s fashion. Full skirt, long train, head piece, sparkles aplenty. I was in love and knew my communion costume was going to be modelled after that dress. We went shopping for my communion dress / costume on a bright but cold Saturday and my Mom and I went into the shop while my Dad parked the car. By the time he entered, a battle was in full swing. Like any good miniature bride marrying a stranger, I had found the dress. It was Aunt Sue’s wedding dress, headpiece and all, in miniature form.
While I was in love and my Mother was in horror. The dress was great for Sue and for her occasion, less great for me and for mine. My Dad asked me if I liked the dress and I told him yes. He asked me (seeing the hindsight of twenty years worth of writing on the wall) if I looked back on the pictures and still didn’t like it would that be okay and I answered yes. My Mom continued to protest and my Dad asked her who’s occasion it was and she, obviously, answered that it was mine. Bottom line: my costume party, my choice. I was (thanks Mom!) dissuaded from the train but I still walked out of that store as happy as an eight year old with a fabulous costume could be. My own voice, thanks to my Dad, had been allowed to come through and so I didn’t just get a dress, I also got a little more trust in myself. I also got to learn how to look back on a wide range of poor choices I have made and live with each of them.
That costume moment was one when I could accept my Dad; a part of him that was pleasing to me. In the moments when he wasn’t behaving perfectly, there was not quite so much acceptance. And what do you know? In those moments of non-acceptance, I became what I feared and what didn’t like about him and sought to avoid: harsh, exacting, unacccepting and unyielding. I can’t say that I understand my father better now than I did when he was alive, but, I can say, I accept him now in a way I didn’t before and, for me, that will always lead to a pang of regret in my heart.
Why couldn’t I accept him fully an on his own terms when he was alive? Not all of his behaviours certainly but all of him. Why couldn’t I just let more things slide off of my back? The simple answer is simply that I was afraid and I wasn’t very evolved. A common but toxic combination. The truth, is I was evolving and refining then and I am refining and evolving now. I am (and I really hope Michelle Obama is proud) in an ongoing state of becoming.
I am also learning and this is one powerful lesson I have learned. While I didn’t want my father to die in order to have to do so, he did die. I didn’t want him to suffer even though I know he was suffering and I can’t change any of what occurred. I couldn’t change it then and I can’t change it now but I can let it instruct me. I can let it shape the qualities my soul needs and wants to experience more fully. It doesn’t all have to be for not. None of it has to go to waste and that’s true of anything.
And so, while I may never fully know the answers to those questions, I am starting to think it was a combination of factors, the most salient being my own inability to separate person from behaviour. I didn’t like a lot of my father’s behaviour then and I probably wouldn’t like it now. There wasn’t always a lot to like. In fact, some of what he did was hurtful and unacceptable then and it probably still would be now. The difference now though is me and my ability to assert myself more effectively, to set boundaries where needed and to accept myself, and other people, more wholly and on each of our respective terms; wherever we are in our respective refinements.
Previously, I would shut down instead of open up. Rather than let my Dad be who he needed to be, I’d either stick around, take whatever he threw out or try and pushback to change it. The flipside was I would just walk away and be angry. In fact, I’d be stewing, getting harder and harder in my own heart because I was resisting rather than accepting. I couldn’t see that while I didn’t have to stick around and accept certain behaviour, I still ought to have accepted all of him. I didn’t need to be around him as he behaved churlishly, but, I could no more separate that part of my Dad from him than I could the things in him that I could easily accept. Things including his free spirit, his strong will, his curiosity and his desire to learn; his sense of adventure, his sense of generosity and his kindness.
I am not one of those people who can saint someone once they’re gone. I’m not even someone who looks back really in nostalgia or an attempt at revisionist history. I can still see who my Dad was — the good and the bad. The difference being now though, I can see him and accept him in his totality. There is no longer segments and fragmentation. I am no longer trying to surgically carve out the pieces I can’t stand while only preserving that which I love. I see him now. All of him and I just wish I had the insight to see it all sooner.
But time is a trickster and a healer and, while it hopefully doesn’t change the clarity and the accuracy of what we see, it can certainly soften a lot of things, including the harder edges we put on ourselves, on each other and on the world. Time is the ultimate refiners fire. Melting away and softening that which we never needed and that which we certainly no longer need to keep. When my Dad initially became terminally ill, I felt the oddest physical sensation. For weeks on end, I felt like I was burning. Literally, physically on fire. I knew very clearly that I wasn’t set ablaze but I felt it. This burning coursing throughout my body. I even told a friend, “I feel like I’m going through a fire and waiting for, and asking to be, delivered from something I can’t be delivered from.”.
Photo copyright Christine Quaglia
After a time the physical sensation of burning passed and as my Dad’s illness progressed toward death, I never thought much about that sensation again, until many months later, when I received a note from a friend wishing me restoration and refinement for the upcoming New Year. This friend talked about the refiners fire and how, while painful, it is also purifying and it brought me back to that sensation that I had felt so acutely eighteen months before. The burning. The fire. The need to be delivered from something that I believed I could not be.
At the time, I felt as though the fire would consume me. That it would swallow me whole and burn me up into nothing. And the fire did burn me up but not into nothing. The fire collided with the gift of my “one wild and precious life” and it refined that gift. Made it something new. I was delivered after all. I see that now and I see that my Dad was delivered too. My Dad who had resisted his illness and prognosis; raged and railed (as he was wont to do) against it, walled himself off from those who loved and wanted to help him. And, yet, at the end of it all, died with more peace and grace and love that any of us would have dared to think possible.
At his sickest, he was going through a fire, he was being purified and refined; travelling to places within and beyond himself that those around him could not touch. We all go through fires and we may do so willingly or unwilling; with grace or without but we will all go through them and the fire will always do its work and refinement. Initially, my Dad went through his refining fire unwillingly, but, as is true for us all, there were forces beyond his control alchemizing and changing him. Elevating and increasing his being even as his physical body seemed to diminish and reduce. It is no accident his favourite book was “The Alchemist.”.
There was pain and suffering and decay, but, also, purification and refinement along the path. That occurs along all of our paths whether or not there is a terminal illness. Life, and each part of it, is all a part of the refiners fire. All part of the refinement itself. And the more we each surrender to our refiners fires, the more we each become purified and take on the exact shape we are supposed to take on right now. I wish I had known that sooner than the hour of my fathers death. I wish I had seen that when I felt he was critical of me or behaving in ways I didn’t like. I wish I had seen with greater clarity that he was in a process of refinement and I was too. We all are always. I see that now. I see that life is an ongoing refiners fire and that acceptance of whole beings puts us even the tiniest bit closer to knowing unconditional love.
Sometimes the refinement from pain is really obvious, other times the refinement from joy is really obvious and, other times still, the refinement is happening without our even knowing it. We are all being alchemized all the time and awareness of that helps us to accept the refining rather than resist it. Acceptance also helps us to accept the refinement of others as well as our own. I read a quote today that says, “[y]our weirdness will make you stronger. Your dark side will keep you whole. Your vulnerability will connect to the rest of our suffering world. Your creativity will set you free. There’s nothing wrong.”. And that is true for me, for my Dad, for all of us as we continue to be refined. Each of our stories, experiences and perceptions are unique and while we are not obligated to always agree wholly with each other we ought to try and accept each other wholly; for all of our sake’s.
Everything and everyone changes and everything and everyone, eventually, comes to an end just like this epically great fall that we have just experienced. It came to an end and it is now refining into winter. There will be another epically great fall and a not so great one and everything in between. We can learn to accept all of the seasons and all of our own seasons and those of each other as we each get purified, refined and, in one form or fashion, emerge new from each and every fire. | https://medium.com/change-your-mind/the-refiners-fire-80381d90c24d | ['Christine Quaglia'] | 2020-11-18 12:54:13.967000+00:00 | ['Parenting', 'Growth', 'Self Improvement', 'Development', 'Self'] |
until those holes are part of the wholeness | what if wholeness
was not that whole at all
what if it was full of many unfilled holes
what if embracing wholeness was
to feel the holes
what if instead of running away, one attempts to go through to the other side of emptiness
what if when your loved ones, praises, beautiful big words and many many things are willing to help you to fill it up
you just don’t
not forever, but at least temporarily
what was filling you wasn’t really you
praises don’t make your self-worth, and blames don’t take it away
what if you allowed yourself to feel the holes, at least once
go deeper, deeper and deeper
until those holes are part of the wholeness
Do you fear that if you get close
it will swallow you up?
Go near it, and sit
with an empty space
feel it, and wait
for an unseen essence to emerge
to eliminate the holes
How long will it take, you wonder?
Oh, when the holes are felt thoroughly,
you would be free
to love…
when you discover the unseen holes
your heart will also see an unseen wholeness.
Befriend with the holes like Chihiro befriending No-face. Spirited away. | https://suluworld.com/until-those-holes-are-part-of-the-wholeness-e6cc3dab6254 | ['Hue Hanh'] | 2021-05-20 08:07:26.571000+00:00 | ['Wholeness', 'Acceptance', 'Poem'] |
Python Virtual Environment for Data Science | Python Virtual Environment for Data Science hiddenntreasure Follow Jun 19 · 8 min read
This article will describe everything about how to setting up a python virtual environment for data science. At the end of the article you will learn about virtual environment, Anaconda, conda, pip, package manager, packages installation, jupyter notebook etc. And how to cope with different project with different version of packages without any conflict.
1. What is Virtual Environment for python?
Virtual environment is a tool that helps to install of the required dependencies for different project. Its like a container or isolated environment for specific project. It helps to resolve dependencies issue , version of python package etc.
2. Why it is needed?
Suppose you are working on two different projects. And different project expect different dependencies and version of python packages. So, you will need to uninstall a version of package and reinstall required version of packages for your current projects. But its a bad practice. Cause when you work on the other project you may need previous version of python packages. So,you need to go through the process again. Besides, you can’t work on two or more projects at a time.
For example : some function is depreciated in the latest version of python (v_3.8.3). But you need to use that function. So, you need to uninstall latest version of python and reinstall previous version of python which allow your required function. But you can avoid the uninstall and reinstall part by creating different python virtual environment.
3. Different ways to create Virtual Environment ?
Python has three popular ways of creating virtual environment. They are virtualenv, pipenv and Anaconda. But we will learn about anaconda today.
4. What is Anaconda?
Anaconda is free and open-source distribution of python. It comes with 250 packages installed and can installed over 7500 packages using both pip and conda. You may asked what is conda? Then i think you know that pip is a python package manager. Where conda is a both package manager and environment manager. It is language agnostic that means conda support other languages like R,ruby etc. And conda package and environment manager is included in all versions of Anaconda.
5. Why Anaconda?
If you are engineer or scientist or enthusiastic in data science ,then you will need lot of packages like numpy, scipy, opencv, tensorflow, keras etc. You will find that it is hard and need lot of work to install these packages in python default approach. I personally experiences frustration to install opencv package in ubuntu os. But using conda i can easily install any version of opencv in my specific virtual environment or even in base environment. pip install packages from PyPI where conda can install packages from:
Install packages (written in any language) from repositories like Anaconda Repository and Anaconda Cloud. Anaconda Cloud provides third party repositories like Conda-Forge. If anacond default repository can’t provide a packages, then you can search in Anaconda Cloud for third party repository.
Install packages from PyPI by using pip in an active Conda environment.
6. How to install Anaconda?
First go to the below link:
You will find different edition like individual, Team, Enterprise and Professional etc. I choose individual edition.
Anaconda for Windows, MacOS and Linux
Windows : Install your required anaconda.exe then install.Its a graphical user interface. So,it easy to install just keep click on ‘next’.
Linux : you could download from above link or from terminal. In terminal change the directory where you want to download. Then use curl/wget followed by anaconda repository link to download in the specified directory.
$ cd /tmp
$ curl -O https://repo.anaconda.com/archive/Anaconda3-2019.03-Linux-x86_64.sh
Ensure the integrity of the installer with cryptographic hash verification through SHA-256 checksum:
$ sha256sum Anaconda3–2019.03-Linux-x86_64.sh
This will give an output:
Output 45c851b7497cc14d5ca060064394569f724b67d9b5f98a926ed49b834a6bb73a Anaconda3-2019.03-Linux-x86_64.sh
Now replace the downloaded file to your Downloads directory, replace ~/Downloads/ with the path to the file you downloaded.
$ cd ~/Downloads $ bash ~/Downloads/Anaconda3-2020.02-Linux-x86_64.sh
Note : Include the bash command regardless of whether or not you are using Bash shell.
The installer prompts “In order to continue the installation process, please review the license agreement.” Click Enter to view license terms.Scroll to the bottom of the license terms and enter “Yes” to agree.
The installer prompts you to click Enter to accept the default install location, CTRL-C to cancel the installation, or specify an alternate installation directory. I
f you accept the default install location, the installer displays “PREFIX=/home/<user>/anaconda<2 or 3>” and continues the installation. It may take a few minutes to complete.
Note : We recommend you accept the default install location. Do not choose the path as /usr for the Anaconda/Miniconda installation.
The installer prompts ask “Do you wish the installer to initialize Anaconda3 by running conda init?” . We recommend “yes”.
Close and open your terminal window for the installation to take effect.
Anaconda installation is complete. Let me remind conda is included in anaconda.
7. How to create virtual environment using conda?
Create an environment with conda for python development. Go to terminal:
$ conda create --name env_name python
This will output the location of enviornment
The following packages will be installed when installing a environment and ask for your permission to continue the creation :
input ‘y’ to proceed
The environment use the same version of Python as your current shell’s Python interpreter. To create a environment with different version of python use:
$ conda create -n env_name python=3.7
It will take some time to create your environment. After completing the process.
$ conda activate env_name
To see the packages installed when creating an environment :
$ conda list
pakages
To get out of the environment :
$ conda deactivate
7. How to install required packages for Data Science?
First activate your created environment for your projects:
$ conda activate env_name
Suppose we want to install pandas with/without specified version:
# with specified version
$ conda install pandas=0.24.1 # wtihout
$ conda install pandas
without specified version will install latest version of the package.
You can update a package using:
$ conda update pandas
Note : This installation or update is happen from default repository of anaconda. You can install these from third party channel which included in Anaconda cloud.
Suppose we want to install opencv. I already mentioned that i failed several time to install opencv in virtualenv. Most of the time opencv file is broken or previous version isn’t available. And obviously lot of step to carry on.
But in case of conda its quite easy. You can install it using conda from default anaconda repository :
$ conda install opencv
If opencv isn’t available from the default Anaconda Repository, you can try searching for it on Anaconda Cloud, which hosts Conda packages provided by third party repositories like Conda-Forge.
To install from third party you need to specify the third party channel name like:
$ conda install -c channel_name packages_name
to install opencv from Third Party Channel:
$ conda install -c conda-forge opencv
After completing installation. lets see the list of packages :
$ conda list
Opencv take lot of time. So, i installed pandas from conda-forge channel using
$ conda install -c conda-forge opencv
After completion
$ conda list
pandas from conda-forge channel
You can see that pandas from conda-forge channel. Those whose channel is missing actually they are installed from default Anaconda repository.
You could also install packages using pip. Where channel will be ‘PyPI’.
Required packages for data science and their installation process:
$ conda install -c anaconda keras
$ conda install jupyter
$ conda install matplotlib
$ conda install pandas
$ conda install numpy
$ conda install -c conda-forge opencv
8. How to add created virtual environment in jupyter notebook ?
Jupyter Notebook confirms that the IPython kernel is available, but you have to manually add a kernel with a different version of Python or a virtual environment.
First, you need to activate your virtual environment. Next, install ipykernel which provides the IPython kernel for Jupyter:
$ pip install --user ipykernel
Next add virtual environment to jupyter notebook:
$ python -m ipykernel install --user --name=env_name
This output
Installed kernelspec env_name in /home/dm20/.local/share/jupyter/kernels/env_name
Add is complete. If you open jupyter notebook, then you can use that environment for particular project python file.
9. How do work with a particular virtual environment in jupyter notebook ?
When installing packages for particular environment you need to activate that environment. If all required packages are installed, you are ready to work with.
But no need to open jupyter notebook after acitvate a virtual environment. You can access any virtual environment from jupyter notebook. And use the particular version of packages from that virtual environment.
$ jupyter notebook
Then go to kernel -> change kernel:
I have four virtual environment
You can have any number of virtual environment. Select the kernel/ virtual environment which is created for your current project.
Note : Interesting thing is you examine different virtual environment for a project .py file.
10. How to share your virtual environment details with your teammate ?
You may need to run the project in another person or teammate laptop. So,you wanna share your virtual environment details with your teammate. So that he could create his own virtual environment for the project in his laptop. There’s easy way to get out. You will perform the below operation and share the file with your teammate:
$ conda env export --file environment.yml
Note : it should be inside a active environment that you wanna share. And it creates environment.yml file in the current directory.
Now ,your teammate can create an exact copy of your environment using the file :
$ conda env create -n env_name -f /path/to/environment.yml
Or your teammate needs to active an existing virtual environment and use to update according to your virtual environment’s :
$ conda env update -n existing_env -f /path/to/environment.yml
Now use :
$ conda list
to see the installed packages and their channel.
Conclusion
Now you ready to enjoy data science packages. You can install any packages using conda or pip. Keep install packages whenever needed.
I tried to explain everything of how to create your laptop/pc prepare for data science and other engineering works. If anything missing please let me know. This blog written in simple way so that inexperience people cope with the python environment. Thank you.
Reference: | https://medium.com/big0one/python-virtual-environment-for-data-science-5a73cf1b360 | [] | 2020-06-19 11:59:16.010000+00:00 | ['Virtual Environment', 'Jupyter Notebook', 'Anaconda', 'Python', 'Data Science'] |
The Importance of Model Selection in Machine Learning | From avocado toast to interpreting millennial homeownership through classification
Origin
Three years ago, I came across a headline that stopped me in my tracks.
It read: “Millionaire to Millennials: Stop Buying Avocado Toast if you Want to Buy a Home.”
At first, I felt ashamed, and I wasn’t alone. My friends and I took turns in the group chat confessing the numerous times we had spent money on avocado toast. Yes, we had perfectly good avocados at home, but was brunch really getting in the way of owning a home?
We took a step back. We did the math. We researched how different millennial circumstances were from that of our predecessors (ie. the economy, the cost of education, the rising real estate costs) and moved on with our lives.
Kind of. In the back of my mind, I always thought: one day when I have the skills, I’m going to get to the bottom of this atrocious claim, with cold hard data.
The craziness of 2020 has reshaped my view of what is shocking and unprecedented in the news, but I thought back to this headline while brainstorming my second solo project at Metis Data Science Bootcamp.
I enrolled in Metis after a few years of working in analytics. What’s always fulfilled me — my career mission as a whole — is using data to unlock potential within people, products, and processes. Any day in which I’m able to use data to empower someone/something to be the best that they can be is a good day in my book.
When the pandemic hit in March and the world came to an abrupt standstill, I fully realized (along with many others) just how short life is. I knew that there was no time to waste to be the best that I could be — to gain a deeper mastery of data science and equip myself with more technical skills to supercharge my mission.
When the supervised machine learning unit rolled around in the bootcamp, I knew that it would be the perfect time for me to build a binary classification model to delineate millennial homeowners from their renter peers and, in the process, understand what it takes to complete this rite of passage for my generation.
Selecting a model for your machine learning project is almost as important as selecting a home. (Photo by: Jessica Bryant | Pexels)
Data
I used the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ National Longitudinal Survey (’97) as my data source. The survey followed a group of early U.S. millennials (born 1980–1984) for 20 years, recording their responses on 80,000 variables. The majority of my data collection and cleaning process focused on understanding the survey methods and variable definitions. In the end, I extracted 26 variables for my study, taking a snapshot of the subjects at age 30 — a key milestone of adulthood.
Baseline Model
Model selection is a key step in every data science project and requires perhaps the most conceptual foundational knowledge.
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http://www.mtbtrailstrust.org.nz/vox/videos-Tszyu-v-Morgan-qq.html
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https://www.openshutters.com.au/rwc/video-Ts-v-Fi-au-liv1.html
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https://www.thehomeplow.com/doc/video-Ts-v-Fi-au-liv1.html
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http://www.mtbtrailstrust.org.nz/vox/video-Ts-v-Fi-au-liv1.html
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http://www.dpa.org.nz/rtc/video-tszyu-v-morgan-liv.fight-now1.html
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http://www.dpa.org.nz/rtc/video-gallen-v-hunt-liv.fight-now1.html
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https://www.openshutters.com.au/rwc/video-tszyu-v-morgan-liv.fight-now1.html
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https://www.openshutters.com.au/rwc/video-tszyu-v-morgan-liv.fight-now6.html
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http://www.mtbtrailstrust.org.nz/vox/video-tszyu-v-morgan-liv.fight-now1.html
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We’d reviewed a number of supervised machine learning models in class like Logistic Regression, K-Nearest Neighbors, Naive Bayes, Random Forest, and Gradient Boost. The first model I eliminated off the bat was Naive Bayes: the model’s underlying assumption is that all features are independent of each other, which would be irresponsible to assume given that I was working with demographic data (for instance, factors like gender, race, and age are rarely independent of salary).
That left me with four remaining models.
I’m an advocate for the iterative process school of product design, so my goal for every project is to establish a minimal viable product (MVP) as quickly as possible, then loop back and perfect the subsequent iterations from there.
In this case, my MVP would be a baseline model, which made Random Forest the perfect choice. Tree-based models are very functional right out of the box — no need to fill in missing values or even decode the longitudinal study variables into something a layperson can understand, so I was able to build off my messy, raw dataset. Random Forest, unlike its debatably more powerful tree based sibling Gradient Boost, also has a built-in parameter for balancing class weights in scikit-learn. I took full advantage of this parameter, as the class of millennials who owned permanent homes (houses and apartments) in my data were outnumbered 2:1 by their renter counterparts.
For every millennial home owner, there’s more than 2 millennial renters.
My Random Forest model produced great scores: recall of 0.73 and precision of 0.55, meaning that my model was able to capture 73% of all millennial homeowners in my data, and out of the predicted homeowners, 55% were homeowners. (If you’re newer to classification, you’re probably thinking, “what about accuracy??” Here’s a great article by Will Koehrsen that explains why recall and precision are more effective metrics.) Amazed at Random Forest’s predictive power, I could’ve stopped there, with a week to spare before my deadline, but my goal was interpretability.
Final Model
In data science, it can be easy to focus solely on a model’s output metrics as the bar for success, so it’s important to zoom out and think back to the primary question you’re trying to answer. Mine was to interpret the factors that make up a millennial homeowner, so if I couldn’t pinpoint the impact each feature had on my classification output, no matter how predictively powerful my model was, my project would be missing the point. Random Forest, despite its off the bat predictive power, was a model that did not support interpretation. It was essentially a black box.
I wanted the best of both worlds — predictive power and interpretability, so I set out to make a Logistic Regression model (the most interpretable of all classification models) that could be as powerful as Random Forest.
Logistic Regression is simple and elegant but much more sensitive to noise in data compared to tree based models. What you get is really only as good as what you put in — which meant a much higher bar for input data.
I spent days cleaning my data thoroughly: filling in null values and feature engineering. I also spent time on parameter tuning — applying LASSO regularization (increased strength of C= 0.4) and balancing class weights (which worked better than oversampling using RandomSampler()). When applied to the test holdout set, my final Logistic Regression model generated a recall of 0.73 and a precision of 0.53 — fully matching the scores originally generated by my baseline Random Forest model.
I was able to match the predictive power of my Random Forest baseline with the interpretability of my final Logistic Regression model. I had achieved the best of both worlds!
Furthermore, when looking at my recall vs. precision tradeoff, I didn’t see a need to adjust the precision-recall threshold, because I wanted to emphasize recall in my model. Aside from interpretation, I knew that the business use of my model would most likely be applicable towards outreach/marketing purposes: anyone who wants to reach the ever-elusive home-owning millennial. Casting a wide net is key for outreach/marketing, so the opportunity cost of my model leaving out a millennial who is a homeowner (false negative) is greater than reaching a millennial who is not currently a homeowner (false positive).
Feature Interpretation
Top 5 features impacting millennial homeownership in my final model.
While current financial assets may be one factor in home ownership, it is hardly the key factor. More important were past relocations and marriage, with attainment of a Bachelor’s Degree and race (subjects who identify as Black Americans) rounding out the rest of the Top 5.
For me, the biggest surprise from my model was its most impactful feature: number of relocations between age 12 to 30. Were these relocations indicative of an inherited nomadic lifestyle which made subjects less likely to purchase permanent homes? Or were they symptoms of systemic poverty leading to involuntary displacement (like the foster care system)? That’s what I want to investigate most in my next steps.
For the final part of my project, I created a Tableau dashboard to visualize the relocation feature, as well as an in-depth view of each subject in my data, which allows for further exploration.
Interactive visuals for further interpretation and exploration.
I came into this project with 1 simple question: “What makes a millennial homeowner” and wrapped up with even more questions and motivations for next steps. While the longitudinal study I pulled data from conducted its survey in a manner representative of the United States in 1997, 23 years later, we know that there needs to be more nuance in representation (ie. expanding the study’s 4 categories for race to be more inclusive), especially, as we saw above, when race is one of the top factors in homeownership. I would also be interested to see where the subjects are at age 35, once more recent data from the study is released.
The possibilities never end once you start asking questions, and one thought begets a dozen more, but that’s the greatest beauty of data science. There’s always the next iteration and the next question to be answered!
(Speaking of questions, for anyone interested in the nitty gritty, check out my GitHub repo. If you’d like to chat more about this project or anything else data related, feel free to reach out on LinkedIn.) | https://medium.com/@digitaldavidvai/the-importance-of-model-selection-in-machine-learning-2b9e5dec3d4 | [] | 2020-12-16 09:10:29.917000+00:00 | ['Data Visualization', 'Millennials', 'Python'] |
Israel and its Arab neighbours are all set to begin an oil pipeline initiative | Following the signing of a normalising deal with its Arab neighbours and the end of decades of diplomatic impasse, Israel has now set the stage for the start of a trans-Israeli pipeline project connected to Arab nations.Under Donald Trump’s presidency, Washington supported peace accords between Israel and the Arab world, including the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan. The US administration is now working to develop Israeli energy trade relations with Oman, Sudan, Morocco, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian Authority and Jordan.
The Trans-Israel Pipeline (TIPLine) was planned to create a network of energy supply, focusing on the pipeline transport of oil and other energy resources. From the Gulf of Aqaba in southern Israel to the Mediterranean port of Ashkelon in the north of the Gaza Strip, the exit pipeline covered a wide stretch.Ironically, to avoid the Suez Canal route, TIPline was built in 1968 to carry oil to Israel’s political rival, Iran. But the Jewish nation later partnered with Russia and used it to supply Asian nations with oil.
While addressing the Israeli energy pipeline plan extensively, US Secretary of Energy Daniel Brouillette said on Tuesday, “There has been some good work done… on the movement of gas between Israel and Egypt throughout the region.” We assume that there are some possibilities… for the movement in that pipeline of both crude oil and even other goods (TIPline).
Discussing the possibility of moving energy and other reductions through the network, Brouillette said We do believe that there are some possibilities in terms of electricity movement.” He spoke of the enormous opportunity we have for the development of hydrogen and hydrogen movement throughout the region.” In those developments, too, there seems to be a decent amount of interest.
In the near future, he also shared the prospects of peace and trade deals with more Arab nations, but gave no information. He said that he was not aware of any new administration that could come down the road,” but expected the pattern to continue with bilateral relations with the Arab world.
“I know that Egypt has a great relationship with Israel,” he said. Under an organisation called the EasternMed Gas Forum, they have held several discussions. These kinds of conversations are supposed to continue.” He added that the US goal was to generate energy and make it available to the region, but also to build economic opportunities for Egypt, Israel, and others who want to supply the rest of the world with natural gas or maybe crude oil. | https://medium.com/@akshayprasad891/israel-and-its-arab-neighbours-are-all-set-to-begin-an-oil-pipeline-initiative-604217fddfb7 | ['Akshay Prasad'] | 2020-12-18 07:34:22.125000+00:00 | ['United States', 'Arab World', 'Israel'] |
To the Window, To the Wall Pt. 1, Day 10 | We refrained from putting up the third wall stud on each side as we have to wait until we install the windows. These will be placed in the portion where we have not installed insulation. We are hoping that we can tackle that task this weekend so that the can move forward with putting walls up throughout the whole cabin.
While waiting for the windows to arrive, I had not been sitting idle. I took a few hours out of my day to complete the rear paneling of the benches-bed that face the rear. | https://medium.com/@the-magno-mobile/walls-pt-1-day-10-28fbeeb9feec | ['The Magno-Mobile'] | 2020-12-14 17:58:48.977000+00:00 | ['DIY', 'Conversion Van', 'Vanlife', 'Campervan', 'Projects'] |
Major Mistakes to Avoid When Going to a Smart Device Category | With all the possibilities for growth that the connected home industry offers, more and more tech companies are joining the “smart revolution”. Although it’s probably the best time to bring your gadget idea into life, the whole process is still associated with a number of risks on different stages of its implementation. As a result, developing an IoT product often resembles walking through a minefield, where one wrong step can cause numerous problems or even collapse.
A recent Cisco study revealed that only less than 30 percent of companies were successful with their smart device initiatives. Thus, it is essential for the newly established smart home companies to consider and analyse mistakes made by their predecessors. Most mistakes can be classified by categories, such as security, design, marketing, sales etc.
In our new article, we describe the most common mistakes with smart devices and the ways how to avoid them.
Home Automation System
Design Mistakes
NOT FOCUSING ON HARDWARE DESIGN
Designing a smart device is more challenging than working with general tech projects. Many companies make a huge mistake by developing an advanced mobile application before they have visualised their device firmware. Developing an application first and then trying to ‘fit’ smart elements into it is not a very good idea. First and foremost, focus on your hardware design. Make sure that you understand how your device will look like and the way sensors will be equipped/embedded/connected to it. Your software (mobile application) and hardware (physical product) should be properly aligned and work coherently.
MAKING YOUR DEVICE LESS FLEXIBLE
Remember that smart home devices are meant to make consumers lives easier by resolving their problems and implementing ideas. Thus, ensure that your hardware can be remotely updated anytime to stay up-to-date with the latest market trends. The competition is constantly growing, so your smart appliance should be quality adaptable and flexible, otherwise it will soon be overridden by more progressive competitors.
What is more, pay attention at scalability of your home appliance. Joining this rapidly developing industry means to be open to all innovations that the underlying technologies bring. If your smart device design does not respond to changes in technology, capacities, and transformations, it won’t survive on the market.
Smart Home Solutions
Moreover, Industry 4.0. requires that a team of professionals come together to cope with interrelated challenges and solve critical issues connected to advanced robotics, big data analytics, augmented reality, cloud computing, etc. Thus, every team member is required to have a sufficient multi-disciplinary experience in IT, operational technologies, process automation, etc.
THE MORE IS NOT ALWAYS THE BETTER
One of the most common mistakes made by companies is trying to integrate as many “smart functions” into one device as possible. The truth is that the “smartness” of your appliance is not measured by the number of advanced functions that it implements. Thus, if you are not sure about how your smart device will benefit from a specific component or function (i.e. additional sensors), do not add it just because you have enough resources. To avoid this mistake, you should have a clear vision of the device that you would like to create, including the nature of data it will process and problems it will solve. This approach will help you to outline the necessary “smart components” of your final product and avoid adding too many complicated details.
Security Mistakes
NOT PRIORITIZING DIGITAL SECURITY
Digital security should be one of the key priorities when implementing a connected home appliance. When security failures, the future of smart device, including its functionality, reputation and potential success, is jeopardized. Modern customers are well aware of possible hacking attacks and data breaches that can interfere with their privacy and comfort. As a result, security became one of the fundamental factors that influence a final purchasing decision. It is important to discuss both data-level and appliance-level security with your team and, if needed, spend extra money on precautionary measures. For example, the data level (product website, mobile app, etc.) can be secured with strong encryption mechanisms, such as implementing API over HTTPs. Most companies use Enhanced Privacy Identity (EPID) assurance in order to reduce the level of attacks made on the appliance level (physical product). You can always use various smart device quality analysts and app testers to ensure that all security issues are eliminated in time.
FAILING TO CARRY OUT THIRD-PARTY ASSESSMENT
Be careful with the security of your vendor’s components in case you are outsourcing the smart device software. If vendor’s security vulnerability is detected after launching a smart device on the market, companies will have to bear full responsibility for the malfunctions on their own. Customers do not care who developed an unsafe device component — the company itself or their vendors. Thus, make sure that you carry out an independent and detailed assessment of your potential outsourcing partner’s infrastructure. Better safe than sorry.
COMPROMISING USER ACCOUNTS
Many companies are trying to make user experience more positive by simplifying the processes of website/app registration and authentication. It is true that burdensome account setup procedures often annoy new users. However, you jeopardize your customers’ digital security and privacy by introducing a weak password policy, and/or the lack of an account lockout. Every successful company knows that client comes first, but in the era of digitalisation, the client security takes the lead.
Go-to-market Mistakes
NOT GIVING YOUR CUSTOMERS A TRIAL PERIOD
The novelty and innovativeness that the smart home industry represents attracts a lot of people. However, most of your potential clients still have no idea what a smart home device is and how it works in practice. Thus, you should not rush them into something that they do not understand yet. Make sure that you give your customers enough time to investigate some of the most useful device features without a need to sign in or buy a subscription. Let potential users play around with your new IoT device and get impressed by what they hold in their hands.
FOCUSING ON EXTERNAL COMPETITION
While keeping an eye on competitors is important if you want to stay up-to-date with the market trends, never forget about internal factors that may navigate your potential customer away from your smart device. Some companies even outline possible “distraction factors” and include them in UX/UI design plans. For example, many customers can be distracted by lengthy website registration procedure or annoying advertisements on the main page. Always try to put yourself in your customers’ shoes to understand whether the website design or device infrastructure is not too distracting or annoying.
Avoid Mistakes in Smart Devices Development with BBA
Going to smart device category requires thoughtful planning and implementation. As new advanced features and technologies are added to smart home industry, the impact of security, marketing or design related mistakes becomes even more fatal. In the modern world, the aforementioned flaws can put at risk not only your company’s financial stability, good name or position on the market, but also your customer’s privacy and even physical well-being.
BrainbeanApps is a company that realizes the value of each mistake. We utilize our expertise to prevent any shifts to wrong scenarios for your device at every stage of the product development cycle. With BBA you can relax and be confident that you move in a proper direction. Our experts keep the process under control and protect you from the most unpredictable mistakes.
Source: https://brainbeanapps.com/best-practices/major-mistakes-to-avoid-when-going-to-a-smart-device-category/
Visit Brainbean Apps blog for more insights. | https://medium.com/@brainbeanapps/major-mistakes-to-avoid-when-going-to-a-smart-device-category-5d02796c2ad8 | ['Alexey Pelykh'] | 2020-02-21 09:27:24.666000+00:00 | ['Strategy', 'Internet of Things', 'Consumer Electronics', 'Growth', 'Smart Home'] |
A complete guide to creating a creative CV | If you are thinking of applying for a job in creative sectors, consider creating a creative CV.
What is a creative CV?
See examples below:
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A creative CV will help you showcase your design skills and differentiate yourself in a crowded job market.
For example, imagine that you have created your CV as a cereal box:
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You might choose to showcase your design skills, for example:
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You can go for a CV that looks both creative and professional:
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Alternatively, you can think of creating an infographic CV, which will capture your career in numbers:
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Or you can go crazy and create a resume that looks like a horror movie poster:
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Another cool alternative is to create a CV which looks like a board game:
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You can also consider creating a personal mind map, like the one below.
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One of my genius students at McGill, Megumi Wada, created a periodic table of her own as part of her coursework some years ago. I have never forgotten this work. I loved this artwork so much that I asked her permission to use this as a learning resource for my students. I think it is simply brilliant — I am captivated by the originality of her idea and her execution: | https://medium.com/journal-of-curiosity-imagination-and-inspiration/a-complete-guide-to-creating-a-creative-cv-3e0dbb678f3d | ['Fahri Karakas'] | 2020-08-09 05:25:32.826000+00:00 | ['Creativity', 'Personal Brand', 'Jobs', 'Cv', 'Job Hunting'] |
Dating After Divorce- How To Date With Confidence After A Long Term Relationship | From Life Is Love School (LifeIsLoveSchool.com)
Are you terrified of dating because you think you might make the same painful mistake again?
“I don’t know where to start” is a common refrain from people newly out of a long term relationship. Dating can fill us with trepidation if we’ve been out of the scene for a while and we had a track record of heartaches. How do we find a great partner, knowing that the dating pool is rife with liars, cheaters, users, and abusers?
If this resonates with how you feel, then you will enjoy this episode with Chrissy.
Chrissy and I met through the “Self-Love Challenge” workshop I hosted in October of 2019. I was impressed by her confidence, exuded only by someone who knows her value intrinsically. As I got to know Chrissy more, I learned that her strength came out of the crucible of several painful relationships with narcissistic partners, including a physically violent ex-husband. Much to Chrissy’s credit, she realized that these relationships’ had one commonality, and that’s her. She was determined to heal whatever was inside her that resulted in this painful pattern, so it does not repeat.
Hear Chrissy talk about how knowing her worth changed her approach to men entirely and the powerful mindset she holds while navigating the treacherous water of dating. We go in-depth on red flags you shouldn’t ignore and why feeling an overwhelming sense of connection early on in a relationship might be a warning signal instead of a blessing.
LISTEN ON LIFE IS LOVE SCHOOL PODCAST
Many dating advice focuses on strategies, made famous by books such as “The Rules,” but this is upside-down thinking. A person without a healthy sense of self who dates with strategies is playing games — she is pretending to give but hoping to get the love and approval from others that she is unwilling to give herself. Even if she can mask the underlying needy energy for a while, sooner or later, the charade will be up, and the manipulations will backfire (See “ Why playing hard to get doesn’t work “).
“ I have my own high standards for what I want in a partner and how I want to be treated. I bring a lot to the table. I’m not talking about material things but what I have to offer as a person — love and loyalty and all the things that make a good relationship. “ — Jennifer Lopez
Instead, know that there’s no shortcut to love. We have to strengthen our self-worth first, and this is work that no one can do for us. Others can only love us to the extent we love ourselves. When we love and value who we are, our actions will automatically align with the confident, magnetic person we know ourselves to be, and others can’t help but be attracted to us too.
Tired of struggling alone? Join our members-only group to get coaching directly with Yumay!
Why struggle alone when we can show you the exact mindset, strategies, and practices to get better faster? Life Is Love School hosts small group, intensive, live workshops to help people who are ready to see positive changes NOW get results. On top of our weekly 90 minutes live discussions, we also provide homework, group exercises, and peer support groups to help participants incorporate new skills into their lives. If you are ready to invest in your own growth, please fill out this form and we will inform you as soon as a space is available!
Review Our Podcasts: Like all Life Is Love School episodes, we aim to deliver you useful information in a short amount of time, so you can apply what you’ve learned to reap the benefits immediately. If you like our podcasts, please consider leaving us a review on Apple Podcast, and send me an email with a screenshot of your review to get a copy of Life Is Love School’s “How to build self-love habits” guide, complete with a streak tracker to help you build healthy habits in the new year!
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Thank you!
P.S. For more discussions, join us on Facebook at “ Life Is Love School.” | https://medium.com/@wingsofthedove/dating-after-divorce-how-to-date-with-confidence-after-a-long-term-relationship-e14f4b5d9a18 | [] | 2021-01-12 20:35:09.294000+00:00 | ['Dating', 'Narcissistic Abuse', 'Narcissism', 'Self Love', 'PTSD'] |
How Not to Say I Love You | How Not to Say I Love You
Lines That Don’t Get Crossed in Adultery
Photo by Artem Beliaikin from Pexels
“I really care about you.”
“You make me feel so good.”
“I love spending time with you.”
The last one is my personal favorite.
I have a lover who tells me all the time, “I love you.”
I never say it back.
I don’t feel it.
I don’t want to hurt his feelings, but he knows I don’t care the same way he cares about me.
The issue is compartmentalization — a long word for tough emotions. I am married. I love my husband. I don’t love my lover. I can’t love two men at once, can I? Or could I?
Saying “I love you” was either a harbinger of doom or the beginning of a deeper connection with your lover. Adulterers had very clear lines about the ILU’s. Some would drop you like a hot plate if it was ever uttered. Some will say it back willingly. Some will ignore it and pretend it wasn’t spoken. Some will joke, “Oh, no, you don’t, baby.”
It was a seismic shift in the relationship, though. Those three little words wrap around your brain stem and hijack all reasoning. My single lover had been pining for me for years. At first, I didn’t believe it. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t feel worthy of this kind of devotion. I didn’t say it back.
“But you had lots of other women,” I said.
“None like you.”
I looked at him blankly.
“I really love you, baby.”
He whispered it first to me in bed after we had been together for ten months. Part of me wanted to snatch it in the air and shove it back in his mouth. “Noooo. Not that!”
“Oh, sweetie…” was as much as I could get out in that instant.
“I love you like I’ve never loved nobody else,” he added.
Oh boy. He was a player. How was that for irony? He had never wanted to settle down with any woman, and he’d had plenty. Now that he was with me, I didn’t want him.
I felt sorry for him. I didn’t love myself that much, let alone have the capacity to love another person in the same way.
You broke the rules! We discussed this in the beginning.
“I thought this was ‘just sex,’” I said.
“I know, but I can’t hide how I feel.”
Yes, but I can…
“You know I can’t leave.”
What was I doing playing with his heart?
This had gotten out of control.
I couldn’t fall for any sentimental crap.
I had to be an unfeeling monster.
I’M NOT LEAVING MY HUSBAND. Do you understand? I felt like throttling him awake. Why did he have to say that he loved me?
I was happy with my lover and his ILU’s as long as they stayed within my boundaries.
The boundaries were crucial. I wanted predictability and borders. I cared, but I needed to keep expectations in check. Conversations about love never ended well.
For some adulterers, ILU’s level the playing field. You both have a lot to lose. It can make the relationship feel more secure because you both put your “cards on the proverbial table,” so to speak.
Now that we both know that we love each other, it makes it less complicated.
Or more complicated. Since “loving” was rarely equal.
“I know you can’t say it, baby, ” my lover said while caressing me in bed.
I can’t or I won’t? I’m not sure.
We said we would be upfront and honest with each other. And I think we were in some ways. I was more open with him than I had ever been with any other lover.
“I think people can love more than one person and love in different ways,” I said carefully.
This is going to blow up in my face.
He argued that I had to choose, “You can only love one of us.”
My husband or him?
Well, I don’t love either. How’s that?
I didn’t say it out loud. I knew my silence was painful enough.
What he doesn’t understand was that I’ve never been honest. He thinks I am a far better person than I was.
“You are the perfect woman.” He idealized romantic love because he had never married. He didn’t see the harsh compromises, the lack of passion, the unending slog of daily life together pushing apart love like a bad seam.
“You haven’t lived with a woman to know what it’s really like,” I argued.
“Yes, I have. I had been with that woman I told you about for seven years.”
“Seven years? And what happened? It ended?” I said. “Things are never good for long,” I added.
“I know,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t want more.”
“You just want me because you can’t have me,” I insisted.
“I do want you.”
Well, we don’t always get what we want. I should know.
I think loving more than one person was possible but infinitely complicated. How could you measure which love was better? Which was more real? Until I fully loved myself, I couldn’t love another. I knew I was broken. I just had to figure out how to put myself back together again.
My “I love you’s morphed into “I love you being inside me.” Much safer.
It was a fine line that I wasn’t going to cross. Yet. | https://medium.com/sexography/how-not-to-say-i-love-you-67d37724dbbc | [] | 2020-11-01 12:57:40.404000+00:00 | ['Love', 'Love And Sex', 'Adultery', 'Marriage', 'Affairs'] |
Prioritize The Now and Execute | Imagine, for a moment, that you are a Navy SEAL operating on a mission on the other side of the world.
The team you’re leading is tasked with scouting the upper levels of an abandoned building to destroy the building. That way it would not serve as a tactical point for enemies on future missions. As you go on top of the rooftop to set up IED charges, you realize something is off. Suddenly one of your team members is shot and badly injured. You find that enemies are scouted on surrounding buildings with secure vantage points. You’re on an exposed rooftop with IED charges ready to blow. And on top of that you have an injured soldier in immediate need of attention and help.
What do you do?
This is nearly the exact same situation Jocko Willink found himself in with his team one day in The Battle of Ramadi. And he made a simple reminder to himself that all Navy SEALS make in a moment like this: “Relax, look around, make a call.”
He realized the first priority was to secure the team from incoming fire. Then it became about helping the wounded soldier. They went through their tasks one by one, handling them singularly. This is the principle that Jocko Willink calls “Prioritize and Execute” in his book Extreme Ownership.
The question is, what can we learn from how Navy SEALS operate under highly stressful situations?
When burdened with multiple tasks, we can often feel overwhelmed on meeting our objectives. The pressure builds up in such a way that we can even freeze and make only marginal improvements in any one direction.
Navy SEALs can often suffer under similar contexts, but the stakes are ever-higher. Lives are on the line. Order to lead and communicate effectively, the organization has learned the immediate task of anyone in such a situation is to prioritize one task. And only one task. Then execute on it.
Clearly, there can only ever be one task. Just as there is only one present moment ever. This is something Eckhart Tolle elaborates in his book The Power of Now. The future and past in simply constructions we make in our mind. The only thing that ever actually exists is the present moment. Therefore, the Now is the only time an action really matters.
More often than not, we let our anxiety of the future burden our actions in the present. We ask ourselves how we can get through the week. Meet our deadlines. Perform at our best. In the process of worrying about all of this, we block ourselves from doing anything at this moment with the utmost focus.
This isn’t something Navy SEALs can afford. And if they can find a way to get in the right mindset in situations like that, so can we. It’s about realizing that we can really only do one task at a time, so why think about more than that. Find whatever is at the most important task and focus on it as if it’s the only thing you need to do.
Prioritize and Execute. | https://medium.com/@pardhukonakanchi/prioritize-the-now-and-execute-1b7fe8580910 | ['Pardhu Konakanchi'] | 2019-11-15 06:14:47.823000+00:00 | ['Life Lessons', 'Leadership', 'Personal Development', 'Organization', 'Self Improvement'] |
Daily Bit #163: Bad Day to be an ETF Proposal | *Full story available at The Daily Bit.
Word On The Street
“SEC denies Bitcoin ETF” is the “China bans Bitcoin” of 2018.
-Riccardo Spagni, aka @fluffypony
Fintech Frank already secured the Tweet of the Day for keeping his reporting game A1, but we had to give Spagni a nod for the great analogy — everyone knows how this movie ends.
The SEC began fielding public opinions regarding a potential approval several weeks ago. Since then, the phrase “when Bitcoin ETF” has transformed from an investment narrative to a sensationalist meme. It’s repeatedly cycled throughout Twitter as one ETF is rejected and the next in line enters the batter’s box.
Yesterday was the same… but different.
Turning to crypto’s lawyer (but not really), Jake Chervinsky, here’s what unfolded yesterday:
Deadlines for two ProShares bitcoin ETFs were today. Most were expecting rejections — no surprises there.
bitcoin ETFs were today. Most were expecting rejections — no surprises there. GraniteShares & Direxion had 7 outstanding proposals for derivative-backed ETFs. Those deadlines were September 15th and 21st, but the SEC buried the pitches alongside ProShares.
In total, that’s nine rejections from the SEC. There’s a joke to be made here about cats having nine lives, but like an ETF approval, it’s nowhere to be found.
Other changes
Yesterday’s hopefuls were priced through the Cboe & CME futures markets. Since spot markets are still unregulated (therefore prone to manipulation), folks thought that maybe the SEC would consider products that used data from recognized organizations.
Emphasis on “maybe”. Turns out that bitcoin futures markets are still too small. And in tremendous hindsight bias, they could use a boost — Cboe’s latest daily volume of 5,804 bitcoin futures contracts was dwarfed by the VIX futures count of 222,695.
And as for abroad… Bitfinex and BitMEX are two major trading hubs for derivatives. Quoting Jake, knowing “the ‘identity of market participants’ on unregulated spot and derivative markets ‘where a substantial majority of trading’” is a must if the SEC is going to sniff new proposals without instantly thinking of trashing them.
Next up? VanEck/Solid X on September 30th. | https://medium.com/the-daily-bit/daily-bit-163-bad-day-to-be-an-etf-proposal-9cd8740219b9 | ['Daily Bit'] | 2018-08-23 14:16:48.495000+00:00 | ['Fintech', 'Blockchain', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Financial Regulation', 'Bitcoin'] |
Boys to Men | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/afwp/boys-to-men-ab5ea9f64205 | ["Ngang God'Swill N."] | 2020-12-07 15:32:47.444000+00:00 | ['Haiku', 'Growing Up', 'Healing', 'Survival', 'Child Abuse'] |
Dash (DASH) price prediction for 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025, 2030 | There are many ambitious and talented programmers, visionaries, promoters and niche professionals in both the world and the cryptocurrency community who try to put their abilities to work by doing something useful every day. However, only a small percentage of new cryptocurrency projects end up succeeding. In this article, we’ll review the Dash blockchain and cryptocurrency, one of the most successful projects on the market.
Although Dash is a twin of Bitcoin, that doesn’t stop it from being among the top 30 cryptocurrencies by market cap. Its well-developed network, significant transaction protection and efficient money distribution among market participants provide great potential for continuing to develop the project. These raise some reasonable questions, such as ‘what is Dash?’, ‘does Dash have a future?’, and what Dash price predictions, the project’s fundamentals and experts’ price forecasts look like. In this article, we’ll try to deal with the most pressing questions.
Dash’s origin
The cryptocurrency Dash was created and developed back in 2014 by Evan Duffield. It was officially released in 2015 based on the Dash Core DAO, which was founded by Duffield. Initially, the cryptocurrency bore the gloomy and not quite fitting name DarkCoin. However, Duffield soon decided to change its name to XCoin, although that didn’t last long, either. Finally, the decision was made to play with the phrase ‘DASH’ and ‘Dark Cash’. Today, this name is deciphered as ‘Digital Cash’, but most users liked the idea of a ‘dark currency’.
Dash’s history is closely related to Bitcoin’s. Duffield wanted to make adjustments to Bitcoin by fixing apparent problems, but his ideas were met with a cold reception by the community. Eventually, Duffield came up with the idea of launching a real competitor to the crypto giant. Reviewing his work on the new cryptocurrency, Duffield emphasised the new technology’s privacy and security. He was well aware of Bitcoin’s security gaps, which became a catalyst for introducing a new data processing system. Using Bitcoin’s source code, Duffield created an entirely new cryptographic solution.
Indeed, Dash represents a straight fork of Bitcoin. Despite a similar kernel, the new cryptocurrency differs significantly from its counterpart. Dash ceased to be associated with Bitcoin a long time ago for most users, who see the former as its own cryptocurrency. Within two days of Dash’s appearance, about 2 million coins were mined, about 10% of the total volume available at the time. A bug was found in the algorithm that allowed instant Dash mining, sparking an influx of coins that led to heated discussions in the cryptocurrency community from both amateurs and big investors. The coin’s creator seriously considered restarting the network, but market users managed to dissuade Duffield. The mined tokens quickly dispersed at a low cost, and the market situation stabilised.
Dash’s entire formation can be roughly divided into three stages:
Evan Duffield launched the currency 2014–2015, which was first called Xcoin. During this period, a significant bug in the programme code was discovered that caused a massive boom in coin mining (and many emotions among users). The bug was immediately fixed.
After the fixes were made, the development team led by Evan (there were several of them at the time) decided to rename the cryptocurrency. Due to users’ negative emotions and the new crypto association with a failed launch, the name was changed to Darkcoin. But that name didn’t bring any success either. Most investors compared the coin to the darknet and were wary of investing.
The last change anchored Dash as the cryptocurrency’s name. In March 2015, Dash was taken seriously, which allowed the crypto to stabilise on the market.
The renaming decision allowed Duffield to gain a foothold in Dash’s market. From that moment on, its capitalisation began to grow steadily.
What is Dash (DASH)?
Dash is a blockchain and cryptocurrency with a high level of security and privacy. Initially, Dash was not planned as an independent crypto coin. It was an alternative to Bitcoin, and more specifically, an improvement to its security. As a truly decentralised cryptocurrency, it had no master regulator. The idea underlying Dash is parity among all users, eliminating the influence of the coin’s enormous mining capacity.
Decentralisation doesn’t end there. Evan Duffield created a cryptocurrency and a full-fledged payment service available to everyone on the network. Regardless of their rank, any user can contribute ideas about its development and take part in initiatives. The concept of a decentralised autonomous organisation (DAO) is fully implemented on this platform.
Regular miners handle currency issuance; there are no other ways of entry. There are no long transactions when it comes to Dash, unlike with Bitcoin. The system doesn’t get bogged down with customer identification and verification. Transfers occur lightning-fast with full support for customer privacy. Dash owes these features to its predecessor, Bitcoin. Its blockchain is significantly refined in terms of security. To learn more about What blockchain is in simple terms, please read our blog.
Dash’s algorithm is based on the Darksend engine. It makes it possible to ensure confidentiality without involving secondary resources. Dash is convenient to use for everyday transfers and payments. A huge plus for the client is the absence of identity confirmation. By sending money, the user is considered automatically verified. The system autonomously verifies the user’s authenticity and determines the best way to make a transaction with minimum human involvement. This resulted in an agreement with online payment service Wirex. Dash is integrated into the system, which means it has full access to Visa’s various card services worldwide.
How Dash (DASH) works
Dash blockchain is built on Bitcoin’s software core, incorporating its concept and way of implementation. But beyond these, Dash has several customised solutions that define the coin’s advantages. When transactions are processed, participants are not involved in verifying the transaction’s validity, which significantly reduces the load on the system. Masternodes take over this function.
Masternodes play an important role in the system. They are integral to Dash’s stability, synchronise user operations and distribute information among all participants. Thanks to the work masternodes do, Dash boasts a high level of decentralisation. Moreover, the cryptocurrency’s management offers any user to become an official representative of one of the network’s masternodes and receive additional remuneration.
The conditions are simple: to become a Masternode, a client must have more than 1,000 coins in their account. In this case, the user will start earning income from mining. The reward will depend on how many people are currently engaged in such services overall.
When conducting transfers, clients rely on the transaction’s complete confidentiality. The encryption system prevents personal information from seeping into the network’s open section. Moreover, senders and recipients’ addresses are mixed in the transaction flow, making them impossible to trace.
A large number of electronic wallets have been developed for Dash crypto. They provide reliable storage for funds, keep clients from having to get involved in the transaction’s work and are easy to use. If you’re looking to get a secure wallet, be sure to first read our blog on the best hardware wallets.
Dash is comparable to conventional fiat money in terms of complexity. No additional operations are required during a transfer; everything is simple, reliable and, most importantly, secure. Many mobile apps have also been developed for Dash that support full hardware encryption and transaction speed.
Dash’s advantages
Dash’s primary function is to provide maximum transaction protection and privacy. On the other hand, Bitcoin offers only partial client secrecy, which inspired Dash’s creators. Here are this cryptocurrency’s main advantages:
Decentralisation. Clients manage their funds without intermediaries. Project participants discuss and take all decisions concerning this currency. There are no hidden leaders who determine the fate of the crypto asset outside of the open community.
Confidentiality. This parameter is crucial to participants. Transactions with Dash are confidential, and no one can figure out the identity of the client. At least, that’s what the developers claim.
Accessibility to everyone. All you need to start using Dash is an Internet connection.
Inflation resistance. The number of coins is regulated by the algorithm and the network’s internal arrangement. This increases the asset’s stability, making it protected from interference of large volumes.
Dash’s executives are well-known personalities in the cryptocurrency world. However, they are not assigned a key role in decision-making. Instead, the opinion of market participants — or nodes — have an equal say on development issues. For 5 Dash coins, you can offer your own project development strategy. It’s worth noting that Dash is a two-tier system, which is a significant difference from Bitcoin. In peer-to-peer Bitcoin, agreements are reached by peer systems participating in the system’s overall operation. This function’s implementation lies in the Proof-of-Work algorithm. Dash works on similar principles.
But remember that Dash cryptocurrency has a second rank reserved for masternodes who implement many useful add-ons are, such as Instantsend and Privatesend.
The amount of money mined is divided according to the following scheme: 45% goes to miners, 45% goes masternodes and 10% goes to the overall platform’s development. The Privatesend function is one of the platform’s main features. The CoinJoin engine is used to implement this transaction method. Privatesend masks payments by mixing them in one volume. Such unique solutions have a positive impact on Dash value predictions.
Dash holds the most decentralised crypto status through decentralised API (DAPI). It is fully open code, in which experts can create their own wallets and software to interact with the platform. Masternodes provide DAPI operations to verify transactions without slowing data processing speed.
Dash (DASH) price analysis
Dash (DASH) is ranked 30 among cryptocurrencies by market capitalisation at $1,205,897,131. Currently, 9,916,011 of Dash’s 18,900,000 supply is in circulation, meaning over half of the tokens’ maximum number has already been mined. One Dash token is worth $123/0.003505 BTC. Here’s an overview of Dash (DASH):
Dash (DASH) price history
In 2014, when the Dash token first appeared on the cryptocurrency market, it was worth only $0.27. Shortly after launch, the price rose to $2–3, and there were no significant changes in the price chart for nearly three years. Since March 2017, the price has steadily increased thanks to higher adoption rates and large investments.
During the famous 2017–2018 cryptocurrency bull run, Dash’s price peaked in December 2017 with an all-time high of $1,642, followed by a slight decline in price. Later in January 2018, however, there was another big jump when Dash reached $1,285.50. Since then, the coin has seen a general downtrend. The Dash price prediction for 2018 couldn’t have foreseen how brutal the coin’s fate would be, ending the year at $66.
Dash (DASH) price prediction 2019
Observing the Dash coin 2019 price prediction, we can conclude that it was a very tough year. Opening Q1 at $80, the price dropped to the $66 support level, where strong buyers finally stepped in and pushed the price to the range high of $178 by late May. From there, Dash tried to break through resistance at $180 but failed, the last attempt was undertaken on 27 June, and the asset started trending down from there. The rest of the year was bearish for Dash crypto, seeing slight bounces here and there. The asset’s price plunged to $38 by 27 December.
Dash (DASH) price prediction 2020
Dash opened 2020 on a positive note, with its price surging from $40 to $140 on 15 January, tripling gains for Dash dip buyers. However, the asset’s growth was stopped by one of the biggest shocks the cryptocurrency market had ever experienced. On 15 February, Dash began to lose value, plunging to $40 on 13 March. Dash quickly bounced back by making a slight wick below the critical support level, leaving its annual low behind. On 20 March, less than a week later, buyers pushed Dash coin above the $65 resistance level. Securing $65 as a solid support level, the cryptocurrency traded in the $65–85 range until early August, when the Dash crypto coin made a quick breakout above $104 on 6 August. However, the asset failed to secure support at $85 and plunged to $65 by early September. In November, Dash continued trending upward, reaching $120. By the end of the year, the price formed a new support level at $85.
Dash (DASH) technical analysis
According to technical analysis of DASH/USDT’s 4-hour chart, the asset is currently consolidating bullishly above the 200-Day Moving Average, as well as the 12- and 26- Day Exponential Moving Averages. The nearest trend supports are $110/$94/$85. The closest resistance levels are located at $135/$150. Currently, Dash is trading hands for $123 per token, which is below the bearish cross of the 12- and 26- EMAs. In the short-term, the token looks bearish and is primed to retest the $110 support level. The full shift to bearish might be considered once Dash’s price falls below the 200MA, with a daily close below that level.
Dash (DASH) price prediction for 2021, 2022, 2023, 2025, 2030
The cryptocurrency’s price is regulated by various factors and is continually changing. Due to market volatility, making an accurate Dash price prediction isn’t easy. As the cryptocurrency industry matures and grows, government regulations are coming into effect. From a government standpoint, privacy coins are a significant threat because anonymous users are free to transfer their wealth without taxes and regulations. It’s difficult to predict how this question will be resolved in the future.
Constant pressure from the government on privacy and freedom of thought is a 21st-century challenge. However, seeing a project like Dash being developed that is backed by the community and embraces decentralisation, security and privacy, we can conclude that demand for such values will only grow in a global society. Let’s review the most credible Dash coin price predictions from cryptocurrency experts to see what they say.
Trading Beasts Dash (DASH) price prediction for 2021, 2022, 2023, 2025, 2030
Trading Beasts’ Dash coin price prediction states that its price will grow long-term. While Dash’s current price is $123, Trading Beasts expects that it may fall slightly to the $90 support level in 2021. However, Dash’s price will recover and grow through 2022–2023. By 2024, they predict that it’ll trade in the $150–200 range.
WalletInvestor Dash (DASH) price prediction for 2021, 2022, 2023, 2025, 2030
Per WalletInvestor’s Dash crypto price prediction, Dash is a bad long-term investment. According to them, the price may drop to $20 by mid-2021, but by December 2021, it could fully recover from the drop, rising to $110. However, in the coming years, WalletInvestor expects that the asset will keep falling and may trade in the $20–40 range by 2025.
CoinSwitch Dash (DASH) price prediction for 2021, 2022, 2023, 2025, 2030
According to CoinSwitch’s Dash future price prediction, the Dash token’s price may rise in the coming years. As the demand for privacy and the adoption level grow, so, too, does Dash’s value. CoinSwitch predicts that Dash price may rise to $950 by 2021 and will keep growing to $2822 by the end of 2025.
Dash (DASH) overall value predictions in the future
Dash’s major strength lies in the system’s publicity. The coin’s creator, Evan Duffield, is actively involved in improving the platform and is joined by a team of developers in these efforts. The marketing strategy is aimed at intense advertising, which gives its results as every second participant of the crypto market knows about Dash. The platform uses new developments — such as InstantSend and PrivateSend, among others — that allow the team to solve problems that have become a tangible obstacle for other cryptocurrencies.
Will Dash (DASH) go up?
As one of the oldest projects in the market, the Dash team is working to improve the product and improve the Dash cryptocurrency’s security and privacy. Keeping in mind that the project has practical applications, we can conclude that, as it is used more widely, the ecosystem will continue to grow along with Dash’s value.
Dash’s (DASH) price prediction today
Dash has grabbed all crypto market participants’ attention. Based on these facts, we can state that Dash remains an attractive asset for future investments. It can be safely considered as a long-term earning tool, with strong prospects for higher demand thanks to the confidentiality and security it provides for transactions. Many cryptocurrency experts agree that the Dash project represents the future of decentralised cryptocurrencies. | https://medium.com/stormgain-crypto/dash-dash-price-prediction-for-2021-2022-2023-2024-2025-2030-3b401187ab1c | [] | 2021-01-15 15:08:12.252000+00:00 | ['Blochchain', 'Stormgain', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Cryptoinvestement', 'Dash'] |
My First 4 weeks at GECKO | This is my tale on how I got myself working in Ireland’s top ranked Blockchain-based RegTech company, “GECKO”.
I wanna start off by saying a huge thanks to my family, cats🐈 , friends, and teachers involved in my journey from being a student to securing my first software engineer job.
It all began when I started the search looking for a crypto or blockchain-based company to do user research on the mobile application I had been working on as part of my final year project, which embraced the idea of sentiment analysis and its use in the cryptocurrency space. It ended up with introduction to GECKO’s CEO, Shane Brett, and the rest is history .
I work with an excellent team of people, who are wickedly smart, and always help me learn different aspects of business every single day. We always kick start our day with a dose of caffeine and some laughter. Working in a such a relaxed environment with open discussion about tech, business, and future plans allows me to absorb and give back the most I can.
Settling in
When I first started work for GECKO I had absolutely no idea what to expect and what work I would be assigned. Now having worked in the team for 4 weeks, one thing is certain, that I have been pleasantly surprised. So far every day has been dedicated to learning and the best part is that I have been allowed to do it at my own pace .
First Week
In my first week I was given some learning resources which not only included books and online resources, but also movies (how awesome is that). I was also given talks on various elements involved in the business and what problems we are trying to solve. I loved it how I was first taught to understand the business, getting funds lectures, before even diving into the code. I also came across lots of buzzwords and names which I kept forgetting until my colleague Stephen set up a dictionary-like document for me, which helped me grasp those better.
Second Week
By the Second week things have already started to get more awesome and technical. I have started learning a new programming language, Rust, which I recently learned is the underlying factory to Facebook’s Libra project. It was full of copying, breaking, and just learning how to set up a new project. In no time I was able to run a smart contract by Centrality’s pl^g blockchain framework which seemed like a magic to me, at first not making much sense, it seemed like another mountain to climb.
Third Week
The third week was a mix of various task and eventually things have started going into my head. I have been hearing some keywords over last two weeks and finally it’s making sense. I can at last follow most of the conversation. I was given a good all round tutorial into the world of funds and have been continuing my Rust adventure. Smart contracts are much more clear to me and I have been reading couple of books to get a more comprehensive understanding. Another hurdle I jumped this week was setting up the Kx Database which took quite an effort to get fully setup and working, but it is one of the most powerful analytics tool I have ever witnessed .
Fourth Week
Week four and its the first time I knew and understood what were the milestones of the week ahead and what my plan was. I was more confident than ever about the work being done and realised what my colleagues were working on, and what I could be expected to provide. I have written my first smart contract and got involved a little bit more into Solidity and how to run it in different test and local networks. Also, I was able to get my hands dirty with the Libra project and check out behind the scenes.
It has been a tremendous time learning and working with the GECKO team and I can’t wait to see and compare how much more I can do and learn in another month, but that’s for another post ;)
Akshat Jain
[email protected]
About GECKO Governance
GECKO Governance provides a suite of Advisory, Consulting and Technology services to the crypto and asset management industries.
The company was founded in 2014 and built the first RegTech solution globally to integrate with Blockchain.
The team have over 120+ years combined financial & crypto compliance experience and are based at 3 global offices — New York, Ireland (HQ) and Sydney, Australia.
Our Advisory and Consulting business provides clients with definitive compliance solutions for their crypto and fund projects on a global basis. | https://medium.com/@geckogovernance/my-first-4-weeks-at-gecko-7860214abe73 | ['Gecko Governance'] | 2019-07-22 11:32:20.833000+00:00 | ['Blockchain', 'Technology', 'Smart Contracts', 'Software Development', 'Ethereum'] |
少年 君の空撮データは何色だ！ | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/furuhashilab/%E5%B0%91%E5%B9%B4-%E5%90%9B%E3%81%AE%E7%A9%BA%E6%92%AE%E3%83%87%E3%83%BC%E3%82%BF%E3%81%AF%E4%BD%95%E8%89%B2%E3%81%A0-5a29fb759ca9 | ['Taichi Furuhashi'] | 2020-12-10 08:31:16.503000+00:00 | ['Drone', 'Taichifuruhashi', 'Github', 'Furuhashilab', 'Dronebird'] |
More Than Friends: It’s a Date | Image by Maura Barbulescu from Pixabay
If you are new to this series, which started as a plan for a sexy short story, but quickly overtook my life.
Previous Chapter: Show Time
Start the the beginning
TJ
I stroke Chloe’s hair. I want to fuck her. My hard-on is raging, but she’s exhausted from everything I pushed and dragged her through. Her hair is sticking to her face from sweat, her heart hasn’t slowed to normal, her breaths are too shallow. She needs care not a good fucking.
“Now I get you a snack then a shower if you want it.”
“What about you?” She gropes behind her but it’s half-hearted.
I grab her arm and press it down against her side. “Chloe, I can tie you to the bed if you can’t let me care for you. Don’t worry about me.”
I kiss her neck. I go to the kitchen and slice an apple. Adding crackers and a couple slices of cheese creates a well-rounded snack. I return to her with the snack and a glass of water.
She’s asleep. I set the snack aside and strip my clothes away. My dick is still hard from the Cinnamon experience.
Lying beside her, I stroke the shaft.
I imagine what I wanted to do with her. Order her to her knees to suck me off, fuck her, come inside her, bury my face in her cunt and lick her until she comes.
Everything we did last weekend, I want do them again. And a few new activities. Tie her up, tease her, more impact play; I purchased a new flogger and crop curious about which sensation she will enjoy most.
I let her moans echo in my head, especially from the bathroom at the bar. Her cunt gripped my dick so hard when she came I couldn’t stop myself. Calling her a slut turns her on, so did the pain from the clamps. The way her cunt glistened from her arousal, it filled the room and it took all my self control not to dive in and have a taste.
I’m so easy when it comes to her. My cock shudders, and I pump as it spurts pleasure. The warmth of her spice shudders through my body and I can’t hold back a moan.
She shifts beside me, and my heart leaps through my body. Did I wake her? She presses her body against mine, her arm coming over me.
I stroke her arm and she sighs contentedly.
I didn’t plan on staying the night, but I don’t want her to wake alone. First I turn out the light, then set an alarm on my phone early enough to return to my apartment for suitable work clothes. My office’s idea of casual Friday is no tie.
I close my eyes for a moment. Pussy shoving her way between our bodies makes me open them. The cat curls up between us and I roll my eyes before setting down again. “I’d complain but I think I’m the one intruding,” I say.
The cat is purring. I let the sound lull me to sleep.
Next morning
I wake to my alarm. Chloe swipes her arm up at the noise. I roll over and turn it off. I curl back into her, kissing her neck and shoulders.
“You’re still here,” she says.
“I didn’t want you to wake alone and feel used.”
“No?” her voice perks a little.
“No.” I kiss down her back, until I find the spot that makes her sigh and wiggle. I blow on the damp skin then kiss my way back up. “Oh my sweet angel.” Her sweet ass cradles into my lap as we spoon. Could we stay here forever?
“I’m sorry I crashed — ”
I grab skin between my teeth. “Do not be sorry. I ambushed you showing up. I needed to see you and I thought it would be a good way to keep your boundary.”
Chloe thrusts her shoulder against me. “I guess it didn’t violate my polices. I don’t — ”
To get her attention, I bite her again. “I have to tell you something.”
“What time is it?”
I smack her ass. “Listen, Chloe.”
She sniffs. “I’m listening.”
“Under duress. There is something you need to hear.” I roll her to her stomach and kiss up her spine. “I love you.
She tries to roll over but I hold her down. “Don’t say anything, don’t move. Just enjoy.” I nip at her shoulder, then kiss from her bicep to her wrist. I suck the soft skin of her inner wrist into my mouth and she gasps.
“Tay — ”
“I love the way you moan, the way you come, the way you gasp when I give you a command. I wanted to tell you before I have to leave.” With a sigh I roll away to check the time. Is there enough time to tease her? When I move back to kiss her good morning, she slides her hands to my dick.
Fuck yes, I suppose there is.
“I will need a morning quickie,” she says stroking me.
My cock is instantly hard. Whatever my girl needs I will provide. I part her thighs and find her slick, ready for me. There’s quick and there’s instant; I want the former. I stroke her clit with my thumb until her nails dig into my shoulders.
She rolls to her side, pressing back her butt nestles into my belly. My cock nudges between her legs. She’s so slick, so ready for me I slip in. I wrap my arm around her and stimulate her clit while I move inside her. She moves with me, her body gripping me despite the liquid.
That’s all it takes to push me over the edge. I’ve fucked her so many times and after it seems as if I want her more than before we started. I am insatiable, and not just the sex, I love being around her.
Deep inside her I shudder a release, but I keep going until it’s too painful to move. Then I slow my touches on her clit until I’m brushing, teasing. “Can you come like this?” I tease her ear with my mouth.
She shakes her head, her hips rocking as she tries to get more friction. “Harder, please.”
“Beg. Beg me to hurt you.” I scrape my teeth across her shoulder.
“God, I love when you hurt me,” she moans, her back arching. “Hurt me, TJ. Make me come, Sir.”
She’s a fucking Goddess. “You know what I’d love to do? Put the clover clamp on you here.” I pinch her clit.
She cries out and I sink my teeth into her shoulder. I would love to draw blood but we haven’t discussed that limit. I rub the squeezed clit between my fingers, making her squirm against me.
“That’s my girl. Come for me.” I soothe her with some gentle flicks of my finger as her thighs clamp against my hand. The muscles under her skin ripple as her throat pours out a song of pleasure.
I drop my head against hers as our bodies slow and cool.
After a while she groans and stretches. “I don’t want to leave this bed.”
I nuzzle her. “Me neither.”
“I’m tempted to call out of work. I haven’t missed a day in months.”
“That is rather tempting.” I flip my head to the side, my heart picking up pace.
She rolls over and grabs her phone. Her eyes stick to mine as she speaks to her boss in a weak voice. “Too sick to come in. I don’t want to pass this on to anyone else.” She’s a good actress, and it makes me wonder if she’s cultivated her skill from acting on camera.
I hold my breath until she hangs up and I call in myself, but I’m less tense. My boss doesn’t give a fuck.
When I’m done, I roll her to her back, kissing her deeply. “We’re free for three days.”
“I guess drinks tonight are out.” I notice a hint of disappointment in her voice. We haven’t been out at all. I’ve been treating her like Cinnamon because I can’t keep my hands off her or my dick out of her. But she needs romance, she needs to know I want her outside the bedroom.
“Let’s go out tonight. What sounds good? Dinner and a movie? Dancing and drinks?”
“Dinner and drinks.”
I brush my lips over her her eyes and cheeks. “You won’t get me drunk and take advantage of me will you?” I rest my forehead against hers, enjoying the moment.
She rubs her nose against mine, which is also her shaking her head. “Tay?” her voice is a whisper. Her body is tense.
I roll away from her and turn her to her belly. I bite her shoulder. “Chloe, my sweet Chloe.” I brush her hair to the side and kiss the back of her neck. My lips travel down her spine, my tongue darting out to taste her salty skin. I stop at her lower back and kiss across to her hip. I grab her ass with my hands, pressing hard into her muscle.
My lips move back up her body until she’s limp and primed. I lay body across hers, pressing her down with my weight. I tease the outer shell of her ear. “Sweet Chloe, I never told you how you make me feel.”
“No.” She isn’t tense.
“I love you Chloe.”
“You don’t want Cinnamon?” she gives voice to her fears. Has her worry been building in her the whole time?
“Cinnamon is an aspect of you. If pretending you are someone else helps you during sex, that’s fine. It’s you who I want. All of you. The sexy slut and the sweet good girl.”
My dick stirs against her leg, and I ignore it. I can’t help how she turns me on.
“I’ve been afraid to love you. Afraid that you still had feelings for Sherry.” She buries her face in my shoulder. “I love you so much Tay. All the times we cried together and laughed. We’ve shared so much.” Her voices cracks and her body jerks.
I draw back to look at her face and I realize she’s crying. My hands cradle her face. “Oh sweet angel. You are my best friend. You’ve been my everything since — when I needed you.” I roll to my back and tug her so I can hold her. She crawls between my legs, her head on my chest, still sobbing.
“I’m not unhappy, just overwhelmed,” she manages.
I stroke her hair thinking of everything we’ve done, everything I’ve demanded of her, and she’s risen to every challenge. Has it been too much? “I’ve been a selfish Dominant, only using you for what I needed, what I wanted. I haven’t been mindful of your wants.”
She rubs her cheek against my chest, wiping the tears away. “I wanted everything we’ve done Taylor. I was the one who demanded you make good on all your promises the first weekend.”
“I let you over extend yourself for my selfish whims. And then I sprung my deep feelings on you when you were vulnerable.”
She pulls away, the tears of overwhelm replaced with lightning. I’ve unleashed a storm and here comes the thunder. “I am an adult. I can make my own choices. If I have a hard time after that’s my problem, not yours. You might top me, but I’m still capable of saying yes or no to you. Right? If I said donkey or stop, you’d stop?”
“Yes. You are right.” I squeeze her. “I hate when you are hurting.”
She relaxes again and my heart constricts. I want to take care of her, but I can take it to extremes. Something Sherry and I fought about more than once.
I kiss Chloe’s head.
“Can I tell you something?” she asks. “About why I won’t rely on you for money.”
My heart leaps. Yes. “Please.”
“You know I have an older sister.”
“Yes.”
“She got married just after college. And she got pregnant right away and quit her job. Her husband turned out to be an ass and she was screwed for a couple years. I was still in high school when it happened, and it was pretty horrifying. It’s not personal, but I don’t want to be in a position where someone else can control me. Or fuck me over. I mean if something happens I’ll be fucked up emotionally, but losing my ability to take care of myself will fuck up my life.”
She twists in my arms so she can look up at me. “I hope you understand. I can give you more details.”
I pull her closer. I want to assure her I’d never do something that could fuck her over. But I know better. Even what seems like the best relationship can break. “I want to say I’d never do that, but I never thought I’d get dumped months before my fucking wedding. So we’ll figure things out.” I cover her hand with mine and lace our fingers.
“I love you,” she says her face still tipped up to mine. “I’m sorry I freaked out.”
“I’m sorry I wanted to fix it and stopped the cleansing.”
“We should get up, shower and eat. Were you serious about going out tonight?”
“Do you want to go out?” She deserves to be treated like the angel she is.
“I’d like that.” She smiles, relaxed, happy.
Guilt punches me in the gut. “I should have asked you earlier but I couldn’t keep my hands off you. I don’t know if I can manage tonight.”
“Nothing I didn’t want. I was the one who dragged you into that bathroom.” She lifts our hands and kisses my fingers.
“Then I bent you over the sink and called you my dirty slut.”
She groans and stretches. “That was so fucking hot, Tay. I used that so many times to get off.”
My dick flexes. “You are a dirty slut.”
She smirks. “I am your dirty slut.”
I wiggle out from under her once my feet are on the floor I pick her up. “Come on then dirty girl, you need to get clean.”
Next Chapter: A Perfect Date | https://medium.com/asrais-purple-prose/more-than-friends-its-a-date-1eb6aba618cd | ['Asrai Devin'] | 2019-08-14 19:51:52.384000+00:00 | ['Erotica', 'Friends To Lovers', 'BDSM', 'Smut'] |
+1(802)722–2574, Factory Reset Google Chromecast When Chromecast Not Working | When do you have to reset Chromecast (factory information reset)?
More often than not, it isn’t important to factory reset Chromecast (factory information reset). The gadget update itself when associated with web. It only from time to time gives issue.However you call on toll free Support Number.
However, in the accompanying two situations, you likely need to reset Chromecast:
• You change your remote switch. Chromecast can just recall one system. In the event that you changed your switch, you can either re-do the arrangement (you may pursue this Chromecast arrangement control) if the old system isn’t in run, or just reset Chromecast.
• Chromecast hangs or stops. You can attempt to plug out the USB control link, at that point check whether Google Chromecast works in the wake of stopping the link back. Be that as it may, if this doe not work or Chromecast hangs habitually, it is smart thought to reset Chromecast (factory information reset) before calling Google support or restoring the unit.
How to reset Chromecast (factory information reset)?
It is very easy to factory reset Chromecast. There are two different ways to factory reset Chromecast.
Technique 1: Use the button on Chromecast to reset Chromecast
Hold down the button (alongside the miniaturized scale USB port) on your google Chromecast for in any event 25 seconds or until the strong light starts blazing. At that point detach the USB control link. Hold up a couple of moments. Associate the USB link once more. This will factory reset Chromecast (factory information reset).
Since there is just one button on Chromecast, you without a doubt won’t miss it.
Strategy 2: Using Google Chromecast App in your gadgets to reset Chromecast
This strategy is just pertinent when regardless you can associate with Chromecast from your gadget (e.g., an Android telephone or tablet).
Once in a while, if Google Chromecast essentially stops and you can’t interface with it from your gadget, you at that point need to utilize strategy 1 referenced above to reset Chromecast.
To reset Chromecast, you need start the Chromecast App on your gadget, discover and interface with it. When associated, tap the menu button, you will see the data on this Chromecast dongle, and a popup window.
visit: https://www.instanttfn.com/blog/how-to-factory-reset-google-chromecast | https://medium.com/@mariasmith0158/1-8662012001-factory-reset-google-chromecast-when-chromecast-not-working-9d9e72801552 | ['Maria Smith'] | 2020-06-04 15:18:34.233000+00:00 | ['Google Chromecast Setup', 'Chromecast', 'Chromecast Not Working', 'Factory Reset Chromecast', 'Google Chromecast'] |
Day 9 of 30 Days of Kink: The Awakening of Fallon Monroe Part III | CHAPTER 5
Gasps, murmuring and straight out laughter greeted us. I chuckled. Humiliation was good for the soul. I saw Cam’s bubblegum slave with a leash around her neck, kneeling next to another man.
That was how it happened in this world. Another Master would take a slave away another if they weren’t on their game.
We walked — well, I walked, and Cam crawled — through throngs of people in various states of undress and sexual entanglement until we got to the table that held many different sexual devices. Selecting a stainless steel cock and ball ring I applied it to Cam before leading him to a wall of women ready to service anyone who asked.
I recognized Parker immediately from her mask and winked. That was her part of the deal. She would help me as long as she was the only one who would taste my cum. I didn’t have any objections to that at all.
I picked her and three other women out of the group and sat in a chair. I instructed the ladies to make Cam feel good. Four sets of lips on him — two on his dick and one on each of his nipples — had him groaning out loud. I motioned for Parker, and she settled between my thighs, ready to work that pretty mouth of hers.
Cam growled and attempted to remove Parker, but I yanked his leash, his head snapping back from the force. Shoving my finger in his mouth, I licked his earlobe.
“Be a good boy and share,” I whispered before biting him.
A good two minutes didn’t pass before my cum was being swallowed by Parker. She was good with the mouth — damn good. She laid her head on my thigh, and I stroked her head while we both watched Cameron struggle not to climax.
The more his dick swelled, the tighter the cock and ball ring got. The head of his brown dick was now a funny colored purple. His nipples were as hard as bullets. Sweat poured down on him as he fought to get away from the girls. He bit his lip so hard he drew blood.
The scent of desperation emitted from his pours. He was close. He opened his eyes and slowly turned his head in my direction. His eyes pleaded with me, but I needed to hear the words.
“P — please let me cum.”
Tears fell from the corners of his eyes, and I laughed.
“No, not yet.”
Yanking him up by his chain, I led him back to our room. Parker followed.
I immediately tied Cam to the chair. Placing another chair in front of him, I had Parker sit in it. I put a ball gag in Cameron’s mouth before kissing the tip of his pulsating dick.
Next, I got Parker situated with a vibrating strap-on. I licked and kissed her pointed nipples while stroking her hot pink dick. Cam’s choppy breathing bounced off the walls. Slowly, I sat on top of Parker, giving Cam a clear view of my pussy hugging each inch as it slipped inside me.
I moaned in earnest. I felt alive. This was what I had been missing, and I was going to make up for it. Cum dripped down my thighs heavily, trailing down to my foot. I placed my pedicured toes near Cam’s face and watched as he struggled in vain to lick them.
It was time to take things to another level.
“Do you want to fuck me?”
He nodded.
“Do you want to feel this tight, wet pussy?”
He tried to talk but only drool slipped from around the ball gag. I spread my pussy lips as I circled and bounced my hips, displaying my engorged clit. His moan was heavy with longing.
“Speak up!” He tried, and I laughed. “Do you want to cum inside?”
Sliding off of Parker, I turned around and sucked my cum off of her dick. The motion intensified the vibrations to her clit. Abruptly I slammed my pussy down on Cam’s thick dick. He screamed in ecstasy.
I ground my hips into him. “Is this what you wanted?”
He whimpered.
As quickly as I got on his dick, I hopped off of it. Turning the vibrations up on the strap-on, I bounced and worked my hips on Parker. It was time for the big finale.
“You said I couldn’t handle you,” I shouted over Parker’s escalating moans. Cam’s eyes snapped to mine, and it was at that moment he realized my accent was gone. “You said you didn’t want me.”
Bending over, I grabbed his knees for leverage and sucked his dick into my mouth. His hips bucked. I ripped off my mask and looked in him in the eye.
“You said you need a woman who was comfortable in her own sexuality.”
Leaning back, I fondled my clit. Both Parker and I squirted at the same time, the hot sticking cum landing on or near Cameron’s dick.
“You said that woman wasn’t me.”
I released the cock and ball ring and watched as his dick shot cum straight into the air. Removing myself from a semi-comatose Parker, I kissed her deeply before removing the still vibrating strap-on.
I turned to Cam, and his eyes pleaded for understanding. I dropped to my knees and licked and stroked him until he was once again hard as a rock. Leaning towards him, I licked his earlobe while pinching his nipples.
“I guess you were wrong.”
Grabbing Parker’s hand, I walked us out of the room.
As we got into the car, I glanced over at Parker. Her hand was buried in her pussy. Smiling, I shook my head. She wasn’t done with me yet. It was going to be a long night.
CHAPTER 6
“Kyle! Kyle!”
Turning around quickly, I glanced in the direction I heard my name being called from. My heart dropped to my knees when I saw Cameron dodging cars and running across the street to get to me.
It had been over a month since I had seen him. I found my own place and moved out of Parker’s. I was sure she appreciated it because Cameron had been semi-stalking her home since that night.
I should have known this was coming.
I had studied sex like most people study for a degree and if there was one thing I knew it was that most men wanted the pussy they couldn’t have. Especially if they used to have unlimited access to said pussy and threw it out on the street!
I watched as he made his way to me. He looked like shit. A part of me was sad. The other part — Fallon — was happy since he so quickly cast me aside for another bitch, a bitch he no longer had.
“What do you want, Cameron?” I sighed impatiently.
I had a long day, and all I wanted was to go home and relax. I didn’t have the time or the energy to rehash things out with him. He had begged, pleaded, and apologized all over my answering machine and Facebook page.
I forgave him.
There was nothing left to say.
“Five minutes of your time, Kyle. That’s all I’m asking for. Please?”
Pushing my purse further up on my shoulder, I moved out of the way of the pedestrians crowding the sidewalk.
“Five minutes and you’ll leave me alone afterward? No more texts, phone calls, or gifts?”
He nodded quickly. “Whatever you want, Kyle.”
I turned around and walked into a pub that my coworkers and I frequented, knowing he would follow. I asked for a table in the back, and we sat down. Quickly our drink orders were brought to us. While I sipped my bourbon, I watched him watch me.
“Say what you have to say.” He reached across the table for my hands. I deftly moved them away from his grasp. “You can say it without touching me.”
Resigned, he ran a hand down his unshaven face.
“I fucked up, Kyle. I know that now. Instead of voicing my concerns to you, I dropped you. That was wrong, and I apologize for that. I was arrogant. I was selfish. I wasn’t the best man I could be. However, I’m not the only one at fault here. You went through the relationship pretending to be something you not, pretending to enjoy something you didn’t. Had we both been upfront about what we wanted we would probably still be together.”
As he continued on with his litany of reasons our relationship failed, I mulled over his last words.
I couldn’t deny the sting of truth. I hadn’t gone into the relationship being who I really was, and neither had he.
As I looked across the table flashbacks of that night ran in my mind, Cameron and I together — both of us at our best — displaying our true selves. Beauty in its purest form.
There was no way I could go back to the way things were between us. Fallon was out of her cage and running wild. I liked it that way. That night opened my eyes to a lot of things.
One, I had feelings for Parker.
Two, I was still in love with Cam.
Three, I wasn’t cut out for a vanilla relationship.
Was it possible for me to have it all — a stable relationship and a fulfilling sex life?
Hours later as I rode the hell out of Cam’s dick and felt Parker’s flicks to my clit I got my answer. While I held both of their chains tightly in my hands and bit back my screams, it hit me.
Yes.
I, Kyle “Fallon” Monroe could have it all. | https://medium.com/the-aambc-journal/day-9-of-30-days-of-kink-the-awakening-of-fallon-monroe-part-iii-4690b07ab750 | ['Phoenix Williams'] | 2019-07-19 18:35:34.083000+00:00 | ['Lovestory', 'Romance', 'Short Story', 'Erotica', 'Kink'] |
Not Your Typical “Mom” | How an under-the-radar series evolved from a typical network sitcom into one of the boldest and most nuanced depictions of addiction and recovery in television history.
The cast of “Mom” at PaleyFest 2018 (from left to right: Jamie Pressly, Anna Faris, Allison Janney, Mimi Kennedy, and Beth Hall)
Like all people, my personal life has been affected by drug and alcohol abuse. I have beloved family members who have engaged in lifelong battles with it and friends that have come precipitously close to the edge of disaster. But I have a less common vantage point through my work as a clinical psychologist.
In my two years of training at the VA Medical Center, I worked with Veterans struggling with substances every day. In the pain management clinic, I worked with Veterans who became addicted to prescription opiates after years of struggling with chronic pain from service-related injuries. In the women’s clinic, I worked with female Veterans who abused alcohol to numb the pain associated with sexual trauma. In the HIV clinic, I worked with gay male Veterans who used crystal meth as an antidote to the shame of the identities they were forced to hide during their service. The paths to addiction and the drugs of choice frequently differed, but the resulting destruction was remarkably similar.
Countless films and television series have touched on addiction with differing success. Two of the best films that come to mind are Traffic and Requiem for a Dream, both of which use ensemble casts and intersecting plot lines to examine multiple aspects of the impact of addiction. Other highlights are harrowing character studies like Trainspotting, Thirteen, The Basketball Diaries, Flight, and Leaving Las Vegas. Portraits of addiction are common on the small screen as well. The pilot of Murphy Brown featured the main character returning from a stint at the Betty Ford Center. Don Draper’s alcoholism was a constant presence from start to finish on Mad Men. And recent streaming and premium cable hits like Orange is the New Black, Nurse Jackie, and Shameless delve deeply into the subject matter. But arguably no long-running series has ever put addiction and recovery front and center on an ongoing basis until Mom.
Promotional image for “Mom” (Copyright CBS)
The Evolution of “Mom”
Mom did not start out with addiction and recovery front and center. When it premiered on CBS in the fall of 2013, it was marketed as a family comedy from super producer Chuck Lorre (Two and a Half Men, The Big Bang Theory). The first season centered on Christy Plunkett (House Bunny and Scary Movie comedienne Anna Faris), a 35-year-old waitress at an upscale restaurant in Napa, California juggling her children Violet (Sadie Calvano) and Roscoe (Blake Garrett Rosenthal), her pot-smoking ex-husband Baxter (Matt L. Jones), her affair with her married boss Gabriel (Nate Corddry), and the return of her estranged mother Bonnie (7-time Emmy winner and reigning Best Supporting Actress Oscar winner Allison Janney). The fact that Christy and Bonnie were drug addicts in early recovery was mentioned frequently but not necessarily central, as most of the first season focused on Christy’s dating life, Violet’s unplanned pregnancy, and Bonnie’s ire at Christy’s desire to get to know her biological father.
Fast forward to its current season (its fifth) and things look very different. The show focuses equally on Christy and Bonnie and the supporting cast is comprised almost entirely of their female support network with whom they work the Alcoholics Anonymous program. These women are Marjorie (Dharma & Greg’s Mimi Kennedy), a woman with decades of sobriety who serves as a sponsor to many; Jill, a divorced socialite who is forced to confront harsh new realities as she struggles to maintain her sobriety; and Wendy (Beth Hall), a meek nurse who finally comes into her own when she gets clean. The plot arcs this season have focused on the relapse of Jill and Bonnie’s half-brother Ray (Leonard Roberts), the transfer of addictions from substances to junk food and caffeine, the futile search for quick fixes and miracle cures for the disease of addiction, and how the codependency fostered by their particular twelve-step program threatens the survival of Bonnie and Christy’s new romantic relationships, with a paraplegic former stunt man (Prison Break’s William Fichtner) and his estranged brother (Wings’ Stephen Weber).
The shift in the show occurred fairly gradually over the second and third seasons, as everyone except Christy and Bonnie exited the show. Christy’s daughter Violet turned 18 and went off to make her own destructive decisions. Her son Baxter went to live with her ex-husband who had now cleaned up his act by marrying an affluent, uptight woman (Less Than Perfect’s Sarah Rue). Christy ended her affair with her boss and the restaurant changed management. With these changes, the parenting child-rearing element and the workplace antics were all but eliminated and the focus shifted to addiction and recovery.
What makes Mom unique isn’t merely that it’s a multi-camera network sitcom with female addicts front and center — although that in and of itself is quite an anomaly. What truly makes it worthy of greater attention and acclaim than it has received is how accurately it does it. Over the course of the five seasons, Bonnie and Jill relapsed and retained sobriety. Two key recurring characters abandoned recovery for good and returned to risky behaviors; Regina (Oscar winner Octavia Spencer) because she felt God was all she needed and Ray because he was just too deeply in denial about his affliction. Christy became a sponsor for the first time and had to cope with her sponsee returning to drug use and fatally overdosing. Christy became reunited with her biological father only to have him die of a heart attack. We learned about the rape that sent Christy spiraling into drug use and the childhood abandonment that turned Bonnie into an ice-cold monster. (In fact, the season three premiere in which we meet Bonnie’s mother, played by Oscar winner Ellen Burstyn, is a series highlight). Marjorie has struggled to reconnect with her estranged son, had her faith shaken by the relapse of her own sponsor, and had her life upended by her new husband’s massive stroke. Christy and Bonnie even became homeless for a time.
But the transition to bolder subject matter hasn’t robbed the show of its light. It remains genuinely funny and has celebrated profound growth in its characters. These women have made amends, put their lives back on track, and found love. Perhaps most importantly, they have found each other and given each other the supportive family system they were all lacking. The juxtaposition of tragedy and humor may seem jarring, but it is the only way the show can be authentic. This is how recovery works. It’s a messy, nonlinear process filled with enormous triumphs and tragic setbacks.
Mom’s willingness to tackle dark subject matter alone doesn’t necessarily set it apart in sitcom history. Shows like All in the Family, Maude, M*A*S*H, The Golden Girls, Family Ties, Roseanne, and others have been interrupting the laugh track for socially important drama for nearly a half century. But this trend has faded in recent years, as series have gravitated toward one of three categories — the half hour sitcom that is 100% comedy, the hourlong drama that is 100% serious, and the occasional “dramedy,” which is more often than not just an hourlong drama that has elements of humor. The half hour sitcom that frequently depicts tragedy is an anomaly in the current landscape.
Although it has never garnered the media attention of co-creator Chuck Lorre’s other recent CBS hits like Two and a Half Men and The Big Bang Theory, it has nevertheless become a steady performer for the network. It holds its own in the ratings in a tough time slot (Thursdays at 9pm) where it airs opposite the Will & Grace revival and ABC’s buzzy block of Shonda Rhimes dramas. It has also won some awards, although these are entirely confined to Janney’s performance. The esteemed actress won two of her seven Emmys in the category of Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series for the show and has since been promoted to the category of Outstanding Lead Actress. Janney is undeniably brilliant. It’s hard to believe that this is her first time doing a multi-camera comedy. Although, after seven seasons on The West Wing, several stints on Broadway, and a slew of feature films, it would be foolish to assume there is any medium she can’t excel at. But the attention heaped on Janney, however deserved, distracts from the fact that this truly is an ensemble show. Anna Faris turns in a truly impressive performance in each and every episode, while Mimi Kennedy and Jamie Pressly have done award-worthy work of their own. (And I have no doubt Beth Hall could as well if they gave her some meatier material.) Then there’s the writing. Although the jokes don’t always exactly hit the bullseye and some episodes — particularly those about the main characters’ love life — can be a tad run-of-the-mill, the remarkably skillful balance of the comic and tragic is something truly special and worthy of admiration. In my opinion, the combination of the pitch perfect acting and brave writing makes it one of the best and most important comedies currently on television.
My Afternoon with “Mom”
Allison Janney uses Anna Faris’s back to sign an autograph at PaleyFest 2018
A couple of weeks ago, I had the opportunity to spend an afternoon in the presence of the cast and co-creator of Mom at PaleyFest, the Paley Center for Media’s annual festival that fetes various television series. After screening an upcoming episode, the five primary cast members and co-creator came out for a Q&A that lasted over an hour. There were two primary topics of discussion. One, which I have covered at length here, is how the show evolved to focus on addiction and recovery. The other, which I barely touched on here, is how unique it is that the show is a woman-dominated affair. The beautiful sisterhood that exists among the ensemble was evident throughout and they shared a variety of moving and humorous anecdotes covering topics like their own struggles with anxiety, the struggle to break into Hollywood, what it’s like to be an aging actress in Hollywood, and the impact of one of their own having astronomical success (Janney’s recent Oscar win came in the midst of filming this season).
The talented and charming Anna Faris graciously joined me for a grainy selfie.
I had the chance to ask a question of the panel. After remarking on how important I found the series to be particularly as a mental health professional, I asked them if they received pushback from the network about moving their show into darker territory. Co-creator Gemma Baker stated emphatically that they received nothing but support from all involved. It certainly didn’t hurt that co-creator Chuck Lorre, one of the most successful and influential men in the entertainment industry, is in recovery himself. When the panel ended, the cast graciously took selfies, signed autographs, and had meaningful conversations with the fans. I got to take selfies with Anna Faris and Beth Hall, chat with Mimi Kennedy, and although I didn’t get to interact with Allison Janney, I had the pleasure of being a few feet away as she immersed herself in the crowd, taking selfies and cracking jokes.
It was clear at the panel that the show didn’t start off trying to be the voice of women in recovery. Nevertheless, a few dozen episodes in they realized that that’s what their show was destined to be and they embraced it wholeheartedly. Through a steadily evolving process of eliminating what doesn’t work and elaborating upon what is working. In that way, the evolution of Mom is kind of like recovery itself. But without the major setbacks. Mom has continued to grow and shine since it’s premiere nearly 5 years ago. | https://medium.com/rants-and-raves/not-your-typical-mom-87bf6b2d8829 | ['Richard Lebeau'] | 2018-04-09 21:54:38.260000+00:00 | ['Mental Health', 'Recovery', 'Television', 'Addiction', 'Feminism'] |
How to assess, understand and make great stock investments | Introduction
Nowadays, the stock market is all the rage and if you haven’t heard a million things about investing in the market to make money, you must be living under a rock. Just kidding. Maybe only a little. But seriously, if you want to learn more about the process, you have come to the right place to dip your toes into the whole thing. We have tried to describe it in the most simplest of ways possible. We’ll teach you how to assess stocks to make great stock investments.
What is a share/stock?
Let’s start at the basic level and try to understand a stock/share. They mean the same thing for all intensive purposes and are linked to part ownership of a company. Basically, anytime a company decides to raise funds from outside i.e. borrow from regular people, it goes ‘public’. It raises funds by selling partial ownership of the company to people who are sold a ‘share’ in the company. These shares are traded on a stock exchange of some sort. The most popular exchanges are the New York Stock Exchange or NYSE, Nasdaq and DOW.
What’s this exchange you speak of?
These exchanges are marketplaces where shares are bought and sold. When someone is looking to sell a share that they own, they post a price at which they are willing to sell the share. Another person willing to pay that price for the share, submits the sum to the market. The market then matches these two people and facilitates the transaction.
Traditionally you needed a stock broker to transact on your behalf who would charge a small fee for their services. But now, with advances in technology, you can cut out the middleman and conduct all the trading yourself. With apps like Robinhood, Webull and M1 Finance, stock trading is easier than ever before.
Investment Strategies
Now that we have the basics out of the way, let’s talk about some general investment strategies as well. There are 3 general paths that investors take when it comes to stocks and shares.
Option A) Some investors look for short term gains and make money by buying stocks at a lower price and then quickly reselling them at a higher price to make a profit.
Option B) Other investors look to invest in stocks that they believe will return high profits way down the road. Thus they purchase stocks to hold them for a long term basis. If the company, who’s stock they hold, does well and the stock price skyrockets, they sell the shares then to reap benefits.
Option C) Lastly, there are those investors who buy stocks from companies that pay dividends to their stockholders. Their strategy is to hold on to the stocks and simply collect dividends. A dividend is a small percentage of profits paid out to the stockholder by the company as a reward for believing in them and incentivizing them to purchase even more stock and therefore invest further in the company.
What should you choose?
There are benefits and drawbacks to each of the aforementioned strategies. When it comes to the first one, the obvious advantage is the potential for making a quick profit. However, the gains earned on a quick sale of shares are taxed higher than shares held long term. The advantages and disadvantages then of the 2nd strategy are the exact opposite of the first one. The advantage of the third strategy is that as an investor, not only can you earn a consistent income from the dividends, but you also benefit from the stocks appreciating in value overtime. The disadvantage is that you have to have a lot of money invested in the stocks before you can see a return on your investment as dividends, that is substantial enough to be considered an extra source of income.
Dealing with Risks
Investing in stocks, regardless of how you choose to do so, isn’t void of any risks. There is always a chance that a company would stop doing well or worse, go bankrupt. In that case you stand to lose your investments completely. Even well established companies go through a lot of ups and downs in their stock valuations as the market conditions change based on the economy. There is not a single company in the world which doesn’t get impacted by the market upheavals.
So when you have invested in stocks, you must be able to roll with the punches and be able to stomach losses here and there. Here one of the biggest things to keep in mind, especially for the long term investors, is the fact that no one can successfully time the market i.e no one can predict when is the best time to invest in the market to make a profit.
What’s dollar cost averaging?
There have been many studies done to suggest that the dollar cost averaging strategy is a successful one to employ for investing. The strategy encourages the investors to pick a certain frequency (be it once a month or every two weeks etc) and religiously invest in the market without caring for whether the market is up or down. The success of dollar cost averaging is attributed to the fact that by not investing your money in a lump sum, allows you to spread your funds over a period of time. This way over a long enough period of time, you end up avoiding price hikes on average.
Things to consider
As an investor, your job is to make sure that you do your due diligence and research the companies whose stock you invest in. To help you understand some of the jargon that is thrown about in the world of stocks, we have put together a list of the key terms:
A Bull Market: Then the overall stock market experiences an increase in average stock prices over a prolonged period of time, it is said to be a bull market.
A Bear Market: This is then the opposite of the bull market when the stocks are generally losing value over a prolonged period of time.
Market Cap: short for market capitalization. This value is the sum total value of all the stocks of a particular company that are out in the market.
Volume: is the number of shares of a particular stock that are bought or sold during a period of time. This is usually measured daily hence the phrase ‘average daily volume trading’ is often heard.
EPS Growth: Earnings Per Share Growth is a measure of how well the stocks of a company are growing over each quarter or year. Usually an EPS rating of 25% over the year is a good indication that a company is doing well.
Although there are several other terms that you should learn over time, the aforementioned ones ought to give an idea about what to look for in stocks that you are considering buying and when to seize the right opportunity. For instance, a company with a high EPS growth percentage, coupled with a large market capital, should lend credit to its profitability and investor confidence. Similarly, a high volume coupled with bullish and bearish trends ought to give you an idea about large swings in the market in either direction (positive or negative).
In conclusion
To sum it all up, investing in the stock market is a risky proposition. You can choose to have an aggressive or a more conservative approach towards investing, depending on your risk tolerance. Regardless of which route you choose to take, you can manage some of the risks by making informed decisions and investing intelligently. This can help you enjoy a rewarding experience.
Disclaimer: Like all other posts on Hustle Domain, please keep in mind that this post is for educational and entertainment purposes only and is not meant to be financial advice. Please practice caution and do your own research before investing. | https://medium.com/@hustledomain/how-to-assess-understand-and-make-great-stock-investments-2be4d8d59696 | ['Hustle Domain'] | 2021-02-05 03:51:53.213000+00:00 | ['Stock Market', 'Side Hustle', 'Stocks', 'Investment', 'Financial Freedom'] |
Now Is the Time to Sweep for Open Loops | Photo: martin-dm / Getty Images
You know what’s less sustainable than survival mode? Pretending to live in survival mode, telling yourself that everything non-essential can wait until less stressful times, and then fretting over those non-essential things anyway.
Recently, I woke up in the middle of night worried about some old classics: Is it time to renew my car’s registration? When is that doctor’s appointment I pushed back 72 times already? Did I ever respond to that email about a collaboration I’m actually really excited about?
Individually, none of these unresolved issues is that big of a deal. And none is urgent enough to go on my daily to-do list. But our brains tend to focus on incomplete or interrupted tasks — it’s a phenomenon called the Zeigarnik Effect. And having all these open loops, as the writer David Allen calls them, does create some psychic stress.
As Allen writes in his productivity bible Getting Things Done: “An Open Loop is anything pulling at your attention that doesn’t belong where it is, the way it is.” It’s hard to ever reach a state of flow or deep work when part of your subconscious is constantly flitting around back there going “Wait! Did we ever return that library book?” It’s like having an app running in the background that you don’t notice until your phone emits a “low battery” death rattle.
And as creativity coach Sam Chilcott writes:
If many obligations are left resolved in your mind, they will keep battling for your attention throughout the day and even until you go to sleep. Having all these open loops can lead to overwhelm, which leads to stress, which means you can’t concentrate on the task at hand due to knowing there are others out there.
It’s a good time to take a collective breath and gather ourselves. Take an hour today and close as many loops as you can. You’ll be surprised at how stress-relieving it can be just to sweep a handful of tiny tasks clear out of your consciousness. | https://forge.medium.com/now-is-the-time-to-sweep-for-open-loops-a6e862271a8b | ['Amy Shearn'] | 2020-11-10 21:04:00.051000+00:00 | ['Getting Things Done', 'Productivity', 'Stress Management', 'Organization', 'To Do List'] |
7 Times the Underdog Punched Way Above Their Weight | 7 Times the Underdog Punched Way Above Their Weight
At the Battle of Chancellorsville during the American Civil War, Gen. Robert E. Lee led his Confederate army to victory against a Union force twice its size. (Source: Library of Congress)
History is filled with one-sided wars, from the Third Punic War, through the British invasion of Zanzibar (thought to be the shortest armed inter-state conflict ever), and to the 1991 invasion of Iraq, there are several examples of a stronger power striking down its weaker opponent without much trouble.
It has also been common throughout history to see war as a game of numbers: victory inevitably goes to the side with more men, better equipment, or a superior military infrastructure and planning. This was perhaps most widespread in the decades preceding World War I: staff officers dedicated years and decades to cut down a few minutes from the railway mobilization timetable.
In this article, I’ll show seven examples where an outnumbered, outgunned, or both, inferior force managed to either beat its adversary or turn what was seen as a quick, easy fight into one where clearly superior forces were struggling beyond what anyone anticipated. The list is by no means ranked, it is more of a collection than a ‘Top 7’ of such wars.
1. Winter war
This one is a rather well-known example among history fanatics, yet, it remains barely mentioned in multiple school curriculums around the world. Still, the story of how a small country outnumbered ten to one in manpower and up to one hundred to one in technology never ceases to amaze the people who come across the story.
A Finnish machine gun nest in February, 1940 / Source: Military Museum of Finland
In the secret protocol of the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union divided much of Eastern and Northern Europe into spheres of influence. Finland belonged to the Soviet Union based on the pact, and in October 1939 the first Soviet demand arrived: Finland was to cede much of the Karelian Isthmus, some strategic areas in the North, and islands in the Gulf of Finland to the Soviet Union. In addition, Finnish fortifications on the Isthmus were to be destroyed and land leased for a Soviet military base in Southern Finland, within striking distance of Helsinki, Finland’s capital.
In exchange, the Soviets offered minor territorial concessions along the Karelian Isthmus, nowhere near in size or importance to the territory demanded in other parts. The Finns also had their offer: during the negotiations in Moscow they offered much smaller concessions in Karelia — all while preparing for an eventual Soviet attack by quietly mobilizing their military in the form of ‘refreshment training’.
By the second half of November negotiations broke down and everyone knew that war was coming. Most observers and the Soviet leadership expected the war to be quick, decisive, and extremely one-sided. What followed was anything but by even the most moderate estimates, the Soviets lost twice as much in dead (about 50,000 to 25,000 Finnish dead), about four times as much as wounded (roughly 188,000 to 44,000 Finnish wounded), 20 times as many tanks (at least 600 to 20–30) and almost 20 times as many aircraft (a very rough estimate of 1,000 to 62). It is also important to mention that Soviet reports from the period underreported casualties, therefore I gave the lowest later estimate I found. It is worth pointing out, however, that some Russian historians believe the accurate figures to be 120–130,000 Soviet dead and as many as 3,500 tanks lost.
Although Finland lost more territory in the peace treaty, the Winter War helped the country avoid the fate of the Baltic States — Soviet military bases in its territory and eventual occupation either directly or via a communist puppet government.
The war also exposed the apparent weakness of the Soviet military, something which was noticed not only by Germany but the western Allies as well. This ineffectiveness against Finland was caused partly by the environment: a harsh winter and an almost non-existent road network meant the large Soviet columns were easy (or easier) pickings for the Finns utilising guerilla tactics whilst maintaining a high morale sustained by better food, shelter, and winter clothing. But the difficulties faced by the Red Army also showed the devastating effect Stalin’s late 1930s purge of Soviet military leadership had on its effectiveness
2. Indochina Wars
Another obvious example of successful underdogs in war is Vietnam (or its northern half at least), the country that beat not one, but two world powers in relatively quick succession (not to mention the role the Viet Minh had in ending Japanese rule). First of these was France in the late 1940s and early 1950s to end colonial rule, then came the United States of America in the 1960s and early ’70s. In both of these cases, the success of Vietnamese resistance was caused by guerilla tactics that were used to the extreme, much better knowledge and use of terrain, and excellent, almost fanatical morale.
Vietcong forces crossing a river / Source: The Eyewitness History of the Vietnam War by George Esper
While the French and American troops were fighting far from home in a foreign land where they didn’t speak the language, the (North) Vietnamese were fighting close to home, and in many cases, for their home. The latter was more and more reinforced by the atrocities committed by United States (US) troops, partly as a result of terrible communication with the locals and partly due to the extreme stress caused by being constantly harassed by hit-and-run attacks.
As a result of the aforementioned factors, Vietnam gained its independence from France following the catastrophic battle of Dien Bien Phu. Two decades later, North Vietnam made peace with the US in 1973 and reunited the country under communist rule in 1975 — three decades after Ho Chi Minh first declared independence in 1945. The greatest American fear, a ‘red wave’ spreading throughout Southeast Asia didn’t come to pass, it turned out that Ho Chi Minh was genuine in his patriotic desires and only wanted an independent Vietnam. Today, the country is one of the fastest-growing economies in the world.
3. Westerplatte
Now we jump back to World War II. The invasion of Poland by the Third Reich and the Soviet Union is often portrayed as Polish defences rapidly collapsing and the country being overrun extremely quickly. However, his is rather far from the truth. Before being attacked from the rear by the Soviets on 17 September, the Polish put up a fearsome resistance against the attacking Wehrmacht and Waffen SS units.
One of the most impressive feats of such resistance was the case of the fortified Westerplatte military base in Danzig (present-day Gdansk). In the case of a German invasion, the objective for the post consisting of a few concrete bunkers was to delay the enemy and hold out for 12 hours. In September 1939, that turned into resisting for a week, enduring air raids, a naval bombardment, a landing by German marines, and various attempts by engineers to disrupt the remaining fortifications.
The Westerplatte on 8 September 1939, a day after the Polish surrender / Source: Bundesarchiv, Bild 183–2008–0513–500
The roughly 200 defenders of the position distracted more than 3,000 German troops, a battleship, and two torpedo boats. The casualties were also disproportionate: before surrendering on 7 September, the Polish lost 15 dead and 40 wounded, compared to 50 dead and about 150 wounded on the German side.
The Germans were so impressed by the fierce resistance that the Polish commander, Major Sucharski, was allowed to keep his ceremonial saber when surrendering and the German troops stood at attention when the remaining Polish garrison marched out of the post. While Major Sucharski died in 1946, his fate was different from that of many other Polish war heroes who were executed by the new communist leadership — he died of peritonitis in an Allied military hospital in Italy.
4. The 1848–49 Hungarian Uprising
When the revolutionary wave of 1848 — or in Hungary’s case large non-violent protests — reached Pest, the estates general in Pressburg (present-day Bratislava) opted to accept the demands of the people, and thus the Laws of April were created. The king, Ferdinand I of Austria (and V of Bohemia and Hungary) accepted the several acts passed by the estates general and enacted them. As a result, all serfs were liberated, the tax-exemption of the nobility was abolished and the legal framework of a modern state (at least for its time) was created, including a publicly elected parliament and a government responsible not to the king, but to said parliament.
Protesters gathered to the National Museum on 15th March 1848 / Source: Wikimedia Commons
These reforms, however, led to reduced power and influence for the Imperial Court in Vienna. As revolts throughout the Habsburg Empire were brought under control, the reforms in Hungary were seen as less and less desirable and nationalities under Hungarian rule were supported in their revolts against the government in Pest (today’s Budapest) — unsuccessfully. After much hesitation, the Hungarians finally marched on Vienna, only to be badly defeated at Schwechat in late October 1848. Following this, the Hungarian forces retreated from Austria, with the royal army hot on their heels.
Throughout the winter, as expected, the regular Austrian army battered the Hungarians, even capturing Pest and gaining control of much of Transylvania. The Hungarian troops bent but did not break entirely. The army under the leadership of Arthur Görgei (arguably the best military leader on the Hungarian side despite his very young age) forced the Austrian army attacking from the west to play a game of cat and mouse in the mountains of today’s Slovakia for two months (January and February of 1849), providing time for a larger body of recruits to be trained up in Eastern Hungary. While Görgei was luring and outmaneuvering the Austrians in the Tatra mountains, Jozef Bem, a veteran of the 1830–31 Polish uprising took command of Hungarian forces in Transylvania and slowly started pushing the Austrian and Romanian forces back.
By the time Görgei’s army reached the Great Hungarian Plain, there was a newly-trained Hungarian army that stood a chance against the Austrians in open battle. The political leadership appointed Henryk Dembinski, another veteran of the 1830–31 uprising as commander of the forces in the main theater of war (i.e. not in Transylvania or today’s Vojvodina). His command was regarded as anything from subpar to downright terrible both by most of his subordinates and later commentators alike. Under his leadership, the Hungarian army made an indecisive attempt at attacking the Austrians but failed at the battle of Kápolna in late February.
The Hungarian forces were not crushed, only defeated. Much of their army didn’t even see combat during the two days of battle, and even those parts which did weren’t destroyed but managed to retreat in good order. Frustration with Dembinski went from simmering to boiling over following Kápolna: corps commanders and other officers of his army refused to serve under him and follow his orders. This forced the political leadership to remove Dembinski from command and give the position to Antal Vetter, a good soldier and one of the most suitable men for the job.
Vetter fell ill, however, and was replaced by Arthur Görgei, something that had a crucial impact on the following months of the war. Under his overall command, the main Hungarian army followed the plan of George Klapka and tried to encircle and destroy the main Austrian army around Hatvan, to the southeast of today’s Budapest. Although this plan didn’t succeed, the Hungarian army inflicted a series of defeats upon the Austrians and sent Windisch-Grätz retreating to the west before turning back to liberate Buda and Pest, the capital of Hungary.
The Battle of Tápióbicske, one of the Hungarian victories in spring 1849 / Source: Hungarian National Museum (original painting by Mór Than)
The Hungarians managed to put up more than a fair fight: in late April of 1849 Franz Joseph was forced to ask for Russian help amid humiliating circumstances. At the meeting, the Habsburg emperor knelt before the Russian tsar and kissed his hand while asking for military assistance against the ‘rebel hordes’ Windisch-Grätz reported as utterly crushed just two months earlier.
Once the Russian army entered the fight with 200 000 soldiers and the peace signed with Piedmont-Sardinia, in Italy, allowed Austria to redirect more men to the Hungarian theatre of war, Hungary didn’t stand much chance against the coordinated attack of two great powers of that age. Görgei managed to pull off his trick again by luring much of the Russian intervention force after his forces through Northern and Eastern Hungary. He intended to buy time for other Hungarian forces to defeat the Austrians before the Russians could really enter the fight. Despite his efforts, by 11th August 1849, almost all other armies were crushed as a result of poor leadership from some generals and a general lack of supplies. Görgei was left isolated with an army hopelessly outnumbered and surrounded on all sides.
Following the resignation of the political leadership, Görgei, as dictator, surrendered with his remaining forces — to the Russians. This was a powerful signal and an insult to the Austrians that it wasn’t them, but the Russian intervention that decided the conflict. Görgei asked the Russians to pardon all his men as they only followed his orders — his punishment became the reversal of said request: while several of his subordinates (friends among them) were executed, thousands imprisoned and many more conscripted into the Austrian army as punishment, he lived for 68 more years with half his country thinking he was a traitor.
Two fortresses, however, managed to hold out for another two months before surrendering to the Austrians on the terms that they were to be pardoned — a promise that was kept, there was no violent crackdown against the garrisons.
5. The Peninsular War
In 1808 Napoleon’s French Empire occupied and took over its former ally, Spain, to aid its attack on Portugal. This happened without any real difficulty as Spanish commanders didn’t expect allied French forces to suddenly occupy fortresses and disarm any Spanish forces they came across. In two months, it seemed that Napoleon’s tried and tested strategy of ‘crush the army, then occupy the capital’ had worked perfectly: both the Spanish king and his successor abdicated and Napoleon’s brother, Joseph, became King of Spain. In the following years, it turned into an incredibly costly and drawn-out conflict for the French that ate up enormous resources and manpower until Napoleon’s defeat and abdication in 1814.
Contrary to other enemies of Napoleon in Central and Eastern Europe, the Spanish didn’t submit to French rule too easily. A popular uprising began almost as soon as the Spanish Bourbons were forced to abdicate. The Madrid revolt in early May of 1808 was suppressed violently by elite French troops (Imperial Guard infantry and Mameluke cavalry). French forces in the citadel of Barcelona were besieged for almost a year before being relieved. These and other setbacks in 1808 and 1809 didn’t break the fighting spirit of the Spanish people.
In the following six years, the Spanish regular forces didn’t achieve major successes in open pitched battles (and that is to put it mildly) but managed to tie down massive French forces by becoming guerilleros and adopting a way of fighting that was so unusual in contemporary Europe that it became forever known as guerilla warfare. By attacking supply lines and patrols, constantly harassing French forces, and avoiding direct engagements the Spanish guerillas helped the outnumbered Portuguese-British regular army of Arthur Wellesley fight the French on a more equal footing.
Spanish guerillas attacking a French column of soldiers / Source: Quadros da História de Portugal (original painting by Roque Gamerio)
Also called ‘Napoleon’s Vietnam’, the Peninsular War led to half a million dead and wounded on the French side and enabled the Coalition forces to invade France from the South by early 1814. However, this victory didn’t come cheap, over a million Spanish civilians and soldiers died as a result of the fighting. The popular uprising also inspired thinkers in other parts of Europe to enact military and government reforms. The Prussians, for example, completely overhauled their government and military in favour of a light infantry doctrine paired with wider citizen’s rights for the subjects of the Prussian king, something which they hoped would empower their population to engage in a popular uprising similar to that of Spain.
6. Chinese Civil War
For the first half of the 20th century, China suffered from repeated civil wars and foreign interference, the most notable of which was the Japanese invasion of first Manchuria in 1831, and then of China itself in 1937. The country was plagued by multiple warlords claiming control of various regions as well as foreign invaders. By the late 1940s the two major forces in this civil war were the communists led by Mao Zedong and the nationalists (also called Kuomintang) under the leadership of Chiang Kai Sek.
This situation was a huge surprise, however, in 1935, right after the infamous Long March, communist forces led by Mao Zedong numbered only a few thousand men along the Sino-Soviet border in the north, kept alive by a trickle of supplies arriving from the Soviet Union. By 1949, they were in full control of mainland China, save for the British colony at Hongkong, the Portuguese colony of Macau, and the Kuomintang forces left in Taiwan. There were two major factors that played a crucial role in their victory.
Kuomintang soldiers marching to fight the Japanese during World War II / Source: Wikimedia Commons (Unknown author)
The first was that the Japanese invasion forced the different sides fighting for control of China to unite — at least until the common foe was defeated. This gave the communists an opportunity to increase their support and gather their strength, something which they capitalized upon extensively by uniting more and more forces under their command.
The other was the extensive use of asymmetrical tactics. At the end of World War II, in 1945, all major urban regions of China were under the control of the Kuomintang. Mao Zedong’s idea to counter this was simple: under his command, the communist forces took control of rural agricultural lands and starved the nationalist pockets out one by one. It is a less well-known fact about Mao that he wrote a book on the theory of guerilla warfare and as we’ve seen he was definitely writing from experience.
7. Ethiopia against Italy
In the late 19th century, the European powers divided Africa among themselves to such extent that by the end of the century only one country managed to remain independent, Ethiopia. Italy had its sights on adding the country to its colonial holdings in the last decades of the century. If you’ve been reading the article so far, you know what comes next: they had a hard time.
In the years before the first war, Emperor Menelik II managed to unite his people and began modernizing Ethiopia: a national bank, railroads, electricity, and modern firearms were all introduced under his reign, as well as a new capital at Addis Ababa built. The emperor achieved this through clever diplomacy with European powers, most importantly France and Russia, who provided weapons and military advisors to train Ethiopian troops.
Italians taken prisoner by Ethiopians in the First Italo-Ethiopian War / Source: Wikimedia Commons (photo by Charles Michel)
When the first war between Italy and Ethiopia broke out in 1894, half of Menelik II’s army was armed with archaic weapons — bows, spears, and swords. To compensate for their somewhat inferior armament, they used numerical superiority against the invading Italian forces. After the Ethiopians destroyed almost the entire Italian force invading their territory, their independence was guaranteed by the Treaty of Addis Ababa.
It was 40 years later, under the reign of Halie Selassie I, that Italy, now a fascist dictatorship under Mussolini, tried to conquer Ethiopia again. Although the Ethiopian army put up a fierce resistance (even taking out tanks by ruining their tracks using steel rods), their army was still armed with a mixture of outdated and modern firearms and archaic weaponry. While that was enough in the 1890s, this time the Ethiopians were defeated by a much larger Italian army utilizing hundreds of tanks and aircraft.
In both cases, Ethiopia managed to turn what was expected to be ‘defeating hordes of savages’ into a tough, desperate fight for a European army that had extensive military training, standardized equipment, and modern technology on its side. | https://historyofyesterday.com/7-times-the-underdog-punched-way-above-their-weight-57963827c5b6 | ['Márton Ujvári'] | 2020-12-08 12:01:50.776000+00:00 | ['Guerilla', 'History', 'Vietnam War', 'World War II', 'Military History'] |
Monetizing Jeffrey Epstein | Monetizing Jeffrey Epstein
Photo by Suzy Hazelwood from Pexels
Never in my wildest dreams could I have ever imagined that after getting convicted of tax fraud and sentenced to serve a year and a day at MCC federal prison in New York City, that I would spend numerous hours alone with JEFFREY EPSTEIN on suicide-watch. But “Lifestyles of the Rich and Infamous” it was for this inmate. Totally bizarre!
I was not the kind of prisoner who was content to sit around all day and hang with the other criminals. In fact, that was the last way I wanted to live my life behind bars. I figured I’d work every hour and every job I could convince the prison officials to give me, the idea being that my time would pass faster at work than lying idle.
And so…I signed up for suicide-watch duty on my second day, which as it turned out, was the only job prisoners were allowed to work before getting medical clearance (which took a few weeks).
My bunky recommended I put my name on the posted sheet. And within a week or two, I’d been oriented for the job (four hours of training) and was on my way to the big time (financially speaking) what with the occasional 4-hour shift at 40 cents per hour I’d be assigned.
There were a lot of inmates who volunteered for the program because (and according to the prison officials), working suicide for 100 hours would get the inmate a certificate which would be worth its weight in gold on the outside when he was released and sought employment in the real world. Plus, that same certificate would cause a sentencing judge to look favorably on MCC inmates who were awaiting that sentencing.
Personally, I wasn’t buyin’ that bullshit. I figured it was simply a way for the Bureau of Prisons to hustle inmates into working a shitty job at slave wages. But I didn’t care about all that. I just wanted out of the unit as much as possible. I found the unit to be a toxic place.
Two things happened simultaneously to give me all the suicide shifts I wanted. First, I took a job in the kitchen — which gave me access to superior food I could bring to the unit after work.
And second, I befriended the prisoner who did the scheduling for the suicide shifts. It wasn’t long before Miles approached me with an offer I couldn’t refuse. If I brought him free food from the kitchen, he’d give me any suicide shift I wanted. The deal was struck. And most days you’d find me downstairs in the kitchen from 1 PM — 7 PM, and on suicide watch from 7 PM — 11 PM. As you can see, I was fully employed.
On August 6th, 2019, when Miles was sent home having served his time, he gave me the scheduling job. Thus, while Jeffrey Epstein was at MCC federal prison — and down in the suicide unit — I was the guy who watched him most nights from 7 PM — 11 PM.
Epstein’s arrival at MCC wasn’t as huge an event as you’d think. I’d already been cellied up with PAUL MANAFORT the week before, and had suicide-watched a couple of inmates whose stories had made it to the media. (One was a terrorist and the other a murderer who chopped off his lawyer’s head.) And EL CHAPO was housed in 10 South. MCC, by nature of its location, was the place to be if an inmate wanted to hobnob with the elite.
What I didn’t understand at the time was that I’d become a primary source for the media on all things Jeffrey once I got out. If I had, I would have asked him many more questions about influential people in his social sphere. As it was, I got some juicy tidbits from Epstein. But it wasn’t my intention to delve deeply into his history and psyche. It was simply my job to keep him upbeat and alive.
In fact, he didn’t kill himself while down on suicide watch. It happened once he was back in the SHU (special housing unit for super bad boys and guys who couldn’t handle general population — which was Jeffrey).
Anyway…because Epstein was of the same age, same religion, and of similar background and educational level as me, we got along instantly. In truth, for a hot minute there, we became part of each other’s routine. I knew that at 7 PM, I’d be descending to suicide to watch Jeffrey. And he looked forward to my arrival even asking once or twice “Mersey! You’re coming back down tomorrow night, right?” with some urgency.
I won’t repeat myself about all the conversations we had. You can go here for that information. Suffice it to say that our interaction was signficant.
Fast forward to November after Epstein had killed himself in August of the same year. Upon my release from prison, I contacted (among other people), an old friend from the music business who knew a lot of influential people in several realms.
When I told him about my relationship with Jeffrey, he fairly exploded “You have to go to the Enquirer with this. Your story is worth six figures. This is going to change your life!” said he.
Well, Fred is an old promotion man, and I was not especially inclined to believe his hype. But the next day, when I received a call from not just the Enquirer…but the daily Mail as well, I began to believe him. Fred had contacted editors who he knew at each media outlet on my behalf, and they were both interested in my story.
Not even one week out of prison and I was having fancy lunches with reporters and/or editors looking to get an exclusive on my story! Not bad for an old jailbird! The Fed could enslave me at 40 cents per hour to watch suicidal inmates all right. But I was about to laugh all the way to the bank owing to my special relationship with one of their suicidal inmates!
After a somewhat protracted negotiation (which only took a few days — but several phone calls and lunches), I gave the Daily Mail a one-week exclusive on my story in exchange for a check which effectively paid all my apartment rent for 2019! Not too bad!
And that wasn’t the end of it. Once I’d been featured in the Daily Mail’s media empire, Discovery ID, the BBC, and Fox Nation emailed me. And because I knew an editor at the Daily Beast, I scored several freelance writing gigs with them and the NY Daily News. And of course, I negotiated paydays for each and every appearance and freelance writing gig.
For a while there, I basked in my 15 minutes of fame — and got some fortune in the deal to boot. And all because the federal government thought it appropriate to take twice as much as I owed in taxes, and send me to prison for a year. If there is a God, he was hooking me up big time!
It is now a year later. After 6 months, my “15 minutes” has ended. That fame and fortune is becoming a distant memory. But it was cool while it lasted.
While I owned my crime and did my time like a man, I always felt that the federal government had taken a pound of flesh when my crimes warranted but a few ounces. And all this fame was karma working itself out.
I’d placed all the unpaid tax money in a municipal bond fund which lent that cash to municipalities in need of infrastructure improvements. When the Feds found me, I had their money. And they not only took what I owed them — but a whole lot more in interest and penalties. Did they really need to lock me up as well? Apparently, yes. But there was a silver lining: a little fame and fotune for a hard-working inmate. Go figure. | https://medium.com/doing-time/monetizing-jeffrey-epstein-a125fe01db27 | ['William', 'Dollar Bill'] | 2020-11-25 16:34:13.120000+00:00 | ['Life Lessons', 'Culture', 'Prison', 'Inspiration', 'Business'] |
Kotlin vs Groovy: The Best for Android App Development | Groovy was a successor of Java; Kotlin is a successor of Groovy. Kotlin has gradually become the official language for Android Application Development. It erases the shortcomings of Groovy but later is still very popular among programmers due to support for static and dynamic typing; concise, brief, direct syntax; relatively short learning curve, support for unit testing, native support for regular expressions, the native syntax for lists and associative arrays, native support for markup languages like XML and HTML and support for domain-specific languages. But we have Kotlin that empowers everyday applications and is 100% compatible with Java frameworks. Java programmers can easily adopt Kotlin. We intend to illustrate the major points of differences for Kotlin vs. Groovy here; let’s find out! | https://medium.com/@konstantinfo/kotlin-vs-groovy-the-best-for-android-app-development-e2dae98a2680 | ['Konstant Infosolutions'] | 2020-12-24 09:17:52.082000+00:00 | ['Kotlin'] |
Must-Read Startup Newsletters (if you’re a fan of Let’s Start Up) | Just a couple of months ago, I started the Let’s Start Up newsletter for founders, investors, startups, and friends. I’ve already sent out nine issues and momentum only continues to pick up.
I started the newsletter to expand my network and inspire others with my experiences as a tech founder. I hope that anyone interested in entrepreneurship, diversity and inclusivity, and tech will find something relevant in my posts.
In the words of a few subscribers:
“Hands down it’s the most authentically engaging content to cross my inbox in a while. Thank you.” -Nneoma “I got my first newsletter from you and it was amazing. I was looking for some information related to non-tech founders building apps and I received your newsletter at the same time.” -Ritika Mehta “I know close to nothing about the VC world but you make it feel very approachable and understandable. Look forward to reading more in the future!” -Joe Ray
But, there are so many other great newsletters and digests out there that I want to share with you. If you like my newsletter, I think you’ll love these!
Girls Night In
I love what this newsletter is all about. The mission of Girls Night In is to help you “unwind, take care, and connect.” The newsletter talks about mental health, life hacks, self-care, friendship, and much more. Check them out!
Femstreet
Femstreet engages females in the worlds of tech and entrepreneurship, with a focus on diversity. They provide news and info about VC that helps our community thrive and stay aware of what’s happening.
For the Love
Looking for a newsletter about branding? For the Love is for startups and mission-driven companies spreading news and information about branding and making the world a better place.
Blooming Founders
Blooming Founders is a small business that focuses on diversity and helping female founders. They provide content, media, and training services and are all-around awesome. Sign up for their newsletter and check out their blog for invaluable info about meeting with investors, running a business, and more!
#5SmartReads
As an avid reader, I love #5SmartReads, a weekly newsletter that gives you news and book suggestions. Hitha Palepu, who runs the digest, also sends out fun posts like gift guides and general life hacks.
Claire Diaz-Ortiz
Claire is an investor, author, speaker, and mother who’s been writing online for over a decade. Her newsletter has 15,000 subscribers and she shares personal and professional news and general info of interest to startups.
Your Social Media Detox
Nicole Tabak runs the Your Social Media Detox newsletter, which provides self-care tips and life advice for content creators. She talks about meditation and yoga alongside social media and the job market.
The Marketing Mind Meld
Kushaan Shah started The Marketing Mind Meld to provide “musings on marketing and human behavior that will blow your mind.” He relates branding to science, tech, and life, offering unique takes on how to stay relevant.
The Startup
Another weekly newsletter is The Startup, which delivers insights to startup owners and entrepreneurs. Creator Richard Awoyemi focuses on personal development tips as well as hacks for the startup life.
Snaxshot
Love learning about food and beverages? Snaxshot is an amazing newsletter created by Andrea Hernández that discusses trends in the food industry with wit and loads of interesting tidbits.
Fundraisedd
Ahh, fundraising. For founders, learning new tricks never gets old. Consider subscribing to Fundraisedd, a newsletter that delivers all kinds of helpful info about fundraising and startup finance.
Checking In with Kat Cole
Successful businesswoman Kat Cole runs the newsletter Checking In with Kat Cole. She sends out best practices, advice, life lessons, and personal experiences to inspire aspiring entrepreneurs.
Awesome People List
Julia Lipton runs the Awesome People List newsletter, which delivers one awesome person to subscribers every week. These people help startups with a variety of tasks and are all hirable on a part-time basis.
Skye’s Newsletter
Skye’s Newsletter is run by Skye Belote, a venture scout and the Pacific Pine managing director. Her newsletter showcases young businesses with promise that are worth noting for investors.
I love following such successful people, and I hope these newsletters inspire you! | https://medium.com/@myfriendjanine/must-read-startup-newsletters-if-youre-a-fan-of-let-s-start-up-792dd2cb0a1 | ['Janine Sickmeyer'] | 2020-12-18 02:29:52.799000+00:00 | ['Newsletter', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Founders', 'Technology', 'Startup'] |
Why The Superhuman Tracking Issue Matters | This post originally appeared on Graphite’s company blog.
Let’s start by getting caught up. Mike Davidson, a entrepreneur, former Twitter employee, and new superhero in the fight for privacy, tweeted about Superhuman’s surveillance tactics:
Superhuman is the hot new email client that you still have to get an invite to use. It’s the go-to client for Silicon Valley tech investors and entrepreneurs. Remember, it’s an email client. Not an email marketing platform. There’s a significant difference, and that difference wipes out 98% of the arguments in favor of Superhuman’s tactics.
Anyway, Mike had some Twitter conversations about the privacy issues, and then over the weekend wrote an article outlining Superhuman’s surveillance practices, how it teaches end-users to practice surveillance, and how it’s flat-out a poor ethical choice by the company. It’s a great read, and you should check it out. For those that don’t want to read that article but are oddly interested in reading this one, here’s the tl;dr:
Superhuman, by default and without consent, inserts a tracking pixel in every email a Superhuman user sends. This is common of email marketing software, and most people who receive mass emails have a general sense that they are being monitored when they open those emails. This is different, though. This could be an email from your boyfriend. It could be an email from your boss. It could be an email from a serial-killer. Hell, it could be from anyone. And Superhuman gives all of those people unfettered access to your private email activity.
It’s not cool, and anyone defending it is seriosuly misguided, intentionally disingenuous, or a bad person. No reason to sugar coat it.
The Broader Problem
The decision by Superhuman to add tracking pixels is bad enough, but what may be more concerning is the public’s reaction. We want to believe that after Facebook’s scandals, after Google’s privacy violations, after it all we as a society have grown an appetite for more privacy. But the reaction to Superhuman’s tracking methods seems to run counter to that belief.
By reading the responses on Hacker News (not usually the best place to gauge an actual response to something), you’ll see that there’s a significant number of people who shrug and say this should be expected. But it’s not just Hacker News.
The replies to Mike’s tweet are similar. In fact, the public’s reaction to dark patterns, in general, are almost planned out before the reaction ever happens. This is how we’ve been conditioned. We accept it because “that’s just how it is.” Or “you want free, you have to deal with this.” (Hard side note here: Superhuman is very far from free).
This feels like the first real test of the public’s response to privacy issues since Cambridge Analytica made everyone a privacy expert. And thus far, I think the public might be failing.
That said, Graphite will continue to fight the fight for privacy. Graphite will continue to embrace ethical design. Graphite will, simply put, be good. | https://medium.com/the-lead/why-the-superhuman-tracking-issue-matters-e5342479be8c | ['Justin Hunter'] | 2019-07-05 14:07:33.626000+00:00 | ['Email', 'Silicon Valley', 'Startup Lessons', 'Privacy'] |
Logistics and Process Management. A brief story about logistics | A brief story about logistics
There is an apocryphal folktale from the end of the Soviet Union. A guard at a construction site, every day, would search workers to make sure they didn’t leave the job site with more than they came in with. Every day, one worker (Vasiliy) would come out with a wheelbarrow full of straw. The guard would search the straw, find no contraband, and send him on his way. After a few years, the site shut down, and the guard asked what Vasiliy was stealing. Vasiliy explained: “wheelbarrows.”
Enterprise logistics: solving solutions
Hopefully, the story illustrates that we can accurately measure the wrong thing. Route efficiency might save us on gasoline, but poorly maintained roads put additional stress on fleet vehicles. Interstate highway clocks may make safer roads for drivers while making truckers’ jobs extremely difficult. Inconsistencies in online shipping models might have your customers creating a secondary market just import what you’re selling.
“My logisticians are a humorless lot … they know if my campaign fails, they are the first ones I will slay.” Alexander the Great
If you can’t move your products well, you can lose money imperceptibly. And if your products never arrive, you won’t have a customer base. (Hence the Alexander the Great quote, Although it’s probably more relevant if you plan to conquer Eurasia.) There is often little or no informal communication between drivers, shipping clerks, and online shopping cart administrators.
People spend years reinventing the wheel and creating efficient supply chains, while bigger companies hoover up their profits with just in time chains built on massive efficiencies of scale. Advia Consulting will help you fight back. Expertise in shipping logistics is yours if you click today, bringing you decreased outlays and a better chance of retaining your metaphorical wheelbarrows. Email today. | https://medium.com/@adviaconsulting/logistics-and-process-management-advia-consulting-d14b965f03a0 | ['Advia Consulting'] | 2020-12-14 17:27:09.124000+00:00 | ['Consulting', 'Erp', 'Logistics', 'Enterprise', 'Process Management'] |
Immutable Collections in Java using Sealed Types | How to define contractual, structural, and verifiable immutable Java collections.
Designing Immutable Collection using Sealed Types in JDK 15
Introducing Sealed Types
JDK 15 was released on September 15, 2020. JEP 360 Sealed Types was included as a preview feature in this release. Sealed Types is part of Project Amber. Sealed classes or interfaces can be used to restrict the interfaces or classes that are allowed to extend them. This is accomplished by using the sealed , non-sealed , and permits modifiers.
What is contractual immutability?
An interface or class is contractually immutable if the available public methods do not allow an instance to be mutated after it is constructed. A contractually immutable collection should not expose methods like add , addAll , remove , removeAll , clear and a mutable Iterator . These methods are available on the Collection , List and Set types in Java. Immutable collections that implement these interfaces are not contractually immutable.
What is structural immutability?
An object is structurally immutable if all of its data members are private, final, and cannot be modified after the object is constructed. String is a great example of a class in Java that is structurally immutable. Once a String is constructed, it cannot be changed. Immutable objects like String sometimes have mutable counterparts like StringBuilder .
What is verifiable immutability?
A class or interface is verifiably immutable if all of the implementations are contractually and structurally immutable, and are restricted to a specific set of classes that can be verified. This is a capability that can now be more easily achieved via Sealed Types in JDK 15. With Sealed Types a developer can restrict the implementations of interfaces and classes to a specified set of types.
A Perfect Use Case for Sealed Types in Java
Immutable collection implementations for Java are available in the Java Collections Framework (since JDK 9), Google Guava and Eclipse Collections. None of the immutable collection alternatives provide the combination of structural, contractual and verifiable immutability today.
Java 9+
There are structurally immutable collections available in the Java Collection Framework via List.of() , Set.of() , Map.of() . The JDK immutable collections are not contractually immutable, because they implement the mutable List , Set , Map interfaces.
Google Guava
Guava has collection types that are structurally immutable, but not contractually immutable. The immutable collections in Guava implement the mutable JDK interfaces — List , Set , Map . Guava restricts the implementations of the immutable collection types by using abstract classes with package private constructors, which require all implementations to be in the same package. This restriction is a novel design approach and a key component of verifiable immutability, but is still lacking contractual immutability.
Eclipse Collections
Eclipse Collections has collection types that are both contractually and structurally immutable. Unfortunately, there is no way in Java 8 to restrict the implementations of interfaces like ImmutableCollection , ImmutableList , ImmutableSet so that verifiable immutability can be provided. It is possible to implement the ImmutableCollection interface and its subtypes outside of Eclipse Collections because they are public interfaces. Theoretically, a “bad actor” may implement the ImmutableCollection interface and pass a mutable implementation to a method call expecting an ImmutableCollection . In practice, it is doubtful that this would be an issue, but the potential does exist.
Sealed Types
The Sealed Types preview in JDK 15 gives developers the capability to finally provide the trifecta of contractual, structural and verifiable immutability in a collections framework. Using the Sealed Types preview feature, we can restrict the implementations of an ImmutableCollection interface using the sealed and permits modifiers.
Similarly, we can restrict the implementations of ImmutableList .
The ImmutableEmptyList implementation of ImmutableList is then declared as final .
Experimenting with Sealed Types in JDK 15 has been interesting and encouraging. I wish this feature was available a decade ago when we first defined the ImmutableCollection hierarchy in Eclipse Collections. I’ve been able to extend the design ideas that we implemented in Eclipse Collections years ago with a feature that provides a more restrictive modeling capability.
The Deck of Cards Kata: Custom Collections
The source code for an experimental implementation of a collections framework can be found in the Deck of Cards Kata repo. The Deck of Cards Kata can be taken to become familiar with multiple collections frameworks including the latest versions of the Java Collections + Streams framework, Apache Commons Collections, Google Guava and Eclipse Collections.
The custom collections framework interfaces and implementations can be browsed online here. The following class diagram shows the interfaces in the framework, including the immutable collection interfaces that leverage Sealed Types. | https://medium.com/javarevisited/immutable-collections-in-java-using-sealed-types-ae8eb580fc1e | ['Donald Raab'] | 2020-11-05 07:17:33.843000+00:00 | ['Eclipse Collections', 'Open Source', 'Software Development', 'Java', 'Programming'] |
DraftKings Week 10 High Stakes Ownership Report | DraftKings Week 10 High Stakes Ownership Report Jaketribbey Follow Nov 17 · 5 min read
Looking at the sharpest plays to learn from week 10
In daily fantasy sports, ownership is a key consideration in tournament lineup building. Reviewing lineup construction and player ownership at the highest stakes reveals valuable information regarding trends that we can take advantage of in the future.
Typically, high stakes players focus on the optimal lineup, or, simply put, the team they believe projects for the most points. With this in mind, we can infer that the popular players in high stakes contests likely had the strongest overall value when measuring cost against projected fantasy points.
In this article series, we will analyze ownership numbers from a low stakes, large field DFS contest (the $9 NFL Slant), and compare them to the ownership in a high stakes contest (the $3,000 Luxury Box). As many would expect, a contest with a $3,000 entry fee tends to have significantly sharper players, so it’s important to review high stakes ownership to see where the pros invested in a given week.
$3,000 Luxury Box Ownership Leverage Leaders
Week 10 was one of the worst weeks for high stakes players this season, as many of the top ‘value’ plays failed miserably. Only high stakes players who avoided the chalk managed to succeed.
At the minimum RB price of $4,000, Mike Davis was by far the top play of the slate, regardless of position. Thanks to salaries being released on Monday mornings, there are always a few weeks a year where a massive value opens up due to mid-week injury news. In Week 10, Mike Davis was a ‘free square’ but he burned nearly 3/4ths of Luxury Box teams with an 8.4-point performance. Davis had his worst starting display of the year in a blowout loss to Tampa Bay, earning just 11 total touches for 44 total yards and 0 TDs. However, the Panthers ran just 48 plays (NFL average is around 65), so very few Carolina players had any opportunity to succeed given the limited opportunities. If this game gets played 10 times, Davis would exceed value at his price in 9 of them. Unfortunately for most high stakes players, this was the 1.
Duke Johnson and Aaron Jones both figured to see more touches than normal in Week 10 thanks to playing in severe weather, forcing their respective teams to turn to the run game. Jones saw 18 total touches but couldn’t find the endzone for just the 2nd time this season, posting a mediocre score for his salary. Johnson saw 14 carries, but his usual role in the passing game was nonexistent, resulting in 0 catches for the first time since Week 1. Both players were solid options at the RB position, but variance was not on their side in Week 10.
No defense has allowed more fantasy points to opposing WRs than the Seattle Seahawks. The trio of Rams WRs, Cooper Kupp, Robert Woods, and Josh Reynolds all figured to benefit as a result. The Rams ran 70 total plays and attempted 43 passes, but only Josh Reynolds managed to put up a decent score relative to his salary. Reynolds’ 29% target share was certainly surprising, and it limited the output of both Woods and Kupp, who only saw 6 targets apiece.
$9 NFL Slant Ownership Leverage Leaders
This is the first time all season we’ve seen sharp players fade Alvin Kamara, and the league’s top RB made them pay with a 3 TD performance. Given the other value available at RB, it’s no surprise high stakes players decided to go another route, but Kamara is simply too good to be entirely counted out, regardless of his price or his opponent.
D’Andre Swift was certainly the most polarizing play of Week 10, as a Sunday morning report suggested he was in for more work than usual as the announced starter for Detroit. Swift was just $100 more than popular high stakes play Duke Johnson, but since Johnson was projected for 2–4 more points on every major site, players across the industry sided with Duke. Swift was the worse play on paper, but a nearly 30% difference in ownership between the two showcases why pivoting off the consensus top plays can oftentimes be very beneficial, especially when the difference between players is just a few projected points.
This is now the second week in a row we’ve seen Tyler Lockett’s popularity exceed that of DK Metcalf, due to the $1100 difference between the similarly projected players. Surprisingly, neither Seahawks WR had a big game for the first time all season, largely due to the poor performance of MVP-candidate Russell Wilson, who logged his worst PFF grade of the season while throwing 2 interceptions and 0 TDs.
Individual Lineup Breakdown
In this segment, we will take a look at some of the specific lineups that notable high stakes players entered in the week 9 Luxury Box. Studying top players is one of the best ways to improve in DFS, as reverse-engineering their process can assist our own in the future.
jayk123x
Total Entries: 3 ($9,000)
ROI: -33%
Currently ranked as the 12th overall NFL DFS player, jayk123x is a former Millionaire Maker winner and typically very contrarian, and this week was no different.
With George Kittle out, Jordan Reed was somehow completely left out of the TE discussion, likely due to his moderate price of $3,500. While most major projection sites didn’t list Reed as a top value, he certainly could have seen the volume needed for a 20-point outing, which would have been a huge edge for jayk123x at just 1.7% ownership.
Jayk123x was 1 of just 3 Luxury Box players to run the game stack of Alex Smith+D’Andre Swift+Terry McLaurin. Smith isn’t typically regarded as a tournament winner due to his incredibly low average depth of target, but as Week 10’s cheapest QB at 3% ownership, a 25+ point performance would have made that stack incredibly profitable. Risky, of course, but that kind of thinking showcases how sharp players find edges over other sharp players. | https://medium.com/the-intelligent-sports-wagerer/draftkings-week-10-high-stakes-ownership-report-33805c211e11 | [] | 2020-11-17 23:01:13.821000+00:00 | ['Sports Betting', 'Sports Analytics', 'NFL', 'Fantasy Football', 'Fantasy Sports'] |
🔥 Stobox Digital Assets Exchange Registration is opened! | Dear Stobox Сommunity,
We are happy to announce that we open user registration on Stobox Digital Assets Exchange!
Before the launch of trading, you can take advantage of being the first registered user. Get your referral link, invite more friends and followers, and we will reward you with STBU, NFTs, discounts, and other pleasant bonuses.
Currently, in the exchange development we focus on two remaining issues:
Security
Crypto exchanges are subject to thousands of attacks per month. Security and reliability of user funds and personal data is our key priority. The Exchange has a strong target on businesses, for which security is a critical requirement, and strong protection of personal data allows us to have a place among the most legally compliant crypto exchanges.
Liquidity
We don’t want to disappoint early adopters with low liquidity. Therefore, we will open the trading as soon as we reach 10,000 registered users. Reaching this milestone will be the focus of our marketing campaign, and we expect to reach this mark by the end of January 2021.
Stobox Digital Assets Exchange is a vital part of the Stobox Ecosystems that transforms traditional finance.
Become part of the community by registering on the Exchange, and get exciting bonuses by inviting friends with your referral link.
Merry Christmas!
Gene Deyev
CEO Stobox | https://medium.com/@stobox-platform/stobox-digital-assets-exchange-registration-is-opened-60e8adb2a1a | [] | 2020-12-23 19:36:30.254000+00:00 | ['Crypto', 'Exchange', 'Stobox', 'Blockchain'] |
Documents Required For Online LLP Registration | In India, we cannot do LLP Registration without proper documents relating to Identity proof and address proof. It requires identity and address proof of all the proposed partners of the llp which is incorporated. Below is the list of documents that are accepted by MCA for the online company registration.
Identity and Address Proof
Scanned copy of PAN Card
Scanned copy of Voter’s ID/Passport/Driver’s License / Aadhar
Scanned copy of the latest bank statement/telephone or mobile bill/electricity or gas bill
Scanned passport-sized photograph
For the foreign nationals, mandatorily apostilled / notarized copy of the passport and Address Proof like the latest bank statement/telephone or mobile bill/electricity or gas bill is required to be submitted. All documents submitted should be valid. The Address proof documents like the bank statement or the electricity bill should not be older than 2 months.
For Online LLP Registration in Mumbai, India, the LLP is required to have a registered office in India. To prove the existence of the registered office, a recent copy of Electricity Bill / Gas Bill / Telephone Bill / Water Bill is required to be submitted along with Registration Application. Also we need to submit the consent of Person whose name is mentioned in electricity Bill / Gas Bill / Telephone Bill / Water Bill for of office as a registered office of the LLP.
Scanned copy of the latest telephone or mobile bill/electricity or gas bill
Scanned copy of Notarized rental agreement in English
Scanned copy of No-objection certificate from the property owner
Scanned copy of sale deed/property deed in English (in case of owned property)
Note: It is not compulsory that your registered office need not be a commercial space; it can be kept at your residence too. | https://medium.com/@startup123regis/documents-required-for-online-llp-registration-a91cf520ff59 | [] | 2020-05-04 07:14:13.354000+00:00 | ['Bloggertips', 'Llp', 'Company', 'Llp Registration', 'Blogger'] |
Designing a Parsing Library in Scala | Parsing is something that many programmers dread. Many prefer to cram all their use cases into existing formats, such as JSON or YAML, even when effectively building a DSL in those formats. If one must parse, many prefer to use parser generators such as ANTLR. But for those that are already familiar with functional programming, using a functional parser combinator library can be a very convenient and high performance alternative.
This post will cover two aspects of a parsing library that may be unfamiliar to some programmers. First I will describe a pattern to improve performance of functional libraries by safely using mutability internal to an implementation, yet opaque to users. Second, once we have fast parsers, I will introduce some design changes to make the parser library safer to use and more able to give precise error messages.
How to go fast?
Li Haoyi in a talk on Fastparse in 2015 made much the same argument for parsing as above: it can be fast and it can be clearly written in normal scala code. Haoyi presented Fastparse, which has a nice API, and is also fast. In scala parsing libraries, there have been a number of libraries with nice APIs, but often the performance was very poor. Haoyi makes the point that you may say you don’t care about performance, but he showed some examples of parsers taking minutes that in fastparse ran in seconds, and it is hard to imagine not caring about that difference. His talk does not detail exactly how Fastparse is implemented, but he mentions internally he uses a number of mutable hacks.
Three years later in 2018 I gave a talk summarizing the main approach of this post. A full realization of this approach can be found in a single file implementation. The core idea of this design is the following:
Encapsulate the mutable state in a private class hidden from users. Parsers have a protected method that receives the state and mutates to have the correct state after the current parser is run. The Parser class is sealed so only the implementations of that parser are in the same file, which allows us to ensure that all parsers are lawful and does not expose this mutation to the user. The user sees a single parse method which accepts an input, and returns an output, but internal to that method it allocates a State instance which will be mutated as the parsing is run.
A simplified version of this pattern is sketched below:
sealed trait Parser[A] {
protected def parseInternal(s: State): A final def parse(str: String): Either[Error, (String, A)] = {
val state = new State(str)
val res = parseInternal(state)
if (state.isError) Left(state.getError)
else Right((str.substring(state.offset), res))
}
}
I want to stress why this design is safe: first, the method that has access to the mutable State value is protected so only subclasses can call it, secondly the trait is sealed so all instances of it are in the current file. Hence there is no way users will accidentally violate invariants required of modifications to State. For instance, parsers never go backwards on success, but an incorrect implementation could possibly update the mutable State offset variable incorrectly, and break that invariant if this were exposed.
Note, this pattern of a mutable inner state also works well for random generation monads, or modeling mutable references. See for example this code, which uses a similar pattern to make a monad to have faster mutable references than using an immutable map with a state monad.
While this pattern is very interesting for writing fast code that maintains, from a user’s perspective, pure functional code, I was dissatisfied with using Fastparse. I had grown concerned with a few issues:
The Haskell community taught us that parsers compose in may ways. Specifically, they have instances of Defer, Alternative and Monad for parser, yet out of the box Fastparse doesn’t give us those instances or always reuse combinator names that a Cats user might be used to. This presents a barrier to learning and reading this code when used in a Cats-style codebase. Moving from Fastparse 1 to 2 requires a pretty major change and relies on macros. Scala 2 macros are slated for removal or deprecation in Scala 3 so it seemed porting code that used Fastparse 1 to 2 would be signing up for another major migration soon. By default, Fastparse parsers are backtracking. While it may seem like a feature to backtrack, parsers that use too much backtracking can easily become exponential in their runtime. Secondly, backtracking makes reporting exactly where an error occurred more complex because we backtrack on error. Fastparse supports cuts, which prevent backtracking, but in my experience the design should be inverted: cut by default, opt in to backtracking as needed. One of the most commonly used parser combinators is repetition: a given thing can be repeated n or more times. Unfortunately, this combinator is not safe to apply to a parser that can parse zero input and succeed. If one does so, at runtime you will run out of memory trying to allocate an infinitely long list. This kind of mistake is common when writing complex parsers, yet there is no static protection in most parsing libraries from this error.
Parsing Fast and Safe
While working in Haskell on a project a few years ago, I learned of the Trifecta parsing library. A main goal of Trifecta is to produce superior error messages to point more clearly to where the parsing has failed, and what is expected. In that design, Trifecta defines four possible outputs of a parser:
“epsilon failure”: failing to parse without consuming any input. “committed failure”: failing to parse consuming 1 or more character of the input. “epsilon success”: success after consuming no input, e.g. a parser that returns a constant value. “committed success”: success after consuming 1 or more characters from input.
One of the most interesting combinators on parsers is alternation: either this parser or that. We first try parser 1 and if that fails, try parser 2. In many parsing libraries this will automatically backtrack on the failure of parser 1. Trifecta introduced to me the idea of alternation only moving to the second one on an “epsilon failure”. Experienced readers might relate this to LL(1) parsers: we can dispatch alternation by looking at only a single next character. Consider the case of parsing JSON. To see if the next item is null, a string, a boolean, a number, an array or a mapping you only need to peek at the next single character. If it does not match what you expect, you don’t consume it. In this case, it is very easy to write a JSON parser without any backtracking and only alternating to the next parser on an epsilon failure.
By contrast, if we start consuming characters to parse a mapping, and the first few characters are “[ ==” we know immediately on parsing the “=” character that there has been an error: we do not want to backtrack and try something new. This is happens naturally in Trifecta because you have consumed some characters to reach that point.
Sometimes we do want backtracking. It is unfortunate, but some parsing does require a certain amount of look-ahead, or can be much more conveniently expressed with such look-ahead. In those cases, Trifecta introduces a combinator that converts all “committed failure” cases into “epsilon failure” cases, so that normal alternation can work. In Trifecta this is called try but in Scala try is a keyword so instead I suggest backtrack.
Even before alternation, perhaps the most important combinator for parsing is sequencing or product: parse A then B. While porting my parsers from backtrack-by-default à la Fastparse to opt in backtracking à la Trifecta, I noticed a kind of combinator I wanted that I didn’t see how to get in Trifecta: a soft product.
Given parser A and parser B, if A returns a success, then if B returns an epsilon failure, then backtrack to before A, else if B has a committed failure return that failure, else if B has a success return the result of both parsers. If A returns a failure return that failure.
I call this a kind of soft-product. As an example, one might use this with A parsing some whitespace or optional connector to a postfix operator parsed by B. Succeeding to parse whitespace but failing to parse the operator shouldn’t fail the entire parse (although potentially this example is better dealt with by making parsers consume trailing whitespace).
To address repetition safety, the ability to safely write code that used parsing of N or more items, I introduced a subtype of Parser which I imaginatively call Parser1. A Parser1 is a parser that consumes 1 or more on success, a Parser1 can never have an epsilon success. We can require a Parser1 to use repetition combinators. It is interesting to note how Parser1 composes with Parser: if you sequence one of each, you get a Parser1 as a result since once characters are consumed they are never unconsumed. This is also true of a flatMap: if at either the first or second parsers is always a Parser1 the result is a Parser1. Leveraging these properties I could easily rewrite most of my parsers as Parser1 values.
In the Scala functional programming community we have embraced more fine grained divisions of our typeclasses than seems common in the Haskell community. For instance, in Cats, if we remove the function called pure, which is the ability to lift a value A => F[A], from Monad we have FlatMap, or if we do so to Applicative we have Apply. Similarly if we weaken Alternative we get MonoidK. The function A => Parser[A] is easy to write: consume no input and just return the argument of type A. Since Parser1 must consume input because it never has an epsilon success, we cannot write such a function A => Parser1[A] which has the other properties we want in relationship to existing Monad laws. So, while for Parser we have have instances of Alternative and Monad, for Parser1 we only have instances of MonoidK and FlatMap. It is interesting that we still have lawful abstractions for these more restricted parsers, and we have the ability to use them in repetitions which are ubiquitous in parsing with an added guarantee: we know we will never have the error of an infinite loop at runtime on an epsilon success.
Summary and Invitation for Collaboration
The main points I want to make here are:
Reemphasize the performance wins of private mutability in code with pure and immutable APIs (see my talk). Call out the value of non-backtracking by default for faster parsers and the better error messages, (thanks Trifecta)! Call out the value of a Parser subtype which always consumes one or more characters on success for writing safer parsers: these parsers have interesting typeclass instances and compose well with fully general parsers (yay Parser1)!
I have implemented this parsing library with full test coverage and used it to replace my usage of Fastparse in a non-trivial case: parsing my python-like statically typed, pure and total functional language Bosatsu. It took a few days to port my parsing code to use my library since I had to locate all the places where I was using backtracking without realizing it. By making a few changes I was able to remove a few of those and am down to only two cases where I currently require non-trivial backtracking.
My library seems to match the performance of Fastparse 1, compiles on scalajs, runs with graalvm native-image and does not use Scala macros. Additionally it follows Cats naming standards and includes Cats typeclass instances. I think it could be an excellent start for a typelevel cats-parse project if anyone is interesting in collaborating with me on this. The best way to reach me is to find me on Twitter. | https://medium.com/@posco/designing-a-parsing-library-in-scala-d5076de52536 | ['P. Oscar Boykin'] | 2020-10-29 22:09:23.858000+00:00 | ['Programming', 'Scala', 'Functional Programming'] |
Poor Knights | The fear,
it holds back
the sickness
as the boat
violently careens down
port side — sideways
it goes, down the giant
wave controlling
every plank, every soaking
wet rope my clenched
fists cling to in
absolute hopelessness.
Inches from capsizing,
the tiny vessel, that is now
only host to me,
rocks back and forth —
back and forth,
after reaching its
end of one wave
and beginning
its ascent of another.
The sickness
begins to well up in me
yet again.
I turn to see land,
a luxury I once took
for granted.
I pray to any god that
would persuade the sea to guide me closer
to shore.
The sea sends
gnarling curls of white
foam meant to sink me,
only pushing me closer to hope.
With immeasurable strength
and will,
the sea lurches me up,
the wet storm
that fuels the fire that thrashes
beneath my trembling bow
slices at my face
as I come closer to the
dark black clouds
from which they
are birthed.
For a moment I am above
the dark, the wet —
the chaos.
I see down, above it all,
if only in torment,
for what I believed
to be my salvation
was only an illusion.
My mind had hungered
for peace. My soul
pined for calm,
only
shrouding my eyes
from truth.
The sweet sight of shore
was now the end of my days,
my fate already foretold
by the story
of the sea.
The water breaks,
and I fall.
I am back in the anarchy
of it all.
It was a trap,
one the ocean
has set for many sailors
before me, claiming
greater men than I.
Jagged shards of rock
that were once seen
as my preservation,
wait for me
as they have now become
my damnation.
I have traveled
over the ocean’s
waters for so long,
using them for selfish gain —
it is only justice
that sacrifices me
to its depths here
and now. | https://medium.com/@kaygroftiii/poor-knights-d948d77ff05d | ['Kay Groft Iii'] | 2019-03-09 00:40:07.252000+00:00 | ['Poetry', 'Travel', 'Oceans', 'Poor Knights', 'Scuba Diving'] |
Monetization Playbook #22 — Monetization is a functional discipline | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/monetization-manifesto/monetization-playbook-22-monetization-is-a-functional-discipline-ed002b0f2008 | ['Strat-E-Gym', 'The Monetization Manifesto'] | 2020-12-10 14:29:00.965000+00:00 | ['Entrepreneurship', 'Startup', 'Strategy', 'Human Resources', 'Monetization'] |
PARSIQ — Bringing Smart Contracts to the Real World | “Building the bridge between blockchain transactions and actions outside the blockchain.” | https://medium.com/@axelf67/parsiq-bringing-smart-contracts-to-the-real-world-acd607c55ee4 | ['Axel F'] | 2020-12-26 10:33:30.465000+00:00 | ['Cryptocurrency', 'Parsiq', 'Ethereum', 'Smart Contracts', 'Blockchain'] |
Coding News Summary #1— NPM 5, Updates to React, Kotlin on Android, and more | Hello!
Here are the most important things happening in the coding world this month:
Node 8 and NPM 5
Node 8 is out and it comes with NPM 5 which claims significant improvement on performance. NPM 5 is packed with new features and fixes. Most notable features are offline mode, --save by default, and a new lockfile that gets automatically created.
Kotlin Becomes First-Class Language on Android
Google has announced that Kotlin, the modern programming language developed by JetBrains that runs on the JVM, will now receive first-class support in Android Studio 3. This is a huge win for the Android community and will play a significant role in the future of Android development. Kotlin aims to have a more friendly syntax for developers in order to improve productivity and readability. Likewise, the language includes null safety, functional programming support, and imposes no runtime overhead.
React 15.5 Released
The React team has released version 15.5 which is the last major release before the highly anticipated version 16. In favor of a smaller codebase, the React team has moved PropTypes and createClass to separate packages. In addition, they've included a codemod to assist with the migration to the new patterns. The React team is also discontinuing support for React Addons, and the React Test Utils are moving from React to React DOM.
99.6% of React 16 Tests are Passing
React 16 is the most highly anticipated release in a long time. As of late-May, the server-side rendering tests are passing which puts the release date in sight. The reason for the excitement over 16 is that it includes Fiber which is a reimplementation of the core algorithm for React. The headline feature of this improvement is incremental rendering which will chunk rendering process. Luckily the API will not change, so all React users can benefit from the update without needing code changes.
Stack Overflow Introduces a Trends Tool
You can now check the trends on Stack Overflow with their new Trends tool. The tool can be used to see the rise and fall of languages and frameworks. For example, Python seems to be getting a lot of attention lately while PHP is experiencing a decline. React, Angular, and Vue are all doing very well while other frameworks appear to be in the later stage of their life cycles.
WebAssembly Cross-Browser Consensus Reached
In a huge win for the future of web development, the initial design for the WebAssembly API (in JavaScript) and binary format have been completed. The WebAssembly team represents all the major browsers, including Chrome, Edge, Firefox, and Webkit. The outcome of WebAssembly is to create a binary format for browsers which will ultimately improve performance and decrease bundle size. The teams are now hard at work integrating the WebAssembly into browsers and updating the developer tools. For the engineers that love being on the cutting edge, you can begin experimenting with WebAssembly by compiling on your own machine.
That’s all we have for you this month. Until next time! | https://medium.com/edge-coders/coding-news-monthly-summary-npm-5-released-updates-to-react-kotlin-on-android-and-more-7c77f760dbf3 | ['Samer Buna'] | 2017-06-29 17:29:37.659000+00:00 | ['Coding', 'Nodejs', 'News', 'Programming', 'JavaScript'] |
Zero to Hero — Master Kafka Tutorial 1 (Basic Theory) | This is the first tutorial of this series, which covers the basic concepts of Kafka
Basic Concept — Data Topics
Topic: A particular stream of data, identified by the topic name. Partition: Topic splits into partitions; Each partition is a queue of messages. Offset: The incremental id assigned to the message in the partition.
Note
Offset guarantees the order of messages in the partition. Offset (the incremental Id) is only meaningful within the partition (i.e. message with id 2 in partition 1 is not guaranteed to be older than message with id 0 in partition 2). Message is kept in the partition for a limited time (default 1 week). Message in the partition is immutable.
Kafka Cluster
Cluster: A cluster contains multiple brokers. Broker: One broker is one server, with a specific ID; The topic partitions are distributed across all the brokers in the cluster. Replication: The replication of data for the topic, so that the partitions in the topic will be replicated for safety purpose.
Note
At any time, only one broker hosts the leader of a given partition (accepts reads and writes), the other brokers host the followers (only sync the data). If the broker hosts the leader is down, a new leader will be selected from the followers.
Producer & Consumer
Producer
Write data to topic Acknowledge mode: acks=0 no data acknowledgment; acks=1 data acknowledgment from leader; acks=all data acknowledgement from leader and all replicas. Message Key: Determines how the data is sent to the partitions; key=null data is sent round robin; key=some_field , messages with the same value for the field will be sent to the same partition.
Consumer
Read data from topic Read data from multiple partitions in parallel, and read data in order within each partition. Consumer Group: One consumer belongs to one consumer group; One consumer group can have multiple consumers; One consumer group reads all the partitions of a topic (e.g. If we have 2 consumer groups, each message will be consumed twice, once in consumer group 1, once in consumer group 2); Each consumer within the same consumer group reads from exclusive partitions. Consumer Offset: Kafka stores the offsets each consumer group has been reading ( __consumer_offsets ) on the topic; So that when consumer dies, it will be able to read back from where they left off after it recovers. Consumer Offset Committing: At most once — offset is committed as soon as the message is received, could result in message lost if the processing goes wrong; At least once — offset is committed only after the message is processed, can result in one message processed multiple time, need to make sure the process is idempotent; Exactly once — can only be achieved between Kafka to Kafka workflows. Consumer Connection: consumer connects to one broker only in the cluster, and it will know all the other brokers, topics and partitions base on the metadata.
Zookeeper | https://medium.com/@gongybable/zero-to-hero-master-kafka-tutorial-1-basic-theory-3c7f43e94556 | ['Y Tech'] | 2020-10-14 19:29:54.677000+00:00 | ['Software Development', 'Microservices', 'Software Architecture', 'Kafka'] |
One With Nature | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/paper-poetry/one-with-nature-2a5e44b20e59 | ['Thalia Dunn'] | 2020-12-01 15:00:50.090000+00:00 | ['Haiku', 'Nature', 'Poetry', 'Paper Poetry', 'Birds'] |
The Heart Freezes Last | It’s chilly here in the hallway office, maybe 55 degrees Fahrenheit. I’ve not been able to get fully warm since my bladder cancer surgery two weeks back. Maybe that’s what set me to thinking about The Match Girl. Or maybe it’s just the season. I’ve read it through several times as the holiday season approaches.
This year the season stirs memories of being cold in tarpaper shacks. Shacks where the lack of noise from a television or refrigerator humming lets in the noise of the wind. Wind in the cracks of doors and windows, but also the sound of wind rattling the leaves on the trees outside, clicking the spinning leaves on the ground, hissing through the long dry grass and broom sage in the yard.
Cold where you can see your breath in your bedroom, huddled for warmth two to a bed. Nights when you really don’t know if you will wake up despite sleeping in all your clothes and donning a sock hat locally called a “toboggan.”
Most of all, today’s cold reminds me of the winter of 1973, the year my brother and I gathered sticks and scraps of shingles to keep a six-inch fire going in the fireplace in the room off the kitchen. There was no heat anywhere else, except when Mama fired up the tiny wood stove in the kitchen to heat bath water.
We faced mortality in our pre-teen years, driven home by the glass of water that froze solid on our nightstand. We fought sleep, afraid that our internal light would go out during the night, and we’d face eternal darkness. Then we resigned ourselves to it — that should it happen, we’d probably feel nothing and we’d not be cold any longer.
I do remember briefly thinking of The Match Girl story we’d learned in school that year, and driving it from my mind. I didn’t speak it aloud to my brother lying beside me.
Thankfully, this was a time when we had electricity, and we plugged our electric blanket into the socket holding the bare bulb in the center of the ceiling. The house had no wall outlets.
My brother and I had worked all the previous summer, and the one before, 40 hours a week, beginning when I was 11 and John was 12, to feed the family. But this second summer we had gone on strike, refusing to cut firewood for the winter. We said that we’d done enough. “You’ll cut it when you’re cold enough.” He was working a hundred hours a week driving a bread truck and wasn’t home to cut the wood we needed.
Dad was right. It was hard enough in summer and fall to cut poles smaller than your wrist, something small enough for kids maybe four feet tall to drag home and cut up with the bow saw. Hard with elbows twice the size of your forearms and biceps from malnutrition. It was worse once winter had a grip.
So we scavenged sticks and slowly worked our way through a few stacks of shingles a previous tenant of the old 1840s farmhouse left behind. Asphalt shingles that made a tiny blue flame and stunk like freshly paved roads.
When 12 inches of sleet fell — and stayed, we agreed that we were cold enough. We donned the ski masks that we slept in during the coldest nights, and took our tools a few hundred yards into the woods, in knee-deep sleet.
We cut long past our hands and feet going numb. The wind whipped the cold off the icy surface, reflecting the cold back into our faces. We dragged the poles to the house and cut them into sections that fit the stove and fireplace.
They weren’t roaring fires, by any stretch. But better than huddling around what had been no more than The Match Girl’s burning bundle of matches.
We laid in a little more wood, then it sleeted another nine inches before the tornado swarm of 1974 wiped out most of the homes around us, killing one of our classmates. After the twisters we cut a lot of wood to be ready for the following year.
Then Mama bought a chainsaw for Dad’s June birthday. Our Uncle Ben and Dad cut up about a cord of fine firewood with it, making our pile look puny indeed.
Then in September, Dad bought a house in town, with indoor plumbing and gas heat. It was with a heavy heart that we abandoned that stack of firewood.
Today I feel, in my aching bones, for those who are truly cold — not just chilly in a big old house out of choice and a preference for originality of architecture. I feel for the children who wonder if tonight’s sleep will be permanent, and for the parents who wonder about the same thing. And I open my heart and my arms that they may find a different kind of relief than the Match Girl found. | https://medium.com/@cdbonner/the-heart-freezes-last-55f7e92f30b9 | ['Dean Bonner'] | 2020-12-25 18:08:30.409000+00:00 | ['Little Match Girl', 'Christmas', 'Memoir', 'Bonner', 'Childhood'] |
My first international conference | When I started blogging and networking my aim was to get connected to the thoughts of the best people in the industry whether it is software or business. There was a milestone that we decided to reach which is to get a guest entry into an esteemed conference.
We estimated to achieve this desired goal in one and a half to two years of committed efforts. This was based on the fact that I was new to all this and if I will not be able to cope up with my stuff. So a bounce-back time, but I am happy to announce that I got a guest invitation into an esteemed group aspire where they talk about empowering the present state of women.
I was happy to hear the speakers and networked with the CEOs and founders of various companies. It was really inspiring to meet different people from all over the world. This helped me shape a better perspective. I was invited as a guest there and I also expressed my thoughts on inclusive development.
The session was a hit but what amazes me is the fact that I was able to achieve this in about 8 months, half of the time that we thought to invest. This is really amazing. But walking this path sometimes is a hard path as there is no real cash in my hand while my friends are making more money, though I want to turn my life into a process-driven form seeing people getting ahead of me in terms of salary sometimes makes me ask the question, is it worth it?
What exactly I want to ask myself is, Is excellence worth it? Because I am giving myself time daily, daily I am following my rituals of attracting riches into my life, but still, I have nothing in my hand. Maybe I am lacking patience. But this thought is coming into my mind because people I know who are not giving in the way I have been are getting better results.
But I am forgetting the fact that how can I say that they are not giving in the way I have been giving in. All that I have in my hands is my own karma, rest success depends on many different factors.
From the mental passage that I drew I just need to have patience and work towards my goals I need to keep walking the path that I think is an important need to stay committed to it and the right things will start happening to me at the right time. | https://medium.com/@iamashusahoo/my-first-international-conference-b13c3a625328 | ['Ashutosh Sahoo'] | 2020-12-06 19:03:28.188000+00:00 | ['Feminism', 'Inclusion', 'Confusion', 'Growth', 'Conference'] |
Lessons from Tulsa, OK: Sending text messages to encourage residents to connect with support… | How do we know if this text message campaign worked and how cities can run their own similar evaluation and project
Tulsa designed and launched a randomized control trial to evaluate the impact of this text alert on people who were considered at risk of eviction because they were experiencing financial distress. The at-risk population was identified by an in-house predictive model based on water billing payment data: the model selects people who are considered more vulnerable to eviction based on whether they have a history of missing utility payments or have had their utilities shut off.
Note: Your city does not need to have a predictive model to replicate this trial! If you have access to a database that contains information indicating the financial status of residents and their phone numbers you can use that information to target recipients. Another option could be to use census level data or a resource like the Opportunity Atlas to identify individuals with higher needs. Or, you can roll out the intervention to a broader group of residents, as long as you can get contact information for all the recipients.
Once the city had identified the recipient group and assembled its phone contact details from the water billing information, the team used Twilio, a cloud communications platform, to send a text message to a random selection of half the people in the sample, while the other half (which served as a control group) was only exposed to the 211 material they would have normally encountered, such as emails or print advertisements.
One of the best parts? The trial was inexpensive to run. Sending messages for this trial cost only $0.0075 per message, for a total expense of about $40 to reach over 5,100 residents.
The city was able to measure the impact of the text message by comparing the number of calls, uptake in support, and service connections from the group that received the message to the group that did not (i.e., the control group).
Tulsa found significant differences between the two groups: text recipients were 17.6 percent more likely to call the helpline and 18.5 percent more likely to be connected to financial services. The success of this intervention showed that text messages can be an effective and cheap method of outreach to at-risk residents. They can help lower the barriers for residents to connect with available financial services — a key step in increasing the uptake of these services for eligible residents. Over the five-month trial, 144 households that received the text message called 211 and got connected to housing services. When compared to the expected rate for the uptake of these services in this period, the text message resulted in an additional 11 households receiving assistance and an additional $16,500 of housing assistance provided.
The Evaluation Protocol
The remaining section of this guide will walk you through a step-by-step on how to adapt this intervention and evaluate its impact in your community.
An evaluation project has four key steps:
Scoping Your Evaluation: Identify your goals, target population, and approach
Identify your goals, target population, and approach Designing Your Evaluation: Develop your evaluation method, outcome measures, and randomization approach
Develop your evaluation method, outcome measures, and randomization approach Implementing Your Evaluation: Deliver your solution, ensure everything goes to plan, and collect data
Deliver your solution, ensure everything goes to plan, and collect data Analyzing Your Results: Conduct data analysis based on your collected data
To design an effective evaluation, Tulsa developed an “Evaluation Protocol” to guide their evaluation design and implementation. While sending a text message may seem straightforward and might not feel like it needs a formal protocol, evaluations need to be implemented in a careful and precise way to generate results that you (and others) can learn from. A protocol can help you to document the decisions and intentions around your intervention. It’s a forward-looking plan that will help you down the road — and also make it easy for people to replicate your work in the future (like we are doing now). We’ve made it easy for you to implement a similar project in your city by giving you Tulsa’s evaluation protocol to follow along.
Download the evaluation replication worksheet to see Tulsa’s evaluation protocol and develop your own approach! | https://medium.com/replication-guides-for-city-led-evaluations/lessons-from-tulsa-ok-sending-text-messages-to-encourage-residents-to-connect-with-support-358b7c7f6a97 | ['What Works Cities'] | 2021-04-22 22:32:33.420000+00:00 | ['Cities', 'Tulsa', 'Data', 'Local Government', 'Behavioral Science'] |
How to Set Up Your Programming LinkedIn Profile | How to Set Up Your Programming LinkedIn Profile
Photo by Carl Heyerdahl on Unsplash
Whether you’re new to the field and looking for your first development job, or you’re a veteran seeking a new opportunity. Nowadays, you need a LinkedIn profile to get the right reach and get noticed.
Why is LinkedIn so important?
Almost every single employer and recruiter uses LinkedIn to find new employees. According to research, 87% of recruiters use LinkedIn regularly. Visibility is key in a job search, and LinkedIn gives you just that with exactly the right people.
It might seem redundant to have to maintain an updated resume, a portfolio website, and a LinkedIn profile. But they’re all critical components of your online professional identity.
How LinkedIn works
LinkedIn might be the most important of these components. Where your resume and your personal site only get seen by people you’ve directed there or the occasional visitor from Google, LinkedIn is a search engine in its own right targeted specifically to find new employees/employers.
Just like any search engine, LinkedIn uses keywords in various areas of your profile to determine if you’re a relevant result when a potential employer/recruiter is searching.
This means that you can optimize your profile by placing the right words in your headline, summary, and skills sections to have a higher chance of being found (by the right people).
Before we get started
If you already have a LinkedIn profile, I would recommend you to turn off sharing for your profile edits. We’re about to make many changes, and it might be nice for your connections if they wouldn’t get an update about every single one of them. Furthermore, making many changes on LinkedIn could inadvertently tip-off your current employer that you’re seeking something new before you’re ready to tell them.
1. Absolute Must-Have Profile Features
The following parts of your profile are absolute must-haves to include on your profile, and they should be done to the best of your abilities.
1.1. Add a good-looking professional profile photo
Example of my own LinkedIn profile photo
LinkedIn, themselves have stated that a good photo can get your profile up to 21x more views than a profile without one. Avatars / Illustrations are fun, but the professional standard is a headshot, which also immediately creates a personal connection with you as a person instead of just a profile.
There’s no need to pay a photographer for a shot like this. Every modern smartphone has a great camera that can create a good shot. Make sure to find a good and simple backdrop that won’t distract the photo away from you (such as a simple wall) or you could use image editing to remove the background and add one digitally.
Make sure that the photo is well-lit. Preferably with natural light. For example, try to make the photo in a well-lit room where you’re facing a window or outside.
Make sure the end result captures you from the mid-torso or shoulders up and that your face takes up roughly 60% of the shot. Photos on LinkedIn are displayed small and the point is to create a connection. If you’re standing far away in the background, you’ll be unrecognizable.
1.2. Add a Clear, Descriptive, Carefully Chosen Headline
The headline field is at the top of your profile, right under your name. By default, this will display your latest job title and employer. You can, however, change this to anything you want.
You can get quite creative with it and stand out compared to other candidates. If you’re changing careers or industries, it won’t throw off potential employers thinking you’re not the right fit by showing your old job title or field.
The headline can be up to 120 characters long. So, you should keep it brief, but have enough room to be creative and explain what you can bring to the table.
Here are some example ideas you could use as headlines:
Use the job title you want to have, not the one you currently have
Front-End Web Developer
SEO Strategist
PHP Web Developer
Add your experience of relevant specializations
Front-End Web Developer — JavaScript, Vue, React
Experienced SEO Strategist for Fashion Retail Brands
PHP Web Developer — Symfony, WordPress, Magento
Potentially add skills from previous job titles in the mix
Front-end Web Developer with experience as an SEO Strategist
Experienced SEO Strategist, Front-end Developer, and Web Designer
PHP Web Developer with 5+ experience as a Front-End Developer.
1.3. Write a Compelling Summary
The summary field can be 2,600 characters (or about 400–450 words) long. This is the place to tell people all about you, your story, your personality, and your experience.
At the same time, this is also the place where you can smartly inject some keywords to show up better in search results (without being spammy).
Here’s my current summary as an example
Example of my own LinkedIn summary
I listed the entire story of my career in different paragraphs for easy reading.
At the end of the summary, I included the specializations section, so I had a non-obtrusive way to include my skills without using technical terms such as ASP.Net in the story.
Bonus tips
Additionally, you can include your contact details or a call to action to, for example, your portfolio site. For example: “Check out my work at …” or “Feel free to e-mail me at …”
1.4. List your experiences
You should carefully curate the list of experiences on your LinkedIn profile. Make sure that it reflects the role you want to move into. This means that sometimes it’s better to leave information out or add additional information.
It’s good to use short, clear, and factual information about what you’ve done. For example: Instead of writing “Managed the company newsletter” you could write “grew e-mail newsletter open rates from 5 to 16%”. This says the same thing but shows that you were a success at what you did. If you can’t use numbers to explain your results, try to explain the best way how it moved the company forward. Make sure to use impactful words such as created, grew, achieved, doubled, launched, established.
1.5. Skill section
The skill section is incredibly important for you to show up in relevant search results. You should make sure that the skills you place here are relevant primarily to the job you’re looking for, and not the job(s) you might have had.
You can include up to 50 skills. But for now, let’s focus on about 10–15 relevant skills starting with your areas of expertise such as “Front-end development”, ”HTML”, “CSS”, “JavaScript”.
Don’t forget to include tools that you’re proficient with that help you stand out from the competition such as: “GitHub”, “Google Analytics”, “Visual Studio Code” “WordPress”, “Magento” etc.
Additional things such as processes like “Agile”, “Scrum” can also be added. Once you’re done adding your skills, you should reorder them so that they go from most important to least important.
Tip: Languages you speak can be added both as skills and as accomplishments.
Top skills
You can choose up to three skills as your “Top skills”. These will be shown at the top of the skills section and are the only ones that show without someone clicking the “Show more” button.
Endorsements
LinkedIn allows you to endorse other people in a skill that they have mentioned on their profile. Anyone can press the “+” button next to a skill and mention how proficient they think that person is in the skill and what their relationship to the person is to give this endorsement.
Having some endorsements could help you perform better in search results, and it just looks good on your profile when other people endorse you.
Getting endorsements can easily be done in the following ways:
Endorsing other people’s skills. Think of (ex-)coworkers, (ex-)classmates, friends, family, clients, or anyone else that you can give an actual endorsement of a skill and do it. There’s a good chance they’ll return the favor. Ask for endorsements. If you’re trying to find a new job, there’s a good chance that people will be willing to take just two minutes out of their day to help you out by giving you a few endorsements. Make sure that the people you ask can give honest endorsements.
Skill Assessments
LinkedIn allows you to take short quizzes containing 15 multiple-choice questions in a variety of subjects. This goes for many skills that you as a web developer can and should have. These assessments take up just a little bit of time, but can help you perform better in search results and give you that little push, especially when looking for your first job in the field.
1.6. Education or other training
Although a formal education is not a requirement in the tech industry in many places, you can skip this section if you don’t have anything to place in this section.
But if you do have a form of formal education, you should definitely add it to your profile. This can also help you be found when hiring managers or recruiters search for candidates with formal education, or people who studied in a certain direction or at a specific school.
Furthermore, this gives you a chance to connect with people who studied the same thing as you, which can lead to finding job opportunities through those people since it’s likely you end up working in the same circles.
2. Should-have profile features
The following parts of your profile are not absolute requirements to include, but are still great things to add to stand out from the competition.
2.1. Add a custom LinkedIn profile URL
When creating your profile, LinkedIn will create a random profile URL for you. You can, however, change this to something unique that’s more professional and recognizable. Most likely this will be your name, if this is unavailable, you could try your full name, and if that’s not possible, you could include a birth year or number.
For example
wesley-smits (name)
wesley-robert-smits (full name)
wesley-smits-1993 or wesley-smits-7 (with birth-year or random number)
2.2. Add an interesting cover image
Example of my own LinkedIn cover image
LinkedIn allows you to upload a cover image, which shows at the top of your profile page and in profile widgets across the entire platform. This is an excellent place to show off some of your personality and stand out from the many people who don’t use this feature and have the default LinkedIn cover.
LinkedIn advises a cover image size of 1584×396, which I would recommend sticking to since the cropping / resizing options are not the best.
As you can see in the screenshot above, I made a simple screenshot using a JavaScript object to write out some personal stuff about me and filled up the bottom of the image with some web development logos. Easy to make, unique, and showcases both my personality and some information about me.
2.3. Feature your accomplishments
If you have any noteworthy accomplishments, this is the place to showcase them. This could be languages you speak, certificates you have, awards you’ve won, projects, or courses you’ve completed such as a hackathon or a 100-days-of-code type challenge.
You could also include publications about you or things you’ve published yourself, like a blog post or magazine article.
2.4. Ask for recommendations
LinkedIn gives us a feature to write a recommendation about other LinkedIn users. Similar to endorsements, the best way to get these are to give them to people and ask them of people.
Make sure that you only collect truthful and meaningful recommendations from people you’ve actually worked with (or potentially studied with if you’re looking for your first job).
3. Things you should not have on your profile
3.1. Your Phone-Number
It might seem like a good idea to include your phone number on your profile when you are job-hunting so that people can reach you directly. Often this leads to your phone number being stored in a bunch of databases, meaning you’ll get many calls until well after you’ve found a new job.
3.2. Irrelevant Information
Don’t add work experience, skills, or any other information that is not relevant to you as a person or what you’re currently looking for.
3.3. Untruthful or Mismatching Information
If your LinkedIn profile does what it does best and gets you a job interview, it will quickly become obvious if your LinkedIn profile does not match with you, your skills, or your experience. Make sure to be consistent in your profile, resumé, and the actual truth.
3.4. Mistakes
It might seem obvious, but it’s worth noting that your LinkedIn profile needs to look professional. One easy way to do the opposite is to forget to proofread and have a profile full of typos or grammar mistakes.
You can ask friends or family to proofread, and I would also recommend you use tools to improve your text. Grammarly has a free plan that does an outstanding job improving your texts if your profile is in English.
4. Additional Tips
4.1. Grow your network
LinkedIn is a great place to connect with people you’ve met or worked with over the course of your life. These people could potentially someday mean something to you, or perhaps you can mean something to them.
A great example would be a coworker of mine. I once taught a class during my studies to students from the year below me, and one person in the room connected with me on LinkedIn. Fast-forward 6-years later, and I share a vacancy on my LinkedIn feed for the company I now work for, and he sees it, applies for it, and gets the job.
Besides fellow students, you could add clients (both your own or your employers if you’ve worked with them), people you meet at networking events, or anyone you think should be in your network.
4.2 Have an active content feed
It looks good if you’re active on LinkedIn and you share relevant information. This could be in the form of sharing your own blog posts, or perhaps you can share other content you’ve found online and offer your perspective on it.
Besides posting yourself, you could also comment or discuss things on posts from people in your network or within niche groups on LinkedIn.
Conclusion
LinkedIn is a powerful platform that can really help you find better career opportunities. I hope this post helped you improve your LinkedIn profile and that it helps you find better career opportunities!
Thanks for reading. If you have thoughts on this or think I left something out, be sure to leave a comment.
And if you want, you can connect with me on LinkedIn or Twitter!
More content at plainenglish.io | https://javascript.plainenglish.io/how-to-set-up-your-programming-linkedin-profile-1c8322c24a72 | ['Wesley Smits'] | 2021-09-12 06:02:54.517000+00:00 | ['LinkedIn', 'Resume', 'Web Development', 'Programming', 'Careers'] |
Kikswap.com $KIK token excellently passed SolidProof Smart Contract audit | Kikswap.com $KIK token excellently passed SolidProof Smart Contract audit
Kikswap is a specified Crosschain DEX and staking platform for meme tokens. From staking these meme tokens to trading them with multi chain features, so it was important to us to audit the $KIK smart contract with the best smart contract security auditor on the blockchain ecosystem.
SolidProof leads blockchain security by pioneering the use of cutting-edge Formal Verification technology on smart contracts and blockchains. Unlike traditional security audits, Formal Verification mathematically proves program correctness and hacker-resistance.
What is smart contract audit?
A smart contract audit is an extensive methodical examination and analysis of a smart contract’s code that is used to interact with a cryptocurrency or blockchain. This process is conducted to discover errors, issues and security vulnerabilities in the code in order to suggest improvements and ways to fix them. Generally, smart contract audits are necessary, because most of the contracts deal with financial assets and/or valuable items.
SolidProof assess whether there are possible security errors in the $KIK contract, and if there are any errors in the contracts report is attach, they have described in a report that which issues critical, medium and low risk, Solidproof external audit give a chance us to improve the security of investments of the whole community in upcoming presale of kikswap.
About SolidProof:
Solid Proof was founded as a community-driven company, and they want to thank our community for being so supportive! Solidproof is Security Audits, DeFi Trust Made in Germany.
Solidproof Socialmedia
🔹Group: https://t.me/solidproof
🔹Twitter: https://twitter.com/solidproof_io
🔹Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/solidproof.io
Social Links:
Website: https://kikswap.com/
Application: https://app.kikswap.com/
Whitepaper: https://kikswap.com/whitepaper.pdf
Medium: https://kiktoken.medium.com/
Github: https://github.com/kiktoken
Telegram: t.me/kiktoken
Twitter: https://twitter.com/kiktoken
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Kiktoken
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCS-KTygQptMhtnlFVEyFJng
Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/user/kiktoken
Discord: https://discord.gg/CRRK3yPq
Media: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/kikswap-com-not-another-meme-000000828.html | https://medium.com/@kiktoken/kikswap-com-kik-token-excellently-passed-solidproof-smart-contract-audit-ddda73f94525 | ['Kikswap', 'Official'] | 2021-12-26 13:07:06.914000+00:00 | ['Kwikswap', 'Kik', 'Binance', 'Bnb', 'Bsc'] |
Zerogoki Token — REI is now listed on MEXC Exchange | Zerogoki, the world’s first algorithm pegged leverage synthetic assets platform, has announced the listing of its token “REI” on MEXC Exchange (https://www.mexc.com/) on the 13th of September 2021 at 11:00 a.m. UTC. Zerogoki is a pilot protocol developed by the passionate team behind the Duet protocol which is committed to building a parallel financial universe governed by DAO.
REI will start trading with the USDT pair.
What is REI?
REI, phonetically from the Japanese word ‘zero’ (れい)”, is the platform token as well as the core asset of Zerogoki, which fuels synthetic leveraged assets. For every $1 of synthetic assets minted, $1 of REI will be burned. Synthetic assets and REI are two-way interoperable, and the same redemption of REI of $1 needs to burn synthetic assets worth $1. In the long run, as the supply of synthetic assets grows, the total amount of REI will deflate and the actual total amount will gradually decrease. The initial circulation of REI is 42,000,000.
MEXC will be listing Zerogoki (REI) in Assessment Zone and to commemorate the launch, MEXC and Zerogoki team are holding an REI Trading Fiesta to benefit MEXC users. Deposit & Trade REI to stand a chance of sharing 47,000 REI giveaway! Details are as below.
REI Trading Competition
Event Duration: 2021–09–13 11:00 to 2021–09–16 16:00 (UTC)
Rules: During the event duration, users that trade REI with a minimum trading volume of 10,000 USDT can stand a chance to win 27,000 REI rewards. Users will be ranked according to their total trading volume, rewards distribution are as below:
Participation Prize
Event Duration: 2021–09–13 11:00 to 2021–09–13 16:00 (UTC)
Rules: All REI traders (excluding users that are ranked in the REI Trading Competition) with a minimum trading volume of 500 USDT are eligible to share a 20,000 REI prize pool. Prizes received by each user are proportional to the individual trading volume during the event.
About MEXC
Founded in 2018, MEXC Global is a centralized exchange that employs a high-performance mega-transaction matching technology. The MEXC platform is run by a team of professionals with extensive financial industries and blockchain technology experience. Currently, MEXC Global has around 5 million users in more than 70 countries around the world. This achievement is a significant milestone, and the platform aims to become a go-to platform for new and experienced investors as they move forward.
The exchange spreads across four countries, Canada, Australia, Estonia, and the United States where it has obtained key licenses in other jurisdictions. The exchange completes 1.4 million transactions per second, which results in increased efficiency and enhanced performance. In the interest of strengthening security and ensuring optimal data integrity, our server clusters are hosted independently in Singapore and Korea.
MEXC has grown rapidly in 2019, gaining a 5% share of the global digital asset trading market by the end of 2019. 2019 also saw MEXC named as the “Most Popular Trading Platform” and “Best Trading Platform” by professional media.
About Zerogoki:
Zerogoki, a transliteration of “Zero number Machine” in Japanese, stands for the model Unit-00, being a metaphor of the prototype. As a trading platform for derivatives deployed on Ethereum and based on an algorithmic anchor mechanism to create leverage tokens, Zerogoki can provide users with leverage tools for both emerging and traditional assets such as Crypto, Gold, Bonds, or even Metaverse Index. Users can use the platform token REI to cast leverage tokens or use the protocol’s synthetic dollar anchor asset-zUSD to buy leverage assets directly.
An innovative pilot version from Duet Protocol Zerogoki aims to offer a playground for various assets and mechanisms to withstand the test in a real trading environment and focused on leveraged and exotic synthetic assets and only has an algorithm-pegging module compared with Duet’s universal assets support and dual-synth module. Going forward, Zerogoki will also provide novel financial derivatives, offering users more vehicles to mint or trade as well as more earning strategies for other participants. | https://medium.com/@zerogoki/zerogoki-token-rei-is-now-listed-on-mexc-exchange-67f239f1024f | [] | 2021-09-12 11:08:43.179000+00:00 | ['Mexc', 'Zerogoki', 'Rei', 'Defi', 'Listings'] |
Topic: Suffering | Topic: Suffering
The following is an essay I wrote for my religions course at university, enjoy!
A pillar of the Buddha’s teaching is suffering. In our course textbook, “Living Religions” by Mary Pat Fischer, she writes “In his very first talk on Dharma at Sarnath, the Buddha set forth the Four Noble Truths, the foundation for all his later teachings: The truth of pain and suffering, The truth of the arising of pain, The truth of the cessation of pain, The truth of the path to end pain: The Noble Eightfold Path.” (Fisher Mary Pat. (p. 142) Living Religions) The Four Noble Truths outline the causes of human suffering, and The Noble Eightfold Path offers the solution for ceasing that suffering.
The First Noble Truth identifies the existence of Dukkha; meaning pain, suffering, or dissatisfaction. The Second Noble Truth is that dukkha is caused by craving sensory pleasures; fame, fortune, attachment to worldly things and ideas, etc. We are ignorant to the motivations behind our cravings, and this creates suffering. The Third Noble Truth is that Dukkha will stop when craving and clinging stop. This is easier said than done. Especially considering we don’t understand why we are attached to things and ideas or why we experience cravings. And finally, The Fourth Noble Truth is that suffering can be stopped by following The Noble Eightfold Path. Having outlined the causes of suffering, Buddha goes a step further to lay out instructions on ending the suffering. (Reference: Fisher Mary Pat. (p. 143) Living Religions).
The Noble Eightfold Path allows humans to stop experiencing Dukkha, suffering, and to break free from the cycle of death and rebirth, to experience nirvana. Again, from our textbook, “Living Religions”, the author provides the following excerpts outlining the basics of the Noble Eightfold Path.
“The first aspect of the Noble Eightfold Path is right understanding — comprehending reality correctly through deep realization of the Four Noble Truths.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). This means developing a proper perceptual map. We have to see the world correctly, through a clear mind, free from the bias and programming of society.
“The second aspect is right thought or intention. The Buddha’s teachings help us to uncover any afflictive emotions that affect our thinking, such as selfish desires or a tendency to hide our imperfections.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). This is saying we must let go of our ego-centric thinking and self-interest. Thinking and engaging with the world, not for self-gain, but for a higher purpose.
“The third aspect is right speech. The Buddha taught his followers to relinquish the propensity to lie, gossip, speak harshly, or engage in divisive speech, and instead to use communication in the service of truth and harmony.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). This is one of the most important aspects of the Noble Eightfold Path. It says to speak properly, and positively. But there is also an understanding of when it is best to say nothing.
“The fourth aspect is right action, which begins with observing the five basic precepts for ethical conduct: to avoid destroying life, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying, and intoxicants.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). The five basic precepts can be thought of similar to the 10 commandments. It is a more compact set of rules to live by but encompasses a lot of the same morals.
“The fifth is right livelihood — making sure that one’s way of making a living does not violate the five precepts.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). This aspect is particularly interesting when applied to 21st century western society, where an emphasis is placed on securing a high paying job to provide security. Although these jobs do not inherently violate the five basic precepts, the capitalist nature of American jobs oppose Buddhist teachings.
“Right effort, the sixth aspect, means striving continually to eliminate the impurities of the mind and diligently cultivating wholesome actions of body, speech, and mind.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). The sixth aspect is one of the more lighthearted of the eight. It simply requests joyful effort. This explains the stereotype that Buddhist are always smiling and happy, even while doing simple task.
“The seventh aspect, right mindfulness, is a distinctive feature of the Buddhist path.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). This awareness is a pillar of Buddhist practice. Being fully conscious of the moment at hand. Mindfulness takes intention and a lifetime of practice, maybe a few lifetimes.
“The eighth aspect, right meditation, applies mental discipline to quiet the mind and develop single-pointed concentration. The various schools of Buddhism that developed over the centuries have taught different techniques of meditation, but this basic principle remains the same.” (Fisher Mary Pat (p. 144) Living Religion). Meditation is perhaps the most widespread practice of Buddhism, though it was also used in other religions around the world under different names like prayer, chanting, yoga, etc. All of these practices are essentially meditations.
According to the Buddha, by following the guidelines provided in The Noble Eightfold Path, one can cease their own experiencing Dukkha, and eventually end the cycle of rebirth and death completely. It may take several lifetimes and incarnations to perfect one’s practice of following The Noble Eightfold Path. With each rebirth one should strive to live better than their previous incarnation.
As described in our textbook, “Living Religions”, Zen Buddhism emphasizes direct insight into the true nature of one’s own mind, to reveal one’s own Buddha nature. (Fisher Mary Pat. (p. 160) Living Religions) In “The Spirit of Zen” by Solala Towler, he writes “Each of us has our own unique embodiment and expression of Zen. Each time someone sits down on a cushion or a bench and enters deep meditation… each time someone brews and shares a cup of tea with grace and humility… each time a teacher instructs his or her student on the Way… each time someone let’s go of their egoic self and instead embraces their eternal self, each time someone shares what they have learned and unlearned on their quest for spiritual understanding…” (The Spirit of Zen (P. 19) Solala Towler) This ties in with the seventh aspect of The Noble Eightfold Path, which covers mindfulness. This excerpt is emphasizing the practice of mindfulness and awareness in all task. By engaging in this constant practice, one can become a Buddha in their own regard.
In “Living Buddha, Living Christ” by Thich Nhat Hanh, he writes “There is a science called Buddhology, the study of the life of the Buddha. As an historical person, the Buddha was born in Kapilavastu, near the border between India and Nepal, got married, had one child, left home practice many kinds of meditation became enlightened and share the teaching until he died at the age of eighty. But there is also the Buddha within ourselves who transcend space and time. This is the living Buddha, the Buddha the ultimate reality, the one who transcends all ideas and notions and is available to us at any time. The living Buddha was not born at Kapilavastu, nor did he pass away at Kushinagar.” (Living Buddha, Living Christ” (P. 34–35) Thich Nhat Hanh) The author goes on to explain how there is also Christology, the study of the life of historical Jesus, as well as the Living Christ. The point of explaining the difference in the historical and living Buddha or Jesus is to show us how we can access their wisdom and embody their teachings.
Hermann Hesse tells a fictional story based on the historical Buddha’s life in the classic novel, “Siddhartha” which was Buddha’s birthname. In the novel he writes “Siddhartha had a single goal before him, one and one only: to become empty, empty of thirst, empty of desire, empty of dreams, empty of joy and pain. To die away from himself, no longer to be I, to find the peace of the emptied heart, by thinking away from the self to stand open to the miraculous: this was his goal. When the entire I was conquered and dead, when every passion, every drive in the heart was still, then the ultimate had to awaken, what was innermost, most essential in being, that which is no longer I, the great secret” (Siddhartha (P. 13) Hermann Hesse) This is a beautiful representation of the Buddha realizing the Noble Eightfold Path. In the novel, Siddhartha sets out to do exactly this, though his journey takes a different turn from the historic accounts.
Outside of Buddhism, other philosophers around the world had different interpretations of suffering. The Stoics in ancient Rome and Greece did not believe in reincarnation like the Buddhist. They saw this life as the only opportunity to express free will. This fundamental difference leads to two very different philosophical paths. In “The Obstacle Is The Way” by Ryan Holiday, a modern stoic book, he writes “Most of the time we don’t find ourselves in horrible situations we must simply endure. Rather we face some minor disadvantage or get stuck with some less-than-favorable conditions. Or we’re trying to do something really hard and find ourselves outmatched, overstretched, or out of ideas. Turn it around. Find some benefit. Use it as fuel.” (The Obstacle is The Way (P. 4) Ryan Holiday) This call to action is very different from the solution provided by the Buddha in the Noble Eightfold Path. Instead of living our lives with purpose to negate the existence of suffering, the Stoics tell us to embrace the suffering and use it to our advantage. There is no emphasis placed on ending the suffering.
American culture is more similar to the Stoics culture, so their guide to dealing with suffering relies on understandings I possess as a Westerner. Buddhist thinking requires an understanding of Eastern philosophy, if it is to be successfully adapted. The Buddha was far ahead of his time with his understanding of suffering, its causes and the remedy. The Noble Eightfold Path is a beautiful guide to living properly. There is no religious dogma attached, or oppressive rules to follow. If applied properly to current times, The Noble Eightfold Path can allow one to cease suffering.
References
1. “Living Religions” by Mary Pat Fischer
2. “The Spirit of Zen” by Solala Towler
3. “Living Buddha, Living Christ” by Thich Nhat Hanh
4. “Siddhartha” by Hermann Hesse
5. “The Obstacle Is The Way” by Ryan Holiday | https://medium.com/@aaron-vince/topic-suffering-4d74f1bf9cb8 | ['Aaron Vince'] | 2020-12-06 17:13:53.325000+00:00 | ['Stoicism', 'Suffering', 'Religion', 'Philosophy', 'Buddhism'] |
Learning How to Learn: Powerful mental tools to help you master tough subjects, Diffuse Mode | Learning How to Learn: Powerful mental tools to help you master tough subjects, Diffuse Mode
How to make use of your superior diffuse mode a.k.a. your subconsciousness
This is a follow-up of the chapter discussing the focused mode. I have a lot of ideas every day, but not enough time to write them all down, so I chose to write the other ideas down before I forget them. I was pretty certain I won’t forget the ideas described in this chapter.
So the diffuse mode is somewhat the opposite of the focused mode. It is active in the background or your subconsciousness. The mistake most people and students tend to make when learning, is that they don’t spend a lot of time in the diffuse mode. This can cause a dramatic lack of depth in their understanding about subjects.
If you teach those students about the simulation hypothesis (see the chapter: 09/14/2019 — Simulation Hypothesis and ‘Good and Evil’), they will use their focused mode to learn every bit of element related to that hypothesis, but won’t spend much time in the diffuse mode. What is the consequence of spending less time in the diffuse mode? Well, they won’t ask themselves those deep and abstract questions like “But how does this hypothesis relate to ethics and morals?” It is a sad trend you get to see in modern education, superficial understanding of material. I much prefer the old days like in Ancient Greece or Rome where even the emperors like Marcus Aurelius knew about philosophy and had a deep understanding about things.
How to enter the diffuse mode
First of all, you can enter the diffuse mode simply by not focusing on anything (through meditation or mindfulness), but this alone is not effective in terms of creativity and learning new things. In order to command your diffuse mode to learn something in the background, you need to use the focused mode first.
For example, you want to know your own personal definition of the meaning of life. What you could start with is simply Googling information (and also storing them long-term), try to answer and view as many perspectives as you can, and then just relax. Do something else like exercising or meditating, the thinking will continue and run in the background. And after 15 minutes or even hours afterward, simply return to the question and you will be surprised how many new and stronger connections were formed in your brain without the conscious ‘you’.
This technique can also beautifully be used when taking tests, exams, or making homework:
https://lifehacker.com/improve-your-test-scores-with-the-hard-start-jump-to-e-1790599531 — Improve Your Test Scores With the “Hard Start-Jump to Easy” Technique
Diffuse mode and working memory
The diffuse mode is not limited to the working memory slots located in your prefrontal cortex, unlike the focused mode which is. This makes your subconsciousness so much more powerful when used correctly (albeit not as powerful as depicted in those movies).
The focused mode also tends to activate old neural pathways that aren’t really that creative nor are the cerebral distances very long (the distance between two activated neurons, brain regions etc). The diffuse mode can activate but also create new neural pathways that have a much longer cerebral distance than the focused mode can. This allows the diffuse mode to be much more creative but also combine ideas from many different brain regions. Again, the diffuse mode is not limited to your working memory slots located in your prefrontal cortex, so it can connect and ‘think’ about as many ideas simultaneously as its neural resources allow.
Diffuse mode and psychedelics
I would really advise the book ‘How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence’ by Michael Pollan to learn more about the information I am going to say next.
So the diffuse mode is mostly active when you don’t focus (using your focused mode). What mostly happens, neurophysiologically seen, is that the activity in the so-called default mode network increases. This allows for all kinds of connections to be much more active too, not only within one brain region but between brain regions, too. This is why someone taking psychedelics gets to see all kinds of weird hallucinations like seeing faces in inanimate objects (this phenomenon, called pareidolia, happens even without taking psychedelics, but the increased activity from the default mode network just increases the probability of occurrence).
People who take psychedelics or meditate have the feeling they have found all kinds of ‘truths’ never thought of before. You could say, that when taking psychedelics, you are essentially being aware of your diffuse mode. During sleep, you are experiencing your diffuse mode, too.
Diffuse mode and Entropic Learning Model
See the chapter 09/11/2019 — Entropic Learning Model for more information.
The diffuse mode is just such an important part of our learning and thinking process, that I made a separate phase in my learning model to remind myself that after hours of hard thinking, I need to relax to allow my diffuse mode to take over the thinking work.
Can the diffuse mode run when you are activating the focused mode?
Yes, but only when you switch tasks or ways of thinking. If you are thinking about psychology and get stuck somewhere, switch to a more left-hemispheric mode of thinking like physics or mathematics (the idea that the left and right brain hemispheres are separated from each other, in terms of logic and creativity respectively, is a myth, but brain lateralization or specialization certainly does exist to a certain degree).
How long does it take to ‘enter’ the diffuse mode?
I am not sure, but as far as I have read the information, it can be as little as 10 minutes to even hours. The thing, however, is that to stay in the diffuse mode, you need to repeat to yourself the images, ideas, questions etc. from time to time in order to make your diffuse mode think about the subject even if it takes hours.
According to research, there seems to be a correlation between having more knowledge and the duration required to switch between focused and diffuse mode effectively. The more knowledge, the faster you can switch between those two modes.
Diffuse mode and exponential learning
It is important, no matter how much homework you have, to try to switch between the focused mode and diffuse mode. It may feel like it takes a lot more time to finish your homework, in the long run, you will understand the things much deeper. This deeper understanding will make it much easier to learn new and related material. You don’t want to end up studying for years and then only using and remembering less than 10%. Imagine how it feels to spend 40 hours a week studying, while knowing in the back of your head that only 4 of these hours were ‘effective’. Keep this thought alive in the background to motivate yourself to use that diffuse mode from time to time and not to rush your learning.
Of course there are many more techniques to make your retention get closer to that 100%, like the method of loci, spaced repetition, interleaved practice, exercise, nutrition, reducing stress, getting enough sleep (which most students lack), etc.
I personally don’t spend 40 hours a week learning (new) things, not only because I don’t have the time for it, but because I don’t really need to. My retention and understanding of material is very close to that 100% and you might even say above 100%, because of all the new ideas I am generating. Those little 20 hours a week quickly turn into the equivalent of 40 hours a week most students follow, and it grows exponentially. | https://medium.com/superintelligence/09-16-2019-learning-how-to-learn-powerful-mental-tools-to-help-you-master-tough-subjects-e99684abb8c8 | ['John Von Neumann Ii'] | 2019-11-10 20:31:05.116000+00:00 | ['Neuroscience', 'Learning', 'Education', 'Students', 'Brain'] |
Top 5 Necklace Styles for HIM | We have a dedicated area for our males, in addition to women’s jewelry types. The most popular and stylish necklace styles are listed below: –
Anjali Goti
Chains
Chains are the most fundamental piece of men’s jewelry. Male celebs, from Justin Bieber to Alan Walker, appear to be infatuated with chains.
And why wouldn’t they be? Because chains provide an unrivaled combination of style and comfort. Chains enhance the beauty of every outfit, from casual to elegant.
Pendant Necklaces
The privilege of wearing a pendant is not limited to women. It can also be worn by men. For the archetypal male, there are a variety of pendant necklace styles to choose from.
The pendant necklace is made out of basic construction. Simple statues are fastened to the metal chain, such as a skull head or a holy cross sign. This entire pattern is quite light across the neckline and is also reasonably priced.
Leather Pendant
A leather pendant might appeal to your boyfriend if he likes wearing beautiful jewelry. It is quite popular because of its world-class finishing and innovative alternatives. A leather pendant is his go-to jewelry for everyday clothes, whether it’s a picnic or a brunch date. Its typical length ranges from 22 to 24 inches.
Bead Necklace
A beaded necklace is made out of a strew of small, soft beads woven into a regular design. It’s devoid of all those pricey and dazzling jewels. Despite this, bead necklaces retain their inherent elegance. You may present this necklace to your partner if he prefers a more simple look and wants his jewelry to match all of his clothes.
Religious Pendant
Anyone who is under the protection of God is at ease in a chaotic world. A religious necklace is one such technique to pique your partner’s interest in religion. The easiest technique to wish for your partner’s prosperity is to place a holy cross symbol near his heart.
Photo by Andrik Langfield on Unsplash
Couples Necklace
You might be shocked to learn that there is an anniversary necklace for both you and your lover on the market. It’s commonly referred to as a couples’ necklace. These necklaces have a pattern that symbolizes the idea of two joined souls.
It looks like a pair of necklaces with a half-heart-shaped pendant on each. You may also choose to have your name engraved on the pendant. As a result, you and your spouse may commemorate this wonderful day by purchasing an anniversary necklace. | https://medium.com/@jewelrytales/top-5-necklace-styles-for-him-396aa29d72f7 | ['Jewelry Tales'] | 2021-12-17 08:16:25.446000+00:00 | ['Jewelry', 'Gifts', 'Jewellery', 'Anniversary', 'Diamonds'] |
Hiding The Pain | As a community, why do we try to hide our problems from the people that care about us? If they care about you and you know they care about you, why do you keep thinking that they won’t want to listen to your problems? If you don’t say anything to them, they will not know what is going on. They can’t read your mind. Even though that would be cool, they can’t. We have to bring the things that bother us out into the light and tell them what is going on to figure out how to get help. And you’re right, it’s scary, and you might not have the words, but you need to do something, and the answer to how you will do it is by putting it in the light of God for them to see.
For God says In John 3:19–21,
And this is the judgment: the light has come into the world, and people loved the darkness rather than the light because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his works should be exposed. But whoever does what is true comes to the light, so that it may be clearly seen that his works have been carried out in God. (Bible ESV)
This verse states that you do wicked things because you hate the light. But why is it that we hate the light? As humans, we hate the light because when we bring everything out into the spotlight, everyone can see what’s wrong with us. But this verse also states that whoever does what is true comes to light, and when they do to is shown that they are doing it for God. So that means we can’t hide in the dark and be with God at the same time. We have to bring our problems into the light to show God that way. We can see what to do to help the situation and so that God can show us the way to do our works for him and his people, not ourselves.
Pray this before leaving.
God, I know that I am messed up, I have some things in the dark that are hurting me, and I need your help. Help me bring these things into the light so that I can be true in my ways and follow you better. I love you forever and always.
AMEN | https://medium.com/@never112003/hiding-the-pain-c71e6b43016f | ['Zechariah Eades'] | 2020-12-21 20:03:44.282000+00:00 | ['God', 'Love', 'Pain', 'Jesus'] |
Political compass test (or a tutorial for your first Data Science project) | Time for hands on! The whole project and the steps shown here are documented in the GitHub page. To understand the process, it is best that you have some Python or general programming knowledge. For simplicity, demonstrations done here are from Senate, as the Chamber of Deputies is very similar, avoiding thus redundancies. But one may check the Chamber of Deputies too in the GitHub project.
Let’s start by the data source.
Part 1 — Obtaining data
The data were extracted from the section of Chamber of Deputies and Senate about open data. In them there are several items — as budget expenditure, hirings, and even some tutorials about hot to access the data.
The way of obtaining data was through Web Scraping, accessing these portals and saving the obtained content. As a matter of example, we’re going to access the page of Senate schedule, on 01/01/2019. This page shows the content of the month from the given day. In this case, it shows the activities of January-2019, from the 1st day.
Access to the Senate open data API, on 1st January, 2019
The first spotlight in yellow is the event description because this the only needed parameter. We can use the same url changing just this date in order to obtain the whole Senate schedule in several years.
The second spotlight in yellow is the date, that is the reception of the President of the Republic. In this case, for instance, there was no vote — as a matter of fact, the parliamentary activities begin in February. Let’s see a case that includes voting.
Here we have in schedule a proposed constitutional amendment (PEC 25/2017), which was voted in February. There are many descriptions about the item, as the proposal date, the appraisal (discussion session or voting), among others. But here there is not a list of senators and their votes. In the schedule there is only the project descriptions, but these projects usually involve discussions and votings, that occur in different dates. The voting description is in another page, but we need to pass in this page to obtain the code, highlighted in orange. From it we search the votes specifically.
Here we have the page of this matter. There is initially an abstract about the voting, showing its result (unanimous victory!). After that we have the parliamentary votes, with all data about the senator and at the end his vote. We see, for example, that the senator Jarbas Vasconcelos voted favourably to this PEC.
In order to effectively process these data, I’ve used a very famous tool for this kind of activity: Scrapy. It has a set of tools that make very simple accessing pages, extracting relevant content and saving results.
We have initially the url of the Senate schedule. The variables are the month and the year, which starts at 04/2011. This is because from this date data is available in the API. Then for each month of each year, we make a request, which will be processed by the function parse_agenda.
This function is wide and made exclusively to access the Senate schedule. But this is common. Each site has its particularities, as the manners of showing information, the ways of navigation between links, etc. There are even sites that protect themselves against who tries to access their content through these robots, using using tools as the reCAPTCHA. However, as in our case we use an open and public database, there is no need to worry about this.
Part 2 — Exploratory Analysis
Here start charts and visualisations. Let’s start with a very simple one:
Total of votes from each party
The chart above tells us very little. This is a history since 2011 and parties change quite often — switch initials, separate, attach themselves, etc. More interestingly would be to see this over time.
Even so it seems not informative. There are many small parties, with few senators, that spoils visualisation. In order to avoid this, let’s make a cut, keeping the parties with more votes and renaming others to ‘others’. Another change that improves visualisation is proportionality, i.e., instead of watching the total of votes from a party in a set year, we’ll see the percentage of participation in the period. Retaining only the parties with more than 1000 votes altogether, we stay like:
Part 3 — Principal Component Analysis
Things here start to become interesting.
PCA is a widely used method emerged from “tradicional sciences” for, among other things, visualisation and interpretation of results. For whom already understands it a little, it’s the decomposition of the covariance matrix in its eigenvectors, sorted by its eigenvalues, which corresponds to the variance of data in each eigenvector.
For whom doesn’t understands it yet, see the figure beside. We have a distribution in two dimensions. Note however that that base formed by those little arrows is far more interesting for explaining data than the x and y axes. More interesting than that: as one arrow is considerably bigger than the other, we can say that it is the principal component. Thus a good approximation we can do is to consider just the bigger arrow to represent data, simplifying analysis. And is that what we’ll do with our parties:
Correlation matrix between parties votes, ordered by 1st principal component
This matrix corresponds to the correlation between parties votes. The greener the color between two parties, the more they vote accordingly. See that the point of a party with itself is always the greenest possible (evidently). In yellow are parties with null correlation — i.e., given the vote of one of them, it is not possible to know the other one’s vote — and in red are the ones with opposite correlation. Noteworthy is that there is not a strongly negative correlation between two parties (there are some points which are slightly red, but they do not even compare to the strength of the green ones). This means that political polarisations are not exactly due to the vote for or against determined matters, but rather by the prioritisation of these.
Here I show you another version of that matrix, with a few modifications:
Correlation matrix between votes from parties with more than 1000 votes, ordered by 1st principal component and with color scale adjusted between [0.0, 1.0]
There were two changes: the cut of parties (keeping only the ones which have more than 1000 votes) and the change of color scale: in the first chart, the red-yellow-green scale lies on [-1.0, 0.0, 1.0]; in the second one, it lies on [0.0, 0.5, 1.0]. And here we have already learned an important lesson:
The way data are shown changes drastically their interpretation
See that with this second char, it’s much more difficult to tell there is no political polarisation. One can see very clearly ‘friend parties’ and ‘enemy parties’. Shortly, is very easy to use data to tell your own version of facts. Be careful!
Something else that is clearly visible on both graphs is the arising of political clusters, some blocks that use to vote in a cohesive way.
See, for example, the groups PSDB and DEM; PP, PL and MDB; and PT and PCdoB. Data shows us something very simple: the coherence between these parties. Coupling this to our specific knowledge, we have a more interesting knowledge production. I’m not a politics specialist, but I dare to affirm that this is a manifestation of what we call respectively of right-wing, centre and left-wing. Let’s deepen this analysis.
Part 4 — The political compass
One of the things I set out to do is to know if it is possible — without manipulating data — to visualise a very popular map, expressed by the meme beside.
The PCA idea comes willingly to help us in this task. It will hardly appear a so simple thing, but I dare try to reach some level of similarity. The process is very simple: just do the same analysis, but instead of obtaining the principal component, one obtains the two principal components.
No further delay, let’s go to results:
The x coordinate is the same used in the previous part, with the difference that I’ve multiplied it by -1 (pure aesthetics, so that left-wing parties stay left and right-wing parties stay right).
As to the y coordinate, it seems that if we assume it’s about the authoritarian/liberal axis, it’ll look like this picture:
Of course there are several caveats to be done comparing my map with the BBC’s:
They use a well defined law set to affirm what is liberal, authoritarian, left-wing and right-wing; while I use just PCA;
BBC uses deputies data while I use senators data;
These laws are from years between 2015–2017, while the range of Senate data is 2011–2019.
However, it’s very exciting to achieve good results with a relatively simple analysis. This is also a great lesson:
Sometimes it’s possible to achieve good results using just traditional statistical techniques.
When it comes to data analysis, the more tools we dispose, the better. Let’s apply a little Machine Learning!
Part 5 — Parties classification
The following table shows the relation between senators, his parties and voting. The numbers in rows are the senators identifiers, according to Senate official API. The first column is the party to which each senator belongs and the next columns are the matters identifiers — law proposals, changes in specific laws, etc. This is about a very simple classification problem: we have the columns that represent votings, and the target column, with the senator’s party. Here I’ve used XGBoost, an implementation of the famous Gradient Boosting algorithm, because it’s fast and it gives some interesting visualisations. The code snippet is very simple. I’ve used cross validation in order to have a good idea of accuracy.
The results, however, are terrible:
0.15625, 0.16129032, 0.24590164, 0.37288136, 0.32142857
In a Data Science project, things go wrong. More important that making them work, is understanding why they have failed. In this case the answer is very simple: (302, 832). Those are the data frame dimensions. There are 302 rows and 832 columns. No need to hesitate too much to state that it is a clear case of overfitting. To confirm this, just look to this confusion matrix:
This matrix was made with the whole dataset. This means the model was very capable of learning data it have seen, but not too much for data it hasn’t seen yet. There are a lot of techniques to improve this model — as reducing the number of columns, use regularisation, adjust hyper-parameters or just switch to a simpler model. But in the moment this doesn’t matter. There are interesting things model has to show us.
Most important projects
Next we have the five most important projects to define the political positioning of a senator, and are they:
PLV 15/2013 — Reduces to zero the aliquots of the Contribution to PIS / PASEP, COFINS, Contribution to PIS / PASEP — Import and COFINS — Importation on the revenue from sales in the domestic market and on imports of products that make up the Basic-needs grocery package;
— Reduces to zero the aliquots of the Contribution to PIS / PASEP, COFINS, Contribution to PIS / PASEP — Import and COFINS — Importation on the revenue from sales in the domestic market and on imports of products that make up the Basic-needs grocery package; SCD 5/2015 — Regulates art. 7th, single paragraph, of the Federal Constitution (Constitutional Amendment nº 72, 2013, origin: PEC №66, of 2012 — PEC of the housekeepers);
— Regulates art. 7th, single paragraph, of the Federal Constitution (Constitutional Amendment nº 72, 2013, origin: PEC №66, of 2012 — PEC of the housekeepers); MPV 695/2015 — Authorizes Banco do Brasil SA and Caixa Econômica Federal to acquire participation in the terms and conditions set forth in art. 2 of Law nº 11,908, of March 3, 2009, and makes other provisions;
— Authorizes Banco do Brasil SA and Caixa Econômica Federal to acquire participation in the terms and conditions set forth in art. 2 of Law nº 11,908, of March 3, 2009, and makes other provisions; MPV 696/2015 — Extinguishes and transforms public offices and changes Law nº 10,683, of May 28, 2003, which provides for the organization of the Presidency of the Republic and of the Ministries;
— Extinguishes and transforms public offices and changes Law nº 10,683, of May 28, 2003, which provides for the organization of the Presidency of the Republic and of the Ministries; PLV 7/2012 — Reduces to zero the rates of the Contribution to the PIS / Pasep, the Contribution for the Financing of Social Security — COFINS, the Contribution to the PIS / Pasep — Import and the Cofins — Imports incident on import and sales revenue in the domestic market of the products it mentions;
Conclusion
Data Science is about, in the end, exploring possibilities, testing hypothesis, proposing solutions. There aren’t many fixed pattern to be followed — creativity matters a lot. I deeply hope that this article have helped you to think about new ideas and explore new limits. See the code! | https://medium.com/neuronio/political-compass-test-or-a-tutorial-for-your-first-data-science-project-ff7fbe5112c5 | ['Willian Werner'] | 2019-09-01 01:12:19.650000+00:00 | ['Data Science', 'Politics', 'Data Visualization', 'Tutorial'] |
AI changing the future of Banking, Key to Crypto | Since we can understand the applications that artificial technologies are bringing to the world. We can start with SIRI all the way to self-driving cars, artificial intelligence (AI) is progressing rapidly. Artificial intelligence can encompass anything from Google’s search algorithms to IBM’s Watson to autonomous weapons.
Meanwhile, a narrow AI may outperform humans at whatever its specific task is, like playing chess or solving equations, AGI would outperform humans at nearly every task. So collective analytic algorithms embedded into the algorithm are bringing rich results, according to statistics.
The implications that K2Crypto using can be described by simple digital banking advantages starting leveraging Fintechs for a better customer experience, through the rise of Neobanking to better regulations and relationships. A good article that summarises is written here in Forbes at the beginning of the following year.
Key to Crypto provides tailored solutions to individuals looking for a friendly ecosystem where finance management is the key. By integrating the most powerful AI algorithms to improve the way they analyze securities and make investment advice, while others use it to improve core operational processes. AI can lead to better predictions, fewer errors, bringing greater efficiency for the investment industry. A growing number of companies, large and small, are finding new ways to incorporate the technology into their own operating models.
Those who embrace the digital revolution and the rise of AI point that some of that technology is already here and it clearly benefitting many people. Including investors in income property, who rely on a multitude of apps and interfaces designed to make handling investment property that much easier.
Open your opportunities by exploring countless open-source platforms or take a peek at rasing technologies of the new world banking management here at K2Crypto. | https://medium.com/@k2crypto/ai-changing-the-future-of-banking-key-to-crypto-d543f6bfb791 | [] | 2020-12-17 14:22:00.004000+00:00 | ['Exchange', 'Investing', 'Banking'] |
A Christmas story about ham, Gila monsters, and capital punishment | We’d all eaten our weight in risotto followed by a box of toffee Sarah and I had brought, when Sarah and Jan left the table for the hot tub.
Though the jacuzzi sounded nice, I didn’t feel like undressing and later being wet and cold, so I stayed at the table with my father-in-law, picking at my plate, nursing a small glass of red wine.
In the moments before Sarah and Jan left the table, we’d discussed teenage criminality: our own, mostly.
Shoplifting.
Drug use.
Underage drinking.
Speeding.
Stupid teenage shit.
We questioned whether the American legal system ought to lock up teenage criminals, much less sentence them to death.
Earlier this year, the Supreme Court passed a ruling saying all death sentences issued to people who committed crimes as teens shall be commuted.
What did we all think about this?
My father-in-law and I had the most thoughts. I, being a high school teacher and he being a retired superior court judge, we were both very familiar with the teenage male, in particular, albeit in very different contexts.
“They’re like baby apes,” I said of teenage boys. “They’re driven by impulse. They can’t help themselves. They make mistakes.”
“But are there teenage mistakes that are indicative of some greater anti-social issue that cannot be repaired?”asked my father-in-law.
We were talking about murder, of course.
I hesitated on the question, flipped back mentally to all the teenage boys I’ve known over the last several years, even the ones I didn’t like: I saw their faces in my memory, remembered their laughs, their academic performance, sometimes their tears . . .
“I can’t imagine one of my boys murdering someone unless they were being impulsive. Unless they were in a really bad situation,” I said, feeling only 90% certain because there’s so much we don’t know about a human being’s capacity for darkness — even a young human being.
The conversation between my father-in-law and I had now become big and philosophical and messy and unanswerable: the kind of conversation territory in which I feel happiest, most at home — both socially and in the classroom.
I don’t like small talk.
I like big talk.
“I just don’t think people should be sentenced to death for things they do as teens,” I said.
My father-in-law nodded, stared at the red tablecloth, replied, “I sentenced a kid to death once.”
BECAUSE OF COURSE HE SAID THIS. IT IS CHRISTMAS EVE IN THE YEAR 2020.
I looked up, suddenly regretting my passionate arguments against sending kids to death row — not because I believed doing so was right or just, but because it was Christmas Eve and I could see sadness in my father-in-law’s eyes over a decision he had to make, he explained, because the law at the time gave him no other choice.
“I don’t believe in capital punishment,” my father-in-law said. “But I had no other choice, and what this boy had done . . . “
I had never heard of Levi Jaimes Jackson or his victim, Patricia Baeurlen.
Sarah tells me, when she was in high school here in Tucson, the case was a big deal.
Mr. Jackson, a white male aged 16 and a half, along with two friends, carjacked a forty year old teacher on her lunch break which she was using to Christmas shop for her children. It was December 10th.
Jackson and his friends carjacked her for fun: they’d recently gotten a hold of a gun, and why not?
They forced Ms. Baeurlen to drive out to a remote part of the desert where Jackson forced her, at gunpoint, to undress with the intent to rape. When she removed her clothing, in the desert, Jackson told her she was ugly, to put her clothes back on again, then had her take them off once more, once more told her she was ugly and had her put her clothes on again before shooting her in the chest and driving off with his buddies in her car.
My father-in-law says Jackson laughed, years later, at his sentencing when reminded of how he humiliated the victim before murdering her.
This wasn’t a kid who got nervous robbing a convenience store and killed someone in the process. This wasn’t a kid who got a gun and accidentally shot a family member, or even a kid who killed their abuser.
Patricia Baeuerlen was only forty. Four years younger than I was, sitting with my father-in-law who told me about how he arrived at a decision in the case.
I am strongly anti capital punishment.
Too much margin for error, and plus we know (if you believe in data, science, and all that shit) that it does nothing to rid communities of violent crime. On the contrary, in states that have capital punishment, the opposite is often true.
We talked a long time, my father and I, on Christmas Eve 2020 about the murder in 1992 that resulted in this gentle man having to pass a death sentence on a boy — even if the boy was still laughing at his sentencing, he was still a boy.
Levi Jaimes Jackson is exactly six months older than me.
When he is released, he will only be forty-eight.
His victim only lived to see forty.
“Maybe he’s a changed man,” my father-in-law posited, reaching for another piece of the dwindling toffee. “Think people can change that much?”
“No,” I said, softly. “I really don’t.”
And I don’t.
I think the kid who fucks up badly as a teenager — selling drugs, accidentally kills someone trying to make a few bucks, deliberately kills someone because they’re a kid and caught up in a fucked up life . . . I think that’s different.
I think the kid that would torment a woman in the desert, her car full of gifts for her children (a detail from the case revealed to me by my father-in-law), then drive around in her vehicle, blasting music, while her body lay dead for the snakes and javelinas, the kid who suggested to his friends they kill someone else that night? I don’t know if that kind of broken, in a kid, can ever be repaired: and we sure as shit don’t repair that kind of broke in America’s prison systems.
I’ve had maybe three students in my teaching life that really scared me.
One scared me because he robbed me, and I thought,”damn, man. I’ve been super nice to you, and you do that to me? You scare me.”
I mean, I’d been robbed/pickpocketed before.
Feels less bad/scary when it’s a stranger who does it.
A student? That felt like a betrayal.
(Plus I was in chemo at the time — he and the other students knew I was a cancer patient, in a fragile place in life, so . . . )
Another student was prone to violent outbursts in the classroom, over really small things, like another student disagreeing with him about — like — anime or some shit.
Or if the computers were being slow.
Or if someone looked at him the “wrong way.”
He’d breathe hard through his nose like a horse, his face would get red, and he was a big guy, and yeah, he scared me. (He once sang the whole of “Will You Still Love Me” AT me, as I was packing up after a NIGHT CLASS, and I just let him because I was honestly worried if I interrupted/stopped him he would murder me. No joke.)
The last student that ever scared me was a teenage boy.
He was a textbook sociopath.
The kind of kid whose eyes make your blood run cold because there’s nothing behind them but contempt and rage.
Even when he’s smiling.
Even when he’s laughing.
Even when he’s eating Takis.
He scared me. He scared other faculty and was eventually expelled or gently encouraged to move on. I no longer remember . . .
Note they were all men. I don’t think that’s an irrelevant fact.
Maybe people and kids like this are broken beyond repair, but maybe their existence should cause us to ask ourselves, as a society, as communities, what are we doing to produce such people?
In the case of Mr. Jackson — he had no parents.
I mean, he had them, but they weren’t a part of his life and when they were, they had abused him terribly.
He was basically on his own from birth.
And yes, there are lots of people for whom this is true who don’t go on to be sadistic murderers.
Thank the gods for that.
Anyway. It’s Christmas Day, and I’m in my STUDIO writing about a murderer.
Because OF COURSE I am.
Because it’s 2020, and only in 2020 would a small Christmas dinner turn into a super intense conversation with a man who actually sentenced a teenager to death.
Like what? Huh?
What you need to know about my father-in-law is that he is a gentle man.
He bought a snake grabber so there’s no need to kill the rattlesnakes that regularly slither their way from the foothills into their yard and garage.
Sarah told me a story of him once trying to save quail eggs from a Gila monster..
He has a tattoo on his arm that says, in Greek, “Philotimo” — roughly meaning, “Love of honor.”
His voice is soft.
He loves children and has a particular soft spot for troubled teenage boys because he himself was once a troubled teenage boy.
When he talks about the many teenage boys who stood before his bench over the years, there is always a tenderness, a palpable empathy. Sometimes he chuckles remembering the simply stupid criminal shit teenage boys would get themselves into. Just STUPID shit. But Jackson was different. This wasn’t “stupid shit.”
And I think maybe my father-in-law is a little haunted by the story of Levi Jackson.
Not only because he sentenced the boy to die, but because he never wanted to sentence the boy to die: the legal system was broken and he just had to work, as ethically as possible, within a broken system, and not to harp on this, but once again we have systems — education, healthcare, law — who are full of good and talented fucking people who are hogtied constantly by beauracratic nonsense rules made by people who are so out of touch or, worse, are utterly divorced from their own humanity . . .
So you take a judge like my father-in-law, a good, thoughtful person, and you tell him, “Okay, here’s this kid who has done something incredibly heinous. Really grisly and awful and cruel. You can give him virtually no time for his crime OR you can sentence him to death.”
That’s it.
Those are the options.
Pass or Fail.
My father-in-law told me what he’d rather have done with Mr. Jackson.
I’ll keep that between us, but suffice it to say what my father-in-law wanted was nothing cruel or unusual for the boy, but fair and just.
He did not want the boy to die for his sin.
I would never want to make such a decision.
My father-in-law has had to make this choice twice.
That’s two times too many for any human being to have to carry.
At least, I think so.
Get rid of the death penalty and you can get rid of forcing the hands of good men and women who are sitting on our courts’ benches.
I tried to find a picture of the victim, Ms. Baeuerlen online. No luck.
I guess when I hear stories like this, I like to see faces.
Anyone can see Jackson’s face online.
I don’t know what to make of his face.
He looks mean, but mean can be play acted — and often is
by men who feel, for one reason or another, vulnerable.
Maybe Mr. Jackson learned to be mean really early on,
when he figured out he was on his own.
Maybe the emptiness was too overpowering for his fragile, underdeveloped moral core — if the seed ever germinated. (I mean, I think we’re all born with the potential to be good. The seed for good is there, but that doesn’t always mean it receives the sunlight and water needed to grow.)
The cruel, cold, awful, painful parts of life sometimes threaten to overwhelm even the strongest, most developed moral fibers.
I’m not trying to be an apologist for Jackson merely because he was a “teen.”
Far from it.
I’ve worked with enough teens to know 99% know the difference between basic right/wrong.
Most teenagers want to follow the fundamental tenets of a civilized society: don’t murder, don’t steal, don’t hurt-on-purpose.
At least this has been true for virtually every teenager I’ve ever known.
Do they do incredibly stupid shit sometimes? Yes. They’re teenagers.
But “stupid shit” and “sadistic murder” are two very different things.
The line between “sold weed at school” and “killed a woman in the desert for fun”
is thick and clear.
One is just damned stupid and plainly illegal.
The other is felonious and evil.
And I know “evil” is a loaded word, but I wish we could all come to a common understanding of what it means.
I think some words must have very specific meanings, and that we all must know what those specific meanings are.
And I think “killing someone in the desert for fun” is evil
— whether the perpetrator is sixteen or sixty.
So. Yeah. On Christmas Eve, 2020, I talked at length with my father-in-law as he processed (surely not for the first time) a decision made nearly three decades ago to put a teenager on death row.
Mr. Jackson will be a free man in four years.
His victim is still dead. Her children are grown and probably have children of their own. I’m guessing the actions of Jackson and his buddies ruined Christmas for their family forever. Not just in 2020, but every year, until all the generations who remember the stunning horror of the loss are also in their graves.
As for me, I am alive.
I am alive in my STUDIO and showered and in my pajamas because it’s Christmas Day.
Even if this is my last Christmas, I will not regret that I spent it writing in my studio, the birds twittering in the bush outside the window, my wife watching television in the other room.
Writing is one of the things I like best.
Followed closely by cooking/eating.
Even though it’s a sort of lonely, melancholy Christmas Day, I have a ham in the slow cooker, and will be (quite shortly) making dessert and Zooming with my family in Chicagoland. Safe, I think, for today. | https://medium.com/@allisonsabalosgruber/a-christmas-story-about-ham-gila-monsters-and-capital-punishment-3e6d59de908b | ['Allison Gruber'] | 2020-12-25 19:47:22.386000+00:00 | ['Murder', 'Christmas'] |
Where is He-Man? | Where is He-Man?
Netflix pointedly tells girls, but not boys, that they can have the power.
“I have the power!”
It was the end of the 1970's and toy manufacturing giant Mattel had a big problem: in 1976, CEO Ray Wagner had unwittingly passed up the opportunity of a lifetime, declining to buy the rights to a space flick called Star Wars. Thanks to Wagner’s lack of vision, the biggest name in toys was watching the tiny, unknown Kenner Toys make money hand-over-fist selling little plastic spacemen with laser swords to 5–8 year old boys.
Finally, in the early 80’s the Mattel design team came up with a character concept that they thought could challenge the Star Wars toy empire (no pun intended) where so many others had failed: a bulky, larger-than-life barbarian warrior, light on clothes and heavy on muscle. He carried a sword in his hand and a huge battle ax on his back. His chin looked like it could smash through walls. He was 5 1/2" of sheer brawn. They called him, “He-Man.”
But thanks to Star Wars, making toys was no longer the most important part of making toys: telling a story was. And so, Mattel made a bold and innovative move, partnering with the animating company Filmation to produce a TV show whose sole purpose in life was to sell He-Man figures. It worked.
The 1982 He-Man action figure
He-Man and the Masters of the Universe became a hit show that ran from 1983–1985, and the toys sold like gangbusters during those years. He-Man, his arch-enemy Skelator, and the cast of zany supporting characters captured the imagination of little boys with a success that, for the moment, even rivaled that of the Star Wars franchise. [Editor’s note: actually, like Star Wars, it captured children’s imaginations. Girls watched and played with the action figures as their brothers did, although our pretend stories were different. But Mattel and Kenner sought and got the boy market, so Rachel is accurate.]
Power has been at the center of the He-Man concept since its inception. The designers were originally inspired by observing the imaginative play of 5-year-old boys, the line’s target consumers. They noticed that the boys’ play featured consistent themes of power — having it, using it, and losing it. Out of this was born the general idea that the toys would appeal to young boys by allowing them to play out their fantasies about being in charge through this big, powerful character who oozed strength from every sinewy pore. This idea is nowhere better encapsulated than in He-Man’s iconic line, “I have the power!”, which he would say as he held his power-sword aloft and transformed from mild-mannered Prince Adam to the buff super-hero He-Man.
But the show also had strong themes of morality and responsibility, with a segment at the end discussing the choices, good or bad, that the characters had made. In other words, although it played into the childhood fantasy of being the one in charge — the one with the power — it also taught that power should be wielded within a framework of morality. It taught that power came with an obligation to do good, not to harm others or to take whatever you wanted.
The show and the toys were wildly successful in appealing to boys, but market research soon revealed that a significant portion of the toys’ consumers — about 20% — were girls. Mattel, which had built its empire on the enduring popularity of the Barbie doll, began to ask themselves: if little girls were playing with toy named “He-man” already, could they not widen that audience by giving girls a character that had everything He-man had, but looked like them? And so She-Ra was born— a female fashion doll/action figure hybrid with the beauty of Barbie, and the power of He-man.
The She-Ra TV show
She-Ra got her own line of mostly-female action figures pals, as well as a spin-off TV series, She-Ra, Princess of Power, which ran for two seasons between 1985 and 1986.
It is this TV series — not the original He-Man and the Masters of the Universe — that Netflix announced plans to re-boot in 2018. This is great news for the women who grew up watching She-Ra and the little girls who will re-discover her. But it leaves me wondering, “Where’s He-Man?”
She-Ra is — and was intended to be — a character who played out the He-Man power theme but could be a representative role model for the young girls that Mattel hoped to turn into consumers. In re-launching the She-Ra story, Netflix is affirming the power theme in the abstract, but in passing over the original He-Man character who started it all, they are sending a message that girls can and should “have the power”, while boys should not. It is a willful sin of omission. [Editor’s note: And also quite difficult to do story wise as She-Ra is He-Man’s twin sister. (It was the mid-80’s. Magical twins were a popular trope.)]
From a business point of view, Netflix is probably making the right choice: in this cultural moment, the combination of men and power has uneasy associations. “Powerful men” is a phrase you will hear frequently if you are at all tuned into the cultural conversation, and it is almost always in the context of some sort of abuse of that power. The entertainment industry’s simple solution to the problem of powerful men behaving badly has been to provide more media to the next generation that empowers girls, while quietly dis-empowering boys.
Many of the same people who will cheer on the new She-Ra series would purse up their lips at the image of the brawny, sinew-popping He-Man crying, “I have the power!” In 2018, He-Man is an embarrassing faux pas, a churlish relic of the unenlightened past. We don’t want any He-Men here, thank you very much.
But I wonder what message little boys get when they see us reject the super-masculine He-man, while enthusiastically embracing his girl-power equivalent? I wonder how old they will be when they start to question why depictions of specifically female strength are slobbered over by adults but depictions of specifically masculine strength are somehow always “problematic” at best, and “toxic” at worst? Will they understand the finer points of the gender politics behind it? And if they do understand them, will they feel that it justifies casting their heroes aside? Or will they feel that on some level, the rejection of He-Man and his kind is a rejection of what they will become whether we like it or not: men.
I have two daughters, and while I want them to grow up into strong, capable women, I also want them to live in a world that is populated by men who have grown up being taught the moral obligation that comes with power. I do not want them to live in a world full of men who have become villains because they were once boys who weren’t allowed to have heroes.
If little boys grow up feeling that the world no longer needs or wants their unique masculine strength, what will they do with power when it comes to them? They will be the sinewy ones, after all. Banishing He-Man will not affect young boys’ craving for power, or their eventual access to it. All it will do is take away a hero who could teach them how to use it for good. | https://medium.com/iron-ladies/where-is-he-man-900c06ef4873 | ['Rachel Darnall'] | 2018-01-04 20:51:09.770000+00:00 | ['Childhood', 'Pop Culture', 'Netflix', 'Sex', 'Star Wars'] |
Construction of a two-level interchange at Novo-Sadovaya will take 2 years | The government of the Samara region has made changes to the program for the development of the region’s transport system. It prescribed the timing of the construction of an interchange on Novo-Sadovaya street.
- Construction is planned to start in 2021. The facility will be put into operation in 2023. Funding will amount to 4 billion rubles, — indicated in the document signed by the chairman of the regional government Viktor Kudryashov.
It is planned to start construction of the interchange in 2021. The overpass will begin near the Sovremennik recreation center and end after XXII Party Congress Street.
In fact, the Novo-Sadovaya section from the Soviet Army to the XXII Party Congress will be raised above the ground. This is how it will look.
The construction of the interchange will be linked to the project of extending XXII Party Congress Street. The authorities will also begin to implement it in 2021 — also at the expense of federal funds under the Safe and High-Quality Roads national project. The work will be divided into two stages. The first provides for the construction of a road from Moskovskoye Highway to Solnechnaya, the second — from Karl Marx Avenue to Stavropolskaya. | https://medium.com/@ads-m7mudrf3t/construction-of-a-two-level-interchange-at-novo-sadovaya-will-take-2-years-ac9d9426a3d | ['Ads Mmudrft'] | 2020-12-16 14:24:35.207000+00:00 | ['Government', 'Construction', 'News', 'Russia'] |
How to Turn a Bad Day Around. | If you are reading this, you’ve had a bad day. And that’s not because you are a failure, or because you just can’t figure out how to “adult”. It’s because you are human, (unless you’re an alien, in which case, do you have bad days?) and all humans have bad days. Regardless of how successful you are, and how often you meditate, you’ll have bad days. Here are some tips on how to turn a bad day around.
Forgive yourself
Probably the biggest part of turning your day around is letting go of the fact it has turned or started off bad. This morning, I slept in an hour past when I planned to get up. Then I proceeded to watch TikTok for almost half an hour after breakfast. This is obviously not unprecedented, but with less time to accomplish my list of tasks, it really didn’t help.
Ultimately, I realized what was happening. I was wasting time doing things that were not good for me in any way. Then I had this feeling of failure. “Why did I let this happen?” “Why did I sleep in?” “Why did I eat that full pizza last night which made running harder?” (No joke I did eat an entire pizza last night) But I realized spending time beating myself up is silly. So, I decided… “hey, you’re only human, get over it, and press on.” So, I did just that.
Do what gives you clarity
You will have to try different things and pay attention to how you feel, but find what bring you clarity. For me, it’s running. For others it may be, journaling, playing an instrument, brewing their coffee, going for a walk, drawing, singing, listing to Metalica, whatever it is, find it and recognize the power it has to help you center yourself.
Once you know what centers you, use it to reset yourself when you catch yourself letting your day get ahold of you.
Get small wins
As Friday is winding to an end, I often make a list of things to do on the following day when I’m still in a work mode. This list can often be large, but when I put my mind to it can often be crossed off in a short amount of time. For me, if I’m struggling with a bad start to my day, I aim to check off the easy things on the list. The things that I would do anyway, like trim my beard.
If you don’t like lists, then focus on what you did well that day, and/or focus on how good you felt a time that you did something that was hard. Oftentimes that gives you the push you need to start rolling in the right direction.
Use incentives
One of the only things that got me to do the things on my list, was the fact I was going to dinner with a friend. It was planned earlier in the week, but I had committed to meeting him at a certain time, so knowing that pushed me to get done the other things on my list.
Another way I used incentives this week was when I told myself if I get up at 6 o’clock on the dot, without hitting snooze, I would owe myself a vanilla bean donut from Donut Planet. Let me tell you something, it worked.
Prioritize
Something that is hard to do, especially if you work off of a list like myself, is push something into the next day, or erase it. However, that’s what you need to do sometimes. If that thing is not the most vital, and especially if it will stress you out all day, and you know you can’t get to it, just move it to a different time, or remove it altogether.
Think about the times you’ve done well
I mentioned this in “Get small wins”, but it also deserves its own space. One thing that has really helped me, is to recall the times I succeeded in beating concupiscence (the tendency towards the easy). For example, I think about how great it felt that time I went to bed at 9:30 without watching any TikTok. I remember vividly how great I felt the next day, and I want that feeling again, hence I make it happen, well…I get close to it.
Avoid media
This one has been a huge one for me. Whenever I watch an episode of New Girl or Space Force, or when I spend time scrolling Twitter, I feel terrible. My personal tendency on the weekend is to literally do all kinds of lazy things because my logic says, it’s rewarding yourself for working 50 hours. The reality is, I actually don’t feel good about myself when I do that. If I read a book, wrote a blog post, learned some German, or went for a run, while it would appear to be exhausting, it actually fills me up.
Media can be really dangerous because it’s like a firehose of dopamine rushing into your brain which then becomes addictive to the point where you can’t put it down (TikTok is the best at this IMO). The reality is our subconscious is upset that we didn’t get the things “we” wanted/needed to get done. It’s really incredible how our brains make us dissatisfied when we have not taken care of ourselves, or have not made time for what we have said is important to us.
End the day well
In my estimation, this is the single most important thing you can do. It is in your power at the end of the day to decide which direction you are going to end in. Even if your day went really poorly, it’s up to you to decide how the day ends. Take stock, forgive any ill feelings you have against yourself, and thank God (or whoever you thank) for all the good things of that day. Things like a house, a job, sunshine — the little things. Then end your day well with the determination that tomorrow is already off to a good start. | https://medium.com/the-innovation/how-to-turn-a-bad-day-around-3ee6983806c4 | ['Silas Mahner'] | 2020-07-20 18:10:40.768000+00:00 | ['Meditation', 'Productivity', 'Mental Health', 'Self Care', 'Focus'] |
The miracle of object-oriented programming | The power of the OOP languages
In the last sixty years the paradigm of the OOP was widely stressed and we assisted at born and diffusion of many languages based on the OOP paradigm.
The power of the OOP languages reside in three key concepts: flexibility, modularity and representation of the reality. Now we will try to discuss about these three concepts and the application on the programming language.
The flexibility is the first key concept that we will analyze. The OOP born to be used on different development scenarios; the presence of the objects that represent the concepts of the scenario of application emphasizes this concept: it is possible, with the same language based on OOP define a library structure or the halls of a cinema or the supermarket products. So every real concept is achievable with an extension of object and the application in different contest make the OOP a flexible paradigm.
The second key concept is the modularity. The OOP paradigm agrees to the definition of objects and every object can interact with other objects creating a hierarchy. If this hierarchy of objects realizes a functional sylos this is identifiable like a module or most commonly a library. The possibility to realize, include and use library write by third part agree to realize applications very quickly; otherwise the developer need to realize the functionality included into the external libraries. The maximum expression of the library is the framework that collect a lot of library to provide a wide set a function.
The last concept is the representation of the reality. This concept is at the base of the flexibility; the OOP represent a reality, but it also can represent most than a single reality: so the it is flexible. With the objects, attributes and methods orchestrate by programming paradigm we can realize a digital representation of the reality: a DVD becomes an object, a title becomes an attribute, watching the film becomes an action or more simply a method. With the OOP changed the way to design the application and also changed the way to think programming. | https://medium.com/quick-code/the-miracle-of-object-oriented-programming-837c3b1f1e59 | ['Marco Domenico Marino'] | 2019-10-24 04:50:18.841000+00:00 | ['Programming Languages', 'Programming', 'Software Engineering', 'Software Development'] |
Made Up Agile | Made Up Agile
Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash
In a hilariously ironic twist, a Senior Contributor for Forbes , Steve Denning, writes in Understanding Fake Agile about how the term “‘Agile’ is often thrown around without any agreement as to its meaning.” The oddest part of this opinion piece is that Denning then goes on to spell out his own definition of what Agile means, defining “the three laws of Agile,” which he says encompass both “operational agility” and “strategic agility.”
If Denning’s definitions and “laws” of agility are not Fake Agile , themselves, then maybe they are just Made-up Agile.
Is anyone else who has participated in actual Agile development projects in the past beginning to wonder where all of this comes from?
What is Agile, Really?
In Part I of my BlueProject Series on Project Methodology I mention that:
in the world of projects, one thing we know is everyone wants to be Agile. Some organizations are even guilty of the excessive and even just plain vacuous use of the term, as if it is a religion, as in: “you are not Agile.” In these firms, you could take this phrase and substitute the word “Agile” with “a true Christian,” and I suppose you’d have a religion.
So, what is Agile, really? Is it a religion, a true set of well established work principles that firms are pursuing, or just another management fad?
Well, Agile, in its purest not-so-made-up-Agile form is actually a project methodology for software development projects. As noted in Part II of my Series on Project Methodology (Speaking of Agile), and as anyone who as actually worked an Agile project before knows, there are twelve principles that are part of the Agile Manifesto. These principles provide the framework for how the various Agile Methodologies (Scrum, Kanban, etc.) are best utilized and also define some general standards about how Agile projects should be conducted; but most of these principles are specific to software engineering. For example, the first principle (“1. Our highest priority is to satisfy the customer through early and continuous delivery of valuable software”) and the seventh principle (“7. Working software is the primary measure of progress”), among others.
For those who can’t get enough of the word Agile, let me be direct: Agile principles can’t be credibly translated into “Strategic Agile” by one more senior McKinsey partner who wants to sell your firm another $500,000 Binder on your firm’s lack of Strategic Agility.
Made Up Agile for All the Usual Reasons
Speaking of McKinsey, the firm, of course, has written its own “report,” The five trademarks of agile organizations, which I would argue is more Made Up Agile. This report, we are informed, is written by the “McKinsey Agile Tribe, a group of over 50 global colleagues bringing expertise from the digital, operations, marketing, and organization disciplines.” I’ll admit when I read this in the italicized preamble to the article, I already started to feel a bit sickened. I get the sense that all of this Made Up Agile stuff is just another way to create new categories of consulting services that can be used to sell multi-million dollar engagements to c-level business executives who, upon reading one of these “report(s),” are even more confused about Agile; but they know they need to be Agile, and so they need to get McKinsey in here (as I have heard numerous times in the past) to perform an “agility transformation,” as McKinsey defines it.
In their article, the McKinsey Agile Tribe spells out “five trademarks of agile organizations” that are, of course, different than the “laws” that Denning articulates, and in a footnote to Exhibit 2, which provides a vague diagram of the “five trademarks,” we are informed that: | https://medium.com/blueproject/made-up-agile-b22209f2f6c7 | ['Peter Walzer'] | 2020-12-21 19:03:23.093000+00:00 | ['Project Methodology', 'Project Management', 'Agile Methodology', 'Agile Development', 'Projects'] |
Who’s Afraid of a Big Bad Trump? | Speaking of frightening Trump devotees, have you heard Charlie Kirk’s latest descent into pro-Trump madness? It’s really something else.
Yes, Turning Point USA’s president now claims that the one thing Americans have to fear is… Donald Trump’s arrest. Kirk goes so far as to say that if Trump is sent to prison, the Left would then come after all of his supporters. Well, not just them, but their children too.
According to Kirk,
“For those of you that say, ‘It doesn’t really impact me, I don’t care if Trump goes to prison.’ First of all, you absolutely should care. Because if we lose, they’re going to come after the churches, they’re going to come after the organizations, they’re going to come after the people, they’re going to come after the social media accounts, they’re going to come after the bank accounts. They’re going to come after every single person that played any form and role in trying to defend President Trump. With social media banning, following in the streets, targeting in every form and fashion. If we lose, if the president loses, they will come for us all. They will come for your children, they will come for your schools, they will come in every fashion. And they won’t stop. This idea that the Left is all of a sudden going to embrace this Christian ethic of forgiveness and moving on, is so shortsighted. You read this article — I have it on CharlieKirk.com — it shows in such vivid detail that they are gonna do whatever it takes to try to personally and intergenerationally destroy Donald Trump. That’s how much they hate him. They hate him — not because of his tweets, not because of his style. They hate him because Gorsuch and Kavanaugh are on the Supreme Court. They hate him because the embassy is now in Jerusalem. They hate him because illegal immigration is going down. They hate him because middle-class wages are going up. They hate him because China’s now being held accountable. They hate him because we’re out of TPP, NAFTA’s been renegotiated… They hate him because all of their schemes have been put in jeopardy. All of the plans of the ruling class were obliterated by a man that they don’t think should even be invited to a cocktail party let alone become president of the United States. They’re going to come with bloodthirsty revenge. President Trump always says “we will get reelected. Not me — us.” We, the American people are intrinsically tied to the president. He’s with us, he’s for us. I’ve called him the bodyguard of Western civilization and boy, is he taking the body blows for us right now. But if they come for him, they are coming for us, and they’re also coming for me.”
Hoo boy, that is one loaded and manipulative speech, isn’t it? Listening to Charlie Kirk speak is such a bizarre thing. He manages to paint Trump in the weirdest, most ill-fitting light — as some sort of a victim. A poorly persecuted man who’s hated by “the ruling class.”
Can you believe it? It says so much about the spin of the far right that they’ve managed to paint one of America’s wealthiest and worst landlords as a poor diamond in the rough.
Charlie Kirk puts together the Democrats and the Left — as if we’re all one and the same — and then says we are the ruling class. Um, what?
Charlie claims we don’t hate Trump for his tweets or “his style ”— and again, I sigh heavily at the overdone language — he claims we hate Trump for his so-called accomplishments. For putting Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court. For moving a U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. For reducing illegal immigration, (both Kirk and Trump neglect to mention it’s been on the decline for decades).
Everything Charlie Kirk says has some bit of spin to it. Most of us on the Left know that the interpretation of wage growth is more complicated than Trump likes to admit. By some calculations, we can say that wages for the middle-class have gone up. But as Time Magazine recently pointed out, economic inequality keeps growing.
I went to Charlie Kirk’s website to find the article that he was talking about. The one that so plainly explains the personal vendetta those on the Left supposedly have for Donald Trump. But I never found what I was looking for.
Instead, I found more propaganda plastered across his site. Videos with titles like, “Charlie Kirk Schools America-Hating Student.” Or, “Triggered Student Claims Charlie Kirk Threatens and Kills,” and “This Leftist Just Can’t Get Anything Right.” Oh, and there’s this gem, “Charlie Kirk: Sending Your Kids to College is Like Playing Russian Roulette With Their Values.”
Charlie Kirk is so great at spinning the news and culture into everything evangelicals want to hear. But he clearly doesn’t understand the Left. Or, you know, those of us who used to be part of the Religious Right.
Do you know what I hate about Donald Trump? I hate how his self-interest knows no bounds. I hate how he lies to the American people. I hate how he has emboldened racists, misogynists, science deniers, and conspiracy theorists to go mainstream.
And let’s face it — I don’t have to love (or even like) Biden to despise Trump. But as a far, far Left voter, I can assure you that Kirk is wrong. We are not out for blood or any sort of revenge. But we would like living wages and quality healthcare for all. We’d like to follow science when it comes to pandemic management.
Crazy, huh? | https://medium.com/honestly-yours/whos-afraid-of-a-big-bad-trump-e6fc04a19b82 | ['Shannon Ashley'] | 2020-09-19 21:35:34.068000+00:00 | ['Society', 'Politics', 'America', 'Culture', 'Trump'] |
Longings Of A Caged Love | The Clash Of Love And Tradition — — African Fiction Part 5
Credit: Unsplash
Okorie was torn apart by Chuka’s remarks. The love lyrics Chuka released kept burning his head with feelings of loss and defeat. He walked back home dejected, his movement being even as slow as that of a snail. He really felt like a chicken pounded by huge rainfall, looking for shelter. He didn’t even utter a word of greeting in his mother’s presence. But Ige knew something had put her son in a sad mood. Okorie’s full resemblance to his mother wasn’t in doubt, for he took after her, feature to feature; the way she talked, and even the way she walked was not spared. Though age was fast telling on her, her beauty of the past was still discernable.
Okorie was pacing up and down in his hut, and spoke things only he understood, when his mother entered. There was nothing Ige detested like seeing worries overtake her only son. Her gaze ran through, pictured a dumb struck Okorie with perspiration broken all over him.
“What is it, my son?” she asked in a tone, which clearly spoke her concern. Okorie sauntered and sighed. “What is wrong with you? Do I no longer deserve to know your worries?”
“It’s Ada,” Okorie spoke and sat down on a mat spread out on the floor. “Chuka is taking her away from me, mother,” he continued as Ige listened attentively. “I think I’m loosing Ada to him.”
“Who? Poor rotten son of a poor man? How could you be thinking of that?” Ige shouted and raked her son with an astonishing gaze. “Don’t think that will ever be possible in this land. Little things should not bother you.”
“Little thing! You call it a little thing, mother? But I saw them! Didn’t you see them dance?”
“And so what!”
“Didn’t you see them embrace? He even lifted her up! Ada’s heart is slipping away from me. Going to that fool.”
Ige took a long look at her son, especially his worried face, and her lips turned into a slight smile. “It’s already done,’ she said. Ada is your wife to be. Don’t be bothered. It’s only a matter of time.” Okorie felt absolutely better when Ige left. He gradually lowered his head unto the mat.
“Oh…sweet mother,” he whispered. Ige’s words of consolation had taken a toll on him. They drowned away his fears.
That night was a cold one. Ige lay awake listening to cracklings of raindrops on the thatched roof. She began to think about Okorie’s observations about Ada and Chuka. Not that she had given up the optimism that her son would have no problem marrying Ada. After all, it was fully backed up by the tradition. But then, Ige never liked taking chances. As memories of the festival came rushing back to her mind, scenes she had called nothing came clear. Particularly when Chuka lifted Ada off the ground. Ada had never done that kind of thing before. Not even with Okorie.
Fear soon dawned on Ige. She concluded her son had cause to be worried, and ran off the next morning to Amanze’s compound to see Ogazi, with all she had to say firmly fixed in her mind.
Ada had already left to fetch some water and her mother was about leaving for the farm when Ige announced her arrival.
“Is anybody around?” she asked and panted almost like a dog that ran for miles in her exhaustion. Ogazi faced no difficulty in placing Ige’s voice. She came rushing forward. It was at the festival that both women last saw each other.
“You are welcome please. I hope this early visit will multiply our fortunes this day.” Ogazi said amidst smiles, embracing Ige and failing to notice the worried face she carried, even though a grin was forced out of it.
“I hope it really will,” Ige replied and took a wooden seat Ogazi handed her.
“What do I offer you this morning?”
“Don’t bother yourself,” Ige replied as her mission firmly revolved in her mind. “I have not come to celebrate when it seems our houses will soon catch fire,” she snapped and looked on. Ogazi lost her wide grin. And pregnant silence pervaded, which elapsed and heightened Ogazi’s curiosity.
“Ige,” she called, almost stuttering, her tone, a very low one. “Tell me what is happening. Why keeping mute. Tell me what is bothering you.”
“May the lizard never grow hair,” Ige began to speak. “Is nothing else but our children. I don’t see what your daughter has seen in Iweka’s son. Didn’t you see her? I know you saw what she did with that young man at the festival. Look, Ogazi. I foresee something about to happen. Not even our late husbands will forgive us.”
“I swear my daughter will never marry another man except Okorie!” Ogazi thundered. Her eyes looked fierce and her anger fulminated. “It’s never done in this land. And my daughter will not start it.”
“This is no talking matter. All we need is to act fast before it becomes late!”
“Yes! You are right! We have to act fast!” Ogazi thought of how to take care of the emerging threat as memories of the ceremony in which Ada and Okorie were engaged slowly slipped into her mind. It was on a sunny afternoon, with many guests in attendance.
There was plenty of palm wine, pounded yam and cassava to delight of the guests, coupled with different kinds of soup. Most of the guests went for the delicious combination of pounded yam and bitter leaf soup. The high point of the ceremony came when little
Ada that was only four years old, carried a gourd full of palm wine to the little Okorie, who was then six years old. Okorie took the gourd form Ada and sipped a little wine. Thunderous applause and laughter erupted from the guests in response, some of whom were already drunk. That marked Ada and Okorie’s engagement.
“Ada, my daughter is not for any other man except Okorie,” Ogazi screamed. She did not want to be the one who would be said to have acted contrary to what the Akoga marriage tradition demanded. “How will I carry the shame?” She asked to Ige.
“Your daughter wants to put us in danger,” Ige responded. “I do not see how posterity will ever forgive us if Ada does not marry Okorie eventually. Please call your daughter to order.”
“I will,” Ogazi uttered, expressing a strong determination to compel Ada to retrace her steps.
“As far as our tradition is concerned”, said Ige, “marriage is, the rich to the rich and the poor to the poor.”
“Yes, that is what it is!” Ogazi concurred instantly. “What it is, is what it is, no changes,” she affirmed.
Longings Of A Caged Love: Watch Out For Part 6 | https://medium.com/illumination/longings-of-a-caged-love-3adc2eb5e23b | [] | 2020-12-23 15:06:38.884000+00:00 | ['African Culture', 'Lovestory', 'African Literature', 'Illumination', 'Fiction'] |
Remove the non-essential elements of tiny graphics (axes, labels and gridlines) | How do you describe in 100 to 200 words the book’s main character and conflict?
I am fascinated by the short book descriptions that are traditionally included on the inside cover or on the back. You have to admit the process is very similar to describing a complex topic using a graphic.
Let’s see a practical example, from the healthcare domain.
Usually, growth charts fill up a full page (even as software) and show the child’s curve points on top of country-specific references (percentile or standard deviations). These pages feature other calculations, components, and labels for parents, puberty etc.
How could we simplify these pages, without losing the essence of this information?
Let’s focus on one value only, and remove all the decorations like grids, and title, or axis labels. You still need to have a graphic which can be easily understood in your application context.
Removing sometimes means replacing with more or less subtle alternatives.
To remove the age axis you need to show the whole birth to 18 years period in this tiny alternative chart. Or some other period which is obvious for the user from previous choices or from the dashboard screen.
To show the evolution of a measured value such as height or weight, you need to draw the curve not in centimetres or kilograms, but in percentiles or standard deviation scores for each point.
The same way, the country-specific references behind the curve become flat reference bands for the -2, -1, 0, 1, and 2 SD lines.
There you have it, a full-page growth chart reduce to its essence. This allows the chart to appear on dashboards, or even be included in tables and text-based documents, as part of the text.
Your application can show a group of such sparklines as small multiples, having the same colour codes and axis, and give a complete overview to your users.
Your turn now
What could you remove from your graphics without losing the essential?
Send your questions and ideas via the Tiny Graphics mailing list.
PS
One of my favourite authors is Haruki Murakami. While reading the three-volume series called 1Q84 I just had to draw a map for myself to understand all the intrigues. Wanna see the map? | https://medium.com/@mapopescu/remove-the-non-essential-elements-of-tiny-graphics-axes-labels-and-gridlines-1a643d8a4a5d | ['Marius Popescu'] | 2020-12-24 15:17:38.934000+00:00 | ['Data Visualization', 'Infographics', 'Dashboard', 'Graphics', 'Tiny'] |
The Question You Should Never Ask Someone Waiting for Cancer Results | Picture: Evie Snow/Depositphotos/29442094
If you’re old enough to read this, you’ll know someone who’s had cancer. Maybe you’ve lost a relative, a friend, a work acquaintance… the list goes on. The disease isn’t discriminating. And there’s a lot of information about it nowadays, information on how to spot it, how to get treatment, how to cope with treatment... But my own experience recently made it starkly clear that there isn’t a lot out there on how to be around people who are looking down the barrel of a cancer diagnosis.
When I was young, a lady from my family’s church was diagnosed with breast cancer. I was too immature to process what was happening to her, how much she — as a single woman in her seventies, facing stage four cancer — must have felt. However, what has stayed with me was her love of reading. She didn’t want to talk to me about her illness, she wanted to talk to me about books. The realisation that someone could read to stave off that kind of fear is probably why I’m a writer today. It definitely planted to seed for me to start writing my novel, Love Imperfection five years ago.That seed sprouted when a friend challenged me to write a romantic comedy with a breast cancer survivor like her who was “real” with people around her who had “real” reactions to her illness.
In the years from my novel’s first draft to pre-publication, I watched other friends kick cancer’s ass, saw how their families coped, and felt confident the whole time that my novel had captured the realities of being a cancer survivor in a way that did them justice. I’d asked the right questions, I’d gotten the emotional stuff right. Or at least I thought I had, until a lump was discovered in my left breast during a routine check on New Year’s Eve in 2018.
I remember the exact expression the radiographer — who’d been telling me that it drove her mad when people confused what she did with radiology — was wearing when she stopped talking, pursed her lips and frowned at something on the screen. There were clicks while she snapped a picture of the image and a moment of tension before she told me she’d be back in a minute. Soon there was someone else in the room who was also frowning, running the ultrasound tool over the spot on my breast and clicking too.
“You’ve found something?” I asked, ever the observant one.
“Yes.” The answer was abrupt and then the radiographer put a hand on my arm, her expression kind but grave. “You’re going to have to talk to your GP about seeing a specialist. Do it straight away.”
Being the kind of person to cheerfully downplay being smacked across the face, only to go “OW” a week later when it’s dawned on me I’ve got a broken jaw, I smiled and thanked them. I even think I joked a bit. And then I went home and calmly booked in for my GP. She sent me off to a specialist, who promptly sent me for more tests, before booking me in for a carbon biopsy. (For anyone who doesn’t know, a carbon biopsy is when they inject black stuff into the lump so it can be seen and extracted during surgery.) And every one of these appointments featured caring medical professionals who all treated me like someone who may soon receive the worst kind of news. Because let’s face it, they have to give the worst kind of news to people every day.
And this is where I discovered something that doesn’t really feature in books, movies or even in the stories of friends who’ve survived the entire ordeal.
This stuff all takes time. And that sucks.
At first it’s the waiting in between the tests — the gap between that first scan and the GP appointment. Then it’s the wait for the specialist. Then it’s the wait for the results of the test the specialist sends me on. Then it’s the wait for surgery (scheduled for Valentine’s day). Then it’s the wait for a month after surgery for those results to come in. During all of that time I had no idea if I had cancer or just something benign that I could walk away from with an interesting story later. (I’m a writer, everything can be turned into a story for later.)
And during this time my mind worked overtime. I made contingency plans for all eventualities. I’d seen enough friends in this very situation to know how it could go. Some have had mastectomies. Some have had breast reconstruction. Some had lumpectomies… I even gave my character, Beth a double mastectomy because it was a friend’s experience. Life choices were being evaluated. Plans for the future were being considered. I suddenly had to face how I felt about my breasts. Did I like them enough to want to keep them if the news was bad? Did I want implants? Would I want preventative surgery? How would that affect my view of myself, my sexuality, my husband’s view of me? (He insisted he didn’t care as long as he has me, and to this day I believe him.)
And the thing is, I didn’t know if I had cancer yet. I was in a limbo where I didn’t really want to tell anyone, because what would I tell them? Firstly, why worry people? And secondly, I have a number of acquaintances — and sadly, family members — who revel in illness, and I couldn’t bear the thought of them speculating over my situation. This was my problem, not something that I wanted people getting a vicarious, morbid thrill from. I refused to be the subject of gleeful awfulizing over someone’s morning coffee and cake. (I know I’m not the only one who knows people who do this.)
My husband knew, of course, and a few other close friends who I felt I could trust. My friends who’d been through this were the first to understand this waiting period of awfulness. They understood the thing that I didn’t before — which is that a lot of the decision making and processing over the whole thing, goes on at this stage. Some of it’s subconscious, some of it happens over rambling late-night conversations over wine with trusted people who’ll listen.
Patting Mim the horse, who we looked after during our first sit. Photo: Courtesy of the author
During the time in between tests and waiting for results and surgery, I firmly decided that I wanted to do the three years of global travel and house-sitting that my husband and I had talked about. We travelled to New Zealand for a week to research a novel, we had friends visit from Japan. I finished writing a book, and we completed the first official house-sit of our three-year project to see if we were going to enjoy it enough to do it full-time.
I did all of this while still knowing that I might have to put everything on hold for treatment and surgery, but refusing to sit and wait. It’s during this time that I came to completely understand one friend’s desire to renovate her kitchen while waiting for her results and another’s desire to leave a marriage and start a new relationship. Life has to go on. Or else.
And I was managing. We — my husband and I — were managing well, until one afternoon three days after my carbon biopsy. I was still woozy from pain medication and anaesthesia when a friend called and immediately demanded, “Do you have your results yet?”
She may as well have smacked me with a shovel.
Before I found myself in this situation, I never would have seen this question as a bad one. In fact, to my shame, I’d previously asked friends going through this ordeal the very same question. But hearing it in that moment, I realised how truly shitty a question it is.
Why? Because anyone going through this ordeal knows when they’ll get their results and the minute they do, they’ll tell the people they want to, when they want to. This isn’t the time for a friend or family member to be looking to alleviate their own discomfort by demanding — or even politely requesting — things move faster, or wanting answers. This isn’t the time for them at all.
My friend’s question forced me to confront the fact I was in limbo, that I was terrified, that I had weeks until my specialist appointment when I’d hear if I had cancer and if my life would be put on hold. I went through all of this in a flash — the horrible realisation of my situation and how powerless I was to do anything about it. And while all this was happening, I was having to explain to my friend that my results weren’t coming in for another three weeks. And because I love and care for her, I didn’t tell her that she’d left me in tears for the first time since the lump was first found.
I immediately called another friend who’d recently gone into remission and apologised for ever asking her the same question. She forgave me with such kindness I started crying again, but this time because I was so lucky to have such good people around me.
How could my concerned friend have asked me about my condition in a way that would have made it okay? I’ve thought about this a lot and the only appropriate answer I’ve come up with is: “Are you okay?” If I’d said I was, then it should have been left at that. If I’d wanted to talk, then listening would have been appreciated. That’s it.
Later in the same week, I popped onto Facebook and saw a post by my husband’s cousin about breast cancer. It was in the vein of, “A lot of people don’t think about how many women die from breast cancer ever year, but I do, and I bet no one is going to share this,” with a picture of a woman who’d visibly just gone through chemo, holding her child.
My first thought was “Screw you.” I’ve always hated posts like these, but in that moment I saw them for the virtue signalling crap they are. I understand on one level that reposting stuff like this can be reflexive — a part of a “my friend put this up and I’ll look insensitive if I don’t forward it” peer pressure — but I assure you, anyone who forwards this kind of thing isn’t doing anyone playing the cancer-result-waiting-game any favours. Just. No. I still have trouble thinking kindly about the guy. He’s a big-hearted person who genuinely cares about people, so I’m sure he didn’t intend on that being the result.
So what were my results?
I don’t have cancer. According to my specialist, who made a point to lean across his desk and give me an emphatic lecture, I am an “extremely lucky” woman given all the previous test results and evidence he’d first been presented with. The tone of the conversation implied that if I wasn’t grateful for the giant gift I’d just been given — something the woman who’d attended the appointment before me hadn’t been granted — I was an idiot.
Celebrating life and moving on…Photo: Courtesy of the author
Because of my brush with cancer, I tweaked my novel before it was published in January 2020 to reflect that awful first bit, before my character’s diagnosis. I decided that I was definitely going to commit to the three years of travel with my husband. I decided to get rid of all the unnecessary baggage from my life, and I was going to think very strongly about the language I used from that day forward when talking to anyone facing a life changing illness. And I was going to be grateful for the life I’ve been given, because as I assured my specialist, I’m not an idiot. | https://psiloveyou.xyz/the-question-you-should-never-ask-someone-waiting-for-cancer-results-9e0713ed3df8 | ['Evie Snow'] | 2020-02-07 13:41:25.638000+00:00 | ['Support', 'Cancer', 'Health', 'Medicine', 'Wellness'] |
Web Scraping Menggunakan RStudio dengan Mudah | Hi, my name is Elza and welcome to my medium! It's nice to see you! | https://medium.com/@wirdayanielza/web-scraping-menggunakan-rstudio-a0de6b940ed8 | ['Elza Wirdayani'] | 2020-11-24 07:53:06.867000+00:00 | ['Data Mining', 'Rstudio', 'Statistics', 'Web Scraping'] |
Purse.io — Now On Presearch. Earn PRE tokens, save money and make… | Purse.io — Now On Presearch
We’re excited to announce that we’ve added an amazing crypto shopping resource, Purse.io, to the list of Presearch resources!
The newest provider on Presearch is Purse.io
If you aren’t familiar with Purse.io, prepare to be amazed, because it enables you to save an average of 18% on ANY Amazon purchase you make when you pay with cryptocurrency!
THE BASICS
Purse.io is determined to make crypto useful. Their platform connects two important groups:
Shoppers: This group is buying Amazon products on the Purse.io platform at a discount with cryptocurrency.
Earners: This group is comprised of those who hold Amazon gift cards, and exchange them for cryptocurrency via Purse.io transactions.
From the Purse.io Team:
Our mission is to make crypto useful. Purse allows users to name their own discount when shopping any product on Amazon by matching shoppers with earners- individuals who wish to exchange their Amazon gift cards for Bitcoin!
PURSE.IO + PRESEARCH
Why add Purse.io to your Presearch dashboard? The name of the game is maximizing your earnings and savings. You already earn PRE tokens for your daily searches. If you think you might want to make a purchase from Amazon, it makes sense to search out a discount (unless you like leaving money on the table. Do you?). Purse.io gives you a discount of 5–33% on thousands (millions?) of Amazon products, with the added bonus of the ability to pay with crypto!
OTHER FEATURES
Referrals and Affiliates
Purse.io has a referral program where you and your friends can each earn $5.00 USD in BTC after $100 each in transactions. You can also utilize their affiliate program to earn additional crypto.
The Purse.io referral program
The Purse.io Community by the Numbers and Stats
Users: more than 317,000
Number of Orders: over 300,000
Average Discount: 18%
Dollars Saved: $6,100,000.00
Purse.io community stats
To add Purse.io to your Presearch dashboard, navigate to your customization widget on your home page. Alternatively, you can check out this easy-to-follow tutorial on adding new search providers.
Click on the customization widget on your Presearch home page to add a new search provider to your Presearch dashboard
At the end of the day, we want Presearchers to have as many search resources as possible to get the best search results. Let us know if you’ll be adding Purse.io to your personal Presearch dashboard! | https://medium.com/@presearch/purse-io-now-on-presearch-b24fc1fa4f94 | [] | 2019-07-10 16:45:13.577000+00:00 | ['Search', 'Bitcoin', 'Crypto', 'Presearch', 'Shopping'] |
Priority Placed Prominently and Purposefully on Prayer | Hello, Benjamin from Brother’s Campfire here.
I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed the Campfire Tale of Steve from https://stevescountry.com/. I would like to see him on a regular here. He is an amazing Storyteller and photographer. It has been an honor and a privilege.
Today, I have a different type of post with a lot of self reflection.
In many ways, the world looks upside down to me. (No offense meant to the other hemisphere of course.)
And lately, I have been left wondering if there is something wrong with what I have been doing with my life. A Lot…
With the political scene, Covid, and all the changes in law enforcement related fields in the United States,
I needed to find a benchmark to see if my mindset and actions reflect who I want to be as a person.
I would love to divulge the ins and outs of these concerns, but there are a lot of things I cannot talk about online due to my job description and not wanting to be overtly offensive.
About mindset, when I have concerns brought to me by my staff or inmates, I try to see what is motivating them and what specific priorities an individual has set to determine courses of action.
For instance, I spoke to an inmate at one point who wanted to be released to the streets to utilize chemical substances upon release.
I went through a wide range of angles in discussion with this offender, and even if given a house, sports car, and Betty Crocker herself to bake cookies every day, he would never give up these substances. | https://medium.com/@brotherscampfire/priority-placed-prominently-and-purposefully-on-prayer-14157d037065 | [] | 2020-12-21 14:43:39.302000+00:00 | ['Bible', 'Brotherscampfire'] |
SwiftUI: Be picky! Your Picker does not pick anything? | Playing around with SwiftUI makes you realise that you can build awesome UI with very little code. At least, if you know what you are doing. Otherwise, you can sit in front of Xcode for hours and become desperate…Since this happened to me when I wanted to use the Picker view in a more complex way as most tutorial examples do, I write these lines to spare you the time.
The problem: I added a Picker into my view, it built without errors and showed me the right options in the Picker itself. But I just could not select any option! Not in Xcode’s preview and not in the simulator!
Spoiler Alert (TL;DR)
The solution: The tricky part of the implementation of Picker is the type equality of an item’s tag and the Picker’s selection.
What does it mean? Continue reading 😉 | https://medium.com/@whywhyminty/swiftui-advanced-be-picky-a390c2b53422 | ['Jeannine Endreß'] | 2020-12-17 17:48:39.853000+00:00 | ['Swift', 'Picker', 'Swiftui', 'iOS', 'iOS App Development'] |
Carmen Sanchez- Morning Star Promotions’ Top Professional of 2021 | Morning Star Promotions is pleased to name Dr. Carmen Sanchez a top professional of 2022. As a distinguished dentist, Dr. Sanchez has devoted several years to her own practice and quality care for her patients. Originally from Santiago, DR, Dr. Sanchez moved to Boston to pursue her career. She attended Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine at Boston University where she earned a Doctor of Dental Medicine in 1995. Subsequently, Dr. Sanchez accepted a position as the dental department coordinator at the Providence Ambulatory Health Center until she opened her own practice in 1999. Her practice, Comfort Dental, was a huge success and Dr. Sanchez opened a second location in 2008 due to increased demand. She specializes in many services such as extractions, surgeries, teeth whitening, porcelain veneers and crowns, Invisalign Braces, cosmetic bonding, correction of underbites and overbites, and more. Dr. Sanchez is a fellow of the Misch Implant Institute. She is also a member of prominent organizations including, the International Congress of Oral Implantologists, the International Dental Implant Association, the Hispanic Dental Association, and the Hispanic American Chamber of Commerce, to name a few. As she continues to thrive as a dentist, Dr. Sanchez treats patients of all ages and provides high-quality services at affordable prices. Due to her expertise, passion, and outstanding patient care, Morning Star Promotions is honored to announce Dr. Carmen Sanchez as a top professional of 2022.
Contact Morning Star Promotions’ today to see if you qualify as a Top Professional of 2021.
(631)676–7754 (P)
[email protected] | https://medium.com/@Morningstarpromotions/carmen-sanchez-morning-star-promotions-top-professional-of-2021-4dd628440419 | ['Morning Star Promotions'] | 2021-12-30 20:55:53.361000+00:00 | ['Dentistry', 'Implants', 'Promotion', 'Professional', 'Doctors'] |
Hyun-Jin Ryu finishes second in 2019 NL Cy Young Award voting | Hyun-Jin Ryu (Juan Ocampo/Los Angeles Dodgers)
by Rowan Kavner
Dodger left-hander Hyun-Jin Ryu finished second in National League Cy Young Award voting behind the Mets’ Jacob deGrom, who won the top pitching award for the second straight season.
Dodger pitchers Clayton Kershaw and Walker Buehler finished eighth and ninth in NL voting, respectively. The Astros’ Justin Verlander won the American League Cy Young Award.
NL Cy Young Award votes
Ryu, who won the MLB ERA title this year, was the only NL pitcher other than deGrom to earn a first-place vote. The Nationals’ Max Scherzer finished third. In a career year for Ryu in 2019, he went 14–5 with a 2.32 ERA. He also had the Majors’ lowest walk rate per nine innings (1.18).
He was named NL Pitcher of the Month in May, when he went 5–0 with a 0.59 ERA, becoming the first Dodger pitcher to earn the honor since Rich Hill in July 2017. His best work came in the first half of the year, when he went 10–2 with a 1.73 ERA and earned the start in his first career All-Star Game.
Ryu was the NL frontrunner in the category for much of the season until a rough patch in August, when he had a 7.48 ERA over four appearances. He rebounded to post a 2.13 ERA in four September starts. Ryu had an ERA below 3.50 in every month other than August.
Ryu’s runner-up finish in Cy Young voting demonstrated how far he’s come since injuries limited him to a combined one start between the 2015 and 2016 seasons. He returned to make 24 starts in 2017, then took a sizable leap in 2018 with a 1.97 ERA, but a groin injury that season limited him to 15 starts.
He nearly doubled that total in 2019, making 29 starts and throwing 182 2/3 innings — his highest marks since his rookie season in 2013— while posting a career-best 6.79 strikeout-to-walk ratio. | https://dodgers.mlblogs.com/hyun-jin-ryu-finishes-second-in-nl-cy-young-award-voting-36dfd1cbe561 | ['Rowan Kavner'] | 2019-11-14 01:49:35.129000+00:00 | ['Sports', 'Dodgers', 'Hyun Jin Ryu', 'MLB', 'Awards'] |
Isn’t It Time The Electoral College Was Dismantled? | My father never voted in presidential elections. When I probed him for a reason, as an adolescent, he reasoned that his vote didn’t matter because the electoral college put the decisions of our nation’s leadership in the hands of a select few delegates, rather than the millions at polling booths.
According to the Library of Congress, our nation’s founders believed that the use of electors would “give our country a representative president while avoiding a corruptible national election.” As such, each state appointed electors equal to their number of senators (two) and members of the House of Representatives, which are apportioned after each census. But with an increasing U.S. population, the number of House seats has not changed since the Taft era, according to Pew Research.
Though electoral votes usually align with the popular vote, on a few occasions, the popular vote winner was not the person who ultimately landed the job in the White House. Indeed, in an election year when over 7 million votes separated the candidates, it’s comical that we sat on pins and needles as counts of votes marginally split by mere tens of thousands in less than a handful of states might have flipped the results of the election, and the will of the voting public.
“A Wyoming resident has 3.6 times more voting power than a Californian.”
Now, Pew finds that 58% of Americans favor replacing the Electoral College with a nationwide popular vote. And as the results of the presidential election have finally been ratified by the electoral college, president-elect Joe Biden should work to abolish the process because it no longer accurately reflects U.S. demographics and has been shown to be corruptible.
Distorted voting power among states
In a CNN opinion piece, Robert Alexander suggests that since many states aren’t competitive, some voters “may feel like their votes are wasted.” Trump echoed this claim that “Republicans have a disadvantage. They lose New York, Illinois, and California before it even starts.”
True, but they’re also more populous than other states. Still, votes from states with large populations are now worth less than smaller states. As calculated in a Washington Post piece after the 2016 election, the distortion provides a Wyoming resident with 3.6 times more voting power than a Californian. It wasn’t always that way, but the reason for the disparity among states in over 200 years is simple — urban populations have increased over time. Yet, we’ve not done much to ensure proper delegate apportionment.
But here’s a novel idea: rather than consider a vote in Wyoming as worth over three in California, what if each American vote was weighed equally regardless of geography? Not all would agree, especially not Republicans.
Details of the Pew study revealed a disparity across party lines for support of a nationwide popular vote: 81% of Democrats would agree to a Constitutional amendment to eliminate the Electoral College, whereas only 32% of Republicans would. They aren’t likely to give up the equivalent to a golfing handicap that improves their standing. | https://medium.com/discourse/isnt-it-time-the-electoral-college-was-dismantled-2f2f9cb57a50 | ['David Leibowitz'] | 2020-12-31 20:59:38.057000+00:00 | ['Government', 'Culture', 'Philosophy', 'Politics', 'Election 2020'] |
I clean while my toddler is awake | Many parents say that they wait until their child is napping before they clean. I understand why a lot of them do it. A lot of toddlers want to undo everything their parents just cleaned, or their toddlers want to help in a way that may not be very helpful.
When my son was a baby I found that he loved to fall asleep while listening to the sound of the vacuum. That was the start of me cleaning while he was awake. I started with the dishes, counters, and then ended with vacuuming while he was awake. My son is two and a half now and loves to help me clean! I let him help me with age appropriate chores as well as teach him new chores as he gets older.
Photo by Heather Ford on Unsplash
It can be difficult to let him help me with some things, but I push the feeling of wanting everything to be done my way and I let him help in his way. I show him how to put utensils in their slots. I show him how to turn on the washer and dryer. My son is also learning how to hang up clothes. Vacuuming is by far his favorite “chore”. I write it like this because I am the one doing the vacuuming, but I let him hold the handle with me. He also has his own little toy vacuum and he goes behind me with it and vacuums.
My son with his vacuum. Photo Credit: Krystal Bakioglu
I feel like cleaning while my son is awake is the best thing to do. It allows him to do the basic task of cleaning up after himself. He will eventually have bigger chores as he gets older, but for now he’s doing age appropriate chores. I am raising him to be independent and to be an equal in his future relationships. I don’t want him to depend on others to clean up after him.
Teaching your child to clean up after themselves is one of the best things you can do to help them learn that cleaning up is the normal. Starting from a very young age is really important too. Let them see you cleaning while they are babies. You can still interact and play with them too. As they get older they will want to help you clean. The first thing my son helped me start cleaning up was his toys. That is a great place to start with young toddlers!
I will add that the one thing I don’t do while my son is awake is mop. Toddlers love to run around and my son is no exception to that! I have a hard time getting him to wait on a chair while the floors are wet, so I do save that one for nap time. He will learn to help with mopping in a few years. Also, my house is not clean 24/7. We live and play here, but we do try to keep it somewhat tidy and organized. A deep cleaning is due soon in my home! | https://medium.com/@kdbakioglu/i-clean-while-my-toddler-is-awake-67d53ec4e3e7 | [] | 2021-06-14 10:20:12.299000+00:00 | ['Cleaning With Toddlers', 'Parenting', 'Babies', 'Toddlers', 'Cleaning'] |
How to use AutoKeras to build Image Classification models using one line of code? | DEEP LEARNING FOR BEGINNERS
How to use AutoKeras to build Image Classification models using one line of code?
How quickly can you classify people into age groups based on their hands? You are one-line-of-code away from knowing. Image Source
Disclaimer: I was tempted to write this article mainly because I was unable to find many tutorials that demonstrate how to use AutoKeras with self-collected custom datasets (i.e. datasets other than popular deep learning datasets like MNIST, ImageNet, or CIFAR-10). Additionally, with the latest version of TF rolled out, many functions (used in existing tutorials) are now obsolete and require an update.
TL;DR
1 line of code for people in a hurry:
ImageClassifier(max_trials = 200).fit(x = X, y = y, epochs = 3, validation_split = 0.2)
Introduction
In our previous articles on Deep Learning for Beginners, we learned how to build an image classification model using Pytorch and Tensorflow. For both models, I intentionally avoided going into details of the hyperparameter optimization process or tinkering with the complexity of the network architecture, both of which are useful for improving the accuracy of models.
Hyperparameter optimization (HO) is the technique of finding the optimal values of different model hyperparameters such as learning rate, etc.
You might have come across hyperparameter tuning in machine learning projects using Grid Search cross-validation. The purpose of doing so is to find the “best” model amongst all competing models. With respect to deep learning, however, the process of finding the best model can be quite challenging especially because of the somewhat cryptic black-box architecture of neural networks.
This is because there are quite a few hyperparameters that can be tuned in a neural network, for instance, number of layers, no. of neurons, activation function, number of filters, stride size, etc that might impact the performance of the network. Although it may seem like a lot to simultaneously find optimal values for each of these, we have an easier option at our disposal.
Say hello to AutoKeras.
Autokeras
AutoKeras: The holy grail of applied deep learning for creating best-of-best neural network architectures, with very little domain/technical expertise.
AutoKeras was developed by DATA Lab at Texas A&M University and its primary goal is to enable deep-learning non-experts to quickly whip up a model with minimum domain knowledge. Let’s see how…
Dataset
We will be working with the Chest X-Ray Images Kaggle dataset. Once you download and unzip it, you will see the chest_xray folder that contains images organized neatly into train, valid, and test subfolders. Each of these subfolders contains two sub-sub folders, one for normal chest Xrays and another for Xrays indicating pneumonia . We will only be working on the ‘train’ and ‘test’ subfolder.
Note: Make sure the chest_xray folder is sitting in the same directory as your Python Jupyter notebook.
Helper functions
We will be creating a python script called helper.py to store the helper functions we will be using. For now, there is just one — img_preprocess .
def img_preprocess(img):
"""
Opens the image and does some preprocessing
such as converting to RGB, resize and converting to array
"""
img = Image.open(img)
img = img.convert('RGB')
img = img.resize((256,256))
img = asarray(img)/255
The function takes as input an image and does three things to it. First, we open the image using Image module from PIL library and convert it to an RGB format. This is quite useful because even though the images might look like they are black-and-white in color, there could be a few colored ones that might have crept into your dataset and are indistinguishable to the naked eyes. Secondly, we are going to resize all the images to size 256 x 256. This is to bring uniformity to the dataset. Finally, we are going to convert the image to a NumPy array using asarray function within numpy library. This is because the input to the train function in Autokeras expects a NumPy array.
Note: In earlier versions of TF, we could simply use the load_image_dataset method within the autokeras.image_supervised module to convert the raw image into a NumPy format. Because the newer version does not support it anymore, hence we had to make use of the asarray method.
Let’s get training…
We will be working on a new python script called AutoKeras_ImageClassification.py in Jupyter Notebook.
Importing libraries
We will begin by importing the necessary libraries and the helper function we created above.
import glob
import pandas as pd
import numpy as np
from sklearn.utils import shuffle import cv2
from PIL import Image
from numpy import asarray import autokeras as ak
from tensorflow import keras from helper import img_preprocess
Note: The two files helper.py and AutoKeras_ImageClassification.py must be in the same directory.
Creating the train and test sets
As I mentioned before, we need to input NumPy arrays as the x parameter into the Autokeras’ train method. To do so, we can simply keep on picking each image present in the ‘pneumonia’ and ‘normal’ folder in chest_xray/train directory and send it to the img_preprocess method to create the input for the train method.
However, there is one big problem with that!
If you read all the images from normal xrays followed by all images in the pneumonia xrays folder, you have unintentionally administered some order effect into your model. That is, the model thinks that the order in which data is fed has an impact on the output, which is clearly wrong and can lead to the classic overfitting problem.
Moreover, we will be creating a validation set from the train set during training (as you will see later on) and if we had all the normal chest x-ray images at the end of the training dataset, it could mean your validation set has misrepresentation of classes. So you MUST shuffle data yourself rather than relying on Keras to do it for you!
A workaround for the aforementioned problem is: create a data frame with two columns: filename and label (0: normal and 1: pneumonia) and shuffle this data frame.
def _create_df(path, directory):
"""
Creates a df (with shuffled entries)
with two columns: file name and label (0: normal or 1: pneumonia)
""" files1 = glob.glob (path + directory + "/NORMAL/*.jpeg")
files2 = glob.glob (path + directory + "/PNEUMONIA/*.jpeg") # creating the train set
df_n = pd.DataFrame()
df_p = pd.DataFrame() df_n['name'] = [x for x in files1]
df_n['outcome'] = 0. df_p['name'] = [x for x in files2]
df_p['outcome'] = 1. df = pd.concat([df_n, df_p], axis = 0, ignore_index = True)
df = shuffle(df) # shuffle the dataset
return df
We then read each file from this data frame and use the helper function to create the numpy representation of the image.
def create_x_and_y(self):
X = np.array([img_preprocess(p) for p in self.train_df.name.values])
y = train_df.outcome.values
return X, y
This is how the complete code, contained within a class called AutoImageClassification , looks like:
def __init__(self, path):
self.train_df = self._create_df(path, "train")
self.test_df = self._create_df(path, "test")
@staticmethod
def _create_df(path, directory):
"""
Creates a df (with shuffled entries)
with two columns: file name and label (0: normal or 1: pneumonia)
"""
files1 = glob.glob (path + directory + "/NORMAL/*.jpeg")
files2 = glob.glob (path + directory + "/PNEUMONIA/*.jpeg") class AutoImageClassification:def __init__(self, path):self.train_df = self._create_df(path, "train")self.test_df = self._create_df(path, "test")def _create_df(path, directory):"""Creates a df (with shuffled entries)with two columns: file name and label (0: normal or 1: pneumonia)"""files1 = glob.glob (path + directory + "/NORMAL/*.jpeg")files2 = glob.glob (path + directory + "/PNEUMONIA/*.jpeg") # creating the train set
df_n = pd.DataFrame()
df_p = pd.DataFrame() df_n['name'] = [x for x in files1]
df_n['outcome'] = 0. df_p['name'] = [x for x in files2]
df_p['outcome'] = 1. df = pd.concat([df_n, df_p], axis = 0, ignore_index = True)
df = shuffle(df) # shuffle the dataset
return df
def create_x_and_y(self):
X = np.array([img_preprocess(p) for p in self.train_df.name.values])
y = self.train_df.outcome.values
return X, y
Finally, to train our neural network, we will create an object of class AutoImageClassification , call the create_x_and_y method to create inputs x and y for the train function. To begin the training process, we simply need one line of code that uses the fit method.
aic = AutoImageClassification(path = "chest_xray/") X, y = aic.create_x_and_y() # autokeras
model = ak.ImageClassifier(
max_trials = 200,
loss = 'binary_crossentropy',
metrics = 'accuracy' ) model.fit(x = X, y = y, epochs = 3, validation_split = 0.2)
Note: The training process will take a really long time so grab a cup of coffee or better yet, make use of the free GPUs available on GoogleColab Notebook to fasten the process.
ImageClassifier is the Autokeras image classification class. To initialize, the max_trials parameter is set to 200, meaning 200 different Keras models will be tried (default value is 100). The accuracy metric will be used to determine how good the model is and at each iteration, the binary_crossentropy loss will be monitored.
The fit method is the place where the magic happens. It will search for the best set of hyperparameters for our model and in turn generate the best model based on our data. It takes as input, predictors x and outcomes y . We also specify epochs as 3 meaning the model is going to train on all of the data 3 times. Finally, we are setting aside a small proportion (20%) of the training data during each epoch to be used as a validation set. This is going to help us ensure our model is not overfitting and is able to generalize well on unseen data.
Once the training process starts, the first few lines of output should look something like this:
Evaluating the model
We will be using the test set to make predictions. But first, we must preprocess the images present in chest_xray/test directory in the same manner as the trainset images.
x_test = np.array([img_preprocess(p) for p in aic.test_df.name.values])
y_test = aic.test_df.outcome.values
To make predictions, simply use the predict method:
# test data
y_pred = model.predict(x_test)
y_pred = [round(y[0],0) for y in y_pred]
print("accuracy = ", accuracy_score(y_test, y_pred))
print("recall = ", recall_score(y_test, y_pred))
print("precision = ", precision_score(y_test, y_pred))
print("f1 score = ", f1_score(y_test, y_pred))
Evaluation metrics on test data
Saving the model for future use
In order to export the trained model:
# Export as a Keras Model.
model = model.export_model()
model.save('models/xray_classification.h1')
To load it again: | https://medium.com/analytics-vidhya/how-to-use-autokeras-to-build-image-classification-models-using-one-line-of-code-c35b0c36e66e | ['Varshita Sher'] | 2020-10-15 12:34:43.133000+00:00 | ['Deep Learning', 'Autokeras', 'Python', 'Image Classification'] |
Martti Malmi Offline Meeting | Dear Community,
On June 27th, IoT Chain CEO Zhuopeng Xie attended a meeting on invitation titled “Martti Malmi Offline Meeting: Blockchain Technology and Industry Application Seminar Series One”. More than 100 blockchain CEOs were in attendance, including those from well-known projects such as NEO, NAS, QTUM, Loopring, BTM, and Kcash.
ITC CEO Zhuopeng Xie
During the seminar, the ITC team discussed application scenarios for ITC together with Martti Malmi and other blockchain companies from around the globe.
Martti Malmi and ITC CEO Zhuopeng Xie
ITC CEO Zhuopeng Xie-second form the left
About Martti Malmi
Martti Malmi was a core Bitcoin developer and founder of a popular Bitcoin forum. In the spring of 2009, he contributed code to the original Bitcoin project and was largely responsible for its initial operation. From 2009 to 2011, he managed Bitcoin.org and the Bitcointalk.org forum through servers in Helsinki, Finland. | https://medium.com/iot-chain/dear-community-403271d18f3b | ['Iot Chain'] | 2018-06-28 06:36:32.050000+00:00 | ['Announcements', 'Itc', 'Bitcoin', 'IoT'] |
Why, When, and How to Establish a Security Department in Your eCommerce Business | Why, When, and How to Establish a Security Department in Your eCommerce Business Lokte Jun 1·4 min read
Online security is a bit like a fire extinguisher — you don’t really pay attention to it until your life depends on it. Unfortunately, many eCommerce merchants don’t place enough emphasis on their “fire extinguisher” until a desperate situation calls for it. While it’s true that installing security protocols and tools may be a costly endeavor and certainly doesn’t generate profit in and of itself, the true value of time, energy, and money saved from dodging potential attacks may be astounding. Online crime is estimated to cost a staggering $10.5 trillion yearly by 2025, with bad actors growing more brazen by the day. More than 50% of all online attacks fall on small to mid-sized businesses, and a reported 60% of the targeted businesses close their doors within 6 months of the attack. Mastercard reports that 66% of small to mid-sized businesses experienced at least one online attack within the last two years.
In our first Q&A session, we answer some of your questions regarding why, how, and when to establish your very own dedicated security department, regardless of the size of your eCommerce business. Remember, the automated tools that bad actors use to target potential victims do not discriminate based on size, profit, market share, or brand awareness.
When should I have at least one person dedicated to information security at my company?
We strongly recommend any size business to focus on security from the very beginning, if possible. It’s much easier establishing security protocols, and a strong security culture in your business from the start, instead of attempting to instill it at a later date. Read our blog post about security education within your eCommerce business here.
With that said, ideally, at least one individual within your organization should be responsible for security. This employee should act as a point of contact in your company; they don’t necessarily need to be an expert, they can simply manage relations with an outsourced security agency.
Can I utilize a platform with built-in security measures?
It’s important to understand the life stage of your company. Starting out, a viable option for you may be a platform with built-in security measures, and this may work well until the day your business outgrows it. Your platform may very well meet your current requirements and include appropriate protection against web attacks and data leaks.
At what point do I need a team versus one person managing security?
Consider the balance between the cost and benefits of housing a security team within your eCommerce business. You certainly need to be at a certain size before needing a larger team. Review your current revenue, the load of work required, and the specific tasks for security personnel when making the decision. It’s also possible to hire an external security agency to take care of your security needs instead of building your own team.
Can I outsource my security needs to an external security agency?
It’s common practice to outsource security needs to an external security company, regardless of the size of your business. Ensure that the security agency you choose understands the needs of your business, and determine whether they are experts in their field. If the agency you choose to work with also offers other services, make sure you verify their security expertise above all else. Just because an eCommerce service provider offers innovative web design, does not mean they are information security specialists.
If you don’t prioritize security when choosing tech or external specialists, you should still be able to pinpoint where and how your security needs are being met. In the end, you alone are liable for the security and safety of your eCommerce business.
What are the challenges to establishing your own security department?
The challenging aspect of creating your own internal security department is hiring skilled and quality talent in the field; you may not want to allocate the necessary funds to hire leading security experts. Consider that many high level security professionals already work at security companies, where they can grow their knowledge and careers. Your company may not offer a challenging enough environment for such individuals. Also, after you’ve built your own security department, you need to manage that team, which presents its own set of requirements.
Still, if your firm is large enough, it may make sense to build your own team. That’s why outsourcing security is a great option, because companies that specialize in security often come loaded with the best minds in the security arena. You may also choose to outsource bits and pieces of your security measures.
To conclude
Based on our experience, we recommend hiring one internal employee who can “own” security in your company, whether that’s managing third party tools and the platform you use, or simply liaising with an external security agency. Moving forward and based on the size of your organization and the needs of your business, you have different options available to you; even with your own team, you most likely will still utilize 3rd party tools and services. And even if you outsource your security needs to a security agency, you should still put that company to the test with an external pen test. That’s why Lokte’s tools and services will come in handy, whatever your situation may be.
There’s no “one size fits all” solution; rather, the solution for you depends largely on the life cycle of your organization and the requirements of your specific eCommerce project.
Which approach do you use for managing security in your online business? | https://medium.com/@loktesecurity/why-when-and-how-to-establish-a-security-department-in-your-ecommerce-business-33b987902330 | [] | 2021-06-01 15:18:06.869000+00:00 | ['Information Security', 'Cybersecurity', 'Ecommerce', 'Security Department'] |
One Forms Two Complete | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/chalkboard/one-forms-two-complete-119532c12edb | ['Daniel A. Teo'] | 2020-12-25 17:06:43.463000+00:00 | ['Prompt', 'One Line', 'Harmony', 'Poetry', 'Love'] |
On Purpose | On Purpose
I never clean behind the couch. On Thanksgiving, I felt like cleaning behind the couch. I dug out a pile of dusty rolled-up papers and found the initial statement of purpose for the Live Music Project, which we’d written on a huge piece of paper and taped to the wall for a community meeting in March 2016, the same week we officially incorporated. The wording has shifted a bit since then, but the work is still the same. ❤️
LMP’s 2016 purpose statement: “To increase access to live music experiences, and support the organizations that are providing that opportunity. To amplify music resources by providing a platform for composers, performers, and performing arts organizations to promote and sustain their work, increase their visibility in the community, and improve audience access to live music.”
This year has me thinking a lot about purpose — the “why” of doing, making, and being. The beauty of purpose is that it doesn’t dictate what you should do or how you should do it. Purpose is the reason. The rest is implementation. Purpose is immune to Covid.
The purpose of my work at LMP is to connect people with live classical music. Almost overnight, Covid radically altered the nature of how live music is performed and experienced. It subverted our existing methods of finding concerts to share with you. It turned our volunteering logistics inside out. It emptied our concert calendar completely; then the opposite, as it redefined the geographical scope of our concert coverage and, in turn, our readership.
But Covid couldn’t touch our purpose.
The beautiful purpose statement that sat behind my couch for the last four years is a beacon. I’m so grateful that the LMP board and I took the time, back in 2016, to articulate our purpose as we filled out oodles of incorporation paperwork, so that we could look to that purpose as a compass in 2020.
Amid the grief of what wouldn’t be — programs on hold, music unheard, epic community eggnog bar-hopping adventures undone (*sob — Rachmaninogg!*), it has been encouraging for me to remember that purpose doesn’t lie in a specific service, in a face-to-face meeting, or even in a concert hall.
LMP’s purpose is in providing access to concert information, so we’ve been staying close to that as the concert landscape shifts throughout this wild year.
We’re continuing to research how performers produce music during Covid, and where they promote their concerts. We’re adjusting our editorial process and our website to collect that information and share it as efficiently and accurately as possible.
We’re asking ourselves how we can show our belief that Black lives matter in the way we display concert information. We’re taking steps to actively highlight the work of BIPOC artists. We see every day that as long as there is music, there are ways to build audiences around music — and that there might not be a more important time to do that than right now.
We’re all trying to find new ways to achieve the things we care about. I want to support you in this, too. If there are ways in which LMP can help you achieve your musical goals, please reach out. Let’s work on these things together. Similarly, if you are in a place to support us with your time, talent, a financial gift, or notes of encouragement — please reach out as well. I love to hear from you.
I hope that whether you’re new to the LMP family or a long-time gobbler of our concert listings, that you’ve found joy in live music this year.
Wishing you a healthy, hopeful, purposeful 2021.
Warmly from Seattle,
Shaya Lyon
Founder & director, Live Music Project | https://medium.com/@livemusicproject/on-purpose-f88b2320f78a | ['Live Music Project'] | 2020-12-28 00:36:44.077000+00:00 | ['Purpose Driven Business', 'Strategy', 'Classical Music', 'Philanthropy', 'Non Profit Leadership'] |
FIX it! | #organizing_stuff_around
“With organization comes empowerment” -Lynda Peterson
Fixing stuff around you or organizing them is great idea perhaps it’s a motivation for yourself to prove. Well, according to Lynda Peterson empowerment comes to those who work in gentle ways, order things and collocate them in compliance.
Here comes my story of organization, or a chance to be a leader without authority. This is surely the new aspect of leadership i was unaware of, a bunch of thanks to Amal Academy for introducing this and providing us with this platform. Well initially, i was wandering all inside my home that what’s the most easiest place to organize. Exactly at that point i realized the work of my mother on daily basis, and it seems so disgraceful to me. Then, i found out my grand mothers room, and the principal of courtesy flashes in my mind.
So, here i share the picture of her bedside and corner table, which she usually uses to place medicines.
Before snap of her bedside
In that way, the things i think needed to be fixed were bed sheet, her blanket, cushions and some clothes. So, i just cleaned the bed sheet, folded her blanket, place cushions, hung some of her clothes in her cupboard and at the end placed her Islamic book which she used to read every time on the shelf. These all things that i fix are must to be organize, because tidy environment promotes our positive energy and contentment in life.
After snap of her bedside
After completing this task, i feel much contented and satisfied with my efforts. I felt like i’m performing something from my virtue and that pleases me beyond expectation. Yeah, i did it sometime, if i hadn’t asked to do so but not now. I didn’t realized this before that organization comes parallel with time and today i have become aware of it.
This whole procedure teaches me with the importance of leadership in our lives, and that the act of leadership isn’t limited to some high mark or status but we ourselves can be leaders of our surroundings.
“THE ESSENCE OF GREAT LEADERSHIP IS INFLUENCE NOT AUTHORITY” | https://medium.com/@aisha-iqbal174/fix-it-37208f41fd64 | ['Aisha Iqbal'] | 2020-12-18 21:20:04.911000+00:00 | ['Fixingstuff', 'Amal Academy', 'Organization'] |
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