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Dussehra: A Religious-cum-Spiritual Festival
Dussehra is a Hindu festival. It symbolizes the triumph of good over evil. One of the stories behind this festival is Ram’s victory over Raavan. Raavan was the powerful king of the demons. He did penance for years to please Lord Brahma. As a result of which Lord brahma appeared and granted Raavan his boon where he asked not to be killed by gods, demons, or spirits. As time passed by, he got more powerful and arrogant. The demons began to disturb the sages and seers. Lord Vishnu incarnated on Earth as Ram, a human being, in order to defeat and kill him, thus circumventing the boon given by Lord Brahma. One day, Raavan kidnapped Sita, the wife of Ram. When he ignored Ram’s request to release Sita, the situation escalated and led to the war. A fierce battle took place between Rama and Raavan in which Rama killed Raavan and ended the evil rule. Dharma was restored on the Earth. Thus, this festival is a reminder of the victory of Good over Evil. On Dussehra, effigies of the demons Raavan, Kumbhkaran, and Meghnaad are burnt with fireworks, marking evil’s destruction. “I did not kill Raavan. His ego killed him.” — Ram I see Dussehra as a religious-cum-spiritual festival because conquering one’s own demons is the true spirit of it and One need not be Hindu to follow this path. Seeing Dussehra through Lord Ram’s Eyes I killed Raavan once I saw him today again He is hiding in us He is among us I won’t kill him this time I, Ram, want every one of you To stand up for yourself Take that one big step Kill the Raavan inside of you Kill the Raavan around you Carry the spirit of Dussehra with you When you burn his effigy Carry on my legacy Kill the evil inside That is your real enemy I am Ram I am always on your side When you fight the good fight Join me and add more light, Shine and grace to your aura Happy Dussehra
https://medium.com/spiritual-tree/dussehra-6a673d88929b
['Simran Kankas']
2020-10-25 18:28:42.110000+00:00
['Festivals', 'Religion', 'Spirituality', 'Spirit', 'Short Story']
Why People Follow Toxic Leaders
More than half of House Republicans — 106 of them — urged the Supreme Court to overthrow the election, effectively trying to disenfranchise millions of voters for the heinous crime of not voting Republican. Thankfully, the Supreme Court recognized the Texas lawsuit for the baseless trash that it was and the Electoral College followed suit with endorsing the will of the American people. Score one for democracy. As well as intelligence and morality. But 106 House Republicans, along with 18 Republican Attorneys General, will forever be on the record as supporting a baseless lawsuit that attempted to obstruct the will of the people. And contrary to all logic, it doesn’t seem to be over. Apparently a number of Republicans are planning to sow further division by challenging the outcome in early January. It’s as though they have lifetime tickets to the wrong side of history. But this is the price of following a toxic leader. Eventually, followers always need to choose between behaviors that are unethical and immoral or risk becoming a target of the very leader they’ve supported. Toxic leaders don’t see their supporters as people. They see them as tools. And as tools, they have little compunction for casting them aside once they’re no longer useful. Everyone is expendable. Former Attorney General William Barr and Georgia Governor Brian Kemp both proved themselves to be ardent Trump supporters. They put their own reputations — and American lives — on the line in an effort to further Trump’s agendas. Yet the moment they stopped following his dictates, the moment they stopped being useful, he turned on them as he has many others. After all, there’s no reason to keep a tool once it’s stopped being useful. This progression seems inevitable. Yet people continue to pile on the bandwagon even as it catches fire. Part of the reason, at least, lies in a six-decade-old study. Would You Please Electrocute This Person? When Stanley Milgram ran his famous experiments in 1961, he wanted to measure the influence of authority on people’s behaviors. Under the guise of using electrical shocks to improve learning, he asked one group to learn word associations and recall them when asked. The other group was charged (haha, get it?) with giving the learner an electrical shock when they gave a wrong answer. The results weren’t encouraging for humanity. Despite screams of pain, pleading for mercy, and people passing unconscious, a full 65% of people continued to apply lethal electrical shocks through the applied lethal electrical shocks to the final 450-volt charge. Of course, no one actually died. There were no electrical shocks. It was all a setup to see if people would submit to an authority figure, even if they knew their actions would be harmful. While nearly all participants were reluctant to continue when the pain they were causing became obvious, the majority did so at the urging of the researcher. Milgram found that when an authority figure directed people, they were remarkably receptive to do things they otherwise would not, including actions that could harm others. Milgram initially wanted to run the experiment in Germany, hoping to explain why German citizens went along with the Holocaust. However, after seeing the test results here in the US, he decided there was no reason to go to Germany after all. Apparently, submission to authority figures is a relatively universal trait. These results have been publicized and cited many times over. But a critical aspect of the test is often lost. And it’s this detail which explains how people find themselves in these situations to begin with. Evil Begins with 15 Volts If I asked you to flip a switch and send 450 volts into someone strapped to a chair, you’d likely offer some colorful language telling me exactly what I can go do with that switch. But if I asked you to flip a switch and send 15 volts into someone, you might be more likely to comply. Fifteen volts is minor, most people would barely feel it. If it’s in your interest to take this step, it’s easy to rationalize it away. There’s no real harm in just 15 volts. Why not? Milgram recognized this and set his experiment up accordingly. He didn’t start with 450 volts. If he did, no one would know his name. He started with 15 volts and then increased the magnitude in 15-volt increments. Participants could rationalize that such a small increase wouldn’t be harmful. As Harvard psychology professor Daniel Gilbert describes in Stumbling On Happiness, “The human brain is not particularly sensitive to the absolute magnitude of stimulation, but it is extraordinarily sensitive to differences and changes — that is, to the relative magnitude of stimulation.” We notice relative changes. We don’t pay attention to absolute magnitudes. Toxic leaders build their supporters in the same way. They don’t start out asking them to support an Anti-American coup and overthrow the world’s longest standing democracy. They start by encouraging people to tacitly align through nonresistance. Just look the other way to these questionable practices. They know that once people begin to rationalize these actions, they’ll rationalize more later. From Jeff Skilling at Enron to Elizabeth Holmes at Theranos, toxic leaders don’t start off by asking people to directly clash with their values. They create situations and give them a role to play. They put people in environments that incentivize following the group and then let them rationalize their behaviors in small, incremental steps. Just as Milgram’s participants could rationalize away each 15-volt increase, followers find ways to rationalize away their own change in behaviors. Before long, they find themselves doing things that were once abhorrent to them. And looking back, it’s difficult to see how they fell into this trap. It all hinges on that first 15 volts. In Milgram’s study, this was the differentiator. If someone took that step, each subsequent shock became less of a relative change. And it was that much easier to rationalize. With toxic leaders, it’s the same principle. The time to stand up in defiance is in the beginning. It’s when you’re asked to be tolerant of intolerance. It’s when you see something that doesn’t seem right, but fear keeps you from speaking out. It’s when your gut gives you that unpleasant feeling that you’re drifting away from your core values and starting down a wrong path. Once those rationalizations begin, you begin to align to the person doing that behavior. It’s now normalized. And stopping becomes much more difficult. Be Wary of That First Step “Assholes tend to stick together, and once stuck are not easily separated,” Professor Robert Sutton wrote in his book, The No Asshole Rule. Sutton offers two main tests to identify a toxic leader: “Test One: After talking to the alleged asshole, does the ‘target’ feel oppressed, humiliated, de-energized, or belittled by the person? In particular, dos the target feel worse about him or herself? Test Two: Does the alleged asshole aim his or her venom at people who are less powerful rather than at those people who are more powerful?” In contrast, good leaders seek to unite people as opposed to dividing them. They don’t talk in terms of us versus them. They focus on how we can all move forward together. Good leaders are results-oriented, but they recognize the need for a broader view of the consequences. They understand that short-term victories at the expense of people’s well-being is not a victory. Good leaders treat their followers as partners, not as tools. They value diverse opinions and suggestions. They listen to their concerns. And they genuinely want to achieve the best solution — even if it isn’t their own. Most importantly, good leaders leave their team, company, or country better off than when they began. At the end of the day, they make decisions that enrich the lives of those they represent as opposed to their own. Be wary of the people you choose to follow. Once you take that first step, every subsequent one becomes a little easier. No one wakes up one day and decides to abandon their values. It’s a slow, incremental process. We chip away at our will one rationalization at a time. Recognize the danger that comes with that first 15 volts. The best time to stand up and resist is before you begin. The second best time is now. Before you have your own lifetime ticket to the wrong side of history.
https://medium.com/swlh/why-people-follow-toxic-leaders-a37d40189197
['Jake Wilder']
2020-12-15 21:06:17.766000+00:00
['Politics', 'Management', 'Self', 'Leadership', 'Psychology']
Thank you
Thank you You made me a better President, and you made me a better man. My fellow Americans, It’s a long-standing tradition for the sitting president of the United States to leave a parting letter in the Oval Office for the American elected to take his or her place. It’s a letter meant to share what we know, what we’ve learned, and what small wisdom may help our successor bear the great responsibility that comes with the highest office in our land, and the leadership of the free world. But before I leave my note for our 45th president, I wanted to say one final thank you for the honor of serving as your 44th. Because all that I’ve learned in my time in office, I’ve learned from you. You made me a better President, and you made me a better man. Throughout these eight years, you have been the source of goodness, resilience, and hope from which I’ve pulled strength. I’ve seen neighbors and communities take care of each other during the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes. I have mourned with grieving families searching for answers — and found grace in a Charleston church. I’ve taken heart from the hope of young graduates and our newest military officers. I’ve seen our scientists help a paralyzed man regain his sense of touch, and wounded warriors once given up for dead walk again. I’ve seen Americans whose lives have been saved because they finally have access to medical care, and families whose lives have been changed because their marriages are recognized as equal to our own. I’ve seen the youngest of children remind us through their actions and through their generosity of our obligations to care for refugees, or work for peace, and, above all, to look out for each other. I’ve seen you, the American people, in all your decency, determination, good humor, and kindness. And in your daily acts of citizenship, I’ve seen our future unfolding. All of us, regardless of party, should throw ourselves into that work — the joyous work of citizenship. Not just when there’s an election, not just when our own narrow interest is at stake, but over the full span of a lifetime. I’ll be right there with you every step of the way. And when the arc of progress seems slow, remember: America is not the project of any one person. The single most powerful word in our democracy is the word ‘We.’ ‘We the People.’ ‘We shall overcome.’ Yes, we can. And if you’d like to stay connected, you can sign up here to keeping getting updates from me.
https://medium.com/obama-white-house/thank-you-9d7cc16c6755
['Pres. Obama', 'Archives']
2017-01-20 15:28:43.844000+00:00
['Politics', 'President Obama', 'History', 'Presidency In Review', 'United States']
Tadhg’s birth: 2 perfect days of mind-blowing pain, and then relief.
The title says it all really: this is not a birth story of rose petals in a lavender oil bath where the mother has 3 cramps, splashes around in a bath for 2 hours, pushes 5 times and low and behold there he is. That would have been lovely, and that was the aim, but as I knew full well everyone’s birth is different. The hypnobirthing courses (by Hollie de Cruz and Amala Midwife organisation) I had done had helped me prepare for anything coming my way. It’s fair to say a lot did come my way. And yet, it was perfect. As Tadhg looked to be a good-size 4kg baby, combined with my pregnancy diabetes, the gynaecologist set a date for induction. I wanted to avoid being induced hence my midwife did a membrane sweep on Saturday (where she separated the membrane of the amniotic sac from the cervix), gradually setting things in motion. It started on a Monday evening. Every 10 minutes a period-cramp came and went but they weren’t regular or strong enough to head to the hospital yet. Sadly, they were still strong enough to ensure I didn’t get a wink of sleep that night. The following afternoon the midwife assessed the situation, and told us that a walk in the forest near the hospital could help move things along. And she wasn’t wrong. I was soon contracting in 3-min intervals, for 45 seconds. These textbook-contractions meant labour had well and truly started. At 5pm (3cm dilation later) we were back in the hospital (St Elizabeth in Ukkel) where I settled into the labour-room. I could not for the life me find a rhythm; moving from the bouncy ball, to all fours, to standing up, to sitting on a chair, listening to Hollie’s voice on the hypnobirthing recordings… it’s like my body needed some time get used to labour and above all, I was hungry (if you know me, that is NOT a good thing.) Though I tried to eat cereal bars it would not settle my hungry tummy. So not only was I in full labour, I was also in a foul mood (poor Simon, he felt so useless, or in his own words, ‘I felt like a spare tit’). Soon after, the midwife ran the birthing bath and in I went. MY GOD whatever pain I was feeling just disappeared, it was glorious. Suddenly I could look at Simon again without wanting to rip his head off. The initial pain relief the bath had given subsided after a few hours when the pain became completely unbearable again. In the meantime my waters had broken, with meconium in it (where the baby has done his first poo whilst still inside), so I transferred to the larger tub in the same room with fresh water. The move ensured contractions became even heavier, which was great, but the pain in my lower back and my pelvis had reached a level I did not know existed. The hypnobirthing lady Hollie on the Bose speaker told me that with every surge I had come one step closer to meeting my baby. All good and well but after what felt like the thousandth contraction I saw no way out. 7 hours was starting to feel like a very long time. After announcing I was still only 5cm dilated, the midwife asked me to avoid focusing on numbers. However, the pain was too much to bear, I was exhausted from not having slept and eaten properly, and started throwing up. It has to be said: how I managed to not puke in the bath mid-contraction was a mind-blowing circus-act. Maybe I should apply for Cirque du Soleil after all. Mooing like a cow, all the while trying to let the contractions do their thing, I had had enough — I needed a reset. The word ‘epidural’ escaped my lips. The midwife encouraged me to hang in there, saying it could all suddenly move quickly, but no… I had mentally and physically been stretched to the impossible for 7 hours and could see no way beyond it. The midwife rang for the anaesthetist, Simon and the midwife got me out of the bath (not sure how they managed to do that, I was like a deadweight lazy old 170kg sea lion in an aqua zoo), they dried me off, threw a robe around my shivering shoulders and off I shuffled to the delivery room next door, stopping in my tracks to deal with the never-ending contractions. Clutching desperately onto Simon, I knew the pain would end soon but every second was one too many. Once I hauled myself onto the bed, all while continuing the loud mooing, in went the epidural. And there it was…. the numbness. The most glorious lack of pain. I yelled ‘I love my life’, several times. Finally I could smile again, looking around to check where I was. I could speak to the midwives and to Simon,… I was back on planet earth. So after what had been 7 hrs of tubbing around in the bath, I lay on the bed and watched in drained fascination as the contractions continued to come and go on a monitor, while I felt absolutely NOTHING. The midwives told me to get some rest as I’d need energy for pushing him out. In my head the tough bit was done, but I had really underestimated this next part. So at 5am (after 5 hrs of rest), I was finally 10cm dilated and we’d decided to let the epidural wear off so I could feel the push contractions and also of course feel him come out of me. The pushing chapter began. Some women push for 5 minutes. Some for 2 hours. You guessed right, I was the latter. Two hours of: on my knees, on my side, on all fours, on my back, all while squeezing Simon’s hand to pulp,… Tadhg’s got a rather large Irish head, hence it took that little bit longer (thank you Boylan family!). The two midwives Florence and Sarah (from independent midwife organisation Amala) who’d been by my side from 7pm the night before, were the best personal support team a birthing woman could ask for: they kept me informed of my progress, didn’t bullshit me, and were incredibly supportive to get me through what felt like a decade of pushing. In between two contractions I was given a mirror to see his little head, and soon after ‘the infamous ring of fire’ was a fact. I pushed into the pain, and after screaming and crying ‘get him out of me, I don’t care how’, I didn’t believe it when Simon said his head was out. Then I knew it was one more push to go so I made it a big one. Oh it burned, the DAMN RING OF FIRE! Shortly after I felt Tadhg slide out of me and flop onto my belly. All while I shouted Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god. Simon was a blubbering mess, I was numb from exhaustion. Simon cut the umbilical cord, I was giving skin-to-skin to Tadhg, not believing he was finally out of me, after 32hrs from the start of contractions — with 17 hrs of active labour. That should have been the end. But it wasn’t. The placenta decided to throw a spanner in the works and desperately stuck to the top right part of my uterus. A gynaecologist was called in, the epidural was ramped up again and in she went with her whole hand to ‘scoop’ the placenta out of me. Fortunately I didn’t feel much pain due to the epidural, though it did feel alien-like. Little parts of the placenta had remained, causing internal bleeding, but fortunately they were prepared for situations like this. 3 hours after giving birth to Tadhg I was wheeled into my hospital room. Low on blood, bone-tired, but high on endorphins and love. 9 months I had read about the physiology and the mental side of birth and read countless other women’s birthing stories. The support I had gotten from midwife group Amala was incredible; they are there for YOU, the birthing woman. Their mentality isn’t just ‘as long as the baby is healthy’, but also about the mother’s health (physical and mental). They are my friends, they felt my pain, they knew what to say and at what time, they listened, they informed me of all my options, they were honest and kind. I felt so empowered, I had pushed this baby out, all by myself with every ounce of power and energy, they made me believe I could and I did. Screw running a marathon: this was my marathon. And I finished it. Hence the title; it was the most perfect and painful birth I could have imagined. And if I had to do that again: I absolutely would, every bloody second of it, with the fantastic Amala midwives right by my side. Sources and contacts: Amala: www.naissance-amala.be Hollie de Cruz: Your baby, your birth. Instagram Hollie de Cruz: : @theyesmummum Midwife and gas and air blogger instagram: @motherofdaughters / @gasandair
https://medium.com/@charlotteelton-39821/tadhgs-birth-the-most-perfect-2-days-of-arduous-mind-blowing-excruciating-pain-and-then-relief-70123b144701
['Charlotte Elton']
2019-09-01 06:13:43.191000+00:00
['Birth', 'Hypnobirthing', 'Midwife', 'Birthstory', 'Pregnancy']
Pandemic Scaling Adventures at Nearpod. Part 1: Pushing Redis Cluster to it’s limits, and back
At Nearpod we make extensive use of Redis. The majority of that use comes in the form of a significantly sized Redis Cluster which we use to manage the millions of virtual classroom sessions that go on throughout the day. We run our Redis Cluster in Elasticache, the AWS managed service for in-memory datastores. This past back-to-school period, Nearpod has seen unprecedented growth. For what was already a popular EdTech tool, you can only imagine the increase in users we’ve seen as students returned to school — virtually — and the world found itself urgently in need of solutions to bridge the learning divide. Our cloud platform immediately underwent a 10x scale event. From this experience, we have some lessons learned about scaling Redis Cluster that are definitely worth sharing. As we grew, we quickly found ourselves scaling up our Redis Cluster to match the load of millions upon millions of new students joining classes every day. Before long, we scaled all the way up to the limit of nodes that Elasticache allows by default, 90. While we were pleased with the scale our SaaS platform had achieved, we were also concerned about how far we could scale the cluster before it would break, not to mention the cost of running such a behemoth. As student activity continued beyond anyone’s wildest expectations, we found ourselves looking to stay ahead of the game — out of an abundance of caution, we opened discussions with Amazon to increase the limit for the maximum number they’d allow in a cluster. We were already sitting at 45 shards, each with 1 master and 1 replica. Amazon agreed to help, however, it took AWS a few attempts to determine how to change the configuration, which told us what we already suspected: we were probably running one of the largest Redis Clusters in Elasticache. That’s when things got even more interesting. After the limit increase was applied by AWS, we noticed something very peculiar. Our nodes hosting shard 46 and beyond were experiencing significantly less load than the nodes for shards 1–45, despite serving a number of keys in parity with the other servers. Puzzled at why this would be, we drilled into the issue. Once we got to the heart of it, it came down to two things: one very detailed (and potentially costly) nuance specific to the open-source code we use to access Redis, and one bug in how Elasticache handles clusters beyond their limit, which helped expose the first issue. A Refresher on Redis Cluster: If you are so inclined, you can read the Redis Cluster specification, but the TL;DR version of how it works is as follows: There are 16k “key slots” and each key slot is assigned to a master node in the cluster (as well as any replicas of said master). Keys are mapped to a slot using a hash function on the key name. When an application connects to Redis Cluster, it needs to do two things: Locate any working node in the cluster Issue the CLUSTER SLOTS command, to ask which nodes have which slots Once the application does that, the client now has all the info it needs to ask the correct node for the keys it needs. It’s important to note here that the CLUSTER SLOTS command is “O(N) where N is the total number of cluster nodes.” In other words, it gets slower the larger the cluster is. Determining what was different: As we investigated, the first thing we did, of course, was look to see if there was a difference in the workload that was hitting the new nodes. The get/set metrics looked identical to the other nodes. Running MONITOR on the node didn’t show anything that stood out as different at all, and nothing on the INFO command pointed to something being wrong. We were exhausting all the usual Redis monitoring avenues. We wondered to ourselves: “Is there anything like a TOP command for Redis?” It was then that we recalled that Redis does indeed have some additional internal cpu usage metrics that aren’t exposed by default. Those metrics are accessible using the INFO COMMANDSTATS command, and it shows how many calls have been made to each type of Redis command, along with the total and average times for each one. Once we had that data, we could see that across the first 45 shards, the CLUSTER family of commands accounted for an astounding 87% of the cpu time (!!!), versus virtually zero on the new shards. Getting to a Root Cause: After the initial stun subsided, we knew we had 2 questions to answer: Why are our nodes spending more time on the CLUSTER commands than on doing actual application work? Why wasn’t shard 46 and beyond doing the same? For question 1, after a closer look, the answer turned out to be quite simple, but hidden deep within the nuance of the open-source client we use to interact with Redis Cluster. Even though we intentionally use persistent connections, the default behavior of the PHP client, phpredis, is that it doesn’t actually keep a copy of the slots mapping between different instantiations of the client. That means that every time we created a new client, it would indeed reuse an existing connection as expected, however it would also ask for cluster slots again. Luckily for us, there is a configuration to keep a local copy of the slots that persists alongside the connection. Once we turned that on, the cpu usage on our Redis nodes dropped almost in half. And, thanks to no longer needing to wait for the additional command, we saw a welcome decrease in our application response times. The second question turned out to be a little more interesting from a cloud infrastructure perspective: There are many ways that you can do service discovery to locate a working node in order to bootstrap your client. You can maintain a list of nodes that the application can reach, have a configuration endpoint that returns a suitable set of available candidates, or you can have one large DNS response with the IP addresses of all of the nodes. The Elasticache implementation is indeed the latter, to return all nodes in the DNS response — i.e.: one big big list of A records. The problem with this approach is that there is a limit to how big a DNS reply can or should be. It certainly makes sense to impose a limit on it, and the way Elasticache goes about it is to limit the response to the first 90 nodes. As you’d guess, this in turn causes shards 46 and above to never be a node the client selects to initially connect to, which in turn means they never get a CLUSTER SLOTS command — thus causing the significant difference in load experienced by those nodes. We brought this to Amazon’s attention, and along with possible solutions that would help engineers scale more effectively at these cluster sizes. Luckily for us, however, solving the first part of the problem — drastically reducing the CPU utilization used by the costly and frequent cluster slot commands — meant we could aggressively begin reducing our cluster size, making the node discovery issue moot (and our AWS utilization costs much more pleasant). Today, we are gladly serving our ever-increasing number of teachers and students through this pandemic, and continuing to scale as always.
https://medium.com/@nicolasfar/pandemic-scaling-adventures-at-nearpod-part-1-pushing-redis-cluster-to-its-limits-and-back-7e8ec5e7d32b
['Nicolas Far']
2020-12-07 22:56:14.078000+00:00
['AWS', 'Edtech', 'Redis']
How NEAT Might Be the Key to Your Weight Loss Goals
How NEAT Might Be the Key to Your Weight Loss Goals Simple changes in your day can have a huge impact on your body composition. Photo by Ryan Moreno on Unsplash Trying to lose weight can be frustrating. The information we receive is confusing — we don’t know what to eat, what exercises to do, or what an ideal weight even is for us. It’s common to experience plateaus and lose motivation. It’s hard to feel like we’re restricted in what we can eat, and it can be exhausting and frankly just non-sustainable to do intense workouts every single day. But losing weight doesn’t need to be complicated, or difficult. Sometimes, the smallest change can be the tipping point in our weight loss journey. So here is one simple change you can make in your life, that can have a big impact.
https://medium.com/live-your-life-on-purpose/how-neat-might-be-the-key-to-your-weight-loss-goals-a569a54b5cd7
['Ashley Richmond']
2020-12-17 14:03:09.274000+00:00
['Self Improvement', 'Lifestyle', 'Health', 'Weight Loss', 'Advice']
10 Best Practices for a Healthy Heart
Introduction Cardiovascular diseases are one of the major mortality causes, worldwide. While some of these diseases are manageable and are short term, the same is not the case with other ones. The old cliché statement which signifies the importance of prevention could not fit a more appropriate situation than this. So what are the Practices for a Healthy Heart? If one is aware of their heart health status, they might be able to avert a bigger heart issue. A diet intervention in teen years might avert a cardiac intervention in years to come! In this discussion, we are going to look at such practices which can improve anyone’s heart health. Try incorporating these in your lifestyle, you are promised some magical improvements. Even adopting half of these practices can have a wonderful impact on your heart health! Practices for ideal heart health So, without further ado, let’s have a look at the 10 best practices for a healthy heart! 1- Annual checkups Going to a heart physician on your birthday isn’t exactly the ideal way of celebrating the big day. But hey, do schedule these regular checkups. For some people, the annual thing works. For some, a monthly visit is mandatory. Do whatever the doctor says or recommends in such sessions, and take prescribed medicines as well. Your doctor knows more about your heart health than you do! 2- Engage in physical activities Exercise is considered a tribute to the heart. For all that pumping that it does, you must reward the heart by engaging in some physical activities yourself as well. However, do not overdo things. It is ideal to start with a 15 minutes jog daily. You can always increase the workload later. This routine will not put your heart under a lot of stress. Get more information about Healthy Heart from the official website Transparent Hands Organization.
https://medium.com/@areebss121/10-best-practices-for-a-healthy-heart-29b26ed826fe
['Transparent Hands']
2021-06-08 10:25:59.270000+00:00
['Healthy Lifestyle', 'Health', 'Healthcare', 'Heart']
Methods for beginners to learn Japanese words 給初學者的背日文字技巧
(華文版本請拉到下面) This article is for those who started to learn Japanese words after being able to use hiragana and katakana. The first thing to remember is the origin of this language. East Asian languages are famous for the hieroglyph, which means it was created from pictures, and you won’t be able to read it while seeing how it is written. As a result, it is important to spend extra time learning how to write them down in the beginning. This is why it must take time to learn the so called “kanji” (漢字). It could be much easier to start with romanization system, but hiragana (平仮名), katakana (片仮名), and most importantly, kanji, must be learned if you want to study more. Being able to use kanji will help you learn and remember Japanese words much more easily in the future. For example, kaisha (会社) in Japanese means company, including 会 (kai) and 社 (sha). On the other hand, shakai (社会) means society. If you already learn 会 and 社while leaning kaisha, it will be just a piece of cake to learn shakai. This could also bring you the concept behind every Japanese word. Try to learn every kanji except for the difficult ones such as kirei (綺麗), but you should al least be able to recognize them. Katakana words are also hard to remember. The most difficult ones, in my opinion, could be the R sound and ones with long(ー) and short(ッ) sound. The good news is that there are some basic rules for those translated from English. However, keep in mind that there are too many words you need to learn individually. Take “internet” for an example. Internet in Japanese is “インターネット”, which is always a nightmare for the beginners. But it is actually easy to remember. The first thing we need to do is to divide the English word into different parts, so internet will be “in”, “ter”, “ne”, and “t”. That’s how Japanese translate this word, by finding specific katakana for these four sounds. Then, we got “イン”, “ター”, “ネッ”, and ”ト” in return. The basic rules we are using here is that, first, when we meet words with “er” or “ar”, we get a katakana with “ー” as a long sound in the end, such as “ter” into ター in this case. Second, for short sounds like “net”, we get a katakana with “ッ”. Finally, “t” will become ト,and “ll” (ball for instance) will become ル. As you see, what the word sounds like does not really matter, even though in some case it does. Instead, you need to write it down and try to divide it into different parts. Well, it is not that hard actually, but there are still some words which don’t follow these rules, and others not coming from English. After all, it is at least not as hard as it used to be after you learn these rules. Facebook Page (華文版本) 這篇教學是給已經學會平假名和片假名,但剛開始背日文單字者。 第一件我們要知道的事情,就是關於日文的啟源。這部分對於已經熟悉東亞方塊字,特別是漢字(かんじ)(kanji)系統的人,是相當簡單的事情養不贅述。對於表音文字系統的使用者,則必須再花費一段時間學習漢字要如何書寫。 基本上,學會漢字對於日文的學習有相當大的助益。雖然在初學期間會是一個大挑戰,尤其是日文的漢字和華文所使用的漢字常常有些許的不同,比如「步」和「歩」;或是相同的漢字表達不同的意思,比如「勉強」代表念書;「大丈夫」代表沒關係。然而,在擁有一定程度的漢字量後,接下來透過漢字來記憶就會讓新單字變得很好背。比如說,「会社」(かいしゃ)(kaisha)代表公司,「社会」(しゃかい)(shakai)則代表社會。如果在學到公司的時候有把漢字記起來,則背到社會這個單字的時候,就只要把已經學會的「社」和「会」反過來即可。單純透過假名來學習的話,就無法具有這種優勢。因此,除了那些太難的漢字,比如「綺麗」(きれい)(kirei),或是其它日本人本身就不常用的漢字之外,盡量把遇到的漢字都記起來比較好。不過就算是那些不會被寫出來的漢字,還是要有能力辨認才行。此外,學漢字還有一個好處,就是可以幫助你瞭解這個單字背後的概念,這會緩慢並深遠地幫助你對於日文的瞭解。 除了漢字之外,平假名也是一個難以處理的東西。就我個人的經驗來說,最難的當屬帶有R的音以及長音(ー)和短音(ッ),但其實仍然是有跡可循的。不過,雖然有跡可循,還是有很多單字要一個一個背才行。 拿「網路」來當例子,網路的英文是「internet」,片假名中則是「インターネット」。這應該是初學日文者最頭痛的幾個單字之一,不過這個單字其實並不難背。首先,我們要先把原文的英文字拆開成幾個部分,分別是「in」、「ter」、「ne」、「t」。這四個部分分別對應到「イン」、「ター」、「ネッ」、「ト」,我們可以從中窺見幾個基本規則。首先,遇到「er」或「ar」結尾的時候,會出現一個片假名並拉長音(ー),也就是這裡的「ター」;而出現短音的時候則使用「ッ」來處理;最後,如果遇到「t」或「ll」(比如ball)結尾,則分別使用「ト」和「ル」來處理。 其實並不難理解,不過重點就在於說,不要太關心原文怎麼念(雖然有時候會需要),而要關心這個字怎麼拼並將之拆開,這樣就很簡單了。當然,還是要記得有很多單字並不完全依賴這些規則,而且還有一些單字並不是從英文來的,這些都要額外一個一個背。這些就沒有什麼辦法了。 臉書專頁
https://medium.com/@philosophyotaku/methods-for-beginners-to-learn-japanese-words-%E7%B5%A6%E5%88%9D%E5%AD%B8%E8%80%85%E7%9A%84%E8%83%8C%E6%97%A5%E6%96%87%E5%AD%97%E6%8A%80%E5%B7%A7-70ad047e9f2b
['哲學宅 Philosophy Otaku']
2020-02-21 10:34:11.171000+00:00
['日語學習', 'Japanese Language', 'Language Learning', '日本語', 'Japanese']
a tutorial on how to make excuses when your lover is a shark
Picture credit: Author call him a survivor all the blood you see on the surface of the water should be his close your eyes and have faith whenever you part your lips to taste his mouth choose not to see the thousand white things that are sharp and sometimes bite choose to define love as a tease a dare and a bluff hold his fin firmly and listen to your heart it is because you are nervous that is why he is slipping away hold him close you can’t lose this one because the world does not tolerate single sisters and society says you are not enough anymore and time is your esteem draining away never let go when he drags you underwater you have trusted him this far he can’t be trying to drown you and maybe you can breathe they say women can adapt in a sea of everything wrong because love is blindly right and death is a myth here and bad boys love better if anyone shouts and says you should be careful that no woman should love a shark that sharks are men with fragile egos, tell them you know him and even though on some days he loses his temper and uses words and fist to express his rage, he always apologises for breaking you and puts you together with gifts so when you fall deeper in water with him, learn to understand a man with privilege and if those bitter feminists talk, tell them it is your life and you have chosen to live it at the bottom of a raging sea when you kiss him always remember to never forget that it is till death do you part even when you see pieces of women and bones of girls lying on the seabed, it means nothing tell the rising fear in your chest that no man eats a woman they just dissolve in his mouth and become an excuse for his righteous anger
https://medium.com/@joshuaomena/a-tutorial-on-how-to-make-excuses-when-your-lover-is-a-shark-3f1cee15c2a0
['Joshua Omena']
2020-12-08 17:28:45.757000+00:00
['Domestic Violence', 'Poetry', 'Gender Based Violence', 'Domestic Abuse']
Progress report on my list-building Plan with Get- response!
As you’ve probably noticed, I’m on a mission to expand my business. So I’ve been trying every list-building technique in the book. More subscribers, more potential sales. Business Review Know what works best so far? It’s giving visitors lots of creative ways to sign up for my list. So I’ve been exploring the collection of form types included in my GetResponse email marketing account. For example, on my blog, I can create a scroll form that follows the reader as they scroll down the page — a friendly reminder to sign up for updates. Or place a fixed-bar form at the top of the reader’s browser, so it’s always in view. And GetResponse includes interesting ways to grab attention — a shake form that … well, it shakes (very gently) to catch the reader’s eye. There’s an exit pop-up form you can set to appear when the reader is leaving (to reduce bounces). And an image pop-up form that allows you to add a colorful photo or image. One of my strategies is to offer a sign-up incentive. I use a download form that releases the e-document and adds the new subscriber to my marketing list You can customize these forms. In fact, there’s a Color Magic tool that matches the form colors to the colors on your website or blog automatically. And any form can be coded to add the new subscriber to the campaign of your choice. Difficult? Nope. After I finish choosing the settings, I copy a snippet of code and paste it into the website HTML — and there it is, looking great. What else? Oh yes, you can add custom fields to the form. The extra data is useful for segmenting my list, personalizing messages, and providing dynamic content. As you know, I started using social media to build my list. (If you’re not, it’s time to wake up and smell the coffee.) GetResponse has free tools that integrate sign-up forms with everyday business tools like Facebook, WordPress, PrestaShop, Joomla, WooCommerce, and many more. To sum up, I couldn’t be happier with the growth of my email list. Once you get forms in place, they keep working night and day, week after week. And if a particular form seems to be under-producing, I can run an A/B test and then tweak it to find out what works best. Click this link to try GetResponse free for 30 days. https://www.getresponse.com/?a=dHMMa9YEhG
https://medium.com/@ala071773/progress-report-on-my-list-building-plan-with-get-response-3ac455cd7dbe
['Amany Alali']
2020-12-26 23:58:53.127000+00:00
['Work From Home', 'Affiliate Marketing', 'Email Marketing', 'Blog', 'Business']
The Best Alexa compatible devices in 2021
In recent years, voice recognition technology has improved in bounds and leaps. It has been integrated into a variety of products and brands. Smart homes allow you to control your smart devices through a speaker using your voice and a digital assistant. Also, Amazon Alexa is now compatible with a huge number of popular products. Here are the Best Alexa Compatible devices in 2021. Amazon Alexa compatible devices What is Amazon Alexa? What are the best Alexa-compatible devices in 2021? How do you make Alexa devices compatible? How to choose the best Alexa-compatible devices? How we test the best Alexa-compatible devices for you? Comparison of the best Alexa compatible devices What is Amazon Alexa? Amazon Alexa is a virtual assistant AI technology. It is capable of music playback, setting alarms, voice interaction, streaming podcasts, providing weather, making to-do lists, etc. It also controls your smart home devices using itself as a home automation system. Thanks to the entrance of virtual voice assistants like Amazon Alexa. What are the best Alexa-compatible devices in 2021? There are lots of Alexa-compatible devices on the market. But you have to get in touch what are the best Alexa-capable devices. Here are some of the best Alexa-compatible devices in 2021. The Best Smart Speaker of Amazon Alexa Amazon Echo Dot 4th Generation Amazon Echo Dot 4th Generation Amazon Echo 4th Gen smart speaker is the most famous smart speaker with premium sounds over the first three generations. Also, it is integrated with the Zigbee home hub. It has the ball shape, better audio quality, and respectable bass for a speaker. Furthermore, it streams songs from Apple Music, Amazon Music, Spotify, Deezer, and more. Alexa is ready to help anytime. You can ask Alexa to play music, play the news, answer questions, set alarms, check the weather, control your smart home devices, and more. It also sills your home with sound by playing synchronized music across echo devices in every room. You can make your home simply by using a built-in hub. You can connect two echo devices to create a stereo pairing. Also, you can connect your Dot with your Fire TV for improved audio. There has no screen or camera; hence it is a great option for those concerned about privacy. The Best Thermostat of Amazon Alexa Ecobee Smart Thermostat Ecobee Smart Thermostat Ecobee Smart Thermostat is the best smart thermostat. It is integrated with Alexa, Apple HomeKit, Google Assistant, and SmartThings. It detects your present temperature and automatically adjusts temperature for energy serving when you are home or not at home. The Ecobee app takes control of temperature from anywhere. Also, the thermostat has a built-in Alexa smart speaker. Hence, you don’t want a separate Echo device. You can be able to ask a question from Alexa just connect your thermostat. The Best Smart Light of Amazon Alexa Philips Hue White LED 4-Pack A19 Smart Bulb Philips Hue White LED 4-Pack A19 Smart Bulb Philips Hue White smart bulb is the latest version of Philips Hue. It works with Alexa and Google Assistant and compatible with Bluetooth and Zigbee. It is simple to get started with just the touch of a button on your smartphone or your voice assistant. Also, you can be able to add up to 10 Hue Smart Bulbs with the Hue Bluetooth app. It can be easily integrated with your Hue ecosystem and will continue to work with your Hue hub. By using your Hue hub, you can easily control up to 50 lights throughout your smart home. Also, it can control your lights while away from home or add devices like Smart Switches and motion sensors. The Best Video Doorbell of Amazon Alexa Ring Video Doorbell 3 plus Ring Video Doorbell 3 plus The Ring Video Doorbell 3 plus is an upgrade from the original Ring Video Doorbell 2. It has added impressive new features like Pre-roll. It allows it to record up to 4 seconds of video before a real event is detected. Also, you can ask Alexa to please show me who is at the door. It is important for when you’re not at the home. It is awesome! You received a mobile notification when anyone presses the doorbell. You can connect it to doorbell wires for constant power or power it with a rechargeable battery. Using the Ring app, you can easily set it up by connecting it to WiFi. Alexa is available to announce on your compatible Echo devices when anyone presses the doorbell. The Best home security camera of Amazon Alexa Wyze camera Wyze camera Wyze camera is with WiFi indoor Smart Home Camera with Night vision. Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant are integrated with this. It has 1080p Full HD live streaming. Also, it lets you see inside your home from anywhere using your mobile phone. Through the Wyze app, you can use two-way audio to speak with your family and friends. When sounds or a motion is detected, it automatically records and saves that video to the cloud freely for several days. Also, night vision lets you see in the dark using 6 infrared LEDs. You can use your favorite voice assistant to see what your child is doing, who is at your door, or anything that you want to keep in touch with. But Wyze cam pan is only suitable with the 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi network, Android mobile devices, and Apple (iOS). The Best Smart Lock of Amazon Alexa August WiFi Smart Lock August WiFi Smart Lock You can control your front door lock from anywhere using the August WiFi Smart Lock key. It needn’t to additional bridge to connect to Wi-Fi. Hence, you can get full remote and voice access functionality. Using the August app, you can be able to send secure keys to family, friends, or people you trust. Furthermore, using the app, you can track who is going and coming, and get alerts. It also has a biometric verification option. Using your smartphone’s facial recognition or fingerprint, you can add security verification before lock your door remotely. It also works with your existing deadbolt. Alexa will inform you when the battery is the law. The Best Smart Screen of Amazon Alexa Amazon Echo show 8 (2nd Generation) Amazon Echo show 8 (2nd Generation) This screen has an 8” HD touchscreen with stereo speakers and adaptive color. You can make video calls with a 13MP camera with auto-framing. It is amazing! You can simply ask Alexa to call your contact. Set timers, news updates, traffic updates, and updates lists are some of the features of this. It can be easily using your voice. You can monitor compatible devices like lights and cameras. Also, you can ask Alexa to stream Apple Music, Amazon Music, or Spotify. Moreover, you can put your memories on this display. Turn your home screen into a digital frame using Amazon Photos. It is also built with multiple layers of privacy control including a microphone off or on the button and a built-in camera shutter. The Best Smart mini Plug Wemo Mini Smart Plug Wemo Mini Smart Plug Wemo Mini Smart Plug is a small smart plug with a WiFi connection. It works with Alexa, Apple HomeKit as well as Google Assistant. Also, it can pair with built-in voice devices. You can monitor the lights with your smart plugin. For instance, it turns them on or off before you return and enter the home. It has a slim design, so you can easily fit two on a single outlet. How do you make Alexa devices compatible? You can connect compatible smart home devices easily, such as plugins, lights, and cameras. Firstly, you want to follow these steps. Before you begin: You want to check whether your smart home device is compatible with Alexa. Then you can use the manufacture’s companion app or website to complete the setup. After then, connect your device to the same Wi-Fi network Download and install the newest updates for your devices. To connect a smart home device, use guided discovery Using guided discovery, you have to connect smart home devices in the Alexa app: You want to select Add Device from the menu After selecting the type of smart home device, you want to select You can follow the instruction on the screen after selecting the brand. Discover your smart home devices with a skill Use the Alexa app to discover smart home devices using a skill. Firstly, you want to go to the menu and select skills Then, find the skill for the device and select Enable. You can follow the instruction on the screen to complete the linking process. After that, ask Alexa to discover your device. You can say “Alexa, discover my device” or select Add device in the app. How to choose the best Alexa-compatible devices? If you want to pick the best Alexa-compatible device, there are few things that you want to consider. Price Sometimes, you will be preferred to cheapest smart home device. Often, the cheapest device is not the best. You have to verify that it meets your needs or not before buying this. Functionality Another thing you want to consider is the features of your smart home device. Is there any specific feature like a Home/Away feature? You want to consider that its feature satisfies your needs before buying. Design This is an important factor you want to consider. Is it has a comfortable design or not? Is this a well-made product or not? We all prefer to buy comfortable, smart devices. So, before picking the smart device, you want to think about design. How we test the best Alexa-compatible devices for you? When we test the best Alexa-compatible devices, we look at a few things. Following are a few things. Performance — There are lots of smart home devices available. There are many functions in every device. But, does it work as they said? We test its performance using several conditions like is it easy to use or not? Features — We test the features the device has and compare them with the other smart devices. Also, we test the price ranges of the smart devices. Price — When compared to the similar smart home devices in the market, how expensive is it? It is the most desirable factor when choosing the best home devices. Set up — Some devices are very hard to set up when compared to others. We test, “is it simple to set up or not compared to similar products. Comparison of the best Alexa compatible devices Comparison of the best Alexa compatible devices Our pick The Echo Dot 4th Generation is our first best option you to try. It is a very famous smart speaker around the world. If you care about sound quality, you can go with Echo Dot. But, if you don’t care much about the sound quality and want to save some money, you can get other Echo Dot varieties. Even still, this Dot is the best pick for the everyday Echo for most. Also, Philips Hue White smart bulb is a really good option for you to light up your smart home. It is simple to integrate with your ecosystem and Hue smart light works with all Echo smart speakers and Google Nest devices.
https://blog.devgenius.io/the-best-alexa-compatible-devices-in-2021-d5ce4e9a2f9f
['Ishara Fernando']
2021-07-05 07:28:33.937000+00:00
['Smart Home Device', 'Alexa', 'Smart Home', 'Amazon', 'Smart Home Automation']
Stay Calm, Keep Breathing
First Open Water Dive Experience It’s 2003, I am sitting on the edge of a boat approximately five miles offshore from the beautiful island of Jamaica. As I look over the bow (front) of the boat, I see a dark overcast approaching. The sea starts to developed swells, growing bigger and bigger by the second. I turn and look at my instructor — Cam Forbush — in front of me, he gives me the nod, I take a deep breath, lean back, and fall into the deep blue ocean. As my whole body submerges underwater, I open my eyes, look up, and take my first breath. It’s silent. I exhale and see bubbles escaping to the surface. It sounds like the infamous Darth Vader with his respirator. I am anxious and intimidated by the vastness of my surroundings, but this does not stop me from the experience of a lifetime. Making a back entry dive from the edge of a boat I am ten years old, and I am about to start my first dive to become the world’s youngest scuba diver. As I surfaced, I was already treading water in the high seas. But I learned to breathe continuously and never hold your breath. With my regulator in my mouth, I swam backward like an elegant jellyfish with my fins and met Cam towards the tandem line (front/bow) of the boat. On any given day, I would be able to see the bottom of the beautiful blue waters of Jamaica. It was not that day. Even though it was my final dive and graduation. In a Roman handshake style, we locked forearms to prevent us from drifting away with the rough seas. With our freehand, we let the air out of our BCD (Buoyancy Control Device) jackets and begin to descend. As we latched onto the anchor line, we slowly descended even further while using it as a guide. The visibility was low — only 2 feet (0.6 meters) — sand and debris were moving all around us. The current was trying to push us away from the only lifeline we had to hold. Moving just a few inches away would make you disappear Anyone can panic in this situation, let alone a small 10-year-old me. But my training continued to kick in: stay calm and keep breathing. I maintained my breathing by focusing on my regulator and the sound of the bubbles escaping. Once we reached the bottom, I performed all of my required exercises effortlessly. Cam extended his hand, congratulated me with a handshake, and we proceeded to surface to complete my training. From that day forward, my passion for scuba diving began. I wanted to know more about my world and the creatures that live in it. A World Within A World As I continued to dive and progress through the ranks, I learned about the many animals that inhabit it. I began to learn about the different species of fish, sharks, and other marine life. I learned more about the underwater world and how it is connected to our world. It is absolutely fascinating. The ocean is an extension of the world we are already familiar with. It is a living being; a being that has its own intelligence and awareness. I began to see the ocean as a teacher, a teacher that is more than willing to teach me if I only listen to it. It sparked my interest in marine biology and to become an active advocate for marine conservation. While my first dive didn’t have the best conditions, it never stopped me. I was trained by a great instructor and remembered to stay calm and keep breathing. I encourage you to take the opportunity to scuba dive at least once in your life. You don’t have to weeks of training and get certified as I did. PADI and other reputable scuba organizations offer same-day training. They pair you off with a scuba professional that will guide you to an experience of a lifetime. If you ever want to know more or share your experience, let me know in the comments. Happy to read what others have to say.
https://medium.com/factmaven/stay-calm-keep-breathing-89d4243dadea
["Ethan O'Sullivan"]
2020-11-21 21:45:46.708000+00:00
['Calm', 'Diving', 'Perspective', 'Scuba', 'Breathing']
The rise of America’s fascist paramilitaries
This is an edited version of an article I originally posted on my personal blog during the summer of 2019. I’m republishing it now because of how relevant it is to the country’s current risk of political violence. In a fascist shift, the state always forms a paramilitary group so that political violence can be carried out without the government being held accountable. It’s predictable that when this process started to happen in America, our version of Hitler’s Brownshirts and Mussolini’s Blackshirts would originate from America’s instruments of imperialism. With the rise of Blackwater during the War on Terror, the Bush administration gained a private mercenary company that came to function as a paramilitary group. Blackwater’s contractors carried out acts of unprovoked violence against innocent people that American troops wouldn’t have been able to commit without intense scrutiny being put upon the U.S. government itself, and Blackwater’s operators have been able to continue their company under a different name since its crimes were exposed. Blackwater’s victims have extended not just to the foreign battlefields of American imperialism, but to the crisis zones in America that capitalism has created; Blackwater’s forces patrolled the streets of New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina, and there’s evidence that they engaged in aggressive violence against the city’s population. Since then, Blackwater (now called Academi) has been getting involved in the Trump administration’s wars against Syria and Venezuela, and another mercenary company called TigerSwan has been profiting off of crises like the 2017 hurricanes and the struggle at Standing Rock. Violent class confrontations, climate change-created natural disasters, and the demand for private mercenary companies to get involved in America’s wars will most certainly all increase in the coming years, and with them will come the proliferation of these uniquely capitalist and imperialist American paramilitaries. But they’re just one part of the fascist thug class that’s emerged in the United States. The rise of private armies like Blackwater has been tied in with the rise of the vigilante far-right militias, and these two categories of armed fascist groups represent a similar threat to the safety of America’s marginalized people. Radical right-wing American militias, whose numbers reached a record high in 2013 and have continued to rise throughout the Trump era, have gained both their symbolism and many of their members from the domestic ramifications of America’s recent wars. Veterans make up a significant amount of the membership of these militias, making for a situation where many of the country’s potential terrorists have gone through military training. America’s fascist paramilitaries also derive their iconography from recent military culture; militia members typically adorn their cars with military-style grilles, grow beards in the same vein as the ones that male U.S. soldiers often sport, and wear outfits that imitate army gear. As the artist Nate Powell has observed, all of these aspects of the aesthetics of American fascists are thematically connected to the aesthetics of the War on Terror. “Active duty personnel in the 21st century almost exclusively wear combat fatigues,” wrote Powell in his cartoon from this year titled About Face: Death and surrender to power in the clothing of men. “Even officer workers and higher-ranking officers. While I read this as extending uniformity to its logical conclusion, it’s a stylistic shift that seems to entertain a stunted child’s play-acting fantasy. Accompanying this ‘forever war’ dress-standard is the adoption of a distinctly paramilitary aesthetic, most strikingly visible in the presence of facial hair, trickling down from allowances made for special forces (and accompanying private mercenary units, which often outnumber actual military forces) for operations in the Middle East, Central America, and Africa. “At its core, this [imitation of military aesthetics in fascist militias] is a child’s power fantasy finally enacted in adulthood,” concluded Powell, “speaking only the language of power, the intellectual crudeness of reaction, contrarianism, opposition… Aggrieved, insecure white Americans with an exaggerated sense of sovereignty have officially declared their existence as above the law, consistent with a long tradition of acting and living above it… These are the future fascist paramilitary participants and their ushers-take them seriously.” By identifying themselves with the symbols of American empire, these militia members have declared that they’re going to uphold the violent legacy of the empire after it implodes in on itself. As the dollar moves towards collapse and American influence declines around the globe, in the next decade the U.S. will likely see a massive contraction of its global military forces-one that results in the U.S. government using its military power to try to control its own population amid an economically and environmentally unstable new era. When Trump or an authoritarian successor carries out a violent crackdown to quell America’s coming period of unrest, the civilians who will be on the side of this crackdown are the fascist militia members. It’s these groups which have already symbolically merged with the police and the military, and which will act in lockstep with whatever actions that the government’s official military forces take to control the population. As fascist paramilitaries always do, the militia members have lately been functioning as enforcers of the political agenda of the far right, with militias policing the border, detaining undocumented people, and using threats of violence to support a recent climate bill boycott from Republican legislators in Oregon. The country’s destabilization in the coming years will cause them to act far more boldly, and to do so with increasing impunity as leaders like Donald Trump work to enable them. The future of America’s fascist paramilitaries could resemble the paradigm of state-sanctioned right wing-death squads that proliferated under regimes like the one of Augusto Pinochet, whose image has ominously become a favorite symbol of solidarity among modern fascist sympathizers. The recent increases in hate crimes like the Christchurch shooting and the Pittsburgh synagogue massacre are preludes to a violent new era that far-right extremists want to create, one where the right’s political opponents and the elements of “degeneracy” are made submissive by routine acts of terror. Both through open calls for violence and through racist dog whistles meant to appease the white supremacists in his base, Trump is normalizing the language that these terrorist groups use to gain encouragement and legitimacy. “We’re taking care of ourselves for a change folks,” Trump said in a speech from last year. “But radical Democrats want to turn back the clock…for the rule of corrupt, power-hungry, globalists,” he continued. “You know what a globalist is? You know what a globalist is? A globalist is a person that wants the globe to do well, frankly, not caring about our country so much. And you know what, we can’t have that. You know they have a word. It sort of became old-fashioned. It’s called a nationalist, and I say really, we’re not supposed to use that word. You know what I am? I’m a nationalist, okay? I’m a nationalist. Nationalist. Nothing wrong. Use that word. Use that word.” The fascist paramilitary leaders who don’t need to speak so codedly are relatively low profile provocateurs like Gavin McInnes, the founder of the hate group the Proud Boys. There are moments from McInnes’ online show where he states the following: We will kill you. That’s the Proud Boys in a nutshell… Like Bill the Butcher and the Bowery Boys, we will assassinate you… If you’re wearing a MAGA hat and some guy with a slightly punk demeanor says, ‘Hey, are you … pro-Trump?’ choke him. Trust your instincts… Don’t listen to what he has to say, choke him… Can you call for violence generally? ‘Cause I am… Fighting solves everything. We need more violence from the Trump people… Trump supporters: Choke a motherfucker. Choke a bitch. Choke a tranny. Get your fingers around the windpipe… Get a fucking gun… Get ready to blow someone’s fucking head off… Get in trouble. Get arrested. Get fired. They can’t kill us all. We can’t pretend that the capitalist power structure will protect us from fascist violence. The police in America have historically aligned with white supremacists, and this tendency has continued in recent years as police have refused to intervene during moments like the outbreak of Nazi violence in Charlottesville. White supremacists have been successfully working to infiltrate police departments for many years, with the recent revelations of racist and violent social media posts from Philadelphia police officers providing insight into the intentions of these ideologically driven law enforcement operatives. Law enforcement is complicit in the rise of the fascist paramilitaries because in a capitalist society, law enforcement is the instrument behind the violence that the state uses to oppress marginalized groups. During a shift towards fascism, the police naturally become part of the paramilitary presence, just as capitalism as a whole naturally transitions into fascism. The police departments, the private mercenary companies, the military, and of course the immigration police all basically share the political agenda of the right-wing militias. This is why we must reject liberal dogma that treats the police as allies, and accept the fact that we’re on our own when it comes to defending ourselves from the threat that the fascist paramilitaries pose. This entails getting involved in groups like the Socialist Rifle Association, is a non-militia organization that seeks to educate nonwhites, women, LGBT people, and other threatened groups about how to prepare themselves for when the bigots become violent. The cops aren’t who will keep us safe. As one clip from the SRA says: “We keep us safe.” — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — If you appreciate my work, I hope you become a one-time or regular donor to my Patreon account. Like most of us, I’m feeling the economic pinch during late-stage capitalism, and I need money to keep fighting for a new system that works for all of us. Go to my Patreon here:
https://medium.com/@rainershea612/the-rise-of-americas-fascist-paramilitaries-316ea5af676f
['Rainer Shea']
2020-11-04 21:49:58.023000+00:00
['Donald Trump', 'Violence']
How to Concede
How to Concede with Grace and Dignity The President and Mrs. Ford after voting in Grand Rapids election day 1976 I’m missing President Gerald R. Ford more than ever. His graceful and dignified concession of the 1976 election to Jimmy Carter was an exemplar of how to deal with this overwhelmingly painful moment. Gerald R. Ford was not the first or last president to suffer this fate, and he wasn’t alone in doing it right. Only one person in American history has gone to the extreme, and has taken the path of petulance and obstruction. He is an embarrassment to the institution of the presidency and the people of the United States. On November 2, 1976, President Gerald R. Ford voted in his hometown of Grand Rapids, Michigan. Afterwards he and Mrs. Ford were upbeat, and walked through cheering crowds shaking hands with everyone in sight. Before heading back to Washington, D.C., he and the first lady attended the unveiling of a large mural in the lobby of Kent County Airport that commemorated the life of the 38th president. It was a deeply emotional event for President Ford. He talked about his parents, and how important they and his family were to him. Everyone, even the press corps, became teary-eyed as they listened to his heartfelt words. That night the president along with his running mate Sen. Bob Dole, his family and close friends gathered in the second floor residence of the White House to watch the returns. It was not a happy evening. It turned out to be one of the closest elections ever to that point. I mainly stayed upstairs with the family, but at one point I dropped in on Chief of Staff Dick Cheney in his office where he was keeping tabs on the tally. He was at his desk surrounded by paperwork and Shlitz beer cans. This wasn’t going to be a champagne occasion. The election returns crawled into the wee hours of Nov. 3, and when the president finally went to bed at three a.m., he wasn’t 100% certain that he had lost, but the networks had called it for Carter. I went to my office in the West Wing and slept on the couch for a few hours. Around nine a.m. I went back up to the Family Residence to see the president. He was in his bathrobe having breakfast alone and reading a newspaper in the family dining room. “I guess we’ve had it,” I said. “Looks that way,” he whispered, his voice shot from the last two weeks of campaigning. “It was great while it lasted,” I said. “I wouldn’t have traded a minute of it,” he said with a smile. Governor Jimmy Carter of Georgia won by a small margin. The final count of almost 80 million votes cast was 50.1% for Carter, 48% for Ford. The Electoral College, the tally that ultimately tells the tale, came in at 297 to 240 a few weeks later. Two hours after his breakfast, the president made the tough call to Jimmy Carter to concede the election. He was in the oval office with Dick Cheney and counselor Jack Marsh. He could barely make himself heard because he’d lost his voice, but he managed to congratulate Carter, then asked Cheney, who was on an extension on the other side of the historic room to read his statement. “Dear Jimmy: It is apparent now that you have won our long and intense struggle for the Presidency. I congratulate you on your victory. As one who has been honored to serve the people of this great land, both in Congress and as President, I believe that we must now put the divisions of the campaign behind us and unite the country once again in the common pursuit of peace and prosperity. Although there will continue to be disagreements over the best means to use in pursuing our goals, I want to assure you that you will have my complete and wholehearted support as you take the oath of office this January. I also pledge to you that I, and all members of my Administration, will do all that we can to insure that you begin your term as smoothly and as effectively as possible. May God bless you and your family as you undertake your new responsibilities. Signed, Jerry Ford.” After they hung up, the president said, “Well, that’s that, let’s go see the press.” He was joined by the rest of the family, and it was a subdued group. Mrs. Ford, however, managed to rally the troops, and got them all to pose for a photo behind the president’s desk. She gave son Jack, who was pretty down, a playful little slap on the cheek, and the photo was accomplished. Because of her husband’s lack of voice, the first lady read the concession statement in the White House press room. President Ford did manage to tell the assembled press corps, “I do want to express on a personal basis my appreciation, and that of my family, for the friendship that all of us have had. And after Betty reads the statement that was sent to Governor Carter by me, I think all of us, Betty, the children, and myself, would like to just come down and shake hands and express our appreciation personally.” Mrs. Ford read the same concession statement that Cheney gave to Carter, and as promised, the Fords waded into the gathered members of the press and shook hands. Definitely not an “enemies of the people” moment. Even though Ford, like every other president in history, had been skewered by the press, he never took it personally. Ford once told me, “Their job is to hold us to account, and ours isn’t necessarily to like it, but to understand that’s what Democracy is all about.” Yep, that same pesky old First Amendment that our soon-to-be-ex-president is always complaining about. President Ford, close personal aide Terry O’Donnell, and I walked back to the oval office after the press appearance. Terry asked the president if there was anything he could get for him. President Ford came out from behind his desk, put his arm around Terry, and told him, “I’ve never really thanked you for the great job you’ve done for me over the last two years. If there’s anything I can do for you after we leave here, just let me know.” Terry took off his glasses and wiped his eyes, and for the first time it really hit me. Here was a guy who had just lost the biggest prize in the world telling a member of his staff that he would do anything he could to help him. I turned and walked out of the room, tears streaming down my face. Flash forward to the here and now. No concession from a president who has clearly lost. And no humanity. Instead of an arm around the shoulder, many got a kick in the ass out the door. At least getting fired by this president is a great resume item. That grand guy Gerald R. Ford who ended our, “Our long national nightmare,” August 9th, 1974, would not have approved, and would have recoiled in disgust at the behavior of the worst person to ever occupy the oval office. (All photos by David Hume Kennerly)
https://medium.com/@Kennerly/how-to-concede-90ae6ca81167
['David Hume Kennerly']
2020-12-25 17:57:35.810000+00:00
['Biden', 'Politics', 'Presidential Campaign', 'President', 'Photography']
Global Agricultural Adjuvants Industry Analysis By Geography
Stratistics MRC’s Agricultural Adjuvants Market report explains company profiling, key segments, market trends, top players and regional, country-level segments. Adjuvants are generally utilized in modern agriculture to enhance the performance of products used for crop protection. Adjuvants enhance the cost-effectiveness of the products used for crop protection by enlarging the length of time the active ingredients in these products are active. Examples of agricultural adjuvants involve activator adjuvants, utility adjuvants, and others. The major purpose of activator adjuvants is to enhance the activity of the pesticide product whereas utility adjuvants are tank mixed within the spray solution to boost and enhance the spray application process. Browse complete “Agricultural Adjuvants Market” report with TOC @ https://www.strategymrc.com/report/agricultural-adjuvants-market By geography, North America is going to have high growth during forecast period due to the presence of local manufacturers, include with extensive array of products, customer appreciation, and regulatory support to adjuvant manufacturers and related agrochemical companies. Moreover, federal regulations governing the appliance of such adjuvants are virtually non-existent within the U.S., which, in turn, promotes the expansion of the agricultural adjuvants market in North America. Some of the key players profiled in the Agricultural Adjuvants Market include Akzo Nobel, BASF SE, Brandt Consolidated, Inc, Clariant AG, Dow DuPont Inc, Evonik Industries AG, Huntsman Corporation, Loveland Products, Inc, Momentive Performance Materials Inc, Solvay S.A and Wilbur-Ellis Company Inc. Request a Sample of “Agricultural Adjuvants Market” @ https://www.strategymrc.com/report/agricultural-adjuvants-market/request-sample Free Customization Offerings: All the customers of this report will be entitled to receive one of the following free customization options: Company Profiling Comprehensive profiling of additional market players (up to 3) SWOT Analysis of key players (up to 3) Regional Segmentation Market estimations, Forecasts and CAGR of any prominent country as per the client’s interest (Note: Depends on feasibility check) Competitive Benchmarking Benchmarking of key players based on product portfolio, geographical presence, and strategic alliances For more information about this report visit https://www.strategymrc.com/report/agricultural-adjuvants-market Report Store: https://www.strategymrc.com/report-store Covid-19 reports: https://www.strategymrc.com/covid-19-impact-reports About Us: Stratistics MRC offer a wide spectrum of research and consulting services with in-depth knowledge of different industries. Our research reports and publications are routed to help our clients to design their business models and enhance their business growth in the competitive market scenario. We have a strong team with hand-picked consultants including project managers, implementers, industry experts, researchers, research evaluators and analysts with years of experience in delivering the complex projects. Contact Us: Email: [email protected] Organization: Stratistics Market Research Consulting Pvt Ltd Phone: +1–301–202–5929 Website: https://www.strategymrc.com
https://medium.com/@srinath.smrc1/global-agricultural-adjuvants-industry-analysis-by-geography-6bd28d6c0c5e
['Srinath Smrc']
2021-12-31 04:49:41.987000+00:00
['Report', 'Market Research Reports', 'Market', 'Business', 'Agriculture']
Building Pinterest’s A/B testing platform
Shuo Xiang | Pinterest engineer, Data As a data-driven company, we rely heavily on experiments to guide products and features. At any given time, we have around 1,000 experiments running, and we’re adding more every day. Because we’re constantly increasing the number of experiments and logging corresponding data, we need a reliable, simple to use platform engineers can use without error. To eliminate common errors made by experimenters, we introduced a lightweight config UI, QA workflow and simplified APIs supporting A/B testing across multiple platforms. (For more information about our dashboards and data pipeline, check out our previous experiments post.) We prioritized the following requirements when building the experiments platform: Realtime config change: We need to be able to quickly shut down or ramp up experiments in real time without code deploy for each config change, in particular when fixing site incidents. Lightweight process: Setting up the experiment shouldn’t be more complicated than a normal feature launch, yet should prevent the user from making predictable errors. Client-agnostic: The user shouldn’t have to learn a new experiment method for each platform. Analytics: To make better experiment decisions, we built a new analytics dashboard that was easier to use. Scalability: We needed the entire system to scale in both online service and offline experiment data processing. Simplified process Experiments at Pinterest follow a common pattern: Create the experiment with an initial configuration, create a hypothesis and document approach to test that hypothesis. Expose the experiment to Pinners, add new groups, disable groups and modify the audience via filters. Finish the experiment by shipping the code to all Pinners or rolling it back and documenting results. In our prior framework, these changes were handled via code, however we wanted to structure these changes in a UI to provide interactive feedback and validation, and in a configuration-based framework to push changes independent of code release. Common experiment mistakes like syntax errors, imbalanced group allocation, overlapping groups or violation of experiment procedures are verified interactively. We also proactively provide typeahead search suggestions to reduce the amount of human input, as shown in Figure 2. Now making an experiment change is usually a couple of clicks away. In order to make the configuration accessible by an arbitrary client in real-time, we take advantage of our internal system to store all experiment settings in a serialized format and synchronize them to every host of our experiment system within seconds. A typical config file has the following content after deserialization: {"holiday_special": { "group_ranges": { "enabled": {"percent": 5.0, "ranges": [0, 49]}, "hold_out": {"percent": 5.0, "ranges": [50, 99]} }, "key": "holiday_special", “global filter”: user_country(‘US’), “overwrite_filter”: {“enabled”: is_employee()}, "unauth_exp": 0, "version": 1 } } The benefit of the separation of config and code is the instant update of experiment settings, meaning configuration changes such as increasing the traffic of a treatment group doesn’t require code deployment. This frees up the experiment from the production deployment schedule and greatly speeds up the iteration, particularly when urgent changes are needed. Quality assurance A single experiment could affect millions of Pinners, so we have high standards for experiment operations and critical quality assurance tools. The experiment web app is also equipped with a review tool, which creates a review process for each experiment change. Figure 3 shows a pending change that modifies group ranges and filters. Reviewers are specified through the UI and will be notified by email. For most experiments we have a cross-team helper group made up of platform developers, users and data scientists. Almost every change is required to be reviewed by a helper who closely examines planning, hypothesis, key results, triggering logic, filter set up, group validation and documentation. Such a process is enforced on our web app so that each change is required to fill in an helper. We also have a regular experiment helper training program to ensure each team has at least one person who’s certified. An experiment is often associated with code changes that embed the control/treatment group information into the decision logic. We require experiment users to add a Pull Request (PR) link in the experiment platform via the Pull Requests button, so it’s easier for helpers and analysts to trace the experiment behavior and potentially debug if needed. In addition, we also send every change as a comment to the corresponding PR in Phabricator (our repository management tool), as shown in Figure 4. Users can create a test-only copy of the ongoing experiment in the UI (as shown in Figure 1). They’ll then be ported to a test panel shown in Figure 5. Any changes made in the test panel will not affect the experiment in production and will only be visible to the testing engineer, who can use the one-click Copy To Prod button to enable it in production. API The experiment API is the interface users will call to link their application code to the experiment settings they made via the UI. Two key methods provided are: def get_group(self, experiment_name) def activate_experiment(self, experiment_name) Specifically, the get_group method returns the name of the group to which the caller will be directed. Internally, the group is computed by computing a hash value based on experiment information, and the method has no side effect. On the other hand, calling activate_experiment sends a message to the logging system and contributes to the analytics result. These two methods sufficiently cover the majority of user cases and are commonly used in the following way: # Get the experiment group given experiment name and gatekeeper object, without actually triggering the experiment. group = gk.get_group("example_experiment_name") # Activate/trigger experiment. It will return experiment group if any. group = gk.activate_experiment("example_experiment_name") # Application code showing treatment based on group. if group in ['enabled', 'employees']: # behavior for enabled group pass else: # behavior for control group pass The gatekeeper object gk in the code above is a wrapper of user/session/meta information needed for an experiment. In addition to the Python library shown above, we have a separate JVM (Scala and Java) library implemented. Support for Javascript and mobile apps (Android & iOS) are also available. Design and architecture The experiment platform is logically partitioned into three components: a configuration system, a set of APIs and the analytics pipeline. They’re connected by the following one directional data flow: Configuration system persists user changes made on the web UI to our experiment database, whose information is regularly published at sub-minute granularity in a serialized format to each service. Experiment clients pick up the experiment configuration and make API calls to determine the experiment logic, such as experiment type and group allocation. The experiment activation logs generated by various clients are sent to Kafka through our internal Singer service, from which the analytics pipeline will create experiment reports with user defined metrics and deliver them on the dashboard. Summary This system rolled out last summer and supports the majority of experiments inside Pinterest. Team specific functionalities such as real-time metrics dashboard, experiments email notification, interactive documentation and collaboration tool and SEO API/UI are also being added to the system. If you’re interested in experiment framework and analytics platforms, join us! Acknowledgements: Multiple teams across Pinterest provide insightful feedbacks and suggestions shaping the experiment framework. Major contributors include Shuo Xiang, Bryant Xiao, Justin Mejorada Pier, Jooseong Kim, Chunyan Wang and the rest of Data Engineering team.
https://medium.com/pinterest-engineering/building-pinterests-a-b-testing-platform-ab4934ace9f4
['Pinterest Engineering']
2017-02-21 19:49:44.512000+00:00
['A B Testing', 'Analytics', 'DevOps', 'Data Engineering', 'Data']
The Emotional Response to Assessing Our Lives
It comes from the unhelpful comparisons I make with my vision for where I should be or where I want to be, with where I think I am. It comes from unhelpful comparisons made with others. Rather than choosing to be contented with who I am, what I have or what I’ve achieved, I set benchmarks that are unrealistic or irrelevant to me. For example, I’ll compare my achievements in the gym to those of my trainer, resenting that they find it easy to remain super-motivated, committed to the cause and living as examples of the lifestyle that they promote. Instead of recognising my own progress and commending my efforts and consistency and my steadily improving fitness, I’ll seek out those who’re doing better than me, and then beat myself up for not measuring up to them. It strips me of the belief that I’ve achieved anything worthwhile, even when I know I have. In my writing, I’ll lament the modest engagement that my articles receive compared to the thousands of likes and numerous comments that more established writers receive. Instead of feeling accomplished for having built a small monthly income from my writing, I’ll feel despondent that I’m not making as much as ‘the others’. Rather than remembering the warm glow that comes when someone reaches out to thank me for something that I’ve written that helped them out, I fixate upon the number of views and followers that aren’t growing as fast as I’d like. Is it constraining to be satisfied? I’m aware of this streak in myself and acknowledge it as a failing, a weakness. It’s the fear of missing out, fear that if I admit that I’m satisfied and contented with my lot, then I might just be settling for too little. I think that’s what concerns me the most. It’s the selective blurring of different pieces of accepted wisdom and interpreting them to suit my own skewed agenda. On the one hand I’m told to set myself audacious and stretching goals, and to work towards them relentlessly. On the other, I’m advised to feel grateful for the micro-steps that represent progress, appreciating what I’ve achieved and committing to work at things for the long-term. Is there not a danger that if I content myself with the small steps of progress, that I’ll lose my resolve for aiming high? The logical answer, is of course not. Being appreciative for the smaller achievements is to embody the spirit of gratitude. It doesn’t mean settling merely for what I’ve got, but it’s a means of grounding myself in the reality that significant progress takes a long time to achieve. When I’m viewing the world through a lens of deprivation, despondency and difficulty, I see only the gaps and the scarcity in my life rather than all the ways in which my needs are taken care of. It’s a mindset that’s akin to lamenting the way that things used to be, back in the good old days, rather than recognising that things evolve and that we are constantly moving forwards and changing. It comes from failing to appreciate that through hedonic adaptation we’re programmed such that over time shiny, new things lose their lustre and fade into insignificance in just the same way that catastrophes and losses fade away so as not to seem so bad when we look back. The past seems easier when looked upon with rose-tinted glasses. The achievements that seemed important a few weeks ago now look trivial and unimportant.
https://psiloveyou.xyz/the-emotional-responses-to-measuring-progress-61b3d4c034d9
[]
2019-10-17 06:36:04.429000+00:00
['Gratitude', 'Self', 'Progress', 'Goals', 'Life Lessons']
Time-Series Forecasting Using An LSTM Model
4.Python working example Modules needed: Keras, Tensorflow, Pandas, Scikit-Learn & Numpy We are going to build a multi-layer LSTM recurrent neural network to predict the last value of a sequence of values, i.e., the TESLA stock price in this example. Let’s load the data and inspect them: import math import matplotlib.pyplot as plt import keras import pandas as pd import numpy as np from keras.models import Sequential from keras.layers import Dense from keras.layers import LSTM from keras.layers import Dropout from keras.layers import * from sklearn.preprocessing import MinMaxScaler from sklearn.metrics import mean_squared_error from sklearn.metrics import mean_absolute_error from sklearn.model_selection import train_test_split from keras.callbacks import EarlyStopping df=pd.read_csv("TSLA.csv") print(‘Number of rows and columns:’, df.shape) df.head(5) The output of the above code The next step is to split the data into training and test sets to avoid overfitting and to be able to investigate the generalization ability of our model. To learn more about overfitting, read this article: The target value to be predicted is going to be the “Close” stock price value. training_set = df.iloc[:800, 1:2].values test_set = df.iloc[800:, 1:2].values It’s a good idea to normalize the data before model fitting. This will boost performance. You can read more here for the Min-Max Scaler: Let’s build the input features with a time lag of 1 day (lag 1): # Feature Scaling sc = MinMaxScaler(feature_range = (0, 1)) training_set_scaled = sc.fit_transform(training_set) # Creating a data structure with 60 time-steps and 1 output X_train = [] y_train = [] for i in range(60, 800): X_train.append(training_set_scaled[i-60:i, 0]) y_train.append(training_set_scaled[i, 0]) X_train, y_train = np.array(X_train), np.array(y_train) X_train = np.reshape(X_train, (X_train.shape[0], X_train.shape[1], 1)) #(740, 60, 1) We have now reshaped the data into the following format (#values, #time-steps, #1-dimensional output). Now, it’s time to build the model. We will build the LSTM with 50 neurons and 4 hidden layers. Finally, we will assign 1 neuron in the output layer for predicting the normalized stock price. We will use the MSE loss function and the Adam stochastic gradient descent optimizer. Note: the following will take some time (~5min). model = Sequential() #Adding the first LSTM layer and some Dropout regularisation model.add(LSTM(units = 50, return_sequences = True, input_shape = (X_train.shape[1], 1))) model.add(Dropout(0.2)) # Adding a second LSTM layer and some Dropout regularisation model.add(LSTM(units = 50, return_sequences = True)) model.add(Dropout(0.2)) # Adding a third LSTM layer and some Dropout regularisation model.add(LSTM(units = 50, return_sequences = True)) model.add(Dropout(0.2)) # Adding a fourth LSTM layer and some Dropout regularisation model.add(LSTM(units = 50)) model.add(Dropout(0.2)) # Adding the output layer model.add(Dense(units = 1)) # Compiling the RNN model.compile(optimizer = 'adam', loss = 'mean_squared_error') # Fitting the RNN to the Training set model.fit(X_train, y_train, epochs = 100, batch_size = 32) When the fitting is finished, you should see something like this: Prepare the test data (reshape them): # Getting the predicted stock price of 2017 dataset_train = df.iloc[:800, 1:2] dataset_test = df.iloc[800:, 1:2] dataset_total = pd.concat((dataset_train, dataset_test), axis = 0) inputs = dataset_total[len(dataset_total) - len(dataset_test) - 60:].values inputs = inputs.reshape(-1,1) inputs = sc.transform(inputs) X_test = [] for i in range(60, 519): X_test.append(inputs[i-60:i, 0]) X_test = np.array(X_test) X_test = np.reshape(X_test, (X_test.shape[0], X_test.shape[1], 1)) print(X_test.shape) # (459, 60, 1) Make Predictions using the test set. predicted_stock_price = model.predict(X_test) predicted_stock_price = sc.inverse_transform(predicted_stock_price) Let’s visualize the results now: # Visualising the results plt.plot(df.loc[800:, ‘Date’],dataset_test.values, color = ‘red’, label = ‘Real TESLA Stock Price’) plt.plot(df.loc[800:, ‘Date’],predicted_stock_price, color = ‘blue’, label = ‘Predicted TESLA Stock Price’) plt.xticks(np.arange(0,459,50)) plt.title('TESLA Stock Price Prediction') plt.xlabel('Time') plt.ylabel('TESLA Stock Price') plt.legend() plt.show() 5. Results Using a lag of 1 (i.e., step of one day):
https://medium.com/towards-artificial-intelligence/time-series-forecasting-using-an-lstm-model-974a86288889
['Serafeim Loukas']
2020-12-09 01:03:23.580000+00:00
['Lstm', 'Forecasting', 'Deep Learning', 'Stock Market', 'Stocks']
Helping Haiti: Local family going above and beyond
Helping Haiti: Local family going above and beyond After sponsoring their second Christmas party for Haitians, Van Mater family looks to 2019 trip Anthony Mazziotti Jan 18, 2019·3 min read Special to The Sun: KC Van Mater, Jim Van Mater’s daughter, with two Haitian girls. Washington Township’s Jim Van Mater was first asked to go to Haiti in 2012. Little did he know the trip would be the spark necessary to start a fire for his family’s desire to provide assistance to Haiti. This past December, the Van Mater family sponsored a Christmas party at the de L’Ecole Miste La Redemption School in Cite Soleil. “This is the poorest section on Port Au Prince,” Van Mater said. “Most people living in this section survive on less than one dollar a day.” They provide the Haitians with a lunch, a Christmas present and a special gift for 360 children, according to Van Mater. “Last year, every child received a Bible. This year, we had crosses made in Haiti for every child,” he said. Van Mater liked giving crosses because it gave a few people jobs. Special to The Sun: A few Haitian girls playing outdoors In June of last year, the Van Mater family not only traveled to Haiti, they fundraised to build an addition to the Greater Works Home for Girls over the course of 2018. In May, his daughter KC said the home was transitioning from one director to another, the fundraising was to build an addition for the director to allow him to live on the premises. “This provided living quarters for the director and his family,” Van Mater said. “With the director now living on the premises, it provides a more stable and family-like atmosphere for the girls.” The Van Mater family will make another trip to Haiti in July with intentions to hold a vacation Bible school for 200 children. “We will feed them lunch every day and send them home with enough food to feed a family of four for a week,” Van Mater said. “We will be bringing medical supplies that we give to our partners, and they take them all over Haiti to be handed out to anyone in need.” The food will be purchased in Haiti in an effort to boost the economy. The July trip will be Van Mater’s ninth. He said that through fundraising and hard work from their partners in Haiti, he provided more than 40,000 meals for Haitians. He spoke about the home he does most work with. “Most of the work we do is at the Greater Works Home for Girls in Port Au Prince,” he said. “There are 39 girls living there. Most have no parents, but some have been given up by their parents because they feel the girls are better off at the home instead of with the parents.” At the home, the girls are provided an education, a place to sleep and are fed daily. “These may seem like small things to us, but to Haitians they are a luxury,” he said. The family has volunteered across the United States but to Van Mater the most satisfying and rewarding feeling comes from that little country roughly 1,400 miles southeast of Washington Township. “In the United States, if you want help, there are programs that provide that. In Haiti there are very few programs to help the poor,” he said. For those who want to get involved with the Van Mater family and their mission to help Haitians, contact the St. John’s United Methodist Church on Ganttown Road in Turnersville at (856) 227–6567.
https://medium.com/@amazziotti/helping-haiti-local-family-going-above-and-beyond-a312c45b5268
['Anthony Mazziotti']
2019-01-18 17:06:55.142000+00:00
['Family', 'Giving', 'Volunteer', 'Volunteering', 'Haiti']
How I learned a Python trick from a JavaScript book
I’m working on a nice little tool for project management in Autodesk Maya. It has a few drop down menus that contain folders and files inside a project root directory. This tool automates a few steps and helps the user quickly switch from one project to another without browsing for files. Maya Project Browser, how it looks as it is in development While working on this tool, I ran into an annoying scope issue with my algorithm when iterating over a loop, that prevented me from assigning the value I wished to a variable. I wanted to track an index value for each drop down menu, and instead I got the same value for all menus. I then remembered reading on a very similar issue on my favourite JavaScript book series — You Don’t Know JS by Kyle Simposon. In his book Scope & Closures, he explains that while assigning a variable to a function from inside of a loop captures a copy of that variable, it is still sharing the same scope. This means that each function call inside my loop refers to a copy of the variable that eventually points to the same value. But I write my tool in Python and not JS, as it is the language used in Maya for writing scripts. From my experience in visual effects, problems are usually similar across different platforms, and the solutions are usually similar as well. But can this bit of wisdom serve me in the world of code? Not surprisingly, the answer is yes! I figured if this scope issue happens in JavaScript, it might as well happen in Python. Simpson’s solution in Scope & Closures to this problem was to pass that variable to the same function, but enclosing it inside an IIFE. Now you can assign that variable to a local variable inside the IIFE (which is inside the loop). The local variable now holds a copy of the value for each iteration and passes that value to the function and it does not change after the loop iterates again and again. In Python, as far as I can tell, there are no IIFEs and no blocks of code, like in JavaScript. To solve this issue, I just enclosed the code inside the loop in a new method and called this method within the loop. This new method essentially serves as an inner scope, similar to JavaScript’s IIFE, which “locks” the value I require and pass it down safely to the method inside. This is basically it! Following below is a detailed explanation of how I implemented this in my code.
https://medium.com/@yairmorr/how-i-learned-a-python-trick-from-a-javascript-book-d5c9c89fc5c3
['Yair Mor']
2019-07-10 11:54:09.499000+00:00
['Maya', 'Python', 'Scope', 'Solutions', 'JavaScript']
Patronage
Ian had gotten his master’s in museum studies because he thought it was more stable than the career he really wanted. He had worked his way through enough underpaid positions at museums around the city that he called himself a serial internist. The joke, if one could call it that, had a 34% chance of getting a laugh. Less than half of those laughs were genuine. Ian had always wanted to be a graphic artist. Paints, portraits, installations, objet d’arts. He had long harbored this dream and had stuffed it away in his mind because he thought he ought to be practical. Hence his bachelor’s in anthropology and his master’s in museum studies. Part of his current underpaid position involved “outreach.” It wasn’t in this capacity that he found himself at a penthouse party of one of the museum’s most generous donors — a software kingpin who had made his money in the early dot-com boom. It was mere luck. His boss had an extra ticket as she couldn’t make it herself. He gladly accepted it. His real aim was to attract some money of his own. He had recently been drawn to a photography project and he needed some funding for exhibition costs. He even had intentions to pay his models if there were enough leftover. It was the kind of party he had seen in movies. The kind of party where servers whizzed by with trays of champagne. As Ian indulged, a server offered advice: “If you want anyone here to write you a check, fix your tie.” Ian looked down to see his striped tie, already a misstep, had clung to the right side of his jacket. He fixed it. The server winked at him and whizzed off. “Thanks again,” Ian called. The server didn’t here, but smart-looking guests nearby did. He had been there no more than ten minutes and they already knew he didn’t belong. The skyline glittered beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows. From this height, it looked ostentatious, downright garish. He had no power in this room, or very little, and yet he felt suddenly complicit. He sipped the champagne, lest the small burning shame in his stomach should blossom into full-blown nausea. “Jesus Christ, I wanna die.” The breathy, exasperated declaration came from a young man, maybe twenty-two, who had planted himself against the wall beside Ian. He wore a purple jacket and white ruffled shirt with a lavender bowtie. “I hate parties like this,” he said, “I hate everyone at parties like this.” It seemed a bizarre statement considering the way he was dressed. He hated these people, yet he wanted to be seen by them. “Who are you?” he asked, “You don’t belong here.” “I don’t?” “No,” he said, folding his arms, “You look like you should be serving the drinks.” “And who the fuck are you?” Ian said as gracefully as he could manage with champagne in his hand and a smile on his face. “See that? You don’t belong here,” he said, “You’re interesting.” Ian couldn’t decide if he stressed the word for emphasis or sarcasm. “I’m Casper.” The name was more than appropriate. His hair was white as porcelain. So was his skin, for that matter. “My name’s Ian. What’s wrong with the suit? It looks like any other suit.” “That’s why you don’t belong here. Look around.” “What are you, a bouncer? You don’t belong here either, do you?” “No, but I blend. And I was invited.” “So was I.” “A pity invite, I’m sure. Don’t worry. Ian made to go. “Wait, don’t go.” “Oh, I’m sorry,” Ian said, “Was that your way of making polite conversation?” “Yeah,” Casper said, “I’m not very polite. And I don’t belong here either, really.” “So why are you here?” “Isn’t it obvious?” Casper asked. When it became clear that it wasn’t obvious, he explained: “I’m arm candy.” “Oh!” Ian said, humoring him, “Arm candy.” “Rich men. I can’t get enough of them. And I suppose I could take care of myself, but I’d rather be taken care of.” “That’s kinda pathetic.” “Jesus Christ, you’re an artist, right? Have some imagination, for God’s sake.” “How’d you know I’m an artist?” Casper blew an exaggerated breath of exasperation to let him know how stupid a question it was. “What are you here for? Money for some startup? Some little pipe dream? Some installation in a dinky little museum in Pilsen?” “It’s a photo series, actually. I’m a photographer, but my funds are kind of limited right now.” “What kind of photo series?” “It’s a nude series. The male form.” “Ah,” Casper said, his dark eyebrows pulled up under the sharp tendrils of his white hair, “Well, if you ever need a model…” “Well…I’m… not sure you’re the type I’m looking for.” “And let me guess,” Casper said, “Everyone in this photo series is beautiful and ripped and very masculine.” “It’s about the exemplary male form. So… I guess, in a way, yes.” Casper’s eyes narrowed: “Right. Exemplary male form.” His eyes shot wide open and he doubled over. Ian backed away to avoid the stream of projectile vomit he was sure was coming. Instead, Casper grabbed his leg and began to jerk to his side. “Oh. Oh shit. Now you’ve done it!” “What? “My foot,” Casper complained, “It’s caught on all this ground you’re breaking!” Ian licked his lips to keep from cursing him. “Okay.” “I’m sure you can pull together some funds here,” Casper said as he stood upright again. “I haven’t had much luck yet.” “You’ve gotta make yourself available.” “I… I don’t think I can…” “You don’t just feel out of place here, you hate it. I can tell. Or you resent it. One of the two. Still, you’re just radiating it.” “I go into all these places where people just have money and have always had it, and they act like they don’t. Like they can forget it. Because they don’t have to think about it.” “Xavier!” Casper called out. Had he even been listening? Xavier, a man of about 55 who had a broad frame underneath his tux and squared-off head that looked like it had been fashioned by Lego. He was rich. Ian could tell. “What are you doing?” Ian muttered. “Making you available,” Casper said as Xavier joined them, “Xavier, this is my new friend, Ian. He’s a photographer. Isn’t he cute?” Ian felt himself flush, but the rich man seemed endeared by it. “Very. Hi Ian.” Not liking one bit where he figured this was going, Ian interrupted: “I think I should — ” Casper jumped in: “I think Archie would love him, don’t you?” “Oh, are you kidding? Archie would leave thumbprints all over that beautiful hide if it were a little younger. Maybe a shave would help.” “Stubble doesn’t become you,” Casper offered. “Who’s Archie?” Ian asked. “All you need to know about Archie is that he’s very rich and very eager to please,” Casper said. “I’ll go get him,” Xavier offered, “Maybe we could have a party of our own, the four of us.” “I’d love that,” Casper said, “Ian?” “I… Sure.” He hesitated, but Casper’s urging look made him reconsider. “He loves parties,” Casper assured the rich man. “As long as I can get a drink,” said Ian. “Don’t drink so much, son,” said Xavier, “It’ll make you sag in all the wrong places.” The older man left them. “Are you his arm candy?” “No, but the one I’m here with tonight hasn’t said more than two words to me since we got here, so fuck him.” A string quartet played in the corner of the room and some of the couples had begun to dance. Hors d’oeuvres were being set out on a buffet table and the smart-looking group seemed to decide by silent vote who among them should move toward it first. They had to be civilized about it — and it wouldn’t be civilized to rush the food as soon as it’s set out. The formality of it all made Ian feel like he was doing espionage in plain sight. He whispered his fears to Casper as if he feared detection: “I don’t think I should do this…” “Archie has been known to fund entire careers off of parties like the one we’re about to have. You’ll love him. He’s actually quite nice,” Casper said, “Nicer than a lot of them.” “You know from experience?” “You catch on fast,” Casper said. The sarcasm was clear. “That’s how I met Xavier. It’s all kind of incestuous.” Ian couldn’t hide his discomfort. Or was it revulsion? “You’ve got this look on your face like I’m disgusting and I don’t like it. You may not be too proud to beg but I won’t beg for anything. I’ll earn what I can get while I can get it.” “Okay,” Ian said, “Really, it’s not my business.” “We’re not gonna be able to do this forever, Ian, darling. Such an easy way to make money. And it’s not exactly prostitution, not that there’s anything wrong with that, there isn’t, but this way they at least respect us a little bit. You’ll see. If you’re at all good at this.” “I feel like I’m being recruited,” Ian said with a sneer. “I’m a born teacher. It’s a gift.” Then, with a softness Ian didn’t expect. “I’m just giving you an option. One that doesn’t involve eating your poor little heart out.” “Archie, this is… Remind me of your name, handsome.” Xavier had sidled up with Archie. They were about the same age, although Archie was somewhat thinner and more fit. His eyes smoldered through gold thin-framed glasses and his salt and pepper hair had a touch of curl to it. “Ian.” “Ian,” Archie said, “How are you?” “I’m… getting used to things.” “Good,” Archie said, “I’m very glad to hear that.” Xavier cleared his throat conspicuously and spoke: “I say we ditch this crowd and have a little private party back at my place.” “Thought you’d never ask,” said Casper. He took Xavier’s arm and the two led the way. “Be gentle with him Archie. He’s green.” Casper casted a mischievous smile over his shoulder to Ian. Archie caught the look and it made him chuckle. “I don’t know what Casper says about me, but I’m a very nice guy.” “No, I think I got that.” Archie held out his arm. Ian took it, feeling rather light in his shoes as they crossed the length of the penthouse together. No one seemed to mind their pairing, or their leaving. “Come on. It’s gonna be very low-key. A few drinks, maybe a little grass, and then, if the mood strikes us both, some very casual sex.” “Then you take care of me, right?” Ian asked sardonically, although he also hoped the answer might be “yes.” “Is that what you’d like?” “I think I’m…” Ian began, but wasn’t brave enough to be voice the rest of the thought until they were leaving the penthouse and heading toward the elevator. “I think I might be a little too old to be taken care of.” “No,” the man said, “Nobody’s too old to be taken care of.” As they crossed to join Casper and Xavier in the elevator, Ian looked out a nearby window to the view of the skyline that had before made him so uneasy, so full of guilt and shame, and decided to be honest with himself. It was never the complicity that bothered him. It was that he wasn’t complicit enough.
https://medium.com/the-red-sweater/patronage-a53df78c87ef
['Joe Shetina']
2020-12-16 19:32:14.938000+00:00
['Class', 'Gay', 'Short Fiction', 'The Red Sweater', 'Short Story']
Parkinson’s research highlights in 2018
Parkinson’s research highlights in 2018 It’s our last blog of the year, so we reflect on a busy and productive 2018 for Parkinson’s research and share some of our highlights. 1. New clues to the origins of Parkinson’s In Parkinson’s, sticky bundles of a protein called ‘alpha-synuclein’ are found inside affected brain cells and are believed to play a role in the damage that causes these precious cells to die. This year, new clues to why and how this toxic protein accumulates have been uncovered, opening up new ideas and avenues for developing treatments. In healthy cells, toxic or damaged proteins are labelled with a tag that marks them for destruction. This process means cells can get rid of unwanted proteins, preventing them from building up and causing problems. USP-13 removes these destruction tags and appears to be overactive in brain cells affected in Parkinson’s — potentially playing a role in unwanted proteins, like alpha-synculein, hanging around too long. Encouragingly, the team found that reducing activity of USP-13 protected brain cells from damage in mice. The team also studied appendix samples from healthy people and identified the presence of clumps of alpha-synuclein protein. These findings add further weight to the idea that, in at least some Parkinson’s cases, alpha-synuclein bundles may appear first in the gut and travel via nerve pathways into the brain. 2. Study launches to predict Parkinson’s We now believe that the changes in the body that lead to Parkinson’s may start many years or even decades before an individual develops the classic symptoms — such as tremor, stiffness and slowness — that lead to diagnosis. This ‘pre-symptomatic’ period (sometimes called the ‘prodromal phase’) offers the best chance to intervene with new therapies that could fix the problems and potentially prevent people developing Parkinson’s altogether. But how do we identify people in these early stages? We are starting to spot some of the early warning signs that someone is developing the condition — things like sleep problems, mood changes and constipation — but we have a lot more to learn before we can confidently predict who will develop Parkinson’s. This year saw the launch of Predict PD, a large study focusing on the early signs of Parkinson’s. The UK-wide study, funded by Parkinson’s UK, is seeking 10,000 people aged 60–80 without Parkinson’s. Find out more about PredictPD, spread the word or take part. The aim is to find clues to the very earliest stages of the condition to help understand who may be more likely to get Parkinson’s. This will hopefully assist the development of tools that identify individuals at high risk and lead to earlier diagnosis. This should also accelerate the development and testing of new treatments that aim to slow or stop the condition as many of these emerging therapies are likely to be most effective when used in the early stages of the condition. 3. Accelerating drug development with artificial intelligence The traditional approach to developing new and better treatments for any medical condition is costly, and it often takes decades to get a new drug to the people who need them. This year Parkinson’s UK and The Cure Parkinson’s Trust successfully joined forces to win a new partnership with a leading British artificial intelligence company, BenevolentAI, to use AI to unlock the masses of existing research data to deliver new therapies, faster. The aim is to identify at least three currently available medicines that can be repurposed to address Parkinson’s, and two brand-new ways to treat the condition with new drugs. This may sound ambitious but BenevolentAI have already achieved similar successes in other conditions including motor neurone disease. Any promising new opportunities uncovered through this pioneering approach will be rapidly taken forward for further development and testing through our Parkinson’s Virtual Biotech. 4. Steps forward for stem cell therapies One of the most promising avenues for developing new treatments is the use of stem cells. They are the original cells from which we are made and are responsible for repairing our tissues and organs when they get damaged. It is because of their regenerative capacity that researchers have been trying to find ways to use them to treat Parkinson’s and many other conditions. The hope is that we may be able to use stem cells to grow new healthy brain cells that can be used to replace those lost in Parkinson’s. Huge progress has been made in the field in the last decade in developing and refining the way stem cells can be manipulated and grown in the lab and in August this year researchers in Japan announced the first cell transplant trial for Parkinson’s to use dopamine-producing brain cells made from stem cells. And this is far from the only clinical trial underway exploring the potential of cell-based therapies for Parkinson’s. Alongside this, there are many other ongoing studies including the EU-funded study TRANSEURO that aims to test the safety and effectiveness of transplanting brain cells collected from foetal tissue into the brains of 40 people with Parkinson’s. The phase 1 trial, which involves the collaboration of researchers from several European countries, including the UK, is well underway and is due to finish in 2019. Read more about global studies underway in this exciting field in our recent blog. 5. Progress towards better clinical trials for Parkinson’s Researchers and drug companies have a new tool in the search for better treatments for Parkinson’s — a brain scan that can be used to select the right people for clinical trials. In July, the European Medicines Agency (EMA) officially endorsed the use of a special type of brain scan to identify people who are most suitable to take part in clinical trials for Parkinson’s. This represents the first major success of Critical Path for Parkinson’s Consortium — a global consortium to improve clinical trials led by The Critical Path Institute in partnership with Parkinson’s UK. As mentioned previously, because Parkinson’s is a progressive condition, caused by the gradual loss of cells in the brain, the best chance to intervene with treatments that can slow, stop or reverse the damage is during the earliest stages of the condition. However, during these early stages, symptoms tend to be mild which makes selecting the right people to participate in trials very difficult. Up to 15% of individuals taking part in clinical trials for new Parkinson’s treatments may have a benign form of the condition that means their symptoms do not significantly worsen over time. These individuals are extremely unlikely to benefit from the new therapies being tested, and their inclusion can affect both the trial results and ultimately the future of the potential treatment. “These brain scans in themselves are not new, but until now there has not been a clear consensus that they can and should be used to select participants for clinical trials,” said Diane Stephenson, Executive Director of CPP, who led the work. “This success is just the first in a suite of new tools that we hope to deliver for Parkinson’s.” What are your research highlights from 2018? So those are our highlights but what do you think? We asked some of our Research Support Network members to pick out theirs, and we’d love to hear yours in the comment section below. Carroll: “In this last year, I have realised computers make a great difference in all areas of Parkinson’s research. Such as speeding up the search for drugs for repurposing, in stem cell therapy and immunotherapy. “After attending a recent conference on artificial intelligence, I’ve learnt that machine learning algorithms will allow these computer systems to predict the best outcome for Parkinson’s treatment.” Martin: “Whilst there remains limited prospect of new treatments becoming widely available within the next few years, 2018 may be looked back on as a pivotal year in Parkinson’s research, with both the stem cell transplantation clinical trial in Japan and the Blue Rock embryonic stem cell trial in the US beginning human clinical trials, offering genuine hope of regenerative medicine within the near future. “There was also significant progress in understanding the genetics, with great work being done out of the University of Dundee in relation to both LRRK2 and Parkin/ PINK1. “We approach 2019 with renewed hope that the better management of Parkinson’s will be realised within a timeframe relative to our conditions.” John and Sue: “Everyone with Parkinson’s exhibits different combinations of symptoms and so clinicians are not able to tailor therapies or predict progression, quickly and reliably yet. “The 100,000 Genomes Project has shown that it will soon be possible to identify genetic subgroups in Parkinson’s which may cause this variability. Better genomic typing should lead to smarter drug trials and personalised treatments.”
https://medium.com/parkinsons-uk/parkinsons-research-highlights-in-2018-ce10eeccdb72
['Dr Katherine Fletcher']
2018-12-17 10:01:00.821000+00:00
['Parkinsons', 'Stem Cell Research', 'Progress', 'Highlights', 'Science']
My clients make me a better customer
Phot credit: istockphoto It is a simple rule, some call it the ‘golden rule,’ but it applies to all aspects of life, in all relationships: Treat others how you like to be treated. In personal relationships, it’s a given, but in a business relationship, it is a must. When I started my business, each and every query was treated as a ‘must convert to business.’ I pitched with the idea that no matter what, I have to bag this business. I was new, I was hungry to establish myself as a business writer. I was not a journalist, I was a content service provider. In those days, it was still being established as a profession. Advertising agencies hadn’t developed a team of content writers, PR firms thought it to be competition, and the general impression was a journalist is a business writer. I was there to state otherwise. I was there to show value of a service people didn’t know existed. That’s what I needed at the time. As the years progressed, I made a mark, ‘content is KING,’ became a thing. I no longer needed to prove content writing is a profession; top management, and communication teams understood the role I played and respected the value. I had gathered enough experience to know my company strengths and limitations. Several interactions, numerous writing assignments, and retainer to project arrangements later, today, we are comfortable and happy with our work and our clients. I run a boutique operation, and am happier for it. I moved to a NOW phase, one that wasn’t natural to me, but one that was essential for my personal and professional bloom. I assessed the work requirements ANDthe people behind it. I, indeed, wanted to work and remain the top quality content solution provider, but I also wanted to evolve in a work- life balance. Being in company I like even whist working. I was in a place to sharpen the parameters. My perspective changed from ‘can I do this work?’ to ‘do I want to do this work?’ I figured, I can make this choice at this point in my professional capacity, because let’s face it, life is too short to deal with people who can be tedious. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve dealt with umpteen brilliant and polite combinations through my work trajectory. It’s been a pleasure. Hell, sometimes the Boss is more humble than the entire team. But there are also times when a team-member having a bad day will find an opportunity to take it out on a vendor, i.e., me. Dealing with people in all sorts of companies, at various designations, coming from varied walks of life, I found myself maturing in interactions, listening with patience, understanding, and empathy…did I mention, patience? It’s a lot of work to constantly remind yourself to put yourself in someone else’s shoes before responding, but I’m aware of it, and work at it. More than before, anyway. There has been a lot of learning and unlearning, and I’ve faced many internal and external challenges, mostly in people management. In hindsight, all good experiences. Why? Because if someone on the other side of the table was short with me, when I was in that position, I made it a point not to be. And if someone was courteous and respectful, it only made me more pleasant, and it made working for them so much more fun that my own creativity would expand! The best part — I’d lift my team in the same direction. I don’t stand for inefficiency in my workspace, I also do not subscribe to the old fashioned, ‘customer is King’ approach anymore. I did, I don’t anymore. There is an equality in my work ethic. Everyone is equal. We work through the tough times together, and we celebrate the wins together too. We carry each other. My big lesson was about how I felt, consciously taking a deep breath, and not paying a bad attitude forward. When it comes to my team or being a customer, the buck (mostly) stops at me (a work in progress). Cue: The golden rule. Photo credit: istockphoto Here are my observations from being a service provider that make me a better customer: Body language: Do you have undivided attention in a scrolling-through-the-phone world? Are they dismissive toward you or are the attentive and interested in this moment? The person was up for the conversation, so pitch to keep them engaged. The way they respond to you is a powerful observation. It helps you assess how the work will progress. Behaviour towards others: Like dating, you see their behaviour towards others — their subordinates, or even the person who serves the cup of coffee. This helps in assessing if you want this person as a client or not in the first place. In long term relationships, it is key to have professionally polite empaths to work with. It subconsciously affects efficiency as you are not cringing while going to work on their assignments. Business style: Transactional, traditional or personal. Some people are just transactional in their approach. Some, mostly the older generation, are very courteous, and then there are clients who talk to you like a peer, like an equal. The minute you identify this personality trait, you can breathe easy. When on a zoom interaction, a phone call, or even an email, you adjust to the approach the client is comfortable with. It strengthens your connection with them, and it NEVER hursts. So give the respect to understand how they like a meeting to go, and comply. Some of my best interactions have been with super polite seniors, even though there were some dips in conversation, a distraction maybe, or even repetition, they were not an effort. They were genuine and carried a feel-good factor (by the way, these are my favourite kind of people, and also a rare breed). It’s a work- style. Learn to embrace that it takes all types to make this world. Communication tone: VERY important. The tone carried over a call, a meeting, or even emails and texts, especially emails and texts, is not lost on the receiver. A to-the-point email is different from a terse one, and EVERYONE can sense it. You don’t have to study communications as part of your undergrad degree for this one. I’ve noticed however, that when the point was made sans rudeness, I responded more productively and much quicker. If there was any disrespect, I found myself walking away before actually answering — delaying the response. It is uninteresting to work with that “off putting” mind space. So who loses for my lack of motivation and delay in efficiency? The person waiting for your response, who is, most probably, on a tight deadline. All these factors layer very close to each other, so close that from a distance they might overlap. The bottom line is, after working for 20 years, I have dealt with plenty where I have rolled my eyes, or happily answered the phone. And though, it’ll always be a mix, I’ll try and remain on the latter end on that spectrum. I like people in a like-minded space with ideals, visions, missions, and most importantly, similar work ethics, it enhances an overall shared understanding on what is best for the business. It makes the project an absolute fun experience. And really, aren’t we all in it for the fun? I know everyone is trying their best, and most of the time, I am aware of this. As a customer, if I ask nicely, if I am respectful towards you, your work, and your time, chances are you won’t spit in my food/ mutter under your breath, do a fabulous job, work within a timeline, and even smile at me, than if I am a nonchalant client. So what do I want now? Since work is an important constant in my life- I love it, it motivates me, I look forward to the challenges, it’s here to stay. But, I am an even more important constant in my life- I love me, I motivate me, I enable my happiness, I’m here to stay till my last breath. My need? A healthy balance with a happy business- client relationship across all tables. It isn’t much to ask. I realise, it isn’t part of everyone’s priority, and I respect that. It is mine though.
https://medium.com/@madhvi-ahuja/my-clients-make-me-a-better-customer-b63efcf51df5
['Madhvi Ahuja']
2020-12-15 11:23:19.228000+00:00
['Work Life Balance', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Life Lessons', 'Writing', 'Customer Service']
Netflix drags streaming TV backward, and cord-cutters should take note
Studying is not about time. It’s about effort
https://medium.com/@rob34768685/netflix-drags-streaming-tv-backward-and-cord-cutters-should-take-note-d062add44274
[]
2020-12-24 17:31:40.361000+00:00
['Gear', 'Services', 'Music']
For the Love of Libraries
The social and political climate in this country frightens me. It does not feel like people remember how to converse or dialogue. The abomination of Nazi book-burning haunts the edges of my mind and repugnance festers deep in my guts when I read Fahrenheit 451. I want to blame the current climate on a lack of reading that keeps minds small. Books have always been a lifeline for me and I cannot imagine why they would not be for anyone else. When my stepson came to live with us when he was 6 years old, he was not much of a reader. But he saw me reading every chance I got. His curiosity grew. We read together, talked about books, and eventually had mom-son library dates. The first time I took him to the library, I remember his eyes getting big, followed by a little “Woah!” It turned into a weekly excursion, with him reminding me on occasion about library day. Realms of discovery Stacks of adventure, shelves of things unknown, pages of curiosities just waiting for discovery. Rifling through books and new topics is like treasure hunting without a map, you never know what you’ll find. Browsing a library can introduce kids to wonders they never knew to ask about and widen their horizons. Reading inspires exploration, curiosity, and critical thinking. When I was a kid, I spent my summers racking up points with the summer reading club, exploring the stacks for the next adventure. I would read about one thing, then wonder about something else and go back to find out more about that thing. As I grew older, I felt confident there was a book for whatever it was I wanted to know. Reading takes you to places you might never experience in real life. I grew up in a small Midwest town with no diversity whatsoever. Part of the excitement about reading was I could explore other parts of the country or exotic places to get a feel for what life would be like somewhere else. I met characters who thought differently than I did, who experienced life in ways that contrasted to my own and followed divergent paths. Rifling through books and new topics is like treasure hunting without a map, you never know what you’ll find. These are the experiences kids need to develop inquiring, curious minds that seek understanding. The exploration of ideas gets kids asking questions and thinking about the why of things. Diverse thinking creates a world that looks for solutions instead of adversaries. Narrow or smallmindedness leads to the kind of behavior that supports the horrors that squash ideas and leads to the burning of books out fear for those ideas. Free library resources The best part about libraries is they are FREE! Not only are printed books in abundance, but most libraries now have e-books available with your library card. The libraries in my area use Overdrive and Libby, with most of the catalog available electronically as print or audiobook. For a real trip, check out the Internet Archive that not only has free book borrowing, but also contains millions of audio, video, and film libraries. All free. Which means ANYONE can access it! Of course, there are e-book and audiobook resources through Kindle, iBooks, and Scribd, often with free books available. With all this knowledge available, why aren’t we all reading like crazy and becoming super-geniuses? Intentional reading When I read Natalia Forrest’s tips for reading more, the first thing I thought of was beating her 2019 total books read. I tapped into my summer-reading-club-child because I only read 107. Now I have a goal of 130 for 2020. The second thing that flooded my brain was a battle cry urging parents to engage their kids with their local library! Send them to the library after school. Set a regular library excursion date complete with treats afterward. Participate in the programs offered all year long. Start a reading contest at home if they don’t have one at the library. Don’t allow screen time until they read a chapter or two. Listen to audiobooks on family trips. Invite your kids to read to you or have a family reading night where you take turns reading to each other. Engage in a family drama where you each take parts of a play to read and act out. Find books about the movies, television, or characters your kids like. Just as one example, it’s unreal how wide and complex the Star Wars universe is — so much happens in print! Or Halo? I don’t play the game, but the books are great! Come up with a topic the whole family wants to learn more about, research it individually and share it. Look for books about your next vacation spot to learn more about its history, geography, and culture. Hope for the future It’s up to us to inspire the next generation of readers and the best way to do that is by teaching how to engage with and love reading. My greatest joy was seeing my son choose a book over a screen. Given an example, time, and encouragement, yours will too.
https://medium.com/raise-a-lifelong-reader/for-the-love-of-libraries-c1d0233df3ac
['Trudi Griffin', 'Ms']
2020-01-29 17:19:34.778000+00:00
['Literary', 'Books', 'Reading', 'Literacy', 'Libraries']
System design paradigm: Caching
The Problem Caching is one of the two ways(the other is replication) to scale read heavy applications. Assume we have an application that handles 100K/s read requests. After load balancing the HTTP request from clients, those read requests will still hit the query backend(traditional DB or some in memory storage). If the backend can handle only 10K/s QPS, what should we do? Pareto distribution of the query The queries can be abstracted as key lookup(most of the time, that’s exactly what they are). Then there is a distribution of the request number among the keys. This distribution is almost always the Pareto distribution(power law). That means a small percentage(e.x. 15%) of keys consists of a large percentage of the requests(e.x. 90%). We can put the 15% most frequently used data in a cache who can handle bigger QPS. The App servers will first query the cache and only go to DB when the key is not there. In our example, that will happen to only 10% of the requests. Then only 10% of the QPS will reach DB. This is the reasoning behind caching. Distributed look-aside cache Distributed sits in front of DB and is shared by all App servers. The cache itself is usually an in-memory DB that handles reading very fast. Most common caches are Redis and Memcached. To query key K, App server use the following procedure: Query cache for K, if cache hit, return the result from cache Otherwise, query DB for K Store the result to cache Return the result to client DB update will send a delete command to cache so that the cached value is invalidated. Delete is idempotent. Another way to keep cache consistent is to rely on expiration. Expiration is simpler design, but has higher inconsistency. Handling thundering herd One corner case is when multiple requests having the same cache miss. For example, suddenly 100K Twitter users reached the server from a link that went viral, but some of the contents are not in cache. Then the cache miss happens in parallel, all of such requests will try to query DB. DB will then face a load of 100K/s read. The solution is a lease. The first cache miss will grant the app server a lease token. Only the app server having the token for a key can query DB and fill the cache. After a token is issued, all subsequent requests to the cache will be asked to retry after a period. The lease expires after a while to avoid deadlock. Race condition between delete and set If we depend on DB update to invalidate cache(delete), there will be a racing condition between cache miss read and DB update that could result in inconsistency: B got a cache miss and queried DB to get V0 A updated DB value from V0 to V1 A sent delete to cache, which was an no-op B filled cache with V0 Lease can also solve the above issue. During update, A first writes DB, then invalidates both ongoing lease and current cache value. Then 4) will fail because its lease was invalidated by A. Cascading failure If cache layer fails, the traffic will hit DB causing cascading failure. The solution is to have a standby cluster handling failed traffic. Full memory snapshot If the data is small(can be sharded into 1~3 shards), all the data can be put in cache. Then there won’t be any cache misses. The update will be from DB update. Each update is buffered in a queue and a job will gradually fan out the update to each shard and replicas. This infrastructure is a separate paradigm(primary replica) by itself. Read-your-write To provide read-your-write consistency, the app server will directly invalidate the cache after DB update. The invalidation will unaunthenticate all the leases that are granted to store value for the given key. Notice, app server can’t store cache directly because there will be race conditions resulting in setting stale value. Local cache Distributed cache will incur significant network traffic. An alternative is to have the cache co-deployed with the app server. It can be a hybrid structure with both local and distributed cache. The local cache will duplicate hot keys on each app server. Less frequent keys are stored in distributed cache. It’s a challenge for the application to decide where to put the key. Further reading How Facebook scaled itself with memcached: paper
https://medium.com/@luanjunyi/system-design-paradigm-caching-e57a25ab2f0a
[]
2020-12-23 15:01:06.751000+00:00
['Distributed Cache', 'Distributed Systems', 'Cache', 'System Design Interview']
Managing Disposables in RxJava 2 — The Less Bad Version
Scoping Disposables Is Important Unless you want bad things to happen it’s important that your disposables aren’t globally scoped and you can dispose of some without disposing of everything. In the Android world I’ve found that having one CompositeDisposable per view controller ( Activity / Fragment ) as well as one per ViewModel seems to work out fairly well. This means we want something that looks something like this… class ExampleViewModel : ViewModel() { private val compositeDisposable = CompositeDisposable() fun doSomething() { val disposable = Single.just(1) .subscribe { //update something onNext } compositeDisposable.add(disposable) } override fun onCleared() { compositeDisposable.clear() } } This will work out fine however in every ViewModel we are forced to create the CompositeDisposable and wire up the onCleared function. The natural extension onto this would be to create a base class for our ViewModel which could look something like this… abstract class DisposingViewModel : ViewModel() { private val compositeDisposable = CompositeDisposable() fun addDisposable(disposable: Disposable) { compositeDisposable.add(disposable) } override fun onCleared() { compositeDisposable.clear() } } Then in every ViewModel that needs this code it simply just extends from the DisposingViewModel and it just has to invoke addDisposable . If you are against the idea of inheritance being used in this way (you aren’t alone) then it’s worth noting that creating a solution for this using class delegation in Kotlin is not much more work. Is There An Even Better Way? There might be. Whether it be a more home grown solution or a battle tested open source project I’m sure something out there exists. At this time I wanted to write a follow-up article so I could deprecate the previous one that continues to rank well on Google and potentially mislead developers. So more on that to come, in the mean time if you have additional thoughts feel free to leave a comment.
https://medium.com/the-kotlin-chronicle/managing-disposables-in-rxjava-2-the-less-bad-version-b3ff2b0b72a2
['Cody Engel']
2019-04-23 17:56:23.188000+00:00
['Reactive Programming', 'AndroidDev', 'Rxjava', 'Rxjava2', 'Android App Development']
Enterprise SaaS: How clients benefit from Professional Consulting Services.
Enterprise SaaS: How clients benefit from Professional Consulting Services. An Enterprise SaaS offering has one element that separates the most successful SaaS companies from the rest of the pack. The not-so-secret sauce of the very best SaaS is leveraging your company’s industry expertise by including high-quality professional services as part of the offering — call it a Product and Services Bundle. Clients select one vendor over the other to either generate new revenue or reduce cost, yet other factors in support of revenue and costs are speed-to-market and risk reduction. However, many customers and vendors end up getting caught up in other factors. So your go-to market messaging has to be clear on how you drive ROI with your SaaS platform. The only way to achieve long term value for your client is to shorten the ROI lifecycle to less than a year, post-implementation. The most effective way you do that is by maximising the complete adoption and usage of your SaaS platform within your client’s business — the more stakeholders using your SaaS offering within the client organization, the stickier they will be. When your client uses every part of your product throughout their business, they see black-and-white value from your product or platform, increasing the likelihood of them to become long-term clients and increasing your ROI in your venture, with a higher ACV (Annual Contract Value) as well as higher and longer TCV (Total Contract Value). When your investors see your long-term, established clients continuing to deliver value, they see the value of their investment too. These long-term relationships can even turn out to be the catalyst to raising your next round of funding further down the line. High value and high returns — for all involved — is the key to the perfect SaaS circle, a business model which works to every stakeholder’s interest. It all starts with delivering clear, high-value services to your paying clients. Adding your team and expertise to a layer of value of your SaaS presents your product as easily embeddable within the client’s business. Let the numbers do the talking Aaron Mittman, a leading SaaS professional with thirty years in the industry, agrees, advising that he has found the most successful of these services always back up their offerings with real, demonstrable value. “Without an ROI calculation to back it up, unique value selling can often devolve into the sales team echoing what management believes its strongest product features to be,” the industry veteran explained in an interview on the Bowery Capital Startup Sales podcast. He simply adds, “Sometimes, it’s better to let the numbers do the talking.” Differentiate your value proposition with Professional Services A strong shift from the past thinking of SaaS should be self-service. More vendors are offering services that are beyond implementation to help their tier-1 clients unlock value, whilst increasing Total Contract Value (TCV). Your team and messaging is to clearly demonstrate the value of why your clients invest in your SaaS licensing and Professional Services and how that drives success, thereby allowing you to differentiate your value proposition in the SaaS marketplace. If your clients are willing to invest more for Professional Services as well as your SaaS offering, you will always drive a higher ROI for their business as well as for your SaaS, staff, and investors. It’s a simpler blueprint for success. Sources: https://siliconcanals.com/news/startups/preventing-your-saas-offering-from-becoming-shaas-shelfware-as-a-service/ https://anchor.fm/bowery-capital/episodes/Unique-Value-Selling-Through-ROI-Quantification-with-Aaron-Mittman-Nanigans-e4em63/a-ahnjn0
https://medium.com/codex/enterprise-saas-how-to-win-clients-through-consulting-services-4014ef9c6ccb
['Billy D. Aldea-Martinez']
2021-07-07 16:45:00.182000+00:00
['Startup', 'Strategy', 'Professional Services', 'SaaS', 'Consulting']
11 Digital Sticker Packs for GoodNotes: Our Picks!
Looking for digital stickers to use in GoodNotes? Whether you’re decorating a digital planner or bullet journal, or just want to add a bit of joy to your lecture notes, you’ll know that there is no shortage of what you can do when armed with digital stickers in GoodNotes. We’ve gone ahead and rounded up some free and premium digital stickers to get you started! But first… How to Use Digital Stickers in GoodNotes We recently unveiled the new Elements Tool, which allows you to save and reinsert images, handwriting and basically anything all across your notes, making it a perfect tool to manage your stickers. When you download digital stickers they’ll typically come in one of the following formats: If your stickers are individually saved as PDF or PNGs… You can bulk import them from your camera roll or directly from the Files app (which connects to Google Drive, Dropbox, and iCloud). Simply create a new collection from the Elements picker and then tap “Add Photos” or “Import from…” 2. If your stickers are laid out as one page in a JPEG or PNG… Add the image into a blank notebook with the Image Tool. Then, using the Image Tool, crop the specific sticker you want. Then tap again with the Image Tool to add it as an Element, so you can access it at any time! 3. If your stickers are in .goodnotes format… Import the .goodnotes file into a new notebook. Then, using the Lasso Tool or Image Tool, add each sticker as an Element. Now that your digital stickers are stored in the Elements Tool, you can access them at any time in any of your notes from the Elements picker in the toolbar! Free Digital Stickers for GoodNotes There are various creators and digital planning enthusiasts that regularly share free digital stickers (and other digital stationery) online. Here are a couple to check out! Ziua Planner Click into the video to find the link to the free stickers! Ziua Planner shares free stickers ranging from washi tape, backgrounds to insert in your calendar blocks, and cute sticky notes in her videos. Ziua Design also has a store on Etsy, where you can find a wider range of paper templates (like student planners, habit trackers and finance planners too). The Dash Planner The Dash Planner regularly releases free digital sticker pages. You can download beautifully designed seasonal stickers, functional sticky notes, and templates to use in GoodNotes from the freebie vault. The best part is that these stickers already come in a .goodnotes file, so you can easily import them straight into GoodNotes and add them as Elements. You can access the freebie vault from The Dash Planner by signing up to their newsletter here. Ellifilm Click into the video to find the link to the free stickers! Elli is another YouTuber who shares “Plan with Me” content and regularly creates free digital stickers that’ll turn any page of your notebook into something you can’t take your eyes off of. She also sometimes shares simple planners and templates with her videos, which you can import and use in GoodNotes. Onetenth Time Click into the video to find the link to the free stickers! Onetenth Time also shares the stickers she creates in her YouTube videos, to help you get a little inspired on how you can decorate your digital journal in GoodNotes. She links to different sticker packs in each video. This particular one showcases the travel-themed stickers she used for her travel journal in GoodNotes. KDigital Studio If you’re looking for something more neat and simple, you can take a look at the free elements collection from KDigital Studio. They’re perfect to supplement any notes that you might have if you want to add an additional sticky note or call out. You can get them by signing up to her newsletter from her website (along with other digital stationery for GoodNotes!). Hanri Click into the video to find the link to the free stickers! Hanri shares new stickers every month, including florals, sticky notes, and cute blobs you can write over. Check out how she uses them in her videos and get inspired for your own digital journals. Premium Digital Stickers for GoodNotes Etsy is a great place to start when looking for digital stickers. The ones we’ve listed out here are all pre-cropped and come in the .goodnotes format, so you can just import them once, and save them as Elements straight away. Widescreen Education — Magic Elements
https://medium.goodnotes.com/digital-stickers-goodnotes-10a55a2aa98b
[]
2021-06-24 03:44:31.272000+00:00
['Apple Pencil', 'Notetaking Apps', 'Organization', 'Digital Notetaking', 'Digital Planning']
NJ’s Jennifer Herring — Visually Impaired Runner, Warrior.. and all heart.
Jennifer Herring running the 5th avenue mile in NYC Marathon 2015 Every so often, while curating what seems like endless amounts of NJ media, I come across a ‘Jersey gem’. A person or place that defines NJ. It’s always a story of grit and character. NJ’s Jennifer Herring is a Jersey gem. [NOTE: If like me, you have at-the-ready excuses for your sedentary lifestyle.. Jennifer’s story is a gut-check.] Jennifer Herring is a runner.. running marathons as a means to raise awareness and funds through Team With A Vision to help those, who like her, suffer from the challenges of living with blindness and visual impairment, caused by optic atrophy, or cone dystrophy. Though her range of vision is only about 2 feet, Jennifer Herring runs.. driven by passion and focused on her mission. Here is Jennifer’s story, in her own words.. as well as a Q & A to help provide details and context, to what a cool New Jersey story Jennifer Herring is. With optic atrophy, cone dystrophy.. What does the world look like? The world is a blur to me. As I look around when I am sitting or running, I can spot some things, but they aren’t clear to me. When I see people at a distance, their faces aren’t clear. I know people by the way they walk or their shape. I don’t see the details clearly unless I am about 2 feet away. I can’t see text unless I am about a foot away. Was there an epiphany moment when you were young in regard to running? Was there a time/place where your heart, mind & passion all connected at once.. and the love of running rushed into your consciousness? I realized my passion for running was real and different when I was the only one in grammar school gym class and then even in middle school (except for one other boy who I ran with) who was so excited to have to run in circles around the field or inside the gym. I wondered why everyone else dreaded because it gave me so much happy energy. My hampered vision didn’t affect it at all because I didn’t have to see a ball or spot anything. I just had to go, and I felt free! When you started to run competitively as a kid, did you need assistance? Jennifer’s High School Varsity jacket. John P. Stevens High School, Edison NJ. I started running Winter Track as a freshman in High School. I made a friend when I went to sign up for it because I couldn’t see the chalkboard with the information to fill in on our papers. But, when it came to running we would usually go out on the roads around school for longer runs. Luckily, we all ran the same pace and stayed close, so I would just follow everyone. I started running cross country sophomore year of high school. I did get lost during my 1st race, but going forward as I learned the different courses, I would try my best to follow other runners or stay with teammates. I remember falling once in the woods, but I got up and kept going to finish my race. I am fortunate that my parents built me tough. I continued running through high school and senior year I was voted captain for track and cross country. I still have my varsity jacket that I was so proud of. When I run the road races these days, everything is a blur, but I can follow people along the way. I am fortunate that nothing out of the ordinary has come up in my path, but I should have a guide along if there are issues.. I am so independent that it takes a lot for me to have a guide, but I am appreciative and fortunate if I do have one. I mostly run road races and stay away from any races that go in the woods or not on paved paths, so I don’t have to worry about avoiding extra obstacles. My usual training path is a little over 3/4 of a mile loop in my development and I run in the road that is flat and fast for me. I run closer to the center to avoid the parked cars and mostly during the week I am out early, so there isn’t much car traffic. The neighbors know me and say “Hi and Good Morning” and most of the dogs bark and rout for me too. :-) When someone who has never run before, begins the process of running.. it’s hard. But something happens along the way, if we don’t give up. Running begins to morph.. and blossom, as a spiritual practice. Is that what running is for you? I run to remember, and I run to forget. I run to figure things out for work and in my life. I was born with the passion inside. No one introduced it to me. It keeps me healthy and I have so much happy energy. When I leave to go for a run, I may feel like crying, but when I return, I feel like singing. It is my therapy and has helped me through college, the passing of my beloved father, and many issues along the way. When I am running in my circles, I don’t need to see where I am going, as I just move forward and feel so strong. Even the fierce wind cannot slow me down in the winter months. I train for my races through the winter and some of the most serene runs are in the middle of the winter when it is quiet and cold with only my thoughts and the sound of my footsteps. When people say to me, “I don’t know how you do it”, I say to them first that they can do it too, or even walking is great too. I then think to myself, “I don’t know how I could live without it.” It is my drug of choice and I have never abused it. I do recommend it to others because it can cure many of life’s ailments and can bring happiness and health which is what most people are searching for. Running is a timed escape each day that you can depend on for helping to get through the life’s daily obstacle course. It is cherished and appreciated and cannot be taken for granted. When running for Team With A Vision, I am always amazed at marathons. People from all over the world come together to raise money and awareness. We all push and inspire each other and are focused on common goals. I believe that if everyone could take a moment and make the world blurry, like the way that I see.. it would help them to draw into focus only the most important aspects of life.. Vision would be focused on what matters most.. Running helps me see the bright side in a blurry world that would otherwise be dark. Recently, while preparing for a race and fund raising I overheard someone say, “She runs for all of us.”.. Meaning that I run for those who can not, and raise awareness and funds to help those who are blind, visually impaired and in need. That is true, and always will be. It is a way to give back, and enlighten the world around me. Team With A Vision 2015 Why is Team With A Vision so special for you? Team With A Vision, is a supportive, inspiring team of visually impaired runners and guides, raising money that helps improve the lives of those with similar disabilities. It reminds me of the camaraderie that I felt when I attended Camp Marcella growing up which is a camp that offers activities for children who are blind, visually impaired, and have multiple handicaps. Team With A Vision is a group of people who overcome obstacles and struggles to continue their passions and inspire others to do the same. They are paired with compassionate people who run and share the same goals of helping others and reaching their potential. These three words, “Never Give Up”, are what I will always live by and hope to spread to others who also have continued obstacles to overcome throughout their lives! A picture of Jennifer and her dad dancing with the 2008 Boston Marathon finisher medal surrounding them both. Gravely ill, Jennifer’s father promised that we would wait until Jennifer handed him the medal, before he passed away. He did so. Footnote — If you are interested in supporting Jennifer’s 2016 Boston Marathon run, please visit Team With A Vision to donate. All funds raised support the Massachusetts Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired statewide network of vision rehabilitation services, which serve individuals, giving them the support they need to live with dignity and independence.
https://medium.com/nowjersey-digital-magazine/nj-s-jennifer-herring-visually-impaired-runner-warrior-and-all-heart-56aa401e1824
['Mike Decastro']
2016-02-08 21:29:49.569000+00:00
['Running', 'Blindness', 'New Jersey']
Trend One: There is a story to be told here — the missing power of communications
This article is part one of our four article series in early learning and childcare post covid. Read the introduction to the series here. The evidence for early childhood education could not be clearer. Early learning and childcare is beneficial from an individual, societal and economic perspective. Yet for the past few decades, neither have been a priority; they are viewed as separate from formal education. “This field has the world’s least tapped-into potential to change the future for the better” Ashley Beckner, Imaginable Futures COVID-19 has highlighted the divergence in access and quality of early learning and childcare available to families. We are in a moment where everyone — parents, teachers, governments and systems — is facing the pain of schools being shut and is open to change. During our 14 conversations one recurring theme was evident: early childhood education has a communications problem. Great storytelling and a compelling narrative can be drivers of change, but they are not currently being used effectively for early learning. The early learning movement needs a revised narrative to drive the change needed and acquire the social capital as well as political power for all children to have the best start in life. The problems with communicating the benefits of early learning: Most narratives are too focused on science/brain development (data driven rather than story driven). This means the narratives do not resonate with people. Early Learning & Childcare needs communication to show how it can make a difference for a 9.7 billion person planet Many benefits are explained in terms of “future benefits” to children and society, rather than tangible immediate benefits. Early learning is not seen as an industry central to society. An example to show this is how industries were picked for support during COVID-19. The stark contrast between support for the hospitality industry, in the UK, with schemes like “eat out to help out” and the lack of any support for childcare services (while insisting they stay open for essential workers’ children) is telling. The early learning field is fragmented, there is no central voice or champion. And it is tricky to include the voice of our main stakeholders: young children themselves. A way forward: We need a simple, clear and sticky message for early learning that everyone can relate to: “Just Do It.” “I’m Loving It.” “When you educate a girl, you educate a nation.” “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” Chances are you have heard these famous taglines or phrases, from outside of and within the education sector. There is no equivalent for early learning. The field needs a group of champions: In the same way Michelle Obama champions girls education or Greta Thunberg is the face of the climate change movement, the early learning movement needs champions. Encouragingly, recently there have been some big names who have started to focus on early learning such as Kate Middleton, The Duchess of Cambridge, and Novak Djokovic. In the past, Shakira has led consensus on early learning. It seems to be time now that such individuals pool their influence to address multiple aspects of the field and encourage action. Overlap with gender and youth movements: While government driven campaigns focus on early learning as a way to create jobs, there is a larger opportunity at hand. Most early years educators are young women. Working with them can take early learning from a niche issue to something that opens the door to governance issues such as gender equality and ballot box issues such as youth employment. We need a mindset shift. Parents, politicians, governments need to see multiple proof points for early learning. Ones that work in multiple locations and contexts with examples across high and low income countries. “In reality, formal schooling starts with early learning. A ‘cradle to career’ model has the potential to integrate education and community support holistically”. Ed Vainker, CEO, Reach Foundation
https://earlyinsights.org/trend-one-there-is-a-story-to-be-told-here-the-missing-power-of-communications-2a1ceb4e348f
['Tarun Varma']
2020-12-17 08:45:24.393000+00:00
['Early Childhood Education', 'Insights', 'Covid 19', 'Perspective', 'Reflections']
3 Simple Tips That Will Dramatically Improve Your Email Game Overnight
3) Give little, say lots This tip can be a little more challenging to wrap your head around. But it’s paramount if you want your emails to succeed. And by succeed, I’m talking about your most important metric… Raking in the dough. So how do you give little, but say lots? Easy — you tell your subscribers what’s behind the curtain, but you never ever let them look. For example, let’s say I’m writing an email about the top 5 things you should do after waking up. And one of my tips might be something like “Perform the 5 Tibetan Rites for 10–15 minutes.” Well, what are the 5 Tibetan Rites? That’s a great question. And if you join me inside such and such a program, I’ll show you exactly how to do it. See what I did there? I’m telling you what to do (the 5 Tibetan Rites), but I’m not telling you how to do it. I’m telling you what’s behind the curtain, but I’m not actually showing you what it is. Make sense? This helps build interest, desire, and curiosity for whatever it is you’re writing about. And when it comes to being an email copywriter, those are very powerful weapons of persuasion. So use them at your own risk, and enjoy. === And there you have it. 3 simple tips that can dramatically improve your email game overnight. Use them, apply them, and watch how much better your emails perform. The difference will be night and day. Of that, I’m certain.
https://medium.com/@danmanifest/3-simple-tips-that-will-dramatically-improve-your-email-game-overnight-74c1a676341c
['Daniel P. Donovan']
2020-12-13 15:22:30.263000+00:00
['Copywriter', 'Copywriting', 'Email Marketing', 'Email', 'Email Marketing Tips']
How art can help us find our superpower
Once a wise man said — The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls. That wise man is none other than Pablo Picasso. You see, whether a human is an introvert or an extrovert a human is a social being. Like fingerprints, I believe we are all unique and different. This is what I like about complex human personalities. There are so many possibilities and much more to discover out there in the world. Yeah, Yeah we all know at….but what is the role of ART in it? Okay so we know that social beings communicate to express themselves, their emotions, feelings, opinions, greetings…and the list goes on. That’s where art comes. It is a way of expressing yourself in a more creative and personalized way. Well, we have languages, why do I have to learn anything else to express myself? First of all, we all can learn a language and converse in it, so it doesn't bring out the uniqueness in us. It doesn’t tell you what you are or what you are good at. It's like a superhero movie, hmm let’s just take avengers. So we all know they are superheroes. But their abilities or in other words their superpower is different from each other. This makes them unique and useful in different situation. After all you can’t expect a superhero’s life to be mundane and routine right!? This uniqueness is what makes us choose our personal favorite superhero depending on our personality. FYI, I love Tony Stark sooooo much. I just love how he creates all the cool stuff and at the same a genius, billionaire, playboy, and philanthropist!!!! SO, now we understood why we need something extra to express who we are right…next let’s think about how can we do that and how art helps us. Let’s talk about art itself. We all have different views on art. Some think of huge magnificent painting on the wall, some think of ballet, some think of beautiful poem or a song or some think it’s a time waste. One thing is for sure it is not at all a waste of time, but rather an activity that improves your creativity and imagination. There are different forms of art. Some might like an art form more than others. But at the same time, it’s not a sin to love and appreciate all of them. Woahh.. that’s huge! So what we choose from these many options gives us an insight into who we are. It can be painting, or music or dance, or even writing a blog, it gives us an image of ourselves and also gives a chance to stand out from the crowd as a unique personality. It also gives a chance for others to understand you better. Through art, we can express our emotions unapologetically without being judged. For example, even if a painting is expressing a sad event, people still admire it or in fact understand the intensity of it’s emotion better. Art makes you feel the emotions. Just putting on your headphones and listening to your favorite playlist makes you happy or reading a poem or a book from your favorite author makes you feel comfy and yourself. The thing is art is not just a creative way to express yourself to others. There is more to that. It helps us to find ourselves. To know our strengths and weakness, our personality, why we are the way we are, is important to have a happy and satisfying life. In the present world of social media, we are more focused on what others are and their strengths and weaknesses. We are trying to build ourselves from the stuff that makes others happy, forgetting we are all wired differently. We spend a huge chunk of our time on social media forgetting that we have a life live. And eventually, we lose ourselves, our uniqueness. Art can be used to know who we are. It gives a chance to spend time with ouselves, cutting out all the toxic world around us. It gives us a chance to imagine beyond reality and at the same protecting the innocence of our thoughts. When we sing a song that we like, or even dance to our favorite song, or even paint or sketch our favorite scenary we feel connected to ourselves. It gives us the confidence that we can create something beautiful through hard work, passion, and patience. It gives us the feeling that we are good at something, which in turn motivates us to explore even further. Not just that, art can be used as healthy distraction if you want to productively procrastinate. It makes our brain happy by giving us time to de-stress. Even Einstein used to play violin in order to relax!! I observed many great humans always have an art from as their hobby. That’s pretty cooll right!! So, basically, whether you choose art as a hobby or do it for some other reasons, in any form, it is a fruitful way to spend your time. In this era of technology, we can learn anything from anywhere, create anything in our garage. What we do with it or how wisely we use this depends on us. That’s all about what I feel about art. I love music and sketching and ocassionally like to dance in a weird way to my fav songs. I am introvert and art helps me to recharge from all the social activity. this is meee!!!😂 So have fun exploring and creating something beautiful and magnificent and at the same developing a skill!!!
https://medium.com/@godhalakshmi/how-art-can-help-us-find-our-superpower-6b3e9fb70edf
['Godha Lakshmi']
2020-12-24 18:03:29.057000+00:00
['Music', 'Self Discovery', 'Self-awareness', 'Art', 'Painting']
How marijuana (THC) and other factors induce paranoia
Paranoia following THC consumption may occur due to illicit nature of marijuana, the possibility of paranoia-tendency people to consume THC, or the role of other factors instead of THC producing paranoia, such as by the cognitive model shown below.[1] There is actually very little research on THC and paranoia, the first experimental study being conducted only in 2015.[2] Based on evidence, I would argue that the awareness of consuming THC is not the reason for paranoia — in fact, it showed to reduce paranoia. However, the study suggests that that THC does not directly induce paranoia, but introduces effects such as panic, anxiety, depression, and negativity, which in turn increase one’s likelihood for paranoia. THC, however, has been studied in terms of paranoia-resembling psychotic effects it may induce.[3][4] This could occur due to increased cortisol (known as the ‘stress hormone’) levels in the blood after consuming marijuana.[5] It could also result from decreased dopamine (a neurotransmitter known for its pleasure-inducing effects) synthesis in those consuming THC.[6] The possible reason for a lack of clarity regarding THC’s link to paranoia is that it only affects some people; this may occur because factors such as environment and legality of the substance contribute to one’s likelihood of becoming paranoid. Neurotransmitter imbalances may further affect paranoia: For example, decreased levels of serotonin (another pleasure-inducing neurotransmitter) may make one more susceptible to depression, which can eventually lead to paranoia.[7] Increased levels of dopamine have also been linked to paranoia.[8] Brain regional activity can also contribute to risk of developing paranoia: For example, elevated activation of the amygdala (contributes to emotion) can raise paranoia.[9] Moreover, genetic differences may contribute: it has been shown that people with a shorter allele for the serotonin transporter (5-HT) gene were more likely to develop depression after a stressful event — again, a risk factor for paranoia.[10] In all, THC and paranoia is a long-winded link that will require meticulous controlling of confounding variables in order to conclusively outline any causal relationship. However, evidence is there, which adds to the multitudinous reasons not to consume marijuana in the first place.
https://medium.com/@mayurihana/how-marijuana-thc-and-other-factors-induce-paranoia-2483fe84fa5f
['Mayuri Hana Vaish']
2019-02-16 16:51:00.742000+00:00
['Neuroscience', 'Brain', 'Marijuana', 'Paranoia', 'Drugs']
WHERE TO SELL USED BOOKS IN NYC?
A few years ago, I went to the state of New York for the first time. I landed at the JFK airport, checked out my baggage, and stood in the line for a cab. Then, a good cab driver took me to Long Island wherein I had to stay in one of the prestigious global hotels. I arrived at an odd hour, my check-in was due in an hour but on request, the modest staff of the hotel gave me the key card to my room. The room was a little messy because someone checked-out of it a few moments ago and the housekeeping staff didn’t perform the cleaning yet. I started looking around, the wardrobe was vacant, the drawers had nothing, although a few chocolate wrappers were lying next to the bed. Of all these, one thing caught my attention. On the study table, beside the lamp, I saw a stack of books. They didn’t seem to belong to the hotel. On further investigation, I discovered that those were used books. Obviously, they belonged to the guy who recently checked out of the room. A few minutes later, a housekeeping staff came in, gave me a greeting chuckle, and started making the chairs which were turned away from each other. I am sure two people sat on them to put their shoes on. After wearing, they moved towards the door thus, changing the direction of the chairs. I asked the housekeeping boy, “Whose books are these?” The boy replied, “These belong to Mr. Smith, he stayed in the room before you. He was a reader Sir. Every day after 8 pm, he would read books. He even told me that the best time for reading books of fiction is in night.” “He is moving to NJ. He wanted to sell these books to a used bookstore in NYC as he didn’t them in his new house. He also asked me if I knew any place.” The staff continued, “I ain’t know no place so couldn’t tell him nothing. He was looking ahead to sell books in New York city which were taking a lot of space on his study table”. The main issue is to find places that buy used books for cash in NYC I know, as a voracious reader, that this problem is quite common among book readers and students. People who have small apartments can’t keep a bookshelf as large as those found in the houses of lawyers. Many New Yorkers, particularly students, are searching every time on the internet for New York city used bookstores. They do it so that they can sell their used books for cash. As most of us know the only major option that is available in NYC is the Strand Bookstore. Strand bookstore is the best-used bookstore in NYC. It has a wide collection of used books of various genres. Strand also gives you a fair price depending on the condition of your book but it has to be in demand. I mean they hold the right of rejecting your used books if those books don’t meet their criteria. One more option is that you sell books by weight. But in the fast-running New York City, it is hard to find a place where you can do so. Luckily, if you discover such a place, the traveling cost will exceed the amount which you will get by selling books by weight. The problem generates from the closing of the used bookstores in Manhattan A few years ago, there were many used bookstores which made the selling of used books in NYC easier. Those bookstores did have a wide collection of used books. You could buy some amazing ones from them at some low prices. The people loved them but the real estate increasing costs made the rent unbearable for so many old bookstores in NYC that they had to shut down. Unfortunately, the second-hand books they sold could not cover the operational costs. Few moved to some other low-cost neighborhood where their clientele got profoundly affected. The closing of used bookstores in downtown NYC and the shifting of a few to low-cost localities have created problems for book readers. This has also made reading expensive for them. Even the foreigners who visit the city are looking for foreign language books. French and Chinese immigrants are seeking Chinese & French bookstores in NYC. The high rental cost has made it unsustainable for medium to small used bookstores in New York. Thus, there are few sources to address the used book needs of New Yorkers. When NYC has no used bookstores then you can’t buy books at a low price; in such a situation to sell your books seems a far cry. Thus, the guy left his used books in the hotel. So, the big question remains where to sell used books in NYC? The best solution for used books in NYC To sell your books in NYC the first thing you’d do is find a bookstore that is near to your place. At least it must be near the place where you work or study. Because of all the problems, it is difficult to find brick-and-mortar stores. Yet, if you look at it with a different mindset then why do you need to sell used books to a bookstore. You need people to whom you can sell your old books; the people living in New York City who give you cash for books which you sell them. An imagination will clarify my point Suppose you are a traveler who visited NYC 15 days ago and you bought an NYC travel book. Now, you’re about to leave NYC. You think of selling this travel book to another traveler or to a person who needs it, who is somewhere around you in NYC. If you find the right buyer for your travel book then not only you will create more space for the NYC souvenirs but you will also get a good price for it. I am sure you’re wondering now,” where can I sell my used books for cash in person near me in New York? where am I going to find such a person? On the way to work, how am I going to identify the person who is seeking to buy my books?” One common answer to all these questions is bx-zone.com bx-zone.com is a website using which you can sell second-hand books in NYC. You can sell your books to students, readers, and bibliophiles who are seeking to buy your books at a low price. The only task which you’ve to do is list your used books in its used bookstore and that is it. Your used books are ready to spread around in NYC through the power of the Internet. Thus, those people who are looking forward to buying those books at a discount will see them. This way you can make decent money from the books you would like to get rid of. Imagine you list your used books, and John living in the next block also lists his used books. Also, Sandra living 10 blocks away list her second-hand books and likewise, thousands of New Yorkers list their old books. So, you can imagine bx-zone becoming a used bookstore endorsing almost all New York city used books. When you make money from old books then you save the environment You must be thinking what point I am trying to make? What idea am I introducing? How can you make money from your used books and also save the environment? But, I know what I am talking about and I will prove it to you in the points below. I am not stating that the money you make — equal to your used books value — you donate it to an NGO which plants trees. There is a different logic behind it - 1. You make money by selling books to people around you in NYC Since you have discovered a way to sell your old books in NYC. Suppose, you follow it and happen to sell your books to different people in New York City. Thus, you make decent money. You will earn money much more than a used book scrap dealer can offer you. This is because you sell your books to someone who needs them, and thus, your books are worth more. 2. Thousands of used books in New York city move from people to people and thus, the trees will produce less paper. Imagine, thousands and thousands of New Yorkers adapt the same way to sell their books. So, now all New York city second-hand books move from people to people. This reduces the demand for already published books at least those, which were published more than 5 years ago. As I said, they won’t cut more trees to produce more paper. If you think about one or two or ten used books then saving the trees seems a far cry. But if you think of all NYC used books combined, this entire process will make a massive difference. In this way, you will be contributing to the environment. 3. Point proved — you make money, you save the environment So, when you sell used books online then you are making money. At the same time, you are making a massive contribution to the environment by saving trees. bx-zone.com is where I sell my used books in NYC When I saw books on the study table in the hotel, I felt that the guy who left them must have this big question in his head, “Where can I sell my books in NYC?”. He enquired with the housekeeping staff a bunch of times about the cheap used bookstore in NYC. He wanted to find a bookstore in Manhattan where he can give away his books. But, he got no answer on time so, he abandoned his books. I associate myself with this feeling too. Every time I see books on my table, which I have read already, I believe in replacing them with different books. I don’t care if the books are brand new or second-hand books. To address such used book needs I have started bx-zone.com. bx-zone is different from the rest of the used bookstores in Manhattan New York. I see bx-zone.com as a medium through which I can sell used books near me and its concept is simple. I also see it as the only second-hand bookstore in NYC which is run by book lovers, NYU students, voracious readers, and bibliophiles. I have done enough talking about the used bookstores in NYC. I also told you that I use bx-zone to sell my used books in NYC but let me also tell you how to use it now. So, below here is the step by step procedure to use it. bx-zone.com puts the process of used books buy and sell in your own hands which means that you have got all the power. 1. To gain this power the first thing that you have to do is to sign up on bx-zone.com 2. The next step that you need to do is log into your account. and move to the used bookstore. Over here a pop-up will appear; you have to enter a few details like your city and your interests so that bx-zone can show you the second-hand books as per your preference. You can skip putting in these details as of now. 3. Now, I am sure you are wondering how to sell your books for which click on the ‘sell used books online’ option. If you are a student and want to sell your college books then I recommend you to bring the stack of books in front of you to not miss any. 4. You will see a form on the screen along with a map of the United States on the right-hand side. If you are working on a laptop then it will appear on the right. If you are accessing bx-zone.com from a phone then it will appear below the form. 5. Start filling the form with the details of your book; fill in the original price and write the selling price. bx-zone.com believes that the bookseller can only derive the correct used book’s value. Hence, the choice of the selling price is also with you. 6. Enter the city as ‘New York’ because buyers search for used books they need by city. 7. Mark the pick-up point on the map. You can set it as your home or any place in NYC where you’re comfortable handing over your books to the book buyers. 8. I am trying to sell my books and I don’t know who buys used books near me. The only thing I know is that some people near me could buy my books, so they are my potential buyers. This calls for an attractive sales pitch which you must write in the description box. 9. The stage is set now. All you have to do is hit the ‘contact owner’ button. After this, your book will start appearing in the used bookstore of bx-zone.com What happens next? To read further click here
https://medium.com/@undefinedabhi/where-to-sell-used-books-in-nyc-3daa36e24880
['Ajay Nagar']
2020-12-17 15:53:55.128000+00:00
['New York City', 'Sell Second Hand Books', 'Sell Used Books', 'Second Hand Books Usa', 'Used Books Nyc']
Power or Policy, Rural Voters Demand Neither
Last week, I wrote that rural voters deepening support for the Republican party, and Trumpism in particular, has been a poor investment. My father corrected me where I used soybean farmers as a rhetorical stand-in for rural America, in that soybeans are at a record global high right now. Considering, however, that the current high price of soybean futures is due to a number of factors completely unrelated to Trump, and rural America as a whole is not entering another Golden Age on the strength of the mighty soybean, I figured I would let it stand. No, what I want to look at is the nature of the return groups get on the “investment” of their support. It can be a tricky subject to tackle. The more obvious the transactional nature the easier it is to measure, but also more unseemly and possibly illegal. If a man gives a mayor $100,000 in cash, and the mayor turns around and awards a $1,000,000 contract to the man’s company we call that bribery. If that same man gives the same money to a PAC who then donates it to/spends it on the same mayor, and the man gets his contract, we call that free speech. Either way, ethics aside, one can certainly argue that this hypothetical shrewd operator is getting a good 10 to 1 return on his investment. Of course, it gets even harder when you consider that the most common form of support is a vote instead of money, and the most common form of return is emotional validation rather than policy change. Only the super-rich are actually in a position to seek contracts from the government or plead for personally lucrative tax and regulation exemptions. The vast majority of us are not Bond villains or Koch brothers. We don’t have personal requests from the government. We have broad notions of what is good and bad and support people we think share our values. We usually share these views with the people we identify with the most closely. It is to these aggregate worldviews that political leaders pay attention. I would argue that the desired return from political support falls onto a Power to Policy spectrum. On the far right of that spectrum, the most pure example I can think of is the NRA. Though odious, the NRA has traditionally been highly effective because their ask is so limited. They don’t care if NRA members are elected to high office. They don’t want veto power over Supreme Court nominees. They don’t care about Senate rules, tax policy, or foreign affairs. All they want is complete inaction on guns in the United States; all they require is a sufficient base of single-issue supporters. A clear set of examples for the Power end of the spectrum are black Americans and Evangelicals. There are, of course, policy goals in both groups, but what they really desire is a political home. Black Americans vote overwhelmingly for the Democratic party, and, despite what a few cherry-picked and highly-touted contrarians say, have clearly gained a lot of power in the Democratic party. A black President, now a VP and the Secretary of Defense, Senators and a Congressional Black Caucus with more than one member, they are arguably the single most powerful constituency in the party. Like Evangelicals in the GOP, black Democrats have veto power over most things from presidential nominees to the Supreme Court. They often get leaders who either look and speak like them, or at least go out of their way to show that they understand and appreciate them. Which brings us, finally, to rural voters. I would place rural voters weakly on the left-hand side of this Power to Policy spectrum. They don’t make consistent and clear policy demands. If they did, the agricultural economy would be treated as lovingly as the energy sector, and family farms like tech start-ups. There would be federal support for rural hospitals and schools, and curbs on Big Agra. As there are not, the confusion is widespread and spawns books like What’s the Matter with Kansas? Yet the demands from rural America are not effective Power demands either. The last farmer President was Carter, 45 years ago and a Democrat to boot. They don’t demand rural leaders or rural policies, a seat at the table, or veto power and thus hold very little influence over the party that depends almost completely on their support. What they get instead are conspiracy theories, tribalism, and cultural validation. Again, this is separate from any ethical or partisan calculation. I will readily admit the NRA and Evangelicals get a solid return on the investment of their support from the GOP, even if I generally disagree with their aims. The current wave of rural support for Trumpism however, feels like watching my grandmother put her savings under her mattress. It may have made her feel safe, but in the end she gained nothing.
https://medium.com/@evancwolf/power-or-policy-rural-voters-demand-neither-f886db6c0b18
['Evan Charles Wolf']
2020-12-22 04:50:28.217000+00:00
['Rural', 'Politics', 'Power', 'Investment', 'NRA']
A house on fire (part 2)
Photo by Shane Young on Unsplash Sleep was not Lisa’s best friend. At least it hadn’t been since the day she had lost both her parents in a car accident. Nightmares of the cruelest order painstakingly ate away the ungodly hours of her life. Still, like every human being that gradually moves on from adversity, she was learning to lead her life normally. Paul’s presence had been her greatest ally, being by her side unconditionally. Paul loved her more than anything in his life and she knew this beyond all doubt. It was two nights to go to their second anniversary and she had a feeling that Paul would be planning a surprise for the coming eve. She was equally excited as Paul’s unfettered care is what had brought her life together and spending time with him in any form gave her bliss and a sense of being alive. The stress at work combined with her personal grief had taken a toll on her and so she had resorted to a sabbatical with an aim of sorting her head and figuring out what she really wanted to do. Paul had been extremely supportive on this. “Peace should not be played with”, he would always say. Post dinner, they usually sat by the bedroom window with a glass of wine talking about their day. It was a usual night sprinkled with excitement for the day that was to come. At half past 11, they got into bed and Lisa hugged Paul tightly, tighter than she usually did. She wanted to tell him something. Something even she didn’t yet know about. Paul kissed her goodnight and soon fell into a slumber decorated by his pronounced snoring. Lisa couldn’t sleep as usual and got back to reading Kafka by the Shore from where she had left earlier. Somehow, she could associate with Murakami’s magical surrealism really well. Next she knew it was quarter to 8. She wanted to be asleep. She wanted to be normal. Soon Paul would be waking up and she didn’t want him all worried for her yet again. Not today. She closed the book, switched off the bedside lamp and pretended to fall asleep. Half an hour later, still awake, she felt Paul’s morning kiss on her forehead. This was routine and one thing she really looked forward to after her stretch of insomnia. Paul got ready and went to the kitchen to fry some bacon and eggs for breakfast. “You wanna have breakfast right now?”, he called out from the kitchen like he always did, very well knowing the answer that she’d have milk and cereal once she woke up. Soon he left for work. Lisa turned in her bed wondering where to place happiness and where to place gloom in this pinboard of life. She thought maybe a glass of warm milk would help her sleep and walked towards the kitchen. As she was heating up milk in the microwave, she saw a squirrel by the window sill. She went closer and noticed that it was knocking on the window. Lisa waved but the squirrel kept knocking, unperturbed by her surroundings. As she lifted the window pane, the squirrel rather than running away just stood there looking into her eyes. She noticed that the squirrel had something horridly uncanny about it in the sense that its lips were unusually red as if a cosmetic substance had been applied to them. They stood there for a minute and before she could realise, Lisa had lost control over her eyes. She couldn’t look away. She couldn’t even blink. Slowly she felt her whole self fading away. In a swift movement, the squirrel jumped over her head onto the refrigerator behind her as she fell on the ground with a loud thud. It started running on the refrigerator’s door, scribbling something on it with its face. Rubbing her eyes, trying to get back to reality, she realised that the effort was all futile and she had already gotten to somewhere else. She smelled fire, but she saw nothing.
https://medium.com/@katyalsahil/a-house-on-fire-part-2-2586043cc8b4
['Sahil Katyal']
2020-12-16 15:32:14.856000+00:00
['Love', 'Short Story', 'Thriller', 'Suspense']
Top 10 Most Effective SEO Tips
Imagine you know how to play the SEO (search engine optimization) game, what would it feels like for you? For the first time on this platform, you will be getting top best search engine optimization tips from On-page factors, to user experience to link building and more. I have discovered that writers on this platform hardly discuss about SEO and as an SEO expert, I want to share with you some effective SEO tips on how you can optimize your site for better search engine experience to get your site ranking top on search engines in no time. These tips are legit because it is what I have helped so many of my client with and today they are happy with their site ranking. Are you ready? Here they are: 1. Home Page When it comes to optimizing your site, your home page layout and architecture is one important factor to consider. Content on your home page should be clear, and also keep clear navigation so readers can find their way around your site thereby reducing your bounce rate. Also, keep your URL SEO friendly and contact information visible. 2. Keyword Research Conduct keyword research before creating any content on your site if you want to rank top on search engines. When conducting keywords research, choose your keywords wisely. You can steal your competitor’s keywords and tweak them to your advantage but, keep main keyword per page. Make sure each page/category on your site contain keywords you want to rank for and use them moderately. 3. Meta Description Keep your meta description under 150 to 160 characters and include your focus keyword within. If you blog on WordPress, I will advise that you search and download “Yoast SEO Plugin” if you have not done that. It is a complete WordPress SEO plugin used by experts worldwide. 4. Header Tags Place unique H1 tag on each page. Use focus keyword in your H1 and LSI keywords in H2 and H3. Avoid header tags in layout. 5. The Content To make your content SEO friendly, it is very important you use your focus keyword in your first paragraph. Long content correlates with higher rankings. Try to make all your content be above 800 words. Focus on keyword density so it won’t look like you are spamming because Google might flag you for that which will drastically affect your ranking. Try as much as possible to add internal and external links into the body of your content where it is relevant. Prioritize quality over frequency. 6. Link Building This is a big factor when it comes to better search engines experience. Create relationship with other webmasters and build links from high Domain Authority sites. If you can see, I said high DA sites not just any sites. If you build external links from low DA sites, you are just killing your site. If you must build backlinks from any sites, it must be from sites with DA of 25 and above for better experience. How do you build backlinks? · Commenting on blogs. · Contributing on online forums and leaving your links as a reference source for people to click and get detailed information on what you are discussing with them. · Social bookmarking · Guest posting Don’t make the mistake of only directing backlinks to your homepage. Also direct backlink to posts you want attention. The more backlinks linking to a particular post, the more it attracts Google bot to check that post to see if it is related to the post the link is coming from and if it, it will be index. 7. Image Optimization With your Yoast SEO Plugin, it is very easy to optimize your images by adding relevant “alt text”. Aside that, make sure to compress image size before uploading it to your blog. Save the image on your computer with the keyword you want that post to rank for. 8. Headlines This is what draws readers to your blog. If your headline is bad, you will hardly get visitors to your site. You must learn the art or else you will suffer from low traffic. Use tool like Buzzsumo to learn how to craft viral headlines that command clicks. If you know of any competitor’s headlines, you can use it but create a better content from the headlines. 9. Content Promotion Encourage readers to share your post by adding social media sharing buttons on each of your post so readers can share your content with their friends on social media. Set up rich pins on your site. Also, you should have a social media content promotion calendar which you should be using to share your blog posts. 10. Google Penalty Recovery Recovery from Google penalties is not straight forward and you should be very careful when removing links, de-indexing pages etc. If in doubt, consider employing the services of an experienced SEO consultant. But here are few tips for you to do: · Remove thin content. · Remove bad links e.g. broken links · Check for hacks/inserted links. · File a reconsideration request. These are the few SEO tips I have for you. Please, if you found very useful, encourage me by giving me a clap. Thank you in advance.
https://medium.com/weebo-media/top-10-most-effective-seo-tips-71582f017ecf
['Okon Joseph']
2018-03-16 10:04:28.945000+00:00
['SEO', 'Search Engine Optimizati', 'Google Ranking', 'Blogging For Business']
Flutter: Chat notifications using FCM in a socket.io powered chat app
A while ago, I wrote an article on how to create a chat app in flutter using a socket.io service. This application connects users to a websocket service and enables real time conversation. While the users can chat when they are online, the application disconnects them from the websocket when they come out of the application. This limitation brings us to the next major requirement in a chat app: receiving chat notifications when the app is running in the background. Taking a cue from my previous article, here I will add the functionality of receiving chat notifications using FCM (Firebase Cloud Messaging). Note: In this article, I am covering the changes for ANDROID devices only. Prerequisites This article is in continuation to my previous article: Flutter: A chat app in flutter using a Socket.IO service. Kindly follow the steps there before moving forward. Step#1: Create a new Firebase App Follow the steps here to create a new Firebase app. Do not forget to download the generated google-services.json and add Firebase SDKs to your android project. Step#2: Add required dependencies In the flutter chat_app, add the new dependencies required for the feature in the project’s pubspec.yaml. firebase_core: ^1.7.0 # required for initializing firebase app firebase_messaging: ^10.0.8 # required for sending/receiving messages through FCM flutter_local_notifications: ^6.0.0 # required to show chat notifications Download the new dependencies added above. $ flutter pub get Step#3: Enable your app to receive notifications In order to create local notifications, you need to add the required intent filter in your android/app/src/main/AndroidManifest.xml. <intent-filter> <action android:name="FLUTTER_NOTIFICATION_CLICK" /> <category android:name="android.intent.category.DEFAULT" /> </intent-filter> Step#4: Initialize Firebase Messaging and Local Notification Create a new dart file firebase/messaging.dart in lib and initialize FCM and Local Notification in it. import 'package:firebase_core/firebase_core.dart'; import 'package:firebase_messaging/firebase_messaging.dart'; import 'package:flutter_local_notifications/flutter_local_notifications.dart'; final FirebaseMessaging _fcm = FirebaseMessaging.instance; FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin _flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin; initializeMessaging() async { await Firebase.initializeApp(); _flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin = FlutterLocalNotificationsPlugin(); const AndroidInitializationSettings initializationSettingsAndroid = AndroidInitializationSettings("@mipmap/ic_launcher"); final InitializationSettings initializationSettings = InitializationSettings(android: initializationSettingsAndroid); await _flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin.initialize(initializationSettings, onSelectNotification: selectionNotification); FirebaseMessaging.onMessage.listen((RemoteMessage message) async { print("onMessage: $message"); await handleMessage(message); }); } Future<dynamic> selectionNotification(String payload) async { print('payload: $payload'); } handleMessage(RemoteMessage message) async { const AndroidNotificationDetails androidPlatformChannelSpecifics = AndroidNotificationDetails('CHAT', "CHAT", 'CHAT', importance: Importance.max, priority: Priority.high, showWhen: true); const NotificationDetails platformChannelSpecifics = NotificationDetails(android: androidPlatformChannelSpecifics); await _flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin.show(0, "New Messages", message.data['sender'] + ": " + message.data['message'], platformChannelSpecifics, payload: 'CHAT'); } Future<void> firebaseMessagingBackgroundHandler(RemoteMessage message) async { await initializeMessaging(); const AndroidNotificationDetails androidPlatformChannelSpecifics = AndroidNotificationDetails('CHAT', "CHAT", 'CHAT', importance: Importance.max, priority: Priority.high, showWhen: true); const NotificationDetails platformChannelSpecifics = NotificationDetails(android: androidPlatformChannelSpecifics); await _flutterLocalNotificationsPlugin.show(0, "New Messages", message.data['sender'] + ": " + message.data['message'], platformChannelSpecifics, payload: 'CHAT'); } Future<String> getFCMToken() async { return await _fcm.getToken(); } Firebase.initializeApp() initializes the Firebase app using the google-services.json you downloaded in your android project. FirebaseMessaging.onMessage.listen() listens to FCM messages and calls handleMessage() which displays the notification in your device. This handles notification when the app is in the foreground. firebaseMessagingBackgroundHandler() handles FCM messages when the app is in the background. getFCMToken() returns the FCM registration token. This token will be used by the websocket service to send FCM messages to offline (not connected to websocket) devices. Note: Do not create any class in firebase/messaging.dart as firebaseMessagingBackgroundHandler() is expected to an anonymous function. And finally, initialize FCM from main.dart. void main() async { WidgetsFlutterBinding.ensureInitialized(); initializeMessaging(); FirebaseMessaging.onBackgroundMessage(firebaseMessagingBackgroundHandler); ... runApp(MyApp()); } Step#5: Send FCM token to websocket service on connect In this step, we will let the websocket service know about the FCM token of a user. In chat.dart, while connecting to websocket, add queries to send userName & FCM token.
https://medium.com/nerd-for-tech/flutter-chat-notifications-using-fcm-in-a-socket-io-powered-chat-app-7fabe6a3d912
['Vikash Kumar']
2021-10-25 13:23:48.999000+00:00
['Flutter', 'Firebase', 'Messaging', 'Socketio', 'Notifications']
The Tale of Web Avenue
The Tale of Web Avenue It was a pleasant day in the computer avenue, the CPU was running at a moderate temperature, fans were running at optimal speeds, and Dev Coder was as usual busy programming(actually fixing bugs). Things turned upside down when Dev Coder was struck with a bug he couldn’t figure out. He asked the wisest man on computer avenue for help, he was none other than Chrome Singh. Dev Coder -Hey! Chrome Singh. Could you please guide me to stackoverflow.com? Chrome Singh -“I’m at your service sir. I’ll show you the way to stackoverflow.com right away and also give you about 6,24,00,00,000 results (0.79 seconds)”. Exclaimed Chrome Singh. Chrome followed the standard protocols and checked if it has the IP address in its cache memory(temporary memory). Chrome was disappointed that the IP address was unavailable in the browser cache.
https://medium.com/dsc-ghrce/the-tale-of-web-avenue-8842a9db7a9
['Shreyas Malewar']
2020-12-15 15:54:09.125000+00:00
['Web', 'Dscghrce', 'Internet', 'DNS', 'Ip Address']
Enterprise CI/CD Best Practices — Part 1
If you are trying to learn your way around Continuous Integration/Delivery/Deployment, you might notice that there are mostly two categories of resources: High-level overviews of what CI/CD is and why you need it. These are great for when you are getting started but do not cover anything about day two operations or how to optimize an existing process. Detailed tutorials that cover only a specific aspect of CI/CD (e.g., just unit testing or just deployment) using specific programming languages and tools. We believe that there is a gap between those two extremes. We are missing a proper guide that sits between those two categories by talking about best practices, but not in an abstract way. If you always wanted to read a guide about CI/CD that explains not just the “why” but also the “how” to apply best practices, then this guide is for you. We will describe all the basic foundations of effective CI/CD workflows, but instead of talking only in generic terms, we will explain all the technicalities behind each best practice and more importantly, how it can affect you if you don’t adopt it. Setting Priorities Several companies try to jump on the DevOps bandwagon without having mastered the basics first. You will soon realize that several problems which appear during the CI/CD process are usually pre-existing process problems that only became visible when that company tried to follow best practices in CI/CD pipelines. The table below summarizes the requirements discussed in the rest of the guide. We also split the requirements according to priority: Critical requirements are essential to have before adopting DevOps or picking a solution for CI/CD. You should address them first. If you don’t, then they will block the process later down the road. Requirements with High priority are still important to address, but you can fix them while you are adopting a CI/CD platform Requirements with Medium priority can be addressed in the long run. Even though they will improve your deployment process, you can work around them until you find a proper solution. Best Practice 1 — Place Everything Under Source Control Artifact management is perhaps the most important characteristic of a pipeline. At its most basic level, a pipeline creates binary/package artifacts from source code and deploys them to the appropriate infrastructure that powers the application that is being deployed. The single most important rule to follow regarding assets and source code is the following: All files that constitute an application should be managed using source control. Unfortunately, even though this rule seems pretty basic, there are a lot of organizations out there that fail to follow it. Traditionally, developers are using version control systems only for the source code of an application but leave out other supporting files such as installation scripts, configuration values, or test data. Everything that takes part in the application lifecycle should be checked into source control. This includes but is not limited to: Source code Build scripts Pipeline definition Configuration values Tests and test data Database schemas Database update scripts Infrastructure definition scripts Cleanup/installation/purging scripts Associated documentation The end goal is that anybody can check out everything that relates to an application and can recreate it locally or in any other alternative environment. A common anti-pattern we see is deployments happening with a special script that is available only on a specific machine or on the workstation of a specific team member, or even an attachment in a wiki page, and so on. Version control also means that all these resources are audited and have a detailed history of all changes. If you want to see how the application looked 6 months ago, you can easily use the facilities of your version control system to obtain that information. Note that even though all these resources should be versioned control, it doesn’t have to be in the same repository. Whether you use multiple repositories or a single one, is a decision that needs careful consideration and has not a definitive answer. The important part however is to make sure that everything is indeed version controlled. Even though GitOps is the emerging practice of using Git operations for promotions and deployments, you don’t need to follow GitOps specifically to follow this best practice. Having historical and auditing information for your project assets is always a good thing, regardless of the actual software paradigm that you follow. Best Practice 2 — Create a Single package/binary/container for All Environments One of the main functionalities of a CI/CD pipeline is to verify that a new feature is fit for deployment to production. This happens gradually as every step in a pipeline is essentially performing additional checks for that feature. For this paradigm to work, however, you need to make sure that what is being tested and prodded within a pipeline is also the same thing that gets deployed. In practice, this means that a feature/release should be packaged once and be deployed to all successive environments in the same manner. Unfortunately, a lot of organizations fall into the common trap of creating different artifacts for dev/staging/prod environments because they haven’t mastered yet a common infrastructure for configuration. This implies that they deploy a slightly different version of what was tested during the pipeline. Configuration discrepancies and last-minute changes are some of the biggest culprits when it comes to failed deployments, and having a different package per environment exacerbates this problem. Instead of creating multiple versions per environment, the accepted practice is to have a single artifact that only changes configuration between different environments. With the appearance of containers and the ability to create a self-sufficient package of an application in the form of Docker images, there is no excuse for not following this practice. Regarding configuration there are two approaches: The binary artifact/container has all configurations embedded inside it and changes the active one according to the running environment (easy to start, but not very flexible. We don’t recommend this approach) The container has no configuration at all. It fetches needed configuration during runtime on demand using a discovery mechanism such as a key/value database, a filesystem volume, a service discovery mechanism, etc. (the recommended approach) The result is the guarantee where the exact binary/package that is deployed in production is also the one that was tested in the pipeline. Best Practice 3 — Artifacts, not Git Commits, should travel within a Pipeline A corollary to the previous point (the same artifact/package should be deployed in all environments) is the fact that a deployment artifact should be built only once. The whole concept around containers (and VM images in the past) is to have immutable artifacts. An application is built only once with the latest feature or features that will soon be released. Once that artifact is built, it should move from each pipeline step to the next as an unchanged entity. Containers are the perfect vehicle for this immutability as they allow you to create an image only once (at the beginning of the pipeline) and promote it towards production with each successive pipeline step. Unfortunately, the common anti-pattern seen here is companies promoting commits instead of container images. A source code commit is traveling in the pipeline stages and each step is being rebuilt by checking out the source code again and again. This is a bad practice for two main reasons. First of all, it makes the pipeline very slow as packaging and compiling software is a very lengthy process and repeating it at each step is a waste of time and resources. Secondly, it breaks the previous rule. Recompiling a code commit at every pipeline step leaves the window open for resulting in a different artifact than before. You lose the guarantee that what is deploying in production is the same thing that was tested in the pipeline. Best Practice 4 — Use short-lived Branches for each feature A sound pipeline has several quality gates (such as unit tests or security scans) that test the quality of a feature and its applicability to production deployments. In a development environment with a high velocity (and a big development team), not all features are expected to reach production right away. Some features may even clash with each other at their initial deployment version. To allow for fine-grained quality gating between features, a pipeline should have the power to veto individual features and be able to select only a subset of them for production deployment. The easiest way to obtain this guarantee is following the feature-per-branch methodology where short-lived features (i.e. that can fit within a single development sprint) correspond to individual source control branches. This makes the pipeline design very simple as everything revolves around individual features. Running test suites against a code branch tests only the new feature. Security scanning of a branch reveals problems with a new feature. Project stakeholders are then able to deploy and rollback individual features or block complete branches from even being merged into the mainline code. Unfortunately, there are still companies that have long-lived feature branches that collect multiple and unrelated features in a single batch. This not only makes merging a pain but also becomes problematic in case a single feature is found to have issues (as it is difficult to revert it individually). The evolution of short-lived branches is to follow trunk-based development and feature toggles. This can be your endgame but only if you have mastered short-lived branches first. Best Practice 5 — A basic build should take a single step CI/CD pipelines are all about automation. It is very easy to automate something that already was very easy to run in the first place. Ideally, a simple build of a project should be a single command. That command usually calls the build system or a script (e.g., bash, PowerShell) that is responsible for taking the source code, running some basic tests, and packaging the final artifact/container. It is ok if more advanced checks (such as load testing) need additional steps. The basic build, however (that results in a deployable artifact) should only involve a single command. A new developer should be able to check out a brand new copy of the source code, execute this single command and get immediately a deployable artifact. The same approach is true for deployments (deployments should happen with a single command) Then if you need to create any pipeline you can simply insert that single step in any part of the pipeline. Unfortunately, there are still companies that suffer from many manual steps to get a basic build running. Downloading extra files, changing properties, and in general having big checklists that need to be followed are steps that should be automated within that very same script. If a new hire in your development team needs more than 15 minutes for the basic build (after checking out the code in their workstation) then you almost certainly suffer from this problem. A well-built CI/CD pipeline just repeats what is already possible on the local workstation. The basic build and deploy process should be already well oiled before being moved into a CI/CD platform. Best Practice 6 — Basic Builds are Fast (5–10 minutes) Having a fast build is a big advantage for both developers and operators/sysadmins. Developers are happy when the feedback loop between a commit and its side effects is as short as possible. It is very easy to fix a bug in the code that you just committed as it is very fresh on your mind. Having to wait for one hour before developers can detect failed builds is a very frustrating experience. Builds should be fast both in the CI platform and in the local station. At any given point in time, multiple features are trying to enter the code mainline. The CI server can be easily overwhelmed if building them takes a lot of time. Operators also gain huge benefits from fast builds. Pushing hot fixes in production or rolling back to previous releases is always a stressful experience. The shorter this experience is the better. Rollbacks that take 30 minutes are much more difficult to work with than those that take three minutes. In summary, a basic build should be really fast. Ideally less than five minutes. If it takes more than 10 minutes, your team should investigate the causes and shorten that time. Modern build systems have great caching mechanisms. Library dependencies should be fetched from an internal proxy repository instead of the internet Avoid the use of code generators unless otherwise needed Split your unit (fast) and integration tests (slow) and only use unit tests for the basic build Fine-tune your container images to take full advantage of the Docker layer caching Getting faster builds is also one of the reasons that you should explore if you are moving to microservices. Best Practice 7 — Store/Cache Your Dependencies It’s all over the news. The left-pad incident. The dependency confusion hack. While both incidents have great security implications, the truth is that storing your dependencies is also a very important tenet that is fundamental to the stability of your builds. Every considerable piece of code uses external dependencies in the form of libraries or associated tools. Your code should of course be always stored in Git. But all external libraries should be also stored by you in some sort of artifact repository. Spend some time to collect our dependencies and understand where they are coming from. Apart from code libraries, other not-so-obvious moving parts are needed by a complete build as your base docker images or any command-line utilities that are needed for your builds. The best way to test your build for stability is to completely cut off internet access in your build servers (essentially simulating an air-gapped environment). Try to kick off a pipeline build where all your internal services (git, databases, artifact storage, container registry) are available, but nothing else from the public internet is accessible, and see what happens. . If your build complains about a missing dependency, imagine that the same thing will happen in a real incident if that particular external resource is also down. Continued on part2. Cover photo by Unsplash.
https://medium.com/containers-101/enterprise-ci-cd-best-practices-part-1-94a0aa87b4e
['Kostis Kapelonis']
2021-06-14 11:14:20.140000+00:00
['Cloud', 'Continuous Deployment', 'Continuous Delivery', 'Continuous Integration', 'DevOps']
Floating Pond Fountain — How To Choose The Right One
Homeowners can add a valuable “element” to their outdoor landscape. Are you one of those homeowners who are always ecstatic and open to ideas of decorating their homes and properties? This piece could belong to your interests! Read to know more. Floating Pond Fountain A tremendous and heartfelt pressure amounts to have a costly addition for home improvement, but at the same time, the budget relents. Have you been there for most of the time? To be honest, a Floating Pond Fountain would be an excellent investment if you can pull it off. Let’s say you can, then what? How to choose the right one? We’re here to help you with that in the following. Fountain of the right size People are under the impression that a pond fountain does what it does in all cases — aerate the pond. However, that’s not true. It truly depends on the size of the pond and therefore, would require a bottom aeration unit in bigger ponds. Economical options We raised the idea of Floating Pond Fountains because they are cheaper, efficient, and versatile. You can use the floating pond fountain for aerating different areas and it requires minimum efforts for installing the same. It’s fair enough to say that it is an economical option as compared to the fixed ones. Package choices We are delighted to say that you can order packages of floating pond fountains and get various things in the same kit. From LED lights to spray patterns, you can pick them all in a complete package and not bother buying individual units.
https://medium.com/@fountains2go/floating-pond-fountain-how-to-choose-the-right-one-4ffe13c8ff7a
[]
2019-03-18 09:28:34.354000+00:00
['Surface Aerators', 'Decorating', 'Fountain', 'Home', 'Home Improvement']
Trump’s ‘Emergency’ Arms Sales
Terry H. Schwadron June 17, 2019 Amid our overwhelming piles of partisan politics, here comes an issue in which senators from both parties seem to be ready to stand against Donald Trump — approval of “emergency” arms sales to Saudi Arabia to pursue the war in Yemen. When the issue arises as soon as this week, you might raise both eyebrows to note that a number of Senate Republicans will be crossing over to stand with Democrats on opposing the sales. The Senate actually is voting on a set of 22 resolutions of disapproval for the sales, a vote to block each of the sales of different weapons groups. Weirdly, of course, this issue is arising as tensions in the region are on high alert as the result of another attack on oil tankers in the Persian Gulf, an attack that the United States says was ordered by Iran. In return, Iran not only denies it, but now is threatening to start processing uranium again. Basically, the reasons are two: Senators in both parties are upset with Saudi Arabia, especially since last year’s murder in Turkey of American journalist Jamal Khashoggi allegedly at the order of Saudi prince Muhammad Bin Salman, and enough senators are offended by Trump’s declaration of “emergency” conditions to try to bypass normal congressional reviews for the sales. Opponents need the 47 Democratic votes plus four Republicans for a necessary simple majority. They should have that and more: Republican Senators Rand Paulof Kentucky, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Todd Young of Indiana and Mike Lee of Utah have indicated they will co-sponsor the opposition bill, and others are expected to follow. Indeed, issue in the end may come down to whether enough Republicans will stand with the opposition to withstand a certain Trump veto of the measures. Overall, this vote is looking to parallel an earlier note of Senate approbation for Trump policy-making. The Senate voted to halt U.S. support for Saudi war-making in Yemen, only to draw a presidential veto; the Senate lacked the 67 votes needed to override the veto. Trump has invoked an emergency provision under the Arms Export Control Act to push through the sales without a congressional review period. Because lawmakers are challenging the sales under the same law, they need only a simple majority to send the resolutions to the president, according to The Hill.com. This move to block the sales reflects growing frustration on Capitol Hill about the U.S.-Saudi relationship and would come after two other votes fell short in recent years to block arms deals with Saudi Arabia. One, in 2016, got support from only 27 senators; in June 2017, a second won backing from 47 senators. Since then, U.S.-Saudi relations have soured further amid growing concerns about Saudi Arabia’s involvement in the years-long Yemen civil war and the Khashoggi killing with no apparent U.S. response. The 22 weapons sales would also send weapons to the United Arab Emirates and Jordan, including precision-guided bombs, Patriot missiles, mortar rounds, drones, fighter jet parts and other military support. The Trump administration cited a heightened threat from Iran as its justification for invoking the emergency sales. In remarks for a House committee hearing, R. Clarke Cooper, the assistant secretary of State for political-military affairs, said, “These sales and the associated emergency certification are intended to address the military need of our partners in the face of an urgent regional threat posed by Iran; promote the vitality of our bilateral relationships by reassuring our partners; and preserve strategic advantage against near-peer competitors.” Among the Republican senators, the measure is drawing favorable comments, but few commitments yet from Senators Susan Collins of Maine, Steve Daines of Montana, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Jerry Moran of Kansas, who had voted with Democrats on the earlier measure to end support for the Saudi military campaign in Yemen. Republicans Marco Rubio of Florida, Cory Gardner of Colorado, and Mitt Romney of Utah, said they were more upset by the “emergency” procedures being declared more than by the arms sales themselves. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell indicated that the mathematics of the earlier vote on ending support for the Yemen campaign might hold again. Failure to overcome the veto allowed the support to continue. Democratic Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut, a major sponsor, said opposition would face a battle in overcoming the expected veto. Still, the issue shows that beneath all the partisan overlay, there is some kind of conscience breathing among Senate Republicans. ## www.terryschwadron.wordpress.com
https://medium.com/@terryschwadron/trumps-emergency-arms-sales-1cf54fbf48b4
['Terry Schwadron']
2019-06-17 11:02:04.803000+00:00
['Republicans', 'Trump', 'Foreign Policy', 'Saudi Arabia', 'Congress']
HOT WIRED TO MARRY AT THIRTY
ERROR: type should be string, got "https://www.pinterest.com/pin/3870349653674781/\n\nIn your twenties, the world is full of opportunities and most people would try a million activities if they could. You would have been done with schooling, might have learnt a new skill or you might be practicing a new religion while others may spontaneously feel out of place and without balance, not knowing what they really want to do. Your thirties, is when you build and maintain whatever facts and specifics you have approved in your twenties. You start to see life more differently and most definitely would be able to identify real from fake.\n\nBack when I was in high school, I always felt cocoons of failure whenever I got to school late. Especially in situations when I got so close to the school gate before I heard the bell. The world around me would suddenly be paused and I would start to sense a quick gush of bad luck and weary in me. I then equally start to think about what punishment and penalty I would have to face before heading to class.\n\nThis is an exact expression of how young adults of today feel when they have five to seven years more to thirty. They start to slander themselves into multiple relationships just to find the right one and settle on or before they clock thirty years of age.\n\nHastiness becomes the tenant of the minds of females at 23, 24 and 25 years. Fear and abolishment becomes the bearer of statues in the minds of 26, 27 and 29 years old females and regret and guilt fully embraces the heart of 30 years old females.\n\nA recent survey showed that little of 10% of 100 would find their spouse or partner at ages below twenty years, therefore the loop of time for marriage becomes a supposed marathon relay ground where males and females who are young adults start to meander in the thoughts and actions of finding the ‘one’ before the caution line is drawn.\n\nIts gets harder for women who are not yet married after they clock thirty years old in Africa. They swiftly become bearers of guilt, and some tends to acquire a huge contempt for motivational speakers and advisors. The sensation of a door being shut at an open space begins to crawl on them, darkness gradually starts to creep on their initial glooming lights. This feeling has arguably led some of them to in turn ‘settle for less’ just to get off the dash board of misery.\n\nAlthough, biology qualifies masculinity over femininity in terms of sex organ deterioration over years of growth. So it is justifiable and advisable for the female gender to be rather hasty and cautious of the time slander (THIRTY YEARS).\n\nIn past times, research showed that majority got married when they were in their twenties. Thus the thirty years old operando is just a new norm. The puppet race the current generation has gotten themselves into, have been drawn farther by other pursuit due course. Some of which are pursuant of wealth, equality, advocacy and inner peace as the case may be.\n\nWhy have you been wired to marry at thirty?\n\n- Historical flaws.\n\n- Congenial advices.\n\nHistorical flaws:\n\nEven when you try not to bulge, concerning history has its way of attracting scenarios towards you. While you were a kid, you probably have heard stories of how your grandparents met themselves in their twenties and got married. Hell! This might even be the same age bracket at which your parents got married.\n\nHypothetically, you feel obligated to do so or even worse because of the present age and time the world is in, where even at your twenties you are still not confident that you would get your life on track after so many advances towards several activities. When you finally do get your life together, the next and appropriate decade to then do as your parents have, would be when you are thirty. You start to feel some homogeneity in you, just because your siblings also got married on or before thirty.\n\nIt automatically gets registered to you that it is only right to get married on or before thirty. Observation have shown that a better percentage of men got married at a younger age just because their parents had done it at the same age and they feel the same obligations to tread their footprints.\n\nCongenial advices:\n\nI once had a friend who was advised into getting married, when she was twenty three. An advice continually rung into her intuition solely because she was done with her first degree. The greatest of this persuasions have been seen to come from clergies and sometimes parents. You get the same symphony of words from your parents and it comes right back through your clergy man. And you start to think you are getting way too old not to have been married. Most times, it is as a result of them seeing that you are done with schooling, or have achieved a major break at a younger age. You then get advices like, its best you do get married now, it would be young and fun for you, and you would have so many years to enjoy marriage. Sadly, so many young adults have been lured by this little but constant push into toxic marriages.\n\nWhy should you get married at thirty?\n\nNo one knows the amount of time they have till other major breakthroughs and mile stones of their life’s. When you would finally get that doctorate degree, when you would equally buy your own house or when you would entertain others at the lunching of your own company. So, it is rather normal than rational to want to get married alongside, whilst you achieve all you want. My ideology is to ask yourself if you have settled other ‘ally’s’ of your life before wanting to enter into an eternal commitment such as marriage. ‘Ally’s’ being spiritually, educationally, financially, morally, economically, socially. If you have settled all of this to a minimum, then I feel you might just be ready for marriage.\n\nF.S.O"
https://medium.com/@fatunlasamuel/hot-wired-to-marry-at-thirty-fcb576087c46
['Fatunla Samuel']
2020-12-11 04:54:33.570000+00:00
['Marriage', 'Love', 'Youth', 'Family']
The Price They Pay
The Price They Pay The Human Cost of Collegiate Athletics Memorial Stadium Newman Field William Bassett sits in a black office chair in the training room in the Graham Athletic Center moving and clicking a mouse across a desktop computer. The sophomore lacrosse player is taking his fifth imPACT concussion assessment test. His curly black hair, still slick with sweat from practice, gets in his eyes and he wonders if that’s what is slowing him down. When the test is over, he looks over at the trainers and heads to the locker room to change before he gets his results. It’s slow Friday afternoon in the training room — only about 15 athletes had signed in. College athletics have long provided “physical fitness, leadership skills, discipline, recreation and entertainment to student-athletes and others, often at a relatively low cost,” writes Forbes reporter Richard Vedder in March, 2018 article The Three Reasons College Sports Is An Ugly Business. The article discusses how athletes at major schools generate millions of dollars in revenue for the institutions but are often treated badly in the process. These Division 1 athletes don’t get a share of the money they make and there are numerous examples of colleges purposely dumbing down college classes for their athletes to keep them on the courts and away from the classroom. Vedder lists many occasions, but this one stuck out: “In North Carolina, thousands of students, many of them athletes, took phantom courses that made a mockery of academic integrity and the NCAA did nothing substantively.” Just because collegiate athletics are a bargain asset for campuses and their extended communities, though, doesn’t mean it doesn’t come with a cost. Especially for the scholar-athletes who put in thousands of hours of practice and make sacrifices for the chance to play in college. According to the National Collegiate Athletic Association, the governing body overseeing collegiate athletics, fewer than two percent of college athletes will have a professional career. For most, this is the peak of competition. Athletics at Whittier College became prominent in the 1920s. Back then, the school competed against national powerhouses such as USC and UCLA. The struggling football team has a storied history, not the least of which is because former president, Richard M. Nixon, was a benchwarmer. Currently, the school offers a wide variety of Division III sports for student-athletes, including football, basketball, cross country, soccer, swimming and diving, tennis, track and field, lacrosse, water polo, golf, women’s softball and volleyball, and men’s baseball. We compete in the Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SCIAC), against eight other area schools including Chapman, Occidental, La Verne and other similarly situated schools. The Whittier Poets take their athletics seriously. The student body consists of 30.2 percent athletes according to the Whittier College website. Walking around campus, it’s easy to spot the athletes with their Under Armor-sponsored gear, backpacks, hoodies, t-shirts, pants, shoes, etc. Every athlete gets a custom set of apparel each season, as long as you can pay. In Division III, you don’t get scholarships and the athletic department does not pay for the apparel and gear for most sports. Gearing up can range from $150-$300 out of pocket. Even on our small campus, it takes two hands to count the number of people on crutches or riding those leg scooters. Most are athletes. It may be hard now to imagine a future prices to pay for playing college sports, but a 2017 Sports Illustrated article looking at Division 1 athletes noted that two-thirds sustained major injuries and half of those became chronic. College athletes are 2.5 times more likely to suffer from chronic injuries than non athletes. Old injuries are no joke. Studies cited in the SI article indicate that health problems associated with injuries sustained playing college sports grow over time as the injuries limit former athletes’ abilities to exercise — leading to increased risk for cardiovascular disease. According to the article, one study showed former college athletes perform worse in physical fitness tests than non athletes later in life. “You get a physical on the way in,” says Paul Weinacht, a former offensive lineman at Stanford University who is quoted in the article. “But there isn’t a physical on the way out. No one asks about your injuries when you leave.”
https://medium.com/engl-201/the-price-they-pay-7330545fd91d
['Keylee Leong']
2020-03-10 21:45:55.445000+00:00
['Whittier College', 'Sports', 'Concussions', 'Athletics']
Browsing courses on Cademy 2.0 🎉 — Changelog #11
Why? How often do you know exactly what you want to order when you open your takeout app of choice? When was the last time you opened Netflix and knew exactly what you wanted to watch? It happens sometimes, but just as frequently you tend to browse and explore and let serendipity determine your fate. This is why we’ve decided to redesign our browsing experience to encourage exploration and discovery. This is the very first step towards our vision of the future of Cademy. Behold ! 🎓Cademy 2.0! A new home page & search experience Featured courses Subject areas and categories We launched the first version of Cademy exactly three weeks ago, and we have been working around the clock to bring it closer to our vision of the future. We hope you’ll enjoy the new look and if you have any comments or feedback please post a comment below or email us. Don’t forget that you can keep in the loop with all our updates on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and on our blog. Or sign up below for email updates:
https://medium.com/cademy/browsing-courses-on-cademy-2-0-changelog-11-e44cd588949a
['Adrian Binzaru']
2020-04-06 17:44:37.004000+00:00
['Cademy Changelog', 'Startup', 'Education', 'Product', 'Updates']
Why Do You Want Okinawa Flat Belly Tonic?
Why Do You Want Okinawa Flat Belly Tonic? Okinawa flat Tummy Tonic is uncommonly planned from 100% normal fixings that could assist people with killing their exorbitant fat misfortune during the pandemic. Level Paunch Tonic arrives in a powder structure and thus it is not difficult to be overcome with water as you take your exercise center protein shake. The Fat misfortune supplement begins working from the underlying driver to kill the fats from its foundations and assists you with totally liberating from fats gain ever throughout everyday life. No Concerns By any stretch of the imagination, Okinawa is the best Regular Enhancement for normal weight reduction. This regular enhancement works by consuming the unnatural fats acquired by your body during the pandemic. As per the item amalgamation group, the enhancement is an amazing combination of spices and flavors that are demonstrated to support weight reduction and upgrade your body’s digestion. Digestion is a characteristic course of our body to change over food into energy while keeping it from going to create fats. The Okinawa Tonic is ready from Japanese methods to help in weight reduction. The Item has shown itself to be awesome and powerful as far as losing the gut fats from your body.
https://medium.com/@ziasaad5/why-do-you-want-okinawa-flat-belly-tonic-2c134e34d7ac
[]
2021-10-26 11:45:40.912000+00:00
['Okinawaflatbellytonic', 'Okinawa Flat Belly', 'Fat Burning Foods', 'Okina', 'Fatlossjourney']
Mike Pence has women problems
Photo by History in HD on Unsplash An unexpected “tell” about the depths of Vice President Mike Pence’s anti-woman decay came about an hour into the debate. Before then, Pence interrupted his opponent, Sen. Kamala Harris, multiple times and filibustered the debate moderator, USA Today’s Washington Bureau Chief Susan Page, by ignoring time limit rules. Every woman watching this behavior recognized their own experiences with men interrupting and talking over them, which is why Sen. Harris’ firm, no nonsense “I’m speaking” comeback resonated widely. While this display of “mansplaining” was beyond frustrating, (I yelled at the television twice and tweeted multiple times my thoughts about Pence’s disrespect) it was somewhat par for the Republican course. His crime-boss partner, Donald Trump, did much worse to Vice President Joe Biden and moderator Chris Wallace of Fox News. What surprised me, in addition to The Fly, was his statement about Judge Amy Coney Barrett: “[S]he’s a brilliant woman, and she will bring a lifetime of experience and a sizeable American family to the Supreme Court of the United States…” I immediately wondered, “Is there no childcare for justices? Why does she have to bring her “sizeable American family” to the Supreme Court? Comedian Sarah Cooper tweeted, “I guess one of Pence’s criteria for female Supreme Court judges is fertility.” Yet, I don’t think this remark has come under a lot of scrutiny. What did he mean? It was an odd remark, and he said it oddly. With gusto and a touch of glee. Considering he comes across as a pretty placid guy, the way in which he said it made an impression. It gave me pause about Pence and the entire Trump-Republican establishment’s deep-seated retrograde attitudes towards women. The comment seemed pregnant with meaning, especially with Pence’s backward attitudes toward working mothers and child care. Pence’s record as radio personality, congressman, governor of Indiana and vice president is full of statements, votes, policies and actions that target women and LGBTQ people for disenfranchisement, attempting to make us second-class citizens. Pence’s debate comment on Coney Barrett and her family came in the context of a very pointed question about abortion and overturning Roe v Wade, which he dodged answering. Pence, who grew up Catholic and became “born-again” as a young adult, seemed, in his smarmy way, referring to a Catholic trope by emphasizing Coney Barrett’s “sizeable” family. Coney Barrett is Catholic, and reportedly, a member of an ultra-conservative Catholic community called People of Praise. Was this a cynical ploy to appeal to Catholic voters? Trump won the Catholic vote in 2016, but there is much dissatisfaction with Trump in 2020 among Catholics. Joe Biden, who is Catholic, appears to have peeled away that support. But the comment also came in a bigger context of the 2020 elections, the massive gender gap between Trump and Biden among women, and Pence’s dodge on overturning Roe v. Wade and implementing a ban on abortion. It also came just a week or so before Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s and his gruesome GOP zombie cohort’s brazen attempts to force down the throats of the American people a Trump nominee for a lifetime appointment on the highest court of the land. By not answering the question, and instead placing an emphasis on Coney Barrett, Pence just followed the Republican playbook: evade, deny, lie and stonewall. Trump did the same in his debate with Biden when he said, “Roe is not on the ballot.” Like Pence, Coney Barrett holds widely-known conservative views on birth control and the Affordable Care Act, Roe v. Wade and abortion, same-sex marriage and LGBTQ rights. Many are also concerned about her out-of-the-mainstream views and legal opinions may also extend to putting limits on in vitro fertilization (IVF), stem cell research, potentially elevating embryos and fetuses to personhood with the same rights as born people. She also held a clerkship with one of SCOTUS’ most conservative justices, Antonin Scalia, and says she shares the same “judicial philosophy” as he. That could also put the Obergefell v. Hodges same-sex marriage decision in danger of being overturned. Pence’s comment brought to mind the administration’s promises to ultra-conservative billionaires and evangelicals to overturn the ACA, Roe v. Wade and same-sex marriage, by reifying the image of the family as Coney Barrett’s: white, heterosexual, with many children and the mother fully in charge of them all. Pence’s comment seemed to signal that Roe v Wade is a linchpin in the decades-long attempt, by the Republican-led coalition of far-right, extremist groups and billionaires, to roll back democratic rights and gains women have made. First they come for abortion, then they come for birth control, then they come for science-based health care, family planning and research. They also come for women’s personhood, roles and the definition of family, all in the name of theocracy not democracy. (And if that’s not enough, as Harris said at the debate, “If you have a preexisting condition — heart disease, diabetes, breast cancer — they’re coming for you…”) If Pence is proud to be “pro- [fetus] life,” why not come clean and say they want to ban abortion? Why bury it in a pivot? Maybe it’s because the majority of Americans, Catholic voters included, support Roe v. Wade and other hard-won rights that conservatives want to do away with, such as access to birth control, same-sex marriage, and the Affordable Care Act. U.S. Catholics are racially and ethnically diverse, and politically split fairly evenly between Democrat and Republican. Yet, a majority, especially Catholic women, support keeping abortion legal. The day after the debate, news broke that 13 men were arrested for plotting to kidnap and possibly kill the governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer. Misogyny and terrorism, unleashed by the Trump administration, on frightening display. Between the president’s tweets and speeches there is enough evidence to show his disdain for living up to America’s promise of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. But with Pence, his contempt is quieter. Under the radar. It’s in comments like bringing “a sizeable American family” to the Supreme Court. Pence is the sheen guy. He gives this administration the patina of respectability. Or as NY Times columnist Timothy Egan said, “Pence is not just the great enabler of Trump’s awfulness, but the man who puts a godly sheen on it. In that sense, he’s more dangerous, and arguably more evil, than Trump.”
https://medium.com/engendered/mike-pence-has-women-problems-8f19339e9f0a
['Teresa Albano']
2020-10-14 00:50:42.798000+00:00
['Politics', 'Society', 'Women', 'Womens Rights', 'Election 2020']
QANX Token listing on PancakeSwap and Uniswap on June 2 (~2:00 PM UTC)[continuosly updated]
Launchpads The opportunity to buy QANX Token on several launchpads will be possible soon since many QANplatform community members asked for Launchpad allocations before the PancakeSwap and Uniswap listing. Update: Tokenomics Roadmap QANplatform — QAN blockchain platform QANplatform is the Quantum-resistant hybrid blockchain platform. Developers and Enterprises can build software applications like DApps or DeFi and run business processes rapidly on blockchain. QANplatform is the fastest blockchain to deploy to cloud platforms like Amazon AWS or Linode. “QANplatform’s key mission is to build a future-proof blockchain platform, not just another one on the list. Quantum-resistant security is their USP, but QAN takes one step back and focuses on lowering the entry barrier for the developer community, so startups and enterprises can build their Proof-of-Concepts (PoC) and Minimum Viable Products (MVP) as fast as possible to reach mass adoption. We solve this issue with building integrations to existing and widely used and loved programming languages (Rust), DevOps technologies (Docker, Kubernetes) and Cloud Platforms like Amazon AWS. Thanks to our unique development, QANplatform is the fastest blockchain to deploy on the market. Developers can deploy QAN private blockchain to Amazon AWS in <5 minutes.” says Johann Polecsak, Co-Founder and CTO of QANplatform Pitch deck: click to read White paper: click to read Technical white paper: click to read — — — NOTE: This article is the only credible source and will be updated continuously. — — — About QANplatform: QANplatform is the Quantum-resistant hybrid blockchain platform. Developers and Enterprises can build software applications like DApps or DeFi and run business processes rapidly on blockchain. QANplatform is the fastest blockchain to deploy to cloud platforms like Amazon AWS or Linode. Website: qanplatform.com Twitter: https://twitter.com/qanplatform Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/QANplatform Telegram: https://t.me/QANplatform
https://medium.com/qanplatform/qanx-token-listing-on-pancakeswap-and-uniswap-on-june-2-2-00-pm-utc-continiuosly-updated-e3d6b3616b45
[]
2021-09-05 18:20:09.360000+00:00
['Uniswap', 'Pancakeswap', 'Qanplatform', 'Blockchain', 'Cryptocurrency']
How I Write
It always starts with a line. The line is my way in, a port of call and entry. I think of the line as a house boarded up and dead-bolted shut. Outside, a pack of hungry thieves hovers. They survey the surroundings, search the terrain, try the windows and doors until they find an opening. A frame of glass, a means to break in. The line could exist anywhere in the story — it doesn’t matter where it falls, only its existence matters. If anything, I prefer to start in the middle because then I’m not daunted by the space I need to fill below. A line buys me time until I figure out the rest. One line builds upon another until the story takes shape and form. The ending? Your guess is as good as mine. I know the ending when it reaches its conclusion. I’ve no grand plan, no Nabokovian notecards. I only have that hot first line. I’m what Zadie Smith would call a “Micro Manager,” “Micro Managers like me build a house floor by floor, discreetly and in its entirety. Each floor needs to be sturdy and fully decorated with all the furniture in place before the next is built on top of it. There’s wallpaper in the hall even if the stairs lead nowhere at all. Because Micro Managers have no grand plan, their novels exist only in their present moment, in a sensibility, in the novel’s tonal frequency line by line.” Make no mistake, I don’t craft one perfect line to the next. I’m meticulous about the arrangement of sentences, not their movement. After that first line, I need a torrent, velocity. This fucker’s got to move fast to hold my attention. Let me explain. I played clarinet for thirteen years. I was good at it but never great because I’d rather write to music than play it. But I learned a great deal about writing in the playing. For example, I loved a run. Playing a long stretch of notes without breathing, ascending or descending chromatically. Especially on the upper register. The elegant slur of your fingers tapping the keys, the breathless nature of it, and the feeling of being carried by the music were exhilarating. Back then, I used to hold my breath underwater so I could take larger gulps of the music. I could swallow half of a page of sheet music before I keeled over. That’s how I preferred to play — squeezing in every note I could until I could no longer breathe. It took me years to appreciate tonguing the reed and its abrupt staccato, which felt halting and violent. I hated articulating notes, I wanted to be the drunk at the bar slurring them. Until I realized you needed the staccato to appreciate the run. It was a break in the music, a moment where the player (and the audience) could collect itself and rest. The beauty is in the balance of the two and knowing when to use which. I think about that in my writing, how the first line has to come out swinging. How it needs enough momentum to carry a paragraph and then I stop. There’s my beat, my rest. I think about that as I’m editing the paragraph. Creating a series of manic lines juxtaposed with a three-word, monosyllabic sentence. Even within the run, I need the illusion of a break. I’m no Faulkner, I don’t engage in a rap battle with the semi-colon, crafting run-on sentences that find their inevitable conclusion at the bottom of the page (bless that man, but it ain’t me). Or two. After the first paragraph, I read it aloud. I’m 44 and I’ve been writing since I was six, so you do the math. Why I mention this is that I’m practiced. Immediately, I’ll know if I’ve missed the mark on cadence and rhythm. I’ll know which word is the culprit, which “bumped” me (a workshop term I abhor, but it works). Meaning, if the word has too many or too few syllables. Whether the word doesn’t do the job another word can. I’m meticulous about word choice, as I believe the words you choose and the arrangement in the sentence have to work on at least two levels — one, a pragmatic explanation of what’s going on, and two, what’s really going on under the sheets. Unless you’re Ben Marcus or that experimental crowd where the art is in the line and the story doesn’t have to be practical (or make sense) to the reader. For that crew, the story is subservient (or at times irrelevant) to the music of the line. I fall somewhere in the middle. I like to fuck with words and their arrangement but I don’t want you wading in the dark without a map, compass, or at the very least, a flashlight. When I examine the paragraph, I’m a pathologist. I like to look at it on a macro level — did this graph convey what I wanted it to? Does it leave an opening for what comes next? Does the arrangement of the sentences make sense? Do they have a logical order to them? Can the reader move relatively swiftly through them? Then, I excavate at the line level as mentioned above, but I also consider how I’m using words to evoke an image or mood. I pick my battles with this because I can often veer in the territory where I get too imaginative and fussy at the line level and that just fucks up the story. Instead, I ask myself whether I’ve challenged the words I’m using and how I’m using them. While I think it’s important to learn all these arbitrary rules, the mark of a writer is how they break them. I’ll transform nouns into verbs. I’ll turn an image or an allusion on its head. For example, I wrote in a story (which I can’t remember), “Watch as I open the door to my heart and all the mothballs flutter out.” In that line, I liken my heart to a locked chest. One that hasn’t been opened in a while, and when it does there’s this massive exhalation of the old and a welcoming of the new. Then, I look at the adjacent lines. Do I have too many long sentences without a break? Depending on the story, I’ll think about how I can merge exterior interruptions with the interior nature of the narrative. A perfect example of this is in Delillo’s White Noise, a prescient novel, ironically enough, about a toxic America. Threatened by some airborne event, sickened by consumerism, capitalism, and technology. I remember reading that book when I was 24 and nearly passing out because this fucker had such a way with a paragraph. Delillo could encompass an entire world in and out of your living room in two adjacent sentences. In the novel, you have a series of white noise interruptions in the story in the form of radio & television announcements, background and ambient sounds, sirens, the hum of personal computers, and microwaves. All of this to say I often “interrupt” or inject paragraphs with outside information whether it’s a song that relates and amplifies the sentence that preceded it, or a bit of dialogue. I love this because it opens up the story. Makes it larger than what it is on the page. I liken it to surgery where our skin is the shield for a symbiotic network of organs, bone, marrow, blood, etc., it’s a story contained. Neat and functional. Then, you cut the body open and you introduce tools and fingers and the world that exists outside of your body. It’s an invitation for the exterior to play nice with the interior. To internalize the beauty (or horrors) of the outside world. I don’t write the kind of stories you settle into, rather you’re always on guard, waiting for the attack. Many people don’t like this. I don’t care. I’m not writing for everyone. Everyone will tell you that if you want to get better at writing, you have to read. Nothing new to see here, folks, but I read with a scalpel. I will literally cut pages out of a book (not so much anymore — but this was big for me in the 1980s and 90s) or copy sentences from a book to a new sheet of paper and analyze them for days. Why did I like this particular sentence, paragraph, or scene? I’ll zoom and in out until I figure out what the author’s done and how I can make it my own. One of my literary heroes, Jenny Offill, notes in a recent interview, “But if you’re someone who is trying to move to a more pared-down language, or language that is trying to do things at a couple of different levels at the same time, the workshop environment can be difficult. So I try to teach my students to read at the line level, because I think that’s what’s helpful: to start thinking about what they’re writing line by line, as well as the bigger picture. I’m also always trying to make them read things in different genres: poetry or essays or non-fiction or primary sources from science or anthropology. I want them to get a sense of the strangeness of language. It reminds you that there are all these different ways in which you can create density and give a vital feeling to the words on the page.” On the line and paragraph level, I look to writers like Jenny Offill, Amy Hempel, Raymond Carver (and that whole Gordon Lish gang). I’ll look at poetry (poets.org is an excellent place to explore) to understand how to be economic with the words I use and how I use them. Poetry is tyrannical in this way and there’s much to be learned on a line level. But then when the paragraph is over, I keep moving. I build the story paragraph by paragraph. I’ll step back and read each aloud as I build and then read 2–3 together to see if I’ve got the rhythm and pacing right. Is there a logical (at least to me) movement in the story. It doesn’t need to be chronological — for the life of me, I can barely write anything in chronological order because I view time as cyclical rather than linear, but I digress — it just needs to be progressive. Am I taking my reader through a journey or spinning them in circles? Granted, I want to challenge my readers, but I’m not keen on torturing them. Notice how I said “my” readers because not everyone will come to my work, but for the people who do, I want to make sure their ride is fairly smooth. While I know every story could feasibly go on forever, I know when to end it. It’s more of a feeling like I’m turning into a rest stop where it may not be completely finished, but it’s finished for right now until I give the page (or screen) some breathing room and I return fresh. Most of the work I publish here is a first draft and normally takes about an hour or so to write, unless it’s for a publication for which I’ll go through a round or two of edits. I’m not precious about my work or attach any emotion to it even though much of my work is emotive in nature. I’m a serial killer of the word and I consider editors a gift to the writer. Because once the high from the line is over and you’ve got a story, you have to slash and burn in service of the story. Most recently, I gut-renovated a piece for Human Parts, and editors are crucial to ensuring your readers aren’t lost, bored, or wanting to murder you. They have the distance and discipline to point out your blind spots. But they don’t reconstruct how you write — instead, they take what you’ve given them and try to make it the best it could be. My best editors have been guides. We talk about the arrangement of paragraphs and the flow of the narrative at the editorial stage. For a recent OneZero piece I published, the editor invited me to cut half a page from the beginning because it was taking me too long to get where I needed to go. And editors have been ardent negotiators on a line level and you have to pick your battles on what lines you fight for and which to let go in service of the story. But whether you have an editor or are working on a piece on your own, distance and perspective are key. Once I’ve completed a draft (and my first drafts are normally second or third drafts because I labor and edit as I go), I take a few days off and then I’ll return to it, merciless, invigorated. I’m the kind of writer who loves editing more than the first go on the page because in the editing the story slowly reveals itself. You go deeper. You excise fat. You diagram sentences. You consult sources (inspirational or informative). In my mind, a piece is never really finished. I’ve published two books traditionally and if I could rewrite them, believe me when I say I WOULD. But that’s the mark of growth. Of writing the first draft of garbage and transforming it into beauty or dive further into the grotesque. That’s the journey. That’s the mark of your progress. Having the ability to step back and learn from all that’s become before, how you’d approach an old story differently. How your ear is trained to know what sounds right or doesn’t — even if you can’t explain it. Recently, I’ve started revising stories I wrote in my twenties. Most of them make me cringe, but it’s sort of like visiting an old friend who’s in dire need of a makeover. It’s the union between two selves to form a brilliant, beautiful whole.
https://medium.com/mastering-the-mechanics/how-i-write-5044032bf195
['Felicia C. Sullivan']
2020-04-07 18:05:35.915000+00:00
['Creativity', 'Storytelling', 'Books', 'Writing', 'Writing Tips']
Slackjaw Featured Theme: Sex & Dating
We feature a new humor theme every couple of months. Slackjaw’s current featured theme is Sex and Dating! (Learn about submitting a featured theme piece in our submission guidelines.)
https://medium.com/slackjaw/slackjaw-featured-theme-sex-dating-40c735101e3f
[]
2020-11-26 08:33:25.007000+00:00
['Sex', 'Dating', 'Romance', 'Humor', 'Satire']
Secrets Of Medusa
Story of Medusa and its relevance Perseus and Medusa. Image Source: Wikimedia Commons (Public Domain) According to the legend, Medusa was a beautiful woman and caught the eyes of Poseidon. Due to a long-time feud between Poseidon and Athena, he wanted to defile the latter’s temple. Poseidon persuaded Medusa, and both performed the act at Athena’s altar. Furious, Athena exacted her revenge by turning Medusa (an evident show of male chauvinism and patriarchy) into a snake-haired monster, albeit a mortal one, who was grotesque enough to turn beholders into stone. Perseus, son of Zeus and mortal queen Danaë, was on the quest to slay Medusa to save his mother from the clutches of King Polydectes who coveted her. Gods favored him by providing with five objects to overcome his ordeal — a knapsack to hold Medusa’s head; Hermes’s winged sandals; Hades’s helm of darkness (for invisibility); Zeus’s adamantine sword; and a highly reflective bronze shield from Athena. Shield The bronze shield plays an important role here as Medusa cannot be faced directly but only through reflection. Later, Medusa’s head was embossed into the shield and presented to Athena, who called it Aegis. Medusa by Caravaggio has its base in the form of a shield. The portrait was done on a convex board made out of poplar with Medusa’s visage, bringing out its reference to Aegis. The technique for the preparation and painting was complex. The poplar board was covered with a layer of linen and given four different preparation layer. On top of it, an additional layer was added to make the background more reflective and another layer for the actual backdrop, which is greenish-yellow in color (a concoction of verdigris and lead-tin yellow paint). Further, the painting was done with three layers of siccative oils, turpentine, and mastic with traces of beeswax. Finally, the shield was finished with a few layers for the protection of paint. Self-portrait Medusa vs Caravaggio. Image Source: Wikimedia Commons (Public Domain). Edited: Author Unknown to many, Medusa is a self-portrait of Caravaggio. If we look at the image, we can see that the forehead, bulging eyes, and the widened cheeks of Medusa resemble that of Caravaggio. He had used a convex mirror to study his reflection and used his features as an inspiration for the painting. Why would anyone want to immortalize themselves as a monster? Caravaggio had his face painted as Medusa to prove that he was, in fact, immune to her dreadful gaze. It is believed that Medusa was unaffected by her face.
https://medium.com/lessons-from-history/secrets-of-medusa-d79741b9b548
['Sandhya Ganesh']
2020-11-01 08:28:33.478000+00:00
['Mythology', 'Art', 'Caravaggio', 'Painting', 'History']
Top 24+ Moving On Quotes to Help You Forward and Letting Go
1. Good, Better, Best. Never let it rest. Until your good is better and your better is best. 2. When things go wrong, don’t go with them. 3. I want someone who is …. DTF ………….Dedicated Trustworthy & Faithful. 4. EGO is the only requirement to destroy any relationship. So SKIP the E and Let it GO. 5. Sometimes the wrong choices bring us to the right places. 6. Crying doesn’t indicate that you’re weak. Since birth, it has been a sign that you’re alive. 7. An average person, lies 10 times a day. And the most common lie is “I AM FINE”. 8. Admit it, you are not the same person you were a year ago. 9. Sometimes the last thing you want to hear is the first thing you need to hear. 10. Your LIFE is a PUZZLE, don’t waste your time trying to place ppl where they don’t fit. 11. And one fine day when i slept without checking your last seen, It was the day I finally started to move on. 12. Mission one accomplished, I woke up. 13. At the end of the day, remind yourself that you did the best you could do and that is good enough. 14. Beautiful things happen in your life when you distance yourself from all the negative things. 15. Let it hurt. Let it bleed. Let it heal. And let it go. 16. Don’t ruin a good today by thinking about a bad yesterday. Let it go. 17. Be strong enough to let go and wise enough to wait for what you deserve 18. Never accept anything less than you deserve to remember, you teach people how to treat you 19. Cutting people from your life does not mean you hate them, it simply means, you respect yourself. 20. Sometimes the worst place you can be is in your own head. 21. You can be a good person with a kind heart and still say no. 22. Some people are going to leave, but that’s not the end of your story. That’s the end of their part in your story. 23. The most difficult aspect of moving on is accepting that the other person already did. 24. Expect more from yourself and less from others. 25. Things always get better with time, just wait and see. A heartily Thank you for visiting in our website wishesline.com, for more wishes, quotes, message you can visit in www.wishesline.com
https://medium.com/@familywishes99/top-24-moving-on-quotes-to-help-you-forward-and-letting-go-6847908fb699
[]
2020-06-05 19:08:25.960000+00:00
['Help', 'Forward', 'Letting Go', 'Quotes', 'Moving On']
Indian National Congress’s 1931 Resolution: Why We Need To Review the Fundamental Right to Bear Arms!
Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely- Edward Abbey The Karachi Resolution that was passed by the Indian National Congress in 1931, declared the need for “Purna Swaraj” (Complete Independence) and put forward a list of fundamental rights and principles. One of the primary being, the Right To Bear Arms for Individual Citizens! This resolution and the right to bear arms was advocated by both Nehru and Gandhi as well. Now more than ever, as Independent India transitions to become a world power. The right to bear arms for every free and sane citizen without a criminal intent as a fundamental right must be reviewed again. As it can promote not only freedom but a check on crime, corruption, and exploitation by anti-social elements as well its own Government! The Karachi Resolution, in its directive principles for the State, states “vii. Right to keep and bear arms in accordance with regulations made in that behalf and such reservations as may be required- for public safety.” It is a very carefully written principle, and it does ensure that the right to keep and bear arms be given with “REGULATIONS” meaning, a check on the mentally insane or criminally driven folks not be handed over the complete right to arms! Certain restrictions and rules, on the usage of arms in the public and many such checks and balances, to ensure the basic freedom of owning a firearm for self-defence, of one’s body, and one’s property doesn’t lead to exploitation and lawlessness. But you might ask. Why should the right to bear arms be fundamental in the first place? Abraham Lincoln once said “This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it or their revolutionary right to dismember it or overthrow it.” We all know the undermining fault in a democracy, though it is the best system in the world. History has shown us that, Governments grow powerful as the interests of big elite corporations, individuals and the yearning for the power of leaders all collide to ensure an oppressive regime controlled by a Police Force leads to a strict Police State of oppression, and exploitation of the public. Often such regimes are possible and arise from democracies. Where soon the basic fundamental rights of citizens like freedom of expression, freedom of owning property, and the freedom of assembly and press are hijacked and destroyed by a Police State. The best examples that stand between our eyes today are nations like China, North Korea, or even the Former USSR whose decline lead to a failed state of oppression and seizure of fundamental rights of citizens post the rule of Lenin. With dissenters and those who spoke out against the Government being sent to forced labour camps (Gulag). Sometimes, the institutions whose sole purpose is to protect citizens and their interests like the military, intelligence agencies and police forces grow so corrupt they themselves are hijacked by malicious intentions! Another best example of this is our next-door neighbour Pakistan, which is Governed by its elite intelligence service Inter-Services Intelligence and its army! As opposed to elected officials or its people! The only way to prevent a coup d’etat or takeover of power by malicious people through the use of Government! Is to ensure citizens are armed as a militia that cannot be oppressed or controlled by the barrel of a gun! In which case, Governments will be afraid of their people, and not vice versa! Hitler famously said “The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to allow the subjugated races to possess arms. History shows that all conquerors who have allowed their subjugated races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by so doing. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that the supply of arms to the underdogs is a sine qua non for the overthrow of any sovereignty. So let’s not have any native militia or native police.” Hitler, who later became the de facto dictator of Nazi Germany, and oppressed his own citizens, taking away their fundamental rights prevalent in a democracy himself has explained in a nutshell. An armed free population will ensure their nation doesn’t fall into the hands of dictators or the corrupt! Even Mahatma Gandhi, with a multitude of reasons such as this, backed the right to bear arms as a fundamental right. During World War 1 first openly expressed his support for private citizens to own arms, stating: ‘Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look back upon the Act depriving the whole nation of arms as the blackest. If we want the Arms Act to be repealed, if we want to learn the use of arms, here is a golden opportunity. If the middle classes render voluntary help to Government in the hour of its trial, distrust will disappear, and the ban on possessing arms will be withdrawn.’ Furthermore in 1931, in a letter to Lord Irwin. Mahatma Gandhi about British rule wrote: “It has impoverished the dumb millions by a system of progressive exploitation and by a ruinously expensive military and civil administration which the country can never afford. It has reduced us politically to serfdom. It has sapped the foundations of our culture. And, by the policy of cruel disarmament, it has degraded us spiritually. Lacking the inward strength, we have been reduced, by all but universal disarmament, to a state bordering on cowardly helplessness.” This letter was followed shortly by the Karachi Resolution of 1931, by the Indian National Congress that advocated the right to bear arms to the sane private citizen! In this letter to Irwin, we can clearly Gandhi suggesting that disarmament is what made the Indian nation weak, and pushed into a state of helplessness that made it easy for the British to loot and exploit the nation of India. An essential question, we have to ask is. Would the Bengal Famine have occurred if the poor had guns to defend their food stock from the British? Would such a gruesome Jallianwala Bagh have occurred if the protestors had arms to defend themselves? Similarly, we must also be wary that even our own Governments can become as worse or even worse than the British in the future, as India’s economical might grows so, so will the resources of a Government. What if one day a Big Brother or a group of Big Brothers decide to use the Indian Government as a tool of oppression against its own people? The warnings of history are as relevant as today. And Gandhi and Lincoln’s beliefs on Gun. Lord Acton once said, “Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely!” The Karachi Resolution was vehemently opposed by Ambedkar and ultimately stuck down during the writing of the Constitution! The Arms Act of 1959 was passed later, an act even more anti--Gun than the one British passed! Making it illegal for citizens to defend themselves! The era and relevance of Ambedkar’s opposition to the act are long lost. He simply said as to why he opposed the act: “ I personally myself cannot conceive how it would be possible for the State to carry on its administration if every individual had the right to go into the market and purchase all sorts of instruments of attack without any let or hindrance from the State.” The relevance and logic of Gandhi’s support for the right to bear arms, as well as the support for it for the intellectual brass of the Congress in 1931 still holds true today! And shall hold true for centuries! Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s words when the Arms Act of 1959 was passed by Nehru’s Government, should perfectly sum it up: “The present Bill seeks to repeal the Indian Arms Act enacted by the British rulers eighty years ago with a view to disarm the whole nation. Apart from the consideration of safeguarding the Empire, this policy of depriving the whole people of arms was motivated in the main by a sense of deep distrust and an attitude of contempt towards the Indian people. I am sorry to note that even after twelve years of independence, the present Government have not been able to shake off completely the legacy of their predecessors. The present Bill as by the Joint Committee is an improvement on the original Bill no doubt, but traces of this distrust linger still, and restrain the Bill from going as far as it should. Hence this note of dissent. “The right to bear and carry arms is an inviolable and sacred right of every free citizen and though this has not been included in the list of fundamental rights enumerated in the Indian Constitution, the right of self-defence accepted and guaranteed by the Indian Penal Code implicitly acknowledges the right to possess arms. Since India is not in a position to run into a race of armaments with big powers, or their satellites, surrounding our boundaries and having hostile and expansionist designs against us, the only course open for us is to arm our people and make military training compulsory for all adults and able-bodied citizens…. “….The present Bill seeks to liberalise the licensing provisions, but the liberalisation is very halting, the procedure of securing a license still remains irksome and dilatory and the license-seeker left to the whims and caprice of the bureaucracy….” A discussion nationally is much needed amongst the young citizenry of a New India about the need to make the right to bear arms a fundamental right!
https://medium.com/@vedaitharaju/indian-national-congresss-1931-resolution-why-we-need-to-review-the-fundamental-right-to-bear-99c9feb5a00b
['Ved Aitharaju']
2020-11-17 08:37:16.787000+00:00
['Nehru', 'Indian National Congress', 'Gandhi', 'Congress', 'Guns']
How to add and remove nodes in Apache Pulsar
Adding and removing nodes is one of the most common operations when managing a distributed system. We’ve heard from users that have used both Apache Kafka and Apache Pulsar that adding and removing nodes can be operationally burdensome in Kafka because it requires operations teams to manually balance data between nodes in the cluster. This balancing act is known to be error prone and to consume a lot of bandwidth, making it all too easy to break production deployments. Apache Pulsar, in contrast, is built on top of a layered, segment-oriented architecture that separates stateless serving from stateful persistence. This clean separation between concerns allows for independent scalability between the serving and persistence layers, which significantly simplifies operations. In Pulsar, adding and removing nodes is incredibly simple because there’s no need to rebalance data. For some technical details behind node operations in Pulsar, check out our blog post How a segment-based architecture delivers better performance, scalability and resilience. In this more practical tutorial video, I’ll show you how easy it is to add/remove nodes to/from an existing Apache Pulsar cluster. Video source:https://youtu.be/_BW67HAkS-w More on Apache Pulsar If you want to learn more about Apache Pulsar, please visit the official website at https://pulsar.apache.org. If you want to learn more about the differences between Apache Pulsar and Apache Kafka, please checkout our comparison series of blog posts: You can also participate in the Pulsar community via: The Pulsar slack channel. You can self-register at https://apache-pulsar.herokuapp.com. The Pulsar mailing list. For getting the latest updates about Pulsar, you can follow the projects on Twitter @apache_pulsar. About the author Sijie Guo is the founder of StreamNative, VP of Apache BookKeeper, and PMC Member of Apache Pulsar. Previously, he was the tech lead for the messaging group at Twitter, where he co-created Apache DistributedLog. Prior to Twitter, he worked on push notification infrastructure at Yahoo. You can follow him on twitter.
https://medium.com/streamnative/how-to-add-and-remove-nodes-in-apache-pulsar-fae7b0127f51
[]
2020-02-07 05:33:42.386000+00:00
['Apache Pulsar', 'Big Data', 'Node', 'Tech Blog', 'Distributed Systems']
On-demand Storage — An empty industry becoming a billion-dollar empire
On-demand Storage — An empty industry becoming a billion-dollar empire Image Source: Pexels Talk about Oil, Agriculture, Technology, or any of the next big thing; it just may not be 5G, it’s the ever-growing demand for space. Most humans are materialistic by nature; this is a fact! The reason is not rocket science; it’s because our desires grow daily. And to cushion our growing desires, our consumption habit tends to grow in line with our desires, especially in Nigeria, a nation which is largely a representative example of the African continent. Here, the measure of a man’s wealth is by how much possession he has. These possessions need to be stored and kept in a safe space. Any entity of ferrying goods or storing people’s belonging must be ready to offer needed assurance that clients’ belongings are safe. Only then would they be willing to pay for such a service. Quite many of us have not come to realise that there’s a growing business in the on-demand storage industry. It has boomed over the last few years, but perhaps not in Africa and by extension. Nigeria. The large empty lands, unused/underutilized warehouses and idle parking spaces have become fundamental to the daily lives and activities of people today. The fact that people are migrating in droves to urban areas and making these places crowded is creating untold opportunities for on-demand storage business to thrive. And with the influx of human capital comes the need for more space. A lot of people come in to start a small business, a tech startup, rent accommodation for their new families, find a space to park their cars, in fact, a large number of startups need more space for excess inventory. The old is retiring and leaving to a quieter place; most prefer moving back to their villages, creating more space for the young. On-demand storage is hotter than ever as these changes have created a vacuum for more people to seek a safe and convenient space in storing their possessions. In the U.S., entrepreneurs have bought the vision and have seen the potential of on-demand storage. It’s on record that when the U.S. economy went into the great recession, the on-demand storage industry flourished while other businesses went under. For instance, during the recession of 2008, most of the startups that have become giants of late like Uber, Airbnb, WhatsApp, Venmo, Groupon, Pinterest, Slack etc. Even Microsoft founded in 1975 was still in the recession-era. When any economy slides into a recession, companies shut down and sell. People lose jobs, and some might have to move. With reduced income status also comes the need to augment it to maintain a decent standard of living. And looking for that comes the need to co-share with others to spin in some income from idle assets. Some then see this as an opportunity and begin to explore it professionally to keep that income sustained. This is essentially how Uber and Airbnb grew within a short time frame. Same goes for storage. Space is always never enough, especially in urban centres. For those who understand how to create an opportunity from a problem as recession necessitates, they key into demand for space for those who need impromptu. Investors know this and so many key startups are evolving in the self-storage industry, bringing ideas and creativity that allow their users to enjoy a simpler and more convenient on-demand storage experience. Now, they can view their stored possessions online, schedule a convenient pick, and drop from warehouses to their destination, and vice versa, amassing millions of dollars of funding by so doing. Companies like Clutter Inc., StoreLoad, Boxful, and Spacebox are notable startups that help people and businesses to digitize their static and mobile storage facilities into an on-demand self-storage service where anyone in need of them can with through the comfort of their smartphones buy up and use these economic spaces. Demand for space continues to rise. In the U.S., the storage unit industry is worth a whopping $38 billion with a steady expansion and growth since 2012. It’s a market that accommodates new investors and empowers existing players. Without a doubt, the convergence of both buyers and sellers and the growth being witnessed is worth an in-depth look. Undoubtedly, this is one industry that will keep rising exponentially as the years go by. Image Source: Pexels Today, people are migrating to more crowded urban areas. There is a shift in human resources, and a lot goes with this shift. People are moving to better employment, and this creates opportunities for space owners. A lot of people need space for their inventory. This is where on-demand comes in, with just a few sellers available to service the much larger buyers, there are more consumers of space than there are suppliers, this creates room for more people to come on board. A lot of people have empty spaces in their rooms, a large expanse of unused land, idle garages, in fact, people have less space and more possessions, and with the rise of on-demand storage, a solution is already at the tip of our fingers. The Next Big Player It’s no surprise that the on-demand storage industry is expanding into different parts of the world. In Europe, there are thousands of units with tenancy rates hitting around 80% since 2016, while in Asia, there is a steady rise in the number of storage units by at least 40%. With the birth of StoreLoad in Nigeria, Africa is gradually coming into the picture, and her vast number of possessions and land is a strong indicator that she is going to be the next big player in the steady growth enjoyed by the on-demand storage industry. Look out for us on social media we are always grooving there. Twitter |Instagram |LinkedIn |Facebook
https://medium.com/storeload/on-demand-storage-an-empty-industry-becoming-a-billion-dollar-empire-39f406927f99
[]
2020-12-14 14:09:41.370000+00:00
['Startup', 'Storage Industry', 'Logistics', 'Storage', 'Storeload']
Fitbit vs. WHOOP: Finding Your Wearable of Choice
Photo by Andres Urena on Unsplash G lobal Fitness Trackers market size was estimated to be $30.41bn in 2019 and is expected to reach $91.98bn by 2027, which exhibits growth at a CAGR of 15.2%. All around the world, companies are seeking a stake in the fitness wearables industry — a sector flooding with all forms of players — from established technology corporations to fitness-focused startups. However, they seem to be onto something… According to an August 2020 report published by Fortune Business Insights¹, the Global Fitness Trackers market size was estimated to be $30.41bn in 2019 and is expected to reach $91.98bn by 2027, which exhibits growth at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 15.2% over the forecast period (2020–2027). The expected growth of this market provides an attractive opportunity for both product development and financial investment in the near future. Not only are the number of available products growing rapidly, but the function of these products will continue to vary, emphasizing different niche health goals — sleep, movement, glucose monitoring, heart rate. As a fitness and health enthusiast, I am always interested in the evolution of these products. Recently, I switched from Fitbit Inspire to WHOOP as my “fitness wearable of choice,” in an attempt to find a product that better aligns with my personal wellness journey. For readers wondering which of these products they best align with, here are some tips based on my experience: When should you get a Fitbit? You are less connected to your phone Fitbit watch faces contain a clock and summary of your performance (such as steps taken, calories burned, and minutes exercised). For those who like to take breaks from picking up their phone, they can still track this meaningful data right from their wrist. WHOOP does not contain a watch face, which requires checking the app from time to time, in order to monitor your daily metrics. Your job requires more movement Step counting can be a fun and competitive way to keep yourself active, however, it can be a bit frustrating for users with a sedentary job or lifestyle. A good Peloton ride can be just as beneficial as an outdoor walk, but it may leave you feeling like you “let down” your wearable friend. For users who can reap the benefits of step counting throughout the day, through a more active job or lifestyle (think nurses or teachers), Fitbit provides a great source of motivation to get to your daily step goal. WHOOP does not contain a step count feature, which for sedentary workers may provide a source of relief, knowing there are other ways to encourage physiological health benefits. Simplicity is important Whether it be your first or tenth trial fitness wearable, Fitbit seems to attract and benefit customers that value simplicity in their fitness routines. Skip the bells and whistles — this product is easy to use, with a simple design, and collects necessary data to inform its users of relevant health outcomes. When should you get a WHOOP? You have trouble relaxing WHOOP’s data collection recognizes “daily strain” as a key performance indicator. While it can be motivating to continue to maximize your daily strain, WHOOP users are also encouraged to obtain a certain level of recovery, either from a long sleep at night or less strain the following day. This will keep the gym-rats in check and remind them that recovery is just as important as performance, in order to sustain effective workouts. You are interested in sleep performance WHOOP collects a ton of data while you are sleeping to analyze your sleep performance and provide feedback on sleep quality. Some features include Time in Bed, Disturbances, Efficiency, Respiratory Rate, and Sleep Latency. This will help users identify which factors contribute to more a restful, deep sleep, and which factors may not (sugar and alcohol for me!) Fitbit does provide “sleep scores” for users, but I find that the tracking is relatively inconsistent, and the amount of data does not compare to the analysis mentioned above. You participate in a variety of fitness activities WHOOP allows users to track a monstrously wide variety of activities including things Australian football, basketball, climbing, coaching, commuting, gaming, manual labor, meditation, wrestling. No daily activity will be left unaccounted for with the WHOOP, and each activity will be analyzed to track its contribution to your daily activity strain.
https://medium.com/in-fitness-and-in-health/fitbit-vs-whoop-finding-your-wearable-of-choice-e7a4f683d8b8
['Tara Hally']
2020-12-31 13:32:40.502000+00:00
['Consumer', 'Fitness', 'Technology', 'Wellness', 'Workout']
Let’s make using crypto easy
Cryptocurrency is center stage. The rapid rise of bitcoin and the emergence of altcoins has everyone thinking about cryptos and the esoteric blockchain. In the last few months, bitcoin went from deep subreddits and tech communities to the front pages of every major publication. We all watched with awe as the price of bitcoin skyrocketed, thinking about our early-adopter friends that just became millionaires. In the midst of crypto fervor, it can be easy to lose sight of the true value of digital currency. Companies like Coinbase are capitalizing on greed, showing charts that imply over 1000% return, and confirming the idea that cryptocurrency is just an easy way to get rich. Over 10 million people, many of whom don’t even understand how bitcoin or ethereum work, have created a Coinbase account. But Cryptocurrency isn’t about making money — it’s about digitizing money While price fluctuations have made early holders wealthy, the real value of Bitcoin is the use of a distributed ledger to record transactions. Cryptocurrency simplifies the flow of funds and eliminates the need for a trusted third party. Right now, if you wanted to move money around the world, it would be faster to fly with cash than it would to send the money electronically. That’s crazy. Moving money should be easy. Banks, payment processors, financial services – everyone is trying to skim off the flow of funds through our financial system (they’re stealing from you). Cryptocurrency makes the movement of money fluid and frictionless, and eliminates the need for middlemen that aren’t providing true value. What’s more, centralized institutions claim the right to determine who does and does not deserve access to financial services. Every day, people are rejected from conventional banking, in and outside of the developed world. In a capitalist society, access to financial services is not just a nicety, it’s a human right. Cryptocurrency can liberate us, providing everyone an equal opportunity to accept money from employers (and friends) and spend money on goods and services. You can’t win at cards if you aren’t dealt any. And it needs to be easy Cryptocurrency will never gain traction unless people have an easy way to use their digital currencies. Hot wallets on the App Store today make users save and secure long mnemonic seeds, and they reduce people to 30-digit addresses in an effort to emphasize anonymity. This is not a recipe for mass adoption — we are inadvertently scaring people away from using Bitcoin as an everyday currency. Using cryptocurrency should be simple, intuitive, and beautiful. If we intend to make digital currency a viable payment system, then we must prioritize the user over the technology. It is only through beautiful, functional design that we can share the magic of blockchain-based assets with the entirety of society. So, join us While the technology behind bitcoin is groundbreaking, the products built around it are lagging. Bitcoin and digital assets provide a foundation for trust-less financial services, but their impact is limited by the usability and thoughtfulness of consumer-facing crypto products. With Splash, we want to bring cryptocurrency into everyday life, for everyday transactions, for everyone. Members of the Splash community Learn more about Splash
https://medium.com/splash-wallet/splash-lets-make-using-crypto-easy-25303b456a6b
['Bryce Bjork']
2018-11-20 20:40:22.207000+00:00
['Blockchain', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Bitcoin Wallet', 'Yale', 'Bitcoin']
AYS Daily Digest 31/7/19: Conditional disembarking
Libya is not safe! Euro-Med have documented the deaths of more than 1,000 people, the wounding of 5,500, and the displacement of more than 100,000 civilians as a result of airstrikes and clashes in the country. The deliberate targeting of the field hospital and the killing of doctors reflects the warring factions’ total disregard for the rules of international humanitarian law and highlights the absence of any accountability Targeting medical personnel is a flagrant violation of the rules of international law, according to Article 21 of the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949, which criminalizes attacks on medical institutions and staff. SEARCH AND RESCUE Forty people in a boat, including a baby and two children, were rescued by the teams of Proemaid. Seven boats with 239 people on board have safely landed on the Greek Aegean islands in a single day. EU Asylum trends There have been 287,500 asylum applications submitted since the beginning of the year, up by 14 % from the same period in 2018, according to EASO statistics. Furthermore, more persons were seeking asylum at the beginning of 2019 compared to the end of 2018, despite the fact that applications usually peak during the summer and autumn months. Overall, asylum trends in 2019 are a continuation of a surge in the number of asylum applications submitted in the EU in the autumn of 2018, particularly by certain citizenship groups. Three % of all applications in May were submitted by self-claimed unaccompanied minors. Such a high number of UAM applicants from Afghanistan has not been seen for the past two and a half years, EASO reports. Unlike the general notions among Europeans, the most common countries of origin of applicants in May were Syria, Afghanistan and Venezuela. On their interactive map you can see that the overwhelming majority of decisions are negative and have remained so. GREECE Strong protests and clashes with police in Exarcheia tonight A demonstration was held in the downtown Athens district of Exarchia on Wednesday at the memorial of teenager Alexis Grigoropoulos, who was shot and killed in 2008 by a police special guard who was released from prison on Tuesday, Ekathimerini reports. More signs of a general increase in the police presence in central Athens are reported. Four teams of five police officers have reportedly already been set up, each with heavy weapons, bulletproof vests, night vision binoculars, flash and sound grenades. The officers will “constantly be out of the police vehicles, with the aim of serving as a deterrent and instilling a sense of security in those who see them.” BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA Four million convertible marks to be used for building a police station?! The four million convertible marks earmarked for refugees in Vučjak by the federal government were supposed to be fully directed to local Red Cross aid active in the field, but reportedly the county has decided part of the funds might be redirected to building a police station in Bužim. The Red Cross at the same time asked for donations of food from the Bosnian citizens. The Una Sana county has been demanding more engagement from the federal government, who now say they intend to make their spending plan. The mayor of Bihać said to the Bosnian media that he would hope the funds would be transferred to those bearing the biggest burden in the situation, the citizens and cities of Velika Kladuša and Bihać. FRANCE Calais In Calais, everyone seems accustomed to repeated evictions. “Why do they start with the tents? They could have started with garbage cans!”, some of the local activists complain. “When the police come, we leave for an hour or two. The police destroy everything and we come back,” they say. However, unlike before, the associations no longer gather some of the two to four tons of tents that the police throw away, as that might give the impression that they work with the police, and would deprive them of the people’s trust. Nantes L’Autre Cantine Nantes needs donations for preparing meals: Oil — Potatoes — Onions — Garlic — Tomato sauce and tomato paste — Peanut paste — Spices: salt, pepper, paprika, pepper, ras el hanout, turmeric, cumin Along with these, they also need more equipment for hosting people and helping them feel safe. -> if you can provide any of those things, please contact them and donate directly! GERMANY Forty-five Afghan refugees were deported from Leipzig / Hall airport to Afghanistan on Saturday, 30 July. Germany has welcomed almost 9,000 relatives of refugees to the country since August 2018 as part of a family reunification programme, reports say. However, the number of permits to be issued to family members since the law change last year has been limited at 1,000 and the UN has called the process too complex and too slow. The World Bank puts the number of refugees currently in Germany at just over one million. There are a lot of online language courses, websites and apps that can help refugees learn German. DENMARK The stance by the newly elected Danish government might still turn out to be problematic to implement under the new, so-called “paradigm shift” with a change in focus from integration to future repatriation. Denmark will reportedly take in refugees protected under the UNHCR quota system from this year. The immigration ministry has also informed UNHCR that it will accept general quota refugees from 2020.
https://medium.com/are-you-syrious/ays-daily-digest-31-7-19-conditional-disembarking-753038ed2c62
['Are You Syrious']
2019-08-01 11:14:52.927000+00:00
['Refugees', 'Europe', 'Italy', 'Digest', 'Greece']
#Howto create a bar chart with 23° | EN/GER
So what’s the difference? The difference between wide and long format lays in the number of chart-types you can create once you have saved the dataset. Turning the data into long-format by using our “Autocreate Groups” function leaves you with more options because -as the name implies- it automatically creates groups, which can be helpful when applying filters or creating grouped, or stacked bar charts. How do I create a grouped or a stacked bar chart then? In contrast to a “regular” bar chart, a grouped or stacked bar chart represents at least 2 groups . “simple bar chart” Gender; Age male; 20 Female; 30 “grouped bar chart” Gender; City; Age male; Vienna; 20 male; Berlin; 30 Female; Vienna; 30 Female; Berlin; 40 Let me give you an example: For this chart we first used the wide format. Since no groups are created this way, we can still only display a simple bar chart — or donut for that matter. You can only select one out of the two value fields (Age female or Age male). We now use the same data set and turn it into the long format with the “Autocreate Groups” function. The two columns “Age female” and “Age male” now become one “Group” column. Both cities Vienna & Berlin are now assigned a value for the male group and the female group. #German# Das Erstellen von Balken- und Säulendiagrammen mit 23 ° ist mit wenigen Klicks möglich. Dazu musst du lediglich die Daten hochladen und deinen bevorzugten Diagrammtyp auswählen. Wie muss die Datentabelle aussehen, die ich hochladen möchte? 1. Wide-Format Wide-format data 2. Long-Format Long-format data Glücklicherweise spielt es keine Rolle, welches Format deine Daten haben. Das liegt daran, dass wir alle Daten automatisch in das Long-Format konvertieren, um die Verarbeitung zu vereinfachen. (Außer du deaktivierst die Funktion “Autocreate Groups”)
https://medium.com/@23degrees/howto-create-a-bar-chart-with-23-aa6f1f01ff27
[]
2020-04-27 09:04:17.742000+00:00
['Data Journalism', 'Data Visualization', 'Dataviz', 'Maps', 'Charts']
Silver Linings
Paralyzed is fear, but air doesn’t stay still, Fluctuating lingers around our noses, our mouths, our eyes. Laments and tears rain on dry stones, cracked open by Humane cries among deserted tombs of an off-limits church. Immobility at its place and stuttering uncertainty lock Doors and gardens to children’s eruptions of freedom. It’s true: anguish, grief, gloom, and solitude. But. Walls keep bodies enclosed, but minds fly Pegasus Through windows, trotting to win the sky of Spring. Indisputably masked, but faces turn to the scent of Sun and Zephyr, living impressions from nature’s actions. Many deaths hurt hearts, but emotions bind and strengthen Renewed parental and filial acknowledgement in Love. Through the crevices of fear, still passing air Brings oxygen and change. Through souls’ buried sorrow, sprouting hope Takes root in spirit and life. Through glitters of collective love, a fresh new start Explodes indomitable and contagious. Prodigious human, rejoicing for just a thin slice of moon, you find hidden silver linings and their precious boon.
https://medium.com/promposity/silverlinings-335f14f85f8
['Raffaella Ferretti']
2020-04-10 11:36:00.792000+00:00
['Love', 'Poem', 'Silver Lining', 'Poetry', 'Hope']
Timeless web design: Online portfolios today — and in the year 2000
Timeless web design: Online portfolios today — and in the year 2000 A nostalgic trip through homepages of brand agencies and type foundries on the cusp of the new millennium. Philippe Starck, a renowned industrial designer, once said: “A designer has a duty to create timeless design. To be timeless you have to think really far into the future, not next year, not in two years but in 20 years minimum.” Born in 1990, I witnessed the internet evolve from text to immersive audio-visual experiences. And throughout, I wondered—can design be timeless on such a fast-changing medium as the web? Starck’s own website unfortunately wasn’t up in 2000, but archive.org has preserved landing pages of many other agencies of the day. Are you ready to jump into the time machine, shed a tear of nostalgia, and see if their designs would speak to the audiences of today? Design studios Many of the top design agencies today were founded long before personal computers and the web. As such, they had to consciously transition from print, to the Internet. Pentagram London Pentagram, founded in 1972, is the world’s largest independently-owned design studio. Its list of past and present partners includes such stars as Alan Fletcher, Bob Gill, Paula Scher, and Michael Bierut. Pentagram’s 2000 website was written in Adobe ColdFusion Markup, and like many websites of the day, tried to replicate print design elements on the web. The menu, drop cap, titles, and image captions are pixel-perfect low-resolution GIFs. The columns — hand-crafted with <td> tags.
https://uxdesign.cc/timeless-web-design-online-portfolios-today-and-in-year-2000-234ff5612bb9
['Philip Seifi']
2020-11-27 23:51:24.575000+00:00
['Web Design', 'UI', 'Branding', 'Design', 'UX']
Circles
Photo by Nareeta Martin on Unsplash You twirled- frantically perfect pirouettes- like a jewelry box ballerina desperate to escape confinement, basking in momentary spotlight only to collapse into black without being what you wanted. I tried to dance with you and float up, join a chorus line of clouds swirling with delicate synchronicity in a Van Gogh sky. You became a wayward cloud like fog- a hazy solipsistic suspension obscuring jagged landscapes- and I, an emotional centrifuge, spinning to separate affection from your ice crystal self-obsession. But, I could not whip you up like a cotton candy dream because love cannot sustain in perfect circles. It radiates from the centrifugal force of need and races forward like an errant comet pulled into the sun, shedding icy refuse to become awe-inspiring light. In the centerless jumble of a circle unspun there is space where I may whirl with the dizzying potential of broken things.
https://medium.com/scrittura/circles-7df9f5db5abf
['Debra Simon']
2020-09-01 01:25:34.987000+00:00
['Growing Up', 'Relationships', 'Life Lessons', 'Love', 'Personal Development']
I Hate Revising. I Love Revising.
I Hate Revising. I Love Revising. Photo by Simon on Unsplash Revision is incredibly important and way different from editing. Before I dive into why my love-hate relationship with revising, let’s make a clear distinction between editing and revising: Editing: Checking grammar and punctuation Spelling Word choice Line editing Proper linking and sourcing Rewriting for clarity Revision: Story structure Expressing key details Consistent style Great detail and supporting points Sentence flow Rewriting for the intended purpose: (i.e., narrative storytelling, sales page, short story, argument) Why I Hate Revising It feels like my first thought was wrong It’s too much work to move stuff around I don’t want to think critically Why I Love Revising It improves my writing It forces me in new directions It solidifies the purpose of my writing It makes me try new approaches I always thought revision was about taking the bad out, but it’s really about putting better stuff in. Revising helps me rebel against my natural storytelling abilities, which to be quite honest — aren’t good. Years of writing and I’m trying to get better at how I set up a story, reveal details, and communicate a point. To be honest, I’ve only done this well a few times. I think I was able to do it in one of my most popular stories — this one about me and a guy who needed a ride. I could have told that story in a vastly different way, just said something like “Oh yeah once I was at a grocery store and this guy wanted me to give me him a ride home, and I said yes, but I wasn’t completely sure of my decision.” That’s essentially the story. But it’s told in an uninteresting way. With not a lot of detail. And with that story, I spent a lot of time on it. It was an important story for me to think about and one I really wanted to tell. Not every story deserves that much attention, as any regular blogger or Medium writer will tell you. In general, the amount of revision depends on: The type of story or writing you’re doing The purpose of your writing Your own personal comfort level and satisfaction I have published things too quickly, and then not quickly enough. The more you write, the more you will become aware of your own quirks and deficiencies, as well as your own style. The more you write, the better you will become at finding that equilibrium, and the faster you will respond.
https://medium.com/create-make-write/i-hate-revising-i-love-revising-221ed12b13b1
['Josh Spilker']
2020-12-27 01:05:31.932000+00:00
['Writing Tips', 'Creative Process', 'Creativity', 'Writing', 'Motivation']
It's time to bid goodbye to Medium.
Verbys will allow creators to read & write, create their portfolios, and learn the intricacies of being a professional writer. This is just one part of the expansive content ecosystem we are building at maice. I want to take this opportunity to thank you for your support and hope that you follow us to the next wave in content creation geared towards Indian creators. Take part in our beta test and tell us how we can make the platform better. Creators and readers like you define verbys and we just can’t do without getting to know how you feel about it. Here’s the link to verbys. This works best on a Laptop/Desktop: https://solid-heaven-224714.firebaseapp.com/efc098d0-fdfd-11e8-b532-f76535852eed/read SEE YOU THERE… with love and admiration, Abhishek Thakur. Cofounder, maice.
https://medium.com/maice/its-time-to-bid-goodbye-to-medium-e033a6d2d19f
['Abhishek Thakur']
2018-12-19 18:51:34.444000+00:00
['Medium', 'Verbys', 'Maice']
Megan Fox Responds to the Resurfaced ‘Sexualized at 15’ Interview
Megan Fox Responds to the Resurfaced ‘Sexualized at 15’ Interview While this may sound like celebrity gossip to some, as a sexual assault survivor, this news feels personal. (Transformers director Michael Bay and actress Megan Fox) Source In 2007, the massive blockbuster hit Transformers was released, starring Megan Fox and Shia LaBeouf, and directed by Michael Bay. Megan Fox, then 21-years-old, played the breathtakingly gorgeous sidekick/love interest Mikaela Banes, to LaBeouf’s nerdy character of Sam Witwicky. Transformers made $709 million worldwide, and the live-action film thrust its two stars onto the cover of every magazine cover that year. Fox and LaBeouf came back for the sequel, Revenge of the Fallen (2009), but when the third installment of this popular franchise was announced, it was announced Fox would not reprise her role of Mikaela Banes. It was a shock to fans everywhere to see Fox walk away from the franchise that gave her her big break. “It was her decision not to return. She wishes the franchise the best.” But for those who remember the Megan Fox interview in 2009, there seemed to be a much simpler answer as to why Megan was parting ways with the franchise. And it felt more like they had fired her for this interview. About director Michael Bay, she said in an interview with Wonderland Magazine: “He’s like Napoleon and he wants to create this insane, infamous mad-man reputation. He wants to be like Hitler on his sets, and he is. So he’s a nightmare to work for but when you get him away from set, and he’s not in director mode, I kind of really enjoy his personality because he’s so awkward, so hopelessly awkward. He has no social skills at all. And it’s endearing to watch him.” These comments are rumored to be the reason behind her alleged firing by producer Steven Spielberg even though he’s denied these claims. After this Wonderland interview, she was “canceled”. Everyone talked about how ungrateful she was to the director of the movies who launched her career. Following the release of the third movie without her, Fox was known as a “Katherine Heigl” type (a woman complaining about the movie/directors that brought her success). The movie industry deemed her as problematic — canceled before the internet decided they would and could cancel whoever they wanted. This is what I remember of Megan Fox and why she deserved to be canceled.
https://medium.com/fearless-she-wrote/megan-fox-responds-to-the-sexualized-jimmy-kimmel-interview-ab87ae7f2f56
['Jessica Lovejoy']
2020-09-28 15:15:00.132000+00:00
['Culture', 'Equality', 'Women', 'Celebrity', 'Sexuality']
The Coronavirus Crisis Shows Why, If We Are To Solve Big Problems, We First Need To Rebuild Trust
We’re beginning to see the peak of the Coronavirus crisis in hard-hit urban areas like New York City, thanks to social distancing measures and the bravery and dedication of healthcare workers. Yet despite the progress, you only have to look at Singapore to see that the epidemic can back flare up at any time. Meanwhile, we’re seeing armed mobs show up at state capitals to protest lockdown restrictions even as Covid-19 hotspots shift from larger cities to rural areas like Albany, GA, Sioux Falls, SD and Gallup, NM. In many ways, these areas are more vulnerable due to higher prevalence of health conditions and less access to medical care. Clearly, we have a deep problem with trust. Research from Gallup finds that trust in institutions has been declining for decades. A study at Ohio State found that, when confronted with scientific evidence that conflicted with their views, people would question the objectivity of the science. Our social contract is broken. We need to establish a new one. Disruptive Generational Shifts We didn’t get here by accident. Our current age of distrust grew out of four generational shifts that have been brewing over the last 50 years. First, and most obvious, are the technology shifts, including digital technology, as well as advances in antibiotics, genomics and agriculture. Generally, these have been positive developments, but have contributed to historically high levels of income inequality, which undermines social cohesion. The second shift is of resources. We have seen oil’s rise to dominance since the 1970s, which has greatly affected geopolitics over the past half-century, but now may be reversing. The price for oil actually fell into negative territory recently. Coal has largely been displaced by natural gas and renewables, while other resources, such as rare earth elements, are in high demand and subject to supply disruptions. The third shift is migratory. Since 1970, the share of immigrants in the US has risen from a low of 4.7% to 13.6% of the population, the most since the 1890s. In 2015, the foreign born population in the US totaled almost 45 million, many of which have religious and cultural heritages that often seem strange to their native born neighbors. Lastly, and possibly most importantly, we are beginning to see a massive demographic shift. Over the next decade, baby-boomers, many of whom came of age during the Reagan revolution, will be replaced by millennials, whose experiences with the Great Recession, debilitating student loan debt and rising healthcare costs, have very different priorities. So you can see where all the tension in our society is coming from. Americans are seeing their work life disrupted by technology, while they also compete for scarce resources with people who not only look and sound different, but often have very different values and beliefs, and all this is happening in the midst of a massive generational political shift. Our Prisoner’s Dilemma In theory, finding a way forward shouldn’t be complicated. We only need to analyze the issues, identify options and build a consensus on what to do. Yet in the early 1950’s, researchers at the RAND Corporation were able to show why things aren’t so simple, through a thought experiment called the prisoner’s dilemma, which involves two suspects being interrogated separately. Here’s how it works: If both prisoners cooperate with each other and neither confesses, they each get one year in prison on a lesser charge. If one confesses, he gets off scot-free, while his partner gets five years. If they both rat each other out, then they get three years each for a total of six years, collectively the worst outcome of all. Notice how if each player acts purely out of rational self-interest, the best strategy is to defect. No matter what the other does, each one is better off ratting his partner out. Yet in the pursuit of self-interest, both are made worse off. It’s a frustrating problem. Game theorists call it a Nash equilibrium — one in which nobody can improve their position by a unilateral move. It takes trust. It seems that we have a similar problem today. For example, in their study of the Tea Party movement, Theda Skocpol and Vanessa Williams found that the activists, who were mostly older Americans, were not against government spending in general. For instance, they supported Medicare and Social Security. It was the benefits that went to others, who they saw as “freeloaders,” that they found objectionable. Rebuilding Shared Purpose It’s not hard to see why we’re so divided in America. 50 years ago, our society was largely homogeneous — white, christian and middle class. Today, however, due to the four generational shifts noted above, we’ve become a patchwork of interests and cultures and that makes it hard to create the kind of trust we need to overcome our prisoner’s dilemma. For example, the Tea Party activists that Skocpol and Williams studied believed that younger Americans were trying to get free healthcare and didn’t want to pay for it. Younger Americans, however, could point out that they not only already have to pay into the Medicare system that older Americans enjoy, but that they will also have to pay for decades of debt that their elders have accrued (in large part because of Medicare). Finding shared purpose is even more difficult when race and culture come into play. Many people want to protect and preserve their communities from people they see as having different values and heritage. Many of those protesting the Covid-19 restrictions made clear that one reason they resented the restrictions was because they were being imposed from outside their communities. Yet if we are ever going to be able to meet the challenges that face us today — and Covid-19 is only one of many — we will need to create a new sense of shared purpose. Rewriting The Social Contract The challenges we face today can seem overwhelming, but we’ve been here before. In the 1930s and 40s, we faced a global depression, massive genocides and a world war that claimed the lives of 75 million people. Europe, once the center of western civilization, was in ruins, its people struggling to survive. Yet out of those ashes we built a new world order and a new social contract. The United Nations created a global forum for solving problems, Bretton Woods established a global financial system and the Marshall Plan rebuilt Europe. In the US, the New Deal permanently altered the role of the public sector. Out of World War II a new vision for public funding of science transformed America into a technological superpower. These institutions were far from perfect, but they served us well for half a century. However then, as now, we can’t create a better future simply by looking to the past. The public trust has been shattered because our institutions have failed us. Technology won’t save us. Markets won’t save us. We need to save ourselves. Yet still, I have to believe our future is bright. The coronavirus pandemic has brought about the greatest scientific mobilization in history and inspired a level of collaboration that until now would have been unheard of. The money and effort invested will likely pay dividends far beyond the current crisis. Similar efforts can help us meet our other challenges. The first step, however, is to reestablish trust. Lasting change is always built on common ground. Greg Satell is an international keynote speaker, adviser and bestselling author of Cascades: How to Create a Movement that Drives Transformational Change. His previous effort, Mapping Innovation, was selected as one of the best business books of 2017. You can learn more about Greg on his website, GregSatell.com and follow him on Twitter @DigitalTonto
https://greg-satell.medium.com/the-coronavirus-crisis-shows-why-if-we-are-to-solve-big-problems-we-first-need-to-rebuild-trust-8f5ea74512c1
['Greg Satell']
2020-05-23 12:04:42.156000+00:00
['Leadership', 'Coronavirus', 'Trust']
How Elon Musk Is Teaching Me To Learn Anything I Desire
How Elon Musk Is Teaching Me To Learn Anything I Desire I can’t think of anybody in the world that has more of a passion for building a better future than Elon Musk. Running the likes of SpaceX, Tesla & The Boring Company, he has become one of the most incredible figures within our generation. But he’s also managed to mould me into somebody that has self-confidence, and the ability to do pretty anything. After endless hours of research on the man, here are the lessons which he taught me that have allowed me to learn almost anything I desire: Connect The Dots. Anybody who knew me within high school was well aware that I had problems paying attention to whatever was being said. My brain was constantly in overdrive thinking about my career, my life, my future. And so connecting the dots in order to generate a relationship between two subjects is something that has hugely benefited me. For example, asking me to remember how an airplane flies is absolutely useless. For reference, its air flow rapidly going over the wings, which throw the air down toward the ground, generating an upward force called lift that overcomes the plane’s weight and holds it in the sky. I’d forget that in an instant. However, saying that the reason I’m able to travel the world is because airplanes generate lift in a certain way (given above) is something that I’m much more likely to remember. First principles. When Elon Musk discovered that the price of launching a rocket was approximately $65m, he had to rethink the entire process in order to make it more economical. So he broke it down into different parts. What is a rocket made of? Aerospace-grade aluminum alloys, plus some titanium, copper, and carbon fiber. Then I asked, what is the value of those materials on the commodity market? It turned out that the materials cost of a rocket was around two percent of the typical price. I have done the exact same method with my business in order to improve the economics of it. After all, reducing the operating cost to create a higher profit margin is something that’s extremely important. What are my current expenses? What’s the easiest way to go about reducing them? Once identified how to reduce the expenses, I was able to figure out how to increase my revenue significantly. I would love for my business to have more revenue. In order to do that, I need to meet people that have money. So who can afford my service that would be interested in it? What’s the best way to get in touch with them? I mapped it out. I reverse engineered each & every scenario to create a solution that would reduce the cost of my operating expenses, and simultaneously increase the overall profit margin. If you are hoping to do something similar, identify what you are struggling with. Break it down into core elements so each one can be tackled in a meaningful way that produces results.
https://medium.com/@mattthenomad/how-elon-musk-is-teaching-me-to-learn-anything-i-desire-a8bab6a37122
['Matt Lillywhite']
2019-02-07 07:27:34.988000+00:00
['Education', 'Elon Musk', 'Tesla', 'Spacex']
Orphanage and old-age homes struggling to take care of inmates
Due to the coronavirus lockdown, the lives of several people came to a standstill. During that time, several people were struggling financially. While some people had the support of their loved ones and their families, the people living in orphanages and old age homes were left with no support during that time of distress. Orphans and elderly are still unable to continue with their normal lifestyles as they do not have any funds left.These people now fear they would not be able to survive if the situation remains unchanged. Majority of donations are now ,diverted towards Corona Relief Funds. People normally donated rice and other items to them. However, since the lockdown, the donations have stopped, creating an issue for the facilities. Even the regular donations have stopped as lockdown had impacted financial condition of the donors badly. Few homes are on the verge of collapse.Even self-funding inmates are unable to pay.As a result, 20%-30% homes have closed , while some that have an average 50% occupancy are not admitting new people, According to administration officials of old age homes and orphanages funds had declined by as much as 75%-80% during the lockdown.
https://medium.com/@lakshay.seruds/orphanage-and-old-age-homes-struggling-to-take-care-of-inmates-52078f34213f
['Lakshay Gupta']
2020-06-23 11:49:02.467000+00:00
['Lockdown', 'Elder Care', 'Helping Others', 'Orphans', 'Lack Of Funding']
Stuck between cultures: growing up Latina in the US
Stuck between cultures: growing up Latina in the US How I learned to accept myself (wavy hair and all) For as long as I can remember, I’ve had crippling insecurities about my intelligence, talents and appearance. As a child, I remember wanting to change my nose, knobby knees and huge eyes, because I wanted to look like the fair-skinned girls in magazines. For years, I would straighten my hair every day and wore loads of concealer to make my eyes look less buggy. I always admired kids who seemed to be confident and sure of themselves, when I always felt awkward and like I didn’t belong. I grew up in a family of six, squeezed into a two-bedroom duplex. My parents were loving and supportive, but sadly I was ashamed of them and wanted to be like the ‘perfect’ families I saw on TV. My parents didn’t push their Bolivian and Mexican culture on me because they wanted me to be American and not experience the discrimination they had endured. As a first generation Latina in the US, I felt stuck between two cultures. Looking back, I’ve come a long way from that little girl who wished her family was more like the ones on TV. Now, there isn’t anything I would change about myself and background because it makes me ‘Me’. Here’s how I managed to overcome my insecurities and embrace my culture (and why it was the best thing I’ve ever done for my career). Me at 8 years old at the Galleria Ice Rink in Houston My breaking point I had no choice but to make some big changes to my life, beliefs and habits in my late 20s. Over the years, I had picked up some seemingly normal but unhealthy habits, like drinking a few times a week to blow off steam from stressful work. I was eating out almost every meal and not exercising. My emotional, mental and physical health were beginning to deteriorate. To make matters worse, I went straight from a devastating break-up into an emotionally abusive relationship. My work environment and boyfriend were toxic. I felt constantly judged. Saying ‘I don’t know’ was frowned upon, and it was not acceptable to make mistakes. I felt like I had hit rock bottom, which forced me to stop and question the direction my life was headed. I had learned to ‘fake it till you make it’, acting confident even though I didn’t feel sure of myself. Many adults I observed over the years were anxious, doubtful of themselves and constantly thinking of worst-case scenarios to feel prepared and avoid mistakes. So I started mimicking these qualities, to feel like I was accomplished and in control. It worked in some ways, but only got me so far. I felt constantly anxious, trapped and unhappy with my day-to-day life. Ditching unhealthy habits The first change I made was to quit alcohol. I wasn’t ok with calling myself an ‘alcoholic’ but I knew that something wasn’t right. After working in a tense environment all week, having drinks on the weekend was what I looked forward to most. I knew my happiness should not depend on alcohol, but quitting wasn’t easy. It felt like I was losing a best friend and I missed having a crutch to avoid uncomfortable feelings. I felt very empty. So I decided to replace this addiction with yoga. I was traveling the world as part of my job and had already begun to do little workouts in my hotel rooms along the way. When I stopped drinking, I began to teach myself a yoga sequence. I lost 30 pounds and my health improved immensely. I felt better — both physically and mentally. It became the most important part of my day and I shifted my lifestyle to fit my yoga practice. People joked that I became a health nut, but for me it was about managing my emotional and mental health. The practice helped me realize that I wasn’t a victim and I could take charge of my life. I learned that discipline is actually freeing. I didn’t have to be pushed around by a job and life that I hated. I proved that I could make changes in my health and outlook on life. And if I could do that, then maybe I could make some changes to my career, too. So I took some time off in 2016 to travel and figure out how to do something that I love for a living. Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia 2016 Embracing my culture In 2016, I travelled to South America and visited my father’s home country, Bolivia, for the first time. I learned so much about my family and felt connected to my roots for the first time. Bolivia is incredibly beautiful, but very poverty stricken in some areas. I learned to appreciate the brave journey that my parents made, and saw how the people in my father’s home town were so joyful, family focused and comfortable being themselves, without any of the anxiety or stress I had become accustomed to. Funny enough, the job I dreamed up in my mind ended up looking very similar to the job I eventually found at Xero. During my first year, I was asked to be part of Latino Tax Fest in Las Vegas. I was still hesitant to speak Spanish and didn’t fully identify with the Hispanic culture, but there was so much pride and openness at this event that I found myself oddly at home. I felt myself acknowledging my roots even more and becoming comfortable speaking Spanish at work. I even started listening to Spanish music and leaving my hair wavy for the first time. I was gravitating towards the Hispanic community in my day-to-day work. The Hispanic accountants I worked with were really excited to speak to someone who understood accounting and technology and Spanish — three totally different languages! As the second largest country of Spanish speakers in the world, there was a huge opportunity for me to reach the Hispanic community in the US. I never imagined that travelling to South America would help me embrace my culture and improve my career in the way that it did. Feeling proud in 2020 Empowering myself When I chose a career in accounting, the decision was based on feelings of fear and my yearning for security. It was the only place I had felt good enough. I don’t regret my decision, because I understand so much more having gone down this road and can now give insights to others in similar situations. I now realize I can make my life decisions from a more powerful, expansive place. I was already good enough from the beginning. Growing in my career was only made possible by empowering myself. When we realize there is no outside authority that dictates the order in which we do things or decisions we make in our lives, we start to see how much power we really have and can begin to make some lasting changes. A lot of our limitations are self-imposed and based off something that happened in our past. Once we become aware of these limits and feel empowered to overcome them, then we can do more than we can have ever imagined. Telling my story In 2019, I took on a project to help Xero create a new initiative for the Hispanic small business community in the US. I did a lot of market research and presented my ideas to the highest levels of leadership at Xero. Instead of trying to be perfect, I was honest and shared my story about how using my language and cultural knowledge helped me finally embrace my roots. Xero decided to move forward with the initiative, and I felt more supported that I had my entire career. Once I started sharing my story, I realized how important it is for people coming into their careers. When I was young, I didn’t have role models from a career standpoint. I didn’t know how to find a job that was secure and consistent, that didn’t leave me frustrated and burnt out. By sharing my story, I hope I can make people see that embracing your full self — including your culture — can help you discover new opportunities in your life and career. I’ve come a long way since being a timid and insecure young woman. Of course, I am still relearning some of these lessons, but I am proud of my growth. Today, I’m the US Hispanic Market Director at Xero and get to support my community while doing work that I love. I have a healthy lifestyle, am surrounded by supportive people and feel grateful to my parents for immigrating to this country so I could have a better life. I feel incredibly lucky to be Latina and love the warmth of our culture — I now acknowledge that it’s an integral part of who I am and how I give back to this world.
https://medium.com/humans-of-xero/stuck-between-cultures-growing-up-latina-in-the-us-7c9cd90b1c7f
['Jackeline Velez']
2020-10-22 21:03:20.688000+00:00
['Culture', 'Latina', 'Diversity', 'Empowerment', 'Career Advice']
Somalia: ‘I love working with dedicated teams who want to make a positive change in this world’
Somalia: ‘I love working with dedicated teams who want to make a positive change in this world’ To mark World Humanitarian Day, Ali Yackub, a WFP Logistics Officer in Somalia, talks about what makes him tick Ali, right, checking relief items in Beletwyne — one of the worst flood-affected areas of Somalia. Photo: WFP/Ali Yackub “I’ve been stationed in some of the remotest regions of Somalia, but I’m currently working in Mogadishu, the capital, helping coordinate for the Logistics Cluster, supporting the transportation of critical cargo, on behalf of our humanitarian partners. I joined WFP in 2007. “My day usually begins on the runway. I get to the airside office at 07:30 to activate the day’s plan for cargo movements. It’s often extremely hot. During the past few months when floods and COVID-19 response were at their peak, I’d work from dawn until dusk with little or no break. “Unprecedented heavy rains caused devastating flooding and have displaced over one million people. We have also experienced the worst desert locust upsurge in 25 years — they’ve destroyed farmland and thousands of livelihoods. A plane is loaded at Mogadishu airport. Photo: WFP/Ali Yackub “When coronavirus broke out, humanitarian needs soared. Some call it a ‘triple threat’ emergency. Needs were urgent. Many roads were made impassable by the floods. Air transportation was quickly identified as the best way of shifting relief supplies. “Lockdown at Mogadishu airport caused delays in getting cargo and passengers onto the planes. Those days were non-stop. I would be on the phone, out in the baking sun, following up with transporters, airline operators, the airport authorities and the partners themselves and rushing between offices and the warehouse. “For the flood response, we moved sandbags for the Government to help populations affected by the devastating flooding earlier in the year. We are also supporting the World Health Organization and the Somali Ministry of Health in transporting vital medical equipment and supplies, such as hospital beds and oxygen tanks. Ali starts his day on the airstrip at Mogadishu airport. Photo: WFP/Ali Yackub “A major challenge can be when cargo doesn’t arrive on time, and passengers don’t show up for the flights we have organised. Other issues can arise when there are delays landing clearance at smaller airports. You can plan an entire flight, load up the cargo and get ready to go, only to be told you can’t land at your destination because some paperwork is missing. As the cargo we are moving is so critical, this aspect of the job can be quite stressful. “After nearly three decades of instability, Somalia is now on a positive trajectory, following the re-establishment of the Federal Government in 2012. However, the country continues to struggle with recurrent food and nutrition crises, widespread insecurity, political instability, underdeveloped infrastructure, and climate shocks such as drought and floods. “World Humanitarian Day has made me reflect on why I am working in this sector. I love working with dedicated teams who want to make a positive change in this world.”
https://medium.com/world-food-programme-insight/somalia-i-love-working-with-dedicated-teams-who-want-to-make-a-positive-change-in-this-world-fe3e46c1493e
['Amelia Stewart']
2020-08-18 12:10:20.534000+00:00
['United Nations', 'Logistics', 'Somalia', 'Hunger', 'Humanitarian']
Five Command Line Tools for Data Science
One of the most frustrating aspects of data science can be the constant switching between different tools whilst working. You can be editing some code in a Jupyter Notebook, having to install a new tool on the command line and maybe editing a function in an IDE all whilst working on the same task. Sometimes it is nice to find ways of doing more things in the same piece of software. In the following post, I am going to list some of the best tools I have found for doing data science on the command line. It turns out there are many tasks that can be completed via simple terminal commands than I first thought and I wanted to share some of those here. This is a useful tool for obtaining data from any server via a variety of protocols including HTTP. I’ll give a couple of example use cases for obtaining publically available data sets. The UCI Machine Learning Repository is an excellent resource for obtaining datasets for machine learning projects. I am going to use a simple curl command to download a data set taken from the blood transfusion centre in Hsin-Chu City, Taiwan. If we simply run curl [url] which in our example will be curl https://archive.ics.uci.edu/ml/machine-learning-databases/blood-transfusion/transfusion.data this will print the data to the terminal. Adding some additional arguments will download and save the data using a specified filename. The file will now be available in your current working directory. curl -o data_dl.csv https://archive.ics.uci.edu/ml/machine-learning-databases/blood-transfusion/transfusion.data Another common method of obtaining data for data science projects is via an API. This tool also supports both GET and POST requests for interacting with an API. Running the following command will obtain a single record from the OpenWeatherMap API and save as a JSON file named weather.json . For a more comprehensive tutorial on cURL see this excellent article by Zaiste. curl -o weather.json -X GET \ 'https://api.openweathermap.org/data/2.5/weather?lat=37.3565982&lon=-121.9689848&units=imperial&appid=fd4698c940c6d1da602a70ac34f0b147' \ -H 'Postman-Token: dcf3c17f-ef3f-4711-85e1-c2d928e1ea1a' \ -H 'cache-control: no-cache' csvkit is a set of command line tools for working with CSV files. The tasks that it can execute can be divided into three areas: input, processing and output. Let’s look at a quick real-world example of how you can use this. Firstly let’s install the tool using pip install. pip install csvkit For the purposes of this example, I am going to be using the same CSV file I created from the UCI Machine Learning Repository via a curl command above. First, let’s use csvclean to make sure that our CSV file is in the correct format. This function will automatically fix common CSV errors and remove any bad rows. A useful aspect of this function is that it automatically outputs a new cleaned version of the CSV file so that the raw data is preserved. The new file always has the following naming convention [filename]_out.csv . If you would prefer for the original file to be overwritten you can add the optional -n argument. csvclean data_dl.csv In the example file I have, there are no errors but this can be a really useful way to reduce errors further down the line when working with CSV files. Now let’s say we want to quickly inspect the file. We can use csvcut and csvgrep to do this. Firstly let’s print out the column names. csvcut -n data_dl_out.csv | cut -c6- Recency (months) Frequency (times) Monetary (c.c. blood) Time (months) whether he/she donated blood in March 2007 Let’s now determine how many classes there are in the target column whether he/she donated blood in March 2007 . csvcut -c "whether he/she donated blood in March 2007" data_dl_out.csv | sed 1d | sort | uniq 0 1 The csvgrep function allows you to filter CSV files based on regular expression matching. Let’s use this function to extract only the rows that match class 1. csvgrep -c "whether he/she donated blood in March 2007" -m 1 data_dl_out.csv You can also use csvkit to perform simple data analysis using the csvstat function. Simply running csvstat data_dl_out.csv prints descriptive statistics for the entire file to the command line. You can also just request the result of only one statistic with an optional command. csvstat --mean data_dl_out.csv 1. a: 373.5 2. Recency (months): 9.507 3. Frequency (times): 5.515 4. Monetary (c.c. blood): 1,378.676 5. Time (months): 34.282 6. whether he/she donated blood in March 2007: None IPython IPython gives access to enhanced interactive python from the shell. In essence, it means you can do most of the things that you can do in a Jupyter Notebook from the command line. You can follow these steps to install it if you do not already have it available in your terminal. To initiate IPython simply type ipython at the command line. You are now in the interactive shell. Here you can import python installed libraries and I find this tool most useful for doing some quick data analysis on the command line. Let’s perform some basic tasks on the data set we have already been using. First I will import pandas, read in the file and inspect the first few rows of data. import pandas as pd data = pd.read_csv('data_dl_out.csv') data.head() The file column names are quite long so next, I am going to use pandas to rename them, and then export the resulting dataframe to a new CSV file for later use. data = data.rename(columns={'Recency (months)': 'recency', 'Frequency (times)': 'frequency', 'Monetary (c.c. blood)': 'volumne', 'Time (months)': 'time', 'whether he/she donated blood in March 2007': 'target'}) data.to_csv('data_clean.csv') As a final exercise let’s inspect the correlation between the features and the target variable using the pandas corr() function. corr_matrix = data.corr() corr_matrix['target'].sort_values(ascending=False) To exit IPython simply type exit . At times you may also want to obtain a data set via a SQL query on a database. The tool csvsql, which is also part of the csvkit tool, supports querying, writing and creating tables directly on a database. It also supports SQL statements for querying a CSV file. Let’s run an example query on the cleaned dataset. csvsql --query "select frequency, count(*) as rows from data_clean where target = 1 group by frequency order by 2 desc" data_clean.csv Yes, you can perform machine learning at the command line! There are a few tools for this but SciKit-Learn Laboratory is probably one of the most accessible. Let’s build a model using our blood donations data set. SciKit-Learn laboratory relies on the correct files being placed in consistently named directories. So to begin with we will make a directory named train and copy, move and rename the data file to features.csv . mkdir train cp data_clean.csv train/features.csv Next, we need to create a config file named predict-donations.cfg and place it in our data directory. [General] experiment_name = Blood_Donations task = cross_validate [Input] train_directory = train featuresets = [["features.csv"]] learners = ["RandomForestClassifier", "DecisionTreeClassifier", "SVC", "MultinomialNB"] label_col = target [Tuning] grid_search = false objective = accuracy [Output] log = output results = output predictions = output Then we simply run this command run_experiment -l predict-donations.cfg . This automatically runs the experiment and creates an output folder containing the results. We can run a SQL query to summarise the results in the Blood_Donations_summary.tsv file. cd output < Blood_Donations_summary.tsv csvsql --query "SELECT learner_name, accuracy FROM stdin "\ > "WHERE fold = 'average' ORDER BY accuracy DESC" | csvlook There are many other command line tools that can be useful for data science but I wanted to highlight here those that I had found useful in my work. For a really comprehensive view of data science at the command line, I found the book Data Science at the Command Line which is freely available online to be extremely useful.
https://towardsdatascience.com/five-command-line-tools-for-data-science-29f04e5b9c16
['Rebecca Vickery']
2019-06-21 13:12:35.359000+00:00
['Towards Data Science', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Machine Learning', 'Programming', 'Data Science']
Minnesota Weather: Quick-Hitting, Narrow Band Of Snow Thursday, Whiteout Conditions Expected
The crash scene around 9:30 a.m. Credit: Minnesota Department of Transportation A fiery crash on Interstate 94 in Monticello has backed up traffic on the snowy interstate Thursday morning. The Minnesota Department of Transportation’s website says the crash happened between Wright County Road 19 and County Road 18 that blocked the westbound lanes of the interstate. According to the Minnesota State Patrol’s report, the “large crash” happened at 9:10 a.m. on westbound I-94 at Flenning Avenue Northeast. State Patrol Sgt. Jesse Grabow says I-94 westbound at exit 201 in Albertville is closed due to “several crashes” on I-94 near Monticello. MnDOT traffic cameras show several vehicles, including semi-trucks, near the crash site, including a semi-truck that is on fire and producing a large amount of black smoke. The crash scene at 10:30 a.m. Credit: Minnesota Department of Transportation Grabow says the driver of that truck is OK. The State Patrol says other injuries of those involved in the pileup have not yet been determined. Traffic cameras showed several emergency vehicles at the scene. The crash scene at 10:27 a.m. Credit: Minnesota Department of Transportation At the time of the crash, I-94 was covered in snow and ice, Grabow said. Early Wednesday, The National Weather Service said a narrow band of snow would move across the area in the morning, dropping 1–2 inches of snow. Shortly after the crash, the National Weather Service issued a snow squall warning for east-central Wright County and north-central Hennepin County until 10:30 a.m., noting the impact could include “dangerous life-threatening travel.” The weather service warned that “a dangerous snow squall was located over Albertville, or 10 miles northeast of Buffalo, moving southeast at 15 mph,” and it was creating “extremely poor visibility” on I-94. According to the National Weather Service, snow squalls move in and out quickly, typically lasting less than an hour, and may only produce minor amounts of snow accumulations. Squalls produce sudden white-out conditions, which combined with falling temperatures produce icy roads “in just a few minutes,” and can happen when there’s no winter storm in progress.
https://medium.com/@daouas999/minnesota-weather-quick-hitting-narrow-band-of-snow-thursday-whiteout-conditions-expected-e3bb7be1bc3a
['Dilan Tech']
2020-11-12 18:37:16.902000+00:00
['Weather', 'Médiá', 'Minnesota', 'Minnesotaweather', 'Thursday']
Why do People Like to Outsource their Content Writing to India?
Introduction It’s no secret that we all like to save our hard-earned money. As a freelance content writer, I have seen firsthand how the content industry is quite varied. Most native speakers who have as little as 1–2 years of experience are able to reel in even $40–50 for a 1000 word article, whereas a non-native Indian speaker would be pulling around $15–20 for the same 1000 words. I am not here to complain about the difference in pay between native and non-native speakers, yet I am here to point out the sheer difference as a reason why people like to outsource work to Indian Content Writers. But other than price most Indian Content Writers provide the same basic standards such as plagiarism free content and offer it within a tight deadline. Although price remains the primary benefit for choosing writers in India or other foreign countries the overall benefits of outsourcing remain pretty much the same. Let’s explore a few reasons why you would want to outsource your content needs. Allows you to Focus Your Efforts Elsewhere This holds to be true whether you are a budding business owner or a freelancer. By outsourcing your content requirements you will be empowered to focus your efforts on other aspects of your business. As a business owner, you would be needed in other aspects of your business be it strategy, execution, or even business development. \ Fresh Ideas It is always good to have a varied viewpoint, especially as you get into a routine and start viewing your business from the same angle. Content creators are often indulged with the latest marketing trends or industry news. With their diverse portfolio, they will be able to serve you with the experience and knowledge they have acquired in their time serving various clients. More Content in Less Time As an individual, there is only so much you can write. It is frankly understood that writing requires not only a natural flair but also a clear mind. This means that there is only so much you can write in a day. This could hamper your content schedule in the long-run by outsourcing your work to a content writer you can get things done a lot more efficiently. It is no secret that if you want good content you must invest your time to research, create, and finally publicize your content. Industry Experts Perhaps the most important benefit of outsourcing your content to Indian Content Writers or anyone else for that matter. You are enabled to hire expert writers for any particular niche. Most writers are specialized in a particular niche including anything from tech, travel, food, or retail. Along with industry-specific writers you are also able to experiment with different kinds o writing apart from your standard blogs and articles. This includes everything from brochures, infographics, editorials, and even video. Conclusion Content writing services will help you out as you are empowered with more freedom to work on your own business development. By outsourcing your content, you will be able to not only dish out more content in less time and bring fresh ideas to the table. It is always a good idea to experiment with new ideas and check out somethings that you have never tried before. Outsourcing your content is one of these things. It is not only Indian Content Writers, but the concept of outsourcing your content can be applied with just about any content writer out there. I wish you the best of luck on your future endeavors and hope that you find a great outsourcing solution. But yeah, if you do indeed ever need help with your business and its content needs, Indian Content Writers is here to help!
https://medium.com/@medamsuhas/why-do-people-like-to-outsource-their-content-writing-to-india-f22a390801c9
['Suhas Medam']
2020-12-25 14:22:27.990000+00:00
['Content Writing Services', 'Content Writing Tips', 'Content Writing Company', 'Content Creation', 'Content Writing']
What’s a Data Scientist?
by Manuel Sainz de la Pena This is the first question I receive when I tell a family member or friend that I am currently studying to become a data scientist. The truth is that I didn’t really know the answer to that question when I began my Data Science boot camp with General Assembly. Sure, I had a rough idea. I was aware of the prevalence of data in all of our lives. And I knew that companies would certainly pay for someone to analyze that data and provide actionable insights. However, I definitely did not have a complete understanding of what exactly a data scientist does, and what are the skills a data scientist should possess. In an effort to answer these questions, I will share what I’ve learned so far about the typical workflow of a data scientist. Question Asking I believe that the first pre-requisite for any good data scientist is to have an open, curious mind. Question asking is the first step of the data science workflow and it is imperative that we identify a precise “problem statement” that we can specifically address in order to add value to an organization. An example of a problem statement would be something to the effect of: “I want to predict the sale price of a home in Ames, Iowa based off its zip code, square footage, and overall quality.” This is an iterative process which usually requires sharpening and narrowing down of the problem statement once we obtain our data and understand its limitations. Obtain Data and Clean it The next step in the job of a data scientist is to obtain and clean our data. This can be accomplished in a variety ways. Some websites allow us to scrape data directly from them. We might be provided with an existing data set, or we might have to go out and collect the data we are looking for ourselves! Cleaning the data is where data scientists often spend a big chunk of their time. The following are common issues that a data scientist might have to deal with at this stage: missing/null values duplicate entries outliers incorrectly formatted data There is no one size fits all solution for these types of problems. However a data scientist must be able to rationalize and defend the choices they make in the data cleaning stage. Exploratory Data Analysis Visualizations are a data scientists’ best friend when it comes to Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA). The goal of EDA is to better understand the relationships between variables in our data. We can create graphs to visualize these relationships. For example, making bar graphs showing the average sale price for houses in Ames, Iowa based on the number of bedrooms and bathrooms would most likely provide insight. My personal favorite type of visualization is the Seaborn Correlation Heatmap (example shown below). Heatmaps allow us to visualize the correlation strength between our target variable (sale price in this example) and independent variables (Overall Quality, Total Square Feet, etc.). They are also extremely useful when it comes to identifying which independent variables might suffer from multicollinearity. This information can help us to remove redundant features which will negatively impact our models. Feature Engineering Feature engineering is the process of deciding which features we ultimately choose to include in our models. There are two steps usually involved. Feature Selection: This step typically involves removing features from our model that add more noise than predictive power. Removing the redundant features we identified during EDA is usually a good starting point. If our model has too many features it can also skew the bias-variance tradeoff too heavily towards variance, and thus result in an overfit model which will not perform well on unseen data. Feature Construction: This step refers to the creation of new features from existing ones. For example, in our Ames, Iowa housing sale price predictor, a new feature could be created that sums the total number of bedrooms and bathrooms into an entirely new feature. Or perhaps multiplying the square footage by the “house quality” integer value would give us a numeric feature which ends up highly correlated to sale price. Feature construction is an iterative process that can be aided by outside research and one’s own intuition. Modeling At last, we’ve gotten to the machine learning stage in the data science process. First, we need to select the type of model(s) we would like to train. Below is a cheat sheet from Microsoft Azure showing a useful flow chart for how we might pick the best model for our specific project. Below are the basic steps we need to follow to create a model: Split data into a training and testing set Instantiate whichever model we will be using Fit the model with training data set Obtain predictions for the testing set from the trained model Use performance metrics to evaluate the performance of the model The simple steps above can be made infinitely more complex, but serve as a basic guide for what occurs when we conduct supervised machine learning. Communication of Results We know have our model, its predictions, and have evaluated the strength of those predictions. Perhaps the most important part of our job as data scientists is to effectively communicate our results. Data scientists must be able to tell a compelling story with their data and usually this involves utilizing clear, compelling visualizations. Failure to communicate results effectively can result in a whole lot of work going down the drain, if we cannot convince our audience to act on our findings. Thus, as data scientists it is critical that we practice and refine our presentation skills to maximize our impact.
https://manuelsdlp.medium.com/whats-a-data-scientist-4b0fb2c4dd2f
['Manuel Sainz De La Pena']
2020-12-13 16:39:18.525000+00:00
['Data Scientist', 'Data', 'Data Science', 'Data Visualization', 'Machine Learning']
Making the Racism Vanish: How the Right Manipulates Facts
I didn’t pay a lot of attention to the story. Another whiny white fratboy having a meltdown and crying to right-wing media sources how his “patriotic” defense of police caused a new professor to chastise him. The poor baby was upset by it. I saw the article in the hate sheet, the Daily Mail, a paper for illiterates in England that is most famous for having supported Hitler and Mussolini through its editorials in the 1930s. Since then it has been race-baiting Meghan Markle and coming up with new inventive spellings for words along with incoherent sentences—I presume their editors are still in grade school. The other right-wing rag, the New York Post, also picked up the same weepy story about the poor boy who is jockeying to be the next Charlie Kirk or Ben Shapiro. The child with the big mouth was shown in the Daily Mail all decked on in his Trump paraphanalia waving the racist white supremacy gesture in the air. Here is the original photo the Daily Mail ran. You can clearly see that the child with the big mouth is in his Trump gear and waving the white power gesture in the air. Now that is a cropped photo but here is the original. And you can see the cretin with the boy waving the same gesture, so it was just an incidental gesture made without thinking, they choreographed it intentionally. It’s two asses waving “white power” while in their worship gear for America’s first truly authoritarian president. While the boy with the big mouth was being praised by the alt-Right I went back to find the photo of him showing his true colors and suddenly couldn’t find it. It vanished and was replaced with one of him dressed in suit ready by bural, with slicked back hair. The New York Post had titled the original photo with the child’s name “…-facebook-02.jpg” and the Daily Mail had originally cited the boy’s Facebook page as the source for this white power gesture photo. Apparently neither paper thought this a problem when they first published the photo. But painting someone waving a racist gesture as a victim doesn’t work very well. Out of the blue both papers deleted the photo with the gesture and put the suit photo in its place. I did a reverse image search on the racist photo and found the records showing both newspapers had originally published it. (See below). As far as I see things this inconsequential child is not the story here, one reason I don’t use his name, he is just a puppet used by the newspaper for their purposes. The real story is how the newspapers manipulated their readers and then edited their original reporting to further this goal. I went to the child’s Facebook page and there was no such photo there either. If the Post and Mail had been honest in attributing the child’s page, it had been wiped there as well. I went back to the Dail Mail and the New York Post and both of the newspaper removed the Trump/gesture photo but neither, as far as I could see, told readers they replaced this questionable photo. This selective editing was hidden from the public and unacknowledged. Both papers are sleazy, scandal sheets with a far right bent to them. Both tried to paint this child as a victim but having their “victim” waving a white power gesture in their story undermines their goal. They removed the tell-tale photo and replaced it and none of them admitted doctoring the facts to improve the boy’s image. What they did is not journalism, it’s propaganda.
https://medium.com/the-radical-center/making-the-racism-vanish-how-the-right-manipulates-facts-9a3d17a21d84
['James Peron']
2021-05-03 21:14:46.997000+00:00
['Propaganda', 'Racism', 'New York Post', 'Daily Mail', 'Alt Right']
How to Optimize B2B Deal Management to Cut Costs and Losses in 2021
How to Optimize B2B Deal Management to Cut Costs and Losses in 2021 ReadWrite Follow Jan 14 · 5 min read A lot of companies suffered supply chain disruptions due to COVID-19. Certain experts have described the situation as a Keynesian supply shock, a negative event that triggers aggregate supply shortages with bigger impacts than the prior reduction in labor supply. There is still a lot of uncertainty in the air, so many businesses still don’t know how to approach the coming months. Though businesses have been undergoing changes, those shifts do not necessarily have a clear direction. One area of supply chain operations that have undergone only a little change is deal management. Deals are still handled pretty much in the same way, with the same old tools and strategies. Yet, they get more complicated. This leads to unnecessary additional costs and losses. A recent study by Enable summarized the views of 100 sales, purchasing, and finance professionals and found that 83% of companies reported supply chain disruptions in some capacity due to COVID-19, and 47% have seen their revenue decrease between 10–80%. Many businesses are losing millions of dollars each year because complicated deals are handled using outdated techniques. COVID-19 and Deal Renegotiation COVID-19 has delivered the biggest shocks to supply chains globally, forcing businesses to make swift changes to adapt to the new reality. Right now, governments around the world are easing lockdown measures, despite fears of a second wave of the pandemic sweeping through. There is still a lot of precariousness and businesses are under pressure to renegotiate deals. Renegotiation is inevitable since COVID-19 has altered the conditions upon which most deals were agreed. The existing arrangement puts all parties in a deal at a disadvantage. Now, the problem is that many businesses would still be using the same poor tools that had consistently put them at a loss, even before COVID-19 was discovered. Going forward, businesses need to rethink their strategies and pivot to digital for better deal management. Digitized deal management allows businesses to collect more data, gain better insights, and make better decisions when processing deals. Ultimately, optimizing deal management strengthens your supply chains and even makes your sales team more effective. Benefits of Optimized Deal Management to Sales Reps 1. Data-Driven Insights One of the hallmarks of an improperly managed deal is confusion. Following the signing of an agreement, parties must continue to acquire insights into the realities and conditions that affect the deals. For instance, renegotiating deals at this time will require poring over the data of the business impacts of the pandemic. Optimized deal management allows the sales team to access and properly assess current information on deals. 2. Friction-less Agreement Deal negotiation involves many (often conflicting) ideas, and as all parties work towards finding common ground, some uniformity is necessary. Effective deal management puts collective principles above personal ideas. This cohesion drives attitudes that would lead to less friction, an important requirement if deals must go through successfully. The availability of data-driven insights enhances transparency in the process, which, in turn, builds trust. As such, deals are processed faster, for the good of every party. 3. Collaboration Deal information should be accessible on-demand to all interested parties at any time. This is important both for making critical decisions and for monitoring progress. The world increasingly becomes connected; deal brokers need to capitalize on this to optimize their processes. According to Accenture, “digital solutions could ‘virtualize’ the entire end-to-end deal management process, perhaps using a web-based portal to bring together a virtual team from multiple areas of the organization.” Collaboration improves the relationship between deal parties. This, in turn, lowers the lifecycle of deals, empowering sales reps to close more deals in shorter times. 4. Accountability The situation described above, how businesses lose millions due to unclaimed rebates, is an obvious sign of poor deal management. Optimized deal management is necessary for setting better goals and properly implementing factors to monitor progress. Digitization of Deal Management Deal management is one area of business that has not fully embraced digitization. Yet, most of its challenges are tied, directly or indirectly, to the use of outdated tools in a rapidly changing world. For one, data has become the world’s most vital resource. In deal management, having detailed and accurate data is paramount to preliminary research and for maintaining comprehensive visibility of running deals. Likewise, data is needed for better forecasting. Recounting the words of an old study, “without accurate forecasts, sales managers can expect a big gap between forecasted deals and actual closed-won deals.” Businesses have far more data to deal with than they did ten years ago, meaning pages of spreadsheets and other paperwork can no longer deliver the right results. Deal management solutions help you to make better, data-driven decisions by giving you real-time analysis and visibility. The prevailing data management strategy has data spread across various sources: spreadsheets, emails, and physical paperwork. This lack of consistency is what leads companies to make poor decisions and miss out on financial opportunities such as rebates. Better forecasting with digitized deal management enhances the robustness of supply chains. By accessing relevant data, businesses can improve their risk monitoring. This results in better preparation and better adaptation to changing needs. Instead of going with assumptions that things will fall into place, businesses can determine that through proper data analysis and subsequently implement methods to adapt their operations to even the worst shocks. The digitization of deal management reduces dependency on certain key individuals. Due to the severe limitations of paper spreadsheets, usually only a few individuals broker deals and fully understand the ramifications applied. With a cloud-hosted deal management solution, however, you can create a multi-threaded relationship. This translates into a more effective implementation of deals by boosting collaboration between all parties to the agreement. Businesses must change their approach to deal with management. It’s no longer business as usual. In fact, while talking about cloud-hosted deal management solutions, there’s already been suggestions on the future role of artificial intelligence in enhancing deal management. AI will help improve data analytics, automate financial processes, and overcome forecasting challenges with predictive analytics. Conclusion In essence, no business can afford to be left behind. Deal negotiation aims to reach an agreement that is profitable for both sides. But if a business persists with outdated tools and approaches to deal management, it wouldn’t be getting the right value for its agreements. You can avoid losing money in unclaimed rebates and so on by digitizing your deal management to optimize negotiations. Digitizing deal management helps you to collect detailed data, maintain comprehensive oversight, and make better decisions concerning deal negotiations. How to Optimize B2B Deal Management to Cut Costs and Losses in 2021 was originally published on ReadWrite by Joseph Chukwube.
https://medium.com/readwrite/how-to-optimize-b2b-deal-management-to-cut-costs-and-losses-in-2021-9354691e2e21
[]
2021-01-14 00:34:59.594000+00:00
['B2B', '2021', 'Deal']
The Case for Using Covid-19 Exposure Notification Apps
Last week, I got a text from the New York State Department of Health inviting me to use the state’s contact tracing app. It was the first time I’d received an invitation, and my first thought was: After eight months of Covid-19, you’re asking me to use it now? Today, the case count in the U.S. reached 16.9 million, and over 307,000 Americans have died. Transmission is rampant in a majority of states. If an app notified me every time I had a close brush with someone who tested positive for Covid-19, would it even make a difference in helping stop the spread? I asked Michael Reid, MD, MPH, who’s heading up the contact tracing programs for both San Francisco and California and is an assistant professor at the University of California, San Francisco specializing in infectious disease. The short answer is that it’s not known for sure whether these apps help reduce transmission in the U.S.: Not enough people have adopted them, so there’s not enough data. https://www.reddit.com/r/GGGvSzeremetafree/ https://www.reddit.com/r/GGGvSzeremetafree/comments/kfsqh8/watch_szeremeta_vs_gg_g_live_streamsreddit/ https://usastream6.medium.com/moderna-vaccine-gets-thumbs-up-states-say-their-allotments-are-being-cut-covid-19-now-nations-1b254868e6a https://usastream6.medium.com/us-surpasses-17m-coronavirus-cases-just-a-day-after-setting-record-death-toll-as-it-happened-4dd3616918f https://usastream6.medium.com/modernas-vaccine-is-poised-to-roll-out-in-the-u-s-898f397c02ef https://mhumayra792.medium.com/a-second-covid-19-vaccine-is-slated-for-approval-165ccd0947cd https://mhumayra792.medium.com/the-next-conspiracy-theory-i-got-covid-from-the-vaccine-ae31c1258ca0 https://mhumayra792.medium.com/what-to-know-about-serious-adverse-effects-and-deaths-in-the-moderna-vaccine-data-45b3831c72a3 https://ariftokai92.medium.com/vaccine-trial-participants-randomized-to-placebo-should-get-vaccine-now-b44209cfcd8e https://ariftokai92.medium.com/the-fda-is-expected-to-authorize-the-moderna-covid-19-vaccine-for-emergency-use-friday-7d1a400b39d0 https://ariftokai92.medium.com/do-you-want-to-see-what-covid-19-vaccination-looks-like-ec18b0990aa9 The long answer, though, suggests they may still play an important role in reducing transmission of Covid-19, especially once the country is ready to fully emerge from shutdown. Reid began his explanation by clarifying that these apps are for “exposure notification,” not for contact tracing per se. “They function to complement existing contact tracing capabilities,” he says. “That’s a useful distinction to make so that one understands that they’re not replacing the need for human contact tracing.” Human contact tracers — which the U.S. is woefully lacking, notes Reid — identify people who test positive for Covid-19 and interview those people to find out who they’ve had close contact with. Those people are then notified about their exposure and given instructions for self-quarantining. This is a tried and true public health method for reducing transmission of infectious disease, and it’s proven to be a powerful tool for controlling Covid-19 in countries like South Korea, Vietnam, Japan, and Taiwan. But the contact tracing process has a gap that apps may help fill. When a person who tests positive for Covid-19 is interviewed by a contact tracer, they identify people who they already know, like household members and close friends and family. They can’t, however, identify people they interacted with who they don’t know, like the salesperson at the grocery, or a teller at the bank. While working as a contact tracer, says Reid, he learned that most people don’t know who they acquired Covid-19 from, and a substantial number of cases also elicit very few contacts. Exposure notification apps can alert people if they’ve been exposed to a stranger with Covid-19 and give them “the agency to take matters into their own hands,” he says, by self-quarantining and contacting their local public health department, which can use that information to track outbreaks. These Bluetooth-based apps allow phones to communicate with other phones that they come into contact with; if one user has logged a positive test result, the other will be notified. For this reason, explains Reid, apps could actually have even more utility in a situation like the one we’re in today, where there is more widespread transmission of the coronavirus — assuming enough people use them. “If we’re ever going to go back to work or be on school campuses, or on factory floors, then these kinds of tools could be a real asset to be able to determine who you’ve come into close contact with who you might not otherwise known.” The big caveat, he notes, is that the most important public health interventions are still social distancing and mask-wearing. Whether enough people will use exposure notification apps remains to be seen. A recent Reuters analysis estimated that about 6 million Americans had used the apps by mid-November and that nearly 50% of the U.S. population would have access to one of these apps by Christmas. In April, a modeling study from the University of Oxford showed that 60% of the population needs to adopt these apps to end transmission. There are numerous reasons why people may not have downloaded the apps (Nature explains them in-depth here). Privacy is one common concern; in a OneZero story published in April, my colleague Will Oremus questioned whether these “opt-in” public health apps would be treated as such by private entities like churches and schools, and another colleague, Sarah Emerson, raised concerns that marginalized groups would bear the consequences of widespread surveillance. Reid didn’t seem too worried about the privacy issue, though. “Ironically, I think that’s a really peculiar conversation to be having, given that Google and Apple and other technology companies are scraping your data all of the time for information that they’re going to use to target you for new products that you’re going to buy,” he says. “The mechanics of exposure notification technology is such that [the data] is not being centrally housed in some department of public health data warehouse.” After talking to Reid, two things became clear to me: First, the country needs more human contact tracers and can’t expect apps to make much of a dent in transmission on their own. Second, I should probably just download the app. At the very least, there appears to be minimal cost and risk to me, and doing so would add another layer of protection to myself and the people in my household, plus support the work of the human contact tracers as they scramble to identify where the virus is headed next. And, looking ahead, it may very well be a tool I’ll encounter again in the future. If exposure notification apps are shown to be effective, “I think they’re going to play an important role when the next pandemic comes around,” says Reid. “And chances are it’ll come around sooner than the last one.”
https://medium.com/@gameus40/the-case-for-using-covid-19-exposure-notification-apps-8dc9f0a619b3
['Https', 'Www.Reddit.Com R Nflstreamsredditnow']
2020-12-18 20:46:24.991000+00:00
['Coronavirus', 'Public Health', 'Covid 19', 'Technology', 'News']
Joe Biden’s bid to rally the ‘free world’ could spawn another axis of evil
Joe Biden’s big idea — a US-led global alliance of liberal democracies ranged against authoritarian regimes and “strongman” leaders — sits at the heart of his American restoration project. His proposed “united front” of the great and the good is primarily intended to counter China and Russia. Yet it could also antagonise valued western allies such as India, Turkey and Poland. For this and other reasons, it seems destined to fail. Biden pledged during this year’s election campaign to hold a “summit for democracy” in 2021 “to renew the spirit and shared purpose of the free world”. It would aim “to strengthen our democratic institutions, honestly confront nations that are backsliding, and forge a common agenda”, he said. It was needed because, partly due to Donald Trump, “the international system that the US so carefully constructed is coming apart at the seams”. It’s a laudable aspiration. Recent years have seen a marked growth in oppressive, mostly rightwing regimes that ignore international law and abuse UN-defined universal rights, including democratic rights. But how will Biden decide who qualifies for his alliance? Totalitarian North Korea and Syria’s criminal regime are plainly unwelcome. Yet illiberal Thailand, Venezuela and Iran all maintain supposedly democratic systems. Will they get a summit invite? Diplomats are already predicting Biden’s grand coalition will end up as a rehash of the G7 group of leading western economies — the US, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, the UK and Japan. One wheeze is to add India, Australia and South Korea — a notional “D-10”. But that simply creates another elite club from which many actual or aspiring democracies are excluded. What is the future of the UN in the age of impunity? Read more Part of the difficulty is Biden himself. Terms such as the “free world”, recalling his formative years during the cold war, sound outdated. His blithe assertion of American moral superiority jars with recent experience. “We have to prove … that the US is prepared to lead again, not just with the example of our power but also with the power of our example,” he says. It’s an old refrain. Yet the songsheet has changed, and so have the singers. China does not threaten global security in the existential way the Soviet Union once did. The fundamental challenge it poses is subtler, amoral and multi-dimensional — technological, ideological, commercial, anti-democratic. The idea that a cowed world is counting on the US to ride to the rescue is old-think. The age of solo superpower is over; the unipolar moment was squandered. Power balances were already shifting before Trump destroyed trust. Weak, divided Europe may prove to be the exception in welcoming Biden’s initiative. “We need to step up our action to defend democracy,” says Josep Borrell, EU foreign affairs chief, amid alarm over recent trends highlighted in the V-Dem Institute’s Democracy Report 2020. It asserts that for the first time since 2001, autocracy is the world’s leading form of governance — in 92 countries in total, home to 54% of the global population. Britain’s international position is now so enfeebled that it will back almost anything Biden suggests. Germany will support his initiative too, as long as he does not endanger its lucrative China exports. Hungary and Poland are problematic. The Polish government’s disregard for judicial independence and abortion rights sits badly with a campaign promoting liberal values. According to V-Dem, Viktor Orbán’s Hungary is no longer a democracy at all but an “electoral authoritarian regime”. Viktor Orbán has been criticised for being at the head of an ‘electoral authoritarian regime’ in Hungary. Photograph: Omar Marques/Getty Images Looking further afield, Biden’s democracy drive could be like trying to herd cats, with much clawing and spitting. India is a case in point. It calls itself the world’s biggest democracy. Yet under prime minister Narendra Modi, it has become one of the biggest rights abusers, oppressing political opponents, independent media, NGOs such as Amnesty International, and millions of Muslims. Modi has nothing to say about democracy, except how to subvert it. Strictly speaking, Biden should add Taiwan, a model east-Asian democracy, to his guest list. To do so would utterly enrage China, so perhaps he won’t. Including Sudan and Afghanistan, both striving for democracy, might constitute wishful thinking. Conversely, snubbing Turkey, Peru, the Philippines, Uganda and a host of other flawed or pretend democracies would greatly offend otherwise friendly governments. The point here is that Biden, like all his predecessors, will in the end be obliged to deal with the world as it is, not as he would like it to be. As Barack Obama demonstrated in 2009, making a fine speech in Cairo about new beginnings in the Arab world feels good but ultimately signifies little. When the Arab spring faltered, the US backed the bad guys — in Egypt’s case, the dictator Abdel Fatah al-Sisi — because it suited its selfish geopolitical interests. https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-Buc-v-Vik-li-tv.-01.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-Buc-v-Vik-li-tv-0002.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/Video-Cardinals-v-Giants-Live-gme03.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/Video-Cardinals-v-Giants-Live-ja001.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-Chiefs-v-Dolphins-liv-Tv01.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-Chiefs-v-Dolphins-liv-Tv04.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-Giants-v-Cardinals-liv-sa001.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-vik-bac-4k-tv010.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-cowoys-v-Benga-liv-tv4.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-cowoys-v-Benga-liv-tv3.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-cowoys-v-Benga-liv-tv2.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-cowoys-v-Benga-liv-tv1.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-tex-ber-5k-tv4.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-tex-ber-5k-tv3.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-tex-ber-5k-tv2.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/video-tex-ber-5k-tv1.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/Broncos-v-Panthers-Lvq-4.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/Broncos-v-Panthers-Lvq-3.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/Broncos-v-Panthers-Lvq-2.html https://newyork.breastlink.com/sites/web/Broncos-v-Panthers-Lvq-1.html China and Russia, and other undemocratic outcasts such as Saudi Arabia, will count on rediscovered realism to temper Biden’s plan in practice, even if he persists with old-school American rhetoric about values and rights. Only if he and his allies attempt something meaningful, such as actively defending Hong Kong’s shattered freedoms, will Beijing feel the need to push back. Unlike Eritrea or, say, Belarus, there is much China can do if Washington’s pro-democracy tub-thumping grows unbearable. On issues such as the pandemic and the climate crisis, Beijing’s involvement is indispensable, and Biden knows it. All manner of economic, diplomatic and political leverage could be used to deflect US pressure. Most provocative is the suggestion, recently recycled by Vladimir Putin, that Russia and China may forge an anti-western military alliance, potentially drawing in lesser powers such as North Korea. This probably won’t happen. But it’s just possible that Biden’s well-meant but polarising “alliance of democracies” will deepen divisions and unintentionally spawn a new “axis of evil”. Unlike the much-hyped original, this one would be truly formidable. Since you’re here … … and it’s nearly the end of the year, we have a small favour to ask. Millions have turned to the Guardian for vital, independent, quality journalism throughout a turbulent and challenging 2020. Readers in 180 countries around the world now support us financially. Will you join them? We believe everyone deserves access to information that’s grounded in science and truth, and analysis rooted in authority and integrity. That’s why we made a different choice: to keep our reporting open for all readers, regardless of where they live or what they can afford to pay. This means more people can be better informed, united, and inspired to take meaningful action. In these perilous times, a truth-seeking global news organisation like the Guardian is essential. We have no shareholders or billionaire owner, meaning our journalism is free from commercial and political influence — this makes us different. When it’s never been more important, our independence allows us to investigate fearlessly, and challenge those in power. In this unprecedented year of intersecting crises, we have done just that, with revealing journalism that had real-world impact: the inept handling of the Covid-19 crisis, the Black Lives Matter protests, and the tumultuous US election. We have enhanced our reputation for urgent, powerful reporting on the climate emergency, and moved to practice what we preach, rejecting advertising from fossil fuel companies, divesting from oil and gas companies and setting a course to achieve net zero emissions by 2030. If there were ever a time to join us, it is now. Your funding powers our journalism, it protects our independence, and ensures we can remain open for all. You can support us through these challenging economic times and enable real-world impact. Every contribution, however big or small, makes a real difference for our future. Support the Guardian from as little as $1 — and it only takes a minute. Thank you.
https://medium.com/@kuttatuikere/joe-bidens-bid-to-rally-the-free-world-could-spawn-another-axis-of-evil-b0a3dc08c9c7
[]
2020-12-13 17:48:47.507000+00:00
['European Union', 'Russia', 'US Politics', 'China', 'India']
2021 Chatbot Trends: what is the new year storing for AI bots?
Since this year of 2020 has presented us all with many challenges and a need to adapt to a “new normal”, technology has never been more relevant and crucial than ever. Beyond helping us to cope with social distancing and to reach out to our loved ones, it has also being a major support in businesses. Furthermore, automated assistance in online companies allows for businesses to handle every single request. Chatbots seem to fit perfectly into these extraordinary times, when it comes to handling customer care and to facilitate a customer experience that secures peace of mind for the consumers, as well as stability for all businesses’ sizes. Today, the top five countries using chatbots are the USA, India, Germany, the UK, and Brazil — being the US home to the largest part of the world’s chatbot users (36%), reports Chatbot Life. Only last year in 2019, it was estimated that a quarter of the world’s population was using chatbots, says Chatbots Magazine. On the other hand, looking ahead into 2021, about 85% of customer interaction will be handled without human agents, while $5 billion will be invested in chatbots by 2021, according to AMEInfo. So, let’s take a look at some interesting facts about bots: Chatbot ecosystem overview 50% of businesses plan to spend more on chatbots than on mobile apps. (Chatbot Magazine) 64% of internet users say 24-hour service is the best feature of chatbots. (Techved) 1.4 billion people are using chatbots today. (Acquire) Chatbots can cut operational costs by up to 30%. (Sprout) Statistics on chatbot usage show that by the end of 2020, 80% of companies will use chatbots. (smallbizgenius) Customer service stats 53% of service organizations are going to use chatbots within the next 18 months. (SalesForce) 46% of users would prefer to communicate with a live agent instead of a chatbot. However, by combining chatbots with live-agents, allows the later ones to spend their time solving more difficult and complex problems. (SalesForce). Approximately 40% of people of all ages prefer to use chatbots when shopping online in 2020. (Tidio) Why care and invest in chatbots? 2021 trends and the future of bots With a projected worldwide market size of more than $1.3 billion by 2024, chatbots will be a driving force for business communications, reports l.inchpin. Bank systems will automate up to 90% of customer interactions using chatbots by 2022: Almost 40% of major companies with more than 500 people are going to implement at least one intelligent assistant or AI-based chat robot in 2019. By the end of 2020, 80% of entrepreneurs will use chatbots. (Chatbots Magazine) Almost 40% of major companies with more than 500 people are going to implement at least one intelligent assistant or AI-based chat robot in 2019. By the end of 2020, 80% of entrepreneurs will use chatbots. (Chatbots Magazine) Companies will save 2.5 billion customer service hours using chatbots by the end of 2023: One of the main goals of the companies that implement chatbots is to reduce customer service work time. According to Juniper’s research, the introduction of chatbots will save 2.5 billion customer service hours over the coming years. The customer service cost reduction across the retail, banking, and healthcare sectors is estimated to amount to $11 billion annually by 2023. (Chatbots Life) One of the main goals of the companies that implement chatbots is to reduce customer service work time. According to Juniper’s research, the introduction of chatbots will save 2.5 billion customer service hours over the coming years. The customer service cost reduction across the retail, banking, and healthcare sectors is estimated to amount to $11 billion annually by 2023. (Chatbots Life) AI chatbot trends are positioned to undergo transformational changes that will be implemented across several core business processes. (Source: QATC) These include automating business methods, forecasting consumer behaviour and recommending products and services. Fluido.ai’s landing page graphic Consumers and customers are moving forward with technology, that’s why they are expecting 24/7 service availability. Although the world of AI and chatbots might still feel futuristic for some, the reality is that chatbots are the fastest and most efficient way to analyze, process and provide data and deliver tailored customer service to match all the different target audiences. Chatbots will eventually transform the customer experience and the customer journey as we know it. Not only on the web, but chatbot agents are also being integrated into other forms: voice, mobile, among others. On the other hand, customers are learning to interact with bots to access services, purchase goods and get instant answers to their queries. Understanding your business and knowing about your target market is no longer enough — the need to automate your game is crucial to move forward with the future of customer service.
https://medium.com/fluido-ai/2021-chatbot-trends-what-is-the-new-year-storing-for-ai-bots-5404dd2cb23c
['Mercedes Thomas']
2020-12-22 09:11:49.836000+00:00
['Chatbots', 'Bots', 'Conversational UI', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Customer Service']
Worse than 1975: Trump’s cynical betrayal of the Kurds
Worse than 1975: Trump’s cynical betrayal of the Kurds “Comment: Paul Iddon details just how profoundly President Trump has betrayed the US’ former Kurdish allies.” US President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw US troops from northeast Syria’s border regions and green light a Turkish ground incursion there is a breathtakingly cynical betrayal of America’s Syrian Kurdish-led allies against the Islamic State (IS), and will lead to even greater instability in Syria. Mere hours after Trump had a phone call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, US troops near the Syrian border began to withdraw. The White House released a statement saying the US military will not support any Turkish operation but will withdraw from the border areas where it will take place, effectively authorising it. This amounts to a cynical betrayal of a reliable ally that sacrificed more than anyone else to rid Syria of the Islamic State’s self-styled caliphate, an endeavour that ultimately cost the lives of 11,000 men and women of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). But Trump’s desire to withdraw US troops from Syria isn’t the only thing making this a betrayal. After all, the Kurds and the SDF never really expected the US to safeguard their long-term post-IS interests in Syria and knew the partnership was purely ad-hoc. It’s also betrayal because of how Trump essentially scrapped the “safe zone” plan for northern Syria after the US got the Kurds to make major concessions in order to make it work. “With US troops leaving the border, most of Syrian Kurdistan’s cities are now going to be even more vulnerable to Turkish attack than before” Beginning in August, the US began the rapid establishment of the so-called “safe zone” on the Syrian border with Turkey to dissuade Ankara from launching a cross-border military operation. The SDF was compelled to make concessions to stave off any potential attack against it, which in August seemed imminent. The group immediately complied. It removed heavy weapons from the border regions and also destroyed its defensive fortifications there. Turkey was given the right to monitor the zone through joint patrols on the ground and helicopter flyovers to verify the SDF’s compliance with the agreement. Despite all this, Ankara expressed dissatisfaction and continually threatened to launch a unilateral operation anyway. Now, Trump has essentially decided to let Turkey attack, barely a month after the US convinced the Kurds that by destroying their defensive positions Ankara could be appeased. With US troops leaving the border most of Syrian Kurdistan’s cities are now going to be even more vulnerable to Turkish attack than before. This surely constitutes an incredibly cynical act of betrayal. A Turkish attack on northeast Syria could spark a war across hundreds of kilometres of the border. Large numbers of Kurdish and Arab civilians in this hitherto stable part of northern Syria would likely become internally displaced persons or refugees. On top of this, thousands of IS militants are held in prisons in SDF-controlled territory and could potentially escape if the SDF has to divert its resources to try and fend off a Turkish invasion of their homeland. Such a disastrous outcome is surely the very last thing this war-weary region needs. Also, a Turkish attack would be both unjustified and certainly an unprovoked act of aggression. While the largest component of the SDF — the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) who are the armed wing of the Democratic Union Party (PYD) party — was founded as a branch of Turkey’s arch-enemy, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the YPG never attempted to use the vast border territories it controls in northeast Syria to harm Turkey. They pledged they wouldn’t do so back in 2012 and have remained true to their word. This was despite the fact that since then Turkey destroyed large swathes of towns and cities in its Kurdish-majority southeast during the military campaign against the PKK in 2015–16 and also invaded the northwest Syrian Kurdish enclave of Afrin without provocation in early 2018, killing several YPG fighters and displacing over 100,000 Kurdish civilians. If Trump’s decision isn’t ultimately reversed, as his prior order to immediately withdraw US troops from Syria last December was, this could amount to the most cynical betrayal of Kurds since 1975. In the mid-1970s, a joint covert action project by the United States, the Shah’s Iran and Israel supported the Iraqi Kurds in their war against Baghdad. The covert effort was run from Iran and consisted of arming and paying the Kurdish Peshmerga. This enabled the Kurds to keep on fighting the much larger and better-equipped Iraqi Army. Comment: Trump washing his hands of Islamic State won’t solve the problem But in 1975, the Shah decided to completely ditch the Kurds to reach a deal with then-Iraqi Vice President Saddam Hussein that gave Iran sovereignty over half of the Shatt al-Arab waterway. Since Iran was the conduit for equipping the Kurds, the project collapsed shortly thereafter. A vengeful Iraqi army overran Kurdistan and 250,000 bitter and disillusioned Iraqi Kurds became refugees in Iran. A US investigation into the programme the following year, the Pike Report, discovered that the CIA had suspected the Shah would sacrifice the Kurds to reach a deal with Saddam over two years prior, but was ordered not to warn the Kurds so the Shah would have “a card to play” in negotiations with Saddam. “As cynical as that whole episode was, Trump’s decision today is arguably even worse” The report also found that the US and Iran had hoped the Kurds “would not prevail” since they preferred a continuation of “a level of hostilities sufficient to sap the resources of our ally’s [Iran] neighbouring country”. “Even in the context of covert action, ours was a cynical enterprise,” the report aptly noted. As cynical as that whole episode was, Trump’s decision today is arguably worse. Back then, the US and Israel completely relied on Iran to supply the Peshmerga, and the Shah did not give them any known forewarning of his decision to meet Saddam and sign the agreement, meaning there was little they could do after the Shah pulled the plug on the whole project. Syria Weekly: Winter is coming to Al-Hol camp and children will be its victims In today’s Syria, the US has a mere 1,000 troops to assist in anti-IS operations. Out of these, only 150 were working with Turkey on establishing the “safe zone”. This minuscule number is all that was needed to ensure no unilateral Turkish operation can happen without Erdogan running even the slight risk of killing or wounding American military personnel. By staying, the US would essentially have forced Erdogan to adhere to the safe zone agreement, which is actually quite a good deal for Ankara since it addresses any legitimate security concerns it has. But Trump has made clear that he is unwilling to do even this to help an ally that has sacrificed so much to combat the marauding threat IS posed to the world. A cynical enterprise indeed. Paul Iddon is a freelance journalist based in Erbil, Iraqi Kurdistan, who writes about Middle East affairs. Follow him on Twitter: @pauliddon Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff. Paul Iddon To read the article on the original site Click here
https://medium.com/thenewarab/worse-than-1975-trumps-cynical-betrayal-of-the-kurds-e4c2f55ab630
['Newarab Comment']
2019-10-08 19:27:38.596000+00:00
['Paul Iddon', 'Syria', 'Comment']
Maoris are better integrated into NZ-society than Aboriginals in Australia. Here’s why.
Maoris are better integrated into NZ-society than Aboriginals in Australia. Here’s why. Indigenous people have it tough across the world. Why are Maoris fairing “less badly” than Aboriginals? Maori Haka in action Whilst in Wellington for work some time ago, I was walking down the main street of the business district and came across a man busking on the footpath. He didn’t receive a second glance from any other passerby. What struck me, however, was that he had a large tattoo, covering his entire face. He was a Maori, and this was his country. Looking around, I noticed that every government office had signage not only in English but also Maori. In fact, over the few preceding days, I noticed a great many things: newsreaders began their shows with “Kia Ora”, instead of Good Evening, there were Maori TV channels and language lessons, the Hakka was performed by the National Rugby League team to large crowd filled stadiums, a Maori party prominently featured in national politics, Maori issues often discussed in the news, and Maori words — be they names of places, people, or things — were enunciated with care, by white and brown alike. These are all little things on their own, but when considered together, I couldn’t help but marvel at how much a part of everyday life the indigenous people of this country were. Is there actually any difference? This feeling was accentuated when contrasting it with my own country. In over 30 years of living in Sydney, how many aboriginal phrases did I know? In fact, how many aboriginal people did I know? How many did I work with? Actually, how often did I even see them, and when I did, what percentage of the time did they appear as integrated participants of society and how often did they appear to be members of an unfortunate fringe? Anecdotally, it seemed that one country had done a better job of social integration than others. Could this be backed up by fact? Perhaps considering some basic human development and quality of life measures would shed some light toward this: Social inclusion statistics of Indigenous populations Suspicion confirmed. Though Maoris are by no means on par with their compatriots of European descent, with stark differences worthy of intervention; the gap between Aboriginals and the rest of Australia is orders of magnitude worse by comparison. What could be the reasons behind this great difference? Australia and New Zealand are neighbouring countries. Both were colonised by the British, and both had a pre-existing indigenous population who suffered at the hands of the new arrivals. How could there be such a pronounced difference in how Maoris fared in New Zealand, compared to the Aboriginals in Australia? The answer, I believe, can be attributed to three key reasons: #1: Smallpox Though Maoris also suffered from introduced European diseases to which they had no immunity, it impacted the aboriginal population far more severely. In fact, some 50–70% of the Sydney and NSW indigenous population died after succumbing to the disease within just 2 years, by 1791. Such rapid decimation of the people, in turn, brought about a complete social collapse. Those who survived, fled inland with the disease, furthering its spread of it to other populations. #2: Maoris were far more unified There were 250–300 different Aboriginal nations on the continent, each with a different language, and countless more dialects. As such, it was difficult to unite them against a common threat. The Maoris however, though in many different and often competing tribes, spoke a common tongue, and managed to largely unite behind a single Maori King, thus presenting a more united front. #3: Establishing formal treaties The Aboriginals, came to Australia 40,000 years ago and were nomadic hunter-gathers, who did not ostensibly (from a European perspective anyway) mark their territorial borders or develop their land through agriculture. As such, under British Law, the land could be considered Terra Nullius, and thus available for the crown’s political occupation. It was not until Mabo in 1992 that Terra Nullius was overturned. In contrast to this, the Maoris only came to New Zealand from the Society Islands in the 1300s. They were a far more “advanced” society, had settled with villages, and had chiefs with whom Europeans could negotiate, trade and treaty with. This enabled them to : Procure Muskets which better enabled them to fight fire with fire. which better enabled them to fight fire with fire. Sign the Waitangi Treaty which entitled Maoris the same rights as British Subjects. Thus they were enfranchised along with everyone else in 1853 and had a voice in parliament with the creation of special Maori electoral seats from 1867 onwards. which entitled Maoris the same rights as British Subjects. Thus they were enfranchised along with everyone else in 1853 and had a voice in parliament with the creation of special Maori electoral seats from 1867 onwards. It took nearly another 100 years for Aboriginals in Australia to get the vote, and still do not have their own electoral representation. Though there were disagreements between Maori and Europeans over Waitangi Treaty, at least there was something over which to debate #4: Timing Events in New Zealand unfolded many decades after they did in New South Wales. By 1840, when the Waitangi Treaty was signed, the British Empire had outlawed slavery and was relatively more humanitarian in its approach Concluding thoughts I’m not in any way making light of, nor denying the injustices the Maori have suffered, but am merely stating that the Aboriginals have had a somewhat different experience altogether, which may explain the difference in their level of social integration.
https://medium.com/swlh/are-nz-maoris-better-integrated-than-australian-aboriginals-in-their-countries-89525b698bfe
['Kesh Anand']
2019-11-14 11:11:16.668000+00:00
['Maori', 'Aboriginal', 'New Zealand', 'Society', 'Australia']
Take Me to Shanghai
To me, photo editing has some intriguing parallels to human memories. Upon encountering a person or traveling to a location, we do not inscribe exactly how they are in our mind. Consciously or unconsciously, we instead remember an impression of those people and places, shaped under the influences of subjective perceptions. While some may argue that editing strips away the authenticity of photography, I believe its purpose extends beyond enhancing mere visual appeals. As soon as you touch the shutter button, you capture a moment from an angle that belongs to you, and only you. But when fine-tuning the photos, you reconstruct your unique perceptions so that the rest of the world gets to see it through your lens. The still images become alive with your memories, thoughts, and emotions, desiring to resonate with the audience. For quite a while, these ideas remained at the back of my mind. It was not until I came across a shot of Shanghai, my hometown, that I truly grasped the tangible connections between perception, memory, and photography. Photo by Eric Van Nynatten At first sight, the picture was just an ordinary shot of a nameless street in the city. But an indescribable sense of familiarity hit me at a vulnerable spot, my nostalgia spilling all over the floor. Maybe it was the backlit silhouettes of hasty passengers that reminded me of the crowded commute to my grandmother’s home that did it for me. Maybe it was the fragments of the rosy dusk, faintly glowing through the crevices between skyscrapers, exactly like the marshmallow sky I used to stare at while daydreaming about my life beyond junior high. Or perhaps it was the damp, shining surface of the macadam road. Gazing at those puddles of rain, I could almost smell the humidity of Shanghai’s drizzling June. Although these elements also appear universally in other urban landscapes, the subtle ambiance of this picture engulfed them in a distinct air of Shanghai. Clarity and sharpness is just right — neutral, enough to show the details but not too much Saturation — makes the light pop against the warm tones of city lights Saturated light balanced by the overall gentle, rosy tint and temperature Almost six years after moving to the States, I thought my wistful sentiments for the city that I was born and raised in had faded long ago. Upon seeing this photo, however, I realized that every bit and piece of the city still breathes so much life in my headspace. I miss Shanghai as much as I did on the day I left.
https://medium.com/guac-magazine/take-me-to-shanghai-4a71e5f82d67
['Guac Magazine Editors']
2019-04-08 19:00:47.893000+00:00
['Photo Editing', 'Photography', 'Nostalgia', 'Shanghai', 'Moving On']
The Strange Cure for Insomnia In Trump’s America
I drank more. I drank less. I worked out every day. I fostered rescue dogs and let them curl up at my feet. I tried old standbys. Crackling rainstorms. Ribbiting and cawing jungles. Philip Glass. I dived more deeply into YouTube and found a popular channel of ASMR videos, where Maria folds hand towels and plucks at combs for 1.3 million subscribers chasing a tingling sensation in their scalps. I went more obscure and queued up a woman whispering The Little Prince in French. Nothing worked. It was May 2015, and I could not sleep. I can’t remember what internet wormhole I’d tumbled through when I hit the jackpot: the late Senator Robert C. Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia, delivering 14 hours of lectures about the rise and fall of the Roman Senate. In 1993, President Bill Clinton was lobbying the Senate to pass a line-item veto bill that would give him the power to strike individual spending projects from the federal budget. Byrd had recently assumed the chairmanship of the powerful Appropriations Committee and pumped more than $1 billion of pork back to his impoverished state. A line-item veto threatened his dreams of more highways, fisheries, and theater restorations. And so, once a week over four months, Byrd traced the slide from republic to empire, Romulus to Julius Caesar. His argument was self-serving but also historically cogent — surrender the power of the purse to the executive and America will suffer Rome’s fate. And the whole thing, all 14 hours of it, was collecting dust on YouTube. As cameras roll, a chyron periodically flashes: “Senators may speak on any subject during a morning business period.” Byrd, who was 75 at the time, speaks slowly. Very slowly. He’s like a barely moving bicycle that you’re sure is about to tip over until another turn of the handlebars buys a few more feet. He opens with a 56-word sentence that requires 62 seconds. In a 2006 TED Talk about climate change, by comparison, Al Gore, one of the slowest talkers of his political generation, clocks in at a blazing 133 words per minute. Byrd’s staccato is so self-assured and natural that he must have exited the womb in a blazer, white hair neatly coifed. Except Byrd grew up poor. His erudition was self-taught. The patrician accent sails along — until he rushes through a dozen words, and suddenly he’s a country boy again with a mouth full of pebbles. Other times, Appalachian molasses oozes out. The s’s in “Cincinnatus” and “Spurius Postumius” hiss and simmer. Vowels accordion for no reason: Hannibal “had maintained an espion-AHHHge system in Italy.” Byrd’s voice is ear candy, and so are the long pauses in between. Feet pad across old carpet. Senate pages whisper. A clerk’s telephone rings. The white noise of democracy. His words are unimportant. You barely register them. It’s 1993 and The Adults are in charge. It is a safe place to close your eyes. And so I did. I slept through the hottest summer on record and the Mad Max reboot and was certainly asleep, along with many other people, when a man and his wife rode down an escalator as Neil Young screamed “Rockin’ in the Free World” and Hillary forgot to visit Wisconsin. Byrd died, in 2010, as the longest-serving senator in U.S. history. First elected to Congress in 1952, Byrd was the last of the old Southern Democrats and a link to a bygone era. He was an antique, and antique stores can be ugly places. Byrd was deeply flawed. As a young man, he jump-started his political career by joining the Ku Klux Klan. In 1964, he filibustered the Civil Rights Act for 14 hours. Google him today and you’ll find Byrd has been reincarnated as a far-right punching bag: If President Trump is so bad, why did the Democrats harbor a member of the KKK? And yet Byrd also evolved. He apologized. He integrated the Capitol police corps for the first time since Reconstruction and pushed for Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday to become a national holiday. After Byrd’s death, NAACP president Benjamin Jealous said that he “reflects the transformative power of this nation.” At a moment when both halves of the country hope the other will repent, a man capable of that kind of personal change might have something to say. After the 2016 presidential election, I couldn’t sleep. I needed Byrd’s soporific again. He was still waiting for me back in 1993. The YouTube traffic hadn’t budged; the most popular video still had just a few thousand views. Sometimes I drifted into an uneasy sleep. But this time, mostly I listened. And what I heard sounded very familiar. “Rome was at the mercy of an ill-informed and passion-ridden mob, which was incapable of ruling itself, much less an empire,” he says of that late-Republic period. Like those Romans, many Americans in the early 1990s, he says, have become impatient with a government that lurches from one self-inflicted crisis to another. The Romans themselves yearned for a strong man. But Julius Caesar did not seize power on his own. The Senate handed it to him “deliberately, with forethought, with surrender, with intent to escape from responsibility.” I finally understood that Byrd’s lectures weren’t just about securing money for another bridge in rural West Virginia. He may not have foreseen our current predicament, but he heard rolling thunder on the horizon. He collected his lectures into a book, but it is online where his singsong ruminations have found their place as a lullaby for troubled times. For many Americans, the past year has brought the belated realization that, no matter how elegant and organic our system of “checks and balances” may sound, it is not a scientific fact. Institutions are people. They either honor their promises or they don’t. Office buildings, agency crests, and the Capitol Dome won’t save us. “Power is not a substance,” Byrd says in one video, tapping his temple. “Power is an attitude in the minds of people.” In 256 B.C., while the Roman republic still thrived, Marcus Atilius Regulus landed his consular army in Carthage. He was captured, tortured, and starved. After six years, the Carthaginians sent Regulus back to Rome to negotiate peace, on one condition: He had to return to captivity if the talks failed. Two thousand years later, Robert C. Byrd donned a powder-gray suit and paced the Senate chamber and recounted that story. Regulus urged his countrymen to reject the peace offer. The Roman senators took his advice, then added that he need not keep his promise to the Carthaginians. Why return to imprisonment? His wife and children begged him to stay. At this point in the story, the muffled voices in the gallery go silent. No one else is in the frame, but one imagines a few bored clerks glancing up from their papers. U.S. senators swear to uphold the Constitution, Byrd explains. “Six times I’ve stood there,” Byrd says, and here his voice cracks, “and taken that oath.” He jangles nervous coins in his pocket. “How serious do we regard this oath? Sometimes I wonder if we ever think of it again until the next six years have passed.” We have retreated into ourselves, reforming old tribes and forging new ones. Institutions are under bombardment, and so we run for cover behind corporations, race, money, and guns. We abandon our rights and scramble for privileges. They are easier to lose, but also easier to obtain. Privileges don’t ask that we make considerations and sacrifices for people we will never meet. In a world of privileges, men and women and Republican congressmen who keep their word are not smart. They are, in the estimation of president and a growing number of Americans, losers. Regulus kept his promise. His honor demanded it. He returned to his captors. The Carthaginians quickly learned that he had undermined them during the negotiations in Rome. They cut off Regulus’ eyelids and placed him in a spiked box facing the sun until he died. As darkness closes in, and we lie awake mulling debts owed and whether to honor them, it turns out that Byrd’s grainy YouTube ghost might have a bedtime story worth hearing.
https://medium.com/s/story/the-strange-cure-for-insomnia-in-trumps-america-778b57280bcd
['David Gauvey Herbert']
2018-06-19 21:36:59.610000+00:00
['Democracy', 'Senate', 'Politics', 'Senator Robert C Byrd', 'YouTube']
Are You Really In Control? The Power of Habits
Watch your thoughts, they become words; watch your words, they become actions; watch your actions, they become habits; watch your habits, they become character; watch your character, for it becomes your destiny. The preceding quote has been attributed to many people — the Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu, Ralph Waldo Emerson, the Buddha, and even a supermarket magnate named Frank Outlaw, among others. We come across similar “inspirational” phrases every day. They make us evaluate our present habits in a split second and think about the things we would like or need to change in our own life. Even if you consider yourself to be very focused and determined, chances are you still struggle to adopt new behaviors in your everyday life. Think for a second of your bad habits, from eating too much junk food (despite a commitment to lose weight) to constantly blaming others or the circumstances after a poor performance at work (playing the victim). Recognizing that we act this way and wanting to stop doing it may have zero impact on changing the habit. Common sense is not common action. What is the solution then? Understand how habits work. If you do, it becomes much easier to change them. Our Automated Brain Our brain is almost always in the “auto-pilot” mode — some researchers claim it can get to 98% of our time awake. Purchase and consumption, for example, are repeated regularly and usually in the same context. We tend to buy the same brands of products across different shopping episodes, purchase the same amounts in a supermarket across repeated visits, and eat similar types of foods in our everyday life. Meanwhile, retailers track all our buying behavior through credit cards and rewards programs. And the same happens in different contexts, from social media activity to health services. As customization becomes increasingly powerful, it will become more and more difficult to break outside of our comfortable habits. But why does our brain automate so much of what we do? One word: energy. Our brain makes up only 2% of our total mass, but it consumes 25% of all the oxygen we inhale. It has to be very efficient, and that is why it is constantly looking for new ways to save energy. Automating behaviors in the form of habits is one of the best ways to do so. Our brain classifies all the information it receives in different parts, which are then automated. Have you ever learned how to drive? You have to plan and make every single movement intentionally. After a bit of experience, however, you could do it without thinking, requiring less brain activity compared to the first try. As soon as a behavior becomes automatic, the decision-making part of our brain goes into a sort of sleep mode. It can almost completely shut down, and this is a real advantage because it means we have more mental activity to devote to something else. That is why it is easy — while driving, for instance- to completely focus on something else: like the radio, or a conversation. And that is also the exact same thing that happens when we reach for a sweet after a meal — our brain just doesn’t consider it a task anymore — and we go on autopilot. No Memory Required Habits are much stronger than you think. And the reason for this lies in the structure of our brain. You might think habits are the same as memory, but they are actually different processes in the brain. Researchers believe habits are formed and stored in the basal ganglia, located on the more “primitive” lower part of the brain. This is why anyone can learn new habits — even people who are incapable of forming new memories. In the 2000s, a patient named Eugene had a disease that destroyed a major part of his brain dealing with memory. He had anterograde amnesia — he was incapable of forming new memories (like in the movie Memento). He would introduce himself to people dozens of times a day, and every day seemed entirely new to him. But surprisingly, Eugene was able to form new habits. A researcher gave him two different colored objects, one of them marked with “correct” on the bottom. He was asked to choose one object and turn it over to see if it was the “correct object.” A person with intact memory would only need one try to learn what the correct object was. Eugene didn’t have a memory, so he was slower — but eventually, after dozens of trials, he was able to habitually get it right anyway, with a 95% accuracy. He never consciously remembered ever doing the experiment, and he couldn’t explain why he was choosing the correct object. How could Eugene do all this without memory? They were habits, formed in a different part of the brain: For the memory game, being presented with the objects was his cue; He then executed the routine of flipping over the correct object; And finally got the reward of the pleasure of picking the right object. Subconsciously, this had been ingrained into his brain, without him ever articulating why he was doing what he was doing. Habit start as a conscious decision, but ultimately the loop can reinforce itself. Over time, you may end up losing full control over your behavior — with a cue, your brain shifts to autopilot and executes the routine. Mindset Matters — What Do You Believe In? “Whether you think you can change it, or you think you can’t — you’re right” One of the most successful examples of habit change is Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). Its famous 12-step program makes recovering alcoholics go through a few important activities to increase self-awareness and accountability. The steps surely help, but they won’t feed the hard work. What makes the success of AA is belief. The believe that you do have the power to make your new habit a permanent behavior. That you can cope with the stress of the craving without falling back to your old self. That things will get better. Where does it come from? When the new guy comes to the meeting, sit together with the group and listen to the story of the other members. At some point, he looks around and thinks: “If it worked for that guy over there, why not for me?” If you go to the meetings but don’t really believe you can do it, you have already sabotaged yourself — you won’t even try. Our beliefs are like unquestioned commands, telling us how things are, what is possible and impossible and what we can and cannot do. As a result, changing our belief systems is central to making any real and lasting change in our lives. Keystone Habits In Charles Duhigg’s book, The Power of Habit, he discusses the idea of keystone habits. These habits can have a domino effect — get one habit right, and many other good habits fall into place naturally. Here’s an example. A study on weight loss tried to get obese people to follow a simple habit: write down everything they ate, at least one day a week. While difficult at first, it became a habit for many. Unexpectedly, this small habit rippled throughout their diet. When forced to review what they ate, the study participants couldn’t help noticing when they snacked or when they had unhealthy dinners. They then proactively started to plan future meals so that when they wanted a snack, they reached for an apple rather than a chocolate bar. The keystone habit of keeping a food journal created an environment for more healthy habits to thrive. Eventually, participants who kept a journal lost twice as much weight as the control group. Some examples of keystone habits are: Journaling: When I journal I feel more happy, creative and productive (to start you can enroll in our mindset challenge); Exercising: According to research, exercise is correlated with better mood, less stress, more confidence, and better sleep; Developing daily routines: Having consistency in our day is beneficial to our health and productivity; Meditating: Besides a number of health benefits, meditating regularly is correlated with increased memory and awareness, reduced stress and anxiety, and increased goal-setting. Other examples can include drawing, reading, and even making your bed every morning. How to choose a keystone habit to work on? Use the inversion technique and ask yourself: What are the results I want? What are the actions that someone who already achieved these results usually do? What do I need to believe in order to act / behave that way? What kind of habit that, if performed regularly, would made me believe in it? The following quote from BJ Fogg, a professor at Stanford, sums this idea up nicely: “If you plant the right seed in the right spot, it will grow without further coaxing. I believe this is the best metaphor for creating habits. The “right seed” is the tiny behavior that you choose. The “right spot” is the sequencing — what it comes after. The “coaxing” part is amping up motivation, which I think has nothing to do with creating habits. In fact, focusing on motivation as the key to habits is exactly wrong. Let me be more explicit: If you pick the right small behavior and sequence it right, then you won’t have to motivate yourself to have it grow. It will just happen naturally, like a good seed planted in a good spot.” You don’t have to start big, but you must start somewhere. And journaling daily is scientifically proven as one of the most potent and powerful keystone habits you can acquire.
https://medium.com/quest-self-coaching/are-you-really-in-control-the-power-of-habits-a85bce807991
['Danilo Kreimer']
2019-08-02 14:26:21.695000+00:00
['Self Improvement', 'Habit Building', 'Awareness', 'Change', 'Coaching']
Measuring Fairness in Machine Learning Models
Notations To simplify the exposition, we will consider a single protected attribute in a binary classification setting. This can be generalized to multiple protected attributes and all types of machine learning tasks. Throughout the article, we will consider the identification of promising candidates for a job, using the following notations: 𝑋 ∈ Rᵈ: the features of each candidate (level of education, high school, previous work, total experience, and so on) 𝐴 ∈ {0; 1}: a binary indicator of the sensitive attribute 𝐶 = 𝑐(𝑋, 𝐴) ∈ {0; 1}: the classifier output (0 for rejected, 1 for accepted) 𝑌 ∈ {0; 1}: the target variable. Here, it is whether the candidate should be selected or not. We denote by 𝐷, the distribution from which (𝑋, 𝐴, 𝑌) is sampled. We will also note 𝑃₀(𝑐) = 𝑃(𝑐|𝑎 = 0) The Many Definitions of Fairness Unawareness It defines fairness as the absence of the protected attribute in the model features. Mathematically, the unawareness definition can be written as follows: Because of this simplicity, and because implementing it only needs to remove the protected attribute from the data, it is an easy-to-use definition. Limitations. Unawareness has many flaws in practice, which make it a poor fairness definition overall. It is far too weak to prevent bias. As explained in our previous article, removing the protected attribute doesn’t guarantee that all the information concerning this attribute is removed from the data. Moreover, unaware correction methods can even be less performant when it comes to fairness improvement than aware methods. Demographic Parity It stipulates that the predictions’ distribution should be identical across subpopulations. Mathematically speaking, demographic parity can be defined by 𝐶 being independent from 𝐴: However, it is almost impossible to reach strict equality in practice. On top of that, the double condition on 𝐶 is not always necessary, as some applications require to only focus on the positive outcome (getting a job, being granted a loan, etc.). The following relaxed version of the demographic parity rule is used in practice: This relaxed version is called the “p%-rule” (p being a parameter), and was defined by Zafar, Valera, Rodriguez and Gummardi as a generalization of the 80% rule, also known as the “Four-Fifths Rule” of the U.S. Uniform Guidelines for Employee Selection Procedures. In practice, one of this definition’s advantages is that implementing demographic parity may helps improve the professional image of the minority class in the long term. This improvement is due to the progressive settlement of a “positive feedback loop” and justifies the implementation of demographic parity policies in the short- to medium-term horizon. A second advantage is technical: as this fairness definition is independent from 𝑌 (the target variable), there is no need to have access to its data to measure and correct bias. This makes this method particularly suitable for applications when the target is hard to qualify (employment qualification, credit default, justice, etc.) Demographic parity (with laziness) Limitations. On the other hand, demographic parity has various flaws. First, it can be used in an inappropriate context, meaning where disproportionality is truly present and independent from a protected attribute, or from a proxy for the protected attribute. In our example use case, enforcing demographic parity would result in discrimination against some qualified candidates, which could be seen as unfair. This first flaw underlines one of demographic parity’s problems: it concerns only the final outcome of the model but doesn’t focus on equality of treatment. This lack of fair treatment necessity is demographic parity’s second problem, which is called laziness. Nothing would prevent the use of a trained model to select candidates from the majority group, while candidates from the minority group were selected randomly with a coin toss — as long as the number of selected candidates from each group is valid. A third flaw is due to demographic parity’s independence from the target variable: in the case where the fractions of suitable candidates in both classes are not equal, which is mostly always the case, demographic parity rejects the optimal classifier 𝐶 = 𝑌. The last flaw is highlighted by Weisskopf: because demographic parity leads to affirmative action, it leads to recurrent criticism. Such criticism can contribute to undermining the reputation of the minority group in the long term. Equality of Odds, Equality of Opportunity As demographic parity’s main flaws are all linked to the inequality of treatment it introduces among subpopulations, two research groups came up with similar definitions of fairness which took into account how each group was treated: Equality of Odds and Disparate Mistreatment. We will use the Equality of Odds denomination in this article. Equality of Odds is defined as the independence of 𝐶 and 𝐴 conditionally on 𝑌. In other words, a classifier treats every subpopulation the same way if it is has the same error rates for each subpopulation. The mathematical definition of equality of odds is: However, in the same way that reaching demographic parity is very hard in practice, finding a model that satisfies equality of odds is challenging and often comes at the price of low model performance. Equality of Odds. Notice that, in order to satisfy this definition, more than half of the recruited candidates have to be unqualified In the same way a relaxed version was defined for demographic parity, Hardt, Price, and Srebro defined equality of opportunity as a weaker version of equality of odds. Equality of opportunity results in applying the equality of odds constraint only for the true positive rate so that each subpopulation has the same opportunity to be granted the positive outcome. Equality of opportunity is defined as: To get back to our recruitment example, satisfying equality of opportunity means that we would recruit the same ratio of qualified candidates from each subpopulation. Equality of Opportunity In practice, as we cited before, equality of odds and equality of opportunity both have the ability to guarantee equality of treatment among subpopulations. Thereby, they also sanction laziness, which was one of the demographic parity definition flaws. This definition also gets rid of the fact that demographic parity was rejecting the optimal classifier 𝐶 = 𝑌. In that case, both false positive and false negative rates would be 0% for the whole population, meaning 0% for each subpopulation, proving that the optimal classifier satisfies both equality of odds and equality of opportunity. Limitations. However, there are two main flaws linked to equality of odds (and equality of opportunity) and both can be summed up by the fact that this definition might not help deal with unfairness problems in the long term. First, it doesn’t take into consideration possible discrimination outside of the model. As an example, as protected attributes (race, gender, class, etc.) have more or less always had an impact on access to opportunities such as loans or education, such discrimination could result in an unbalanced ratio between the privileged and unprivileged class, which will just be replicated by a model satisfying equality of opportunity. So, in our recruiting case, if only 10% of our candidates are from the unprivileged class (because the job is highly qualified and only few people from the unprivileged class have had access to higher education), only 10% of the finally recruited candidates will be from the unprivileged class. The second flaw is a consequence of the first one in the case where there is an extreme difference between the privileged and unprivileged groups. In that case, by preserving the contrast, the model satisfying equality of opportunity might in the long term increase this difference, resulting in a vicious circle. Predictive Rate Parity A slightly similar fairness definition is predictive rate parity and was introduced by Dieterich, Mendoza and Brennan. A model satisfies predictive rate parity if the likelihood of the positive observation of the target variable among people predicted with the positive outcome is independent from the subpopulation. Mathematically speaking, predictive rate parity is defined as follows: In practice, relaxed definitions also exist for this definition, and, depending on the value of interest of 𝑌, we can talk about positive predictive parity or negative predictive parity. Positive predictive parity is defined as follows: A practical example is that, among all the recruited candidates, the same proportion of really qualified applicants should be the same. Respectively it means that the recruitment errors are spread homogeneously among subpopulations. Thereby, predictive rate parity should guarantee that candidates are chosen by the model based on their real qualification for the job. Positive predictive parity. Notice that it isn’t possible to satisfy predictive rate parity in this situation As the notion is similar to equality of opportunity, one of its advantages in practice is that it validates the optimal classifier 𝐶 = 𝑌, as both necessary probabilities are equal to 1 in the case of perfect classification. Another advantage could be called inclusiveness, as predictive rate parity (and especially positive rate parity) literally means that the chances for a recruited individual to succeed are the same no matter the subpopulation it belongs to. Limitations. However, this definition’s resemblance with equality of opportunity also makes its flaws similar: it doesn’t take into account unfairness preexisting among candidates and replicates it. Models corrected under predictive rate parity can also boost unfairness in the long term. In practice, this method also has definition flaws: it needs access to the true value of the target, which is sometimes hard to define (true qualification for a job as an example) and it is very similar to equality of opportunity but way more difficult to implement in practice. No Free Lunch in Fairness Now that we’ve explored the different types of fairness definitions, we have to highlight a fairness property that has crucial importance when correcting unfair algorithms in practice. This property is called the Impossibility Theorem of Fairness and states the pairwise incompatibility of all group fairness definitions discussed here (demographic parity, equality of odds, and predictive rate parity). It is impossible to satisfy all definitions of group fairness, meaning that the data scientists need to choose one to refer to when starting a fairness analysis. Conclusion On top of biased data issues (cf. our previous article) lies another obstacle when it comes to correcting unfairness in practice: there is no consensus on the definition of fairness. Already existing legal material is too vague to be used in machine learning, and there are currently six main fairness definitions across research papers on fairness: Unawareness, Demographic Parity, Equality of Odds (and of Opportunity), Predictive Rate Parity, Individual Fairness, and Counterfactual Fairness. The Impossibility Theorem of Fairness proves that Demographic Parity, Equality of Odds, and Predictive Rate Parity are pairwise incompatible, which makes satisfying all fairness definitions impossible. Therefore, we face a practical dilemma when it comes to designing fair machine learning models — there’s no “best” answer. Now that we’ve defined how to detect unfairness in machine learning models, the next article in our fairness blog posts series will focus on how to correct unfair models.
https://medium.com/data-from-the-trenches/measuring-fairness-in-machine-learning-models-2be070fab712
['Alexandre Landeau']
2020-09-18 06:27:32.454000+00:00
['Responsible Ai', 'Fairness', 'Data Science', 'Machine Learning']
Futures Studies, Foresight, Futurism, Futurology, Futures Thinking…What Name???
There are so many names to refer to the discipline that investigates alternative futures. Futures studies, foresight, futures literacy, futures thinking, anticipation, futurism, futurology, and many others. These terms are often used -and misused- interchangeably without explanation of the reasons why they are to be considered synonyms. Clearly, there is a lot of confusion on which term we should use and which term(s) we should not use. Countless times, I have been asked to elaborate on the difference between these monikers, especially by newcomers in the field, in absence of clear guidelines. So let’s try to make some clarity. The most commonly used terms to refer the investigation of alternative futures are futures studies and foresight. Let’s look at the similarities and differences between these two terms first. Futures Studies vs Foresight Futures studies, sometimes also shortened as futures is, as the name says, a field of studies. It involves studies of alternative futures done by academic researchers in universities. In fact, the World Futures Studies Federation, arguably the most academic oriented association in the field, uses the term Futures Studies, and defines it as “A scientific field of research involving scholars and researchers”[1]. That is why you might have also heard of the term futures research, which is used as a synonym of futures studies and mostly by academics, but less commonly than futures studies. Beside this “ivory tower” connotation, futures studies also has a social sciences connotation. This is because many scholars and researchers active in this field received training in the social sciences, including sociology, political sciences, public policy, etc., and thus, imbue the discipline with a social scientific viewpoint. Foresight, on the other hand, refers to the application of futures studies methods and techniques by organizations, including for-profit, not-for-profit, and governmental organizations, to be prepared for the future. Foresight is a word most often used by practicing managers, and is considered part of strategy. That’s why you might have also heard of the terms strategic foresight, or corporate foresight, and less commonly business foresight and organizational foresight[2]. In other words, although futures studies and foresight refer to the same set of methods and techniques to investigate the futures, foresight specifically designates the use of those methods and techniques as a management tool. As foresight is a set of practices or activities to make the firm prepared for the future and attain superior performance, we say “doing foresight” rather than “having foresight” as in plain English[3]. Beside this major difference between futures studies and foresight, there are 3 minor differences that ought to be mentioned: · First, foresight has had a strong emphasis of scenario planning, particularly that of the intuitive logic school of thought. As this school is Western, foresight has also had a Western connotation. Although his has been recently changing as the word foresight has increasingly been used globally. Futures studies, on the other hand, has had a consistent tradition for taking into account Asian and non-Western perspectives, such as Causal Layered Analysis and Integral Futures[4]. That is why we call it studies, in the plural form[5] · Second, foresight necessarily implies action in the present[6], as the investigation of the futures is conducive to changing the strategy of the organization. Futures studies, on the other hand, although one of its major tenets is studying the futures to change the present[7], might actually not imply doing so. A futures studies project could just build scenarios for third parties’ use or to increase awareness on them. · Third, since foresight is relatively more concerned with preparing the organization for the future and increasing its bottom line, it is also relatively less concerned than futures studies with improving the future for humanity in general. Futures studies, on the other hand, has a much more pronounced emphasis on studying the futures for the betterment of our civilization. However, this has been changing as new and more participatory foresight methods are emerging, involving both organizations and wider communities[8]. So futures studies and foresight are actually the same set of methods and techniques applied in different contexts and with slightly different connotations and objectives. We can therefore represent them graphically as two largely overlapping but not completely coinciding circles, like this: The recent trend has been that these 2 circles are getting closer and closer as the boundaries between futures studies and foresight start to blur. Indeed, an increasing number of academic professionals is involved in foresight projects in organizations outside of their universities. The Western vs non-Western connotation that once distinguished futures studies and foresight is starting to blur, and there is an increasing number of foresight methods and approaches that involve organizations along with external communities. In view of the above, my suggestion is that we use the term futures & foresight to refer to the investigation of alternative futures, rather than either futures studies or foresight. We can say futures & foresight scholar/researcher, futures & foresight practitioner, and futures & foresight project. But it is certainly still okay to use either futures studies or foresight, if you have a preference for one of the two terms. However, it ought to be mentioned that it is probably more correct to use the term futures studies in an academic context, and the term foresight in a practical context. It follows that futures studies scholar/researcher is probably better than foresight researcher, and that foresight practitioner is probably better than futures studies practitioner. But these guidelines are not watertight. You might be a scholar researching foresight in organizations, and that will make you a foresight researcher, rather than a futures studies researcher. And finally, referring to the methods, both acceptions are okay: you can say you are using futures (studies) methods/tools, as well as foresight methods/tools. The same goes for futures workshop and foresight workshop. So now that we have made some clarity on the differences and similarities between futures studies and foresight, let’s examine other commonly used terms. Futurism Futurism refers to a wide variety of approaches to explore the future, including predictions, pop-science opinions about the future, and layman speculations. For instance, the last article you have read online about how robots will take over can be labelled as futurism. This term refers to a much broader domain than futures and foresight, so we can represent the relation between futures & foresight and futurism graphically like this: It goes without saying that a large majority of futurism work is different from futures & foresight. Futures & foresight doesn’t predict nor speculates about the future. It investigates alternative futures systematically. It requires methods. It requires training. It requires knowledge on how to use methods, or a methodology. It should be carried out with rigor. Anyone, one the other hand, can write an educated guess about the future without futures & foresight training. This is something to take note of. It follows that we should not refer to futures & foresight using the term futurism. It also goes without saying that we should not use the word futurist to refer to the professions of researcher and practitioner of futures & foresight. This is because the term futurist refers to a wider range of professions, including those who engage in speculations, which include but is not limited to the practice of futures & foresight. Futures & foresight researcher/practitioner, or futures studies researcher and foresight practitioner, seem to be better and more appropriate candidates. Futurist painting (Claudio Marcon) We should also avoid using the terms futurism and futurist because they are closely related to the eponymous Italian artistic movement of the early 1900s. This movement was a value-laden ideology to destroy the past, speed up the future, and blend man and machines. This is anathema to futures & foresight, which downplays single ideologies and aims at deconstructing them in favor of a pluralistic viewpoint towards a range of different futures[9]. Futurology Futurology is a name used by non-experts to refer to futures & foresight. Usually found in encyclopedias or curated volumes, its aim is to sound explanatory to readers who have never heard of the words futures studies and foresight. It goes without saying that if we are researching or practicing futures & foresight in our profession, we should avoid using the term futurology, let alone the term futurologist, as these words will sound odd and encyclopedic to anyone having an inkling of what futures & foresight is. This is self-explanatory as it occurs in our daily life: when we refer to animals, for instance, we don’t use their encyclopedic names, which might be an obscure Latin word. We use their more common, plain English name Future studies It appears that some practitioners are using the term future studies, in the singular form, to refer to the investigation of alternative futures. In my experience as reviewer of several academic journals in the field including Futures, Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Futures & Foresight Science, and On the Horizon, I have consistently noticed that researchers and practitioners using this term seem to be not aware of the growing literature using the term futures studies, in the plural form. This is righteously so as the plural, futures, is to signal that we ought to investigate many of them, not at single future. Alternatively, the use of future studies might be used to refer to an approach to the future that emphasizes trend watching and prediction (e.g. that of Singularity University). Although intriguing, this approach exhibits a salient disconnect from the growing community of futures & foresight researchers and practitioners. I would therefore discourage the use of this term as it might signal a lack of professionalism to other researchers and practitioners in the field. Futures literacy Futures literacy refers to the competency of being able to consciously understand the role that thinking about the future has in the present [10]. Given that this competency is found wanting in many individuals, this term is often used to refer to early stages pedagogical settings, when we use tools of futures & foresight to enhance the anticipatory capacity of individuals who have likely never heard about futures & foresight before. UNESCO uses this term when it enable communities to think about the futures and use this imagination fruitfully in the present, or to become “futures literate” [10]. However, it is wrong to use this term to refer to the discipline of futures & foresight. Futures Thinking Futures thinking is a very controversial term because it is erroneously used by futures & foresight researchers and practitioners as a synonym of futures studies. If futures and foresight has developed a tradition of practices, futures thinking refers to the cognitive processes enabled by those practices. The former is at the practical level; the latter is at the psychological level. The two terms refer to processes at two different levels of understanding and analysis. Therefore, although it is not wrong to say that futures & foresight enables individuals to have futures thinking, it is wrong to use the term futures thinking to refer to the discipline of futures & foresight, or to say that futures & foresight is part of futures thinking. The confusion over this distinction has been unfortunately fueled by practitioners who have been using futures thinking to market themselves as this term is undeniably cool, especially in view of the buzzword design thinking. For instance, the Institute for the Future has launched a series of online courses on Coursera called futures thinking[11]. These courses include imagination techniques that are not part of the futures & foresight tradition, along with established futures & foresight methods. In this series of courses, foresight is also considered part of futures thinking. This is a good example of practitioners actively fueling the confusion because although the quality of the material provided in the courses in high, the naming is not correct. Forecasting Forecasting refers to predictions in the short-term future. This is different from futures & foresight for several reasons: · While forecasting is carried out with quantitative extrapolation techniques, futures & foresight consists, by and large, of qualitative approaches. ·Forecasting involves predictions, which futures & foresight avoids in favor of alternative futures. · Forecasting involves single point estimates in the future, e.g. GDP growth 5 years from now, while futures & foresight anticipates a variety of elements to build comprehensive scenarios. · Forecasting looks at the short-term future (1 to 5 years), whilst futures & foresight looks at the long-term futures (5 to 50 years). Finally, there is a variety of other less commonly used terms including anticipation, perspective thinking, futuristcs, and more. These terms are used by single practitioners or small groups of practitioners to refer to their own approach to or viewpoint of the study of the futures, and do not speak of the growing tradition of futures & foresight. For instance, Poli sees anticipation as a set of forward-looking attitudes and activities in a wide range of scientific fields, including the natural sciences and humanities[12]. This name does not designate futures & foresight, which is just a component, according to this view, of anticipation. Another example is perspective thinking. Originating from the French La Prospective, this term indicates a circumscribed group of futures & foresight practitioners [13], which does not stand for the whole field of futures & foresight. I would therefore also recommend against using these terms unless you are part of these smaller schools of thought. References & Notes [1] What is Futures Studies, WFSF Website. Retrieved from: https://wfsf.org/about-us/futures-studies [2] Rohrbeck, R., & Bade, M. (2012). Environmental scanning, futures research, strategic foresight and organizational future orientation: a review, integration, and future research directions. XXIII ISPIM Annual Conference, Barcelona, Spain. Rohrbeck, R., Battistella, C., & Huizingh, E. (2015). Corporate foresight: An emerging field with a rich tradition. Technological Forecasting and Social Change,101: 1–9. [3] UNDP (2018). Foresight, The Manual. Retrieved from: https://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/librarypage/capacity-building/global-centre-for-public-service-excellence/ForesightManual2018.html [4] Whether Integral Futures is truly a non-western approach is still under debate. [5] Sardar, Z. (2010). The Namesake: Futures; futures studies; futurology; futuristic; foresight — What’s in a name? Futures, 42(3): 177–184. [6] ibid. [7] Bell, W. 1997. Foundations of Futures Studies. New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, Volume 1. [8] See Ramos, J., Sweeney, J. A., Peach, K., & Smith, L. 2019. Our futures: by the people, for the people. Nesta. Retrieved from: https://www.nesta.org.uk/report/our-futures-people-people/ Popp, R. 2013. Participatory futures research. Research or practice consulting? European Journal of Futures Research, 1:16. [9] See 5,7. [10] UNESCO (n.d.). What is Futures Literacy? Retrieved from: https://en.unesco.org/themes/futures-literacy [11] Futures Thinking specialization on Coursera: https://www.coursera.org/specializations/futures-thinking [12] Poli, R. (2017). Introduction to Anticipation Studies. Springer. [13]La Prospective: http://en.laprospective.fr/ CREDITS FOR ICONS (The Noun Project): Chanaky, David
https://medium.com/predict/futures-studies-foresight-futurism-futurology-futures-thinking-what-name-3b3863ceab8c
['Alex Fergnani']
2020-08-10 09:50:20.973000+00:00
['Futures Thinking', 'Futurism', 'Futures Studies', 'Futurology', 'Foresight']
How to Talk to Children About 9/11
How to Talk to Children About 9/11 Key points On the 20th anniversary of 9/11, children are likely to be exposed to information about the tragic event, which may evoke emotional reactions. Parents can help their child process information and emotions but they should gauge where their child is at and whether they are willing to talk. Parents can use discussions about 9/11 to foster valuable lessons regarding adversity and resilience, respect, security and solidarity. This marks the 20th anniversary of the tragic events that occurred in New York on September 11, 2001. Kids all over the country will learn about, hear about, and observe tributes and commemorations marking this anniversary. Most of our children will have faint memories of the event, many were too young to remember it, and some weren’t even born yet. It becomes a challenge for us to know what to say about it and how to say it in a developmentally age-appropriate way. Be conscious not to shy away from having this potentially difficult conversation. Make the concerted effort to gauge where your child is at and their willingness to talk about it. Be respectful of where they are at and take notice of what they’re saying and what their body language conveys. Evaluate whether or not they want to speak. Don’t force the conversation. If they prefer not to speak, continue to check in and let them know that you are there to listen whenever they are ready to talk. For those kids who are readily willing to speak, let your child’s thoughts, feelings and interests guide the conversation. Express details of the facts in age-appropriate language. Here’s a resource list with facts about the history of The World Trade Center, what happened on 9/11 and how the site was rebuilt. An additional resource from the 9/11 Memorial Museum helps families with activities to create at home. Dealing with emotions and reactions to the anniversary: This coming week, kids are bound to be exposed to TV and internet discussions about the attacks and may even get a glimpse of video footage from the scenes on 9/11. They are also bound to have tributes and commemorations at school, at their local places of worship, and in other settings. Be sure to ask kids how they are processing all the information that they are exposed to. It can evoke emotions such as sadness, fear and/or confusion, which you can help manage and process with them. Be aware of your own emotions and reactions to the anniversary, as well as all that your child is conveying about it. We may have experienced trauma, whether directly or indirectly, and it can impact the way in which we are able to offer support to our children. We also have the opportunity to model open empathic communication if the dialogue is collaborative, engaging and supportive. Why we need to talk about 9/11 and how we need to talk about it stems from our core values and the fundamental principles we hope to instill in our children. We can help to foster valuable lessons in the midst of devastating tragedy. These values can directly guide how we talk about it. We have the opportunity to teach our children about: Adversity and resilience: Even if they fall in challenging situations, which can sometimes be inevitable, they can persevere and thrive, and very often learn something valuable, recalibrate/rebuild and emerge even stronger. Openness toward difference and the unfamiliar/unknown: With curiosity and compassion, rather than with inflexibility and preconceived negative judgments, they can be open to others who are different or unfamiliar to them. Unity and connection: Even among tragedy or misfortune, they can unite, connect, be compassionate and heroic. Solidarity and standing up for what they believe in: As Americans and in their personal value system, they continually strive for freedom, justice, and peace. Safety and security: They remain safe as we currently have stronger policies in place to ensure our safety and security. They share the belief that most people in the world by nature are kind and loving, the ones that are violent and hurtful are the small minority. Being present and in the moment: Moments in life and life in general are so precious that they want to really pay attention to all that surrounds them and live life to the fullest. Practicing gratitude: They can promote gratitude for their freedom and liberty by seizing opportunities to express themselves and be heard by advocating for themselves and others. Personal pride and living life purposefully: They can take pride in doing the right thing and for living a meaningful, purposeful life based on what they identify as being truly important to them. Sound judgement and personal responsibility/choice: They can take personal responsibility for having judgments and making certain choices and decisions and consciously learn from them. Being respectful of others: They can make the choice to be kind and behave respectfully toward others no matter how they are being treated because of their fundamental humanism and value of showing respect to all people all of the time. Some experiential exercises that help to reinforce these values include: (a) identifying rescue workers and first responders who were heroic during the attacks and exploring what their role is in helping people, (b) interviewing several adults about how they experienced or felt a sense of unity and connection to others during this time, and © creating a collage out of magazines or other materials or mediums expressing how they feel and are processing the anniversary. These exercises give kids the opportunity to express themselves and process their thoughts and feelings regarding the attacks. It also reminds us to assess ours as well as we all embody the quote from Deepak Chopra: “For me and my family personally, September 11 was a reminder that life is fleeting, impermanent, and uncertain. Therefore, we must make use of every moment and nurture it with affection, tenderness, beauty, creativity, and laughter.”
https://medium.com/@drmichellemaidenberg/how-to-talk-to-children-about-9-11-37df88316f94
['Dr. Michelle Maidenberg']
2021-09-08 18:22:48.229000+00:00
['September 11', 'Parenting Advice', 'Parenting', 'Tragedy']
Driving Diversity and Social Inclusion in the Open Source Corteza Project
With a university degree in Social Science, much of my early adult life was spent debating the equalities and inequalities of life with my fellow students. Admittedly, I wasn’t the student with the most erudite or succinct points of view (and probably never will be!), but one thing became crystal clear to me: While social inclusion can be the goal, it’s often useful to think of it as a discipline and responsibility to be constantly maintained and improved. Exclusion can be structural, but inclusion can be too. When forming the board of directors of the Corteza project, we went out of our way to ensure that the board had a majority of women. We also recruited a proud member of the LGBT community. We set the bar high, with the criteria of prior proven leadership in their field being compulsory. In the end, we achieved our goal, something which is startlingly rare in open source projects — a board of directors not dominated by men. However, let’s face it, though it’s a step in the right direction, this is still not a 100% socially diverse board. We have more work to do with regards to casting the net wider in our recruitment efforts. As Corteza attracts wider and wider audiences we intend to profit from this exposure and fulfill our responsibility. Next on the agenda for the Corteza project is to recruit Chairs for our outreach programmes. These are roles which determine how the overall Corteza project meshes together from a strategic perspective and include the following categories: Humanitarian Ecological Health Locali(s)(z)ation Accessibility Commercial Public Sector Educational Identity & Privacy Compliance Security Digital Economy Once again, we intend to drive diversity of representation among the programme Chairs and, once again, we will only recruit those who have proven credentials relevant to the specific programme in question. This is a voluntary role and the “give” is one hour of your advice per month to help determine a programme strategy and keep it on track. If you think you or someone you know might fit the description, please don’t hesitate in visiting the Corteza Project community server at https://latest.cortezaproject.org and open a conversation with me there.
https://medium.com/@niallmccarthy/driving-diversity-and-social-inclusion-in-the-open-source-corteza-project-198c9afcdbf6
['Niall Mccarthy']
2019-07-01 13:52:55.714000+00:00
['Open Source', 'Board Of Directors', 'Inclusion', 'Diversity', 'Volunteering']
Get Started With React Credit Card
Install npm install --save react-credit-cards After you install, you need to start your app again with npm start . SetUp Now we create a components folder in your src directory. In this folder, we create a file and name it MyCards.js . Now our folder structure looks like this: Home Directory Open your MyCards.js file, and create a simple functional React component. Now our MyCards.js file looks like this: OK, now we’ll import some things from our react-credit-cards package. We import two things from react-credit-cards and place our Mycards.js file at the top. Cards: import Cards from "react-credit-cards" Style sheet: import "react-credit-cards/es/styles-compiled.css" So far, our MyCards.js file looks this: MyCards.js After we successfully import the cards and the style sheet, we move onto actually coding. Create a state, and define the default value as an object Create a form, and also create a change handler So now our MyCards.js look like this: MyCards.js After you successfully do this step, it’s time to implement our Cards component which provided our react-credit-cards package. The card component accepts four arguments as props: CVC , expire , name , and number . This pass our value from input box to this component’s props using the state. So far, our MyCards.js file has all of this code: MyCards.js
https://medium.com/better-programming/getting-started-with-react-credit-card-ac44071eeb45
['Jobayer Hossain']
2020-05-11 12:49:32.379000+00:00
['Nodejs', 'Programming', 'React', 'JavaScript', 'Reactjs']
Hanging up my chalks!
I started teaching SSC kids English in 2007. I wasn’t supposed to do that. But I did like always, going against popular opinion! Amma was strongly against my decision to spend weekends with students instead of studying. She, herself being a teacher in Kannada medium, was well aware of its impediments. She was into teaching “field” as she never considered it a “business”. To her, it was a way of saying thanks to her parents who gifted her education. Her argument was that one person from family was enough for the deed. Even my dad’s dad was a primary school teacher and had the most beautiful handwriting of all. At least my dad says so. Teaching is a noble job. It brings with it this magnanimous attitude that is remarkably different from anything else you do in life. Connecting with kids, hearing their side of confusion, maintaining discipline and conversation on the same line are some of the facets that inject adrenaline on an otherwise dull morning. Fastforward to 2010, I’ve decided I won’t be teaching anymore. No more sleepless weekends for me. I guess I’ve grown out of this stupid idea of “changing the world” with education. It’s not a worthy fight. Honestly. Every time I came back home, I had pictures of those kids in my mind who never spoke or were too mischievous to even care. It was always good apples and bad apples. On a lighter note, I’m tired of selling false dreams to these students for they’ll learn the way of life sooner or later and they’ll know that it isn’t going to be an easy ride either! I was the youngest staff member too everywhere I went, be it classes, community school or small-time tuitions. And I’m happy I’m still young while I’m getting away from it to explore unseen avenues like learn French or violin or whatever. Teaching was the best thing I ever did in my godforsaken pale life and like they say, “Once a former teacher, always a former teacher!”
https://medium.com/shaktianspace/hanging-up-my-chalks-24ab3cd7343f
['Shakti Shetty']
2017-01-10 10:46:00.875000+00:00
['English', 'Classroom', 'Life', 'Education', 'Grammar']
Rodney Reed Case: Jimmy Fennell
The Rodney Reed case got national attention when Reed was en route to being executed on November 20th, 2019. Reed has made multiple attempts to file for a stay of execution. November 20th, 2019, was just his fourth time. Now, one could argue the evidence and update you about the case. However, I would like you to continue to read my articles. Also, listen to our podcast episode as well. Let’s focus on Jimmy Fennell. If you have been following, then you know he is the alleged killer of Stacey Stites. Leaving Rodney to rot on death row for a crime he did not commit. Background: At the time of Stacey’s murder, Jimmy Fennell Stacey’s fiance worked as a Giddings Police Officer. In the beginning, Jimmy Fennell was the main suspect. However, DNA cleared him of being involved with Stacey’s murder. The DNA tested was that only from semen. There were beer bottles found around Stacey’s body. Furthermore, dusting for matching fingerprints on the pickup truck that Stacey and Jimmy shared. The lack of evidence not collected mainly comes from the apartment shared. In my opinion, its negligence was due to Jimmy Fennell being apart of the neighborhood police force. The truck was left unattended by the town over trying to avoid any clean up of evidence, or so they would like us to believe. However, the Red Chevy pickup truck was indeed left alone. The Chevy pickup truck was examined, but nothing was found. The beer bottles found by her body were also not tested for DNA. Stacey’s pants were placed on wrong with the bottom facing up, showing signs of sexual assault. The only evidence used to convict Rodney Reed was semen matching his DNA. Who is Jimmy Fennell? Jimmy Fennell was the fiance to Stacey Stites. Stacey Stites found murdered in a remote area in Bastrop, Texas in April of 1996. Jimmy ended up losing his job as a police officer in 2007. Jimmy Fennell was charged and convicted of kidnapping and raping a woman while he was on duty. Please click to hear the women who were allegedly raped and kidnapped by Jimmy Fennell. In 2008, Jimmy Fennell was sentenced to ten years in prison. However, Jimmy was released from prison in March of 2018. According to other reports, a white supremacist from the Aryan Brotherhood wrote an affidavit. This affidavit from a man named Snow states, Jimmy approached the Aryan Brotherhood seeking protection from other groups in prison. Also alleged that Jimmy claimed he killed his “N*gger loving fiance.” Unfortunately, Jimmy’s protection from the Aryan Brotherhood was short-lived. Once the brotherhood discovered he was an ex-police officer and serving time for raping, Jimmy without protection from the Aryan Brotherhood, according to Snow. Now, forcing Jimmy to be moved to a more protective unit. Now with a witness that can confirm that Jimmy admitted to the murder of his fiance Stacey Stites. Along with the fact that he has an innocent man sitting on death row sole because he is black and was having an affair with his then-fiance, speaks volumes in Mr. Reed’s case. Is that the only reason that Rodney Reed should be free? No, there are more elements to this case. However, if you have this many holes in a particular case that ends in death. Before you decide to punish what could be an innocent man for this crime via death without all the solidified facts. How can we help? This has been an ongoing fight to save this innocent man’s life. Please look into: The fight for Rodney is not over, join the team, Stop the Execution of Rodney Reed!, and Free Rodney Reed!. Reference: Jimmy Fennell: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know (2019.17.11)https://heavy.com/news/2019/11/jimmy-fennell/ Who Killed Stacey Stites? (2002.24.05)https://www.austinchronicle.com/news/2002-05-24/93214/ New witness for Reed says fiance confessed to murder (2019.31.10)https://www.statesman.com/news/20191030/new-witness-for-reed-says-fiance-confessed-to-murder
https://medium.com/@niaonair/rodney-reed-case-jimmy-fennell-ddb04fdbc543
['Nia On Air']
2020-11-22 00:39:39.095000+00:00
['Criminal Justice Reform', 'Criminal Justice', 'Innocence Project', 'Murder', 'Death Penalty']
table
Where is the table? I’m going to write a song.
https://medium.com/@kerimalpalt/table-137857e4d4d8
['Kerim A. Altuncu']
2020-12-05 16:23:15.578000+00:00
['Simple', 'Short Read', 'Poetry']
How a White label SEO Agency Saves an Organization?
SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is a digital marketing strategy used to enhance the website’s visibility on search engines for relevant searches. When an agency provides SEO services to a digital agency without using its own brand name, it is known as white label SEO. A white label SEO agency provides several services to its clients for the purpose of ranking factors. But, how a white label SEO agency protects digital agencies from violating the terms of services of SERPs. Here are the services that a white label SEO agency provides - SEO experts analyze on-page SEO audits of the entire website to increase their SERP rankings. Keyword research is the first step after designing an SEO strategy for the best ranking on SERP. Link building is an effective SEO strategy to build domain authority and get the best rankings. When you partner up with a white label SEO agency like DashClicks, you get other tools and various other digital marketing services. It allows you to focus on the growth of your business without worrying about website traffic. White label SEO agencies provide you instant reports with excellent SEO strategies regarding business development. Therefore, involve yourself with white label partners and take your business to the next level.
https://medium.com/@ljohnc47/how-a-white-label-seo-agency-saves-an-organization-6cd433f88aee
[]
2021-12-22 07:05:39.131000+00:00
['SEO', 'White Label Partner', 'Dashclicks', 'Seo Services', 'White Label Seo Agency']
An Argument Against First Principle Thinking
One the most celebrated traits of today’s most successful entrepreneurs is the ability to think differently than the vast majority of people. As my friend, Gijs — who is also participating in this daily story challenge — wrote, Elon Musk’s “secret sauce” is his ability to reason from first principles. But what does it mean to think for yourself? And why don’t more people do it? Reasoning from first principles requires forgoing heuristic-based thinking in pursuit of more fundamental truths. A heuristic is defined as “any approach to problem solving that employs a method, not guaranteed to be optimal, perfect, or rational, but instead sufficient for reaching an immediate goal.” In other words it’s a mental shortcut. In the 1980s most people assumed the market for computers was limited to businesses. Steve Jobs exploited this heuristic. More recently people assumed high-price luggage could only be sold in stores. Jen Rubio and Stephanie Korey exploited that heuristic when they founded Away and began selling luggage over the internet. Many of the most famous entrepreneurial stories are heuristic exploitation stories. In our startup-obsessed society these stories have become mainstream folklore. Steve Jobs and Jen Rubio are fast becoming the new heroes in this shared mythology. Yet I don’t think that first principle thinking is anymore common today than it was 25 years ago. And that’s by design. Generally speaking, evolutionary traits influence human behavior more than cultural norms. From an evolutionary perspective, questioning norms is inefficient. Which of these two humans do you think is more likely to survive? The one that questions the ethics of killing its prey or the one that hunts without second thought? It’s easy to forget that reason is a modern luxury. Even from a more modern cultural perspective, first principle thinking has many disadvantages. Take ethics and law as one example. In a modern, specialized society it’s unreasonable to expect everyone to study ethical principles extensively. Instead legal systems codify ethical principles into a set of heuristics that everyone can follow. (This, of course, creates systemic injustice when the power is in the hands of one homogenous group). One way of looking at our society is like a multi-armed bandit problem. For those unfamiliar with this idea, Josh Kauffman gives a great explanation in his blog post Explore / Exploit: Imagine walking into a casino and deciding to play the slot machines. There’s a row of machines, each of which has a different probability of paying a reward when you pull the lever. Some machines pay more — some much more — than the other machines, but you’re not sure which machine has the highest return. If you knew the best machine in advance, you’d just pull that lever all day long, but you don’t have a clue, and no one is going to tell you. The only way to find out is to start pulling levers, pay close attention, keep track of what works and what doesn’t, and do the math. There’s a tradeoff to be made, however: when you choose to pull a lever you haven’t pulled before, you get new information about that option, and that information is valuable in finding the best overall machine. But pulling the less-tested lever has an opportunity cost: you’re not pulling the lever you currently think will give you the best return. There’s a risk that the lever you pull will return less than what you would’ve brought in pulling the current optimal lever, and that’s a very real cost. Information is valuable, but it comes at a price… The solution to the bandit problem is easy to understand: the optimal strategy is to start with a period of exploration, where you pull levers at random and gather information. When you have more information about what works and what doesn’t, you shift to spending the majority of your time pulling the best lever (exploitation), but you keep exploring the other options in case your current best option isn’t the very best that exists. So here’s an idea: maybe society is a bandit problem where the goal is safety, wealth, and happiness. A small group of “misfits” like Musk, Jobs and Rubio explore new ways of progressing towards that goal and fail 9 times out of 10. But they gather new information and occasionally find new paths that the majority of people exploit (no negative connotation here). In this model, maybe we have just the right amount of explorers.
https://medium.com/swlh/an-argument-against-first-principle-thinking-7ef952a55298
['Michael Thomas']
2019-06-25 08:05:09.837000+00:00
['Startup']
Letters to my emotions- A series (Ego).
Letters to my emotions- A series (Ego). Dear Ego, Awareness and I planned for a quiet evening just in the time for the sunset! I understand you’ll be joining us too. I acknowledge your belief that you have an important job to do, and that you take your job very seriously. Apparently your job is to take me back to fear, the dark place, you now call- the comfort zone or maybe your home. And keep doing so if you feel must. But I will also be doing my job while I gaze at the sun and the beautiful orange sky; which while setting, gives me the hope of getting a day closer to my manifestations. And awareness will do its job which is to stay in present and remain inspiring. I understand the stories you tell me are to protect me, but often it has got nothing to do with reality. Anxiety loves when you show up and now I understand why you two make such good friends! But my dear friend Ego, those stories come from a place of past conditionings and presumed realities; and that comfort zone is nothing but the danger zone. Did I not tell you, growth occurs outside the comfort zone? But you did quite a job to always make me feel otherwise! I also understand you dread it when Change shows up but how will you deny that it is the only constant in the perpetual universe? And maybe it’s time you both make amends with each other. The grandiose sense of self of everything revolving around you, let’s not dwell into it, please? I recognize and respect that you are a part of the family and I will never exclude you from our activities. But your suggestions will never be followed. Dear ego, I accept you but I do not approve of your stories. I hope gradually you find your way back and become one of us. ~With love and firmness.
https://medium.com/@bhaswatikalita/letters-to-my-emotions-a-series-ego-9a8eb63f9c9d
['Bhaswati Kalita']
2020-04-23 08:52:25.979000+00:00
['Mental Health', 'Emotions', 'Ego', 'Psychology', 'Letters']
7 “TBR” BOOKS THIS SEPTEMBER
New month! New set of books on my TBR list! SEPTEMBER! credits to the owner of the photo. First and foremost, I’d like all my readers to be informed more specifically those who are not into “booktube” the meaning of “TBR” because just before I created this blog I’ve searched for it, as simple as this, “What does TBR mean? And here’s what it normally means… See? But for those who are familiar with the booktube communtity, “TBR” is defined as “To Be Read”. Booktubers and monster readers usually jot down their list of To be read books every month no matter how their choice of genres vary. However, in my case, I read various genres every month. In my August TBR, I remember I went from erotica to a couple of contemporary novels. Who would’ve thought it has end my August so well ! Moving forward, it’s a new month — September! I’d like to take this opportunity to enjoy the novels of this amazing writer, known for her brilliant and entertaining young adult fiction novels, a New York Times Bestselling author and 2016 Goodreads Choice Awards in the Romance Category, none other than Colleen Hoover. I aim to bury my emotions in the depth of Hoover’s inspiring and thought-provoking writings which I believe she was best known as well, it is also one way I made myself at ease. Weird, isn’t it? I know but it really works. Aside from Hoover’s novels, you’ll also notice three irrelevant novels from other authors which I also included in my TBR list for the reason that I’ve wanted to read those novels since then and it is only this month that I got the chance to do so. Why? Well, simply because I’m just a simple reader and I mostly get broke. The books that I’m referring to are from one of the prominent classic authors, Oscar Wilde, Haruki Murakami who was praised by The Guardian as “among the world’s greatest novelists” and from Daniel Handler who was best known for his pen name Lemony Snicket author of the famous adventure novel “A Series of Unfortunate Events”. For instance, here are the 8 books on my “To be read” list this September: (Note: All the novels descriptions are from Goodreads, credits go with them.) Colleen Hoover’s… Too Late Sloan will go through hell and back for her little brother. And she does, every single night. Forced to remain in a relationship with the dangerous and corrupt Asa Jackson, Sloan will do whatever it takes to make sure her brother has what he needs. Nothing will get in her way. Nothing except Carter. Sloan is the only good thing to ever happen to Asa. He knows this and he never plans on letting her go; even if she doesn’t approve of his lifestyle. But despite Sloan’s disapproval, Asa knows what it takes to get what he wants. He knows what he needs to do to remain on top. Nothing will get in his way. Nothing except Carter. Upon reading reviews about this novel, it seems to me that it’s a combination of suspense and sociology it is still under contemporary novel though but I’m not that fond of reading political-concept novels because it stresses me. It’s Hoover’s writing so why not give it a shot? Ugly Love When Tate Collins meets airline pilot Miles Archer, she knows it isn’t love at first sight. They wouldn’t even go so far as to consider themselves friends. The only thing Tate and Miles have in common is an undeniable mutual attraction. Once their desires are out in the open, they realize they have the perfect set-up. He doesn’t want love. She doesn’t have time for love, so that just leaves the sex. Their arrangement could be surprisingly seamless, as long as Tate can stick to the only two rules Miles has for her. Never ask about the past. Don’t expect a future. They think they can handle it, but realize almost immediately they can’t handle it at all. Hearts get infiltrated. Promises get broken. Rules get shattered. Love gets ugly. Goodness! This one really hypes me up, after I read its synopsis, I suddenly had this lapse of scenes that might happen on the book and It’s getting me so hyped up now that I heard it’ll have it’s film adaptation. *saving all my feels* November 9 Fallon meets Ben, an aspiring novelist, the day before her scheduled cross-country move. Their untimely attraction leads them to spend Fallon’s last day in L.A. together, and her eventful life becomes the creative inspiration Ben has always sought for his novel. Over time and amidst the various relationships and tribulations of their own separate lives, they continue to meet on the same date every year. Until one day Fallon becomes unsure if Ben has been telling her the truth or fabricating a perfect reality for the sake of the ultimate plot twist. I am getting good reviews and ratings on this novel which made it more interesting, giving me so much curiosity underneath that ‘ultimate plot twist’. I heard the twists and turns in this novel is unpredictable. If you know me, you should know that I love unpredictable books. How impressive it is when a book fails my expectations in both nice and miserable way. It Ends With Us Lily hasn’t always had it easy, but that’s never stopped her from working hard for the life she wants. She’s come a long way from the small town in Maine where she grew up — she graduated from college, moved to Boston, and started her own business. So when she feels a spark with a gorgeous neurosurgeon named Ryle Kincaid, everything in Lily’s life suddenly seems almost too good to be true. Ryle is assertive, stubborn, and maybe even a little arrogant. He’s also sensitive, brilliant, and has a total soft spot for Lily, but Ryle’s complete aversion to relationships is disturbing. As questions about her new relationship overwhelm her, so do thoughts of Atlas Corrigan — her first love and a link to the past she left behind. He was her kindred spirit, her protector. When Atlas suddenly reappears, everything Lily has built with Ryle is threatened. With this bold and deeply personal novel, Colleen Hoover delivers a heart-wrenching story that breaks exciting new ground for her as a writer. It Ends With Us is an unforgettable tale of love that comes at the ultimate price. People who have read this book wanted us to be aware that this book is certainly deep and moving. Colleen Hoover has warned her readers as well the first time its synopsis has been released, leaving this note in the latter part as a warning: “This book contains graphic scenes and very sensitive subject matter.” Dang! It’s been only 2 weeks since I shed tears over a novel and I’m missing the misery. Go ahead, Colleen Hoover! Make me cry my heart out! Enough with this Hoover fascination, these three books that I have mentioned also get to be on my list. Why we broke up by Daniel Handler Min Green and Ed Slaterton are breaking up, so Min is writing Ed a letter and giving him a box. Inside the box is why they broke up. Two bottle caps, a movie ticket, a folded note, a box of matches, a protractor, books, a toy truck, a pair of ugly earrings, a comb from a motel room, and every other item collected over the course of a giddy, intimate, heartbreaking relationship. Item after item is illustrated and accounted for, and then the box, like a girlfriend, will be dumped. I’ve been aching to read this book the first time I saw it on a bookstore. It wasn’t only the title who caught my attention, it’s actually the cover as well — minimal and such a mystery. According to several reviews, the book is written in letter form with illustrations on it. Seeing a young adult fiction book with illustrations is what I think an emerging way to differ one’s content to others Probably because it appeals to be more interesting and quite unique. The illustrations have a connection to the story so it isn’t just an illustration meant for designs. I might do a review of this. So stay tuned and keep reading. What I talk about when I talk about running by Haruki Murakami In 1982, having sold his jazz bar to devote himself to writing, Murakami began running to keep fit. A year later, he’d completed a solo course from Athens to Marathon, and now, after dozens of such races, not to mention triathlons reflects upon the influence the sport has had on his life and–even more important–on his writing. Equal parts training log, travelogue, and reminiscence, this revealing memoir covers his four-month preparation for the 2005 New York City Marathon and takes us to places ranging from Tokyo’s Jingu Gaien gardens, where he once shared the course with an Olympian, to the Charles River in Boston among young women who outpace him. Through this marvelous lens of sport emerges a panorama of memories and insights: The eureka moment when he decided to become a writer, his greatest triumphs and disappointments, his passion for vintage LPs, and the experience, after fifty, of seeing his race times improve and then fall back. By turns funny and sobering, playful and philosophical, What I Talk About When I Talk About Running is rich and revelatory, both for fans of this masterful yet guardedly private writer and for the exploding population of athletes who find similar satisfaction in distance running. ©wikipedia This one is nonfiction, a memoir of Haruki Murakami. What I love about Murakami’s books is that you won’t end any of it without learning something towards life. Though I haven’t read all his books, reading its entire synopsis and plot gives me the idea of his lectures teachings on people through his experiences and wise deep thoughts. I am looking forward for enlightenment throughout the entire book. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde Dorian Gray is the subject of a full-length portrait in oil by Basil Hallward, an artist who is impressed and infatuated by Dorian’s beauty; he believes that Dorian’s beauty is responsible for the new mode in his art as a painter. Through Basil, Dorian meets Lord Henry Wotton, and he soon is enthralled by the aristocrat’s hedonistic worldview: that beauty and sensual fulfillment are the only things worth pursuing in life. Newly understanding that his beauty will fade, Dorian expresses the desire to sell his soul, to ensure that the picture, rather than he, will age and fade. The wish is granted, and Dorian pursues a libertine life of varied and amoral experiences, while staying young and beautiful; all the while his portrait ages and records every sin. Made popular due to its corrupting influence and his brilliant plot, The Picture of Dorian Gray is what I think a classic novel that really anticipates me. I’ve read its synopsis and plot several times and yet it still fascinates me to picture the splendid scenarios played in it. I don’t want to force myself scrutinizing what made it a controversial novel, I aim for entertainment whenever I read, spoiling my mood while I’m in the midst of the vast world of fantasy is a big N.O! There you have it, the eight books on my TBR list this September. Have you planned what books are you going to read this month? Let me know below if these books get to your own list. Happy Reading!
https://medium.com/ceeart/7-tbr-books-this-september-554d650a973a
[]
2017-10-03 07:03:46.238000+00:00
['Books', 'Book Recommendations', 'Colleen Hoover']
Ramen Ratings — NPV Analysis.. This is my first project on Data…
This is my first project on Data Science, Data Analysis and Visualization...!! Aim of the Project: What Makes instant Noodles so popular globally, and what is the Characteristic feature of one Brand or Variety of Ramen compared to the other. Libraries and packages: Packages to Install Libraries to be imported Dataset: This dataset is an export of “The Big List” (of reviews) from the Ramen Rater website and converted to a CSV format. Columns in this dataset include Brand, Variety (the product name), Country, and Style (Style the Ramen is served). Stars indicate the ramen quality, as assessed by the reviewer, on a 5-point scale Dataset Overview Pre-Analysis: The Data Contains the following Columns: df1.info() Checking for Unique Values: df1.nunique() Data Cleaning: 1. It appears that styles: ‘Can’, ‘Bar’ and ‘Box’ are outliers — very few stars and occurrences. 2. The dataset contains Brand/Variety that is not Ramen: Example: Brand = ‘Pringles’, Variety = Nissin Top Ramen Chicken Flavor Potato Crisp. Mis-spelled Product, Brand & Country names 3. Discovering Outliers: 3. It appears that there are some brands that have been rated 0.0 which is invalid. 4. Removing Outliers: a) Deleting the outlier style — ‘Box’, ‘Can’, ‘Bar’ b) Deleting the rating = 0.0 as it is an invalid value. Data Analysis and Inference: The more reviews a brand has, the more people have tried it. We won’t classify a brand as good based on the number of stars since any brand can easily make the list with just one 5* product. Top 10 Best Brands: Top 10 Brands Rating Distribution by Country: Preference by syle of Ramen Served: Country vs Style: Brand vs Country vs Stars: Country, Brand and mean avg rating for each country: Country, Style, and Number of times each country reviewed a style: Group for Country, Style and mean avg rating for each country: Distribution of Star Ratings: Top 100 Ramen Product Strings: Word Cloud Project Team: Arvind, Shamia, Ullas, Prabhu LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/arvind-murali2
https://medium.com/@arvind-murali/ramen-ratings-npv-analysis-babd868b32fa
['Arvind Murali']
2020-11-23 20:04:33.585000+00:00
['Visualization', 'Numpy', 'Word Cloud', 'Pandas', 'Ramen Noodles']
The best of Dynamics 365, in Flock
The best of Dynamics 365, in Flock Get real-time business intelligence in your favorite work chat app Flock now integrates with Microsoft Dynamics 365 to offer you easier access to business critical reports and sales intelligence — all within Flock. Teams use Dynamics 365 to find the right info at the right time to move their business forward. And now, Flock allows your team to get all that info right where you need it the most — in your favorite work chat app. Reports from Microsoft Dynamics 365 in Flock Daily summaries, weekly comparisons and more — you can configure this integration to share data on metrics that matter to you and your team. And making this magic happen is as simple as 1–2–3! Install the Microsoft Dynamics 365 app from Flock’s app store. Configure the app and select which reports you’d like to receive. Go back to Flock and see actionable insights pouring in, in real-time. If that’s too simple for your taste, here’s the process in a little more detail: Install the app (duh!) Go to the Flock app store and search for the Microsoft Dynamics 365 app. Or click here to go to the app page, and click on Install. Tell it what to do (double duh!) Fill in your team’s Microsoft Dynamics URL. It might look something like yourorg.crm.dynamics.com. Select which metrics you’d like to receive reports on and their frequency. Select which Flock channel you’d like to send these reports to. Kick back and relax (huh?!) No, seriously, that’s all. Just kick back, relax, and you’ll see real-time reports on metrics show up in the Flock channel of your choice. Icing on the cake? You can configure the Microsoft Dynamics 365 app to send different reports to different channels so every team member has access to the data they need, right when and where they need it. So, there you go. No more shuffling tabs and juggling apps. You can now receive real-time business intelligence in Flock, discuss it, work on it together, and get things done, faster. Also, if your team uses a different CRM, check out the apps for Freshdesk and Zendesk in Flock’s app store. Let us know how your team uses these apps to be more productive. Cheers!
https://medium.com/flock-chat/the-best-of-dynamics-365-in-flock-4559be5bc9f6
[]
2018-06-27 06:59:19.812000+00:00
['Apps', 'Business Intelligence', 'CRM', 'Productivity', 'Flock']
Azure DevOps Multi-Stage Pipelines
Now we have an Environment and the Approval in place we can move onto the Pipeline. Pipeline I already had a multi-stage pipeline I have been using to demo a container build, so I decided to adapt that as it made sense to slot in an approval at the stage where our container image is built, tagged and pushed, there are a few stages before that though so lets take a quick look at those. First up is the stage where the Resource Group is created; - stage: "SetupRG" displayName: "Resource Group" jobs: - job: "CreateResourceGroup" displayName: "Resource Group - Setup" steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az group create --name $(APP_NAME)-rg --location $(LOCATION) displayName: "Resource Group - Use Azure CLI to setup or check" As you can see, I am using the Azure CLI and variables which are defined in the header of the Pipeline. Once the Resource Group has been created the next stage launches an Azure Container Registry if one doesn’t exist, if there is already one there then nothing happens; - stage: "SetupACR" displayName: "Azure Container Registry" dependsOn: - "SetupRG" jobs: - job: "SetupCheckAzureContainerRegistry" displayName: "Azure Container Registry - Setup" variables: - name: "DECODE_PERCENTS" value: true steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | ACR_ID=$(az acr show --resource-group $APP_NAME-rg --name $ACR_NAME --query "id" -o tsv) if [ -z "$ACR_ID" ]; then echo "There is no Azure Container Registry, we should sort that" az acr create --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(ACR_NAME) --sku Basic --admin-enabled true else echo "There is already an Azure Container Registry, we don't need to do anything else here" fi displayName: "Azure Container Registry - Use Azure CLI check or setup" Now that we have a container registry to push our image to we can build and the push the container, this is the stage where we will be getting approval before building; - stage: "BuildContainer" displayName: "Build, Tag and Push the container image" dependsOn: - "SetupACR" jobs: - deployment: BuildPushImage displayName: "Build, tag and push the image" environment: "production" pool: vmImage: "Ubuntu-20.04" strategy: runOnce: deploy: steps: - checkout: self - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | export THETIMEANDDATE=$(date '+%Y-%m-%d-%H%M') echo "$THETIMEANDDATE will be the point in time tag" az acr login --name $(ACR_NAME) docker image build -t $(IMAGE_NAME) ./ docker image tag $(IMAGE_NAME) $(ACR_NAME).azurecr.io/$(IMAGE_NAME):latest docker image tag $(IMAGE_NAME) $(ACR_NAME).azurecr.io/$(IMAGE_NAME):$THETIMEANDDATE docker image push $(ACR_NAME).azurecr.io/$(IMAGE_NAME):latest docker image push $(ACR_NAME).azurecr.io/$(IMAGE_NAME):$THETIMEANDDATE displayName: "Use Azure CLI to build and push the container image" As you can see, rather than defining a job we are using a deployment this means we can then use the environment we created and because the environment is what our approval is attached to the deployment won’t progress until approved. One thing to note here is that there are two steps, the first checkout step downloads a copy of the repo which our azure-pipelines.yml and Dockerfile are in, without this step the build would fail. The second step builds, tags and then pushes the image to the Azure Container Registry launched in the previous stage. The remaining stage, assuming the previous three stages have all completed, configures and launches an App Service Plan, App Service and then configures automatic deployment of any subsequent images which are pushed to our Azure Container Registry, as you can see the code below the steps are only executed if the App Service Plan has not been configured, if our Application is already running then these steps are skipped; - stage: "SetupAppServices" displayName: "Azure App Services" dependsOn: - "SetupRG" - "SetupACR" - "BuildContainer" jobs: - job: "CheckForAppServicePlan" displayName: "App Service Plan - Check if App Service Plan exists" steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | APP_SERVICE_PLAN_ID=$(az appservice plan show --resource-group $APP_NAME-rg --name $APP_NAME-asp --query "id" -o tsv) if [ -z "$APP_SERVICE_PLAN_ID" ]; then echo "There is no App Service Plan, we should sort that" echo "##vso[task.setvariable variable=appServiceExist;isOutput=true]No" # there is no app service plan so we should do stuff else echo "There is an App Service Plan, we don't need to do anything else here" echo "##vso[task.setvariable variable=appServiceExist;isOutput=true]Yes" # nothing to do lets move on fi name: "DetermineResult" displayName: "App Service Plan - Check to see if there App Service Plan exists" - job: "CreateAppServicePlan" displayName: "App Service Plan - Setup" dependsOn: - "CheckForAppServicePlan" condition: "eq(dependencies.CheckForAppServicePlan.outputs['DetermineResult.appServiceExist'], 'No')" steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az appservice plan create --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(APP_NAME)-asp --is-linux displayName: "App Service Plan - Use Azure CLI to setup" - job: "CreateAppService" displayName: "Web App - Setup" dependsOn: - "CheckForAppServicePlan" - "CreateAppServicePlan" condition: "eq(dependencies.CheckForAppServicePlan.outputs['DetermineResult.appServiceExist'], 'No')" steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az webapp create --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --plan $(APP_NAME)-asp --name $(APP_NAME) --deployment-container-image-name $(ACR_NAME).azurecr.io/$(IMAGE_NAME):latest displayName: "Web App - Use Azure CLI to setup" - job: "CreateAppServiceSettings" displayName: "Web App - Configure Settings" dependsOn: - "CheckForAppServicePlan" - "CreateAppServicePlan" - "CreateAppService" condition: "eq(dependencies.CheckForAppServicePlan.outputs['DetermineResult.appServiceExist'], 'No')" steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az webapp config appsettings set --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(APP_NAME) --settings $(APP_SETTINGS) displayName: "Web App - Use Azure CLI to configure the settings" - job: "CreateAppServiceID" displayName: "Web App - Configure & Assign Managed Identity" dependsOn: - "CheckForAppServicePlan" - "CreateAppServicePlan" - "CreateAppService" - "CreateAppServiceSettings" condition: "eq(dependencies.CheckForAppServicePlan.outputs['DetermineResult.appServiceExist'], 'No')" steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az webapp identity assign --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(APP_NAME) displayName: "Web App - Use Azure CLI to assign an identity" - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az role assignment create --assignee $(az webapp identity show --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(APP_NAME) --query principalId --output tsv) --scope /subscriptions/$(az account show --query id --output tsv)/resourceGroups/$(APP_NAME)-rg/providers/Microsoft.ContainerRegistry/registries/$(ACR_NAME) --role "AcrPull" displayName: "Web App - Use Azure CLI to assign an identity" - job: "EnableCD" displayName: "Web App - Configure Azure Container Registry connedction and enable continuous deployment" dependsOn: - "CheckForAppServicePlan" - "CreateAppServicePlan" - "CreateAppService" - "CreateAppServiceSettings" - "CreateAppServiceID" condition: "eq(dependencies.CheckForAppServicePlan.outputs['DetermineResult.appServiceExist'], 'No')" steps: - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az webapp config container set --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(APP_NAME) --docker-custom-image-name $(ACR_NAME).azurecr.io/$(IMAGE_NAME):latest --docker-registry-server-url https://$(ACR_NAME).azurecr.io displayName: "Web App - Configure the App Serivce to use Azure Container Registry" - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az webapp deployment container config --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(APP_NAME) --enable-cd true displayName: "Web App - Enable continuous deployment whenever the image is updated on the WebApp" - task: AzureCLI@2 inputs: azureSubscription: "$(SUBSCRIPTION_NAME)" addSpnToEnvironment: true scriptType: "bash" scriptLocation: "inlineScript" inlineScript: | az acr webhook create --name $(ACR_NAME)webhook --registry $(ACR_NAME) --scope $(IMAGE_NAME):latest --actions push --uri $(az webapp deployment container show-cd-url --resource-group $(APP_NAME)-rg --name $(APP_NAME) --query "CI_CD_URL" -o tsv) displayName: "Azure Container Registry - Add the web hook created in the last task to the Azure Container Registry" A full copy of the azure-pipelines.yml file can be found in the following repo https://github.com/russmckendrick/docker-python-web-app. Running the Pipeline Now that we know what the pipeline looks like this what happened when it executed for the first time, first off, you (or whoever your approver is) will get an email; The approval email Once you click through to approve the deployment you should see something which looks like the following;
https://medium.com/media-glasses/azure-devops-multi-stage-pipelines-bcbed581fa2d
['Russ Mckendrick']
2021-04-25 15:11:33.394000+00:00
['Azure Devops', 'Docker', 'DevOps', 'Pipeline', 'Azure']