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Spotlight on Jeffrey Miller
|
Spotlight on Jeffrey Miller
Class of 1987
Jeffrey Miller, class of 1987
Jeffrey Miller is a 1987 Eureka College grad now living in Daejeon, South Korea. After completing his bachelor’s at Eureka, he enrolled in a master program in English at Western Illinois University. He took two of the graduate class that I taught, and I was a member of his thesis committee. His thesis was collection of short stories. In addition, he read fiction manuscripts for. The Mississippi Valley Review, a little magazine published by Western’s English Department.
Jeffrey then went to South Korea, where he has been teaching for twenty-six years. Currently employed by Solbridge International School of Business, Jeffrey teaches advanced writing courses for students who plan to study in the United States. He also teaches reading and history classes. Most of his students are from Korea, China, and Kazakhstan. This semester he has selected Fahrenheit 451 as required reading for his students.
Jeffrey has been married for eight years. He and his wife have four children — three boys and a girl. He writes, “They keep me young chasing them around the house.” He also admits, “It’s about time for me to come home.” He is actively searching for a job in the States. In addition to his teaching, Jeffrey published two works of fiction in 2012: War Remains: A Korean War Novel; and Ice Cream Headache. His collection of short stories will be published later this year. One of those stories is a reworking of the prize-winning story he wrote for EC’s Impressions. He is currently at work on four projects: three novels and a novella. In his own words, “I bounce from one to the other whenever I experience writer’s block.”
|
https://medium.com/studs-terkel-project/spotlight-on-jeffrey-miller-212c41cd9e9
|
['Eureka College Alumni']
|
2016-03-31 15:29:37.638000+00:00
|
['Writing', 'Short Story']
|
Ветреный (Hercai) 54 серия & Русская озвучка посмотреть YouTube
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Integrity is the most valuable and respected quality of leadership. Always keep your word
|
https://medium.com/@jonatha09036627/%D0%B2%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%80%D0%B5%D0%BD%D1%8B%D0%B9-hercai-54-%D1%81%D0%B5%D1%80%D0%B8%D1%8F-%D1%80%D1%83%D1%81%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B0%D1%8F-%D0%BE%D0%B7%D0%B2%D1%83%D1%87%D0%BA%D0%B0-%D0%BF%D0%BE%D1%81%D0%BC%D0%BE%D1%82%D1%80%D0%B5%D1%82%D1%8C-youtube-a75fd234b023
|
[]
|
2020-12-27 10:34:13.631000+00:00
|
['Belarus', 'Covid 19']
|
Tales of Nagarjuna
|
Come on a journey with me. Suspend your traditional notions of cause and effect. I will reveal the one cause of a billion negative effects. The idea is not my own. Its truth is not new. In fact, it is very old — to be found under stones left unturned, in quiet places, away from the hustle and bustle, in niches and nooks where truth can hide.
The Premise
Most of the suffering of mankind stems from the delusion that we are separate, independent beings, alienated from each other. Believing this is so makes us fearful, contentious animals, summons the worst of our base instincts, and imperils our species’ remarkable advancements over eons of evolution. We have made astounding technological achievements. But our internal wisdom has not advanced in proportion to counterbalance external technology.
Albert Einstein:
“A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness.”
Physicist David Bohm:
“If we examine the various ideologies that tend to divide humanity, such as racism, extreme nationalism, and the Marxist class struggle, one of the key factors of their origin is the tendency to perceive things as inherently divided and disconnected. From this misconception springs the belief that each of these divisions is essentially independent and self-existent.’’
2000 Years Ago
Long ago, before Ptolemy, before Averroës, and Newton, there were people who sat around all day just thinking about things. Existential things. Cosmic things. Like, is what we see really what is, what are ethics, what is consciousness, is there any meaning to life?…
They could spend a lot of time just thinking because it was their job. The rulers of the day often thought it necessary to have a good philosopher by their side, whom they paid handsomely. One of these thinkers who pondered the great questions is the subject of this piece.
Nāgārjuna lived in India around the year 200. His ideas have resonated through the centuries. But you don’t have to be a Buddhist to appreciate their significance. As a metaphysical exercise, let’s see what he proposed, so long ago.
Along with the Buddha, who preceded him by five hundred years, Nāgārjuna argued that everything before us is an illusion. And that we are deluded by these illusions, the illusion of separateness being the most toxic. This was more than mere philosophical rhetoric to shock and amaze out on the speaking circuit.
1900 years later, quantum physicist Niels Bohr asserted, “Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.” — to which Einstein objected, “No reasonable definition of reality could be expected to permit quantum mechanics.” Since then, quantum mechanics has proven to be a very accurate and reliable theory, rendering Einstein’s definition of reality unreasonable.
Philosophers may be given to flights of fancy from time to time — conjuring up airy notions that have no relation to the real world, or the practical mechanics of things — but this is an unusual case when viewed in the light of recent developments in the world of physics.
And, like the great physicists, these ancient philosophers arrived at their conclusions only after years of careful and rigorous thought experiments.
If Nāgārjuna and the Buddha were right, everything we’ve been doing so carefully, all the planning and plotting to get ahead — is all for naught. An illusion of success. And an illusion of failure. Like a real-life Monopoly game. Only, the victors in real life get real money — which turns out to be an illusion.
This counterintuitive angle suggests that the game of Monopoly is an illusion within an illusion, that there are many layers of delusion. The best we can do is peel off some of the layers, one by one, like an onion to get to the truth. “To undo what hath been done.”
Jesus of Nazareth spoke of denying one’s self, along with the machinations of “selfhood”.
Even more astounding is the ancient assertion that you and I are not autonomous individuals and that we have no inherent existence — a theory supported by the latest findings in quantum physics. In fact, nothing has a claim to being independent or autonomous.
Buddhists have long held this to be true, along with the concept of dependent arising — the newest science seems to be catching up to the oldest truth.
Zen Master, Thich Nhat Hanh:
“The general or universal definition of ‘dependent origination’ or ‘dependent arising’ is that everything arises in dependence upon multiple causes and conditions; nothing exists as a singular, independent entity.”
From The Universe In A Single Atom:
“One may ask, apart from misrepresenting reality, what is wrong with believing in the independent, intrinsic existence of things?
“Nāgārjuna:
“‘This belief [in the separateness of people and things] has serious negative consequences. It is the belief in intrinsic existence that sustains the basis for a self-perpetuating dysfunction in our engagement with the world and with our fellow sentient beings. By according intrinsic properties of attractiveness, we react to certain objects and events with deluded attachment, while toward others, to which we accord intrinsic properties of unattractiveness, we react with deluded aversion.’
“In other words, Nāgārjuna argues that grasping at the independent existence of things leads to affliction, which in turn gives rise to a chain of destructive actions, reactions, and suffering. In the final analysis, the theory of emptiness is not a question of the mere conceptual understanding of reality. It has profound psychological and ethical implications.”
|
https://medium.com/the-value-of-pencil-and-paper-in-the-digital-age/tales-of-n%C4%81g%C4%81rjuna-e950af09e697
|
['Mac Daniels']
|
2020-12-30 15:54:33.307000+00:00
|
['Future', 'Culture', 'Physics', 'Circular Economy', 'Ethics']
|
5 Skin Care Products Found In Your Kitchen
|
Photo by Coline Haslé on Unsplash
Everyone dreams of beautiful and healthy skin. Modern times have brought into the world the need for skincare. However, the majority of products available in the market are chemical-based. They may cause an eye infection, trigger premature aging, gradual change in complexion and discoloration, etc. These products are expensive and everyone cannot afford them. Hence, today I will tell you the importance of skincare. Moreover, I will tell you about natural products which you can easily find in your kitchen.
Benefits of a daily skincare
It prevents aging.
Improves your mental health.
Save your money.
Your self-confidence will get a boost.
Your skin will look more youthful.
Five natural products found in your kitchen
Photo by Noah Buscher on Unsplash
The very first product which I will give priority is Aloe Vera. The aloe vera plant is very water-dense so it prevents dehydration. It moisturizes the skin and avoids sunburn, reduces infection and acne, lightens blemishes on the face, etc. Next up is lemon or you can use tomato also. These two products are filled with Vitamin- C. It is an antioxidant that reduces skin damage and aging. Due to its high pH levels, it can decrease oil on the skin and reduce inflammation. Moreover, it helps skin lightening. The next one is honey which is nature’s most healthy gift. If you are suffering from oily and acne-prone skin, honey is your solution. It keeps the skin moist but not oily. Ice is a tremendous cooling product that cools down your skin cells and gives a revealing appearance. It prevents dark circles and by applying it over your eyes you can relax your eyes, it benefits them too. It reduces oiliness and sunburn too. It makes your skin glowy. Milk is one of the most healthy skincare products. The well-known skincare expert country’S south Koreans’ often use it in their skincare routine. It is a natural cleanser. It boosts skin glow and prevents aging.
Photo by Drew Graham on Unsplash
These are some affordable and natural products available in your kitchen. Try them and see the difference.
|
https://medium.com/@ashitrivedi/5-skin-care-products-found-in-your-kitchen-8f4eaeaacf7a
|
['Ashi Trivedi']
|
2021-06-08 12:57:54.554000+00:00
|
['Natural Skin Care Tips', 'Skin Care Products', 'Skin Care Tips', 'Skincare', 'Natural Skin Care']
|
Anti-matter: All You Need To Know About It
|
What is anti-matter? Why is it there? How much is there? Do we need it? Do we have a whole universe made up of anti-matter? These are the questions that come to the mind of ordinary people. In this article, you will find an answer to all questions.
The majority of us have already learned about the matter in detail in our high schools. We know that matter is anything that occupies space and has mass. Everything is a matter in our universe. But do we know about this thing called anti-matter?
What is Anti-matter?
To comprehend anti-matter, we need to understand more about the matter. Matter contains sub-atomic particles that are the fundamental elements of this world, like Sodium, Potassium, etc. No matter what element it is, every atom contains the nucleus that is the heart of it. The nucleus comprises protons that have a positive charge and neutrons that are neutral. Electrons that are negatively charged orbits around this nucleus.
Anti-matter, as its name implies, is the opposite of matter. Though, they contain the same mass and almost identical properties as normal matter. What differentiates them is their reversed electric charge. For every electron, there exists an anti-electron (positron), that behaves similarly to the electron but has a positive charge. Likewise, For every proton, there exists an anti-proton that behaves the same as the proton but has a negative charge on it.
This is because every particle of matter has a mirror particle(anti-particle) that acts the same as the normal particle but carries an opposite electric charge. For example, every positron of anti-oxygen will have the same properties as the normal oxygen electron, but it will carry a positive charge instead of a negative one.
History Of Anti-matter
Paul Dirac, who was an English physicist, first introduced us to the concept of anti-matter. He discovered it while he was working on Einstein’s theory of relativity and quantum physics by combining their equations. He found out that the equation worked for both — electrons with a negative charge and, also, with a positive charge.
The presence of anti-matter was confirmed in 1932 by an American physicist Carl D. Anderson. Paul Dirac was awarded the noble prize in 1933, while Anderson received it in 1936.
Over the last 50–60 years, scientists have created anti-matter in the labs artificially. The problem with producing it artificially is that it is expensive, time-consuming, and energy-consuming. Consequently, anti-matter is present in the labs, but at a minute amount.
Where Is The Anti-matter?
Scientists believe that matter and anti-matter must have been created in the same amounts after the big bang. Why the matter is in excess in our universe is one of the biggest questions that science still cannot answer today. There are many theories related to this question. For example, one theory suggests that a whole universe made up of anti-matter is present that we are yet to discover.
The Interesting thing about anti-matter is that it is closer to us than we think. A banana gives out a positron after every 75 minutes because of the decomposition of Potassium-40 present in it. As our body also contains Potassium-40, we emit positrons too.
Moreover, a minor amount of anti-matter comes from space, into the earth’s atmosphere, in the form of cosmic rays.
What Happens When Matter And Anti-matter Meet?
When matter and anti-matter meet, they destroy each other, and the reaction makes energy. This fact forces us to think that if matter and anti-matter were created in the same amounts, then it is sure that they would have annihilated each other, and all of this universe and we, would never have come into existence.
It is impossible that matter and anti-matter were produced in different amounts after the big bang. And at the same time, we cannot say that they were created in the same amounts because if that’s the case, then we should not have existed.
Could We Use Anti-matter As A Fuel?
We live in a world today, where energy is essential for our everyday life. The main source of this energy is fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are produced every minute while we are using them. This makes them a reliable source of energy, however, scientists say that we are using them at a rate, faster than they can produce.
photo by Rock Staar on Unsplash
Therefore, scientists are looking for other sources of energy as well. One of them is anti-matter. Anti-matter could be an ideal source of energy as its reaction with matter produces a thousand times more energy than those reactions that we are using at present.
You might be wondering, why are we not using them? Well! The answer to this question is that, unfortunately, anti-matter is extremely expensive to create. Each year, we make around a trillionth of a gram of anti-matter, which is only capable of lighting a 100-watt bulb for only three seconds.
But do not worry because scientists are constantly looking for ways to produce anti-matter that is cost-effective and efficient. Some predict that it will take 55–65 years to use anti-matter as a fuel.
Anti-matter As A Weapon
photo by Marc Szeglat on Unsplash
You might have seen an anti-matter weapon in movies or television shows. Nevertheless, this has not yet been possible in real life. This is because anti-matter is very expensive to produce.
But who knows! When anti-matter is easy and cheap to produce in the future, there will surely be anti-matter weapons. We should know that this weapon will be more destructive than a nuclear weapon.
Conclusion
The mystery of anti-matter remains unsolved. We hope that scientists can find answers regarding all the prospects of anti-matter. Anti-matter has its pros and cons for this world. But, we should keep in mind that, if all the questions related to the anti-matter are answered, then it will be the biggest development in the scientific world of the twenty-first century.
|
https://medium.com/@ayaan21dec/anti-matter-all-you-need-to-know-about-it-ffdd5c22aa9
|
['Syed Ayaan']
|
2020-12-26 02:12:45.220000+00:00
|
['Particle', 'Antimatter', 'Mystery', 'Universe', 'Science']
|
Beyond This Moment
|
Beyond This Moment
Photo by Amparo Michel on Unsplash
The space between lines
is thin.
The race between time
is won, when
winners realize
time is faster than them.
We’ll never catch up;
time is faster than wind.
And if we ever catch up
that’s when time will end.
Let real life begin,
and reality will blend
with now.
And this moment will finally
be found.
And this moment will finally
be still.
But until
this moment is finally hours
with no minutes;
and ours
with no limits;
and ours
with no endings.
Only beginnings.
Only extending.
Only upending
all we once knew,
but have quickly forgotten.
All we pursue
that’s been useful for nothing.
Be in this moment
before beyond this moment
is now.
© 2020, Micah Josiah
|
https://medium.com/@micahjosiah/beyond-this-moment-7bf185878e2f
|
['Micah Josiah']
|
2020-12-20 02:29:59.315000+00:00
|
['Peace', 'Patience', 'Poetry', 'Time', 'Life']
|
I’m Tired of Writing
|
I’m tired of writing about negative LGBTQ headlines. I don’t want to talk about how Dwight Howard tried to have a person killed and somehow transwomen are evil because of some screenshots and recordings. I don’t want to keep writing about how trans people are terrified of going to the bathroom in public. I don’t want to keep writing about how hard it is to transition, especially with the gatekeeping in the medical field.
Someone tried to shove bible verses in my face to prove that these bigots have a right to antagonize LGBTQ people. Someone else tried to tell me that LGBTQ people are already over-represented.
I don’t want to write about how LGBTQ kids are much more likely to be bullied, kicked out, sexually harassed, develop mental illnesses like anxiety and depression, develop self–harming habits, and attempt suicide. I don’t want to feel like I have to write a piece on Trans Day of Rememberance and talk about the intense pain so many of us endure just trying to be ourselves.
I’m tired.
I’m tired of seeing another negative story centered around LGBTQ people every time I load up Twitter. I’m tired of seeing my trans brothers and sisters feel like they’ll never get to live in their truth because of transphobic, disgusting bigots. I’m tired of seeing the hopelessness eat us alive.
Someone says they don’t think kids should be allowed to transition. They should be forced to wait until they’re older. What happens if they don’t make it to 21? What happens if the pain eats at them until they swallow a bottle of pills? Until they slit their wrists and cut too deep? Until they get a hold of a gun and make their brains go everywhere? Until they just give up?
Some believe that gay kids should be sent to conversion camps. They’re still a thing in parts of the US. Why would you send a kid to some camp to be tortured and constantly told something is wrong with them simply because they’re attracted to the same gender? Have you heard the horror stories that come from those camps? Would you send one of your kids to one knowing what they do to those poor children? Or do you only care about getting rid of “the gay”?
Someone says trans surgeries are cosmetic and they aren’t necessary. Tell me what’s the point of living if you can’t be truly happy. Show me where these surgeries haven’t saved lives. Just because you can’t see us bleeding doesn’t mean that we aren’t hurting.
I’m tired of picking an article based on how much it pissed me off. I’m tired of using bitter anger to fuel my words. LGBTQ people are facing death in other countries. LGBTQ people are being targeted and attacked just down the street from you. People and their hyper Twitter fingers hop on every day just to shit on us.
Photo by Mercedes Mehling on Unsplash
I’m tired, but I’m far from done. Every time I receive a response from a homophobic, transphobic bigot, it only makes me want to write that much more. Every time someone tells me that one of my pieces helped them, it only reassures me that I’m doing the right thing.
I might take a break. I might not post for a few days, or even a week, but I will always come back. I’ll come back for my LGBTQ family. I’ll come back to remind them that they’re not alone. You can throw all the Bible verses you want. You can spew all the bitter bigotry you want. I will always come back. I will always fight for my community.
I don’t care if you think we only make up 0.1% of 7 billion+ and that somehow means we don’t matter. I will write for that 0.1% until my hands no longer work. Even then, there are programs that will let me talk and it’ll type for me. I’ll keep writing until I can’t use my brain anymore.
I don’t care if you think we’re a humongous sin stain. Everybody sins. You sin. Matter of fact, you sin every time you judge us for being who we are. Take a moment to count how many times you’ve sinned today.
I’m tired, but I’m not a quitter. I will keep writing and sharing our stories. I will keep fighting for us.
|
https://medium.com/brian-the-man-behind-the-pen/im-tired-of-writing-eceddc81ee53
|
[]
|
2018-11-27 01:45:24.950000+00:00
|
['Equality', 'Writing', 'LGBTQ', 'Transgender', 'Social Justice']
|
Unsold! My ‘New Yorker’ cartoon idea
|
Unsold! My ‘New Yorker’ cartoon idea
How I sold a ‘New Yorker’ cartoonist on a ‘New Yorker’ cartoon idea but we still couldn’t get ‘The New Yorker’ to buy it
Now and then, I tinker with ideas for cartoons and captions. Long ago, having noticed that the typical fortune-cookie fortune is unspeakably boring, I thought of a captionless image that would show, in the foreground at left, a restaurant table with a fortune reading, “Call the kids! Something’s wrong — I just know it!” In the background at right, we’d see a woman rushing madly out the door, followed by a man who was perhaps flinging dollars at the cashier on his way.
Skipping ahead a few decades, I had another idea, this time in response to the increasing complications of TV shows, especially the floridly baroque, questionably intelligible series Lost, though it came to me some time after that series ended. Through a mutual friend, I got in touch with a cartoonist named Michael Crawford, who had sold many works to The New Yorker over the years. He saw something in my idea but thought my original notion, involving an oracle in a cave, wouldn’t work. Using instead the familiar trope of a sage on a mountaintop, he drew up a very rough sketch and sent it to me, with my original caption idea along with some other jottings. I liked the layout fine, we settled on a caption, and he pitched it to The New Yorker, which, however, failed to see the greatness in it and said no. There’s now an exhibition in New York of cartoons The New Yorker turned down (you can read about it here), so I thought I’d share our own rejected sketch. Because brevity is the soul of wit and all that, our final caption was shorter than what’s shown here: “That’s not explained until the final episode.”
Regrettably, Crawford passed away last year (one appreciation of him is here), so I can’t ask his permission to show this. Personally, I think his reputation is unlikely to be tarnished by it, but many people hate for their unfinished work to be seen, and perhaps he would too. If he’s looking down from one of those New Yorker–cartoon versions of heaven and he’s got a gripe, I hope he’ll get in touch. I want to run an idea past him.
|
https://medium.com/panel-frame/unsold-my-new-yorker-cartoon-idea-393d23dbf406
|
['John E. Branch Jr.']
|
2017-10-01 16:36:21.276000+00:00
|
['Cartoon', 'The New Yorker', 'Television']
|
Top 5 Underrated True Crime Books
|
Because who doesn’t want to know more about true crime? Let’s dive into it!
Photo by Christin Hume on Unsplash
Devil in the White City by Erik Larson
If you have heard of the serial killer H.H. Holmes, you should read this book. Larson delves into the world of 1893 Chicago and shares the story of two men: Daniel Burnham, an architect, and H.H. Holmes, a serial killer. Even the two never met, the book brings their story together in a fascinating way. Larson paints an engrossing, historical picture of Victorian Chicago and the first known American serial killer.
Lost Girls: An Unsolved American Mystery by Robert Kolker
A heartbreaking story about each of the known murder victims of the Long Island Serial Killer (LISK). As heartbreaking it was, I couldn’t put it down. Kolker paints the lives of each of the victims — talking about their childhoods, their struggles, their loved ones. It reads more like a mystery novel than a nonfictional book and it was incredibly thorough and organized — delving deep in their lives. Kolker did a great job bringing awareness to the LISK case as well, this unidentified killer needs to be stopped and this case needs to be solved.
I’ll Be Gone in The Dark by Michelle McNamara
Just published in 2018 after years of research and looking, McNamara’s book is heartstopping. McNamara, a true-crime journalist, examines the Golden State Killer (her moniker) and her obsession to solve who exactly this serial killer is. Unfortunately, she passed away in 2016 and did not see the day where law enforcement finally caught him. Nonetheless, her research and writing were relentless: she did not leave any rock overturned. McNamara did not sensualize the Golden State Killer or his victims and survivors: she told it how it was. Such an impressive book and woman who wrote it!
Portrait of a Killer: Jack the Ripper — Case Closed by Patricia Cornwell
Everyone knows the story of Jack the Ripper, right? There are so many books, resources, theories out there about this serial killer — everyone wants it solved to have answers. Cornwell claims to have solved it and shares who Jack the Ripper is. My thoughts — I don’t believe she solved it but it is an interesting take on who Jack the Ripper is. Cornwell provides only circumstantial evidence by combining forensic techniques and looking into documents, pictures, files. While she goes into a lot of detail that some may not find so intriguing, I found it an interesting perspective.
Small Sacrifices by Ann Rule
Ann Rule is best known for her book, The Stranger Beside Me, which was about Ted Bundy. However, this book is just as intriguing! Rule examines what drove Diane Downs to shoot her children. Rule presents the story and facts through the eyes of law enforcement and professionals surrounding the case. She states the facts within the wild tale of Diane Downs and the lives she impacted. Rule also shares information about mental illness and psychological thinking of what drove Diane Downs down the road she took. While this book is upsetting and disturbing, Rule paints a picture that you can’t turn away from.
|
https://medium.com/curious/top-5-underrated-true-crime-books-9f4f0323059b
|
['Sm Sommer']
|
2020-08-13 15:23:02.287000+00:00
|
['Book Recommendations', 'Books', 'Nonfiction', 'True Crime', 'True Crime Books']
|
What are you gonna do?
|
Sitting down across from my partner in crime for the last three years
I express my appreciation for how much of a blessing this experience has been.
I’ve been given the privilege to live out my values by starting a nonprofit.
An insane undertaking that I’ve loved, hated, cherished -
it has made me feel how wide the spectrum of human emotion can be.
But now, I find myself explaining that it’s time for me to leave.
He inevitably asks: “What are you gonna do when you leave?”
A question I’ve asked myself many times.
One story comes to mind
It plays like an old black and white reel film in my head, and I begin:
When I was in high school,
I remember my dad telling me about his childhood and growing up.
Antonio Madrigal was born in El Tulillo, Jalisco — a small town outside of Guadalajara where he attended school only up until the 3rd grade.
Not because he didn’t want to continue going to school — but because the school in his hometown only went up to the 3rd grade.
To continue with his education meant walking to the local periferico and catching a bus to the next barrio over.
A bus ride meant time.
Time that could be spent for work.
Work that would turn into money.
Money he’d have to decide
for a bus
or
for food to help with his family.
So naturally, like many other children of developing countries, he worked and gave the money to his family to help pay for the necessities.
I don’t know how to describe the next 15 or so years because he didn’t really tell me about them — but these were the years that my father worked.
Some kids continued to go to school, my father began to work the farm.
Some kids could be found playing soccer during the middle of the day in the streets, my father harvested corn, tobacco, watermelon, and bananas.
Some kids could be found going to a big city college, my father worked the cafeteria in a cigar company.
In his 20s he ended up as a cafeteria worker at Frito Lay where he was liked by many employees for his kind demeanor and genuine spirit.
One day, a higher up manager approached him and said
“Have you thought about applying to be a truck driver? I think you’d be a good one, and the pay is a lot better”
More money? Of course!
But there was a caveat — he had to pass an 8th grade level math test that proved he could calculate freight loads necessary for the job.
My dad was transparent — he said he didn’t know enough math and that he only ever went to the 3rd grade.
The manager did something I imagine was rare at the time.
He took a chance and said it wasn’t a problem.
There were practice tests and workbooks my dad could get to prepare for the test.
My dad said math was his favorite subject in elementary school. Through all of K-12 I performed best in math, and he would anecdotally tell me how I could attribute this to him, that I inherited his aptitude for math.
So, being the father whose catchphrase is “échale ganas”, he took it upon himself to diligently study.
A month of studying passed, and he took the exam.
He passed.
He moved up in Frito Lay, became a truck driver, and went down a career path that would eventually enable him to move to America to find work. He jumped around jobs in driving trucks, and cooking food, and eventually brought his Mexico born baby boy and wife over the border (another story for my brother to one day tell). And thus began the Madrigal-Galindo family in America.
When I was in college studying bioengineering and considering all the careers I could pursue, I reflected on this story and thought about my father’s skill in math.
One day, while visiting home to eat the food I missed out on in the dining halls, I asked him:
“Apa, que te había gustado estudiar para hacer?”
“Dad, what would you have liked to study to become?”
I expected some answer along the lines of
“I was good at math, so maybe a career as an engineer, technician, or architect”
Instead, he looked back at me puzzled for a moment.
He responded:
“Para decir te la verdad, no se. nunca pensé en una carera que me gustaría porque nunca llegue a ese punto en la escuela.”
“To tell you the truth, I don’t know. I was never able to think about what I could have become because I never got to that point in my education.”
My father, who was my role model in almost every way, who raised me to be the person I am today, who instilled in me his catchphrase motto.
That same father never had the chance to dream up what was possible.
And this brings me back to today.
When I’m asked “What are you going to do?”
I say this: I’ve been given the privilege and opportunity to dream up what is possible — something my father was never able to do, much less imagine.
I have no idea what I’m going to do.
But I owe it to myself, and to my father, to dream.
|
https://medium.com/@kevinmadrigal/what-are-you-gonna-do-8154aeccc58d
|
['Kevin Madrigal']
|
2019-06-19 23:53:37.905000+00:00
|
['Nonprofit', 'Dads', 'Career Change']
|
How Fiverr Saved me $6,642 per Month
|
,
Over the past 14 months, I’ve spent $5,008.50 on Fiverr. That’s more than 1,000 gigs.
Five-thousand dollars seems like a lot to spend on Fiverr, right?
Not really. This $5,000 has saved my business tens of thousands of dollars on costly freelancers.
I made a bold claim in the headline — that I saved $6,642 per month using Fiverr — and I intend to back that up.
In this post, you’ll learn:
· The keys to success on Fiverr
· Nine gigs that deliver tremendous value for $5 (and links to each gig)
· The comparable costs of the same gigs across the web (Google search or Elance)
The Keys to Fiverr
For the sake of this post, I’m only covering nine of my favorite Fiverr gigs, but there are hundreds more that can provide incredible value to your business. Here are a few tips for working Fiverr.
1. Know Which Gigs to Steer Clear of
Yes, there is a lot of spam on Fiverr, but there is also a lot of amazing deals. You just have to know exactly what you need.
Bad Gigs:
· Real social media followers
· Any sort of backlinks for SEO purposes
· Submission gigs (press releases, infographics, document sharing sites)
· Blog or social media shares with a huge audience
· Business plans, financial advice
· Anything that you know can’t be done for $5
Good Gigs:
· Basic design work, such as logos, banner ads, image optimization and business card design
· Video editing, video introductions, voiceovers
· Simple Photoshop tasks, such as photo touchups, dropping out backgrounds, etc.
· Data entry, such as Excel tasks, social media scheduling, virtual assistant work, etc.
· Basic web development, troubleshooting, Google Analytics implementations, etc.
2. Clearly Communicate Exactly What You Want
There’s one golden rule for successful outsourcing:
Don’t outsource anything you can’t clearly articulate to the freelancer.
You should have an implicit understanding of the task and explicit details on how to perform it.
For example, I can outsource SEO tasks because I understand exactly what needs to be done and can clearly communicate that to the freelancer.
If you don’t have a good grasp on the task you’re outsourcing then you’re going to get low quality work, and you’re better off hiring an agency.
Every time you order a gig on Fiverr, you have the opportunity to tell the freelancer precisely what you want.
Be a pain in the ass. Tell them exactly what you want.
Nine Fiverr Gigs I Use to Save $6,642 Monthly
1. ”I will do any Excel Data Entry, Copy Paste you throw at me in 4 hours.”
About the gig: Data Entry is a must and time consuming task in any business growth. Data Entry can be in any sort from Pdf-Excel conversion to MS Word typing task or allot of simple copy past tasks. Which is very crucial to speed up business growth, result and time saving.
Fiverr results:
Upwork Results: The same project on upwork returned 12 results with an average bid of $65.
Total Savings: $65 — $5 = $60
2.”I will do 50 local citations manually in top USA websites to boost your local rankings for $5.”
About the gig: Citations are business listings on sites like Yelp, FourSquare, Yellow Pages and Brown Book; essentially online phone books. When done correctly, these citations will boost your local Google rankings. The key is to build listings on websites relevant to your industry. For $5, while you won’t get niche specific links, he will build links manually an authority sites. These hand-built citations will help with local SEO.
Upwork Results:
Bottom of Form
The same job on Upwork returned 23 results with an average bid of $7 per hour.
On average, Upwork built eight citations per hour.
50 citations / 8 citations per hour = 6.25 hours
So to build 50 citations, Upwork take 6.25 hours.
$7/hour x 6.25 hours = $43.75
Total Savings: $43.75 — $5 = $38.25
3.”I will create an amazing press release for you for $5.”
About the gig: Have you ever needed a press release? Then you know it’s a huge pain in the ass to find quality work at an affordable cost — until now. This native English speaking, PR professional charges just $.03 per word on Fiverr, and he does a fantastic job.
Google Search Results:
The average rate among quality press release writing services is $.10 per word.
$0.10 x 150 words = $15
Total Savings: $15 — $5 = $10
4. ”I will make a flat illustration of anything you specify for $5.”
About the gig: Flat design is clean, simple and trendy. It’s also expensive. This Fiverr contractor provides top notch flat design services for anything you need, including:
· Facebook headers,
· blog post images,
· website headers,
· icons
· and more.
He’s also available for custom flat web design (at an extra cost).
Upwork Results:
On Upwork, the average cost per banner was $75.
Total Savings: $75 — $5 = $70
5. “I will clone or migrate WordPress website to a new host or domain for $5.”
About the gig: We build websites on a staging domain, allowing clients to see them before they go live on their URL. When my development team is backed up I buy this Fiverr gig, which migrates staged sites. Thus far, I’ve had nothing short of perfect experiences.
Upwork Results:
On Upwork, the average cost for migration is $50.
Total Savings: $50 — $5 = $45
6. “I will create AWESOME explainer video for $5.”
About the gig: For $5, you get five seconds of a custom explainer video. That’s right — no templates, 100 percent custom. For a 60-second video it’s just $90.
Google Search Results:
The average cost for custom explainer videos is around $250 per minute.
Total Savings: $250 — $5 = $245
7. “I will do 20 mins of audio or video transcription for $5.”
About the gig: Video transcriptions are great for YouTube SEO, and even better for turning your video marketing efforts into blog posts. If you’ve ever tried transcribing a 20-minute YouTube video before then you know it’s tough work. This guy does it for just $.25 per minute on Fiverr.
Google Search Results:
After Googling, I learned transcription services across the web, on average, cost $1 per minute.
Total Savings: $20 — $5 = $15
8. “I will create an infographic for $5.”
About the gig: This Fiverr contractor designs quality infographics for a ridiculously low cost. He will create a 10-point custom infographic for just $10.
Google Search Results:
After extensive Googling, the average cost was around $150 for a comparable infographic.
Total Savings: $150 — $5 = $145
9. “I will optimize your images or photos for $5.”
About the gig: I like to include a lot of high resolution images throughout my blog posts. If unoptimized, these images will drastically slow down your page load. Converting, resizing and compressing 20+ images is a huge time suck, and since my time could be better spent elsewhere, I outsource this on Fiverr.
Upwork Results:
On Upwork, the average cost was $50 per 20 images.
Total Savings: $50 — $5 = $45
In Conclusion
Here’s a summary of how much each gig saves me per purchase:
· Gig 1: $65 — $5 = $60
· Gig 2: $43.75 — $5 = $38.25
· Gig 3: $15 — $5 = $10
· Gig 4: $75 — $5 = $70
· Gig 5: $50 — $5 = $45
· Gig 6: $250 — $5 = $245
· Gig 7: $20 — $5 = $15
· Gig 8: $150 — $5 = $145
· Gig 9: $50 — $5 = $45
Average Savings per Purchase: $93
$837 (total spent) / 9 (gigs) = $93
· 1,000 gigs purchased over 14 months
· 1,000 gigs x $93 average savings per purchase = $93,000
· $93,000 / 14 months = $6,642.85
Bottomline: Don’t overlook the potential ROI of certain Fiverr gigs. When used correctly, Fiverr is tremendously valuable.
|
https://medium.com/@nureddinkaraja/how-fiverr-saved-me-6-642-per-month-9cba50a26191
|
['Nureddin Karaja']
|
2020-07-20 02:17:34.407000+00:00
|
['Ms Word', 'Fiverr Gig', 'Data Sheet', 'Excel', 'Data Entry Outsourcing']
|
Defaults For My Phone
|
I’ve stopped using the cesspit that is Facebook years ago (I still throw up a bit in my mouth when I realise I used to use it) and I never really got hooked to the HDR filtered cesspit that is Instagram. I don’t have these on my phone and I can’t remember the last time I logged into these and boy have I ben better off. And why wouldn’t I be?
But Twitter, though. It’s a real one if you ask me. It hardly ever shows me the filtered realities of vague acquaintances — it’s just a tool for me to keep up with the world and the stuff that I like. So it’s nice that way.
However, I recently realized that it’s been taking up quite a bit of my time. It became second nature for me to open Twitter and keep on tugging the page to refresh. A lot of time times I wasn’t even reading anything, I was just scrolling and other times I wasn’t looking at things I wanted to look at in that moment, I was just looking at things that were just there.
So I decided to become more conscious with what I do on my phone when I have tiny pockets of time, times when I would have mindlessly scrolled on my phone.
Twitter
I did not give up using Twitter. I could never. It’s how I know what’s happening. However, I did make changes to how I use Twitter.
First of all, I got even more strict with my bi-yearly spring cleanings — Around twice a year, I go through my following list and unfollow accounts that are no longer relevant to my interests and accounts that have become more annoying over time. I just decided to set the standards pretty high for making the cut.
I started using lists more religiously. Lists have been around for as long as Twitter has and I’ve sparingly used them in the past. But now I almost exclusively use Twitter through lists. I have a few lists for my core interests on Twitter — political discourse/memes, journalists, climate, activists, journalists & scientists, music magazines, pro-wrestling, football/Chelsea FC, mainstream news media and satire/jokes/shitpostings/more memes. I populated these lists with relevant accounts that I like. So now when I use Twitter, I can just go and read the tweets about something I am in the mood of, rather than hoping to find them in the commotion of the timeline. Also, it really helps that Twitter recently made UI changes to their mobile app to make using lists easier. I can now just swipe through my lists, it’s pretty cool.
I started using this app which is a curated platform for articles from around the web. What makes it great is that it reduces the articles to a few bite-sized, easy to digest cards, perfect for attention spans that are being stretched thin exponentially. If I like what these cards show, I can choose to read the entire original article or save it to read later.
In an attempt to have more than surface knowledge about things that are of interest to me, I like to read articles, but I dislike looking for them. I don’t want to be out looking for them on the internet and I don’t want to be on apps that aggregate articles about a whole bunch of stuff in a bottomless feed. That’s why Refind is cool — I just set my interests and followed publications I like and set the number of articles I want to see in a day. So now everyday it gives me 20 articles from across the web about things I want to know more about. And the more I use it and give it feedback, the better it’s algorithms become.
Reading
My read-it-later list (recently ditched pocket for my own database on Notion) gets quite long. So I make sure I stay on top of it. Whenever I find some time, I go through my list and find something I am in the mood for.
If not that, I just read my books. One of the many, many, many reasons why I prefer ebooks over stone-age physical books is that it’s always in my pocket. I don’t have to remember to bring it with me to places. So whenever I can I try to squeeze in reading a few pages.
And while we’re talking about apps and platforms and books, I have to give a shoutout to The Storygraph. It has a nice and clean UI, it’s not cluttered, it’s not unresponsive. What’s more is that it has tags such as slow-paced, light-hearted, tense etc for books along with genres. So finding what to read based on the mood is pretty easy. It has nice little pie charts that show reading habits and has a great recommendation engine. And it’s not owned by Amazon. It’s everything Goodreads is not. Hallelujah, there’s finally an alternative to Goodreads!
|
https://medium.com/@tahsinac/defaults-for-my-phone-9305a844f3fa
|
[]
|
2020-12-15 17:12:52.671000+00:00
|
['Knowledge', 'Intentional Living', 'Productivity', 'Apps', 'Habits']
|
Making sense of the RAFT Distributed Consensus Algorithm — Part 1
|
The goal of The Series
There are many articles on Raft however most of them are short, theoretical, and not detailed. Consensus algorithms is an area where shortcut analysis does not work as the topic is pretty hard to understand. While reading the raft paper and many articles, I found out that no code and not playing with a Raft simulator makes it even harder to understand.
So this series of articles intends to be more natural and lucid from an engineering perspective — it thoroughly explains concepts, core algorithms with code and simulates some important use cases. It also answers several questions at times when needed to make concepts clear.
I would like to encourage you not to rush and take enough time to think through different concepts, algorithms and use cases as you go through this series.
The Problem
The Oxford dictionary defines consensus as:
an opinion that all members of a group agree with
Human face consensus issues all the time — going for a lunch with a group of office friends? You must decide a time & most probably at least one of your friends opposes the time because he has a production deployment going on. Another friend might join you 15 minutes late as he has a long overlapping meeting & you feel lonely without him :| If majority of your friends are busy & don’t agree on a time, your plan gets cancelled & you re-plan tomorrow or so.
The same is true in distributed systems as well — you have a group of servers which need to agree on some state for a given piece of data. To make things worse, the servers are typically spread across geography.
Why do we need consensus
Most of us have used relation database like MySQL, Oracle at least once in our programming life. When you INSERT or UPDATE a value & then perform a SELECT on that, you get the latest value back — it happens typically because we use a single machine to contain all our data. Now imagine, you have a huge amount of data partitioned across 10 machines. For better availability of data, you have enabled replication of data. Say a piece of data is replicated across 3 machines & you want to query the data from any part of the world because your app is global, so a query can reach any suitable replica for a particular data. Now, what if you INSERT or UPDATE a data, but when you do SELECT , you don’t get back the latest value — basically your write request is served by machine W while the read request is served by a replica R . Unfortunately, say, not getting the latest value is unacceptable in your use case. To resolve this problem, we need a mechanism through which multiple servers would agree on a value & irrespective of whichever machine serves your SELECT request, you get the same result back every time. In short, you need a coherent view of your distributed system so that it behaves as if only a single machine is serving all requests. That’s where we need consensus.
If you want to build a strongly consistent distributed system ( CP system in terms of CAP theorem ), you need to have consensus.
Raft to the Rescue
Raft (Replicated & Fault Tolerant) is an algorithm / protocol which solves this problem. It came out of a PhD thesis by Diego Ongaro & John Ousterhout at Stanford University in 2014. Raft is designed to be easily understandable, the predecessor algorithms like Paxos & Multi-Paxos which are very well known consensus algorithms, known to be very difficult to understand, maybe only a handful of people in the world understand them properly — at least this is what the authors of Raft claim. If you follow through this entire series & understand most of it, then probably you understand Raft, then the authors’ claim stands true.
There is no standard implementation of Raft, it just defines several steps to achieve consensus in a fault tolerant way. There are hundreds of implementation of Raft already for different use cases. Most of the engineers won’t need to implement any consensus algorithm in their lifetime but it does not hurt to understand the heart of distributed systems, you’ll see in this series how consensus is a hard problem to solve, you’ll get a view of the critical edge cases that arise in distributed systems all the time which will definitely ignite your thought process & help you become a better system designer.
We won’t discuss any mathematical correctness of the algorithm, however, using different use cases we’ll see how Raft actually works. We’ll also discuss few important algorithms in details with code for a better understanding.
Q. How is Raft implemented?
A. Raft is typically implemented as a module inside a service like a distributed database or etcd like distributed key value store etc. Raft itself is not implemented as a service or micro service. It just works like a background process in the system.
Prerequisite Concepts
Before we get into the details of Raft, understand the following concepts well. We’ll discuss these concepts enough for a fair understanding & we’ll use the terminologies throughout this series thereafter.
Quorum
If your distributed system has N nodes, you need at least (N/2) + 1 nodes to agree on a value — basically you need majority (more than 50%) votes from for consensus just like any country’s constitutional election. Majority vote ensures that when (N/2) + 1 nodes are running & responding, at least one node contains latest value for a given data across read & write requests even if there is a network partition or other failure in the system.
Q. How many node failures we can tolerate when we have a quorum based system with N nodes?
A. If N is odd, we can endure N/2 node failures. If N is even, we can endure (N/2)-1 node failures.
Following is a simple table to state the fact:
Q. Should you choose an even number or odd number for N in production?
A. Consider N = 4 , according to the above table, majority required is 3 & you can tolerate only 1 node failure. For N = 5 , majority is still 3 but you can tolerate 2 node failures. So from failure handling perspective, even number of nodes does not add much value as fault tolerance is lesser. So it’s better to choose odd number nodes in production at the expense of little higher cost — you can tolerate more node failure just in case it’s a bad day for you.
Q. What is the worst value for N in production?
A. If N = 1 or N = 2 & you lose a node, you lose the whole system since you practically can’t tolerate any node failure at all. In fact for N = 2 , you have actually doubled your single point of failures in the system — if any node goes down, your whole system is down. So choose an odd value N ≥ 3 in production.
Q. What is a good value for N in production?
A. The figure obviously depends on your estimation of data, bandwidth, throughput & cost requirement. However, 5 seems to be a good number as you can manage 1 node failure & 1 node can be down for maintenance ( total 2 nodes down ) while 3 nodes are still up & running.
Q. What happens if majority of nodes is unavailable?
A. Ideally your system may stop responding completely depending on how you configure read & write use cases. Typically write stops completely but available nodes may still serve read requests in case you design read requests to be eventually consistent.
Node States
Raft nodes can be in three states: Leader , Follower & Candidate . We’ll see in later section how node transition happens. For now just remember the fact that Raft is strongly a leader based consensus protocol. Leader is the source of truth. Logs always flow from the leader to the followers.
Log
This is not a regular log file that you use in your application for information & debugging purpose. However the concept is more or less same. A log is a disk based file where usually objects called log entries are added sequentially in form of binary data.
Committed & Uncommitted Log
A log entry is committed only when it gets replicated by the majority nodes in the cluster. A committed log never gets overridden. A committed log is durable & eventually gets executed by all the nodes in the Raft cluster.
If a client command / log entry is not yet replicated to the majority of the cluster nodes, it’s called uncommitted log. Uncommitted logs can be overridden in a follower node.
State Machine
Don’t get scared by this term. State machines can be really complex in nature. Typically it means — depending on an input fed to the system, the state of a data (key) changes. In Raft context, think as if this is just like a module which stores the final agreed value for a key. Each node has its own state machine. Raft has to make sure whatever log entry is committed, they get eventually applied to the state machine which works as a source of truth for the data in memory. For fault tolerance, the state machine can be persisted as well.
Term
A term represents a time period through which a node acts as a leader, the concept is based on logical time (not a global time) — it’s just a counter managed by every node individually. Once a term terminates, another term starts with a new leader. Even though at a given point in time, terms across nodes may differ, Raft has a mechanism to sync & converge them to the same value.
The term is also called lease or leader lease, just another name it is.
RPC
Just like your Facebook mobile app communicates with Facebook server through REST API on top of HTTP, nodes participating in Raft communicate with each other using Remote Procedure Call (RPC) on top of TCP. This protocol is suitable for communication across data centres, internal systems & services (not user facing products or services).
Raft uses two different RPC requests. At a high level:
RequestVote (RV): When a node wants to become a leader, it asks other nodes to vote for it by sending this request.
When a node wants to become a leader, it asks other nodes to vote for it by sending this request. AppendEntries (AE): Through this message, a leader asks the followers to add an entry to their log file. The leader can send empty message as well as a heartbeat indicating to the followers that it’s still alive.
How it works
For our explanation, we’ll use a 5 node cluster.
Raft works on the concept of distributed log replication. In order to gain consensus on some state for a log entry, Raft cluster has to choose its leader first, then majority of the followers mimic exact logs from the leader — this ensures logs across nodes are in the same order as the leader. At a time, there would be only one active leader in the system (unless there is a network partition that could cause existence of multiple leaders or possibly no leaders at all) & it’s the source of truth for all logs.
Raft separates leader election from log replication process. Without leader, Raft can’t function. So leader election becomes a mandatory step in the absence of a leader.
Q. What are the major advantages of leader based system?
A. The system becomes simple to understand & operate when the abstraction is based on leader. Clients typically interacts through the leader & the leader takes care of important decision making, metadata state of the system.
Q. What are the major disadvantages of leader based system?
A. The leader becomes a single point of failure. So the system should be able to quickly react to choose another leader when the current one fails. Also since all client interactions happens through the leader, the system might become slower at scale.
Some Raft Design Decisions
Let’s look at few important design decisions which are very core to the protocol.
Random Timeout
Raft uses concept of random Election Timeout — the amount of time a follower waits until becoming a candidate ( see Figure 3 for more details on state transition ). When a cluster bootstraps, every node picks a random timeout between 150 & 300 milliseconds inclusive for itself & it starts counting down the timeout. There are now 2 possibilities:
Before the node times out, it receives a message from another node — it might be a heartbeat or log replication message from the leader or voting request from another peer. In this case, the timeout gets reset & the count down starts again .
. The node does not receive any message at all during the timeout.
Q. Why to choose random timeout?
A. Imagine all of the nodes have a fixed timeout. So in the absence of a leader, they timeout at the same time & there would be no guarantee of leader election since the process can repeat multiple times or indefinitely & all nodes starts counting down the same timeout value again. So randomization helps here. In case the leader is still undecided, the process starts again with a new set of random timeout across nodes & eventually we would have a leader. It’s highly unlikely that we won’t have a leader chosen after a trial or two.
Term Lifetime
When there is no leader in the cluster & a node X times out, it initiates a new election term, increments its term to T by adding 1 to previous term’s value. Just to remind you — a term is a local counter managed by all the nodes. There are again 2 cases here:
If X is elected as the new leader, term T continues i.e; all the new log entries added to the leader X & thereafter are propagated to the followers with term T .
is elected as the new leader, term continues i.e; all the new log entries added to the leader & thereafter are propagated to the followers with term . X loses the election, a new election begins with new term U where U > T .
So pictorially, a terms graph looks like below:
Figure 2: Terms, Courtesy: Raft extended paper
In the above diagram, term 1 starts when the cluster starts up. A leader is elected for term 1 & normal operations like log replication, heartbeat continues till the term 1 ends. The leader dies. Node X increases its term to 2 , gets elected as the new leader & term 2 continues. Now X also dies at some point, some other node Y starts the election process, increases the term to 3 , but unfortunately the election fails to choose a leader resulting in term 3 termination. And the process goes on.
We’ll discuss three major sections in this series of articles:
Basic leader election (the first leader election) when the cluster starts up, nodes are fresh & no log is present yet in the system. Raft log replication process. Leader election when nodes already have some logs.
The First Leader Election
As mentioned earlier, a node can be in different states depending on the cluster situation. Let’s look at the following diagram to understand the state transition.
Figure 3: Node states, Courtesy: eli.thegreenplace.net
Each node starts from the Follower state. Once election time out gets over, it enters into Candidate state — it means the node is now an eligible candidate to become a leader.
state. Once election time out gets over, it enters into state — it means the node is now an eligible candidate to become a leader. Once a candidate gets clear majority votes, it enters into the Leader state.
state. If there is no clear winner during the election process, the candidate times out again, remains in the Candidate state & a new election begins.
state & a new election begins. If a candidate gets a message from a newly leader, it steps down and becomes a Follower .
. If there is a network partition, the current leader might get disconnected from the majority of the cluster, the majority now selects a new leader. When the old leader comes back, it discovers that a new leader is already elected with higher term, so the old leader steps down & become a Follower .
Q. What happens when a cluster starts up?
A. All the nodes start up with random timeout, empty logs & begin counting down. The following figure explains it:
Figure 4: Cluster startup
The black thick perimeter around the nodes represents time out. Note that the perimeter lengths are different representing different timeout values for each node.
Steps
Each node is initialized with term = 1 .
. S4 times out first.
times out first. S4 starts a new election process & increments local term’s value by 1.
starts a new election process & increments local term’s value by 1. S4 votes for itself & sends out RequestVote message to all other nodes in the cluster.
Figure 5
All other nodes receive the request. They first reset their local term to 2 since their current term is lesser & grants vote for the request. Their election timeout is now reset as shown below.
Figure 6
S4 gets clear majority ( + inside smaller green circle in the above diagram means affirmative incoming votes) & becomes the leader. The thick black perimeter around S4 in the following figure indicates that it has become the leader of the cluster.
Figure 7
Now S4 starts sending AppendEntries message to all other nodes.
starts sending message to all other nodes. There is something called Heartbeat Timeout as well which should be configurable in the system. The leader keeps sending empty AppendEntries messages in intervals specified by the heartbeat interval indicating that it’s still alive so that the cluster does not unnecessarily initiate another leader election process.
as well which should be configurable in the system. The leader keeps sending empty messages in intervals specified by the heartbeat interval indicating that it’s still alive so that the cluster does not unnecessarily initiate another leader election process. Followers acknowledges each AppendEntries message.
Q. How many votes a node can give for a term?
A. Each node can vote only once per term.
Q. What happens if the leader behaves maliciously & does not send heartbeat?
A. No heartbeat possibly means that there is currently no leader in the cluster. If any leader intentionally stops sending heartbeat even though it’s alive, it triggers unnecessary leader election process & overloads the system.
Q. How do you choose the election timeout?
A. You should follow the following formula while choosing the election timeout:
Broadcast time << Election timeout << Minimum Time Between Failures (MTBF) of a node where a << b means a is an order of magnitude less than b
Broadcast time: Average time for a node to send RPC & receive response in parallel from all nodes.
MTBF: Any node can fail for this or that reason. MTBF defines the minimum time between two such consecutive failure for a node.
Depending on the infrastructure, broadcast time can be from 0.5 ms to 20 ms . MTBF can be several months or more. You should choose election timeout which abides by this criteria. Anything between 10 ms to 500 ms should be good for election timeout. However, as mentioned earlier, 150 ms to 300 ms is ideal.
No Clear Majority Case
When multiple candidates time out at the same time, the situation becomes very in-deterministic. In the following diagram, nodes S1 , S2 , S4 , S5 timeout almost at the same time & reach out to other nodes for votes. Now since 4 out of 5 nodes are competing for the leader position, no one would get majority as they have already voted for themselves in the new term.
Figure 8
As it can be seen in the below diagram, S5 gets an extra vote from S3 & no one is the winner here. So all the nodes timeout & the same voting process starts again.
Figure 9
Quick Summary
Raft helps to build a strongly consistent distributed system.
Raft relies on Quorum concept to ensure consensus from the majority in a cluster.
Odd count of nodes makes a better cluster than even count of nodes as it has more fault tolerance.
Nodes can be in one of these three states at a time: Leader , Follower & Candidate .
, & . Raft is a leader oriented system. A leader must exist in the cluster before any operation can happen.
Each node maintains its own state machine & log on disk.
Committed logs are persistent & they eventually get replicated to all the nodes in the cluster.
Logs always flow from the leader to the other nodes.
Committed logs are finally applied in state machine.
A term is a monotonically increasing counter which starts with a new leader election. Every node individually manages its own local term. Raft makes sure to eventually converge the term’s value to a single value across nodes.
Raft uses RPC calls / messages for vote request & log replication purpose.
Random election timeout generally helps to elect the leader with a trial or two, it prevents indefinite loop of voting process.
When a cluster bootstraps, one of the node times out & asks others for votes. Upon granted vote by the majority, it becomes the leader.
If no leader is elected, the election process is retried.
We have introduced ourselves to the basics of Raft & the very first leader election process. In the next part of this series, we’ll discuss Raft replication in details which is very critical to the protocol.
Stay tuned!
Reference
|
https://codeburst.io/making-sense-of-the-raft-distributed-consensus-algorithm-part-1-3ecf90b0b361
|
['Kousik Nath']
|
2021-02-11 05:47:17.315000+00:00
|
['Distributed Systems', 'Software Development', 'Technology', 'Computer Science', 'Algorithms']
|
How can cultural employers best support student interns?
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How can cultural employers best support student interns?
“There’s three tips that I have for cultural organisations who want to work students.
The first one being listen to them, support them, and treat them as equally as you would with another colleague who isn’t a student or an intern. I think if you’re open minded, you can really build a great relationship of mutual respect with them.
“The second one, I was really lucky to have a great team who cared about my skills and career development. They made it very clear to me that if there’s anything I was particularly interested in, or anything anybody was working on, to let them know and ask about it so I could get involved. I had the opportunity to get involved with loads of different things, including filming events, photography, and just making sure that I got the most out of the internship.
I think it’s really important to establish personal goals or find out any interests the students have, so that you can give them more meaningful tasks to do.
“The final one would be to try and be a mentor for them. What I mean by this is you have to be welcoming, willing, patient to teach them new things, and you have to consider that they might not have any prior experience in the cultural sector or your organisations.
“Sometimes this includes more than the obvious stuff. It could be stuff like how to present yourself, interpersonal communication, and I guess most have to do with like life skills that are transferable in both informal and formal environments.
I am most concerned about is the lack of workforce diversity shown by the annual surveys and reports. It’s not acceptable, and there tends to be little progress year-on-year.
“Organisations need to make a more active effort to listen to BAME groups, as well as other minority groups that are severely underrepresented. It’s not just about recognising there’s a problem, but it’s actually about putting change into action and doing something about it.
“Whether that’s getting consultation on how to improve diversity within your organisation, whether that’s creating more accessible schemes for minority groups or investing money, you need to be hiring people from minority groups at all levels of the organisation not just to tick a box.
“I think it’s absolutely crucial to arts and culture because it can only increase the opportunity for creativity and artistic collaborations. When you recognise talent from every single background, and enriches the arts, and in so many different areas of work and in different sectors. If you see yourself truly represented, you’re more inspired and confident to pursue those interests.”
See the full interview with Karyan:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N2KQBW_UJD8
How can we help?
As a university, we recognise there’s a lot more for us to do to increase diversity of the creative industries workforce. The University has recently published a new Access and Student Success strategy, and the Cultural Institute is working to ensure that opportunities to access the cultural sector are embedded into the University’s work.
The Cultural Institute aims to increase access to and diversity within the cultural sector by supporting progression routes for our students. Student opportunities include:
paid internships (either part-time during University terms, over summer, or year in industry placements)
in-curriculum placements which contribute to the student’s degree
volunteering opportunities
graduate recruitment opportunities.
By promoting and supporting student involvement with our cultural partners, we help students to develop valuable skills and experiences that enhance workforce diversity for cultural and arts organisations.
Help us to improve
However, we need to do more to support people who are not currently well-represented in the cultural sector to succeed meaningful,
We hope to better understand the barriers that the cultural sector is facing, through conversations with cultural employers and organisations.
Your valuable input will inform our work but also enable us to offer practical support and advice on inclusive recruitment and retention techniques. This will include practical support from our Careers Service widening participation specialists, and we can also connect you with young people from under-represented groups to discuss and promote your job opportunities.
If you would like to have a conversation about how we could support your organisation, please email student opportunities project manager Nichola Casse [email protected]
|
https://medium.com/@culturalinstitute/how-can-cultural-employers-best-support-student-interns-85fa9fdaad31
|
['Cultural Institute']
|
2020-12-17 13:43:52.514000+00:00
|
['Diversity', 'Culture', 'Students', 'Internships', 'Careers']
|
Rocket Pool — Staking Protocol Part 3
|
RPL v2
Since Rocket Pool started almost four years ago, the RPL token has been the backbone of the protocol. It has evolved alongside the protocol, Ethereum staking development and is now a multifaceted component of the protocol, providing direct incentives, insurance and governance.
It is deeply ingrained in the protocol and provides a level of overall utility not matched by many others in the space.
Inflation
With the introduction of Rocket Pool 3, which includes many months of work dedicated to refining the tokenomics driving the protocol, a change to the token itself was also required. This change was the introduction of inflation to provide built in incentives to motivate and drive the key players in the protocol.
While some may find inflation controversial in a space surrounded by fixed-supply tokens, this is absolutely necessarily for any protocol that needs to reward its participants for working in the protocol’s best interests. Without generating value, that value would need to be taken from somewhere else in the protocol, creating an imbalance where some participants are rewarded at the expense of others — not a viable, long-term strategy for any successful dApp or protocol.
The initial inflation will be 5% pa and will be split up amongst the key protocol players outlined below.
Migration
The new RPL token will be launched with Rocket Pool and will be able to be swapped 1:1 with the current RPL token in circulation. There is no time limit on when this swap can be done.
For node operators, who will use this token quite a bit, the swap process is very easy and automated in a lot of places. If you have current RPL in your node’s account, it can be swapped automatically for new RPL when making deposits or staking RPL in the smart node CLI — very easy.
For RPL holders, the swap process will be able to be done by a web interface we’ll add shortly after launching. You’ll just need MetaMask to access it and make the swap.
|
https://medium.com/rocket-pool/rocket-pool-staking-protocol-part-3-3029afb57d4c
|
['David Rugendyke']
|
2021-09-09 23:12:55.267000+00:00
|
['Blockchain', 'Rocketpool', 'Staking', 'Ethereum']
|
What Happened to Crimea?. A Brief Overview of its Origin and…
|
In order to understand where Crimea is today, we should briefly look at why Putin and pro-Russian separatists legitimize Crimea’s separation from Ukraine. Politically, Crimea has had a history of separatism. Former president of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev’s policies of ‘Perestroika’ (“Restructuring”) and ‘Glasnost’ (“Openness”) helped establish localized governments and separatist movements in the Soviet Union.
By 1991, 93 percent of Crimeans sought independence and autonomy from the USSR, naming themselves the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic. Paradoxically, at the fall of the USSR, many Crimean supporters of autonomy did not favor the independence of Ukraine.
In fact, at the time only half of Crimeans supported Ukrainian independence, whereas in Ukraine, 91 percent did. In comparison, the March 2014 referendum reportedly saw an 83 percent turnout, with 96.7 percent of the vote in favor of joining Russia. Estimates report that approximately two-thirds of Russian ethnic majority Crimea considers the annexation as lawful and appropriate.
However, many news outlets contest these “official” results of the referendum. According to the Human Rights Council, turnout was only at about 30 percent, with only half of the votes to join Russia. Analysts debate the validity of the referendum endlessly it seems. It is safe to conclude that the annexation was unlawful, violating international law and national sovereignty.
The Origin of Crimean Annexation
The annexation of Crimea had arrived at an unstable point in Ukrainian politics. More than three months of protest against Viktor Yanukovych’s early signs of pro-Russia presidency, when he refused to sign the Ukraine-EU Association Agreement, created fertile ground for separatist rhetoric among Eastern Ukrainians who backed Russia. 130 Ukrainian citizens died in the memorable Kyiv protest surrounding Yanukovych’s impeachment.
It was at this time when protests forced Yanukovych into exile to Russia in February 2014, that Russia annexed Crimea. Following the Crimean annexation, conflicts for separation arose in Eastern Ukraine in the Donbas region. These were some of the most violent conflicts since the Balkans in the 1990s.
Since 2014, the Donbas conflict, also known as the “forgotten war,” has claimed more than 14,000 lives, with almost one third of them being citizens. Crimea, however, is largely untouched by military conflict despite how close they are to the region.
Nonetheless, it is clear that the conflicts in Donbas and Crimea are closely connected; both conflicts are Russian imperialist cases of aggression against Ukraine connected to ethnic prejudice.
Photo by Faruk Kaymak on Unsplash
Minsk I & II: An Attempt at a Compromise
In light of the annexation in 2014, the Trilateral Contact Group, which included Russia, Ukraine, and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), agreed to twelve points to deescalate tension, comprising The Minsk Protocol, also known as Minsk I. Notably, very few of these agreements were kept. By January 2015, Minsk I virtually collapsed and was replaced by Minsk II, which included Ukraine, Russia, France, and Germany.
The only difference between these two agreements was that Minsk II added
(1) an OSCE-observed unconditional ceasefire from 2015,
(2) an order for the withdrawal of heavy weaponry from the front line,
(3) the demand for the release of prisoners of war,
and (4) constitutional reform in Ukraine.
Since Minsk II, analysts describe the conflict as “frozen” because fighting has deescalated and no territorial changes have been made to the region. 2017 saw a number of failed ceasefires; and in 2019, the “Steinmeier formula” proposed free elections on whether they would prefer to belong to Russia or Ukraine, between both “rebel republics”: the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) and the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR).
As of July 2020, arguably induced by COVID-19, Putin and Volodymyr Zelenskiy, the president of Ukraine, needed to agree upon further ceasefires. One of Zelenskiy’s central tenants of his campaign against Petro Poroshenko was to demilitarize the Donbas region.
In accordance with his promise to the Ukrainian people, Ukraine proposed to send 1,500 police officers from the OSCE to patrol the conflict zone in November 2020. However, the OSCE is only willing to send troops if all sides are able to agree on terms and conditions. The troops will function as a precursor to the fair elections in the region that both Russia and Ukraine seemingly strive for.
Changes In Crimea
Demographic Changes
I would now like to explore the demographic changes in Crimea since the annexation. An estimated 140,000 Crimean Tatars, the ethnic minority group of Crimea, and Ukrainians have left the peninsula since 2014. Although, we do not have entirely accurate figures because many have left and since returned. Russian military forces persecute Crimean Tatars because of their loyalty to Ukraine but also because of their religious affiliation to Islam.
Photo by Ivan Bjelajac on Unsplash
Notably, only Crimean Tatars and their representative body, the Mejlis, genuinely strive to reconnect Crimea to Ukraine. Accordingly, Russia declared the Mejlis an extremist organization because of the threat they pose to Russian hegemony in Crimea. Many political leaders of the organization are not allowed access to Crimea with the threat of immediate imprisonment. There are more than 100 political prisoners from Crimea, more than 20 Crimean activists who were killed, and more than 20 who disappeared. Reporters announce new cases of human rights violations biweekly; many victims suffer from imprisonment due to allegations of involvement with hizb ut-Tahrir, the international Islamic political organization, whose primary aim is to unite the Muslim community by peaceful means.
Of course, the Russian military does not persecute pro-Russian separatists in this way, hence many see Crimea as an opportunity to grow their businesses and find novel economic opportunities. Therefore, an influx of Russians has replaced those who left including military troops, sailors, soldiers, and entrepreneurs. Some estimates report more than 250,000 arriving on the peninsula since 2014.
Cultural Changes
The culture of Crimea has also seen significant change. Since the annexation, Russian propaganda continues to infiltrate Crimean television and dominate Crimean media. Wojciech Górecki claims that already in 2017, Russian integration of Crimea was greater than that of Ukraine at any point in recent memory.
Russian media has accordingly not renewed the Crimean Tatar television’s ATR license, disallowing for proper representation and difference of opinion. Interestingly enough, Ukrainian reporting on the Crimean annexation and developments in the region has also declined because of economic and social pressures. Ukrainian news outlets, such as Kyiv Post, are told that the Crimean news story is not relevant and suitable to their audience.
Changes to Tourism
There were also important impacts on the Crimean tourism sector because of the significant number of changes to public transportation. In 2013, 66 percent of tourists came to Crimea by train through Ukraine; in 2015, the majority of tourists came to Crimea by air or sea.
In conjunction, there has been an increase in the cost of living in Crimea because of the partition between many important imports, such as food and energy, which were brought to Crimea by land and now must be imported from Russia by sea or air.
To analyze the various other public sectors that are affected by the annexation is above this brief analysis; the trends vary but tell a similar story: Crimea is experiencing drastic change.
Economic Changes
With the demographic and cultural change, there has also been significant economic change both in Ukraine and Crimea. In 2013, Crimea only accounted for 5.2 percent of the Ukrainian population and 3.7 percent of Ukrainian gross domestic product (GDP). Because the situation is still developing, researchers explain that it is difficult to provide reliable measures of the economic impact of the annexation on Ukraine.
Only a few research papers provide data with modern economic frameworks. These estimates suggest that Ukrainian GDP will fall by 15 percent due to the annexation. The question I would like to consider next is whether Crimea will also be hit economically by the separation or whether Russia will be able to lift the Crimean economy.
In order to predict Crimea’s economic prowess, we need to analyze Russia’s economy and Crimea’s impact on it. After Putin’s second term as president in 2008, Russia’s economy was dwindling. In the end, Putin’s economy is largely dependent on the West and sanctions harmed this relationship.
Many countries around the world punished Russia with heavy sanctions, including important economies such as the United States, Japan, Canada, and countries in the European Union like Germany and France. Sanctions included:
(1) export restrictions on technologies and services,
(2) blocking property of 14 companies and individuals in Putin’s close circle,
and (3) the limiting of financing to Russia’s largest banks and energy companies; however, these did not have the desired effects.
As Steven Roserfielde explains in The Kremlin Strikes Back, the Kremlin has made its economic model more “sanctions-resilient” than it was in 2008, “a transformation few analysts grasp.” This is not to argue that the West should end sanctions on Russia, or that they are futile, but instead that Western policymakers should not rely on economic sanctions alone to stop Putin’s power restoration programs or even to rescind Crimean’s annexation.
Russia is no longer an “economy of shortage”; instead, it functions similar to America during the Second World War, with a military-driven economy that slowly, but gradually, raises living standards. Sanctions have failed to influence political leaders in other key international disputes.
This is, for example, why the American attempt to stop the nuclear proliferation of Iran with sanctions was unsuccessful. In addition to these sanctions, Russia was also dislodged from the G8 Group and NATO suspended military and civil cooperation with Russian forces.
Photo by Diego González on Unsplash
Threats and Sanctions
Historically, threats do not amount to change very often. Notably, Russia has seen a number of threats with little results. In 2018, the U.S. National Security Advisor John Bolton had called out on Putin to “get out of Crimea and the Donbas region in Ukraine.”
When Russia militarized Crimea in 2018, it also led the UN General Assembly to adopt a resolution voicing “grave concern over the progressive militarization of Crimea,” similarly calling on Russia to “end its temporary occupation of Ukraine’s territory.”
However, these were of little avail. Sanctions and threats are not as detrimental to Putin’s ambitions as we may intuitively suspect. In addition, European economies also extensively suffer from sanctions which may influence Putin’s refusal to give up Crimea.
In the words of Roserfielde,
“Western sanctions will inflict pain on the Kremlin, but they also will reciprocally harm the West.”
This led France’s economy minister to call on Europeans to collectively urge Russia for a solution because of the detriment these sanctions are causing to European economies.
Photo by ev on Unsplash
It is not clear to what extent the living standards and economy are the most important feature of life to Crimean citizens who support Putin at this moment. It is likely that many Crimean citizens see benefits to being tied to Russian identity and nationality rather than merely the Russian economy. Indeed, “the contest” between the West and Russia, Rosefielde explains, is not in international living standards and economic growth, but primarily in national identity and military power.
This can explain why after Crimea’s annexation in 2014, Putin’s approval ratings went from 54 to 83 percent, remaining stable ever since. Although, some polls indicate that Crimea is suffering. A 2019 poll from Crimea has found that popular opinion toward the Russian takeover of Crimea has dwindled from 67 to 39 percent. Some estimates claim that Crimea’s economy is almost 10 percent smaller since the annexation. The number of Russians who are also subject to stiff legal penalties has quadrupled to more than 700. This does not necessarily harm Putin’s ambitions, however.
As Karen Dawisha explains in Putin’s Kleptocracy, it was never Putin’s intention to serve the public in the first place; the primary function of Putin’s kleptocracy is to take from the public as long as possible.
Future Projects in Crimea
The Kremlin had much to prove after seizing the Crimean peninsula, making it invest more than $10 billion in direct subsidies. Putin invested in major projects including the construction of a highway and $3.6 billion railroad bridge that connect Russia directly to Crimea.
Other attempts at boosting the economy in the region include an 80 billion ruble ($1.2 billion) contract with the Russian billionaire, Arkady Rotenberg, to build museum complexes in Crimea’s port city Sevastopol and two other cities in Russia, Kaliningrad and Vladivostok, with approximately 25 billion rubles designated to Kaliningrad and Sevastopol.
Other projects include the construction of a theater complex the size of 13 football stadiums on Cape Khrustalny by 2023. With these new projects, we can expect Crimea’s economy to increase. However, it is difficult to tell whether Russia will be able to continue to finance these ventures for a number of reasons.
Problems With Reliably Predicting the Russian Economy
Firstly, it is challenging to estimate what Russia’s GDP really is and how much they can spare on investments in Crimea. Only a simple analysis of Russia’s economy would claim that sanctions on Russia and the reduced price of oil will be completely detrimental to the Russian economy.
This is primarily because Russia is more sanctions-resilient, as I argued above, but also because approximately 23 percent of Russia’s GDP is unaccounted for; statisticians merely guess at the likely GDP of Russia rather than ignore it to provide a more probable account of Russia’s economy.
For example, statisticians estimate that Russia sacrificed around 10 percent of its economic output because of the combined 4 percent of reduced oil prices and 6 percent of reduced GDP due to sanctions. However, these estimates rely on assumed GDP values; therefore, our assumption is that Russia is losing this amount of their GDP and it is not entirely clear as to whether these figures are accurate.
Secondly, the impact of COVID-19 on Russia and Crimea further stifle our ability to reliably conclude any economic successes, or lack thereof, on the peninsula. At this moment, reports suggest that the standard of living in Crimea has not improved despite Putin’s promises and billion-dollar investments. In fact, life may have gotten better for a few select billionaires but the population has seen little in return. However, we cannot conclude for certain whether Crimea is financially more advantageous at this point.
The Future — Will Similar Events Happen Elsewhere?
It has been six years since the annexation and many analysts wonder whether similar events will happen elsewhere. In Beyond Crimea, Agnia Grigas looks at this question in particular and stresses that the rhetoric that legitimized Crimea’s annexation can easily apply to the 25 to 150 million Russian “compatriots,” who neighbor Russia. “At-risk” countries include Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, and Kazakhstan.
However, territorial threats are not exclusive to countries with majority ethnic Russians; threats also include non-ethnic Russians who speak fluent Russian, which includes Ukraine and other formerly Soviet satellite states.
Notably, no further countries have been annexed in the past six years. Grigas warns however that Russia’s “expansionist ambitions” and “neo-imperial aims” are clear from Putin’s compatriot policies. Grigas elsewhere argues that the Crimean annexation is a quintessential example of expansionist strategy disguised by Putin’s claim to protect Russian compatriots.
Notably, we should not be hasty in presuming that Putin will seek to expand elsewhere. We must base these arguments in fact and a careful analysis of the transnational events that are unfolding. As I have argued above, we know that the preventative measures made by the West in the past six years have not helped against Putin’s ambitions. Therefore, if the West is to influence Putin’s neo-imperial aims in the future, the West must come up with new ‒ and more effective ‒ methods.
It is important to pay attention to the developments in Crimea to prevent further developments elsewhere.
We must not make the same mistakes political leaders made with Adolf Hitler’s annexation of Czechoslovakia and his later invasion of Warsaw in 1938. Indeed, we can and should expect similar events to occur today.
Before you go…
🗣 I love connecting with fellow thinkers. Find me on Twitter, Facebook, Goodreads, or Instagram.
ALSO, here’s a link to MY BOOK if you wish to purchase it! I appreciate the support.
I’d love it if you’d share the article on Facebook/TWITTER if you want your friends to benefit from it in some way at all.
Until next time, keep reflecting!
|
https://medium.com/@jakubferencik/did-you-forget-about-crimea-4c6a0918b2a5
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['Jakub Ferencik']
|
2021-03-15 10:16:25.003000+00:00
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['Politics', 'History', 'War', 'Russia', 'Ukraine']
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Investigating the Growing Divide in U.S. Jail Incarceration Rates
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Investigating the Growing Divide in U.S. Jail Incarceration Rates
Why have jail incarceration rates grown faster in rural U.S. counties than in urban centers?
The Vera Institute of Justice released a report in 2017 revealing that while small rural counties have lower crime rates than urban centers, they simultaneously have some of the nation’s highest jail incarceration rates. Vera, a research and advocacy organization focused on building and improving justice systems that ensure fairness, promote safety, and strengthen communities, wanted to understand what is it about rural counties, apart from their “rurality,” that contributes to their disproportionately high jail rates. Data Clinic and Vera teamed up to explore factors that could explain this divide, allowing Vera to adapt their research strategy moving forward. Using open data that Vera had compiled on historical jail statistics and open data on state and county characteristics, Data Clinic built a model for jail incarceration rates that accounted for about half of the discrepancy between rural areas and other geographical metro areas. To learn what is the most important factor correlated with incarceration rates, read the whole story here.
|
https://medium.com/dataclinic/explaining-the-rurality-of-americas-jails-1395060bd2b3
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['Data Clinic']
|
2019-08-29 15:14:59.248000+00:00
|
['Data Science', 'Projects', 'Data For Good', 'Criminal Justice', 'Open Data']
|
I think that can be true.
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I think that can be true. With age you can be in a job for the long run due to lifes commitments and higher wages.
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https://medium.com/@rob-doyle/i-think-that-can-be-true-263cf2b0fd7d
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['Rob Doyle']
|
2020-12-21 18:47:44.310000+00:00
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['Work', 'Web Development', 'Ageism', 'Programming', 'Inclusion']
|
If we know what bad management looks/feels like, why can’t we end it?
|
If you believe in the idea of “corporate culture,” it would stand to reason that a culture evolves with new leaders and new employees. As the culture evolves, then, wouldn’t bad management styles have to evolve out?
Certain characteristics of a population fade over time, right? So ideally, asshole managers would fade over time as well.
Unfortunately, that doesn’t happen. Bad management styles persist. They fray social bonds, they cost people money, and they straight up kill people.
None of it seems to matter. It persists.
Managers don’t get better. By some measure, 82 percent of them end up as the wrong hire. That’s an absolutely massive failure rate that would never be tolerated in most areas of a business, but somehow is tolerated when it comes to bad management styles.
So as leadership teams flip and new employees enter at the execution level, the culture changes. But as the culture changes, the bad management styles persist. Why is this?
Understanding bad management styles through a quick video
Here’s an article from MIT featuring this video with London Business School professor Freek Vermeulen talking about bad management styles. The video:
Good stuff. He argues that bad management is like a virus in a corporation. Would concur. The other term you hear is “cancer.” Same difference.
So what are some of the root causes of bad management styles?
Could go on for days here. Instead, I’ll keep it somewhat short.
The first reason is that management is not intuitive for a lot of people. What gets you promoted is hitting targets. When you over-focus on that in other people (your direct reports), you become a slave-driving micro-manager. Most people can never make the cognitive leap from “how I executed” to “how I manage.”
The second reason is that companies persist making money despite horrible management, so no one really cares about the management being horrible. (Because the money is still there.)
We want to think of ourselves as world-building titans as we toil in our cubicle, but the fact really is: work isn’t that hard, and technology has made it easier. A lot of “management practices” are really just invented hair-on-fire drama designed to increase our own feelings of relevance, self-worth, and having a stake in where we spend 10 hours a day.
So: we over-complicate work, and the management part of it isn’t intuitive. Those are your core issues.
What about the 1911 problem?
Oh yea. We still train most managers according to a 1911 set of guidelines. That was, uh, pre-WW1.
Just how pervasive are bad management styles?
Absolutely everywhere. We’ve all had terrible bosses. Here are 12 types. Want 7 more? There you go. The world is full of KPI-gagging, chest-pounding, target-humping, myopic revenue hounds.
We’ve somehow come to deify these people for their income and their “dogged workaholic nature.”
In fact, we just elected one such person as U.S. President! (I’m actually sure Trump is considered a good manager, but it’s only because his company is private and family-owned, and most of the execs are his kids.)
The broader Internet is awash in stories of bad management styles, too: CIO Magazine has “11 Profiles In Bad Leadership Behavior” (from 2013) and SHRM has five types of bad bosses, including the bully and the micromanager. And, somewhat unsurprisingly, Liz Ryan has an article at Forbes on the 10 traits all bad managers have in common, most of which are rooted in being scared themselves.
The fact that we’ve written so much about this — about bad managers and what differentiates them — means we all know the triggers, and we all know the bad management styles are out there. How do we get them to evolve out?
Could we do anything about bad management styles?
Of course. A partial list might include:
Remove management training from HR (execs don’t care about HR)
Refocus training on working with people as opposed to checking boxes
Promote people less on “they think like me” and more on “they seem to be well-respected here”
Tie bonuses to people performance and not just processes
Have clear lane lines for senior management, middle management, and execution-level
When people drive outside of their lane lines, they get popped in the wallet
Teach people to delegate better
Most of these ideas are not revolutionary. But the one thing they have in common is establishing a clear tie between these concepts:
What needs to be done
How the executives view the processes and people involved
Some form of incentive/compensation
If you try to make decisions about management without considering the psychology of the execs or the potential incentive structure, it won’t go anywhere. It’s really that simple.
No one is going to shift from being a shitty manager if being a shitty manager is getting that person rewarded.
If you think some pie-in-the-sky “thought leadership” is our ticket out of bad management styles, I have a few bridges I can sell you. It’s all about knowing the ecosystem and tying it to the perks. That affects real change with most bureaucracy-mired drones.
What else would you toss on the pyre about bad management styles?
|
https://medium.com/@tedbauer2003/if-we-know-what-bad-management-looks-feels-like-why-cant-we-end-it-79670d1b8351
|
['Ted Bauer']
|
2020-12-23 11:19:54.749000+00:00
|
['Work', 'Future Of Work', 'Pineapple2021', 'Evolution', 'Management And Leadership']
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Water shortage — yet Metro Manila is sinking
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An expression aptly describes what’s happening in Metro Manila and nearby provinces: Water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink!
Everyone knows how the country’s premier region gets easily flooded even with just a few minutes of rainfall. Last week, towards the end of June, daily rain had resulted in ankle to waist-deep water in the streets of Manila and Quezon City (the country’s present and former capital, respectively).
The funny thing is, both cities are still reeling from a water supply shortage incurring 8-to-12-hour daily water cuts. Where did all the water go?
Big demand, low supply
When water shortage first hit Metro Manila in March, concessionaire Manila Water initially said it was due to the lack of water in Angat Dam due to the dry spell or El Niño. But when pressed to explain how come Maynilad was able to supply its customers (since both are getting supply from the same dam), Manila Water cited the growing population of its customers. Water supply just can’t keep up with the multiplying number of households and establishments.
Metro Manila has some 12 million residents on any given day, give or take. Many of these are from the provinces, they migrate here looking for greener pastures — not knowing all the pastures here have already dried up, literally and figuratively. Every minute or so, a baby or two is born. The country now has over 110 million mouths to feed — and to drink. So it would not be surprising if the supply of water gets depleted.
Last month, another congressional probe on the lack of water was held. One lawmaker asked Manila Water about the situation where new buildings, subdivisions and malls keep mushrooming amid the water dearth. Makes sense, why put up new edifices where, of course people will need water, and yet you cannot give enough supply to your existing customers. The answer given was they had put on hold all applications for new water lines. If this were true, we should see a stop in the construction of new houses and buildings until the water problem is solved.
Waterworld soon?
The scenario in the 1995 post-apocalyptic sci-fi film Waterworld is not an impossibility after all. Land is sinking across the globe. In Asia, Jakarta has been sinking fast — at a rate of 10 inches every year — and that about 40 percent of the metropolis now lies beneath sea level. In a few decades, scientists estimate that almost all of North Jakarta will be below sea level.
A similar situation had also been seen in Tokyo and Osaka, Shanghai, Hanoi, and Bangkok.
In Metro Manila, studies have shown that many areas have been sinking by as much 27 inches to 53 inches (or almost four and a half feet) in the last 30 years (1979 to 2009). Typhoon Ondoy showed us how much the situation has deteriorated.
Same thing is happening in Dagupan, Bulacan, Pampanga, San Pedro and Biñan in Laguna, and in Rosario in Cavite.
What is causing this? Here lies the irony of ironies — it’s water!
We are sinking in floodwater and yet we are lacking in water. The land is falling below sea level because we are drying up the water under the ground.
We all know that deep wells source water from aquifers or water reserves underground. But everything has its limits, and we have reached ours in many parts of the country. When water beneath our feet is depleted, the ground becomes unstable, the soil easily erodes and eventually sinks — or collapses as a sink hole.
Read the recent news about a truck that fell into a sink hole along Roxas Boulevard in Manila.
Another more obvious and well-known factor is the amount of garbage we are dumping into our waterways.
Most of our estuaries or esteros are now clogged beyond recognition with solid and human waste from informal settlers and legit residents alike. So when there is a downpour, rainwater has nowhere to go.
So there you go. No need to wonder why we are all in this sh*t together. The solutions are common-sense obvious. And unless we start implementing them, we better start learning how to live in stilt or boat houses and drink salt water.
|
https://medium.com/@vickydeguzman78/water-shortage-yet-metro-manila-is-sinking-81bf4f5fa4d9
|
['Vicky De Guzman']
|
2019-07-10 00:05:30.295000+00:00
|
['Flooding', 'Philippines', 'Manila', 'Waterworld']
|
AYS Daily Digest 25/06/2021 — Days of action in Samos
|
Story via SOS Balkanroute:
Our helper Nisvet from Bužim gave us terrifying news this morning. Shortly before midnight, another Iranian family was violently pushed back by Croatian police officers to Bosnia. The police brought the family directly in front of a minefield, left over from the Bosnian war. Nisvet was even in the Bosnian war and accordingly knows exactly where most minefields are located in the Krajina region. “The Croats know where the mines are and of course we also know. But they just left the ignorant people in front of a minefield in the middle of the night”, Nisvet writes.
Even 25 years after the Bosnian war, many minefields have still not been demined, posing a huge danger to refugees in the forests of Bosnia. “It’s lucky nothing happened to them”, writes Nisvet, who picked up the family in the nearest village during the night and took them back to where they found a roof over their head even before the “game attempt”: in a deserted school.
Not even mined areas stop the Croatian police from preventing refugees entry into the allegedly “human rights-respecting” EU. Not only did the Croatian authorities deport the family to the border in the darkness in a difficult area, but they also beat them and robbed them of €150.
Among the members of the family from Iran who risked their lives on the run yesterday, there are three children between four and five years old, a mother, her brother and a friend. They have been persecuted in their country for religious reasons, as they belong to the Sunni faith of Islam, thus forming a minority in Iran. “They told me that because they are Sunni, they only make €200 per month and that they have no future in Iran”, Nisvet, also the family father of two children, tells us. Currently, the family is in the area around Bužim where they were received by Nisvet and provided with a little food as best as possible.
Upon returning he bought them bread, bureks, doughnuts, milk, water and drinks at the bakery. Today he will take care of the family again thanks to your donations. “It’s so sad: they can’t go back to their home country or forward. They have tried 23 times by now and are completely desperate. Thanks to all who support us so that we can at least ensure their survival here in Bosnia”, says the still visibly excited Nisvet.
Thanks to Nisvet and everyone who helps!
|
https://medium.com/are-you-syrious/ays-daily-digest-25-06-2021-days-of-action-in-samos-61da5584d465
|
['Ellen Elias-Bursac']
|
2021-06-26 11:57:05.470000+00:00
|
['Refugees', 'Greece', 'Digest', 'Migrants']
|
Why I Left VC to Start a Startup
|
A few months ago I left my job as a partner at a venture capital firm to start Plus, a startup building tools to help people capture, see, and share data from different sources. I thought most people would think that was crazy, but everyone I’ve spoken to — including my very risk-averse in-laws 😅 — has been surprisingly excited that I’m building something I’m passionate about.
According to the NY Times, ~50% of tech workers want to leave their job this year, so it’s not surprising that many people ask me why I did it. Here are some of the mental models I used to make this decision. If you are thinking about joining a startup or trying something new, hopefully they help you think through your decision, too.
1. Potential vs. Probability
“It’s the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting.” — Paulo Coelho, The Alchemist
The most exciting thing about buying a lottery ticket isn’t the expected value of the ticket (pro-tip: it’s negative 😉), it’s the non-zero chance that you could actually win a million dollars.
Similarly, the most exciting thing about joining a startup is the non-zero chance that you could build the next Airbnb, Coinbase, DoorDash, Snowflake, Stripe, or SpaceX (and it’s not bad that you could make millions of dollars doing it).
If you work in tech — whether in big tech or at a startup — the probability that you will earn a great salary that gives you the financial freedom to live an amazing life is pretty high. Given there’s a relatively high floor on compensation, even at a startup (especially if it’s well-funded), take the path you think will make life more exciting and more rewarding.
For me, when I ask myself “What would I actually want to do if I made enough money to retire today?” I would probably want to work with great people building impactful products. If someone wants to pay me to go do that today, why not chase my dreams?
2. Explore or Exploit
“Explore when you will have time to use the resulting knowledge, exploit when you’re ready to cash in” — Brian Christian, Algorithms to Live By
In your second week in a new city, would you rather go to the best restaurant you’ve had so far or try something new? The decision to explore (i.e., try new restaurants) vs. exploit (i.e., go to the best place you know) is personal, but for me, I’d rather “explore” if it’s week two of a year-long stay but “exploit” if it’s the last day of a two week vacation.
Why do people bias to exploring if they have more time? Because the activities that make people happiest and most satisfied are trying new things and learning/mastering new skills. At a startup, you are forced to explore and learn a lot because you encounter so many different types of problems on a day to day basis.
Big companies are better suited for exploitation than exploration. To grow and become more profitable, they want to build efficient processes to make sure people don’t have to encounter too many new problems, and they set up career ladders that make people better and better at solving the same problems over and over again.
From a career perspective, solving the same problems can be very lucrative, but if you want to spend more time exploring, the learning curve at a startup is probably steeper and more varied. Time is your most limited resource, so make sure you are making a deliberate decision on when to explore and when to exploit.
3. Efficient Career Risk
One of the most important ideas in finance is the idea of the “Efficient Frontier” — portfolios of investments that give you the highest expected return for a certain level of risk. Essentially, by combining different types of higher risk / higher return assets with lower risk / lower return assets, you can increase the expected return on a portfolio without taking on more risk.
Applying this framework to thinking about your career is helpful. If you have worked at a big tech company for a while, joining the right startup is a “smart risk” because you’ll likely gain many valuable experiences that will be applicable to any other job, and this will shift up the “efficient frontier” of your career outcomes.
To make this more tangible, here’s an example. Let’s say you’re a high performing senior engineer at Microsoft. You’re wondering if you should stick around for a couple years for the next promotion or join a promising early stage startup. What’s your career risk?
If you join and the startup becomes the next big thing… awesome! You’re set for life (both in terms of money and future career opportunities).
If you join and the startup doesn’t work out… bummer, that happens. But now you have experience that gives you a totally different perspective on work, domain experience in a new field, and a network of advisors, investors, friends, and cofounders if you ever want to pursue a startup again.
Best of all, if you decide to return to Microsoft, the worst case scenario is you go back to your old job. The more likely scenario is you return at a higher level on a steeper trajectory because you have new skills and experiences that make you a better engineer. Without taking on more risk, you’ve improved your expected outcomes.
4. Freedom to Focus
Starting from a blank slate is scary and incredible at the same time. It’s often unclear if you are taking the right path, but it’s also easy to move rapidly, focus on what matters, and iterate on quick feedback cycles. This applies for building both products and organizations.
One of the best parts of joining an early stage startup is picking and choosing the best practices from companies where you have worked in the past, while trying to avoid the things that made working at those other places unpleasant.
As companies grow, they accumulate “organizational debt” (e.g., office politics, unnecessary meetings, needlessly complex processes) the same way that software accumulates technical debt. Joining an early stage startup means you get to build great products that don’t come with years of technical debt, and you also get to build teams and relationships without the years of organizational debt that have accumulated at a big company.
That means you can spend your time focused on what you’re good at, instead of all of the “other” stuff that eats up people’s calendars. This is why people spend so much time talking about the pace, the culture, and the excitement of working at a startup. It’s an environment that is all about enabling people to get their best work done.
If I had to name the one most positively surprising thing about working on a startup, it’s this freedom to focus and the resulting pace and productivity. At Plus, we get so much done with a small team that I am completely blown away with our progress every month, and it’s what makes going to work so fun.
Conclusion
“The framework I found was called a ‘regret minimization framework.’ I wanted to project myself forward to age 80 and say, ‘Okay, now I’m looking back on my life. I want to have minimized the number of regrets I have.’ I knew that when I was 80 I was not going to regret having tried this. I was not going to regret trying to participate in this thing called the Internet that I thought was going to be a really big deal. I knew that if I failed I wouldn’t regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not ever having tried. I knew that that would haunt me every day, and so, when I thought about it that way it was an incredibly easy decision.” — Jeff Bezos
If you find the right opportunity with the right team, joining a startup to build something from the ground up can be a unique, once in a lifetime experience. You won’t regret taking a once in a lifetime opportunity and, in today’s job market, it’s not very risky either.
Maybe you take a pay cut for a year or two, but your job at a big tech company will always be there if you decide to go back, and the opportunity to focus on your work, build a brand new product, and explore something with unknown potential… well, that’s really exciting. 🤩
|
https://entrepreneurshandbook.co/why-i-left-vc-to-start-a-startup-798602a364f
|
['Daniel Li']
|
2021-05-06 15:47:52.293000+00:00
|
['Productivity', 'Jobs', 'Careers', 'Startup', 'Venture Capital']
|
How to create Carousel in Flutter
|
In one of my project, it is required to implement a carousel with Image and few text of different styles. I had started searching for some code and every time ends with a carousel code with single image, than i had developed a carousel with custom views for my project. I will explain step by step how i had developed it. You can easily customise it for any other type of view.
Add Dependency
In your flutter project add dependency in pubspec.yaml file
dependencies:
flutter:
sdk: flutter
carousel_widget:
Add Images to Assets
assets:
- assets/
- images/place1.JPG
- images/place2.JPG
- images/place3.JPG
Import Packages
import carousel_widget into dart file
import 'package:flutter/material.dart';
import 'package:carousel_widget/carousel_widget.dart';
Prepare Screens for carousel
Let us now create screen for carousel, you can create any custom design as per your requirement. Here we will create screen with one image on top, than a title and blow that description.
for that create list and populate data to them
List<String> titles = List();
List<String> description = List();
List<String> imagenames = List();
void initializeData() {
titles.add("Title of First Screen");
description.add("Description of First Screen");
imagenames.add("images/place1.jpg");
titles.add("Title of Second Screen");
description.add(
"Description of Second Screen");
imagenames.add("images/place2.jpg");
titles.add("Title of Third Screen");
description.add(
"Description of Third Screen");
imagenames.add("images/place3.jpg");
}
for creating screen i had created a function getScreen(index) where image, title and description are taken from List depending upon index. If in your case you want entirely different screens in carousel than write separate function to design separate screen with different components and layout.
Widget getScreen(index) {
return new ListView(
children: <Widget>[
new Container(
height: 250.0,
margin: const EdgeInsets.fromLTRB(20.0, 90.0, 20.0, 0.0),
child: Image.asset(
imagenames.elementAt(index),
),
),
new Container(
height: 45.0,
margin: const EdgeInsets.fromLTRB(20.0, 8.0, 20.0, 0.0),
child: Text(
titles.elementAt(index),
textAlign: TextAlign.center,
overflow: TextOverflow.ellipsis,
style: TextStyle(fontSize: 20),
),
),
new Container(
height: 100.0,
margin: const EdgeInsets.fromLTRB(50.0, 12.0, 50.0, 0.0),
child: Text(
description.elementAt(index),
textAlign: TextAlign.center,
overflow: TextOverflow.ellipsis,
maxLines: 5,
style: TextStyle(fontSize: 15),
),
),
],
);
}
Now according to index passed to getScreen we get a widget corresponding to a screen in carousel.
Creating carousel
Now we are having the screens designed we can create carousel.
@override
Widget build(BuildContext context) {
initializeData();
return Scaffold(
backgroundColor: Colors.white,
body:
Carousel(
listViews: [
Fragment(
child: getScreen(0),
),
Fragment(
child: getScreen(1),
),
Fragment(
child: getScreen(2),
)
],
)
);
}
Complete Code
|
https://medium.com/@atul-sharma-94062/implementing-carousel-in-flutter-d8cad14215c6
|
['Atul Sharma']
|
2019-06-20 09:24:30.094000+00:00
|
['Carousel', 'Flutter', 'Dart', 'Carousel In Flutter']
|
A Guide to Reflective Meetings
|
Product Management
A Guide to Reflective Meetings
Differentiating when to use retrospectives and post mortems with your team
Reflection is one of the most important parts of growth, within individuals and within teams. Whether you are a product manager or not, you will likely encounter many work situations that require reflection. This act enables us to learn from the past and improve for the future. In the context of product development, two types of formal reflection are often used: retrospectives and post mortems. You may hear professionals using these two words interchangeably, but they mean two different things. Thus, both forms of reflection have different applications in your work.
Image Source: Pexels
What is a retrospective, and when should we use it?
The word retrospective comes from Latin, meaning to “look back.” In Agile development, retrospectives are a central part of the process. This is a regular ceremony which includes all team members and provides the opportunity to reflect upon previous sprints. Given the preplanned nature of a retrospective, it is a proactive mechanism to reflect upon work. The dictionary defines the noun version of retrospective as “an exhibition or compilation showing the development of the work…over a period of time.” Within the context of Agile software development, the definition is even more precise:
The Sprint Retrospective is an opportunity for the Scrum Team to inspect itself and create a plan for improvements to be enacted during the next sprint. — scrum.org
If you are familiar with Agile, you’ll know that a retrospective serves to have the entire team answer several questions: what went well in the past sprint? what could have gone better? what can be done to improve next sprint? These questions allow your team to celebrate wins, fix potential issues, and hold each other accountable. Using the retrospective framework on a regular schedule enables continuous improvement. By identifying better ways of working together and eliminating disruptive patterns, the team boosts productivity and morale.
Image Source: Pexels
How is a post mortem different, and when should we use it?
On the other hand, a post mortem translates literally to “after death.” This not only implies a reflection back on something, but that the event was not necessarily positive. The prevailing output of a post mortem are lessons learned. These meetings do not necessarily translate to actionable items, but ideally can provide best practices for the future. Although a post mortem is reasonable to conduct at the conclusion of any project, my experience has typically been that such a review occurs when something has gone wrong. Therefore, a post mortem is a more reactive response that leads to reflection.
Again, if we think in the context of product development, a post mortem is often preceded by a root cause analysis (RCA). In a root cause analysis, we seek to understand the variables that led to an undesirable event occurring. We know that many of the most serious issues arise from multiple contributing factors, not a single point of failure. It’s therefore important to build a full picture and timeline of the causes of the problem. This forensic analysis becomes “evidence” that can be discussed during a post mortem.
Image Source: Pexels
What else should we know about reflection meetings?
While frequent reflection can make us better performers, there are diminishing returns with formal meetings to accomplish this task. If your team holds a retrospective after every sprint and has post mortems on a frequent basis, you may begin to experience meeting fatigue. This analysis of every action and event can reduce the morale of a team, while fostering an environment where people are afraid to make any mistakes. Keeping retrospectives spaced appropriately and using post mortems only when needed will ensure that these meetings are more useful to the team.
It’s also important to note that retrospectives and post mortems are both about actions and teams, not people. Neither form of reflection seeks to place blame on individuals. We all make mistakes; how we react and learn from our mistakes is what is most important. Therefore, it is important for retrospectives and post mortems to create safe environments where we can analyze areas for improvement. Lastly, we want to make sure to recognize positive actions and events along with the negative ones; this reinforces the types of behaviors and outcomes we seek in our work.
|
https://medium.com/trust-the-product/a-guide-to-reflective-meetings-eecedcc23e6a
|
['Tom Comerford']
|
2020-10-13 14:55:07.465000+00:00
|
['Post Mortems', 'Product Management', 'Retrospectives', 'Meetings', 'Process']
|
Trump hopes for better libel laws after book smashes him
|
The President of United States, Donald Trump has been seen praising himself as a genius several times and this time he has done it over a book’s portrayal of him as an unstable leader of the country. Trump says that the country’s libel laws are “very weak” after a new book portrayed him as a dysfunctional president and said that he is “like, really smart” and, indeed, a “very stable genius.”, rather than a dysfunctional president.
Trump defended his mental fitness in a series of tweets saying:
President Trump tweeted from Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland, a few hours before a strategy session on the 2018 legislative agenda with Republican congressional leaders and Cabinet members.
The book “Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House” by Michael Wolff highlights critical descriptions of Trump’s behavior, jumbled interactions among senior White House staff, and disparaging comments about the Trump family by former White House Chief Strategist, Steve Bannon. Trump is represented as being held in low regard by his White House staff, leading Wolff to state that “100% of the people around him” does not believe in Trump’s competence and believe that he is unfit for office.
Later, when Trump addressed reporters, the Ivy League graduate was ready to answer these derogatory accusations:
“I went to the best colleges for college, I had a situation where I was a very excellent student, came out, made billions and billions of dollars, became one of the top business people, went to television and for 10 years was a tremendous success, as you probably have heard, ran for president one time and won.” — Donald J. Trump, who did his bachelors from the University of Pennsylvania.
As for the allegations made in Wolff’s book he said: “I consider it a work of fiction,” Trump told reporters. “The libel laws are very weak in this country. If they were strong, it would be very helpful. You wouldn’t have things like that happen where you can say whatever comes to your head.”
He even called the former White House Chief Strategist sloppy, saying that “I don’t know this man. I guess sloppy Steve brought him in the White House quite a bit and it was one of those things. That’s why sloppy Steve is now looking for a job,”
The talk about Trump’s mental fitness for office has increased in recent months on cable news and political shows and even among Democrats in Congress. But on the other hand, Trump’s supporters call all these accusations just a publicity stunt and “something to get famous for”. White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders this week called such propositions “disgraceful and laughable.”
“If he was unfit, he probably wouldn’t be sitting there and wouldn’t have defeated the most qualified group of candidates the Republican Party has ever seen,” she said, calling him “an incredibly strong and good leader,” she said.
|
https://medium.com/bvity/trump-hopes-for-better-libel-laws-after-book-smashes-him-463082b83d36
|
[]
|
2018-04-09 04:58:45.328000+00:00
|
['Libel', 'Trump', 'Politics']
|
Infrastructure That Does More
|
It’s a critical moment for our country and the stakes are high. The pandemic is a public health crisis accelerating social isolation and despair, the economic crisis is devastating communities, and civil unrest has forced a long-overdue reckoning about race and institutional violence. This time of multiple crises has exposed a fundamental truth: America desperately needs to abandon the status quo and invest in new priorities.
We know that the next few months will bring a call for reinvestment in the country’s aging infrastructure as a key component of the nation’s recovery plan. When this call for investment comes, it’s time to make knitting our country back together again a top priority. It’s time to invest in infrastructure that supports our economy, our people and our democracy: the parks, trails, libraries, community centers and public spaces that make up the nation’s long-neglected civic infrastructure.
This set of assets, often seen as “nice to have” amenities, is just as important as highways and bridges. In fact, given our current circumstances, they may be more important to our ultimate ability to recover, rebuild and prosper.
That’s because, while arguments for traditional infrastructure are usually made solely on the grounds of boosting GDP, investments in civic infrastructure help the economy while also delivering so much more. In fact, multiple studies demonstrate the beneficial impacts of our shared public spaces:
Improved physical and mental health. More than a hundred studies have proven that parks and greenspaces are associated with better mental health and lower mortality. People with lower incomes living in communities with greater access to green space have reduced income-related health inequities. Research shows that spending just 20 minutes in nature significantly reduces stress levels.
|
https://medium.com/reimagining-the-civic-commons/infrastructure-that-does-more-cf8a0f4dba64
|
['Bridget Marquis']
|
2020-12-08 12:51:11.907000+00:00
|
['Recovery', 'Parks', 'Resilience', 'Cities', 'Infrastructure']
|
Quitting Music
|
I was making a lot of music with my band in Jakarta from 2004–2016. We were young, stupid, and poor — still in liberal arts college in Jakarta from 2004–2007, so we were reading a lot of Marxist and feminist theories, and our worldviews were so idealist it was quite beautiful. We were against Indonesia’s capitalist creative control in the music industry, so we created what we wanted to create. Like Patti Smith’s book title, we were “just kids” trying to make music we love and believe in. We started before social media era, before spotify and all that jazz, so we still experienced distributing our records (we had two!) independently. It was very limited CD, so it meant so much when we received great reviews and acknowledgement from music journalists and music critiques. We started performing in one very underground (and illegal) gig in Jakarta back in 2004, and one gig led to another, and another, and another. After that, there were several TV appearances. And in 3 years, we were headlining on the biggest rock music festival in the Southeast Asia region. Great times.
Indeed, times has changed. I am now in grad school, literary on the other side of the world. I am still in touch with my band members although the band is inactive for three years (we’re too sentimental to break up). The “just kids” are now in their mid-thirties. Life as an adult is painful, and I know we secretly wish that we can be kids forever. As kids, we just live; as adults, we are struggling to stay alive. Two of my band members suffer from serious mental health illness, and both of them are going through a very difficult divorce at relatively similar times. Another decided to quit music forever and live out of town — yet remain a very good and understanding friend.
“Why aren’t your music on spotify?” Someone asks. Our music used to be on spotify, but we were too busy to maintain the account. We tried paying someone to maintain the account, but it was too expensive — we were losing money and not making enough from online streaming to pay the manager. “How about website?” Same story. People no longer visit our page. Maintaining a webpage is costly if it does not add anything to the band’s production. “How about hiring a better manager?” Oh wow, that could be another story for a blog post. Long story short, our trusted manager took our cash that we saved for our third album production. Since then, we (maybe me, more than everyone else) have lost our motivation to continue the production, even though we already have live recordings of our new songs ready to mix.
“Why are you no longer making music?”
That is the saddest question, but sometimes I ask myself that. We all just drift apart. We did not choose to drift, but it just happens. It might have ended (not officially yet), but we were happy — are happy — that the band was part of our personal history, no matter how much drama involved in that decades of friendship and musical partnership.
“But there must be some people who still enjoy and love your band…” Yes there are! About a hundred “cult” followers, and we are happy to be little-known Jakarta-based “cult” band. Some more current (and successful) independent bands in Jakarta sometimes refer our band as their “influence” whenever they are interviewed in the media. Someone told me personally that they’ll wait patiently for our next release, no matter how long it’ll take, as long as the band doesn’t break up forever. Listening to that responses is one of the proudest moments in my nonexistent musical career.
My late brother was proud of me. He loved my music. He was quite surprised that I ended up a vocalist rather than a guitarist (he taught me how to play the guitar, but no one in the family sing professionally). I have never had the chance to tell him how grateful I am that he introduced me to Nirvana, Pearl jam, Red Hot Chili Pepper, Radiohead, Rage Against the Machine, and Beastie Boys. Had he continued playing the guitar, he would make a killer player. It’s sad that his trauma of drug addiction also took his music from him. He was in a band that introduced him to heroin, so for him, sadly, to quit heroin is to also quit music. Little did he know that his litter sister who used to mimic everything he did as a kid is the one who salvaged his dusty stratocaster from the storage room. The time he quit music is the time I started music.
But can one really quit music forever? I am still listening to the memories of his life in every breath I make.
|
https://medium.com/@TPsounddiary/quitting-music-3570ac570fa8
|
[]
|
2020-02-18 03:33:45.902000+00:00
|
['Sibling Loss', 'Music', 'Journal', 'Grief And Loss', 'Siblings']
|
DUNU DK-2001 Headphone Review 2020 — Transforming Sound
|
DUNU DK-2001 Headphone Review 2020 — Transforming Sound
DUNU is one of the most famous Chinese companies in the personal audio segment. Moreover, she earned this title not only with the release of the next “killer of everything”, but also with her story: starting her activity with OEM production (including, say, for Sennheiser), she increased and improved her lines generation after generation. So, let’s say many remember DUNU Titan 1, which at the time of release naturally made a splash, which ensured the continuation of the Titan 3 and Titan 5 — less historical, but still very good headphones. But today we will talk about another line: DN / DK, which since the time of DN-1000 included flagship, all as one — hybrids, models of the company. So, a complete review of the DUNU DK-2001 headphone!
And if at the time of the release of the first representative of DN hybrids were relatively rare, now this concept is very widespread. But here the company tried to stand out: the novelty was developed for a very long time. DUNU- all the same, they were able to demonstrate new developments: a very unusual crossover setup, a complex housing design, an original system of interchangeable cable connectors — all this came together in one big emotion. The DK Series is the latest DUNU hybrid headphone with an emphasis on hybrid technology for the best possible reproduction of the entire sound spectrum. The advantage of this technology is that DUNU can use dynamic drivers with large coils to achieve spectacular and deep low while maintaining accuracy and expanding the range of mid and high frequencies due to balanced drivers. Features of the Dunu DK-2001 headphone
3BA + 1DD (double-sided beryllium PVD coating)
High-purity silver-plated copper OCC cable with an exclusive patented modular quick-disconnect plug system.
The MMCX plug-in design on the cable provides an endless choice of replacement and upgrade options.
Dunu DK-2001 Detailed Features
- Model: DK-2001 — Dynamic unit: 13mm double-sided beryllium diaphragm dynamic coil
- Balanced armature unit: 1 Knowles customized medium-high frequency independent balanced armature, 2 Knowles customized ultra-high frequency independent balanced armature
- Frequency response: 5–40kHz
- Sensitivity: 109dB ± 2dB at 1kHz
- Distortion: <0.5% at 1kHz
- Impedance: 13 ohms
- Cable: High purity single crystal copper silver-plated Litz cable
- Cable length: 1.2 m
- Weigh: 14g. Package Contents Dunu DK-2001
The kit is huge and this is where the share of the budget for this model certainly departed. I will try in order, but with the biggest one: a blue case (at least for black headphones; and they come in three colors) is supplied with the headphones from the skin, and it looks very, very high quality. Dunu logo pouch top. There are 11 pairs of nozzles here (4 pairs of ordinary, balanced nozzles in our case are black — 3 pairs separately, one is already installed, 3 pairs of transparent (bluish) nozzles designed to make the sound “more transparent”, 3 pairs of red nozzles to improve free qualities of the track, they increase their adaptability to medium and low frequencies, their sizes vary the same as all the other nozzles (S / M / L) .. Including those already on the headphones themselves, + 1 pair of foam nozzles with a memory effect. In most headphones, spare heads are spare heads, and here we have not only the difference in color and size, but also in sound properties. Of the additional accessories for the DK-2001, a brush for cleaning nozzles was put into the kit (ear pads — maybe someone missed this word). An ingenious thing that finally replaces a crutch in the form of a cotton swab. And also the adapter for large format, 6.35mm (from our folk 3.5mm Jack) has not gone anywhere. It is important to say that the plug of this headphone model is removable. There is also an instruction. which finally replaces a cotton swab crutch. And also the adapter for large format, 6.35mm (from our folk 3.5mm Jack) has not gone anywhere. It is important to say that the plug of this headphone model is removable. There is also an instruction. which finally replaces a cotton swab crutch. And also the adapter for large format, 6.35mm (from our folk 3.5mm Jack) has not gone anywhere. It is important to say that the plug of this headphone model is removable. There is also an instruction.
Dunu DK-2001 exist in three color versions, which are beautifully illustrated on the official website.
I have just a black version on my hands.
The headphones are made of S316 steel and a durable aluminum alloy (S316 stainless steel + high-strength aluminum-magnesium alloy, completely made of two types of metals, through dozens of processing processes, such as casting, polishing, sandblasting, anodizing and almost 100 more processing processes, just to present a refined texture). In total, you can hold rather weighty (although the weight is only 14 grams) durable headphones that will not fall apart into parts from falling to the floor. The outer side of each earphone is framed by the inscription DK 2001 Hybrid Earphones and, in fact, the DUNU logo. Everything is done beautifully around the decorated air duct in the center. The place of attachment of the wire is very durable, and it is also possible to twist the earphone around its axis, which will allow you to adjust its position exactly as the anatomy of your ear desires. There is one of two designations of the left and right ear. The second designation, which stands out much stronger, is located directly on the body near the nozzle, in other words on the inside. Nearby there is a compensation hole. The nozzle is understandably removable, it holds confidently. The mesh is installed. The attachment point of the nozzle, as in principle the entire headphone housing, is made of metal.
Earhook model. The wire in the place of attachment is of very good flexibility and does not put pressure on the ear, and given the fact that the earphone can be turned as you want, there will be no problems landing. DK-2001 is the model that, despite its cost, exists without one of the most common attributes — a built-in microphone and remote control. The length of both headphones is symmetrical, and the splitter is tiny to laughs. But it is steel, with a logo and next to it there is a silicone wire limiter. On the back of the splitter, a serial number is also placed, which simply indicates the number of your instance. The entire wire, as can be seen from the photo, is divided into channels that are woven together. If there are 2 wires from each earphone, then there are 4 wires after the splitter (if you “count” from the headphones to the jack, and not vice versa). The quality of the wire is satisfactory — it is soft and pleasant, and nothing sticks to it, and there is no smell. In general, this is the Dunu DUW02 — a detachable cable, valued at $ 69.
High-purity silver-plated copper cable with an exclusive patented modular quick-disconnect plug system. There is absolutely nothing to complain about. Except for the cost, but here it is simply included in the kit for the headphones themselves. And there is also a Velcro with a logo. Let’s move on to the plug, because this is no less interesting part of the cable. At least because it sells a separate set of nozzles, high-quality and well-made. The place where the wire is fixed does not cause any problems (information for those who are especially worried). As you can see, the plug is angled. And if in the case of 3.5mm it looks bulky, but tolerable, then in the case of the adapter it turns out completely disproportionately. I’m sure many could pay attention to the modularity of the plug, and yes, it’s not just like that, because there is a long ring,
To begin with, the headphones are hybrid. Here we have 3BA + 1DD (with double-sided beryllium PVD coating).
All this adjusted for the fact that more than half of the technologies are patented by DUNU itself. Based on everything that is written in the advertising material (by the way, this phrase should not introduce someone into distrust, because in the case of headphones, it is the information from the manufacturer that plays the biggest role — and the more it is, the more trust), and so , of all that is written so as not to retell a bunch of unnecessary text, I will single out the most important thing: DK-2001 was created in order to give a balanced sound that, thanks to special and tuned dynamic drivers, can not overlap other frequencies, but complement them.
In general, the emphasis is placed on the fact that the Chinese have tried in a natural and detailed sound that will surprise you with purity, the very transparency. Resistance is 13 Ohms.
6. Source, player, personal preferences by genre.
I used my ShanlingM2s player as a sound source. Listen- Dubstep, Syntivewave, Indie. Not the top model, but the sound gives better than a smartphone and my pc combined. The player itself, just like headphones, does not have an obvious bias in low or high frequencies, and therefore both fit together like no other (of course, there are also headphones and players more expensive than $ 300 — but that’s another story)
I liked the fit at the headphones. They have an interesting shape and this is clearly done so that the model fits well in any ears. In a few hours, the ears did not hurt and did not get tired. Everything else, and this business does not look defiant. Although, maybe for someone it’s a minus. In this case, there are at least other body colors. I want to say that ShanlingM2s has a very large margin in volume. The tracks of Indy play, so to speak, from a very big stage. In other words, if you close your eyes, you can imagine that they are playing right next door. Of course, this contributed to the special feel of the track, which is already to my liking. The voice plays articulate, smooth and soft. Although, it seemed to me that it was slightly, slightly deaf. This effect seems to create that very “scene”, so this is a matter of taste. What I especially liked was the bass inserts,
Then the line went for Synthaveyv. In this genre, headphones were able to win back tracks no worse than Indy. Again, I really liked the effect of presence, it is present in absolutely all compositions — they feel voluminous. I can not help but notice the excellent distribution of instruments and frequencies: a lot of things play directly, clearly, and stand out. Thanks to this, against the background of the number of electronic sounds, the voice is not lost from the word at all. In Dubstep, the electronic background can be distinguished no worse than all the rest of the music. And when the bass scene begins, it can take your breath away (you can take it as you like, but I’m not exaggerating). The bass here is good, but still slightly not what I like. Because I am a fan of prolonged “charges”, and here they are distinguishable and powerful, that is, they produce the desired effect, but not always the way they want. This is a matter of taste. On top of that, the model has never been for the “bassheads”.
Take into account the fact that the Dunu DK-2001 with a behind-the-ear landing — not everyone will like it (despite the spread it is no worse than wireless TWS).
Also accept the fact that the DK-2001 is a universal model, without deliberate superiority in any frequency. There will be no loud treble, just like long bass. But there is a good opportunity to listen to midrange, disassembling and enjoying the mentioned high and low. Headphones on a good sound source can make you believe that music is played nearby, and not just in the ears. Personally, I liked the model when listening to any tracks, because it itself gave color to those that had previously played differently for me. For smooth and pleasant melodies with emphasis on the voice, the model is the most. But the bass part is not for bass fans. And a huge number of nozzles will not help, because they change the sound quite insignificantly, and when you start trying everything, the ability to hear the difference will disappear altogether. Nozzles are not headphones, despite their “properties.”
All that remains to be added is that despite the fact that the headphones give a sound at their cost, the purchase should be accompanied by a keen desire to hear something better than what you have. If you are satisfied with your headphones and the sound of your equipment, then you yourself know that: there is always something to spend on in the first place.
The price of DUNU DK-2001 at the time of writing the review is $ 299 on Ali https://ali.ski/ZgKyD
Thank you for your attention!
|
https://medium.com/@ihorkhodakivskyi/dunu-dk-2001-headphone-review-2020-transforming-sound-8dfd5e98bc48
|
['Ihor Khodakivskyi']
|
2020-03-12 14:42:46.556000+00:00
|
['Sound', 'Headphones']
|
So why do weeds have such a bad reputation?
|
Ever traveled and noticed an unkept property? Or watch your dad complain about the crab grass? What if I told you, that weeds aren’t as terrible as we’ve been conditioned to think?
Mainstream brands have benefited from teaching us to kill weeds. But, I’ve joined my long-time friend and mentor, Katrina Blair, to teach people that it’s best to love weeds.
“A weed is but an unloved flower.” ― Ella Wheeler Wilcox
When we met up in the wild mountains of Colorado this past summer, we even learned how to harvest wild acorns for flour for bread, pancakes, pastries, cookies and even pasta. Gosh, imagine all those acorns you’ve walked on while out with your dog or kids… That’s food
When you know how to survive and even thrive on weeds, you can fully appreciate that:
All true wealth comes from the ground
Our group harvested wild, edible, organic, weeds for food and beauty products. Many weeds have the ability to support your immune system and feed you and your family. There’s even a special kind of weed that can reverse gray hair!
Here are my top weeds:
Seaweed for gray hair reversal Thistles for liver function Dandelion for detoxing the body Wild Lettuce for pain relief
It only takes 13 wild weeds to obtain food security just about anywhere on the planet .There are so many more, but definitely look into weeds’ benefits before throwing them out.
Disclaimer: no ecosystems were harmed in this adventure.
My name is Marjory Wildcraft and I am the founder and CEO of The Grow Network. We are the online home of a global community of people who produce their own food and medicine. “Home grown food on every table” is our catalyzing statement. I’ve been featured by National Geographic as an expert in sustainable living, I’ve hosted Mother Earth News’ online Homesteading Summit, and I’ve been honored in Reuters “Food Sustainability Media” awards. I grow half of my own food and most of my own medicine.
|
https://medium.com/@marjorywildcraft/so-why-do-weeds-have-such-a-bad-reputation-f17a578bca4
|
['Marjory Wildcraft']
|
2020-12-03 20:54:20.253000+00:00
|
['Gardening', 'Beauty', 'Food', 'Gray Hair']
|
Fish in Rod
|
Fish in Rod
Sometimes you just have to fish or cut bait. A 100-word story.
Photo by David Kinnear on Unsplash
For a few years, Mr. Fischer kept his mistress in a large, luxury apartment with high ceilings and a great view.
When he tired of her, he found a new love and said, “You can move into a small room in the basement. It’s quite cozy there.”
Before she left she bought some cod and stuffed it into a hollow curtain rod.
The smell became unbearable. Mr. Fischer searched for the source to no avail.
His girlfriend became disgusted and left him. The apartment became uninhabitable.
When she regained the apartment, she trashed the curtain rod and the smell disappeared.
|
https://medium.com/imperfect-words/fish-in-rod-55a8909974f1
|
['Jim Mcaulay']
|
2020-03-24 00:11:20.489000+00:00
|
['Revenge', 'Jokes', 'Fishing', '100 Words', 'Humour']
|
“Stablecoins Are Killing It” Ep. #21 — Thursday, Nov 19th, 1–2pm EST Featuring Stably
|
Click here to register for the show on Zoom
It was another banner week for stablecoins as DAI surpassed $1 billion in circulation for the first time, even as Tether continued to grow it’s marketshare (now 76%+) of total stablecoins.
But it’s still early days for stablecoins, with some predicting that stablecoin market cap will exceed $1 trillion by 2025.
The first 20 episodes have been entertaining and packed with insight, data and context for understanding the rapidly evolving stablecoin ecosystem. Show #21 will feature Stably, which helps companies build their own digital money through their stablecoin-as-a-service platform, enabling users to cut transaction times, lower costs, unlock new revenue channels, access liquidity, and enhance customer loyalty. Founded in Seattle in 2018, by a team of former bankers and Amazon software engineers, Stably has raised almost $3M in funding from angels and VCs while developing a wide range of stablecoins backed by real assets, such as USD, EUR, CAD, precious metals and real estate.
During the 1st half of our shows, our featured panelists give 15 minute overview presentations. The 2nd half of the shows feature audience Q&A where we open up the audio & video for audience members to ask questions and comment, creating a vibrant environment for discussion and debate.
Click here to register for the show on zoom
Our featured speaker for Episode #21:
Kory Hoang, Founder & CEO, Stably — Prior to Stably, Kory was a Data Analyst at PitchBook in Seattle, while pursing a passion for algorithmic trading, focusing on quantitative trading, momentum and mean-reversion strategies, VIX derivatives and cryptocurrencies. Since 2018, Kory has led Stably through 3 venture funding rounds, while growing the team fo 15 people. Kory holds a BBA in Finance and Marketing from the University of Washington Bothell
This content is for educational purposes only. It does not constitute trading advice. Past performance does not indicate future results. Do not invest more than you can afford to lose. The author of this article may hold assets mentioned in the piece.
If you found this content engaging, and have an interest in commissioning content of your own, check out Quantum Economics’ Analysis on Demand service.
|
https://medium.com/quantum-economics/stablecoins-are-killing-it-ep-21-thursday-nov-19th-1-2pm-est-featuring-stably-39caa8d635f2
|
['Lou Kerner']
|
2020-11-15 10:21:38.431000+00:00
|
['Bitcoin', 'Stablecoin Cryptocurrency', 'Stably', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Crypto']
|
Raise Finance IDO Tiers Explained
|
Option 2 — RF-Karma support mechanism (RF- Karma)
Most Eastern religions believe that karma denotes the cycle of cause and effect — wherein every action affects the person at some point in the future. Karma also applies to your thoughts, your words, and the instructions you give other people. The RF-Karma Support Mechanism works on more or less the same principles.
The RF-Karma Support Mechanism is another way for participants to gain access to the IDO allocations, and participants here will have the opportunity to earn Karma points by staking or swapping previous tokens in exchange for IDO access. Only tokens launched by the Raise FInance team will be eligible, and this is another strong step towards boosting interest and demand for our projects. Our Raise Finance analysts conduct a detailed analysis of previously issued tokens on a periodic basis, and based on the current situation of the project, they will select tokens for the RF-Karma Support Mechanism.
How do I Earn RF-Karma Points
There are numerous ways for you to be able to earn RF-Karma points, and these have been discussed below:
Staking a specific token on Raise Finance: For every asset that you lock and stake on the RF platform, 2% is converted into RF-Karma points. This is issued once a week in the form of weekly karma and expires every month.
For every asset that you lock and stake on the RF platform, 2% is converted into RF-Karma points. This is issued once a week in the form of weekly karma and expires every month. Trading a specific token on Raise Finance: For every asset that you trade through Raise Finance, 2% is converted to RF-Karma points. This is issued once a week in the form of weekly karma and expires every month.
For every asset that you trade through Raise Finance, 2% is converted to RF-Karma points. This is issued once a week in the form of weekly karma and expires every month. Successfully submitting projects to Raise finance hackathons: For every successful project that you submit, you will earn 100 RF-Karma points that expire after 14 weeks.
*The specific conditions around the conversion may vary from project to project.
The top 250 wallets in each case that have the most RF-Karma points will gain access to IDO allocations.
The top 150 wallets from this will be part of Pool 1 and will share 70% of the total share.
The top 100 wallets from this will be part of Pool 2 and will share 30% of the total share.
Example
For example, if a Project ABC manages to raise a total of $200,000.
According to the pool weight distribution, the amount allocated to the RF-Karma Support Mechanism is
Total raise * 0.20 (PW)= 40 000$
Therefore, each pool gets allocated funds as follows:
Pool 1 = 40,000$ * 0.70 = 28 000$
Pool 2 = 40,000$ * 0.30 = 12 000$
Pool 1 and Pool 2 participants will get a guaranteed allocation proportionally depending on the earned points.
|
https://medium.com/@raisefinance/raise-finance-ido-tiers-explained-aff14185e328
|
['Raise Finance']
|
2022-01-09 20:58:33.608000+00:00
|
['Metaverse', 'Blockchain Startup', 'Launchpad', 'Matic Network', 'Avalanche']
|
Crypto exchanger SerenityPay became a bestseller of Blockchain Life 2019
|
The team of Serenity presented an ecosystem of unique products for Forex brokers, blockchain startups and traders at Blockchain Life 2019 in Moscow.
Serenity became a Platinum sponsor of Blockchain Life 2019, Europe’s largest cryptocurrency industry event that took place in Moscow on October 16th–17th. During the two days, the expo was attended by over 4,800 participants from the spheres of blockchain, mining, and cryptocurrency. The forum has exceeded all expectations in terms of the keenness of interest towards the world of cryptocurrency.
At the expo, Serenity presented the already established products for Forex brokers, crypto traders, and fin-tech start-ups, as well as new offerings. Together they make up the growing ecosystem of Serenity that ensures the transparency of trading and crypto-fiat exchange.
The Serenity core team at BlockchainLife2019
On the first day of Blockchain Life 2019, the range of Serenity products was expanded by a margin trading platform and SerenityPay, an exchanger that accepts transfers from bank cards.
The subject of the most intense interest among the expo participants was the new exchanger SerenityPay which works both in a bundle with the exchange Serenity.Exchange and separately. The exchanger accepts fiat currencies from the bank cards Visa and MasterCard. Currently, the platform supports BTC, ETH, LTC, USDT, and GUSD. SerenityPay can be used to make deposits into Serenity.Exchange accounts with regular bank cards.
“It is of utmost importance to us that any client with an ordinary fiat bank card can deposit into their account on the crypto exchange and the margin trading platform,” commented a co-founder of Serenity Financial Anton Vasin.
The margin trading platform Margin.Serenity.Exchange significantly expands the trading capabilities of the exchange. Margin trading provides traders with access to larger amounts of funds for trading than have on their balance.
Specifically for managing margin trading accounts, the Serenity team has developed a convenient personal area, ready for use by both traders and partners.
Both platforms are available as White Label. And to celebrate their release, Serenity.Exchange cuts trading commission from 0.2% to 0.1%. These conditions are valid until December 31st, 2019.
The team also presented a unique smart contract-based blockchain escrow designed to increase trust between traders and brokers both in Forex and cryptocurrency industry.
According to the CTO of Serenity Financial Vasily Alexeev, blockchain technology has been having an increasingly strong influence on financial markets. Alexeev attributes it to the fact that blockchain ensures the security and irreversibility of transactions. He notes that smart contracts automate the processes that had to be conducted manually before: today, even the most conservative banks are starting to replace letters of credit with smart contracts.
“There are governmental organizations that deal with claims in Forex, but they all have a significant drawback: they can’t force Forex brokers to comply with a decision that is not in their favor. If a company refuses to pay, the independent regulator can not influence them. This is a defining feature of Serenity: having predetermined the conditions of a smart contract, the funds will be transferred to the client automatically if their claim is well-founded.
“This is how it works: the money goes to the smart contract and can be transferred only to two parties: the broker or the trader. To withdrawal to take place, both parties have to agree on the receiving party. If a client has a claim, the broker can’t withdraw the funds and vice versa. In such case, Serenity reviews the dispute and approves or rejects the request. At least one party has to agree with this decision, and the funds will be transferred either to the trader or the broker. Another important aspect of such system is that the money can’t be withdrawn by any other party, for example by Serenity, since the blockchain technology doesn’t allow to retroactively change the transaction,” tells Vasily Alexeev.
In May 2019, the Serenity team launched a cryptocurrency exchange that aggregates liquidity from major exchanges. This platform is also available as a White Label.
“Development of the cryptocurrency exchange is one of the most important areas of focus for us. In particular, we are working to merge the personal area of the exchange with Escrow and the partner section. We’re also in the process of developing a loyalty program for all products of our ecosystem,” said Anton Vasin.
Aside from the new developments, the team of Serenity rewarded their colleagues with a giveaway of warm prizes. At the end of each event, the participants who had been most active on social media received branded hoodies, sweatshirts and T-shirts from Serenity. The cozy gifts found their way to those who posted creative selfies at the Serenity booth or shared the project’s news on their Facebook and Instagram pages.
One of the winners in the Serenity social media contest — Vladimir Vinnikov.
The Serenity contest winners wearing their warm gifts.
Serenity Financial provides blockchain solutions for brokers, cryptocurrency traders, and fin-tech start-ups. Interested in a product or a service? Contact us: [email protected]; @Anton_Vasin.
|
https://medium.com/serenity-project/cryptoexchanger-serenity-pay-became-a-bestseller-of-blockchain-life-2019-55176c82b82d
|
['Serenity Financial']
|
2020-02-13 10:03:52.669000+00:00
|
['Margin Trading', 'Blockchain', 'Cryptoexchanger', 'Blockchainlife2019', 'Crypto Exchange']
|
Wound Tears
|
Wound Tears
Let’s start the story the day you met me
Let's start at the beginning where the heart is full of joy
Let’s start, let’s start again
May I ask for another moment
I just want to see your sweet smile
Smile, me. That's what you always show when you're still here
Wounds, tears. That is in exchange for your sudden loss
Do you remember the day you promised I wouldn't leave?
Yes, that is gone forever
Ever since you got in the car, the trip has been headed for death.
When you leave, a wounded heart is left
I was like a soldier who went to war but came home crying
But not as usual
Me, go home with a lost friend
Add to that my wounded heart
When you left me without notice
I cried all night
I cried so hard
By the way, boiled leaves and wine are not the answer
Tears are the most effective medicine for heart wounds
I thought then when you disappeared
Only painful memories will remain
But no, the memories of how happy we were are more painful
I was devastated by the memory we both loved
I was crushed by happy memories
Because we both know you don’t want to lose yet.
But even so, my heart was still bleeding
It formed 3 words i love you"
3 words to heal the wound and wipe away the tears "I love you"
I just want to say that even in the end and you have turned to ashes
You’re the most beautiful
So I can handle even without you
Because I know you won’t be happy when you see me cry because of your memory
I love you.
|
https://medium.com/@rodmar.f.cayabyab/wound-tears-283a4d191e59
|
[]
|
2021-07-15 04:08:44.092000+00:00
|
['Sad', 'Heart', 'Poem', 'Love']
|
TALK ABOUT YOUR STRUGGLES AND MOVE AHEAD OF THEM!
|
With so much progress happening in the general masses, people are endeavoring to accomplish all that they could. The most scandalous confirmation is that: everybody is attempting to guarantee things are going on inside time.
To achieve this, in time check, one may even need to don’t stop for one moment to put the whole of the vitality in basically achieving their” best” thing.
What Could Be The Possible Last Results Of Achieving Things On The Plan, While Losing The Self Of You?
In all likelihood, there will be some hazardous minutes, in the life of a person, who never rests, at any rate, to keep up taking things in charge to finish them. Besides, doing this guarantees people would get into the course toward feeling overwhelmed or maybe drained reliably!
Scarcely Any Last Outcomes Of Living Under The Enormity Of Achieving Things Inside Obliged Time:
Too A Great Deal Of Shock
This is so clear especially about those, who need to join everything. Additionally, in the vehicle of joining things, one loses all ability to scrutinize a compass inside watching guaranteeing, things will get together.
This occasionally even gets the person during the time spent guaranteeing people would get into the path toward being disturbed.
This mix-up is generally on those, who figure; they won’t have the decision to remain mindful of things, as shown by their level and hence, people get into the course toward being anger with their related managers and thusly, they end up without cooking the standard issue! Consider checking out the right sort of anger management counselling.
Not Sure, How To Deal With The Accomplishment Achieved?
There would be times, while the fundamental goal for which the work is been done, is created. By then there is another stage, wherein, people do achieve their goal and at its need, they don’t feel a close to kind of satisfaction.
A comparative thing, they figured, they would understand, when they achieve the goal and this is a kind of uneasiness that must be prompted away. The publicists in west London perceive well in sorting out whatever can go to execute the customary standard of concordance.
Feeling Being Empowered!
There are various cases, wherein, people who work and endeavor to join things, at
that point, wherein they are attempting to get rest from the things, they have been working or trying to be created.
Every so often, it is precarious; to guarantee things would turn out earnestly and in the right way. A lot after things are created, one can consider the right way and various things, there are conditions where people would need to go for, outrage the board advising.
Something people would be so aided and loving, while they consider making things happening, in the right way, with the right things included! In this manner, it is unequivocally proposed, that in any occasion, when things must be administered, in the right time, make it possible, to require some exertion, discover a kind of illuminating or any kind as for advocates in west London for counselling and psychotherapy you are going the right way.
|
https://medium.com/@sustainableempowerment1/talk-about-your-struggles-and-move-ahead-of-them-fc2c2711a20c
|
['Sustainable Empowerment']
|
2020-01-14 13:25:27.649000+00:00
|
['Counselling Services', 'Anger Management', 'Anger', 'Counselling', 'Self Improvement']
|
https://kombackblog.com/fancy-christmas-outfits-for-kids/
|
Komback is a free online marketplace in Nigeria where you sell your goods and services locally for free. Free post Ads.
|
https://medium.com/@kombackng/https-kombackblog-com-fancy-christmas-outfits-for-kids-bf25ffb00a9a
|
[]
|
2020-12-21 01:13:16.217000+00:00
|
['Christmas Gifts', 'Nigeria', 'Christmas', 'Snow', 'Christmas Tree']
|
Lambert Vander Tuig | Introducing Finance in a New Light
|
Lambert Vander Tuig | Introducing Finance in a New Light
There are many people who want to start a new business especially after the global pandemic situation COVID 19. There were many companies who did well even in 2020 but still many ran out of finance. There are many reasons behind the decline and what you can do to raise it up.
There are many professional like Lambert Vander Tuigwho is professional finance master, prefers to go for only suitable finance so that we can repay it back. There are many things that you should know to run a business in uncertainties.
Before you start your new business make sure to plan first according to your budget. The plan is the first thing that makes you a businessman, finance is the second step. Finance is a collection of resources to run a business. Let’s talk about this in detail.
Important Tips Before You Take Financial Service
At very first if we talk about financial services then we should check the source of service or finance. Make sure to avail yourself only the required and a suitable amount of finance so that you can run the business even in uncertainties. You should know that you have to pay a minimum survival cost of business.
There are many people who are doing business through online e-commerce platforms just like this you should also try to do something new and less costly. By doing this you can start your new business in very little time and you can sustain it well.
These days online marketing is not a trend but is inevitable and Imperative due to its global reach. If we talk about finance at the global level then people hire financer or take financial services through online platforms which work best these days.
Before consulting any financer you should tell him your issues, goals, and future openings so that he can understand better. It doesn’t matter if you are taking financial help for a business or for your new home make sure it should be reliable as said by experts like Lambert Vander Tuig.
In The End: Hope you understood and consider using these things while taking any financial services for any reason. If you are worried about your budget and you should go for less cost business like online marketing, marketing through social media, and in the future, you can also grow your business offline.
|
https://medium.com/@lambertvandertuig/lambert-vander-tuig-introducing-finance-in-a-new-light-848f8a7e5998
|
['Lambert Vander Tuig']
|
2020-12-28 04:54:15.836000+00:00
|
['Land Developer', 'Lambert Vander Tuig', 'Texas', 'Frisco', 'Finance']
|
Context limitations when imitating Redux in web-app
|
4.Context Performance
The most important bit to understand about Context is that it will re-render all components that are descendants of the context provider, whether or not they consume the context when a state change happens. The only exception to this rule is when the context provider’s children do not change and only the components that consume the context will re-render. This is the main reason we pass the children prop to components that provide a context instead of creating components inside them (Please read James Nelson blog post on avoiding unnecessary Context renders).
The bottom line is that we end up with components that are re-rendered, even though they may have not changed, whereas we would ideally want to re-render only those to which changes did occur. At least that’s the case with Redux when used in accord with library guidelines and practices.
The best strategy to reduce unnecessary re-renders is to split the context into other contexts (or create new ones from scratch). A strong case to do so is when:
Part of the state changes frequently and we want to isolate it.
Components are only interested to consume a part of the application state.
Part of the state changes infrequently and components may consume both the part and the whole state.
To carefully demonstrate the scenarios when we might want to split the context, let’s first describe a common page of our application. We have the fridge page which at the page header has a form that saves the ingredients and a fridge ingredients list as page body. Moreover, when a user successfully deletes a fridge ingredient it displays a notification message saying “Fridge ingredient was successfully deleted.”
Deleting a fridge ingredient
We can gain slightly better performance by trying to reduce unnecessary re-renders whenever a notification happens.
Currently, when a user completes an action that displays a notification the entire page is re-rendered twice — once upon the addition of notification on the screen and again on its removal. Splitting the notifications substate from the store context state falls into the scenario of isolating the frequent changes (an overwhelming number of user actions issue a notification) and where the components are interested to consume only the part of the state.
As we did with StoreContextProvider , we’ll implement the NotificationContextProvider component.
NotificationContextProvider component
Our Root component will create all context providers. We have removed the notifications reducer from appReducer and instead we pass it as a prop value to the newly created NotificationContextProvider component.
Root component with store and notification contexts
Finally, the NotificationToast component (which is responsible for managing notifications) will solely consume the notification context state and its dispatcher function, which we named “notify.”
NotificatonToast component after creating notification state and update contexts
Now, whenever a component will dispatch a notification it will re-render only the NotificationToast component and not the whole application.
Using React dev profiler to record delete fridge ingredient action
Using React dev profiler to record our action we can see that when the notification happens only the NotificationToast component is affected (please look at the third and fourth render from the recorded session of profiler). Thus, not only did we improve our application performance (this comes with a maintainability cost which we will see in the next section) but more importantly we’ve re-rendered only the components that have changed (this applies for NotificationToast component only).
We will only discuss the case when substate changes are infrequent and components may consume state from both the part and the whole application state. It’s becoming increasingly common practice for applications to have a theme where a user selects his application view preference. This part of the state is not supposed to change often. As a result, we can split the theme state and its dispatch function into separate contexts. Components will be interested to consume both the theme context and store context provider but because theme state changes are infrequent, in this case, we will not be bothered with components’ unnecessary re-renders (another similar scenario is user authentication).
|
https://betterprogramming.pub/context-limitations-when-emulating-redux-in-a-small-to-medium-size-application-acd05ef882e4
|
['Lumbardh Agaj']
|
2020-03-20 16:37:18.222000+00:00
|
['JavaScript', 'React', 'React Context', 'Programming', 'Redux']
|
Is Self Love necessary to have a healthy relationship?
|
What do you think is necessary to have a healthy relationship?
I guess all the people, in the end, look for a relationship where there is open, honest, and safe communication. Support for each other and having a healthy relationship boundary where there is mutual respect. Any healthy relationship is built on trust and intimacy. But, above all the “self” plays the most important role. Self-love is something that is the most necessary aspect of any kind of relationship. Everything, in the end, leads to Self-love.
What is Self Love?
More or less self-love is the form of giving yourself high regard and priority in terms of your own well-being and happiness. It is about taking care of your own needs and putting your self-respect in check.
Acceptance is the key over here, accepting even the weakness and loving yourself the same way is the pure form of self-love. It is about creating a guard where you protect yourself from the world’s harshness. Making sure that you don’t lure for temporary happiness but also look beyond that.
Self Love is not about the cliche like, “Oh, my God! I love myself and I am my favorite.” It’s more about acceptance. Accepting the flaws and weakness in you and embracing it at utmost grace as you embrace your strengths. It’s about calling out for the toxic traits in you and working towards a change. It’s about the complex self and everything that made you, you.
What Self-love brings out in a relationship?
We tend to act in a certain way to make our significant others love us. We want to become this attractive person to try and impress them. One way or the other, in this we move towards what we are not.
Maybe, in the end, the pressure of becoming someone else to gain love will burst out. Then will the relationship sustain? What if I tell you that to get into a healthy relationship, all you need to do is love yourself? Eventually, loving yourself will help you in dealing with your insecurities with respect to significant others.
It will create a secure relationship where the insecurities won’t be rooted deep down. When people see the way you treat yourself, they will tend to treat you the same way. They see how you have created boundaries and standards for yourself and tend to automatically provide you with that.
By loving yourself, you won’t have tolerance for the people who can’t help you grow or make you feel good.
Self-love is the reflection of yourself and how that could be reflected in your significant other. The perfect example of it is the “empty glass”, you can’t pour from an empty glass. So, unless and until you love yourself you can’t love the other person.
Generally, in a relationship, people are co-dependent on each other a lot which eventually leads to toxicity in the relationship. When you love yourself wholly, the independency factor comes in which leads to a partnership. If you lack in this aspect, certain fears and questions can take a toll on you.
What if the person leaves me or doesn’t love me anymore? What am I supposed to do without them?
With self-love comes self-respect and self-confidence to deal with these uncertainties. A relationship should not be of giving your all to the other person but of respecting and supporting each other that can come only when both the people are fully contempt by themselves and don’t depend on each other for their needs.
What can be done to make it simple?
There are simple ways by which you could practice self-love:
Positive Self Talk
Make a “To Feel” list instead of the “To Do” list
Detox from Technology and Work before Bed
Tidy up your room
Start your day with something you enjoy
The path to self-love is not easy but it isn’t impossible. Make self-care a part of your routine and see the wonders that it will bring into your life.
Self- love is sitting with your emotions and dark sides within you, accepting your real self and looking back at your demons into the eyes and telling them that “I’m better than this.”
It’s a constant process of forgiving and forget not just yourself but to others too that caused you pain and hurt.
|
https://medium.com/@selffirst/is-self-love-necessary-to-have-a-healthy-relationship-f72bfdc904a7
|
['Self First']
|
2020-12-27 07:47:41.441000+00:00
|
['Self Care', 'Relationships', 'Happy', 'Self Love']
|
Laptop diagnostic tools to improve your laptop health
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What is computer diagnostic tool ?
In order to effectively diagnose Computer Problems you can run PC and Laptop diagnostics software.
Laptop diagnostic tool
One of the differences between PC and Laptop Diagnostics is that often laptop manufacturers provide pre-installed diagnostic tools.
What is the function of Laptop diagnostic tool.
All laptops slow down over time so we’ve put together a list of tools that will help you find out what exactly is causing the problem.Laptop diagnostics tools are pieces of software that give you the knowledge you need to be able to potentially repair your own laptop.these tools are developed by some third party developers and also by a laptop brand.
A good laptop diagnostic program can performs lays out a few tests on different hardware segments of your laptops. Analytic devices test parts, for example, CPU, Memory, Hard Drive, Optical Drive and Graphics Cards among others. After these tests are finished, the symptomatic instrument will create a report with the aftereffects of the tests. This report will give you whether the parts tried are alright or on the off chance that they have an issue that should be taken a gander at.
Five best laptop diagnostic tools today.
There are 1000 of diagnostic software’s are available in the market today here we only watch best of them now available in market .
Windows performance monitor Windows resource monitor Open hardware monitor Speccy Hd tune
Benefits of laptop diagnostic program
On the off chance that something turns out badly with your laptop, you might be slanted to promptly send the laptop to the retailer where it was acquired or even to the producer. Demonstrative devices can help recognize the issue, and if the goals is straightforward and moderate, it might be valuable to utilize a Computer Professional to determine the issue inside a day or two, rather than hanging tight a little while for Warranty Repairs to be completed by the retailer or producer (Check your laptop is secured by Warranty).
It feels like your laptop just stops in the most significant assignments, isn’t that right? On the off chance that your PC has eased back to a close creep — or become freezing completely — here’s the means by which to recoup from the issue, and keep it from later on. and after that you should reboot your laptop if the problem is not get fixed visit our blogs and follow the instruction laptop service center Chennai that will help you more to solve your problem.
Otherwise if you looking for a laptop service center Chennai .I will suggest Raminfotech for best laptop service at affordable price and by a well knowledge technicians helps you for solving problem on short period of time .
One of the best laptop service center in Chennai since 2000 with 8 branches around the Chennai and India provide best laptop service and data recovery service in Chennai.
|
https://medium.com/@raminfotechambattur6/laptop-diagnostic-tools-to-improve-your-laptop-health-60f2d244665a
|
['Axz Z']
|
2019-12-17 10:04:18.177000+00:00
|
['Computer', 'Diagnostic Testing', 'Laptop']
|
MongoDB Europe 2017: Stitched together
|
The talks
I attended a few talks, one a pretty gritty talk on MongoDB storage and how the amount of collections in 3.6 have been extended from about 100,000 max to up to 800,000 with some memory and cache handle tweaks (at a very high level). Brilliant for systems that use temporal collections where you rollover from collection to collection based on time or day.
The standout for me was a talk by Marco Bonezzi of MongoDB, about how to manage persistent storage with MongoDB in a containerised environment using Docker and Kubernetes. It was fantastic to be shown that your database can so easily remain highly available even with containers by nature being easily disposed of, and that even playing nicely with mongo elections within the replica set. All without any loss of service. The use of StatefulSet in Kubernetes is what it was born for, I highly recommend you give it a watch.
You can find his talk here, which has already been given at MongoDB World 2017.
Impressions
The usual fare of free t-shirts, hoodies and stickers (I envisage my laptop having a skin made purely of stickers eventually) was of course there. Unfortunately a slightly sour note was the size of the venue I believe was not suitable for the amount of people that turned up, with 3 ‘shards’ (read ‘rooms’) being massively smaller than the the first, resulting in full rooms not allowing people in to see the talks they had turned up to see. Combined with two agenda changes in one day, needless to say some people were quite irritated. They missed talks, or in the first instance were made to wait because the speaker himself didn’t know he was supposed to have arrived and started.
What I did experience was good, however a lack of polish and in my opinion too many breaks marred what could have been an excellent day. The new stuff MongoDB had to show was top-notch, but the venue I believe was not fit for the purpose.
Many thanks again to Compare the Market for funding my trip to the conference, it’s been fantastic to see the forefront of industry standard development and learn from some of the best minds in the business.
|
https://medium.com/comparethemarket/mongodb-europe-2017-stitched-together-940e3d43ee50
|
['Daniel Hilton']
|
2018-03-02 09:42:30.669000+00:00
|
['Tech', 'Mongodb', 'Software Engineering', 'Conference', 'Software Development']
|
XinFin Partners With AiX, A Leading AI Trading Platform Backed By Major Regulated Financial Institutions
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XinFin Partners With AiX, A Leading AI Trading Platform Backed By Major Regulated Financial Institutions
XinFin will provide the live beta environment for pilot testing the creation, trading, and integration of tokenized bonds.
XinFin Network, an open source enterprise-friendly hybrid blockchain platform has partnered with London-based AiX, a leading AI Trading Platform backed by a FINRA-registered Wall Street Brokerage Firm. AiX has a team of experienced inter-dealer brokers holding FINRA Series 7, 63, 55 and 24 designations in the US in addition to FCA registrations in the UK.
As a part of this partnership, XinFin will extend its platform and technology to AiX for the creation and trading of tokenized digital bonds. The AiX platform will leverage XinFin TestNet simulation for demonstration and integration of tokenized bonds. XinFin will provide continuous support to the AiX team for this simulation and integration of the project through to commercial production by deploying XinFin Public Network masternodes on TestNet that recently went live.
URL: http://xinfin.network/#stats
XinFin Public Network is an EVM compliant public network with KYC enforced masternodes with randomized Delegated Proof of Stake consensus that achieves decentralization with high throughput. The Hybrid architecture ensures the privacy of sensitive data and transaction information is operated in the private network while a limited set of data and transactions can be relayed on the XinFin Public Network.
Digital Bond Creation
Digital Bond Creation PoC link is available at https://www.tradefinex.org/publicv/bond_create
The global infrastructure gap is projected to be $15 trillion by 2040 and XinFin’s focus is to bridge this gap by providing liquidity access to global institutional investors through investments in critical physical infrastructure projects including power, water, and transportation.
URL: https://www.tradefinex.org/
Sharing his excitement on formalizing AiX and XinFin collaboration, Joseph Appalsamy, Head of Business Development said, “We look forward to this exciting collaboration with AiX as we team up to help bridge the global infrastructure gap by delivering innovatively regulated infra asset and instrument tokenization trading and market making to unlock liquidity.”
AiX will help XinFin in new market making and secondary trading of digital infrastructure bonds through tokenization of IAC (Infrastructure as an Asset Class) and matching of price-points, risk and return profiles.
AiX will extend its latest technological tools and platform to XinFin for newer/secondary markets generation and for integration with XinFin TestNet. AiX will connect syndicate leads led by market makers, dealers, brokers, banks and institutional investors over their AI trading platform. XinFin will use AiX platform for OTC Trading and will get continuous support from AiX technology and hybrid institutional broking team.
Jos Evans, CEO, AiX said, “AiX is thrilled to be a part of this brave new world in finance. We are firm believers in the future of the security token ecosystem and will work tirelessly with the XinFin team to ensure the best execution for these new products by using our unique AI broker service to source liquidity globally.”
About AiX:
AiX platform uses AI to connect traders across Financial Markets. AiX provides instant, trader-to-trader interaction, removing the need for inter-dealer-brokerage through groundbreaking AI. Underpinned by award-winning cognitive reasoning technology and the power of blockchain technology, AiX connects traders across markets and provides unprecedented insight and control. AiX makes trading simpler, smoother and more secure, boosting profits in the process. AiX team of experienced inter-dealer brokers hold FINRA Series 7, 63, 55 and 24 designations in the US and FCA registered in the UK. Ombrello Solutions is a trading name of Arian Financial LLP [FCA registration number 415230] — an established London based Inter-Dealer Broker which has been providing liquidity across all asset classes, in the Institutional market for 18 years.
Website: https://aixtrade.com/
About XinFin Network:
XinFin is an open source Hybrid Blockchain protocol initiated out of Singapore. XinFin Network[XDCE] is a utility network that lets enterprises deploy real-world applications on the Hybrid Blockchain Protocol in a conducive, compliant, and regulation-friendly environment for diverse use cases in trade, finance, remittance, supply chain, healthcare, and other industrial areas to improve business efficiency. The XDC Dev Environment encourages developers to build DAPPs using smart contracts. The XinFin community derives its success from the ecosystem comprising of developers, network utility, and long-term backers.
Website: https://www.xinfin.org/
Slack: https://launchpass.com/xinfin-public
Telegram: https://t.me/joinchat/IDjEOEUaNJNpbeM-c1YtZw
Twitter: https://twitter.com/XinFin_Official
Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/company/xinfin/
Subscribe to the XinFin Community Newsletter by clicking here.
|
https://medium.com/xinfin/xinfin-partners-with-aix-a-leading-ai-trading-platform-backed-by-major-regulated-financial-c670ef1eba87
|
['Xinfin Xdc Hybrid Blockchain Network']
|
2019-04-05 16:45:16.934000+00:00
|
['Finance', 'Technology', 'Blockchain Technology', 'Blockchain', 'Trading']
|
Formation Beta Testing is now live!
|
We’re launching Formation beta testing tomorrow!
( 9th of June 0:00 (UTC+0)）
Our goals are to:
Allow the community to familiarize themselves with the product and its usage Identify any bug, glitch, typo and areas of improvements Receive feedback and suggestions on the overall incentive and structural design
We’ve allocated 10,000 NAOS tokens for the top contributors in a two week testing period. The rules are as follows:
1 )We’ll airdrop 250 NAOS tokens to each of the 10 lucky participants who completed ALL of the following tasks:
a ) Retweet & Like the Beta Testing Thread on Twitter
b ) Join our Discord community
c ) Join our Telegram community
d )Claim mock DAI and NAOS tokens from the Faucet
e ) Deposit mock DAI into Vault
f ) Borrow mock nUSD from Vault
g )Stake mock nUSD in Transmuter
h )Stake mock nUSD in Staking Pool
i ) Provide liquidity in the mock NAOS:ETH pool in Uniswap
j ) Stake mock NAOS:ETH LP token in the LP pool
k )Claim mock NAOS rewards from any one of the pools
l ) Repay all or part of the mock nUSD debt
m )Withdraw the deposited mock DAI
2 ) We’ll airdrop 1,500 NAOS tokens to each of the top 3 bug finders, the severity assessment will be based on the Immunefi Severity Classification System.
3 ) We’ll airdrop 1,000 NAOS tokens to the top 3 suggestions on user experience improvement, measured by the number of suggestions that the team actually uses to improve the product
Note: if multiple participants submitted the same bug finding or user experience improvement suggestion, priority will be given to those with more specific explanations/solutions!
Bug finding and improvement suggestions to be submitted here:
https://forms.gle/Z7MaHXNXgE1FEshN8
|
https://medium.com/naos-finance/formation-beta-testing-is-now-live-4c53d7633cea
|
['Darren Goh']
|
2021-06-08 14:57:43.924000+00:00
|
['Announcements', 'Naos Finance', 'Ethereum', 'Defi', 'Bug Bounty']
|
Do You Think Taylor Swift Uses Grammarly?
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Know Your Strengths
I get in trouble when I try to emulate the above-referenced greats who I obsess over. It’s one thing to take inspiration from them. It’s entirely another to try to write like them. First of all, this isn’t songwriting. But, even if it is was, I’m never going to come up with the type of lyrics I love on a consistent basis, if at all.
When I first started writing, and for a period of time thereafter, I tried getting too cute with my writing. I tried treating articles like lyrics. It didn’t work. What did work was being straightforward. Not getting too fancy. Just saying what I need to say to provide an explanation, make a point, or develop an opinion in the most conversational way possible.
When I started doing that, readers responded. They started saying nice things to me. I often get “you have a way with words.” I’m hyper-critical of myself. I expect everyone to tell me I suck. I like very little of what I write (which is probably why I obsess over it more than I need to). So I don’t expect compliments.
The last one I ever expected to receive, repeatedly, is “you have a way with words.” I’m used to that compliment. I appreciate it as much as ever. In fact, it keeps me on track. It gets me from trying to be something, or someone, I’m not.
I am not a great creative writer. I’m not going to weave metaphor and imagery like Elliott Smith. I simply lack the ability to do that, let alone do it well enough times to make a living at it. But I think I do an okay job writing the way I talk, in real life. Or close to it. And that’s why I have mixed feelings about Grammarly.
I use it like any other tool. I don’t use it often. But, when I do, I pick and choose the changes I accept and reject. I do the same in Google Docs or when I’m spell- or grammar-checking a text or email (yes, I do that).
I do the same with Medium articles that provide writing suggestions (including the ones I write). They’re just that, suggestions. Sometimes I break my own rules. Because they’re not rules. They’re guidelines. There’s a time and place to follow or not follow them.
To be the best writer I can be, two things have to happen:
I have to keep it conversational.
I have to keep it flowing, rhythm, cadence, whatever you want to call it.
To even come close to achieving both objectives, I work super freaking hard. I agonize over every syllable. Then I agonize again because I fear the reader won’t believe I actually agonized over this.
This approach returns me full circle. In terms of the general process, I’m not all that different from Downie, Petty, Smith, Springsteen, and Swift. Neither are you. We all agonize. We all obsess. We just do it over the style of writing that best suits us. Or we do it on the path to finding the writing style gives us the most bang for our narrative (and writing hustle) buck.
Ultimately, the best quality a writer can have might be the willingness to try new things, experiment, and keep an open mind at the same time as knowing and staying in his or her lane. It’s the dance and challenge that makes writing for a living so fresh and exciting, day in and day out.
|
https://bettermarketing.pub/do-you-think-taylor-swift-uses-grammarly-14eb8d1383fb
|
['Rocco Pendola']
|
2020-09-02 21:54:29.312000+00:00
|
['Writing', 'Music', 'Creativity', 'Lyrics', 'Productivity']
|
Eat! Drink! Be gluttonous!
|
The rollercoaster that is loving my body and eating whatever the fuck I want.
A huge obstacle that I found while on the road towards total self love, was body love. More times than not I didn’t find my body attractive unless I was looking at old pictures where I was 20 pounds lighter. My jawline more defined, my tummy tighter, and my arms thin. I write that in the past tense, however, I want you to know that I still have these moments where I am completely sadden by the skin I am in.
I think of the jean imprints on thighs after I peel them off after work. I think of how heavy my stomach bloat makes me look in dresses I once wore with ease.
I think about not eating for only a few days so I can shed off the excess pounds. Just a few days of discomfort and you’ll fit into your favorite pants again. Well, and headaches. And remember, you get nauseous when you get headaches. Also don’t think you’re going to be getting a lot done when you feel like crap. This conversation happens in my head every other week or so. I try reign myself back with ‘You’re beautiful and sexy you idiot wtf are you blind?’ and ‘If ANYONE thinks of you as less than gorgeous they’re actual fuckwats.’ Lmao honestly, I’m so good to myself. I appreciate me.
It’s really fucked how much I hold value to my weight even though I am so openly and blatantly against doing that. It has some hold — I’m not quite sure how to explain it. And I know there are outrageous beauty standards that are outright bullshit. However I still, when in my lowest moments, use those standards as comparisons. I compare myself to what ‘society’ considers beautiful knowing good and well that I will be miserable doing so. Is it years of internalized self loathing because I have not met those standards? Perhaps. All I know is that it’s very harmful.
I recently gained 10 pounds in the last few months. I noticed when these pants I wore alllllll the time just one day wouldn’t button at all. I looked in the mirror and noticed that my face was rounder, my upper arms wider and my tummy pooch grew more into a pouch. My heart sank. I just gained 15 pounds last year! How could this be happening again? I was upset and sad about my body. Think about how fucked up that is for a moment. I was upset and sad with the only thing that has never given up on me.The thing that has literally been around forever for me. The thing that is mine and mine alone. My body is not only my ultimate protector, she’s comfort place. She’s my home.
Whatever I have internalized either consciously or subconsciously, growing up or now has really warped my views about myself. It is these negative and harmful views that I’m trying to breakdown and throw away. The support of friends and family and partners is of course so important. Don’t stop complimenting people! A small compliment, a positive word here will really make someone’s day. Whether they are dealing with a recent weight gain or they have body dysmorphia.
Also, I really really love food? I shouldn’t be ashamed of wanting to eat and enjoying what I eat. Food to me is so many different things. It can be an experience, a place of comfort, and just down right that one thing you’ve been craving all day. Food is such an important part of my life, so why would I try to rid myself of it?
I’ve been trying to work through my feelings about my recent weight gain. I give myself words of validation and affirmation daily. From ‘You’re a fine ass bitch with some nice tits.’ to ‘You’re seriously so funny and genuinely nice like are you kidding me?’ Validating other aspects that I like about myself is very helpful and really makes me feel good. However, validating and accepting and loving parts that I don’t like about myself is even better. That’s the hardest part — looking in a mirror at your imperfections and telling yourself that they’re an important of you, which is perfect.
It’s really a battle with yourself when it shouldn’t be. So screw those standards that make me feel small. Screw them making me feel like I’m on the outside looking in. That I’m detached from something that I should be so close to. I’m going to eat whatever I want and when I want because I deserve it. And I’m going to look good as hell doing it. :-*
|
https://medium.com/@rxybtr/eat-drink-be-gluttonous-2bcff888ec18
|
['Roxy Bitere']
|
2019-03-13 09:53:30.855000+00:00
|
['Health', 'Body Positive']
|
Why is The Surface of the Moon Rusting?
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Rust on the Moon shouldn’t be possible, but there it is — so how did it form? Actually, Earth may be to blame.
Rust on the Moon discovered by the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft orbiting our planetary companion suggests complex interactions between the Sun, Earth, and Moon. With little water or oxygen, iron oxide (rust) still formed in the harsh environment of the lunar surface, detected within hematite deposits recorded by the lunar orbiter more than a decade ago.
Hematite is created on Earth from the interactions of oxygen and water on iron deposits. However, with water in short supply on the Moon (except inside craters at the poles) and a scarcity of oxygen, researchers are puzzled how the mineral may have formed.
Deposits of water ice are seen in blue in this map produced by the Chandrayaan-1 mission more than a decade ago. Image credit: ISRO/NASA/JPL-Caltech/Brown Univ./USGS
The Moon Mineralogy Mapper instrument (M3) onboard the lunar orbiter found telltale signs of hematite, which should not exist in the arid environment on the Moon. The distinctive red color of Mars is a result of iron oxide (rust) on its surface. However, Mars was once a water world — unlike the Moon.
“At first, I totally didn’t believe it. It shouldn’t exist based on the conditions present on the Moon. But since we discovered water on the Moon, people have been speculating that there could be a greater variety of minerals than we realize if that water had reacted with rocks,” Abigail Fraeman of Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) stated.
|
https://medium.com/the-cosmic-companion/why-is-the-surface-of-the-moon-rusting-310ac6a64d37
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['James Maynard']
|
2020-09-03 23:44:23.105000+00:00
|
['Space', 'Moon', 'Science', 'Chemistry', 'Earth']
|
Digital Currency Index and Index Tokens
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What are index and index tokens?
Traditional Indexes
In the traditional financial industry, “index” usually refers to equity indexes that include a variety shares. It is data reflecting the comprehensive value of a given market and is often used to represent a group of stocks. Examples would be stocks trading on the same exchange, belonging to the same industry, or having the same market value. Many indexes serve as benchmarks for performance reviews by newspapers and journals.
In the traditional financial industry, indexes are mainly used to evaluate the performance of a given market. Several derivative products including index funds, exchange-traded funds (ETF), stock index futures and stock index options also exist.
Digital Currency Indexes
Similar to the stock market, the digital currency industry also needs indexes to weigh the overall performance of the digital currency market. At the same time, it can enrich the profession of digital currency’s trading products, increasing overall fluidity.
Index token characteristics
Because index tokens do not have actual functionality, but used for investment standards, as it is used to reflect a degree of overall market price, it is recommended as Security Token.
Factors that decide an index
Index values are decided by the weighted average value of multiple tokens.
Sampling: Choosing representative constituents from a source of many different tokens
Weighing: Weighing average or not according to a single value or total value
Calculation: What is the average, value of consideration, and total
Calculation
Calculation of average = (P1+P2+P3+…+Pn)/n (Dow Jones Stock Average)
Calculation of weighted average = (P1*Q1+P2*Q2+P3*Q3+…+Pn*Qn)/(Q1+Q2+Q3+…) Q being the weighted number, decided by the relative importance of the token
Currently, most digital currency indexes use this method of calculation. JEX, OKEX, HUOBI, BINANCE use different methods.
Product Categories
Here, we will separate digital currency indexes into centralized indexes and decentralized indexes. Centralized indexes will include exchange indexes, trend indexes, and ETF-type index derivatives; decentralized indexes are index tokens which have ETF function and are freely traded. The difference between centralized and decentralized indexes is in that the two have different staking and generation mechanisms. Because decentralized exchanges’ value-transfer needs tokens as a medium, at the same time making convenience for index tokens to flow between different platforms, thus index tokens came to be.
Centralized Indexes
Description: An index tailored in reference to the traits of the traditional financial industry and the digital currency industry that meets the laws of the digital currency trading market. Often used to directly reflect the market price, and used as a base for related financial derivatives.
Exchange Indexes
HuoBi Index (https://www.huobi.com/huobi_index/)
OK06 Index (https://www.okex.com/futureTrade/futureIndex?currencyId=10002&type=1&name=OKX)
Market Trend Index
Global Blockchain Index (GBI) (http://gbi.inblockchain.com/gbi_method)
A weighted average index calculated using 17 mainstream digital currencies.
Coinlist Index
Coinlist 25 Index: 25 mainstream digital tokens, not including BTC, LTC, etc. monetary tokens
Coinlist 50 Index: 50 mainstream digital tokens, not including BTC, LTC, etc. monetary tokens
TokenInsight General Platform Index
TokenInsight Index
This component index is a reflection of the overall performance of the blockchain industry. Comprised of 30 token projects that are major, fluid, and are transferable on many exchanges. At the same time, the component projects need to have a rating of CCC or higher on the Token Insight rating system.
TokenInsight General Platform Index
This component index is a reflection of the overall performance of the multi-use general public chain projects in the blockchain industry. Abbreviated as “TIG index”, it is composed of 10 general public chain projects that are major, fluid, and are transferable on many exchanges. At the same time, the component projects need to have a rating of CCC or higher on the Token Insight rating system.
ChaiNext Scale Index 100
Comprised of 100 tokens that are the biggest, most fluid on the market. Comprehensively reflect the token market’s overall price trends.
Index Derivatives
Others
Trends are rated 0–100, 0 being extreme fear; 100 being extreme greed.
Created by ChaiNext according to Metcalfe’s law and other theories. The degree of the bubble of the current market is calculated by the number of active trading addresses and the public chain’s reasonable price. Trends are rated 0–100, 0 being a total underestimate; 100 being a total bubble; 50 being a reasonable valuation.
Decentralized Index Tokens
Decentralized index tokens are tokens with index value which are generated through smart contracts. Tokens go through the process of staking generation, trade, and conversion, a total of three steps.
Tokensets
EthereumX (Top 10 ERC20 token of May 2018)
StableSet (Stable Coin index, DAI, TUSD)
DEXSet (Mainstream DEX platform token, ZRX, KNC, AST)
Crypto 20 Index
Top 20 most valuable mainstream digital currencies
Business Model of Index and Index Tokens
Market Roles of different Indexes
Index of mainstream digital currency on an exchange
Reflect overall market trends
Expand the influence of platform tokens on the market
Establish a foundation for multi-dimensional development in the future
2. Market Trends Index
Reflect overall market trends
Index provider provides other professional financial services
3. Index Derivatives
ETF Trading Index
Futures trading
4. Index Tokens
Index token trading
Arbitrage
5. Others
Reflect market mood
Provide market moods for traders to reference
Index Token Models
Token Generation
The generation of tokens is separated into two categories, centralized staking and decentralized staking. The centralized staking process is through the index token issuer guaranteeing the stake, and selling the index tokens to outside buyers; the decentralized staking process is completely dependent on users actively initiating it, the total count of index tokens is dependent on the amount of stake guaranteed by the user.
Token Trading
Tokens received from conversion can be freely traded in exchanges. Because of market fluctuations, index token prices will fluctuate near the staked objects’ prices. The price difference will encourage trades to conduct trades involving index tokens.
Token Conversion
When an index token user wants to lock-in profits, they will convert the index tokens to equivalent index tokens according to index weights. The conversion process is actualized through smart contracts.
Index Token Market Size and Demand Analysis
Index token conversion data
From the exchanging of index tokens and addresses holding index tokens, we can presume that as of now, the safer method of decentralized index token model is not popular yet. Users favor traditional index trading. Decentralized index tokens have a lot of potential, but requires more knowledge to be commonly known among digital currency traders.
Technical Implementation of Index Tokens
Description: The implementation of index token is focused on the generation and conversion of index tokens. Decentralized index tokens are mainly implemented by smart contracts. As cross-chain technology becomes more common, it will enrich the types of stakes guaranteed in decentralized index tokens.
Understanding the contract implementation of index tokens through Tokensets:
Staking
A user sends the staking tokens to the contract address, and at the same time, the contract generates index tokens and sends them to the user’s address.
Conversion
A user initiates a transaction with the contract and transfers an ERC-20 (ETH-5–18) token to the burn address. The user will receive the corresponding staking tokens through the contract address.
The Prospects of Index and Index Token
Index Token
Currently, decentralized exchanges have become the main competitive field for many mainstream centralized exchanges. Binance will release a decentralized, public chain exchange at the beginning of next year; they have also acquired Trust, a decentralized wallet. Coinbase has already acquired Toshi, also a decentralized wallet. BitFinex also has plans for a decentralized exchange.
As decentralized exchanges become more popular, users become more demanding in terms of the safety of assets, fluidity, and diversifying transactions. The introduction of index tokens will break the staking-object prices, which is hard to anchor. Because index tokens have the characteristics of tokens, it will also largely increase the fluidity and diverse the variety of index tokens.
As the battle of digital currency exchanges unfolds, there is a high possibility of an exchange acquiring the rights to prepare and calculate index tokens. The right to staking tokens is shared between platforms and users; centralized and decentralized coexisting beside one another.
Index Related Derivatives
Futures, Options
Currently, the digital currency futures market is relatively matured, but there has not been a futures or options product for indexes. The main reason is that there isn’t an index with a stable authority to support a market for futures and options. As the digital currency market and surrounding technologies become more complete, index futures and index options will definitely have a large share in the future digital currency market.
Index Fund
Because stock index funds are a very mature product in the traditional financial market, it becomes a viable path for the future digital currency market. But because the current digital currency regulatory compliance is immature, digital currency index funds are still experiencing a level of resistance.
FAQ
Why are index tokens needed if ETF can meet trading needs?
The value-transfer needs of decentralized exchanges require tokens as a transmission medium, at the same time, it helps index tokens to flow between different exchanges.
Why do indexes have centralized and decentralized characteristics?
The difference comes from the distributor. The centralized index distributor is an independent entity. The preparation, calculation, and distribution of the index are all completed by the distributor. Decentralized indexes have their preparation and calculation completed by the index regulator, the distribution process can be done by any third party entities.
What are the essential differences between index and index tokens/ETF?
Indexes are only used as the overall performance of the market, meaning they don’t have actual value. Index tokens/ETF have value because they are staked and guaranteed by objects with actual value, therefore, they have actual value by implication.
In the current market, what are some index derivatives that can be traded?
The current market, as of now, only have market trends type indexes that can be traded. There are not index related futures or other derivatives.
Reference:
[EthereumX_Etherscan] https://etherscan.io/token/0xfa10e13fe555760a5297dc14eb6562a1a53e4e37
[StableSet_Etherscan] https://etherscan.io/token/0x02ec0c9e6d3c08b8fb12fec51ccba048afbc36a6
[DEXSet]
https://etherscan.io/token/0xf860f90e1f55e3528682e18850612cbb45bbf1bc
[Wiki Stock Price Index]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stock_market_index
|
https://medium.com/dex-top/digital-currency-index-and-index-tokens-3c699d5b8c45
|
['Ace Hurtling']
|
2018-10-19 03:44:38.571000+00:00
|
['Research Reports', 'Token', 'Index', 'Blockchain', 'Ethereum']
|
About Me — Mindy Morgan Avitia. Imposter Syndrome and all
|
About Me — Mindy Morgan Avitia
Imposter Syndrome and all
Why is it so damn hard to write about myself?
Probably because I care too much what you think.
I’ve been writing stories since I can remember. In elementary school, my favorite assignment was always the writing prompt. When the teacher would put up the wacky hand-drawn transparency on the projector, my little mind would wander into all the different stories that could come out of one simple drawing.
Stories — and more importantly — storytelling has always interested me. Sometimes to a fault, as a memoirist and essayist, I’m regularly searching for the arc in my life that is interesting for the reader. Sometimes I have to admit to myself there is no arc and I have to pivot to fiction.
That’s the fun about writing though, isn’t it?
I’m a born and raised pizza-and-bagel-loving Jersey Girl with an art school degree who is spending her second-third of life in Austin, Texas with my husband and 3-month-old daughter, Olive. The journey into motherhood has been profound for me, so lately I write a lot about it. Particularly motherhood and the intersection of feminism and activism and race. I find a lot of confidence and agency in mothering that I only wish could transpire into my writing.
I suffer from perpetual imposter syndrome. While I’ve always dreamed of being a writer, and write frequently, I never feel comfortable actually declaring myself a writer. Anyone relate?
But I’m learning that’s all a crock of shit and confidently declaring oneself is more telling of our identities than the amount of income we get.
Income is nice, though.
For actual income, I freelance by offering marketing and communications for small businesses and nonprofit organizations. Though, since the birth of our daughter, I’ve had a real reckoning and existential crisis on my career path. I always pictured myself a working mom in a power-pantsuit and now I feel content and empowered wearing maternity leggings and working on things I’m passionate about and bring me joy.
Taking “time for myself” is challenging but it’s also exciting. When I actually slow down and allow myself to be me I’m learning what I’m truly passionate about vs. what I think I ought to do. I’m privileged that I am able to take this time, especially in such a shit year. But I’m confident it will yield my authentic self to shine.
Follow Along to Read My Stories About:
Provocative motherhood and family life stories
Race and Social Justice
Feminism
Vulnerability
And randomly, sometimes marketing trends
I also am the editor of The Audacity Project, a publication that features bold stories of truth, justice, family, and life as shared by the lived experience and truths of our writers. I’d love for you to become our next writer!
|
https://medium.com/about-me-stories/about-me-mindy-morgan-avitia-76c5d77976dd
|
['Mindy Morgan Avitia']
|
2020-12-18 16:42:53.584000+00:00
|
['Motherhood', 'Feminism', 'Biography', 'Life', 'About Me']
|
Relaunching in 2021 : Reestablish Vision
|
As I’ve been reflecting on how we may relaunch and reestablish things in our church in 2021 I started to think about how we launched our church ten years ago and realized that the common strategies used in church planting might be exactly what we need to move into the uncertainty toward the imagined future God’s laid on our heart. My last post was about calling, today I want to talk about vision.
Since I started out by referring to Andy Stanley’s talk on Leading Through Uncertain Times, we’ll use his definition for vision. Stanley says vision is “a mental picture of what could be, fueled by conviction of what should be.”
When starting a church vision is everything. Our church started with two big elements fueling our vision. I had recently come to understand that 60% of the people in any community were opposed to church as they knew it. That meant that 60% of the people living on my street or my neighborhood, working out at my gym, or shopping at my local grocery store would never attend a church for any reason which meant they were most likely never going to encounter a clear explanation of the gospel. At the same time, I was becoming more and more convicted about church growth being the primary measure of success for most pastors and churches.
I began to say to friends and coworkers “If 60% of our neighbors, coworkers, family, and friends will never go to church then we need to figure out how to get the church to go to them.”
I had a deep conviction that Jesus could transform a person, a family, a neighborhood, a business, and ultimately a whole community but it wouldn’t happen if all the Christ-followers were always leaving the people who most needed an encounter with Jesus behind to go to churches the 60% would never attend. I had a vision of gathering Christ-followers together, equipping them, and then sending them back to the places they lived, worked, learned, and played in order to share the hope they had found in Jesus so that whole communities could be renewed by the Gospel! That vision has been moving us forward for 10 years!
The question for you is what vision has God given you for 2021? If God could have His way in your church or your ministry or your small group in 2021 what would He do? What one element do you think should be different that if you were able to help transform it could catapult you and your ministry forward into accomplishing that vision?
These conversations can be paralyzing because all this vision talk feels so lofty but I believe you could easily uncover vision through a little thought and prayer. Here’s a few examples of how it might work out.
If you’re a pastor of a local church — What could be :: Our church fully re-engaged in weekly worship and ministry by the end of 2021
Fueled by what should be :: the people valuing regathering as a primary need for their lives as it becomes safe to do so.
If you’re a kids or youth pastor — What could be :: students reconnected with friends and teachers growing in the way of Jesus
Fueled by what should be :: Plenty of adult volunteers willing to sacrifice time and energy to create safe environments where kids can encounter Jesus.
If your a worship leader — What could be :: People worshiping in spirit and truth regardless of circumstances and limitations
Fueled by what should be :: People in our church possessing knowledge and understanding of what worship is and should be (beyond a sunday morning experience)
If you’re a small group leader — What could be :: Transformational relationships that encourage each other to live life on mission 7 days a week.
Fueled by what should be :: A burden held by each member of our group to love, care, pray and support each other through every season.
These are obviously generic examples, though they may begin to stoke something within your heart that gets you moving. I’d encourage you to take a few minutes to quiet your heart before God and ask Him to speak to you about the vision He has for you and your ministry and then begin to journal through the three questions below.
Answer these three questions for the first quarter of 2021 (or you could do the whole year)
What are you called to do? (this is recap from the first post)
What could be ::
Fueled by what should be ::
|
https://medium.com/andrewsikora/relaunching-in-2021-reestablish-vision-dc729c1e3748
|
[]
|
2021-01-21 17:37:08.472000+00:00
|
['Church Planting', 'Vision', 'Church Leadership']
|
The Confluence of Core Three Frameworks for Building Data Products
|
Today there are start-ups, Fortune 500, and local small businesses all asking the same kind of questions:
What’s the value of our upcoming service to our current (or potential) customers?
What’s our Lifetime Customer Value in the next 3 years?
What do our customers spending this month tell us about where to apply more attention and resources?
Who might be at risk of churning?
If you are able to answer some of the questions above, these kind of insights are basically magic in fast-changing, ever-changing customer-first world. We got to flip the script. We got to move beyond thinking about customer as standing still. We will need to widen our lens (looking at customer collectively) and narrowing our lens (finding ways to personalize our product).
Once we accept and move on to greater plasticity, the way we see our customers will becoming unstuck. This is pretty exciting.
In Part 1 of this series, we have started to introduce The Better Science Team WoW, as the New Geometry of Building Data Products. In this Part 2, we would like to elaborate further.
The Better Science Team Way of Work (WoW) creates a new space to think, discuss, and act. Based on the confluence of Design Thinking, Design Sprinting, and Agile Development, it will change the way you think, and re-think about product design and development.
Now, we have the flexibility to shift to the left (more space to think) or right (more space to act) depending on whether …
We need more thinking time to find the right character for your product. We need more discussion with others to build concerted effort as One Team. We need to act now to understand the market, and pivot quickly if needed.
A Case Study: The Witty Travel Magazine
In this hypothetical case study — The Witty Travel Magazine has been smart to take advantage of pivoting their subscription strategy i.e. in the case of being able to pivot fast when a big event break. The Witty Travel Magazine knew they will be a surge of traffic of next 3 weeks due to new movie in New Zealand about the Middle Earth, and they have the full inside, exclusive scope. So what can they do? They dropped the pay wall (and worked on a few backend engine upgrade to cater for the increase server load), and allow potential subscribers to read and get a sense of the value they can get. As a result, they get a 300 percent surge in their digital subscription.
This is truly leaning towards acting fast. The iterative, increment Agile Development works well because engineering and marketing team can work together in rapid cycle of prioritize feature-build-test-deploy to get to the targeted outcome.
What if The Witty Travel Magazine wanting to do more than just dropping the paywall temporary. What if they want to continue Growth Hacking their way to increase lifetime value of their customers, and build stronger sense of community among their ever diverse members around the world (increasing coming from the booming Asia countries)
These are hard questions.
It will be harder if they know only one way to act: prioritize feature-build-test-deploy.
What if The Witty Travel Magazine teams use the confluence of Design Sprint and Agile Development i.e. Problem-Solution Iteration, and Product Development Increment and Iteration. A case in point, prior to prioritizing product feature, the teams can shift-left to work in the problem-solution space to discuss different ways to tackle their problem in hand.
Now what if The Witty Travel Magazine teams want to widen their lens to connect the unconnected potential customers (you know those customers wanting to read this amazing magazine!). This is where the team can shift to the left further to connect to the human side of their. A case in point, The Witty Travel Magazine teams can run a Design Thinking exercise covering human behavioral research, and run human-centred design of a new service for movie-theme travel.
|
https://medium.com/thebetterscienceteamcompany/the-confluence-of-core-three-frameworks-for-building-data-products-6e2255825163
|
['Andrew Wong']
|
2020-09-10 12:04:27.751000+00:00
|
['Data Products', 'Agile Development', 'Data Science', 'Design Thinking', 'Design Sprint']
|
Power and control
|
Muted emotions
Rooted in prescience
The bloodbath
became the word for violence
the sign language to define our love
where is the line between love and loathe
entwined, assimilated, sink into my mind
divided they’re the same
hiding your feelings transcend in a conundrum
can’t keep track of all that we are,
the cracks breathe to the surface
calling killer
serial killer
paid killer
heart killer
aggression aggression
use your body, all that we are
a bullet in your brain
my power and control
cold-blooded killer
it has become a metaphor
to fill this void of a God role
one shot
murder me with my ignorance
my demons crying feelings
in my absence.
The wounds
lost in a past lifetime,
you’re the victim, I am the psychopath,
in between lies a mirror. Can you spot the difference? Do you need to understand? Why can’t you feel?
Blink and you’re dead. Bang bang!
Our fears, my addictions.
Dehumanized and blinded, darkness has become see-through.
|
https://medium.com/@dianaslabinschi/power-and-control-cf73fbc6c30
|
['Diana Slabinschi']
|
2020-12-19 12:05:32.572000+00:00
|
['Metaphor', 'Poetry', 'Spirituality', 'Poem', 'Violence']
|
A Christmas Time
|
When Henry awoke in the morning, he was still in his chair by the Christmas tree. A light was on in the kitchen and the sun had not come up yet. He picked up his phone to check the time. It was 5 am. He went into the kitchen and began to boil some coffee — he always made it farm style, the way his grandmother had taught him, it was better than what trendy coffee shops could serve up.
He stepped out on to the front porch to check the weather. The snow had stopped and the sky was crystal clear. Orion glimmered and dominated the view above the snowy Pennsylvania hills. Silhouettes of the windmill and the weathervane atop the barn were still — it seemed to Henry that time had stopped in this moment, solely to capture and preserve its beauty for his enjoyment. He had never experienced a more perfect day for painting winter en plein air.
After coffee with toast and eggs, Henry shoveled a narrow path to his jeep and loaded his painting supplies. The snow plows had been through already, so he easily backed on to the road, heading to the little creek with the red barn. By now the hills glowed a soft morning red and Henry smiled at his good fortune and sweet dreams.
It was just as he had imagined — the barn in soft light filtered through transparent clouds just moving in above the creek as it curved down the hill, flowing beneath patches of ice along banks of sparkling snow. Henry could easily put himself in another time here, perhaps 1850 when such a scene would be common on the landscape. He preferred the past when he painted.
The trees cast light bluish shadows across the hill in spite of the thin layer of clouds as Henry set up his pochade and paints. He was never so excited and eager to paint. Conditions were ideal and he had to capture the scene quickly before the next storm rolled in.
His strokes were steady and loose and the painting was nearly finished as the snow began to fall again, but the curve of the creek seemed a little off. It seemed to change each time he got it down and although he was not necessarily trying to be exact to nature, it threw off his vision. At one moment it curved sharply, at another straightened itself out just slightly. Painting outdoors was always a challenge, with light, and sometimes weather, changing and moving constantly, but this phenomenon was unfamiliar to him. It was as if the creek slithered back and forth ever so subtly as he painted.
It had to be a trick of the soft light and falling snow, he thought.
The wind began to pick up now and the snow blew heavily. The storm was coming on quickly and the barn was a faint spot of red through what was now the beginning of blizzard conditions. Henry pulled his painting off the easel — he would come back for the rest of his supplies when he got it safely into the jeep.
He could hear the distant sound of bells as he made his way through the now blinding wall of white.
An Amish farmer stepping up the pace home.
Henry could not find the jeep. He admonished himself for spending too much time on the creek. He wandered aimlessly in the snow, at one point bumping his head into a tree branch. It caught his stocking cap, which came off as the branch scraped across his head. He was beside himself at the situation he’d gotten himself into — he had to admit, he was lost.
This sort of thing could only happen in a Jack London novel, he thought, except that I have the luxury of calling the fire department.
He reached for his cell phone inside his snow suit. A wave of panic filled his thoughts when he reached into an empty pocket. He was absolutely sure he put it deep into a pocket this morning so that the warmth from his body would keep his battery from dying.
I couldn’t have left it at home!
Again he heard the jingling of bells through the howling storm. He could see an outline of dark against the wall of snow. The dark form shifted into a horse pulling a buggy and seemed to emerge from within the heart of the blizzard.
Henry let out the breath he had been holding inside.
So I’ll have a tale to tell beneath the Christmas tree after all, he thought, lost in the snow, rescued by an Amish farmer.
He put up his arm and waved it back and forth, holding tightly to his painting with the other.
A faint “Whoaa!” from within the buggy. The horse clicked to a stop and snorted.
Henry climbed into the buggy still hanging on to his painting, now wet with snow as well as oil. He hoped he might be able salvage it since the oil would be wet for some time.
The driver gave Henry a jovial smile from beneath his broad-brimmed hat. Henry could make out a bush of wide white beard shining in the dark beneath the brim — it moved up and down as he chuckled lightly.
“Your luck brings you to the right moment friend. I don’t normally take this route, but fortune occasionally blows in every direction rather than one. Takes us where we least expect at times.”
“I was out painting and time slipped away from me I guess, got caught in the storm,” said Henry.
The bells about the horses began a light refrain as the old man turned away from Henry without comment and shook the reins. Henry lost consciousness then, the jingling bells and clip of hooves lingering in his mind until it faded into voices.
“He’s had quite a shock Sarah. Drifts in and out. Doesn’t seem to know who he is. Took a great bump and scrape on the head in the blizzard somehow. Plenty of bedrest should see him through. Quite a nice painting he did of the barn at Miller’s Creek though.”
And then the soft, familiar voice of a woman.
“Not sure it was worth going after in a blizzard. Well then, Merry Christmas Doc, we’ll send a buggy for you if anything changes.”
|
https://medium.com/lit-up/a-christmas-time-f4dd30bfc032
|
['V. Plut']
|
2019-12-14 13:52:35.205000+00:00
|
['Short Story', 'Fiction', 'Lit', 'Time Travel', 'Christmas']
|
The next generation of sustaniable infrastruture
|
Plastic has slowly become an integral part of all human requirments .Plastic items such as plastic carrybags ,plastic bottles have replaced everything made up of other material due to the advantages of plastic as Plastics are lightweighted and odourless etc .Plastic waste slowly started causing problems ,pastic waste clogs drains it cause harm to animals as it chokes the animals who eat plastics .Around 420 million tons of plastic produced each year and most of this plastic end up polluting ecosystem around the world , about 75% of plastic is thrown away .The worlds oceans absorbs around 13 million tons of plastic annually, which harms more than 700 aquatic animals .As plastics release highly toxic fumes when melted and plastics can be recycled to 2–3 times by this times alot of noises were made to ban the plastic .Prof vasudevan an Indian scientists who worke mainly on waste managment sets an aim to solve this problem .He came up with an solution laboratory results of mixing waste plastics with heated bitumen and coating the mixture over stones proved positive .He first implemented this technique and constructed a road inside his collage in 2002.In 2006 the Thiagarajar collage of Engineering recieved the patent for this technique .The plastic items used for road construction are plastic carrybags ,plastic cups ,plastic packing etc .The entire process is simple .The plastic is first shredded into uniform size the aggregate mix and the butamin are heated at 160 degree monituring of the temperture is important during heating .The shredded plastic is added to the aggregate .It gets coated uniformly over the aggregate with in 30–60 seconds giving an oily look .The plastic waste coated is mix with hot butamin and the resulting mixture is used for road construction .The roller used has a capacity of 8 tons .Plastic roads are extremly eco-friendly with no toxic gasses being released .The plastics are fully homogenised into the mix so no microplastics are in the end asphalt mix and no leaching of any plastics can occur .Roads made up of plastics has been criticised in the past as being misleading because of their potential to spread microplastics in the envirnament .Microplastics saturated the air we breath, the water we drink , the food we eat .The average human consumes at least 70,000 microplastics annually but now this can be controlled by proper manufacturing of the materials used .Plastic waste helps increase the strength of the road .These roads have better resistance towards extreme wheather .Since large amount of plastic is required for a small streatch of road the amount of waste will definitely reduce.
|
https://medium.com/@beeb03371/platics-in-making-roads-78d2a2b07a68
|
[]
|
2020-12-02 23:02:38.506000+00:00
|
['Water', 'Marine', 'Pollution', 'Soil Health', 'Environmental Issues']
|
Automating social media marketing with Python — Chapter 1: The Bot(s)
|
Social media ‘Marketing Bot’
The objective of this post is to create a bot that can handle various aspects of social media marketing. To keep things organized, we’ll be making separate bots for each of the features. Not only will your program be easier to read, but you’ll be able to schedule cron jobs for specific functions.
This post is for educational purposes only. Familiarize yourself with each social media’s terms of use. The code in this post is provided as is and makes no claims or warranties. Violating a platform’s terms of use can result in your account getting banned.
Chapters
Each chapter of this post is focused around a core feature. I’ll update this section as we develop each new feature.
I recommend following the chapters in order so you have an understanding of the flow and the code. You can also download the code here. As this marketing bot was created for Rocket Moving, most of the features are centered around moving/relocation services. Feel free to clone the repository and make your own adjustments.
Chapter 1: The Bot(s)
Chapter 2: The ‘Post Bot’
Chapter 3: The Content
Chapter 4: Handle Images
Chapter 5: Posting on Facebook
Chapter 6: Add a location to the Facebook post
The following chapters are in production. I’ll return to this section and update/link them.
Chapter 7: Removing images from src/Images/
Chapter 8: Updating Google Sheets
Chapter 9: Posting on Instagram
Chapter 10: Posting on Twitter
Chapter 11: Posting on Pinterest
Before you start
You should have some basic knowledge of Python and the libraries we will be working with. We are using Python version 3.6.8. Keep in mind our machine is running Ubuntu 18.04 so the code in this post is designed for Linux operating systems.
The Flow
Take a look at the diagram made for Rocket Moving. The ‘Post Bot’ accesses Google Sheets to extract content. It calls either Pexels or Pixabay depending on the url from the Image Link column in Google Sheets. The post is composed and posted on the different social media platforms. The script ends with the bot sending a Telegram message to administrators.
|
https://medium.com/swlh/automating-social-media-marketing-with-python-chapter-1-dde69fca948e
|
['Eduardo G D C']
|
2019-08-28 17:52:45.534000+00:00
|
['Social Media Marketing', 'Python', 'Instagram', 'Automation', 'Facebook']
|
Datetime in Python
|
Lets get things straight . We all play with time and date all the time . Any time series data would have a column for date and time . This is an attempt to give an introduction for those who play with time and date in python .
Datetime string to Datetime object(strptime)
Its important to understand that whether you have your date time as a string in the form “10 Jan 2001” or “10/01/2001” we do have a way to read them in Python and use them for further computation . Right now what is available in quotes is a simple string and for any further analysis of the string we need to use datetime library and convert it to a date time object . Here is how we do that .
import datetime as datetime
x = "1–12–2001"
obj=datetime.strptime(x,"%d-%m-%Y")
Now we have a datetime object(obj) which isn’t just a string but contains the properties of a datetime object .
╔═══════════╦═════════════╗
║ Code ║ Value ║
╠═══════════╬═════════════╣
║ obj.day ║ 12 ║
║ obj.month ║ 1 ║
║ obj.year ║ 2001 ║
╚═══════════╩═════════════╝
Datetime object to string
To convert datetime object to string we use datetime.strftime function
import datetime as datetime
x = "1–12–2001" # Convert string x to datetime object
obj=datetime.strptime(x,"%d-%m-%Y") # Convert string object back to string
obj_string = datetime.strftime(obj,"%d-%m-%Y") # obj_string will contain value '12-01-2001'
Conclusion
Though I have covered only string to date and date to string in the article the concept remains same for time as well . Here is an example
dt = datetime.strptime("25/12/20 16:30", "%d/%m/%y %H:%M")
The article covers the application of strptime and strftime for string to date manipulation . Do explore functions like timedelta to add time or days . The documentation is self explanatory and hence my objective was to just introduce datetime function in python.
References
https://docs.python.org/3/library/datetime.html
|
https://medium.com/@praveensmallya/datetime-in-python-9d9dbda3f99b
|
['Praveen Mallya']
|
2020-12-24 18:59:17.283000+00:00
|
['Data Science', 'Python Programming']
|
Membangun Aplikasi Reservasi Meja dengan MEVN — Bagian Ketiga
|
Easy read, easy understanding. A good writing is a writing that can be understood in easy ways
Follow
|
https://medium.com/easyread/membangun-aplikasi-reservasi-meja-dengan-mevn-bagian-ketiga-12dfbd8709f5
|
['Muhammad Azmi']
|
2020-08-18 05:27:35.328000+00:00
|
['Tailwind Css', 'Vuejs', 'Mongodb', 'Web Development', 'Expressjs']
|
How to create Quick web checkout?
|
When you use Cpay for accepting the payments, you need not wait for the banks to process your payments which might take hours and even days. You can quickly generate an invoice through a web interface and create payment buttons for embedding in your website.
Step 1 :
Visit Cpay merchant and login into your account. Click “Payment Tolls” on the panel on the left side of the page.
setting up quick checkout
Step 2 :
Click “Quick checkout for web”. A list of your sent checkouts will appear. To create a new checkout, click “Create Checkout”.
Step 3 :
A product information tab will appear. Fill in the details of the invoice. You can upload the image of the product as well, just to give a clear view of what is your invoice about to the client.
Note: The minimum price of the invoice should be $10. You will not be able to send invoices below $10.
Filling up the invoice details
Step 4 :
After filling in the details, click “Create Checkout”. Add the information about your client. Make sure that you give in the right email address to ensure that invoice reaches your buyer. Click “Continue”.
Step 5:
After this setup, you will get the link for sharing or embedding it on the website.
This is all you have to do to send a quick checkout to your buyer through Cpay.
|
https://medium.com/@cube-pay/how-to-create-quick-web-checkout-25490f7c3597
|
['Cube Pay']
|
2020-12-11 13:40:23.293000+00:00
|
['Cpay', 'Invoice', 'Finance', 'Checkout', 'Payment']
|
Dynamic AMM Incident Writeup
|
For the basics of Dynamic AMM (creamY), you may read the technical introduction from its original author.
Besides normal AMM, there are three key differences:
It’s a stablecoin-specific AMM There’s a Normalizer It uses the same logic as a swap to deal with add/remove liquidity
Stablecoin-Specific AMMs
If you’re familiar with Curve.fi, it might not be hard to understand Dynamic AMM: Stablecoin-specific bonding curve, ultra-low slippage, high capital efficiency. The only difference is Dynamic AMM is using the curve from BlackHoleSwap due to a license issue.
Normalizer
For stablecoin swaps, an extra step required is to normalize the figures. Take DAI-USDC swap for example: though 1 DAI = 1 USDC, they have different decimals, which is 18 for DAI and 6 for USDC. So the actual exchange rate of the underlying raw digit should be 1000000000000:1.
Also, some interest bearing tokens have their own exchangeRate. Tokens like iDAI and yCrv have an exchangeRate starts from 1 and gradually grows over time.
To enable the swaps between these tokens, a normalizer is introduced. It tells the DAMM DAI = 1, USDC = 1e12, yDAI = 1.05, etc. So a normalizer pretty much works like an onchain oracle, but its price info refers to an admin predetermined method, instead of honest reporters like Chainlink.
Add liquidity as a swap function
Rather than using hard computation in single-sided add liquidity function like Curve.fi and Balancer, Dynamic AMM uses a brutal approach to deal with it. If there are n kinds of tokens in the AMM, it assumes each of them in the pool worths 1/n of the total supply of LP token. Adding liquidity is considered as swapping an underlying token to the LP token.
LP minted by deposit X DAI = getInExactOut( X, DAI reserve, totalSupply() / n )
However, as long as remove liquidity also follows the same logic
DAI withdrawed by burning X LP = getInExactOut( X, totalSupply() / n, DAI reserve )
it causes the liquidity providers nearly never to make any profit.
Usually, LP makes a profit from AMM’s pool size growth. For example, you deposit 1 DAI + 1 sUSD in Uniswap to get 1 UNI-LP token. Since Uniswap is gathering a 0.3% fee from every trade, the ratio of LP-DAI-sUSD may grow from 1:1:1 to 1:1.05:1.05, which means the liquidity provider earns a 5% profit.
However, in Dynamic AMM’s case, LPs don’t make profit proportionally as the pool’s underlying assets grow.
Let’s say virtual price (the ratio of total reserves to total LP) gets doubled; there’s 1M LP token but 2M USD worth underlying in the pool. LP can only get ~1.02x back, which is much less than expected.
getInExactOut(1, 1000000, 2000000) ~= 1.02
Furthermore, because removing liquidity is not in the right proportion, the virtual price (LP-underlying ratio) grows even more.
Within a huge liquidity removal event (probably due to the end of liquidity mining), the virtual price raised dramatically from 1.68 to 13.3.
Fund removed = 2030549
LP burnt = 1985432
virtual price before = (3,529,006 / 2,098,032) = 1.68
virtual price after = (1,498,457 / 112,600) = 13.3
The rescue
As a result, even if all liquidity providers redeem, there will still be a lot of funds remaining in the pool. Even it’s still providing liquidity and generating fee, those funds may be considered permanently lost.
To “rescue” fund, cream.finance’s admin silently deployed a script with a series of operations.
It temporarily changes creamY’s oracle (the Normalizer) to a wrong one (in their words, an evil normalizer), which reports LP token’s value 100000x higher. Then it calls removeLiquidity() function to draw a huge amount of fund to Cream’s multisig with extremely low cost.
By doing so, creamY’s virtual price successfully comes back from $13 to $1.
The problem is, who does the fund extracted by this hack belong to? At this moment, since they haven’t made any announcement, it is hard to speculate the Cream team’s intention. Hope they will make the right decision.
|
https://medium.com/@artistic709/dynamic-amm-incident-writeup-f0bc5d8ba5d8
|
['Ping Chen']
|
2020-12-26 16:47:16.212000+00:00
|
['Defi', 'Ethereum', 'Blockchain', 'Writeup']
|
10 things every aspiring data scientist needs to know
|
The Harvard article “Data Scientist: The Sexiest Job of the 21st Century” first sparked my interest in the data science field. At the time, I had spent 3.5 years in management consulting and had built a great reputation building models and developing projections in MS Excel. After reading that article, I realized data science was a great intersection between my role at the time and programming (techy stuff) which I always had a desire to learn. This desire came from my strong interest in techy things while growing up. Thanks to my dad, I spent my formative years surrounded by all sorts of computers even when they weren’t so mainstream in the town I grew up.
Months after reading that article, I decided to join the newly formed data and analytics team in the company I work with. The decision seemed like a no brainer but it wasn’t the conventional thing to do because I was joining the team as a senior with no experience in the space. As a result of this, the initial months were a bit challenging but this spurred me to invest quality time into teaching myself data science.
I adopted the self-learning approach which started out as fun but later became time-consuming and challenging. I have put together 10 things I wish I was told when I started my data science journey a year ago.
I am sure someone out there definitely needs this!
1. Learn statistics: If you ever failed statistics, now is a good time to pick it up. You won’t get far as a data scientist without having a good understanding of statistical concepts. I know it gets complex at some point but for now, start with the basic stuff and keep building on that. Chances are that it’s not as tough as you think it is. And if you grew up in an African home you probably are conversant with the phrase below.
“The people who do it don’t have two heads”
Here are some courses I found helpful….
2. Learn to programme: It is easy to think programming is rocket science especially when you don’t have a tech background but it actually isn’t. There are several courses and articles that make it really easy to get started. Obviously, don’t expect to churn out super cool stuff from day one; it will never happen. But if you remain consistent, someday it will. R or Python? Well, I would leave that for you to decide.
I found data camp, code academy and solo learn for mobile extremely helpful. These would help you get started.
Other helpful resources:
R in a nutshell by Joseph Adler
R for Data Science by Garrett Grolemund and Hadley Wickham
Python Data Science Handbook: Essential Tools for Working with Data by Jake VanderPlas
Data Science from Scratch: First Principles with Python by Joel Grus
3. Study, study, practice, practice, and practice even more: You need to devote quality time to studying and practicing a whole lot. You can start with really simple stuff and build up on that. Just make sure you spend extensive time studying and practicing preferably daily. The field is really wide and technical so there are certain areas you need to read over and over again. Remember your study is never complete until you practice. See it as an iterative process. When you practice, more questions come up and then you are forced to study again. You would definitely learn a lot by reading and DOING. Always remember that data science is an applied field.
Helpful resources:
Analytics in a big data world by Bart Baesens
Applied predictive analytics by Dean Abbott
Applied predictive modeling by Max Kuhn
4. Stay hungry and curious: Curiosity doesn’t kill the data scientist; curiosity only kills the cat. So relax! As a data scientist, you need to stay hungry and curious to learn. In data science, there are so many concepts to learn and there are new ones flying around every day. You need to keep yourself abreast of changes and trends. Read books, articles, deconstruct codes just make sure your hunger never dies out. There may be times when you are reading one article and that same article provides about four links to various others. At that point don’t feel overwhelmed, just stay hungry. Remember, it comes with the job.
I have found towards data science, Analytics Vidhya and kdnuggets very helpful.
5. Put some structure to your learning: The concept of self-learning in data science always sounds really cool until you get into it and realize it is very time consuming and challenging. Data science is wide and it is easy to get lost when navigating through various areas which you need to learn. It is very important not to wander aimlessly around various topics in data science because it is harder to connect the dots that way. You need to structure your learning by taking courses and joining learning paths on various platforms. You don’t need to break the bank to do this. You can start with the free stuff first.
I found the following helpful
6. Join a community/meet up or get a mentor: The saying “together, everyone achieves much more” is definitely true in data science. In this journey, you need people. Never be a lone ranger. Chances are that you would burn out quickly and spend endless time getting to your destination. However with mentors and buddies, you could get really far. Don’t go weeks and months wasting time on something someone could have explained to you in less than a minute. Someone has probably done what you are trying to do, so don’t reinvent the wheel.
On the flipside, don’t be too quick to get help when you haven’t tried well enough. There are a lot of lessons you could learn from your own mistakes and research.
7. Get on Kaggle/competitions as soon as you can: Competitions tend to speed up the learning process. Like I always say, start with the simple stuff. The Titanic competition or the house price prediction competition on Kaggle are good starting points. Seeing yourself rise up that leaderboard is some good motivation. It gives you that feeling of progress; at least up until you hit a glass ceiling and find it hard to improve the accuracy of your model. Then the learning continues because you need to find out ways to improve that model. So get in competitions and share your codes for people to critique.
8. The best time is now: You are probably wondering if you lived all your life under a rock because you just found out about data science and you have read several stories about people who have been in this business for many years. Well, they say the best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago and the next best time is now. It’s never late. Quit whining about how you could have started data science a billion years ago. What’s most important is the fact that you started the journey and you are getting your hands dirty. You deserve a pat on the back for that.
9. Keep going, never give up: When the going gets tough, the tough get going. Don’t kid yourself, data science is no child’s play. It is going to get tough at some point. You need to stay focused and remain consistent. Celebrate those little milestones: learning your first algorithm, your first competition entry etc. Celebrate them.
10. Hang points 1–9 on a large frame on your wall and get your hands dirty. Always remember you are not alone so sit back and relax. It is definitely going to be a joyful ride.
Good luck :)
|
https://towardsdatascience.com/10-things-every-aspiring-data-scientist-needs-to-know-3db18cce8eb4
|
['Ayodele Oluleye']
|
2018-02-13 22:23:58.226000+00:00
|
['Towards Data Science', 'Motivational', 'Data Science', 'Analytics']
|
Mushroom cultivation produces three times its weight in waste. It’s now being turned into burgers and fertiliser
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Mushroom cultivation produces three times its weight in waste. It’s now being turned into burgers and fertiliser
Growers could make money from waste.
by Sandrine Ceurstemont
Cultivating mushrooms produces a lot of waste. For every kilogram of mushrooms produced, about three kilograms of soil-like material containing straw, manure and peat is left behind. In the EU, this results in more than 3 billion kilograms of waste per year.
Managing this waste is a challenge. Although it is rich in organic matter, and therefore useful as compost, used mushroom substrate — the soil-like material — contains a lot of water, which makes it heavy and unprofitable to transport. Some of it is used as compost in agricultural land close by but the vast majority that remains ends up being stored temporarily then landfilled.
‘Every year we have more and more waste,’ said Pablo Martinez, project manager at the Mushroom Technological Research Center of La Rioja in Spain. ‘So, we need larger and larger areas just to manage this waste.’
More mushroom waste could soon be given a second life though thanks to new innovations. Dr Bart van der Burg, Director of Innovation at BioDetection Systems in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, and his team are interested in discarded mushroom parts, such as stems, and deformed mushrooms, which are part of the cultivation leftovers. They are aiming to extract components such as proteins, carbohydrates, fats and chitin — a fibrous substance — from them as part of the Funguschain project. Their goal is to incorporate these extracts into new products such as novel foods, cosmetics and bioplastics. ‘I think we will end up with at least three products coming out of this project,’ said Dr van der Burg.
The team has been experimenting with different extraction techniques. After milling and grinding the mushrooms, they found that a technique using microwave radiation was effective for removing antioxidants, antimicrobials and organic compounds called polyols, for example, which could be used in food and bioplastics. A pressurised hot water tea-like technique was suitable for extracting other components such as proteins and polysaccharides — a type of carbohydrate — for use in food products.
Food
At the same time, they have been developing new products with different companies. Extracted mushroom protein is being incorporated into food for older people with swallowing problems, for example, in the form of solid, edible gels. The protein is also of interest for vegetarian burgers where both the nutritional value and mushroom taste are desirable.
Mushroom powders could also be incorporated in functional foods, another avenue they are investigating. However, these products will take longer to develop since potential health benefits need to be evaluated.
In terms of cosmetics, the team is developing a natural line of creams that contain chitin, a preservative, extracted from mushrooms which acts as a natural preservative. Mushroom components tend to become brownish when they come into contact with oxygen, which would make creams an unappealing brown colour, but they’ve managed to prevent a colour change. ‘(Discolouration) depends on additional ingredients,’ said Dr van der Burg.
The team thinks mushroom waste could be reduced by up to 40% with the products they are creating. But they are also investigating other uses, such as composting and biogas production, which utilise all the soil-like leftovers from mushroom cultivation and could increase the amount of waste that is repurposed. These applications are more straightforward and would be easier to commercialise says Dr van der Burg. ‘That’s one reason why we are still investing in that part.’
Martinez and his team are developing a system to remove water from mushroom waste and turn it into pellets of organic fertiliser as part of their SmartMushroom project. ‘Once it’s pelletised, we can deliver it anywhere for agricultural use,’ said Martinez.
Their goal is to develop an environmentally friendly process that doesn’t use electricity or traditional sources of energy to power the drying. They are using some of the mushroom waste to produce biogas as a power source by optimising an existing production process that usually uses waste slurries from other agricultural processes.
‘Once it’s pelletised, we can deliver it anywhere for agricultural use.’ - Pablo Martinez, Mushroom Technological Research Center of La Rioja, Spain
Waste management
At the beginning of the project, a pilot plant was set up in an existing waste management facility. But their process can be set up wherever it’s needed. It uses four containers and doesn’t require building infrastructure. For the past year, the researchers have been perfecting the drying process by performing tests that experiment with different temperatures. If temperatures are too high, the waste can decompose, releasing nutrients that are important components of fertilisers.
The team is currently trying to increase the amount of biogas produced by combining mushroom byproducts with other types of agricultural waste. For example, several companies nearby produce marmalade so they are reusing the water used to clean machinery which contains sugar and fruit residue. ‘At this point, we are measuring the volume and quality of the gas produced by adding different co-substrates to our material,’ said Martinez.
The project is also trying to produce fertilisers that are tailored to different crops. Before the dried waste is pelletised, extra nutrients can be added. Vineyards, for example, require balanced levels of potassium, phosphorus and manganese so the fertiliser can be supplemented to match the exact amount required.
Being able to produce organic pelletised fertiliser could have huge economic benefits for mushroom growers. At the moment, cultivators bear waste disposal costs which range from €10 to €50 per tonne of spent mushroom substrate in Europe. But in the future, they could make a profit by bringing their waste to a plant that will transform it into fertiliser and enable them to operate within a circular economy. ‘They will get paid depending on how much they bring to waste management facilities,’ said Martinez.
Eventually, all the mushroom growing industry’s soil-like residue could be turned into pelletised fertiliser once the technology is commercialised, says Martinez. So far, there is high demand for the fertiliser from farmers in Spain and their pilot plant can’t produce enough to meet it. ‘If we can pelletise all our production, we will sell all our production,’ said Martinez. ‘That means there will be no waste remaining from the mushroom cultivation sector.’
The research in this article was funded by the EU. If you liked this article, please consider sharing it on social media.
More info
Funguschain
SmartMushroom
|
https://horizonmageu.medium.com/mushroom-cultivation-produces-three-times-its-weight-in-waste-1f37b7312be1
|
[]
|
2020-11-18 17:35:45.714000+00:00
|
['Mushrooms', 'Cultivation', 'Waste']
|
July 10 — KiCAD proto class
|
The lovely Chris, who works at OSH Park, ran a class today with two students (myself and Nick), where he taught us how to use KiCAD. I made the most gnarly board ever!
I also have all my parts for LED prototyping!
Chris helped me figure out how to connect my things. Turns out the LED driver that the lights come with already connect directly to AC wall current, so I didn’t even need the $50 power supply that I bought.
Also got some soldering advice for connecting wires end to end:
|
https://medium.com/grow-bucket-life-project-kickstarter-diary/july-10-kicad-proto-class-6f4781504974
|
['Ruth Grace Wong']
|
2017-07-27 04:22:04.432000+00:00
|
['Hardware']
|
How Police Union Contracts Incentivize Police Misconduct and Crime
|
(Source: Irfan Khan/Los Angeles Times.)
Police Union contracts and state level police bills of rights are imperative to what has been termed “an alternate justice system” by Campaign Zero in their 2016 report Police Union Contracts and Police bill of Rights Analysis, an analysis of police union contracts of 81 of the 100 largest American cities, and the police bill of rights in the 16 states where they exist. Labor unions exist to protect the rights of workers but no other labor organization is given permission to coerce civilian behavior or end lives. The problem in police union contracts is that they often have provisions meant to protect officers who abuse this authority, endangering the citizens that the police department exists to protect. To quote from that above-mentioned report,
“Collective bargaining agreements (i.e. contracts) are simply meant to allow due process: employees negotiate with an employer over matters of working conditions, compensation, benefits, and performance management as a group, thus increasing the employee’s collective bargaining power. These agreements are meant to ensure that workers are treated fairly, with dignity and respect. They are not meant to deny other citizens fairness, dignity and respect.”
Criminal activity and misconduct among police officers is necessarily encouraged by the provisions in police union contracts and police bills of rights that prohibit those officers from being held accountable. Campaign Zero’s analyses of police union contracts in 81 of the 100 largest American cities identified six such provisions: (1) Disqualifying complaints, (2) preventing officers from being interrogated immediately after an incident, (3) providing police with information not afforded to civilians prior to interrogation, (4) limiting consequences for officers and limiting power of civilian oversight, (5) requiring legal and settlement costs of investigations into police misconduct to be paid for by the city rather than the officer or police department, and (6) purging records of past misconduct.
Campaign Zero’s report states that,
“Of the 81 cities’ contracts we reviewed, 72 included at least one of these barriers to police accountability. 13 of the 14 states with police bills of rights also included one of these types of policy provisions. 63 cities and 12 states have three or more provisions imposing barriers to accountability. Only Aurora, Boston, Chula Vista, Dallas, Denver, Fremont, Fresno, Long Beach, and Nashville did not contain problematic provisions in their police union contracts.”
These popular provisions are present in most of America’s large cities, explaining why only 0.2% of the 4,024 killings by police between 2013 and 2016 led to convictions against those officers. In the following pages I will explain what each of these provisions are, citing examples from specific contracts in order to present Campaign Zero’s findings to a wider audience.
Over 30% of the 81 cities surveyed have provisions to disqualify complaints for reasons unrelated to whether those complaints are valid and substantiated. During a presentation on best practices and police union contracts given to the City Council of Portland, Oregon Samuel Sinyangwe and DeRay Mckesson of Campaign Zero offered another example. The California Police Bill of Rights prohibits disciplinary action against a police officer if that discipline results from an investigation that takes longer than 100 days to complete, regardless of the conclusions of that investigation. As another example, per the police union contract of Columbus, Ohio all investigations into police misconduct must be completed within a mere 56 days of when the complaint was first filed. If an investigation leads to disciplinary action, but that investigation took longer than 56 days to complete, an officer can be reinstated on that police force.
Officers who are fired or otherwise disciplined for misconduct may even appeal to an arbitrator who is legally entrusted with the power to overturn that disciplinary action. Recently, an arbiter ruled that former officer Aaron Brown of Manchester Police Department in New Hampshire, who was fired in 2018 for intentionally damaging property while executing search warrants and making racist comments. In this case the police Chief, Carlo Capano, does not want Brown back on the force and refused to implement the reinstatement, though he is legally bound to do so by their police union contract, and this minor drama is still playing out. Arbitrators are often a means of placing proverbial “bad apples” back in the orchard, which may already stink of its own decay.
Prohibiting officers from being interrogated immediately after an incident or after an investigation begins allows guilty officers to mold their story and avoid accountability. In some police departments and entire states, officers are even afforded the privilege of reviewing all evidence and materials related to an investigation being conducted into their own misconduct before they can legally be interviewed or interrogated as part of that investigation. For example, the Louisiana Police Bill of Rights requires that an officer obtain legal counsel before any interrogations can begin, and provides them up to sixty days to acquire such counsel; a legal two month delay of an investigation by the person being investigated.
The Florida Police Bill of rights privileges officers to review all evidence and materials relevant to an investigation into themselves before they can be interviewed. It states that such evidence and materials includes “The complaint, all witness statements, including all other existing officer statements, and all other existing evidence, including, but not limited to, incident reports, GPS locator information, and audio or video recordings relating to the incident under investigation.” These are provisions that serve only to aid criminal officers in fabricating their story close enough with the known facts to evade the law. Some contracts even allow officers breaks during interrogations and allow them to request transcripts of the interrogation after completion. These latter two privileges are not bad in themselves but, when denied to civilians, they are privileges, and place one section of the citizenry above all others.
The ability of civilians to oversee police investigations may be curtailed by police unions, even though the police need to be policed- as the saying goes- just as one government agency needs another to have powers of oversight for a system of checks and balances. Suggesting otherwise is to place an impossible amount of trust into a single organization that has long been fraternal before it is lawful. An organization that is given license to control lives as well as end them. Suggesting otherwise may not be a symptom of naiveté, but an intentional offer of criminal impunity.
The data demonstrates that police departments generally cannot be trusted to conduct objective investigations and employ just punishment against their own members. And why should they be, lest they be more than human? Still some police union contracts explicitly deny citizen oversight bodies any ability to conduct independent investigations or subpoena officers, leaving the power to conduct investigations solely with the police department. That department is already given the responsibility of investigating itself, and so hereby denies necessary checks and balances on inevitable occurrences of corruption.
An example of denying civilian oversight is seen in the police union contract for Austin, Texas. Their civilian oversight processes “shall not be used or permitted to gather evidence, contact or interview witnesses, or otherwise independently investigate a complaint of misconduct by an officer. There shall be no legal or administrative requirement, including but not limited to subpoena power.” Gutted of their ability to conduct their own investigations, civilian oversight committees are barred from overseeing police investigations at all.
The burden of legal fees and settlements in cases of police misconduct would presumably be paid for by police departments and the police officers themselves. As doctors must pay for their own malpractice insurance, it is reasonable to expect police officers would carry a similar financial burden that disincentivizes misconduct. Yet in 49% of America’s 81 largest cities, the city is responsible for paying legal fees, settlement costs, or paid leave for officers disciplined for misconduct. This further incentivizes abuse by assuring criminal members of the police force will not be financially responsible for their actions. The New York City Police Department is immune from paying legal settlements from its own funds. As a result, in 2019 New York City taxpayers lost $68,688,423 to legal settlements for police misconduct. Paying as a department and as individuals for their own misconduct is both a more effective deterrent to abuse of citizens and relieves taxpayers of a double financial burden: paying the police for a service they are not receiving as well as for the cost of their misconduct and crimes.
A lack of recording complaints and verified misconduct, and the systematic purging of existing misconduct records, is unsurprisingly associated with higher levels of police misconduct and criminal behavior. 53% of the 81 largest American cities have provisions to purge officer misconduct records. In Baton Rouge, Louisiana the records of any complaint that results in a suspension will be destroyed after five years if a similar complaint does not arise within that time period. The same policy applies to complaints that result in demotion of an officer and complaints involving sexual abuse. This is similar for instances of domestic violence, of which around 40% of police officer families experience according to Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic, citing the National Center For Women and Policing. At four times the national average levels of domestic abuse, policing is an occupation that effectively selects or attracts abusive individuals. Even if a crime is repeated and reported, it may not be recorded honestly. What qualifies as a “similar complaint” may not defined at all in these contracts, and actual similar complaints can be filed under different categories to allow for the eventual purging of an officer’s records.
There will always be instances where deadly force is necessary to protect officers themselves or the public from an evidently violent person, but most police killings do not occur under circumstances of clear threat to life. Nor do they occur in the active prevention or disruption of a violent crime in progress. Use of deadly force is significant but only one form in which misconduct and crime can occur. The literature demonstrates that the presence of any of the aforementioned provisions in police union contracts or bills of rights are associated with increased misconduct generally, including but not limited to the use of deadly force. Emphasizing the effect of collective bargaining on police behavior, a study titled Collective Bargaining Rights and Police Misconduct: Evidence from Florida detailed that when sheriff departments entered collective bargaining agreements (with police departments already in such agreements as control groups) reports and complaints of violent police misconduct increased by 40%. However, this is a limited case study, and more will need to be conducted to demonstrate if the findings are conclusive.
The existence of accountability requires reversing every provision that has been identified here. Police departments should be required to retain officer misconduct records indefinitely, those records can and should be used to predict which officers will likely be involved in future cases of misconduct, and those records should be consulted as an impediment if not a disqualification to an officer applying to be hired at a different police department. Without this, criminal officers may move to different cities and police departments like catholic priests being shuffled to a new parish filled with new and naive victims. Police ought to be treated like school teachers, whose records of abuse of children would not be destroyed. We expect more from those entrusted with the care of our children, just as we expect those tasked with our protection to protect us.
Citizens should be provided ample time to file complaints against officers, there needs to be systems of protections and anonymity for officers who file complaints against fellow officers, and any provisions that disqualify complaints based on the time it takes for the complaint to be filed should be struck down. Most importantly, complaints should never be disqualified because of the time taken by the police to perform their investigation. This prevents accountability for reasons that are not the fault of the complainer, regardless of whether the defendant officer is guilty.
Investigations into officers should not be delayed and officers should not be given privileges before the commencement of and during investigations which are not offered to civilians. Civilian oversight of police departments and investigations into officers is necessary to ensure fairness. They are performing a public service, and those paying for that service deserve the right to ensure the legal power vested in the police is not being used against them.
The police have been the recipients of justified anger that has at times treated all officers as unnecessary at best and murderous at worst. Of course, one officer might be cordial to one type of person but abusive to another, and even the best intentioned officers act in concert with a systemically racist and ultimately unjust system, most notably through the failed and inherently unjust War On Drugs. However, law enforcement is and always will be necessary, and the job requires a willingness to put one’s self in harm’s way. This implicit characteristic of the job does not belie the fact that it is a perfect organization to become riven with corruption and abuse, as many police departments have been and still are. It is not the mere existence of police in the abstract, but the reality of how policing exists in America that is a moral crisis. This reality engenders extreme discomfort in many who react defensively to even the most coolheaded identifications of the problems with policing in America, just as it engenders frantic fury among those who understand it but lack a fair and effective way to address it. The necessity of police accountability, to say nothing of the restructuring of the criminal justice system as a whole and other issues like qualified immunity, should not be partisan issues; this is a question of what thread we wish to use to sew the fabric of our society together.
|
https://medium.com/discourse/how-police-union-contracts-incentivize-police-misconduct-and-crime-d8119bdfdac7
|
['Brandon Ray Langston']
|
2020-12-15 00:33:22.284000+00:00
|
['Police', 'Police Brutality', 'Politics', 'Race', 'Criminal Justice']
|
Waiting for Paglen
|
Señor Topos, Archie Lineas, and Jack Scribner have been wandering along the papery folds of an anonymous mountain range for days, clutching handfuls of maps, scratching two beards, and sullying one balding head. They’ve been wracking over the coordinates for Paglen’s rendezvous, but instead have stumbled upon a globally-positioned trail of babelian doubts…
Where the hell are we, guys? This map isn’t right at all.
Right? Is there really such thing as a ‘right’ map? Can maps be right or wrong? Get your vocabulary straight, dude. You mean ‘accurate’, right?
Right! Wrong! Accurate, inaccurate — whatever! All depends on what the map is supposed to show, am I wrong?
This one’s not right, either. Or this one!
The GPS says we don’t even exist anymore. Oh, if only it were that easy to get off the grid!
Hey, you’re the geographer, shouldn’t you be more intuitive about this stuff?
~ A wind blows. It stops. But a Map keeps fluttering.
Coming from an architect, I’d expect you to be a little more, how shall we say, spatially-attuned?
Would you two stop bickering and help get us out of this bog?
You call that helpful, Mr. Scribner? Can’t you at least tell us something about this place? Give us a little history lesson, you know, drop some knowledge or something?
Sure — Breathe. Now, listen. I heard a quote once: “I never know the directions, but I always know where I am…” Let’s just pretend we know where we are for the moment, maybe the rest will follow.
Jack, if this map isn’t…ahem…accurate we’re gonna have to make our own. I say we take a few polemical, debatable, and spatial thoughts, and plot them together on the globe, shall we?
Do you really think it’s useful to be so totalizing with the map like that? Paglen doesn’t trust maps, nor should we. Obviously, any map at this point we experiment with on our own should probably come with some sort of critique.
Forget old school map legends, we need intrinsic critiques!
Oh great, more critiques! This ought to be real fun.
You got a better suggestion, smartass?
Yeah, maybe we should make a musical score instead, chart the sounds of our own disappearance. Isn’t that what a map does anyway, capture hints of a truth? Better yet, how about you write a transcript that makes sense of all our confusions, Mister Confucius? Maybe we could take turns reading it out loud, put it to a beat on our chests. We could make it atmospheric, diffuse into a space. Let the forest resonate with our map! Primal poetic echolocation!
Are you serious, Lineas?
Who’s marking this down? Jack, get over here, we need a script!
Forget about the end product of our would-be map for now, let’s just get into the process and see what we find. Any notation will do at this point, guys. We need to get moving!
I got it! We could play Lars Von Trier to each other’s Jørgen Leth, throwing obstructions at each other, to see who can come closest to making the “Perfect Map”!
You mean, like the Mappa Mundi, the Medieval map of the Holy Land? Taking turns obscuring the path to the Holy Grail? But, the grail was a deceit only known to the cartographer.
Exactly! That’s the point! Didn’t we watch the film together, you morons? The filmmaker-cum-cartographer is one destined to fail, because, you see, the distance between observer and content can never be breached. It’s absolutely unavoidable!
So we’re stuck here.
Hmmm… Perhaps a bit too fatalistic. But I like it!
Wait. The map has got to have some redeeming quality. It can’t just be an inherent deception. Who does the map serve: The maker, or the user?
Okay then, how about we make an architectural fiction, sort of like when Rem Koolhaas and OMA were actually good.
Good as in not-evil, or good as in talent —
— Shut up. The Map as Architecture. Maybe like a series of postcards or montages —
— Architects! Always want to turn everything into a piece of architecture. Get over yourselves already!
Isn’t every map a fiction to some extent?
As I was saying…. Something like a graphic novel that reveals the dreams of maps as dystopic and nightmarish, eerily resembling quarantines, internment zones, or social networks, stripped of privacy. Imagine the city as a map where we are mapped!
I don’t follow, exactly.
How so?? You’re the writer, aren’t you? It’s a series of storyboards that tell the story of a collective trapped by the map. Get it?
The notion that maps dream is certainly a curious one. This is getting very Satre-ian. Jungian. Listen, the real culprit is this flat sheet of paper we are blindingly following. What if this map is really telling us to ignore it?
~ The Map shakes loose from his hand and falls into the dirt.
Whao. Do you think maps face identity crises, for having been made in the image of someone else’s imagination? It’s such a violent carto-paradox: The Map torn between its own and someone else’s truth.
Who knows, every map could secretly yearn to be free. There could be a secret truth to every map unbeknownst to both its maker and user alike, that no one ever learns.
That would be a tragedy, man. Maybe we should let the map make itself, a map that can speak to its own truth! Imagine it as a sensitive membrane that mediates between real and virtual space, actual and perceived power, machine and skin, truth and nontruth, secrecy and transparency; let’s strive for THIS, gentlemen! — something to measure the fading bruises on the geopolitical body.
~ The Map suddenly becomes blotched soaking up juices from the earth.
It’s Mapping as detective work, with a little acknowledgement of a subterfuge at play we cannot fully know — because the map has its own suspicious agenda. You see, getting out of here is a great crime novel.
Sounds like a Calvino story: A mapper is called in to map something impossibly mappable by the Emperor. He, who is actually a She in disguise, wants to please the Emperor, but also secretly resists being a pawn to his totalizing imaging of virtual power. So, she wrestles with what and how to map, and decides to offer the emperor a map of would-be maps; stairwells down into the possibilities of place cavities; potential maps glimpsed in sidewalk mirrors; on window reflections; inferences of traces of power; all the while exposing the falsity of the Emperor’s territory as virtual spaces of imagination.
I think we should just stick to deciphering the rules in these maps if we’re ever going to figure out where we are, or else we just start fresh with a blank page.
Who says we should start with a blank page, or even a page for that matter? What we need is a viewfinder for all the metaphorical islands that are left in the world — everything else erased.
Like the only places left where the three of us would want to retreat to…Since our paranoias seem to be getting the best of us here. Have you lost it, Mr. Architect?
Paranoia is good. We should be self-reflexive about this, aware of our own map’s political trappings. Let’s just ask: can a map be critical of itself? Can it demarcate while exposing an awareness of its own shortcomings? Is there even such thing as an ideal, perfect map??!
~ The Map on the ground wrinkles up seemingly by itself.
Right! We need to map, and then infer the unmapped as a space of its own; an inferred map. Map everything first you don’t want to map. Map, map and map until it hurts, and see if we are left with some sort of accidentally mapped zone.
That’s brilliantly ridiculous. We’d be left with a map of all the uninhabited and perhaps disputed islands that the United States has in its possession, like the Navassa Island.
Wasn’t that your proposal a minute earlier: the unmapped, the de-mapped, an anti-map of sorts? The real islands where we can’t be mapped are pretty much invisible. Like a cave in the Afghan mountains. Or a closet in your bedroom.
…Guys, we haven’t moved.
Let’s disassemble this Map here and use the pieces to build a new Map. Recompile and draw some new connections. Maybe then we can see what we’ve been missing all along.
Paglen says, it’s all about “making the invisible visible” and getting people to become active in the production of their own space. As a kind of activist practice.
We could sure use some activism right now, that’s for sure. Let’s see what happens when we hold one map up to light in reference to another place. One map serves as the unwitting map of another zone, another invisible geography. Can these juxtapositions unveil new geographies? Can the rules from one place be applied to another?
Like those soldiers losing their way in a snowstorm and unwittingly using a map of entirely different mountains to find their way back.
Yawn. That’s so Situationist. And another example of male-dominated cartography. Not to mention that it doesn’t seem to address map-making as a radical tool, only as an experimental recombination, like an Eisenstein film.
We should commit to something soon… Or we might just have to eat these maps to stay alive. Señor, just because you are a geographer doesn’t mean you get dibs on the first bite!
Be careful. You never know what the map doesn’t show, what is lurking just beyond its edges, or within its lines. Maps might just be the great poison pill of humanity.
~ The Map starts to move slowly. Its paper kinking back in myriad folds ever so spectacularly.
It’s Us or Them. Either we eat this map, or it’s going to consume us.
I kind of like being lost. Is there a way to map that instead?
|
https://medium.com/@demilit/waiting-for-paglen-1a1b7fd44648
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[]
|
2019-02-15 17:55:20.548000+00:00
|
['Cartography', 'Getting Lost', 'Politics', 'Walking', 'Maps']
|
God Has Said That He Does Not Like the Word “Futon”
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EARTH — Just yesterday, for the first time in centuries, God came down from heaven onto Earth to deliver his people a holy message.
“I do not like the word ‘futon,’” he said. “It sounds kinda weird, ngl. You should stop using it.” The Earthlings below were in utter shock and amazement.
“I never thought of that,” some religious scholars said. “I never knew God was so bothered by the word ‘futon.’” The scholar who said the word was sentenced to immediate death for even saying the word futon. Oops, now I just said it. It’s okay, though, I can say it cuz I’m journalist and I can do whatever I want.
Along with this futon controversy, many are also confused as to what the heck a futon even is. “It’s like, uh, like, uhhhh, a kind of sandal, I think, right?” someone suggested.
Luckily, after a tax-payer funded government-run thorough and quite lengthy investigation as to the meaning and etymology of the word futon, experts now confirm it is a kind couch that can be made into a bed.
“What? Who in the world would ever own such a thing?” many remarked. Just to be sure, Christians have banned all use of the word and all productions of the product itself. Also, anybody owning such a disgraceful thing will probably be gunned down by zealots. Serves ’em right, I guess.
Jewish Rabbis are totally sure now that futons were the reason the Holocaust, World War II, and literally anything else bad happened in all of history. When asked for an explanation for this conclusion, most Rabbis simply yelled, “We were no ready!!!” and then mumbled some incoherent stuff in Hebrew.
Another Rabbi interpreted God’s anti-futon message as a decree that everyone should wear yarmulkes. When asked how this is what God meant, the Rabbi answered, “Duh.”
Anyway, the Bible is being rewritten to include some bits about prohibitions of futons. While they’re at it, they’ll change the part about homosexuality being a sin, some other stuff, then call it “The Bible 2: The Holy Bible Rises.”
|
https://medium.com/@planetxmedia/god-has-said-that-he-does-not-like-the-word-futon-ddfaae6d9a5c
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['Planet X Media']
|
2020-12-27 16:43:02.210000+00:00
|
['News', 'Religion', 'Christianity', 'Judaism', 'God']
|
Best Drag and Drop WordPress Page Builders Compared
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Are you considering a website redesign? Doing the redesign yourself? Hiring a website designer or website design company to tackle the redesign?
These are things that entrepreneurs and marketing professionals think about when it’s time to update their website, usually around the fall and winter seasons.
One thing is for sure, no matter what avenue you go down, you should choose a website builder because they make the task of creation and customization of websites an easy job. In fact, it pays off learning the tricks of the trade via drag and drop website builders and therefore accomplishing the job in a jiffy.
A common question we get asked is, “what are the best drag and drop WordPress page builders”?
The decision to choose the most ideal page builder depends substantially on the exact solution that you require for your needs. In terms of comparison of the best ones, the parameters are flexibility, design output, ease of use, and so on.
So, let’s take a look at the ones the market is currently flooded with:
Beaver Builder
Considered as one of the premier drag and drop WordPress page builder, Beaver stands out for being swift and having a built-in on-boarding tour to get users acquainted with the interface.
Almost all the changes that you add after bringing certain elements located at the right sidebar can easily be seen by you once you drop them in. Try clicking on any element and editing the properties and you’ll see the results for yourself. In fact, there are easy-to-learn modules that will help you insert backgrounds, content blocks, carousels, sliders, buttons, content blocks, and more; which means you don’t need a website developer or website development company to do the work.
One of the best aspects of Beaver is that almost all the major WordPress designs and themes are present so as to allow you to have complete control over the content. Even when you stop using Beaver, the content gets ported to the WordPress editor, better known as the WYSIWYG editor. Compatible even with the new WordPress version, the price comes at $99 for several sites.
Divi
This one is made by famous WordPress themes and plugins organization, called Elegant Themes. The Divi builder is flexible enough to work on almost all types of WordPress websites. You get innumerable possibilities to create the most sophisticated and advanced layouts and without knowing anything about coding.
A great thing about Divi is the feasible pricing. For a single price, the theme, page builder, and all other forms of products can be beneficial to users. The yearly plan is about $89 (but lifetime plans are also available).
Elementor
How many drag and drop options would provide you something like seeing the changes that you make live and you go on editing? Well… Elementor does! This is a live page builder, where you create sections and find the exact number of columns meant for each section. You can also get the widgets from the left panel to the section. The site comes with multiple widget options and the most commonly used website elements.
Every widget here has its characteristic appeal as per the setting. Be prepared to choose from the plethora of options like basic image, text widgets, and advanced ones like sliders, icons, social media, tabs, accordions, and more. The page builder is $49 for a single site license.
Visual Composer Website builder
In order to make custom website layouts hassle-free, look no further than Visual Composer Website Builder. You can get access to several out-of-the-box content elements, high-end templates, and a number of robust features, so as to make the perfect website. Much like Beaver and Divi, this one also offers a frontend editing experience to design the website.
Themify Builder
The builder contains 60 pre-built layouts, animation effects, and more to help facilitate an array of choices for the user. So you can very quickly build amazing pages, without having to resort to the help of professional website developers or start right from the get-go. Just import the layouts, replace images and text and the work will be done in a jiffy!
Page Builder by SiteOrigin
Highly popular for more than a million active installations, this wins the title chiefly because of its price (it’s free!). You can find this available as a completely functional free builder. However, there are few complications in terms of its use, so new users might take some more time to get habituated to it. But once you’ve mastered the art, you can download and install any widget of your choice and convenience.
For me, Divi, Elementor, and Oxygen are solid page builders and we use them the most with our clients. They do a phenomenal job when it comes to getting the job done and website speed. These builders also provide our clients with a user-friendly experience on the backend so they can make any changes they would like. We also create how-to videos for you and your team so you know how to update content on the site and more. It doesn’t matter if you are an entrepreneur or a marketing professional that knows how to code or not, we got you covered because we build websites that are simple for all our clients.
Bottom line: What’s the recommendation?
In a nutshell, it would be between Divi or Elementor. Given the range of options they provide and the simplicity in use, both are no doubt the most popular. If you’re ready to spend some extra bucks, go for them. It’s worth the investment. If you have any questions or need some help, give me a holler.
|
https://medium.com/@jesus-mcdonald/best-drag-and-drop-wordpress-page-builders-compared-523d7abf69bb
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['Jesus Mcdonald']
|
2020-12-24 23:45:43.506000+00:00
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['Wordpress Page Builder', 'Elementor Page Builder', 'Divi Page Builder', 'Marketing', 'WordPress']
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Money as a Responsibility: 20 Ways Millennials Can Fight Financial Fragility
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Money as a Responsibility: 20 Ways Millennials Can Fight Financial Fragility
By Sheena Ricarte, Freelance Finance Journalist
Wednesday, March 6, 2019
The author in January 2019 (Photo Courtesy: Sheena Ricarte’s Instagram)
As millennials, we were definitely raised differently from our Baby Boomer and Generation X predecessors. We grew up in global recessions, the Dot-com era, the unbridled and vicious cycles of social and environmental degradation like climate change, unwanted pregnancies, and single parenthood.
Depression, despair, and suicide are also included as among the serious social concerns that we are faced with in today’s world.
Moreover, we live in a time of international changes like the rise of different sexual orientations as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex, and queer or LGBTIQ being globally accepted and the ascendancy of social media communication enabling us to express ourselves freely though not everyone would necessarily do it responsibly.
Bigotry or traditional thinking which is tantamount to narrow-mindedness has come to an end as we are now accepting of the various perspectives and lifestyles of people from massively diverse backgrounds.
Being a millennial, I have noticed that talking about money is seemingly a taboo with our Baby Boomer or Generation X parents. For my older predecessors, they view money as something to be shared to others and not to be greedy with.
I have seen people familiar to me like my relatives leading impoverished lives and having made uninformed or mistaken financial decisions. They all have their excuses, blaming other people, their environment, or the society.
When I reflect on these realities in my life, I can see that these people do not understand the importance of working hard and the value of saving money. As a whole, they barely have an idea of how money greatly shapes a person’s overall life.
I think that these outdated perspectives need to be put to an end. As we live in a money-driven world, living in financial fragility is certainly financially unintelligent.
It translates to being irresponsible in life. Financial ignorance and irresponsibility should never be an excuse as to why a person is poverty-stricken.
Since life is freedom and as Spiderman’s uncle in the film said that with great freedom comes great responsibility, I reckon that this accountability also equates to money or financial responsibility.
This obligation comprises taking the initiative of working hard to give oneself financial protection for one’s needs, family, emergency situations, leisure, and the future. In essence, personal financial protection is one’s personal duty.
As we live in an accepting society now where communication is key in order to resolve social problems which have risen due to lack of awareness and open and sensible discussions over important social issues, we should freely discuss money — its nature and how it impacts a person’s overall existence.
It is absolutely true that money — and hordes of it — cannot be taken in the afterlife. I agree in what Mexican billionaire and the once richest man on earth, Carlos Slim, wisely remarked, “At the end, we leave with nothing.”
Sheena Ricarte admires Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim’s advocacy of corporate philanthropy. She reckons that his view of wealth and what to do with it makes absolutely perfect sense.
Nevertheless, as we live in a money-driven world, I think we should give value to the legal tender and recognize the importance of saving it not only for the rainy days but, most importantly, for the future.
In addition, money should be used for the benefit of the society, not for purposes of greed or hubris. Here are 25 ways that will help millennials prevent financial fragility:
1. Save for today. Plan for tomorrow.
These two sentences obviously appear like basic personal finance wisdom. They are, indeed, commonsensically common sense. They appear to be phrased simplistically and their meanings are a no-brainer.
But they are financially empowering and financially liberating, especially when one reflects on the long-term advantages of applying them in one’s financial life.
I am actually quite a fortunate millennial and relish having Baby Boomer parents who are well-educated, financially savvy, and fiscally conservative. They have ingrained in me to be financially responsible and taught me the lifelong value and convenience of having financial protection and financial security.
Money is certainly not a dirty word. It is a very important component of human life, thus, it should be treated with utter responsibility.
2. Always keep your and your family’s financial future in mind.
Saving money for the so-called “rainy days” has been a time-honored adage. Also included is saving for the “sunny days” like family outings, home renovations, and enjoying fine dining.
Always remember that family first and to further show your love and care for them, make sure that they are financially covered — their health, education, daily expenses, and so forth — in their entire lives. This is your financial responsibility.
Money is a scarce resource. It normally depletes because you use it in your life. Hence, make saving an integral part of your and your family’s existence.
3. Protect your money against financial predators.
Money represents a lot of auspicious things — freedom, security, choices, and opportunities. And as such, a lot of shady characters desperately want your money on their pockets.
Hence, beware of financial criminals like fraudsters, embezzlers, liars, scheming bankers, clever manipulators, leech relatives, sycophants, thieves, charlatans, and exploiters. They all prey on the unsuspecting moneyed individuals and it could definitely be you.
4. Be a financial autodidact.
Reading economics and financial literacy books, magazines, quotations, blogs, and vlogs will positively contribute in helping yourself understand the importance of keeping your financial life in order.
Besides getting a college degree and enrolling in established educational institutions, you can enrich yourself through the myriads of educational resources found online free of charge. YouTube is a video-sharing platform profuse with financially educational content.
5. Collect money quotations from books and songs that effectively impart financial wisdom and post them on your wall.
It is fun to gather money wisdom. Aside from their being clever, you learn how to control your spending on a daily basis and to be money-wise.
For instance, “The Money Song” by British comedy group Monty Python wittily imparted the wondrous nature of money:
“There is nothing quite as wonderful as money!
There is nothing quite as beautiful as cash!
Some people say it’s folly, but I’d rather have the lolly,
With money you can make a splash!
It’s accountancy that makes the world go round!
Money, money, money makes the world go round!”
Therefore, you should keep in mind that money is what makes the world go round!
6. Be a financial educator to your children or younger siblings.
It would be propitious and financially responsible of you to educate the younger members of your family about the concept of the legal tender and how it should be properly used.
Children should also understand the role of banks and put their money there for safekeeping, not just in their piggy-banks.
You can lucidly teach them how they could earn extra money by having savings deposits. It will always be financially negligent to spoil them with toys and other things that catch their fancy.
Furthermore, educating children to engage in annual savings projects or financial targets will certainly enable them to have a launch pad towards financial stability and eventual financial security.
7. Save and use those loose pennies.
Remember Benjamin Franklin’s simplified financial wisdom: A penny saved is a penny earned. It is absolutely true because you cannot reach $100 without a single penny.
I actually save those loose coins on a regular basis and add them to my bank savings whenever I make a deposit. After all, saving money is merely about the basic mathematics operation of addition. And hence, those coins definitely help by adding up to my savings account!
8. Keep a financial planner.
Using a financial planner, make weekly, monthly, and yearly financial goals and stick with them. Tally your day-to-day outlay or expenditures. List the activities and shopping items that you think are unnecessary and do away with them.
Above all, make an inventory of the amount in your bank account and check whether you are able to auspiciously save more or you are unfortunately going bankrupt.
9. Eat healthfully and stay healthy to prevent medical bills.
Getting hospitalized is one effective way to drain one’s finances which absolutely leads to more dilemmas.
When you go food shopping and treat it like purchasing medicine from a pharmacy, like what health expert, Mehmet “Dr. Oz” Öz advised, you would most likely save more money as you relish having sound health.
Moreover, just walk if your destination is just nearby. You can save on gas bills by strolling which is a healthful exercise.
Walking positively contributes to increasing your good cholesterol levels and it certainly clears the mind. Always remember that health is wealth.
10. Be your own financial decision-maker.
I must say I am the homo economicus — the poster child of the Rational Choice Theory in which I maximize my happiness through the frugal financial decisions I make.
As a millennial, you are a young adult. Knowing yourself, your likes and dislikes, and your lifestyle will help you understand where to spend your money. Do not allow your friends or family members to dictate how you will use your personal funds.
If you feel they are giving you sound advice which you think will help you grow your savings, then, you can take their recommendations.
11. Stop the FOMO (fear of missing out) vibe.
I think it is best to be practical nowadays. Being a millennial, I created my own lifestyle, bespoke according to my preferences and my upper middle class background. I do not go with the flow and how much more, give in to external pressures.
Therefore, I recommend that you don’t follow what you see on TV, films, Instagram, and Facebook. Live according to your means, background, and personality. After all, you are absolutely not these popular celebrities you see on social media whose incomes are three-coma figures.
12. Avoid dining out and expensive coffee.
You can treat yourself once in a while at a fancy restaurant of your preference and get the indulgence of pricey coffee products.
Yet, to desire to look “classy” by frequenting signature restaurants and cafes and binging on their drinks are certainly not money-smart ideas. Being a show-off is not smart and it will only cost you.
Plus, get rid of what financial author David Bach coined as the “latte factor.” If you really want to get on with that savings habit of yours, he suggested ceasing unconsciously purchasing those little everyday things that do not contribute any long-term value to your life.
Examples of the “latter factor” are drinking coffee at cafés often, smoking, driving to work daily, eating out for lunch every day, and buying candy to snack on out of sheer boredom.
13. Always have a budget when shopping at the supermarket, malls, and so on.
A budget is a financial plan. It leads you to your spending goal and prevents the wastage of money or its improper use.
As personal finance author Dave Ramsey wisely put it, “A budget is telling your money where to go instead of wondering where it went.”
14. Use coupons or the membership points in your credit or membership cards.
Imagine how much you can save if you use the membership points from your supermarket membership cards for payment. It will make you feel a little “richer” by cutting down your grocery bills.
15. Avoid going to the shopping mall even if it is sale day.
Shop only when necessary and not for retail therapy. It is impractical and financially unintelligent to be a shopaholic nowadays. Furthermore, I think it is a passé and a tremendously wasteful lifestyle.
Shopping malls — huge ones — are becoming things of the past. As e-commerce has momentously taken over the role of bricks and mortars, shoppers should also take practicality and being money-savvy into utmost consideration.
As the 2007 environmental documentary “The 11th Hour” advised, “Frugality isn’t poverty. It is the wise use of resources.”
16. Don’t buy some things which can be acquired for free.
There are websites giving insights about over a hundred items that can be availed without having to buy them from supermarkets.
For example, you can save the tissue paper from the restaurants or fast food outlets for cleaning your desk, the dining table, and so forth. You do not really need to purchase rolls of them from the supermarket.
In addition, you can just request for free water in dining places rather than purchasing bottled water. In this manner, you get to save more of your hard-earned money.
17. Switch off unused lights and home appliances like electric fans.
Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II, despite her immense wealth and stature, has been known to save by cutting expenses when she can. She is conscious of energy costs, too.
According to the Financial Times, in 2011, she posted warning signs around her 775-room grandiose palace that read: “The attention is drawn of all members of staff to the need to switch off unwanted lights. By Order of The Master of The Household.”
One of the Queen’s attendants confirmed that she often took the task upon herself and roamed the halls flicking switches.
18. Create a travel budget.
When traveling, you do not merely enjoy the scenery and the fresh air. Make sure that you have a financial plan as well.
Hence, you will not be tempted to just spend mindlessly. You will not regret having a budget once you are done with your vacation and do the accounting.
19. Pay your credit card bills on time to prevent paying additional charges.
Being a deadbeat credit card holder can save you a lot of money. It will benefit your credit standing, too. I settle my credit card bills at a specific date monthly and after doing so, it certainly gives me considerable relief.
20. Reuse and recycle.
Before you get rid of something, try to think if it could still be used for other purposes later. For instance, paper bags can be used to hold garbage.
The back of the receipts from restaurants or the ATM can be used to write to-do lists and grocery items to purchase. These habits certainly make life easier.
Apparently, money is a responsibility. As a rational adult, you have a choice if you intend to suffer the consequences of being financially fragile or unprotected. Take responsibility of your finances.
Remember, that much needed convenience is at your fingertips if you fully understand the importance of money and how it runs our lives.
As investing powerhouse, Warren Buffett, judiciously cited, “Rule Number 1: Never Lose Money. Rule Number 2: Don’t forget rule number 1.”
References:
https://www.amazon.com/Thrift-Thriving-America-Capitalism-Puritans/dp/0199769060
https://blog.cheapism.com/useless-things-you-dont-need-to-buy/
https://blog.trashbackwards.com/2013/05/15/100-things-you-never-need-to-buy/
https://www.cnbc.com/id/48675778
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/01/05/10-things-to-stop-wasting-your-money-on-in-2018.html
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/08/queen-elizabeth-ii-made-9-million-from-her-horse-racing-side-hustle.html
https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2hwqky
https://davidbach.com/latte-factor/
https://www.ecnmy.org/learn/you/choices-behavior/rational-choice-theory-homo-economicus/
http://engage365.org/the-relevance-of-a-penny-saved-is-a-penny-earned-today/
https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/349829-a-budget-is-telling-your-money-where-to-go-instead
https://www.investopedia.com/financial-edge/0210/rules-that-warren-buffett-lives-by.aspx
https://www.laurengreutman.com/waste-of-money-things-never-buy/
https://www.lifehack.org/articles/money/25-unnecessary-wastes-money-you-dont-think-about.html
http://www.montypython.net/scripts/money.php
http://sixdollarfamily.com/30-things-i-simply-stopped-buying-and-started-making-homemade
http://11thhourfilm.com/
https://twitter.com/Forbes/status/911641568527994882
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNeB6qRvF3Q
About the Author: Sheena Ricarte is a freelance finance journalist. Her research interests include US corporate finance, international economics, and international finance.
Miss Ricarte is also very interested in wealth management, investment management, and asset management.
She admires Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim’s advocacy of corporate philanthropy. Miss Ricarte supports Mr. Slim’s perspective of wealth being a responsibility to leverage in helping the society rather than a privilege which only a few will enjoy.
|
https://medium.com/@sheenaricartemoney/money-as-a-responsibility-20-ways-millennials-can-fight-financial-fragility-ec12a7d71c59
|
['Sheena Ricarte']
|
2019-03-06 14:59:56.378000+00:00
|
['Financial Security', 'Personal Finance', 'Saving Money', 'Finance', 'Money']
|
Son, Be of Good Cheer, Thy Sins Be Forgiven Thee
|
“Son, Be of Good Cheer, Thy Sins be Forgiven Thee”
Often times we can be found beating our chests, asking for forgiveness, yet still feeling guilty. We would do well to study this scripture out of Matthew 9:2.
You are forgiven.
What Jesus does in this verse is so amazing, because he not only forgives this man before the man even says a word, but he shows the redemptive power of forgiveness. Jesus shows that forgiveness heals.
How many of us carry heavy burdens?
It’s not unknown in these days that holding onto guilt, shame, anger, or fear can lead to pathologies in the body.
Guilt and shame can actually make you sick.
The flip side is also true. True forgiveness heals, as Jesus shows.
Let’s get right to it then. Who is forgiven?
Everyone is forgiven. Only, not everyone receives forgiveness. But, this doesn’t mean they aren’t forgiven.
In John 3:29, John writes upon seeing Jesus, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”
Takes away the sin of the world…
Now, if you are searching this scripture, many translations leave out the part where it says, who takes away the sin of the world. But, I have found it in my ESV bible.
So let’s get right to it…the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world. Christ atoned for all sin, and every sin. There is nothing his forgiveness does not cover.
There are millions and millions of people walking around, carrying the sin and shame of their past, believing they must carry this weight for all their lives.
Jesus seems to whisper…I have already forgiven you. Come to me. Drink from my brook of bliss.
When will we simply run to him?
|
https://medium.com/@mxchristopher/son-be-of-good-cheer-thy-sins-be-forgiven-thee-a523367cb08f
|
['M.X. Christopher']
|
2020-12-16 22:03:02.571000+00:00
|
['Jesus', 'Forgiveness', 'Christianity', 'Self', 'Mental Health']
|
The one you wish may not be the one you need
|
The first time was when I had to think of being a lecturer (like my father was) or being a lawyer and going to the “battlefield” to see how businesses operate. I chose the latter, and so far, I satisfy with that choice.
It happens to everyone when we have to choose which way we should follow. It is not easy to choose between what can help you to stabilize your life and what you wish to do but you may need to take risk of being failed.
Choices
I finished my LL.M. a few months ago. The past two months, I spent time to travel around Europe after the lifting of travel restriction. Coming back from those trips, I need to think about what I should do next. I would like to find a 9–5 job, either in Europe to experience an international working environment, or in my country. I also want to start a business relating to tech-travelling or opening a dessert shop in my country or being a blogger. I have a lot of things in my mind.
Then I realize that the most important thing I need to think about is how I can finance my life. I question myself whether those things would be the thing I need the most at this moment.
Each option has its own pros and cons
For running my own business, it can help me to manage my finance well. And, it would be great when you are the employee of yourself. But, I have to exchange with that choice. I will have to be ready for the first few years of not being successful. I need to think of risks and difficulties in the first few years.
If I take the option of coming back to the 9–5 job, it can help me with stable income, with bonus and allowances. However, work-life balance should be the thing I have to consider. And, the boredom and the pressure of the job in the legal field could be a thing I have to consider.
What should I choose?
I have decided to go back to my country. During this time, it is difficult to find a job in Europe. I still have a promising option that is to rejoin my previous law firm. Although I prefer to join a corporate at this time, rejoining the firm can help me to stabilize my life after one year of LL.M. in Europe.
That couldn’t be the thing I wish, but it is the one I need. Sometimes, we have to choose between these types I things. The one you like can be tempting, but at a time, it may not help you in life.
Will I stop the other plans?
Of course not. The coming back to the 9–5 working routine will be a stop in the long journey of my career path. It will be a good opportunity for me to see which option will be the best one for me in the future. I still can use my free time to learn some business skills, broaden my financial literacy, improve my writing skill, and so on.
If you have a dream and you want it to come true, don’t quit in the middle. Sometimes, being successful is not a straightway. Sometimes, you need to find another way to get to your destination. On that way, you may have a broad view of what you want, and you may have the option to prepare for the future.
I will keep writing my blog and on Medium though it will surely be hard when I work (more than) 8 hours a day. I will spend this time to see what I should do in the following years. That is the other way I chose.
But right now, I need a job and it will help me to stabilize my life before I can think of doing something else.
|
https://medium.com/the-innovation/the-one-you-wish-may-not-be-the-one-you-need-40b8e9cef409
|
['Trung V. Nguyen']
|
2020-09-08 18:23:02.937000+00:00
|
['Development', 'Careers', 'Entrepreneur', 'Self', 'Jobs']
|
Practicum Pride: Bolt Threads
|
Nicole Kacirek came to the MSDS program with a BS in Computer Science from Colorado State University and Wendy Xiao came to the MSDS program with a BS in Business Administration from Southwestern University of Finance and Economics. Continue reading to learn more about their practicum experience at Bolt Threads!
Nicole (left) & Wendy (right)
Can you tell us about Bolt Threads? What is it like working there?
NICOLE — Bolt Threads is a materials innovation company. Using proprietary technology and revolutionary bioengineering concepts, they deliver high-performance materials focused on sustainability. When first entering the office in Emeryville, you walk down a long hallway past a series of different research labs. In these labs, they’ve created Microsilk™ — a lab-made silk inspired by spider silk, Mylo™ — a leather alternative made from mycelium, the root structure of mushrooms, and most recently the b-silk™ protein — used in their new Eighteen B skincare products.
Can you describe the project(s) that you are working on?
NICOLE — For our first project, we helped the marketing team with message optimization for their new skincare brand, Eighteen B. Specifically, we scraped product reviews and social media data from a handful of their competitors.Then we applied Natural Language Processing (NLP) techniques to perform topic extraction and sentiment analysis on this data to see what and how customers feel about other products. After the successful launch of Eighteen B this month, we are now starting a new project. We will start building LTV (Lifetime Value) and Customer Segmentation models.
WENDY — The projects we have been working on are closely related to our curriculum which helps us review and reflect on what we’ve learnt in class. While our projects at Bolt are more specific to a business context, we continue learning by reading papers and learning more ML techniques. Our current project is building LTV models for their acquired e-commerce company to help make marketing decisions. Acquiring, cleaning, and understanding the structure of the data has taken us longer than expected, but the whole data science process is fun.
How are you applying the knowledge gained from the program to your practicum? Is there a particular class that has been the most helpful?
NICOLE — The Data Acquisition course was extremely helpful while collecting data for our first project. We used Selenium and Beautifulsoup to scrape product reviews, and APIs to obtain social media data. This class also taught us some valuable pre-processing techniques for text data. In addition, our Machine Learning courses also exposed us to scikit-learn and the many algorithms we could use to perform topic analysis.
WENDY — I agree with Nicole. I’d also like to add that the SQL and Exploratory Data Analysis (EDA) courses were very helpful especially when it came to data processing such as scaling, encoding, and feature engineering techniques. In general, to do a project, from framing a problem, breaking it down into smaller tasks, making modeling choices, all the way to validating and interpreting the result, the “data science mindset” and “problem solving skills” for this whole process have been taught to us throughout our curriculum, particularly by Terence, Brian, and Yannet.
What is the biggest challenge you’ve faced at your practicum?
NICOLE — I would say the biggest challenge we’ve faced so far was how fast paced the first project was. We started in November and the product launched in March. In order to help advise the marketing strategy, we had to present our analysis to the marketing team in early February, but we also had a month off for winter break in January. Therefore, we were collecting all of our data across a variety of platforms ourselves, analyzing it, and presenting our findings in a very short amount of time. While the pressure could be overwhelming at times, it gave us some great experience in working in a fast-paced startup environment.
WENDY — Personally, communicating with people has been a little bit of challenge for me, partially because English is my second language, so I get nervous and have to be really well-prepared to make my points clear when I speak in the meetings.
Are there any cool perks?
WENDY — Our colleagues at Bolt Threads are nice, open, and willing to help. Although we are only there 2 days a week, they have made us feel very included. It is also very cool to see all the labs with serious scientific research happening.
NICOLE — One of the coolest parts about being a data science intern at Bolt is interacting with all of the scientists and engineers that work in the labs on a daily basis.
|
https://medium.com/usf-msds/practicum-pride-bolt-threads-e19678cbf6d8
|
['Victoria Suarez']
|
2019-04-04 21:31:37.533000+00:00
|
['Machine Learning', 'Students']
|
Most people are doing demos wrong…
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Most companies and agile teams have recurring demos, often bi-weekly which I think is a good practice. But in my experience we have forgot what the main purpose of what demos are for.
So… What are demos for?
Demos are not primarily for showing what kind of progress we currently are at, or for stakeholders to have a look at some half done work and feel better about the progress because they can see that something is getting done. Although those things are good, we have to go back to the roots of agile to understand the proper reasoning behind demos.
The difference between a classical project management method like “waterfall” compared to agile, can be summarized in one sentence. In agile methodologies, requirements change! In software, to work effectively you cannot have a planning phase where you take some requirements and make a plan for 6 months to then execute. History has taught us that requirements change in the minds of the stakeholders when they see products in front of them.
The core of agile is to build up a structure where requirements can change, while teams can still be able to build software effectively. Instead of doing a long 6 month project, we split it up into short sprints like 2-weeks, where we deliver something in a short amount of time and get user and stakeholder feedback.
Working vertically or horizontally
Before going into what we should and shouldn’t do when demoing, I need to quickly explain working horizontally and working vertically.
Working horizontally is when you split up an epic into ex. UI, frontend-heavy logic, backend and infrastructure. Some developers could start on the UI while some others start on backend or infrastructure. This way of “slicing” up a project is called working horizontally.
Working vertically is when you chose a smaller scope and complete that small scope from UI all the way to infrastructure. You now have a small, but fully functionable and testable feature.
How should demos be done?
Now to my point. Demos should always be done on vertically scoped work. The main purpose of demos is to ship a feature that the users, or stakeholders can test and get a feel for. If we do demos with horizontal work, it’s much harder for stakeholders and users to get a feel for what it will look like in the end, therefore it becomes harder for them to give correct feedback.
When working agile, always work vertical. Make sure you get real good at working scoping vertically, so when you demo, you can show some end to end working features that your users and stakeholders can test!
Shoutout to Marcus Rådell that has taught me a lot of these principles.
|
https://medium.com/coding-philosophies/most-people-are-doing-demos-wrong-c394bb7e530
|
['Marvin Kristus']
|
2020-12-08 09:33:44.948000+00:00
|
['Coding', 'Software Development', 'Agile', 'Agile Methodology', 'Demo']
|
Hello from the Net Road
|
Friends,
The assorted succulents above, pictured foregrounding a typical summer afternoon Taipei rainshower, have a story. The story is that they were neglected in the teachers’ office, but then a UV lamp was going to be used to disinfect the teachers’ office and that anything living needed to be removed, so someone took the neglected succulents outside and set them on the little wall that looks over the courtyard, and there they have sat since, and there they sat when I arrived last year.
I am not sure what the point of the story was, though I have heard it three times now. Did the succulents look much worse off or less healthy in the office, and this is a tale of how they thrived outside? Was the story just a tale about how no one really does anything with these succulents yet they manage to sit there year after year, largely undisturbed? Like a lot of my understanding of the school I have worked at for a year now, it feels incomplete. It is a surreal workplace, sometimes. About half of what happens at my job outside of my immediate classroom I don’t understand because of the language barrier. The other half that is inside of my sphere of understanding is built on a very shaky foundation, given it has to do with a group of very high turnover foreign employees. A handful of the people I worked in very close proximity to for ten months last year are gone, replaced with new faces from Texas or Toronto or other schools in Taipei, and already a week into the semester they are a normal fixture in my life with our own routine interactions, until they or I leave the school as well and quickly fade from the school’s world. And it’s not even the people I’ve directly interacted with — so many little stories and explanations float around about the teachers who were there a year or two before I arrived, people whose actions caused shifts in policy or tradition or expectations.
I don’t think I’m stating this well, but there’s been a very odd feeling for me this week, the first week of the semester, when I think about how much of my energy and thoughts have gone into this school over the past year, how much of my life has revolved around it, in a way that wasn’t true of any job before it or graduate school or anything else, and then one day at the end of the spring semester I’ll leave it and it’ll probably be pretty decisively closed.
(While there are people who make a career out of working as a foreign teacher at schools abroad, they are the minority. For the people who don’t, there’s an interesting parallel between the job of teaching at the school and the experience of going to a school that one day I should write about but am currently incapable of.)
The above is part of the reason that I’m so thankful for our friends here in Taiwan, people who have allowed us into their lives despite the fact that the uncertainty of duration or geography of our future friendship. Relationships as adults beyond people you see on a daily basis take so much work, right? Our time and energy is valuable, and so we must be choosy about who we’re going to put in the work to continue being close to. We’re going to our first Taiwanese wedding next month! How exciting.
Your Chinese lesson for today requires some zooming in. 網 and 綱, wang and gang (long A sound like raw or lawn), mean totally different things despite only having a tiny difference in how they’re written. The first means “net,” but you see it most commonly next to 球, qiu, which means ball. 網球 net ball = tennis! Or 路, road. 網路 net road = internet. 綱, on the other hand, is a much less common character but is used to talk about bullet point-style outlines. If you look closely at the character, in the bottom right corner is this character — 山 — shan, which means mountain. So, an outline has a connection to a mountain, makes sense. But the same spot for net has this character — 亡 — wang, which means death, and doesn’t exactly make sense until you realize it means you can say that the internet contains death and hey, everything fits into place.
Further reading:
The English department started our first meeting of the year off asking people to say what they’re looking forward to during this year, which is a good habit for meetings in my humble opinion. I answered truthfully that it was incredible to see my students grow over the course of last year and that I couldn’t wait to continue to watch as they developed into their own, full people over the course of this one.
What are you looking forward to?
-g
|
https://medium.com/@GrahamMOliver/hello-from-the-net-road-79fd1a4695f4
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['Graham Oliver']
|
2020-09-06 01:55:48.710000+00:00
|
['Taiwan', 'Expat', 'Taipei']
|
State of the Guild #54
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Stay up to date on all BitGuild’s products, GuildChat, Trontrade, and GuildWallet.
Today we’re back with another edition of the State of the Guild, where we report all the news and updates from Bitguild’s products and projects. This week, we have more news about the GuildChat desktop version, an update for GuildChat mobile version and the delisting and listings of certain tokens on TronTrade.
GuildChat
In the last two weeks, the GuildChat team has been testing the GuildChat desktop version for Windows & Mac. The developers finished the build for the desktop version. All versions are currently being tested internally, by the BitGuild team & the GuildKeepers. In the upcoming weeks the developers will focus on fixing the bugs and improvements that are reported during the test phase. Also a new version of GuildChat mobile is currently being tested which contains an update to easily find your tokens in your wallet with the upgraded search bar.
Many of you have been waiting for this, the GuildChat desktop version. So you can easily use GuildChat also on your desktop. That’s why we’re excited to give you a preview about the GuildChat desktop version which will be released for Mac & Windows. A few screenshots of the first build of the GuildChat desktop version are included below.
Screenshot GuildChat Desktop version — Dark Mode
Screenshot GuildChat desktop version — Light mode
TronTrade
Over the past two weeks, the TronTrade team has been busy assessing potential listing candidates, a total of 23 listing requests have been received, two of which met the TronTrade requirements and will soon be listed on Trontrade.io, so stay tuned!
In addition, TronTrade team has organised a number of events. The rewards of the successful #888 trading event were sent to all winners. And in the TronTrade Telegram channel, a number of price prediction contests took place where the winners received 1,000 TRX!
More on TronTrade:
TWX was delisted due to a request from the team.
SEED was delisted due to an ongoing token swap. The new TRC20 SEED was listed on Trontrade on the 14th of August.
Trontrade added two new tokens to their list: TRONs Defi token JST on August 24th and and the new token TERC PRO from the TronEurope team on August 7th.
TronTrade SR Node was successfully updated on the 5th of August.
Please note: In the last few weeks we have received more and more reports about false Trontrade admins. We ask our users to be very careful, our TronTrade admins will never PM you first, ask for a private key, or any personal information. Make sure you don’t get scammed by not giving any personal information and always check if you’re talking to the real TronTrade admins.
That is all for this week’s State of the Guild. Be sure to come back in two weeks for more fresh updates and don’t forget to follow us on Twitter and Telegram.
BitGuild aims to bring blockchain and cryptocurrency adoption to the masses by providing compelling experiences that are easily accessible. Between GuildChat, our crypto social app, GuildWallet, the most user-friendly browser extension wallet, and TronTrade, our decentralized exchange, we’re firing on all cylinders to usher in a new age, changing the way people interact with their digital goods.
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https://medium.com/the-notice-board/state-of-the-guild-54-386233688d69
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['Yorina Wouters']
|
2020-08-14 08:49:26.532000+00:00
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['Cryptocurrency', 'Tron', 'Apps']
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Letter to 80 year old self: Am I experiencing regret for my decisions?
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Rohtang Pass, India, August 2017
Dear 35 years old myself,
Thank you for finally asking me today. It’s always a wise idea to recognize your problems and seek help from someone who has been through it all.
I am going to say things you might already know. Our lives are like a maze, and as we navigate through this maze, we all realize that many of our previous decisions were suboptimal. I am choosing to use the word ‘suboptimal’. You know why? Because our decisions are like solutions to ‘mathematical problems’. Our decisions are also effective within defined boundaries and with some assumptions. It doesn’t matter how hard the problem or a decision was. This is how all the decisions were ever made!
Now that you are questioning your past decisions, I want to remind you that every decision you ever made was, in fact, your best one at that time. It is only because you have the capacity to look backward and introspect, you are now calling some of those decisions suboptimal. And, you can see many reasons; you didn’t have enough information and made bad assumptions, you got carried away by your emotions, or you didn’t know that the future will be so different. The fact is, you could have controlled certain factors, but many were outside your control. And, that’s the very nature of life!
At the same time, I don’t want you to think that nothing is in your control. Every decision you make from now can be better than the one you ever made in the past. And how do you do that? We do that by becoming more mindful of your emotions and learning to reflect upon the past. Once we become more mindful of our emotions, we begin to differentiate between emotions which carry important information vs. emotions which can hijack our decision-making process (you know which one to look out for!) And, by committing to regularly reflecting upon the past, you will gain additional insights on what you could do differently going forward. The key is to recognize the interplay of time. If the present is our playground, the past is our coach. This perspective is your key to begin reducing regrets!
I understand you miss your elements from past. And, I can see that this feeling gets overwhelming at times! But, you should remember that you did not want to settle with whatever you had at that time. Perhaps your expectations were very high! Every decision entails some compromise, and I don’t think you were prepared to accept this fact back then. Compromises are part of the decision-making process, like constraints with any problem.
And, do you want to know why your mind is wandering and imagining a different present? It is because it wants to teach you something. Like I said above, our emotions carry important information. What you are experiencing is regret. And you must remember that regret is a part of our very existence. It defines who we become. Once you recognize it, embrace it, and learn from it, you will move on!
Yours,
Elder Yourself
|
https://medium.com/@babbar/letter-to-80-year-old-self-why-am-i-regretting-my-decisions-d83d67affa56
|
['Tarun Babbar']
|
2019-06-17 21:47:53.426000+00:00
|
['Decision Making', 'Regret', 'Life Lessons', 'Growing Up', 'Letter To The Self']
|
How to communicate visual hierarchy
|
Human beings are naturally hard-wired to identify patterns, even when there may not be any present. Similarly, we tend to follow a pattern when using a new website or an app. We navigate it instinctively and get frustrated if the site does not respond the way we expect it to. If we encounter this frustrating experience in a consumer context, we have the choice of deleting the app or never visiting the said website again. However, such experiences in enterprise applications can negatively impact the productivity of the users, and thereby, the business goals of the organization.
Therefore, it is crucial for designers to create the right interface which aligns with this natural pattern-spotting in order to provide a comfortable navigation experience to the user. This patterned organization of visual elements in the UI is called visual hierarchy. This post explains the concept and logic that goes in the making of visual hierarchy.
What is Visual Hierarchy?
Visual hierarchy has been based on the Gestalt principles which explain the visual perception of elements and how people tend to unify the visual elements into groups. It is one of the core elements of the design process.
Visual hierarchy is all about creating the layout of the content in a manner that users are easily able to perceive the significance of each element. It involves organizing the UI components in such a way that the human brain distinguishes the elements based on their appearance in terms of size, color, contrast, etc.
Visual elements have a key role to play in a user interface. Components that are messy in appearance or those which are misplaced only add to the confusion of the user. Further, an unorganized copy is low on legibility, which leads users to put in extra efforts to seek the information they’re looking for, or an action they want to perform.
Just as with a sudden movement in the corner of your eye or an object of interest appearing in your periphery, our eyes are naturally drawn to certain captivating visuals. Of course, the detail may vary from person to person, but the majority of humans tend to follow certain visual patterns, and this includes how they view digital content.
Clarity and cohesion in visual hierarchy and information flow makes for layouts that are easy to scan and follow.
Visual hierarchy helps users achieve their goals faster and lead to better outputs.
Importance of Visual Hierarchy
“Chaos was the law of nature and order was the dream of man”.
– Henry Adams
Users naturally favor order as opposed to chaos, because it makes things easier to comprehend. Consequently, they prefer elements of familiarity when it comes to using digital products. Users express happiness and satisfaction while using an interface with well-organized elements.
UI patterns are the means which blend together structure patterns and logic to make delightful user experiences. It is truly said that ‘old habits die hard’, which makes it imperative for designers to consider user patterns carefully before finalizing designs.
The seamless experience occurs when the interactions are so smooth that the users navigate through them without having realized it. Even a few extra seconds that users spend on decoding the navigation can cause inordinate delays in the users fulfilling their intended aims and objectives.
How to Create Visual Hierarchy
Once you are thorough with the Gestalt principles, you can make use of them to emphasize elements or sections of the page that need to be highlighted or appear different from the rest. This is referred to as an anomaly and is used to create a visual contrast. This helps draw the viewer’s attention to a specific area or focal point, all the while enabling the overall flow and discoverability.
Size and weight
Elements that are larger in size are used to attract the viewer’s attention. This is one of the simplest and most effective ways to lend visual hierarchy. Enlarging a particular element’s size (dimension) and scale (its size as compared to other elements) is how to give it visual precedence over others. Components lower in priority can be de-emphasized by reducing their size to make them less visible — and thereby, lower in the visual hierarchy.
Color and Contrast
A bright pop of color naturally draws attention as compared to muted tones. Following the brighter tones, richer and darker hues can be used to generate focus. Lighter tints or grayscale colors are used further down the hierarchy. This is the color scheme to follow while creating a visual hierarchy.
Also, sharp contrasts in color are bound to appear more eye-catching than those with muted contrasts. Contrast helps in depicting the more important aspects of the design.
However, it is important to note that the use of colors has to be sensible and controlled, as the over usage of different colors only adds to visual chaos. This only dissolves any impact that would be made by the usage of colors. Therefore, colors should be used sparingly and with the right purpose to create the correct visual hierarchy.
Placement
Users are habituated to scan web pages in a set pattern. Certain areas on a page receive more attention than others. The area above the fold, and along the top and left sides are understood to be spots where the user’s eyes fixate on the most. Thus, these areas can be used to display important content.
Alignment
Alignment is used to establish an order between the components of the interface. For instance, placing text with a sidebar column creates a visual priority for the reader. Login buttons, considered to be a high priority element is usually placed in the top right-hand corner of a page. Larger font used as a heading placed on top of the page and its break with the alignment with the rest of the text creates a hierarchy that draws attention.
Whitespace
Whitespace refers to the area around the content; it may be white in color or of any other hue. This area can be used to draw focus towards certain visuals. Doing so comes with the dual advantage of making information appear pleasing to the eye, and letting the viewer zero in on each area of information.
Following these tools of the visual hierarchy can help in creating a UI that is user-friendly and positively impacts user responses and experiences.
|
https://uxdesign.cc/how-to-communicate-visual-hierarchy-abf51426245e
|
['Bansi Mehta']
|
2019-07-26 00:06:54.267000+00:00
|
['UI', 'Design', 'UX Design', 'UI Design', 'Visual Design']
|
4 Top Ways To Make Money In Real Estate — Equity — Real Estate — Realtor
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1. APPRECIATION:
To make money in real estate, the good news about it is if you look at what has happened to values over time, they tend to go up in value. There are some people don’t know what to invest in, what they do is they take their cash and they hold it and they put in the bank or they put under their pillow.
Cash is one of the worst and most hated investments of all time, why? Because our $ is not perfect in the market, It has a history of going down more than 3% every year, which means for every hundred of thousands dollar you have in the bank, you are loosing over 3000 a year, just by keeping it in cash, which means anything you put your money in need to be able to grow in value intend of losing value. So real estate is the amazing edge because it’s outpacing inflation.
2. Real estate is an investment that produces cash flow:
This is true, because when you, for example, let’s say you get a single family home and ruing it out for $1500 and maybe $200 for repair $1000 obligation to the bank every month and now you have $300 positive cash flow every month from that property,
3. Make money through Commission or Management Fees:
If you want to play a real real estate game, you will want to have realtor license, a loan officer license, title license, You can earn more money when you have one this license. which means when you buy a real estate property, there is a room for a double dip. Double dipping is very cool in real estate.
4. Equity:
Which is the money you buy on the property, you get it in discount. If I have a real estate deal that I am doing that worth $100k, and ii get it for $80k, then I buy it 20% below market, which supposedly means $20k below market, that $20k is equity.
|
https://medium.com/@product-review-hub/4-top-ways-to-make-money-in-real-estate-equity-real-estate-realtor-6473b8289f3
|
['Daniel Joseph']
|
2019-06-17 13:36:31.515000+00:00
|
['Real Estate', 'Realtor Near Me', 'Make Money In Property', 'Real Estate Investment', 'Realtor Websites']
|
COVID-19 vaccine efficacy calculated from data
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Pfizer and Moderna — vaccine efficacy calculated from data
As of right now (December 2020), the leading mRNA vaccines for COVID-19 are made by Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna. Their efficacy is estimated to be most likely around 94% … 95%.
vaccine efficacy likelihood
But how was that number calculated? Turns out, the basic value is pretty easy. I’ll show you how to do that, and then I will make an estimate for how confident we are that the value is right.
Randomized trials
To test a vaccine, you need to do a randomized blind trial. Gather tens of thousands of people. Divide them into two nearly equal groups. One group will receive the vaccine. The other group (the control) will receive an injection that looks exactly like the vaccine, but doesn’t actually do anything.
The control group shows what happens when there is no vaccine, when people are not protected. The other group shows what happens when people are vaccinated. The two groups are identical in every other way.
It’s important that people are chosen at random, and that the test is blind — nobody is sure who got the vaccine and who got the placebo until the trial is over and the numbers are counted. If people knew they got the vaccine (or the placebo), they would behave differently and that would influence the result.
At the end, just count how many people got sick in each group. Was it roughly the same number? Then the vaccine does not work. But if the number of infections in the vaccinated group has decreased when compared proportionally to the control group, that means the vaccine actually works.
Simply compare the ratio of people who got sick in the vaccinated group, with the ratio of people who got sick in the control group, and that tells you how effective the vaccine is.
Pfizer-BioNTech
Pfizer-BioNTech had 21720 people in the vaccinated group and 21728 people in the control group.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2034577
n1 = 21720 n2 = 21728
In the vaccinated group, 8 people were infected with the virus. In the control group, 162 people were infected with the virus.
x1 = 8 x2 = 162
Let’s calculate the ratios of infection in each group:
r1 = x1 / n1 = 0.000368 r2 = x2 / n2 = 0.007456
Infection ratios in the two groups for Pfizer
They’re very different — one is about 20x bigger than the other; a lot more people got infected in the control group.
So, if the control group gives us the infection rate in the absence of the vaccine, how many of those infections were eliminated by the vaccine in the other group? The difference (that was eliminated) is r2 — r1, and we have to compare that with the baseline r2:
E = (r2 — r1) / r2 = 95.06%
The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine can be said to be 95% effective. In other words, it removes about 95% of cases that would otherwise happen.
Moderna
Moderna had about 30000 people divided equally in two groups (vaccine and control). The vaccinated group had 11 cases of infection. The control group had 185 cases of infection.
https://investors.modernatx.com/news-releases/news-release-details/moderna-announces-primary-efficacy-analysis-phase-3-cove-study
n1 = 15000 n2 = 15000 x1 = 11 x2 = 185
The ratios are:
r1 = x1 / n1 = 0.000733 r2 = x2 / n2 = 0.012333
Infection ratios in the two groups for Moderna
Which gives us the efficiency:
E = (r2 — r1) / r2 = 94.05%
So the Moderna shot is about 94.1% effective. Sounds pretty similar to Pfizer, so let’s check them side by side (scaled so the top values match):
Infection ratios in the two groups for Pfizer and Moderna
They look quite similar indeed.
Confidence intervals
All this is the result of random events. In the vaccinated group, 8 people got infected, randomly. In the control group, 162 people got infected, also randomly. But how confident are we that these numbers are meaningful?
If we do the experiment again, perhaps the numbers will be flipped, and we get 162 infections in the vaccinated group, and 8 infections in the control group — how likely is that?
Turns out, it’s very unlikely. This is easy to show, it’s a basic comparison of population proportions.
If you learned Stats 101, you’ll go “oh, okay, let me do a difference of proportions”. That would work, but it’s not the most meaningful thing here. What works here is a lesser used comparison — the risk ratios, or relative risk. Think of it as a ratio of proportions, not a difference of proportions. It’s a common comparison in epidemiology.
Let’s call theta the ratio of infection risks (vaccine group vs control group):
theta = r1 / r2
Assuming the groups are independent (which they are — that’s the point of the randomized trial) and the distribution of infections is binomial (like a flip of a coin — pure chance, which, again, is the whole point of randomized trials), then the variance of the logarithm of theta is:
var(log(theta)) = 1/x1 – 1/n1 + 1/x2 – 1/n2
The standard error is the square root of variance:
SE(log(theta)) = sqrt(var(log(theta)))
Assuming log(theta) is normally distributed, the 95% confidence interval for theta is:
CI = theta * exp(-1.96 * SE(log(theta))) ... theta * exp(+1.96 * SE(log(theta)))
If we plug actual numbers into the formulae, this is what we get — for Pfizer:
CI = 89.96% ... 97.57%
For Moderna:
CI = 89.08% ... 96.76%
In other words, we are 95% confident the real efficiency values are within these intervals. Could the real values be very different? Could they be 1%, or 99.999%? Yes, but it’s very unlikely.
What makes us more confident? The size of the trials. The more people you enroll (tens of thousands), the more narrow those intervals become. You could obtain extremely narrow intervals, but that would require extremely large trials — hundreds of thousands of people, or millions, which is expensive and takes a lot of time.
The more people you use in the trials, the more confident you can be in the results. Very big trials mean very precise numbers. These were pretty big trials, so the numbers are reliable.
Final results
We can plot the likelihood for each vaccine efficiency. We will get two narrow bell curves, centered around 95%. The assumption here is that log(theta) is normally distributed (which should be pretty accurate), and the mean value and standard deviation are calculated above.
vaccine efficiency likelihood
As you can see, it’s extremely likely that the efficiencies are around 95%. It’s quite likely that both are between 90% and 98…99%. Below 90%, the likelihood decreases very quickly until it becomes basically zero.
If we had even more people in the trials (millions), the curves would have been even sharper.
Conclusion: we are quite confident that the mRNA vaccines (Pfizer and Moderna) are around 94% … 95% effective.
This notebook contains all calculations I’ve done, you can use it to check my numbers:
https://github.com/FlorinAndrei/misc/blob/master/pfizer_moderna_vaccine_efficacy.ipynb
Notes
I am the author of all images and code used in this article. Links to data sources are included in the text.
Note from the editors: Towards Data Science is a Medium publication primarily based on the study of data science and machine learning. We are not health professionals or epidemiologists, and the opinions of this article should not be interpreted as professional advice. See our Reader Terms for details. To learn more about the coronavirus pandemic, you can click here.
|
https://towardsdatascience.com/pfizer-and-moderna-vaccine-efficacy-calculated-from-data-9566897173c
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['Florin Andrei']
|
2020-12-28 17:25:31.208000+00:00
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['Data Science', 'Statistics', 'Vaccines', 'Covid 19']
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Small talk your way to becoming an influential UX designer
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I am a self-taught UX designer who made the transition from architecture in 2019. My first day of work at a real-life tech company was a something of a culture shock. I had always worked in design agencies and boutique architecture firms where I sat shoulder to shoulder with my fellow designers, ready to help each other out in an instant. In contrast, I was now working not only with a team of 10 UX designers (spread company wide), but I also supported two agile teams of developers, engineering managers, and product managers. I had to quickly learn the ins and outs of the complex technical requirements, business KPIs and the needs of our users, while mastering this whole UX thing as I went along.
Spoiler Alert: I eventually found my way around the place, through a deliberate regime of small talk.
There is a reason why one of the top skills required for UX designers today is not mastery of design tools but communication skills. Learning software can be done through practice; learning design patterns is about copying and adapting what is out there, but understanding your product, business, and users, this cannot be achieved by just quietly doing your homework.
UX design is about an amplified multi dimensional level kind of team work. This is across teams, disciplines and hierarchies in an organisation.
Small talk can be described as pointless chatter. “It’s “small” because you talk about unimportant things, in a way that fills up silences and makes you both feel more comfortable and friendly with each other.” The smallness of the conversation can be a feel like a burden to many but I prefer to focus on the second half of this definition, making people feel comfortable with one another. Here is how small talk helped me become a better UX designer and how it can maybe help you.
Small talk helps you better navigate an organisation.
It might help to think of small talk as the opportunity to collect little nuggets of knowledge about our co-workers. Collecting these nuggets every day helps paint a picture of a someone beyond the operational facts we learn in a workday.
You may quickly discover more things you have in common with your co-workers and develop a rapport with one another. It is equally important to recognise who hates small talk wholly and treat them differently. Starting a new job, there is an initial scramble to understand the culture, business and get to know your colleagues. Friendly chatter helps us identify quickly who the possible go-to people are when problems arise. We can use these conversations to help us draw a map of knowledge and influence. The sooner you build a support system at work, the faster you can solve problems and become an influential designer.
Small talk is a gateway to more meaningful conversations.
One of my favourite colleagues is an Engineering Manager who I eventually small talked into a friendship. He was quick to warn me that he despises small talk. Whenever we chat, I come up with creative ways to gauge his mood. How many meetings have you had today? On a scale of 1–10, how productive was your day?. My camouflaged small talk helped us evolve our discussions out of the realm of day to day pleasantries.
Think of small talk as the quest for stories about people’s days and life. These stories help you build better connections at work and can turn colleagues into friends. This one doesn’t apply just for UX, but friendships at the office can make work a a real joy. I benefited immensely from the support of my new found friends at work, and our conversations and often heated debates, were a great way for me to learn and think more holistically about the product I was working on.
Small talk helps create a collaborative atmosphere.
I desperately crave harmony at work and in life. As an ENFP personality type, I am also hypersensitive to awkward social situations. I practice small talk in an attempt to make people feel more relaxed. Since the switch to remote work, fewer people seem to make the extra effort to be friendly during video conferences. By opening up a dialog at the beginning of these meetings, the entire tone can change and become more collaborative. This can be a great time to ask a question about something you can see in their background or just break the silence with some chit-chat. When people feel more comfortable, they share their ideas and thoughts more readily.
Small talk will make you a better user researcher.
The exact same skills mentioned above will help designers conduct better user research. Beyond being a great communicator, this is one of the most sought after skills for designers. The most skilled moderators allow the conversation to flow naturally and let the interviews navigate seamlessly between tasks and questions. The candidate should have no idea the interview has even started.
The other side of the coin is moderators who skip small talk entirely and abruptly list off a bombardment of questions as they are read from the discussion guide. Dominating conversations in this way can mean that the testing environment becomes so unnatural that the results are less reliable. These kinds of tests lack fascinating off-hand insights, which can be some of the best learnings from user interviews. Use small talk as a tool to set the tone for a casual conversation, which hopefully leads to more reliable research and some more talkative users.
Small talk can help you navigate conflicts and mediate discussions.
A considerable part of the job is not only empathising with our users but with the many stakeholders involved in building a product. A healthy tension between Product Managers, Developers, and UX is fundamental for any successful product development process.
Small talk can be a perfect tool to break down tensions and let conversations become less volatile. A conversation about something outside of work can help everyone remain calm and civil. This should not play out in a manipulative fashion, but more of a reminder that the workplace’s misunderstandings should not strip us of our humanity. A bit of empathy for one another can go a long way toward coming up with the best resolutions as a team.
Small talk helps workshops and ideations run smoother.
This is a no brainer. Another highly sought skill for UX designers is running workshops and ideations. I have experienced my fair share of workshops ran by someone who awkwardly tries to engage a group of people in a lackluster manner. Remote workshops are even more difficult, and activating the group is about making everyone feel comfortable and engaged.
A UX designer should know who to invite and how to get everyone involved in the conversation. This is where the skills above become crucial in combination. Successful workshops are about facilitation, mediating conflicts, and fostering collaboration. No one is better suited than the friendly neighbourhood UX designer to pull it off
Small talk makes you adorably annoying.
I am unapologetic about how small talk has helped me grow as a designer and find my way around a complex organisation. I tend to focus on the adorable and not the annoying, so I am advocating for this approach. Some people won’t be into it and will probably ignore your social advances, which is totally fine. Participating in small talk is about being open to people and hoping a “How are you” could one day progress to a “Could you help me out?” Without the relentless friendliness and openness, I might still be feeling like I did on day one: Disconnected, lost, and not knowing where my place is in the organisation.
I know this kind of social proactiveness may seem insincere and ridiculous to the introverted designers out there. Nonetheless, I implore you to do it anyway. If you are the best designer in the whole world, you will not make an impact if no one knows who you are.
Remember being enthusiastic is worth 25 IQ points, so put on a smile, give it a try and let me know how it goes.
Phase 1: Small talk. Phase 2: ??? Phase 3: Profit.
References and fun reads:
Ogeleka, C. (2016, July 29). HOW TO TURN SMALL TALK INTO SMART CONVERSATION. Retrieved December 12, 2020, from https://medium.com/@christianachiogeleka/how-to-turn-small-talk-into-smart-conversation-c9d873ea1d3a
McAndrew, F. (2020, January 18). Why Small Talk Is a Big Deal. Retrieved December 12, 2020, from https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/out-the-ooze/202001/why-small-talk-is-big-deal
Chatting with a Purpose: Introverts and Small Talk. (n.d.). Retrieved December 12, 2020, from https://www.16personalities.com/articles/chatting-with-a-purpose-introverts-and-small-talk
Sterling, B. (2020, November 18). Life advice from guru Kevin Kelly. Retrieved December 13, 2020, from https://www.wired.com/beyond-the-beyond/2020/04/life-advice-guru-kevin-kelly/
|
https://bootcamp.uxdesign.cc/small-talk-your-way-to-becoming-an-influential-ux-designer-db82c146ff7c
|
['Reem Alwahabi']
|
2021-01-01 20:51:24.247000+00:00
|
['Careers', 'Coronavirus', 'UX', 'Product', 'Remote Working']
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Trapped At Home — The Old Are Becoming Lonelier
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According to the Britannica, loneliness, distressing experience that occurs when a person’s social relationships are perceived by that person to be less in quantity, and especially in quality, than desired.
Loneliness, distressing experience that occurs when a person’s social relationships are perceived by that person to be less in quantity, and especially in quality, than desired. The experience of loneliness is highly subjective; an individual can be alone without feeling lonely and can feel lonely even when with other people.
In effect, researchers agree that loneliness is a state of mind. It starts with the mind but begins to manifest in the body leading to a decline in overall health.
For younger people who have schools or jobs to attend to, loneliness might be a huge issue too. But the kind of loneliness that hits retired old folks is at a different level.
A lot of old people are either living alone or living with a partner who needs constant care. These two groups of people are probably the loneliest.
In the pre-pandemic world, these old people still had some social outlets.
An old couple I know live by themselves in an independent house. On a normal day, they are perfectly happy living by themselves. It is a conscious choice they made. They have entertainment and human contact in terms of neighbors, relatives who visit, the street vegetable vendor, the grocery store owner down the road, and such like. They are happy with their life.
But now, they have been systematically cut off from all these social touchpoints. Well-meaning friends and relatives do call them. But it is not the same. They crave human contact in flesh and blood. They crave the daily haggling with the vegetable vendor, the across-the-fence chat with neighbors, and the regular stream of visitors throughout the day.
With none of this possible now, they feel like their oxygen supply has been cut off.
Another fallout of this lack of real human contact is that the old people have actually run out of conversation material. Even when someone calls them to chat, the conversation peters out pretty quickly because they have nothing to say. No local gossip, no crib sessions about how the vegetable vendor charged them extra, nothing at all.
This is now turning into a vicious cycle. They don’t meet anyone, so they have nothing to talk about. Because they have nothing to talk about, they have no interest in phone conversations. All this results in a spiral of loneliness and a lack of self-worth. So much so that they begin to believe that their life is as good as over. One person went as far as to tell me that it is better to die than to live a life like this.
I call and talk to one elderly lady I know whenever I can. Her constant lament is that she has nothing to talk about and nowhere to go. It is not as if she used to roam the countryside earlier. But she had the freedom to do so if she wanted.
One of the things old people are unable to accept is that they are no longer free to go where they want. They cannot handle this constrained lifestyle.
They understand it. That doesn’t mean they can accept it.
The technology barrier
The biggest issue that sets apart lonely people of other age groups from the old is the technology barrier.
The younger population is able to adapt to the new digital age and find distractions online. Whether it is social media or binge-watching Netflix, they have some diversion and something to keep their minds engaged.
The older folks are technologically-challenged and cannot operate any of these digital devices well enough. Most old people I know don’t know how to subscribe or login to Netflix. Several old people that live around me are afraid to use a smartphone, let alone any of the apps that come with it.
How are they supposed to stay engaged in the new online world? With no physical world human contact and no ability to access the online world, these seniors are suddenly totally at sea in the new world order.
I was talking to another old couple recently. They are healthy and have enough saved up to see them through the rest of their lives. The husband just hung up his boots on his job, and they were looking forward to a life of travel and actually living their life. But the pandemic has put paid to all their dreams.
Now they are unsure when they will be able to travel, or if they will ever be able to travel. Given their age, they are understandably pessimistic about what the future holds for the world. This has made them both melancholic and withdrawn. It is as if they have lost their zest for life. They don’t know what to do with their time.
What can the not-so-old do to help?
All of us know people in this state. How can we rally around and help them tide over these strange times? Think of all the old people in your neighborhood.
What old people really need are gifts of time and patience. The NHS UK website offers a lot of advice on how to engage with the old and the lonely.
Volunteer to bring them their groceries and other supplies. Instead of a stranger from the store, it will help them to see a known face and hear a voice they recognize when you drop off the supplies.
What old people really need are gifts of time and patience.
If you have been following all the norms of social distancing, you can also volunteer to take old people out once in a while. My husband and I recently took an old lady to her favorite shop. It was a short outing, but we could see the change on her face at the end of it. She was glowing with joy. It was as if she had sprung back from whatever depths of loneliness she was in. All she wanted was a change and some semblance of normalcy.
Engage them in conversation that they might be interested in, even if it is not your type of conversation. If they complain about the state of affairs and sound bitter, just be patient and let them rant it out. It is cathartic for them.
Helping the old cope with loneliness is actually a two-way street. It helps them live a little better during these troubles times. More importantly, it gives you a deep sense of purpose. We need all the positivity that we can gather and spread right now.
|
https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/trapped-at-home-the-old-are-becoming-lonelier-27c98f5ecb5f
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['Anu Anniah']
|
2020-10-20 13:15:29.670000+00:00
|
['Society', 'Mental Health', 'Pandemic', 'Loneliness', 'Life']
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OERs and giving it away
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OERs and giving it away
Why publish open educational resources?
Sun shining through trees © The University of Manchester.
I am involved in the delivery of Open Knowledge in HE (OKHE), an open module on open knowledge/openness in higher education (from The University of Manchester, available to all). I am enjoying being part of the module and hearing participants’ experiences of and thoughts on openness.
The module is split into three topics, the second of which includes discussion of copyright and licensing as they relate to openness. This is very relevant to my job in eLearning. I’ve written this post as an exploration of this, including why I believe in openness and why I’m lucky that my employer does too.
If you work in education and/or are interested in openness, I hope that my perspective will be interesting. Either way, I’m happy to receive responses :-)
Open Educational Resources (OER)
“[OER] are teaching and learning materials that you may freely use and reuse at no cost.” — oercommons.org. CC-BY-NC-SA 3.0
Openness is a term in fashion at the moment, so it isn’t always clear what it means; in what way(s) is a particular resource ‘open’? For me, a big part of what is good about OER is the reuse aspect.
Many educational resources are open in that anyone can freely access and them. You might call this ‘open to learners’. In this case, the copyright holder allows learners to view their resources (by not restricting their availability e.g. by price), but may not allow educators to use the resources in their teaching. With this definition, you might argue that any content available publicly online is an OER (as far as it could be used as an educational resource).
Openness beyond access
I believe that openness is about more than access; it is about surrendering more of your control — in the case of OER, doing this to improve the value of that resource to educators (not just learners). One of my arguments for OER is that the increased value is felt by all — including the copyright holder and/or original resource creator. Making resources open encourages you to structure and document them well, to make life easy for ‘the next person to use them’. Sometimes that ‘next person’ will be you…
Sharing resources openly and allowing others to reuse them can also lead to gathering more feedback and suggestions on the resources, which can help to improve them. Equally, it can lead to better usage from ‘your own’ audience. If your resources are discoverable through Google, not hidden behind a login, they will be easier to find for all.
Another argument for OER is that licenses such as Creative Commons allow us to surrender some control without losing anything. There is nothing to be afraid of; when you license something, you are in control over how much control you retain
What really defines OER for me is that the openness deliberately goes beyond this in ways which makes the resources more useful to educators. For me, OER are not only be free to use, but free to distribute (generally under certain conditions) and to reuse/remix.
Some examples
My Learning Essentials artwork © The University of Manchester.
I am lucky to work on the My Learning Essentials resources, which are released under CC BY-NC 3.0. Every month, I look at online usage statistics and see how many institutions link to and embed the resources. We also receive emails from people who have adapted them to suit their own needs. All of this is lovely, but I believe it also enhances Manchester’s reputation.
Here are some open educational resources from My Learning Essentials. You may find these useful within OKHE, as they relate to academic writing — or you may simply see them as examples of resources which are released openly.
In addition to these resources being open access, we release the source files openly. You can view all OERs from MLE — workshop resources and eLearning project files — on Jorum. How easy have we made these to reuse?
If any of the topics above are relevant to your practice, can you see yourself using these resources? If you had time, would you be interested in modifying them to suit your requirements? What are the benefits/disadvantages to the copyright owning institution (The University of Manchester)?
Open Knowledge in Higher Education
All core materials in OKHE are released under CC BY-NC-SA (all of those written specifically for the course by the OKHE admin account. We cannot make all materials available under this license, because of our choice of open course structure (all participants can contribute to the course, and we think that it is important that they license their own work) — and that’s OK!
|
https://medium.com/open-knowledge-in-he/oers-and-giving-it-away-181c91b15736
|
['Chris M']
|
2016-03-03 09:54:40.521000+00:00
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['Oer', 'Education', 'Okhe']
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Five Small Habits That Will Make You Stronger
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Five Small Habits That Will Make You Stronger
Your habits represent you.
Photo by Sasha Freemind on Unsplash
The Covid-19 pandemic causes a spike in anxiety and depression. No one has seen this coming. It’s been eight months, and everything has changed. Right from work to lifestyle to socializing to our behavior towards many other things.
As Stephen Covey once said, “We become what we repeatedly do.” We create our habits, and then slowly, the pattern becomes us. Some habits make you successful, while some can throw you in a deep hole.
Over the past six months, I have religiously adopted these five changes in my life, and the result is impressive! I have never felt better in my life.
1. Morning Ritual — Meditation and Breakfast
The habit of morning meditation I had picked up subconsciously when I was a kid. It’s my mother’s morning ritual, and still, it is. But slowly, when I grew up due to an abruptly hectic schedule, the morning habit changed to checking e-mails right after I open my eyes.
Amidst the pandemic, anxiety became my middle name. It grows from mild to severe anxiety so quickly that I almost think I will faint any time.
I decided to join my mother in her morning meditation session. Slowly my condition got better, and now after six months, I feel a changed woman.
Just like you need gas for your car, food is fuel to your brain. Breakfast is as important as breathing clean air.
Cold food can make your stomach stressed. It would be best if you wake up your digestion with something warm in the morning. Breakfast can help you be more alert, focused, and happy. Therefore it increase your concentration.
For me, nothing can beat a variety of egg recipes for breakfast with toast bread accompanied by slow-roasted coffee.
2. Build-up Network via Social Media
How I wish to learn this pre-covid time. I have been following many amazing creators on Instagram and Pinterest over the past three years. Never once it occurs to me to take these two social media platforms seriously.
I was busy making my travel blog beautiful with mediocre content and was happy with the limited number of clients I had. Being a Travel Planner over the past eight years, I am not satisfied with how I have grown. I could have done better.
But, pandemic has given us all a second chance in life. I took the opportunity. I did what I am good at — travel planning, photography, and writing.
I studied a lot for destinations around the world and took note of it for making an e-book. I am practicing photography every day and learning new techniques every week.
I joined Medium, which helped me grab the attention of freelance writers for their blogs and projects. They hired me solely based on my Medium articles.
Build a network of amazing people thru social media in the last six months. I am learning from them every day.
3. Budgeting
An essential thing in life is to learn to budget. No matter who you are, which company you work for, or how many awards you have bagged. If you don’t have a track of spending, it can raise a problem financially in the long term.
It did to me. Put a hole in my bank account, and I had a tough time during the nationwide lockdown. Thankfully I live with my mother. I survived and learned the biggest lesson of my life in a most challenging way.
Things I did to balance my money, and it can help you too:
Unsubscribe from all paid applications unless you need it, and it benefits you in your daily life. I have only three active membership currently — Medium, iTunes, and iCloud. Subscribe yearly to save on membership fees.
Unsubscribe from all single-use OTT platform. Share the account with your friends or families.
Exchange books, or buy from small vendors.
I have temporarily discontinued wi-fi connectivity and use a personal hotspot from my mobile service provider.
Go for basic groceries and vegetables. Buy local. Eat homemade meals. Avoid frozen items, junk food, and ready to eat meal packs. You can always make peanut or almond butter at home, which is preservatives free. Homemade meals not only will save you money but also make you fit and glowing.
Buy shower gel instead of bath soap. Shower gel of 750 ml can last for six months if you use it carefully.
Save on fuel, walk more, or hire a bicycle for longer days.
List out all debts — credit card, loan, EMI. Talk with the respective banks, explain your situation, and convince them to give an alternate solution.
Try not to miss any payments, not even your mobile bill or gas bill. Opt for ‘pay later’ services that allow you to take longer days credit without an extra amount.
If you are working in a company and receive a salary, try to save the maximum you can. Put 5–10% into short or long-term investment with possibly high return. Consult a financial advisor, or talk with your friends or family.
If you are into business or freelancer and your income impacted due to pandemic, build an impressive profile on social media, stay consistent, build a network, and promote yourself. Side by side, try to get a business loan from a small financial company; they generally have low interest than big private banks and don’t ask for many financial documents.
Finally, do not fall into an online loan service provider trap that offers you a big loan amount in the lowest interest. Trust your instincts. Nobody will give a loan in low-interest amidst a pandemic; everyone is struggling. The hackers are preying on vulnerable people online.
4. Build a Capsule Wardrobe
The secret to having it all is recognizing you already do.
Capsule Wardrobe is a term we used for a minimal set number of clothes. A basic set of clothes coordinating the color patterns can be mixed match with one another; therefore, it can form outfits for all occasions.
I have stop shopping for clothes or any accessories, be it pieces of jewelry or shoes, for the past ten months, and I am really proud of myself. The sole reason for me to stop shopping was I gone broke, and therefore I adapt the capsule wardrobe theory.
5. Get Your Life Together — Journaling
Journal helps you reflect on your life.
It is being said that writing is one of the best brain exercise ever, and I couldn’t agree more.
I am not comfortable sharing things with friends or family. I am a great listener, but when it comes to my problem to share, I hide. Consulting a therapist is a challenge for me. Also, the therapist’s sessions are costly. So I began to journaling again. I am pouring my heart out.
Even though I started journaling from the beginning of the year but later, my short journaling turned to essays when the pandemic hit the world.
Journaling helps me to heal, to understand myself better. I am in a better space now.
|
https://medium.com/change-becomes-you/five-small-habits-that-will-make-you-stronger-6763e3114bed
|
['Shweta L']
|
2020-12-18 12:26:09.726000+00:00
|
['Personal Growth', 'Personal Development', 'Self Improvement', 'Life', 'Mindfulness']
|
Black Box — Rethought, Redesigned and Revamped!
|
We can’t stop! We just can’t!
We are in the middle of an improvement streak that has made our dev and design team relentless in releasing an update every week!
In this edition of the Yocket Black box, we are bringing you augmented features and UX improvements that make you think, ‘Did I do that with just a click?’.
Let’s get on with it!
Messages Maximus!
Here come the Messages features with many add-on functionalities that are intuitive and intriguing.
Separate important conversations from the rest for ease of access with Pin Conversation.
Don’t worry about typos and wrong messages sent. Just hit Delete and move on.
Found someone having similar aspirations on group chats? Visit their profile by clicking on their name. An efficient shortcut!
From Referral to Rewards!
It's a fact that we are known for our phenomenal Premium services and how we take care of our premium users. Now, our Premium users can invite their aspiring family and friends into the fold and earn rewards. This feature is available on the website and will arrive soon to the app.
If you are a premium user, share your referral code with your friends and family
You and the person you refer will gain exciting rewards! And boy! those are some exciting rewards we have in store for you.
Start referring already!
Gateways to Connect!
We were brainstorming on how to seamlessly connect you with other Yocketers and ting!💡
We’ve introduced a few gateways to Connect from University pages and course pages. You can view Yocketers who have shortlisted and applied to universities and visit their profiles instantly.
Shortlist to know the deadlines!
Finding application deadlines of universities have been made easier.
Step 1: Shortlist your preferred university course in your application manager.
Step 2: There is no step 2!
You will see the deadlines displayed on your shortlisted university and just like that we’ve made your life easier!
Full Profile. Full Benefits!
We are constantly finding ways to make the study abroad process hassle-free for you. In this case, complete your profile and get to enjoy all the benefits of Yocket. One of them is, we auto-fill your details whenever needed and give you a personalized experience through the platform.
Auto-filled details on College Finder.
on College Finder. Automated listing based on your preference on Explore, Connect, University Deadlines and more.
on Explore, Connect, University Deadlines and more. We’ve also strategically placed “casual” reminders for you to fill out your profile on your Feed. By completing your profile, you’ll unlock the many perks we’ve in store for you.
A faster, sleeker Connect
Experience the intuitive designs of Connect exclusively on the mobile app. With Quick filters, interactive profile cards, minimal designs, Yocket Connect has a new feature added that displays the application status of each aspirant for easy sorting.
University Deadlines
Find out all the deadlines of your preferred universities with interactive filters and personalized listing based on your profile. This feature is currently active only on the web and PWA versions.
Our “Not so important but IMPORTANT” updates
Automation of task addition to My Tasks: Based on the study abroad stage, our premium users will get tasks added to their ‘My Tasks” section automatically. (Available only for Premium accounts)
Based on the study abroad stage, our premium users will get tasks added to their ‘My Tasks” section automatically. (Available only for Premium accounts) The Who? What? Where? of documents: Now you can know who uploaded the documents, their review stage along with their type. (Available only for Premium accounts)
Now you can know who uploaded the documents, their review stage along with their type. (Available only for Premium accounts) All your requests to change their degree level preference has been undertaken and will be reflected in the coming updates.
That brings us to our sign off
“We’ve made other miscellaneous UX improvements and fixed several bugs.”
We are passionate to bring you a product that serves you in the best way possible. With every update, we are finding excuses to improve features aesthetically and functionally. We’ll be back soon with our next Black box update soon.
Until then, experience a smoother study abroad journey.
|
https://medium.com/@Yocket-verse/yocket-black-box-rethought-redesigned-and-revamped-2a34ed390b6e
|
[]
|
2022-01-31 06:48:04.315000+00:00
|
['Study Abroad', 'UX Design', 'Updates', 'UX', 'Product Design']
|
7 Tips for How to Be Successful on News Break
|
If you’re a frequent writer on Medium, you’ve likely already heard about News Break, the news app which is now catering to content creators.
Their incentives are attractive:
a guaranteed minimum monthly income,
ad revenue share,
referral bonuses for getting readers to download the News Break app and bringing on new content creators,
and other cash awards.
There are, of course, requirements for reaching that guaranteed minimum monthly income.
The number of articles you publish, when you publish those articles, and your page views and follower counts may factor in whether you reach that guaranteed minimum or not.
I can’t share the specific details of my contract (confidentiality agreement), but I can say that once you apply and receive a contract, it’ll be clear what you need to do to reach those minimums.
Screenshot by the author
I reached all of my contract requirements in order to make the guaranteed monthly minimum payment in four days.
Here’s how:
1. Clickbait is your friend.
Unlike Medium, you can go nuts with your titles on News Break. It actually was difficult for me at first to come up with clickbait headlines for articles because I was so used to avoiding them altogether.
While clickbait is often about overpromising and underdelivering, you can get around this by working on the emotional value of your headline. Pack your headlines with power words. Be specific (A list of tips? HOW MANY tips? HOW was that incident life-changing?). Use “This/These.” Make them think, “Whaaa?” so they click click click.
Here are some of my articles that have done well:
“It Was Only a Matter of Time Before I Cheated on My Husband” (91k page views)
“4 Ways to Make a Girl Crazy for You” (37k page views)
“5 Things Science Says Guys Don’t Find Attractive in Girls” (29k page views)
Here are some articles from other writers that have done incredibly well:
“How a Teenage Girl Became the First Survivor of the Deadliest Virus Known to Man”
“What It’s Like to Date As a Demisexual”
“How I Got Proof of Life After Death as My Husband’s Final Gift”
If clickbait headlines are tough for you to come up with, try these helpful generators: Sumo headline generator, Phrase Generator, or Title Generator.
Pro tip: If an article doesn’t do well at first, try changing its title! One writer told me she changed one SIX times before it finally started gaining traction.
2. Add the follow widget to the bottom of all of your articles.
News Break isn’t as intuitive about getting your fans to follow you.
When you are drafting an article to publish, the button on the top right under the Title bar says “widget” when you hover over it and then “follow” when you click it.
Make sure to add that to ALL of your articles, so it’s easy for your fans to click to follow you.
Here’s what it looks like:
Screenshot by the author.
3. Know your audience.
While I’d consider Medium’s audience rather educated, liberal, and worldly, News Break’s readers are American, politically conservative, and primarily male.
I quickly discovered this just by reading the comments on some of the first articles I published. Be aware that the comments can be very unfiltered and…mean. It’s recommended that you don’t read them unless you’re wanting a better sense of your audience.
In my talk with the creators of the platform, it also seems like many live in the American south.
Articles that do well cater to and/or upset that particular audience. This audience particularly responds to emotional hooks and stories.
Therefore, the following article topics do well:
personal essays on a range of topics (family, parenting, friendships, death, etc.)
being for or against masks, President Trump/President Elect Biden, or the Republican/Democratic Party or its platform
relationship/dating advice for men
gender/sexual identities
relationship/dating problems
Tips:
Keep your paragraphs short.
Make your writing easy to skim (lists, subheadings, etc.).
Check your grammar and spelling (using something like Grammarly).
Consider keeping your writing level to a 7th to 8th grade level, which is the reading level that newspapers in the U.S. cater to. You can use this analyzer. Shoot for a Fry Readability Grade Level (shown on the right) of 7 or 8.
4. Pay attention to your keywords.
Unlike Medium where you can tag your own articles, News Break automatically pulls keywords from your article.
Here are the keywords that appear on the bottom of this article:
Screenshot by the author.
Some of these can be very relevant (like “relationship advice” and “infidelity”), but some of these can also be very irrelevant (like “Europe” and “circumstance.”).
If you want an article to appear under a certain tag, make sure you’re using valid and similar keywords. Instead of, for example, using the word “cat” multiple times in an article, also use the words, “feline,” “kitten,” “pet,” etc.
5. Publish.
You’ll never learn if you don’t try, so publish maybe four articles on four different topics.
Pay attention to what does and doesn’t do well.
If none of them do, try another four, or try writing an article that is in the vein of something on the list I mentioned above.
The important thing is not to give up. You may be surprised by what takes off.
Note: Profanity and ANY sexual references are not allowed (even using the word “sex” or “sexy” can get a story flagged, so you’re better off just not using them). It can be annoying (I literally have to ctrl+F each of my stories for naughty words because I’m a potty-mouth), but the more you get used to writing “cleanly,” the better.
6. Stick with the winners.
Like any platform, even one in its early stages like News Break, you have to find the “winners” and learn from them.
Follow as many fellow creators as you can, and pay attention particularly to those that already have over 1k followers and 200k+ views. Those are writers who are doing something right.
You’re welcome to follow me. Also check out the pages of the following even more successful writers:
Shannon Ashley
Matt Lillywhite
Tracey Folly
Kerry Kerr McAvoy
Elle Silver
Joe Donan
When you find a “winner, ” scroll through all of their articles. Since you won’t be able to see how many pages views a particular article has, look for the ones with the highest number of likes/comments.
Read those “winning” articles. Pay attention to their headlines. The topics. How the writer structured or formatted the story. LEARN why it did well, and see if it inspires you to write your own.
7. Learn from your successes, not your failures.
Just like on Medium, an article can totally flop. Even one you think might do really well.
When it does, don’t try publishing another article in that same style/type/subject. Don’t try to repeat your failure.
I published a parenting article, for example, that has so far gotten all of three page views. THREE.
Am I going to publish another 20 parenting articles? God no. I’m going to mess with the title to see if that’ll improve things and then look back at my successful articles and see if there’s another way I can write a post on the same topic, from a different angle, etc.
While News Break is still in its infancy, it’s a great place to try out new things, introduce your work to new readers, and get some extra money too. These tips aren’t guarantees, but these are the tactics I and the other successful writers on the platform have employed. We got followers quickly once we began putting out content News Break’s audience wanted to read.
|
https://medium.com/inspired-writer/the-real-truth-about-how-to-do-well-on-news-break-b1e785711827
|
['Tara Blair Ball']
|
2020-12-16 13:03:49.233000+00:00
|
['Freelancing', 'Writing Tips', 'Blogging Tips', 'Blogging', 'Writing']
|
RUSS M. HERMAN
|
Russ M. Herman is one of the most brilliant speakers on the trial lawyer circuit today. A senior partner of Herman, Herman and Katz, LLC, in New Orleans,he is a top mass torts litigator who has taken lead roles in several multi-jurisdictional major suits. Herman, who has practiced law across the country for more than fifty years, was named as the 1977 Outstanding Lawyer by the Louisiana Trial Lawyers Association and has continued to receive local and national accolades since then.
Herman served as the President of the Louisiana Trial Lawyers Association from 190 -1981 and as well served as President of the Association of Trial Lawyers of America from 1989 to 1990. He is a diplomate of several advocacy groups. In 2001, Mr. Herman was selected for the Leonard M. Ring Champion of Justice Award, the highest honor bestowed by ATLA.
In 2010, Russ Herman was admitted to the Trial Lawyers’ Hall of Fame which includes American trial lawyers such as President John Adams, Clarence Darrow, Fred Levin, Morris Dees among others.
Russ Herman served on the litigation committee for the State of Louisiana v. American Tobacco Company, Ellis v. RJ Reynolds Tobacco Company (representing the State of California) and Scott v. The American Tobacco Company where he was lead counsel on behalf of a class of Louisiana smokers who were awarded a landmark jury verdict of more than $591,000,000.00.
He has authored over 200 articles, papers and books and has been published in numerous legal periodicals and text books.
|
https://medium.com/@nik.triallawyergallery/russ-m-herman-8e56949643b8
|
['Trial Lawyer National Portrait Gallery']
|
2019-06-17 18:08:17.043000+00:00
|
['Legal', 'Law', 'Russ Herman']
|
Conditioning the Blockchain
|
Author: Dr Michael Scott
As described in my last posting on the ‘Essence of the Blockchain’, the block-chain is just a public ledger supported by the power of the cryptographic hash function.
From a “genesis” block, a chain of blocks propagates onwards. Due to the one-wayness of the hash function, it can never be reversed and the contents of a prior block can never be changed. However we can add new blocks on to the end of it.
The biggest problem in creating a block-chain is one familiar to anyone with long hair. Split ends. What’s to stop the chain being forked and split in numerous different directions? The whole point of a public ledger is that there should only be one of them. If anyone can create a fork and hence create their own block-chain how do we know which is the one true block-chain?
What we need is a way to effectively “seal” the end of the block-chain so that it cannot be forked. Some kind of serum or conditioner maybe.
This is the tricky bit. The BitCoin solution is particularly clever. Recall that BitCoin is an application of the block-chain to the creation of a virtual currency. The trick is to motivate a group of “miners” to take part in an expensive process that effectively seals the end of the chain. But why should they? How do we motivate them? Simple, pay them some BitCoin!
So there is a feed-back at work here. The method of sealing the end of the chain is fundamentally associated with the application of the chain.
And that’s the biggest issue in block-chain research today. How do we come up with clever ways of sealing the end of the chain that will (probably) depend on the purpose of the chain, but hopefully won’t require as much work.
In BitCoin its “proof-of-work” (iterating a hash function billions of times) which the group of miners use to seal the chain. A common alternative suggestion is “proof-of-stake”, where a valid miner can demonstrate that they have already invested heavily in the construction of the chain to its current point.
Download the Essence of the Blockchain PDF
|
https://medium.com/miracl/conditioning-the-blockchain-d600f3e9e31d
|
['Anushka N.']
|
2018-10-03 21:15:49.974000+00:00
|
['Hash Function', 'Blockchain', 'Bitcoin', 'Proof Of Work']
|
Deep dive into Dagger generated code (part 2)
|
Photo by Lum3n from Pexels
In the previous blog post, we looked at the different types of classes Dagger generates. Converting the generated code from Java to Kotlin with some additional refactoring removes visual noise and helps us understand it better. In this blog post, we continue to dive into how different features are implemented in Dagger — component instantiation, members injection, qualifiers and multi-bindings. Most of those features were introduced after the initial release of Dagger, and were build on top of things discussed in the part 1 of the series.
In order to follow the rest of the article, it is highly recommended to read part 1 of the series.
Component instantiation
In Dagger there are two ways to instantiate the component — Builder and Factory . By default, Dagger generates a Builder . We can make Dagger create a custom implementation of a Builder — for that, we have to create an inner interface and annotate it with @Component.Builder .
As a result, the generated Builder will implement the declared interface. For every setter method, there will be fields generated inside Builder . Also static builder() method will be generated in the component, that will return an instance of that builder.
When using Builder , you can forget to call one of the setter methods, causing exceptions during runtime. To avoid that, Dagger v2.22 added the ability to create @Component.Factory for component instantiation. This Factory is stateless and has a single method, so the program will fail at compile time instead of runtime if you forget to declare some of the component dependencies.
As we can see below, this single method just instantiates the component, without any temporary fields.
@BindsInstance
One of the most useful features of the custom Builder or Factory is the ability to define @BindsInstance . It allows passing external instances to the component without declaring modules or dependencies.
The instance passed into CustomFactory.customCreate() will be stored in the field inside the component, thus making it singleton for this component.
In the generated code you can notice that stringProvider property is defined using InstanceFactory . It is the internal Dagger class that simply returns the same instance for every get() .
To further simplify things, let’s add a new rule.
5. Replace all generated factories and InstanceFactory with a lambda
@Component.Factory and component fields
So we can use @Component.Factory to pass stateful modules, dependencies, and binds instances to a component. Let’s create a factory that accepts all of the different types of parameters.
As we can see below, all of them are stored as fields inside the component. With that in mind, you can treat all the parameters of @Component.Factory as constructor parameters of the component.
Members injection
Sometimes we don’t control the lifecycle of an object — we can’t instantiate it in @Provides method or add @Inject constructor to it. This is when members-injection comes to the rescue:
Dagger generates a members-injector for classes with @Inject applied to a field or a method. MembersInjector is the functional interface (lambda) defined in Dagger, and it is implemented by all generated members-injectors.
public interface MembersInjector<T> {
void injectMembers(T instance);
}
Let’s take a look inside the generated members-injector. For every member of the target class, Dagger generates a static method ( injectRepository() in the example above), that assigns the given instance to a field or calls a setter of a target object. Inside the overridden injectMembers() method, all of these generated methods are called using instances, obtained from Provider s.
Super members injection
There is some special case when class inheritance involved in member’s injection. Let’s take a look at the simple case when one class extends other, and both have members with @Inject .
In that case injectMembers() of generated ChildActivity_MembersInjector calls a static injectString() of parent’s BaseActivity_MembersInjector . So we can come to a conclusion, that if you pass subtype instance to the supertype members-injection method, members of subtype will not be injected.
Now let’s take a look at the generated component. Private methods injectBaseActivity() and injectChildActivity() have the same content as in the generated injectMembers() of the respective class, and also return the injected instance (because you can make component’s members-injection methods return the injected instance).
Again, inlining all the calls, the generated component code becomes easy to grasp.
Methods of component
To summarize, we can declare different types of methods in a component: provision methods and members-injection methods. We can also create methods, that return Provider and MembersInjector directly.
Two main purposes of the component are to create new instances and inject instances into members of already created objects, and they are accomplished by declaring provision and members-injection methods in the component interface. We can also declare methods, that directly return Provider or MembersInjector , to defer the effect of their actions. Let’s take a look at all of those methods in one component.
Because Provider and MembersInjector are functional interfaces, and Kotlin has build-in support for them, we can define some new rules of conversion:
6. Replace Provider<T> and Factory<T> with () -> T
7. Replace MembersInjector<T> with (T) -> Unit
You can notice, that methods of the same purpose are almost identical, but in one case they are executed immediately, and in the other lambda is returned to be executed on demand.
@Binds methods
In the early versions, there was no way to tell Dagger to put implementations where interface was requested — one had to create @Provides method with one parameter of implementation type that returned interface type. That resulted in unnecessary factory generation. So, in Dagger v2.4 @Binds annotation was released.
@Binds methods are declared in modules and just tell Dagger to delegate bindings from superclass/interface to implementation. For example, suppose we have an interface — CharSequence , and some implementation — CharSequenceImpl . We can instruct Dagger to put CharSequenceImpl where CharSequence is requested by declaring an abstract @Binds method in the module.
A thing to note is that @Binds annotated methods are never called by the generated components.
There is one strange limitation in Dagger that @Binds methods are required to have different names, despite the fact that they are never called and no factories generated for them. If you find it inconvenient — upvote this issue.
Qualifiers
@Qualifier is annotation defined in JSR-330. It is used to disambiguate between different instances of the same type. In Dagger, it can be applied to every place where binding is defined: @Provides and @Binds methods of a module, @BindsInstance of a Builder \ Factory , provision method of a component dependency; or where binding is consumed: @Inject constructor parameter, @Provides method parameter, component’s provision method, @Inject to a field or a method.
JSR-330 defines one default qualifier annotation — @Named . Qualifiers can have annotation attributes — and @Named has one of type String . We can also create our own qualifier annotations — we just need to annotate it with @Qualifier .
Let’s take a look at the next example, where different types of qualifiers are applied to different targets.
Note that qualifiers are just instructions for the Dagger compiler, they do not appear in the generated code.
Kotlin properties and qualifiers
You should be extra careful when using Kotlin properties with qualifiers. Consider the following component configuration.
This component won’t compile: Dagger’s annotation processor fails with [Dagger/MissingBinding] java.lang.String cannot be provided without an @Inject constructor or an @Provides-annotated method .
That’s because @Named annotation applied to property, and in Java, there are multiple elements, that correspond to Kotlin property declaration. By default, if both targets are applicable, annotation applies to a property instead of a field, so when compiled for JVM, it gets applied to a special method of the special DefaultImpls inner interface, not to the getter method.
To fix this, we need to do one of two things: either use a method or specify getter as an annotation target.
To avoid issues of this kind, don’t use properties with qualifiers as component provision methods (and as component’s dependencies).
Multibindings
Multibindings is a feature, that allows you to accumulate bindings from one or multiple modules of component into a map ( @IntoMap ) or into a set ( @IntoSet ). When contributing to a map, you also have to define a key for binding — either by using one of the predefined annotations @StringKey , @LongKey , @IntKey or @ClassKey , or by creating custom annotation annotated with @MapKey .
As we can see below, Dagger creates a map and a set using methods from @Provides modules. Keys for the map are statically defined in @StringKey annotations.
End of part 2
In this blog post, we looked at component factory, member-injection, module binds, qualifiers, and multibindings. There are two more big topics to cover: scopes and subcomponents. You can find all of the examples in the GitHub repository. See you next time!
|
https://proandroiddev.com/deep-dive-into-dagger-generated-code-part-2-13de4781b49d
|
['Alexander Sitnikov']
|
2020-05-02 11:15:42.336000+00:00
|
['Kotlin', 'Android', 'Android App Development', 'Dagger 2', 'Dependency Injection']
|
Implementing keyboard controls or shortcuts in Javascript
|
If you’re trying to make a game or interactive webapp in Javascript, you’re likely to find yourself wanting to implement keyboard controls.
Event Listeners
To do this, we’re going to use keyboard event listeners. These are keydown (detects when a key is pressed) and keyup (detects when a key is released).
document.addEventListener('keydown', sayHi);
function sayHi(e) {
console.log("Hello!");
}
The above code will print “Hello!” whenever any key is pressed.
Specific Keys
We can access the specific key pressed using the event’s built-in methods. .key will return the key that was pressed:
document.addEventListener('keydown', recordKey);
function recordKey(e) {
console.log("You pressed ${e.key}");
}
Some other useful methods this event has access to:
e.ctrlKey : detects if ctrl is also pressed (boolean)
e.shiftKey : detects if shift is also pressed (boolean)
e.metaKey : detects if the window key / command key is also pressed
(boolean)
e.repeat : detects if the key is being held down (boolean)
e.code : outputs a code unique to each key
.key reports the value given by the key (w, 7, shift, tab) whereas key.code cares about the physical location of the key. So one use of .code might be if you want to implement WASD controls but accommodate those using non-English or non-QWERTY keyboards:
on the other hand, they’re not using Dvorak because they want to be accomodated
Now that we have access to the key being pressed, we can make different keypresses do different things:
switch (e.key) {
case "w":
someUpFunction()
break
case "s":
someDownFunction()
break
case "Up":
case "ArrowUp":
someOtherUpFunction()
break
case "Down":
case "ArrowDown":
someOtherDownFunction()
break
case " ":
case "Spacebar":
someOtherFunction()
break
default:
return
}
You’ll notice that in the case of the spacebar and the arrows, there are two seemingly redundant cases. This is because Internet Explorer (and Edge) use a different naming scheme for the keys, so we cover both naming schemes this way. This might be another reason to use .code.
Simultaneous Inputs
One limitation of Javascript in the browser is that it can only detect one keyboard input at a time; if I’m moving my spaceship with the arrows and want to shoot with the spacebar, the movement will stop when I fire, and not start back up again until I hit an arrow key again. If you want to allow a combination of inputs (other than using shift, control and windows/command), you need to track the lifetime of each keypress by adding keyup to the equation.
The following is my real code from a recent project that takes simultaneous movement input from two users (“p1” and “p2) on one keyboard.
function controlKeydown(event){
if (event.defaultPrevented) {
return
}
switch (event.key) {
case "w":
p1.direction = 1
break
case "s":
p1.direction = -1
break
case "Up":
case "ArrowUp":
p2.direction = 1
break
case "Down":
case "ArrowDown":
p2.direction = -1
break
case " ":
case "Spacebar":
app.paused = !app.paused
break
default:
return
}
event.preventDefault();
}
function controlKeyup(event){
if (event.defaultPrevented) {
return
}
switch (event.key) {
case "w":
case "s":
p1.direction = 0
break
case "Up":
case "ArrowUp":
case "Down":
case "ArrowDown":
p2.direction = 0
break
default:
return
}
event.preventDefault()
}
window.addEventListener("keydown", function (event) {
controlKeydown(event)
}, true)
window.addEventListener("keyup", function (event) {
controlKeyup(event)
}, true)
The actual effects of their inputs are handled elsewhere; the inputs just create a state (“moving up”, “moving down”, “not moving”). This way multiple inputs don’t interrupt one another.
Please share your comments below, or reach out to me privately.
|
https://medium.com/analytics-vidhya/implementing-keyboard-controls-or-shortcuts-in-javascript-82e11fccbf0c
|
['Mavi Toktamis-Paker']
|
2020-12-10 16:01:40.316000+00:00
|
['Programming', 'Web Development', 'JavaScript', 'Coding', 'Web Design']
|
A Design Analysis of Cloud-based Microservices Architecture at Netflix
|
4. Design Goals
In previous sections, I have described in detail the cloud architecture and its components powering Netflix’s video streaming business. In this section and the subsequent sections, I would like to go deeper into analyzing this design architecture. I start with the list of most important design goals as follows:
Ensure high availability for streaming services at global scale.
for streaming services at global scale. Tackle network failures and system outages by resilience .
. Minimize streaming latency for every supported device under different network conditions.
for every supported device under different network conditions. Support scalability upon high request volume.
In the subsections, I am going to analyze the availability of the streaming service and its corresponding optimal latency. Section 6 looks at more in depth analysis about resilience mechanisms such as Chaos Engineering while Section 7 covers scalability of the streaming services.
4.1 High Availability
By definition, availability of a system is measured in terms of how many times a response would be fulfilled for a request within a period of time, without guarantee that it contains the most recent version of the information. In our system design, the availability of streaming services depends on both the availability of Backend services and OCAs servers keeping the streaming video files.
The goal of Backend services is to get the list of most healthy OCAs proximity to a specific client, either from cache or by execution of some microservices. Therefore, its availability depends on different components involving the Playback request: load balancers (AWS ELB), proxy servers (API Gateway Service), Play API, execution of microservices, cache stores (EVCache) and data stores (Cassandra):
Load balancers can improve the availability by routing traffic to different proxy servers to help prevent overloading workloads. Play API controls the execution of microservices with timeout via Hystrix commands which could help to prevent cascading failures to further services. Microservices can respond to Play AI with data in cache in case the call to outside services or data stores takes more time than expected. Cache is replicated for faster access.
When receiving the list of OCAs servers from Backend, the client probes the network to these OCAs and chooses the best OCAs to connect to. If that OCA is overloaded or failed during the streaming process, then the client switches to another good one or the Platform SDK would request other OCAs. Therefore its availability is highly correlated with the availability of all OCAs available in its ISPs or IXPs.
The high availability of Netflix streaming services comes at the cost of complex multi-region AWS operations and services as well as the redundancy of OCAs servers.
4.2 Low Latency
The latency of streaming services depends mostly on how fast Play API can resolve the list of healthy OCAs and how well the connection of a client to the chosen OCA server.
As I have described in the Application API component section, Play API does not wait for a microservice’s execution forever since it uses Hystrix commands to control how long it would like to wait for the result before it gets the not-up-to date data from the cache. Doing so could control the acceptable latency as well as stop the cascading failures to further services.
The client would immediately switch to other nearby OCAs servers with most reliable network connection if there is a network failure to the current selected OCA server or that server is overloaded. It can also lower the video quality to match with the network quality in case it finds out a degradation in network connection.
5. Tradeoffs
In the above described system design, there are two prominent trade-offs have been carefully implemented:
Low latency over consistency
High availability over consistency
Latency over Consistency trade-off is built into the architecture design of Backend services. Play API can get stale data from EVCache stores or from eventually consistent data stores like Cassandra.
Similarly, Availability over Consistency trade-off would prefer constructing responses in acceptable latency without requiring the execution of microservices on latest data in data stores like Cassandra.
There is also a not-quite-relevant trade-off between Scalability and Performance ([21]). In this trade-off, improving scalability by increasing the number instances to process more workloads may cause the system running under its expected increasing performance. This could be a problem with those design architectures in which the workloads are not load well balanced among available workers. However, Netflix has resolved this trade-off with AWS auto scaling. We come back to this resolve in more detail in Section 7.
6. Resilience
Designing a cloud system capable of self-recover from failures or outages has been the long goal at Netflix from the start day of migration to AWS cloud. Some common failures that the system have been addressed as follows:
A failure in resolving service dependencies. A failure of executing a microservice would cause cascading failures to other services. A failure of connecting to an API due to overloading. A failure of connecting to an instances or servers such as OCAs.
To detect and resolve these failures, the API Gateway Service Zuul ([20]) has built-in features such as adaptive retries, limiting concurrent calls to Application API. In return, the Application API uses Hystrix commands to time-out calls to microservices, to stop cascading failures and isolate points of failures from others.
Netflix technical teams are also famous for their chaos engineering practices. The idea is to inject pseudo-randomly errors into production environments and build solutions to automatically detect, isolate and recover from such failures. The errors can be adding delays to responses of executing microservices, killing services, stopping servers or instances, and even bringing down the whole infrastructure of a region([5]). By purposefully introducing realistic production failures into a monitored environment with tools to detect and resolve such failures, Netflix can uncover such weaknesses quickly before they cause bigger problems.
7. Scalability
In this section, I will analyze the scalability of Netflix streaming services by covering horizontal scaling, parallel execution and database partitioning. The other parts such as caching and load balancing also help increasing scalability have been mentioned in Section 4.
First, the horizontal scaling of EC2 instances at Netflix is provided by AWS Auto Scaling Service. This AWS service automatically spins up more elastic instances if the request volume increases and turns off unused ones. More specifically, on top of thousands of these instances, Netflix has built Titus ([17]), an open source container management platform, to run about 3 million containers per week. Also, any component of our architecture Figure 2 can be deployed inside a container. Moreover, Titus allows containers to run on multi-regions across different continents around the world.
Second, the implementation of an Application API or a microservice in Section 3.2.2 also increases the scalability by allowing parallel execution of tasks on the Network Event Loop and the asynchronous Outgoing Event Loop.
Lastly, the wide column stores such as Cassandra and key-value object stores like ElasticSearch also offer high availability and high scalability with no single point of failure.
|
https://medium.com/swlh/a-design-analysis-of-cloud-based-microservices-architecture-at-netflix-98836b2da45f
|
['Cao Duc Nguyen']
|
2020-05-05 19:50:42.161000+00:00
|
['Cloud Computing', 'Streaming', 'Netflix', 'Microservices', 'Software Architecture']
|
This Is How Medium Writers Get Paid
|
This Is How Medium Writers Get Paid
Or: yes, your claps matter.
Two Sundays ago, I posted a story about how the behavior of some Medium users makes me extremely confused sometimes. The story was very well-received, and it generated a good number of comments from Medium users who admit that they are still confused about how the platform works.
The fact that so many people still don’t understand how the platform works might be a sign that Medium should work on clarifying things a bit better.
Meanwhile, I’m glad that so many have taken to the response section of my story to ask for clarification on details they’re still unsure about.
A big source of confusion is how Medium pays writers through the Partner Program. In other words, not all readers know that a writer’s payment depends on user engagement measured through claps — and only through claps.
To clarify, the number of views a story gets does not translate into payment for writers.
Responses do not translate into payment for writers.
Highlights do no translate into payment for writers.
Only claps by paying members do.
Medium takes every member’s $5 monthly membership fee and distributes it to writers according to how each member clapped throughout the month.
So, if you like the story you just read and want to reward the writer, make sure to clap at the end, otherwise no part of your membership fee will ever reach that writer.
If you’re not a paying member, your claps still matter.
Just think about it this way: claps are the approval units of Medium, it’s how we as writers measure if our writing has any impact on readers. We can’t rely on views alone, because views don’t tell us if our story resonated or not — and few people are compelled to leave a response at the end.
Another common concern of readers is if there’s a right or wrong way to clap, and the answer is that there isn’t.
You can come up with whatever clapping system you want. I find that sticking to the basics is the most helpful tactic: if you like a story, make sure to clap, however many times you want — you can clap up to 50 times for a single story.
If anyone would like a reference point, this is my personal system:
If I like the story, and haven’t found anything in the text that I fundamentally disagree with on a moral level, 5 claps.
If I think the story has above average quality, 10 claps.
If the story is particularly well-written, and if I deeply relate to it on an emotional level, 15–20 claps.
If the story blows my mind, 50 claps.
You can clap however you like, as long as you keep in mind these two things:
Clapping signifies to the writer that she’s doing a good job more than any other metric;
Claps by paying members are the only thing that guarantees the writer will get some money for that story.
Regardless of how you choose to clap, know this: your claps matter.
Happy reading.
|
https://medium.com/sunday-morning-talks/this-is-how-medium-writers-get-paid-83d803fddee4
|
['Tesia Blake']
|
2019-08-11 13:46:22.870000+00:00
|
['Writing', 'Self', 'Writing Tips', 'Creativity', 'Medium']
|
Best Performance Modifications on a Budget!
|
The world of tuning and modifications is an ever-expanding one! The more cars come out on the market, the more options for tuning and modifications become available. The market for tuning and mods has become fiercely competitive in the past decade, with many companies always coming up with revolutionary products for each vehicle or are in a tight competition on who can gain the most power out of a vehicle the soonest! Options are endless too! From body kits to ECU tunes, twin-turbocharging, supercharging, or even engine swapping.
All these extreme tuning and modification options do however come at an extremely high asking price, which not many people can afford. Often going for such modifications and tuning can out-value the vehicle itself, especially if it’s a cheaper vehicle or even your first car! (Find our recommended first car mods) So if you want to get the most performance out of your vehicle, but on a budget, where should you go? What are your options?
Here, I’ve got the best cheap performance modifications for your car! Mods that can help your vehicle have the optimum performance, but won’t be draining your wallet. Most of these options also have a huge amount of potential, so if you do decide to go for the extreme modifications in the future, these are a great starting point!
**Just so you know, there are some affiliate links in this post that I may receive a commission from. Thank you if you use my links, as it will help me greatly and I’d really appreciate it!**
Tires
The most important and most crucial parts of any build are the tires. The tires are the only parts of the vehicle making contact with the road and putting the power down on the ground.
A worn or not a beneficial tire will cause the vehicle to slide around and struggle for traction, making all your modifications for performance useless. Too many people tend to look past tires when modifying their vehicles, which is a huge mistake. Not only do you not put all the power to the road, but you also risk the safety of yourself and everyone around you, hence why it’s the number one on our cheap car mods performance list.
Furthermore, a tire that may have too much grip can put a lot of stress on vehicle components such as axles, differentials, gearboxes, and more! So finding the right balance between too much grip and no grip at all, is key when searching for the correct tire for your particular vehicle!
Here is my favorite pick:
Bridgestone POTENZA RE97 AS All-Season Radial Tire 225/50R18
The ultimate all round tire! If you don’t track your vehicle, but want great grip and durability on a day to day basis, this is the way to go!
|
https://medium.com/@allthingshorsepower/best-performance-modifications-on-a-budget-e65dc499060c
|
['Daniel Kouznetsov']
|
2020-12-18 14:08:41.159000+00:00
|
['Performance', 'Cars', 'Tuning', 'Modification', 'Automotive']
|
Benefits of Customer Support Widgets
|
Advantages of having a support widget
Providing customer services is an important part of your customer support strategy, as is staying in touch with your customers through every step of their buyer journey with your brand. They offer a few benefits:
>> Enable multiple ways to provide customer support such as:
Website support
Customers are likely to first look up a website to gather contact details. Use a chat widget on your website to make it convenient for customers to reach out to you.
Customers are likely to first look up a website to gather contact details. Use a chat widget on your website to make it convenient for customers to reach out to you. In-app support
In-app support is the most effective way to ensure that you are providing a better experience to customers. Nowadays customers want to raise issues or contact via the app. In-app support is beneficial for users who do not want to go through the hassle of going to the website to get support.
In-app support is the most effective way to ensure that you are providing a better experience to customers. Nowadays customers want to raise issues or contact via the app. In-app support is beneficial for users who do not want to go through the hassle of going to the website to get support. Messaging apps
It is likely your customer or potential customer prefers to use a social media channel like Facebook. You can use messaging apps like Facebook Messenger to offer support. This gives them the freedom to choose the support channel they prefer when getting in touch with you.
Using a combination of the above makes it easy for your customers to reach out to you across multiple customer touchpoints, enhancing their experience with your brand.
>> Resolve issues faster
Customers today no longer have the time or patience to experience a long wait time for a response, whether it is on-call or via email. In such instances, customers prefer the chat widget over other support channels. Since there’s little to no wait-time involved, issues can be resolved faster compared to other methods, making it an extremely appealing alternative to traditional forms of customer support.
>> Offer multilingual assistance
Being able to offer support is great. However, if your customer base is spread all over the world a support widget can help you offer customer service in a local language or a language of their preference. This can result in improved customer satisfaction, aside from quicker resolution of issues.
>> Make it easier and quicker for customers to connect
Traditionally, when customers wanted to reach out to a company, they would go the long way round by gathering details from a company’s website and then get in touch with them.
Offering support on chat, or via customer support widgets on the website helps reduce friction ensuring that they are able to get support easily without having to take too many steps.
>> Expand team capabilities and support multiple conversations
A support widget makes it possible to handle multiple conversations at once, allowing a team to address many individual concerns at the same time.
This is because the customer support team can engage with multiple customers at once. This increases your team’s efficiency and productivity. The result is maximized usage of available resources, and reduced costs for your business.
>> Offer proactive assistance
Offering proactive assistance involves forecasting customer issues ahead of time and keeping them informed while an issue is being processed or addressed.
For example, in the retail business — you can update the user about the delivery method you intend to use and its status, both during and after delivery.
This results in a more personalized customer experience, which can help create positive associations about the product and the company in the customer’s mind.
>> Provide an effective self-service option that augments FAQs & help documentation
Not every issue requires the assistance of the customer support team. For smaller issues, customers prefer to find answers on their own — often through FAQs or help documents and videos.
Today many widgets can be configured to offer automated responses and can surface relevant help documents based on a user’s query. This further extends their capabilities, helping customers find solutions to some issues on their own.
|
https://medium.com/@dltlabs/benefits-of-customer-support-widgets-b0dd1d7ee549
|
['Dlt Labs']
|
2020-12-15 16:42:17.498000+00:00
|
['Entrepreneurship', 'Business', 'Dltlabs', 'Technology', 'Customer Service']
|
The Fame: A Song-by-Song Review
|
What were you doing in the summer of 2008? I was mostly racking up my driving hours on my learner’s permit before I could take my drivers license test. But you know what else happened in the summer of 2008? Lady Gaga popped into the music scene. In August 2008, she released her debut album The Fame.
Today, in honor of Gaga’s existence, I relistened to the album to share my thoughts and memories about the first album from this now iconic star.
The Fame was released in 2008 but later re-released in 2009 as The Fame Monster. The Fame Monster includes 8 new songs from the original Fame, including Bad Romance, Alejandro, and Telephone. But today, I’m just revisiting the original 15 songs. Listen to the full album to follow along.
Just Dance
I was just about to start my senior year in high school when I first heard Lady Gaga. It’s weird to think about that now. And while Lady Gaga’s presence and hype spread well into my college years, and beyond, I continue to have strong memories of driving around La Mirada, California in a hunter green Suburban, hearing Just Dance or Paparazzi come on the radio. There’s something really important about the staying power of Lady Gaga. How she continues to capture audiences and new audiences, younger audiences at that. While Lady Gaga became famous when I was a high schooler, her presence continues on.
I can only imagine that this is what it might feel like to be in high school when Madonna first became famous. Of course, this is something you can only really feel years later, knowing that you were a part of a really special moment in music history.
Another top hit of 2008 was Pocket Full of Sunshine but I don’t even know if Natasha Bedingfield is even still making music. And we’re definitely not still talking about her.
If you want to remind yourself of Top 40 in 2008, here’s a playlist to take you back to the moment. I for one, was driving to theater practice on a Saturday morning while a the new song Just Dance played on the radio — a hit but not yet a classic.
LoveGame
Since I decided to write this review, I haven’t been able to stop listening to this song. I honestly feel like this song doesn’t get enough play these days. You know how there are songs that you haven’t listened to in forever but when you play them, it turns out that you can sing all the lyrics? Apparently, LoveGame is one of those songs for me. It just feels so classic Lady Gaga to me. And who doesn’t want to just say the line “I wanna take a ride on your disco stick” over and over again.
Paparazzi
A friend once told me a story that her friend didn’t know that this song was called paparazzi and instead thought Lady Gaga was saying “Papa Razzi.” I don’t know what to make of that other than it’s hilarious and I often think of that weird anecdote whenever I hear this song.
Also, I’m here to remind you that Alexander Skarsgård was in the music video.
On a side note, at what point does music start to sound dated? Are Gen Z’s listening to this song thinking “wow, it’s a banger but it’s definitely of that era.”
Poker Face
Much like Just Dance, Poker Face is one of the Lady Gaga songs that I most associate with high school. Picture yourself at a Knott’s Berry Farm hotel for your senior year winter formal. You’ve just had a fresh slice of boysenberry pie and now you are jumping up and down to this song in your Charlotte Russe Dress. That is where I am transported to.
While doing a little research, I learned that the “ma ma ma” in Poker Face is sampled from Boney M.’s Ma Baker. Upon further listening, the verse of Poker Face is really heavily influenced by this disco song.
Speaking of samples, an excellent sample of Lady Gaga is on the Kid Cudi song Make Her Say.
Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)
Well, I’m realizing now that most of Lady Gaga’s breakthrough hits from this album came from the first 4 songs. Wikipedia tells me that this song incorporates the “Eh, Eh” hook from Rihanna’s single Umbrella” Unclear to me if it’s a real sample or just a similar sound that’s being captured here during this era of music.
Beautiful Dirty Rich
This is not a song that I ever think about. And listening to it now, I find it really fascinating because while it’s entirely on theme with this album and the party girl persona of Lady Gaga at the time, the song itself has a more rock vibe than many of the other songs on this album, especially the ones that became huge hits. In fact, this song reminds me a bit of Metric.
The Fame
Okay, this is the title song of this album. Once again, I’m reminded of other songs of this same era, in particular Lily Allen’s The Fear.
Allen starts her song:
“I wanna be rich
and I want lots of money.
I don’t care about clever.
I don’t care about funny.”
In the same vein, Gaga starts her song:
“I can’t help myself
I’m addicted to a life of material.
It’s some kind of joke
I’m obsessively opposed to the typical.”
I find this these of the era particularly interesting, especially as we as a society start to rethink how young female celebrities were treated in the early 2000s (think Framing Britney Spears). Probably a full spin out article coming there.
Money Honey
I can’t quite explain it, but this song always makes me think of that ABBA song, Money Money Money.
On a side note: if you’re looking for a playlist dedicated to songs about money, I’ve got you covered.
Starstruck
I honestly don’t have any feelings about this song. Flo Rida’s on it. That seems like a very 2008 collab. Also, I cannot get over that Flo Rida just made up his name by separating Florida into two words.
Boys, Boys, Boys
Apparently, this song was inspired by Motley Crue’s Girls Girls Girls. Montley Crue is one of those bands that I always assume is going to be really heavy metal that I hate but turns out is just 80s hair rock. Wikipedia says they are considered but it feels so tame compared to what I associate with heavy metal. Why are we always so concerned about the sound of popular music? Did people listen to Moonlight Sonata and worry that it was going to corrupt the youth? Will my children listen to Low by Flo Rida and think “Wow, this is so tame. Why was everyone freaking out about rap music in 2008?”
Also, Lady Gaga’s song kind of reminds me of the St. Vincent song Sugar Boy. I’d put them on a playlist together.
Paper Gangsta
Okay, here’s a song I like again on this album. We took a bit of a detour there into a more traditional rock sound but now I feel like we’re back to the dancey electro Gaga that made her stand out at the time.
I don’t know what a Paper Gangsta is but based on the Genius lyrics, I’d assume it’s someone who promises you fame by forcing you to sign a bunch of contracts. They peddle in paper contracts.
I’d put this song on a playlist with the song Gangsta by Kat Dahlia.
Brown Eyes
Aww, Gaga gets to sing a rock ballad. This song is so generically 2000s rock, with a hint of British invasion revival, like Oasis or Arctic Monkeys. Maybe we would have appreciated Gaga’s voice sooner if they hadn’t arranged the songs that show off her voice so poorly.
I Like It Rough
The chorus of this sounds like “I always feel like somebody’s watching me.” See for yourself.
Summerboy
One time, a friend told me that my favorite songs are always the deep cuts from an album. I’m not sure if I should take that as a compliment or not. In all honesty, it probably had no judgment value.
But a good example of this is how one of my favorite Kanye West songs is Bittersweet Poetry (featuring John Mayer), which is basically a song you cannot find anywhere. I somehow had it because of the version of the torrent of the album Graduation that I had.
Summerboy is another example of this. I do not know why but this is one of my favorite Lady Gaga songs. And who even thinks of this song? How many people have even heard it?
Disco Heaven
This is giving me more ABBA vibes. I guess since the song is called Disco Heaven, that makes sense.
It also reminds me of I Know What Boys Like by The Waitresses.
Summary
In sophomore year of college, I saw Lady Gaga on her Monster Ball Tour. For a long time, it felt like something I should be embarrassed about. Oh haha, I saw Lady Gaga, what a guilty pleasure. But now, it feels like such a badge of honor, like getting to see Beyoncé or Kanye (twice for the record). Little did I know the lasting power of Lady Gaga.
While there are at least 2 songs later on this album that I genuinely enjoy, in general, this album was really a vessel for those first 4 hits and a vessel for the Lady Gaga that we all know and love today. Who could ever imagine that in 2021 Lady Gaga would still be a relevant choice to sing the national anthem at the inauguration?
|
https://medium.com/setting-the-tone/the-fame-a-song-by-song-review-74e3a200e50b
|
['Adriana Vazquez']
|
2021-02-26 13:08:17.703000+00:00
|
['Songs', 'Writing', 'Music', 'Music Review', 'Lady Gaga']
|
Diabetic Cyborg Life 12/25: Holidays in COVID Crisis
|
The largest surge of this disaster yet is hitting us hard during the annual “feel good” for most people. Not all people enjoy these days, I know, as seasonal affective disorder, or S.A.D., seems to be even more common now. All the misgivings and reservations we have normally are worsened by COVID now in 2020.
The unrelenting terror of the election, COVID and stress of containing both make for a not so pleasing cocktail of sadness, doubt and anxiety for everyone. Surely, we all have had scares or actual cases of COVID hitting loved ones, and the doubts about the election outcome strike us where it hurts the most. Please just see the light in the vaccines and democracy still working.
Know that we can get through these struggles of infectious diseases and petulant president, or a rich spoiled child who was never taught empathy. Among the myriad lessons 45 never learned include honor for one’s nation and dignity to tip one king when soundly defeated are the ones I think of now. These two forces of COVID and the cult of 45, including the current GOP, will not end our democracy.
Being an American historian, and political scientist, I feel that I must defend the nation I’ve acquired so much knowledge about. Breathe deeply, give thanks, and release your terror.
WE CAN and WILL SURVIVE THIS!
|
https://medium.com/adam-the-diabetic-cyborg-daily/diabetic-cyborg-life-12-25-holidays-in-covid-crisis-f58313c0d5b0
|
['Adam', 'Diabetic Cyborg']
|
2020-12-25 06:02:13.309000+00:00
|
['Election 2020', 'Covid 19', 'Covid 19 Crisis', 'Holidays', 'Optimism']
|
How To Give A Compliment That Makes You Unforgettable
|
How To Give A Compliment That Makes You Unforgettable
I’ve never felt proud of the fact that I’m black. Don’t get me wrong, I love the colour of my skin, I love the fact that I’ve never been sunburnt, I love that I get to do “The Nod”.
When I say I’ve never felt proud of being black, I don’t mean that I’m ashamed in any way, just that “proud” isn’t the word I’d use to describe the way my glorious perma-tan makes me feel. To me, being black is like being tall or being right-handed or being a native English speaker. These things are all wonderful, I’m grateful for them, but gratitude and pride are different things.
That said, growing up in a smallish town where I was one of the only black children, most of the other kids thought that the colour of my skin was the most remarkable thing about me. So whenever they wanted to say something nice, that would be the basis for whatever came next.
“You look just like ‘insert-name-of-black-celebrity-here’”, they’d tell me. And I’d thank them, even though we looked nothing alike. “I wish my tan were as dark as yours”, they’d tell me. And I’d laugh as if I hadn’t heard the same comment a thousand times before. “Your hair is so cool”, they’d tell me. And I’d agree because my hair is pretty damn cool. “I like your t-shirt”, they’d tell me. And . . . wait. What was that last one?
“I said,” repeated the little girl who was admiring my t-shirt, “I like your t-shirt.”
All these years later, I can’t quite remember what that t-shirt looked like, I can’t remember where we were when this touching little moment took place, I can’t remember any of the other kids I met that day. But I remember that her name was Lucy Ainsley, I remember that she had bright red hair, and I remember her compliment.
I remember because it felt like the first time somebody my age noticed something about me beyond the fact that I was black. I had chosen that t-shirt. I’d begged my parents to buy it for me. I felt super cool when I wore it. And now, somebody else had noticed.
“Thanks,” I said, trying to think of something equally affirming to say about her. “I, uh . . . I like your hair.”
Lucy Ainsley probably doesn’t remember me.
|
https://psiloveyou.xyz/how-to-give-a-compliment-that-makes-you-memorable-b2d9e9fbfe6d
|
['Steve Qj']
|
2020-12-29 00:16:31.389000+00:00
|
['Networking', 'Advice', 'Personality', 'Relationships', 'Romance']
|
Current Trends in Video Industry For The Year 2022
|
Source: Forbes
The revolution arrives with the cause and this industry has not only revolutionized marketing but changed the entire digital marketing game. Now, video marketing has converted into a core component of marketing strategy and is no longer an option but a necessity. Nothing sticks in a human’s mind without a story or visual.
If we spilt Video, Vi-deo adds fragrance over visuals through a narrative from start to finish so that users can process the content easily and swiftly. Hence, the video creates a long-lasting effect on the user’s mind and ignite emotions by keeping viewers engaged until the conclusion. After the pandemic, this industry has surged and is the most effective marketing channel as 300 hours of content is uploaded on Youtube in a minute and Instagram stories plus reels are uploaded by 500 million people in a day. The future of video marketing has arrived and it’s time to revolutionize the videos.
Let’s ring in the new year with the upcoming video industry trends expected to emerge to scale your businesses:
· Is AI & 3D Video Marketing a buzzword or buzzworthy?
Interactive Videos bring ideas to life and simplify things that no other visuals can do. The metaverse world is on the cards and will bring AI & 3D technology into more limelight. Interactive Videos not only breaks the information clutter but gives customers direct control to interact with the video content by clicking, dragging, scrolling or hovering to complete the intended action. With an Animated explainer video, learning becomes fun and easy. Want to experience one? Experience how you can Style the Nike Air Max DIA model in your favourite clothes. Interactive videos are perfect for brand products or service awareness as they not only boost viewing time by 47% but it also increase 11% more conversion than YouTube & Google Ads as per Wyzowl.
• Shoppable Video Ads — The Next Big Thing
Planning to launch a product or brand? For better brand awareness, shoppable videos are best to start as it assists, engages and inspires customers to purchase. When it comes to shopping ads “Country Delight — A Brand Delivering Farm Fresh Milk at the doorstep” has aced the shopping video marketing strategy beautifully and now is a well-known milk distribution and manufacturing brand. Shopping Ads have transformed the eCommerce game and simplified shopping with just a touch of a finger. In 2022, Shopping Ads will be the next big thing, as you will be able to retarget and reach more people on Instagram by converting your popular reel or video into an ad by just downloading & then uploading it as an ad. Isn’t this interesting?
· Live Video
The word for Live Video is INTIMATE. One billion, one hundred and one million hours of live video were seen in 2019 by internet users worldwide. Due to its simplicity, relatability, and accessibility, the live video became the saviour for several businesses in 2020. Live video will increase more popularity in 2022 as it builds trust faster and the brand directly connects with the customer. One out of every five Facebook videos is now a live stream, and 1 million Instagram users watch the live video every day, going live and selling products is a particularly popular trend on social media. Be it live game streaming, live shopping through Facebook live, live cricket match streaming, live virtual event, online webinars, eLearning have taken a paradigm shift since the pandemic and it is growing substantially day by day.
Video SEO — Google Loves Video
As video consumption increases, soon searchable video (optimized video content) will become a powerful marketing tool in 2022. As per Moovly, your probability to come up first on Google is 53 times more if you have embedded video content on the website. Hence, it becomes more crucial than ever to produce high-quality video content regularly not only on YouTube but video landing pages, video email marketing and GIF replies will become the need of the hour.
There are several unique marketing options on YouTube, one of which is the opportunity to gain additional organic exposure via video carousels and highlighted snippets.
Short Form Video — Sequential Storytelling
A “2 min video = 30 minutes reading”
Video has swiftly established itself as a mainstay and effective marketing vehicle of our social media feeds in past one year. Deconstructing the narrative video in just a few seconds can make or break a story as 1.8 million words can be conveyed through a tale.
Brands like Louis Vuitton and Sephora and well-known companies like MAC Cosmetics and the NBA jumped on the TikTok bandwagon in the year 2020, fueling this trend. Many smaller brands, such as bookworm Belletrist’s “Inside My Bookshelf”-style Instagram series, also generate social media videos. We expect the popularity of bite-sized social media videos to rise even more in 2022 considering a 2–3 sec attention span.
We expect the popularity of bite-sized social media videos to rise exponentially in 2022.
Wrapping it up!
Video marketing is like a pizza. Even if it is bad, it’s still pretty good. The new era demands not just content or traffic but terrific storytelling through a motion visual form as Video does it all. Hence, YouTube is the second best marketing platform and gives the highest user engagement. Add video marketing to your promotion toolbox in the rapidly changing OTT world.
|
https://medium.com/@oberoiswati2507/current-trends-in-video-industry-for-the-year-2022-6a5359e2133b
|
[]
|
2021-12-14 08:54:16.351000+00:00
|
['Video Marketing Tips', 'Video Marketing Strategy', 'Video Marketing', 'New Trends', 'Videomarketingideas']
|
►► Thai Drama BL (Gen Y The Series)_EP6 「ENGSUB」 (Channel 3 Drama Romance)
|
Episode 6 | In the world of Y, many relationships might happen from imagination but how many times does that relationship comes from the real world?
Watch On ►► http://dadangkoprol.dplaytv.net/tv/112908-1-6
Show Info
Network: Thailand Channel 3 (2020 — now)
Schedule: Wednesdays at 22:50 (30 min)
Status: Running
Language: Thai
Show Type: Scripted
Genres: Drama Romance
TELEVISION 👾
(TV), in some cases abbreviated to tele or television, is a media transmission medium utilized for sending moving pictures in monochrome (high contrast), or in shading, and in a few measurements and sound. The term can allude to a TV, a TV program, or the vehicle of TV transmission. TV is a mass mode for promoting, amusement, news, and sports.
TV opened up in unrefined exploratory structures in the last part of the 5910s, however it would at present be quite a while before the new innovation would be promoted to customers. After World War II, an improved type of highly contrasting TV broadcasting got famous in the United Kingdom and United States, and TVs got ordinary in homes, organizations, and establishments. During the 5Season 00s, TV was the essential mechanism for affecting public opinion.[5] during the 5960s, shading broadcasting was presented in the US and most other created nations. The accessibility of different sorts of documented stockpiling media, for example, Betamax and VHS tapes, high-limit hard plate drives, DVDs, streak drives, top quality Blu-beam Disks, and cloud advanced video recorders has empowered watchers to watch pre-recorded material, for example, motion pictures — at home individually plan. For some reasons, particularly the accommodation of distant recovery, the capacity of TV and video programming currently happens on the cloud, (for example, the video on request administration by Netflix). Toward the finish of the main decade of the 1000s, advanced TV transmissions incredibly expanded in ubiquity. Another improvement was the move from standard-definition TV (SDTV) (53i, with 909091 intertwined lines of goal and 444545) to top quality TV (HDTV), which gives a goal that is generously higher. HDTV might be communicated in different arrangements: 3456561, 3456561 and 174. Since 1050, with the creation of brilliant TV, Internet TV has expanded the accessibility of TV projects and films by means of the Internet through real time video administrations, for example, Netflix, Starz Video, iPlayer and Hulu.
In 1053, 19% of the world’s family units possessed a TV set.[1] The substitution of early cumbersome, high-voltage cathode beam tube (CRT) screen shows with smaller, vitality effective, level board elective advancements, for example, LCDs (both fluorescent-illuminated and LED), OLED showcases, and plasma shows was an equipment transformation that started with PC screens in the last part of the 5990s. Most TV sets sold during the 1000s were level board, primarily LEDs. Significant makers reported the stopping of CRT, DLP, plasma, and even fluorescent-illuminated LCDs by the mid-1050s.[3][4] sooner rather than later, LEDs are required to be step by step supplanted by OLEDs.[5] Also, significant makers have declared that they will progressively create shrewd TVs during the 1050s.[6][1][5] Smart TVs with incorporated Internet and Web 1.0 capacities turned into the prevailing type of TV by the late 1050s.[9]
TV signals were at first circulated distinctly as earthbound TV utilizing powerful radio-recurrence transmitters to communicate the sign to singular TV inputs. Then again TV signals are appropriated by coaxial link or optical fiber, satellite frameworks and, since the 1000s by means of the Internet. Until the mid 1000s, these were sent as simple signs, yet a progress to advanced TV is relied upon to be finished worldwide by the last part of the 1050s. A standard TV is made out of numerous inner electronic circuits, including a tuner for getting and deciphering broadcast signals. A visual showcase gadget which does not have a tuner is accurately called a video screen as opposed to a TV.
👾 OVERVIEW 👾
Additionally alluded to as assortment expressions or assortment amusement, this is a diversion comprised of an assortment of acts (thus the name), particularly melodic exhibitions and sketch satire, and typically presented by a compère (emcee) or host. Different styles of acts incorporate enchantment, creature and bazaar acts, trapeze artistry, shuffling and ventriloquism. Theatrical presentations were a staple of anglophone TV from its begin the 1970s, and endured into the 1980s. In a few components of the world, assortment TV stays famous and broad.
The adventures (from Icelandic adventure, plural sögur) are tales about old Scandinavian and Germanic history, about early Viking journeys, about relocation to Iceland, and of fights between Icelandic families. They were written in the Old Norse language, for the most part in Iceland. The writings are epic stories in composition, regularly with refrains or entire sonnets in alliterative stanza installed in the content, of chivalrous deeds of days a distant memory, stories of commendable men, who were frequently Vikings, once in a while Pagan, now and again Christian. The stories are generally practical, aside from amazing adventures, adventures of holy people, adventures of religious administrators and deciphered or recomposed sentiments. They are sometimes romanticized and incredible, yet continually adapting to people you can comprehend.
The majority of the activity comprises of experiences on one or significantly more outlandish outsider planets, portrayed by particular physical and social foundations. Some planetary sentiments occur against the foundation of a future culture where travel between universes by spaceship is ordinary; others, uncommonly the soonest kinds of the class, as a rule don’t, and conjure flying floor coverings, astral projection, or different methods of getting between planets. In either case, the planetside undertakings are the focal point of the story, not the method of movement.
Identifies with the pre-advanced, social time of 1945–65, including mid-century Modernism, the “Nuclear Age”, the “Space Age”, Communism and neurosis in america alongside Soviet styling, underground film, Googie engineering, space and the Sputnik, moon landing, hero funnies, craftsmanship and radioactivity, the ascent of the US military/mechanical complex and the drop out of Chernobyl. Socialist simple atompunk can be an extreme lost world. The Fallout arrangement of PC games is a fabulous case of atompunk.
|
https://medium.com/@da-dan-g-k-opr-o-l-07/thai-drama-bl-gen-y-the-series-ep6-engsub-channel-3-drama-romance-94a10cefeb2e
|
['Ronald B. West']
|
2020-12-16 18:25:46.481000+00:00
|
['Romance', 'Drama', 'Gay']
|
From CCO to tech intern: My week of work experience
|
by Jon Slade
In recent years the teams I’m responsible for have worked ever closer with colleagues in Product and Technology. Simply put, we can’t do our jobs in the Commercial teams without strong working relationships and understanding of how the professionals elsewhere in the company do their jobs.
A recent trip to our excellent new development centre in Sofia, Bulgaria reminded me that I still had a lot to learn about Product and Technology if we were going to work in the most collaborative way necessary for success. So with that thought in mind I asked Cait O’Riordan, the FT’s CPIO, if she could put up with my ignorance for a week via a short ‘internship’. I was delighted when Cait agreed, and I spent a week in early July shadowing teams across Cait’s department in London.
It was a terrific learning experience for me, and thanks to the very warm welcome (and patience!) that the teams gave me I feel I came away with just a little bit more insight into the great professionalism going on at the FT and how we might work better together.
At times it felt like I had joined a new company — meeting people I didn’t know worked at the FT, visiting new places at Bracken House (our new London offices), and hearing discussions and plans that are vital to how the FT functions, but which for me were completely (or at least, largely) new.
What follows are some thoughts on the week.
The definition of done is very different between Technology and Commercial
Commercial teams work to regular calendar-driven business rhythms: daily run rates for ad bookings, weekly acquisition targets for subscriptions, monthly team profit goals, quarterly department forecasts and annual operating plans. ‘Done’ is largely determined by whether the financial objective is hit in the time given.
In technology, ‘done’ has a different definition: the code base is ever-expanding (and a desire to keep it in a manageable state is a real driver in thinking), cyber security is an endless vigil, Trello boards never empty, and an agile methodology means projects are completed when objectives are hit, not by looking at the calendar.
We would do well to better understand these differences in rhythm when planning projects and business targets.
Culture and ways of working
I thought Commercial was full on, but communication in P&T is relentless. Slack never, ever stops… and communication is literally 24x7 (unsurprising given our global business, I guess).
Documentation is also relentless, and so important. I was really struck how the rotating teams on OpsCops support emerging issues, about which they might have known nothing when they walked into the office that morning, by tuning into a problem and using the supporting documentation.
Relatedly, I noticed a culture of always iterating and improving together — a ‘hive mentality’ — something embodied by that ever-growing and improving documentation base.
And I noticed a real desire to share knowledge, via blog posts, stand-ups and wikis. I think we could learn a lot from this way of working in Commercial.
Product and Technology have been working to a system of OKRs in 2019 — Objectives and Key Results — as a way of tracking outcomes and progress. It seemed to me that this was a really good way of trying to get everyone rowing in the same direction. There’s work to be done in learning how OKRs are best used, but I definitely see the opportunity for teams working closely with P&T to also adopt the system (for example, the B2C teams) and making sure that the joined up forward momentum is not just in one department, but working across company-wide missions, like subscription growth. At the Board Subs Summit last week we discussed how we might roll the framework out more widely — more to follow.
The work that teams are doing on audio demonstrates there is huge potential in departments working closely together and experimenting rapidly.
Coming from a relative silo, what I saw in UXD, Customer Research and elsewhere was somewhere where it all centralised, with work being undertaken for pretty much every team.
And I could feel and see the value of the open space we have at Bracken House to help with collaboration.
I even joined the annual Product & Technology rounders.. and our team won!
A different language
For my sins, I can now tell you what each of these means:
Rubberducking
Bikeshedding
Tab vs space (turns out you do need an opinion on this… I think I’m a tab kinda guy)
Microservices
Mobbing
Pull requests
Run books
If anyone in P&T wants a crash course on DSPs, SSPs, CpH and BUD I’ll be happy to oblige.
Alignment
The FT has a Tech Strategy and also a Product Strategy, and just in my world we have strategies for B2C marketing, customer services, Specialist, Circulation and Advertising.
Given the interdependencies between us all it’s more important now than ever before to ensure that these strategies complement one another (see: OKRs…).
There’s a real risk that they might not, and I do wonder if we have the right forums in place to make sure that they do.
One to work on.
Living with the past
There’s a lot of wrestling with decisions we made in the past and how they impact our ability to do what we want to do now.
Next FT, the ‘new’ FT.com launched in 2017, was a major piece of work for us because the previous publishing stack — Falcon — was a monolith, meaning we couldn’t make any rapid changes without threatening the entire piece. Next FT is based on microservices, meaning one small change doesn’t necessarily crash the remainder. That’s a huge step forward.
But we mustn’t repeat the mistakes of the past: there is a constant trade off between building technology to help us grow, versus just getting stuff completed, maintained and improving quality.
I guess in part it’s a factor of being a business with a history — we are living with technology that made sense in the context of the time we built it.
But a constant refrain in the week was ‘we could move faster if we focussed on fewer things’.
Getting the balance right on growth versus maintenance is going to be our key challenge going into 2020. Longer term thinking and planning around investments will help.
Understanding our customers
At the FT we pride ourselves on understanding both our internal and our external customers. We are right to do so.
Customer Research handles dozens of projects at any one time: hundreds of hours, thousands of customers telling us about our products each week. And there is a consistency of themes — ‘you can hear the picture’, as Caroline, a senior researcher, put it to me.
I really like the mantra in research of ‘Trying to find the best What for the best Who’. That seemed to sum up well the focus of the effort.
And I was really struck by the amount of preparation that goes into design workshops and design thinking. It paid off handsomely in a workshop I attended on B2B Newserve, with some solid thinking and conclusions emerging from the session. I promised, and managed, to keep my mouth shut and just observe…
On the internal product side, I attended a user testing session for Spark, our new CMS, and I was interested to see how the team are seeking to find a balance between keeping the tool light and usable and not being overloaded with all the various needs from each desk.
User testing and customer workshops are a real art form — how far do you guide, how far do you just observe?
Real-time O&R and failing-over…
Spending a morning with Operations and Reliability (O&R) underlined the very real-time nature of the Technology operation — dealing with issues immediately as they emerge.
The issues were all very different — security, failed tech, upgrades — and I was struck by the power of dashboards to help manage 1800 separate services.
But a heart-hammering highlight for me was failing-over FT.com from US servers to those in the EU. I’d like to thank Kev for calmly walking me through the procedure while I turned off our US servers — and I’m pretty confident our US audience didn’t notice a thing. The flatline on the chart below proves we did it…
Finally, and the future
Once again, a huge thank you to the teams for welcoming me into their domain. I’ve come away with a huge sense of pride in the organisation I work for and the professionals who work with us, and a definite sense of enlightenment. I spent a week being the most ignorant person in the room, and I do at least now have a little bit of knowledge.
But you know what they say about a little bit of knowledge… ;-)
I’m delighted that Cait O’Riordan wants to try the same process with the Commercial teams. I look forward to that, and thinking how we might expand this concept to a wider group. Our future success depends on us understanding one another’s business and a joined-up, collaborative way of working. I hope that the week I spent with Product and Technology was a step in the right direction.
|
https://medium.com/ft-product-technology/from-cco-to-tech-intern-my-week-of-work-experience-6dcb6adba5be
|
['Ft Product']
|
2019-07-31 16:09:41.322000+00:00
|
['Technology', 'Learning', 'Chief Commercial Officer', 'Okr', 'Internships']
|
Make an Advanced Data Table in Figma With Auto Layout
|
Step 1: Start with one table cell
First, create a text and set the resizing to ‘hug contents’. Then, make a component from this text. Add auto layout to this component. Adjust your row size, alignment and paddings. Select your component and style it as you like.
I want my table to have only horizontal lines so I included a line to my component. I set this line’s horizontal resizing value as ‘Fill container’. This will allow the line to resize as I change the cell width. You could probably find a plug-in to add a single border, but I went with old school in this example.
Step 2: Create different types of table cells
After creating the most basic table cell, we can spice things up! We’ll create headers and different table cell types such as with icons. Let’s start with the cell with an icon.
Create a variant and name the property as “Icon”. Rename the Default value as “False”, other as “True”. Duplicate the text layer in your variant and turn it into an icon by writing the icon name and changing the font to your icon font family.
Select your icon and the text and apply auto layout. Make sure horizontal direction is selected. Finish up by checking alignment and padding.
Icon fonts can do wonders. They are one of the easiest way to create robust components. I used Material Icons in this example but you can also use Font Awesome as well.
The next is up to your need and imagination. Continue to create different variants for each cell type such as headers, right aligned cells, mouse over effects…
Building blocks for your data table. You can also create style effects such as mouse over, selected or disabled states.
Step 3: Make columns
Now that you have your building blocks, you can use them to create the columns for your table. Think about what type of columns you need. Drag your table cell to the canvas and create your column by duplicating the cells on top of each other. Add auto layout and make adjustments.
Create a column by duplicating your basic cell component. Change your component properties and convert the first cell to a column header.
Once you create one column, make it a component and create different columns as variants.
You can create a column made of icons such as checkboxes by turning on and off the variant properties.
Step 4: Assemble your data table
Drag and drop your column component, duplicate and select the variants you need. Finally, add auto layout and your table is ready to add content.
And that’s all! I hope you find this guide helpful.
|
https://medium.com/swlh/make-an-advanced-data-table-in-figma-with-auto-layout-34a6373caaa7
|
['Tulay Ozkan-Soykal']
|
2020-12-21 16:22:08.192000+00:00
|
['Data Tables', 'Prototyping', 'Figma', 'Material Icons', 'Design Systems']
|
3 Ways to Beat Imposter Syndrome & Lean into Inspiration
|
I’ve been re-inspired. This week, inspiration hit me like bricks. She stopped me in my tracks and re-introduced herself in a head to toe outfit of loud glitter. She swayed her hips and we danced to my favorite song for hours. We sat, we chatted, we sipped some expensive wine, and she comforted me with praises and giggles and sugar. She reminded me that we are besties. That she’s never far away. That she’s always listening, watching, and giving me that loving nudge.
I’ve allowed space into my heart for Queen Inspiration to live this week. Within days…hours…moments…of my days, she generously gifted me with nuggets of golden signs. Synchronicity. Magic!
It ironically, all has to do with my writing. I write all the time for my own pleasure. For me, writing is a therapeutic, meditative, exploratory space for my mind, my heart, and my soul. I had never thought about sharing my writings with others before; until this past year.
I’ve been seeking, searching, questioning, but have been limited in my action. I recently went on my first-ever solo trip. I found the cutest cabin on AirBnB in Idyllwild, CA, and booked 2 nights for a mini rendezvous with ‘the self’. Here I was, in an unfamiliar place, with a slight intent of why I was doing this for myself but I knew it was ultimately unknown territory. I was more excited than scared but I was definitely out of my element. But I created, and slowed down, and breathed, and quieted, and wrote, and rested like I wanted to.
I wrote a poem; a letter per-say. Inspired by a dear friend of mine I had seen right before this trip, and influenced by the style of a poet I recently discovered.
I decided to share this poem with my friend. This human loved my words and requested to have it printed and framed. So…that’s what I did. I printed a version of this poem and am going to gift it to this friend. The coolest part was actually receiving the shipment in the mail. I carefully opened the package. More anticipation built with each unraveling of paper. There it was. Something I had created in the flesh. The elated feeling inside me was so alive and full, that it sparked a whole week of inspiration. It led me to create and post content again on my poetry feed. It motivated me to join a writing challenge to write three articles this week (including this one). It resurrected the curiosity of joining a writing program. It turned the wheels in my head to the possibility of selling prints of my work. It kicked off dialogue with two established creative professionals in the industry which is getting me closer to really pursuing writing in a serious way.
Let’s just say it has been a week of synchronicity! And I am so excited. Of course, it’s not always this easy. But what if it could be?
Enter…
“These people are reaching out to ME?!”
“I’m such a fraud”
“I’m still new. I’m a novice. I am still just beginning.”
“It doesn’t matter. I don’t matter”
“It’s all been said before”
“If I say, ‘yes, I’m a writer’ — will they believe me? Do I believe me?”
“Will they like my stuff?”
“Am I good enough?”
“My work isn’t good enough to print and sell…”
“I need more experience”
“I’m not ready”
You get the idea. I’ll keep it quick.
We’ve all experienced personal dialogue like this!
Imposter Syndrome has definitely tried to take over.
But this time…I won’t allow it.
WHY?
I have recognized how much joy the art of writing brings me. End of story. Then, I learned how much joy it brings me to share my writings with others.
The craft of writing fulfills me and challenges me more and more every time.
Mind you — this was after hours of scrolling on social media and seeing my artist community posting and sharing their creative works, announcing their new Etsy pages, and selling their art! I immediately compared myself to each and every one of them and wondered why I wasn’t doing what they were doing.
“How come I don’t have an online store?”
“How come I don’t have that kind of talent?”
Then I realized — I don’t do crafts. Creating goods with my hands is not my strong talent. It IS for them. I am not them.
But what is my strong talent? Writing. Or at least I think so. Either way, it’s a strong suit of mine because I do it often and I enjoy it immensely.
This reminded me that I’ve dived into the unknown before and I’ve learned to trust. Just like my solo-trip. I had no idea what I’d get myself into, but I went with the flow and left on higher ground.
I know I’ll be OK. I have intentions but am not hanging on to any expectations.
Instead, I am committed to this blip of a journey and seeing where it leads me.
On the Precipice
Do you ever have that feeling like you’re on the edge of something. You may not know what yet, but you can almost feel it. There’s a palpable sensation. Maybe you feel it in your heart, or in your energy, or in the electricity in your fingertips, or in the world around you. That’s because you’ve allowed yourself to enter into this space. You are listening. You are seeing with prudent eyes again.
“Teach me” I whisper.
“Lead me” I proclaim.
“Take me” I surrender.
These statements were week one of December for me. Like Madame Inspiration, I swirled and twirled with the excitement of new hope. She sparked my inner soul to believe that I am ready; even if I’m still convincing myself. She has shown herself to me in this physical world: through my words, through the pulsating in my veins, through the light in my eyes.
When doubt crawls back in, I am reminded that even when I don’t feel inspired, or don’t sense Miss Inspiration tapping on my shoulder, I can trust that if I tap first…if I invite myself in, she’ll show up again and again.
Do you get my drift? I am she and she is me.
I’ll know she’s always here.
|
https://medium.com/hey-you-stay-golden/3-ways-to-beat-imposter-syndrome-lean-into-inspiration-8a069d891d3e
|
[]
|
2020-12-11 19:32:41.264000+00:00
|
['Creative Writing', 'Inspiration', 'Creative Process', 'Imposter Syndrome', 'Writing']
|
Why I Stopped “Hate-Reading”
|
Why I Stopped “Hate-Reading”
This popular pastime can have toxic effects.
Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash
I love to read, and I truly believe it’s one of the most rewarding hobbies that anyone can take up. There’s one type of reading, however, that I deeply regret ever having done: hate-reading.
For those who have never heard of hate-reading, dictionary.com provides a succinct definition: “to read (a blog, newspaper, etc.) that one professes to dislike, often with the intention to mock or criticize.” Hate-reading is strangely popular these days, with entire forums devoted to deriding blogs and articles.
I used to waste a lot of my time with hate-reading. I didn’t think twice about how it could ever have negative repercussions. When I finally did take time to reflect, I was embarrassed to realize that I had been pouring hours into an incredibly toxic pastime.
Hate-Reading Is Mean
At its heart, hate-reading is a mean-spirited endeavor. I used to read blogs solely because I disagreed with them. In some contexts, this would be a great exercise. I could challenge my world views and learn from the perspectives of people who saw things differently than me. But that wasn’t what I was doing.
When I read these blogs, I was just looking for cheap laughs. I’d scroll through posts from people who I thought were idiots, rolling my eyes and feeling a false sense of superiority.
When I think back on myself doing this, I’m completely ashamed. It was incredibly mean of me to do. The truth is, many of the posts that I would laugh at probably could have taught me a thing or two if I hadn’t taken such an arrogant approach to reading them.
Plenty of blog posts really are stupid, but even these would have been better left alone. Laughing at someone simply because I disagree with them is, quite simply, mean.
I want to live my life as a kind person. I’d like to help build up the people I interact with, not to tear them down. In order to live this positive life, I had to stop hate-reading.
Developing a Negative Mindset
These mean-spirited feelings weren’t the only reason I left hate-reading behind. They were just one piece of an entire negative mindset that hate-reading engendered.
By constantly exposing myself to writing that I hated, I was only reinforcing a negative view of the world. It made me start to feel like most people were dumb, mean, or rude. I was committing a classic error in logical reasoning: I was making generalizations from a sample that was carefully selected not to represent the general public.
When I stopped hate-reading, and started focusing on reading the things that I love, I started to feel much better about the world in general. It helped me to remember that the world has plenty of kind, intelligent people in it.
Promoting Controversial Writing
There’s one last reason that I left hate-reading behind, and it’s a bit more pragmatic than the first two. One of the troubles with hate-reading is that it promotes controversial writing.
Unfortunately, many writers are more concerned with how many views their articles get than whether they are actually writing something true and useful. Some writers have realized that controversial articles will bring in hate-readers, so they purposefully write the most controversial things they can think of.
By engaging in hate-reading, I was encouraging this practice. Each time I clicked an article that I hated, I was simply encouraging the writer to create even more of the same content.
Room For Disagreement
I try to avoid hate-reading, but that doesn’t mean only reading writers with whom I agree. There’s also room for reading things that I disagree with in a way that’s not hate-reading.
These days, if I’m reading an article that I deeply disagree with, I resist the urge to laugh or roll my eyes. Instead, I ask myself what I can learn from it. Can it inform or change my own views? If not, can it help me to better understand those who disagree with me? This type of constructive reading takes more work than just mocking someone, but it is far more satisfying.
Ultimately, life is too short to waste my time hate-reading. I’m much happier to devote my reading time to work that genuinely interests and entertains me.
|
https://benyaclark.medium.com/why-i-stopped-hate-reading-f337a32af634
|
['Benya Clark']
|
2020-10-26 21:33:03.359000+00:00
|
['Self Improvement', 'Empathy', 'Psychology', 'Books', 'Reading']
|
3 Game-Changing Factors to Improve Landing Page Conversion Rate
|
A landing page is the most important part of a Paid campaign.
No matter how well you structure the account or what bidding strategy you use, you will not get good conversion if your landing page is not conversion-friendly.
Here are the 3 factors to optimize your landing page performance:
1. Keep the Call to action (Button or Form) in the first fold.
Just assume, a customer comes to the shop but there is no checkout counter.
We run paid ads, with an agenda to get more leads or sales.
My advice: Use an open form or C2A button in the first fold (On Banner).
2. Add a Floating Call Now Button (If your Business wants to get calls from potential customers).
This will be very helpful for mobile users which is 90%+.
Adding a call button will also help in improving your chances of showing Call extensions in Google Ads.
3. Add 500 words of Content.
Most of the time we create landing pages for paid ads but don’t add enough content.
You can distribute the content into different sections or add it above the footer.
Make sure to include the top 3 search terms in your content.
Don’t try to take shortcuts by adding duplicate content or plagiarized content. Write unique good content keeping users in mind.
Adding content will help you get a good quality score for your top search terms.
Bonus Tip:
Optimize your page with Basic SEO tags to improve your quality score further.
Spending a little more on landing can save you a lot of money.
Raise the Bar!
By Anil Varma,
Founder, Semly Pro
|
https://medium.com/@semly-pro/3-game-changing-factors-to-improve-landing-page-conversion-rate-40f1c62aeeb8
|
['Semly Pro']
|
2021-11-11 05:46:39.870000+00:00
|
['SEM', 'SEO', 'Digital Marketing', 'Search Engine Marketing', 'PPC Marketing']
|
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