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What will change after the 500 and 1000 bills are discontinued | Modi’s decision for discontinuation of 500 and 1000 bills to crackdown the black economy has come as a surprise to most, but to me it appears to be a more elaborate plan to organize the economy into a structure which will be more friendly to the corporates. As somebody who takes immense delight in the deconstruction of purpose behind an action I took upon myself to imagine the results of such a grand scale endeavor. With whatever limited intellectual capacity I possess I was able to point out a few points to myself where such a decision will take into effect. Most of them are general enough that no one would disagree, but a few are more particular.
The withdrawal of the paper money from the economy on such a scale will create a shortage of currency for transactive purposes. This will increase the demand for money (not increasing the net demand but demand for whatever currency is taken out of the economy but is not replaced at present), while the supply reducing at the same time. The supply curve will shift to the left while the demand curve will remain at the same place thus creating a new money market equilibrium where the production will fall in very short term. But as the old money will be replaced by the new notes, the supply curve will again start moving rightwards. Although it will not reach the old equilibrium because a lot of black currency will exit the economy that would have otherwise been used by the political parties during the election, thus injecting high powered currency in the market. This through multiplier effect expands the general economy during elections. This step is good and bad at the same time. Good because the political parties who used to hoard money for campaign purposes will not be able to do now. Bad because the industry is already growing slowly, which would have received some impetus during upcoming elections. In the short run there may be depreciation of currency, but will start readjusting as the currency is replaced. The target people for this policy are not the real holders of the black money (here black wealth). Most of the billionaires who have a lot of black money keep it either in offshore accounts or convert them into assets which are not in the form of liquid currency and thus should be differentiated as Black Wealth. Thus the real effect is on small business enterprises and middle class people who try to evade taxation in order to maximize whatever little profit they make. These people will have to turn their intended paper notes and declare how they earned them thus giving out tax on it. So most (almost all) of the accumulation of the black money will be from the smaller fish creating a false impression that the problem has been solved. This will render more of a political advantage to the ruling party rather than to some real good. Because of the collection of money an impression of an essentially black moneyless economy will be promoted. This will strengthen the idea that the income and wealth disparity persisting in the economy is rather a natural result than an intended purpose. This has already happened in America and the West where 10 biggest corporations of the world hold more wealth that 190 (the counties figure maybe +-10) countries. Due to the enforcement of slabs on the withdrawal of money through ATMs and Banks, there will be less money flowing in the form of paper currency and people will be forced to use online and electronic solutions. This will boost the private commercial banking and thus direction of real high powered money to the big corporates who will finance their projects through loans from currency deposits of the public that will essentially be deterred from withdrawal at a point in time. In short there will be more cash available with the bank at all times to give out loans if such a slab continues.
This is a very preliminary examination of the situation and has not been researched. It is an intuition based approach. I will present a more formal approach in my article with more research backing it. | https://medium.com/ali-javed/what-will-change-after-the-500-and-1000-bills-are-discontinued-983ab53a0214 | ['Ali Javed'] | 2016-11-22 13:35:28.533000+00:00 | ['Money', 'Monetary Policy', 'Economics', 'Currency'] |
How Ethereum block rewards changed: from 5 ETH to the thirdening | In our last post, we talked about how new Ethereum blocks are mined, what uncle blocks are, and how miners get their rewards. This time, we’ll delve deeper into how the size of the reward is determined and thirdening means.
Ethereum is an inflationary currency. Its supply constantly grows, and there is no maximum limit on ETH supply. It’s the same with any fiat currency, actually. There can be as many USD in circulation as the US government wants to print. By the way, the situation is very different with Bitcoin, where the upper limit is set at 21 million BTC — and no more BTC will be mined beyond this point.
The difference between inflationary USD and inflationary ETH is that new ether is mined according to an algorithm. At any given moment, you can calculate how many new ETH will be produced on the main chain in the next 24 hours, week, or month. For example, right now the block reward is 2 ETH per block, and the average block time is 20 seconds. So about 6 new ETH are created every minute, 6*60=360 ETH every hour, and 360*24=8640 ETH every 24 hours.
To this, you need to add all the new ETH awarded for adding uncle blocks. As you may remember, when two blocks with the same transactions inside are mined at the same time, one is selected to be added to the main chain, and the other becomes an uncle block — a bit like an orphan block on Bitcoin. Some miners might continue to build on this uncle for a while, but eventually they abandoned it. We’ve also discussed that uncle blocks are rewarded, too, but at a lower rate. For the first one, a miner gets about 87.5% of the full block reward, but each new block added to the uncle chain gets less and less. That’s why miners switch to the main chain sooner or later.
Because it’s hard to predict how many uncle blocks there will be every day, you can’t calculate exactly how much new ether will be produced in any 24-hour period. But one thing is certain: Ethereum inflation never stops. And when there’s more money in circulation, it tends to lose value. So if the amount of ether becomes too great, its price might fall. The way the network tries to deal with this problem is to cut the block reward from time to time.
When Ethereum launched five years ago, a total of 72 million ether were produced as part of the genesis block. Those who contributed to the project were awarded 60 million ether, and the rest went to the Ethereum Foundation.
For a while after launch — until the block height of 4 399 999, to be precise — the reward was 5 ETH per block. Back then, the price wasn’t particularly high, though, so mining ETH wasn’t a get-rich-quick scheme at first.
On October 17, 2017, the Byzantium hard fork was activated. At block 4 370 000, the reward was cut from 5 ETH to 3 ETH. Uncle rewards were adjusted accordingly. This was part of the so-called EIP (Ethereum Improvement Proposal) 649.
Finally, on February 28, 2019, the Constantinople update went into effect at block height 7 280 000. That’s when the notorious “thirdening” happened. This means that the block reward was cut by one third — from 3 ETH to 2 ETH per block. This was an extremely controversial decision, and its negative effects for small, independent miners can be serious in the long term.
In our next post, we’ll talk about the difficulty bomb, the Ethereum ice age, and how miners can suffer from the thirdening. All this exposition is necessary before we can get to the most interesting part — 2Ether dynamic block rewards. Stay tuned and follow us on social network.
Web site — https://2ether.com/
Twitter — https://twitter.com/2Ether_
Discord — https://discord.gg/TuqG4py
Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/2Ether/
Reddit — https://www.reddit.com/user/2Ether
Medium — https://medium.com/@2ether
Teletype — https://teletype.in/@2ether
Telegram — https://t.me/ether2support
Telegram chat — https://t.me/blockchain_2ether | https://medium.com/@2ether/how-ethereum-block-rewards-changed-from-5-eth-to-the-thirdening-162827e1b5dd | [] | 2019-10-28 20:31:34.955000+00:00 | ['Ethereum Blockchain', 'Ethereum', 'Blockchain', 'Mining', 'Cryptocurrency'] |
Bear Tail | Bear Tail
Once upon a time there was two good friends wolf and Bear. One day they were wandering in jungle they saw a big nest in a tree.
Bear: what is this?
Wolf: don’t you know! It’s the palace of Eagle the king of birds.
Bear: okay! Wait for a while I want to see the palace of king so the start walking across the king palace where in the Queen Bear ask?
Wolf: she’s on sparrow hunting.
Bear: what! Really! A Queen on sparrow hunting.
Wolf: said yeah that’s the duty of birds Queens (like prince, like people)
Bear: laugh on this
There raise a voice from the nest, and Bear said who is this?
Wolf: they are prince and they are practicing singing.
Bear: Ah! Okay Bear went near the nest to and start laughing on them and said do prince looks like them?
They look like Heron or crow babe.
Eagle kids heard the Bear comments and becomes mad. There heart began to burn in the fire of revenge. They decided not to eat till revenge.
After a while the birds King and Queen return. They bring food for their kids, but they didn’t eat anything.
King and Queen became worried what happen? Did anyone abuse you or beat you?
As they were the kinds of king and Queen.
Not only King and Queen every bird love and respect them. So, they said we have been disgraced, and we will not eat till revenge.
King said angrily who disgrace you?
Kids told the whole story of bear. And king said angrily let me teach Bear a bitter lesson.
The kids said to king that they will not eat anything till their father bring the tail of Bear in revenge to them.
King of birds eagle call his minister crow and told him the whole story. King order Minister to make plan of revenge inform every bird on jangle that I want Bear Tail.
The minister call for meeting at sequoia tree.
In meeting they decided that sent messenger to animal king loin. He will tell king loin that Bear disgrace Bird king and price. Now give us Bear Tail with hairs in penalty or get ready for war.
Heron was given the task of messenger. He told the whole story to king loin and ask him that he only had two choices give us Bear Tail with hair, or get ready for war.
On hear this king loin become furious and roar angrily. For a moment there was complete silence in the jungle.
King look angrily at Heron and said your king eagle is bursting with pride. Ask him ready for war.
This new spread like fire in jungle. On one side animal were getting ready for war and other side birds were ready to take there king revenge. Giant and little Animal like elephant, Bear, Camel, mouse all were waiting for war to begin. Eagle, kite, falcon, vulture to fly, mosquito all were burning in the fire of revenge. There was hustle and bustle in jungle. Earth nor the sky have seen such a threatening war scene ever. The preparation of Cold War were in final stages. Everyone was mixed up that how will birds fight with big animals while other think birds will fight your air so how will animals kill them.
Birds minister send fly as spy agent to enemies. She secretly flu in enemies camp and note there war strategy. But when animal spy agent squirrel as went there woodpecker with his beak nearly killed her, but she find a way to escape.
Animal king lion on seeing this said success favors the powerful. We don’t need there secret we will conquer them with our power.
Final the sun rises and war begins.
Birds cover the whole sky over war ground with their sharp nails and beaks soon the animals' army with roaring, Screaming and giggling voices arrive in ground. The earth was trembling under there feat. Leaf monkey was commanding the army on front.
But…! Birds were in sky and Animals were on ground. They had eye in eye for a while and suddenly began the Squabble and abused war from both sides. Animal were touting birds that if they have a courage then they should come on ground. Birds were angrily saying if they are brave they should come in the air, they will tear their eyes. The exchange of harsh words was going from both sides, and suddenly the Animals' army commander leaf monkey gets mad on cassowary on calling him coward. He jump at him. On seeing this kingfisher attack on his eye and the animal commander become blind he lost his way, and birds with their nails and beak hurt him badly. Animal sees it as bad omen they quickly rescue there commander and returns to there camp with their wounded commander.
Next morning the armies marched to war to ground. Now jackal was leading his army as a commander. Animals put Frills in their commander tail, and he was walking with Hoist tail. He stand bravely in the front of birds army and raising his tail high.
Today jackal will lead the Animal army this was already been told to Birds commander crow by spy agent fly. He further told the commander about animal war strategy that today Animal new commander will fight with Hoist tail all the day which is sing of no worries for their army. But if the tail of commander is down it will be signaled of trouble for tall animal.
The birds King Eagle order his commander that Today, he want to victory at any cost. I don’t want my sons to be hungry anymore. Commander said Don’t worry we have got the secret of victory.
Commander calls the mosquito and tell him something in his ear.
Now when both the armies come in front of each other. Mosquito went secretly and started biting on jackal tail.
The commander jackal at first tries his best to keep his tail high but due to continuous bite, and he couldn’t control. He start moving his tail. All the army was looking at commander tail. Due to pain commander bring his tail down. On seen this army start running on all directions no one turn back. There was a blatant in war ground. The commander also take of heels. Birds were laughing on there victory.
Now the king loin was alone his army left the war ground. So, he accept his defeat. Animals sent the tail of Bear to Birds king Eagle and both start living with peace again. | https://medium.com/@arsalanahmed_7627/bear-tail-e48dd9a928b1 | ['Arsalan Ahmed'] | 2020-12-27 10:21:39.983000+00:00 | ['Short Story Writing', 'America', 'Fiction Writing', 'Writing', 'Content Marketing'] |
Kanban vs Scrum | More and more companies are using agile methodologies, according to the EducacionIt Adoption Report, 41% of companies are maturing in practice, 19% are experimenting with agile practices and 18% are considering an agile practice .
On the other hand CertiProf (leading institute in professional training), has conducted a survey on December 2019 and February 2020, in order to know the current state of the labor market-agility relationship, the most outstanding practices and the most used frameworks.
One of the most outstanding points of the report is the sustained growth in the use of agile methodologies, not only in the IT industry, which corresponds to 72%, but also within the responses there are also engineering areas, human capital, business / finance, marketing, sales and operations.
Globant, for some time has become an ambassador of Agile methodologies, not only with its practices, events, but also by aligning the stakeholders with its digital transformation programs.
For all the aforementioned, I consider it is important to highlight:
Is impossible to compare Kanban with Scrum, because Kanban is a Method and Scrum is a Framework.
Some strengths of the most two used methodologies within the Agile world, their similarities and characteristics:
Scrum is the most chosen by teams especially in our industry and is recognized as a synonym for Agile, while Kanban is known more as a board, the truth is that both are perfectly compatible and both are combined to achieve the same objective.
Kanban is based on:
-Continuous development and delivery, made up of simultaneous tasks. -Kanban teams use visual planning tools, which make up a board, where you can see the User Stories and how they move in their different states, each represented in a column until completion.
When to use kanban?
-When the work flow is continuous, For example, in support and maintenance teams. -In teams with many incoming requests with different priorities.
The important thing:
- WIP limit, is to limit the tasks that can be per column and per person. - The key is to visualize the flow at glance and quickly detect queues or bottlenecks.
Scrum: like Kanban it is also divided into user stories and displayed in a workflow.
Scrum teams commit to deliver value every certain time interval, which is clearly established and can vary from 1 to 4 weeks, these iterations are called Sprints.
Scrum puts emphasis on its pillars, constant inspection, adaptation and transparency, as well as making a retrospective and if it is necessary to make any changes to achieve the objective in a transparent way for the team.
When to use Scrum?
-In teams that seek to deliver value continuously and incrementally at the end of each sprint, teams committed to the job. -Scrum is used to solve complex problems (eg, building an innovative product) where continuous inspection and adaptation is required. In addition to having a common Sprint goal on the team
Scrumban: This term arises from the need to unite both methodologies and is used in those teams that are in an intermediate point between Scrum and Kanban, adopting the best of both methodologies for managing teams and achieving objectives. | https://medium.com/globant/kanban-vs-scrum-26621e4ae750 | ['Sofia Elizabeth Montenegro'] | 2020-12-24 14:14:34.450000+00:00 | ['Scrum', 'Kanban'] |
Bizfluence App to release Dark Mode this week. Why doesn’t LinkedIn have Dark Mode yet? | Bizfluence App to release Dark Mode this week. Why doesn’t LinkedIn have Dark Mode yet? Misha Fitton Aug 23·3 min read
Bizfluencers asked for dark mode and the team is delivering! The update should be coming out this week and will deliver what is a common expectation for apps today…
You know what’s crazy? The business social platform that even in 2021 still doesn’t have dark mode: LinkedIn. It’s surprising that LinkedIn only just recently announced the feature’s development in June 2021. Andrew Hutchinson at Social Media Today describes LinkedIn’s dinosaur-like product strategy quite well in his post about why LinkedIn doesn’t have dark mode:
“It seems a little behind the times, but LinkedIn is currently testing a new ‘Dark Mode display option for its desktop app, which, as it sounds, would make the app much darker, and predominantly black, based on this new example.”
1 year vs. 19 years
However, it looks like the startup Bizfluence, an SMB-Focused Alternative to LinkedIn, will beat them to release nonetheless. What’s shocking is the age difference between the two companies.
Bizfluence was founded a little over a year ago and it is delivering dark mode now vs. LinkedIn which has a far larger team and STILL hasn’t released Dark Mode despite repeated user requests. How old is LinkedIn? It was founded in 2002… 19 years… and still no dark mode release. Wow!
From my observations in Customer Success, Marketing, and Product Management, when you get too big, you get slow and complacent.
I consider LinkedIn’s historical lack of urgency around dark mode as both a failure in Product and Customer Success. With few exceptions, every other social platform — big tech and startups — has released this functionality years ago. Bizfluence is just a year old and still made it a priority after its 2.0 release in early August 2021. Any social platform with good customer success strategy knows that the viewing experience needs to be lighter on the eyes if you want to keep users healthy and engaged on your platform. Dark mode isn’t just a request, but an expectation now-a-days. LinkedIn should have integrated the mode earlier and the lack of earlier inclusion on its product roadmap makes me skeptical of their priorities.
When a startup, Bizfluence in this case, is competing against an incumbent like LinkedIn, big advantages that the startup have are
More real and close connection with its users that create a true understanding of each user group’s customer journey and respective pain points The flexibility to make rapid changes to address user needs and pain points within a development sprint
This Tweet showcases Bizfluence App’s strong startup customer success and product strategy:
Bizfluence Co-Founder Joel Wolh released the news on Bizfluence and Twitter.
You can follow @RealBizfluence and @joelwolh where the startup journey and news will be released as well.
Join Bizfluence: https://bizfluenceapp.com/
iOS App Link
Google Play / Android App
Find me on Bizfluence https://bizfluenceapp.com/profiles/michaelfitton | https://medium.com/@mishafitton/bizfluence-app-to-release-dark-mode-this-week-why-doesnt-linkedin-have-dark-mode-yet-863d2609cf01 | ['Misha Fitton'] | 2021-08-24 00:21:42.660000+00:00 | ['LinkedIn', 'Customer Success', 'Product Development', 'Linkedin Marketing', 'Networking'] |
Practical applications of principles 1–29 of Creativity in The Workplace. | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/creativityintheworkplace/practical-applications-of-principles-1-29-of-creativity-in-the-workplace-7a4977cac9b3 | ['Macy Haahr'] | 2020-12-10 22:08:16.580000+00:00 | ['Creativity At Work', 'Projects', 'Creative Process', 'Creativity', 'Business'] |
TO BETTER IMPACT THE STUDENTS, THE FOCUS TURNS TO TEACHERS! | Paul Bbosa, a commerce teacher at Entebbe Secondary school teaching a skills lab which uses student-centered approach to learning. Bbosa, is one of 1500 teachers that have been trained by Educate!
With Educate!’s focus on competency-based teaching methods, the organization understands that they need buy-in from a particular stakeholder to guarantee the success of their work: teachers.
Their teacher development program provides teachers an opportunity to use proven student-centered pedagogy, like the skills lab approach, while getting experience in mentoring students and coaching other teachers.
Educate! does this through periodic training sessions with two teachers from each of the 750 partner schools. For the teachers who implement these pedagogies in their classrooms, they are seeing immediate success from their students.
Lubega Anitah, the program officer for Educate! in the Entebbe community, does capacity building for the teachers in the region. A former teacher herself, she passionately believes in the work of teachers and the change they can bring in pupils’ lives.
“Because what are we supposed to do as teachers? It is not just teaching, but you’re supposed to cause learning. And this learning is expected to be relevant,” she said.
“We are looking to prepare these kids to face the future,” she added. “We are giving them work readiness skills, and they should go out there when they are ready…Because we’re in a global economy, which is really changing. And these skills are very, very paramount.”
Bbosa Paul is a commerce teacher — one of the two teachers who has been trained by Anitah at Entebbe Secondary School — that believes the program has impacted his teaching style.
“It has helped me help the learners,” he said. “But it has also helped me grow professionally and personally.” | https://medium.com/@tina_80612/to-better-impact-the-students-the-focus-turns-to-teachers-ee688af7f235 | ['The Partnership', 'Psipse'] | 2019-07-10 12:30:53.541000+00:00 | ['Entrepreneurship', 'Life Skills', 'Sdgs', 'Teachers', 'Education'] |
İş Yerinde Mizah | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/t%C3%BCrkiye/i%CC%87%C5%9F-yerinde-mizah-9a56dc8345a3 | ['Muhammet Ali Erdoğan'] | 2020-12-27 18:01:31.915000+00:00 | ['Insan Kaynaklari', 'Mizah', 'İşveren Markası', 'Ｍedium', 'Türkçe'] |
How to build daily work-from-home habits | How to build daily work-from-home habits
Gone are the days of commuting to work in traffic jams, or squeezing into that crowded subway car. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, over 40% of the U.S. workforce and over 60% of the U.K. workforce are working from home. About 25% of the workforce in France is working from home, up from 3% in 2017.
Chances are, you’re working from home too. While many embrace remote work, others find it more difficult. You may be struggling to create routine, organize your home office, or adapt to the loneliness that often occurs from remote work.
But there are specific actions you can take to build effective work-from-home routines. Utilizing them will guide you towards increased productivity and workplace satisfaction. It can take some purposeful planning and organization to start, so follow these key steps to build the right remote work habits.
1. Perfect your workspace
Working from home might mean your home office is actually just a corner of the living room. Whatever space you may have (a full room, corner or desk), make it your own. Separate this space from areas where you relax, socialize, eat, or sleep.
Do whatever it takes to make this dedicated space a comfortable working place. Invest in a supportive chair, a large screen, a standing desk, or whatever makes your office feel like yours. Personalize your space with items you love, like picture frames or plants.
If you can, choose an office space near a window. Natural light makes people happier — and it will help to properly see your computer. Investing in a good desk lamp is also a must.
Creating the right workspace also means investing in tech. Forming a functional space is just as important as comfort and aesthetics. Having a pair of bluetooth, noise cancelling headphones is essential. You may also need a microphone or ring lamp if you’re on virtual calls or remote meetings. Getting a VPN may be necessary if security is a concern.
Finally, once you’ve created your perfect home office, work there. Fight the urge to work from your bed or the sofa.
2. Structure your day with routine
Whether you’re a morning person or not, it’s important to create a routine. Your routine needs to be realistic, making it something you can easily stick with. After all, the best way to form a recurring habit is to make sure it’s something feasible, then repeat it.
Whether you’re a freelancer or full time employee, create a general timetable for your day and stick to it. Try to wake up, eat, and work around the same times each day. Consider doing the more important tasks during hours of the day when you’re most productive. For most people, this may mean a morning routine, but it really depends on your personality and work style. Leave emails, calls, and less-important tasks for afternoon, or whenever you’ve finished the more pressing tasks.
Set alarms if need be when it’s time to switch tasks or change gears. If a particular routine just isn’t working for you, change it up. Once you find a routine that works, stick to it.
3. Minimize distractions
Distractions can come in many forms. From Slack pings to social media to your own children crying, it can be hard to focus at home. Setting up the right home office space can help, but there are other things you can do.
Put your phone on silent if possible, or at least turn the screen away from you during key periods so you won’t be distracted from messages while trying to work.
Consider white noise to help you focus. Many apps offer different white noise options or music to help you concentrate. This is helpful to block out distractions you can’t control, like road construction, noisy neighbors, or traffic sounds.
4. Make to-do lists
Having a list of exactly what you need to do each workday will increase productivity and ensure you don’t forget about any key tasks or top priorities. Usually, putting the most important tasks first to get those done faster is a good plan (this helps you avoid procrastination). But, your list should depend on how you’re structuring your day and when you’re most productive. Some people prefer handwritten lists; others prefer digital.
You can also create a list at the end of the day for the following day. It doesn’t even have to be a full list — just a few key tasks you really want to accomplish tomorrow. Then, you’ll start the next day more focused with a plan already in place.
5. Get dressed
We know how tempting it is to work in your pajamas. But don’t. Dressing the part is always a good way to start the day right, prepare you for productivity, and get you into work mode.
And don’t even think about doing that Zoom call if you aren’t fully dressed. Just trust us on this one. You never know when things might go awry, and you want to maintain a professional appearance in front of your co-workers, boss, and employees.
6. Take breaks and stay social
Taking breaks when working from home is important if you want to keep your productivity high, not lose focus, and boost creativity.
Some people prefer to take a 20/30-minute break every few hours, while others benefit more from taking 5/10-minute resets once an hour. You can set an alarm, or simply take a break while you find yourself losing focus.
Stretch your legs, have tea or coffee, get some fresh air, take a power nap, or listen to your favorite podcast — anything to detach your mind from work. This will ensure you’ll return to your desk refreshed and ready to continue.
When it’s time for a lunch break, prioritize social interaction. A check in with others will help if working from home is making you feel isolated. This is especially important if you live alone or work for yourself.
Consider connecting physically, or with a phone call. Sometimes, only having digital interactions (with friends or co-workers) can actually increase loneliness. So try to meet in person, or pick up the phone.
7. Create boundaries
Not working on your sofa or in bed means you’re already setting boundaries: work is for your workspace. This is important for your mental health, and will also help you to work more efficiently.
But still, if you find yourself working longer and longer hours at home, you should set limits to avoid work creep. Work creep is when work slowly erodes into your personal life and upsets your work-life balance. You can avoid this happening by following the below tips.
Take the time you spent commuting and dedicate it to an activity you love (vs. working more).
Don’t turn your laptop back on post-work hours.
Shut your computer off at a specific time each day.
Pause Slack notifications and ignore emails during non-work hours.
8. Avoid Slack and Zoom burnout with effective scheduling
If possible, try not to schedule more than a few video meetings per day. Zoom fatigue is a real thing, and it comes from the mind trying harder to process visual cues and non-verbal signs via video, which is much harder to do than in-person. If your day is full of video calls, try to space them out in order to take breaks in between. Or, consider a good, old- fashioned phone call instead.
Creating boundaries for Slack will also help. Turn off your notifications after a certain time, and mute them if you’re working on something important. At minimum, turn off or down the sound, so you won’t be constantly distracted by annoying pings all day.
9. Set expectations with family members (or roommates)
Juggling professional and family responsibilities has never been easy for working parents. But for remote workers, it may be even more difficult. Even those with roommates may struggle when working from home.
The key is communication. Work with your partner, babysitter, parents, roommates, etc. to create a schedule or set ground rules. If both you and your partner are working from home, set up a system that allows you each to work when you’re most productive while still balancing other family or at-home responsibilities.
Make sure your office space is quiet or set apart from young children’s play spaces, and if you have teens, discuss expectations about if, how, or when they can enter your office space. With roommates, set noise expectations and discuss how to best utilize shared workspaces.
Your work-from-home habits will soon come naturally
Working from home has its pros and its cons, but if you learn some daily habits to stay productive, it can be a positive professional experience. Remote work is likely here to stay, so the sooner you can perfect that home office and form these WFH work habits for success, the better.
elocance is a productivity app and your audio superpower. Build productive habits and save time by listening. Save articles and PDFs etc., turn them to audio and learn on the go. | https://medium.com/@elocance/how-to-build-daily-work-from-home-habits-e3c014207a94 | [] | 2020-12-06 22:33:37.727000+00:00 | ['Worklife', 'Productivity Hacks', 'Startup Life', 'Daily Habits', 'WFH'] |
Klipsch The Fives review: These Bluetooth bookshelf speakers deliver smooth, refined sound | Ever since 1946, when Paul Klipsch began selling his patented Klipschorn speakers, the company that bears his name has been inextricably linked with horn-based designs. As he discovered a decade earlier while comparing horn-loaded and cone-based speakers, horns offer greater efficiency and more controllable dispersion.
Now, almost 75 years later, the company continues to implement that philosophy in a wide range of speakers, including The Fives, a pair of powered, wireless bookshelf speakers that bespeak high quality in their construction and performance.
This review is part of TechHive’s coverage of the best Bluetooth speakers, where you’ll find reviews of competing products, plus a buyer’s guide to the features you should consider when shopping for this type of speaker.Klipsch The Fives feature setThe Fives are fairly large bookshelf speakers that measure 12 x 6.5 x 9.25 inches (HxWxD). The primary speaker weighs in at 11.8 pounds, while the secondary speaker is a bit lighter at 10.7 pounds. As with most such wireless bookshelf systems, the primary speaker houses all the electronics, while the secondary unit is nothing but a passive speaker. But unlike some such systems, you can select whether the primary speaker is on the left or right with a switch on the back, which makes placement more flexible.
Klipsch The magnetic grilles are made from a tough woven fabric.
Each 2-way speaker includes a 4.5-inch high-excursion fiber-composite cone woofer, the size of which is close enough to 5 inches to give the speakers their name. A 1-inch titanium LTS (Linear Travel Suspension) vented tweeter with 90 x 90-degree Tractrix horn is derived from the company’s lauded Reference Premiere series. The bass-reflex enclosure has a rear-firing Tractrix port, and it’s constructed from sturdy MDF with genuine wood veneer. Also, the speakers come with a handsome magnetic grille-cloth cover.
The built-in, custom-designed amplifiers provide a total of 160 watts of power (320W peak), with each woofer receiving 60W and each tweeter getting 20W from their own separate amp circuits. The maximum output is specified to be 109dB at a distance of 1 meter from the stereo pair, and frequency response is specified from 50Hz to 25kHz (no tolerance given), with bass extension down to 46Hz at 35 percent volume.
Klipsch The Fives incorporate high-quality parts throughout.
One interesting feature is Dynamic Bass EQ, which is normally found only in A/V receivers. Basically, the level of low frequencies relative to the entire spectrum changes depending on the overall level you set—the lower the overall level, the more the bass is boosted to accommodate how the human hearing system perceives different frequencies at different levels. This feature can be disabled using the included IR remote.
Inputs abound on The Fives, all of which are found on the primary speaker. For wireless connectivity, there’s Bluetooth 5.0 with support for the aptX, aptX HD, AAC, and SBC codecs. In addition, physical digital inputs include optical Toslink, USB-B for connection to a computer, and HDMI ARC for connection to a TV.
To use the ARC connection, you need to connect the TV’s ARC input to The Fives’ HDMI input; as you may know, the TV’s ARC input sends audio data to an external device in addition to accepting video and audio data from a device. In this case, you must connect your source devices to the TV and use it to switch between them, and you can’t use the TV’s HDMI ARC input as an input. If your TV doesn’t have an ARC input, you can use its optical digital-audio output or line-level analog-audio outputs to connect to The Fives. (You can read more about ARC in this story.)
Klipsch The comprehensive set of inputs on the primary speaker includes HDMI ARC, phono/line (switchable), 3.5mm stereo analog, optical digital, and USB. A sub output lets you connect an external subwoofer. The 4-pin connector at the bottom right (left, when viewed from this angle) connects the primary speaker to the secondary speaker using the included cable.
Speaking of which, analog inputs include a 3.5mm stereo analog jack and a phono input with two RCA jacks and a ground terminal; the phono input can also be switched to line level. Rounding out the connections on the back of the primary speaker is an RCA subwoofer output, a USB-A port for servicing, a 4-pin connector that’s used with the included cable to connect to the secondary speaker, and the AC power receptacle. A Bluetooth button lets you pair The Fives to a Bluetooth source.
Using the Klipsch the FivesThe top of the primary speaker offers two knurled knobs that are embedded with only a portion of each one extending above the surface. One selects the source, and the other adjusts the volume. The knobs feel very sturdy and substantial, just like the rest of the speaker.
The source-select knob has six white LED indicators next to it. In addition to identifying the selected source, the LEDs also indicate the volume when you change it. In addition, the selected source LED blinks twice when you disable Dynamic Bass EQ and once when you enable it.
The only problem I had with this arrangement is that I couldn’t see the LEDs when sitting directly in front of the speakers. I wish there was an LED indicator on the front of the speaker to indicate the power and Dynamic Bass EQ status.
Klipsch The sturdy-feeling top-mounted controls let you select the source and adjust the volume. The LED source indicators also form a volume ladder when you change the volume.
You can also control The Fives with the included remote, which is small and simple. Along with a power on/off button, it provides a play/pause button, volume up/down, subwoofer volume up/down, mute, and dedicated source-select buttons, along with a Sub Reset button that resets the subwoofer level to its nominal value as well as enabling and disabling Dynamic Bass EQ.
The free Klipsch Connect app for iOS and Android offers another control option for several of the company’s products, including The Fives. But the current version only provides a setup routine, firmware update, and product registration. At first, I didn’t want to register the product since it’s a review sample, but the app wouldn’t go beyond that point without it, so I input my info. The app offers a quick-start guide with videos, which is basically an enhanced version of the printed guide.
As I played with the app, I discovered that the speakers had firmware version 1.5.0 and version 1.5.2 was available, so I performed the update. The download took less than a minute, while the process of updating the speaker took several minutes. This process is far better than downloading the update to a computer, putting it on a USB flash drive, and plugging that into the speaker.
Otherwise, the app isn’t very useful. According to Klipsch, the app will be updated with EQ and other functions later this year.
Klipsch The included remote is small and simple with dedicated source-selection buttons.
Performance of the Klipsch the FivesAs usual, I used the Tidal Master library as my source material playing via Bluetooth from my iPhone XS. Also as usual these days, I started with some Jacob Collier—this time, “All I Need” from Djesse Vol. 3. This wonderful track follows the best tradition of Earth, Wind, and Fire updated for the 21st Century. On The Fives, the vocals were super-clean, but the highs were slightly veiled, and the bass was just a bit bloated. Disabling Dynamic Bass EQ helped, but I couldn’t really hear much difference between on and off.
Next up was “Ojos Negros,” a new single by Paula Cendejas and Girl Ultra. This upbeat Latin track has lots of electronics and deep bass, which again was slightly bloated on The Fives. The highs were a bit laid back, but the vocals were smooth and clear.
Another new discovery for me is saxophonist Nubya Garcia. “The Message Continues” from her debut album Source is a basic jazz combo of bass, drums, electric piano, and tenor sax. The bass is quite prominent in the mix, and as before, it was a bit overblown on The Fives. The sax and piano sounded excellent, while the highs in the cymbals were a tad recessed.
Turning to some classic country, I cued up “Devil in a Sleepin’ Bag” by Willie Nelson from his remastered album Shotgun Willie. The Fives sounded smooth if a bit restrained, and as I had come to expect, the bass was a bit overblown. Willie’s voice sounded—well, just like Willie.
Klipsch Klipsch deserves credit for including a dedicated remote control, so you don’t need to pull out your phone for everything.
For some solo piano, I was surprised to find Chick Corea playing classical literature live in Paris on Chick Corea Plays. I listened to Scriabin’s Prelude #4 from Op. 11, in which Corea injects a jazz interpretation in a few spots. The piano sounded smooth and cohesive, and I didn’t notice any bloat in the bass on this track. The speakers still sounded a bit restrained, though.
Moving on to a larger symphonic sound, I played the finale from Berlioz’ Symphonie Fantastique as performed by the Muncher Philharmoniker under Sergiu Celebidache. As before, The Fives sounded smooth and a bit restrained, especially in the upper frequencies, with no appreciable bass bloat as I had heard on other tracks. In my notes, I wrote that the speakers had a “sophisticated, polite sound.”
Comparing Klipsch the Fives to Fluance Ai60 Mentioned in this article Fluance Ai60 Read TechHive's reviewSee it During my listening sessions, I played each track on the Fluance Ai60 wireless bookshelf speakers, reviewed here, in addition The Fives for comparative purposes. The Ai60s have a 1-inch silk-dome tweeter in a shallow waveguide and a 6.5-inch woofer in a sealed cabinet, and they list for $299.99, less than half the list price of The Fives.
I placed The Fives on top of the Ai60s, which worked out well, since the Klipsch speakers are a bit smaller. I set the Ai60s’ EQ to a flat response and disabled The Fives’ Dynamic Bass EQ, which sounded better to my ear. Thanks to Tidal’s user interface, I was able to switch between them seamlessly.
On every track, the Ai60s sounded brighter and more open than The Fives with crisper highs—in some cases, they sounded just a tad overbright in direct comparison with The Fives. For example, on the Scriabin piano piece, they sounded ever-so-slightly strident. Also, the bass was cleaner, better defined, and deeper with no sense of bloating. The deeper bass is completely understandable, since the Ai60s’ low-frequency extension is specified down to 35Hz, while The Fives are spec’d down to 50Hz.
Overall, The Fives sounded smoother and more refined than the Ai60s, though also a bit restrained in the high end with slightly overblown bass. By contrast, the Fluance speakers were brighter and more open with deeper, richer, cleaner bass that was better balanced with the rest of the spectrum. Some might consider the Ai60s to be somewhat brash and splashy, more like ear candy and less sophisticated than The Fives, but this didn’t bother me—in fact, I preferred the sound of the Ai60s overall.
Bottom line on the Klipsch the FivesThe Fives are obviously a high-quality product, derived from more than seven decades of speaker excellence. The sound is smooth, refined, and sophisticated, though it’s tipped slightly toward the bass and away from the mids and highs. And the bass can be a bit overblown.
The wide range of connection options make The Fives well-suited for many applications, including Bluetooth, computer and TV audio, and even direct input from a turntable. And the build quality is top notch.
At $799/pair, The Fives are not cheap. But if your taste tends toward a refined sound, they could be well worth the investment. On the other hand, if you crave more excitement in the sound of your speakers, the Fluance Ai60 is a better choice, and it’s less than half the cost.
Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details. | https://medium.com/@Richard43785249/klipsch-the-fives-review-these-bluetooth-bookshelf-speakers-deliver-smooth-refined-sound-be3211511b40 | [] | 2020-09-22 18:33:46.494000+00:00 | ['Cutting', 'Chromecast', 'Music', 'Deals'] |
Your definition of customer experience is wrong | Your definition of customer experience is wrong, and here’s why, right, there’s lots of different definitions of what Customer experience is, and if we put them together, we might end up with something like this, the sum of the interactions, perceptions and feelings a customer has with your company.
Frustrated woman having problem …..
You might think that’s a pretty decent definition, James, but you’d be wrong. Most of the definitions you find are going to run along the same theme. Okay, the problem is that theme is completely inside-out. These definitions take a company view of customer experience, not a customer view of customer experience. Go figure. Let’s say that we’re an airline…..
Watch the video and get the full transcript from here
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I have just done a 3 minute explainer video for Outside-In — see it here: https://bit.ly/OIDifference
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Step #3 — Get the Software:
The Experience Manager | https://bit.ly/TEM2021
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Please follow and like me:
Share this:
Related | https://medium.com/@stowers/your-definition-of-customer-experience-is-wrong-a0e8bbb303b | [] | 2020-12-19 17:06:00.760000+00:00 | ['Cx', 'Customerexperience', 'Outsidein'] |
That Alchemy | That Alchemy
A meditation on tears — day 4 of 30 days letting go challenge. Priyanka Srivastava ·Dec 5, 2020
Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash
when we can’t speak we use tears to show our feelings. tears flow quietly and ruin the page, they smudge the words and write a different tale. we need to let go our tears because sometimes they paint a different page. we need to learn to hold them within, we need to find that alchemy which can convert them into a piece of art.
sadness, words, anxiety and tears together they occupy places in us, we need to let go and tumble those building blocks. | https://medium.com/@prankiester/that-alchemy-49ec161b068f | ['Priyanka Srivastava'] | 2020-12-05 01:18:51.093000+00:00 | ['Nonfiction', 'Writing', 'Letting Go', 'Sadness', 'Meditation'] |
DEX Leader MDEX Says Binance Smart Chain is First Step in Multi-Chain Expansion | Singapore, April 9, 2021 — Yesterday, leading decentralized exchange MDEX.com announced its complete integration with the Binance Smart Chain (BSC). Within five seconds, it reported a TVL (total value locked) of more than USD 500 million. Twenty minutes later, it went up to USD 800 million, forty minutes to USD 1 billion, one hour to USD 1.3 billion and two hours, the figure had gone up to USD 1.5 billion with its 2-hour trading volume surpassing USD 268 million.
Integration on BSC caused exploding TVL and trading volume for MDEX
The Heco-based DEX has now completed a cross-chain bridge between Heco (Huobi Eco-Chain) and BSC, apparently the first step it will take in a multi-chain deployment endeavor.
If this sounds like an ambitious undertaking, it is because it is indeed a challenging task. Currently, multi-chain deployment on DEXes does not exist. There have been some cross-chain attempts, including MDEX’s BSC integration, but a grand plan to integrate across Heco, BSC, OKexChain, the Layer-2 network of Ethereum and Polkadot to achieve multi-asset interoperability will be a far more arduous enterprise.
Beginning the Cross-Chain Journey
Built on the Heco Chain, MDEX is very compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM) which has made it easy for users to switch between networks.
The relatively new public chain developed by Huobi enables seamless smart contract integrations, and has already processed many millions of transactions since its inception. Heco utilizes the novel HPoS consensus mechanism that facilitates low transaction costs and fast transaction times. Its meta transaction function also reduces the gas fees of users holding Huobi Tokens.
This well-calculated step to build on Heco has resulted in impressive results for MDEX. Beginning on January 19, MDEX implemented both liquidity and transaction mining on the Heco chain and a month later on February 19, its 24-hour transaction volume exceeded USD 2 billion. On February 25th MDEX ranked first on Coinmarketcap and a while later, also on Coingecko.
The magnitude of this achievement cannot be overstated. When compared with DEX leader Uniswap, which deployed on the Ethereum mainnet in December 2018, its 24-hour trading volumes were averaging USD 1–1.5 billion in the same time period. For a new kid on the block, MDEX’s explosive trading volumes were unheard of.
Heco’s fast transaction times of 3 seconds enabled MDEX to provide its users with a smooth trading experience. MDEX charges about 0.1 US cent per transaction which means that 1 US dollar equivalent of HT (Huobi Token) can sustain hundreds or even thousands of transactions. Its well-designed trading ecosystem has enabled transaction fees to be further reduced and even exempted because of the mining rewards paid out. Slippage is low with high liquidity in the pools, offering MDEX users a trading experience that is close to that of a centralized exchange.
Breaking the Heco Ceiling with BSC Integration
But as funds continued to pour into the young DEX, the MDEX user base was not growing in proportion to the transaction volumes. Within the Heco chain, MDEX would hit the ceiling at some point.
Choosing to expand its market through integration of the Binance Smart Chain was a logical first step. The popular network is known for its capability to handle a large number of transactions per second efficiently and has been adopted by numerous projects and DEXes.
Developed to work in tandem with Binance Chain, Binance Smart Chain (BSC) is specially catered to decentralized applications (DApps) so that the original chain can be optimized for ultra-fast trading. This was to target congestion, caused by DApp smart contracts which could significantly slow down fast transaction times and has weighed down the Ethereum networks. Designed to be complementary but independent to the existing chain, BSC has been a proven solution for scalability.
BSC recently set a record on April 7 with 5 million daily transactions compared to the Ethereum network which saw a little less than 1.3 million transactions. That is a difference of more than 350%! Despite the massive transaction numbers, BSC continues to work efficiently which enables its fees to continue to be low.
As of yesterday, MDEX now successfully supports the decentralized cross-chain protocols of both BSC and Heco, enabling efficient cross-chain interoperability in asset services such as liquidity mining, single token staking and transaction mining.
The integration with BSC has already produced remarkable results for MDEX. Besides the impressive TVL amounts and trading volume increases mentioned earlier in this article, the liquidity pool rewards are also notable with very high APYs.
The MDX/WBNB pair is earning 1.795% APY, MDX/BUSD pair is earning 1,672% APY and the list goes on. Single token staking is also earning high APYs such as 241% for EPS, 117% for CAKE, 112% for HMDX and so on.
MDEX BSC Liquidity Pool Pair Staking
MDEX BSC Liquidity Pool Single Token Staking
Moving Forward with Multi-Chain Deployment
The value of communicating is to transmit information. The value of connecting on the blockchain is to transmit value. When these inter-connections are made with the cross-chain bridges built, then value can be transmitted efficiently across entire networks.
At the time of this writing, the current TVL on HECO is over USD 8.8 billion while that of Ethereum is over USD 51.75 billion. That is almost a 6x difference.
While the congestion and high fee issues on Ethereum are currently vexing users, Ethereum 2.0 is anticipated to solve the current scaling issues. According to Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin, Layer-2 “could scale 100x” in as early as “a few months”.
As with Ethereum, TVL in BSC and OKexChain are substantial and the MDEX team has made astute plans to choose multi-chain expansion in its route for development and growth.
Anticipated results of multi-chain deployment can be summarized as follows:
Massive increases in user base and trading volumes. Improved user experience and convenience on its trading platform because of interoperability with all the mainstream DeFi chains. More opportunities for projects to profit from the exchange of multi-chain assets. More DeFi mining opportunities on the MDEX platform for investors, especially retail investors. Attract and facilitate large funds from big investors and financial institutions to mine. Increase the value of MDX for token holders. Improve the development of the entire DeFi ecosystem by virtue of its multi-chain initiatives which will impact not only the projects and users but also the other DEXes who will likely follow suit.
The multi-chain endeavor will of course not be without its challenges. Delays and inefficiencies can compromise user confidence and MDEX is undertaking a Herculean task in spearheading the multi-chain deployment.
However, as one of the fastest-growing DEXes in DeFi, if its past performance is anything indicative, the MDEX team seems well-poised to take on the challenge. If successful, it is likely that the entire MDEX ecosystem will expand extensively and entrench MDEX in its position as a DEX leader in the DeFi space.
For more info about MDEX, visit the official website: https://mdex.com/#/
MDEX official channels:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/Mdextech
English Telegram: https://t.me/MdexEN
Chinese Telegram: https://t.me/MixDex
Medium: https://mdex.medium.com/
Source | https://medium.com/@bitmediabuzz/dex-leader-mdex-says-binance-smart-chain-is-first-step-in-multi-chain-expansion-348d4428c155 | ['Bit Media Buzz'] | 2021-04-09 10:04:27.337000+00:00 | ['Mdex Dex', 'Mdex Defi', 'Binance Smart Chain', 'Crosschain', 'Multichain'] |
Add Flutter to existing Android/iOS app | Integrating AFE_Flutter in AFE_iOS
Integrating the Flutter framework requires the use of the CocoaPods dependency manager. This is because the Flutter framework needs to be available also to any Flutter plugins that you might include in afe_flutter.
If your app already uses CocoaPods then add below lines to Podfile.
flutter_application_path = '/Users/nirav/AndroidStudioProjects/FlutterModuleDemo/afe_flutter/' eval(File.read(File.join(flutter_application_path, '.ios', 'Flutter', 'podhelper.rb')), binding)
Now, close the pod file and Xcode and run pod install inside your project directory. Once done, reopen the project from .xcworkspace file.
Note: Make sure you don’t open .xcodeproject file otherwise you will get compilation errors regarding Flutter Framework not found.
Disable BITCODE for the target
Since Flutter doesn’t support as of now, you need to disable ENABLE_BITCODE flag located in your target's Build Settings->Build Options->Enable Bitcode part. eseidelGoogle already created an issue on Flutter’s GitHub repository. You can track the status here.
Add a build phase for building the Dart code
Select the top-level AFEiOs project in the Project Navigator. Select TARGET AFEiOS in the left part of the main view, and then select the Build Phases tab. Add a new build phase by clicking the + towards the top left of the main view. Select New Run Script Phase . Expand the new Run Script , just appended to the list of phases.
Paste the following into the text area just below the Shell field:
"$FLUTTER_ROOT/packages/flutter_tools/bin/xcode_backend.sh" build
"$FLUTTER_ROOT/packages/flutter_tools/bin/xcode_backend.sh" embed
Finally, drag the new build phase to just after the Target Dependencies phase.
You should now be able to build the project using ⌘B . To understand what is going on Under the hood, go to this guide.
Write code to use FlutterViewController from AFE_iOS
First, declare your app delegate to be a subclass of FlutterAppDelegate . Then define a FlutterEngine property, which helps you to register a plugin without a FlutterViewController instance.
Now, we can just write a code to open flutter module in our AFE_iOS app. Add below lines in sendDataToFlutterModule method inside ViewController.swift file.
let flutterEngine = (UIApplication.shared.delegate as? AppDelegate)?.flutterEngine; let flutterViewController = FlutterViewController(engine: flutterEngine, nibName: nil, bundle: nil)!; self.present(flutterViewController, animated: false, completion: nil)
Now Clicking on Send to Flutter Module button will open AFE_Flutter module inside our AFE_iOS app. | https://medium.com/flutter-community/add-flutter-to-existing-android-ios-app-ae8c4fb1582e | ['Nirav Tukadiya'] | 2019-07-16 09:10:08.661000+00:00 | ['Flutter App Development', 'Flutter', 'Android', 'iOS'] |
On Free Markets For Money | The Market for Monetary Standards
Similar to any good, service, or form of labor, monetary standards exist in a market, a process by which the price of money for goods and services is established. The market for monetary standards facilitates competition among competing forms of money, and the economic agents responsible for maintaining the monetary standard seek to obtain a share of a finite market chasing scarce resources. Effective usage of monetary standards enables trade and the distribution and resource allocation in societies. The market for monetary standards can emerge spontaneously or deliberately through human interactions in order to enable the exchange of ownership of services and goods.
Monetary standard markets have ranged from free markets, where the best forms of money competed and accurately signal costs and benefits, to monopolies, where monetary standards are controlled by a central agent. Some examples of “free money markets” include barter/commodity economies, free specie markets like early Mesopotamia and the Mongol empire, and even late 1800s America. In general, the common denominator for more competitive money markets have been fairly liberalized economic and political policies. In contrast, most monetary standard markets historically have existed as near monopolies in bounded economies. Whether it was an explicit government diktat or requirements for taxes due to be paid in a chosen media, monopolistic or oligopolistic conditions for monetary markets have persisted for the most part.
The history of money is well documented by many historians, particularly the monopolistic dynamics and externalities of government-issued money. Over the past two thousand years, the monopoly (whether natural or government dictated) of government-issued money has deprived societies and economies from discovering the best forms of money through natural, free market processes. In nearly every instance of monopolistic government-issued money, governments with the ability to fully control issued money have resulted in rapid stock increases and the wealth depreciation of its holders, leading in many instances to economic collapses.
Prior to Bitcoin, the modern market for monetary standards had been monopolistic (or oligopolistic if one were to include other G20 currencies) and monetary standards were extremely similar to one another, sharing similar policies and control by centralized governments. The creation of Bitcoin and the innovations over the past decade have created an experimental testing ground for creating new forms of value and money. In our view, we believe that Pandora’s box has been opened and natively digital currencies and forms of value (whether created as crypto assets or by private corporations) have borne an emerging market for monetary standards. While it is premature to say that we have a free market for money just yet, the US dollar’s position as the global reserve currency is experiencing heightened competition from foreign sovereigns, crypto assets, and private corporate-issued money.
In competitive markets, open competition leads to innovation and product development, providing consumers with a wider selection and better products that serve the needs and wants of its users. In a competitive market for money, monetary standards would compete and lead to the best forms of money for its users. The requisite elements of money become the key points of competition and differentiation, leading to a free market determination of society’s monetary standard.
Monetary Market Competition
There are three widely considered requirements for money: unit of account (ability to specifically measure value), medium of exchange (can be exchanged for good and service as an instrument and avoids the limitations of barter), store of value (ability to retain and exchange value at a future point in time). If a media satisfies these three elements, it can be considered as a form of money and does not need to be limited to what is more colloquially considered “money.” Through this more macro lens, we can see that the categorization of money can extend beyond government-issued currencies, and include crypto assets designed to be money (whether they exist today or are new market entrants), new corporate-issued forms of money, and even digitized traditional assets that, due its newfound digitization and transferability, can be used to transfer value and pay for goods, services, and labor. If asset X can act as a unit of account, retain its value over time, and avoids the limitations of a barter system through market discovery of its price, it should be able to be used as money.
The first two requirements of money are no doubt critical, and hinge upon the ability for economic goods to be measured in discrete units of the media and for the media to have some sort of economic value in the present, a measurement of an asset’s direct or indirect utility. Money has value because society demands the indirect benefit it offers in purchasing power for goods and services. Because society is willing to accept and give money as forms of payment, its value is derived more so from a social convention as opposed to a government mandate. Money has ascribed value ultimately because of supply limitations and resource scarcity. If money was available in unlimited supply, it would be effectively free. Non-zero prices serve as a rationing mechanism whereby consumption is limited to the available supply.
We will focus our discussion on the 3rd requirement of money: store of value, perhaps the hardest requirement for money to achieve and retain. The focal determinant of money’s ability to retain value is 1) high stock to flow ratios (thereby preventing the rapid increase in stock and loss of salability) and 2) lasting social conventions to accept the money. Government-issued money has historically been susceptible to losses in value, as the effectively zero cost of production and printing of unsound money to finance national spending creates a vicious cycle of borrowing from the future to satisfy the needs of the present and alarming devaluation of money. This phenomenon of irresponsible money stock management persists because there are no currently imposed disciplines on government issuers to control the quantity of money in an appropriate manner. The lack of monetary standard competition prevents the market determination of these natural disciplines, and furthermore changes the primary goal of an issuer from providing its citizens with good money to creating a system by which a government can tap into a money supply by owning its manufacturing process.
It is particularly peculiar that fiscally irresponsible governments exist in capitalist economies — capitalist economic participants such as corporations are required by the market to remain fiscally responsible to maintain and grow the value of their currency (i.e. their “stock”) through long-term growth, driven by responsible capital investment, the extension of the production cycle, and increased productivity. Natural market forces also place determinants on how a corporation manages its currency, preventing a company from grossly diluting current holders of their currency with market checks and balances. It becomes quite apparent that the stocks of many corporations could actually serve as better forms of money than many of the government-issued fiat currencies.
Monetary Policy
Monetary policy’s impact and influence is unquestionably an important element in modern economies. Policymakers seek to achieve inflation, growth, interest rate, and employment objectives. Central banks use various tools, including open market operations, lending to banks, and bank reserve requirements, to achieve these objectives. It can be used in conjunction or as an alternative to fiscal policy, which federal governments use to manage the economy through a combination of taxes, government borrowing, and federal spending. Using its levers, central banks play a critical role in managing the rates of inflation, growth, and unemployment by increasing or decreasing the money supply and changing consumption and spending propensities through interest rate manipulation.
Productivity is a critical factor in the long-term wealth and health of societies. Improvements in economic productivity over time (increased aggregate outputs for the same aggregate inputs) causes a relative decrease in broad price levels if the money supply remains constant: if the amount of goods produced in an economy are doubled but the amount of money stays the same, the cost of the goods are halved. Increases in economic productivity generally lead to increases in nominal labor income, as some of the profits generated by businesses flow to its labor. The relative changes in productivity and nominal labor income affect the ultimate inflation in an economy: if wage inflation is higher than productivity (holding consumption propensity and savings rate constant), there is “more money chasing fewer goods” and hence overall price inflation (the rise in the nominal cost of goods). Conversely, if productivity is higher than wage inflation, the cost of goods in an economy falls, or creates deflation.
Central banks play a deeply influential role in managing these dynamics of price level changes. It would stand to reason that with such influence, there should be express or market-driven disciplines that enforce a policymaker’s fiscal responsibility with how a nation’s money supply is managed to promote price stability, enduring purchasing power, and long-term prosperity. Yet, quantitative evidence shows the severe longer-term consequences of monopolistic control and the printing of money when gone unchecked. In particular, the US dollar has emerged as the primary reserve currency of the world over the last two hundred years. However, using core CPI inflation figures, the US dollar has lost 96% of its purchasing power over the century. In the aftermath of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis, the USD M2 money stock doubled to $17t leading to a 16% decline in the USD’s purchasing power and a 31% increase in the US’ debt-to-GDP ratio in just ten years.
Inflation & Purchasing Power
While these data points may seem alarming, many have argued that developed market inflation has been relatively low in the last decade, on average sitting below the 2% stated inflation target by policymakers. Monetary printing simply has not surfaced into inflation. Some policymakers have even expressly stated that the phenomenon of low inflation despite the aggressive monetary stimulus has left them confused. In part, increased globalization and automation have led to a weakening of domestic firms’ pricing power and the passing along of rising costs into wages and ultimately goods’ prices. Furthermore, there are a multitude of innovations that are not captured in inflation measures that have improved the aggregate quality life for the average citizen; the basket itself and hedonic quality adjustments in CPI do not capture these innovations and could even suggest there has been price deflation in goods.[1]
However, the historical inflexible dependence on traditional inflation metrics severely understate the broader pricing dynamics that have occurred in the past ten years. Consumption and goods are just one outlet for monetary stimulus. The capital flow dynamics into other ultimate outlets of the newly minted money paints an inflation reality that is actually far worse than many imagine: real and financial asset inflation have grown substantially and have been the primary beneficiaries of the Fed’s stimulus (see Figure 1). Overall inflation of goods and assets, when adjusted for these monetary outlets, is far higher than the reported sub-2% inflation.
Fig. 1: Total return performance, financial & real asset inflation versus real economy inflation. [2]
Real and financial asset inflation is a predictable phenomenon of monetary stimulus given the mechanics of monetary open market operations and flow of capital. While the Treasury is responsible for printing paper currency and minted coin, the Fed can “print” money by extending credit to banks and charging an appropriate interest rate. The Fed also purchases Treasury notes and mortgage-backed securities from banks and adds credit to the banks’ reserves. Since 2008, the size of the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet has grown substantially; open market operations have led to a 4x increase in the Fed’s balance sheet from $1t to roughly $4t (see Figure 2).
Fig. 2: Total assets, Fed’s balance sheet. [3]
The Fed can also tweak bank reserve requirements and the overnight Federal funds rate, thereby influencing credit extension and its cost in the market. Once banks receive credit from the Fed, they can turn to the market and lend it out to market participants. These market participants tend to be large corporate institutions, who in theory can use corporate loans and debt for increased investment and expansion. This dynamic can be viewed in historical balance sheet data: the total debt-to-equity ratio from the S&P 500 rose from 101% to 112% between December of 2013 to 2018 (see Figure 3). As of March 31, 2019, this ratio stood at 117%.
Fig. 3: Corporate debt levels. [4]
The increased debt levels of corporations, both on an absolute and relative basis, has led to significant increases in share buybacks and dividends relative to capital investment. Between 2013 and 2018, companies increased dividends and share buybacks from $787b to $1.26t, representing a 60% increase (see Figure 4). In comparison, total aggregate spending for capex, R&D, and cash M&A increased just 36% from $1.03t to $1.40t.
Fig. 4: S&P 500 cash spending. [5]
Conceptually, buybacks and dividends provide many benefits for shareholders and long-term economic productivity, releasing underutilized “trapped” capital from companies, prevents suboptimal capital investment, and putting capital toward more productive uses that drive growth, productivity, and innovation. While growth investment in aggregate accounts for a larger share of cash spending and growth investment has risen considerably in recent years, the accelerated share buybacks accounting for the single largest source of US equity demand over the past five years suggest that corporate buyback spending has resulted in elevated equity price levels. Considering this dynamic has occurred on the back of rising corporate debt levels spurred by easy and cheap liquidity from the Fed, we can see that a portion of the considerable monetary stimulus and printing has led to equity asset inflation. [6]
Table 1: Net US equity demand ($ billions). [7]
A Competitive Market for Money
The crypto asset innovations over the past decade have created an experimental sandbox for creating new forms of money. We break down these new types of money into three broad buckets:
Permissionless crypto asset money networks such as Bitcoin
Corporate or foundation-issued money and payments networks such as Facebook, Telegram, and fiat-backed stablecoin networks
Digitized (“tokenized”) traditional assets such as equities, real estate, LP interests, etc.
Permissionless crypto money. Permissionless digital assets that exhibit characteristics of sound money with high stock-to-flow ratios, sufficient network and cryptographic attack resistance, and inflation protection can serve as money. In our view, Bitcoin remains the market leader and will continue to grow its moat through its network effects, feature sets, first mover advantages, and social convention. However, we do see the possibility for other forms of permissionless money to take a smaller market share for more targeted use cases and applications, such as privacy-oriented money and new scalability-focused money.
Corporate-issued money. The desire to transfer dollar-equivalents between exchanges and speculators during closed banking hours led to advent of fiat-backed “stablecoins.” Permissionless asset-backed money like Dai and other algorithmic soon followed with the intention to create a more useable money for everyday use, but have mostly struggled with monetary management issues and expanding beyond speculative use cases. Perhaps the first formidable movements into creating a generalized digital money has come from messenger-oriented companies like Facebook, Telegram, Signal, and even Samsung who are in various stages of development for creating a general crypto money. Since the actual architecture and degree of permission for these platforms is unknown by the general public, we categorize them as “corporate-issued money.” The wide user bases of these applications and deep relationships between the issuer and Fortune 1000 companies can potentially lead to widespread adoption and usage of digital money, competing with legacy payment methods and networks.
General digitized value. Perhaps the furthest from fruition and actual practicality, the move to create smart digital securities for both currently digitized securities like publicly traded equities and previously non-digitized assets like real estate and LP interests creates an interesting potential for new forms of value transfer. The digitization of traditional assets coupled with seamless financial markets creates an opportunity for the full monetization of one’s portfolio and wealth. Imagine for instance a retiree who wishes to pay for a dinner. Today, the retiree must have previously sold a small portion of their retirement portfolio, wait until the trade was settled, then transfer the cash to a primary bank account. Along the way, the brokerage, market makers, payment networks, and banks all take economic rents as intermediaries. In a world in which one’s portfolio is fully digitized and the market infrastructure has evolved, the retiree can instead pay for the dinner using a small fraction of their portfolio (say a share of Apple or a fraction of an LP interest), remitting the due balance as a fraction of a traditional asset which is met with an automatic selling and settlement by the recipient. While there are many barriers associated with such a system (requires a common-denominated value to avoid barter limitations, selection of which shares to sell, and hyper-efficient market and payment infrastructure), there is certainly an interesting potential for financial assets with enduring value into edge case money.
Competitive Forces & Darwinism
The proliferation of monopolistically managed money has deprived users with the ability to find the best money (or monies), despite the lack of evidence that government issuers can responsibly and effectively manage the money supply in the long run. As Nobel Prize winning economist F.A. Hayek explains, “There is no justification in history for the existing position of a government monopoly of issuing money. It has never been proposed on the ground that government will give us better money than anybody else could.” [8]
The history of civilization and dead money suggests that despite attempts by empires and imperial powers to maintain lasting political and economic influence, weakened money backed by fragile empires eventually succumb to Darwinian dynamics and are replaced by money with stronger monetary characteristics (Figure 5).
Fig. 5: Historical timeline of reserve currencies, estimates, various sources
A transition from a monopolistic to competitive market does not spell ruin for the US dollar; in fact, it provides the central bank with the opportunity to return the US dollar to a state of “soundness” and make the currency more competitive in an open field of competitors. Market competition for monetary standards would not only open the market to new entrants and innovation, but also force current issuers to remain disciplined with how they manage their money supply, remaining ever-vigilant on maintaining the soundness of its money and providing the best form of money for its users. Rather than establish the default currency by royal or government decrees, monetary standards can exist in an open, competitive market, lead to a free market determination of our monetary standards, and improve monetary standard optionality for the global citizen. | https://medium.com/galaxy-digital-research/on-free-markets-for-money-d99f80c6dd7f | ['Galaxy Digital Research'] | 2019-11-19 16:12:39+00:00 | ['Investing', 'Blockchain', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Bitcoin', 'Economics'] |
When Industrial IoT Comes to the Office | When Industrial IoT Comes to the Office
On the complexity of IoT in the seemingly straightforward scenario of determining whether a conference room is occupied.
One cool aspect of being part of Favorite Medium is that we get to work with emerging technology, such as industrial IoT. We’ve had the opportunity to work on IoT in many spheres from security to energy grids to physical space analytics. Our IoT projects have spanned the gamut. Sometimes we’re just trying to make an ordinary task a touch easier, such as ordering lunch with a button. Other times, we’re changing the way that people manage a chronic health condition like diabetes via a medical device.
With the Internet of Things, it feels like we’re entering a new era. Chips are getting smaller, more powerful, and less costly to produce. Likewise, the software networks, data storage, and computational power needed to enable devices to communicate are also becoming cheaper to build and maintain. It’s clear that the potential to transform the operations of many industries — and the way that we live — is vast.
Today, we’re sharing about a project that takes place in a location that’s familiar to many: the office space.
The Conference Room Conundrum
The question posed to us was: How can we make the best use of space in an office?
Our client was interested in finding out if conference rooms were being used well. With real estate at a premium, using space efficiently is essential.
Yet figuring out the most productive office configuration has proved to be a vexing problem for facilities managers. They didn’t have meaningful data to help them make informed decisions. Were the number of rooms and the amount of people they could hold the right number for the space? What if there was a way to look and see which conference rooms were available at any given time? On its face, this seemed like a straightforward issue. As we dug into these questions, we found that they became increasingly complex.
To determine whether or not a room was occupied, we outfitted them with PIR (passive infrared) sensors that could detect motion. We built an app that integrated the client’s existing calendaring system. One could search for a room in real time, generating a list of what was available at that moment. Not only that, but if you had booked a meeting and weren’t in the room at the appointed time, the system would ask if you were still planning on using the space. If you didn’t respond within 10 minutes, it would cancel the reservation, freeing the room up for someone else to use.
Installing a sensor under the conference table
Unexpected Challenges
The sensors in each room connected to a gateway via Bluetooth. However, we found that wireless Bluetooth sensors can be unreliable in buildings with a large amount of structural steel or with very thick walls. These can disrupt a sensor’s Bluetooth connection to a gateway. The pilot space we were testing happened to be located in an older building that had been retrofitted with large steel beams. Thus, the sensors constantly lost connection to the gateways. We conducted a lot of complicated field testing just on the reliability of the sensors.
We also found that motion sensors by themselves were not sufficient. Some people like to fidget, but others sit very still. And in the case of the latter, sensors could miss them. There were times when a room became unlocked even though people were in it because there were insufficient sensors placed throughout the room to detect very still people or low occupancy (for example, two people taking up a 10-person conference room). To truly determine if humans were in the room, it would be ideal to add sensors that tracked temperature too.
Another challenge was human. People had concerns about their privacy and were nervous about their calendars interacting with the reservation system. Some people didn’t want to participate in the system at all. At other times, people removed sensors. (A good inventory management system to track devices was important for this project!) Ultimately, any system needs buy-in on the individual and organizational levels in order for it to succeed.
Photo by Carlos Muza on Unsplash
Data Engineering in Office Space Analytics
The conference room efficiency idea was then expanded to the larger space. What if we could generate analytics for the entire office space and see how well (or not) it was being utilized? To do this, we had to carefully design where we placed sensors. Then we collected and stored data for several months. Sensors help capture data in a way that’s far more accurate (and cost effective) than humans with clipboards observing the space.
One key thing we did was separate the raw sensor data from the aggregated space data. So much data was being generated, but not all of it was necessarily meaningful. Cleaning up the data was crucial, as it allowed us to converge on an aggregated data model that supported a wide variety of queries. (Garbage data = garbage insights.) Thus, we could develop a wide variety of visualizations very quickly.
Because the data was “flexible” we could manipulate it in many ways to deliver insights. Our designers and facilities consultants used the data to make recommendations on reconfiguring spaces to optimize how employees actually use the space. For example: the data might show that phone booths were often occupied, particularly at certain times of the day, but that hot desks were not. So, from a facilities standpoint, removing some desks to create more room for phone banks would increase space efficiency.
Takeaways
IoT doesn’t mean that you can just slap sensors on something to make it smart and expect it to start generating data. Even with something as seemingly straightforward as room reservations, we found a level of complexity that isn’t in many traditional web- or app-based software projects. Not only do you have data-related software engineering, you have networking and physics. (When steel and Bluetooth collide!) You also need a good understanding of human behavior related to the objects in their sphere that are collecting data about them. And then you need to understand how to sort and clean that data for it to generate meaning.
You must deal with all of this just to let people know that a conference room is open or to tell them how they are using the spaces in their office.
No matter what the situation or industry, when we approach this kind of platform, we’ve learned that it’s important to understand the broad challenges, not just the software challenges. We may work in the digital realm — but whether it’s analyzing something as ordinary as office space or something as important as medical data that could potentially save lives — at the end of the day, our work is centered on making people’s lives a little better and a little easier. | https://medium.com/fm-stories/when-industrial-iot-comes-to-the-office-4ba746a2bcb | ['Favorite Medium'] | 2019-06-11 01:20:36.817000+00:00 | ['IoT', 'Data Engineering', 'Proptech', 'Sensors', 'Data Science'] |
5 Action Steps for the Department of Housing and Urban Development to Lead a National Mobilization to Defeat the Climate Crisis | The path to an all-out climate mobilization lies through the buildings sector–which accounts for one-third of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. The Department of Housing and Urban Development will be critical for decarbonizing the buildings sector. The agency should establish a Chief Climate Officer to effectively coordinate and implement these efforts.
HUD is also a powerful engine to address many of America’s most pressing problems at once. President-elect Biden ran on a bold plan to retrofit millions of homes and build millions of affordable, sustainable housing units in his first term. Scaling up that mobilization will pay massive dividends. HUD can stimulate and decarbonize our economy by putting millions of people to work solving the affordable housing crisis.
Every month, tens of millions Americans struggle to pay for housing and energy bills. This problem has only gotten worse during the COVID-19 pandemic. These impacts disproportionately impact African Americans, communities of color, and low-income families who are more likely to live in older, energy-inefficient homes. America’s carbon intensive landscape is intertwined with systems of racism and poverty. An all-of-government mobilization to defeat the climate crisis will require intentional approaches to address these issues. In Rep. Marcia Fudge, President-elect Biden has chosen the right woman to ensure that HUD becomes a climate agency.
Representative Fudge has a strong environmental and legislative record. Under her leadership, HUD will be well equipped to confront crucial issues at the intersection of racism, poverty, housing insecurity and the climate crisis. As Chair of the House Subcommittee on Nutrition, Oversight, and Department Operations, Rep. Fudge regularly advocated for justice in our food and agricultural systems. She also oversaw implementation of SNAP, which is one the government’s largest anti-poverty programs. And as a member of the House Subcommittee on Conservation, Energy and Forestry, she led efforts to protect water quality from agricultural runoff and improve soil health.
In order to realize Biden’s climate mandate, every federal agency must become a climate agency. The Department of Housing and Urban Development under Rep. Fudge will be critical in this effort. As President-elect Biden begins an all-out government mobilization to defeat the climate crisis, today, Evergreen Action is releasing 5 concrete actions for how the next Department of Housing and Urban Development must act:
1. Establish a Chief Climate Officer to the HUD Secretary to Coordinate Agency Wide Action
The Department of Housing and Urban Development directly manages over a million units of public housing, and the agency oversees powerful funding authorities, subsidies, and program supports that touch many millions more homes and apartments for low income and working families in every state in the union. To ensure that all of this deployed capital is enhancing the sustainability, resilience, and decarbonization of the built environment and transforming local housing markets for public and environmental health, the incoming HUD Secretary should immediately establish a senior advisor, or Chief Climate Officer, to coordinate sustainability, renewable energy deployment, green building, and energy efficiency efforts across the full breadth of HUD programs and agency mandates with a focus on public housing, subsidized multifamily housing, and community development initiatives. In addition, to ensure coordination within HUD, the Chief Climate Officer can serve as a direct liaison and technical expert on housing and urban development for all White House interagency efforts on climate change. Further, this office should direct a new network of dedicated environmental experts stationed as Special Advisors for Climate to staff every HUD regional field office in the country, with a focus on clean energy deployment, energy efficiency, climate resilience, and local job creation within HUD assisted communities nationwide.
2. Revitalize Public Housing through Renewable, Efficient and Zero Carbon Energy
Existing HUD public housing stock must be preserved and enhanced, cutting operating costs, upgrading construction and maintenance budgets, and improving public health during this time of global pandemic. The next administration should prioritize fully fulling the National Housing Trust Fund (HTF) as outlined in congressional proposals for a Green New Deal for Public Housing, as well as the Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) Fund, to support construction, preservation, and rehabilitation of affordable housing through grants to states and community based organizations, specifically dedicating support for local Public Housing Authorities to upgrade their properties to the highest standards of energy efficiency and climate resilience, with a focus on ensuring distributed renewable energy generation, zero-net energy construction, and green and healthy homes. To support clean energy upgrades to all existing and new public housing stock, HUD programs within the Office of Public and Indian Housing, the Office of Recapitalization’s Rental Assistance Demonstration Program, and the Choice Neighborhoods grant program in the Office of Capital Improvements, should be tasked with meeting aggressive clean energy and zero carbon emissions targets. In order to make rapid progress toward President-elect Biden’s goal of upgrading 2 million residential retrofits, 4 million commercial retrofits, and 1.5 million new affordable housing units within his first term, the Biden administration should direct HUD to prioritize funding projects that focus on energy efficiency, electrification, and other low-carbon upgrades to make public housing both more sustainable and more livable.
3. Accelerate Private Capital Investment in Green and Affordable Housing
In response to current economic and health crises, all tools of mixed use finance should be deployed to accelerate construction of affordable housing and to increase uptake of clean energy measures within existing building stock. The Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) should be expanded to establish new bonus incentives for affordability commitments that extend beyond the required 15-year LIHTC compliance period, for projects near employment and transit centers, and projects that adopt aggressive green building, zero-carbon, and climate resilience goals. Bonus incentives should also be established tied to communities of need identified through Equity Impact Mapping. Rehabilitation of existing building stock should be supported by expanding use of Medicaid funds for qualifying families, to create new streams of capital investment in green and affordable housing where positive health impacts can be quantified. Likewise, utility reimbursement formulas should be restructured to reward developers for energy efficiency investments and on site renewable energy generation, to overcome split incentives from federal recapture of locally achieved energy savings at the property level. This will rationalize incentives for building owners and property managers to invest in cost-saving building retrofits that improve living conditions, green energy use, the environmental impact of buildings, and permanently lower bills for residents.
4. Emphasize Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Funding for Climate Resilience
HUD administers the CDBG program, which directs billions of dollars in grants to state and local governments directly for economic and community development work targeted to low-to-moderate-income (LMI) urban communities. HUD should set standards that help prioritize CDBG funding for low-carbon development projects that benefit LMI communities. Congress previously authorized $5 Billion for CDBG-Coronavirus (CDBG-CV) funding to assist states and cities in responding to this public health crisis, and provided additional flexibility for state and local governments to repurpose existing 2019 and 2020 CDBG allocations. CDBG Disaster Recovery (CDBG-DR) funds are routinely deployed to address recovery in the wake of hurricanes or other natural disasters. Additionally, the CDBG-Mitigation (CDBG-MIT) funding pathway supports long-term disaster mitigation projects that rebuild infrastructure, reduce risk to local economies, and improve resilience to future disasters. The agency should further raise community awareness of CDBG Section 108 loan guarantees, which can support financing for on-site renewable energy projects, with a focus on targeting frontline communities identified by federal equity mapping efforts. Broadly, CDBG and the direct provision of HUD resources to local community clean, renewable, and zero-net energy or resilience projects can be a powerful engine of new investment, job creation, and economic renewal for long term sustainability.
5. Re-launch, Update and Expand the HUD Sustainable Communities Partnership Initiative
Under the Obama administration, HUD, in partnership with DOT and EPA, launched the Sustainable Communities Initiative, an interagency program to support locally driven, bottom up efforts to integrate affordable housing, transportation, and zoning decisions to achieve environmental sustainability in parallel with economic development goals. The Biden administration should direct the HUD Secretary to coordinate with EPA and DOT to restart and update the Sustainable Communities Initiative, a process that should include direct service provision in the field, as well as learning from the limitations of the past iteration of the program, in order to support investment in thriving, dense, and low-carbon urban communities. Further, a renewed Sustainable Communities initiative should include collaboration with the US Department of Agriculture to share best practices and develop joint programming that spans both urban and rural communities. | https://medium.com/@evergreenaction/five-to-mobilize-the-department-of-housing-and-urban-development-9c60f38f4145 | ['Evergreen Action'] | 2020-12-09 22:36:28.155000+00:00 | ['Hud', 'Climate Change', 'Biden', 'Housing', 'Biden Transition'] |
JavaScript Problems — Adding Minutes, Find Min and Max, and More | Photo by Rachel Hisko on Unsplash
Like any kind of apps, there are difficult issues to solve when we write JavaScript apps.
In this article, we’ll look at some solutions to common JavaScript problems.
Add Minutes to a JavaScript Date Object
There are a few ways to add a given number of minutes to a JavaScript.
For instance, we can add 50 minutes to a JavaScript Date object by writing:
const newDateObj = moment(oldDateObj).add(50, 'm').toDate();
We used moment.js to convert the oldDateObj date object into a moment object.
Then we add 50 minutes to it with the add method.
50 is the minutes, 'm' stands for minutes.
Then we convert it back to a Date instance with the toDate method.
To do the same thing with plain JavaScript, we can add the minutes by writing:
const newDateObj = new Date(oldDateObj.getTime() + 50 * 1000 * 60);
getTime converts the Date instance into a UNIX timestamp, which is the number of milliseconds since Jan 1, 1970 12 AM UTC.
Then we add 50 * 1000 * 60 , which is the number of milliseconds in 50 minutes.
We convert to seconds by multiplying by 60 and we convert to milliseconds by multiplying by 1000.
However, we have to be careful with daylight saving time.
The plain JavaScript way doesn’t take into account daylight saving time.
Get a Hash Value in a URL
We can set the window.location.hash to get the value after the hash sign.
Then we can use substring(1) to get the value without the hash.
Therefore, we can write:
window.location.hash.substring(1)
to get the value.
Remove All Classes using jQuery and JavaScript
We can call removeClass that’s included with jQuery to remove all classes.
For instance, we can write:
$("#item").removeClass();
to remove all the classes from the element with ID item .
Alternatively, we can use removeAttr :
$("#item").removeAttr('class');
We can use attr :
$("#item").attr('class', '');
to set the class value blank.
Likewise, we can write:
$('#item')[0].className = '';
If we want to use plain JavaScript, we can write:
document.getElementById('item').className = '';
We just set the className property to an empty string.
Format Number to always Show in 2 Decimal Places
We can round to 2 decimal places with:
Number(1.333).toFixed(2);
to get ‘1.33’ .
toFixed formats the number to a given number of decimal places.
It returns the string representation of it.
prototype and this
There is a difference between using the proottype for instance methods and attaching them to this inside the constructor function.
So, this:
const A = function () {
this.x = function () {
// ...
};
};
is different from:
const A = function () { };
A.prototype.x = function () {
// ...
};
The first way creates separate copies of instance methods within the constructor function whenever we instantiate an instance of it.
The instance methods added to the prototype is reused among all instances in memory.
However, they act the same in that they work on their own instances only.
Therefore, if we write instance methods, we should attach them to prototype since we only have one copy of it in memory, so less memory is used.
Find the Min and Max Values in a JavaScript Array
There are a few ways to find the min and max values in a JavaScript array.
For instance, we can write:
const min = Math.min.apply(null, arr),
const max = Math.max.apply(null, arr);
arr is the array.
apply calls the Math.min or Math.max with the entries in arr as the arguments.
Math.min returns the minimum value of an array and Math.max returns the max value.
They take a comma-separated list of arguments.
A more modern alternative is to use the spread operator.
For instance, we can write:
const min = Math.min(...arr),
const max = Math.max(...arr);
We spread the array entries into arguments with the spread operator.
It’s shorter and gets the same results.
Photo by Sean O. on Unsplash
Conclusion
We can find the max and min values from an array in various ways.
They all use the Math.min and Math.max methods.
Attaching to prototype is better for instance methods than attaching directly to this .
There are various ways to remove classes from a DOM element. | https://medium.com/dataseries/javascript-problems-adding-minutes-find-min-and-max-and-more-fbad38117e20 | ['John Au-Yeung'] | 2020-06-29 08:32:30.502000+00:00 | ['Programming', 'Web Development', 'JavaScript', 'Software Development', 'Technology'] |
The Weekly Authority #35 | Essential Holiday Marketing Tips: How to Maximize Your Marketing Efforts & Results over the Holidays
Happy Thanksgiving! The holiday season is officially here!
For many professionals and business owners, the holiday season can mean working late or odd hours to try to get everything done while buying presents, planning for and attending celebrations, etc.
To help you take care of all of your business’ marketing needs during the hectic holiday season, I’m sharing some useful tips that have worked for me in the past.
These insider tricks can help you keep track of everything, not miss a beat and do so with less stress — and more time to spend on other things (like enjoying the holiday season with your family). They can also help you see better results (and more new leads) from your holiday marketing campaigns!
8 Effective Ways to Manage Marketing Campaigns during the Busy Holiday Season
1. Plan ahead — The holidays are no time to just ‘wing it’ or take your marketing campaigns day to day. If you really want to maximize results and not waste your time (or other resources) — especially during a season when assets like time can be really limited, figure out your goals and objectives ahead of time. Then, establish a process for measuring the results so you know what is more (and less) effective.
2. Build (& test) your landing pages now — Taking the ‘plan ahead’ tip one step further, get your key landing pages in place ASAP. These pages can be key parts of your online sales funnel, and waiting until the last minute to put them together can increase the chances that mistakes will be made or that landing pages are just not as good as they could (or should) be.
3. Look for ideas everywhere — You don’t have to reinvent the wheel when it’s time to develop and rollout a holiday digital marketing campaign. Instead, save yourself some time by figuring out what has worked in the past and what may be working for your competition (or even businesses outside of your industry). Then, put your own spin on it and carefully monitor the results.
4. Automate what you can — Take advantage of scheduling (and other) tools to automatically take care of various aspects of your digital marketing campaigns for the holidays. For instance, you can use Hootsuite, Sprout Social, and/or Mass Planner to manage your holiday social media posts. For your email marketing needs, try using the scheduling options provided by Active Campaign or Mailchimp. With these (and other) tools, you can set up a series of social media posts, emails, blogs, etc. to be published and/or distributed days (or even weeks or months) ahead of time.
5. Know your deadlines — Whether you’re working with campaign deadlines, publishing deadlines or shipping deadlines, make sure you know exactly when they are. If you’re going to be juggling various deadlines, set up a tracking system for these deadlines, and consider creating “alerts” for yourself so that you whenever an important deadline is just around the corner.
6. Consider whether to expand and/or limit your efforts over the holidays — While many businesses heavily step up their digital marketing efforts over the holidays, few (if any) have unlimited resources. This means that it’s important to determine whether you should expand your digital marketing efforts over the holidays and, if so, which ones in particular you should focus on. In some cases, it may be necessary to scale back some efforts so you can focus on others. For instance, you may want to increase email marketing and social media marketing on Facebook and Pinterest over the holidays while scaling back your marketing efforts on Twitter and Instagram.
7. Pay attention to staff levels and capacity — Not only may your staff dwindle during the holidays as people take time off, but the staff who do remain may be overloaded with more clients and more work to shoulder. So pay attention to vacation requests, and have a strategy for offsetting surging workloads (like hiring temporary holiday staff or outsourcing certain efforts), bringing me to the final tip which is to….
8. Hire a pro to step in when necessary — Whether you’ll be off for an extended holiday, you want to have a marketing professional at the helm, or it’s simply time to entirely revamp your digital marketing strategies for the holidays, the guidance of a pro can be your key to success (and better results!). And that can mean more new leads and more new clients for your business.
Top Digital Marketing Mistakes that Even Big Companies Make during the Holidays
Poor preparation or no planning, which leads to poor campaign execution
Campaigns not going out on time
Campaigns not going to the proper audience
Not being ready for an influx of clients
Failing to have landing pages for corresponding ads
Sending people to cluttered, poorly drafted or off-putting landing pages.
Do you have any tips or tricks to share about keeping up with digital marketing over the holidays? What has been more (or less) successful for you?
Tell me more about your experiences — and digital marketing plans for the holiday season — on Facebook and LinkedIn. And:
Check out Digital Authority’s latest blog for more useful tips on digital marketing for your brand over the holidays.
Stay posted for the upcoming weekly when I’ll be making a big announcement about one of the latest (and free!) offerings from Digital Authority!
In the meantime, don’t hesitate to get a hold of me on social media to ask a question about any facet of digital marketing, including Digital Authority’s holiday specials, or just to say ‘hi.’ I look forward to hearing from you!
(note: In the spirit of full disclosure, some links are an affiliate links, which means that I may get a commission if you decide to purchase anything from X company. I only recommend products & systems that I use or have used and love myself, so I know you’ll be in good hands.)
(This article was originally published on DigitalAuthority.co) | https://medium.com/digitalauthority/the-weekly-authority-35-f7015802ef90 | ['Digital Authority Co'] | 2016-12-27 18:31:13.764000+00:00 | ['Marketing', 'Tips', 'Holidays', 'Social Media', 'Digital Marketing'] |
Advanced Spring: File Upload | Uploading and downloading files are common tasks for any web application. Spring offers support for these kinds of actions by providing MultipartFile interface. Let's go over building a simple application which will enable the user to upload/download a file.
The application will be built with Spring boot and will leverage the following libraries:
lombok
H2 in-memory database
Swagger
File entity
The file will be stored in database (you can also choose to store file on disk as well). As we wish to send some additional information (who triggered upload, additional description, etc.) when uploading the file, we need to have these as properties in the table. The File table would look like this:
@Entity
@Table(name = "file")
public class File {
@Id
@GeneratedValue(generator = "uuid")
@GenericGenerator(name = "uuid", strategy = "uuid2")
@Column(name = "id")
private String id;
@NotBlank
@Column(name = "username", nullable = false)
private String username;
@Column(name = "description")
private String description;
@NotBlank
@Column(name = "name", nullable = false)
private String name;
@NotBlank
@Column(name = "type", nullable = false)
private String type;
@JsonIgnore
@Column(name = "data", nullable = false)
@Lob
private byte[] data;
@Convert(converter = Jsr310JpaConverters.LocalDateTimeConverter.class)
@Column(name = "created_at")
private LocalDateTime createdAt = LocalDateTime.now();
}
We don't want to send content to the user when the user is requesting to see additional information related to this file, and that is why we annotated data property with @JsonIgnore .
File service
File service will expose following operations:
create — this operation will create a row in the table with file name provided either in dto or (if the name is blank) by using file name of the uploaded file
— this operation will create a row in the table with file name provided either in dto or (if the name is blank) by using file name of the uploaded file findById — this operation will find file by requested id
— this operation will find file by requested id delete — this operation will delete file by id
File resource (API endpoints)
Now as we have set the ground, we can deal with exposing endpoints for managing file upload/download. The application will provide the following operations:
POST /api/files — will accept file and model which will be used to store additional information related to the file uploaded
— will accept file and model which will be used to store additional information related to the file uploaded GET /api/files/{id} — will provide additional info related to the file
— will provide additional info related to the file GET /api/files/{id}/download — will download the actual file
— will download the actual file DELETE /api/files/{id} — will delete the file and additional information
To store uploaded file we can use MultipartFile variable. The MultipartFile interface provides access to details about the uploaded file, including file name, file type, etc. We can retrieve this variable from the request parameter inside our controller’s method. Alongside the file we will send the model itself which will contain additional information:
@PostMapping(consumes = MediaType.MULTIPART_FORM_DATA_VALUE)
@ApiOperation(value = "Saves File instance.", tags = {"File"})
@ApiResponses({
@ApiResponse(code = 201, message = "A File was successfully created.")
})
public ResponseEntity create(@RequestPart(name = "model") @Valid final FileCreationDto model, @RequestPart(name = "file") MultipartFile file) {
try {
model.setData(file.getBytes());
} catch (IOException e) {
return ResponseEntity.badRequest().build();
}
final File fileCreated = fileService.create(model, file.getOriginalFilename());
return ResponseEntity.status(HttpStatus.CREATED).body(fileCreated);
}
Tuning File Upload Limits
When configuring file uploads, it is often useful to set limits on the size of files. With Spring Boot, we can tune its auto-configured MultipartConfigElement with some property settings. Let's set the following properties:
spring.servlet.multipart.max-file-size=2MB
spring.servlet.multipart.max-request-size=2MB
The multipart settings are constrained as follows:
spring.http.multipart.max-file-size is set to 2MB, meaning total file size cannot exceed 2MB.
is set to 2MB, meaning total file size cannot exceed 2MB. spring.http.multipart.max-request-size is set to 2MB, meaning total request size for a multipart/form-data cannot exceed 2MB.
Testing
As we want to be confident that our app is working properly we need to write unit test to check upload functionality. First thing we need to do is to setup a file and we will use MockMultipartFile for it. The next thing is to setup a model which will be passed alongside. Once we have this set in place we can write the logic which will check if uploading is working correctly:
@Test
public void create_withName_OK() throws Exception {
final FileCreationDto dto = FileCreationDto.builder()
.name("test.png")
.username("[email protected]")
.build();
final MockMultipartFile model = getFileModel(dto);
final MockMultipartFile file = createDummyFile();
final MvcResult result = mvc.perform(
MockMvcRequestBuilders.multipart("/api/files")
.file(model)
.file(file))
.andDo(print())
.andExpect(status().isCreated())
.andReturn();
final File parsed = jsonMapper.readValue(result.getResponse().getContentAsByteArray(), new TypeReference<>() {
});
Assertions.assertNotNull(parsed);
Assertions.assertNull(parsed.getData());
Assertions.assertEquals("test", parsed.getName());
Assertions.assertEquals("png", parsed.getType());
Assertions.assertNotNull(parsed.getId());
final Optional<File> fileOpt = fileRepository.findById(parsed.getId());
Assertions.assertTrue(fileOpt.isPresent());
Assertions.assertNotNull(fileOpt.get().getData());
}
And that's it, we now have the test in place, but how to test with the application running? We can use Postman like following:
Testing file upload with postman
Pay attention that model's content type is set to application/json . Without it you won't be able to upload this file.
TL;DR
Jump straight to the source code. | https://medium.com/swlh/advanced-spring-file-upload-6595d3c2b8f9 | ['Milan Brankovic'] | 2020-11-23 15:09:59.933000+00:00 | ['Education', 'Spring', 'Software Development', 'Spring Boot'] |
POETRY & POEMS NEWSLETTER | ✒✒POETRY & POEMS🖋🖋
UNDERSTAND IF YOU CAN
Hi! I am Bismala Zahid. I have been writing Poetry for the last 5 years. Just a few days, I have made my first publication. It’s name is Poetry & Poems. In it, you can not only read my own poetry, but you can also post your poetry there. And you can tell me my mistakes there too, in the comment box
I have created a Poetry publication, in which not only Poetry, but also Poems and Quotes will be added to your reading. Poetry became my own, neither a copy nor anyone else’s. I invite every branch to read your poetry, who has interest in Poetry.
Hidden under the shadows,
Soothed by the palms of the devil
Burnt by light
Lost my insight
When I was hurt in a fight
With whom should I side ?
The devil that protects me ,
Or the angel that hurts me .
.
Whom should I side with …..
Whom should I side with …….
A few more of this same style are also present in that publication. Some of those who have read your heart repeatedly and some who have become dear to you.
I welcome you all in my publication. Come and join me and move on to the world of Poetry. With the help of beautiful world Poetry.
XO,
~BISMALA ZAHID | https://medium.com/poetry-poems/poetry-poems-newsletter-87420dcb80a8 | [] | 2020-12-13 19:04:45.360000+00:00 | ['Emotional Intelligence', 'Poetry Newsletter', 'Poetry Writing', 'Emotional Poetry', 'Newsletter'] |
How to Cook Like a Chef | Purchase good quality knives and keep them sharp.
Believe it or not, you’re more likely to hurt yourself with a blunt knife than with a sharp knife. A dull blade requires more pressure to cut, increasing the chance that the knife will slip, whereas a sharp knife ‘bites’ the surface more readily. And if you do cut yourself, a sharper blade leaves a cleaner cut, which heals a lot quicker.
Looking after your knives is the hallmark of a good chef, and keeping them sharp is just one part of it. First of all, of course, you need to part your hard-earned cash with some. You don’t need a lot of knives. A good cooks knife, a paring knife (vegetable knife) and a bread knife are all you need. If you like to get your fish whole, for instance, then a filleting knife will more than likely come in handy. Head to your local catering wholesaler and try a few out. Hold them in your hand, feel the weight of them, and see which one you find most comfortable for you. Be prepared; you’re going to pay a lot. Good knives are expensive, but look after it, keep them sharp, and they will last forever. You’ll need a sharpening steel to keep a sharp edge. And a wet stone, in case you need to get the edge back. Never put them in the dishwasher. Wash with warm soapy water and dry immediately. The old adage is true, look after your knives, and they will look after you. My knives of choice are Global Knives.
Salt, salt + more salt
One reason home cooking doesn’t tend to taste like restaurant cooking is our liberal use of salt. Salt makes everything better. Of course, using too much salt in your cooking can be awful, but used correctly, it will enhance your cooking tenfold.
When cooking with salt, it’s important to layer the seasoning. Let’s take a stew for example if you don’t season during the cooking and then only season at the end the resulting flavour will be acceptable but not exceptional. The salt won’t have had the time to do it’s work, to develop into more complex flavours, and the resulting flavour may end up being too salty. Seasoning at the end of the cooking process should just be tweaking the flavour only, checking that it is perfect. Instead, layering the seasoning by adding a little salt at every stage is the way forward. Season the meat before sealing, season the vegetables when sweating them off. The result will be a well balanced, perfectly seasoned stew.
Don’t forget to season your desserts with a little salt too. Yes really. A pinch of salt in your ice cream, brownie or pannacotta mix, will bring out the sweetness of the dish. Add a pinch of salt to your next sweat creation, and you’ll see what I mean.
Use more butter
Butter is, without doubt, is one of the most used products in any kitchen, we use tonnes of the stuff. Chances are you’re not using enough. I know what you are saying — the health implications, but it’s not like you eat at restaurants every day, and this article is, ‘How to Cook Like a Chef’ and chefs cook with lots of butter. If you are sautéing a steak, for instance, add a large spoonful of butter to the pan and using your spoon continuously baste the butter over the steak. We call this napé. Made a delicious sauce using bones? Stir in a knob of butter (monté au buerre) which makes the sauce luxurious and delicious.
Mise en place — everything in its place
Mise en place is what cooks live or die by. It’s all of the ingredients that we need to cook with and dress our dishes during service. Without our mise en place, we are nothing. A whole service can hinge on whether your MEP is ready because the last thing you want to be doing during a busy service is finely dicing some banana shallots. We write lists to stay organised as we usually have multiple jobs to do in a short space of time. If you are cooking for a group of people, you should work this way too. Write a list of everything you need to do, have everything prepped and weighed out so when you come to cook, it will be a whole lot easier. Prep certain things ahead of time like we do in professional kitchens. As I am sure, you are aware most of the meal that you eat in a restaurant is pre-cooked, like purées, sauces and vegetables, so when we receive your order, we only need to reheat and finish things off. If we didn’t, it would take hours to get you your meal. Of course, we cook all meat and fish to order. If you follow this advice, you’ll get to spend more time with your guests and make cooking for friends a lot less stressful.
Never waste anything
Good chefs hate waste. In a well-run kitchen, anything in the bin should be wholly unusable. Keep fish heads, and bones for a fish stock, any carcass for that matter. If you don’t want the chicken skin on the breast, cook it between two trays in the oven for the most delicious chicken crackling. If you are cooking with small fish, like a sprat, save the bones, dredge them in flour, and deep fry them for a delicious snack — trust me, I was dubious at first, but they are sensational. In a nutshell, waste nothing. We owe it to the farmer, or producer to do our very best with their product — all of it.
I recommend reading ‘Nose to tail eating’ by Fergus Henderson.
Balancing flavour
When you taste something memorable, it’s because the flavours are balanced. Too much acidity and the dish will be too sour. Too much salt and it will be too salty and so on. It’s about making sure all of your flavours are harmonious with each other. Fatty pork belly, which is sweet and rich, needs something tart to contrast like tart granny smith apples. Bitter chocolate with a pinch of salt is a match made in heaven. A sour rhubarb crumble paired with sweet custard, or ice cream is divine.
The five basic tastes are sweet, sour, bitter, salty and umami. If everything is balanced, it makes for a great all-round flavour and delicious dish. If one of them is overpowering, the dish won’t work.
Acidity is key
Out of all of the five basic tastes, it is salt and acidity that have the most impact on your cooking. Utilising acidity is your food will enhance your dishes. A drop of vinegar in your gravy will improve the flavour dramatically. If you are crisping up some pork belly in a pan, add a drizzle of balsamic at the last minute to glaze, and it takes the pork to a whole new level.
A simple squeeze of lemon juice or a drop of vinegar can enhance the flavour of most things. As a chef, you are trying to get the most flavour out of your ingredients, and acidity can help massively.
Taste, taste, taste — everything
Chefs taste everything all of the time. It’s so important to make sure it’s seasoned correctly. At every stage of the cooking process, you should be tasting and tweaking the balance of the dish.
Clean as you go.
A kitchen should be clean, spotless in fact: dirty kitchen = dirty food. At a Michelin starred restaurant I worked at I was on the fryer section. We used to pané (breadcrumb) croquettes, sheep’s tongue etc. to order. After one busy lunch service, my bench was messy, as was my apron, covered in the detritus of breadcrumbs, egg and flour. The sous chef grabbed me by the apron yanked me towards him, called me a dirty fuck, and said if I want to work like a pig, I could piss off down the road and work in the pub. He was entirely right, of course. If your section is dirty, you cook dirty, meaning you can quickly lose the clarity of the cooking process.
Utilise the cheaper cuts
As chefs, we are always looking to make our GP (gross profit) meaning we work out how much each dish costs us to create and work out what price we need to charge for the plate of food. Where I work, we work towards a 65% GP. With cheaper cuts, which often have more flavour are a great way to go as you get so much more for your money. Parts of the animal that have to work harder during their lifetime, like legs and shoulders are more flavourful due to the presence of fat. However, these cuts are generally chewier and take longer to cook, due to the collagen which takes a while to break down during the cooking process.
It’s also the mark of a good chef that can turn an unloved, and cheap piece of meat into something exceptional — anyone can cook a fillet steak and make it taste nice.
Go for beef shin, oxtail, pigs cheeks and lamb breast. All of these cuts taste wonderful after long and slow braising. Chefs will always favour a rump steak over a fillet, and so should you!
Less is more
Less is more is the best single lesson I have learnt. Young chefs seem to feel the need to over-complicate their food when it is so unnecessary. It takes a very skilled hand to make multiple flavours and elements work on the same plate. Instead, stick to three of four and concentrate on making them the very best they can be. A dish with fewer, perfectly executed ingredients has better clarity and is much more enjoyable. You also want to be able to taste everything that is on the plate. With too many elements, things can get lost in the chaos. If you only remember one thing from this article, then remember this one — Less is most definitely more. | https://davidjharford.medium.com/how-to-cook-like-a-chef-2f8ee1580c27 | ['David Harford'] | 2020-11-12 15:46:22.334000+00:00 | ['Cooking Tips', 'Chefs', 'Tips', 'How To', 'Cooking'] |
A 2 Year Cry | Dear past me of 2 years ago, you are somewhere in interior BC right now, perhaps passing through Kamloops and thinking again of how ugly it is: the feeling of clogged grey-brown.
Soon you will be nearing Vancouver, with your ridiculously large zebra suitcase name Bridget, and your backpack and bags. You will stagger onto the sky-train to get to the ferry. You will ignore discomfort.
But right now, you are passing through thick smoke and feeling strained and uncomfortable. Like a turd pulsing to get out of the silver anus of a car. Your fawning response is waning and your wolf is showing to your ride-share. Not a snarling wolf, but a lone one, quiet and and longing for aspens in moonlight.
In a few hours, when you arrive in Vancouver, you will either feign or feel wonder, I cannot remember which, at all the crows vacating the city. Swarms of black peeling back to roost for the night. Your ride-share will tell you, that it happens every-night, but you will just see it the one time.
In a few more hours, you will miss the last ferry to Victoria and you will call your friend to tell them. You will have exactly $500 and no job lined up, no home. Your friend, will tell you to catch the last last ferry which goes to Nanaimo. Your friend will drive 2 hours North of Victoria in his green taxi to pick you up.
You will feel scared and beholden. You will feel burdened and tired. You will want to draw back from him and cellophane yourself off. Eventually you will tell him all of this. And he will tell you “ I want to help you. I am choosing to help you. I don’t expect anything in return.”
It will be very hard to believe him, but he is your ride and your anchor on this barely known island and so you will do your best to.
You will sleep on his futon that converts into a double bed while he trawls Victoria for fares. You will hear seagulls and foghorns and in the mornings the clopping hooves of carriage rides.
He will feed you for a week, before you launch into a whirlwind life of nomadicism. Later on passing back through Victoria you will ingest chocolate magic mushrooms he gives you and you will sit on the toilet, very concerned about your pooping. He will come through again and again. He will rescue and drive you and feed you and money you. He will praise you in honey.
And when he says “You feel like family.” You will feel angry because you don’t sense a hook in that, and for most of your life you have been wanting to hook someone, because then they might stay.
He will take you to the Fishook restaurant and you will eat Tacos. You will break up with each other twice, not in the standard way of breaking up, since you were never lovers exactly. But in a way that is exacto knife painful. You will sob and sob and sob.
This will be one of your first break-up of 10 or 12 in the next 2 years. I have stopped counting. And slowly which each unpeeling of the sticking paint of your heart, with each topple of the tower guarding it you will realize that family is what you long for. That family is what you need. And that hooks are for devouring things and things devoured don’t stay.
But before that you will be running. You will be running for exactly 5 months. You will stay in a mansion and look after an old dog with freckles on it’s toes. You will chase chickens back into a coop. You will scream in a trailer after the owner has left for the night. You will scream loud enough that the dreadlocked sheep and ancient apple trees hear you.
You will feel so scared.
It will be terrifying.
I am so sorry.
You will scream in the mansion. You will sob in a cob hut. You will put your face down in a tub every-time you can just to make wounded sound. You will try to ignore the wreckage of your nervous system, just to survive.
Dogs will hear you panic, smell it, and come to lean on your legs. Your friend will come through on the phone for you. Your mom too. And all the time you will be screaming and running and trying to deny electric feelings of enduring fear.
You will be very brave, and mostly alone. You will say “No” to staying with men named after landscapes who yell on their phones while you are in the car with them.They will say “ I didn’t want to take care of you anyways.”And you will know you made the right choice.
More and more you will get good at distinguishing between red flags and trauma. Red flags indeed red, a searing line right down the middle of you. Trauma more muddied and varied in it’s jetsam.
Eventually your luck with work exchanges and housesittings gigs, will choke and stop and all the gas that was keeping you going will fume out. Your friend will drive you to a women’s shelter. You will feel very scared and very small. But you will be determined and enduring.
You will have called ahead about a bed. You will not know that it is a bunk bed. You will not know that it will be bed number 13. You will not know the smell of your room until you enter it. The smell coming from a woman who shuffles and mumbles but never talks to you.
You will not know that you will befriend your other roomate who chats with you in accent and smiles at you. Who hugs you and who has been seperated from her family, her children, because the cops were told she was screaming that she would kill her husband.
You will not be scared of her. But you will be scared of the woman who barks at you “What are you looking at white girl?” Or the very forceful 50 year old who wants to convert everyone to her complaining and wears ball caps and has hands as rough as fence posts.
But right now in this time Over a year and a half ago in January, you are straining to get up the nerve to leave your friend’s car. This will be the final time you will be in it. You do not know that yet.
In a few days time you will break up with your friend for the first time. You will ask him for more commitment to communication and it will end. It will end in tears and holding back in a coffee shop two blocks from the shelter.
In the months later, you will get flashes and twinges as you walk past that place. Soon you will settle into a home with two roomies. And the city will become populated with memories.
But only slowly. So slowly. After all the runnings. After the carrot picking and the screaming. It will be hard to go out. Your room will feel like the only moderately safe place.
There will be a Bridge. The reason you quit running. The reason you put up with a shelter where they put out cans of salmon for you, the stray cat. The reason will be a program for humans like you. People who have suffered abuse. There will be two mornings a week, that shine and give you purpose for 6 months.
There will be meltdowns at the bus stop when the bus is late. There will be that jangly jittery I’m going to explode, I can’t take it feeling, often, often,when you go out and about. When you deliver flyers. You will pee your pants. You will feel ashamed.
You will feel deranged and desperately lonely. But the weight of your loneliness and separation won’t be realized until it starts to lift. The paint continuing to strip, the tower groaning in it’s tedious crumble.
And some days you will wake up and life will feel okay. There will be yellow in the grey and you will see green metallic the logo of your pencil clearly. You will cry in people’s arms and they will pull you close. Someone will say “Wow. Just wow!” In response to you, like you are a miracle and they are in awe.
You will start to discover peace in a city that once felt like a thousand needled eyes. You will sit on hot steps in the sun and feel relaxed. It will not be all the time. It will not be always. But you will start to relax.
A part of this will be the water, you move to. A part of it will be the second island human you move in with. The shared foods and the tough conversations. The big hairy hands holding yours and you breath shreds thorough you with panic.
It will not be perfect. We will relapse. We will lose many people. And with each shake and quake of grief we will garner a little more of ourself. More and more and feel into the truth that we have no edges and make friends with spiders. Slide our feet over the duvet just to play.
We will die. We will cry.We will remember our real name and claim it. We will wake up again and again.
So Tonight on the eve of our anniversary, I will light a candle for for us. To call us home, through the fog and the gloom of a milk clot of a life, to the breathness and the bloom of a new tune. | https://medium.com/@kaicricketmoon/a-2-year-cry-b188d42d0ec | ['Kai Cricket Moon'] | 2019-09-01 01:15:55.541000+00:00 | ['Trauma', 'Healing', 'Prose', 'Memoir', 'PTSD'] |
Demo version will be published 28/03 at 11:00 UTC | Huge news! Demo version of our Cryptoscanner and Cryptonews will be published tomorrow at 11:00 UTC.
Visit: https://algory.io
Join our Telegram Group: Algory Project | https://medium.com/algory-project/demo-version-will-be-published-28-03-at-11-00-utc-b92c9e8a3b58 | ['Tomasz Przybycien'] | 2018-03-27 21:09:45.806000+00:00 | ['Cryptocurrency', 'Blockchain', 'Cryptocurrency Investment', 'Crypto Trading', 'Trading'] |
Manifestation Meditation: Seven Steps To Manifestation | Here’s the loosely held bit of information to manifestation: your prosperity relies upon where you place your consideration. In regular daily existence, our consideration is dissipated. It’s on our bills, on whether we can get the children to class on schedule, on whether we will get an advancement, and many different things, all simultaneously. This is the Beta brain express: the ordinary psyche state, ideal for performing multiple tasks.
Check Out : Manifestation Course
Be that as it may, — Beta is lousy for manifestation, on the grounds that your consideration is excessively dispersed. On the off chance that you’ve been attempting to utilize a strategy like attestations to manifest, it’s difficult to get your assertions to make your fantasies in a Beta brain state. Your certifications have zero force.
You can make whatever you choose to manifest. Essentially, you can make something from nothing. You’re as of now manifesting the life and conditions which presently encompass you. You can change these conditions and manifest something other than what’s expected. Everything necessary is a mystery fixing.
The mystery fixing to manifestation is contemplation. At the point when you think, you will find that it’s anything but difficult to manifest precisely what you need, on the grounds that your consideration is single-pointed: it’s engaged like a laser bar. At the point when your consideration is engaged, what your consideration is centered around manifests, and frequently more rapidly than you might suspect conceivable.
Check Out : Manifestation Course
In only ten minutes per day, or two times every day in case you’re sharp, you can transform you. You can manifest whatever you really want. This seems like a silly case, yet it’s very simple to test it for yourself. All things considered, everybody can save ten minutes per day.
Manifest what you genuinely want
Maybe you’ve just attempted certifications to manifest another vehicle, or work, or a superior relationship. At that point, when nothing transformed, you halted, persuaded that confirmations were futile. Attestations accomplish work. Anyway they work when you’re in a tolerating, thoughtful state when you rehash your confirmations, on the grounds that in this state you’re considerably more impressive — your consideration is engaged.
At the point when you start the manifestation procedure with contemplation, you’re working with yourself, as opposed to against yourself. Experienced meditators state that they know when what they want is en route to them: there’s a “tick”, a sentiment of association. At the point when this association happens they realize that nothing can keep their craving from manifesting. This association consistently occurs in a thoughtful state.
Ten minutes per day for seven days
This Manifestation Meditation takes only ten minutes every day for seven days.
Check Out : Manifestation Course
To upgrade the procedure, you can make reflection simple, by utilizing a Brain Sync program to help. Simply tune in to your picked program, and you will normally get to a thoughtful state. You’ll discover a few proposals toward the finish of this article.
In only ten minutes per day, not exclusively will you find what you genuinely what, yet in addition make the association that tells you that what you need is en route to you.
Here we go: seven days to manifesting your fantasies.
Stage One: Emptiness and empathetic quietness
In this manifestation procedure, you start with unwinding, quiet, and with complete acknowledgment. In this quietness throughout the following days, you will find that your actual wants will come to you. So for the present contemplation, simply unwind, center around your breathing, and let go.
Ideally, you’ll be tuning in to a Brain Sync program as you think, since you can accomplish Alpha and Theta mind states all the more without any problem. Put on your earphones, and sit or rests in an agreeable situation with your spine straight, and unwind.
When you’ve totally loose, and your brain is quiet, infer a being, or a power, that you partner with empathy. This might be an otherworldly figure, or a spot in nature, or the earth, or the stars. Bring this being, or this spot to mind, and permit yourself to feel the empathy, and the graciousness, that is stretched out to you.
Appreciate the caring nearness for a couple of moments.
Stage Two: Intuition and thoughts
Today, unwind and turn out to be totally agreeable once more, and let your psyche clear. In case you’re utilizing a Brain Sync program, put your earphones on, and permit the program to convey you into Alpha and Theta.
Bit by bit, quietness will enclose you. At that point, request your humane being to stretch out benevolence to you again — or permit yourself to feel this thoughtfulness from nature.
Presently infer what you need to manifest. You may comprehend what this is, however don’t be astonished on the off chance that you imagine something totally extraordinary that you wish to manifest.
Inhale profoundly. Unwind. On the off chance that you feel that you’re getting awkward, simply center around your breathing or a period, and tune in to the music in your program. Some of the time you have such a great amount of connection to your wants that it feels awkward.
Watch for synchronicity in your every day life
We’re all instinctive, yet here and there w stifle our instinct. Your every day reflections will prompt you experiencing synchronicities in your day by day life. Simply observe these occasions when they happen. They’re an indication that you’ve made an association, that your contemplation is working.
Stage Three: Expression
In the present contemplation, get to the quietness, and the empathetic state once more. Permit yourself to totally unwind, and feel cheerful and quiet. You may end up grinning during your contemplation.
Check Out : Manifestation Course
In the event that you’ve chosen what you need to manifest, state it so anyone might hear, in case only you’re, or quietly in case you’re not: “I need to manifest another vehicle”; “I need to manifest a new position, with a pay 25 percent more than I’m gaining”; or “I need another relationship — I need to discover my perfect partner.”
Stage Four: Emotion
In the present reflection, get to the quietness and the humane states once more. Express your manifestation-want just as you as of now have what you need. Recently, you made the association, and what you want is as of now yours — it’s totally yours, so state it that way: “I presently have my superb new vehicle”; “I love my new position, with my upgraded compensation”; “I and my perfect partner have discovered one another, and life is great.”
Permit yourself to feel cheerful and thankful that you have what you need. Express appreciation that what you’ve requested has just been given to you.
At the point when your reflection is finished, you may feel a drive to accomplish something — make a call, or address somebody. This drive shows up without feeling. This is your instinct at work. It has been activated by your reflections, and will assist you with manifesting.
Stage Five: Will
Today, you will actuate your will in your contemplation. Your will isn’t what’s regularly thought of as self discipline, that white-knuckle sink or swim feeling. Your will is choice and acknowledgment. It’s not as much a feeling as an inclination — a sense — of certainty.
Access the quiet and the empathetic states again as you’ve done previously. What’s more, once more, express your manifestation-want just as you as of now have it. State: “I currently have my superb new vehicle”; “I love my new position, with my improved pay”; “I and my perfect partner have discovered one another, and life is awesome.”
Presently get to your will, which is focused in your hara.
In combative techniques the wellspring of your will and force is your hara, a point inside your body, around two creeps beneath your navel. It’s otherwise called the dan tien. It’s a significant focal point of chi, of life power vitality in your body. Envision this point in your body as a little zone of red gleaming light, similar to a candle fire, or a shining brilliant ball.
Notice the substantial impressions that you have in your hara. Try not to attempt to transform them in any capacity, simply notice any snugness, or other sensation. At that point permit the limitations you have there to discharge, and permit the vitality of your hara focus to stream up your spine and out of the highest point of your head.
Stage Six: Imagination
Start the present contemplation, as you generally do. Access the quiet and the humane states once more. At that point, express your manifestation-want just as you as of now have what you need. Feel hapy and thankful for your new life — for the manifestation which is now yours.
Let your consideration move to your hara. Envision the light in your hara, and feel the sensations. Let the vitality of your hara stream up your spine, and out the highest point of your head.
As you discharge this vitality, envision your manifestation — picture it in any capacity you can, regardless of whether it’s by visual pictures, by sounds, by emotions. Envision your new life, with your manifestation as a major aspect of it. Envision occasions, total with sight and sound. What does your family think about your manifestation?
Stage Seven: Manifestation
Today, your manifestation procedure is finished. Regardless of whether you understand it deliberately or not, your manifestation is on its way.
In the present contemplation, follow a similar procedure you’ve followed over the previous days. Here it is in a nutshell, with the goal that you can retain it:
1. Quietness and sympathetic acknowledgment;
2. Express: talk your manifestation so anyone might hear, or quietly, and feel the feeling of its satisfaction;
3. Sense the vitality of your will in your hara, and permit it to go up and out of your body;
4. Envision your existence with the manifestation complete.
Utilizing your Manifestation Meditation
You can keep on utilizing this procedure. Your life has just started to change. Continue developing, and manifesting, by utilizing this straightforward contemplation. After some time, you can get to this “manifestation mind state” inside 60 seconds or less in your day by day life. For instance, in case you’re going to give an introduction, utilize the contemplation to both loosen up yourself, and manifest a superb result.
Mind Sync projects to go with your Manifestation Meditation:
Check Out : Manifestation Course | https://medium.com/@manifestgoal/manifestation-meditation-seven-steps-to-manifestation-b4108854f870 | ['Manifestation Goal'] | 2020-04-23 09:27:17.806000+00:00 | ['Low Of Attraction', 'Manifest', 'Manifestation', 'Meditation'] |
DROWNING IN THE “MAINSTREAM” — HEARING VOICES OF HOPE IN THE WILDERNESS | By Niánn Emerson Chase
I live in the “borderlands” of southern Arizona, nineteen miles north of Ambos Nogales, which is, in a manner of speaking, one town split in two: being located in two different countries (the U.S. and Mexico) and having an imposing, ugly wall of steel and swirls of cold, cruel concertina wire, meant to cause serious harm to any human who has contact with it. Needless to say, “the wall” is an eyesore as well as a heartsore for many.
Both sides of Nogales are economically depressed, and so any enterprise that can bring financial rewards is usually welcomed. Because of the current political climate, not much comes to the town(s) of Ambos Nogales, not tourists or new businesses or conventions or movie-makers, though at one time the town(s) bustled with all of these.
I think the last time Hollywood, with all of its glitter and glamour, came to Nogales was in 2012 to shoot some scenes for The Hangover III, which was released in 2013. I recall the excitement of many of the local residents to catch sight of one of the well-known actors who were on site, and even hordes of people from the city of Tucson drove seventy miles to see the movie stars. I don’t recall the hordes coming out to catch sight of the highly respected scholar Noam Chomsky when he recently moved to Tucson; most residents don’t even know who he is, let alone that he resides part of the time in their city. I am saddened by that, for Noam Chomsky offers an expansive perspective of the world’s current social, political, and ecological situation, using worldwide historical events that have led to where we, as humankind, are today.[1]
Among the U.S. population, there are still many more people who know of Hollywood actors (and all kinds of personal details about them) than even an awareness of, let alone interest in, the existence of individuals like Noam Chomsky, who are also on television, radio, and other media formats, though they are less mainstream, are often non-profit or “public,” and are definitely alternative. Like Hollywood stars, people like Mr. Chomsky have a following (though much smaller) who pay attention to the expansive and forward-looking ideas presented in his many talks and writings. The difference between him and most Hollywood stars is that Noam Chomsky is not “mainstream” in his viewpoints of the world’s situation and the route to a saner, more sustainable future for all of humankind.
The entertainment industry and sports venues — with all of the advertising that encourages unsustainable consumption — perpetuate the status-quo consciousness of materialism and selfish pursuit of instant gratification, with very little consideration for future generations and their lot on this problem-plagued earth. There are still too few entertainment films that encourage deeper, more compassionate, out-of-the-box thinking, which might lead to more creative and intelligent solutions to the political, societal, and environmental problems that threaten to end all of life on this planet.
I find it fitting that a film like The Hangover III — which promotes childish and irresponsible pleasure-pursuing that results in poor health, exploitation of others, and a continuation of the “ugly American” syndrome — was set in an area whose peoples have, for centuries, suffered the impact of European and American colonialism and, today, neocolonialism.
“If we could sniff or swallow something that would, for five or six hours each day, abolish our solitude as individuals, atone us with our fellows in a glowing exaltation of affection and make life in all its aspects seem not only worth living, but divinely beautiful and significant, and if this heavenly, world-transfiguring drug were of such a kind that we could wake up next morning with a clear head and an undamaged constitution–then, it seems to me, all our problems (and not merely the one small problem of discovering a novel pleasure) would be wholly solved and earth would become paradise.” - Aldous Huxley from his essay, “Wanted, a New Pleasure”
Every year in the United States, the controversial Columbus Day is officially celebrated as a holiday in October. Indigenous and other people in the borderlands area of Ambos Nogales do not celebrate Columbus Day in the way that many Americans do, for they recognize the fact that Columbus did not “discover” a new world that already had 100 million indigenous people inhabiting the places that he (and others) claimed for Spain (and other European nations). The late Lakota activist leader Russell Means stated that from an indigenous vantage point, Columbus’ arrival was a disaster from the beginning. Although Columbus’ own diaries indicated that he was greeted by the Taino Indians with the most generous hospitality he had ever known, he immediately began the enslavement and slaughter of the Indian peoples of the Caribbean islands. And it didn’t stop in the Caribbean but continued on into other lands. As eminent Columbus biographer Samuel Eliot Morison admits in his book, Admiral of the Ocean Sea, Columbus was personally responsible for enslavement and murder of indigenous peoples.[2] Indigenous peoples are still suffering the ramifications of colonialism that Spain and other European nations brought to the Americas, which include Latin American countries, the United States, and Canada.
In his letter to the King and Queen of Spain in 1503, Christopher Columbus stated: Gold is most excellent; gold constitutes treasure; and he who has it does all he wants in the world, and can even lift souls up to Paradise. That statement pretty much sums up what the underlying principle of colonialism is — a conquering of peoples, culture, and land with motives of greed and power, sinfully using religion as one of its tools to accomplish this.
Russell Means concurred with other non-mainstream historians that Columbus was personally responsible for the design and operation of the encomienda system that tied Indians as slaves to the lands stolen from them by the European invaders.[3] Today the “encomienda system” — in the forms of industrialization, globalization, democratization, capitalism, and so on — is implemented by the 1% (oligarchs) and their cooperating governments, enforcing military, and accommodating cultures-of-consumption that are comprised of masses of citizens drugged by materialism and selfish pursuits.
The Dictionary of Cultural Literacy defines colonialism as “the control of one nation by ‘transplanted’ people of another nation — often a geographically distant nation that has a different culture and dominant racial or ethnic group.” There are classic examples of European nations colonizing countries not only in the Caribbean islands and Americas but also in the Pacific islands, Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Asia, and India. Though there often are benefits for the people and land that have been colonized, the long-lasting, harmful effects far outweigh any good when the motive of the controlling force behind the colonization is arrogance, greed, and lust for power. Noam Chomsky, Russell Means, and other contemporary, non-mainstream scholars, philosophers, historians, economists, scientists, and theologians have documented through their writings, films, and other media the destructive impact of colonialism for generations to come.
flickr.com/photos/herby_fr/
Interestingly, the United States of America evolved out of a rebellion against English colonialism of the new world. Unfortunately, the U.S. is one of the main proponents of neocolonialism, which is “control that is economic and cultural, rather than political”[4] — though, more often than not, there is behind-the-scenes control in the political realms of a country being “neocolonized” today. From the viewpoints of those being “colonized,” “globalized,” “democratized,” or “capitalized,” they are suffering a form of conquering, and this empire-building in their lands and nations is thievery — thievery of their land, their culture, their identities, their resources, their children, and their future.
My ancestor, Ralph Waldo Emerson, realized that “an empire is an immense egotism” and was one of those voices of another century who spoke out against empire-building that was motivated by greed, selfishness, and arrogance. Frederick Douglass, who at 20 years of age escaped his own enslavement and ended up a free man in New York, became a strong, brilliant voice against the type of colonialism and capitalism that resulted in slavery with religion supporting that abomination. Soon after his emancipation from slavery, in an impassioned narrative about his own experiences as a slave, Douglass stated: The slave auctioneer’s bell and the church-going bell chime in with each other, and the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are drowned in the religious shouts of his pious master. . . between the Christianity of this land, and the Christianity of Christ, I recognize the widest possible difference — so wide, that to receive the one as good, pure, and holy, is of necessity to reject the other as bad, corrupt, and wicked.[5]
Unfortunately, not enough has changed since Frederick Douglass’ days, though the language and forms of slavery have changed. Much of mainstream religion is not truly “Jesusonian”, and is still supportive of the status-quo way of thinking and doing, which is based on empire building of nations at the expense of most people’s health, happiness, and at times their lives, as well as the health and life of the planet’s eco-systems. Thank God for the many religionists who practice the true principles of Jesus, which basically is the brother-/sisterhood of all humanity as one planetary family under one Creator God.
Outspoken, Irish-born playwright, critic, and social reformer George Bernard Shaw once stated: In the arts of life man invents nothing, but in the arts of death he outdoes Nature herself, and produces by chemistry and machinery all the slaughter of plague, pestilence, and famine.” Today humankind has inherited the ramifications of many centuries of empire-building and colonialism that developed “the arts of death” in the never-satisfying hunger for “gold” and power. Today, that hunger continues to determine the ways of most corporations and governments, and, unfortunately, the masses have embraced those ways of thinking and doing.
Much-respected and beloved General Dwight D. Eisenhower, who helped lead the way to victory for the U.S. and its allies in World War II, made the following statement on April 16, 1953: Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, from those who are cold and are not clothed. The world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. Though this five-star general — who was a hero in a war that involved many nations of Western civilization as well as those of the Orient, with battles occurring on and over the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans — was admired enough to be elected as President of the United States, his new-found consciousness of the horrors of war and the need to make radical changes in how people perceive progress and civilization-building did not inspire and influence enough people to change the status quo in world views, progress, and problem-solving.
Today, the threat of a third “world war” is ever-present, with countries lining up with their allies for the final showdown. The intimidating military presence — peaceful or otherwise — of many of the countries with histories of imperialism (of which colonialism is a form) in smaller and less powerful countries is a fact.[6] The backlash of these smaller countries fearing occupation has led to increasing acts of terrorism and civil war on their part, which gives reason for the more powerful countries to increase their military presence for “security.”
So, as was in Christopher Columbus’ time, governments, businesses, and religions continue to make unholy alliances to promote empire-building, which has culminated in what we are experiencing today worldwide — extreme weather events and other environmental disasters, economic collapse, social upheaval, and the threat of more than just one pandemic. And, in spite of decades (even centuries) of warning of these dire ramifications from prophets, visionaries, and other non-mainstream “voices crying out in the wilderness” — such as scientists, theologians, psychologists, philosophers, economists, sociologists, educators, physicians, and so on — the madness continues.
Sadly, the ideal of democracy has been tainted by selfish materialism, lust for power, and a distortion of spiritual truths. The universal laws of God (the First Source and Center, the Creator-Parent) have been twisted to support ungodly values or ignored completely. Noam Chomsky aptly declared: In this possibly terminal phase of human existence, democracy and freedom are more than just ideals to be valued — they may be essential for survival. For so many of our planetary brothers and sisters “democracy” is “demo-crazy”, a demonstration of madness.[7]
“A chain is no stronger than its weakest link, and life is after all a chain.”
- William James
Photo by Global Change Media
In this issue of the Alternative Voice, writers point out certain aspects of global changes in the social, economic, and environmental arenas, as a result of empire-building that is not within divine pattern, but a hopeful vision of a coming Divine New Order is also presented. All of us writers live and work at Avalon Organic Gardens & EcoVillage, which is the campus of The University of Ascension Science and The Physics of Rebellion, and adhere to divine administration principles that resonate with the pattern of the First Source and Center of All, the Gift of Life, the Divine Controller, the Infinite Upholder, the Universal Center, the Universal Father, or the Great Spirit, the Creator, God, Yahweh, Allah, or whatever other name has been given to the divine Personality who does indeed exist.[8] Those divine administration principles are based on the foundation of love — a love far beyond what we humans can comprehend fully, though we can begin to recognize, experience, and express a pattern of that divine love and principles here on earth.
Throughout the history (and “herstory”) of humankind, there have been individuals and small groups of people who have had an inkling of the pattern of divine love that dictated how they perceived reality — their world view — and how they lived within their cultures, which were more sustainable for all in their community as well as for their neighbors and the earth’s natural world around them. Not all cultures throughout history have been sustainable (including some of the “indigenous” tribes), but there have always been some, and there are those today, outside of the status quo, who live within some of those principles. And, of course, there are those individuals who struggle to live by their level of understanding of divine universal laws within mainstream society, but it is lonelier and more difficult when not united in living and working with others of similar persuasion.
In his book, The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight, Thom Hartmann emphasizes the need for global radical change, global transformation for the leaders and the masses.[9] When our thinking changes to be more in alignment with the patterns of the Universal Father/Mother, then we transform ourselves, our technologies, our science, our politics, our economics, our medicine, our education, and our cultures. We begin to progress into the first stages of light and life that offer the opportunity for all people (100% rather than 1%) to experience true freedom, healing, health, and happiness if they choose to go that higher path.
As I strive to do daily, I encourage us all to spend more time expanding our minds and viewpoints, reading and researching in exposing ourselves to more “alternative” media as well as beginning to delve into the literature and history of the world’s many diverse and beautiful cultures, for as we begin to truly understand our planetary brothers and sisters and discover our commonalities as well as our plights and frailties, we can genuinely unite as the human race and become inspired to tackle the world’s impending problems as one global family under the one God. I wish you many blessings as you embark of this adventure of discovery, seeking unity without uniformity. | https://medium.com/@alten/drowning-in-the-mainstream-hearing-voices-of-hope-in-the-wilderness-51df36af17b2 | ['Alternative Voice'] | 2021-12-29 22:24:14.373000+00:00 | ['Global Change', 'Mexico', 'Indegenous', 'World War II'] |
Men, Stop Telling Me to Smile | Men, Stop Telling Me to Smile
Photo by Etty Fidele on Unsplash
If anyone has written and published content over a significant period, they’re bound to get criticized. I’m no exception. Granted, it hasn’t happened often on this platform, but I’ve had my share of haters. As a Black queer woman, I’ve had to learn to grow a thick skin fairly early in life to deflect the constant assaults on my humanity, or else I wouldn’t survive. My writing is no different.
To elaborate, one hater recently posted a comment that made me snort. It wasn’t even a response to a story that I’d written but a response to a comment I made on another writer’s story relating some of my experiences navigating a world not designed for me. The last two sentences of the hater’s statement are as follows:
“Smile more. Free yourself from your self-induced bondage.”
For one thing, I’ll gladly free myself from my “self-induced” bondage, as this person called it, once I’m able to walk outside without fear of being leered at by lustful men. Or without fearing getting shot by a sadistic cop. Or once I get equity at any of the myriad things that white folx and men take for granted.
Secondly, the sentence, “Smile more,” likely gave away the hater’s gender because the only people that have ever told me to smile have been male.
Women smiling assures men that we’re agreeable and docile. Women frowning, looking disinterested or disappointed, frightens or displeases them. We’re then dismissed as overly hormonal beings who can’t get a handle on our feelings. Or we’re demonized as bitchy or manly for showing anger or for daring to express a strong opinion.
The expectation that women smile on command as though we are show animals performing a trick to please our trainers is sexist. Nobody orders men to do such a thing, do they?
The result is that men ordering us to smile reinforces the narrative that women only exist for the male gaze and pleasure. Society conditions men to assert control over women’s bodies. They are taught that their wants outweigh women’s autonomy, hence why men have no qualms advising even strange women to smile.
It should come as no surprise that I’ve had men known to me as well as strangers, tell me to smile throughout my entire life. I may have dealt with it more than other women because I’m regarded as bossy or unapproachable by society as a Black woman.
In particular, white men telling me to smile is not only sexist but racist as well. For decades, white people directing Black people to smile are attempting to gaslight themselves into thinking that white oppression isn’t hurtful, damaging, or dangerous. One needs only to view the immense racist iconography depicting smiling Black people, many of whom are depicted in the act of servitude. As long as whites saw us smile while shining their shoes or scrubbing their floors, they could pretend that we were happy and content to stay in our place.
For me, operating under the white and the male gaze means that I’m supposed to smile even when my cheeks ache. So my level of exhaustion is constant that no amount of rest ever dissipates.
Until the person (likely a man) wrote that comment telling me to smile recently, I couldn’t tell you the last time I was ordered to do so. Certainly not since March, when the pandemic upended our lives. I don’t step outside my house without a mask these days. Having half of my face obscured while in public has been a godsend because, for the time being, I’m not forced to appear happy to make some people comfortable around me.
I’m sure some people reading this will think that I’m blowing this out of proportion and that men mean no harm when they tell me to smile. But trust me, the intent isn’t harmless. Men commanding me to smile is intrusive and an attempt to rob me of my agency. Given everything that I’m dealing with just this year alone, with COVID surging out of control in my country along with racial unrest, I have justifiable reasons NOT to smile. Yet, men are so fragile that I’m directed to assuage their egos by appearing pleasant.
So, men, I’m not smiling for you. I’m not a show pony who does tricks on command. If you wouldn’t do something a total stranger ordered you to do, don’t do it to me.
©Vena Moore 2020 | https://medium.com/fearless-she-wrote/men-stop-telling-me-to-smile-9d650e47cd68 | ['Vena Moore'] | 2020-12-18 15:17:19.096000+00:00 | ['Feminism', 'Equality', 'Gender Roles', 'Sexism', 'Society'] |
I sat down with a millionaire who operates 10 businesses while sailing around the world with his family | This man, who shall remain nameless, keeps a very low profile. I happen to run into him and strike up a conversation, which led to another conversation over lunch.
We sat down at an organic food market for lunch and he began to tell me his story.
ISO 9000 is an international standard for quality management systems
He was a writer and senior lead auditor of the ISO 9000.
The ISO 9000 is a globally-adopted, quality business management standard used by huge brands with support businesses located internationally. The reason why it exists is so stakeholders can believe with confidence that a manufacturing plant located in another country will produce exactly what the contract says, without having to travel to that plant to conduct a huge inspection. If the plant is ISO 9000- or ISO 9001-certified, then they know it will perform to standard.
The ISO 9000 is based on 7 quality management principles. Adherers include companies in the automotive, chemical, and aerospace manufacturing industries such as GM, Chrysler, Boeing, General Electric, Northrop Grumman, Alibaba, and Eastman Chemical Company.
This man told me that he applied the quality management principles he helped establish in the ISO 9000 to the ten separate businesses he operates today. His businesses include a skateboard and BMX shop, a network of pawnshops, a consulting practice, a musical instruments shop, an Internet sales business, a real estate development and management firm, a firearms shop, a marine products online store, a standup paddleboards shop, and a visual displays store.
You would think these ten companies would dominate his time. Not so. He spends his time sailing around the world with his wife and family in one of his sailboats, the “Zephyr” or the “Whispering Eye.”
Here’s what he told me about life and business. Visualize everything below in quotes.
Multiple Revenue Streams
If you were to look at just one of the ten businesses I have, it would not be that impressive. It would provide for a simple, decent living for a small family, not much more than that. It’s an unglamorous yet stable, small and focused, profitable operation.
By itself, it’s basic and ordinary. You young, startup-crazy whippersnappers want something so high-profile and instantly viral. My businesses aren’t viral, but they help a specific type of person by providing a quality solution, over and over again.
Multiply a small, quaint, and profitable business by ten and you’ve got a diversified, multi-million dollar portfolio.
Do Not Partner
If you can help it, do not partner with anyone. The more partners you have, the more you have to split the pie. The more partners you have, the more you have to fight for your point of view. The more partners you have, the more time it will take to execute anything. Co-founding is overrated.
Learn the skills yourself, bootstrap, and then hire the right people (see below).
Study the Market
We are in a small market. We are not in San Francisco, Paris, or New York. I’ve seen that smaller markets are two to three years behind the larger markets; whatever is selling in the big cities, will not be selling in ours at the same time. But give it two to three years and it will be selling like hotcakes.
Find out what this is, and be the first to open a shop in your small market.
Be Very, Very Careful With Who You Hire
My employees are transferable between business lines. Each employee is multi-skilled. The girl behind the counter is doing social media marketing online in between customers checking out.
Each business has a manager with a bank card. Each manager is trained in the same principles of the ISO 9000 and is given full control of their business. Through a tight incentive plan, I make sure that if the business does well, they do well. If they want to order the hottest, new products to sell in their shop, they have to sell enough to fill up the bank account, to purchase the inventory.
I look for people who are independent and responsible, who take complete ownership of their business. This allows me to travel the way I do, because I know my employees are working hard for themselves.
Oh, and we have parties OFTEN. We casually share ideas about what marketing tactics are working in one business that may work in another, we have performance awards, and we do fun things together.
How to Do Well in Business
Here is the mission statement for all of my companies, it’s very simple:
To provide our customers with value-added services and quality products.
To be successful in business does not mean changing the world. It means meeting a need (regardless of size) well and dependably over time.
Sell something. If it’s a product, make sure its quality, then sell it at a fair price, and make sure the breakeven point is doable for you as the business owner. If it’s a service, make sure there is added value, as in you are very good and knowledgeable in your field, and the service provided is unique, at least in your market. | https://entrepreneurshandbook.co/i-sat-down-with-a-millionaire-who-operates-10-businesses-while-sailing-around-the-world-with-his-338929c4e8c9 | ['Dave Schools'] | 2019-07-04 14:51:40.745000+00:00 | ['Entrepreneurship', 'Startup', 'Business'] |
‘LIFE IS SO TIGHT’ | Sitting on a pavement in Raleigh Street, Yeoville’s main street, with late-afternoon foot traffic bustling past him, Gift Mupambiki seems unperturbed by the noise around him as he jams on his keyboard.
Despite the incessant hooting of cars and taxis and the commotion of daily life and passers-by, Mupambiki’s repetitive electronic melody is clear. Nearby, a group of men come out of a tavern to watch him play. Most people just pass by, but the occasional child accompanying a parent, unable to contain their curiosity, tries to stop, briefly, to listen.
Mupambiki has been coming to this spot near the library almost every day for years. Blind in both eyes, face mask pulled up to almost cover his eyes, he plays his upbeat keyboard melodies and hopes for some money to be dropped into the tin cup in front of him. His jamming, combined with begging, is how he has been earning a living on the streets of Johannesburg for more than a decade.
Originally from Masvingo in Zimbabwe, Mupambiki encountered many other blind Zimbabweans in Johannesburg after a friend from back home encouraged him to come to South Africa. “I’m trying to raise money to go back to school and finish my studies. I was busy doing an honours in special needs education, but I ran out of money,” he said during a break from his playing.
From his regular spot on the pavement in Yeoville, it’s only about 2km away to the dark and dilapidated building in the Johannesburg inner city where he lives with dozens of other blind Zimbabwean migrants. | https://medium.com/the-endless-journey/life-is-so-tight-blind-zimbabwean-migrants-navigate-inner-city-joburg-30a214a3eb09 | ['The Endless Journey'] | 2020-11-27 10:27:26.820000+00:00 | ['Documentary', 'Africa', 'Migrants', 'Photojournalism', 'Disability'] |
Spending money to make money: A guide to ROI | I remember having a conversation with my husband about taking on a $10 gig on Upwork, a freelancer marketplace, shortly after quitting my job to become a full-time freelancer.
I worried I was selling myself short, despite the fact that the job was small and could be completed in well under an hour.
Not to mention the fact that the $10 would actually turn into $8 after Upwork’s 20% commission.
My husband, in his infinite wisdom, simply said, “Consider it a marketing expense. If that $10 job lands you a review that helps you land more work or better jobs in the future, it’s worth its weight in gold.”
He was right. Fast forward three years later, and I’ve made more than $400,000 on Upwork alone. I currently land jobs at $120 per hour on the platform.
I can’t help but wonder how my career would have turned out had I let my ego get the best of me and turned down that small opportunity. That $10 job did more than just help me land future work. It also taught me about the importance of ROI.
What’s ROI?
Return on investment (ROI) is a performance metric used to gauge the profitability of an investment relative to its cost.
While ROI traditionally refers to money and profit margins, it can also refer to gains in other areas, like opportunity or growth.
To use my earlier example, the cost of taking that job was 30 minutes plus a $2 fee. The return on that investment was an $8 profit and my first 5-star Upwork review, which made it substantially easier for me to land my next project.
By comparison, the other things I was trying at the time to find freelance work simply weren’t producing a meaningful ROI.
That same year, I attended the National Conference on Health Communication, Marketing and Media on the advice of one of my clients. Between tickets, gas and the hotel, I ended up spending about $1500 and about a week of my time. Despite my best networking efforts, at the end of the week I landed no new contracts and no promising leads. That’s an example of a poor ROI.
Do you have to spend money to make money as a freelancer?
Which brings us to a very important question: As a freelancer, do you have to spend money to make money?
And the answer to that question is the same answer I would offer to any small business owner: Probably.
But you’ll need to do so strategically.
If you’re treating your freelance career like a small business, and I hope you are, you already know there are going to be some costs involved.
For instance, you will likely need the basics: An internet connection, a computer, a desk and a chair. There are costs associated with each of these items. No one ever said freelancing would be free.
Then you have marketing expenses such as a website, ads, networking events and social media.
The cost of these items may vary greatly depending on your particular needs and the efficiency of your strategies.
For instance, you can build your own portfolio website using a free website builder like Wix and use the long, free URL (for example, username.wixsite.com/siteaddress). It’s still going to require a considerable amount of time and effort, but it will help keep your monetary costs low.
Others may opt for a more professional, ad-free look and short domain names, all of which will take more time and more money.
But which route should you take as a freelancer? Once again, the answer is the one that provides the better ROI.
If you’re able to win better projects because of a professional looking website, then spending a little more time and money is likely a better overall investment.
On the flip side, if having a great website doesn’t affect your earnings or ability to win jobs, it’s probably not worth the investment.
There’s also the matter of whether or not you have money or time to spend in the first place.
Not everyone has a lot of funds starting out. And that’s okay too. Just know that everything is about scale. Do what you can in the beginning.
We all had to start somewhere. My freelance business today barely resembles my freshly launched business in early 2017.
With each small gain, put a little bit back into the business. It becomes easier to invest in yourself and scale your business as you grow.
So how much time and money should you spend?
As a fan of Shark Tank, I always have the voice of “Mr. Wonderful” Kevin O’Leary in the back of my head.
“Here’s how I think of my money — as soldiers,” O’Leary often says on the show. “I send them out to war every day. I want them to take prisoners and come home so there’s more of them.”
There is no magic formula or single right answer for everyone in every business. However, it’s important to constantly experiment with growth strategies.
Like O’Leary’s soldiers, you may suffer a few casualties along the way because it’s unlikely that you’ll get it right the first time, every time.
But inevitably your soldiers will begin to multiply. That’s when you know you’re onto something worth chasing.
By using this ROI mindset in my own business, I’ve been able to transform my annual revenue from $40,000 in that first year to almost $300,000 per year and growing.
I’ve accomplished this through blogging, hiring help, creating multiple revenue streams and never shying away from things just because they seem hard or require spending a little money.
Ignoring the naysayers
Finally, the biggest thing to keep in mind when it comes to running and scaling your business is the importance of ignoring the naysayers, whose primary objections often seem to revolve around money.
Most commonly, at least for me, the objections are usually about either Upwork fees or health insurance.
There’s even an entire blog post about me from three years ago on Hacker Noon that talks about how I had to pay “at least $10K in Upwork fees” and how he feels “sorry” for my clients.
While I do pay roughly 7% commission to Upwork for jobs I obtain through the platform (a drop from 20% due to my high volume of work), I also get the benefit of using them as the middleman for contracts, invoicing and client acquisition.
In fact I roughly estimate that I’ve paid about $40,000 to Upwork in total at the time of this writing.
But if I told you that you could give me $40,000 in exchange for $400,000 — wouldn’t you take it?
That’s a 90% profit margin. What do you think Mr. Wonderful would have to say about that return on investment?
The same thing goes for my health insurance.
I do have to pay for private health insurance, and yes, it is more expensive than traditional corporate policies.
But why would I want to go back to making $75,000 per year as a salaried employee just to save a couple hundred dollars a month on insurance premiums?
Never worry about saving a penny if it prevents you from making a dollar.
At the end of the day, adopting an ROI mindset might just be the best thing you could do for yourself and your business.
Tennessee native Morgan Overholt is a freelance graphic designer, owner of Morgan Media LLC and co-founder of TheSmokies.com. Morgan and her team have worked with nationally recognized clientele from all over the world, including the Centers for Disease Control Foundation (CDCF), Kimberly-Clark, and Stanley Black & Decker.
Morgan transitioned into the role of freelancer and small business owner after spending nearly a decade in the traditional corporate world left her feeling unsatisfied and unfulfilled. Today, Morgan is passionate about sharing her story with other hopeful entrepreneurs who hope to follow in her footsteps. She has been featured on Upwork.com, Refinery29, and Business Insider.Originally published at https://www.collective.com on March 12, 2021. | https://medium.com/collective/spending-money-to-make-money-a-guide-to-roi-db9ba3444fbf | ['Morgan Overholt'] | 2021-04-15 17:12:02.936000+00:00 | ['Roi', 'Freelancer'] |
On Guillotines, Monarchy, and the American Right | There’s been a lot of talk about guillotines over the past couple of years. They’ve been a symbol of protest against the ever-expanding wealth of tech billionaires, but also more chillingly been invoked (and almost literally constructed!) by those supporting Donald Trump and the Republicans during the insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021. The invocation of the French Revolution by both sides here seems clear, both claiming to wear the mantle of those who threw off their monarchy at the end of the eighteenth century.
Those claims by the Right, however, seem at first glance to not make sense. They state that they represent the will of the people and want to terrorize those they consider “tyrants.” And yet, they themselves have tried to overturn a legitimate election and more recently enacted sweeping voter suppression laws across several states in order to cement their own hold on power. In addition, the Right and their enablers rush to stake out absolutist positions related to “religious liberty” or “freedom of speech” but then cheer on (or directly use) state power to limit just those liberties and freedoms they purport to support. For example, they assert “liberty” to discriminate against the LGBTQ+ community, and assert “freedom” to legislate against mask-wearing during a global pandemic or to ban the teaching of history they don’t agree with.
Those who are understandably concerned about these moves tend to point to the inconsistency of the Right’s position, to their apparent “hypocrisy,” and thereby attempt to shame them into honoring their absolutist positions. But this is a fool’s errand. The problem isn’t the Right’s hypocrisy, but rather their consistency — theirs is a different form of political speech, one rooted cloaked in democratic forms but is at its core authoritarian. The Right uses a political discourse that self-justifies its positions and renders their opponents’ arguments illegitimate.
And the French Revolution can help us understand why that is.
The course of the French Revolution during the late eighteenth century seems, in some ways, a paradox. The monarchy was thrown off, at first gradually and then suddenly. A largely bloodless transition of power came to be awash with blood during The Terror. A radical democratic experiment within a few years transitioned into a new form of dictatorship with Napoleon.
It’s understandable then that historians have been attempting to explain what happened and why almost since the events themselves occurred. This is, after all, the very bones of history itself — not a simple recounting of events one after another but a series of analyses, a conversation among people to help make meaning from sources that often don’t want to tell us what we want to know.
One such analysis, first published in 1978, but this year celebrating the fortieth anniversary of its translation into English in 1981, is François Furet’s collection of essays Interpreting the French Revolution. This was a foundational text in what’s come to be known as the “linguistic turn” in history. Very simply, the linguistic turn is the move by historians to acknowledge that language (written and spoken) constructs and shapes the lived experiences of people in the past. In one of Interpreting’s essays, “The French Revolution is Over,” Furet applied this approach to his analysis of the Terror — the period of the revolution from roughly 1792–94 in which, under the leadership of Robespierre, massacres occurred and most executions were carried out. So, we return to the guillotines.
Furet argued that, in overthrowing the monarchy, the First French Republic ended up adopting a mode of discourse that was taken from the overthrown monarchy. In large part, this made sense because it was readily available to the republicans, having been the dominant language of politics for a century and more. But that language didn’t translate well to a different form of government.
Eighteenth-century French monarchs were thought to have been avatars for the nation. So, that meant that what was good for the king was good for the nation — there was no conceptual daylight separating what the king said and enforced and the will of the nation as a whole. In other words, it’s the apocryphal (and likely false) saying of King Louis XIV — “L’Etat c’est moi” — come to life. The king was the state and the state was the king. This political structure of course benefitted the monarchy greatly, as it allowed them to justify their hold on power. Dissent was not just disloyal to the crown but was treasonous to the state as well.
This stance cannots stand in a democratic form of government. Democracies need argument, debate, discussion — to allow multiple voices to be heard. But the First French Republic was never fully able to cast off that monarchical discourse. And so as the revolution progressed, particularly as the new republic was threatened by other nations who were shaken by what they saw happening in France and war erupted, the Estates General began to assume to themselves the political discourse of monarchy.
Over the course of 1792–94, the avatars of the “will of the people” continued to narrow. It was no longer the legislature as a whole, composed of hundreds of delegates that embodied the “will of the people,” but it specifically became the Committee of Public Safety led by Robespierre. He vocalized the public will and embodied the public good so that those who disagreed became existential enemies of France herself who needed to be eliminated. Hence, we wind up with the Terror — denunciations and mass executions of perceived enemies both at home and abroad. The Terror, Furet argued, was only ended when Robespierre lost control of the discourse and no longer embodied the public will, so he himself became a threat and was executed. | https://medium.com/@prof-gabriele/on-guillotines-and-the-american-right-de0343b72341 | ['Matt Gabriele'] | 2021-06-14 17:20:45.037000+00:00 | ['History', 'French Revolution', 'Republicans', 'Fascism', 'January 6 2021'] |
Cutting down over 95% of your BigQuery costs using File Loads | TL;dr : Use file loads with a relatively low frequency instead of Streaming Inserts with Cloud Dataflow
This story is a prequel to the one I wrote here (Yeah, I’m a star wars fan and sequels come before prequels 🤷♂️)
If you read the blogpost above, you know that we’re trying to build a real-time data aggregation pipeline and to do so, we’re using the following products within the GCP family :
App Engine : To receive incoming requests from our user’s webpage and app. PubSub : A scalable and reliant messaging queue that accepts the messages coming to App Engine. Dataflow : A data processing pipeline which reads messages coming from Pub Sub and transforms them according to our needs. BigQuery : A data warehouse where all the data ingested by Dataflow is saved to.
The challenge here is obviously to keep the throughput and reliability of the system as high as possible while keeping the latency and the costs to a minimum.
As the current state of things, we handle over 300M events per day and these events are stored into BigQuery as soon as they arrive via Google Cloud Dataflow to ensure that the events are made available to our customers as soon as they are emitted (with < 4 sec latency guaranteed).
Interestingly enough, some of our clients didn’t exactly want their data in near-real time manner; for them the data being available a little bit later (say a few mins) was as good, provided they could pay a lesser fee for it.
Now streaming inserts, while crucial to the real-timeliness provided by us; has a cost associated with it and providing a delayed data would mean that we could potentially save some of the costs by batching the inserts into BigQuery!
We went back to take a look at the pricing plans provided by BigQuery and to our surprise, loading data to BigQuery from an external source was free!
What this meant was, if we could store the incoming events to a Google Cloud Storage Bucket and then ask BigQuery to load those saved events, it’s free!
The only price we had to incur was storing and downloading events to and from Google Cloud Storag bucket; which is again free if you are ingressing and egressing data to and from the same region (which we were!).
Having figured out what to do, the only thing left was modifying our dataflow pipeline to Save and Load data into BigQuery instead of Streaming it which it was doing right now.
Thanks to the simple APIs provided by Apache Beam, this turned out to be a less than 5 mins of task.
Less than 3 lines of code, and you’re done!
Now you might be wondering as to why didn’t we decrease the frequency to even a lesser number (say 3 seconds) mimic the real-time nature of Streaming Inserts.
Surely that would have been a good choice, but there are some limitations which prevent us from doing this.
BigQuery API Limits
As of writing this article, the number of Load Jobs that you can perform on BigQuery is limited to 1000 per day which roughly once per 90 seconds.
Note that this is a hard limit and it can’t be increased Increased RAM requirement by Dataflow
Dataflow keeps all the incoming messages in its memory and once the triggering frequency is reached, it uploads them to Google Cloud Storage, hence the new pipeline that we deployed ended up needing 2 cores of CPU alongwith 13.5GB RAM as compared to our old setup which was 1 core CPU and 3.75GB RAM.
While this isn’t something stopping us from implementing near realtime load jobs, it’s something that adds up to your billing costs.
We ended up setting the triggering frequency to 90 seconds, which was enough to keep our clients (who were ok with a delayed latency) happy and helped us reduce unnecessary pricing that we incurred.
Here’s a quick screenshot showcasing the costs that before and after we implemented File Loads.
August 23rd afternoon was when we implemented File Loads
But it wasn’t all bells and whistels; as you can read in this blog, we ran into yet another issue (which we managed to fix after a weeks of searching around and research).
If you are working at a high growth company and want your data made available to you as soon as it’s created; take a look at https://roobits.com/ and we might be what you are looking for!
Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed this story, please click the 👏 button and share to help others find it! Feel free to leave a comment 💬 below.
Have feedback? Let’s connect on Twitter. | https://medium.com/google-developer-experts/trimming-down-over-95-of-your-bigquery-costs-using-file-loads-d08dd3d8b2fd | ['Harshit Dwivedi'] | 2020-02-23 19:41:50.438000+00:00 | ['Cloud', 'Big Data', 'Google Cloud Platform', 'Bigquery', 'Analytics'] |
If Religion Fuels All Conflict, What Fuels Religion? | If Religion Fuels All Conflict, What Fuels Religion?
Religion was a testament to our intelligence, but now it’s a testament to our foolish inertia.
I’ll caveat the perhaps inflammatory and controversial statement in the title of this story: organised religion, fundamentalism, and militantism are to blame, not faith itself. Unfortunately, it’s rare for religious people to be able to avoid the influence of organised religion, and while many people would say of fundamentalists that “they’re not real Christians/Muslims/Hindus”, they do make up a worryingly significant proportion of those who report to believe.
If you need convincing, though, of the idea that religion causes all — or at least most — conflict, then I can only point to the fundamental tribalism which religion creates. It is a self-evident truth that having several different religions, mostly segregated from each other, leads to violence and war. Counter-examples are available, but oft subtly contaminated by the stain of religion.
And before someone screams that I’m an intolerant atheist who doesn’t understand religion, I’m counting atheism as a religion of sorts — an often tribal ideology.
Onto the key question: what fuels religion?
Today, religion is kept healthily on life support — it is still dominant in the world, but a little shifting of fault lines could change all that. Religion is no longer really fuelled by intense debate, scrutiny, prophecy, and originalism. It is kept alive purely by incubation: tight-knit religious communities, within religious sovereign states and regions, perpetuate religion with little challenge or consciousness.
Few ideas get in, and few ideas get out. Few people care to the extent people used to; religion is carried from generation to generation as a sort of tradition with little known purpose. In these communities, you are a Hindu because your parents are, and your parents are because their parents were.
Of course, that’s not to say that theological debates are now non-existent, or that many people don’t dedicate themselves to religion. Rather, the trend is that debate is more and more infrequent, and that conscious dedication is disappearing. | https://medium.com/discourse/if-religion-fuels-all-conflict-what-fuels-religion-e7c8abfb044d | ['Dave Olsen'] | 2019-09-15 10:21:01.061000+00:00 | ['World', 'Language', 'Religion', 'History', 'Intelligence'] |
Our First Two Winters | Our eight by thirty-eight Nashua trailer
had a heater fed by gas bought in
pressure tanks that tended to run dry
on the coldest night of the Kansas year.
Our 1960 Olds Batmobile had bad shocks
and a battery we had to bring
inside on winter nights, setting it
beside the heater to be warmer than us.
Christmas decorations were six tiny, gold,
plastic angels purchased at the drug store,
strung on thread, and hung on the wall, so festive.
We were so poor. We were so happy.
____________
Copyright ©2018, Paul H. Harder II
This poem is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 4.0 License. | https://medium.com/@paulharder2/our-first-two-winters-c48001ddd8d9 | ['Paul H. Harder Ii'] | 2021-02-07 16:06:09.397000+00:00 | ['Happiness', 'Poetry', 'Poverty', 'Christmas'] |
You don’t need a desktop PC anymore | You all should remember the time where having a PC was becoming mandatory. Emails, documents, and even printing something, it was normal for every household to have a PC plugged to the wall. Hardware forums proliferated as the knowledge of building desktop PCs was becoming a requisite, and if you couldn’t afford one, Internet Café (and their variations) would welcome you with open arms and a few pennies.
As of today, these venues are no more. The old Desktop PC, that one big box that sits in your room or office, barely justifies its existence now. It’s not that it has been forgotten, but rather, replaced by other machines, namely smartphones, tablets and laptops.
If you plan to buy a PC to only play games, get a console or get a doctor.
Today, the same questions I asked to my friends to build a PC, that where looking forward to, have now lost meaning.
It’s not about what desktop PC they want to build, but rather, if they even need one at all.
1. Do you require a desktop PC?
Desktop PCs are synonymous of sedentarism, but not in a unhealthy way. It’s about trying to shove the most performant hardware regardless of size and weight. Today, most of the content creation you see on the Internet is done in front of this form factor: from a well-produced video on YouTube to the Boston Dynamics dog software. PC are used for people who create software, content, or research, so if the user qualifies into a “creator”, it may need one.
There may be software (and hardware) that is bound to the PC ecosystem, like development tools or audiovisual hardware. While this doesn’t mean you can’t do the same on an iPad or a Linux machine, a PC with Windows will make your workflow faster as most tools are compatible with Microsoft’s desktop operating system, which is one of the most used on the world — at least, on desktop and laptops.
Outside demanding workflows, there is little to say. For doing office tasks, you don’t need a PC, specially considering you may interact more with web apps than anything else. The undisputed king of tablets, the iPad, can offer very simple (and intuitive) interface to do most of the office work, as long you don’t demand multi-software complex computing from it. iPads are very restrictive about their hardware, if you consider they only have one USB-C port, and like to work under the Apple ecosystem, but they have been steadily opening it up to make the average professional workloads possible. Have caution and be 100% sure the iPad fills your needs.
If you plan to buy a PC to only play games, get a console or get a doctor. Trying to buy a PC to play games, even as secondary function, will break your bank and offer diminishing returns in both experience and performance. Compared to other competing platforms, PC Gaming machines are not relevant anymore, so don’t waste your time.
2. Do you have a large budget?
Budget is always a problem on all technology-related decisions, and for desktop PCs, this has become more than a problem in the recent years thanks to the crypto-mining and chip shortage.
Photo by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash
If your budget is low, you won’t find good machines that come without some cut corners. For example, you may find a machine with a very good CPU, but sacrificing the RAM size, the storage options, or even be left with Intel integrated GPUs. You may find really good deals, but nothing to write home about.
Currently, Chromebooks and iPads are most preferable options to consider if you can’t get a desktop PC with a monitor and some decent peripherals. Both of these are cheap compared to a full-sized desktop PC, and can offer average performance for web-browsing and entertainment. An iPad with a bluetooth keyboard can do wonders on small places, and some models can work decently with a secondary display.
There are some All-In-One in the market that can help you having a PC with Windows (or Linux in some cases) in exchange of poor longevity, zero expansion slots, big-but-average screen, sound, or very few USB ports. Mostly will depend on the specifications and price.
3. Are you tech savvy?
Photo by Alex Kotliarskyi on Unsplash
If the user that will use the PC is not somebody who can even know what is its current monitor native resolution, you may want to NOT build a PC, but rather, buy a pre-built system.
The big problem with building a PC for somebody else is that you’re bound to become the tech support for the machine, perpetually. You will not want become free tech support, even for family or friends. You won’t gift a car to somebody who can’t drive, even if he knows that cars go places, unless you want to be their chauffeur.
Instead, go for a walk inside a retail store if you can with your victim, or look online. On the Internet you may find sites from respectable companies willing to sell pre-built machines, with some slight window for configuration. Some will offer you a flat fee for building the PC for you, like on Redux.
Most retail machines will offer extended warranty and support, in exchange for some additional money. In other words, you will be able to contact people which job is to help diagnose and repair the machine, saving you headaches. While no tech-support is infallible, at least you won’t need to attend calls from your cousin at 3 AM because Fortnite suddenly became slow.
4. Do you need portability?
This part will vary from person-to-person. Some users will need a machine to be with them most of the time, and make any place their office. For these people, having a functioning PC without a wall plug for some hours makes them very productive. Imagine a photographer that needs to send a preview to a client: there is a huge difference between sending a couple of photos during the photoshoot, than seeing them next day just to do the photoshoot all over again.
Photo by Roberto Nickson on Unsplash
When portability is key, then the Macbook Air or Macbook Pro are unmatched, hands down. You may want to get them as long you’re not bound to any software that works exclusively on Windows or Linux. There is a site that may help you check if a niche app doesn’t work on the new M1 chip.
An alternative may be an iPad (or iPad Pro) with a Magic Keyboard or similar setups, especially for people who can’t discern between a bit and a byte, but need something convenient as a tablet and with keyboard compatibility. Just be cautious of the Apple ecosystem that usually gets in the way, like trying to edit a photo from Google Drive.
Otherwise, when portability is just an afterthought, you may want to check small PC cases for some offers as the mini-ITX form is considered an enthusiast market. While big PC cases are mass produced and can be found for cheap prices, moving a full-tower will break someone’s back in the long run.
5. Do you plan to upgrade?
If you plan to constantly inject money into a PC to keep it “top of the line”, then there is no other alternative. The only place that can withhold the test of time is the PC. Additionally, most of the hardware can be re-sold and re-used, so the used hardware market is a very good alternative as long you don’t let your guard down.
This type of flexibility is not without care planning. You don’t buy pieces considering their for longevity, but for what works good now. For example, you may buy 4GB of RAM today, and upgrade to 16GB tomorrow if you feel you’re behind on what is acceptable performance for your applications.
If this is not what you plan, specially considering how fragile can become the occidental economy, then you burn all the cash you can and never look back. In that regard, there is no excuse for choosing a desktop PC. You may well get any other platform that is not “upgradeable”.
In the age of machines with powerful SoC, like the Apple M1, there is no argument to avoid them, in whatever flavor you like: iMac, Macbook, Mac Mini, or even an iPad. Obviously, there are some competitors and some powerful Windows-based laptops, but sometimes the price isn’t right. | https://medium.com/@darkghosthunter/you-dont-need-a-desktop-pc-anymore-fc33aeaa697 | ['Italo Baeza Cabrera'] | 2021-09-13 12:31:09.392000+00:00 | ['iPad', 'PC', 'Hardware', 'Apple', 'Technology'] |
Burnout: Worse as a Writer or at a 9–5 Job? | Burnout: Worse as a Writer or at a 9–5 Job?
Burnout — Photo by Andrea Piacquadio from Pexels
Many people try to achieve more by working longer hours. And they try to get more done by cramming more obligations into their day. But, by stuffing their days with meetings and commitments, their productivity declines.
They experience burnout.
According to the Mayo Clinic,
“Burnout is a state of physical and emotional exhaustion, that also involves a sense of reduced accomplishment”
Anyone who has been working for a few years has likely experienced burnout. And I’m sure you’ve likely experienced it too.
And when this happens, you seem unable to make progress on your work. You cannot concentrate on writing the article. You no longer have the motivation to finish the report.
But burnout is not permanent. You can take action and improve your situation, as we will see in this article. | https://medium.com/@loukas-writes/is-burnout-worse-when-you-are-a-writer-or-a-worker-at-a-9-5-job-349358002317 | [] | 2020-11-27 17:33:44.357000+00:00 | ['Self Improvement', 'Life', 'Life Lessons', 'Burnout', 'Self'] |
Austin Police Cuts Show Democrats Have Forgotten Why They Lost Texas | Texas Governor John Connally (at podium) at a celebration of President Johnson’s 1964 election win. Connally, a Democrat, later took a post in the Nixon administration. (LBJ Library/Public Domain)
EDITORIAL
The eleven Democrats on the Austin City Council this past week gift wrapped the November 2020 election and handed it to Texas Republicans on a silver platter.
A vote to slash 34% of the city’s police budget is controversial within their own party, alienates local business interests, and has stoked furor throughout the Lone Star State. The move threatens to demoralize the police and undermine public safety at a time when homicides, assaults, and deadly road accidents are on the rise.
City Hall insiders and their apologists in the media have been quick to point out that the immediate cuts are only for about $20 million, or 5% of the police budget, while larger cuts will come later, mostly stemming from transferring programs like Victims Services from the police department to other city departments — not from outright eliminating officers and programs.
But that misses the point. Council members wanted to put on a show, and they got one. Their budget even calls for booting the police from their own downtown headquarters and moving them into other city buildings.
It’s a costly and grandiose gesture, and while it might pacify far-left elements in Austin, it will alienate Texans elsewhere, dooming Democratic efforts to retake the Texas House, and potentially reversing Democratic gains among Hispanics, who are disproportionately affected by crime and constitute about 40% of the state’s population.
Following a gain of 12 seats in the Texas House in 2018, Texas Democrats were in striking distance of controlling the chamber, which would allow them to block Republican gerrymandering during redistricting in 2021.
They also were in a position to exploit Republican vulnerabilities over their mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic, and they aimed to make Donald Trump play defense in Texas, where he won only 27% of the Republican primary votes in 2016.
Longer term, Texas Democrats are looking to continue to expand in growing suburbs that form the battleground between the deep-red rural parts of the state and the deep-blue cities.
All of these efforts now are in jeopardy because of anti-police rhetoric out of deep-blue cities like Austin, Portland, and Seattle. Substantively, such attacks on the police also undermine Democratic efforts on gun safety and prisons reform, neither of which will gain any traction if voters feel insecure in their own neighborhoods.
In the 1960s, when Republicans first started gaining ground in Texas, they had to work hard to paint Democrats as “weak on crime” liberals. That effort, which eventually succeeded, ended a century of Democratic power in the Lone Star State, and launched Ronald Reagan into the White House, as well as two Texans, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush.
Now, the GOP doesn’t even have to call names; the Democrats are doing it to themselves. As the saying goes, those who do not remember the past are doomed to repeat it.
100 Years of Democratic Power — And How It Was Lost
Between 1876 and 1972, Texans chose the Republican candidate in a presidential election only twice, and both times that was the war hero Dwight Eisenhower. They voted four times for the architect of the New Deal, Franklin Roosevelt, three times giving him over 80% of their votes.
Texans voted for Roosevelt’s vice president and successor, Harry Truman, and they even voted for a New Englander, John Kennedy, over Richard Nixon in the 1960 presidential election. Then they backed their own man, Lyndon Johnson, with 63% of their votes in the 1964 election.
But something began to change during the Johnson years as the Democratic party tore itself apart over Vietnam, the counterculture, and civil rights. Texans watching the nightly news in their living rooms increasingly saw images of protests, urban riots, and reports of drug use and rising crime. They worried about communism overseas and radicalism within the Democratic Party that they had long supported.
After Johnson dropped out of the 1968 election, Texans showed less enthusiasm for his Democratic successor, Hubert Humphrey, but still gave him a plurality of their votes, passing on Richard Nixon for a second time. (A third-party candidate, the segregationist George Wallace, won only 19% of the votes in Texas, a far lower showing than in Southern states, five of which he won outright).
During the next four years of the Nixon administration, the country was seized by unrest. Protests against the Vietnam War intensified. There were unexplained bombings, acts of riot, and widespread disruptions on college campuses.
Conservative Texas Democrats began to feel increasingly at odds with their own national party. They began to defect; John Connally, the Texas governor from 1963 to 1969, who had been wounded by the same bullet that killed Kennedy in Dallas, took a cabinet post in the Nixon administration. He also headed a campaign group, “Democrats for Nixon,” that opposed the Democratic nominee, George McGovern, portraying him as weak on defense and crime. Millions of Texas Democrats followed Connally’s lead.
McGovern, sensing he was vulnerable on crime, sought belatedly to show that he could be tough. In an Oct. 3, 1972 address, he “promised to make eradication of crime and drug abuse ‘the №1 domestic priority of my administration,’” the New York Times reported. The Democratic candidate called for federal financial aid to crime-troubled cities that would be “focused on increasing the number of foot patrolmen.”
But the damage had been done. McGovern lost Texas to Nixon 33% to 66%. Texans would give Democrats one last chance — narrowly choosing Jimmy Carter in 1976 — but ever since no Democrat has won the presidential election in Texas. In fact, since 1994, Democrats haven’t even won a statewide election for a post like attorney general or general land commissioner.
Texans venerate lawmen like Sheriffs and Rangers — they’re an iconic part of Texas identity.
Throughout the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s, Texas got redder and redder. The “weak on crime” label became one that Democrats couldn’t shake; Michael Dukakis in 1988 famously was attacked for his “revolving door” prison policy, after he had vetoed a bill to stop furloughs for murderers.
There were other reasons, of course, why Democrats lost elections in Texas. But the law-and-order message was a strong part of it. It resonates so strongly in the Lone Star State because frontier lawlessness is such an important part of the state’s collective memory. In the 19th century, Texas struggled to overcome lawlessness and establish a working justice system. That’s why Texans still honor the badge and venerate lawmen like Sheriffs and Rangers.
There were injustices along the way — historians have documented some atrocities perpetrated by the Texas Rangers, for example — but on the whole, that hasn’t changed public opinion, and law officers remain an iconic part of Texas identity, not only in film and in popular culture, but also in Texans’ political consciousness.
By launching a direct assault on that identity, Austin Democrats on City Council are playing with fire. Their budget cuts won’t turn Austin into a lawless town overnight, but they could undermine security in the longer term, and they’ll have political repercussions for a long time to come. | https://honestaustin.medium.com/austin-police-cuts-show-democrats-have-forgotten-why-they-lost-texas-e75dc5a292fa | ['Honest Austin'] | 2020-08-28 03:18:29.395000+00:00 | ['Texas Politics', 'Police Reform', 'Election 2020', 'Defundthepolice', 'Austin'] |
How to Display a PySpark DataFrame in Table Format | How to Display a PySpark DataFrame in Table Format
Photo by Mika Baumeister on unsplash.com
In the big data era, it is quite common to have dataframes that consist of hundreds or even thousands of columns. And in such cases, even printing them out can sometimes be tricky as you somehow need to ensure that the data is presented in a clear but also efficient way.
In this article, I am going to explore the three basic ways one can follow in order to display a PySpark dataframe in a table format. For each case, I am also going to discuss when to use or avoid it, depending on the shape of data you have to deal with.
Print a PySpark DataFrame
To get started, let’s consider the minimal pyspark dataframe below as an example:
spark_df = sqlContext.createDataFrame(
[
(1, "Mark", "Brown"),
(2, "Tom", "Anderson"),
(3, "Joshua", "Peterson")
],
('id', 'firstName', 'lastName')
)
The most obvious way one can use in order to print a PySpark dataframe is the show() method:
>>> df.show()
+---+---------+--------+
| id|firstName|lastName|
+---+---------+--------+
| 1| Mark| Brown|
| 2| Tom|Anderson|
| 3| Joshua|Peterson|
+---+---------+--------+ | https://towardsdatascience.com/how-to-display-a-pyspark-dataframe-in-a-table-format-ef0b40dcc622 | ['Giorgos Myrianthous'] | 2021-06-18 13:35:18.951000+00:00 | ['Spark', 'Programming', 'Apache Spark', 'Python', 'Data Science'] |
WHAT PROBLEM WE SOLVE? | token sale Synapsecoin.io
ROBLEM
1
In traditional Crowdfunding creators present their projects and in many cases do not receive ideal advice in the initial stage of creation. Which often involves the failure of these projects at some point in its life stage.
2
Entrepreneurs pay high rates of commission for platform maintenance and they assume transaction costs, which can represent in some cases up to 30% of their capital.
3
Investors will not receive rewards directly, are made through banking transactions and whether these transactions are carried from one continent to another delay may be delayed up to several weeks.
4
In traditional crowdfunding platforms, investors have no control over their investments, nor any representation. Which creates great uncertainty during the timeout project implementation. And in many cases investments are not safe because it is delivered 100% of the capital raised the project creator, this represents a point against the investor.
SOLUTION
1
SynapseCoin platform offers to projec creator not just one space of funding for their project also provided; advice (Whitepaper, website, marketing, legal area, etc.), support and fund raising tools from the initial stage of the project. This may represent for the creator a successful campaign funds and proper development of your project sustainability over time.
2
SYNAPSECOIN charges 4% of total revenue in SYP project by Crowdinvesting and Crowdfunding campaigns for maintenance of the platform. This fee is taken when the project has successfully completed fundraising. thus providing the best commissions for the creator carry out the project without financial complications.
3
Thanks to Blockchain technology and smart contracts used within SynapseCoin platform; users investments, delivering rewards and profits arrive within minutes, these transactions will depend on how quickly the miners validating network ethereum.
4
On SynapseCoin we provide two financing options. First the Crowdinvesting where investors have control and representation of their investments. And the crowdfunding where investors are rewarded. In both cases the recaudation of each project will be delivered to the creator in parts after verification of compliance with the agreements established in the smart contract. | https://medium.com/@synapsecoinico/what-problem-we-solve-68636b4a506f | ['Synapsecoin Ico'] | 2019-03-06 00:12:26.368000+00:00 | ['Blockchain Startup', 'Startup', 'Token Economy', 'Synapse Coin', 'Crowdfunding'] |
Why Competitive E-Commerce Companies Rotate IP Addresses | Photo by Andrew Neel on Unsplash
We all know the feeling when you want those sneakers so bad you keep checking different websites for the best price. But it seems that they all decide to change the price at the same time. How do they do it? Do e-commerce companies have a secret agreement and email each other as soon as someone decides to raise the price?
Well, not really. But they all have rotating proxies, and they all monitor each other’s businesses. How? Why? What are proxies? How do they rotate? You may have all these questions popping into your head right now, and they’re about to be answered.
What is the IP address rotation?
First, let’s visit the basics: What is an IP address?
An IP address identifies every device connected to the internet, just like our physical addresses identifies where the letters, parcels, and other goods should be delivered.
IP rotation is a process where assigned IP addresses are distributed to a device at random or at scheduled intervals.
For example, when a connection is active via an Internet Service Provider (ISP), an IP address is automatically attached from a pool of IPs. As soon as a disconnection and reconnection occur, the ISP will distribute the next available IP address.
ISP rotate IP addresses because they usually have more users than IP addresses at their disposal. Hence, when a particular user disconnects, the ISP will bring back the user’s most recently used IP address to their pool of IP addresses, thus ensuring the optimization of existing resources.
What is a proxy rotation?
ISPs rotate IP addresses, and this process is transparent to their users. However, out there in the online world, there are plenty of cases when internet users intentionally rotate their IP address. In fact, not even an IP address, but they rotate proxies, which allows them to operate under multiple different IP addresses.
If the proxy server is accurately configured, rotating IP addresses from a proxy pool of IP addresses is possible. With rotating proxies, you can manage numerous connections from a single device, and carrying out web crawling and data scraping operations becomes a much easier task.
Why rotate proxies?
First and foremost, proxy rotation enhances the level of anonymity. Secondly, as already mentioned, it is a widely used practice to automate such tasks as data scraping and web crawling in order to increase success rates.
When it comes to web scraping operations, a common challenge faced by many is avoiding getting blocked by websites while trying to gather the data.
Several techniques can aid the prevention of blocks, and one of them is proxy rotation. It can help to operate scrapers past most of the anti-scraping measures as it allows them to imitate the behavior of multiple organic users. Hence, strengthening the chance of being undetected while gathering vast amounts of data.
There are countless cases out there when proxy rotation is being used. Here are some examples:
SEO firms use proxies that automatically rotate to check keyword rankings from various locations or to promote specific content on social media accounts.
Data intelligence companies rotate proxies automatically to scrape websites for analytics and performance purposes.
E-commerce companies gather product information from competitor’s sites. Why? You’re about to find out.
Scraping and e-commerce industry: the close ties
What do scraping and rotating proxies have to do with e-commerce? If you are in the e-commerce waters yourself, you probably know that the competition is becoming harsher every passing day. At the same time, markets are becoming saturated, consumers are becoming more price-sensitive, and search engines play a vital role in product research.
Today, more than ever, businesses in this industry need to get their hands on as much data as possible. This goes beyond making data-driven business decisions and also has something to do with business growth, market penetration, and sustainability.
Scraping streamlines competition research and provides powerful insights into what the competition is doing. Product information pages have a lot to tell. The price and product description copy only scratch the surface. For instance, scraping product descriptions can help you pick up the keywords the competition is using to rank high. User reviews can help you understand the target customers’ pain points.
Manually doing all this is time-consuming, not to mention the number of errors that are pretty common in repetitive tasks. More importantly, information on product pages changes, including prices, discounts, and sales. You are basically unable to detect these changes and identify patterns if you do it manually.
Scraping comes as the best answer to all your competition research needs. It is ultra-fast because it is carried out by bots. Basically, you get all the information you need in real-time without breaking a sweat because the process is completely automated. The data is well structured so that you can immediately spot trends, patterns, and find specific information.
Since we have established the link between scraping and e-commerce, let’s see why IP rotation is relevant here.
Rotating proxies for scraping product information
Big players in e-commerce verticals are very well aware their competitors are going to scrape their websites. As far as we know, they are doing it themselves as well. However, scraper bots can ruin the customer experience. They can generate a lot of traffic in a short time window. This amount of traffic and requests sent to the server can slow down an e-commerce website or even bring it down.
As a result, many e-commerce websites implement anti-scraping technologies. These technologies enable servers to spot suspicious user behavior and user agents. Telling bots from users is easy today. Frequent requests and a high quantity of requests from a single IP address is one of the main tell-tale signs. This is exactly where rotating proxies become relevant.
Given the fact that you are performing a large scale scraping operation because the number of product pages is substantial, getting blocked is the most probable, if not imminent, scenario.
It appears that rotating proxies are the option in this particular use-case. It is the only way to ensure that requests sent to a server for scraping services originate from a different IP address. Besides, rotating proxies change your scraping pattern.
You can set the proxy rotator in different ways to bypass anti-scraping technologies and run your operation without any disruptions.
There are two ways to do it. You can set it to assign a new IP address for each request, or set a time-based IP address rotation.
Conclusion
Now you know what benefits a combination of proxies and IP rotation provides, and the purpose it serves. If you yourself are carrying out data scraping and web crawling tasks, you simply have to implement a high-quality proxy rotation solution to increase your success rates and protect your proxy pool infrastructure. After all, well-established e-commerce companies are doing this already, and we all have something to learn from them. | https://medium.com/@adelina-kis/why-competitive-e-commerce-companies-rotate-ip-addresses-89d5d833f8b6 | ['Adelina Kiskyte'] | 2020-11-25 08:45:05.227000+00:00 | ['Data', 'IP', 'Web Scraping', 'Ecommerce'] |
Follow these steps to build production-grade workflow with Docker and React | Recently, I decided to extend my skills to include creating software images using Docker containers. I struggled a bit to connect the different pieces of puzzles, but finally, Thanks for Stephen Grider’s Udemy course “ Docker and Kubernetes: The Complete Guide” I got it to work. So, as usual, I am going to document what I learned so it will be easy for me and for anyone to implement the same concept in their application.
In this post, I will teach you how to configure the Dockerfile for both development and production environment. Also, I will walk you through on setting the Travis file to use Travis-CI integration tool. The project folder is available on my GitHub account for your reference.
What is Covered in this tutorial?
We will cover the following topics:
1. Building a single docker container for development environment — including port mapping using create-react-app npm package.
Configure Dockerfile.dev file
Configure docker-compose.yml file to map the services inside the container.
Configure travis.yml file for testing codebase as a preparation step for deploying.
2. Deploy the application image up to the AWS cloud services; this includes:
Create a Dockerfile for the production environment.
Create an account on AWS
Configure travis.yml for deploying.
This tutorial doesn’t cover building sophisticated images with multi-containers — it will be included in a separate post.
Pre-requisites
This tutorial assumes you have some a good knowledge of the following:
npm — have already installed create-react-app package, if not download here. Familiar with React-js Git and GitHub familiarity. Docker Basics, how it works. Docker downloaded on your local machine — including Docker-CLI, Download here. DockerHub account — Download here. YAML syntax, if not you can refer to this site. Travis-CI account, you can sign-up here using your GitHub account. AWS account — here if you don’t have one.
What is Docker???
Since I first heard of Docker I was curious to learn and use it. Docker is not necessary for any application; however, it is a tool in the normal development flow process which makes the developer’s life much more comfortable.
Not only developers, but also end users who are supposed to use that piece of software, and who are familiar with Redis, know how painful it is to install it into the local machine without using docker. Also, docker allows you set up the application infrastructure pipeline once and then any small changes can be done quickly without the need to re-architect your application infrastructure.
In short: Docker makes it easy to install and run software without worrying about setting up or dependencies.
ONE: Generate the React project
In this tutorial, I prefer to use the npm package (create-react-app) because it has a lot of pre-configured files which will make us focus on docker as a concept. So, start with opening up your terminal and type create-react-app project_name. Then assign that directory to be your current working directory.
TWO: Dockerfile for Development
In this tutorial, there are three commands we have to deal with:
npm run start: valid only for the development environment — starting the server at localhost. npm run test: run any tests associated with the codebase. npm run build: building a production version of the application suitable for production — zipping all the application into one folder suitable for deploying.
I am going to deploy to the AWS cloud, so I will follow the approach to create a separate dockerfile for the development environment. It will be responsible for running the image container in the development environment. The other Dockerfile will be responsible for building the image inside the production environment — we will create this later. For the npm run test command, we will write a configuration for Travis-CI to handle it.
NOW, create a new file in the root directory of the project and name it Dockerfile.dev — remember this is only to run our server inside the container.
Note: the configuration steps are almost the same for other application written in different languages.
THREE: Fetching the necessary images
To run the application as a Docker container image on any computer and be able to run the image without any errors, we have to instruct Docker which base image to use. Think of it like what OS the user should use to run the software, and which should be used to run the image successfully.
Go to dockerhub.com and sign-in, then navigate to the explore button — it will show all the available images in the alpine base image. Search for the node repository image. When you click on the official image repo, scroll down to the title “ How to use this image” then you will see that this image is based on the popular Alpine Linux project. | https://medium.com/free-code-camp/follow-these-steps-to-build-production-grade-workflow-with-docker-and-react-a860f695cf14 | ['Salma Elshahawy'] | 2019-04-10 16:57:29.500000+00:00 | ['JavaScript', 'Docker', 'React', 'Tech', 'Programming'] |
AYS Weekend Digest 13–14/06/2020 — Greek Coast Guard Ignores Boat in Distress for Over 15 Hours | Deadly Shipwreck Off Of Libyan Coast///People Evicted From Camps Sleeping Rough in Athens///Bosnian Law Against Distribution of Food///& More
Cartoonist: Emanuele Del Rosso, via Cartoon Movement
FEATURE
Greek Coast Guard Ignores Boat in Distress for Over 15 Hours
A dramatic but all-too-familiar story unfolded over the weekend, when a boat carrying 32 people in distress spent over 15 hours adrift at sea before the Greek government bothered to rescue them.
Several people on board were injured and one pregnant woman was in severe pain. Although some sources reported that she went into labor on the boat, that turned out to be untrue, although the woman did need attention at the local hospital. Regardless, it’s clear that the woman along with several other passengers had been in severe medical distress that was only made worse by spending 15 hours adrift in the Mediterranean.
This callous act unfortunately follows an established pattern in the Mediterranean. Greek and Turkish coast guards were at the scene but both refused to conduct a rescue, saying that the boat was in waters belonging to the other country. The Greek coastguard had removed the boat’s engine and set them adrift early Saturday morning, in the hopes that they would drift back to Turkey. It has become routine for the Greek coastguard to sabotage people’s vessels or set them adrift in flimsy rafts. Not only does this show that the excuse that the vessel was never in Greek waters was a lie, it shows how Greek coastguard official policy seems to be based on brutal racism and cruelty.
The people on board this particular ship were rescued by the Greek coastguard, after over fifteen hours of international outcry. They were taken to Petra, where they will be tested for coronavirus before quarantining in Megala Therma. A large group of locals was waiting for them in the port, expressing their disapproval of the rescue and of more people on the move landing on the island.
This particular story ended somewhat happily, with all people on board rescued and given clean bills of health by the hospital on Lesvos. But what will happen to these people now, dropped into a filthy camp environment, with many people on the island opposing their presence there? What about the countless others who’ve been subjected to illegal, violent pushbacks, with tactics that are designed to kill? | https://medium.com/are-you-syrious/ays-weekend-digest-13-14-06-2020-greek-coast-guard-ignores-boat-in-distress-for-over-15-hours-9e40f9bbabab | ['Are You Syrious'] | 2020-06-15 10:22:17.595000+00:00 | ['Digest', 'Greece', 'Refugees', 'Homelessness', 'Migrants'] |
Congress and the Presidential Election: the Power of Negative Tweets | Congress and the Presidential Election: the Power of Negative Tweets
During the presidential primary season, many observers suggested that should Donald Trump win his party’s nomination, a Republican would likely mount an independent campaign to help prevent Trump from ascending to the Presidency. Of course, it turns out that the only such candidate is little-known Evan McMullin, a former CIA officer who up until launching his campaign in August was a senior staffer in the House. As McMullin tells it, he urged likeminded House members to run but became convinced that no one would do so. “They thought it was too risky. They didn’t want to risk their current seats in Congress. They didn’t want to risk the criticism, and the humiliation, and all of that. I urged them to do it, and they would not do it.” Those same representatives were supportive of McMullin’s motivations though, and at least one suggested that McMullin run himself.
The matter isn’t simply that no elected Republican chose to mount a challenge to Trump, though. In fact, the vast majority chose to support him as their nominee. While roughly a dozen House Republicans have publicly rescinded support for Trump since the tape of him bragging about assaulting women became public this month, prior to that only a handful of the 247 House Republicans said they would not vote for him. That stands in contrast to the significant #NeverTrump movement and the sizable list of prominent Republicans openly opposing their party’s nominee.
Given that House members regularly have self-preservation in mind, I wondered more broadly how that might be reflected in what they‘ve publicly said about the presidential election. To investigate, I turned to Twitter, where I collected tweets from every Republican and Democratic member of the House since the Iowa Caucuses in February — roughly 160,000 tweets in total. Of those, I focused on the 4% that mentioned Trump, Hillary Clinton, or President Obama.
Check out this interactive tool to explore for yourself how Congress has been tweeting about the presidential election.
Here are a couple key takeaways from what I found:
Congress members tweet much more about the opposing party’s nominee than their own
Since February, Democrats have tweeted about 3 times as often about Trump than about Clinton, while Republicans have tweeted more than 4 times as often about Clinton than Trump. For tweets after each party’s convention, the disparity grows further, with Democrats tweeting 4.5 times more about Trump, and Republicans 6 times more about Clinton.
These “negative tweets” in a sense mirror TV ads for presidential elections, where the volume of negative ads far outweighs positive ones. In fact the fraction of negative TV ads has been increasing over the last few presidential elections: in 2004, 58% of candidate ads were negative; in 2008, 69%; and in 2012, over 80%. Additionally, when it comes to reelection-focused House members, given voters’ largely unfavorable view of both candidates, representatives may well be calculating that it helps their reelection bids more to run against the opposing party’s nominee rather than in alignment with their own.
Negative tweets (those about the opposing party’s nominee) also gain much more popularity on Twitter
Let’s look at the case of House Democrats. Not only are they tweeting much more about Trump than Clinton, but their Trump tweets tend to get many more retweets and likes than their Clinton tweets — about 4–5 times as many. Similarly, Republican tweets mentioning Clinton typically get double the retweets as compared to when they mention Trump.
In other words, negative tweeting is not only more common among House members, but is also more effective at spreading on Twitter and reaching more people. Why might this be? For one, scientists studying political ads have found that negative ads tend to be more memorable than positive ones, so it’s reasonable to expect that may hold true on Twitter as well. It may also be that when House members tweet about their own party’s candidate, they do so with less full-throated conviction because of the political consequences of too-closely aligning with their own nominee. As a result, the tweets might be more mundane compared to negative ones which are politically uncomplicated to compose and carry a more enthusiastic message.
Republican House members tweet A LOT more about President Obama than Democrats do
Since February, House Republicans have tweeted 7 times as often as Democrats about Obama (and his eponymous policies), further fitting the trend of predominantly negative campaigning. Interestingly though, while Republicans tweet more frequently about the President than about Clinton (3x more), such tweets are only typically half as popular on Twitter as their Clinton tweets — perhaps a sign that attacks on Obama resonate less with voters compared to fresher attacks on Clinton.
Of course, negative tweets about your own party’s nominee draw lots of attention too
Of the five most retweeted House Republican tweets about Trump this election season, four were negative in nature. Here are a couple:
Such sentiments explain how it’s possible for someone like Evan McMullin to in a matter of weeks go from complete anonymity and limited resources to having a legitimate shot at winning electoral votes. Who knows what might have been had McMullin convinced a well known, better-funded Republican to mount a challenge instead. | https://medium.com/@niryungster/congress-and-the-presidential-election-the-power-of-negative-tweets-285548d3f57 | ['Nir Yungster'] | 2016-10-30 19:46:31.210000+00:00 | ['2016 Election', 'Politics', 'Congress', 'Twitter', 'Data Science'] |
The Storm | It wasn't raining.
When they first got together, it was nice. Simple, easy— they gelled. A year later, they had a kid on the way and the children from his previous marriage, now eighteen, were left to fend for themselves as their dad started over with a twenty-four-year-old. They had a big wedding with the white dress and the dancing— it was nice, normal. Easy.
After the first baby— a little boy with the brownest eyes and the chubbiest cheeks —they started on the next. Another boy followed near-exactly twenty-one months later, this one with the blue eyes of his mother and a silent smile he rarely showed. One calculated procreation event occurred twelve months later and that summer, a baby girl joined the mix. This one had neither of her parents' eyes, but instead the hazel-grey of her father's father, along with a headful of black hair matching most of the people of her father's side.
They named each of their children after the husband's heritage, ending up with Light, Gift of God, and their little girl, Harvester. The second meaning— the one chose not to acknowledge —fit her better. The Reaper. A year after she was born, her father's father died, leaving her the only person left in that family with hazel-grey eyes. As she grew up, her father would change— or maybe his true colors would be revealed —and it would start to rain, to pour, to thunderstorm. But, that wasn't how it would start.
In the early years, the family threw parties and went on expensive vacations, careless despite how careful they acted. They laughed and smiled and acted like nothing was wrong or ever could be wrong. They were
.
Nobody realized that it was starting to drizzle. | https://medium.com/@tessaflower1/it-wasnt-raining-d4ceac360e97 | ['Tessa T'] | 2020-12-19 22:09:19.686000+00:00 | ['Rain', 'Short Story', 'Divorce', 'Sad', 'Poetry Writing'] |
Who out there is perfect? | I post here sometimes about mask safety, Covid testing, hope for the future through paticipation in guidelines, compassion for a medical community trying their best against this common enemy that we do not know all
thevanswers about.
We had tickets to fly to Colorado tomorrow for Thanksgiving. Yes our family was going to be brave. We tested, we have masks and sanitizer ready. We ignore friends who think we are crazy or friends who think we are sheep for being worried at all. It is our decision.
BUT last night we changed our minds (please keep judgments to yourself) Colorado is locking down more tightly. Our parents are older, we don’t know when we will see them again but new rules say NO more than ONE family in a house. We will respect rule and not contribute to problem. Whether through the airport or a quick trip to the
Market no matter how safe it just isn’t worth it.
As I see complaints against others for not following guidelines please consider how you yourself have been lax.
As I see complaints about being controlled or duped into exaggerations about the trajectory of the virus please take a moment to consider all those people who have been lost. It is NOT a hoax. People are in fact dying, some asking with their dying breath “I thought it wasn’t real”.
The virus knows no political party, religion or economic difference.
I don’t know what is going to happen but I thought I’d share a post from a friend in Chile. I also want to point out that in China many people literally did not leave apartments for months before it was under control. Perhaps you know someone who has been this strict but I don’t.
I feel like in the coming months restrictions will get tighter. Before you get upset about that notion I ask you to consider: how many people is it ok to let die in order to maintain our convenient lifestyles?
Leaders are not perfect either but the virus is a common enemy we all need to grapple with.
It is not a time for pointing fingers but for coming together in your own houses with courage to DEFY the virus.
Perhaps short term inconvenience is worth long term success.
From my friend:
We have had mandatory masks wearing since it started. Also the government has a task force that monitors all the areas and puts them in different phases of control. Since May 8 my part of the city was in full lockdown until September 14. During those months we had to get a permit to leave the house. You could only get 2 permits each 7 days and they were for specific reasons i.e. grocery shopping, doctor, care for someone, and a few others. We’ve also had nightly curfew from 10pm to 5 am. Since my area went into phase 2 on Sept 14, phase 1 was full lockdown, we have finally reached phase 4 this week. More freedom of movement and more businesses opening up. It has been difficult but our numbers are going down. It’s all about the mindset that all of the hardships are to help stop the Covid-19, not stopping your life. People have protested and complained that these restrictions have been hard but it the end the numbers of cases proves that without a place to go Covid-19 cannot survive. The sooner people realize this and stop fighting the method, the sooner life can continue. The vaccine isn’t the only answer to this problem. Also as a side note, Life will never return to what is was before because we have to be vigilant now for the next. BTW for those MAGA people, why do you want to go to the past, Humans need to advance. Sorry for a long post.
Thank you for reading. Please stay healthy. | https://medium.com/@strongbodystrongsoul/who-out-there-is-perfect-bc30edc8fb66 | [] | 2020-11-19 16:39:17.678000+00:00 | ['Courage', 'Covid', 'Hope', 'Awareness', 'Compassion'] |
Cutting Through All the Noise | Growing up in a neighborhood just over a mile north of JFK Airport’s Runway 22R/L, I know a thing or two about aircraft noise. We’re talking about the mid-1970s too, when 707s, 727s, and DC-9s freely roamed the skies well before the quieter Stage 3 noise requirements were in place. Ah yes, then there was the Concorde. It felt like time stopped for a minute or so as the sleek supersonic airliner passed a mere few hundred feet above my garage on approach. The vibrations from its engines rattled dishes in my mother’s cupboard and good luck if you were at a pivotal point in any TV show. Of course, as a wide-eyed aviation buff, I relished the extra loud engine noise and would always bolt to the backyard to watch the Concorde’s iconic “droop-snoot” in action. However, I’m fairly sure my neighbors did not share my same enthusiasm for these routine aerial encounters. I can’t say that I blame them.
For Flying Out Loud!
Fast forward several decades, and my, how things have changed. I no longer live a half dozen golf swings from a major international airport, but I’m keenly aware of the tremendous strides the FAA has made in terms of reducing and mitigating aircraft noise. Still, the current situation with regard to noise is a dichotomy of sorts. On one hand, the number of people exposed to significant aviation noise in the United States has declined 90% from roughly 7 million in the 1970s, to just over 400,000 today. This also occurred as total enplanements increased by nearly a factor of five, from 200 million in 1975 to more than 850 million today.
Despite this favorable shift over time, a recent noise survey revealed a somewhat curious discovery. Data from the FAA’s Neighborhood Environmental Study (NES), which was released this past January, indicated a substantially higher percentage of people were “highly annoyed” over the entire range of aircraft noise levels, including those at lower levels (below DNL 65 dBA). So how does that happen with so many fewer people exposed to aviation noise? It’s the same question FAA experts are currently tackling in their bid to rethink the way noise is addressed, including figuring out ways to better understand how people perceive and respond to different types of noise. “This is a nuanced story,” explains Dr. James Hileman, the FAA’s Chief Scientific and Technical Advisor for Environment and Energy during a recent webinar on the NES results. “The noise experience today is very different than it was in decades past.”
Indeed it is. What may help explain this growing distaste for aircraft noise are changes in a range of factors including survey methodology, how aircraft operate, population distribution, how people live and work, and societal response to noise. The NES is the first major update the federal government has undertaken to assess annoyance from aircraft noise since a 1992 reassessment of survey data collected in the 1970s was conducted. The NES attempted to capture some of these nuances and provide more recent quantitative data, which the FAA could use going forward. But before we get into those details, a brief background on sound metrics and the agency’s noise efforts might provide helpful context.
Background Noise
Simply stated, noise is unwanted sound. As we mentioned, there is a great deal of subjectivity involved with that assessment, but also a physical, more objective component as well. For example, we use decibels to measure sound intensity on a logarithmic scale. (Fun fact: a decibel is actually 1/10 of a bel (B), a unit originally used to quantify telegraph signal loss and named after Alexander Graham Bell). But to account for the way people respond to sound, we use the A-weighted scale (dBA). This accounts for both intensity and how the human ear responds to sound, focusing on frequencies that would affect us most (e.g., a crying baby vs. the low rumble of thunder).
Because people are exposed to sounds that vary in length and loudness, the FAA must use metrics that take these factors into account. The FAA’s aviation noise webpage (faa.gov/go/aviationnoise) goes into great detail on these metrics, but we’ll focus on one in particular here that helps measure noise exposure in a uniform manner — the day-night average sound level (DNL).
Figure 1
DNL is a metric that reflects a person’s cumulative exposure to sound over a 24-hour period and is the standard metric used for all FAA noise studies. It takes into account both the noise from a particular aircraft, as well as the total number of aircraft operations over a single day (see Figure 1). For example, the DNL value for a single very loud event (like my Concorde experience) could equal that of several hundred aircraft that are less noisy, like near a busy general aviation airport. It also accounts for the complex set of variables that could cause noise to vary, like aircraft weight and configuration, weather, and time of year. To account for increased noise sensitivity at night, DNL is weighted to assess a 10 dBA “penalty” for operations between 10:00 pm and 7:00 am.
The FAA began using a DNL of 65 dBA as a threshold for significant noise exposure in response to the 1976 Aviation Noise Abatement Policy. Together with federal land-use guidelines, this helped the FAA to significantly reduce the number of people living in areas exposed to aviation noise as was pointed out earlier. The agency also established eligibility for noise mitigation funding, like sound insulation for schools or homes.
Peace of Your Mind
To get to the meat of the matter on noise, the FAA also had to find a way to represent the effect of noise exposure on people. Researchers use the term “annoyance” to capture the varied adverse reactions people have to different levels of noise exposure. With the help of social surveys, this relationship can be measured with what’s known as a dose-response curve. If that term sounds like it belongs in a medical textbook, you’re correct. It’s a term also used within the medical field to measure the relationship of an exposure and a reaction. In fact, the FDA used dose-response curves to help pinpoint optimal dosing amounts for COVID-19 vaccines. In the FAA’s case, the dose is aircraft noise and the response is a measure of how it annoys people. Current FAA noise policies, including the DNL 65 dBA threshold, are driven by a dose-response curve developed in the 1970s, known as the Schultz Curve. Although the Schultz Curve was reviewed and revalidated in 1992, its underlying survey data is 40 years old.
That brings us to the FAA’s most recent effort to better understand the impact of aircraft noise exposure, the NES. By measuring responses to a modern fleet using updated data collection and analysis tools, the FAA was able to depict a more contemporary picture of the response to aircraft noise exposure. The NES involved surveying more than 10,000 residents living near 20 representative airports. A range of airport types were selected for the study including larger commercial airports as well as medium-sized airports with a healthy mix of general aviation and rotorcraft operations like Des Moines International and Savannah/Hilton Head International.
As the right side of Figure 2 indicates, the new national curve reflects a much higher level of annoyance and a substantial change in the way people perceive aircraft noise. To help better understand and address these changes, the FAA issued a Federal Register Notice in January (86 FR 2722) to make the public aware of the NES results and to solicit feedback on where the FAA could further direct resources. The agency is now reviewing the more than 4,100 responses received during the comment period with the hope that this feedback will help shed light on the shift in increased annoyance levels and inform future steps. | https://medium.com/faa/cutting-through-all-the-noise-4f99910f918c | ['Faa Safety Briefing'] | 2021-07-01 12:25:22.029000+00:00 | ['Faasteam', 'Safety', 'General Aviation', 'Drones', 'Noise'] |
Writing Every Day Begins… | Let’s make the promise before the year ends.
Illustration part of the Abstract Memento Collection.
When the year 2020 started, back when we had no idea just how differently this new decade was going to start, I was ready to embark on a journey that would lead me to write more. While I expected that journey to involve more adventures and those adventures experienced without masks, I managed to keep true to my intentions and significantly boost my amount of writing (and reading) throughout the year.
I shouldn’t perhaps put reading in parenthesis, because through this pursuit I learned that reading truly sparks the mind. As I write now and regale you with my anecdotal tale, I can’t help but realize that whatever success I have achieved this year in the literary realm, I owe to my active pursuit of reading; from books to medium articles. Reading beckons me to write, and I imagine it is so for many as well. The way I see it, the reader and writing organically engage in a conversation that, although many are content with the information and keep to themselves their analysis, many others are bursting with new inspiration and thoughts that need to be expressed in some way. I am one of those folk.
But here is where I must put a stop to my self congratulation because I truly did less than I expected to. And therefore, without being overtly self-critical, it is my own decision to begin a new journey as the year dawns. I shall aim to write and publish every day. Do I promise masterpieces that shake the very foundation of humanity? I certainly wish I could, but in reality, it will be an exercise of expression that will revolve around my career, pursuits and creative aspirations.
I had coined 2020 as the “Year of Adventure” in my personal journals. I bought concert tickets, planned trips and prepared for an unforgettable year. The reality was that it was the “Year of Self-Analysis”. A year to understand the world and its complexities, understand how I personally wish to engage with those complexities, and clarify what are my true priorities and desires in life. I did a lot of self-branding exercises, lots of mind maps, and had multiple sleepless nights of thinking these sort of things in convoluted and magnificent ways alike. I have learned so much of myself and my partner, and what we truly want out of life — and the more I read and wrote, the more I felt I could deal with the immensity of detailing the answers to those questions.
It is on this never ending journey that is self discovery and purpose alignment that I realized that writing is at the core of my progress. The exercise of organizing your thoughts and using common language to create mental visuals with cleverly organized words brings clarity and purpose of thought. It is my hope that my writing of stories, observations and anecdotes serve as a portal to a different realm. A point of connection with another human being who took a different path and explored different things. Lastly, I truly, with all my heart hope that the journey is as fun for you as it will undoubtedly be for me.
With love,
Ade | https://medium.com/@adevarias/writing-every-day-begins-e937df2534a4 | ['Andrea Arias'] | 2020-12-27 22:39:10.538000+00:00 | ['Year In Review', 'Daily Blog', 'Reflections', 'Analysis', 'Writing'] |
Day One: I am an anti-Black racist. | Day One: I am an anti-Black racist.
Before I’m crucified or worse off, ignored: when I say, “I am an anti-Black racist” it’s not with pride. I say it with the same tone I imagine someone in recovery would say, “Hi, I’m Jane and I’m an alcoholic.”
I consider this a marked improvement from the chirpy and self-righteous tone I would have said, “I’m an antiracist! Black Lives Matter!” I’ve never declared myself as an antiracist, by the way. Mostly because I can’t. Of the many horrors I participate in, for one, is the prison-industrial complex which I implicitly support and fund when I pay my taxes. And let’s not talk about the promotions I’ve taken in place of Black co-workers who were more deserving, considering tenure and performance. I can’t take up the label on social media, in-person, or even in the privacy of my own thoughts. In my heart, I know I’m not an antiracist although I aspire to be one; I’m not worthy of the label.
Alas, I’ll cut this short because we don’t need another essay of prolonged self-flagellation and white-adjacent guilt. I also can’t write a personal essay about how enlightening this past month has been when it comes to my knowledge of the persecution of Black people, the extent of their suffering, and my part in it. To be honest, I’ve known this for a long time and I think most of you have known it too.
In a widely shared video (at least in my corner of the internet), a white woman asks white people in the audience to stand if they would be happy to be treated as a Black person is in our society. No one stands. She goes on to say, this is proof you are all aware of the difficulties and injustices that Black people face, and clearly this is not something you would want for yourself. This video looks like it was recorded in the 1970s. I knew when I was ten or eleven what it meant to be Black. Maybe not in so many words as I do now but I knew, instinctually, the same way you knew in fifth grade not to sit next to Erica during lunch because she’s a “loser”. This is not to say the reality of Blackness rests solely on the suffering other people inflict on them. It encompasses the full expression of their humanity as it does for everyone else.
In contrast to what I perceive as popular opinion, I don’t think the appropriate response for non-Black people is to be up in arms about what’s happening in the United States. A more appropriate response would be to be ashamed, deeply remorseful, and grateful that Black activists purposefully disown divisive, hateful rhetoric because it would only further chaos, pain, and violence. Should non-Blacks be protesting, then? Definitely. Voting in solidarity for Black interests? Absolutely. Calling out their racist aunt? Probably. But to be angry? I don’t think so. At who? The government? Other white people? Trump supporters? “Those” Asians? Who do we really have to be angry with but ourselves when it comes to anti-Black racism? Or more importantly, who can we more effectively control and affect other than our very own self?
Suddenly becoming anything without reckoning is dangerous. It’s reductive. It’s insulting. It’s the other scarlet letter everyone is avoiding like the coronavirus: it’s performative. No self-respecting adult can take up a label, at least one that requires such a paradigm shift without giving it thought, debate, and self-reflection. I don’t want to make the mistake of declaring myself as part of the solution when I’ve failed to admit my part in the problem. As Ibram X. Kendi draws the parallel in his widely read and recommended book, How To Be An Antiracist, to be antiracist is like fighting an addiction. One that requires you to fully, consciously, and persistently acknowledge the ways you are, in fact, a racist and to remain vigilant. | https://medium.com/365-ally-for-black-lives/day-one-i-am-an-anti-black-racist-766af732e1e6 | ['Jee Young Park'] | 2021-04-04 17:14:59.462000+00:00 | ['Anti Black Racism', 'Racism', 'Journaling'] |
Family of Thomas de Maizière | Learn more. Medium is an open platform where 170 million readers come to find insightful and dynamic thinking. Here, expert and undiscovered voices alike dive into the heart of any topic and bring new ideas to the surface. Learn more
Make Medium yours. Follow the writers, publications, and topics that matter to you, and you’ll see them on your homepage and in your inbox. Explore | https://medium.com/family-trees/family-of-thomas-de-maizi%C3%A8re-1e69a8cb6600 | [] | 2020-12-20 03:36:11.317000+00:00 | ['German Politics', 'Thomas De Maizière', 'Germany', 'Lothar De Maizière'] |
Internet of Things (IoT) Market Ecosystem Map | I wanted to gain a better understanding of the Internet of Things market and how all of the different players fit together. I created a map for myself, hopefully you will find it useful too.
Some caveats before we dive into the analysis.
This ecosystem map is not designed to be 100% comprehensive. It’s more to understand all the different spaces within IoT.
I am biased towards startups in the space.
If I am missing something tweet me @mccannatron.
This space is developing quickly so take this into consideration.
Observations
Company observations
Consumer
Nest vs. SmartThings — In the long run is it better to have one dominant product and build a platform around that (Nest), or build the platform first and the devices around that platform (SmartThings/Samsung)? Hue/Smart Lights — Smart light bulbs receive a much higher margin vs. traditional LED Bulbs. The Hue bulbs sell for $60 each. Mistfit and Withings — Are both interesting platforms and could potentially be worth more than Fitbit given their product lines. Athos — Looks interesting and they just hired a great VP of product. *For Fun — Pet Devices* — I can’t believe how many pet devices are here already. Catfi will help you remotely feed your cat, Fishbit will monitor your fish, and CleverPet will help you play with your dog while you are at work.
Enterprise
Weft — Cost of sensors and ability to transmit low power data could really change the shipping and logistics industry. Granular — Was surprising to me how many startups are in the “Smart Agriculture” space. Bastille — If IoT is adopted within enterprise applications, IoT security will be a huge market. Proteus — they produce a FDA approved chip embedded inside pills and is powered by the body itself (no battery / no sensor) to let doctors monitor if and when patients take their pills.
Connectivity/Platform | https://medium.com/@mccannatron/internet-of-things-iot-market-ecosystem-map-28a73d1393f | ['Chris Mccann'] | 2015-07-29 05:05:40.718000+00:00 | ['Internet of Things', 'IoT', 'Market Research Reports'] |
Winter (Inflation) is Coming | There are many times in life where I notice something is happening, I make a mental note of it and schedule time to think about that noticed “thing” at some point in the future. One of those things came back and really hit me in January — why was the U.S. dollar so weak in 2017? The U.S. Dollar Index, which measures the value of the dollar against a weighted basket of currencies, recently slipped to its lowest level in more than two years.
As it was happening last year, it surprised me. At first glance, the U.S. has much more lucrative yields for its bonds than Japan or Europe, which is a factor in the currency. The German bonds are yielding 0.70% and Japan’s bonds spent much of last year in the negative (an investment that structurally costs money). The U.S. economy is doing better than most economies around the world. So why is the U.S. dollar falling in value?
There are several factors that go into answering this question of what affects the price of a currency. One is the country’s overall economy. Another is how much the country’s debt yields in returns. Better yields attract money. Another factor still is the trade surplus/deficit. And yet, another factor is how much outstanding debt the country has, relative to GDP, and whether the rate of the deficit is expanding or contracting.
As Mr. Wonderful (Kevin O’Leary) says, “ Money goes where it’s treated best.” So, we have to ask the question — why is the U.S. dollar continuing to fall against other currencies? In 2017, the U.S. dollar lost 11% compared to a basket of currencies tracked by the $DXY index. Why did this happen? To answer that question we need to look at who is treating money the best.
On the surface it would seem that the U.S. would be the best place for money. Its bonds are yielding 2.8% on the 10-year treasury in contrast to countries like Germany or Japan which are yielding near 0%. So why would the U.S. be experiencing outflows of money if it gives the highest return compared to other countries? The answer ultimately comes down to an investor’s belief that they are going to get paid back in the same amount of purchasing power as they lent, plus interest. I think the calculus right now is showing that most people do not believe the government of the U.S. will pay its debts in the same amount of purchasing power as when lenders’ lent the money. Borrowers will get paid back the dollars they lent; it’s just that each dollar will not have the same purchasing power at bond maturity as at the time it was lent. More deficits lead to more inflation will outpace yield.
Governmental Policy
There are several factors, and the most recent is probably the most compelling. The Trump tax plan, on the surface, looks good to companies. However, if you look a few years out, it is going to wildly add to the U.S. deficit and overall debt. That is going to reduce purchasing power for each dollar because more dollars, because more dollars are going to need to be printed to service the debt. This is the reason why the U.S. Dollar continues to slide in value in 2018.
When you see the dollar falling against other currencies, you see the mechanics for how we import inflation from the dollar. This means we have to buy foreign products for more dollars because the value of each dollar is dropping in relation to the foreign currency. If the prices for foreign products are increasing, that is inflation. The market is seeing this and, as the dollar falls, our chances of getting high inflation here in the U.S. rise. I suspect we will see good to moderate inflation in 2018.
Inflation
To watch for forecasted inflation, look at 3 criteria:
• Money Supply (M2) — Currently Expanding
• Price of Copper — Above $3 and slightly rising
• Treasury Yield (10-Yr) — 2.8% and rising
As of now, M2 Money Supply has been steadily rising, even with the normalization efforts from the Fed. This creates the potential for inflation because more money in circulation means each unit is worth less. Checking in on the price of copper, it’s over $3. That means a base commodity has an increasing price, and that leads to inflation. Many investors call it “Doctor Copper” because the price of copper is a very good leading indicator. Finally, the 10-Yr U.S. Treasury rates are producing a yield of 2.8% and they are rising. These signs all point to rising inflation in 2018.
The Case for Anti-Inflation (Stagflation)
There is work done by Harry Dent who outlines a case that inflation is not correlated to the money supply, that it’s directly correlated with demographics. He explains, with an aging economy, there is no way to get inflation. He is predicting a deflationary bust. You can check out some of his work, here.
Winter is Coming
I think indicators are pointing to some inflation in the medium-term. Some of the best investments in a rising inflation environment are: emerging markets, commodities, materials, industrials, real estate and precious metals. I would be focusing my research in each of these areas. All the heavy global government debt is having an impact on the financial markets. It’s time to consider this possibility in your investment plan. I tout some recommendations in my 2018 Investing Themes post.
Based on how the foreign currency markets are reacting, traders think there’s going to be more inflation in the U.S. than expected. This is surmised from the fact that the U.S. dollar keeps losing value. It lost roughly 11% of its value in 2017 and roughly 2% already this year. Traders think the deficits are going to be a lot greater than what’s being projected by the U.S. government. Many make a case for the deficit to blow up to over $1T per year starting in 2019, so an additional data point to watch is the projected deficit number for 2019 and beyond. That add $1T every year to the national debt. If that widens to over $1T, we can assume there will be more inflation because it’s one way to get out of debt faster (by inflating the currency, paying off debt with dollars worth less and reducing purchasing power per unit of currency).
My prediction over the next two years? Winter (Inflation) is Coming. | https://medium.com/hackernoon/winter-inflation-is-coming-bee4a9eb3b5f | ['Jake Ryan'] | 2018-06-21 22:06:49.432000+00:00 | ['Inflation', 'Stocks', 'Macroeconomics', 'Investing', 'Gold'] |
Shelter gears up for Holiday Open House | Shelter gears up for Holiday Open House
With the holiday season in full swing, The Animal Orphanage is finding ways to spread goodwill to not only people, but also those four-legged friends. Currently, the shelter is gearing up for its annual Holiday Open House.
The open house will be held at The Animal Orphanage, located on 419 Cooper Road, on Saturday, Dec. 7 from noon to 3 p.m. and will give families a chance to find a potential furry family member to adopt.
“It’s during the holiday season, so it gives people an opportunity to browse our shelter,” shelter director Christine Todd said.
With the shelter currently at full capacity, those in attendance will be able to see more than 65 dogs and 50 cats.
“Our cat room is full, and we have a lot of kittens as well,” Todd said.
Todd said during this time of year, the shelter usually sees an influx of strays. She added that although the shelter is currently trying to adopt out some of its animal orphans, the shelter also recently sent out tips on how to find a lost dog in the shelter’s newsletter.
“You’d be surprised that people don’t know what to do,” she said.
In addition to opening the doors, The Animal Orphanage’s Holiday Open House will feature an “Ask the Vet” segment with Dr. Mark Rosenberg, who will also be offering pet micro chipping for $25 with all proceeds going directly to the shelter’s emergency medical fund.
Light refreshments will also be served, including hot chocolate and coffee.
During the event, families will be able to view orphans, who include dogs such as chocolate pit-bull terrier Brenda and young American Bulldog Pinkey. Cats will also be up for adoption, including young Calico Madeline and Gus.
Todd added that while the shelter does use Petfinder to list all their available adoptees, recent technical difficulties have made it challenging for the shelter to post new arrivals, such as the shelter’s litter of 11 pit-bill mix puppies, affectionately dubbed the “holiday hounds.”
“It’s just a way to showcase our animals,” Todd said.
In addition, Todd said the event would help the shelter “restock their shelves” and help to collect items on their holiday wish list.
“People are very generous, donating everything and anything on our wish list,” Todd said.
Items on the wish list include liquid dish detergent, non-clumping cat litter, Pedigree dog food, and toys and treats for both cats and dogs.
A complete list of items on the holiday wish list is available on The Animal Orphange’s website. In addition, the shelter also has a wish list posted on Amazon, which gives people the opportunity to purchase products the shelter needs to be shipped to the Animal Orphanage.
Todd added that while the shelter does not offer same-day adoptions, all applications submitted during the open
house event would be processed starting the day after the event.
“We have a lot of help on hand to process that day,” Todd said.
For more information, please visit The Animal Orphanage website at www.theanimalorphanage.org or call 627–9111. | https://medium.com/the-voorhees-sun/shelter-gears-up-for-holiday-open-house-7829a32f6b05 | [] | 2016-12-19 14:34:48.223000+00:00 | ['Families', 'Headlines'] |
A Way Out of Washington’s Impasse Over Venezuela | Mike Pompeo, 70th United States Secretary of State.
Until now, Norwegian-facilitated negotiations to end Venezuela’s presidential showdown and long-suffering crisis have failed. Nicolás Maduro has yet to be overthrown in Venezuela. U.S. foreign policy towards Venezuela has turned out to be a disaster. To make things worse, President Trump still needs to save face in Venezuela before the presidential election later this year, even if the face-saving comes without President Maduro’s ouster. Although Donald Trump has denied being behind bungled the Venezuelan coup plot called ‘Operation Gideon’, his administration is still being encouraged to investigate the events and clarify its details.
Time has taught us that Donald Trump is a pragmatic politician and businessman. Even if they both have different ramifications and ways that players intrinsically judge them, business strategies are similar to political ones. The main goal of businesses is to make a profit, and governments’ goal is to ensure economic stability and growth. Trump is willing to change direction as long as it is profitable, necessary and high-returning. Long-term confrontation can be expensive and not very convenient. During the last few weeks United States President Donald Trump not only welcomed Mexican left-wing President López Obrador, but also said on July 10 that his administration believed that Venezuelan political figure Juan Guaidó was losing some power.
In spite of Trump administration’s Venezuela policy, Lopez Obrador’s Mexico has supported Maduro. Mexico has stood alone within the once 14-country Lima Group in not recognizing Venezuelan political figure Juan Guaidó. Before meeting Trump, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said that he’d be willing to sell gasoline to Venezuela as a humanitarian gesture despite United States sanctions against the South American country. The prospect of a more united Latin American left has been growing since November 2019, when Fernández and AMLO started to discuss reviving CELAC, a regional diplomatic alternative to the Washington-backed Organization of American States (OAS).
On July 17, Donald Trump himself tweeted that John Bolton released massive amounts of Classified Information — material that a government body deems to be sensitive information that must be protected — in his book. Even if we have legitimate reasons not to believe everything Bolton has said, and he has yet to explain a great many of his motivations, the truth is that many of his statements make sense and seem to be factual. Bolton confessed that Donald Trump has never taken Juan Guaidó very seriously. By spring 2019, Trump was calling Guaidó the “Beto O’Rourke of Venezuela”. In November 2019, Trump called O’Rouke a poor bastard. Moreover, Bolton said that Trump doubted Maduro would fall, having said he was too smart and too tough. In sum, Trump’s opinion on Maduro was by far more positive than his view of Guaidó.
Numerous states still recognize Nicolás Maduro as president, as shown by Venezuela’s election to a seat on the UN Human Rights Council in a vote held on the 17th of October 2019. Even if Juan Guaidó is still recognized as the legitimate acting president by 58 countries, including the United States, the pressure has not been enough to dislodge Maduro. In fact, one should acknowledge that there is some gray area here, as India is a key strategic ally of both Venezuelan and United States governments. New Delhi has not recognized Juan Guaidó, and still remains as one of the most important strategic partners of the United States. It is worth to note that shared American and Indian concerns about a rising China’s behavior have been a significant driver of the United States-India partnership over the last two decades.
In Europe, it has become evident that some of the countries that recognize Juan Guaidó as interim president have provided some kind of economic aid to Maduro’s government. Consequently, Trump administration officials last year stressed that they were to push for financial sanctions against Spain for what they say was its financial support of Nicolás Maduro’s regime. According to the United States government, Nicolás Maduro was moving money through Spain’s Central Bank. Venezuela’s central bank was apparently relying on its Spanish counterpart to transfer and receive funds abroad at a time when U.S. sanctions have prompted many large banks and financial institutions to shy away from any actual or perceived dealings with Venezuelan entities. In an emailed statement, a Bank of Spain spokeman said the account kept by Venezuela was used to pay operating expenses related to the diplomatic relations between the two countries and the balance of the account was relatively small.
On the other hand, overcoming sinophobia and russophobia was one of the main challenges of the Venezuelan opposition. Not only their actions, but also their words, have aggravated the already-existing doubts of the U.S., Chinese and Russian administrations. Guaidó’s team did not build confidence among the Chinese and the Russians nor contribute to the conditions needed for a peaceful solution. Therefore, it is very likely that China, Russia, Cuba, Iran, Mexico, Nicaragua, India and Argentina will keep supporting Maduro, more or less.
According to a report from the Institute for Science and International Security, a nonpartisan Washington think tank focused on nuclear non-proliferation, 49 countries violated UN Security Council sanctions imposed on North Korea between March 2014 and September 2017. History tells us that a lot of United States allies aren’t following through on their promises when it comes to sanctions. There are very few reasons to think that things will be different this time. It is feasible that many countries, entities and enterprises will find a way to work with Venezuela under the table.
The Trump administration has just realized that Nicolás Maduro was not as dumb as some thought he was, nor are the opposition advisors as intelligent as they claim to be. The Venezuelan opposition has proven to be highly overpromising, optimistic, and ‘sensationalist’, but not very reliable and successful when it comes to veracity of the facts provided and fulfilling of promises made. The damage is already done, not only to Venezuela, but also to the Trump administration, which has lost credibility. Something new has to be done in Venezuela. There is a two-decade-long history of the United States government missing opportunities in the South American country, once the richest and most prosperous nation in the region.
Allies of the two political sides should press them to overcome their reluctance and return to the negotiating table. While this political power struggle unfolds, one of the major underlying concerns for the Venezuelan people is the dramatic ongoing crisis. Though the talks have so far been suspended, their resumption is still the best hope for averting a worsening crisis in Venezuela. As long as we do not set realistic expectations, it is very likely that prospect for a swift return to the table will continue to seem poor. Lastly, and perhaps, most importantly, this inaction is seriously damaging the U.S. reputation across the world. Rarely do things go as planned in revolutionary situations and holding back and waiting can sometimes make the difference between success and failure. What happens next in Colombia, Brazil and Venezuela will be a key factor in determining the direction and strength of the region’s political wave and trends.
-
Vicente Quintero
Vicente Quintero is a Venezuelan social scientist. He holds a Bachelor degree in Liberal Studies from the Universidad Metropolitana of Caracas (Political Science, Political Economy, History and Philosophy). He attended the Russian Language and Culture course of the Saint Petersburg State Polytechnic University (University Preparatory Academy). He is now pursuing a postgraduate degree in Government and Public Policy at the Central University of Venezuela, and has also enrolled in the Theologian Department of the South American Parish of the Moscow Patriarchate — not to be confused with ROC — . As a Venezuelan plastic artist, his artworks have been shown at the Alejandro Otero National Museum of Caracas. | https://vicentequintero.medium.com/a-way-out-of-washingtons-impasse-over-venezuela-92cc45465596 | ['Vicente Quintero'] | 2020-07-30 17:33:17.349000+00:00 | ['History', 'War', 'United States', 'Venezuela', 'Politics'] |
Youth Voting in the 2016 & 2017 Elections 🙋🏽️🙋🏼📈 | by Hamdan Azhar and Farhan Mustafa @Grafiti
Youth voting up 31% from 2013 Gubernatorial elections in Virginia, reflecting nationwide uptick for youth voting in 2016 Presidential elections.
Last week, in the Virginia gubernatorial election, Democratic candidate Ralph Northam handily defeated Republican Ed Gillespie, 54–45%, in the highest turnout Virginia governor’s race in two decades. Now, the latest analysis by the research group CIRCLE at Tufts University finds that voter turnout among young people aged 18–29 doubled to 34% in 2017 compared to just 17% in 2009. (In contrast, youth voting was stable in the New Jersey governor’s race.)
The Census Bureau has published estimates of voting rates by age group for presidential elections dating back to 1964. They find systematic and consistent differences in voting rate, with over 60% of people aged 45+ voting in 2012, compared to 49% of 25–44 year olds, and just 38% of 18–24 year olds. Youth voting since the Reagan era peaked under the election of President Obama in 2008 — and despite suffering a sharp drop in 2012, notably increased in 2016.
Youth voters tend to come out strong after 8-year terms, perhaps excited by voting for change. But youth voting during presidential elections shows different patterns. While youth voting suffered its largest drop during President Clinton’s mid-term election, it surged to its highest jump during the President Bush’s mid-term election in 2004, a trend that continued through President Obama’s 2008 election. After a drop in 2012, youth voting jumped slightly again during the 2016 elections.
Youth voting also differs greatly between states. In the 2012 presidential election, across the United States, 38% of 18–24 year olds cast ballots. However, in Hawaii, Texas, and West Virginia, the voting rate among 18–24 year olds was under 23%. Only five states had a voting rate of at least 50% among 18–24 year olds, with Mississippi leading the nation at 62%. In comparison, in the same election, the average voting rate among 25+ year olds was 59%, a difference of 21 percentage points. Moreover, the voting rate among 25+ year olds was greater than 50% in forty nine out of fifty states. (California came in 50th place at 49.3%).
The 2014 midterm elections were especially poor in terms of youth turnout. In fifty out of fifty states, voting rate among 18–24 year olds was under 30%, with Maine leading the nation at 30% and Hawaii coming in last at 8.3%. (Ed: it also led to a horrible mustard stain of a chart below, but we decided to keep it, to remind us of the stain on our democracy :/)
Turnout among adults aged 25 and older, while lower than it was in presidential election years, was still strong especially in Maine (64%) as well as Colorado, Wisconsin, and a handful of other mostly Midwestern states where there were key Senate races.
Youth voting in the 2016 presidential elections was slightly higher compared to 2012, overall, with noticeable increases in voting rate among 18–24 year olds in Kentucky (from 37% to 51%), Nebraska (from 36% to 50%), and Wyoming (from 32% to 53%).
The adults, however, while showing significantly higher turnout than youth voters, actually declined in total voter turnout compared to the 2012 presidential elections.
Let’s hope the recent trend in Virginia hints at wider youth participation — and actually lead to a bump in mid-term elections in 2018! Chances are that it might not happen, given the history of voting patterns. Voting among all age groups drops during mid-term elections in relation to presidential elections. However, the 2018 elections will be the biggest test of Trump’s populist politics, with even more at stake than in previous elections — a nation’s sanity.
What do the youth voting numbers look like in your state? And what should we do about it? Leave us a comment below with your thoughts! | https://medium.com/grafiti/youth-voting-in-the-2016-2017-elections-%EF%B8%8F-%EF%B8%8F-1174e6cc078b | ['Farhan Mustafa'] | 2017-11-16 17:14:58.976000+00:00 | ['Data Science', 'Elections', 'Culture', 'News', 'Politics'] |
Writers’ Newsletter: Updates to Sexography for Writers | Writers’ Newsletter: Updates to Sexography for Writers
An Addendum From the Editor
It’s been quite a year so far, and as 2020 draws to a close, it’s safe to say that Medium itself has gone through some massive transformations. We’ve switched over to the new relational model, there have been some updates to the distribution guidelines and rules, and we’ve seen drastic changes to our landing page, Medium.com, all of this serving to reaffirm the 2,500 Heraclitan ideals that all is in flux, that change is the only constant.
It is the times like these that test our resolve, that demand that we get up from our cozy, comfortable spaces and actually grow. Have you ever heard of a success trap? For those who don’t know what a success trap is, a success trap is when we find something that works, the magic sweet spot that brings us the kind of success we find valuable, and it traps us into halting our own progress — our own growth.
This happens a lot in the worlds of business, economics, and politics. Imagine investing heavily in land-line telephones in 2001 or MySpace in 2005 because those were the industries that brought you success in the beginning, and thus they felt safe. Imagine investing heavily in Polaroid cameras in the late nineties. You see where I’m going with this. You’d probably be out of a lot of money because each of those firms — and the investors who chose to invest in them — fell into a success trap. And today, the changes are much more rapid as communication becomes faster and faster and tech speeds up.
In my view, success traps are the enemy of personal development. Complacency is the enemy of feeling like we’re moving toward some particular goal; like we’re accomplishing something that gives us a sense of purpose and value. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t fall into these myself. Sometimes I’ve written two or three great stories that all fit into a certain theme, only to see the forth one bomb because the times were changing, trends were changing, the whole world and its aggregate perspectives were changing around me, and I was still trying to do the same old thing.
And it’s with this in mind that I ask us to challenge ourselves and grow with the times, to not become complacent with the same ideas, the same formats, and the same style that we’ve become used to. If change is a part of Medium, it’s safe to say that change will be a part of Sexography, too.
Science Vs. Pseudoscience
Recently, I’ve rejected quite a few pieces for pseudoscientific claims and overpromising. Here at Sexography, we strive to curb the spread of disinformation, even if that disinformation is accidental, borne through ignorance, or well-intended. It’s often the well-intended misinformation that sounds the most plausible because sometimes reality can be whackier and much more counter-intuitive than we give it credit for.
Going forward, we’d like to reiterate that if you want to submit a scientific piece, something that makes any claims of health, diseases, sexual wellness, and more, we’re going to ask that it be scientifically robust and intellectually honest.
This means that we want such pieces to cite credible sources and contain those links in the work for additional reading. A lot of self-help writers come out and make a lot of bold claims and never back them up with any evidence. We don’t want this.
This also means that the science is high-quality. If you aren’t very scientifically literate, we suggest not attempting such pieces. For instance, if you’re not quite sure the difference between a preliminary study, an epidemiological study, a double-blinded placebo-controlled study, and an observational study, perhaps it’s time to dive deep into this world before attempting to submit these kinds of pieces. In fact, it’s in the Medium rules for distribution…
Pseudoscience or questionable health/medical/diet claims, including anti-vaxx
Conspiracy theories
If you’re trying to argue that the cure for anorgasmia, the inability to climax, is deep breathing, safe to say you’re going to have to provide a lot of evidence to support this claim. If you title your work The One Sure-Fire Way to Make Sure You Climax Every Time!, and you cite one study that’s preliminary and says at the bottom something to the effect of, “This is just a preliminary study to see how we could methodically perform a more robust study. Further research is needed,” it’s safe to say that your piece will be rejected for making claims that can’t be supported by the evidence.
Evidence matters because we presume that our readers will believe what we say, and if by believing what we say, they might engage in an activity that’s either harmful or stops them from getting the effective and proven treatments that they need, well, that’s very bad.
It’s also important that we cite people with proper training. If you come up with an idea that makes objective claims about sexuality, it’s important that you don’t just turn to Google and search for the top articles that support your claim from any random blog. This is far from a complete analysis of the subject and these too will continue to be tossed out.
Any risks and drawbacks to the information we have on a topic should also be included. If a study mentions that it looks promising but they could only secure enough funding to try the study out with 23 participants, say so. If there’s any risk of following the advice, if there is potential for serious harm, it’s safe to say it’s not going to be published.
Pro-tip: I reach for academic journals when doing science pieces, I read and analyze all of the information I can on a subject before typing my first word. The National Institute of Health website is great for checking out studies from all over the world, it can be found at nih.gov.
Hate Speech
We here at Sexography are inclusive of all views, sexes, genders, races, creeds, and basically any conceivable type of human you can think of. At the same time, I’ve had to reject quite a few pieces that broke another two of Medium’s distribution guidelines:
Stories that promote intolerance or prejudice against individuals or groups, including the use of scientific or pseudoscientific claims to pathologize, dehumanize, or disempower others.
Unsubstantiated accusations of illegal or unethical behavior
The rule of thumb to follow here is to ask yourself if your piece is informative, helpful, and empathetic, while at the same time remaining critical; or if it’s hostile & written out of aggression for a certain group of people. This is a very delicate needle to thread.
There are no justifications for hate speech carried out against whole groups of people and these pieces will continue to be rejected. Instead, try to come at another’s viewpoints or life situation from a place of understanding, try to steel-man their positions, try to show the benefits of their perspectives and the reasons they adopt them.
Words like “many” and “some” are vital, here, so we don’t end up labeling entire swaths of people who share some superficial likeness as being “bad” and sowing the seeds of division. Rather than attacking a group based on race, sex, LGBTQ status, marital status, etc., try criticizing larger ideas that certain people of all types share, but be sure to criticize the ideas themselves and not just say that all people who believe X are evil, bad, immoral.
Some Other Important Things to Consider
Here’s what we do want:
Thoughtful, high-quality work.
Science-based sex education and understanding.
Provocative pieces that make people think and that might not have all the answers.
Deep, existential subjects relating to the human condition.
Personal essays and stories that get to the heart of what it means to be a sexual beind (not erotica — we don’t publish erotica).
Journalistic integrity, as opposed to hit-pieces, smear campaigns, and other dirty tactics that the world has too much of.
Articles that get curated. Make sure you’re getting curated a lot. If not, maybe consider changing up your approach.
Here’s what we don’t want:
Not to state the obvious, but, erotica. We don’t want erotica.
Stories riddled with profanity and vulgarity. A sparsely used profane word is one thing, but articles that are trying the shock-and-awe approach to getting reads will be rejected. Try to say what you have to say delicately and with tact.
Politically-motivated articles that cherry-pick science and data to fit a certain conclusion. These make claims that aren’t supported by the evidence they cite unless much of it is ignored.
Stuff that’s too content-market-y. If you give us one or two paragraphs about a subject and then spend six or seven pushing a product, and the overwhelming takeaway was “buy this product”, and the article said little else, it’s safe to say we’ll reject it.
Hit-pieces, smear campaigns, and other dirty tactics that the world has too much of, as opposed to journalistic integrity.
A constant influx of uncuratable pieces.
Let’s See Some Quality Writing
This has been a tough year. Here in the U.S., we’ve had a chaotic presidential election as the entire world watched, all wrapped up in a global pandemic that forced most of us to be homebound. It’s been a crazy ride. But we can push through it. I know as times get tough, the tendency can be to just turn out as many pieces as possible without paying much respect to quality. This isn’t the answer. Trust me, I know from much, much experience that quality will take you a lot farther than quality.
Think of the best writers you know who publish the greatest stuff and realize they don’t have some magical skill that allows them to sit down and spit out articles in just a few minutes or hours; that’s not how it works for anybody. Putting in the time, revising your ideas, revising your drafts, and constantly improving pieces until you feel they’re perfect, rather than rushing them out the door, is the way to become more successful.
I believe the writers we’ve accumulated who contribute to this publication can step up their game and achieve these goals, both to meet publication standards and for the sake of their own excellence. We strive to bring our readers the highest quality work from around the web and we’ll continue toward that goal. | https://medium.com/sexography/writers-newsletter-updates-to-sexography-for-writers-535709be8290 | ['Joe Duncan'] | 2020-12-08 16:11:59.497000+00:00 | ['Policies', 'Updates', 'Medium', 'Publishing', 'Writing'] |
Six reasons why David Bernhardt is not fit to be the next Interior Secretary | According to an analysis by the Center for American Progress, David Bernhardt is the most conflicted of all of President Trump’s cabinet level nominees. Nearly three-quarters of Bernhardt’s 27 former clients listed on his recusals have actively lobbied the Interior Department since 2017. According to the Washington Post, Bernhardt has so many conflicts of interest that he carries a list of his former clients in his pocket.
Bernhardt’s calendars released to the public are overwhelmingly void of meaningful details, with hundreds of hours of “internal” and “external” meetings lacking descriptions of who he meets with. While Bernhardt and his staff have fought to keep his calendars secret, a number of undisclosed meetings have been with oil and gas industry representatives, including the American Petroleum Institute.
At a recent House Oversight Committee hearing, an Interior Department official was unable to confirm that the Acting Secretary’s calendars are not deleted or erased on a regular basis. In a letter responding to a request for Bernhardt’s calendars from House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Raul Grijalva, Bernhardt denied that he keeps a calendar but said he has staff that create entries on a daily schedule for “the organization of daily appointments.”
Last week, Senator Tom Udall and Representative Betty McCollum wrote a letter to Interior’s Office of Inspector General calling for an investigation into the ethical irregularities of David Bernhardt and asking for a review whether the ethical policies that apply to Bernhardt are sufficient.
To prevent additional information from being released to the public, Bernhardt’s Interior Department proposed rules to limit Freedom of Information Act requests. A bipartisan group of lawmakers, including Senate Finance Chairman Chuck Grassley and House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings, wrote a letter to Bernhardt saying the “proposed rule needlessly encroaches” on the public’s right to government information.
2. Even his home state has rejected his agenda
Bernhardt’s home state senator, Colorado’s Michael Bennet, has already announced he will not support Bernhardt’s nomination. Senator Bennet’s position on Bernhardt is in line with the sentiment of most Colorado voters. According to a Keating Research poll released by the Center for Western Priorities, when Colorado voters were asked what direction the Interior Department should move towards, 74 percent said Interior must do a better job striking a balance between preserving public lands and responsible energy development, 18 percent said what mattered most for the department was increased oil and gas development, and only 3 percent said having a Colorado native running the department was important. | https://medium.com/westwise/six-reasons-why-david-bernhardt-is-not-fit-to-be-the-next-interior-secretary-fe22d1370753 | ['Western Priorities'] | 2019-03-26 16:16:00.919000+00:00 | ['Wildlife', 'Trump Administration', 'Environment', 'National Parks', 'Public Lands'] |
Hey Google ! - Delete my Data Properly — #GoogleVRP | Hey Google
Status: FIXED
Reported: May 05, 2021
Hello y’all it was a long break. Some burnouts, depression and blah blah. And after all that shit jumped right into Google VRP to find what i am capable of again. But let me be honest, this is a accidental find and I didn’t even believe this would even be accepted and rewarded by Google ;)
I have a bad habit of pinning multiple tabs in my browsers which might have some of my confidential data like passwords too…
Yah, it might seem pretty bad and awkward but I do that which makes it comfortable for me. And the place I store these data is Blogger which is set to Private. In-order to overcome this bad practice I decided to delete some of my data and also I deleted some of my Gmail ID’s which I used to create such blogs. After a couple of days when I saw one of my pinned tab the blog was still up and it was still accessible to all users even though I deleted the Gmail ID couple of days back.
Initially i thought it might be some cache hanging out in my browsers but it wasn’t, in that case I tried reproducing the issue. So, i used one of my existing account and create a blog named testblog1.blogspot.com posted some random images and tried deleting the gmail account which i used to create the testblog1. After a couple of hours, I checked if it was still available for public, but it was deleted properly including all the images which i tried to access directly from the CDN.
I was totally confused and decided to recall my old settings of my old blog which I used to store my passwords. I noticed i had my another account added as a author on it. So, i restored the deleted blog which can be done within 30 days and added a New user as Admin to manage the blog.
So,this time instead of one now there are two persons to manage the blog. Here’s a simple image to explain the situation.
In case#1 there’s only one person to manage the blog
there’s only one person to manage the blog In case#2 there’s two person to manage the blog
And when the Admin on case#1 is trying to delete his entire account, the data is properly deleted.
But when there are two admins instead of deleting the blog, the ownership is actually transferred to Admin2. The reason i find this interesting is because when I was trying to delete the account there was no proper message displaying whether the blog ownership will be transferred. I felt something awkward since the application actually fails to notify properly.
I was still wondering if it would be accepted and even if accepted will be it rewarded 🤔 but still I decided to report this on May 28, 2021 and the bug got accepted on May 31, 2021
That’s not only the shocking thing, it was rewarded with a amazing reward which I never expected to happen. And I had no idea why it was even rewarded and when i tried to know why I found this in Google VRP Rules page.
~ Any design or implementation issue that substantially affects the confidentiality or integrity of user data is likely to be in scope for the program. ( Privacy Dudes !! )
And that’s how I earned a new position in Google Hall of Fame 😂
And the issue is now even patched by simply adding a couple of lines during your Google Account deletion !!
That’s it for today and follow for more cool write-ups coming up !!
UPCOMING WRITE-UPS !!
Hacking into Google’s Ticketing System — #GoogleVRP Send a Email, get kicked out of Organization — #GoogleVRP Abusing video Elements in YouTube — Pt.2 | #GoogleVRP
Well if you love this write up drop a clap 👏, let’s connect then:
Twitter: sriramoffcl
Instagram: sriram_offcl
LinkedIn: sriramkesavan
Peace ✌️ !!! | https://medium.com/techiepedia/hey-google-delete-my-data-properly-googlevrp-83349ca8e0e1 | ['Sriram Kesavan'] | 2021-08-23 13:57:44.636000+00:00 | ['Security', 'Information Security', 'Google', 'Cybersecurity', 'Bug Bounty'] |
6 Ways Democrats Failed in 2020 and 6 Ways to Fix It | What’s at risk:
The GOP is hard at work attempting to entrench minority rule: millions of more votes were cast for Democrats in the US Senate and for the presidency, yet with the electoral college and the composition of the US Senate, plus gerrymandering in the US House of Representatives, Republicans still hold significantly more power than their vote share should enable. With the work of Mitch McConnell to entrench conservative judges throughout the judiciary and the record number of Republican judges appointed during the Trump presidency, the courts are going to make progressive legislation difficult. There is a reason Democrats need to talk about court reform, adding seats to the Supreme Court, making DC/Puerto Rico states, abolishing the electoral college, and more — Republicans have rigged the system in their favor and are ruthlessly using the levers of power.
The scariest part of this is who that Republican minority will be composed of; in the Trump era, young people who are conservative and actively involved in Republican politics are not driven by tax policy or beliefs in smaller government. Instead, they are driven by racism, QAnon, and white supremacy. Racial resentment has led College Republican recruitment for years, and the alt-right has only increased that. With less than a third of Generation Z identifying as conservative, the new leaders of the Republican party will be members of the alt-right, across the board.
Even so, Democrats can fight back.
Reasons to be encouraged:
Democrats need to recognize that while their sky-high expectations of a blue wave didn’t materialize, they still unseated an incumbent president, a rare and challenging feat. For the last four years, Trump dominated American life, commanding an incredible amount of media attention and crowding out so much other discourse. Incumbency is a powerful tool, and Trump leveraged it to his advantage, breaking rules and norms to hold the Republican National Convention at the White House, plus setting the national agenda and defining the discussion in a way that you can only truly do when you’re in power. Trump used the powers of the executive branch for his benefit, and yet he lost. The 2020 election became a referendum on Trump.
Could Democrats have done better down-ballot? Certainly, the fact that the election was such a referendum on Trump might have harmed Democrats down-ballot as so much of their case became about unseating the President while Republicans were messaging about how Democrats across the board were the problem. This imbalance led many people to vote for Joe Biden and then vote down-ballot for Republicans. They also had to fend off the millions of people who Trump-inspired and brought to the polls — few other Republicans have shown they can tap into those voters. It is possible that many of them won’t be as inspired in 2022 or 2024 without Trump on the ballot (though he could very well run again in 2024).
Democrats will need to adjust their pitch (Trump bad!) is no longer going to work, but without Trump standing in their way, they can act and take credit. If Democrats win the Georgia Senate special elections and institute economic stimulus, Biden should have his name on every check sent out. Should President Biden follow through on forgiving student loans, every person with a loan forgiven should get a letter signed by the President. Democrats can act legislatively and executively to make positive changes and gain support through their actions.
There are also encouraging signs for Democrats in how engaged the Left was in this election; progressives and younger voters were highly involved and turned out in record numbers. Combined with critical reforms to fix the party, Democrats have an opportunity for unparalleled success. We can nitpick Joe Biden’s campaign (and believe me, many strategists already are), but in the end, he won. He beat an incumbent president, he will win 300+ electoral votes when all is said and done, and his team closed with a message in Build Back Better that was intersectional with climate change and racial justice.
House Democrats and Senate Democrats have no such defense. To take the US Senate, Democrats will need to win a dual January 5th runoff in Georgia for two US Senate Seats. Instead of picking up seats, Democrats have lost them in the US House. Yes, gerrymandering plays a role, but it isn’t the whole story. Many democrats made messaging mistakes across the board, underspent on digital, ignored field, and far too often failed to understand the Latino vote and other BIPOC.
To win up and down the ballot, Democrats must fix those issues going into the 2022 mid-terms.
How to fix it:
1. Stop thinking of Latinos (or Blacks, or anyone else) as a monolith.
Far too many folks on the Left think of Latinos as a single voting bloc. They ignore the vast array of cultural differences in these communities, thinking that the white supremacy and anti-immigration stances on the right mean these communities are guaranteed Democratic votes. This is a vast misunderstanding — Latinos is a broad term; it bundles up Cubans in Miami-Dade Florida with Tejanos in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas, and other communities across the country. It ignores the distinctly different policy desires and needs of these communities, which Republicans did not, targeting distinct Latino communities differently. In Texas, Trump targeted Texas Tejanos, a traditionally Democratic group but with a specific set of concerns such as the oil and gas industry, gun rights, and more. They tailored their message — meanwhile, national Democrats largely ignored this distinct community.
The same thing happened in Miami-Dade County, where Cubans and Venezuelans in Florida helped Trump to win the state after his campaign invested in Spanish language radio ads, organized in these communities, and spoke to them about issues — and stoked fears — that resonated with them. Trump also spent less time rallying against and insulting immigrants in 2020 than in 2016 or 2018 — yet Democrats didn’t see their losses in these areas coming. If there is one major thing Democrats take away from 2020, it should be to stop treating these crucial communities as monoliths and to talk to not just Latino communities but other Black and brown communities about their issues, not only their identities. Know your audience and quit assuming that you can spend all of your efforts expanding your coalition rightwards (or white wards) without losing votes — Black people, Hispanic people, women, LGBTQ — they are not locked down.
Want to improve on this? Invest in organizations led by Black and brown organizers. Listen to folks like Chuck Rocha. Instead of creating a Latino department, and siloing them off, give them power and influence, hire people of color throughout your campaign infrastructure at every level.
2. Stop overprioritizing white people!
Look, I am not saying the Democratic party should abandon appealing to white people, but my goodness, do Democrats need to stop prioritizing white voters who are less likely to vote for them than people of color. Trump won over 73 million votes in 2020, the vast majority of them from white voters, and liberally used white supremacy and racism to rile his base into a furor. Most of these voters knew what they were voting for — they have gotten four years of Trump in office to see what’s on offer. Socialism as a dog whistle is often about “the wrong people” getting handouts — this is code for people of color. White people have enjoyed a longstanding advantage in American life. Whether they fully articulate and accept it, many voters support Republicans out of fear of losing their privileged position in American life. Often, cultural Republican voters — mostly white and often suburban, may have voted against Trump and then voted down-ballot for Republicans due to ideological reasons, seeing their job as done.
White voters should certainly not be ignored entirely, but Democrats are clearly at a disadvantage when it comes to gaining the population's votes that broadly supports white supremacy. Efforts to defuse misinformation and be more precise on the economic benefits provided by Democratic policies should be used to make a difference, but choosing to ignore people of color in favor of fighting losing battles for white voters is a drastic misuse of resources. Instead, Democrats should consider regional outreach that could bring in rural voters of all stripes. The weatherization program that Biden included in his clean energy plan is an excellent example of this kind of policy outreach, as are investments in rural hospitals, programs that benefit farmers including adjusting subsidies to better help family farms instead of large corporations, expansion of broadband internet, developing the mass timber industry, and more.
3. Embrace popular progressive policies.
Republicans have spread propaganda about socialism and used it as a dog whistle for white supremacy for decades. They paint any progressive policy as socialist. Yet when you dig into the numbers, progressive policies are popular. Democrats need to stop letting Republicans and centrists scare them away from winning messages with deep popularity and instead embrace populist progressive messaging.
Even “Defund the Police,” the slogan that many in Democratic leadership have blamed as toxic to down-ballot Democrats in 2020, shows little evidence of having been a disastrous as folks contend. Suppose activists saying “Defund the Police” (something most Democrats didn’t even embrace) was somehow the problem. Why did Minnesota, where George Floyd was killed igniting Black Lives Matter protests across the country, go from Dem +1 in 2016 to Dem +7 in 2020? Images of the burning Minneapolis police precinct blanketed news coverage for a time. Yet, the Democratic vote share went up, and the organizing of Rep. Ilhan Omar and others in and around Minneapolis helped deliver Minnesota firmly to Joe Biden.
I said it in my previous piece on why democrats need to embrace popular progressive policies. Still, far too many Democrats choose running as ‘Republican-lite’ instead of standing for issues and working people. In 2020, every swing seat Democratic incumbent who cosponsored the Green New Deal or Medicare for All won re-election. There are other factors than just support of popular progressive policy; however, such policies demonstrate a positive vision for the country, are effective organizing tools and show voters that you stand for something.
Voters prefer someone who stands for ideas, even something they may disagree with, over politicians who seek to poll test every message and move with the times like a weathervane. We want leaders, not just representatives.
Regardless of support for progressive policies, Democrats can expect socialism accusations — they are dog-whistle racial resentment attacks. You are not going to make them go away. However, you can make them less effective. It is not progressive policies that lose; it’s letting Republicans frame the narrative.
4. Build Leftwing media
Republicans are framing the narrative through their massive media arm, from Fox News to conservative talk shows, to social media. Democrats need not only to work to fix modern media, but they also need to develop their own left-wing media to espouse progressive politics. Republicans are more effective than Democrats at pushing out a consistent, across the board message. They reach much more significant social media numbers with regularity; Democrats need to develop their own media apparatus to level the playing field. Efforts such as Crooked Media are a good start, but much more needs to be done.
One of the alt-right tools has been misinformation and sowing distrust, often through conspiracy theories that morph into movements such as QAnon. For Democrats to beat back the radical right, efforts to combat misinformation must be encouraged, and the Left needs a much more effective messaging and communications operation.
5. Go Digital
Part of that effective communication must be a massive investment in digital media and digital infrastructure. Long gone are the heady days of 2008 where Barack Obama’s insurgent campaign seemed to herald a rising progressive digital infrastructure. Democrats have struggled to adopt those concepts, let alone keep up with today’s digital trends. With a major media disadvantage, this can be disastrous to many democratic campaigns and policies.
At every level, the national and local parties need to invest heavily in developing digital infrastructure and ensuring that candidates are using digital advertising. Any consultant that believes direct mail and mass-market television are inherently more effective than digital ads is either out for themselves or an idiot. Stop listening to them and start building digital infrastructure. Look to the work done by AOC, Ed Markey, the Sunrise Movement, Justice Democrats, and others for examples of successful digital operations. Even better, bring in digitally native organizers from Gen Z, give them resources, and let them work. Embrace people with digital competency and develop digital competencies within organizations.
6. Invest in year-round deep organizing.
Organizing is how you make Republican attacks less effective. Investment in year-round deep canvassing makes a substantial impact, and there is data that shows this type of organizing work blunts the force of racial resentment attacks at the polls. The Democratic party traditionally gets grassroots organizers excited to get folks elected, then doesn’t stay in touch and continue outreach — abandoning these communities is a waste of resources. Additional investment in year-round canvassing can build long-term infrastructure that is easier and cheaper to activate electorally.
This is one of the areas that Democrats will have to evaluate in the 2020 election data as they consider why House Democrats lost so many seats and underperformed in many places that President-elect Joe Biden won. The decision to stop knocking on doors (the most effective form of organizing outreach) may have cost many members their seats, even though it was done with public health in mind.
In 2021 as a vaccine is distributed and during the Georgia runoff elections, we will have to continue to consider how to organize in a COVID-19 safe way effectively. Democrats clearly could have and should have done better on this. The Trump campaign was knocking on a million doors per week as the election closed, and that was a decisive advantage for them in key states and kept this election as close as it was. Typically, Democrats have Black, Brown, and youth organizers who are doing incredible work on the ground to ensure Democratic victories: this year was an exception for much of the country, with the pandemic in full swing. Hopefully, this will lead Democrats to recognize their impact and give them the resources, trust, and attention they deserve.
By embracing the future and moving away from the past, Democrats can enact positive, progressive change — and win up and down the ballot. Failing to do so and failing to do the deep anti-racist canvassing needed in this country will mean Democrats continue to lose their white vote shares and allow Facebook to radicalize more people across the country.
The opportunity to change the paradigm is there, but Democrats need to act fast and make the changes necessary. | https://medium.com/the-purple-giraffe/6-ways-the-democratic-party-failed-in-the-2020-elections-and-the-6-ways-to-fix-it-cca1dae6e90d | ['Conor Bronsdon'] | 2020-11-23 18:18:48.588000+00:00 | ['Democratic Party', 'US Elections', 'Elections', 'Democrats', 'Election 2020'] |
The Queen’s Gift | Sometimes the Queen comes into my room at night and whispers in my ear the names of stars on the other side of the universe. They aren’t cool and intelligent names like Alpha Centurai. She mutters names like, ‘Fugglesoo, Murdy-Mur, Lick-Stop-N-Pop, Fartbox’ and so on.
The only thing that makes her go away is the sun coming up. Her Majesty yelps like a kicked dog and flies away, back to her bedroom in Buckingham Palace before the maids realise she’s missing.
I like the whole routine. Her posh accented voice, the soft murmuring of hundreds of oddball names, it helps drift me off to sleep with dreams so heartbreakingly beautiful that I regret waking up.
The last thing I ever expected was for a second night visitor. One night the Queen came in when I turned off my lamp as per usual, but this time she came with a little creature in the palm of her hand.
“This is Megmump,” she whispered in cultured tones. “You’ll have to take care of her now. She’s come all the way from Biggletock.”
I held out my hands, blind in the midnight dark. The little creature, obscured in deep shadow, fell into my hands. The Queen did not stay and list the strange unknown stars tonight, but instantly flew out of my window and away back into the black night. I knew deep inside that this was the last time I would ever see her.
Slowly, I lowered my hands. The creature plopped onto my lap. Then I carefully stretched my arm over to my bedside table towards the lamp. I needed to see.
I flicked the switch.
My lap was empty. | https://medium.com/@aliceowriting/the-queens-gift-908671adf970 | ['Alice O Writing'] | 2020-12-27 17:26:58.708000+00:00 | ['Short Fiction', 'Short Story', 'Fiction Writing', 'Abstract Art', 'Queen'] |
Anthos : Portable Google Cloud Platform Hybrid Management | Portability
If you want to be able to run the same application both in the cloud and on-premise, you need portability. To realize the promise of application portability, you want to build your applications once and run them anywhere using the same tools.
Anthos helps address infrastructure and policy portability; there are a couple of other key aspects: API and tools portability.
API Portability
Application API portability is what developers think of first re. write once / run anywhere. There are two ways of solving for this:
Use common services across the cloud provider and on-premise. Along one dimension this is the degenerate case and the solution is the same as if you’re just running on-premise. Cloud providers such as Google provide one-click deploy of datastores/databases such as MongoDB/Cassandra and messaging services such as RabbitMQ/Kafka with various levels of management through their marketplaces (eg. Google Cloud Marketplace), and there’s a well-established on-premise ecosystem. This approach provides your application with full access to all of the services’s features; the downside is that even in the cloud, you either need to take advantage of the service vendor’s managed service offering, or manage scaling, high availability, and disaster recovery yourself. Use managed cloud services in the cloud, and open-source services on-premise. This provides you the full power of the cloud provider’s services; in the case of Google Cloud Platform’s fully managed services, this includes scaling, high availability and disaster recovery as part of the fabric; this is difficult to replicate. The downside is that your application needs to speak to different APIs in the cloud and on-premise. Fortunately this is solvable: conceptually this is the extension of Java’s write once, run anywhere promise for which Enterprise Java Beans and the Spring Framework solved decades ago, and which the Go Cloud Development Kit solves for today.
You’ll need to determine the right approach based on your preferred development language, your timelines, the complexity of your applications’ use of the services’ APIs, and the relative value of fully managed services in the cloud.
Sample decision tree
Go Cloud Development Kit
The Go Cloud Development Kit (Go CDK) allows Go application developers to seamlessly deploy cloud applications on cloud providers, as well as on-premise. It does this by providing stable, idiomatic interfaces for common use cases like storage and databases; it supports provider-specific escape hatches for edge cases to avoid the least common denominator trap.
Today it provides the following interfaces and implementations:
Blob store
In-memory
Filesystem
Google Cloud Storage
Azure Storage’s BlockBlob, along with OpenBucket
AWS S3
Postgres
Google Cloud SQL
AWS RDS PostgreSQL
MySQL
Google Cloud SQL
AWS RDS MySQL
Pub-sub
In-memory
RabbitMQ
Google Cloud Pub/Sub
Azure Service Bus Topic and Subscription
AWS SNS (Simple Notification Service) and SQS (Simple Queueing Service)
Some interfaces and implementations are still missing, but the project has been adding new interfaces and implementations regularly since its launch last summer: Firestore, MongoDB, and DynamoDB are on the roadmap, as is Kafka.
In addition, the Pub/Sub Emulator for Kafka implements a gRPC server that satisfies the Cloud Pub/Sub API as an emulation layer on top of an existing Kafka cluster configuration; it’s a Java-based Docker or Kubernetes distro.
Tools Portability
The other portability aspect is how you provision and manage the services on which your application relies. Historically you’d use one set of tools (eg. gCloud) to manage Google Cloud Platform managed services, and another (often multiple) to manage on-premise open-source application data and messaging services.
Kubernetes’s Custom Resource Definitions (CRDs) provide a consistent , declarative resource management facade for the provisioning/management of external datastores/databases (eg. CloudSQL instance) and messaging services. Developers can create a custom resource definition that defines the config schema for a new resource, and a controller that implements the resource’s behavior. The Kubernetes API server machinery can manage new resources as service endpoints without requiring any modification so they can be kubectl apply’d, etc.
The Operator pattern combines custom resources with custom controllers to provide a true declarative API. This allows you to declare or specify the desired state of your resource and tries keep the current state of Kubernetes objects in sync with the desired state. You can use custom controllers to encode domain knowledge for specific applications into an extension of the Kubernetes API.
Note that Operators extend to more services than you might think; intuitively, one tends to think of a service like Google Cloud Storage as a fully managed service, so presumably not needing provisioning/management. However, the Go CDK does not provide a way of creating a new bucket, categorizing this as an operations task, so you’d need an Operator for Google Cloud Storage to manage it using the Kubernetes model.
Over time, cloud providers and open-source vendors will likely provide Operators for their resources, enabling consistent declarative provisioning of resources across clouds and on-premise. For instance, … | https://medium.com/google-cloud/google-cloud-platform-hybrid-management-4680c9fdf938 | ['Ferris Argyle'] | 2019-08-27 11:09:28.444000+00:00 | ['Hybrid Cloud', 'Google Cloud Platform', 'Cloud Computing', 'Kubernetes Engine'] |
Elizabeth Kagimbi: Stepping out of myself. | By Mwaniki Nyaga, KamiLimu Management Committee Member
Design provides us with choices to define ourselves. It is often hidden in places, within services and in business innovation. Nowadays, people are finding a deeper sense of identity, purpose and gratification through creating and maintaining connections, memories and experiences. Oftentimes, this cannot be derived only from material product purchases. Therefore, we have come from the idea that designers simply make appealing and usable components and products, to an appreciation that their work impacts the perception of entire brand and customer experiences, and beyond that — to making those experiences meaningful.
In this interview, Elizabeth Kagimbi, a User Experience (UX) Researcher and Product Designer specializing in Human Experience and Interface Design, shares her encounters with self-doubt, and lessons she has learnt as a researcher, multifaceted designer and mentor. At KamiLimu, Elizabeth is the UX Track professional mentor.
Elizabeth Kagimbi, Cohort 5.0 Professional Mentor.
Who is Elizabeth?
I’m a conceptualizer, a wannabe Disney director, and a low-key adrenaline junkie. I’m a creative at heart.
How do you feel this creativity expresses itself?
I draw and paint a lot, but for myself. Maybe one day when I’m retiring I’ll have a gallery showcase for my art. I animate too in my spare time. As a creative, there are times when I feel pressured or I have a lot of self-doubt. The painting and animating are primarily for my mental health: they relieve the pressure I experience whenever I have a bloated workload.
How did you arrive at experience design as your field of specialization?
Growing up, I wanted to study Medicine, not art. Disappointingly, I did not qualify to pursue Medicine after my final secondary school exams. A friend suggested that I should try out a course at Nairobits, a Digital Design School. Going in, I was looking forward to learning computer programming but this desire was not to be met immediately as I first had to learn about the fundamental principles of design. I enjoyed my time in the program tremendously, and during our final project presentations two years later, my first employer spotted my portfolio and invited me to interview for an internship. At the time, I had not settled on a particular aspect of design and you’d find me doing animation, graphic design, as well as coding web pages. During the internship, I was advised to combine my graphic design and animation skills to support the marketing team. Three years later, as a Junior Designer with the product and marketing team, I worked on a project to improve a brand’s product experience to include accessibility by the visually-impaired. The experience was quite eye-opening, and it made me question the authenticity of my designs and the reasoning behind them. It triggered my decision to move to a more user-centric design process where every design I did would be geared towards improving a situation faced by real people.
Did you need to learn what it means to design for people at that point?
It’s a continuous process. I’m grateful that throughout my career I’ve been surrounded by people who have allowed me to learn by making mistakes. I’ve come to realise that designing for people is a never-ending learning process: I started as an animator, realized that I needed to create usable products, which led me to take a human-centred design course with IDEO, after which I started to create impactful designs for actual people, and I began to both ask good questions that trigger emotions and hold conversations that give the right answers to the design challenge at hand. That’s how the process of learning and becoming has manifested itself in me.
What do you wish you knew about design when you started that you know now?
Three things. One, understanding the people I’m designing for is crucial. I need to learn their hopes, their fears and their needs. Two, my preferences and tastes are not always similar to those for whom I am designing. Three, I won’t always get it right on the first try. Initially, I thought I needed to be perfect and that I should get everything in the right place all at once. But I’ve come to see the good that comes out of iterating, seeing whether something works, asking for feedback and re-presenting the design in a new way.
On the second point, how are you able to separate your preferences from the design?
My first three years working were all about creating fancy designs that would please my ego. Six to seven years down the line, I saw that it wasn’t about me. Through respecting the process of being human-centred, I gradually grew out of the need to fulfil my ego.
Why did you want to be a mentor with KamiLimu?
When this opportunity landed on my table, I was a bit hesitant. The impostor syndrome kicked in: “I don’t think I’m there yet.” I didn’t believe I had enough experience to give proper advice or mentor. Through conversations with a lot of people, including some of my friends in design who have been mentors at KamiLimu, I realized that they believed I could do it. My mentor walked me through my previous work and achievements and the impact they have had over time, and, with that, I saw the need to share my experience with the mentees at KamiLImu.
What did you hope to achieve with your UX Track mentees?
I wanted them to know what it takes to be a designer; not only about the planning that goes into a look and feel but also the impact of a designed solution on both the people and the business. I also wanted to create awareness on why we should be empathetic as designers. I like to show designers that they are indeed talented, but also help them ask the why’s behind what they are doing; to create an environment where they are in-sync with their audience. I also hoped that they would have fun while doing their research!
What was your approach to their personal projects?
I decided to use IDEO’s Human Centred Design ideology, a creative approach for hands-on problem solving, as well as some aspects from The Design Council’s Double Diamond. Both methods entail building a deep empathy with the people you’re designing for, generating tonnes of ideas, building and sharing prototypes with the audience in order to learn from them and refine your concept for an eventual launch.
Were the mentees’ achievements in line with your hopes?
The process of becoming a good designer is a marathon, not a sprint. All my mentees have developed a certain level of confidence, enough to even apply for UX jobs. Their case studies had a level of detail that was incredibly humbling. I even shared them with my workmates and they were really impressed! They have all become more curious and more confident in their design skills and putting their design work out there. I attribute the positive mindset and attitude that the mentees have to KamiLimu. It was very evident in the ease with which they did their research and asked questions when in doubt. I can’t wait to see what they come up with in the group project!
How is your overall experience being an ICT Track mentor?
I’m so elated to have been picked to mentor. My experience has enabled me to do a lot of learning, especially in getting to know my mentees’ characters and capabilities. I have also relearnt ways of teaching, like dumping resources on people without clear guidance won’t result in productivity. And understanding where my mentees are coming from. I’d definitely do this again and also recommend it to other experience designers in the community!
What are you looking forward to doing or learning in life over the next year?
I want to improve my research skills. Remember, I started from a market-led industry which steered me to where I am now, in a user-centred industry. As a designer, I need to understand the data I collect and the psychology behind it. Therefore, I’ve started going down the path of data science research. I’m curious about how to understand customer insights, the process of data visualisation, and how to use statistics and Python to support the two. | https://medium.com/@kamilimu/elizabeth-kagimbi-stepping-out-of-myself-6966ea1ca546 | [] | 2020-12-20 10:42:01.871000+00:00 | ['Human Centered Design', 'Empathy', 'Kamilimu Ict Track', 'UX', 'Kamilimu'] |
Day-1 | Today is the first day of my 30 day challenge. The reasons why I started this challenge about it seemed interesting first then I thought I can improve my english writing skill during this challenge. So it’s quite helpful for me. The third reason is my winter break about to start overmorrow and I already started feeling lazy and bored. I think probably this challenge will make my life more interesting and brighter than now.
May you think what is the challenge I am talking about. This challenge means I ought to write a day event of my life daily but I can also write about any books, movie, people, animal or memories and poems either just if I want.
I am not really glad about my nowadays english skill. I’ve been want to improve it so long time. Today is the day I have to start my journal to get better english.
What I learned during quarantine? :)
This morning I woke up at 10am. I wanted to get up early as 8am but I couldn’t so. I’ve been really bad sleep cycle since quarantine started. I thought within sleep early and wake up early or sleep late and wake up late has no difference. But it has! My acne problems got worse than ever. Even though I’ve been sleep at least 7hours a day, I still feeling so tired and have no intention. Therefore I understood good sleep cycle is so important for my health.
Sorry for my bad English:\ hope it will got better when this challenge has finished. | https://medium.com/@indrakh/day-1-d21ece3d016 | [] | 2020-12-16 13:30:35.328000+00:00 | ['Монгол', 'Day', 'Challenge'] |
The journey of breaking a monolith into microservices | The world is moving from monolithic architecture to microservices architecture. For an organization with production legacy code to go down that path is a huge architecture decision and the opening shot of a very long journey. I’m not going to explain which architecture is the best for different cases, I trust that if you are already here you know what’s best for you.
Each organization has its own reason to move to microservices. The common ones are:
Faster adoption of new technologies.
Shorter release cycle.
Cloud scalability.
The reason can sometimes distract us from the whole picture and make us focus on specifics. That would be a mistake. When starting this journey, it’s recommended to have a high-level design of microservices architecture for the application with the understanding that the suggested design is answering the initial need. In other words, the main reason that led us to this change.
I was part of this journey more than once, and each time it’s a little different because each monolith is one of a kind. But there are still a lot of similarities between the cases. This can be translated into guidelines for the journey.
Decoupling
Usually, the high-level design will reflect the business logic components from the existing monolith. At this point you’re probably saying to yourself, “the monolith is well designed, we have a high-level design for microservices that reflects that, what’s the big deal here?” Well, it’s not that simple.
A monolith, no matter how well designed and how well coded, is by nature two sources of coupling.
Common code between the different components
Usually, a monolith will have an area in the code that won’t contain business logic, it will contain utilities. When talking about utility codes that are in common use between multi components, we’re not talking about microservices candidates, but on potential libraries.
The main difficulty with decoupling the common code is that in many cases this code area becomes a black hole for “lost code” and this black hole situation has a huge effect on the decoupling process.
I saw common code packages with no boundaries at all and in other cases some of the common code was not part of the original design and it’s just “thrown around”. Before starting to extract a library out of a monolith, it’s very important to define what the responsibilities of this library are and to find the coupling points of the current code.
Blurring boundaries — the code is at the wrong location
The meaning of blurring boundaries is, on the one hand, that one business logic component uses abilities of another component (instead of moving this ability to the common area) and on the second hand that the common code implements different behaviors depending on the caller (instead of one generic behavior and implementing of the different behaviors on the caller side).
Before starting to take a component out to a microservice, we MUST understand where it’s coupled with other components or with the common code. If we’ll find the coupling points after we started the process, it will harm the project timeline. It may cause a change in the original design, an extra unplanned effort or even the understanding that it will be better to postpone the current microservice development and start with some pre-requisite. Imagine that you are having a surgery in a hospital and at some point during the process the doctor realized that the analysis was wrong and now you need two more surgeries, one to fix the damage from the current redundant surgery and another in order to fix the original issue. So, in this analogy we are the doctors and the code is our patient. Let’s treat it well.
The coupling points are like dependencies between components. Therefore, after you have the full coupling picture, create a coupling chart for yourself (the same as you would do for a dependencies chart) so it will be easy to plan the journey.
For example:
Let’s take Service A as an example. If I would just start and implement Service A, without the coupling chart, during the development process I would find out that I need Libs 1&2. If I would find the way to squeeze it in my schedule, Lib 3 will surprise me on the way and then Lib 4. All of these surprises will increase the project estimation a lot and maybe will also cause changes in the original design.
What I would like to do here is to start from Service A dependencies that doesn’t have any coupling with other dependencies (Lib 1 & Lib 4), then go backward, step-by-step, on the chart until you can implement the microservice. Some of the work can be done in parallel if all are ready in time for integration.
Following this method, for a scenario when the microservices priority for us is Service A > Service C > Service B, the implementation order will be very simple:
Lib 1 & Lib 4 -> Lib 3 -> Lib 2 -> Service A -> Lib 5 -> Service C -> Service B
Remember that in a real-life scenario, you’ll probably have much more services and libraries to analyze and implement. However, the similarities will be that for the first microservices you’ll need to implement a mass of libraries and it will get thinner with time because as long as you go into this journey, you’ll have more “ready to use” libraries.
New functionality
After the starting point of this journey, there is no turning back. Therefore, if the journey is already started and we want to new code into our application we need to be clever about it.
If it’s new functionality, it’s highly recommended to take this opportunity and add a new microservice to the architecture. This new microservice can be responsible for this new functionality only or for other existing responsibilities (to break out of the monolith) if it makes sense. Implement the new functionality will increase the coupling points inside the monolith and will make it more complicated to break it out in the future.
If it’s a new utility for the common code, the consideration is the same, just replace microservice with a library.
If it’s a bug fix, do it in the monolith. No harm will happen.
Conclusion
Breaking a monolith is a long and complicated journey with surprises along the way. All we can do to make it easier is to avoid surprises as much as we can by planning. Remember the main goal, at some point the monolith will go away and we’ll have an application built from microservices only. | https://medium.com/@guyheimann/the-journey-of-breaking-a-monolith-into-microservices-116cff4dde5e | ['Guy Heimann'] | 2020-12-28 12:08:01.146000+00:00 | ['Monolith', 'Decoupling', 'Microservices', 'Software Architecture'] |
不知道自己在金門買屋好嗎？那些房屋稅，你都瞭解嗎？ | in Both Sides of the Table | https://medium.com/compwm/%E4%B8%8D%E7%9F%A5%E9%81%93%E8%87%AA%E5%B7%B1%E5%9C%A8%E9%87%91%E9%96%80%E8%B2%B7%E5%B1%8B%E5%A5%BD%E5%97%8E-%E9%82%A3%E4%BA%9B%E6%88%BF%E5%B1%8B%E7%A8%85-%E4%BD%A0%E9%83%BD%E7%9E%AD%E8%A7%A3%E5%97%8E-4c85b0b436cc | ['Tony Zeng'] | 2019-06-27 04:19:29.668000+00:00 | ['房屋', '投資', '買房', '理財', '金門'] |
How to get the most out of a mentorship program as a mentor or mentee | Originally posted on F-Secure’s blog: https://blog.f-secure.com/how-to-get-the-most-out-of-a-mentorship-program-as-a-mentor-or-mentee/
I have been privileged to be part of mentorship programs from varying perspectives, from being a mentee, mentor, to an organizer. The first time I took part in a mentorship program was in 2017 as a mentee. It was at a time when I was looking to transition from Academia to Industry and I wanted to network and get guidance in my transition process.
I got matched to a lady who was the head of an IT department at a transportation company. Although the relationship didn’t last long, she gave me valuable insights that I still carry with me today. She helped me improve my cover letter as well as my CV by pointing out that I needed to always communicate value and results rather than listing the responsibilities that I had. And to try as best as I could to put that value in numbers, which was not an easy thing to do with academic positions.
That additional perspective plus experience is what mentorship programs offer. Mentorship programs, when done well, allow you to reflect on how you work and find ways to improve yourself.
Fast forward to 2020, I am now part of another mentorship program, an internal program at my workplace that is meant for all the Fellows (F-Secure employees) across all the different units and offices where we operate. In this program, I got to participate as an organizer, a mentor, and a mentee. I learned something new and valuable in each of those roles and I wanted to share some of these learnings.
Naturally, both the mentee and mentor have to be ready to commit to the process. It usually helps to have a written agreement signed by both to show this commitment. Once you do decide to commit, here are some tips or guidelines.
As a Mentee:
Understand that you are the driver of the relationship. It’s your responsibility to set up the expectations, arrange the mentoring meetings, the meeting frequency, etc.
Understand that the mentor is not there to do the work for you. You are responsible for your development. This means you should also say when it’s not going well.
Set a realistic goal and communicate it well to the mentor. I find it useful and more valuable to set a goal that challenges you and will have an impact on you once you go through the program. For example, as I shared earlier, I had the goal of transitioning from academia to industry. This was a challenging goal which has had a huge impact on my career .
Depending on the length of the program, break that goal into few manageable and measurable objectives and try to tackle one at a time over one or two meetings. In my last mentoring program, which lasted over 5 months, I had 3 objectives and the mentor also had 3 objectives. And we tried to tackle one objective in each meeting.
Prepare for the meetings, that way you and the mentor get the most out of the meetings. Even though the meetings can have the atmosphere of a casual chat rather than a serious meeting, preparing a focus for each meeting helps in achieving the objectives. I usually agreed on the agenda of the next session at the end of each meeting. Preparing or giving a purpose to each meetup also reduces the common feeling of meetings of “I am wasting the mentor’s time”.
Lastly, try to include personal topics for discussion and fun activities, this way you will get to build a more open and trustful relationship.
As a Mentor:
As a mentor, you are usually there to guide and not be a problem solver. It’s easy especially for technically orientated persons to be problem solvers, but the idea is to help your mentee figure out the solution. This is also where good listening skills come in handy.
Put in the effort and take time to also prepare. You shouldn’t be too comfortable that you are the one with the knowledge and that you are just going to pass it on. It’s best to learn how your mentee learns and adapt your guiding process to them. You have to learn how to transition from being an expert to a leader.
Get rid of the imposter syndrome — I remember when someone asked me to be a mentor, my first thought was “was I qualified enough to be someone’s mentor?” and I have heard many mentors ask themselves this. Key is to be confident that you are in the position you are in for a reason and that you have something to contribute to a person who wishes to grow. Have healthy confidence in your abilities.
Have and show empathy — Be able to put yourself in your mentee’s shoes and see whether the advice you give relates to that person. For instance, if your mentee is in some way disadvantaged it doesn’t help to tell them,” work hard”, without taking into account or discussing the existence of possible structural barriers that prevent that person from advancing as they would like, no matter how hard they work.
Lastly, set your own objectives in the program. I feel that that helps build a more mutually beneficial relationship.
I just also recently started participating in another mentorship program. This one is a cross company program where people from different companies are paired together. Under this program, I will be focusing on developing myself as a more valuable and insight-focused data scientist (more on that to come) and I will surely be applying many of the above tips.
Write and let us know what other tips you have. | https://medium.com/@mdoucem/how-to-get-the-most-out-of-a-mentorship-program-as-a-mentor-or-mentee-fc148ad4c68b | ['Myriam Munezero'] | 2020-12-21 23:56:35.088000+00:00 | ['Mentor', 'Mentee', 'F Secure', 'Mentorship'] |
Written Tales Writers Group | Writers
Written Tales Writers Group
Come join us on mewe
Photo by Andraz Lazic on Unsplash
With the current censorship on Facebook, Twitter, and other social platforms, Written Tales can no longer tolerate or support it. We created this print and online magazine to defend free speech where readers and writers connect through writing.
Anyone who believes what’s happening is not an issue, then they better rethink where they sit. Speech is a fundamental right that separates us from dictator nations. Once they silence one side, the other is next. Read history; it repeats.
Most writers fail to realize is under socialist or communist regimes, the creative arts are the first removed. Writers are executed or locked away. Look into the Gulag, and you will be astonished at the numbers of writers and poets silenced as political prisoners (1). Some died. Their crime? They spoke out.
This is not about right vs. left or Biden vs. Trump. If you believe it is, you are foolishly naive and bought into the propaganda hook, line, and sinker. Without getting full-blown political, I leave it where it is.
One last note, many in the mainstream media and social platforms are lying outright about the owner of Mewe. To set it straight, here are the words directly from him. Please meet us on mewe where we can all enjoy lively chat, wonderful articles, and tips to help you get promoted and your work recognized. Free speech is free speech and not censored speech. | https://medium.com/written-tales/written-tales-writers-group-769b66791790 | [] | 2020-11-14 01:12:23.186000+00:00 | ['Poetry', 'Writers On Writing', 'Fiction', 'Short Story', 'Writing Tips'] |
The .3 Percent THC Threshold Hurts Our Hemp Farmers | Despite the wild west stage hemp is currently running through, the versatile crop is here to stay. From fiber, to extraction, to smokable flower, 465,787 acres of hemp were planted across the United States in 2020, according to Hemp Industry Daily. While that is a very large stash, more than a few farmers have had their crops go up in smoke…and not in a good way.
For example, USA Today, reported, “ About 13% of Iowa farmers’ hemp fields had to be fully or partially destroyed because the THC levels in the plants exceeded 0.3%, the maximum allowed under state and federal laws.”
According to the USDA interim final rule enacted on October 31, 2019, “ the term “hemp” means the plant species Cannabis sativa L. and any part of that plant, including the seeds thereof and all derivatives, extracts, cannabinoids, isomers, acids, salts, and salts of isomers, whether growing or not, with a delta-9 tetrahydrocannabinol concentration of not more than 0.3 percent on a dry weight basis.” Under federal law, anything above .3 percent is considered marijuana.
With the vast majority of hemp grown outside, thousands of variables can affect how the plant will produce THC. In an article published by Terpenes and Testing Magazine, “ THC and other cannabinoids are plant defense mechanisms, and cannabis responds to environmental stress with decisive chemical action.” It is also worth noting genetics also play a role in how a plant will produce THC. Farmers should always throughly research which strains they will choose to plant.
Iowa isn’t the only state watching its crops go up in smoke. This is an issue farmers in every state face. Besides battling pests, the weather, and a million other factors, farmers have to battle the plants themselves in order to remain compliant with already outdated laws.
There is a push from dozens of groups to raise the legal THC limit to 1 percent. Everything from financial damage to farmers to how the extraction process and the THC percentage correlate has been cited as reasons to change the legal limit.
However, there is hope for the hemp sector of the cannabis industry. In early December, the House passed the MORE Act, which, if passed by the Senate, will decriminalize marijuana. This could open up the door needed to raising the THC limit for legal hemp.
The hemp industry is growing, but the .3 percent THC threshold is hurting our farmers. The current threshold puts farmers at unnecessary risk of losing their otherwise healthy crop. Without reasonable boundaries, the industry’s growth is restricted. Thankfully, the current research within the industry is helping to provide valuable information used to change outdated legislation. Only through education and research will we pull hemp out of its wild west stage into a new era. | https://medium.com/@thehempbitch/the-3-percent-thc-threshold-hurts-our-hemp-farmers-30d4a7d40868 | [] | 2020-12-15 19:45:32.450000+00:00 | ['Thc', 'Opinion', 'Farming', 'Hemp Farming', 'Hemp'] |
Living Visual | Living Visual
a free-flow photo manifesto
Today the world is emotionally active, but even more impatient. The digitation increases, the physical disengagement grows. What emerges from this fragmented reality? Inconsistency. There’s a fabrication embedded into the general experience, playing out like a flawed story line…
… made up of all peaks and no valleys.
But lighten your heart. This is the world’s pattern, not yours.
Learn to observe it from afar, and be at peace with your own valleys. Know their heart rate. Start to see the long-term vision. Sense yourself, and observe this ‘living visual’. It will change as you do, in the present.
Each day you choose to engage with the living visual, you will cultivate a gradual incline. Move past the trappings of premature, reward-laden expectations. Follow a natural consistency, inspired by the willingness to grow your sense of concentration and gratitude.
Life will be difficult. It will interrupt you, it will hurt you. It will burden your spirit, exhaust your consistency. But only in moments. Let them pass through you at their own speed. Then pause and drift… drift into purpose. | https://medium.com/snap-shots/living-visual-764a3251b353 | [] | 2020-04-23 23:27:59.797000+00:00 | ['Nature', 'Life Lessons', 'Meditation', 'Perspective', 'Photography'] |
Why Am I Poor? What To Do When You Are Tired of Struggling Financially | Why am I poor? People ask me this question all the time.
Honestly, it is a tough question to answer because there are so many variables — very few people are poor because of one specific action. Often I’ve found that when people want to stop being poor they have to address multiple issues. To further complicate things, most of these issues are intertwined which means you have to be making multiple changes at the same time.
What this also means that if you want to stop asking why you are always poor there are multiple ways to begin addressing your money issues and multiple ways of fixing your problems.
Often I’ve found that if you can find one of two problems areas to address as you work to fix those areas the other smaller money issues will begin resolving themselves.
I’m also a firm believer in the fact that being poor is often a mindset issue. I know a lot of people who are poor on the books who actually do great financially. When you choose to manage your money rather than have it manage you most people can begin to make substantial process in their personal finances.
1. Why you may be poor — You constantly overspend!
If you can’t learn to control your spending you are always going to be poor. I say this because I know personally.
I enjoy spending money.
I love the rush of finding a good deal and having cute fun clothing and all the other junk we waste money on.
There have been multiple times in my life when I’ve had to ban myself from certain stores to keep myself from spending money. Even though our finances have stabilized, I still avoid Target and Costco.
Those two stores are my weakness. I can always find something I “need” when I’m there.
The best way to control your spending is to avoid situations that you know will trigger your spending. If you have problem stores, stop shopping there.
Another option is to leave your credit card at home and only shop with cash. It sucks when you find an amazing deal, but it keeps you from overspending.
If you want to stop being broke, you have to learn to control your spending.
2. Why you may be poor — You don’t follow a budget
Ahhh, the dreaded B word. Seriously though, budgeting isn’t as bad as people make it out to be. When I finally started budgeting — and doing it right — I felt like I got a raise.
I seriously save so much money when I’m actively budgeting and paying attention to my money.
What I really like about having a budget is the control it gives me.
I set a budget at the beginning of the month and then I control where I’m spending my money. I don’t let my desires for stuff control my spending (or at least I try to control it).
The best part about budgeting is watching your savings account start to build. You won’t be poor when you can begin putting a little bit of money aside each month. It really is life changing when you learn to budget and do it right.
If you are struggling to budget and save money one of the easiest ways to cheat the system I’ve found is to sign up for a DIGIT account (Affiliate Link). DIGIT automatically transfers small amounts of money from your account to a separate savings account. I started using Digit almost a year ago and already have almost $7,000 saved.
3. Why you may be poor — You waste your time!
You are probably wondering why this is on a financial blog. Here is the deal, you will never get ahead financially if you are constantly wasting time.
#toughlove — if you know every detail of what is happening on The Bachelor/Bachelorette, but haven’t read a book or listened to a podcast lately you are wasting time.
I’m not saying don’t veg out occasionally, but if that is all you do with your free time you are wasting a ton of time for self-improvement. Lack of self-improvement is one of the biggest reasons that people are poor.
Think about it this way. If you spent an extra 30 minutes working out each day, how much quicker would you get into shape and lose the extra ten pounds you have been struggling with for 2 years (yah that is me!)?
It would happen real quick.
The same goes for your job situation. If you spend an extra 30 minutes a day working on your job skills how quickly would you get the promotion? What if you spend an extra 30 minutes a day on educational training? What about 30 minutes reading a good book?
One of the reasons that people are poor is because they won’t even spend 30 minutes a week reviewing their finances and coming up with a plan.
What I’m trying to say, is if you just focus even a short amount of your free time on self-improvement I can guarantee that you’ll start making more money (especially if you start a side-hustle).
Find the one thing that causes you to waste time and do something about it. For me, it is social media. I love hopping on Facebook or Instagram. Thirty minutes later when I come up for air, I get so frustrated with myself. I finally started setting a timer before going on social media.
How do you waste your time? Comment below, so I know I’m not the only person!
Your goal over the next couple of weeks is to carefully look at how you spend your time. Find the number one time suck and do your best to eliminate it. Then keep going down your list and gradually work through all of your negative habits.
One of the best ways I’ve found to overcome my negative habits (always a work in process) check out this Free Downloadable Habit Tracker.
Remember being poor is more about your attitude and mindset then your money. There is a difference between being broke and poor!
Wasting some time is okay, but the goal is to make sure that the time you waste is minimal and is controlled by you, not your subconscious mind.
4. Why you may be poor — You spend too much money going out!
Spending money on entertainment is a great way to end up poor. Look back over your spending for the last three months. How much money did you spend on:
Dining out/socializing
Movies
Alcohol
Parties in general
Gambling
Take-out food (because you hate cooking like me)
Sporting events
Coffee/treats
Smoking
I’m not saying that any of these things are bad. I’m just saying that they need to happen in moderation.
If you are poor and struggling to pay your bills you need to be looking at the extra’s in your life and making some major changes.
Everyone needs a little bit of time to relax and have fun. The trick is to do it in moderation! When our entertainment budget starts to get out of control we sit down at the beginning of each week and reprioritize our activities.
Over the years, we’ve had to learn to say no. It isn’t always fun, but you can’t do every social activity you are invited too.
One of the ways I’ve tried to cut my spending is by finding inexpensive hobbies. Inexpensive hobbies are great since they keep you occupied, but hey they are inexpensive ways to enjoy your time. Check out this list of 100 inexpensive hobbies to get started.
5. Why you may be poor — You have overspent on a house or car!
Have you heard the term, house poor? This refers to the fact that you have a huge house payment that you can’t afford.
I’d much rather have a small house and have the extra cash then a huge house that is costing me all my money.
I’ve seen the same thing with cars. I’m sorry, but if you are making $40,000 a year then you shouldn’t be buying a car that is worth $40,000.
Overspending on cars and homes can put you in the poor house quicker than anything else I know.
This one is often a two-step process. Most of us have already gotten ourselves into trouble in this area, so the first step is to take steps to correct our current problems. This may mean radical choices like selling a current vehicle, even if you are underwater and purchasing a beater.
I’m a firm believer in running my car’s into the ground. We finally broke down and purchased a new truck, but until 3 months ago, our three other vehicles all had over 200,000 miles.
It may mean taking the steps to sell a home and do some major downsizing. Everyone is in their own situation so you’ll need to do your own assessment. Here is a standard rule of thumb though. Your housing costs shouldn’t be more than 25% of your take-home income and you shouldn’t have vehicles that are worth more then you make in a year.
Related Post: How To Avoid Overspending on Your Home Mortgage
If you fall into any of these situations it is time to do some major downsizing. It will suck, but your pocketbook will thank you later.
6. Why you may be poor — You ignore your money issues!
It is super easy to think that if you ignore your money issues that they will go away. I’ve tried it — it doesn’t work.
You just get poorer when you ignore your financial problems.
This is a whole lot easier said than done, but honestly, you have to face facts. Take a deep dive into your finances and then make a plan. Don’t just go surface level. Look at your spending patterns, look at your debt, look at your budget, look at your personal habits? You have to ask yourself over and over again, why you are poor?
What behaviors do you have that are causing you to remain poor and continually make poor financial decisions?
Until you can be honest with yourself and face facts you will continue to be poor.
One of the best things you can do is to create a personal financial plan. This link will take you to an article I wrote with a free downloadable personal financial template.
7. Why you may be poor — You don’t understand the power of interest!
Interest can either make your very very poor or very very rich. The question is will you be paying interest or earning interest.
You will always be poor if you are constantly paying interest. Debt is the biggest tax you will ever pay and honestly poor people tend to pay a disproportionate amount of interest. If you have poor credit you will end up paying higher rates on everything. Also as a poor person, you tend to finance more purchases. Unfortunately, a lot of these purchases are items that you should be paying for in cash which makes the situation worst.
There is nothing wrong with liking and purchasing quality products, the trick is to do it responsibly. You have to find the balance between your budget and the products you want/need.
I’m a firm believer in cutting costs in some areas so that you can spend more in other areas. For example, I’m a huge outdoor nut and I like having quality outdoor gear. However, I’m not a huge fashion person, so my regular clothing is purchased at discount stores so that I can use the money on outdoor gear instead.
Spending is all about making informed spending decisions rather than purchasing items on a whim.
If all else fails and you just can’t seem to control your spending then you probably need to take drastic steps and cut your credit cards up. I’ve had friends who didn’t want to cut them so they froze their credit cards in a block of ice.
Be creative and find ways to cut your spending!
9. Why you may be poor — You are underemployed!
Being underemployed is the worst! Unfortunately, it is an easy trap to fall into. Sometimes we are just desperate for jobs, so we take whatever we can get. Sometimes we get trapped in dead-end jobs. Sometimes you just outgrow a job. There are tons of reasons you can be underemployed.
Being underemployed will definitely keep you poor. When you are underemployed you tend to underperform as well. It is hard to stay motivated when you don’t feel appreciated or are making decent money.
I’m a firm believer in the fact that you should constantly be trying to improve your job situation. At times this means growing within your own company. Other times it means searching for a new job. Depending on your mindset it may also be time to branch out on your own and go the entrepreneurial route.
Every situation is different, but often starting a side hustle to earn a little bit of extra money can solve the underemployed situation.
10. Why you may be poor — You have a scarcity mentality!
Having a scarcity mentality is often a quality attributed to “poor” people. This isn’t super politically correct, but I believe that when you have a scarcity mentality it leads to a poor attitude which typically leads to becoming poor.
If you don’t believe you can succeed then why should anyone else? It will affect your job prospects, it will affect your spending. A poor attitude literally impacts every aspect of your life.
I know that many people have reason to believe in the scarcity mindset. If this is you, I’m so sorry for the constant negativity in your life and for the many things that have caused you financial issues (often outside of your control). I get it, life sucks at times.
Here is the deal though, if that is your attitude you’ll never be able to get ahead. Turning your thought process around is crazy difficult, but you have to make the choice today to dump the scarcity mentality. You have to decide that you are going to start cutting costs, you are going to find ways of making extra money and you are going to start paying yourself first.
If you want to stop asking “Why Am I Poor?” then you need to change your financial habits
You don’t have to be poor, you may be broke occasionally, but you don’t need to be poor. I know that when money is tight and you feel like the world is collapsing around you it is hard to even breath let alone change your money habits.
When you are struggling financially literally all of your time is spent trying to keep your head above water and end up even poorer. I’ve been there, it is really rough, but you are the only one that can pull yourself out of your financial hole.
If you look at this list and feel completely overwhelmed (which is normal), then take a deep breath and start working on one step. Work on one step for 1–2 weeks and then gradually add another step to the mix.
Don’t expect to change your financial picture overnight. It took us 5 long years of sacrifice to pay off $293,000 in debt. I still owe $102,000 on my home and we’ve now been aggressively paying down our debt for almost nine years.
Here is the deal though, if we had never started our debt free journey 9 years ago I can guarantee that we would be really really poor right now.
We had to work on every single one of these steps (usually multiple times). We messed up (check out this post on when I completely blew our budget), but we got back up and restarted the process multiple times.
We aren’t rich, but I no longer consider myself poor and for the most part, we don’t struggle financially as much anymore. It took us a long time, but I just want you to know that it is possible to get your finances in order and begin reducing your debt. You can do it!
If you have any questions or need help to get started feel free to email me or leave a note in the comment sections. I’d love to hear how much debt you have and what steps you are taking to get out of debt and stop being poor!
This article is for informational purposes only, it should not be considered Financial or Legal Advice. Not all information will be accurate. Consult a financial professional before making any major financial decisions | https://themakingofamillionaire.com/why-am-i-poor-what-to-do-when-you-are-tired-of-struggling-financially-8def09610df9 | ['Amy Esplin White'] | 2019-02-16 15:39:09.277000+00:00 | ['Personal Finance', 'Money Mindset', 'Poor', 'Money Management', 'Money'] |
A Comparative Analysis between Generator expressions and List Comprehensions | In Python Framework we can either use generators or list comprehensions to solve many coding requirements, however, a very simplistic classification can be made when to use a generator expression or when to use list comprehensions.
If our focus is to optimize memory or we need our code to consume less memory to store its intermediate results we can use generator expressions instead of list comprehensions(Evidence is clearly visible in the below with explanation).
import sys
list_square=[i**2 for i in range(5)]
gene_sq=(i*i for in in range(5))
print(sys.getsizeof(list_square)) — — This will give the output as 120
print(sys.getsizeof(gene_sq)) — — This will give the output as 112
Reason — Generators use the lazy iterator unlike the normal list which do not store their contents in memory as conventional list object does.
Now, List comprehension has an advantage over generator expressions when computation speed is taken into consideration.
To summarize list comprehensions are faster to evaluate than generator expressions we will see by using a sum function on both List and generator object respectively(Below is the evidence via statistics).
import cProfile
cProfile.run(‘sum([i ** 2 for i in range(10000)])’)
The Output is below:-
5 function calls in 0.007 seconds
import cProfile
cProfile.run(‘sum((i * *2 for i in range(10000)))’)
The Output is below:-
10005 function calls in 0.010 seconds
Clearly we can observe the computation time taken for sum function to complete on a list is 0.007 seconds and the time taken to complete the same sum function on a generator expression is 0.010 seconds.
Thus, if memory is a factor then generator expressions are useful, however if performance is a factor then list comprehensions are a better choice respectively. | https://medium.com/@guru-pattnayak/a-comparative-analysis-between-generator-expressions-and-list-comprehensions-85b3325cdde0 | ['Guru Pattnayak'] | 2020-12-17 18:23:49.448000+00:00 | ['Python Generators', 'Python List Comprehension', 'Python Programming'] |
RANKING ALL THIRTY EIGHT 2018 HORROR FILMS I SAW THIS YEAR | Happy 2019! Here’s a recap of every single 2018 horror movie I was able to watch this past year. Next to each quick recap, you’ll notice a link to either a podcast, video or written review on each one I was able to review this year as well.
Horror had another great year in 2018, capped off by the legendary hype leading up to the return of horror icon Michael Myers. The genre is killing it on all fronts, be it theatrical, VOD, streaming or television. It’s a great time to be a demented fucker. Enjoy it my bloodthirsty friends!
38. Open House
Nothing. Happened. For nearly two goddamn hours. Then in the end….NOTHING HAPPENED. (Full Written Review)
37. Tremors: A Cold Day In Hell
“There is an idea of a Tremors: A Cold Day In Hell; some kind of abstraction. But there is no real movie: only an entity, something illusory. And though I can hide its cold /gaze, and you can check Netflix and feel flesh gripping the remote and maybe you can even sense it and the original are probably comparable… it simply is not there.” This is me using American Psycho to admit I can’t remember a goddamn thing about this movie.
36. High Voltage
Despite my deep love and respect for David Arquette and Luke Wilson…Seriously, who has pictures of them doing awful things to hookers? They deserve better.
35. The First Purge
Oh, so the good guy we’re supposed to admire and root for is a drug kingpin who turned his hometown into a cocaine toilet? Cool. (Full Podcast Review)
34. Truth or Dare
For some reason this particular version of bubble gum high school horror didn’t piss me off as bad as a film like The Gallows. There was a certain spirit to it that made Truth or Dare not all that un-enjoyable. (Full Podcast Review)
33. The Nun
Man, that Nun is scary AF! Let’s make a National Treasure sequel with her! (Full Video Review)
32. You Might Be The Killer
Meta horror can be fun but not when you get too cute with it. (Much love for Fran Cranz and Alyson Hannigan though)
31. The Meg
Mindless and entertaining enough. The Meg just needed a splash of horror here, an R rating there and a bit more…well….balls. (Full Video Review)
30. The Ranger
A punk horror slasher with a kick ass premise. (Full Written Review)
29. Summer of 84
Way too late and repetitive on the whole 80’s kids and bike riding nostalgia wave but that ending was a nice touch. (Full Video Review)
28. Apostle
For Gods Sake people, choose a storyline and end the fucking movie already! I’ve never went from frightened to napping so fast in my life.
27. Bird Box
Oh shit, dude. We forgot to put the CGI monsters in the movie! Ah fuck it, we’ll just make them invisible and pretend we did it on purpose.
26. CAM
Rad sex horror with a charming lead actress is awesome. I also like endings and explanations though.
25. The Predator
Forty percent the hilarious, badass flick we all had hoped for. The other sixty percent kind of smells like Bigfoot’s dick. (Full Video Review)
24. Terrifier
Bitch, you nasty. You’re good…….but you nasty. (Full Video Review)
23. Mom and Dad
Would have paid the ticket price for the Nicolas Cage mid-life crisis rant alone. (Full Written Review)
22. Insidious: The Last Key
I have a soft spot for Insidious movies and Lin Shaye. There’s just more edge to these movies than anything in the Conjuring universe. (Full Video Review)
21. Hellraiser: Judgement
The biggest surprise of the year and better than it had any right to be. Especially given what they had to work with. (Full Video Review)
20. Looking Glass
I’m the only one on earth who saw this Nicolas Cage movie about a hotel voyeur caught up in a murder investigation. Damn shame, because I liked it a lot. (Full Written Review)
19. Puppet Master: The Littlest Reich
Bitch, you nasty part II. This was fun. (Full Video Review)
18. The Night Eats The World
What can we change in our zombie film that will make anyone in the world want to watch another zombie film? Meh, let’s just make them completely silent…… AND IT WORKS.
17. You Were Never Really Here
I love Joaquin Phoenix and this was well made with quick, visceral violence that reminded me of Drive…. but will you please stop fucking mumbling and staring at the floor?
16. Annihilation
There was a lot of unnecessary hubbub getting to the good stuff…. but that bear scene haunts my fucking dreams. (Full Written Review)
15. The Ritual
The Blair Witch Project without the annoyances of found footage. The ending is fascinating…..if it had made sense, The Ritual could’ve touched greatness. (Full Written Review)
14. Revenge
If Nicolas Winding Refn ever made a straight up rape/revenge story it would look like this. EVERYONE BLEEDS SO MUCH.
13. Terrified
The REC of 2018. Wear your brown pants.
12. Unfriended: Dark Web
Why is desktop horror so weirdly satisfying? (Full Video Review)
11. The Cleaning Lady
This stalker flick with a twist has an gnarly spirit about it. There are multiple “oh shit” moments people will be talking about once this flick finds distribution. (Full Written Review)
10. Hell Fest
This is probably not the tenth best horror film to come out this year. Matter of fact, I’ll guarantee it isn’t…but this is my list dammit and this is my tenth favorite horror film of 2018. It was just so nice to see a 90’s style slasher film NOT tied to any previous franchise released on the big screen. The twist at the end was a well crafted microcosm of the entire film. Simple and fun. The entire layout was a natural nostalgia trip to the days of the late 90’s and early 2000’s when Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer by-products were all the rage. We don’t need to relive the entire period but a fun two hour trip was nice.
9. Mandy
I’m well aware of how much higher this will be on most lists. This wasn’t even crazy Cage. This was frenzy Cage. On an unholy level of awesome. Mandy delivered some of the best scenes of the year in any genre. Moments of pure unfiltered cocaine Cage and a macaroni cheddar goblin aside; the first half of the film suffers a bit from the same disease as last years batshit (but fun) film, The Void. There’s a lot of visual meandering that doesn’t feel like it necessarily adds anything substantial to the story line. The parts here are ultimately better than the whole…..but some of the parts were balls on fire awesome. (Full Video Review)
8. The Clovehitch Killer
Dylan Mcdermott will never get the praise he deserves for this role and that’s a goddamn shame. He completely sheds his normal cool dude skin for an awkward sodie pop fueled nerd dad who may or may not be the next BTK. The Clovehitch Killer takes what My Friend Dahmer attempted last year and dunks that shit; Asking not only the question of “What’s it like to know a serial killer?”but “What if my perfectly normal parent is a torturous sexual deviant serial killer whom my entire town is obsessed with?” A fantastic film for those interested in the nuances of serial killer psyche and true crime in general. (Full Video Review)
7. A Quiet Place
Something about the marketing for A Quiet Place hit the perfect mark between “this shit is scary” and “you can take the whole family to see it”. For example, when I saw this in theaters there was an older couple. The type that you were surprised to see in an horror movie audience. At one point the loud whispering lady leaned over and said to her husband “You know, they are married in real life.” To which he hilariously leaned over and replied “SHHHHHHHHHHHH”. I still laugh about this when I think about it. The kind of cute dismissive old man moment you don’t get in most horror auditoriums. Everyone seemed to love A Quiet Place and for good reason. John Krasinski and Emily Blount delivered an entertaining horror experience that even made us cry and maybe shit our pants once or twice. (Full Video Review)
6. The House That Jack Built
If an art house film and serial killer biopic became a movie Megazord it’d be The House That Jack Built. This is one of the greatest serial killer films I’ve ever seen. It’s the closest thing to the depraved genius of American Psycho I’ve witnessed. It’s my favorite performance by an actor (Matt Dillon) this entire year. Eventually, the artsy side of Jack hijacks the wheel and we veer into self important Lars Von Trier-ville but that isn’t enough to fuck up my fascination with Mr. Sophistication. (Full Video Review)
5. Unsane
Most of the time movies drop in January because they are unworthy pieces of hot salad poop. Sounds disgusting, I know. Unsane came out during that month of early movie darkness and as a result no-one speaks of it. Well, here I fucking am! This Steve Soderbergh film turns out to be a great stalker film based on paranoia and imprisonment. Two of the worst ways to describe your career choice, but hey if the shoe fits; kill yourself with it. Wait, what were we talking about again? Bonus points for super slasher film vibes towards the end. (Full Written Review)
4. Overlord
Overlord was too cool for all of us. That’s the only possibility I can fathom for why it didn’t do better at the box office. Bad marketing perhaps? The DREDDcurse strikes again! (Drops to knees, screams “KARL URBAN!!!” at the sky whilst crying). Either way, Overlord finds a spot in not only the top five horror movies of the year, but top five action also. All the rad makings of a fun B-movie built to look like a summer blockbuster. A blast from start to bloody end. It actually would have been my favorite action film of the year if it weren’t for Mission Impossible: Fallout.
3. Hereditary
Hereditary not only boasts this years Oscar winner for best lead actress (if only the Academy voters watched horror or movies) but it also pulled off a legendary movie rope-a-dope. If you’re a fan of boxing or the film Broken Arrow, you’ll know the rope-a-dope as a basic fake out of your opponent. You show them the left, then knock them out with the right. Hereditary gives you a deep, dark look at loss and grief. A lot of dark family drama with smooth little moments of subtle horror. It is then, while you are weak and emotional; that it kicks you in the throat, lights you on fire and throws you out of a window. It even calls you a bitch on your way down. Hereditary follows all this up with a smart, occult ending that will have you thinking, talking and seeing old people wieners dangle. That last part wasn’t a positive. Scariest movie of the year? Yes. (Full Podcast Review)
2. The Strangers: Prey At Night
Again, not saying this is the second best horror film made in 2018. Not even the scariest. I do feel like it’s the funnest. The crew behind Prey At Night took what most thought would be a terrible cash grab follow up to the original home invasion film, flipped the script and walked away slowly as it exploded most bodaciously behind them. (Full Video Review)
1. HALLOWEEN
The crews behind Halloween pulled off the impossible. Not that they brought back Jamie Lee Curtis after so many years away from the franchise. Nor that FX artist Christopher Nelson created a universally beloved mask for Michael; A task that has escaped so many before him. Not that the writers and director were able to live in cohesion among nostalgia and creativity. Not that new Michael Myers actor James Jude Courtney mastered the nuances of Nick Castle’s 1978 movements which others can barely even explain verbally, much less recreate. No, it’s that the crew behind Halloween 2018 made Michael Myers scary again. The shape is once again a force to be reckoned with.
Halloween wasn’t perfect. There were issues with certain characters. The ending doesn’t seem sure of itself or where it wants to go next. Things weren’t as final as promised (though I’ve always hoped the sequels kept coming.) The way it came to exist in 2018 was however, perfect. This movie was an event. For a time the world treated Halloween as though it were the next Avengers film. At least it felt that way in my world. When released the crowds were huge and the theaters were packed. The film was received positively on Rotten Tomatoes and almost all of the word of mouth buzz had been positive. The people returned the favor by making this the highest grossing slasher film of all time. Halloween isn’t just a movie; It’s the official resurgence of the slasher genre. (Full Video Review)
Thanks for reading! Please be sure to follow, clap and all that good shit. If you’re interested, check out our horror movie youtube channel here: We Watched A Movie and if you need anything shoot me an email: [email protected] | https://medium.com/@wewatchedamovie/ranking-all-38-horror-films-i-saw-in-2018-17a806e19735 | ['Mike Holtz'] | 2019-01-01 21:32:55.139000+00:00 | ['2018', 'Movies', 'Horror Movies', 'Top 10', 'Halloween'] |
Bravman to Bucknell | by Alex Katz
Sorry, John. Orange just ain’t your color.
Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education John Bravman has been selected as the next president of Bucknell University. Check out reports from Bucknell and Stanford.
Not much else to add. We’ll leave you with words from VP Bravman: | https://medium.com/stanfordreview/bravman-to-bucknell-40a527b2b0a7 | [] | 2016-12-09 02:54:20.347000+00:00 | ['Education', 'College'] |
The Others: Being Disabled and Challenging Social Norms | Here’s the thing about being disabled. You have to spend a lot of your time solving problems other people don’t have to really think about. Some of those problems aren’t so bad. For example, I might drop my phone and have to find someone to pick it up for me. Inconvenient, but not a big deal.
Then there are the other problems. What I’ve found is the degree of complexity of any disabled problem tends to have more of a correlation to social acceptability than anything else. Case in point, I spend a concerning amount of time figuring out how I’m going to go to the bathroom each and every day. There are obvious solutions to this particular problem. I could get a catheter, but I’m not going to do that. For one, they’re painful and prone to infection. Also, it gets in the way of certain other activities. You probably don’t need to use your imagination here to figure out what I’m talking about.
Quick tangent. Sexuality is one of the one of the best examples a topic that disabled people have to figure out how to deal with that is extremely socially unacceptable to discuss. I know this because a lot of disabled friends have reached out and suggested I write about this and I just can’t bring myself to do it. It’s not that I’m embarrassed or shy or anything. Point of fact, I actually feel somewhat guilty for avoiding the topic altogether because it speaks to a lot of the stereotypes and assumptions that people make about the disabled. I even have some really great stories that articulate all that. The real reason I won’t discuss it is some of my friends read my blog and there are just some things you would rather not know about your friends.
So here’s what I will say. People often ask the following question in the most awkward way possible, exactly as I’m about to phrase it, almost as if everyone got together at some point and decided that this was the best way to ask it.
“Um, can you, well, you know?”
When you see a disabled person, assume they can “you know.” In fact, assume we can do most things. We’re all human, with the same wants and needs as everyone else, and there’s really nothing wrong with saying that.
Back to the bathroom thing. This is a challenge socially because, at the end of the day, someone has to help me with it. I have a few friends that help me with this on a daily basis and, as far as I can tell, they really don’t mind. The problem arises when none of these friends are around. There’s nothing as uncomfortable as driving into a bathroom and asking a stranger to help you go pee. A surprising percentage of people are more than willing to assist, and an even more surprising percentage don’t seem to be at all bothered.
Here’s another common problem. A lot of places aren’t ADA compliant. It’s a little frustrating to hear the uproar about transgender bathrooms and how willing people are to chime in on prejudice when there are still so many people that can’t even get into the bathroom. And I do mean that quite literally. Some places don’t have a stall big enough for my wheelchair, so I have to park in the middle of the room and just go in front of everyone, which is pretty embarrassing. Other places don’t even have a door big enough for a wheelchair to get into the bathroom, so I have to hide behind the building and hope we don’t get caught. Or you can hold it and sit in a very special kind of hell because some building wasn’t compliant.
Then there are the problems you simply can’t anticipate. My friend and I were at a party one time and I asked if we could go to the restroom. About halfway through, he leaned over to move my arm and stood up too fast, smacking his head on the rounded ceiling, knocking himself out. I heard a thud as he hit the ground and my mind went into a spiraling panic. What do you do in that moment? Do I call for help? Did I just kill my friend? I couldn’t backup because he fell behind me, so I couldn’t get out to find help. Also, it wouldn’t matter anyway because my pants weren’t up, so I couldn’t really leave the bathroom. It was in that moment that I realized that this was the exact kind of problem only a disabled person would ever have to deal with. Also, what kind of an asshole architect designs rounded ceilings like that? What possible purpose could that serve other than to cause this exact situation?
After about five minutes of trying to figure out if I could push my friend with my wheelchair without running him over so I could go get help, he woke up and was, or course, very confused. Needless to say, I felt pretty guilty for the rest of the night. Fortunately for me, he now laughs about it and thinks it was still a fun party. Also, now I can tell people that I knocked him out that one time.
Another socially challenging thing for disabled people is having children. This one is really challenging because, well, let’s face it: most people hope they don’t have disabled children. One of the things people say is they just hope they have a healthy baby, which is another way of saying not like me. It’s unsettling to think about. In terms of math, I’m relatively safe. One in forty people are carriers of the recessive gene that causes my disability, so there’s only a 2.5% chance my wife and I could have a child that was disabled. Assuming she fell into that 2.5%, there’s a 50% chance that our child would have what I have.
May the odds be ever in your favor.
Then it becomes difficult because I can’t actually care for a child. I can’t hold a baby or feed one. Once the kid hits four or five and effectively can do most things, I could start to play a role in the child’s life. Until that time, I couldn’t really do much. So when someone asks me if I want kids, the answer is that I like kids but there’s a 2.5% chance I would have a disabled baby and my wife would have to care for the child for the first few years (and me). Do with that what you will.
And then the spiral really gets out of control. Is it really good for me to be dating at all? Talk about cart before the horse here. Statistically speaking, I’d strike out well before the topic of reproduction even became a concern. But what happens if I find someone crazy enough to deal with my inner five year old personality? Is it fair to drag someone into this world? I’ll come back to this topic later.
Here’s another very different way of looking at your life when you’re disabled. When I was ten years old, the doctors that specialized in my disability told me that my life expectancy was 20 years old. That’s a very disturbing thing to hear when you’re ten. It’s also tricky because you can’t talk about it. When someone asks, “Where do you plan to go to college?” the response they aren’t expecting is, “I don’t plan to go to college because I’m going to die before I would graduate.”
Then a very weird thing happens. You hit 20 and your first thought is, “Am I going to die this year?” I went back to the doctor and they told me that they were wrong before and that my life expectancy was now 30. While this was great news, it kind of threw a wrench in my life plan. Instead of dying this year, I needed to plan for ten more, but really only ten.
Then another weird thing happens. You hit 30 and go back to the doctor. They told me that due to scientific innovation and such, my life expectancy was now 40. The first thought the voice in my head uttered was, “If the current rate of scientific innovation persists, my life expectancy will extend by ten years every ten years, which means I’m never going to die.” The second thought it had was, “Do doctors not know what math is, or is that trait that determines whether or not you go into engineering? Good at problem solving but can’t do math? Become a doctor.” The next thought I had was, “I’m kind of being an asshole right now,” so I decided to say, “Oh, cool, right on.” I also decided to stop asking the doctor how long I was going to live.
Now back to the dating thing. One question I heard a long time ago among my friends was, “Where do you see yourself in ten years?” They said living in a house, maybe with kids, so on. The answer in my head was very different. “Either dead or at the doctor’s office being told I was going to live to 50.” Is it then fair for me to bring someone into a relationship that will probably only last ten years at best? Again, cart before the horse, but it’s a fair question.
I know I talk about it a bit lightheartedly and it kind of throws people off. I think that, for me, it has always been a reality. I used to attend a summer camp for disabled people like me and there was a family of five kids that all had the same disability. Every year at the talent show, they would do a group show, but every few years, there would be one less of them. Four boys and one girl. Three boys and one girl. Three boys. Now they have all passed away. The part of this story that upsets me the most isn’t that they passed away.
The upsetting bit is that I can’t remember their names.
Because of that exposure and the constant thought that it was going to happen, it’s not really a concern of mine. I can talk lightheartedly because it’s just something that happens, but it isn’t something other people are eager to dive into. Other people really are concerned. The trouble is that sometimes it’s something that would be nice to talk about. This is a problem I have. This is a concern I have. This is a reality of mine. But I have to keep it to myself.
A lot of being disabled is about tackling problems by yourself. No one else knows about the challenges we face because we have created a world where certain topics are off limits. They’re simply inappropriate. My hope is that people start challenging themselves on what they consider acceptable. The more open we are, the more we can face together, the less we have to handle alone. | https://medium.com/disability-stories/the-others-being-disabled-and-challenging-socially-normal-40a6565cbbd9 | ['Brian Rivera'] | 2016-06-07 13:51:24.971000+00:00 | ['Rights', 'Dating', 'Disability'] |
Why do newbies ask so few questions? | Why do old people drive so friggin’ slow? It would seem that with little time left on planet earth they’d hurry up to CVS and pick up the damn prescription and get back to the business of torturing their children and living out their days. But no, they hunker down in that Buick, place their knuckles on the steering wheel, point their battleships toward port and cruise along at a steady 3 knots.
I hope when I’m 85 I drive my age — everywhere I go! I may drive through the 7–11, even if it’s not a Drive-Thru.
What does that have to do with today’s blog entry you ask? I’m not sure, but it’s just another rhetorical question.
As a manager or supervisor we have all had the experience of dealing with the “newbie”. It’s quite nerve racking as a manager actually. You’re trying to set the new tone with the guy or gal and they’ve just come from HR where they’ve gotten a lot of paperwork to fill out and a bunch of orientation stuff that is designed to simply insulate the company from a potential lawsuit. You may or may not realize this but in HR’s eyes they are not an employee. They are a potential litigant in an ugly lawsuit against Fudge Motors. They’re not giving you training, they’re assuring the court that you’ve received training. Welcome to the post-industrial age.
So, Ned or Nellie Newbie has just joined the firm. You’re trying to make their first day completely different than your first day. You remember that right? The guy or girl who was supposed to be your supervisor, showed you to your desk, told you where to get some pencils and paper and if you were lucky and the supervisor was actually a planning person, had a computer, phone and other tools available for you. If you weren’t so lucky they told you that the help desk would be setting those up for you “real soon now”. If you were shit out of luck, he or she would have told you that YOU needed to put in a help desk ticket (ignoring the fact that you don’t have a computer or phone nor do you know how to contact the help desk).
Welcome to corporate America where our associates are our greatest asset!
Fast forward 2 months. You have a computer, you have a phone, you know where the coffee machine is and you know where the best (and worst) places to eat lunch are — but you’re still a newbie.
You’re boss gives you your first real assignment. “Ned, Fred or whoever the hell you are…”, he says, “I need you to write a program to parse the log files and let marketing know how many hits they got on that new flaming logo they put out there. They want to get some feedback on their 6-month project to provide snappier, sexier, more eye-catching, customer attracting websites.”
“Um…cool!”, you say trying to hold back the question that everyone now should be asking themselves — what do hits on the flaming logo have to do with sales? You learn not to question marketing too much in corporate America.
“Oh. If you have ANY questions, any questions at all, please ask me or Joe over there, he’s the resident guru. If he doesn’t know the answer, then the question was probably not worth asking…he he he he.”, jokes the pointy haired boss as he hopefully fades into the background of your life.
But what about the boss’ perspective. He thinks he’s done the right thing. He’s given you the assignment and let you know that if you run into issues there’s a life line available.
What actually happens in practice?
Well, Ned or Nellie struggle for days, weeks or months. When asked about their progress they say, “I’m making progress. I’m running into a few issues, but I’m working them out.”
DANGER! DANGER! DANGER! WARNING WILL ROBINSON!
Trust me when I tell you this, no questions from a newbie = lost in space.
You can also trust me when I tell you this, that’s the natural order of the universe.
Newbies, by definition are ignorant and unaware (some may use the word clueless). I use the word ignorant in a very specific, personal way. By ignorant I mean, they may have some general awareness of something related to your business, but they have little if any knowledge of it. Awareness of your specific industry or situation may be lacking. There may also be a lack of awareness of more advanced elements of their own craft.
They are usually not wholly unaware. They have some limited awareness of the subject matter, domain or skills necessary to perform their duties but they are, for all intents and purposes, fairly ignorant and unaware.
Knowledge is gained through first, awareness and subsequently by, learning and experience. Without awareness knowledge is impossible. Without learning and experience, skill and expertise are impossible. Thus learning is a necessary component of knowledge, but unfortunately insufficient. Without awareness we are clueless.
“As the circle of light increases, so does the circumference of darkness around it.” — Albert Einstein
Awareness exposes our ignorance. Once we understand our ignorance, learning is possible. Without awareness we are forever in the dark. Awareness is a prerequisite for learning. Learning involves asking questions and seeking answers. Why do newbies ask so few questions?
The answer should now be obvious. They are unaware. They have no context. Their circle of light is quite tiny, so their circumference of what they know they don’t know is also quite small. As their circle of light (knowledge) increases, the circumference of what they aware of that they don’t know increases. This is the domain of things they need answers to.
The Circle of Knowledge.
Albert Einstein may have been the first to verbalize this concept but none of this is original thinking, and I apologize for not citing the sources, but it may just be part of the collective brain at this point.
In the figure to the left, C represents the vast darkness of my unawareness. A represents my limited knowledge. The circumference of A represents what I am aware of that I don’t know (or what I know of the darkness). The circumference touches the darkness, thus that part of the darkness, I know; but only that part. As my circle of knowledge grows in size to B, and my circumference grows proportionally, I am aware of more things that I am ignorant of.
In other words, I am now aware of more things that I don’t know about.
Now let’s look at newbies and their relationship to asking questions.
As managers we are all frustrated because we think we know what the the graph of questions vs experience should look like.
In reality, as I’ve explained already, newbies have no idea what questions to ask because they are both unaware and ignorant. This is a bad combination for people that are trying to impress their boss and an even worse situation for bosses that do not understand the newbie syndrome.
So, newbies ask less questions than experienced folks. This dilemma leads to lots of problems when you are dealing with new employees in a business. Newbies tend to get themselves all gummed up because they don’t know what questions to ask and therefore don’t ask any questions at all. They go down rabbit holes for days and make little progress on our precious projects while managing to frustrate the hell out of us.
How many of us have said, “If you were stuck, why didn’t you ask for help?”. The truth is that the newbie is scared of his ignorance, unaware of the fact that he is stuck, unaware of what help to ask for and as we all suspected, just generally clueless.
How do we address this?
First, it is much more important to hire curious people than it is to hire knowledgeable people. This is because curious people will be life long learners.
As their circle of knowledge grows they will know exactly how ignorant they really are! Knowing they are ignorant, curious people will seek knowledge. On the other hand, simply knowledgeable people are sometimes complacent, lazy or just uninterested in expanding their circle of knowledge.
We all know the unambitious know-it-all that has a superficial knowledge of everything but knows practically nothing — a nuance on the complacent and lazy among us. They like to learn new things but do not embrace the circumference of their circle sufficiently to truly appreciate their own ignorance.
Curious and ambitious people however, are recursively blessed in
their pursuit of knowledge. The more they know, the more they now know they don’t know — which leads them to seek more knowledge — which leads them to the epiphany of their ignorance — which compels them to learn more. It’s an M.C. Escher staircase toward knowing.
Second, to combat the newbie syndrome we need to concentrate on awareness first, and knowledge second. Orientation of new employees therefore, should concentrate on making them aware of everything they do not know rather than teaching them a small handful of useless lessons.
A pack of blank index cards with titles written at the top describing some subject they need to know about, together with a reference or two will go much farther in expanding Mr. Newbie’s horizon than 100 on-line training courses.
If we are talking about a technical job, then pointing out that there is a vast library of functions that are “over there” and that this library contains most if not all of what they need tells them something useful. It tells them that, there’s good stuff over there, it’s vast, they’re ignorant regarding the content, but it might solve their problem. If they’re curious, you have them hooked.
I guess teaching someone to fish is ok, but how about telling someone that catching fish is possible and that humans have been known to do that from time to time. Maybe if you make someone who is really bright, curious, and talented aware of the concept of fishing, they might create the ultimate fishing rod! Right Ron?
Third, newbies need hyper-supervision. At the risk of pissing them off you need to hover like the Action News helicopter covering the O.J. chase. Once an hour is not too much hovering for the employee that just started this week. You can ween him off your hourly visits after a week, at which time I would suggest only 8 visits per day (assuming an 8-hour day), which is to say, stick with it as needed.
After a few more weeks you might give him 2–3 visits per day.
After 6 months you might be safe, depending on the person, utilizing one strategically scheduled visit per day.
After several years, one “howyadoin” per week is a good practice.
Your Mileage May Vary — you may have to adjust based on the CQ (Curiosity Quotient) of the newbie. If he’s a really curious guy, he’s going to be a perpetual motion learner at this point and your work is done. Sort of like a self-winding watch. If not, then you have a typical employee in corporate America and a challenge on your hands as they grow old, complacent, tired, entitled, whiny and ultimately become the primary reason HR exists — a lawsuit waiting to happen.
To summarize:
1. Hire curious people
2. Make them aware
3. Supervise, supervise, supervise
So now you’re aware of the Newbie Syndrome and why they don’t ask questions. Any questions? ;-) | https://rclauer.medium.com/why-do-newbies-ask-so-few-questions-85f8c98a700d | ['Rob Lauer'] | 2018-09-05 13:37:50.333000+00:00 | ['Management And Leadership', 'Learning', 'Software Development'] |
Learn redux-optimist | Learn redux-optimist
Simplify optimistic rendering with redux-optimist library
Pikachu evolves into Raichu
The redux-optimist library has been extremely helpful to me, and I’d like to share that with you. I’ve designed a simple tutorial where I’ll walk you through how to set up and use the middleware. We’re going to use a sweet Pokémon API as our demo practice. We’ll fetch this Pikachu and optimistically evolve it to Raichu. If the request fails, then we’ll devolve back to Pikachu.
Let’s install the dependencies we need, in your terminal:
yarn create react-app app-name
cd app-name
yarn add react-dom
yarn add react-router-dom
yarn add react-redux
yarn add redux
yarn add redux-thunk
yarn add lodash Follow along to set up Redux, or skip ahead to step 3 if you have your own preferred Redux setup.
a. open src/index.js
b. Create action file, in your terminal: touch src/pokemonActions.js && open src/pokemonActions.js
c. Create reducer file, in your terminal: touch src/reducer.js && open src/reducer.js
d. open src/App.js
e. open src/App.css
3. Let’s install redux-optimist now, in your terminal:
yarn add redux-optimist
4. I suggest committing here; that way you can see your git diff before implementing redux-optimist and after redux-optimist :
git add . && git commit -m "feat(redux): finished setting up redux"
5. Modify our pokemonActions.js to create new actions and pass some responsibility to the redux-optimist library:
6. Create a middleware folder and create this file getRaichu.js inside the folder, in your terminal: mkdir src/middleware && touch src/middleware/getRaichu.js && open src/middleware/getRaichu.js
7. Import and use the getRaichu.js middleware in our index.js :
8. Modify our reducer.js to work with the new actions and middleware:
9. Now, in your terminal, yarn start and open up your console. I’ve placed a couple console.log to help observe the procedure of our action, middleware, and reducer.
You’ll notice that the object in GET_RAICHU_BEGIN is a mock Raichu, where I only supplied the name and image. Then when the request succeeds, GET_RAICHU_COMPLETE sends the full object returned from the API to update our store.
10. Now let’s imitate a failed request by commenting out the fetch request on line 32 in getRaichu.js and commenting in line 33.
This time you will see that we optimistically render Raichu until the request comes back as a fail. The store will automatically revert back to Pikachu. At this time we also capture the error from the failed request and display it to the user. So, moral of the story, don’t evolve your Pikachu :) | https://medium.com/better-programming/learn-redux-optimist-ca1a41a82165 | ['Robert Chen'] | 2020-11-07 14:43:32.881000+00:00 | ['Front End Development', 'Programming', 'React', 'JavaScript', 'Redux'] |
McAfee says decentralized exchanges are a game changer | McAfee says decentralized exchanges are a game changer
John McAfee, the cyber security expert and cryptocurrency enthusiast, was recently interviewed by Michael Gu of the popular cryptocurrency themed blog Boxmining. During the interview he made a prediction that decentralized cryptocurrency exchanges will dominate the space and make centralized exchanges eventually go the way of the dinosaur.
He tweeted a link to the interview along with this message:
“Decentralized exchanges, when fully functional, will mark the end of any potential control by governments and will be the beginning of the largest economic boom in human history.”
McAfee sees power in numbers and thinks the decentralization of cryptocurrency exchanges can create unbreakable networks of people.
McAfee says a huge advantage of decentralized exchanges is the computing power. The millions of powerful computing devices that could potentially be contributing to a decentralized exchange like Bithemoth will create a secure distribution that can’t be achieved by centralized exchanges.
McAfee goes on to explain that not even police, or governmental institutions could take down a decentralized exchange. Adding that, “as long as the exchanges are distributed across millions of devices, it would be impossible for them to shut down.”
McAfee has been railing against centralized exchanges on Twitter, amongst other places, for a while. He claims that they have too much power and users should not be so fast to trust them with their assets.
Bithemoth agrees that centralized exchanges are vulnerable to hacks and thefts and that the decentralized model and cold storage devices will provide a level of security that cannot be achieved by centralized exchanges.
When asked about the future of ICOs and whether or not ICOs will die out, McAfee assured that new blockchain startups will continue to be born.
“If you’re talking about new projects that come to fruition and create new coins? No, that will never die out.” | https://medium.com/bithemoth-exchange/mcafee-says-decentralized-exchanges-are-a-game-changer-b2c524cc4433 | ['Bithemoth Exchange'] | 2018-09-28 13:49:58.778000+00:00 | ['Blockchain', 'John Mcafee', 'Crypto', 'Bitcoin', 'Decentralization'] |
Behind the Lens: Photographing the President in 50 States | This week, the President will visit South Dakota, marking the 50th state he has visited during his administration. As such, it’s also my 50th state with him.
To mark the occasion, I chose one photograph from each state that we’ve visited.
This was not as easy as I thought it would be. With help from photo editor Phaedra Singelis, I tried to depict a variety of situations. Some are more lighthearted; some are sad, and some are poignant. Some are with the Vice President; some are with the First Lady, and a couple are with the entire family. A selection of photos are centered on policy, and others on politics. Some focus on the President as Commander-in-Chief — others on his role as consoler for the nation.
I hope you enjoy this gallery. And stay tuned — we’ll be adding a photograph from South Dakota following his visit there on Friday. | https://medium.com/vantage/behind-the-lens-photographing-the-president-in-50-states-8202eca6408 | ['The Obama White House'] | 2016-05-20 20:04:39.168000+00:00 | ['President', 'Photos', 'America'] |
Trump’s CDC is Banning Evictions, and it Probably Will Help Him. | Trump’s CDC is Banning Evictions, and it Probably Will Help Him.
His latest faux populist gimmick could work.
Carolyn Kaster/AP
As I’ve said now countless times before, I’ve struggled with processing just how quickly everything has spiraled out of control over the course of a matter of months. It feels as though with each passing day, the American people have dealt with a new layer of unnecessary trauma and suffering, and the sense of utter despair and hopelessness only intensifies the more I attempt to come to terms with the extent of it. But considering we are fresh in to a new month, the fact that tens of millions of people have been unable to pay their mortgage and rent has been heavy on my mind, and prompted a renewed sense of dread about what lies ahead in the coming weeks and months.
Recently, it was reported that the Trump administration will be using the CDC as a means by which to stop the coming wave of evictions.
Chris Arnold with NPR writes:
“The Trump administration is ordering a halt on evictions nationwide through December for people who have lost work during the pandemic and don’t have other good housing options. The new eviction ban is being enacted through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The goal is to stem the spread of the COVID-19 outbreak, which the agency says in its order “presents a historic threat to public health.” It’s by far the most sweeping move yet by the administration to try to head off a looming wave of evictions of people who have lost their jobs or taken a major blow to their income because of the pandemic. Housing advocates and landlord groups both have been warning that millions of people could soon be put out of their homes through eviction if Congress does not do more to help renters and landlords and reinstate expanded unemployment benefits. …Under the rules of the order, renters have to sign a declaration saying they don’t make more than $99,000 a year — or twice that if filing a joint tax return — and that they have no other option if evicted other than homelessness or living with more people in close proximity.”
Of course, while this is an undeniably essential move in this moment in order to prevent the mass humanitarian crisis from coming to fruition, as per usual the American government has put a bandaid on a gushing wound they will no longer be able to hide come January when months worth of back rent is expected to be paid. It should also go without saying that the President hasn’t done this out of the goodness of his heart, and that this has nothing to do with the wellbeing of the American people, but instead everything to do with the preservation of his own power as the impending election grows closer and closer.
The thing is, I’m not sure anyone who will immediately benefit from this action is going to care about that at all. In all honesty given the circumstances they’re in, I really cannot blame them.
If nothing else, this is yet another indication of the sadistic, criminal, and frankly abusive way the American people have been treated by the very people — in all levels of government — who we are supposed to trust will listen to our concerns, and advocate for the best interests of their constituents.
In perhaps the most mild way one could look at it, Americans have been abandoned by our lawmakers. People have been starved in to submission, and robbed of any last shred of stability they have through no fault of their own while politicians go on “recess” on the taxpayer’s dime to solicit donations from their high-dollar donors. While owners of small businesses across the country are wondering how they’re going to get through this, the Treasury secretary is handing out hundreds of billions of dollars worth of taxpayer money to some of the largest corporations in the country. While Jeff Bezos , the founder and CEO of Amazon — a company which doesn’t pay any federal taxes — has nearly doubled his wealth to 200 billion dollars as a direct result of this pandemic, the American people who created his wealth have gotten one time checks of $1200 dollars to get us through.
Given the amount of trauma that’s been inflicted on us, is it any wonder that the American people are so desperate for some sort of help, that when they get it from him President Trump is rightfully confident that the absolute bare minimum could be enough to help him to retain his power?
As I’ve been saying before, people need something to vote for, not just something to vote against, and for at least some of us, this recent ban on evictions could be that “something”. There’s not a doubt in my mind that in this twisted dystopian hell-scape we find ourselves in, Trump will be able to gaslight a number of people in to forgetting the fact that he helped to create the situation they find themselves in, so long as he reminds them on a consistent basis that he was the one who took the action that allowed them to keep the roof over their child’s head while — as I’m sure he’ll say — congress did nothing.
I’m not sure anything could serve as a better testament to just how far this country has sunk than the idea that the shelter of tens of millions of people has been boiled down to nothing more than a partisan, political tool for the electoral aspirations of a six times bankrupt billionaire who happens to hold the highest office in the land. It seems as though every day, there’s more and more reason to grow concerned that he may indeed be re-elected, and I’m still trying to prepare myself for that very real possibility. | https://medium.com/discourse/trumps-cdc-is-banning-evictions-and-it-probably-will-help-him-8bf572fed10b | ['Lauren Elizabeth'] | 2020-09-04 20:12:46.234000+00:00 | ['Society', 'Election 2020', 'Politics', 'Trump', 'Government'] |
Blockchain to disrupt the monopolistic Collaborative Economy. | P2P Models aims to use blockchain-driven Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) to boost a Collaborative Economy which is decentralized, democratic and where profits are distributed.
P2P Models aims to use blockchain-driven Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) to boost a Collaborative Economy which is decentralized, democratic and where profits are distributed.
A Monopolistic Collaborative Economy
The Collaborative Economy is not what we were promised. Inspired by Wikipedia, it emerged from the idea of peer-to-peer networks of citizens, sharing and collaborating for the common good, in every field. However, today we can observe how digital monopolies concentrating data, resources and power are the new normal. Instead of decentralizing the power of traditional institutions, we can see how the platform economy is creating larger than ever monopolies: Uber is larger than any taxi company, Airbnb than any hotel chain, Google than the traditional providers of infrastructure, and Facebook governs more than 2 billion users. This market dominance has of course some benefits on the services they provide, but it is not without serious drawbacks, in a context where scandals are common. E.g. terrible labor practices in Uber or Deliveroo, privacy-hindering services by Google, regular collaboration in mass surveillance programs by most major companies as revealed by Edward Snowden, or Facebook’s Cambridge Analytica mess. Even worse, any new start-up aims to either be absorbed by these giants, or become the new monopoly in an un-platformized field. Is this science-fiction pseudo-dystopian scenario all we can expect? What would it take to change the rules of this nasty game?
The P2P Models Vision
A new research project has the ambitious aim of facilitating the emergence of a different ecosystem. P2P Models has a simple yet challenging research question: can we build online platforms in a different way? Can we build Collaborative Economy platforms which are decentralized, so there is not a single owner of the whole infrastructure? Can we build platforms where the decision-making is democratic, involving their users, which may become empowered? And yet, can we make such platforms in a way in which the profits are distributed across the users?
Structure of P2P Models proposal.
New Governance & Economic Models
The project will harness the potential of the blockchain to tackle these issues. However, instead of focusing on Finance and crypto-currencies, the project will explore the potentials of Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs). The idea is to replace the traditional online platforms like Airbnb, which relies on a centralized server infrastructure controlled by a single actor, with the serverless DAOs hosted and executed in a decentralized blockchain network.
Can we build Collaborative Economy platforms which are decentralized, so there is not a single owner of the whole infrastructure?
Such DAOs may embed the rules for the users to interact with each other in a peer-to-peer manner. Thus, we can easily imagine a decentralized Airbnb developed that way. Moreover, users could vote which changes they would like to see in their DAO-platform, empowering them in the process. Then, we could see an ecosystem of multiple decentralized Airbnb’s, with different features depending on what their community has decided, e.g. some totally anonymous, others with a high insurance in case something goes wrong, others adapted to a local culture. Without the strong dependency on platform owners, profits could be more distributed and users rewarded in multiple forms (e.g. cryptocurrency, votes, reputation, shares). In such ecosystem, interoperability provides a competitive opportunity, since the users, and even their reputation, are shared across the ecosystem (sharing the same blockchain), instead of locked in a single platform… allowing new start-ups to reach faster critical mass, sharing users and even components with other companies. In such ecosystem, barriers to entry are lower, competition is higher, and dominant positions are harder to maintain.
If that vision is to be realized, at least partially, the building of DAOs is critical. Thus, the project will build a framework and tools to enable the modular construction of DAOs, especially those providing Collaborative Economy features. Therefore, the project will build “lego’s” or building blocks, embedding different features, so that developers may combine them to deploy their new platform. Being a fully free/open source platform, anyone could build their own building blocks for their specific needs, and if desired contribute them for others to use.
In the same way, other series of building blocks will embed governance models and economic models, focusing on democratic and redistributing approaches. The characteristics of the blockchain, and in particular smart contracts, enables the automated execution and enforcement of rules in a decentralized context. Thus, the project will allow user communities to be governed, at least partially, by explicit rules embedded in the code. This may allow democratic rules that make these communities more inclusive and equal, e.g. taking into account gender, minorities or low-income profiles.
Furthermore, the blockchain, through its tokenization, facilitates the distribution of value. However, tokens may be much more than crypto-currencies, alternatively represent equity, decision-making power, non-transferable reputation, or even property ownership digital certificates. This may enable the emergence of new business models, where user participation is rewarded.
P2P Models will perform social research, codesign pilots with communities, build a testbed for researchers… all with the aim of moving from an ecosystem controlled by Silicon Valley centralized monopolies to an open interoperable ecosystem. Today, with the help of the blockchain, there is a window of opportunity to change the rules of the game. Will the project manage to avoid the dystopia.
Text originally published at Open Access Government. Available here. | https://medium.com/p2p-models/a-monopolistic-collaborative-economy-ec81d1b6b482 | ['Samer Hassan'] | 2021-04-22 08:49:16.840000+00:00 | ['Platform', 'Dao', 'Blockchain'] |
Ocean Equity Banking | Ocean Equity Banking
The Blue Economy, with all that it signifies for our future, cannot succeed if we do not re-direct our investments to best practitioners rewarded for their adherence to social responsibility, environmental sustainability, regulatory control, and social equity.
Banks are at the functional center of the global economy — central banks, banking consortium, investment banks, and local banks — that supply the financial wherewithal to start, operate, expand, and innovate. They are, of course, conservative, risk adverse, and guided by consensus, regulatory concerns, and profit. As such, they have ceded much innovation finance to venture capital, and, by so doing, have perpetuated past behaviors, demonstrated returns, and careful investment that is valued only in the balance sheet, shareholder distribution, and short-term prospect. We may look to them to finance an automobile or home or a predictable business, but we can’t rely on them for long-term investment in transformational change.
But perhaps we can.
We hear much talk about the “green” economy, and more recently about the “blue” economy, a discussion of various concepts and specific ideas put forward by think-tanks, progressive politicians, and environmental organizations that have met with outright opposition by ideologues and corporations vested in the status quo. It has seemed mostly academic, although there may be hope for the future in the United States as a new national administration begins to redress the decline encouraged by an old one, to regain the regulatory power to counter abuse, and to rejoin European and Asian nations in a global agenda to meet the critical challenges of climate change worldwide. National and international initiative is to be welcomed. But my hope lies, ironically, in the profit motive, that is, in the prescience of some corporations and institutions, even banks, to see that the “green” and “blue” elements envisioned are actually good business to be adopted immediately as part of a stream of accelerated change.
Here are some encouraging signs. Some governments, central banks, and corporations have begun to define and accept guidelines for mandatory climate risk disclosures to be used by institutions and investors for assessment standards that balance risks such as technology, market, and reputation against opportunities such as efficiency, energy consumption, emissions, modified goods and services, market access, and resilience over time. This equation, if used to analyze and plan accordingly, could result in a new and transformative re-calculation of cash flow, financial impact, and return on investment. This approach is being advanced aggressively in the United Kingdom where, according to a Bloomberg News Report, the government expects 100% of “premium listed companies,” such as BP and Royal Dutch Shell, “energy companies with heavy engagement in offshore oil and gas, to have such disclosures in place.” The UK Treasury suggests that more than 90% of banks and building societies and 89% of insurers will have accepted this behavior by 2022.
Europe provides another example. BNP Paribas, a French bank with global engagement, has recently established an Exchange Traded Fund (ETF) that focuses on an equity performance index of companies that, according to its’ announcement press release, “demonstrate sustainable exploitation of ocean resources and responsible stewardship of the marine environment…fifty large capital companies…participating in the blue economy…equally weighted… companies in five categories; coastal livelihood, energy and resources, fisheries and seafood, pollution reduction and maritime transport.”
The ETF fund specifically also includes companies that conform to the Ten Principles of the United Nations Global Compact for human rights, labor, environmental sustainability and corruption, as follows:
that support and respect protection of internationally proclaimed human rights that make sure that they are not complicit in human rights abuses that uphold freedom of association and recognition of the right to collective bargaining that eliminate all forms of forced and compulsory labor that abolish child labor that eliminate discrimination in respect of employment and occupation that support a precautionary approach to environmental challenges that undertake initiatives to promote greater environmental responsibility that encourage the development and diffusion of environmentally friendly technologies, and that reject corruption in all its forms, including extortion and bribery.
What does it say about our society that investments that respect such principles could possibly be considered too risky, too novel, too antithetical to what we call profit and return on investment? Should not every company, indeed every investor, expect and honor such standards? Who in good conscience would ignore the pollution and corruption that these principles address? Who would look away from such consequence as complicit endorsement of such inequity known and enduring?
Companies exploiting the world ocean have indulged in all of these behaviors. They have been sustained and promoted by our indifference and have been excused from accountability in the calculation of financial return. This willful blindness must no longer be acceptable. The Blue Economy, with all that it signifies for our future, will fail if we do not re-direct our investments to best practitioners rewarded for their adherence to social responsibility, environmental sustainability, regulatory control, and social equity. If you care about the ocean, call your broker and ask these questions. There are alternative investments to be had, and the time to “buy” is now. | https://medium.com/@thew2o/ocean-equity-banking-b8713c5d2c3c | ['World Ocean Observatory'] | 2020-12-02 16:59:56.176000+00:00 | ['Equity', 'Investment', 'Banking', 'Environment', 'Sustainability'] |
Adobe CC Sales, Deals & Discounts — Get 40–70% Off Adobe Creative Cloud (2021) | The best Adobe Creative Cloud discounts.
Looking for the best Adobe Creative Cloud discounts?
Adobe offers the industry leading software when it comes to graphic design & creative work so we don’t blame you!
The problem is that Adobe subscriptions can be quite expensive which is why we’ve put together this list of Adobe discounts.
As Adobe partners, we can offer you 40–70% off all of Adobe’s best creative software including Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe InDesign, Lightroom, XD, Spark and more — wherever you are in the world and available right now in June, 2021.
So if you’re looking on how to save on Adobe software in 2021, this article is for you!
Thank you for your support — we are a participant in the Adobe Affiliate Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Adobe.com.
The Best Adobe Creative Cloud Discounts Available Right Now
We’ve compiled a list of the best Adobe Creative Cloud discounts in a number of different categories as per below:
Read on to get the best Adobe discount!
How To Get An Adobe Discount
Trying to find a discount on Adobe CC software can be challenging as there are so many different options, plans and apps.
Adobe do push their Creative Cloud All Apps subscription however you can also buy Adobe apps separately, such as Photoshop or Illustrator which is more than suitable for graphic design, video editing and UX design.
To give you more clarity, we have put together this guide on how to get the best deals on Adobe CC for new & existing subscribers.
Further below are the latest Adobe Creative deals for students, individuals and more.
How To Get Adobe Deals For New Users:
See if you’re eligible for a student discount or other discounted plan below Choose if you want the full Creative Cloud All Apps or just a single app Decide if you want to pay monthly or yearly to save more
How To Get Adobe Deals For Existing Subscribers:
If your Adobe subscription is getting too expensive, Adobe do have three options available for you.
A) 2 Months Free Offer
Did you know that you may be eligible to get two months free from Adobe? This is a compassionate discount for those wishing to cancel their subscription because of price.
To apply for the 2 free months, head to your Adobe account page and click “Cancel Your Subscription”. When asked to do so, you must select “Price” as the reason. You may be offered two months free. If not, you can try chat to their customer service.
B) Adobe COVID-19 Discount
Adobe are offering 2–3 months free to help those affected by COVID-19.
Click here and then chat or ring support to receive the discount stating COVID as the reason.
C) Upgrade & Save Offer
Another way to get a discount is to buy a single app purchase and then upgrade to the full CC suite. This sometimes becomes cheaper than if you just bought Creative Cloud All Apps straight out.
Adobe Discount For Students & Teachers
How to get an Adobe student discount?
If you are you a current student or teacher you are eligible for up to 65% off Adobe Creative Cloud on their Students & Teachers plan.
Who qualifies for an Adobe student discount?-To qualify as a student for Adobe you must provide some proof of your education, whether it be part-time or full-time.
If you’re not a student or teacher, you can easily become a student and then save up to 65% off on Adobe’s most popular annual plan, CC All Apps. See the instructions below.
Is Adobe free for students? Students don’t get Adobe for free but they can save up to 65% on Adobe’s plans which is their best deal right now.
Sign up to the Adobe Certified LogoCore logo design course (just $80) to qualify you as a legitimate student.
You can then get Adobe CC for 65% off for one year, saving you ~$385.
Once you’re a student, click here to go to Adobe’s student discount page.
How to get an Adobe teacher discount?
The same discounts apply for teachers so if you’re looking for an Adobe discount for educators-pick the Students & Teachers plan.
Adobe Discount for Individuals
Adobe’s student deal is the best deal however for individuals you can still save some money including 35% off their regular plan.
How to get Adobe discount for individuals? — As an individual, you can pre-pay for the full year and save 35% which nets out to a savings of a few hundred dollars.
If you pay for the full year upfront, you also get a month free on Adobe Stock which includes 10 free premium photos.
Exclusive Just Creative Adobe CC Discount: 35% Off Adobe Creative Cloud
Get all of Adobe’s apps for 35% off with our exclusive partner deal suitable for UK, USA, Canada, Australia and Mexico, on sale dates only.
Adobe Photoshop Discount
How to get Adobe discount on Photoshop?
You don’t need to pay for Adobe’s full Creative All Apps subscription to get access to their most popular software.
You can simply pay per software such as a subscription to Adobe Photoshop.
You can also combine software and get a further discount such as combining Photoshop & Lightroom in a package which will save you approximately 50% on your subscription.
This Photography bundle offered by Adobe is the best deal on Adobe Photoshop.
There are currently no other special offers on single apps like Adobe Illustrator or InDesign just yet.
You could also make use of their free 7 day trial:
Adobe CC Discounts for Government, Non-Profit, Military, Veterans & Seniors
Does Adobe offer discounts for non-profits? Yes, Adobe do have some available discounts for non-profits.
Adobe also offer Enterprise & Government Employee discounts.
Adobe currently do not offer military, veteran or seniors discounts however you can try talking to their chat support team.
Adobe do not offer promo codes, coupons or discount codes, but rather list the sale price on their website for limited amounts of time.
Adobe Stock Discount (10 Images Free)
You can get 10 images free if you sign up for Adobe Stock for one year ($30/month), or simply try for free for 30 days.
How To Get Adobe CC For Free
To get Adobe CC for free, simply sign up to their 7-day free trial.
Select your plan and enter your credit card information, try it for free for 7 days and then cancel it before the 7 days are up.
Can I get Adobe Creative Cloud for free? — In theory, you can with a free trial however using a ‘free’ version of Adobe Creative Cloud is illegal.
Other ways to get Adobe CC for free or cheap is to use an older version of Adobe software, or you could set up a new trial each week or split the license with a friend.
These methods are illegal and you can get your account terminated or suspended by Adobe.
If you’re trying to reduce costs with the Adobe subscription, you could consider buying a license to just one software such as Adobe Photoshop instead of the whole Adobe CC.
Or start with a free 7 day trial.
Continue reading this Adobe Creative Cloud Discount article on the JUST Creative blog… | https://medium.com/@justcreative/adobe-cc-sales-deals-discounts-get-40-70-off-adobe-creative-cloud-2021-698f67db30d3 | ['Jacob Cass'] | 2021-07-08 22:39:43.135000+00:00 | ['Graphic Design', 'Discount', 'Adobe Creative Cloud', 'Adobe', 'Illustration'] |
5 Important Tips on How to Work From Home | 5 Important Tips on How to Work From Home
Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash
We’re being advised to get used to a ‘new normal’ as a way to deal with the pandemic. We know that a vaccine is incoming but aren’t clear about the timelines of our being vaccinated. We want to go back to the old life but it’s been way too long since then and we are exhausted in every way.
Let’s face it. We are living in unprecedented times. We are managing our careers, our families, our daily household tasks — all from the same place: HOME.
None of it has been easy and we are true warriors for making it this far.
A big point of struggle while being cooped up at home was around managing everything without having any clear demarcations on where the personal ended and where the professional began.
This piece is to help identify the right framework to thrive while working from home in the new normal.
THE BENEFITS OF WORKING FROM HOME
Let’s first acknowledge the positives:
Work from Anywhere in the World
Get Jobs from Anywhere in the World
More Time with Your Family
No More Traffic Jams to be Dealt With
THE CHALLENGES OF WORKING FROM HOME
Most people are surprised by the stress they feel once the novelty of working from home wears off and the stress of its challenges becomes more apparent. The negatives are many, some of which are:
Blurred Lines Between the Personal and Professional
Drops in Productivity
More Distractions
Way More Screen Time
Less Bonding with Colleagues/Social Isolation
THE MASTERLIFE SOLUTION
Now that you know you are not alone in facing these stressors and just how commonly they can occur, hopefully you feel less isolated in what you face. You may also feel more energized in tackling these challenges head-on and minimizing some of the stress that comes with them.
CEO, Growth Hacker, and Author Anirudh Narayan has a simple framework which when followed, can ease the physical, emotional, and mental burdens that we’ve been carrying since March 2020.
Additionally, with a change in mindset and approach, a few simple daily habits, and practical tools — we can absolutely crush working from home!
1: START THE DAY RIGHT
Photo by Daan Stevens on Unsplash
What can really help is if you start your day as if you were actually heading out to work. Wake up early, take a shower, wear some nice clothes (no, not your PJs), and head over to an organized work-space that you’ve set aside for yourself.
Never work from your bed because you want our brain to completely dissociate working from relaxing.
Add some plants to the aesthetic. This can work wonders.
2: STICK TO SCHEDULE
Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash
Plan your day in a way that ensures maximum productivity. Arrange for work calls to be between 9:30am to 11:30am. Immerse yourself in deep work from 11am to 4pm (remember to eat a light lunch on time), and have the remaining work calls from 4pm to 6pm.
Remember, minimize calls as much as you can.
The zoom calls of the pandemic normal, while efficient, also cause dissonance between the mind and the body. Your mind tries to believe that you are speaking in person while your bodies are not in the same location. This can be draining.
3: THE LAUNDRY WILL NOT DO ITSELF
Photo by Kyle Arcilla on Unsplash
You may be the Captain in charge of the platoon that is your family and pets. Make sure that all the tasks are delegated and that each person is accountable every day for their share of the housework.
No, it is not the woman’s job to take care of the kids, kitchen, laundry, and groceries. It’s 2020. Let’s leave the stereotypes in history where they belong.
If you have kids, make a list of chores for them that they need to follow. This is great for character building. Everyone needs to contribute to the household.
4: STAY CONNECTED
Photo by Charles Deluvio on Unsplash
Talk to your friends. Plan game nights once a week. Catch up on what’s going on within your comfort circle. Add fun to your life. Movie nights, date nights — whatever works. Compartmentalize fun for at least the weekends. You need to take breaks. All work, no play, and all that jazz.
5: ME, MYSELF, AND I
Photo by Joanna Kosinska on Unsplash
Amidst all this, remember to carve out time for yourself. Self-care is of utmost importance.
When you take care of yourself, you are equipping yourself both physically and emotionally to take care of other people.
Remember, you can bring out the best you when you are at peace on the inside. Take a hot shower. Listen to your favourite music. Read a book. Write in your journal. You know what’s best for you — so go do it.
Put it on your calendar if you have to.
On priority.
STAT. | https://medium.com/@masterlife/5-tips-on-how-to-work-from-home-d8d1f248c3b9 | [] | 2020-12-28 11:50:43.757000+00:00 | ['Working From Home', 'Tips', 'Pandemic', 'New Normal', 'Self Care'] |
B1G1X: Business For Good | The global B1G1 community is made up of wonderful people who all share the same purpose: Business for Good. B1G1 events are not your typical industry expo’s and the B1G1x, Northern Hemisphere Conference was no exception. #TeamClarity were left reeling after B1G1x last week, empowered and determined to create a better business, a better life and a better world for our #Clariteers and all those connected.
Aynsley (CEO) and Steve (COO) have both been key contributors and ambassadors of the B1G1 global giving initiative through their previous businesses and individually for many years. Despite this, learning about the causes and people that the community supports is always a powerful eye-opener. Nicki Mih of Free To Shine Cambodia, started off day one with a number of humbling stories and reality checks for the B1G1x delegates. It is so important for us all to see the positive impact that the B1G1 community in particular is having on the girls in Cambodia.
Day one was full of fantastic speakers, including our very own Aynsley who shared his thoughts on how to ‘Bring Your Team With You’ in business. Centred around making sure the directors are leading from the front, Aynsley’s talk neatly incorporated many themes from previous talks in the day about conscious leadership. In particular, by ensuring your team is onboard with your companies culture and core values, we get one step closer to achieving the Global Goals objective to irreversibly eradicate poverty by using business as a force for good.
The key message from the first day of B1G1X was that any business can change the world by making small, continuous, habitual impacts. And as we are living through the fast-changing digital age, there are no excuses not to embed and automate giving back into business processes or systems. As Paul McGivillary pointed out in his talk; love, joy, compassion and life cannot be automated. But, we must use technology to enable and enhance our generosity, rather than worry that it is going to replace us.
At Clarity, we are proud of our partnership with B1G1 and therefore were very excited to learn how the giving initiative is growing and taking off in other countries across the world. On day two founders Paul and Masami shared valuable insights of their plans to grow the Business for Good movement in 2019. They also shared brilliant stories from their Impact World Tour which appears to be going from strength to strength. We love being able to support them and the wider Buy 1 Give 1 community in whatever way possible. If you would like to find out how you too can make your organisation a ‘Business for Good’, please check them out on https://www.b1g1.com/businessforgood/ | https://medium.com/@theCLRTYproject/b1g1x-business-for-good-eb73384ac34a | [] | 2019-02-20 14:22:11.202000+00:00 | ['Global Goals', 'Business', 'Giving', 'United Nations', 'Impact'] |
You Are Already Perfect | You know best. What a revelation!
It is amazing to me (well, maybe not amazing …) how many “whole and healthy” people still treat the rest of us like gremlins.
I have friends (virtual and real life, thankyouverymuch…) who are so open-minded and helpful and compassionate. And yet, I’ve heard from more than one of them that I shouldn’t eat bananas, because of…. carbs??? LEAVE. ME. ALONE.
Listen folks. Bananas are good for you. Especially when baked into a luscious bread mix. Life is not complicated.
Should you be healthy? Of course! I wish great healthiness for you!
Should you try to be healthy? A little.
But listen… it is not a punishment. It is not a competition. And it should never, ever, be a comparison.
My body is different from yours in probably 1,000 ways. Therefore, it is impossible to say that what feels good to me will also feel good to you.
If your sleep is disrupted, or your mood is constantly in the garbage, then maybe you should change something or other. But what you change and how you cope is up to you. You know best. What a revelation!
We should all have constant reminders that Facebook ads, TikTok celebrities, and “health gurus”:
don’t actually know us, probably don’t care about us, therefore… cannot POSSIBLY decide what is right for us.
What is it that they say?…
You do you, honey.
xoxo
www.twitter.com/needsmorelemon
www.instagram.com/needslemon
www.facebook.com/needsmorelemon | https://medium.com/@needsmorelemon/you-are-already-perfect-cc750f65f8dd | ['Needs More Lemon'] | 2021-02-09 02:32:49.392000+00:00 | ['Self Care', 'Empowerment', 'Wellness', 'Food'] |
Letterkenny 2020 [S9— E1]- Episode 1 : American Buck and Doe | 〘 Official | Drama | Online | Schedule | Trailer |Funk 〙
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Released: 2016–02–07
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Genre: Comedy
Stars: Jared Keeso, Nathan Dales, Michelle Mylett, Etc
Network: Crave
❏ STREAMING MEDIA ❏
Streaming media is multimedia that is constantly received by and presented to an end-user while being delivered by a provider. The verb to stream identifies the process of delivering or obtaining media in this manner.[clarification needed] Streaming refers to the delivery method of the medium, instead of the medium itself. Distinguishing delivery method from the media distributed applies particularly to telecommunications networks, as almost all of the delivery systems are either inherently streaming (e.g. radio, television, streaming apps) or inherently non-streaming (e.g. books, video cassettes, music CDs). There are challenges with streaming content on the Internet. For instance, users whose Internet connection lacks satisfactory bandwidth may experience stops, lags, or slow buffering of the content. And users lacking compatible hardware or software systems may be unable to stream certain content.
Live streaming is the delivery of Internet content in real-time much as live television broadcasts content over the airwaves with a television signal. Live internet streaming takes a form of source media (e.g. a video camera, an audio tracks interface, screen capture software), an encoder to digitize the content, a media publisher, and a content delivery network to distribute and deliver the content. Live streaming does not need to be recorded at the origination point, although it frequently is.
Streaming is an option to file downloading, a process where the end-user obtains the entire file for this content before watching or listening to it. Through streaming, an end-user can use their media player to get started on playing digital video or digital sound content before the complete file has been transmitted. The word “streaming media” can connect with media other than video and audio, such as live closed captioning, ticker tape, and real-time text, which are considered “streaming text”.
❏ COPYRIGHT CONTENT ❏
Copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to make copies of a creative work, usually for a limited time.[1][2][3][4][5] The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself.[6][7][8] A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States.
Some jurisdictions require “fixing” copyrighted works in a tangible form. It is often shared among multiple authors, each of whom holds a set of rights to use or license the work, and who are commonly referred to as rights holders.[citation needed][9][10][11][12] These rights frequently include reproduction, control over derivative works, distribution, public performance, and moral rights such as attribution.[13]
Copyrights can be granted by public law and are in that case considered “territorial rights”. This means that copyrights granted by the law of a certain state, do not extend beyond the territory of that specific jurisdiction. Copyrights of this type vary by country; many countries, and sometimes a large group of countries, have made agreements with other countries on procedures applicable when works “cross” national borders or national rights are inconsistent.[14]
Typically, the public law duration of a copyright expires 50 to 100 years after the creator dies, depending on the jurisdiction. Some countries require certain copyright formalities[5] to establishing copyright, others recognize copyright in any completed work, without a formal registration.
It is widely believed that copyrights are a must to foster cultural diversity and creativity. However, Parc argues that contrary to prevailing beliefs, imitation and copying do not restrict cultural creativity or diversity but in fact support them further. This argument has been supported by many examples such as Millet and Van Gogh, Picasso, Manet, and Monet, etc.[15]
❏ GOODS OF SERVICES ❏
Credit (from Latin credit, “(he/she/it) believes”) is the trust which allows one party to provide money or resources to another party wherein the second party does not reimburse the first party immediately (thereby generating a debt), but promises either to repay or return those resources (or other materials of equal value) at a later date.[1] In other words, credit is a method of making reciprocity formal, legally enforceable, and extensible to a large group of unrelated people.
The resources provided may be financial (e.g. granting a loan), or they may consist of goods or services (e.g. consumer credit). Credit encompasses any form of deferred payment.[2] Credit is extended by a creditor, also known as a lender, to a debtor, also known as a borrower.
FIND US:
✓ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/
✓ Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/
✓ Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/ | https://medium.com/letterkenny-2020-s9-e1-episode-1-american-buck-and/s9-e1-letterkenny-season-9-e-1-full-streaming-6becf3d27d11 | ['Sora Minato'] | 2020-12-25 18:29:01.443000+00:00 | ['Startup', 'Illumination', 'Covid 19', 'Life'] |
Plausible Deniability | Keith parked four houses away. He walked into the open garage and handed Jerry a box.
“Thanks. I needed these.”
“This the last time. If she finds out, we’re both dead.”
“I promise.” | https://medium.com/centina-pentina/plausible-deniability-d30c58b1d44f | ['Mark Starlin'] | 2020-12-16 02:28:42.873000+00:00 | ['Microfiction', 'Relationships', 'Food', 'Family', 'Pentina'] |
Research for Design — Part 5 | In this Research for Design project, I have tried out many different methods to acquire information and to fulfill my expectations and goals. Hanington & Martin’s Universal Methods of Design have been helpful in assisting me in finding methods that are the best fits for my project. Additionally, I also applied research methods - for example, the 50 renderings - that I have learnt from my previous projects to this one. I made a mess map with Kumu, a stakeholder map on Mural, and a lipstick consumption keyword map. The most exciting parts of this project were my communications and interactions with my stakeholders. Those were really interesting experiences; I designed questions, conducted video interviews, and also created face mask renderings based on people’s feedback. All these attempts were very important for me to better understand consumers’ needs and expectations in the market.
So to speak, the part that we shared our 20 renderings with our research participants and asked for their feedback was necessary. After analyzing people’s choices, we found that the most wanted qualities of a face mask were transparency, innovative technology, convenience, and simplicity. Along the process, I also acquired some surprising yet thoughtful responses from people. One participant told me he preferred designs that showed more diversity and inclusion. He raised example how a transparent mask would be much more convenient for deaf people who rely on lip readings. That really got me into thinking that a qualified and successful design should be able to understand and customize individual need.
In this last part of the project, we created two final prototypes of our ideal face masks through different media forms. Since the ultimate purpose of the project is to create a mask that will work for lipstick lover and user, we ended up creating advertisements that are expected to attract consumers’ attentions and market the products.
My partner Houming created a video that is a mix of lipstick and face mask advertisements, imagining a future that face mask becomes a trend, an aesthetic, and a norm as well as a world where lipstick goes well with face covering.
Video made by my project partner, Houming.
Link to the video here👇:
On my end, I have acquired my inspirations from American vintage ads and decided to transform two into a sort of modern pop vintage ad poster. The original posters that I used were J. Howard Miller’s famous Rosie the Riveter “We Can Do It!” and a Max Factor lipstick ad (specific date unknown).
Based on the feedback we collected from our participants last week, we designed two new face mask designs that have combined all the desired qualities. I transferred the designs onto the vintage ad and poster and played around with the contents in the original works.
It is really fun to see the collision of old-fashioned-ness and modernity. The vintage poster and ad provide our designs agencies, while at the same time, our designs give these slowly fading artifacts new forms and meanings.
Designs of masks and reinterpretations on vintage ad and poster:
Two new designs of the ideal lipstick-friendly face covering.
The 3-in-1 mask in Rosie the Riveter. | https://medium.com/@padmayyang96/research-for-design-part-5-21ccbeaf7026 | ['Padma Yawen Yang'] | 2021-05-03 23:26:32.466000+00:00 | ['Vintage', 'Design', 'Masks', 'Advertisement', 'Prototype'] |
Coaches Corner Chat #2: Developing Leadership | Brian Shrum, Head Womens Coach at Youngstown State University — What is Leadership? A leader is someone who is going to make the team better.
Coaches are leaders! Leadership within the program starts with the coach! Consistency in behavior and message are important — and must match the definition the coach has for “What is Leadership?”
Communication is key! Consistent feedback — even better is the idea of “balanced” feedback — positive and negative! | https://medium.com/@traintodevelopplaytowin/coaches-corner-chat-2-developing-leadership-1928997c2522 | ['Kieron Boyle'] | 2020-12-18 16:37:39.483000+00:00 | ['Leadership', 'Leadership Development', 'Leadership Coaching', 'Leadership Skills', 'Leadership Training'] |
TRADI JUISE | This bonus offer has been created by the applicable Vendor and not by ClickBank. Accordingly, ClickBank is not responsible for any information contained in the offer, including, but not limited to, any product information, promotions, incentives, expected returns or other information contained herein. In addition, ClickBank is not responsible for any links to third party websites in conjunction with this offer. Such links do not imply any endorsement by Tradijuise of such websites or the content, products or services available from such websites. By clicking on or accessing a third party website listed, you acknowledge sole responsibility for and assume all risk arising from your use of any such websites.
INCOME DISCLAIMER : This website and the items it distributes contain business strategies, marketing methods and other business advice that, regardless of my own results and experience, may not produce the same results (or any results) for you. Tradeology.com makes absolutely no guarantee, expressed or implied, that by following the advice or content available from this web site you will make any money or improve current profits, as there are several factors and variables that come into play regarding any given business. Primarily, results will depend on the nature of the product or business model, the conditions of the marketplace, the experience of the individual, and situations and elements that are beyond your control. As with any business endeavour, you assume all risk related to investment and money based on your own discretion and at your own potential expense.Go link | https://medium.com/@mathew.mcdaniel85/tradi-juise-8f28f45d4387 | ['Mathew Mcdaniel'] | 2021-12-29 00:15:46.493000+00:00 | ['Actions On Google', 'The Interested Challenge', 'Bernie Sanders'] |
Ring rolls out end-to-end encryption for select doorbells and security cameras | Ring rolls out end-to-end encryption for select doorbells and security cameras Britney Jan 20·3 min read
Ring’s promised rollout of end-to-end video encryption for several of its doorbells and cameras finally arrives today, offering an additional level of security for Ring users willing to put up with some inherent trade-offs.
Mentioned in this article Ring Video Doorbell Pro Read TechHive's reviewMSRP $249.00See it Amazon-owned Ring first announced the end-to-end encryption rollout during its annual hardware event last fall. At the time, Ring promised that the free feature would arrive before the end of 2020. It’s now mid-January 2021, but that’s close enough.
Ring is calling the initial stage of its end-to-end encryption rollout a “technical preview,” and for now, it’s limited to eight doorbell and camera models, including the Video Doorbell Pro, the Video Doorbell Elite, the Floodlight Cam, the Indoor Cam, the Stick Up Cam Plug-in, the Stick Up Cam Elite, the Spotlight Cam Wired, and the Spotlight Cam Mount.
[ Further reading: The best home security cameras ]Ring said it will solicit feedback on the new feature on the End-to-End Encryption screen within the Ring app.
Videos recording by Ring cameras are already encrypted on their way to the cloud and while they’re sitting on Ring’s servers. With end-to-end encryption, however, Ring videos are wrapped in an additional level of AES 128-bit encryption, starting locally on the camera itself and continuing all the way to a user’s iOS or Android phone, where it’s finally decrypted. That means no third parties will be able to see your videos without the private decryption key of a public/private key pair, which is stored only on an “enrolled” phone and secured by a 10-word, auto-generated passphrase.
Because end-to-end encryption protects Ring videos from any and all prying eyes, users who enable it will give up some key features, particularly those that depend on in-the-cloud video analysis.
Motion verification and “people-only” mode, for example, scour your recorded video clips in the cloud for movement and people, so these features won’t work with end-to-end encryption enabled. You also won’t be able to view live feeds of your enrolled Ring cameras on an Amazon Echo Show or a Fire TV device.
Still, plenty of users may likely decide that the added level of security provided by end-to-end encryption is a worthwhile tradeoff.
Ring isn’t the only smart home manufacturer to offer end-to-end video encryption for its security cameras. Apple’s HomeKit Secure Video also boasts the feature, and unlike Ring’s end-to-end encryption, HomeKit Secure Video does allow for features such as people detection, because the analysis is performed locally (on a “home hub” device such as an Apple TV, an iPad, or a HomePod) rather than in the cloud. That said, there are only a small number of HomeKit Secure Video-enabled cameras available, while Ring cameras are much more ubiquitous.
Ring’s end-to-end encryption push is the latest measure that the brand has taken to shore up its security bona fides, which took a beating following a series of widely publicized attacks by hackers.
Last February, Ring began rolling out mandatory two-factor authentication, a key defense against hackers looking to take control of Ring cameras with stolen passwords. We’ll show you how to do that in this story.
Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details. | https://medium.com/@britney55392137/ring-rolls-out-end-to-end-encryption-for-select-doorbells-and-security-c-d8af00bcf16d | [] | 2021-01-20 01:32:23.690000+00:00 | ['Tvs', 'Chargers', 'Consumer Electronics'] |
WIP3 Formal Voting Begins! | WIP3 review
In this proposal, the core development team explains the background of the birth of the Huobi ECO Chain, formally proposes to the community a plan to enter the Huobi ECO Chain, and tries to put forward a specific plan.
According to the feedback from the community, the community is concerned about the implementation cost of this plan.
In order to better reflect the will of the community, we made the following option settings:
Select “400K”: Allocate 400K WPC for mining incentives of the Heco chain
Select “300K”: Allocate 300K WPC for mining incentives of the Heco chain
Select “200K”: Allocate 200K WPC for mining incentives of the Heco chain
Select “100K”: Allocate 100K WPC for mining incentives of the Heco chain
Select “0”: Deploy the lending protocol only
The core development team will implement this proposal according to the option with the most votes in this voting.
For more details, check here: https://gov.wepiggy.com/t/topic/416
Formal voting
Now, community members can vote through the formal voting website: https://vote.wepiggy.com.
Time：2020/12/25 10：00–2020/12/28 10：00（UTC+8 Time）
Tutorial:
https://www.yuque.com/zgryhn/duu5f7/uzfhic | https://medium.com/@wepiggy-com/wip3-formal-voting-begins-839573f1af07 | [] | 2020-12-25 02:15:43.196000+00:00 | ['Cryptocurrency', 'Defi', 'Ethereum', 'Blockchain', 'Bitcoin'] |
The potential of Data Collaboratives for COVID-19 | By Stefaan G. Verhulst
We live in almost unimaginable times. The spread of COVID-19 is a human tragedy and global crisis that will impact our communities for many years to come. The social and economic costs are huge and mounting, and they are already contributing to a global slowdown. Every day, the emerging pandemic reveals new vulnerabilities in various aspects of our economic, political and social lives. These include our vastly overstretched public health services, our dysfunctional political climate, and our fragile global supply chains and financial markets.
The unfolding crisis is also making shortcomings clear in another area: the way we re-use data responsibly. Although this aspect of the crisis has been less remarked upon than other, more obvious failures, those who work with data — and who have seen its potential to impact the public good — understand that we have failed to create the necessary governance and institutional structures that would allow us to harness data responsibly to halt or at least limit this pandemic. A recent article in Stat, an online journal dedicated to health news, characterized the COVID-19 outbreak as “a once-in-a-century evidence fiasco.” The article continues:
“At a time when everyone needs better information, […] we lack reliable evidence on how many people have been infected with SARS-CoV-2 or who continue to become infected. Better information is needed to guide decisions and actions of monumental significance and to monitor their impact.”
It doesn’t have to be this way, and these data challenges are not an excuse for inaction. As we explain in what follows, there is ample evidence that the re-use of data can help mitigate health pandemics. A robust (if somewhat unsystematized) body of knowledge could direct policymakers and others in their efforts. In the second part of this article, we outline eight steps that key stakeholders can and should take to better re-use data in the fight against COVID-19. In particular, we argue that more responsible data stewardship and increased use of data collaboratives are critical.
I. Theory of the Case: How Data — and Data Re-Use — Can Fight Pandemics
A range of evidence exists from around the world to suggest that better use of data can help to address many complex public problems, including climate change, crime, economic inequality, and public health crises. At The GovLab, the action-research center at New York University which I co-founded, we have repeatedly seen that the sharing and reuse of aggregated and anonymized data — e.g., from telecommunications, social media, satellites, and Internet of Things sensors — can improve traditional models for tracking disease propagation and other questions.
Such efforts often occur when private companies repurpose their data, collected during the normal course of business, toward public ends. For instance, telecommunications data from the company Orange has been re-used to support the response to Ebola in Africa; and data from Telefónica in Mexico has been deployed to combat swine flu. Social media data from Facebook has likewise been used to understand public perceptions around Zika in Brazil while satellite data has helped track seasonal measles outbreaks in Niger. In addition, geospatial data has supported malaria surveillance and eradication efforts in Sub-Saharan Africa and, more generally, many infectious diseases have been monitored using mobile phones and other mobility-related data.
The potential and realized contributions of all this data teach us several vital lessons. Chief among these is the importance of re-using data, particularly involving entities working toward the public good leveraging data held by the private sector. In all the examples mentioned above, the potential of data was realized when companies provided public, non-profit, research, or civic organizations with functional access to privately held datasets. We call such partnerships data collaboratives. They are an emerging form of public–private cooperation deployed around the world, often with significant results.
The second important lesson is that the supply of and demand for data is often widely dispersed across geographies and sectors. Combined with a shortage of data expertise, particularly within smaller non-profit and civic organizations, this fragmentation leads to tremendous inefficiencies that stunt data’s potential and limit its ability to mitigate complex public problems. The problem of fragmentation is exacerbated by conflicting legal jurisdictions and often poorly communicated and misunderstood regulatory regimes.
These inefficiencies in data collaboration lead to costly delays in response times, lost opportunities to save lives and livelihoods, and a persistent lack of preparation for future threats. Much potentially impactful data is never made accessible to those who could productively use it. Much of the data that is released is never used in a systematic and sustainable way due to limited discoverability, poor quality, and a lack of data expertise among recipient organizations. The European Commission’s Expert Group on Business to Government Data Sharing, of which I am a member, recently stated:
“[M]uch of the potential for data and its insights to be used for the benefit of society remains untapped […] Due to organisational, technical and legal obstacles (as well as an overall lack of a data-sharing culture) business-to-government (B2G) data-sharing partnerships are still largely isolated, short-term collaborations.” (Executive Summary, p. 7.)
II. Seven Steps Toward Better Re-Use of Data to Fight COVID-19
How do we overcome these shortcomings? Based on the European Expert Group’s final report, our own research, and that of others (see a full list here), we have identified seven steps that should be taken immediately by policymakers and other stakeholders. These steps would enhance the data collaboration ecosystem, helping to ease inefficiencies and bottlenecks. In the process, they would make the re-use of data a much more potent weapon in the fight against Covid-19, as well as other future pandemics.
1. DEVELOP A GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK: The lack of clear, consistent national and transnational governance frameworks is one of the main factors currently limiting the potential of data re-use. Hence, it is crucial public and private actors, as well as civil society, work together to develop or clarify a clear set of laws, regulations and norms to govern the trusted re-use of privately held data for the public interest. This framework should include governance principles, open data policies, trusted data re-use agreements, and transparency requirements and safeguards. In addition, it should include accountability mechanisms, including ethical councils, that clearly define duties of care for data accessed in emergency contexts and do not obligate new and additional data collection by the private sector.
2. BUILD CAPACITY: Collaboration is also frequently limited by a lack of capacity — technical, financial and otherwise — to re-purpose and re-use data. It’s therefore essential that policymakers and other stakeholders work to increase the readiness and operational capacity of the public and private sectors to re-use and act on data, for example by investing in training, education, awareness building and reskilling for lawmakers and civil servants. Building capacity also includes increasing the ability to ask and formulate questions that matter and that can be answered in a meaningful way by data. Currently, much data is released by organizations without any clear purpose or clearly understood end use. Identifying and articulating a list of priority questions, as well as metrics to assess impact, could facilitate more targeted and rapid responses by data holders when societies are confronted with crises.
3. ESTABLISH DATA STEWARDS: Private, public, and civil society entities should create and promote the position of Chief Data Stewards within organisations. Data stewards can take the form of individuals or groups within organisations. They are tasked with identifying and nurturing potential collaborations, as well as with identifying data that could be shared toward the public interest. Data stewards can also lead efforts to measure impact and ensure that any insights that result from sharing are actually acted upon. Importantly, Data stewards should be mandated with protecting potentially sensitive information and ensuring the re-use of data does not violate privacy.
4. BUILD A NETWORK: Parties across sectors should work together to establish a network of data stewards. This community of practice could coordinate and streamline efforts and provide greater transparency on current work on data stewardship and collaboration. Its mission, objectives, participants, and criteria for participation should all be made open to the public, and its activities should be undertaken in an inclusive manner.
5. ENGAGE CITIZENS: Citizens should be encouraged to co-create data collaboratives for well-defined and documented public interest purposes of their own choice. To enable this, governments and corporations should promote user-friendly crowdsourcing and data donation mechanisms. These mechanisms should clearly articulate to citizens how their data will be responsibly used, re-used, and protected. In general, efforts should be made to make more transparent to citizens what the benefits of data collaboration could be for them personally, and for society at large.
6. UNLOCK FUNDS: Funding from a variety of sources, including crowdfunding, should be unlocked and sustained without the use of heavy-handed procurement. Funders should support data systems and infrastructure with an eye toward future crises as well as current challenges. A system of pre-qualified recipients should be established to facilitate rapid access to funds and other resources during the early stages of a crisis. Other incentives for data collaboration should also be established, including public recognition of private companies and civil organisations that engage in data collaboratives, so that they may be eligible for funds. In addition, existing schemes that exist to incentivize or encourage data collaboration should take societal priorities into account when making decisions on how to allocate funds.
7. PROMOTE TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATION: For all the progress in data methods and new hardware and software, technology continues to be something of a bottleneck. With the support of governments and foundations, data scientists and researchers should co-design and co-develop technologies that can help implement data collaboration at scale, in a responsible and sustainable way. This collaborative research should be as transparent and interdisciplinary as possible, and could focus initially on core needs such as privacy-preserving technologies, security technologies, and access-control technologies.
One overarching component of our framework is essential to emphasize, and applies to all of the above action items. Sharing is not, and cannot become, a pretext for privacy violations or erosions. Reuse must only take place on aggregated and anonymized data within the confines of a strict set of rules that ensure privacy. Societal benefits cannot come at the cost of individual rights (or else they are no benefits at all). As explained above, data stewards will play an important role in ensuring these protections. Working with other internal and external stakeholders, they can ensure privacy protections, and that the potential of personal data to solve public problems is never used as justification for the limitation of individual liberties.
Conclusion
Needless to say, these seven steps are not silver bullets. They will not, on their own, eliminate existing roadblocks to data collaboration. They will also not single-handedly allow us to overcome the global pandemic the world now confronts, but this is a long, hard-fought battle, and every inch counts.
Data can be a potent weapon, especially when it is re-used responsibly across actors and sectors. The recommendations we outline here represent an important first step toward unleashing that potential. At The GovLab, we plan to continue our research — in collaboration with our many partners, including the 300 individuals that have signed our Call for Action from around the world — toward identifying legitimate and effective ways to implement the above steps.
The above article is based upon a Call For Action: Toward Building The Data Infrastructure And Ecosystem We Need To Tackle Pandemics And Other Dynamic Societal And Environmental Threats. It has received almost 300 signatories.
The author would like to thank all signatories and in particular Ciro Cattuto and Richard Benjamins for their leadership and support in the initiation of the call; and Andrew Young, Andrew J. Zahuranec and Michelle Winowatan, all at The GovLab, for their research support.
Stefaan G. Verhulst is Co-Founder and Chief Research and Development Officer at The GovLab, and an Editor-in-Chief of the open access journal Data & Policy published by Cambridge University Press. For more information about to contribute to Data & Policy, read here. | https://medium.com/data-policy/the-potential-of-data-collaboratives-for-covid19-e88301427943 | ['D P Blog Admin'] | 2020-04-15 16:56:51.088000+00:00 | ['Data Steward', 'Open Data', 'Data Governance', 'Data Collaborative', 'Covid 19'] |
My Relationship with Religion | I wasn’t always into religion like my peers. Some people I knew would always go to church every Wednesday and Sunday with their family. I never did, I always acted as if I went to church on the weekends, thinking that was how I could fit in with my friends.
My family isn’t as religious as most. My father grew up in a Baptist home, but eventually, as he grew older, he became non-denominational, meaning he is respectful of any Christian denomination. My mother, on the other hand, was born into Catholicism and still follows that religion to this day. My parents made the decision not to force religion on my siblings and I because they respect whatever we believe. With this decision I was never baptized as a baby and our family never went to church unless it was an occasion that involved my Mom’s side of the family.
When I was around 10 or 11 years old, I started to become interested in religion, specifically Catholicism and how it works. I had my grandmother buy me a monthly subscription for books with devotions for that month. There are two definitions of devotion, the love or loyalty for a person or activity and the second definition is religious observations. In a way, both definitions intertwine with each other.
I would say my own prayer for my family and close friends, after that I would say the ‘Our Father’ and ‘Hail Mary’ once before I would finally drift off to sleep. But I slowly stopped doing it just because I felt like it wasn’t important to me anymore. I did feel a little guilty that my grandma spent all that money for me not to read the monthly devotion books that kept coming in. I was really disappointed in myself because I lost faith in that moment and I felt God didn’t love me as much as the people who went to church every week and the people who were baptized.
While in my break with God, I felt like my world was slowly falling apart. I started falling out of love with myself and religion because when you are friends with constant church-goers, you feel like you’re so out of place because you have no idea what they’re talking about when they talk about disciples or scripture. It wasn’t until the passing of my great-grandmother and my grandfather when I started being infuriated with my faith. I thought at that moment “Why would God take the most important people in my life away when they were supposed to help me pave the path to my future?”
Depression and anxiety have been on my shoulders since I was about 12–13. This was one of the reasons I decided to get back into going to church and trying to bring my faith back into my life. I let my mental health guide me to wherever it wanted to take me, and slowly it started to control my life.
It wasn’t until September 2018 when I started to make religion a part of my life again. One of my best friends helped me push myself back into the groove of religion. She started taking me to adoration with her and her family, who are very religious. Then she invited me to go to RCIA, which is Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults. In RCIA classes, you can learn more about Catholicism and they introduce you to the idea of Baptism, even if you are above the age recommended, which is an infant.
For RCIA classes, I go to Prince of Peace with one of my friends and my sister. There is a priest who leads the discussion with a room full of people. He has a slideshow he presents in front of everyone and everyone is allowed to speak their minds and ask questions about the topic. After the class-wide presentation, everyone splits up into groups and has their own little discussion about the topic, go over the notes they took and what they’ve learned that night. One night my friend Lisa, my sister and I asked if we could do our own group after the presentation since we were the only teenagers. They said of course, so we went to own our room with some snacks and we just had an amazing talk about the presentation and with our extra time we just hung around and told stories to each other and I have never laughed so much in my life.
We started going more often I realized how much I missed being in the religious scene. Scripture is sacred writings of a certain religion. I started getting really into scripture, I started writing down quotes that really spoke to me and I reflect on it and how it makes me feel.
One quote that has always stuck to me is “So do not fear, for I am with you; do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand” (Isaiah 41:10). The reason this quote has always stuck with me is because when things get tough, instead of putting all that weight on my shoulders like I used to, I’ve tried to hand my problems to God himself by praying about it and looking for solutions as well. Sometimes, I feel like he can only do so much to help. With that, I try to help myself out as much as possible, which is more than I used to do for myself in earlier years.
Over the course of these couple of months, I’ve truly become happier with myself. I’m not sure if its because I have found myself into a religion I like and that is so accepting of others, but I’d like to think so. If younger me saw what I was doing today I think she would have gone into religion earlier in her life. I feel like she would be happier and have less stress on her shoulders about ‘acting religious’.
Today, I’m happy with the friends I have and I’m grateful that God put them into my life for a reason and helping me understand my purpose. I feel like I understand why some people do this just out of the blue, maybe they need help just like we all do. | https://medium.com/finding-faith/my-relationship-with-religion-a7e02135bea1 | ['Isabella Strom'] | 2019-02-02 20:47:49.603000+00:00 | ['Experience', 'Religion', 'Catholicism'] |
Your Coffee Order, Based on Your Political Affiliation | Democratic — Hot Latté w/ 2% Milk
IMAGE: Unsplash — George Kroeker
Due to its very basic nature, this type of coffee brings in a wide range of people. A “big tent” one could say.
For far too long, the Democratic Party has come to the table asking for less before negotiations even begin. The people ask for almond milk, Democratic leaders then compromise towards skim (as though that’s what we asked for), and then they walk away with 2%.
I understand this may work for some people; and by “some people” I mean the self-interested and those who profit from the sale of cow milk (big pharma, oil, real estate, etc.) However, we can do so much better. We no longer have to settle for the bare minimum.
Also, for some of these “Democrats” that are really just moderates and centrists, they say they’re drinking lattés when in reality they just threw in a splash of milk. That’s not a latté, Klobuchar.
And Conor Lamb, stop blaming progressives for lost House seats this year. It was people like you that made Biden’s win a close call, and the fate of the Senate now determined by two runoffs. Every House candidate that won reelection this year supported Medicare For All. What a wild insult to the vast majority of Black, immigrant, Latinx, and Queer people that worked so hard for Democratic campaigns this election season when they really shouldn’t have had to because their human rights were at stake.
In principle, and I mean in the very general sense of what a latté is, this type of coffee isn’t “bad.” The root of it is that we need structural change towards how we operate as a whole. What we’re currently serving isn’t nearly enough.
Republican — Hot Black Coffee
IMAGE: Unsplash — Matt Hoffman
I understand why in theory this makes sense, but just like a 2% latté, simplifying, or in this case, cutting parts away from a drink doesn’t make it “one size fits all.” You’re just leaving out what most people want (need) simply because it works for you, then claiming people are just whiners for holding you accountable.
The reality of it is, this type of coffee just isn’t sustainable.
Are you honestly going to tell me that if the only way coffee was prepared was black that everyone’s needs would be met? People are fluid and multi-layered creatures, not machines. Your rationality argument doesn’t mask the fact that your coffee simply lacks.
Let’s add another perspective to this year’s Senate results. Your majority in the chamber is now being determined by Georgia’s two seats; the same state that the Biden campaign and community organizers just flipped Blue. This hasn’t been done since President Clinton’s election. The people have had enough.
The U.S. House, Senate, and White House were all serving black coffee a few years back and we all know how that turned out. The peoples’ needs continued to be unmet, if not received further harm from what you believe “is best.” The House and presidency (and maybe the Senate) now only serve everything but black coffee for a reason. Expand your horizons and move on.
Libertarian — Iced Black Coffee
IMAGE: Unsplash — Matt Hoffman
You may ask, “How is this any different from hot black coffee?” My response: It isn’t.
Libertarians claim to be “socially liberal and fiscally conservative.” Sure Chad, whatever you say. If you are able in the same breath to agree with full marriage equality, but stand by customer discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, crying the “importance of private ownership”, then you aren’t “socially liberal.”
Cold black coffee is just more approachable because it’s not blistering, but that doesn’t mean it’s not absolutely bitter. Just because you may be embarrassed or ashamed to admit you are black coffee, doesn’t mean you aren’t. It means you are rejecting reality. (Tearing Libertarians a new one isn’t new behavior for me.)
Iced black coffee and hot black coffee are the same drink. Period, end of sentence.
Green — Hot Vanilla Lavender Latté
IMAGE: HeyFoodapp.com
This is an example of a prime latté.
Use whatever milk works best for you, you’re still getting that creamy vanilla, lavender goodness like everyone else. The base is the same, but there’s a little wiggle room for individual preference; just like any true progressive policy.
A lot of 2% latté drinkers will tell you that this is just unrealistic. They’ll say, “You can’t just give-out specialty lattés left and right.” Well, why not? If that’s what people want, and we have plenty of ingredients for it, then that’s what they should get. Sounds like somebody may actually be a big fan of hot black coffee.
The issue here is…. not all progressives are on board. Yes, we very much agree with the concept you're going for here. What you stand for is absolutely feasible. The implementation is just a little off.
We aren’t caving though to the false beliefs stated by the 2% latté drinkers, but what if we want this iced? Can we get vanilla and not lavender, or lavender and not vanilla?
I definitely support this type of coffee, but it needs some tweaking. I’m sorry people group you with iced black coffee. You definitely aren’t the same.
Progressive/Democratic Socialist — Custom Drink
IMAGE: Unsplash — Kamil S.
The main reasons why people drink coffee are for the caffeination and the coffee taste. Let’s just stick with the objective then instead of distracting ourselves with the preparation. As long as the mission at hand is done, people should have their coffee however they want it, as long as everyone is getting coffee.
Am I right or am I right?
Good policy is holistic and comprehensive. We can afford the Green New Deal. We can afford Medicare For All. We absolutely need a tax on the ultra-wealthy. We cannot afford the continuing and increasing devastation that will result without progressive policies like these.
Trumpism/Fascism/Bigotry — A Steaming Cup of Battery Acid
IMAGE: ThoughtCo.com
This isn’t coffee. This is acid.
Some people like to sell it like it’s coffee though. Some hot black coffee drinkers will gladly hold up a cup of battery acid and exclaim, “This is what black coffee should be!” Meanwhile, they have a visible hole burned through their throat. As long as they benefit from it, they could care less about what they’re selling.
Then we have people who know it’s not hot black coffee, but out of “pride” would rather have acid than anything else. I don’t like 2% milk either, but if you think I’m drinking battery acid instead you’re dead wrong.
We can disagree on the type of coffee, but don’t lie to my face. I’m not falling for it. I have ethics, human compassion, and a moral compass. | https://medium.com/an-injustice/your-coffee-order-based-on-your-political-affiliation-94a5edbb6f59 | ['Max Micallef'] | 2021-01-02 18:43:23.510000+00:00 | ['Government', 'Politics', 'Coffee', 'Republicans', 'Democrats'] |
First Mother’s Day Without Her | I cried as I wrapped my daughter’s presents for her 16th birthday. My mom would’ve given my daughter all the presents she wanted. She would’ve asked my daughter for a wish list with links to the store’s websites. My mom would’ve wrapped the gifts in crisp, colorful paper, with satin ribbon and silk flowers on the packages. Elise, my daughter’s name, would be written in impeccable script on the gift tag. My mom would’ve done all of this if cancer hadn’t spread through her brain.
There will be no more birthdays with my mom, and no more gifts from my children’s grandma. My mom was a generous grandma. When the kids created holiday wish lists, she wanted to be the one to get them everything. She didn’t like the years that Hanukkah came before Christmas, because the in-laws might give our kids the gifts she wanted to give. When Elise was into American Girl dolls, Grandma was the one to buy her the newest doll, the miniature ski gear, the roller skates, the horse, and the bike with the banana seat and tasseled handlebars and every new doll outfit too. Grandma would also buy things my kids didn’t even know they wanted. Art supplies, puzzles, and books on topics that interested them.
My mom was a gifted, creative teacher that spent a lot of her own money buying books for her classroom, then later for her grandchildren. She was a master at pairing kids and books. When my son was a toddler, she brought him books every time she came to visit. And that was weekly. Whatever his interest, she could find books on the topic — trucks and construction, dinosaurs, sharks, rescue heroes, and the Percy Jackson series. My mom read Thank You, Mr. Falker over and over to Elise, who loved hearing about a girl who struggled to learn to read, as she had.
I cried again the day after my daughter’s birthday. This time, as I looked at photos on my phone of Elise with her friends, celebrating her Sweet 16th at the Ariana Grande concert in downtown L.A. I used to text my mom photos of my kids all the time. It was an easy way to connect with her. As my mom’s cancer progressed, it was more difficult to find ways to connect with her. She was in pain. She was frustrated. Angry. Tired. Tired of doctor’s appointments and tired of the pain. My mom was a beautiful brunette woman with brown eyes and a big smile. Always wore lipstick — hot pink or red, or burgundy, if it matched her outfit. She always matched her outfits. Colorful clothes. And she had long, acrylic fingernails that were painted to match, too.
This Sunday will be the first Mother’s Day without my mom. I won’t see her in a bright pink outfit from Talbot’s. I won’t hear her ask my son about his first year of college or the camp job he’ll start this summer. I won’t eat vanilla bundt cake with her. Or smell her latest perfume purchase from Bloomingdale’s. I won’t feel that my gift for her is “not enough.” Because I sometimes felt “not enough” around her. She was a perfectionist and sometimes that made me feel pressured to behave perfectly too.
Cancer has a cruel way of reminding us of our imperfections. It stripped a woman of her pride in her outward appearance. Before she died, we had time alone together in the hospital. She wasn’t wearing one of her bright silk blouses, or pink lipstick or matching Tory Burch shoes. She was in a hospital gown. And hospital socks, that didn’t match. Her wig was askew. She tugged on it and said it itched. I asked her if she wanted to take it off and she said, “Yes, I’m done with this.”
That was the first time I’d seen her like that. She’d lost her hair from the cancer treatments, but she’d gained a vulnerability I hadn’t seen. We talked a lot and she was so interested in hearing about her grandkids. She wanted them to know how much she loved them and that they will find their way and that maybe the first year of college didn’t go so smoothly for my son, but he didn’t have to stay there. He could come home or go to junior college or do something else. He’s such a great kid, she kept saying. And so creative. About my daughter, she kept saying how brave she is to high jump and go snowboarding. And she’s so proactive about exploring hair styling classes and she should pursue that if she loves it.
They will find their way, she kept saying. They will find their way. My mom passed away a week after that conversation. Now I am trying to find my way. | https://medium.com/heart-soul-pen/first-mothers-day-without-her-a767778c5385 | ['Carol Adler'] | 2019-05-10 18:39:58.590000+00:00 | ['Birthday', 'Mothers And Daughters', 'Family', 'Mothers Day', 'Cancer'] |
To repair trust and relationships, Biden must act boldly | When President Obama took office, he inherited the legacy of President George W. Bush’s disastrous Global War on Terror and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Those wars — along with the U.S. abuses at Abu Ghraib, CIA black sites, Guantanamo Bay, and discriminatory domestic policies — created an impression that America was at war with Muslims globally. In response, President Obama sought to deconstruct that perception and pivot toward a “new beginning” with Muslims around the world, featuring partnerships based on mutual interest and mutual respect. That effort was successful in marking a departure from the calamitous Bush era, but it left unachieved a number of key policy goals (most notably progress on an Israel-Palestine two-state solution) and arguably maintained an imagined construct of the “Muslim world” that in effect problematizes Muslims.
President-elect Biden is inheriting a similarly tarnished American reputation and a set of failed Trump-era policies that are steeped in anti-Muslim animus. For the most part, President Trump’s foreign policy has been an embarrassing failure. His Trump-first, unilateral, transactional approach has undermined America’s power and prestige, and the list of issues requiring urgent attention by the Biden administration is long and daunting.
Many of the hallmarks of Trump’s failed foreign policy — including xenophobia, hostility to multilateralism, an abandonment of human rights, and the gutting of the State Department — have directly impacted Muslim-majority countries and communities. Trump’s presidential campaign started off with an announcement of his Islamophobic “Muslim ban,” which he haphazardly implemented once in office. He withdrew the United States from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action to deal with Iran’s nuclear program and reinstated various sanctions, which have only brought Iran closer to developing a nuclear weapons capability. He has coddled authoritarian leaders around the world, including those who lead Muslim-majority countries, and has dropped any pretense of concern for human rights. As a gross example of this, he reportedly endorsed Chinese President Xi’s internment of over a million Uighurs in Xinjiang. And as part of his gutting of the State Department, Trump did not appoint a special envoy to the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, allowing many years of progress in that relationship to languish.
Furthermore, Trump’s unequivocally pro-Israel approach to the Israeli-Palestinian issue has created diplomatic facts on the ground that may have ended prospects for a two-state solution. Trump shut down the Palestine Liberation Organization’s mission in the United States, and eliminated U.S. funding for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East. He moved to Jerusalem the U.S. Embassy to Israel, closed the U.S. consulate general there, recognized Israeli sovereignty over the Syrian Golan Heights, and has brokered several agreements in which Arab states establish relations with Israel — all without any Israeli concessions regarding the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
As Biden reinvigorates U.S. diplomacy and leadership globally, there are several considerations that can help him and his administration successfully re-engage with Muslim-majority countries and communities globally, without repeating mistakes of the past.
First, end the bigotry, at home and abroad.
Arsalan Suleman speaks at a Brookings Institution event in 2019. (Image: Brookings Institution)
President-elect Biden has pledged to repeal Trump’s “Muslim ban” on his first day in office and also to urge Congress to adopt the No Ban Act, which would prevent similar discriminatory policies in the future. Those steps would help to mark a clear repudiation of Trump’s anti-Muslim bigotry. But further than that, it is important to ensure that other areas of policy — including counterterrorism policy or efforts to prevent extremism — do not reinforce anti-Muslim discrimination. And thinly disguised efforts to further marginalize and discriminate against Muslims and Muslim institutions — like the sporadic efforts to ban the Muslim Brotherhood — must also be rejected, whether they originate domestically or are promoted by foreign states.
Second, prioritize human rights and democracy.
Muslims are the victims of some of the world’s most pressing human rights crises. Myanmar perpetrated a genocide against the Rohingya Muslims of Myanmar, over 800,000 of whom are living as refugees in neighboring Bangladesh. China has imprisoned over a million ethnic Uighur Muslims in internment camps, as part of a concerted effort to destroy the Uighur religious and ethnic identity — a crime against humanity and potential genocide of colossal proportions. Syrians continue to endure horrific crimes under the Asad regime, and the Yemeni people remain victims of a protracted conflict involving many of its neighbors. Millions of Muslims and other religious minorities in India are facing targeted discrimination, and the Kashmiri people remain under an oppressive lockdown as the Indian government centralizes control of the once semi-autonomous region. The Palestinian people also continue to suffer human rights violations while under Israeli occupation.
There are also pressing human rights concerns in a number of Muslim-majority states who are close American partners, including Saudi Arabia and Egypt, where the crackdown on dissent and democratic participation continues unabated. And the democratic transitions in Tunisia and Sudan, among others, will require ongoing support. Addressing these urgent human rights situations, and reinstating human rights and democracy as core components of U.S. foreign policy, must be a top priority for the incoming Biden administration.
Third, actions speak louder than words.
Policy change, not rhetoric, will be the ultimate barometer of a successful Biden foreign policy. The situations mentioned above and long-standing policy concerns — like the Israeli-Palestinian situation and the continued operation of the Guantanamo Bay detention facility — need to be addressed with boldness and expediency. Indeed, this may be the last chance for the United States to resuscitate the Israel-Palestine two-state solution and prevent Israel’s occupation of Palestinian lands from becoming a full annexation. Public diplomacy efforts are certainly an important component of U.S. diplomacy, but they cannot make up for bad or failed policies. And public diplomacy initiatives should be based on policy — and not based on religious identity, which can inadvertently reify false constructs like the “Muslim world.”
Finally, personnel makes all the difference.
President-elect Biden has made a commitment to ensuring that his administration truly looks like America, representing the full diversity and talents of Americans from all backgrounds. That laudable commitment must include Muslim Americans, who continue to enrich American society in all of its aspects. Visible inclusion of Muslim Americans in the Biden administration is the most effective way to repudiate Trump’s “Muslim ban” and will help signal America’s return to inclusion and equal rights for all. | https://medium.com/the-diplomatic-pouch/transition-note-5-to-repair-trust-and-relationships-biden-must-act-boldly-22e639681a48 | ['Institute For The Study Of Diplomacy'] | 2021-01-05 23:10:50.852000+00:00 | ['Biden', 'Diplomacy', 'Middle East', 'Muslim', 'Islam'] |
A Peculiar Characterization of the Exponential Function eˣ | The exponential function eˣ is very interesting on it own because it can be defined using various mathematical concepts such as limit of a sequence, value of an infinite summation, upper limit of an integral and the unique solution of a differential equation. It also plays a significant role in statistics, particularly in the probability density function (PDF) of the normal distribution. Recall that the PDF of the standard normal distribution is
Probability density function of the standard normal distribution
It is well-known that normal distribution is one of the key players in statistics due to the Central Limit Theorem, which asserts that if one has large enough sample size, then the distribution of sample mean will be closed to a normal distribution. However, this is not our main concern of this article.
Furthermore, the exponential function eˣ has many important real-life applications. Some of them are modeling growth in populations, economic changes, fatigue of materials, bacterial growth/decay, and continuously compounded interest.
In this article, we will | https://medium.com/cantors-paradise/peculiar-characterization-of-the-exponential-function-829edbdb50ea | ['Nhw', 'Maths Phd'] | 2020-12-20 17:40:28.038000+00:00 | ['Math', 'Mathematics', 'Exponential Growth'] |
AI in Production: The Impact of AI on the Publishing Value Chain | A graph representing the metadata of thousands of archive documents. Source: Wikimedia Commons
AI is coming. AI is here. In the popular press, you read a lot of stuff about the future of artificial intelligence, and I do believe, as do many others, that it’s a technology that has a long way to go before it lives up to the hype (and the dread — cf. our companion Medium piece from this week, Retiring the T-700: Toward a Mandalorian Conception of Artificial Intelligence) of its name.
I’m reminded of a quote from Stack Overflow and Discourse.org co-founder Jeff Atwood when asked if he had any ideas for utilizing artificial intelligence algorithms. His short response: “I do not. I’m not sure ‘artificial intelligence’ is a particularly useful concept at this time. “machine learning” is at least a little more accurate in describing where we are. 😉” I think what Atwood’s perhaps curmudgeonly response points to is that we’re still seeing machines and algorithms trained to do only one thing or a couple of things well enough to be called intelligent or learning.
In a discussion with Hederis team members on the subject of AI in publishing, founding team member and head of operations Erica Warren elucidated one reason why some tech insiders like Atwood remain wary of the AI label:
Part of the issue is that when people think of AI/ML, they generally think of complete automation — and our experience with building our automation product in the past (at Macmillan) is that while even 95%–99% of cases might be straightforward, the 1% over the course of an entire book is actually a lot. So to go that route, publishers either have to (a) lower their standards of quality — which is a non-starter for professional publishers competing with self-publishing, or (b) review all of the changes manually anyway, which defeats the time savings of using AI in the first place.
So while much of the dread and fear around AI relates to too much unchecked autonomy, the healthy skepticism toward all these products labeled AI relates to the fact that the machines are just not autonomous enough.
But as Erica pointed out, when we stop expecting AI to do all the work and accept a symbiotic role with AI as assistant, we can start to understand the potential these technologies have for apps like Hederis and publishing in general:
And the way to do that is to avoid entirely automated “push-button” systems. What we strive for is the concept of an “AI-assistant.” Computers are good at processing large amounts of data quickly, and matching new data to patterns in historical data. The challenge with publishing applications, in fact with any application that deals with art, is that the heart of creativity is novelty. ML applications are NOT good with handling something new that they haven’t seen before. Humans, though, are great at problem solving with new information. What we’re not good at is doing rote, repetitive work accurately for an extended period of time. So you can see that this is an ideal situation to sort of share the load, with the computer being optimized for the repetitive work and the people handling the unique situations that the computer is not able to handle — and in the end we get a higher-quality product in less time.
In publishing, AI and machine learning seem to be trained, broadly, on doing a few sets of tasks fairly well, and your position in the publishing value chain will definitely affect how you benefit (or suffer) from AI’s impact. In a keynote for Digital Book World’s inaugural AI conference (held virtually in May 2020), Lee Huang, a former digital executive and AI expert, described some broad areas of problems that AI is typically trained on — namely, natural language processing, semantic analysis, disambiguation, classification, and taxonomy — and offered up his CAPA framework for utilizing AI in a publishing setting. CAPA stands for Content Creation, Answers & Predictions, and Automation. Giving examples from each category, Huang’s presentation offered clues to how C-suite executives at major publishers are thinking of AI: as a place to generate engagement and revenue at a lower cost. Much of the dread that surrounds AI involves the fear that intelligent machines will replace intelligent humans in the workplace. To Huang’s credit, he frames a lot of the cost-saving benefits of AI for publishers as ways for a publisher to expand into new experiences — automatically generated AR tied to what the machine reads in your text, “deep voice” audiobook narration, automatically generated plain-language summaries of data sets and bodies of research — as opposed to ways to downsize existing staffs. but it still equates to growth in profits and capacity without growing staff. The logic of downsizing is, of course, looming in the shadows, if it’s not outright staring us in the face.
Although the executive view of AI may give the folks grinding it out in content creation, editing, and production the feeling that they’re headed for planned obsolescence, the other keynote from the DBW panel, given by Jason Boog, a journalist who writes about and experiments with AI for outlets such as Publishers Weekly and Towards Data Science, offered a view to ways content creators, and writers specifically, can form personal and open relationships to AI. Boog wrote a step-by-step tutorial about how to use the OpenAI API to access GPT-2, a powerful, interactive NLP language model that allows users to train a computer to do various tasks, including generating pieces of longform fiction. He presented this and other examples of how everyday people without massive R&D budgets or computer science PhDs on staff can start building and training their own AI assistants.
One theme of Boog’s talk was that, while the output of many of these publicly accessible AIs is a predictably mixed bag, AI can provide enough raw material for the right creatives and editors to do great work with less rote effort.
Boog’s sentiments resonate with Hederis’s own philosophy of AI adoption and use, which we are excited to develop and roll out as we head into our third quarter out of beta. The sentiment was echoed by these final comments from Erica Warren:
With enough data, it’s definitely possible to help users get more books through their system quickly by automating the boring stuff and letting humans use their time to actually make meaningful decisions, and use their considerable knowledge and skills instead of just doing manual labor.
While some “classic” production problems, such as classification and tagging of manuscripts are getting the AI/ML treatment from established publishing players and startups (this is an area where Hederis will be developing further capabilities over the coming year), we believe there are other questions, about what constitutes “skilled” type design and other production decision-making scenarios, that have yet to be asked and answered with AI. We’re excited for the next year, and to be a part of this conversation around the future of book production. | https://medium.com/hederis-app/ai-in-production-the-impact-of-ai-on-the-publishing-value-chain-5674dd87193f | ['Hederis Team'] | 2020-12-21 21:15:47.246000+00:00 | ['Publishing', 'AI', 'Machine Learning', 'Artificial Intelligence'] |
Denial To Promote The Reality Show | Denial To Promote The Reality Show
Disclaimer — -The following isn’t a news report. This is opinion developed from many sources, some of which are included for transparency, clarity, and rebuttal, and is the Free Speech that shares ideas.
Denial To Promote The Reality Show….
Capitalism depends on and promotes hierarchy, so anyone believing it will promote equal justice, has been duped by the Reality Show — —
https://www.politicususa.com/2019/06/16/netanyahus-wife-admits-criminal-misuse-of-state-funds.html
in a plea bargain carrying no jail time. — — — — end of politicususa info — -
Meanwhile in America — --https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/6/14/1864879/-Phoenix-cops-handcuff-and-threaten-black-couple-at-gunpoint-after-4-yr-old-takes-Barbie-out-of-store
video showed police officers arresting and drawing a gun on them after their 4-year-old daughter allegedly stole a doll. — — end of dailykos info — -
The Netanyahu example could be filled by any oligarch, and probably has been quite often.
https://www.politicususa.com/2019/06/16/trump-fires-pollster.html
Trump’s response to bad poll numbers is textbook losing candidate behavior. The country is looking eager to dump Trump, and instead of trying to sway voters, Trump is rejecting reality. — — -end of politicususa info — —
Ownership of message by corporate-owned mainstream media has projected the anomaly of capitalism as “our system” over what should be a democratic (small d) Constitutional republic. This is a reason use of the label socialism strikes fear in the hearts of so many voters, in one person’s opinion — — https://www.politicususa.com/2019/06/16/warren-and-buttigieg-jump-in-south-carolina-as-sanders-plunges.html
— — In fact, capitalism uses authoritarianism; any capitalist will so inform, if asked. In contrast, a democratic (small d) socialism will more closely follow the principles as expressed in the Preamble — —
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
— — — end of Preamble to The US Constitution, that seems to describe democratic (small d) socialism — — —
One would be hesitant about endless investigations of politicians which sadly in 2019 include Supreme Court Justices, except that we have replaced our democratic (small d) Constitutional republic with a government those politicians have informed the public would be “run like a business”, and now is populated by more than a few Reality Show snake oil salesmen — — PETITION — ---https://act.credoaction.com/sign/investigate-kavanaugh?t=5&akid=32899%2E2842878%2EPwpZ86
Brett Kavanaugh, who was credibly accused of sexual assault and lying under oath, should not have a seat on the Supreme Court.1 He got one because Republicans broke the rules to confirm him, but Democrats can make sure Republicans don’t get the last word. — end of CREDO info — —
Our nation has been indoctrinated into falling for the propaganda that We The People are less honorable citizens of the USA, then we are widgets in the factories of oligarchs. This is the reason the democratic (small d) socialism as proposed by Bernie Sanders is a remembering of the principles as expressed in the Preamble to the US Constitution.
Received from the Advancement Project — -
https://twitter.com/search?q=%23CloseTheWorkhouse&src=tyah
Until we can rise above the Capitalist Party D&R rhetoric that grows strong by dividing We The People, justice won’t prevail — --https://advancementproject.org/donate/
That’s why we have a team in St. Louis right now. Our partners, Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream, hosted a press conference and public call to action calling on the Mayor to shut down the jail. We also launched the Justice Remix’d Scoop Truck Tour that will be driving around the city with the #CloseTheWorkhouse campaign, talking with people about re-envisioning public safety and thriving communities for everyone.
— end of advancementproject info — — -
These are reasons the governance of, by and for The People, which may be a definition of democratic (small d) socialism, makes sense, if you are of We The People — --https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndD23MCDF_k — One will hear ongoing reasons to promote self-rule, from Bernie Sanders — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4QQeDwYZD-A
With all due respect, perhaps a reason America is still buying the lie of the defunct system of capitalism, is that so many of the public are still waiting for the rising tide to raise their personal boat — --https://www.laprogressive.com/idiot-king/?utm_source=LA+Progressive+NEW&utm_campaign=ca6c81ab80-LAP_News_4_15_April_17_PC4_15_2017_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_61288e16ef-ca6c81ab80-286972237&mc_cid=ca6c81ab80&mc_eid=e213faa886 — Once again, capitalism is about hierarchy; and the best example is the Pyramid Scheme. Those at the bottom, and/or anywhere except at the peak, will not share in the loot. While the R branch of the Capitalist Party is blatantly embezzling (in true business action) the wealth of the nation, how much more wretched is the D branch, as it pretends to want to help the public, under capitalism?
Capitalism goes hand-in-hand with The Military-Industrial Complex. Is Tulsi Gabbard the best Presidential candidate running? Some believe she is — — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VDFQGCFeDw — Of interest will be the comparison between Tulsi Gabbard and Elizabeth Warren, on the topic of war. Tulsi Gabbard has nothing of the Reality Show about her.
The Military-Industrial Complex uses many methods to intimidate other nations — -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1vK9DaEgtg
**************************************************************************************************************************************************
Some voters in the US were disenfranchised due to Capitalist Party D&R election rigging that is controlled by political Parties. The Capitalist Party R&D, have as their objective, putting in place rules that ensure the candidate choice of a particular Establishment Party is put into office, even against the wishes of the voters.
Please remember political Parties have no standing under the US Constitution, but voters do have standing under the US Constitution. Due to disenfranchisement of 3rd-Party candidates, Bernie Sanders who is an Independent, chooses to run as a Democrat for President. If a voter is a member of a 3rd-Party, and wishes to vote for 3rd-Party politician Bernie Sanders, in the Democratic Primary, that voter may be disenfranchised of his/her Constitutional right of a free and fair election, as happened to a large number of voters in NYS in 2016.
One suspects these disenfranchised voters who may have felt defrauded of their right to vote in the 2016 Democratic Primary, voted for Trump in the 2016 general election. One believes this will happen again, because needless to say, the Capitalist Party R&D prefer chaos in the election system, which is a control mechanism for political Parties with no standing under the US Constitution, while the voters do have standing under the US Constitution. This is an interesting red-herring to wield a control that is not Constitutional.
*****Each state is different as to their voter registration guidelines. Anyone wishing to vote for Bernie Sanders for President in the Democratic Primary, should check to be sure they will not be disenfranchised at the polls, once again in 2020, as in 2016. A voter can easily switch between political Parties, rather than functioning as a captive Party loyalist, to a political Party that is not loyal to the voter. *****
Or one can be registered to vote, without being affiliated to a particular political Party. Please remember, the US Constitution supports free and fair elections for voters, but is blissfully unconcerned about political Parties. That some Americans believe “we are a 2-Party system”, is nothing but propaganda.
*****Be sure to check with your state to register to vote in the Primary according to your wish and by exercising your US Constitutional right to vote.*****
*****One may also advocate for ranked-choice voting, that will expand choices for voters, and provide a greater possibility of free and fair elections.*****
*********************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
We can do better — — -Credit for this phrase belongs to a fellow financial planner, name to remain private, who expressed this opinion about 30 years ago, and which phrase was so non-threatening, sensible and meaningful, that it has echoed through one’s thoughts ever since. Any similarity of words used currently by public characters is coincidence. The English language has a limited number of words, which generally aren’t patented.
https://www.haudenosauneeconfederacy.com/influence-on-democracy/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pIDtvTydkU&t=638s
In Solidarity With People And Nature —
www.mothersoutfront.org
www.facebook.com/gpnjbc ;; — Green Black Caucus
www.greenpeaceusa.org
www.economichumanrights.org
www.draftbernie.org
www.psr.org
www.blackyouthproject.com
www.riverkeeper.org
www.catskillmountainkeeper.org
www.celdf.org
www.wearesenecalake.com
www.democracynow.org
www.gp.org
https://www.greenparty.org/Platform.php
www.freepress.net
www.codepink.org
www.m4bl.net
www.starhawk.org
www.openthebooks.org
www.nyipl.org
www.pogo.org
www.opensecrets.org
A Resource — www.7song.com | https://medium.com/@jeanhhricik/denial-to-promote-the-reality-show-43ce72e925e0 | ['Jean Hhricik'] | 2019-06-17 17:38:21.741000+00:00 | ['Government', 'Tulsi Gabbard', 'Bernie Sanders', 'Socialism', 'Free Speech'] |
The End of The Line-Part 2 | The End of The Line-Part 2
The Glory Dilemma
Too often people tend to lose sight of God’s involvement in their divine given journey and toward completion began to play god themselves. For humankind, it appears uncomfortable for them to allow God to take credit for their success. Many may feel that God claiming all the credit for himself, is “self-aggrandizement” or God being conceited. Yet the Scriptures state:
“…let him do it as of the ability which God giveth: that God in all things may be glorified…” (1Peter 4:11, KJV) “For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Corinthians 6:20, KJV)”…the multitudes saw it, they marveled, and glorified God…” (Matthew 9:8, KJV) “Whoso offereth praise glorifieth me…” (Psalms 50:23, KJV)
Therefore, everything is ultimately for His glory. God’s claim to glory is addressed in the book Visioneering, A. Stanley quoted from a book by J.I. Packer entitled Hot Tub Religion. It says:
“…God aims always to glorify himself is an assertion we at first find hard to believe. Our immediate reaction is an uncomfortable feeling that such an idea is unworthy of God, that self-concern of any sort is incompatible with moral perfection, and in particular with God’s nature as love…If it is right for man to have the glory of god as His goal, can it be wrong for God to have the same goal? For if man can have no higher purpose than God’s glory, how canGod? If it is wrong for man to seek a lesser end than this, it would be wrong for God, too. The reason it cannot be right for man to live for himself, as if he were God, is because he is not God. However, it cannot be wrong for God to seek His own glory simply because He is God.”
We have oftentimes seen community leaders to nationally known people take and claim God’s divine vision as their own. Probably because they desire some claim to fame, attention, or praise. They develop what Stanley calls, “spiritual amnesia” and lose sight of God’s involvement in their journey to completion. They start to take God’s blessings for granted. They start to enjoy notoriety and rewards that come with success then feel indispensable to the vision. They lose sight of God’s involvement in their journey.
If God is kept in the forefront, you will not develop “spiritual amnesia”.
Finishing Well
At the end of a God divine vision is God. When God intervenes, you will find yourself changed. We have seen some of God’s chosen servants finish well. To mention a few, there’s Joyce Meyer, Billy Graham, Benny Hinn, and Andrew Womack.
Each person mentioned above was given a God-ordained vision and remained faithful to the vision that God gave them. Their faithfulness resulted in opportunities to preach to millions of people and to travel to the ends of the earth teaching the gospel and healing people. Like Billy Graham, they too, have impacted millions through their ministry on radio and/or television.
Joyce Meyer in an interview on Trinity Broadcasting Network stated that when she got her divine vision she was nine years old. Her father was molesting her and continued to do so until she left home. She later got married had children then divorced. However, her vision did not die. She held prayer meetings and services in her living room for years then rented a television spot for a short while. For a short time until she realized that she was “the only one speaking during the question and answer show. No one could get a word in edgewise.” She stopped that TV interview show got married again, raised her children but continued with the vision that God had given her.
Now she is a well-known teacher and preacher reaching millions of souls each and every day through her ministry on television She has outreach programs that help people all around the world. She asked the Lord, “Why me?” She was “broken and God changed” her and gave her a vision. She said that she cannot take any “credit for what God has accomplished in her life and through her ministry”.
All the ministers and teachers mentioned above have stated in their teachings on TBN that they have asked God, “Why me?” You too may ask, “Why me?” But why ask when God has promised to always be with you.
The End of The Line, here!
God is always with you. God has promised through scripture to be with us in every circumstance and to never leave us nor forsake us. Therefore, you should keep the faith and believe that whatever vision you are given, if you listen to and follow God’s prompting that you will come out on the other side and completely finish the way God wants you to. You can trust God to do what only He can do for and in you. In the Bible, 2 Corinthians 12:7–10, Paul knew this well:
“And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure. For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me. And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ’s sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.”
The Lord spoke to Paul and told him, “My grace is sufficient for you.” God made it clear that his strength is perfect in the areas of our human weakness. Paul allowed God to be his strength. So, if God’s grace was sufficient for Paul; it is sufficient for you. | https://medium.com/@tvicki/the-end-of-the-line-bfa2f0253a31 | [] | 2020-12-26 12:32:14.136000+00:00 | ['Vicki', 'The Way', 'Gods Presence', 'Insights', 'Grace'] |
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