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How Facebook and Google uses Machine Learning at their best | “Machine learning will automate jobs that most people thought could only be done by people.” ~Dave Waters
Hello everyone , so today I will like to tell you how the most famous companies Facebook and Google uses Machine Learning at their best to ease their tasks and do cool stuffs that earlier was thought to be impossible.
What is Machine Learning?
Have you ever wondered that how we learn or how from our birth our brain learns each and every bit, be it our parents and friend’s faces or riding bicycles or learning mathematical formulas etc. It is because our brain observes whatever we see and makes patterns (which we call as experiences )and by analysing these patterns it predicts and makes further decisions. Due to this decision making power of our brain unlike computers the developers thought that why not we give prediction and decision making power to the computers which would add extra stars to the computers speed ie now computers can take decisions and do predictions as fast as they do calculations. So to achieve this they brought the concept of Machine learning which is to make some programs that based on the data provided to the computers (similar to experiences of our brain) can predict results or target values. In this way these programs can basically help machines learn.
“Machine intelligence is the last invention that humanity will ever need to make.” ~Nick Bostrom
Now talking about the companies, Google and Facebook took a great advantage of the Machine Learning and not only reduced their work load that was earlier done by humans but also proved to be the smartest and most lucrative and innovative companies for the clients.
How Google uses Machine Learning?
Google has declared itself a machine learning-first company.
Google is the master of all. It takes advantage of machine learning algorithms and provides customers with a valuable and personalized experience. Machine learning is already embedded in its services like Gmail, Google Search and Google Maps.
Google services, for example, the image search and translation tools use sophisticated machine learning. This allows the computer to see, listen and speak in much the same way as humans do. Much wow!
Gmail
As you all know that our social, promotional and primary mails are separated in different boxes . This is filtered through Google as it labels the email accordingly. This is where machine learning plays a crucial part. The user intervention is used to tune to its threshold and when a user marks a message in a consistent direction, Gmail itself performs a real-time increment to its threshold and that’s how Gmail learns for future and later uses those results for categorization.
Smart replies:
This is really a smart move made by Google. Now, with the help of this feature, you can reply instantly in a second. With the suggested replies given by Gmail. ‘Smart Replies’ and ‘Smart Compose’ are indeed the best products that Google has given to its customers. These are powered by machine learning and will offer suggestions as you type. This is also a major reason why Google stands as one of the leading companies today.
Also, it is not just in English. It will bring support in four new languages: Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese.
Google Search and Google Maps
This also employs machine learning and while you start typing in the search box it automatically anticipates what you are looking for. It then provides suggested search terms for the same. These suggestions are showcased because of past searches (Recommendations), trend (which everyone is looking for), or from your present location.
For example — Bus traffic delays — Hundreds of major cities around the world, thousands of people traveling, One machine that is learning and informing . Google gets all the real-time data on bus locations and forecasts it in a jiffy. So, now you don’t have to wait long hours for your bus.
With the combination of time, distance traveled, and individual events as datasets, it is now possible for Google to provide predictions. Now, there is no need to rely on bus schedules provided by public transportation agencies.
With the help of your location, day of the week, and time of day, your estimated time of arrival (ETA) can be understood.
The best invention ever done for students is Google search and no one will deny it. Google Search and Google Maps use machine learning too and help the people in their day to day tasks.
You can check the awesomeness of Google Machine Learning by just going to Google and then typing or speaking just weather and without asking anything it will automatically tell you the whole weather report for your area. This is the cause of Machine Learning
Google Assistant
It helps one to assist in everyday tasks, be it household chores or a deal worth crores. The Google Assistant makes it easy for you to search for nearby restaurants when it’s raining heavily, helps you to buy movie tickets while on the go and find the nearest theatre from your place. Also, helps you to navigate to the theater. In short, you don’t have to worry when you have a smartphone, because Google takes care of everything. This is all done due to strong machine learning algorithms used by google.
Google Translate
The world is migrating. Leave the rest of the world, at least 24 languages are spoken in India itself, with over 13 different scripts and 720 dialects. Well, if we talk about the world there are roughly 6,500 spoken languages in the world today. Can’t thank Google enough cause we’ve all used Google Translate at some point (I hope, you travel a lot too).The best is that it’s free, fast, and is generally accurate. Its translation of words, sentences, and paragraphs have helped many to decode and understand.
It is true that it is not 100% accurate when it comes to larger blocks of text or for some language, but it can provide people with a general meaning to make the understanding less complex. All this is possible because of Statistical Machine Translation (SMT). So, no matter how much you hate mathematics or statistics you will have to thank and love it .
This is a process where computers analyze millions of existing translated documents from the web to learn vocabulary and look for patterns in a language. After that Google translates it. It then picks the most statistically probable translation when asked to translate a new bit of text.
Speech Recognition: Ok, Google.
The speech recognition feature enables the user to convert audio to text by applying powerful neural network models in an easy-to-use API. Currently, the API recognizes 120 languages and its variants to support the global user base. Through this voice, command-and-control can be enabled and the audio can be transcribed from the call centers. Also, the processing of real-time data can be done. Starting from streaming to prerecorded audio, speech recognition has mastered it all and all credits can be given to Google’s machine learning technology.
Reverse Image Search
Google’s Search by Image is a feature that uses reverse image search and allows users to search for related images just by uploading an image or image URL. Google accomplishes this by analyzing the submitted picture and constructing a mathematical model of it using advanced algorithms. It is then compared with billions of other images in Google’s databases before returning matching and similar results. When available, Google also uses metadata about the image such as description. Reverse image search is a content-based image retrieval (CBIR) query technique that involves providing the CBIR system with a sample image that it will then base its search upon; in terms of information retrieval, the sample image is what formulates a search query.
Image search creates categories that you might be looking for. With the image search, it becomes easy to search for similar images. It also helps to find the websites that contain these images and the other sizes of the picture you searched with.
Google Adsense
With the help of machine learning, Google keeps track of the users’ search history. With the help of that history, it recommends the advertisement to the user as now its aware of its target market. It’s heavily based on the search history data and machine learning helps Google to achieve this.
It created a win-win situation. With Google AdSense, the website owners earn money from their online content and AdSense works by matching text and display ads to the site based on the content and the visitors.
There are many more examples such as Google Music, Google Photos ,Google Adwords etc. which makes great use of Machine Learning and that is the reason that Google has the most number of users in most of the field as it not only makes our work easier but also solves the problem smartly.
How Facebook uses Machine Learning?
Machine Learning is the vital aspect of Facebook. It would not even be possible to handle 2.4 billion users while providing them the best service without using Machine Learning!
Let’s take an example. It is mind-boggling how Facebook can guess the people you might be familiar with in real life using “People You May Know”. And they are right most of the time!!! Well, this magical effect is achieved by using Machine Learning algorithms that analyze your profile, your interests, your current friends and also their friends and various other factors to calculate the people you might potentially know. That’s only one example ,other aspects are the Facebook News Feed, Facial Recognition system, Targeted Advertising on your page, etc. which we would look below.
Facial Recognition
Facial Recognition is among the many wonders of Machine Learning on Facebook. It might be trivial for you to recognize your friends on social media (even under that thick layer of makeup!!!) but how does Facebook manage it? Well, if you have your “tag suggestions” or “face recognition” turned on in Facebook (this means you have provided permission for Facial Recognition), then the Machine Learning System analyses the pixels of the face in the image and creates a template which is basically a string of numbers. But this template is unique for every face (sort of a facial fingerprint!) and can be used to detect that face again in another face and suggest a tag.
So now the question is, What is the use of enabling Facial Recognition on Facebook? Well, in case any newly uploaded photo or video on Facebook includes your face but you haven’t been tagged, the Facial Recognition algorithm can recognize your template and send you a notification. Also, if another user tries to upload your picture as their Facebook profile picture (maybe to get more popular!), then you can be notified immediately. Facial Recognition in conjugation with other accessibility options can also inform people with visual impairments if they are in a photo or video.
Textual Analysis
While you may believe photos are the most important on Facebook (especially your photos!), the text is equally as important. And there is a lot of text on Facebook!!! To understand and manage this text in the correct manner, Facebook uses DeepText which is a text engine based on deep learning that can understand thousands of posts in a second in more than 20 languages with as much accuracy as you can!
But understanding a language-based text is not that easy as you think! In order to truly understand the text, DeepText has to understand many things like grammar, idioms, slang words, context, etc. For example: If there is a sentence “I love Apple” in a post, then does the writer mean the fruit or the company? Most probably it is the company (Except for Android users!) but it really depends on the context and DeepText has to learn this. Because of these complexities, and that too in multiple languages, DeepText uses Deep Learning and therefore it handles labeled data much more efficiently than traditional Natural Language Processing models.
Targeted Advertising
Did you just shop for some great clothes at Myntra and then saw their ads on your Facebook page? Or did you just like a post by Lakme and then magically see their ad also? Well, this magic is done using deep neural networks that analyze your age, gender, location, page likes, interests, and even your mobile data to profile you into select categories and then show you ads specifically targeted towards these categories. Facebook also partners with different data collection companies like Epsilon, Acxiom, Datalogix, BlueKai, etc. and also uses their data about you to accurately profile you.
For Example, Suppose that the data collected from your online interests, field of study, shopping history, restaurant choices, etc. profiles you in the category of young fashionista according to the Facebook deep neural networks algorithm. Then the ads you are shown will likely cater to this category so that you get the most relevant and useful ads that you are most likely to click. (So that Facebook generates more revenue of course!) In this way, Facebook hopes to maintain a competitive edge against other high-tech companies like Google who is also fighting to obtain our short attention spans!!!
Language Translation
Facebook is less a social networking site and more a worldwide obsession! There are people all over the world that use Facebook but many of them also don’t know English. So what should you do if you want to use Facebook but you only know Hindi? Never fear! Facebook has an in-house translator that simply converts the text from one language to another by clicking the “See Translation” button. And in case you wonder how it translates more or less accurately, well Facebook Translator uses Machine Learning of course!
The first click on the “See Translation” button for some text (Suppose it’s Beyonce’s posts) sends a translation request to the server and then that translation is cached by the server for other users (Who also require translation for Beyonce’s posts in this example). The Facebook translator accomplishes this by analyzing millions of documents that are already translated from one language to another and then looking for the common patterns and basic vocabulary of the language. After that, it picks the most accurate translation possible based on educated guesses that mostly turn out to be correct. For now, all languages are updated monthly so that the ML system is up to date on new slangs and sayings!
News Feed
The Facebook News Feed was one addition that everybody hated initially but now everybody loves!!! And if you are wondering why some stories show up higher in your Facebook News Feed and some are not even displayed, well here is how it works! Different photos, videos, articles, links or updates from your friends, family or businesses you like show up in your personal Facebook News Feed according to a complex system of ranking that is managed by a Machine Learning algorithm.
The rank of anything that appears in your News Feed is decided on three factors. Your friends, family, public figures or businesses that you interact with a lot are given top priority. Your feed is also customized according to the type of content you like (Movies, Books, Fashion, Video games, etc.) Also, posts that are quite popular on Facebook with lots of likes, comments and shares have a higher chance of appearing on your Facebook News Feed.
So theses are some of the cool stuffs about how theses large companies are benefitted by Machine Learning. So now I will take your leave by telling you some interesting words of the co-founder of Chatables , Amy Stapleton and director of Paetoro Dr. Dave Waters.
We are entering a new world. The technologies of machine learning, speech recognition, and natural language understanding are reaching a nexus of capability. The end result is that we’ll soon have artificially intelligent assistants to help us in every aspect of our lives.” ~Amy Stapleton Predicting the future isn’t magic, it’s artificial intelligence.” ~Dave Waters
Thank you for reading!! | https://ushivam4u.medium.com/how-facebook-and-google-uses-machine-learning-at-their-best-f43453f6109d | ['Shivam Prasad Upadhyay'] | 2020-10-20 08:03:31.862000+00:00 | ['Machine Learning', 'Speech Recognition', 'Facebook', 'Google', 'Facial Recognition'] |
Reinforcement Learning with Reward Modeling | As research and development in data science has progressed, Data Science has expanded to include a wide variety of different machine learning techniques with various strengths, weaknesses, and applications. Some of the techniques I find the most fascinating are described by the sub-category ‘deep reinforcement learning’. In this post I’ll dive into a research paper produced as a collaboration between deep-mind and openAI in 2017 titled “Deep Reinforcement Learning from Human Preferences”. First, I’ll explain the problem that reinforcement learning aims to solve and how the general structure for these algorithms is set up, then jump into how the model described in this paper improves upon this concept.
Reinforcement learning is a strategy for producing a model that can produce intelligent actions within a given environment. For example, if you wanted to teach a model how to play a game, you would likely want to use a reinforcement learning model. Early reinforcement learning algorithms like q-learning could only handle discrete environments and action spaces. Evolutionary reinforcement learning algorithms could handle continuous environments and action spaces, but they require large amounts of compute power to train implementations that don’t get stuck in local minima. A more recently developed algorithm called the actor-critic method is an advancement of q-learning that can handle continuous environments and action spaces without the same exponential increase in compute power associated with evolution-based algorithms. Since the algorithm implemented in this paper is a variation on the actor-critic method I’ll explain a little bit about how the Actor-Critic method actually works, but it is worth noting that the concepts in this paper can be applied to any reinforcement learning algorithm that is capable of handling continuous environments and action spaces.
The Actor-Critic method works by implementing an ‘agent’ that contains two models, one that generates actions given a specific environment state, and one that evaluates an action given the action, the state that action was taken in, and the reward produced by the environment. The reward is calculated by the environment and is typically a mathematical formula that calculates how good a particular state is based on the environment variables.
basic Actor-Critic flow of information
Where this algorithm starts to struggle (and most other reinforcement algorithms), is when the reward function is difficult to define. The critic needs to be told how good or bad the current state is to be able to evaluate how good or bad the move that produced that state is, but if the quality of the environment state is difficult or impossible to quantify, then what? If the task was to say, teach a robot how to properly fry an egg, how would you write a mathematical formula using the robot’s sensors to determine how well it’s doing?
This is where the research in this paper comes in. The paper suggests the use of a supervised learning model that produces a reward given a particular state. The data that the reward model is trained on are short segments of environment states and the actions the agent took in those states. Then the model will pair these clips up and show them side by side to a human and the human determines which one looks more like the task that is trying to be achieved.
Actor-Critic flow with reward modeling
This way the agent can keep training in the environment and receiving rewards from the reward model while the human can evaluate the clips at their own pace. As the human evaluates more and more clips, the reward model keeps getting updated and getting more accurate at giving a reward that represents the human’s objective. As the reward model gets more accurate, the agent also becomes better at taking actions that the human prefers. The results the researchers got in this paper indicated that a minimal amount of input by the human resulted in very accurate model performance.
accuracy of reward model, synthetic queries are generated by choosing the clip that the real reward function rated higher
This widens the array of problems reinforcement learning can produce and reduces the number of human hours required to produce significant results. It also reduces the level of expertise needed to train the model. An example would be if you wanted to teach a model how to do a backflip in a game, before you would either have to write an intricate formula for evaluating a backflip attempt or you would have to give the model examples of a human controlling the character to do a backflip, both of which would require some expertise to some degree. On the other hand, if you just need to be able to identify which of two examples looks more like a backflip, just about anybody is going to be able to make that distinction. This opens the door for crowd sourcing the dataset for the reward model if the problem is complex enough. For the relatively simple challenges the models in the paper where learning, only about 1 hour of non-expert human evaluation produced results that were as good or better than using a pre-defined reward function that took approximately 2 hours for an expert to write. Additionally, the researchers were able to train some of the models to exhibit novel behaviors for which writing a reward function would be extraordinarily difficult, and yet it still only took about 1 hour of non-expert evaluation to produce that functionality. This implies that this concept should scale well with more complex tasks with hard to define evaluation. If the task you want to train an agent to perform can be described by saying “I’m not sure exactly how to define it but I’d know it when I see it” then this modeling technique is probably the answer. | https://medium.com/@matthew-l-williamson-96/reinforcement-learning-with-reward-modeling-944a377a1380 | ['Matthew Williamson'] | 2020-11-23 06:19:17.912000+00:00 | ['Reinforcement Learning'] |
How Korea Does Contact Tracing | How Korea Does Contact Tracing
It’s not an app
South Korea never had a lockdown and yet they beat COVID-19. How did they do it?
The short answer is that it’s a long answer, covered in depth here. For this article, I’ll cover just one part of the puzzle —contact tracing.
This is all based on a report from the COVID Translate Project, and the official Korean government playbook. I recommend reading the whole report, and all the source documents that they’re translating. There’s a lot we can learn from Korea, and news reports miss almost all of it.
When it comes to contact tracing, Korea didn’t reinvent the wheel. They just used technology to dramatically speed it up. The Korean system allowed them to trace contacts in as little as 10 minutes, which is unheard of. It’s like everyone else is on bicycles and Korea has a bullet train.
Here’s how they did it.
Many Data Points
Everyone’s talking about apps. Get everyone to install an app and, boom, contact tracing. That’s not how it works. Korea did not rely on an app for contact tracing. Instead of an app, they used a wide constellation of data.
Cellular GPS data Credit card transactions Drug purchase records CCTV footage
This was a broad, redundant set of data combed over by trained people. Those people would find and message contacts manually, but the system also released anonymized information to the public. Koreans don’t have to wait for an SMS. They can contact trace themselves.
Through an API (I assume) the anonymized location data is released to multiple third-party sites. Anyone can then see each case on a map, and when the infected person was there. That means you can check your own route and see if you need to get tested or be careful.
There’s no single point of failure here. If the data is missing there are humans, if the humans miss someone there’s crowdsourcing. If you depend on one app then you’re just one buggy deployment away from the plague. Korea has multiple, redundant data points all backed by layers of human bureaucracy and an engaged population. That’s what makes their contact tracing so robust.
Faster Tracing Through Technology
Contact tracers work with the data, it’s not an automated system
Korea still has contact tracers, they still do interviews, they still do paperwork — the basic system would be recognizable to someone from 1918. The difference is speed. Because all the laws have been written, nobody has to call in a favor at the phone company or get a court order. Because the data is published online, no one has to walk around pasting signs.
I’m pointing this out because, again, none of this is a magic bullet. None of it is automatic. The Korean method was planned, negotiated and legislated in advance. Then those bureaucracies were well-staffed and funded for years, when nothing was happening. Finally, the underlying public health methodology had to be sound before layering technology on top.
It’s an amazing feat, really, and most of it is invisible.
This newly developed system utilizes the cooperation of the police departments, Credit Finance Association, 3 major telecommunication companies, and the 22 credit card companies to update travel and transaction information in real-time. In addition, analysis of big data is used to automatically determine travel route and location information per specified time period and reflect it visually on a map. It also analyses locations with a large pocket of infection to identify the spreader within that region, in addition to other analytical information. As the process to do the same task, which once took 24 hours, is now reduced to 10 minutes, it takes a heavy load off the epidemiological surveyors and allows for a much faster and efficient way to react to situations when mass infection occurs.
Ten minutes for contact tracing is crazy. Sometimes it takes me more than 10 minutes to find my phone.
Why Korean Contact Tracing Works
This speed is why Korea was able to avoid lockdowns. Regular contact tracing is effective, but if you wait 24 hours the virus has already spread. Regular contact tracing is also really labor-intensive. After about 100 cases you just can’t and you have to shut down entire cities or the whole country.
In Korea, however, they can track down infected people in minutes and get them off the streets. So the streets can stay open.
Contact tracing is, in effect, their secret weapon. Everybody knows you’re supposed to do contact tracing, but only places like Korea and Taiwan can do it this fast.
Legal Groundwork
All of this is, of course, a privacy landmine. If we enacted a similar system overnight in Sri Lanka, locations would be boycotted or burnt. The system works in Korea because A) the public had hard experience with MERS and B) they democratically created these laws with built-in privacy protections.
For example, the locations can only be tracked for a certain period, have to be anonymized, and only certain people can request and use the information. When the pandemic is over, data will be deleted. This wasn’t a system designed in a panic, it was deliberated democratically and written in law.
Personally, I think that we’ve already given up our privacy for targeted shoe ads, without any protection at all. A legal system for a clear public health purpose is actually a good use of data.
What Other Countries Can Do
I hope I’ve said this enough, but the key insight is speed. All of their technology, all of their bureaucracy is just there to make their response as fast and aggressive as possible. That’s the only way to beat an exponential disease.
Hence the lesson is not to do nothing until you’ve built this perfect system. Do whatever you can right now, work the phones, walk the streets, trace every contact you can. Build the technology and systems in the meantime or, better yet, get the Korean Ambassador on the phone. But understand that they built this system years ago, not in the middle of a pandemic.
I think that too many people just glance at Korea and think ‘OK, we’ll use technology’. Like some magic app, or blockchain, or AI, or some other bullshit. It doesn’t work like that. Korea doesn’t have a tech solution, they have a solution that uses tech. It’s different.
The number one thing I’ve learned from reading the COVID Translate source documents is how diligently they prepared, and how far in advance. It’s not just contact tracing, they setup institutions, stockpiled PPE, wrote plans, rewrote plans — they were ready. Technology is just one part of that puzzle, and you need the whole thing for it to make sense. And, honestly, that’s not going to happen right now.
Right now just do what you can. Next time, do like Korea. | https://indica.medium.com/how-korea-does-contact-tracing-1b2662b5b894 | ['Indi Samarajiva'] | 2020-06-05 13:08:52.561000+00:00 | ['Coronavirus', 'Privacy', 'Korea', 'Health', 'Government'] |
How White Terrorism Isn’t Terrorism | How White Terrorism Isn’t Terrorism
The whitewashing of terrorism in Nashville is real
If a Muslim bombed Nashville that’d be terrorism, and the entire Muslim community would blamed. Because it was a white man, however, media pulls out the thesaurus. Terrorism is black and white, except when it’s white. This racism around the word ‘terrorism’ has been getting brown people killed for decades, but now chickens have come home to roost. Now it’s killing you.
The contortions of your press to call Nashville anything but terrorism would be hilarious, were it not so dire. American ‘terrorism’ propaganda, laundered through its press, has killed over 1 million people killed and displaced over 37 million. The spectre of brown terrorism is the wind beneath your drones.
The real air cover comes from your media. The word ‘terrorism’ makes it OK to torture, abduct, murder and occupy people because terrorism is so scary. People in Idaho are so scared of something that will never happen to them that they must see blood in Yemen, and the media keeps them scared. If one Muslim does anything it’s everywhere, and it’s on all Muslims. It’s one thing, done by one people, and never isolated events. ‘Terrorism’ dehumanizes Muslims, and you can see it in the vast rhetorical leaps the press is taking to humanize the Nashville bomber. Because he’s one of them.
What we’re seeing here is that terrorism isn’t really a word at all. It’s a weapon of war. It’s the central propaganda piece of white power, used to label all violence besides their own. Of course a white man can’t be a terrorist. The word might be right, but the man is white, therefore it’s wrong.
“The Waste Land”
The first step in covering white terrorism is to put everything in passive voice. That’s one thing George Orwell missed in 1984. You don’t even need to censor words. Just use more words and mix up their order.
Not the complete lack of a subject in this Guardian piece, and most pieces covering white terror. Bombs blow things up by themselves. People mysteriously ‘suffer’ injuries. All of the facts are here — a suicide bomber set off an explosion, injuring people — but the story is completely obscured. Because the terrorist appeared to be white, they just made the subject completely disappear.
For some reason the Guardian even puts the word ‘bomb’ in quotes because, I dunno, was it a white bomb? Maybe it was economically disadvantaged or something, and not like the other bombs. There’s a whole tree of racism, root and branch, connected to this bullshit article. As T.S. Eliot said.
“What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish?”
Do not go gentle into that good white
Stupid headline rewritten by Ayman Mohideen
The New York Times headline writer has really outdone themselves on Nashville. Here they’ve written a literal elegy for a suicide bomber.
“A quiet life, a thunderous death, and a nightmare that shook Nashville. “
WTF are they talking about? Did Elvis’s cat explode after eating too much peanut butter and jelly? Oh no, it was a terrorist attack. Who knew.
If the suicide bomber were brown he’d already be made into a monster, as the Times just made up in Caliphate. Op-Eds blaming the entire community would be freely flowing. Instead we get an Ode To The Complicated Suicide Bomber, because he’s white.
With their disgraced Caliphate podcaste the Times broadcast stories about a fake terrorist, but faced with a real one they can’t even use the word. They’ve exhumed Dylan Thomas instead.
Rage, rage against the dying of the white.
Terrorism isn’t word
As you can see, the word terrorism isn’t a word, it’s a weapon. To use the word ‘correctly’ would go against its purpose as a weapon, which is to point it towards your enemies. The West has been caught in a two-minute hate against Muslims, now going on two decades.
White people love to print scary stories about scary foreigners, but never themselves. Terrorism is why they commit violence, but never what they do. The broader story is that they’re the good guys, and pesky facts need to get in line. War becomes peace-keeping, freedom becomes occupation, ignorance becomes strength.
Brown people are dehumanized and only white violence has complexity, or else the white subjects simply disappear. Bombs just explode. City blocks just level themselves. The white community never needs to examine themselves. They just soothe themselves with synonyms and look away.
The facts may be wrong but the story is right. Us good, them bad. Nobody cares if the drums of war are out of tune. They just need to beat on, relentlessly.
Why White Terrorism Isn’t Terrorism
That’s why white terrorism isn’t terrorism. It’s the same reason that white corruption isn’t corruption, and why white coups aren’t coups. Because that wouldn’t make sense. Because white people are good, they do good, they’re the only thing standing between the world and terrible bad. So corruption becomes ‘norm breaking’, coups become a joke, and terrorism becomes a random ‘intentional act’ like in Nashville.
They say that news is the first draft of history, but this isn’t true. The first draft of history is propaganda.
But let’s be honest here. Not saying the words will not make your problems go away, and your problems are real. Nashville was a terrorist attack, it was just a warning. Do you know the thing about warnings? It’s best to listen to them.
As I have told you, as many people have told you, violence is coming to America. With this attack it has obviously arrived. Someone played a loudspeaker and blew themselves up. How much clearer can a warning get?
Your President and Republicans talking about insurrection, where do you think that leads? All the people carrying guns on your street, don’t you think they have bullets? America has sown the wind, and will reap the whirlwind. Wake up you fools. Wake up from your own toxic mythology and look around. Blood is on the wind. | https://medium.com/@indica/how-white-terrorism-isnt-terrorism-7992336ba39b | [] | 2020-12-28 09:11:22.479000+00:00 | ['Race', 'War', 'USA', 'Terrorism', 'World'] |
Cloud Kitchen Industry in India | Image Credit: Unsplash/Jon Tyson
When was the last time you visited a restaurant to have food? Chances are, in the past ten months, you haven’t visited any restaurants and fulfilled your hunger pangs from food aggregators like Swiggy and Zomato. Many of the outlets listed on these aggregators only serve online deliveries and don’t provide dine-in services, i.e., they operate on a ‘cloud kitchen model.’ So, what are these Cloud Kitchens, and how do they work? Cloud Kitchen is a space where food is prepared and delivered to customers after taking orders online. Various food brands operate from the same kitchen driving down the cost of operation. Also, these kitchens can be set up at non-premium locations that command significantly lower rents. Brands like Fasoos, The Bowl Company, Firangi Bake, Behrouz Biryani, Mojo Pizza, etc., all operate on this model.
Market Analysis
According to RedSeer Management Consulting, the Cloud Kitchen industry in India is projected to become a $2 billion industry by 2024. The emergence of food aggregators and the changing food habits, especially in Metro cities, are critical in driving the industry’s growth. Cloud Kitchens accounted for 20% of the food delivery market, but that trend is about to change drastically in favor of Cloud Kitchens. Cloud Kitchen players like Rebel Foods that operates brands like Fasoos, Lunch Box, Wendy’s have seen growth in the average order values in the last few months.
Growth Drivers
1. Changing food consumption habits — Before the COVID-19 pandemic struck, the online food delivery business was on the rise due to changing food consumption habits. The urban middle class is warming to ordering food online due to various factors like the availability of a wide variety of menus, aggregator-driven discounts, convenience, etc.
2. Increased adoption of food aggregators — Food aggregators like Swiggy and Zomato have penetrated beyond Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities. Small restaurants are also finding value in being listed on these platforms.
3. Covid-19 Pandemic — Though the lockdown has been lifted across India and dine-in services have resumed at 50% capacity in many restaurants; consumer confidence is still low. Sensing this, the many established F&B players in the industry focus on pivoting to a multi-brand, delivery-only model. For example, Massive Restaurants that operates fine-dining restaurants like Pa Pa Ya, Farzi Café, and Made in Punjab are planning to build cloud kitchens as they are cost-effective and scalable.
Challenges faced
1. Losing control to food aggregators — After Uber’s exit from the food-tech space, the market has consolidated, with Swiggy and Zomato emerging as the two major market players. Though Amazon has entered the market with its deep pockets, winning consumers, and building loyalty will be tough. Discovery on the food aggregator platform is an essential driver of orders for the cloud kitchens, and the platforms have sole control over it. This leads to over-dependence on the platforms.
2. Competition from food aggregators — Sensing the massive potential in the cloud kitchen space, food aggregators have launched/invested in cloud kitchen brands. These brands will get preferential treatment on the platforms in terms of discovery, offers, etc. By a cliched value net model of game theory, the aggregators add more players to reduce the added value of the existing cloud kitchens and thus reduce their bargaining power.
3. The online food delivery industry structure — To capture market share food aggregators like Swiggy and Zomato are still burning cash on each order they fulfill. Once they stop subsidizing the platform’s consumer side, the cost of fulfillment will rise, and so will the commission they charge to the cloud kitchens. This will severely affect the profitability of these kitchens that operate on razor-thin margins.
4. The Paradox of Choice — Food aggregators value the number of listings on their platform as it enables them to showcase growth to investors. However, having too many choices for consumers is not necessarily a good thing. Overcoming this phenomenon is another challenge faced by these cloud kitchens.
Competitive Landscape
The market is dominated by established brands like Rebel Foods, which serves 15 cities via its 220+ cloud kitchens across India. Swiggy launched its cloud kitchen in 2017, and since then, it has created close to 200 brands. It has Swiggy Access program under which it provides kitchen space, called pods, to restaurant partners who lack presence in any particular area. Swiggy has invested close to 175 crores in Access business between 2019 and 2020, showing how big it is betting on this model. Other brands like Freshmenu have around 36 cloud kitchens serving four cities, while Box8 has about 100 cloud kitchens serving four cities. Swiggy has an inherent advantage over its competitors due to the amount of data it can get from consumers and curate its brand according to the hyperlocal needs. The recent entry of established F&B players in this space has certainly spiced up the market competition. An exciting time ahead for all the food lovers out there. | https://medium.com/@prasada/cloud-kitchen-industry-in-india-cfc3daa8888 | ['Prasad Antapurkar'] | 2021-06-17 17:50:53.406000+00:00 | ['India', 'Delivery', 'Cloud', 'Kitchen', 'Startup'] |
Katy Perry Wants to Lift the Stigma Surrounding Depression — And Does the Exact Opposite | Katy Perry Wants to Lift the Stigma Surrounding Depression — And Does the Exact Opposite
“I am so grateful I am not a drug addict”
Photo by Christina Victoria Craft on Unsplash
When her album flopped in 2017, Katy Perry struggled with depression. Last Friday, she was a guest on the JMO Confidential Podcast and spoke candidly about lifting the stigma surrounding depression.
It is important that celebrities use their platform to normalize talking about mental health. Unfortunately, Katy Perry made a very unhelpful comment about medication and implied that people who use pharmaceuticals are drug addicts.
I typed out the relevant parts of the interview below:
Katy Perry: “There were some pretty dark days, and I think that was pretty evident on my last record, what I was going through publicly and it was pretty intense. I became very depressed, more depressed than I had been in the past. In the past, I was able to just kinda brush it off my shoulders and write a song about it, and get on with my life, and this time I couldn’t get out of bed. And so I had to do some real hard work, around that, and why, and dig really deep. So I’ve been on a real wellness journey the past couple of years. ( . . . )”
Jonathon Moran: “Wellness, do you mean meditation? For me, I’ve been very open about my depression over the years, like very open, and suicide attempts and things like that, and I am really strong now. I feel that me being open about it is a way to give back to people and show that you can go through — ”
Katy Perry: “Yeah, that’s what the music is really about. A lot of it is about that. I’m definitely really open about it and I want to take the stigma off of talking about it. ( . . . ) I’ve always been on a journey of health and wellness, mentally especially, being in such an intense industry, and the things it does to your mind. But I went on a journey to adopt some good tools so I didn’t have to lean so far into pharma, I’m so grateful I’m not a drug addict.”
She goes on to explain that she uses tools like meditation, childhood trauma therapy, and talking about feelings to cope with her depression.
You can listen to the interview yourself here. After 8 minutes she starts talking about pharmaceuticals.
Now don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that Katy Perry has found a way to deal with her demons, but why does she seem to throw people who use medication under the bus? Why does she imply that medication isn’t a good tool in dealing with depression? Why does she choose to use the word “drug addict” when she talks about pharmaceuticals?
Sometimes it feels like you are welcome to talk about depression, but only if it is the right “brand” of depression. The one you can get rid of by meditation, long walks in nature, yoga, and memorizing 25 inspirational quotes by an indie author.
Not all people with depression are the same
We all know the trite mental health tools: have a set sleep schedule, eat healthy food, exercise, drink enough water, meditate, go to therapy, and so on. These things will give you a good foundation to deal with your depression.
For some people that is enough. Other people need antidepressants to reduce symptoms and prevent relapses. Some people take medication temporarily, others are on them for life. None of these people are drug addicts because they “lean into pharma”.
As the stigmas surrounding mental illness slowly becomes less, statements like Katy Perry’s make the stigmas surrounding medication worse.
She overcame her depression through therapy, meditation, music, and the support of her partner. She did this without using medication. Great for her, but not all depressed people are the same.
Why Katy’s comment is unhelpful
Depression has many different faces. What feels like rock bottom for one person, can feel like an off-day for the next. There have been countless studies about the best treatment for depression, and there is no method that works for everybody.
In general, the combination of therapy and medication gives the best results. For me, therapy did the trick and I never took medication. There are many people like me, who’ll overcome depression without using medication. What works for me, doesn’t have to work for you though. And most people who deal with depression, improve greatly after taking medication.
However, taking medication always comes with a risk. Even a simple paracetamol tablet can have side effects. Antidepressants can make symptoms worse, and even lead to death. But because they also save lives, the benefits far exceed the risks.
And this is why we need to get rid of the stigma surrounding medication. The decision to start meds can be a difficult one, and I strongly believe doctors should be cautious with prescribing antidepressants too quickly.
To be able to make an informed decision about medication, it is detrimental to not be painted as “weak” or as a drug addict.
If you are contemplating to start using medication, you need to be pretty strong not to be influenced by a global pop star boasting about how happy she is for not being a drug addict and how meditation cured her depression.
Maybe antidepressants aren’t for you, just like they weren’t for me and Katy Perry. That’s fine. But can we please give people the space to use antidepressants, without implying they are weak? After all, suicide rates have dropped since the introduction of SSRI antidepressants. If taking meds gets you out of bed or keeps you alive, you shouldn’t be judged for it. | https://medium.com/invisible-illness/katy-perry-wants-to-lift-the-stigma-surrounding-depression-does-the-exact-opposite-a2c350a9d299 | ['Judith Valentijn'] | 2020-05-17 17:42:34.761000+00:00 | ['Mental Health', 'Mental Illness', 'Psychology', 'Depression', 'Antidepressants'] |
“Emotional Content Strategy” Review —Using Canva as an Example | Emotional targeting
I remember when I first moved to Melbourne, I was stunned by all the coffee choices I got to have. Walking down in a random neighbourhood, I could easily find several reputable brewers and try all the unique taste and aroma of their specialty. The only thing bad about it was when I got too many choices, I was left in the dilemma of which brand to choose in the long run. I did not want the hassle of ordering different coffee beans all the time, and also as a student, 1kg bulk order was way more cost-effective than getting 1 pound at a time.
Here is when emotions come into my decision making. There were two brands that stood out in flavours with similar price points. Brand A delivers normally within 36 hours once the order is placed, sometimes adds in special surprise like a mini bouquet for Mother’s Day. Brand B however, raised price out of nowhere and even though I signed up as a member, there was never a time when I feel ‘special’ about their service.
Both brands have the best quality beans but which one I ended up being with is pretty obvious. Brand A clearly devoted enough efforts and spent more time taking care of customers’ emotions while brand B didn't do anything wrong really, but has lost one long-term customer. That is because we don’t only buy a product, we are often after the emotional values created by a purchase.
Talia has created a framework to help businesses take care of customers’ emotional needs. The framework consists of 4 steps:
Step1 Emotional Competitor Analysis
Unlike regular competitor analysis that focuses on products and service, we focus on the emotional side of things for the first step. There are four elements Talia recommended us to look at including key message, colour, image, and emotional triggers. Using Canva, an online design software, as an example. The key messages on its landing page are:
“Design anything” “Everyone can create professional designs with Canva. It’s easy to use and free.
Short and concise. Canva makes its key message about the users. It emphasises how users would be able to create a design in a professional and easy way. The turquoise colour of its logo represents refreshment, energy and creativity, while on the landing page banner, the image consists of store discount on mobile devices, as well as stylish, designer-looking man and woman as featured characters, implying the variety of design work the tool is offering. The purple base of the banner also brings the magical and spiritual effects, reinforcing its emotional triggers —the simplicity of this tool empower people to design.
On the other hand, Canva’s well-known competitor, Adobe Illustrator, features itself as the “Industry-leading vector graphics software”. The key message immediately presents a sense of sophistication, placing its brand as a service for professionals in the design industry. The orange theme creates a sense of enthusiasm, stimulation and encouragement. Characters, animals and all other images on the landing page are vector presented, which is aligned with its service. Its emotional trigger is the convenience of cloud-based / cross-device service.
Talia recommended to do at least 10–15 competitor analysis and put the common emotional triggers together to see whether they are covered by your own brand. One thing I found very interesting is that, once I do emotional competitive analysis based on the 4 elements above, I immediately have a strong preference on which brand I would like the most. Try it yourself and see whether this works with your emotional brain!
Step2 Emotional SWOT Analysis
The next step is to conduct an emotional SWOT analysis. Again, instead of comparing features and prices, we focus on what emotions are triggered by your brand and the overall industry.
A screenshot of Canva interface during Christmas season.
Strength : Simplicity and empowerment. Canva creates the emotion of empowerment by making people believe they can create good, professional design in a very easy way.
: Simplicity and empowerment. Canva creates the emotion of empowerment by making people believe they can create good, professional design in a very easy way. Weakness : Lack of originality. Canva makes it easy for people to design by creating tons of template that are available for free. This triggers people’s emotion, thinking whether the design would be original enough to be unique.
: Lack of originality. Canva makes it easy for people to design by creating tons of template that are available for free. This triggers people’s emotion, thinking whether the design would be original enough to be unique. Opportunity : High demand for better looking visual materials. The demand for good designs is raising as the world now more than ever need great visuals to catch people’s attention on the internet. Thus non-designers are in the emotionally-desired mood for good visuals and an easier-to-operate tool.
: High demand for better looking visual materials. The demand for good designs is raising as the world now more than ever need great visuals to catch people’s attention on the internet. Thus non-designers are in the emotionally-desired mood for good visuals and an easier-to-operate tool. Threat: People’s lack of confidence in doing design work; people are not sure whether good design pieces are necessary. A lot of non-designers assume design is just too hard to learn and don't believe they have the creativity that’s needed.
SWOT analysis will help us better understand the competitive landscape emotionally and what we can leverage when we get into creating strategy — which is the 3rd step.
Step3 Emotional Content Strategy
The next step is to put what we have collected into the following table — the emotions, elements, words, visual, and colour. Talia used the online dating industry as an example to showcase her framework:
Talia’s Emotional Targeting Content Framework — using online dating industry as an example
For us if we put Canva and Illustrator into the table it looks like:
Canva V.S. Illustrator using Talia’s Emotional Targeting Content Framework
Step4 Testing
Last but not least, as usual: test, test, and test. All the analysis and hypothesis are not valid till we get enough support with data. Just like Talia mentioned in the course, conversion optimisation is not only about reaching one certain KPI but more about understanding customers, who change along the way too. So keep up with the testing! | https://medium.com/@julialichun/emotional-content-strategy-review-using-canva-andas-an-example-2702d1f864f3 | ['Julia Lin'] | 2020-12-27 13:01:40.770000+00:00 | ['Content Strategy', 'Emotions'] |
Defining authenticity: If a cat has four legs… | Defining authenticity: If a cat has four legs…
Authenticity is an important idea. It may even be one of the most important ideas, especially now that economic collapse has humbled us and made us warier of puff and hubris. Dan Leatherdale Follow Jun 17, 2019 · 3 min read
Increasingly, it seems, we like things to be real. Our footprints are lighter, our palettes more earthy, and our detectives more Norwegian. The Pope has cleared the Vatican shoe-racks of Prada, and the PM prefers a ramble to a rumpus. ‘Even the highly-polished auto-tune excesses of millenium pop have been replaced by earnest-looking kids with acoustic guitars and ‘real’ voices. Why? Because it’s more ‘honest’.
And the real joy in authenticity, as a concept, is that it conveys so much meaning in a single loose-fisted punch. It speaks of a person whose tongue is not forked, and who chooses to be truthful over being politic. You can trust them, you know where they stand, and they bring a big piece of themselves into everything they do.
Equally, authenticity tells of a person who isn’t blind to their own qualities and faults, who questions their own motives, and who has a strong enough grasp of their own identity to be simultaneously vulnerable and brave, serious and silly, curious and assertive. In other words, they have a sufficient sense of self to act with compelling coherence without sacrificing unpredictability.
If this same person is lucky, or has done the work, they will also have the skills to portray or express that self to other people. This way, their thoughts and ideas can carry across space, intact, and into the minds (and selves) of others.
And this is the alchemy of communication: it makes a communion of individuals during a moment of connection — moments which, when nourished, can become the grounds for enduring and even-handed relationships that enable others equally to be authentic.
Given all this, it’s a shame that the word is becoming a bit of a mush. Pressed into glib service on too many websites, and on the front covers of too many books, it calls out to be rescued from the mossy banks of brochure-level blandness.
At AGL, we are trying to achieve this very thing. We have combined our deep experience of working in this area with an evidence base drawn from science to create a three-part model of self-sustaining authenticity.
Over a series of blogs, we will look at each part of this model in turn, asking what we can do at that stage if we are to achieve authenticity. We will also look at how each stage can be linked to a range of desirable outcomes such as enhanced well-being, higher motivation, better performance and a culture of inclusion.
For now, though, let me leave you with a thought. In his play ‘Rhinoceros’, Ionesco teases the circular arguments of self-regarding philosophers by proposing that if a cat has four legs, and so does a dog, then a dog must, in fact, be a cat. This was funny in the context of the time, but it may be that we continue to fall into the same trap: A grown up is a serious, controlled person who separates play from work, prefers dry data to stories, and keeps their emotions well under wraps; I am a grown-up, and therefore… Oh. I’d better change then. | https://medium.com/agl-communications/defining-authenticity-if-a-cat-has-four-legs-4e0e02f0c829 | ['Dan Leatherdale'] | 2019-06-17 14:24:01.812000+00:00 | ['Leadership Development', 'Executive Coaching', 'Communication Skills', 'Personal Growth', 'Authenticity'] |
Data cleaning and feature engineering in Python | Data cleaning and feature engineering in Python
Building better machine learning models for predicting San Francisco housing prices
Housing price data provides a great introduction to machine learning. Anybody who has bought a house or even rented an apartment can easily understand the features: more space, and more rooms, generally lead to a higher price.
So it ought to be easy to develop a model — but sometimes it isn’t, not because machine learning is hard but because data is messy. Also, prices for the exact same house in different neighborhoods of the same city, even only a mile away, may have significantly different prices. The best way to deal with this is to engineer the data so that the model can better handle this situation.
Since finding data can be the hardest problem in machine learning, we will use a great sample set from another data science project on Github which is a set of housing prices in San Francisco, mostly over the last few years, scraped from San Francisco Chronicle home sale listings. This data set can be found here: https://github.com/RuiChang123/Regression_for_house_price_estimation/blob/master/final_data.csv
First, we’ll load the data from a local copy of the file.
import pandas as pd
housing = pd.read_csv("final_data.csv")
Now, let’s take a look at a few graphs of this data set, graphing the total number of rooms by the last sold price.
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
x = housing['totalrooms']
y = housing['lastsoldprice']
plt.scatter(x,y)
plt.show()
That single point in the far lower-right corner is an outlier. Its value is so extreme that it skews the entire graph, so much that we cannot even see any variation on the main set of data. This will distort any attempt to train a machine learning algorithm on this data set. We need to look more closely at this data point and consider what to do with it. If we sort the data by the total number of rooms, one of our axes above, it should stick out.
housing['totalrooms'].sort_values()
Here are the results:
7524 1.0
11223 1.0
3579 1.0
2132 1.0
5453 1.0
2827 1.0
... 2765 23.0
8288 24.0
9201 24.0
6860 24.0
4802 26.0
8087 26.0
11083 27.0
2601 28.0
2750 28.0
10727 28.0
11175 33.0
8300 94.0
8967 1264.0
Name: totalrooms, Length: 11330, dtype: float64
Indeed, that data point does stick out. It is the very last value in the list, which is a house that has 1,264 rooms! That is very suspicious, especially since the plot shows it having a pretty low price. At the very least it is wildly inconsistent with the rest of the data. The same may be the case with the previous value showing 94 rooms. We can take a closer look at these two houses with the following commands, pulling them up by their numeric identifier.
First let’s look at the house which supposedly has 1,264 rooms:
df = pd.DataFrame(housing)
df.iloc[[8967]]
This query shows something even more suspicious, which is that the “finishedsqft” field is also 1264.0. In other words, this is clearly just an error, probably on data entry — when the original data set was created, somebody accidentally used the same value for both finishedsqft and totalrooms.
Now, let’s take a look at the value just preceding it, with 94 rooms:
df.iloc[[8300]]
This home which supposedly has 94.0 rooms has only two bedrooms and two bathrooms! Again, this is an error. It is not clear how this crept in, but we can be pretty certain that if we go to this house, it does not have 94 rooms, but only two bedrooms and two bathrooms. We will need to eliminate these two data points but first let’s take another look at a graph of finishedsqft:
x = housing['finishedsqft']
y = housing['lastsoldprice']
plt.scatter(x,y)
plt.show()
There is another outlier in the lower-right. Let’s take a closer look at this data:
housing['finishedsqft'].sort_values()
Here are the results
1618 1.0
3405 1.0
10652 1.0
954 1.0
11136 1.0
5103 1.0
916 1.0
10967 1.0
7383 1.0
1465 1.0
8134 243.0
7300 244.0
...
9650 9699.0
8087 10000.0
2750 10236.0
4997 27275.0
Name: finishedsqft, Length: 11330, dtype: float64
First, unexpectedly, there are ten houses listed at 1.0 square feet. This is clearly wrong. Note that these were impossible to see in the graph, we had to look at the actual values. Additionally, the above results show the largest house at 27,275.0 square feet. It turns out, this is a house with only 2.0 bedrooms and 2.0 bathrooms, even though it is listed at 27,275 square feet, so this is almost certainly a mistake, or at least an extreme outlier. Let’s eliminate all of these outliers and take another look at the graph.
housing = housing.drop([1618])
housing = housing.drop([3405])
housing = housing.drop([10652])
housing = housing.drop([954])
housing = housing.drop([11136])
housing = housing.drop([5103])
housing = housing.drop([916])
housing = housing.drop([10967])
housing = housing.drop([7383])
housing = housing.drop([1465])
housing = housing.drop([8967])
housing = housing.drop([8300])
housing = housing.drop([4997])
x = housing['finishedsqft']
y = housing['lastsoldprice']
plt.scatter(x,y)
plt.show()
This is looking much better. There still may be some outliers in here, and we could investigate them more closely if we really wanted to, but there are no single data points in this view that are distorting the graph, and probably none (that we can see) that would distort a machine learning model.
Now that we have cleaned the data, we need to do some feature engineering. This involves transforming the values in the data set into numeric values that machine learning algorithms can use.
Take the “lastsolddate” value, for example. In the current data set, this is a string in the form of “mm/dd/yyyy.” We need to change this into a numeric value, which we can do with the following Pandas command:
housing['lastsolddateint'] = pd.to_datetime(housing['lastsolddate'], format='%m/%d/%Y').astype('int')
housing['lastsolddateint'] = housing['lastsolddateint']/1000000000
housing = housing[housing['lastsolddateint'].notnull()]
Now let’s create a checkpoint for our data so that we can refer back to it later.
clean_data = housing.copy()
Additionally, there are a number of fields that we cannot or should not use, so we will eliminate them.
I prefer to create functions to do this sort of work that we might do again and again, as we will see below, in order to simplify the code as we try out different hypotheses.
We remove the columns in remove_list for a number of reasons. Some of them are text values we just cannot do much with (info, address, z_address, zipcode, zpid). The latitude and longitude fields might be useful in some form but for this example it may just complicate things — no reason not to experiment with it in the future though. The zestimate and zindexvalue fields were actually produced by other data science techniques (probably from Zillow), so using them would be cheating! Finally, we will drop usecode (e.g. house, condo, mobile home) which could be quite useful but we will not use it for this example.
def drop_geog(data, keep = []):
remove_list = ['info','address','z_address','longitude','latitude','neighborhood','lastsolddate','zipcode','zpid','usecode', 'zestimate','zindexvalue']
for k in keep:
remove_list.remove(k)
data = data.drop(remove_list, axis=1)
data = data.drop(data.columns[data.columns.str.contains('unnamed',case = False)],axis = 1)
return data housing = drop_geog(housing)
Now that we have cleaned up the data, let’s take a look at how a few algorithms manage using it. We will use scikit-learn.
First, we need to split the data into testing and training sets, again using a function that we can reuse later. This assures that when we test the data, we are actually testing the model on data it has never seen before.
from sklearn.model_selection import train_test_split
def split_data(data):
y = data['lastsoldprice']
X = data.drop('lastsoldprice', axis=1)
# Return (X_train, X_test, y_train, y_test)
return train_test_split(X, y, test_size=0.2, random_state=30) housing_split = split_data(housing)
Let’s try Linear Regression first.
import sys
from math import sqrt
from sklearn.metrics import mean_squared_error, mean_absolute_error, r2_score
from sklearn.model_selection import GridSearchCV
import numpy as np
from sklearn.linear_model import LinearRegression
def train_eval(algorithm, grid_params, X_train, X_test, y_train, y_test):
regression_model = GridSearchCV(algorithm, grid_params, cv=5, n_jobs=-1, verbose=1)
regression_model.fit(X_train, y_train)
y_pred = regression_model.predict(X_test)
print("R2: \t", r2_score(y_test, y_pred))
print("RMSE: \t", sqrt(mean_squared_error(y_test, y_pred)))
print("MAE: \t", mean_absolute_error(y_test, y_pred))
return regression_model
train_eval(LinearRegression(), {}, *housing_split)
This train_eval function can be used for any arbitrary scikit-learn algorithm, for both training and evaluation. This is one of the great benefits of scikit-learn. The first line of the function incorporates a set hyperparameters that we want to evaluate against. In this case, we pass in {} so we can just use the default hyperparameters on the model. The second and third lines of this function do the actual work, fitting the model and then running a prediction on it. The print statements then show some stats that we can evaluate. Let’s see how we faired.
R2: 0.5366066917131977
RMSE: 750678.476479495
MAE: 433245.6519384096
The first score, R², also known as the Coefficient of Determination, is a general evaluation of the model showing the percentage of variation in the prediction that can be explained by the features. In general, a higher R² value is better than a lower one. The other two stats are root mean squared error and mean absolute error. These two can only be evaluated in relation to other evaluations of the same statistic on other models. Having said that, an R² of .53, and the other stats in the many hundreds of thousands (for houses probably costing one or two million) is not great. We can do better.
Let’s see how a few other algorithms perform. First, K-Nearest Neighbors (KNN).
from sklearn.neighbors import KNeighborsRegressor
knn_params = {'n_neighbors' : [1, 5, 10, 20, 30, 50, 75, 100, 200, 500]}
model = train_eval(KNeighborsRegressor(), knn_params, *housing_split)
If Linear Regression is mediocre, KNN is terrible!
R2: 0.15060023694456648
RMSE: 1016330.95341843
MAE: 540260.1489399293
Next we will try Decision Tree.
from sklearn.tree import DecisionTreeRegressor
tree_params = {}
train_eval(DecisionTreeRegressor(), tree_params, *housing_split)
This is even worse!
R2: .09635601667334437
RMSE: 1048281.1237086286
MAE: 479376.222614841
Finally, let’s look at Random Forrest.
from sklearn import ensemble
from sklearn.ensemble import RandomForestRegressor
from sklearn.datasets import make_regression
forest_params = {'n_estimators': [1000], 'max_depth': [None], 'min_samples_split': [2]}
forest = train_eval(RandomForestRegressor(), forest_params, *housing_split)
This one is a bit better, but we can still do better.
R2: 0.6071295620858653
RMSE: 691200.04921061
MAE: 367126.8614028794
How do we improve on these results? One option is to try other algorithms, and there are many, and some will do better. But we can actually fine tune our results by getting our hands dirty in the data with feature engineering.
Let’s reconsider some of the features that we have in our data. Neighborhood is an interesting field. The values are things like “Portrero Hill” and “South Beach.” These cannot be simply ordered (from most expensive to least expensive neighborhood), or at least, doing so would not necessarily produce better results. But we all know that the same house in two different neighborhoods will have two different prices. So we want this data. How do we use it?
Python’s Pandas library gives us a simple tool for creating a “one-hot encoding” of these values. This takes the single column of “neighborhood” and creates a new column for each value in the original neighborhood column. For each of these new rows (with new column header names like “Portrero Hill” and “South Beach”), if a row of data has that value for the neighborhood in the original column, it is set to 1, otherwise it is set to 0. The machine learning algorithms can now build a weight associated with that neighborhood, which is either applied if the data point is in that neighborhood (if the value for that column is 1) or not (if it is 0).
First, we need to retrieve our check-pointed data, this time keeping the “neighborhood” field.
housing_cleaned = drop_geog(clean_data.copy(), ['neighborhood'])
Now we can create a one-hot encoding for the “neighborhood” field.
one_hot = pd.get_dummies(housing_cleaned['neighborhood'])
housing_cleaned = housing_cleaned.drop('neighborhood',axis = 1)
We will hold onto the “one_hot” value and add it later. But first, we have to do two more things. We need to split the data into a training set and a test set.
(X_train, X_test, y_train, y_test) = split_data(housing_cleaned)
For our final step, we need to scale and center the data.
from sklearn.preprocessing import StandardScaler scaler = StandardScaler()
scaler.fit(X_train)
X_train[X_train.columns] = scaler.transform(X_train[X_train.columns])
X_train = X_train.join(one_hot)
X_test[X_test.columns] = scaler.transform(X_test[X_test.columns])
X_test = X_test.join(one_hot)
housing_split_cleaned = (X_train, X_test, y_train, y_test)
Let’s unpack this step a bit.
First, we apply StandardScaler(). This function scales and centers the data by subtracting the mean of the column and dividing the standard deviation of the column, for all data points in each column. This standardizes all of the data, giving each column a normal distribution. It also scales the data, because some fields will vary from 0 to 10,000, such as “finishedsqft,” while others will vary only from 0 to 30, such as number of rooms. Scaling will put them all on the same scale, so that one feature does not arbitrarily play a bigger role than others just because it has a higher maximum value. For some machine learning algorithms, as we will see below, this is critical to getting even a half decent result.
Second, it is important to note that we have to “fit” the scaler on the training features, X_train. That is, we take the mean and standard deviation of the training data, fit the scaler object with these values, then transform the training data AND the test data using that fitted scaler. We do not want to fit the scaler on the test data, as that would then leak information from the test data set into the trained algorithm. We could end up with results that appear better than they are (because the algorithm already is trained on test data) or appear worse (because the test data is scaled on their own data set, and not on the test data set).
Now, let’s rebuild our models with the newly engineered features.
model = train_eval(LinearRegression(), {}, *housing_split_cleaned)
Now, under Linear Regression, the simplest algorithm we have, the results are already better than anything we saw previously.
R2: 0.6328566983301503
RMSE: 668185.25771193
MAE: 371451.9425795053
Next is KNN.
model = train_eval(KNeighborsRegressor(), knn_params, *housing_split_cleaned)
This is an a huge improvement.
R2: 0.6938710004544473
RMSE: 610142.5615480896
MAE: 303699.6739399293
Decision Tree:
model = train_eval(DecisionTreeRegressor(), tree_params,*housing_split_cleaned)
Still pretty bad, but better than before.
R2: 0.39542277744197274
RMSE: 857442.439825675
MAE: 383743.4403710247
Finally, Random Forrest.
model = train_eval(RandomForestRegressor(), forest_params, *housing_split_cleaned)
Again, a decent improvement.
R2: 0.677028227379022
RMSE: 626702.4153226872
MAE: 294772.5044353021
There is certainly far more that can be done with this data, from additional feature engineering to trying additional algorithms. But the lesson, from this short tutorial, is that seeking more data or pouring over the literature for better algorithms may not always be the right next step. It may be better to get the absolute most you can out of a simpler algorithm first, not only for comparison but because data cleaning may pay dividends down the road.
Finally, in spite of its simplicity, K-Nearest Neighbors can be quite affective, so long as we treat it with the proper care. | https://towardsdatascience.com/data-cleaning-and-feature-engineering-in-python-b4d448366022 | ['Scott Johnson'] | 2019-04-09 13:23:07.182000+00:00 | ['Scikit Learn', 'Machine Learning', 'Python', 'Feature Engineering'] |
Leaving | I will leave this wild land of imported sources,
a divided nation, made comfortable
by echoing ear trumpets of split radiation.
When I was eighteen, I possessed
a blue duffle bag and bicycle later stolen
by someone who just needed it more.
I felt sorry for the mall security guard
in his quiet, flickering room, beaten
by a wicked tree that covered his cameras.
For years, coins trickled without account,
negative numbers a deep grainy red
that met the slash of wet scissors
in a lonely upstate summer.
So I bought a new bicycle, and rubbed my
thighs on it in the mountains, chattered
my teeth as the thermometer rose and fell.
But I returned — as a person — as a story —
as a person with stories — who continued
down a slow decline to an eventual passing. | https://medium.com/@trappermarkelz/leaving-9aeae68e6e65 | ['Trapper Markelz'] | 2020-12-04 16:13:14.040000+00:00 | ['Poetry', 'Free Verse'] |
Manitoba’s Largest Draw Of 2020 On December 17 | 2020 is ending, and Canadian immigration is working twice as hard since the year has presented so many difficulties for candidates.
Manitoba, however, is completing 2020 on a positive note. The province recently held the largest draw of the entire year on December 17. The Manitoba Provincial Nominee Program issued invitations to 419 candidates who will now be allowed to submit an application for a provincial nomination. International graduates and skilled workers received invitations during the draw do they can apply to any of the following streams:
Skilled Workers in Manitoba
International Education Stream
Skilled Workers Overseas
Requirements of the draw
Each category required candidates to have a minimum Expression of Interest score. Candidates in the Skilled Workers in Manitoba needed a minimum score of 375, and they managed to secure 329 LAAs.
The Skilled Workers Overseas stream required candidates to have a score of at least 707 and they got 50 LAAs in total. On the other hand, the applicants under the International Education Stream had no EOI score requirement, and they received 40 LAAs.
With this draw, the number of LAAs distributed so far in 2020 has risen to 4,888. The Manitoba Provincial Nominee Program included candidates from the Skilled Worker Overseas stream in this draw if they got invitations via the strategic recruitment program.
Candidates engaged in a regulated occupation got invited during this draw. According to the MPNP, they have the right to reject candidates who are not occupied in a regulated profession. 37 of the 419 LAAs distributed were given to Express Entry candidates. They are required to have a job seeker validation code, a valid Express Entry ID, and experience in any of the province’s In-demand Occupations list.
Canadian PR Visa From The Comfort of Your Home! Discover Your Immigration Options Today! | https://medium.com/@betterplaceimmi/manitobas-largest-draw-of-2020-on-december-17-de0c2a561d80 | ['Betterplace Immigration'] | 2020-12-21 06:21:09.303000+00:00 | ['Immigration', 'Betterplaceimmigration', 'Canada Immigration', 'Canada', 'Manitoba'] |
Happy Employees Make Happy Customers = More Profit $$$ | Businesses started realizing that to achieve success, setting up a customer-first policy is a must.
Even though prioritizing your customers’ needs will most certainly increase customer satisfaction and loyalty, under no circumstances should managers forget about equally important assets of their company — employees!
Yes, measuring happiness might be a bit challenging but it is worth the effort as you don’t want to have dissatisfied employees sloppily doing tasks they don’t enjoy.
Negativity is an airborne infection. The lack of happiness of one of your employees will cause dissatisfaction in another. This cycle will then reach your customers, and your staff’s low supply of energy and motivation will take root in them.
If the above-provided statistics were not enough to convince you to start caring about your employee happiness, in the following sections we will provide more details and benefits of happier employees.
In other words, we’ve listed bad news, and now it’s time for some good news!
Benefits of Happier Employees
1. More Creativity
Employee-customer interaction is not scripted roleplay. In a world of rapidly changing customer preferences and increasing competition between the organizations, creativity becomes important when determining success.
Innovative thinking is a critical skill for your employees as your customer service staff is the first representative of your business that customers interact with. Happiness contributes to the creativity because it increases the mental flexibility of people and promotes the positive reception of new challenges.
These qualities are exactly what you want your employees to possess if you want to increase the positive attitude of customers towards your business.
2. Better Service
Employee that is satisfied and happy with the company is more motivated with provided products/services, which helps serve customers with more information and enthusiasm.
According to Gallup, companies that have happier employees show 147% higher earnings per share than their competitors.
This makes sense. If a happier employee is more informed about the product and presents it to the customer with enthusiasm and positive energy, certainly the latter will find the informing service preferable and will be willing to visit the business again.
3. Saved Money
Employee that enjoys the workplace is more likely to stay. Think about the additional costs you will have to face when hiring a new worker such as the cost of advertising or interviewing, the cost of onboarding and training, the cost of errors as well as time for adjusting and etc. It is too much of a headache and most of the times not worth the hassle.
4. Better Customer Relationship
A warm smile, a positive attitude, attentiveness and motivation. These are all the qualities of an engaged customer service representative and also the qualities necessary for making a customer happy.
Human emotions, regardless positive or negative, are easily transmittable. Make sure that the only emotion that your employees are communicating with your customers is positivity. Invest in the happiness of your workers and see yourself how it will pay back with happy customers willing to shop with you more.
How to Promote Employee Happiness
Now you understand the significance of satisfied staff but might still be wondering how do you make your employees happy?
Well, there are several things that you can do and the best thing about it is that it comes from the employees themselves!
1. Innovate With Technology
92% of employees indicated that technology would increase their work satisfaction. New technology makes the work easier for your employees and transforms repetitive tasks into a more enjoyable experience. With an increasing number of millennials in the workforce, innovative gadgets should be a must at your workplace.
Such innovations will promote clearer communication between the workers and fewer errors. It might sound counter-intuitive but the implementation of technology might promote more human interaction.
Tools that automate the sing-in process of your customers, for example, will give your workers more time to interact with customers and build a genuine relationship with them.
2. Productive Workplace
The physical state of the office or a shop is an important aspect of promoting productivity. Make sure that the working space is organized exactly the way that would promote positive energy while providing the necessary things for your employee’s needs.
One of the best ways to do so is letting them personalize the workplace. Who would know how your employees want their working place to look like if not your employees themselves? Give them the freedom to organize things as they wish to and have a place that they can call their own.
3. Valuing Their Effort
Nothing kills the motivation more than someone not appreciating your hard work and dedication.
But also, on the contrary, praising your employees will motivate them for better future performance. Companies, where managers focused on the strength of their employees, showed more the double workers engagement compared to the company where the weaknesses of the employees were highlighted.
Don’t be quick to criticize your employees for committed mistakes. Rather, provide a feedback that will benefit the person for future performance and encourage by additional training or motivation.
4. Ask for Feedback
Just because your employees have a smile on their face today does not mean that it will be there forever.
Don’t think that your employees are satisfied or that it will stay fixed like that forever. Keep monitoring your employees’ attitude towards work and their level of satisfaction.
Set monthly or quarterly meetings with your workers do discuss their satisfaction and feelings regarding the work. Going the extra mile will prove itself being beneficial! | https://medium.com/@mr.nick6000/happy-employees-make-happy-customers-more-profit-72eecfec064a | ['Nicholaos Gouvouniotis'] | 2021-08-23 16:52:24.593000+00:00 | ['LinkedIn', 'Bing', 'Google', 'News', 'Yahoo'] |
Why I Double Down on Prioritization to Be More Productive | A few years ago, I found myself feeling completely overwhelmed by my mounting todo list. Endless meetings to attend, emails awaiting a response, plus my own work to complete, and oh yeah this thing called a personal life would be nice to have.
I had taken a promotion requiring me to move overseas and added a lot of new responsibilities. If you’ve ever moved or taken on a new job, you know either of these are stressful enough on their own. Trying to do both at once in a foreign country is exponentially more stressful. I knew I needed to do something different.
Over the years, I’ve experimented with plenty of apps and techniques to boost my productivity. All in the hopes that I could save a bit more time, add more value, and in general, reduce a bit of the stress associated with deadlines.
According to Statista, I’m not alone, as more than 76% of smartphone users have some sort of productivity app on their phones. Add the constantly evolving list of time-saving techniques, and it’s clear we’re all searching for ways to get ahead of our todo lists and take back control of our time.
I found no matter what I tried, it never seemed to be enough. Sure, I found ways to manage projects better, efficiently juggle a busy schedule, and create more focus in my day. But I was only saving minutes, or hours at best, when I needed to be saving days.
I decided to reflect both on the various tools I had been using to be more productive as well as how those more successful than myself manage their time.
I came to two conclusions 1) most productivity trends tend to focus on how to get work done while 2) truly successful people focus on what work should get done.
I knew then if I wanted to take back control of my time, I needed to double down on prioritizing what was on my backlog.
Early on, I realized this is much easier said than done. It’s easy to prioritize between what’s critical and not so critical. And there are plenty of tools to help you make those decisions.
What I want to share with you is how to save days of productivity and prioritize between more than one crucial task and another.
Know what matters most to you
Whether it’s in life or work, you’re going to be pulled in different directions by everyone else’s priorities. To keep your head above water, you need to know what’s important to you, what you stand for, and who you are.
Create guideposts based on your priorities, so when something new comes along, you can instinctively know if it falls in the ‘yes’ or ‘no’ pile.
Relocating from the US to Europe I knew a significant guidepost for me was work-life balance. With my new double down philosophy, I knew I needed to carefully consider anything that posed a risk to the balance I was seeking.
I began saying no to side projects or additional meetings which would have me regularly working late or eating up “my time.” In the past, I would have accepted feeling it was necessary to build my career or be a team player. I focused on giving my full attention and effort to only my most important projects.
The choice won’t always be easy for you, but cutting out what doesn’t fit with your priorities will free up more of your time and brain space than any app or time management technique can shave off.
With more time on your hands, you’ll quickly find you have more energy, become more productive, and deliver better work. Your colleagues will realize they can trust and depend on you to get done what you’ve committed to so they can focus elsewhere. They thanked me for it, and they’ll thank you for it as well.
Get comfortable saying no
Knowing your priorities is the first step towards improving your productivity. The second is saying no, often, to what’s not important. However, saying no all the time can become almost as stressful as the thought of completing your current todo list.
I found this out when trying to hold to another one of my priorities in my new role. My inbox was being filled up with requests, leaving me little time for my own project teams.
I’ve always believed in a people-first approach. I knew in order to be true to myself it was crucial I continue to do so now. I had to make it clear any requests that interfered with my teams’ needs would have to be declined.
During this time, I found a couple of tricks that helped me get comfortable saying ‘no.’
The first is finding creative ways to say ‘no.’ Let them know if they want you involved in Project A, they will need to give up your involvement elsewhere. But be specific about whether it’s Project B, C or D they would need to give up.
This way, you stay true to your priorities, keep your workload under control, and also help them to determine what’s really important.
The second comes with time but has the most substantial impact; consistently stick to your priorities. You and your colleagues will realize when you say ‘no’ to one thing you’re actually saying ‘yes’ to so much more.
You’re saying yes to your best work, yes to supporting your team, and yes to being more productive. Over time your coworkers will understand your priorities and only come to you with the things you already want to say ‘yes’ to.
Invest your time now to make time for tomorrow
Defining your priorities requires proactivity and an upfront investment of your time. The same is true when it comes to implementing them. You’ll feel uncomfortable the first few times you say ‘no’ to someone. But putting in the time and effort to decide what’s essential and have a few difficult conversations now will be an investment that pays dividends in the future.
Being productive requires you have the time, energy, and focus to bring your best self to the table and get things done. When you prioritize, you make this possible.
Don’t wait for your backlog to fill up or your calendar to get swamped with meetings. Begin to invest your time today to decide what you should be doing so you can spend less time worrying about how you’ll get it done. | https://medium.com/the-ascent/why-i-double-down-on-prioritization-to-be-more-productive-a601eca3f69d | ['Brian Early'] | 2019-09-07 15:57:02.057000+00:00 | ['Work', 'Productivity', 'Time Management', 'Career Advice', 'Self'] |
Arrived, Never to Stay | Arrived, never left
For peace was found in you
Always in pursuit, elusive, momentary
Drawn into the light for darkness seize
Arrived, never left
And like a Finnish song in a summer, hämmentävä
African hats tempting in all its colours, resisted
Summer was over, lavender wilting
Arrived, never left
New and unknown, controlling
Words with confidence, questioned
For brevity is the language of pain
A coffee maybe one or two
For in silence, we speak
With no intent for goodbyes
But never to stay, never to stay | https://medium.com/@rjbarrete-54463/arrived-never-to-stay-ceb9618dd0e7 | ['Rj Barrete'] | 2020-12-18 16:45:40.415000+00:00 | ['Summer', 'Poetry', 'Lavender', 'Connection', 'Friendship'] |
How to Kubernetes: Use Conftest to Audit Infrastructure-As-Code | At Fairwinds, we leverage OPA (Open Policy Agent) in our open source product Polaris, as well as in our SaaS product, Fairwinds Insights. As our dev team implemented these features, it got me thinking about other ways we could leverage OPA at Fairwinds to enhance the reliability and security of our Kubernetes environments.
At the same time, I was trying to come up with a way for us to better audit our many infrastructure-as-code repositories. For each client we have, there’s a repo, and everything we do for that client goes into that repo. As you can imagine, standards across customers gradually slip out of date, and we need to know when they do. Currently we have an internal Python-based solution to do this, but it’s become a bit unwieldy and dated. The plan was to rewrite it, but EJ (our former CTO), had a better idea: “Why don’t we use OPA?” My response, of course, was to facepalm. Why didn’t I think of that? So I went looking around the OPA repositories, dusted off the little bit of knowledge I had of and put together a proof of concept. I needed a way to run and test policies, so I updated my version of conftest which, it turns out, is designed to do exactly what I needed to do: audit configuration files.
Writing the Policy
The next bit, writing the policy, is the hard part. As someone who regularly develops in languages such as Python and Go, this was a lot harder than I expected.isn’t a programming language, it’s a query language, which means the way I need to think about all this isn’t quite the way I normally think. Once you get into the groove of it, it’s extremely powerful, but it took me quite a while. I decided to start out by checking which version of a Terraform module we’re using and compare that to a list of approved modules. There’s good examples of this out in the wild, so I was able to source those to get moving.
The most basic policy I could write was something like this:
package terraform import data violation[{"msg": msg}] {
m := input.module[name]
source := m.source
not source == "git::https://github.com/FairwindsOps/terraform-vpc.git?ref=v5.0.1"
msg = sprintf("%s module version %s is out of date", [name, source])
}
The first line, package terraform, just allows me to divide up the policy into multiple parts. Eventually, I'm going to end up with a bunch of different modules, such as terraform , kops , and kubernetes . When using this policy with we will target the terraform module using the --namespace=terraform flag.
The next part of the policy reads in all modules in the terraform data passed to it, and compares each one to a static string. If there's a match, it returns the msg as a violation.
This policy is functional, but it doesn't quite achieve the results we want. We need to add the ability to check different module names against different strings. This requires a map variable that we can use to specify multiple module names, we'll call it module_allowlist. This gives us the following:
package terraform
import data
module_allowlist = {
"vpc": "git::https://github.com/FairwindsOps/terraform-vpc.git?ref=v5.0.1",
"bastion": "git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//aws?ref=aws-v0.6.0",
}
violation[{"msg": msg}] {
m := input.module[name]
source = m.source
not source == module_allowlist[name]
msg = sprintf("%s module version %s is out of date", [name, source])
}
Here we are comparing the actual module source to the corresponding source in the module_allowlist map. This is better, but we have another problem: What about modules with multiple allowed versions? The bastion module above is a great example; we expect different versions of bastion depending on which cloud provider you're using. Let's change the map format to module_name: [list of possible versions]. The new policy looks like this:
package terraform
import data
module_allowlist = {
"vpc": ["git::https://github.com/FairwindsOps/terraform-vpc.git?ref=v5.0.1"],
"bastion": [
"git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//aws?ref=aws-v0.6.0",
"git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//gcp?ref=gcp-v0.1.1",
],
}
violation[{
"msg": msg,
}] {
m := input.module[name]
source = m.source
not contains(module_allowlist[name], source)
msg = sprintf("%s module version %s is out of date", [name, source])
}
contains(sources, elem) {
source := sources[_]
source == elem
}
Now that we have a list of possible versions, we introduce a function contains to check and see if our source module is in the list of allowed sources for that module. This means that by populating the map with more information, we can check for all sorts of module versions, not just one.
The last thing we want out of this policy is to return more data when outputting the results as JSON. Our goal is to be able to store and present or analyze this data, so it helps to add more details. Luckily, the mechanism is already there, we just need to utilize it.
The final product is this file, called terraform.reg:
package terraform
import data
module_allowlist = {
"vpc": ["git::https://github.com/FairwindsOps/terraform-vpc.git?ref=v5.0.1"],
"bastion": [
"git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//aws?ref=aws-v0.6.0",
"git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//gcp?ref=gcp-v0.1.1",
],
}
violation[{
"msg": msg,
"family": "terraform",
"check": "module version",
"module": name,
}] {
m := input.module[name]
source = m.source
not contains(module_allowlist[name], source)
msg = sprintf("%s module version %s is out of date", [name, source])
}
contains(sources, elem) {
source := sources[_]
source == elem
}
In the definition of the violation, we have added several pieces of data:
"msg" - The message I am going to return in the variable msg . This was already in place
- The message I am going to return in the variable . This was already in place "family" - A string indicating where the data came from, in this case
- A string indicating where the data came from, in this case "check" - I want to be able to tell what I am checking. Here, it's "module version"
- I want to be able to tell what I am checking. Here, it's "module" - This will be set to the name of the module that triggered the violation, via the variable name
The end result is that we can now run:
conftest test <path-to-terraform-file(s)> --policy terraform.rego -ojson --namespace terraform
and get output like this:
[
{
"filename": "bastion.tf",
"namespace": "terraform",
"successes": 0,
"failures": [
{
"msg": "bastion module version git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//aws?ref=aws-v0.5.0 is out of date",
"metadata": {
"check": "module version",
"family": "terraform",
"module": "bastion"
}
}
]
}
]
Or, if you prefer to view the results on the CLI, drop the -o json flag:
FAIL - bastion.tf - terraform - bastion module version git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//aws?ref=aws-v0.5.0 is out of date
Adding Tests
rego has another really awesome capability that I wanted to leverage: Unit Testing. This is really powerful for writing policy, as well as for maintaining it in the long term. In order to try out this functionality, I wrote a test for the terraform.rego policy from the last section. Here's my new terraform_test.rego file:
package terraform
empty(value) {
count(value) == 0
}
no_violations {
empty(violation)
}
test_module_source {
violation[{"check": "module version", "family": "terraform", "module": "bastion", "msg": "bastion module version git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//aws?ref=aws-v0.0.0 is out of date"}] with input as {"module": {"bastion": {"source": "git::https://github.com/fairwindsops/terraform-bastion.git//aws?ref=aws-v0.0.0"}}}
}
Essentially, I expect there to be a violation if I pass in a module called bastion that has a version that is not in my list. This test can be run using the command conftest verify.
Conclusion
Now I have the ability to write an entire suite of audit policy, run it against all of our infrastructure-as-code, and generate structured JSON data that will allow me to analyze the results and report the findings. Even better, since Fairwinds Insights supports OPA, I can plug these policies in and have Insights collect and manage that data for me. This will likely become an integral part of our workflow, enabling our SREs to better manage many clients and gather helpful information along the way. | https://medium.com/uptime-99/how-to-kubernetes-use-conftest-to-audit-infrastructure-as-code-b2004a5fc6f | [] | 2020-12-07 13:31:05.172000+00:00 | ['K8s', 'Kubernetes', 'Terraform', 'Open Policy Agent'] |
What is the FLEET of the Largest Airline in Morocco, Royal Air Maroc in 2021? | What is the FLEET of the Largest Airline in Morocco, Royal Air Maroc in 2021? Junaid 3 days ago·4 min read
Boeing 747–400 of Royal Air Maroc, currently used by the Morocco Government, ImageSource: WikiCommons
Commonly known as RAM or Royal Air Maroc, the national airline of Morocco, a country situated in the north-westernmost part of the Maghreb region off North Africa. This airline, which is currently owned by the Moroccan government, operates an extensive domestic and international network to Africa, Asia, Europe and to parts in North and South America as well.
Before we head on to, the types and fleet the airline consists, let us go over the Brief History of the RAM.
The airline was founded in 1947 and began its flight operations in 1949, using Junkers Ju 52s, a transport aircraft designed and manufactured by the German aviation company Junkers.
After the Moroccan government purchased a 67.73 percent share in the airline, it changed its name to Royal Air Maroc (RAM) and quickly grew to 16 flights in 1958, consisting of four DC-4s, three DC-3s, seven Bretagnes, and two C-46s.
As the airline grew and new domestic networks in both, Europe and North Africa were established, Royal Air Maroc took deliver of its first Boeing aircraft, the Boeing 727, in 1970, launching additional routes and forming a subsidiary airline, Royal Air Inter, for its domestic network.
Junkers Ju52 shown above initially used by RAM in 1949, ImageSource: WikiCommons
With the gradual expansion and replacement of aircrafts, RAM also purchased a Boeing 747–200B in 1978, and the airline had 3,583 workers by 1980. During this period, as the industry progressed with transatlantic routes and new generation aircrafts, RAM’s fleet consisted of Boeing 737’s, 747’s, and 707’s, and in 1986, Royal Air Maroc was the first and only African airline to introduce the Boeing 757 into service, connecting major cities in North and South America to its hub, Casablanca.
As the aviation industry evolved, with the introduction of fuel-efficient aircrafts and an increase in the number of passengers due to rising fuel prices, many of the older four generation aircrafts were replaced by airlines. RAM, on the other hand, not only replaced, but ordered twenty new Generation Boeing 737, and replaced the ageing Boeing 747 with leased Boeing 767’s.
Royal Air Maroc also achieved the most profitable year following ten long run years in 2012, by restrutring the fleet, reducing the number of employees, and removing ten medium haul aircrafts.
As of 2018, the airline operated ninety four destinations across the world and also decommissioned the sole Boeing 747-400 in its fleet.
Fleet
Royal Air Maroc has formerly operated various aircrafts, ranging from Boeing 707’s to Boeing 747’s, Airbus A310’s to A330’s, ATR-42’s, and many more older aircrafts.
However, as of 2021, Royal Air Maroc’s fleet includes largely of six ATR-42s, which they ordered and took on behalf of its subsidiary in 2011 and 2009.
The airline also owns a large number of new generation Boeing 737s, twenty-eight of which are Boeing 737-800s and the remaining two are Boeing 737 MAX-8s.
These two Boeing 737-MAX-8s were grounded immediately following the two fatal MAX accidents in 2019, and they had only accumulated seventeen hours before being consigned to storage.
One of the 4 Embraer 190 aircraft of RAM, ImageSource: WikiCommons
RAM’s fleet also includes nine newly fuel-efficient Boeing 787 dreamliners, five of which are Boeing 787–8 and the remaining four are Boeing 787–9. Both variations are identical, however the -9 version is twenty feet longer than the -8, resulting in increased passenger capacity.
Following the airline’s affiliation in the OneWorld Alliance, these aircrafts will assist RAM in connecting long-distance routes such as Casabalanca — NewYork, Paris, and many more destinations.
Rest of the fleet of the airline, consists of four Emraer 190 aircrafts, having a passenger capacity of ninety-right. Royal Air Maroc, also converted one of its Boeing 767–300(BCF) passenger aircraft into a frieghter in 2018, replacing a Boeing 737(F), which was later withdrawn from its service in 2018.
As of 2021, Royal Air Maroc’s fleet consists of fifty-nine aircraft, forty-eight of which are in service and eleven of which are parked.
Please let me know what other airlines’ fleets you’d want to learn about. | https://medium.com/@aviationsurf/what-is-the-fleet-of-the-largest-airline-in-morocco-royal-air-maroc-in-2021-7bec0f1bc44e | [] | 2021-09-14 15:05:52.191000+00:00 | ['Aviation Industry', 'History', 'Africa', 'Morocco', 'Airlines'] |
An L.A. Ghost Story | An L.A. Ghost Story
The neighbors who taught me about the past, present, and future
Photo: wildfires/Flickr
“You get used to the dark, you realize the ghosts are all friendly” — Jack Kerouac
My first L.A. apartment was a real dumpy place on the side of the road, under the 405 Freeway.
I had two roommates and one bathroom they had to walk through my room to use.
We had a ghost named Susan who hung out at the top of the stairs and got so mad at me for dating a dumb rocker boy, she broke a glass and let me find it in the sink the next day. (I have no idea why her name was Susan. It was a long time ago.)
It was a haunted, dilapidated building, but I only paid $300 a month, so I didn’t mind. I was young, naive, and had no idea what I was doing with my life.
Now I know that’s freedom.
I remember counting quarters, one rainy night, with my roommate Myrah, a cool hippie chick I worked with at Lululemon.
We were broke and wanted to buy a candy bar.
Running to the gas station across the street, we laughed at our handful of loose change, our empty bank accounts, because somehow we knew it wouldn’t always be that way.
And after all, we had each other.
We bought a Snickers bar and Reese’s peanut butter cups, split both, and danced all night to “Home” by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros.
Now she lives in Bali with her husband and two beautiful kids, selling her own linen dresses for $300.
I wish I knew how happy we had been that night, dancing, eating our candy, not caring about the future or the past or the cars zipping by on the highway above us.
But how can you measure happiness based on what you don’t know yet? | https://humanparts.medium.com/an-la-ghost-story-d6ddca70f7 | ['Erica Rhodes'] | 2020-06-16 18:48:36.147000+00:00 | ['Race', 'Death', 'Life Lessons', 'Relationships', 'Life'] |
Connecting an AWS and GCP VPC using an IPSec VPN Tunnel with BGP | The Peek booking platform processes thousands of tours, activities, and rentals each day. Behind the scenes, the DevOps team here has always been early adopters of containerizing our applications using Docker, and deploying these container using Kubernetes, and Helm. In addition to containerization, we have strived to move toward applying Infrastructure as Code (IaC) and leveraging tools such as Terraform across our fleet of services in both AWS and GCP.
As part of Peek’s journey this year, our focus turned to creating a multi-cloud environment using AWS and GCP. The goal was to have our private services and databases exist in either cloud provider VPC, and still be able to easily communicate with each other. To achieve a production ready infrastructure, we needed a solution that was also redundant. Our solution came down to setting up a high availability IPSec VPN Tunnel.
This guide will illustrate how to assemble the VPN tunnels between both cloud providers. As a quick overview, on both sides we’ll have a VPC with a public subnet and a private subnet. The public subnet we will use to create a bastion to access a private host in the private subnet. The private hosts in AWS and GCP will be able to communicate with each other after the VPN tunnels has been established. In order for the VPN to be production ready, we will need to setup a High Availability (HA) Cloud VPN on the GCP side and two Site-to-Site VPN Connections on the AWS side. This will form four total VPN Tunnels. Each VPN tunnel will also use dynamic BGP routing to determine the CIDR ranges from each VPC.
Here is a diagram of what the resulting network configuration will look like:
Prerequisites
For this tutorial you will need admin access to an AWS account as well as admin access to a GCP project. A VPC network in each cloud provider with CIDR ranges that do not overlap. Each network should have a private subnet, and a NAT in order to enable egress on private instances. The following configuration values will be used:
AWS
A VPC with a public and private subnet in us-east-1, making sure the CIDR range is not conflicting on the GCP side.
VPC with a CIDR range of 10.0.0.0/16
A public subnet with range of 10.0.0.0/24
A private subnet with range of 10.0.0.1/24
An instance in the private subnet to test the VPN Tunnel with ICMP and port 22 opened.
GCP
A VPC with a public and private subnet in us-east4, making sure the CIDR range is not conflicting with the AWS side.
VPC with a CIDR range of 10.10.0.0/16
A public subnet with range of 10.10.0.0/24
A private subnet with range of 10.10.0.1/24
An instance in the private subnet to test the VPN Tunnel with ICMP and port 22 opened.
Overview
GCP has two types of VPN Gateways you can create, classic and High Availability(HA). We will be creating the HA version of the VPN gateway which will allow us to achieve 99.99% SLA. In addition to this gateway, we must create 4 tunnels between GCP and AWS. On the AWS side, we will need to create two Customer Gateways and two Site-To-Site VPN connections.
Steps
We will be bouncing between GCP and AWS, so sections for each provider are carefully demarcated “GCP Side” or “AWS Side”
GCP Side
Go to your GCP project, in the left nav bar, go down to Hybrid Connectivity, select “Cloud Routers”. Click “Create Router”
2. In “Create a Cloud Router”, fill in the following. Click “Create”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-cloud-router
Description: (blank or anything you want)
Network: gcp-sandbox
Region: us-east4 (Northern Virginia)
Google ASN: 64520 (You can use any private ASN (64512–65534). Make sure it doesn’t conflict with the ASN in the AWS side later)
*Note: 4200000000–4294967294 is not allowed in AWS so don’t use this range.
*Note: 4200000000–4294967294 is not allowed in AWS so don’t use this range. Select “Advertise all subnets visible to the Cloud Router (Default)”
3. Now in Hybrid Connectivity, select VPN.
4. Select “Create VPN Connection” or “VPN Setup Wizard”, select “High-availability (HA) VPN”. Click Continue.
5. Create a VPN Gateway. Fill in the following. Click “Create & Continue”.
Name: gcp-sandbox-vpn-gateway
VPC Network: gcp-sandbox (VPC you created in GCP)
Region: us-east4
6. The following screen will appear. Copy the Interface 0 and 1 IP address. We will need this on the AWS end. Leave it on this screen for now while we switch to AWS.
AWS Side
7. In your AWS account, go to VPC -> Virtual Private Network (VPN), select “Customer Gateway”. Click “Create Customer Gateway”.
8. Fill in the following. Click “Create Customer Gateway”
Name: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-cg1
Routing: Dynamic
BGP ASN: 65420 (The ASN you used to create the GCP Cloud Router)
IP Address: 35.242.61.73 (IP from Interface Tunnel 0 in GCP VPN Gateway)
Certificate ARN: blank
Device: blank
9. Repeat step 8 and create a second Customer Gateway using the Tunnel 1 IP from the GCP VPN Gateway. Fill in the following.
Name: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-cg2
Routing: Dynamic
BGP ASN: 65420 (The ASN you used to create the GCP Cloud Router)
IP Address: 35.220.60.77 (IP from Interface Tunnel 1 in GCP VPN Gateway)
Certificate ARN: blank
Device: blank
10. Now in “Virtual Private Network (VPN)”, select “Virtual Private Gateway”. Click “Create Virtual Private Gateway”.
11. Fill in the following. Click “Create Virtual Private Gateway”
Name tag: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-vpg
ASN: Custom ASN: 64512 (Any ASN you want. This will be used on the GCP side)
12. After the creation, look in the list of Virtual Private Gateways, select the gateway you just created (aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-vpg). Right click on the gateway and “Attach to VPC”.
13. In the following screen, select the VPC you want to connect with GCP (AWS Sandbox). Click “Yes, Attach”. The state will show “attached”
*Note: As of 7/22/2020, the documentation from GCP states to “Create two AWS Virtual Private Gateways”. This is not correct, since you can only attach one Virtual Private Gateway to the VPC. If you attempt to attach a second Virtual Private Gateway, it will throw an error
14. On the left nav bar, go to Virtual Private Network (VPN) again, and select “Site-to-Site VPN Connections”. Click on “Create VPN Connection”
15. In “Create VPN Connection”, fill in the following. Do not click “Create VPN Connection” yet. We need to change the Tunnel Options which is detailed in the next step.
Name tag: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-vpn1
Target Gateway Type: Virtual Private Gateway
Virtual Private Gateway: vgw-00a6862ef16d8404e (name tag: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-vpg). Select the Virtual Private Gateway you just created.
Customer Gateway: Existing
Customer Gateway: cgw-05ec02a5c083d0ef6 (name tag: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-cg1). Select the first Customer Gateway you created that matches Tunnel 0 in GCP.
Routing Options: Dynamic
16. Tunnel Options. Normally we do not need to alter the tunnel options, however there is a known compatibility issue with the size of the AWS transform set, which is larger than GCP will accept. This causes the GCP Cloud VPN Tunnel rekey process to fail. You can read more about this here.
We reduced the transform sets to use the following options.
Repeat the same Advanced Options for Tunnel 2. Click “Create VPN Connection”
17. Select the new Site-to-Site VPN connection (aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-vpn1). Click “Download Configuration”
Select the following.
Vendor: Generic
Platform: Generic
Software: Vendor Agnostic
Click “Download” to save the Configuration for use later when we go back to GCP (file name should be <vpn id.txt>).
18. Create a second Site-to-Site VPN Connection by repeating steps 14 to 17. The second Site-to-Site VPN Connection should have the following values.
Name tag: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-vpn2
Target Gateway Type: Virtual Private Gateway
Virtual Private Gateway: vgw-00a6862ef16d8404e (name tag: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-vpg). Select the Virtual Private Gateway you just created.
Customer Gateway: Existing
Customer Gateway: cgw-02852ebb8f7e7b000 (name tag: aws-sandbox-to-gcp-sandbox-cg2). Select the second Customer Gateway you created that matches Tunnel 1 in GCP.
Routing Options: Dynamic
GCP Side
19. Add VPN Tunnels — Moving back to the GCP Side and continuing from Step 6. For Peer VPN gateway, make sure “On-prem or Non Google Cloud” is selected. “Peer VPN gateway name” Click choose in the drop down and select “Create new peer VPN Gateway”
20. The “Add a peer VPN gateway” screen will pop up. Fill in the following.
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-peer-gateway
Interfaces: Select “four interfaces”
Open the first configuration file you downloaded from AWS.
Interface 0 IP address: 23.22.97.192 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Outside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway.)
Interface 1 IP Address: 54.84.104.211 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #2” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Outside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway.)
Open the second configuration file you downloaded from AWS
Interface 2 IP Address: 3.209.145.120 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Outside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway.)
Interface 3IP Address: 52.86.52.34 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #2” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Outside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway.)
Everything should look like the following:
Click “Create”
21. Your screen should now show additional options and 4 VPN Tunnels that are not configured.
22. Under Cloud Router, select the Cloud Router we created in step 2.
23. Click on the first “VPN tunnel (not yet configured). Fill in the following. Click “Done”
Associated Cloud VPN gateway interface: “0 : 35.242.61.73”
Associated peer VPN gateway interface: “0 : 23.22.97.192”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel1
Description: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel1
IKE version: IKEv2
IKE pre-shared key: Lw3mshg60bimW61itK7rWI6UnIo16aM7 (Look in the first configuration file you downloaded under “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#1: Internet Key Exchange Configuration” -> “- Pre-Shared Key”
It should look like the following:
24. Click on the second “VPN tunnel (not yet configured). Fill in the following. Click “Done”
Associated Cloud VPN gateway interface: “0 : 35.242.61.73”
Associated peer VPN gateway interface: “1 : 54.84.104.211”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel2
Description: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel2
IKE version: IKEv2
IKE pre-shared key: Z8O3eDTtExyIaHsdp6UYFMhjJn4mSCt5 (Look in the first configuration file you downloaded under “IPSec Tunnel #2” -> “#1: Internet Key Exchange Configuration” -> “- Pre-Shared Key”
25. Click on the third “VPN tunnel (not yet configured). Fill in the following. Click “Done”
Associated Cloud VPN gateway interface: “1 : 35.220.60.77”
Associated peer VPN gateway interface: “2 : 3.209.145.120”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel3
Description: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel3
IKE version: IKEv2
IKE pre-shared key: _wcatTFJKrTwcZkOtwWcTKTEWcoRu0ka (Look in the second configuration file you downloaded under “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#1: Internet Key Exchange Configuration” -> “- Pre-Shared Key”
26. Click on the fourth “VPN tunnel (not yet configured). Fill in the following. Click “Done”
Associated Cloud VPN gateway interface: “1 : 35.220.60.77”
Associated peer VPN gateway interface: “3 : 52.86.52.34”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel4
Description: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-tunnel4
IKE version: IKEv2
IKE pre-shared key: j7QtMjzwJxGTptV66TvzhRGe8VqI__e1 (Look in the second configuration file you downloaded under “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#1: Internet Key Exchange Configuration” -> “- Pre-Shared Key”
27. The completed VPN Tunnels should appear as follows:
Click “Create & Continue”
28. Configure BGP Sessions — You should see the following screen:
Click “Configure” on VPN tunnel1
29. Create BGP session — Fill out the following using the first configuration file you downloaded from AWS. Click “Save & Continue”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-bgp1
Peer ASN: 64512 (The ASN from the Virtual Private Gateway from AWS)
Advertised route priority (MED): blank
Cloud Router BGP IP: 169.254.224.134 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Customer Gateway)
BGP peer IP: 169.254.224.133 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway)
Select “Use Cloud Router’s advertisements (Default)”
30. Click on the second BGP Session configuration. Create BGP session — Fill out the following using the first configuration file you downloaded from AWS. Click “Save & Continue”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-bgp2
Peer ASN: 64512 (The ASN from the Virtual Private Gateway from AWS)
Advertised route priority (MED): blank
Cloud Router BGP IP: 169.254.95.90 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #2” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Customer Gateway)
BGP peer IP: 169.254.95.89 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #2” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway)
Select “Use Cloud Router’s advertisements (Default)”
31. Click on the third BGP Session configuration. Create BGP session — Fill out the following using the second configuration file you downloaded from AWS. Click “Save & Continue”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-bgp3
Peer ASN: 64512 (The ASN from the Virtual Private Gateway from AWS)
Advertised route priority (MED): blank
Cloud Router BGP IP: 169.254.240.26 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Customer Gateway)
BGP peer IP: 169.254.240.25 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #1” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway)
Select “Use Cloud Router’s advertisements (Default)”
32. Click on the third BGP Session configuration. Create BGP session — Fill out the following using the second configuration file you downloaded from AWS. Click “Save & Continue”
Name: gcp-sandbox-to-aws-sandbox-bgp4
Peer ASN: 64512 (The ASN from the Virtual Private Gateway from AWS)
Advertised route priority (MED): blank
Cloud Router BGP IP: 169.254.112.106 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #2” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Customer Gateway)
BGP peer IP: 169.254.112.105 (Look for “IPSec Tunnel #2” -> “#3: Tunnel Interface Configuration” -> “Inside IP Addresses:” -> Virtual Private Gateway)
Select “Use Cloud Router’s advertisements (Default)”
33. Your BGP Configuration should look like the following:
Click “Save BGP Configuration”
34. You should now see a summary of the VPN Setup:
Click “OK”
35. In your list of Cloud VPN Tunnels, refresh you browser after a few minutes. You should see that the VPN tunnel and BGP Sessions are showing “Established” for all four tunnels.
AWS Side
36. If you now go back to AWS, list the Site-to-Site VPN connections. Click on the tunnels you created. In the Tunnel Details tab should be the two created tunnels, both showing ‘UP’.
37. Now that the connection are established, we need to make sure the routes from GCP are added to the route tables. In VPC, click on “Route Tables” in the left nav bar. Select the route table associated with your VPC. Click on the “Route Propagation” tab. You should see the virtual private gateway you created with “Propagate” set to “No”. Click on “Edit route propagation”
38. Check the box under “Propagate”. Click “Save”
39. Repeat step 37 & 38 for the other subnets that are part of the VPC.
40. When you click on the “Routes” tab, you should now see the 10.10.0.0/24 and 10.10.1.0/24 GCP CIDR ranges add to the table automatically.
41. Verify it all works — For this tutorial my test bastions use the following ips:
AWS — 10.0.1.220
GCP — 10.10.1.2
SSH into the AWS host (10.0.1.220) in the private subnet. Ping the GCP host (10.10.1.2) which exist in the GCP private subnet. You can also run a netcat nc -zv 10.10.1.2 22 to confirm that it is also allowing connections.
ubuntu@ip-10-0-1-220:~$ ping 10.10.1.2
PING 10.10.1.2 (10.10.1.2) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 10.10.1.2: icmp_seq=1 ttl=63 time=3.97 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.1.2: icmp_seq=2 ttl=63 time=3.03 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.1.2: icmp_seq=3 ttl=63 time=3.05 ms
64 bytes from 10.10.1.2: icmp_seq=4 ttl=63 time=3.49 ms
^C
--- 10.10.1.2 ping statistics ---
4 packets transmitted, 4 received, 0% packet loss, time 3003ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 3.036/3.388/3.976/0.391 ms
ubuntu@ip-10-0-1-220:~$ nc -zv 10.10.1.2 22
Connection to 10.10.1.2 22 port [tcp/ssh] succeeded
Let us do the opposite. We’ll ping and netcat the AWS host (10.0.1.220) from the GCP host (10.10.1.2).
ubuntu@app-service:~$ nc -zv 10.0.1.220 22
10.0.1.220: inverse host lookup failed: Unknown host
(UNKNOWN) [10.0.1.220] 22 (ssh) open
ubuntu@app-service:~$ ping 10.0.1.220
PING 10.0.1.220 (10.0.1.220) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 10.0.1.220: icmp_seq=1 ttl=63 time=3.72 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.220: icmp_seq=2 ttl=63 time=3.09 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.220: icmp_seq=3 ttl=63 time=3.04 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.1.220: icmp_seq=4 ttl=63 time=3.17 ms
Summary
Obviously setting up cross-cloud networking with high-availability is an involved process with many components, and requires a considerable effort to stay on top of all the gotchas. Hardening a setup of this nature is made possible by leveraging automation using tools like gcloud, aws-cli, or Terraform.
Now that we have a solid, highly available VPN connection across providers, we can connect services like CloudSQL to AWS. | https://medium.com/peek-travel/connecting-an-aws-and-gcp-vpc-using-an-ipsec-vpn-tunnel-with-bgp-f332c2885975 | ['Tony Leung'] | 2020-07-29 15:39:51.996000+00:00 | ['Google Cloud Platform', 'Networking', 'Infrastructure', 'Engineering', 'AWS'] |
Focus on the Self and Not the Surrounding. | Being a teacher, a science teacher, to be more specific, I encounter so many views of the students and the teachers and parents. While I was busy teaching habitat and adaptations to my kids, I asked them whether they are adapted to e-learning because all of us have been learning online for nearly one year. Most of them nodded without a smile which conveyed their thoughts to me very clearly. A few seconds later, I randomly said Thanks to coronavirus, we have developed ourselves and started expressing their disagreement with my agreement. As a result, I am writing this article, which focuses on the self and not the situation.
All of us are going through a revolutionary change. The catastrophe that coronavirus has caused can neither be neglected nor be avoided, but it can certainly be accepted and utilized for the benefit of our society. Let me give you an incident to facilitate understanding. A colleague at work was very frustrated that he has not traveled for almost 12 months now and that he might not travel for the next six months. After listening to his irritability for nearly 8 minutes, I replied very politely, “I hope you now value the freedom you have, and you will utilize it only for the purposes that favor you and are not against you. My statement didn’t let him speak anything further, and I assumed that he got my point.
There is no denial that coronavirus has done non-recoverable damage to individuals and society as a whole. Nevertheless, to my knowledge, quite a few people have made the best out of this period, which would have been impossible otherwise.
A friend and an outstanding actor realized that he has to put in his energy somewhere while locked up at home or else he, along with his energy, will end up in a disaster. That’s when he started to write a book, which was his dream for ages, and he not only completed the book but also published it. If I had to ask him, he would say 2020 has been the best year of his life because he achieved his dream. Another friend tried and discovered that he is an amazing cook during this pandemic, and cooking brings him loads of pleasure.
On the other hand, devastated by the coronavirus, my well-settled neighbor, an architect by profession, went into depression because of the drastic decline in the world economy, which may or may not affect his business.
Pandemic shares common features with the second world war
In the second world war where people were facing similar lockdowns. The only slight difference is that we were locked up in our houses, and they were locked up in prisons. Today we have numerous options for online delivery, but they were starving. People were dying with no food and basic amenities, and all those who were alive were waiting to die because it seemed better than surviving. There was no ray of light until a psychologist changed their opinion about the situation which offered a huge aid in recovering from the situation.
Nature had hit the restart button then, and nature has hit the restart now. We evolved then, and we are evolving now. Every challenging experience that we face has only two possibilities Evolution or destruction. Fortunately, the choice is always ours to focus on ourselves and evolve or focus on the situation and be destroyed. Choose wisely. | https://medium.com/this-shall-be-our-story/how-to-focus-on-self-and-not-the-surrounding-bd9d3683eae3 | ['Vijaya Dialani'] | 2020-12-14 18:43:30.711000+00:00 | ['Self Improvement', 'Positivity', 'Happiness', 'Life', 'Growth'] |
Delicious Indomie and smokie | Indomie and smokie. Our first Food, Fun and Feast Episode is here!!! Kindly like our channel and subscribe to the new & exciting Indomie Life TV for more mind blowing shows and. Please share to your social media and your friends and family It help to support this channel a lot Thank you.
On Today’s food, fun and feast we are bringing Indomie back home with an indigenous style. Indomie with Locust beans and Ponmo and our special guest is Yomi. The Indomie Game: Reblog this with your favorite flavor. You can have Indomie and smokie using 4 ingredients and 4 steps. Here is how you cook it.
Ingredients of Indomie and smokie
You need of pkt indomie noodles. You need of blueband. You need of smokie cooked. You need of chilli.
See more ideas about indomie, food, ethnic recipes. A blog about recipe with Asian spices,indonesian foods,tofu,tempeh,rice,coconut. Indonesian company’s Indomie noodles is increasingly in demand in Nigeria. Could it one day replace meals like jollof rice as the nation’s favorite?
Indomie and smokie step by step
Boil some water then add indomie.. Let it boil for 2 mins then add blueband, bumbu sauce and chilli and mix well. Cover and cook for 3 mins.. Once cooked, cut your smokie in cubes and mix in the indomie.. Enjoy.
Indomie is a brand of instant noodle produced by the Indonesian company Indofood. It is distributed in Australia, Asia, Africa, New Zealand, the United States, Canada, and Europe. The brand of Instant Noodles from Indonesia. A type of food most Africans eat when their mum has not cooked any food or there is none at home. See more ideas about Indomie, Ethnic recipes, Recipes. | https://medium.com/@krisyunanta/delicious-indomie-and-smokie-43df94c04ceb | [] | 2020-12-20 15:26:19.081000+00:00 | ['Noodles', 'Indonesia', 'Food', 'Indomie'] |
How sanitizes and organizes Dunnellon FL arrange your workplace | While most firms have professional people dedicated solely to cleaning the workplace, some best practices may be used regularly to maintain workplace hygiene. This was especially important after the outbreak. While the world heals from COVID 19 and workplaces reopen, offices must maintain a high level of cleanliness and safety. Sanitizing and organizing Dunnellon FL might help make life easier. Some of the most significant suggestions for keeping a clean and hygienic office may be found in the sections below.
Workers spend the bulk of their time at work, so keeping it clean and well-maintained is essential. Organizations invest heavily in providing a pleasant working environment for their employees. A clean, pleasant working environment creates a professional appeal and a decent working atmosphere, which enhances employee productivity.
Pointers for having a quite clean and sanitary workplace
Remove the trash daily
Garbage, such as unused papers, clips, stationery, and other items, will not only take up more space in your office, so hire sanitize and organize Dunnellon FLto make it clean. Furthermore, you are enraged while you search for the stuff you require the most. As a result, it’s a great way to get rid of the trash. Make it a habit, and you may be able to get rid of the things you don’t need. You’ll be able to effortlessly pack your desk while maintaining a clean and spacious workspace.
Stock up the cleaning products
Your home should seem big and secure, but physically cleaning the entire area takes a long time and does not produce the desired results. As a result, it’s critical to keep high-quality cleaning materials and equipment on hand to save time and assure optimal results. It would be advantageous if you also possessed the best bag vacuum cleaner, as well as a well-chosen cloth, dustpan, broom, and mop. Furthermore, having expert cleaners from sanitizes and organizing Dunnellon FL with the right cleaning approach.
Managing and organizing the cables
The cables were among the first things you’ll notice. Despite your best efforts, you would have let the cable swing in your workstation, and it isn’t a pleasing sight. Unfortunately, this may also be harmful. Thus cables must be arranged. Cable organizers are available on the market and are a great option for cable management.
Organizers of desks
Your workspace should be a tangle of wires and cables. We frequently overlook an important part of our jobs: the need for a well-organized workstation. If you keep everything on your desk, it will appear cluttered, and there will be no area for work. It also does not provide a professional appearance. To keep your workspace tidy, you can purchase desk organizers. A desk with drawers and racks for paper and papers would also be beneficial. Electric recipients are built into working desks, preventing needless cords from being visible on your desk and interrupting your workspace.
Promote employee hygiene
Companies place a premium on their employees’ health and hygiene. A tidy office is one strategy, but sanitary standards among employees are also critical. Ensure that your workplace has hand sanitizer and towels at or near the workstation. Sanitizers can be strategically positioned throughout the workplace to make them easily accessible to employees. Sanitizes and organizes Dunnellon FL should also urge them to wear masks, utilize restrooms, and maintain social distance.
A clean restroom is a must
A clean toilet is required in every office. Toilets must be maintained exceptionally clean and sanitary since so many people use them. Make sure it’s cleansed and disinfected regularly. Don’t forget to include toilets and hand dryers in the bathroom. It is also necessary to have an air refresher on hand.
Deep office cleaning schedule
When employed individuals clean up their workstations, it is also vital to engage sanitizes and organizes Dunnellon fl. experienced professionals can clean even the most remote sites. They perform quick service and clean the area with the right combination of tools, equipment, and understanding.
Wrapping it up!!!
These are some of the strategies for thoroughly cleaning the office. However, keep in mind that office cleaning is the best technique to follow. Your office will become more pleasant for employees, and productivity will increase if you hire sanitizes and organize Dunnellon fl. | https://medium.com/@tranquilcleaners/how-sanitizes-and-organizes-dunnellon-fl-arrange-your-workplace-bad33a6c175c | [] | 2021-11-24 05:45:46.373000+00:00 | ['Home Improvement', 'Cleaning', 'House Cleaning', 'Clean', 'Sanitation'] |
Monthly Supply of Houses Still at Record Lows | Monthly Supply of Houses in the United States stayed at record low of 3.3 months of supply in October 2020 and down from 3.6 months in July 2020 and 5.0 months in January 2020.
Comparing to 30-Year Mortgage Rates shows decreasing supply as mortgage rates decrease — the exception being the 2000–2009 period.
More detail on the 2000–2009 period below shows that two groups form above and below 5 months of supply — the 2000–2005 group and 2006–2009 group.
In 2000–2005, monthly supply remained fairly flat as mortgage rates decreased. From 2006–2009, supply increased, regardless of where rates went.
Paul Mangione
Fort Schuyler Advisors
@paul_mangione | https://medium.com/@pmangione/monthly-supply-of-houses-still-at-record-lows-acab9cb4343 | ['Paul Mangione'] | 2020-11-27 13:33:58.934000+00:00 | ['Mortgage', 'Interest Rates', 'Housing', 'Real Estate', 'Finance'] |
3 Limiting Beliefs You Need To Overcome To Start Your Business | Happy New Year to you! Welcome to 2020! Welcome to a new decade!
Goal setting for the new year is always a hot topic this time of the year. The fact that you set a goal for 2020 and scheduled it on your calendar doesn’t mean you’ll achieve it. Your success in life and goal achievements is all shaped by our mindset.
Mindset is a collection of stories in your mind that forms your belief system. It shapes the way you think. In December 2017, I first heard about the concept of “ Limiting Beliefs” from my role model Michael Hyatt.
Limiting Beliefs are negative stories we tell ourselves in our minds. Stories like “I don’t have what it takes to run a business” or “I’m always sidelined for a promotion because of my gender” or “I’m too old to get a job” e.t.c. Sound familiar?
In 2011, I set a goal to start an international personal shopper business. But 3 limiting beliefs held me back from accomplishing my goal.
Limiting Belief #1
“I’ll never be successful or fulfilled in life without a Corporate job.”
I suffered a lot of rejection trying to find a job in Corporate America. I believed the lie that my success and fulfillment could only come from a corporate job. I felt any endeavor outside a corporate job had no value. This limiting belief blinded my eyes to other possibilities of success and fulfillment in life.
With several disappointments from job interviews, I slipped into depression. I didn’t know success and fulfillment can come from starting and running a business too not only a 9–5 job. I’m not naive about the fact that both sides of the coin have their Pros and Cons.
But success and fulfillment can come from both and not one only. Your self worth is not determined by your corporate achievement at your job. You’re worth more than your corporate job! You have so much more value than you think!
Limiting Belief #2
“Everyone is already doing what I want to do.”
This limiting belief is a major reason why people never take action on their dreams or goals. Those who have valuable content to share are often paralyzed by this limiting belief. I used to be one of them. I’ll scroll through other people’s social media feeds and tell myself how I could do better than them. But, I never took action to do anything.
It’s amazing how we have the perfect business ideas all planned out in our heads. But the belief that “everyone is already doing it” keeps us from taking action. I believed this lie for a long time. Like Marie Forloe says “There’s always room for that special something you have and the world needs to hear it”.
Limiting Belief #3
“My service offering is not valuable because it’s not rocket science”
This limiting belief still had a stronghold on my mind 5yrs into running my service business. I graduated with honors. I had a Bachelors Degree. I had a Master’s Degree. I had a Project Management Certification. I had other academic accomplishments and all I was doing was shopping and shipping for people I’ll often say to myself.
I felt my life was wasting away. I felt my intellectual capabilities were being underutilized. I would reminisce on what life could have been like working a high powered corporate job with all my qualifications. Until one day! I got a call from a customer, she needed my help to buy a medical device for her daughter’s surgery.
The device was not available in the country where she resides. It was available only in the US where I reside. I sourced for the device and found it. But her daughter’s medical condition had deteriorated to the point that even if I shipped the item, it would no longer be helpful. Her daughter died but something came alive in me that day.
For the first time in 5yrs, I felt free from the shackles of this limiting belief. I felt the service I was providing was valuable even though it wasn’t rocket science. Every item I buy for a customer is solving a problem for them. Whether it’s snacks for their kids’ lunch kit or a medical device to save their child’s life. It is valuable to them and that’s all that matters.
“You become what you believe, not what you want.” - Oprah Winfrey
To achieve the goals you set this year, become aware of the collection of stories you’re telling yourself. A movie director can change the script in a story to achieve a specific goal. You can do the same to your limiting beliefs. You can overcome your limiting beliefs and achieve your goals!
In my next post, I’ll share the 3 Liberating Truths I used to overcome my Limiting Beliefs and start my business. I’ll also share how I create a set of Liberating Truths each New Year to help me achieve my audacious goals.
What limiting beliefs are holding you back from taking the next step to start a business this year? What negative stories are you allowing to play in your mind? Please share in the comment section. I’ll love to hear from you. | https://medium.com/@chichiukomadu/3-limiting-beliefs-you-need-to-overcome-to-start-your-business-b3db7a764991 | ['Chichi Ukomadu'] | 2020-05-21 04:51:03.053000+00:00 | ['Startup Lessons', 'Startup', 'Side Hustle', 'Mindset', 'Entrepreneur'] |
I’ll be heading off to prison next week, due to some Silk Road shenanigans from the past. | How did I get caught?
Like you probably can imagine, a mere tip is not enough for the police to imprison anyone. But in my case it was more than enough to launch a substantial investigation, which was allowed to burn through a large amount of resources.
A few months after the tip was received my phone was tapped 24/7, I was under surveillance several days a week by undercover agents.
Furthermore the police drove around my neighbourhood with Stingray’s in hopes to discover more cell phones in use by me, as they suspected me of using phones that were not registered in my name.
Actually they were wrong on that suspicion (at the very least🙄), I only used one phone, but the lack of evidence gathered from them tapping my phones had them puzzled. They couldn’t figure out how I stayed in contact with my suppliers, and other helpers.
I actually thought that was really weird, this investigation was ongoing in 2016 and you’d think they had heard of Wickr, Telegram, Signal and the likes by then.
Simply put, the reason for them not hearing me speak about criminal actions on my regular phone line was because I had several encrypted apps on my phone that allowed for encrypted communications.
Some worked better than others, and some did not work at all, which I would later come to learn (the hard way).
In addition to regular undercover surveillance, phone taps, and the use of Stingray’s (which I believe were illegal for police to use at that time) — I was also subjected to the police entering my apartment, without my knowledge, for an unknown amount of times over the timespan of 2–3 months.
When inside my apartment, they installed even more surveillance equipment, some of which I’m 100% positive were illegal at the time, amongst others a physical keylogger installed to sniff out any passwords I used to log on to a stationary computer in the office part of my apartment.
That keylogger would later be responsible for me getting fucked.
Long story short, they got me good, and after sparing no resources on the investigation itself — they didn’t hold back when they authored the charges against me either.
What did I get convicted for?
The police were not modest when pressing their charges against me, they had been receiving some criticism from the press over the last couple of years for being unable to act on darknet drug vendors. So when they needed it the most, along came I as a perfect target for them to state an example.
Without going into specifics, I can share that I finally got convicted for trafficking about 50 kilograms of cannabis (both weed and hash) and around 1 kilogram of Cocaine (the regular kind, not crack).
For this I received a sentence of just over 6 years, and I will begin serving this sentence in a few days. Actually though, due to time served in custody (while the police were investigating the case further after my arrest) I will have closer to 4 years left to serve. So I won’t be gone for a total of 6 years from now…. but it’s going to be a while until I get back online. | https://medium.com/mr-kr%C3%BCgers-world-of-crypto/ill-be-heading-off-to-prison-next-week-due-to-some-silk-road-shenanigans-from-the-past-8f2da33b2139 | ['Krüger Cryptographical Smoothing'] | 2019-01-24 23:02:54.557000+00:00 | ['Bitcoin', 'Crime', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Blockchain'] |
HOW TO FIND A SAFE NANNY FOR YOUR CHILD IN NIGERIA | Many parents turn to close relatives, circles of friends or agents to find a suitable nanny for their wards. That can be a good starting place but it’s imperative that parents dig deeper before allowing someone to be alone with their children. When it is about your child safety, you can never be too careful.
The first thing parents should do when considering a nanny is to run a background check. It’s important to note that a Google search is not a background check, you must make sure that you check a potential nanny’s criminal history.
Avant Halogen connect families with screened and verified nannies through the screenedworkers platform. For example, screenedworkers.com displays badges next to individuals who have successfully passed background screenings.
If you are considering a nanny who isn’t registered on screenedworkers.com, ensure you request for background check on them from the same platform. If a nanny isn’t willing to provide information to run background checks on them, consider it a red flag.
Hire verified Nanny on screenedworkers.com
Screenedworkers.com offers various background screening services for prices ranging from about N5,000 for a basic check to about N15,000 for services that include reviewing criminal records.
Reference checks are also important, once a nanny have clean background checks, then it’s a great time to start checking references.
It is recommended to ask potential nanny for three references. Ask the references whether the nanny was responsible, how they followed directions, why they no longer work for them and if they would ever consider hiring them again.
With background checks, reference reviews and parental intuition, you can be rest assured that your child is in good hands. | https://medium.com/@screenedworkers/how-to-find-a-safe-nanny-for-your-child-in-nigeria-4700794fde33 | ['Screened Workers'] | 2019-09-12 11:56:52.930000+00:00 | ['Domestic Workers', 'Domestic', 'Baby Care', 'Nanny'] |
The 3 Easiest Ways For Newbies To Start In Affiliate Marketing. | With the guide of the Internet, you can nearly have everything directly readily available. With only a couple of snaps you gain admittance to thousands and even large number of snippets of data and information on for all intents and purposes any field of interest. As a long time elapse by, the Internet constant to impact revolutionary changes in numerous aspects of human undertakings, including trade. Specialists say that the data space, normally known as the internet, develops by north of 1,000,000 pages regularly as an ever increasing number of individuals use the Internet for data, instruction, diversion, business and other individual reasons. It doesn’t take a business-arranged person to understand that this peculiarity can achieve high as can be monetary profits. The Internets quickly developing notoriety in the new years is without a doubt a chance for business that any business person would not have any desire to miss.
You may be figuring no one but financial specialists can get a lot of cash-flow out of the Internet, dont you? Reconsider. You also can procure truckloads of money through the Internet regardless of whether you dont have items to sell and prominent and set up organization. How? That is through member showcasing. You may have gone over these words over the net while surfing. Member showcasing is an income dividing among a vendor and a partner who gets compensated for alluding or advancing the shippers items and administrations. It is one of the blossoming businesses these days since it is shown to be cost-effective and quantifiable method for accomplishing extraordinary benefit both for the shipper and the associate and different players in the member program, for example, the offshoot organization or subsidiary arrangement supplier.
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Associate advertising turns out adequately for the vendor and the subsidiary. To the primary, he acquires freedoms to publicize his items to a bigger market, which expands his opportunities to procure. The more associate sites or persevering partners he gets, the more deals he can anticipate. By getting partners to advertise his items and administrations, he is saving himself time, exertion and cash in searching for potential business sectors and clients. At the point when a customer taps on the connection in the member site, buys the item, prescribes it to other people who search for a similar thing or gets it once more, the trader increases his odds of acquiring. Then again, the partner advertiser benefits from every client who taps on the connection in his site and who really buys the item or profits of the help given by the shipper. By and large, the associate gets commision per deal, which can be fixed rate or fixed sum.
Assuming you need to be a member advertiser and make fortunes out of the Internet, you might follow the accompanying three generally essential and least demanding ways of beginning a powerful offshoot showcasing program. First is to distinguish something specific you are keen on or energetic about so you wont be exhausted and compelled to foster your partner site later on. Zeroing in on a particular region you realize will assist you with drawing out your best absent a lot of dangers and exertion. You can add an individual touch to your site and give your guests who are potential purchasers a feeling that you are a specialist in your field. Along these lines, you gain their trust and ultimately urge them to purchase the items you underwrite. Next is to search for great paying dealers and items or administrations identified with your advantage and make now a site. In picking the items, you should likewise consider its change rate | https://medium.com/@bholakhadka636/the-3-easiest-ways-for-newbies-to-start-in-affiliate-marketing-dcd526575d51 | ['Bhola Khadka'] | 2021-11-23 14:21:58.434000+00:00 | ['Work', 'Passive Income', 'Money', 'Internet Marketing', 'Make Money Online'] |
The Call for Educational Transformation | On 7 September 2021, we launched the publication of the r3.0 Educational Transformation Blueprint, for which I served as the lead author, and co-authored with Bill Baue and Ralph Thurm. This ninth Blueprint in the r3.0 work ecosystem of Blueprints includes 7 Transformative Learning Perspectives for Regeneration and Thrivability. The Blueprint also shares the stories, perspectives, and suggestions of an eclectic group of educators, economists, evolutionary scientists, transformation facilitators, and system designers, who met over a period of 9 months from February-July 2021.
Through this Blueprint, we hope to inspire and empower the necessary inner and outer learning shifts that can move us towards trajectories of regeneration, and ultimately thrivability. Such shifts require a major transformation in the way learning is currently taking place (and envisioned) as well as new ways for initiating and inspiring the kind of transformative learning that leads to the necessary behavioural change.
These inner and outer shifts will also require a major commitment, individually and collectively, to address the root causes of the multiple crises we are in. Although this collective challenge requires that we each play our role and responsibility to bring forth this necessary shift, it is also important to realize how the burden of inaction and the cost of harm continues to fall on those most vulnerable, including our planet.
At the forefront of the larger trajectory shifts that the r3.0 Blueprints advocate are necessary inner shifts in terms of our personal and collective consciousness. These consciousness shifts will not come about through a predominantly intellectual or goal-oriented process, not even the UN Sustainable Development Goals.
What we mean by Regeneration and Thrivability
Regeneration is the act of healing, improving, and enhancing a place, system, or relationship with the healthy flows and thrivable conditions for life. Life as a whole, and most natural living systems and organisms, are regenerative by design and in behaviour. Yet our dominant economic systems are decoupled from these regenerative operating principles, as such creating impacts that are not regenerative, and thus also not sustainable. Regeneration is an unfolding dynamic process and a journey that reconnects our humanity with the larger web of life and the universe.
Regeneration is a critical and key responsibility for our species at this tipping point of life on earth, which begins by acknowledging the extensive damage and imbalances that our human actions have caused and are costing life on earth. Regeneration and learning for regeneration should become a primary concern of education, yet in many places and institutions, it is not. Regeneration as a focus also implies and places upon us ethics of care and stewardship, as an unfolding dialectic of inner and outer transformation.
Thrivability includes regeneration and yet expands this further by also focussing on new conditions for our future evolution. Thrivability, i.e. our ability to thrive, has many different meanings and associations and can serve as both a vision and a promise. Although thrivability is commonly associated with our ability to flourish, be happy, and fulfilled, we consider thrivability as systemic and intrinsic to life.
Thrivability as a developmental process focuses on learning how to create systemic capacities and conditions for becoming future creative, life-affirming, and possibility increasing. Thrivability as an evolutionary learning process not only restores, regenerates, and heals what has become injured, weakened or damaged but also creates the conditions for the emergence of new possibilities and futures.
Our focus is on developing the awareness, understanding, and capacities for regeneration and thrivability. We consider this to be the essence of what education should be about and for. To prepare us to mature and wisen as a regenerative and thrivable species by empowering us with the capacities and awareness for becoming better stewards of our planet, our commons, and our shared future wellbeing.
Summary of the 7 Transformative Learning Perspectives
These seven transformative perspectives can be applied to curriculum redesign, as part of transformative learning conversations, and most importantly for creating the learning spaces that invite reflection and inquiry through which emerge new levels and ways of understanding and action.
It is our hope that by developing and deepening the context and possibilities for learning through these seven perspectives, that learning can become more meaningful, experiential, relevant, and thus also more transformative for this time of significant change.
Source: r3.0 Educational Transformation Blueprint (BP9).
The 7 Transformative Learning Perspectives are explored through 21 topics over 7 chapters that offer an in-depth exploration of the multi-dimensional nature of systemic transformational change for regeneration and thrivability. These perspectives and topics are briefly summarized here below:
1. Learning as Context — The Anthropocene, the Noosphere, and A New Renaissance.
Provides essential conditions and attractors for transformative learning and for inspiring our personal and societal development towards regeneration and thrivability.
2. Learning as Life — Three Evolutionary Principles of Life, Five Stages of Transformational Change, and Five Syntony Spheres of Evolutionary Learning Ecosystems.
Provides necessary foundations for developing our ecological literacies and ecosystemic capacities for regeneration and thrivability.
3. Learning as Future — Cosmology of Futures, Imaginal Capacities, Futures Literacies.
Provides necessary foundations for developing our future literacies and imaginal capacities for regeneration and thrivability.
4. Learning as Agency — Transformative Agency, Bildung as Stewardship, and the Governance of Agency.
Provides necessary foundations for developing our agency capacities for stewarding regeneration and thrivability.
5. Learning as Connection — Learning as a Connective Pattern, Digital connections and the role of AI and VR, and Learning Feedback.
Provides essential inquiries for developing our digital literacies, connective capacities, and regenerative feedback systems for creating thrivable learning systems.
6. Learning as Story — Learning as Story in Place, the Mythic Structures of Learning, and how to create New Stories of Learning.
Provide necessary foundations for developing conscious communication, depth perception, and sense-making capacities and for becoming the story creators for regeneration and thrivability.
7. Learning as Community — Becoming a Global Learning Community, Bioregional Learning Communities, Weaving the Mycelia Networks of Future Education.
Provides the necessary foundations for developing community based global consciousness that is life centered and future inspired, as well as for the development of collaborative capacities to become caretakers and stewards of our commons — our world and future.
The Why of Educational Transformation
This is a critical time to be alive on Earth where our actions and inactions have far-reaching consequences for decades to come. Now more than ever we need to develop our collaborative learning capacities and push the edge of what education can become.
Our own evolution as a species is hinging on the intersection of multiple crossroads, which raises the critical question of whether mainstream education is able to prepare us for who we are to become in order to address the enormous challenges now upon us. It further raises the following questions:
How does what we learn and how we learn catalyze the required personal as well as collective transformations of our assumptions, habits, attitudes, and actions
And how does formal and informal education support and prepare people to access and develop their future potentials of a new kind of civilization that is life-centered and ecological by design?
Is education inviting us to explore what it means to consciously influence how we evolve as a species during this time of unprecedented changes?
The ‘why’ of ‘educational transformation’ is directly related to our societal change and development, and in particular, the mechanistic growth archetypes that have become so dominant. Although many societal changes have brought a greater quality of life to many more people with access to facilities and technologies that have helped to improve their standard of living, there are also consequences to these mechanistic growth models that cannot be ignored.
Collectively, our societal growth and development exceed the carrying capacities (planetary boundaries) of our planet, and furthermore, more than fifty percent of our biodiversity has been destroyed in less than 5 decades, which has now resulted in a “code red” climate and biodiversity emergency. Our future has become less secure and safe as a result of these extractive and mechanistic growth models for developing our societies and lives.
For hundreds of years, this predominantly western capitalist agenda has prioritized economic growth over wellbeing, and sought progress and success in quantitative ways, at the cost of our planetary health and biodiversity. This is turning our planet into a commodity, and at best a natural capital, rather than valuing our planet as a living being and the conditions for us to thrive together with our planet. As explained eloquently by economist Hazel Henderson:
“Clearly, economics has always been about power, control over others and natural resources, influencing human relationships, culture, politics and laws in most societies. It has produced the narrow globalization of markets and today’s global financial casino still inflicting daily damage on global ecosystems and local communities. Economic theories see efficient societies as those where market completion means almost every human transaction is conducted in money and tracked by macroeconomic statistics. This is almost as insane as communist goals of having governments own all the means of production! It’s time to get beyond the last century’s Cold War between capitalism, communism, socialism, libertarianism and all these over-simplifying ideologies of “left” and “right”.” ~ Hazel Henderson (2021).
Despite an increase in formal literacies and access to schools worldwide, humanity continues to exceed the carrying capacities of our planet, moving more deeply into trajectories of collapse. Even more so when education follows a similar doctrine as the narrow economics that Hazel Henderson described above.
Our mainstream economic archetypes of unlimited and extractive economic growth are the result of many combined and often unquestioned choices, priorities, expectations, and assumptions about life that result from a long historical process of normalization (Thurm, 2021). This process of ‘normalization’ and ‘habituation’ is often summarized under the concept of a ‘worldview’, ‘gestalt’, or ‘mindset’. However, by naming this as ‘a worldview’, ‘gestalt’ or ‘mindset’, we risk creating yet another ‘it’ to which we attribute the power to significantly influence the way we make decisions and direct our lives.
For centuries economic goals and interests have been driving the goals, priorities, and resources of what education can and should be focusing on. The transformation of education requires the transformation of our economic systems as part of a common strategy and commitment. Our current sustainability crisis reveals starkly how free-market mechanisms cannot provide the course directions for moving away from the current collapse trajectories (Fullerton, 2019). In other words, the whole notion of a free market is not free at all and has brought compounding ecological debts and biodiversity costs, as well as tremendous suffering and costs to indigenous societies.
Despite knowing the issues, there is inadequate global leadership to address politically and economically what is required for securing our planetary and future wellbeing. This also raises the following questions concerning educational transformation:
Is the future possibility of a regenerative and thrivable world sufficiently appealing and realizable for engaging people on a personal and collective learning journey for regeneration and thrivability? How can education become an attractor and enabling condition for the inner and outer shifts towards regeneration and thriving? What are we teaching new learners about the ways of life on planet Earth and the modus operandi for their and our success and wellbeing?
The trajectories of collapse have a long history of many unintended consequences and persistent denial of alternative options. Almost every sphere of life has become economized and monetized, as well as the places in which we live, meet, and learn. Many schools have been reduced to learning factories, with focus on standardized testing, ranking, and rigid learning outcomes and methods (Christopher Chase, 2014).
Learning for regeneration and thriving requires both new ways of learning as well as new ways for engaging learning, and in particular learning processes for developing a holistic awareness and systemic capacities. This also includes learning from emerging futures, instead of using only reflective hindsight and focus on behaviour modification. In particular, learning how to sense the dynamics of the systems we form part of and learning how to sense what is seeking to be born. Becoming aware of the underlying unity within our growing complexity and how to work with the nonlinearity of complexity (Smitsman, 2019).
The Purpose of Education
EARTHwise Thrivability Education— Ecological literacy with Anneloes Smitsman
We hold the view that the core purpose of education is to facilitate our human development as a regenerative and future creative process of life, by:
Developing our awareness, understanding, and capacities for regeneration and thrivability. Honouring the earth as the home we share and by learning from the feedback of life. Becoming the systems, cultures, and civilizations for a thrivable world and future.
This educational context applies to our personal as well as the larger collective spheres of learning that include our societies, organizations, cultures, and communities. Learning and development are essentially transformative processes, whether this takes place at the nano-level of a group of cells, the roots systems of plants, our human journey, or the cosmic level of galaxies. We are life and the nature of life is change and transformation through learning and development.
Unfortunately, mainstream education has become stifled in so many places by the mechanistic economic goals we have imposed on it, which run contrary to the processes and rhythms of life. These mechanistic goals are turning schools into learning factories with standardized curricula and tests.
When mechanistic economic goals direct the purpose of education, learning becomes monetized and trapped in paradigms, worldviews, and norms that inhibit our ecological development. This also raises the question of whether education in its current forms, and with the pressures and expectations we have imposed upon it, can act in a transformative capacity. Perhaps, a starting point is to free education from needing to be the solution and answer to all our problems.
Telling a person they “must” transform and “become the solution” isn’t helping their transformation; if anything it hinders it. There has been so much talk and focus on the transformation of education and the education of transformation that many well-intended transformative initiatives have become the very barriers for the required and desired transformations. It appears education has itself become entangled in the constrictive dynamics and forces that hinder our world from becoming all it can be. In the words of Stephen Sterling:
“If education is to be an agent of change, it has itself to be the subject of change. […]. While a new discourse on repurposing education is arising in some circles, a dangerous disconnect remains between Westernized formal education systems and the dynamic social learning needed in this watershed moment. The world of institutions, concerned largely with income and status in a competitive market, is on a collision course with the larger world, which faces an existential threat to human survival and the integrity of the biosphere underpinning all life. How do we rapidly recalibrate education so that it serves rather than undermines the future?” ~ Stephen Sterling (2021)
If the purpose of education is to become the heart that fuels our transformation and serves our future, it is essential that we understand what connects and disconnects us through this process. In Africa it is said that it takes a whole village to raise a child, equally it takes a whole global learning community to raise humans with the capacities, understanding, and commitment to become regenerative people of thrivable worlds.
Exploring the Enabling Role of Education
Education that enables the required transformative learning of self, community, and society also requires narratives that can engage this process. Words such as interdependence, right relationship, stewardship, collective responsibility, planetary boundaries, ecosystemic health, wisdom, unity in diversity, and inclusiveness are starting to emerge in education curricula. Especially in educational programs that nurture a spiritual appreciation of nature, and include practices for imagination, art, play, and creativity.
Education that enables also requires learning processes that can shift behavior. This requires first of all a deeper understanding of the trajectories we are currently on, and how our perspectives and experiences of that journey may differ.
Furthermore, the transformative capacities of education have been severely constrained by the same cultures and growth archetypes that are at the root of our sustainability crises (Smitsman, 2021). ‘Success and progress’ in the current setting of our mainstream economic paradigm are still largely defined in terms of wealth or income (i.e., GDP) and not in terms of well-being. These models drive our world to the edge of collapse by pursuing unsustainable growth archetypes that drive patterns of profit maximization for companies, and wealth maximization for individuals.
The journey towards regeneration and thrivability requires a radical redefinition of success, and the development of whole new growth archetypes that are embedded within the planetary and social threshold boundaries that serve our thrivability. A redesign of curricula and educational systems of schools and universities is only the beginning step for empowering lasting transformative change. In particular where this relates to persistent harmful economic and political pursuits of unlimited growth that endanger the carrying capacities of our planet and future wellbeing.
The harmful and unsustainable economic growth archetypes are based on exponential growth through extractive production and unlimited consumption, which have also become the growth archetypes for many educational organizations and programs. Living systems grow and develop through intricate feedback loops that regulate and adjust essential systemic functions and boundaries. These boundaries and feedback loops are largely missing in our economic, educational, and governance systems.
The ‘why’ of educational transformation is not only about our sustainability or climate crisis, there is a deeper and even mythic dimension at play as well. In Myths, heros and heroines are often confronted with major challenges for which new capacities have to be developed. There is usually a scene of danger in the form of a beast or a life-challenging situation to challenge the transformation of the learner through which new and sometimes dormant capacities and perspectives emerge and develop.
Multiple scenarios of danger and challenges have now become manifest; the COVID-19 pandemic, our climate crisis, biodiversity loss, radicalization and polarization of our political and social lives, breakdown of old institutions and norms, and so forth. Yet, could it be that underlying all this it is time for humanity to also evolve the mythic archetypes and patterns for how we have been learning, growing, developing and evolving?
What will be the new mythic patterns, codes, and archetypes of future civilizations who are regenerative by design and have learned how to thrive with our planet? What can become possible when we shift our predominant focus on individual heros and heroines to the ‘heroism’ of the collective? Shifting from ‘me’ to ‘we’ and ‘us’ and becoming more diversely inclusive of the myriad of identities, backgrounds, cultures, and narratives, is essential for becoming thrivable civilisations (Smitsman and Houston, 2021).
Furthermore, the mythic patterns of humanity’s dominant cultures have mostly centred around fighting ‘the beast’ (or enemy) rather than transforming it by facing our inner demons and resolving our inner projections. This dualistic mythic pattern continues to dominate the mainstream narratives in the media, politics, and in the stories children learn and watch.
The so-called beast of our ‘sustainability crisis’ is not outside of us. Declaring war on climate change or the coronavirus crisis, as if often narrated in the media, is not going to help us find and develop the new capacities for this time. What is called for now is one of the deepest learning processes we have ever had to embark on, namely our maturation as a species.
Corona Lessons and Impacts on Education
The coronavirus pandemic has impacted each of our lives and continues to do so. It has also impacted on educational opportunities for so many learners around the world. While some students were fortunate to have access to distance learning, many did not, which has taken the digital divide to whole new levels. Especially for learners with disabilities and developmental challenges, the impact of this coronavirus crisis is felt most severely. The coronavirus crisis is far from over and also reveals deeper learning issues that go to the root of our sustainability crisis, such as:
Collective commitment — The issues at hand require collective commitments towards our shared responsibilities for resolving the multiple challenges we are faced with, and with awareness and responsibility for how this impacts the most vulnerable. Cooperative innovation — Finding lasting cures for all people is the only solution, not merely for a subset of a few. Long-term cooperation and a collaborative focus are required; especially within the business and investment community. Economizing life by prioritizing short-term economic gains over systemic health and wellbeing is symptomatic of the root causes of our sustainability crises. Transformation embraces uncertainty — A crisis always brings uncertainty, the question is how we can work with this uncertainty to let go of old habits, embracing the unknown, and make space for the emergence of new possibilities through trial and error and experimentation. Seeking to secure or eliminate perceived threats limits our transformative capacities and blocks learning. Future preparedness begins now — The COVID pandemic reveals how unprepared we are to resolve the much greater crises of runaway climate change and irreversible biodiversity loss. Until we develop the required capacities for becoming ‘future-creative’, the default learning pattern will be one of learning by crisis rather than learning how to avoid creating crises.
Extracts from the executive summary and chapter 1 of the r3.0 Educational Transformation Blueprint.
Citation: Smitsman, A., Baue, B., and Thurm, R. (2021). Blueprint 9. Educational Transformation –7 Transformative Learning Perspectives for Regeneration and Thrivability. r3.0 | https://medium.com/@anneloessmitsman/the-call-for-educational-transformation-c10948b75d6 | ['Anneloes Smitsman'] | 2021-09-16 07:35:43.591000+00:00 | ['Sustainability', 'Regeneration', 'Transformation', 'Education', 'Learning And Development'] |
Brave New World, are we there Yet? | In 1932 Aldous Huxley wrote Brave New World. In 1958 he concluded the world was becoming IT much faster than he originally thought.
Photo by Mateo Catanese from Unsplash
May 18th 1958
Aldous Huxley, talks to Mike Wallace about the threats to freedom which he foresees coming at us in the future.
A social critic, obviously ridiculed as he speaks of matters most people are unable to grasp. Regardless the fact his arguments sound improbable, he is given the right to speak.
Mike lits a cigarette on a television show. Philip Morris makes a fortune on a conversation regarding the threats of advertising. Life is jolly.
Aldous Huxley — […] the dictatorship of the future, I think will be very unlike the dictatorships which we’ve been familiar with in the immediate past.
Overpopulation, bureaucracy, propaganda, drugs, advertising, behaviour altering subliminal programming, lack of critical thinking skills, and technology. The list goes on. The issues Aldous mentioned in his works as most dangerous in the hands of the wrong people have never rang as true.
If you want to preserve your power indefinitely, you have to get the consent of the ruled, and this they will do partly by drugs as I foresaw in “Brave New World,” partly by these new techniques of propaganda.
They will do it by bypassing the sort of rational side of man and appealing to his subconscious and his deeper emotions, and his physiology even, and so, making him actually love his slavery.
Mike Wallace — Well, let me ask you this. You’re talking about a world that could take place within the confines of a totalitarian state….Do you believe that this Brave New World that you talk about, could, let’s say in the next quarter century, the next century, come here to our shores?
Aldous Huxley — I think it could.
I feel it so extremely important here and now, to start thinking about these problems. Not to let ourselves be taken by surprise by the…the new advances in technology.
To avoid the disaster Huxley suggested preventive education and laws banning the use of the ‘controlling technologies’. In 1974 The United Nations Human Rights Commission task force denounced the use of subliminals and called for the prohibition of their use. That’s about that. | https://medium.com/predict/brave-new-world-are-we-there-yet-e5ee8c9c854b | ['Agnes Kim'] | 2020-05-03 08:49:45.343000+00:00 | ['Pandemic', 'Writing', 'Brave New World', 'Future', 'Philosophy'] |
Error Handling in Combine Explained | Combine Streams and Typed Errors
A big difference between a framework like RxSwift and Combine is the requirement of typed error definitions in streams. If we compare the Observable with its Combine equivalent AnyPublisher , we can see the difference in the type declaration.
public class Observable<Element> : ObservableType
struct AnyPublisher<Output, Failure> where Failure : Error
The AnyPublisher requires us to specify the Failure error type while the Observable only takes the generic Element type.
Swift requires us to think about error handling which we can take as something good. However, it does not hold us back from defining the expected type as just Swift.Error , which basically comes down to the same behavior as in RxSwift.
Once you do require your stream to expect a certain error type, you’ll run into casting errors as each operator needs to return the same error type as the leading stream. Let’s dive into the Combine operators for error handling.
Mapping errors using mapError
To map an error to the expected error type we can use the mapError operator. In the following example, we have a passthrough subject which expects a URL output and a RequestError error type.
Once we start mapping this stream into a URLSessionDataTaskPublisher we immediately get an error pointing out the error type mismatch.
Error handling in Swift Combine using mapError
In this case, the solution is as simple as using the mapError operator which will wrap the URLError into a RequestError using the session error case we defined earlier.
Using the retry operator
In the above example, we’ve used a URLSessionDataTaskPublisher . You might want to use the retry operator before actually accepting an error when working with data requests. It takes the number of retries to take before letting the stream actually fail.
Catching errors
If you want to catch errors early and ignore them after you can use the catch operator. This operator allows you to return a default value for if the request failed. Examples of this could be:
An empty array for search results
A default image placeholder if the image request failed
The latter is the one we will use in our example.
Using replaceError instead of catch
ReplaceError vs Catch: both operators seem very similar. The big difference is that the replaceError(:) operator is completely ignoring the error. As in the above example, we're doing nothing more than returning the placeholder notFoundImage in the case of an error.
We could simplify this by using the replace error operator to directly map any errors into our placeholder image:
When the assign(to:on:) operator is unavailable
A common example in which you’ll need to map errors is when you try to assign an outcoming value to a property of an object. You’ll try to use the autocompletion and you find out that the assign(to:on:) operator is unavailable. The following error will occur if you are forced to write the code either way:
Referencing instance method ‘assign(to:on:)’ on ‘Publisher’ requires the types ‘RequestError’ and ‘Never’ be equivalent | https://medium.com/better-programming/error-handling-in-combine-explained-9f622ba759ce | ['Antoine Van Der Lee'] | 2019-08-16 13:49:22.215000+00:00 | ['iOS', 'Swift', 'Programming', 'iOS App Development', 'Combine'] |
Pit Bull Pic | Pit Bull Pic
My capstone project: Use a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to be able to distinguish between images of pit bulls and images of other breeds of dogs.
My dog Jack
There are features of pit bulls that distinguish them from other breeds, like the way their ears flop, or the size of their smiles! I want to create a model that can tell the difference between pit bull images and images of other breeds of dogs. First things first, I need a lot of dog pictures! I wrote a couple blog posts about scraping images from Petfinder using the Petpy API. There is part 1 where I scrape all the photos I need, and part 2 where I downloaded them. After that, I decided I needed more images, so after searching around I found the Stanford Dogs Dataset that contains 20,580 images from 120 different breeds. This turned out to be very helpful when gathering non-pit bull images.
image from Petfinder
After gathering 10,000 images from Petfinder and downloading the Stanford dataset, I begin the long and tedious process of cropping the photos that have a front facing dog with only slight angles to either side. Now that I have tons of headshots of dogs (or as many as I can do without going crazy), I divide them into two classes: pit and not pit. Now I create my model with tons of layers, I create my data generators and run it. I’m so excited to make my plots and see! Here’s my first instance of running my model:
Uh oh, that doesn’t look very good! Alright, let’s try adding a dropout layer.
Ok, at least that doesn’t look worse. How about another dropout layer?
Ok, now we’re talking. This went from devastating to decent really fast! whew. So, is more of a good thing better? I think I will add one more dropout layer and see…
In this case, yes, more is better. So let’s keep going, maybe a fourth dropout layer will be even better!!
So there is a limit on how long a good thing stays good. I am going to stick with three dropout layers. My model is looking really good. If you haven’t guessed my capstone is not finished yet. I do know one thing, and that is if I continue to add images to the model, it should only get better. Now I’m back to work. :) | https://medium.com/@geophysicist/pit-bull-pic-92492e7f3157 | ['Jenny James'] | 2020-10-09 16:17:37.211000+00:00 | ['Programming', 'Data Science', 'Data Journalism', 'Python', 'Data Analysis'] |
Post-Election Stress Disorder | (Let me start by saying that I am — IN NO WAY — trying to minimize or make fun of PTSD (Post Traumatic stress disorder) I recognize and understand its severity and the devastating effect it has on people.. My aim here is to point out what I, as an armchair psychologist, observed of the psychological effect that a violent election has had on Tanzania’s citizenry.
Ok, so now that I managed to catch your attention, I want to discuss the 2020 elections in Tanzania (though it cannot be called that by any stretch of the imagination). It has taken me a while to get back to write anything substantive about politics in Tanzania because what had transpired wasn’t anything that me or my fellow Tanzanians had thought or imagined would or could happen.
Where to start? The shenanigans of the registrar of parties, NEC, and ZEC were not unexpected. In fact, the “Saba Saba Nyeupe” initiative had been about trying to avoid anticipated negative outcomes. Obviously, demanding for an independent electoral commission became irrelevant as soon as the main opposition parties announced their participation with the existing commissions in place. No criticism here; they had a difficult choice to make between boycotting the election and trying to participate and win despite the hurdles biased and partisan agencies would throw at them. They chose the latter. Well, they, and us all, paid the price, as NEC and ZEC announced Magufuli, Mwinyi, and CCM absolute majority winners based on numbers they pulled out of thin air (actually based on numbers preset to serve an agenda beyond having Magufuli and Co. win, but that is a topic for another day). Point in case, here we are nearly two months after the results were announced, Magufuli and Mwinyi have already formed their cabinets, but NEC has still not published the results. Clearly, the patent fallacies they had announced are beyond massage. For instance, given the videos and images from the campaign trail (on social not mainstream media), how could Lissu have gotten a mere 10% of the votes that Magufuli had. What breakdown by constituency and polling station could possibly support such a ridiculous final tally? Furthermore, according to independent estimates on voter turnout, some 5–6 million Tanzanians had voted on the 28th. So, what massaging of the numbers can support that Magufuli got some 12 million votes.
The comedy of the regime’s attempt to stuff the ballots, for me at least, had been unexpected. Not in that they tried, but rather in its extent and the blatant way in which it had been carried out. As the images and stories were coming in, on pre-ticked ballots having been found in back and gunny-bags on ‘voters’ and in police vehicles, as well as entire boxes under the tables of election officers, I had been laughing and fuming simultaneously.
Photo taken by Patrick Meinhardt as seen on Getty Images website
When I saw the image of the woman trying to push a thick brown envelop (presumably full of fake ballots) through the narrow opening of the ballot box, I nearly fell off my chair. On this matter I generally went from laughter on the ridiculousness of it all, to anger over it happening and the blatancy with which it did. Why would she, and so many others, be complicit in such pathetic thievery? Mental relief, at least on this matter, came much later, when it dawned on me that this woman and tens of thousands of her ilk, mostly civil servants like teachers, were threatened with dismissal from their jobs and offered a few thousand shillings as incentive. They were victims. Poor woman, she had been so scared, she had wanted so badly to be done and get out of there she had tried to push in the fake ballots as they had been given to her, in the brown envelop.
I also realized that this whole tragicomedy had not been about us, not us being gullible or stupid, but about them, the regime. This is who they are; stupid, incompetent fools who come up with ridiculous plans and implement them absurdly. Unfortunately, all this clowning around may be comic, but the consequences are very tragic.
However, what really traumatized me, and many others, is the extreme violence that had been meted out by security forces just before, on, and after election day. Internet shutdown did little to hide the atrocities that had been committed.
Family weeps over body of Chacha Isangora, Chadema member who was poll agent at a polling station and shot in broad daylight on election day
As photos and videos trickled in, we were horrified and left shell shocked. Wanton violence, beatings, torture, and murder, never seen in Tanzanian elections. Weirdly, even though I cried again and again, I cried and was affected the most by an audio recording of the harrowing wails of a Zanzibari man as he asked for God’s help. I do not think I have ever felt as helpless as at that moment.
Bi Saada Ali Hassan who suffered severe burns after police “bombed”” her house. She passed away on December 8th, 2020 at Mnazi Moja Hospital.
Thankfully, eventually, that feeling of helplessness, of futility, turned into anger and outrage that I channeled into collecting evidence and documenting atrocities and filed a submission at the International Criminal Court. Even though hearing testimonies and reviewing audio visual evidence had been painful at times, it had been well worth it. These atrocities will not be forgotten, and one day, those who gave the orders and those who executed them, will be held to account.
Yes, we are all shocked and traumatized by what transpired on and around October 28th. Also, many of us feel betrayed by opposition politicians who chose to compromise and accommodate scoundrels. And though we may feel we have “lost”, I believe the real losers are Magufuli, Mwinyi, and their CCM cohort. All these “winners” who look broken while claiming victory. And why would not they be. There are no more illusions left, no lies to hide behind. Despite all the plotting and manipulation, despite all the threats and arrests, despite biased commissions and agencies, despite endless illegal and unjust acts, despite tear gassing and ballot stuffing, at the end of the day, it took extreme violence to keep Magufili, Mwinyi, and CCM in power. They know this, we, citizens, know this, and they know that we know this. Isaac Asimov said: “Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent”. Well, these are our incompetents, our “kings” naked for all to see, committing extreme acts of violence because they have run out of ideas. | https://medium.com/@mariasarungitsehai/post-election-stress-disorder-99f3b42ee4b4 | ['Maria Sarungi Tsehai'] | 2020-12-18 14:06:12.287000+00:00 | ['Tanzania', 'Voter Fraud', 'Violence', 'Election Fraud', 'Election 2020'] |
The Slow Death of Mainstream Church | Photo by Edwin Andrade on Unsplash
I grew up in houses of worship…literally. My father was a minister with a mainstream protestant denomination in Canada. Many days of my youth were spent playing in church gyms, exploring nooks and crannies of century-old buildings, and trying to be “helpful” to my dad and the church secretary.
In my teens, my mother went back to school in order to make the jump from teaching to ministry as well. This meant two churches, two congregations, two places in which I was surrounded by people with certain expectations of the minister’s kid. Sometimes the expectations of others are worse than the expectations of your own family.
Through my teens, I experimented…a lot. Oh, there were no drugs, sex, or anything like that. Can you imagine the scandal in the church community if the minister’s kid got caught with some pot? This was the nineties, when the war on drugs was still raging.
No, I experimented with church. Different denominations, different worship styles, different beliefs, I tried a bunch of them. Always too worried about what other people thought to just let myself be who I wanted to be.
Throughout this time, I was a regular attendee at regional church meetings. We met once a year to discuss the work of the church on a larger scale, and about once a meeting I would stand up and speak on something or another. This experience gave me a healthy respect for not only debate, but the process of achieving consensus instead of majority.
I spent my summers working at summer camp, though my beliefs began to evolve and I ended up rejecting the small, petty beliefs of exclusion that they espoused. In their own terms, I love the believers and hate the beliefs.
I owe a lot to those formative years, they have shaped me in ways that I never would have chosen.
I famously fell asleep during a prayer at the end of an all-day planning session with the leadership team.
As I moved out of my teens and into my post-secondary years, I found myself drawn towards leadership in different organizations. I worked as a volunteer youth minister in my denomination, serving in a couple of different local and regional roles. I also served in leadership with a non-denominational group on my university campus.
Though in retrospect, my heart wasn’t totally in that one. I famously fell asleep during a prayer at the end of an all-day planning session with the leadership team. In my defence, I had worked an overnight shift the night before.
I have worshipped in arenas, in tiny chapels, around fires with a small group of friends, while walking solo through a labyrinth, and while riding wind-driven waves in a canoe. I have also worshipped in cathedrals, with hundred-plus voice choirs, from the pews, from the choir loft, and from the pulpit.
Church has never been about worship.
I don’t believe that worship is limited to certain buildings.
I don’t even believe that worship is limited to certain religions.
Church is not about worship. | https://matthewwoodall.medium.com/the-slow-death-of-mainstream-church-5a7c29ac83cd | ['Matthew Woodall'] | 2019-10-14 01:48:37.010000+00:00 | ['Christianity', 'Community', 'Family', 'Faith'] |
Genomik Data Science ve Transkripsiyon Faktörü | JunD
The protein encoded by this intronless gene is a member of the JUN family, and a functional component of the AP1… | https://medium.com/datarunner/genomik-data-science-giri%C5%9F-ve-transkripsiyon-fakt%C3%B6r%C3%BC-%C3%BCzerine-bir-%C3%B6rnek-8052533a1a86 | ['Ömer Özgür'] | 2020-06-08 12:59:12.758000+00:00 | ['Data Science', 'Deep Learning', 'Veribilimicat', 'Genetics'] |
Valuing BNB Token: How Binance Could 2X BNB Coin Value Overnight | In a previous CoinFi research analysis written by our very own Chief Data Scientist Alex Svanevik, we compared various exchange tokens using TVEV ratio, discovering that there is a simple model we could use to assess whether or not an exchange token is priced fairly in relation to other exchange tokens. In this post, we will attempt to value the Binance exchange token (BNB coin) from a cash flow perspective.
The reasons for CoinFi’s fascination with exchange tokens are:
The utility/token economics are generally well defined, making them easy to understand and value.
Exchange tokens as a whole (especially Binance) have been widely used, circulated, and battle tested. Several of them have even had a series of buybacks.
Despite the recent sell-off in crypto, exchange tokens have held up quite well, as shown in the graph below.
As we can see from the above plot, since March 2018, BNB tokens have doubled in value over BTC while HT (Huobi Token) has more than tripled!
For this article, we will focus on valuing BNB coin for three reasons:
Out of the exchange tokens, the BNB coin has had the longest history. For the past few months, Binance has consistently been among the exchanges with the largest volume traded and is arguably the largest exchange in existence. Lastly and most importantly, the primary use case for BNB token is very clear — it provides a discount on traded volume. This simple model makes it relatively easy to come up with an accurate valuation. In future blog posts, we may look to estimate the value of other features of various exchange tokens that don’t relate directly to the transaction fee discount.
Below is the basic market data for BNB:
The current utility of BNB tokens come as a form of transaction fee discount where you pay in BNB rather than the native currency you trade.
Discounts on transaction fees for holders of BNB are as follows:
The definition of what “Year 1” means is not clear on the BNB website, so we decided to find out from Binance directly.
First off, shout out to CS Yuu at Binance support for the swift reply (9 min) — good customer support is always a great sign.
Does BNB Coin Value Go to Zero?
What this means is that by the 5th year of BNB’s existence, the transaction fee discount actually goes to zero!
So unless BNB comes up with additional utility of the token, the value that comes from the transaction fee discount will go to zero, and all that will be left is the value of the token as an exchange currency.
Keep in mind that about $100 million volume of BNB trades a day, with a good chunk as a form of exchange currency to buy or sell other cryptocurrencies, so even as it currently stands, there would be some residual token value after the discount ends.
Binance can (and by our estimation will likely) add additional incentives in the future for BNB token holders, in order to compete with some of the incentives other exchange tokens are offering.
Binance also recently added a new feature as of May 18th 2018:
While the above new feature certainly changes token demand, likely having a positive impact on price, we will focus mainly on the transaction fee discount, since it is the most significant token utility and the most straightforward to value.
How We Modeled the Value of BNB Coin
Unlike many token utility models, the BNB coin has a clear fundamental monetary value that we can quantify — the transaction fee that traders save by holding the BNB tokens. We want to know how much this utility is worth.
As a result, we can actually view BNB as a cash flow generating asset, where the cash flow comes in the form of transaction fees saved.
Now let’s consider the following scenario: Suppose someone was to own all of the BNB tokens, how much should they charge to willing traders on Binance?
From this angle, we can view ownership of Binance tokens as a business with predictable cash flows, which will allow us to easily value the token.
First Step: Estimating Volume
First and foremost, we need to estimate the $USD volume traded in order to see how much a company that lends out BNB could possibly make each year.
Keep in mind that Binance as an exchange has been in existence for about one year, so trying to project $USD traded volume years in the future is no easy task, and we’ll need to make a few assumptions:
For the past several months, Binance has been among the top exchanges. Arguably, it is the #1 exchange in terms of $ value traded and given their current dominance, it seems unlikely they’ll be unseated in the near future.
Over the last few weeks, Binance has been trading $1.6 billion worth of cryptocurrencies per day. While this volume fluctuates depending on action in the market, it is a good baseline assumption.
There is certainly a chance that Binance may drop off the radar. If that turns out to be the case, then the exercise of valuing BNB may end up becoming a pointless one. However, this is (at least partially) offset by the fact that we are not putting any growth projections on the total crypto trading market as a whole.
If we assume $1.6 billion trades on Binance everyday, we can estimate the future cash flows of this hypothetical company lending BNB to its customers.
Year 1 — which has a 50% discount — is omitted from this model since BNB tokens are coming towards their 11th month of existence.
We use 0% interest to discount for first estimation as current interest rate at around 2% is still historically quite low and will not have a big effect on our conclusion.
Total sum of cash flow up to Year 4 is $258 million.
Based on this model, the utility of BNB token’s “transaction fee discount” is potentially worth $258 million.
Some of you may point out that this model is flawed because not everyone efficiently buys the exact amount of BNB to optimize their trading costs. This point becomes irrelevant since the value of the company holding BNB coin would depend on what the optimal lending is, rather than who has decided to be efficient on buying an exact number of BNB tokens for their trading.
Furthermore, some token holders may hold more than is necessary, which would offset the traders that forget to hold BNB.
Circulating Supply or Total Supply?
With this $258 million dollar value assigned to the token’s “transaction fee discount” utility, we would like to see what portion of the token price is due to this feature.
Here we use circulating supply. This differs from our exchange token analysis on TVEV ratio where we used total supply to account for the large discrepancies in % token circulation.
For the purpose of trying to figure out what percentage of the current market cap is accounted for by the transaction fee discount utility, we need to consider the total amount of tokens that are available for traders to use in order to receive that discount. This happens to be the circulating supply.
With a circulating market cap of $1.89 billion, the “transaction fee discount” utility of the BNB token accounts for roughly 14% of the price of the token.
So Where Did the Other 86% Go?
Binance uses 20% of their profit to buyback and burn BNB. Like a share buyback program, this adds additional value to the price of the coin which we have not accounted for. Imagine the company that lends out BNB, they can eventually sell back the idle BNB at a predetermined value.
We haven’t considered growth into the model. But with a premium price, there is likely some growth priced in, and as crypto currencies become mainstream Binance is poised to reap the benefits.
BNB also has other utilities such as the 2x referral fee we pointed out earlier in the article, and also recently added a feature that allows amplification of voting power for listing for holders of BNB, which justifies additional premium on the price.
Binance hinted earlier in the year that their goal was to eventually work towards becoming a decentralized exchange and some have speculated that BNB may be used as a form of gas to power the network — certainly an exciting development worth a premium price.
Additional features may be added which would likely adjust the token economics and token value. Basically, the transaction fee discount has so far served as a way of attracting crypto traders to sign up for their exchange.
We pointed out earlier in the article, BNB pairs trade for decent volume, and more and more traders are using it as a form of exchange currency to buy and sell other cryptocurrencies given it an intrinsic value as a form of exchange currency.
One Simple Change Binance Could Make to 2X the Token Value
What happens if Binance were to extend the transaction fee discount of 25% to all BNB coin holders in perpetuity? Let’s examine how that might affect the price on BNB.
From our previous table (Year 2 figure which uses 25% transaction fee discount), it would mean $146 million of potential annual transaction costs saved by traders or $146 million in annual cash flow for our hypothetical BNB lending company.
Given that this is potential cash in perpetuity, we can use the perpetuity formula used to calculate a financial contract that pays never ending annual dividends to its owners to value the market cap.
We use the US 10 year rate at 3.1%
Value of perpetuity = $146 mil / 3.1% = $4.709 billion
Using circulating supply of 114,041,290, this implies a per token price of $41.3, nearly three times the current price just on the transaction fee discount feature alone!
This is not even taking into account future features which could lead to an even higher valuation, or the burn feature and growth projections.
While such an announcement would be great news for traders in Binance and hodlers of BNB, why would Binance want to do this? Technically, they would be forfeiting $146 million of annual revenues a year — definitely a non-trivial number, especially for a company that will likely continue to face stiff competition in the future.
However, the benefits potentially outweigh the costs for Binance as a company:
Binance and its founders hold a significant portion of BNB coins so their incentive is aligned with hodlers out there.
Extending discounts beyond year 4 would ensure that BNB coin stays relevant and continues to trade and circulate. It may solidify BNB even more as an exchange currency for buying other cryptocurrencies.
If more people hold and trade BNB, it would lead to increased circulation on BNB coin which would have an upward spiraling effect on the coin price.
They will continue to be among the cheapest among the major exchanges, and if the market grows, their share of the total revenue pie will also grow.
So in short, it is a win-win for all sides. | https://medium.com/coinfi/valuing-bnb-token-how-binance-could-2x-bnb-coin-value-overnight-61cf06394310 | ['Coinfi Editorial Team'] | 2018-06-19 10:05:24.274000+00:00 | ['Crypto', 'Bitcoin', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Blockchain', 'Binance'] |
Setting up Jupyterlab over Spark | This post shows how jupyterlab can be setup over an existing spark cluster. To know how to setup a Spark cluster please refer to my earlier post on the same.
Operating System : Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 7.6 (Maipo)
Hadoop Version : 3.2.1
Java JRE : 1.8
Python : 3.7
Spark : 3.1.1
Steps
Create a new conda environment for JupyterLab
#conda create -n <Environment Name> python=3.7 jupyterlab pandas scikit-learn seaborn
conda create -n jupHub python=3.7 jupyterlab pandas scikit-learn seaborn
2. Switch to new environment
conda activate jupHub
3. Install needed modules
conda install ipykernel conda install configurable-http-proxy
4. Check the available kernel specifications for Jupyter
jupyter kernelspec list
$ jupyter kernelspec list Available kernels: nlg /users/sparkadm/.local/share/jupyter/kernels/nlg pyspark /users/sparkadm/.local/share/jupyter/kernels/pyspark python3 /auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/share/jupyter/kernels/python3 $
5. You would be editing the last file under /auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/share/jupyter/kernels/python3. You will add necessay environment varibales, spark submit arguments, jar dependencies etc in this file. This is where you tell Jupyter notebook created from this kernel to submit job to a Spark cluster
{ "argv": [ "/auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/bin/python", "-m", "ipykernel_launcher", "-f", "{connection_file}" ], "display_name": "Python 3.7", "language": "python", "env": { "HADOOP_CONF_DIR": "/home/hadoop/conf", "HADOOP_USER_NAME": "sparkadm", "HADOOP_CONF_LIB_NATIVE_DIR": "/home/hadoop/lib/native", "YARN_CONF_DIR": "/home/hadoop/conf", "LD_LIBRARY_PATH":"/auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/lib:/usr/lib64/mysql:/usr/local/lib64:/auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/:/usr/cisco/packages/oracle/current/lib:/usr/lib64:/usr/local/lib", "PYTHONPATH": "/auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/bin:/auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/lib/:/home/spark/python:/home/spark/python/lib/py4j-0.10.9-src.zip", "SPARK_HOME": "/home/spark", "PYTHONSTARTUP": "/home/spark/python/pyspark/shell.py", "PYSPARK_SUBMIT_ARGS": "--master spark://171.70.184.87:7077 pyspark-shell" } }
6. Start Jupyterlab
jupyter-lab — no-browser
$ jupyter-lab --no-browser [I 23:18:51.655 LabApp] JupyterLab extension loaded from /auto/csap/python3/lib/python3.6/site-packages/jupyterlab [I 23:18:51.655 LabApp] JupyterLab application directory is /auto/csap/conda/envs/jupHub/share/jupyter/lab [I 23:18:51.661 LabApp] Serving notebooks from local directory: /auto/csap/csap/Jupyter/Dev [I 23:18:51.661 LabApp] Jupyter Notebook 6.4.0 is running at: [I 23:18:51.661 LabApp] http://xyz.abc.com:8888/ [I 23:18:51.661 LabApp] Use Control-C to stop this server and shut down all kernels (twice to skip confirmation).
or you can start it as a background deamon
nohup jupyter-lab --no-browser > jupyterlab.log &
7. Jupyterlab is now running on port 8888. If you cannot access it you may want to ensure that port is enabled. As root you need to run below command
iptables -I INPUT -p tcp --dport 8888 -j ACCEPT
8. There are few more settings that can be added such as configuring directory where the notebooks are created in etc. Firstly create the config if does not exist
jupyter notebook --generate-config
9. This will create jupyterhub_config.py file under <USER_HOME_DIRECTORY>/.jupyter folder.
10. You can mention the default notebooks directory here. There are few more settings in this file which could be altered for LDAP connection, Jupyterlab user id and passwords etc. | https://medium.com/technology-and-trends/setting-up-jupyterhub-over-e35bceb580ca | ['Shobha Deepthi V'] | 2021-06-17 08:59:09.591000+00:00 | ['Jupyter Notebook', 'Jupyter', 'Big Data Platform', 'Jupyterlab', 'Apache Spark'] |
BEST REVIEW OF Philips Avent Ultra Comfort Single Electric Breast Pump SPECIAL OFFER | More comfortable pumping position due to unique design
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I attempted to use several pumps for my previous birth (18 months ago) as I was determined to breast feed. I found this one the most comfortable, the most easy to use and the easiest to clean. I unfortunately wasn’t producing any milk so sold it but I’ve bought it again for this pregnancy. Definitely recommend.
Better than the very popular competition product, that basically did nothing for my wife. This on the other hand does work, does not hurt her breasts and the stimulation is just enough for our daily needs. Excellent, as with most Avent products we own. Its really comfortable and does take the hard work out of expressing. Also has reduced down the time it takes with a manual pump. I would say it needs a tad bit more suction and a button to increase the downflow before it goes onto the next pump but I think that just my personal option other then that it still deserve 5 stars. As described. Came with clear instructions. Not as powerful as I would have liked & it was loud although I had nothing to compare it to so maybe the noise is normal. If you mainly pump I’d suggest a double or a hospital grade.
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Really compact machine which does the job nicely! After having a premature baby I have spent the last 5 weeks expressing with the hospital grade Medela which gave great volumes. Now at home I’m finding I need to express and bottle feed so needed a good pump. This one came highest rated on google and was half price for Black Friday. I’ve found it does well for getting decent volumes quickly. The unit is very small and compact and can be used with AA batteries, though I haven’t attempted this.
The parts are easily washable and the bottle is a great shape for pouring into other bottles/ storage containers as it has no strange lips like tommie tippie ones do. The only downside is that it’s very loud, not a problem most of the time but could be an issue if you needed to express at night and would definitely put doing it discreetly in public out if the question. | https://medium.com/@faizal.idris.7410/best-review-of-philips-avent-ultra-comfort-single-electric-breast-pump-special-offer-64bd0fa7ec6 | ['Faizal Idris'] | 2019-05-26 09:34:29.171000+00:00 | ['Baby', 'Baby Products', 'Breastfeeding', 'Amazon', 'Breast Cancer'] |
Ignoble Laureate and the Armageddon | Ignoble Laureate and the Armageddon
In 1964, when Jean Paul-Sartre refused to accept the noble prize for literature his rejection letter which has now been published said a spectacular line about the ethics of an author. He wrote to the Swedish Academy, “The writer must, therefore, refuse to let himself be transformed into an institution, even if this occurs under the most honorable circumstances, as in the present case.”
Previously he had refused the award as well as the money associated with the most prestigious of the french awards, legion d’honneur in 1945. While there are no prizes more controversial and politicized than noble each year its frivolity becomes more apparent.
From totally undeserved prizes like the one given within six months of Barack Obama’s election to the office without having done anything to obvious Swedish bias against Russian intellectuals it has become a manipulation tool for imperialist governments.
With all the blood in its name, probably the one history will never forget is Aung San Suu Kyi. Like all privileged pillaging elites of a cosmopolitan society, she studied from top institutions in India and then went on to Oxford. Upon her returned she quickly becomes involved in politics and rose to a conspicuous position through a tough stance against military might in her country. Without her clout in the western world she gained a position of strength gradually and in 2015 won a landslide victory in elections to become the unprecedented leader of Myanmar.
Buddhist warmongering against the Rohingya Muslim minority in the country recently took off with Aung San’s complete support and has turned into a genocide. As Times reported these are the messages Muslims receive “F — g kalar,” a slur that Burmese ultra-nationalists like to apply to Muslims or others of South Asian appearance. “Why don’t you stop your work?”
2012 massacre of Rohingya Muslims living in the western part of the country under the pretext of spying for Bangladesh forced many to live in miserable camps. Recently intoxicated by the promises of far-right leader Narender Modi of India, Bangladesh’s prime minister Haseena Wajid, the notorious daughter of Sheikh Mujib has refused to accept the refugees. UN could not be expected to behave differently as US mouthpiece on foreign policy and Ban Ki Moon refused to call this genocide a genocide.
Muslim genocide around the world isn’t coalescing at a slower speed either. Far right governments in Europe, US, India and elsewhere have started whetting out Muslims. None of this should come as a surprise, though. Have we not been told by Prophet SA that end of times will dawn soon upon his Ummah and its clear signs can still be found in the books of Hadith. Some of them go like this:
“There will come to the people years of treachery (deceptions), when the liar will be regarded as honest, and the honest man will be regarded as a liar; the traitor will be regarded as faithful, and the faithful man will be regarded as a traitor; and the Ruwaibidhah will decide matters.” It was said ‘Who are the Ruwaibidhah?’ The Prophet replied: “Shallow and worthless men who will speak about the affairs of the people.” (Narrated by Ibnu Majah) Allah’s Messenger (saas) said: “The Harj (will increase).” They asked, “What is the Harj?” He replied, “(It is) killing (murdering), (it is) murdering (killing).” (Bukhari) Great cities will be ruined and it will be as if they had not existed the day before. (Al-Muttaqi al-Hindi, Al-Burhan fi Alamat al-Mahdi Akhir al-Zaman) The poor will grow in number. (Amal Al-Din Al-Qazwini, Mufid Al-’ulum Wa-mubid Al-humum) Gains will be shared out only among the rich, with no benefit to the poor. (Tirmidhi) The Last Hour will not be established until they (wicked people) commit adultery on the roads (public ways). (Ibn Hibban and Bazzar) People will indulge in homosexuality and lesbianism (Al-Muttaqi Al-Hindi, Muntakhab Kanzul Ummaal) Near the establishment of the Hour there will be days during which (religious) knowledge will be taken away (vanish) and general ignorance will spread… (Bukhari) A time will come when a man will not care about how he gets things, whether lawful or unlawful. (Bukhari) Allah’s Messenger (saas) said, “In the End Times men will come forth who will fraudulently use religion for worldly ends and wear sheepskins in public to display meekness. Their tongues will be sweeter than sugar, but their hearts will be the hearts of wolves.” (Tirmidhi) When the old have no compassion for the young, when the young show no respect to the old … when children grow angry … Judgment is at hand. (Reported by Omar (r.a.)
The end of time has gotten near and the promised battle of Ghazwa Hind, which western world calls the Armageddon is looming upon us. All religions are convinced of this final battle which isn’t hard to predict even for the ones who don’t believe in monotheist religions. I wish there was a better way for the mankind to have solved its problems but Allah’s decrees are meant to happen and happen it will.
In Hadith it is narrated by Abu Hurraira RA that Hazrat Muhammad (P.B.U.H.) told him: “Definitely, one of your troop would do a war with Hindustan, Allah would grant success to those warriors, as far as they would bring their kings by dragging them in chains / fetters. And Allah would forgive those warriors (by the Blessing of this great war). And when those Muslims would return, they would find Hazrat Isa Ibn-e-Maryam(A.S.) in Syria (Shaam)”.
Let us all give our last and hope that Allah accepts us among the righteous ones who fought in his way to end the oppression, tyranny, and rampage. | https://medium.com/minhaajmusings/ignoble-laureate-and-the-armageddon-5e39da590e8 | ['Minhaaj Rehman'] | 2016-12-09 10:35:04.410000+00:00 | ['Armageddon', 'Islam', 'Rohingya', 'Aung San Suu Kyi', 'Myanmar'] |
Reading List 2020: MA Regenerative Economics | Reading List 2020: MA Regenerative Economics
Curated by Daniel Wahl for Schumacher College
I was a student on the MSc in Holistic Science at Schumacher College in 2001–2002. For the last 4 years I have been teaching on the MA in Ecological Design Thinking, and this year I started teaching on the MA in Regenerative Economics.
I only had one 2-hour conversation session with the students. We covered a lot of ground. I curated the reading list below based on my notes from that dialogue to offer the students pathways to dive deeper into the subjects their questions raised or my my answers referred to.
Sharing my recommended reading suggestions to the MA in Ecological Design Thinking led to a lot of positive feedback from around the world.
Encouraged by this interest and gratitude I decided to also share this resource list more widely. May it serve!
Economics:
Business:
Other thinks we touched on:
—
If you like the post, please clap AND remember that you can clap up to 50 times if you like it a lot ;-)!
Daniel Christian Wahl — Catalyzing transformative innovation in the face of converging crises, advising on regenerative whole systems design, regenerative leadership, and education for regenerative development and bioregional regeneration.
Author of the internationally acclaimed book Designing Regenerative Cultures
Please consider becoming a patron of my ongoing work: | https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/reading-list-2020-ma-regenerative-economics-8a9293eda2fa | ['Daniel Christian Wahl'] | 2020-11-06 07:57:06.432000+00:00 | ['Economics', 'Regeneration', 'Economy', 'Sustainability', 'Education'] |
The celebrity hairdresser with a secret of his own | For 35 years, the rich and famous came to John Harding’s central London salon to get their hair cut, coloured, and styled. Joan Collins; Vanessa Redgrave; Rod Stewart; Tony Curtis; Kristina Tholstrup and occasionally husband Roger Moore; Sarah Churchill; and many more.
The salon was on Elizabeth Street, Belgravia; a place where leafy garden squares reflect in the polished brass plates of embassies and hedge funds.
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“There were lots of wealthy people in the area,” says John, now 77. “Lady this and Lady that.”
But the actors, singers, and aristocrats who came to John’s salon would not have guessed his secret. Unless, that is, they noticed that he rarely answered the phone. That’s because, if he did answer, he might need to check the appointments book, or write something down.
And that was a problem — because John Harding, hairdresser to the stars, was unable to read.
John grew up in Islington, north London, and went to Laycock School. He wasn’t uninterested — “I liked art, geography, history, and my maths was OK” — but always found reading “very difficult”.
He soon found himself in D class, the bottom rung, and stayed there. He doesn’t blame his teachers -”If there’s 30 in a class, it’s hard to help out” — or his parents.
“My mum wasn’t a very good reader, and my dad wasn’t either,” says John. “My dad was a working class man — he was in the printing trade, a union man — and he didn’t have a lot of vocabulary. He didn’t have time to help me, but that was a man of that era.”
John could recognise three-letter words from memory, but “just didn’t have any idea how to break longer words down”.
“I couldn’t read something that was interesting like a history book or a geography book,” he says. “That was too far.”
He doesn’t think he had dyslexia, but he was never tested. So he stayed in D class, hiding it from friends, bluffing as best he could, until it was time to leave. How did those school days feel?
“It’s more of an embarrassment, you know?” he says. “I used to get very edgy when it came up.”
At 16, it was finally time to leave school. But what jobs were there for boys who couldn’t read? He was good with his hands, but didn’t want to be a carpenter, electrician, or plumber. “You had to get up too early,” he jokes.
And so he took a job at the hairdressers round the corner — sweeping the floor, washing the hair, and avoiding the appointments book.
After Islington, John progressed to salons in Kennington, Pimlico, then Mayfair. But it was difficult to learn the trade — after all, who wants their hair cut by a beginner? So, in his own time, he went to academies in the evenings. He “won a few competitions” and, when John was 20, an ex-colleague asked him to join his new salon in Pimlico.
“He offered me good money,” says John. “I told him I’d do it — provided I didn’t have to do any bookwork.”
It proved a life-changing decision. At Pimlico, the receptionist introduced John to her sister, Heather, and they were soon married. She became one of the few people to know about John’s illiteracy.
“She was very clever. She did all that stuff for me.”
Looking back, says John, he should have learned to read then. But with a new wife, and soon a young family, he “put it on the back burner”. It didn’t affect his career — aged 25, he opened the successful salon on Elizabeth Street where he would stay for 35 years. But outside the salon, the challenges remained.
“If we went to a restaurant with friends, my wife would say ‘You’d fancy this John’, knowing full well I couldn’t read it on the menu,” he says. “Basically, you bluff your way through life. It’s crazy the things you make up.”
So did any of his customers — Collins, Redgrave, Churchill, et al — know he couldn’t read? “None at all,” he says.
In his 50s and 60s, John twice tried to learn at evening classes. “But I felt I wasn’t really getting very far,” he says.
“It was difficult for the teachers to have time with you. The teacher would let you read alone, then give you 15 minutes of her time. Which is good, but not as good as one to one.”
So John may have stayed illiterate. But then, eight years ago, he came home to find Heather — his wife of almost 50 years — dead in their lounge. She had suffered heart failure aged 69. | https://medium.com/@kachaakola/the-celebrity-hairdresser-with-a-secret-of-his-own-8d23a40ec072 | [] | 2020-12-24 16:56:25.107000+00:00 | ['Celebrity', 'News', 'Entertainment', 'Hairdressers', 'Beauty'] |
How to Talk So Kids Will Listen | How to Get Kids to Listen | Most parents complain that their kids do not listen to them. What do you do when someone on the other side of a phone call cannot listen to what you say? Don’t you try at your end so that the other person can listen? This is exactly what you need to do when it comes to how to get kids to listen; you need to know how to talk so kids will listen.
The daily interaction right from going to school upto after-school homework is essential. We don’t want these interactions to be battles. The main button we want to press is our words should not hurt them. Start the day with loving words. The kids are our dependents. They are here for our love and warmth.
The words that irritate the child are instruction words — do this and do that or don’t do this. Consider this — how insulting would you feel when you have to work with your boss or spouse watching you behind your shoulder and yelling at you ‘complete this, do it fast, you are always late!, you are clumsy,…’ Your child is small, but he has his independent will and freedom to choose as per his preference.
Now consider this — how happy you were whenever you got any appreciation from boss, friends or family. So make sure you appreciate your child daily for small things you want to encourage.
You can analyze your daily situation and come up with adjustments:
When a kid comes home, talk to him — ‘looks like you must be tired have some drink or food’, instead of reminding about homework and things which are to be done, talk about things he likes — his friends, games . This is a kid-friendly tip, when it comes to how to talk so kids will listen. Spend quality time encouraging him to talk more about his interest. The best thing you can give your child is to spend time with them . You would be amazed to realize the different aspects of your child and find a new friend in him.
— ‘looks like you must be tired have some drink or food’, instead of reminding about homework and things which are to be done, . This is a kid-friendly tip, when it comes to how to talk so kids will listen. Spend quality time encouraging him to talk more about his interest. . You would be amazed to realize the different aspects of your child and find a new friend in him. Come up with a fixed time when to sit for studies and convey it with loving words. Don’t keep reminding the same thing — it shows that you don’t have confidence in him. Let him bear the consequence of not doing homework a couple of times. The realization one gets by experiencing anything first hand teaches more, than anyone else.
when to sit for studies and convey it with loving words. Don’t keep reminding the same thing — it shows that you don’t have confidence in him. Let him bear the consequence of not doing homework a couple of times. Say without losing your cool or peace on your face — like ‘once your brushing and bathing is done then we will have breakfast. Or you can have a quick peek in your mobile.’
— like ‘once your brushing and bathing is done then we will have breakfast. Or you can have a quick peek in your mobile.’ Come up with different ways to present what you want to say to him like- ‘Let’s sit for studies early, so you can play with friends in the evening or watch T.V later.’
what you want to say to him like- ‘Let’s sit for studies early, so you can play with friends in the evening or watch T.V later.’ You may ask your kid to pick up clothes but in a normal tone without any force and without dialogues like ‘how many times I have to tell you the same things!’ Or ‘you never listen to me!’. Somedays you might have to pick up clothes and tell him with love once in a few days.
like ‘how many times I have to tell you the same things!’ Or ‘you never listen to me!’. Somedays you might have to pick up clothes and tell him with love once in a few days. Positive words encourage a person. Positive words have happy vibration. Therefore, encourage the positive side and ignore the negative side -which means appreciate the things you want him to do. This is the easiest way to try when it comes to how to talk so kids will listen. Consider the following examples, ‘The day when you complete your homework early, you enjoy as you will get to play more with your friends.’ or ‘The day when you play in the fresh air you are more happy and energetic.’ or ‘ The day we all have dinner together on the dining table we eat healthy and feel connected’ or ‘The day you get ready in morning early, you have more time to do your favorite things.’
encourage a person. Positive words have happy vibration. Therefore, -which means appreciate the things you want him to do. This is the easiest way to try when it comes to how to talk so kids will listen. Consider the following examples, ‘The day when you complete your homework early, you enjoy as you will get to play more with your friends.’ or ‘The day when you play in the fresh air you are more happy and energetic.’ or ‘ The day we all have dinner together on the dining table we eat healthy and feel connected’ or ‘The day you get ready in morning early, you have more time to do your favorite things.’ Not all days are smooth, some will be rough but don’t let that affect your intent — intent not to hurt your little one .
. Always speak in a positive manner because there is a Soul within every person including your little one . When something positive happens, it is wrong to say anything negative about it. All these problems arise because one states the negative in that which is positive. This is something you should take care of when it is the matter of how to talk so kids will listen. And whenever you say, “No harm done,” the instant you say this, tremendous changes take place from within . So always speak positively.
. When something positive happens, it is wrong to say anything negative about it. All these problems arise because one states the negative in that which is positive. This is something you should take care of when it is the matter of how to talk so kids will listen. And whenever you say, . So always speak positively. Readout interesting stories to kids on the topics you think you want them to improve.
Param Pujya Dadashri says, “Nothing negative has happened to me for so many years. I have never experienced even the slightest negativity in any circumstance. If your mind becomes positive, you become divine, which is why I tell people to get rid of their negativity through maintaining equanimity. Then only the positive will remain. In your worldly affairs, stay positive. In nischaya (real viewpoint), neither the positive nor the negative exists”.
Argumentativeness in the Child is Indeed a Reaction Returning to You
Questioner: (If we say anything, then) my children argue a lot. They tell us, “Why are you lecturing us ?” Dadashri: In spite of them arguing a lot if you indeed teach them with love, then their arguments will decrease. These arguments are your reaction. Up to now, you have continued to intimidate them, isn’t it! That does not go away from their mind, it certainly cannot be erased. So, then, it is due to this that they continue to argue. Not a single child argues with me. That is because I am talking to all of you with true love. | https://medium.com/@dadabhagwan/how-to-talk-so-kids-will-listen-how-to-get-kids-to-listen-2646ab8c8732 | ['Dada Bhagwan'] | 2020-01-16 05:36:01.326000+00:00 | ['Parenthood', 'Children', 'Parenting Advice', 'Childhood', 'Parenting'] |
America’s First Impeachment | The very first case of impeachment in America was brought in 1774, instigated by the colonial House of Representatives against Peter Oliver, Chief Justice of Massachusetts. John Adams prepared the Articles of Impeachment, which listed corruption, greed, and disloyalty, all indicating “high crimes and misdemeanors,” as the bases for impeachment.[1]
Adams had first become concerned over the decreasing “Independence of the Judges”[2] (as he called it), when in 1773 word came from King and Parliament that judges in the American colonies would no longer receive their salaries from their local legislatures (and colonial representatives) but would instead receive all salaries directly from the Crown.
Chief Justice Peter Oliver had crowed with joy over the news of his new Crown-guaranteed salary, and saw no problem in overseeing cases which directly affected the Crown while also receiving his salary from the Crown. The colonists of Massachusetts, however, quickly recognized the potential for unfair judgments (especially concerning highly contentious issues of taxes and standing troops), and loudly and violently protested the paying of royal salaries to local judges. Rowdy types vowed to take Peter Oliver out to the Liberty Tree on Orange Street and let him swing from the branches until he repented of his evil ways.
The Liberty Tree
But law-abiding John Adams could not countenance threats of physical violence against a judge, no matter how crooked, corrupt, or weak-willed he might be. The law must take its course against Justice Oliver, Adams advised his fellow colonists — and the method to do so was impeachment.
There was no precedent for impeachment in the colony but Adams was undaunted. He began researching how such a process might legally be undertaken in the colony, using impeachment cases that had been pursued in England as his model. He marshalled the necessary precedents in law, wrote up his findings, and took careful notes of Oliver’s actions as Chief Justice.
One evening, while attending a dinner party with fellow colonial representatives, Adams overheard a group discussing the paying of royal salaries to colonial judges, lamenting this “fatal Measure [that]… would be the Ruin of the Liberties of the Country.” Inserting himself into the conversation, John loudly pronounced that he just might have the answer to the problem.[3] He “told them…there was one constitutional Resource… [which was] nothing more nor less than an Impeachment … by the House of Representatives before the Council…”[4]
When the men asked Adams for his help in bringing an impeachment case against Peter Oliver, Adams jumped at the chance. For the next few days and nights he worked on preparing the Articles of Impeachment, while members of the Massachusetts House of Representatives hovered about. A passing friend later commented to Adams, “you keep late Hours at your House: as I passed it last night long after midnight, I saw your Street door vomit forth a Crowd of Senators.”[5]
Relying on case law, moral imperatives, and the history of Massachusetts and its charter, John Adams began the Articles of Impeachment by setting forth the duties owed by judges of the colony to their fellow colonists; they were bound to defend against incursions into colonial rights and deprivation of colonial liberties. Adams then went on to specifically describe the actions undertaken by Peter Oliver which violated his sworn duties to the colonists, and demonstrated not only his “false Representations and evil Advice,” but also his “corrupt Administration of Justice.”
For example, Oliver had accepted the “Sum of four Hundred Pounds Sterling, granted by his Majesty…” and hoped for its future “Augmentation.” By doing so, he had committed the “high crimes and misdemeanors” of taking “a continual Bribe” in clear “Violation of his Oath.” Adams added, with what he hoped were demonstrable facts, that Oliver had been compelled into “accepting and receiving the said Sum” by “the Corruption and Baseness of his Heart, and the sordid Lust of Covetousness.”[6]
Peter Oliver
The House of Representatives approved the Articles of Impeachment and quickly moved to distribute Adams’ legal and factual findings throughout the colony. Colonists far and wide approved of the impeachment. But the Royal Governor of Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson, refused to recognize either the merits of the claims against Oliver or the legality of the process of impeachment. He declared that Chief Justice Oliver would not be removed, no matter how the Massachusetts House of Representatives had voted.
John Adams did not despair. He knew that a judge without jurors could do little, and that the colonists would never serve under a man like Peter Oliver. Within months, Adams was proved right. When called to serve as jurors in their local courts, almost each and every one of them refused to participate in a court system tainted by an impeached chief justice, just as Adams had predicted. Even when Chief Justice Peter Oliver stayed away from court, colonists refused to sit as jurors and declined the oath of service. As one man testified in Boston, when asked why he refused to serve, “we believe in our consciences, that our acting in concert with a court so constituted… would be betraying the just and sacred rights of our native land… [which we need to preserve for] our posterity.”[7]
Without jurors, no cases could be heard, and the Royally-administered court system was brought to a standstill. The disruption of the royal administration of the colonies was now on a roll. Taxes would not be paid, tea would be tossed into the sea, British troops on the streets of Boston would be harassed and hassled.
It is easy to see in retrospect how the impeachment of Peter Oliver was the beginning, in so many ways, of the path towards a declaration of independence by the colonies from England, and the start of the American Revolution. But at the time, John Adams saw primarily two results from his impeachment efforts: the American colonists had come together to declare that their rights were inviolate, and the taint of corruption, greed, and immoral behavior would not be tolerated; and his law practice dried up. After all, with no courts in session, his legal work fizzled. He would soon find other activities to fill his time.
This post is a modified excerpt from my new book, American Rebels: How the Hancock, Adams, and Quincy Families Fanned the Flames of Revolution, coming out in March 2020. | https://medium.com/nina-sankovitch/americas-first-impeachment-84bd26c5042e | ['Nina Sankovitch'] | 2020-08-04 17:11:18.281000+00:00 | ['American History', 'My Books', 'Politics', 'Impeachment', 'John Adams'] |
How to Get Maximum Value With Antique Furniture | Antique furniture is a collectible interior furnishing of considerable age, which may be classified according to its age, rarity, condition, utility, or other unique features which make it piece of furniture desirable as a collectors’ item. Vintage furniture is on-trend, and there are several reasons for its popularity.
If you love antiques and find it hard to know how or where to shop for them, you might be under the impression that you’ll just have to live without your dream vintage furniture. Antique furniture pieces reflect the style and features of the time they were made; this can be called the antique’s “period.”
Within the vintage category, pieces dating from the 1950s to 1980, are generally considered retro. Newer used pieces, those dating from the mid-1980s and later, are simply regarded as used furniture. All furniture in the mid-century modern style that has been popular since the first decade of the 21st century can be labeled as both vintage and retro.
Simply being old does not make any furniture vintage in the technical sense, even though most people use the term old and vintage interchangeably. To earn the title vintage, the piece should also be an example of what defined a particular style of that period. For example, an Eames chair is a good example of vintage (or retro) furniture of the mid-century modern era. The piece does not have to belong to a well-known line or the best-known manufacturer; it simply has to exhibit the best characteristics of that era.
Vintage pieces become less common as time goes by — even pieces that were once mass-produced and ubiquitous. As they grow more unusual, vintage pieces give your decor individuality and style, maybe even creating a “cool” factor that can’t be achieved when furnishing entirely with new pieces.
Since the vintage category covers furniture over several decades, you have two choices when decorating with vintage pieces. You can either choose pieces all from one vintage/retro era, such as mid-century modern, using them to re-create that style right down to the accessories; or you can carefully curate a collection of vintage pieces from different eras in a combination that makes a harmonious and cohesive look. If you combine pieces from several eras, make sure to tie the room together with color and a level of formality, so that even if the pieces are from different times, they all share certain visual elements.
You are being a friend to the planet when you buy vintage pieces. It is one of the most environmentally conscious methods of furnishing your home because you are preventing old furniture from going to the landfill. And furnishing with vintage pieces is healthier for your home because the furniture has already finished off-gassing whatever formaldehyde or other toxic substances are present in the finishes and glues. If these pieces need to be refinished, you can use non-toxic finishes.
If you appreciate fine-quality furniture but your budget is limited, buying vintage pieces gives you the ability to indulge your fondness for the better things in life. Vintage pieces are less expensive than buying new furniture of the same quality. You may also find that older furniture was better made and used finer materials than new pieces costing many times more.
Furniture often gets little use, which makes the “vintage” seem more authentic or “classic old fashioned”. Garden furniture of the cottage style find their way into the interior of the home and are used as cosmetics chairs and side chairs in the bedroom or dressing room.
Finding Help with Moving Professionals
We hope you found this blog post How to Get Maximum Value With Antique Furniture useful. Be sure to check out our post Is Antique Dying? The State of Antique Furniture Today for more great information!
Planning a move? With All Around Moving you don’t need to worry about any unexpected charges. We are always upfront about our prices and take pride in taking care of every need of our customers before and during the move. For a stress-free move where you don’t need to take care of anything contact us today! We are “A+” rated members of the Better Business Bureau and a member of Greater New York and Miami Dade Chambers of Commerce.
Discover how uniquely priced we are compared to other moving companies in New York, NY & Miami, Florida. Get a moving quote specifically tailored to your moving needs by calling us TODAY! | https://medium.com/@allaroundmoving-com/how-to-get-maximum-value-with-antique-furniture-ac30aa2d45e7 | ['All Around Moving'] | 2021-01-24 16:01:43.606000+00:00 | ['Antique', 'Antique Furniture', 'Home', 'Vintage', 'Values'] |
Cambodia’s Rich Cultural History — 8 Excursions That Will Leave You Breathless | No trip to Southeast Asia is complete without a stop in beautiful Cambodia. Although this tiny country is only slightly bigger than the state of Missouri, it offers enough to do to justify a trip all on its own. Located in the southern portion of the Indochinese peninsula, its lush tropical vegetation and beautiful beaches offer holidaymakers a slice of paradise.
For those interested in past civilizations, Cambodia was home to the Khmer Empire for six centuries. It was a period of incredible artistry and technical achievements, of which there is still much evidence. UNESCO has recognized three extensive sites as World Heritage Sites. Additionally, the organization has inscribed five elements of Cambodian culture as Intangible Human Heritage to be safeguarded.
Here is more information about eight excursions you can take in Cambodia that will amaze you:
1. The Angkor Complex
The Angkor Complex houses 259 temples in a forested area of 400 square kilometers near Siem Reap in the north of Cambodia. It was recognized as a World Heritage Site in1992.
Photo by Paul Szewczyk on Unsplash
The complex was the former capital of the Khmer empire, and the temples demonstrate how the culture blended local heritage with early Indian influences from Buddhist and Hindu religions. The site encompasses the entire range of Khmer art from the 9th to the 14th centuries.
The temples are built of brick and stone intricately carved with faces and scenes. The carvings depict religious and mythological elements, as well as the everyday life of the times. The most notable of the temples is Angkor Wat, the Bayon Temple at Angkor Thom, and the Ta Prohm temple, which is overgrown by jungle.
2. Preah Vihear Temple
Preah Vihear Temple was built in the 9th century to honor Shiva, but most of the structures were built later in the 11th and 12th centuries. The temple’s markings include images of Suryavarman II performing religious rituals. It was recognized as a World Heritage Site in 2008.
The temple is located on the top of Dindrik Mountain, near the Thai-Cambodian border. Visitors must enter from Thailand as the Cambodian side consists of an inaccessible cliff face. Visitors should check that borders between the countries are open.
3. Temple Zone of Sambor Prei Kuk
The Sambor Prei Kuk temple complex, also known as “the shrine in the jungle,” dates to the 6th and 7th centuries. The ruins are the former capital of the ancient Chenla empire. The site is Cambodia’s most recent World Heritage Site and was recognized in 2017.
The site is located in Phnom Penh in Kampong Thom Province about 109 miles east of Angkor. The structures making up the complex were built at different times using brick and sandstone. There are some unusual features such as octagonal towers and ponds, animal sculptures, and more.
4. Royal Ballet
UNESCO recognized the Cambodian Royal Ballet as a World Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2008. Also referred to as Khmer classical dance, it originated with this civilization and has been in existence for over a millennium. It is ideally performed with the accompaniment of an orchestra. Routines were performed during royal celebrations such as marriages and coronations.
Traditional dances feature four characters representing Neayrong (Man), Woman (Neang), Giant (Yeak), and Monkey (Sva). Costumes are a spectacular display of gold and silver, and the performances cover every range of emotion. The Royal Cambodian Dance Company travels extensively, but a home performance is all the more magical.
5. Sbek Thom, Khmer Shadow Theatre
Sbek Thom is a shadow puppet theater tradition featuring giant “cut-out-patterned” leather puppets. The puppets are controlled by bamboo sticks moved by dancers to traditional music and stories told by two narrators. The shadows, or silhouettes, are projected onto the white screen.
The ancient tradition is regarded as sacred and only performed on specific occasions such as the Khmer New Year or the King’s birthday. The practice was almost eradicated completely under the repressive Khmer Rouge regime. But fortunately, some puppets and performers survived, and three theatres have been revived. Performances take place outdoors at night and can last several nights. Sbek Thom was also recognized in 2008 as a World Intangible Cultural Heritage.
6. Tugging Rituals and Games
Traditional “tug-o-war” games emphasize the need for cooperation and social unity. They celebrate the start of agricultural seasons and symbolize the power of nature, and are held in front of village temples. The tradition involves the entire community and was recognized as an Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2015.
7. Chapei Dang Veng
Chapei Dang Veng is Cambodia’s traditional music. It centers around the chapei (a form of lute) combined with song. The lyrics involve poetry and folk tales but also satire. So, to become an accomplished chapei player requires wit and storytelling capabilities in addition to musicality.
Chapei players tend to be men, but there’s no impediment to women who wish to play. It was a tradition passed between generations within families, but was almost wiped out by the Khmer Rouge regime. It was recognized as an Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2016.
8. Lkhon Khol Wat Svay Andet
Lkhon Khol Wat Svay Andet was recognized by UNESCO in 2018 and is the most recently inscribed Intangible Cultural Heritage of Cambodia. It is practiced only by the Wat Svay Andet Buddhist monastery community near Phnom Penh on the Mekong River.
Photo by Taylor Simpson on Unsplash
The traditional performance by masked men is accompanied by an orchestra and melodious recitation. It facilitates interactions between the community and the Neak Ta (guardian spirits). The practice is designed to bring prosperity to the community, its lands, and harvest. The tradition is threatened by economic migration, lack of resources, and the breaks caused by war and the Khmer Rouge regime.
An Opportunity to Contribute to Continuity
Observations of historical architectural sites are undoubtedly enriched by the experience of live performances dating back to the civilizations they represent. Visitors to Cambodia have the unique privilege of contributing to the maintenance of treasured cultural traditions through their patronage. | https://medium.com/@dgeithner/cambodias-rich-cultural-history-8-excursions-that-will-leave-you-breathless-dc4b3930a997 | ['David Geithner'] | 2021-05-03 20:07:43.137000+00:00 | ['Vacation', 'Cambodia', 'Adventure', 'Holiday', 'Tourism'] |
Containers vs. Serverless | Photo by James Harrison on Unsplash
Why is this important?
I want to tell you about the pros and cons of managing your own containers versus letting serverless do it for you. The tribal warfare needs to stop. Let’s just agree on a couple of facts. Both technologies have awesome use-cases and valid pain points. I just want to tell you when to use what.
In response to this, there are several factors to take into account. The main, most prominent, is indeed development speed and time-to-market for startups. But, once you dig down there are several important factors to think about, like complex deployment scenarios and the time it takes to deploy your application. Vendor lock-in is another key point you need to think about, even though I’d argue it’s not that big of an issue. The cost is though. If you’re responsible for paying the infrastructure bills at the end of the month you’ll care about how much you’re spending.
Ready to learn something new? Let’s get started.
What are containers?
Let’s be short and sweet. Containers are isolated, stateless environments. A container is a lightweight, stand-alone, executable package of a piece of software that includes everything needed to run it, including code, runtime, system tools, system libraries, settings, etc.
By containerizing the application and its dependencies, differences in OS distributions and underlying infrastructure are abstracted away.
I like to say that it’s like a tiny virtual machine, but not really. Most developers understand the concept of virtual machines. We are used to running apps in virtual machines. They simulate a real machine and have everything a real machine has. Well, running an app inside a container is the same, except for a couple of important architectural differences. Mainly that containers run on the same operating system kernel. Let me show you…
Here you can see a nice overview. Virtual machines use something called a hypervisor. It manages every virtual machine on a host. And as you can see every VM has its own operating system. While containers share the host operating system. Making containers significantly smaller and much faster to create and delete.
Container pros and cons
When comparing containers to serverless, based on your developer background and personal profile, the advantages and drawbacks may not be the same. However, I believe a set amount can be agreed upon, with keeping both camps happy.
Using containers means you won’t have any auto-scaling by default. It’s something you need to set up yourself. Luckily, vendor-specific tools like AWS Auto Scaling make it rather painless. The advantage here is that you have full control of your resources, and you are in charge of the scaling, meaning you can theoretically have infinite scalability. Well, as close as your provider allows you.
All the control and power you have does indeed show a major drawback — the complexity it introduces. You need to learn about the ecosystem and the various tools at your disposal. For many, it’s a steep learning curve, because ultimately you’re the one deploying and managing the application. In having more freedom and control, you must submit to the fact it will be complex with various moving parts. Sadly this introduces more cost. After all, you’re paying for the resources all the time, no matter whether you have traffic or not.
Not everything is that bad though. Awesome benefits are the many monitoring and debugging tools you have at your disposal. The ecosystem is so evolved you won’t have any issues setting up the necessary tools. Last of all, with containers your team will have the same development environment no matter which operating system they’re using. That just makes it incredibly easy for larger teams to be efficient.
Container use cases
The use-cases for containerized applications are significantly wider than with serverless. Mainly because you can, with little to no fuss, refactor existing monolithic applications to container-based setups. But, to get maximum benefit, you should split up your monolithic application into individual microservices. They’ll be deployed as individual containers which you’ll configure to talk to each other.
Among the usual application you’ll use containers for are Web APIs, machine learning computations, and long-running processes. In short, whatever you already use traditional servers for would be a great candidate to be put into a container. When you’re already paying for the servers no matter the load, make sure to really use them. “Pedal to the metal” would be a fitting term.
Deploy a containerized Node.js app to a Kubernetes cluster on AWS
There will be a couple steps we need to focus on, first of all creating a container image and pushing it to a repository. After that, we need to create a Kubernetes cluster and write the configuration files for our containers. The last step will be deploying everything to the cluster and making sure it works.
Ready? Take a breath or two, this will be a handful.
Note: Make sure to have Docker installed on your machine in order to be able to run the commands below.
1. Creating a container image
Here’s what a simple Node.js/Express application looks like.
// app.js
const express = require('express')
const app = express()
app.get('/', async (req, res, next) => {
res.status(200).send('Hello World!')
})
app.listen(3000, () => console.log('Server is running on port 3000'))
Pretty familiar, right? Creating an image from this is rather simple. First, we need a Dockerfile.
# Dockerfile
FROM node:alpine # Create app directory
WORKDIR /usr/src/app # COPY package.json .
# For npm@5 or later, copy package-lock.json as well
COPY package.json package-lock.json ./ # Install app dependencies
RUN npm install # Bundle app source
COPY . . EXPOSE 3000 # Start Node server
CMD [ "npm", "start" ]
This will configure what our image will look like, the dependencies to install, what port it will expose and which command to run once a container is created.
Time to build the image.
$ docker build . -t <docker_hub_username>/<image_name>
This command will take a while if you haven’t built the image before. Once it’s done, you can push it to the container repository. I’ll show you Docker Hub, but you can use whichever you want.
$ docker push <docker_hub_username>/<image_name>
Note: Make sure to authenticate yourself before running this command. Run the $ docker login command.
Once you push the image, your Docker Hub profile will list the image. It’ll look something like this.
With step one wrapped up, you have made the image available for pulling to a Kubernetes cluster of choice. Time to create a cluster.
2. Create the Kubernetes cluster
The easiest way to get up and running quickly with Kubernetes on AWS is a tool called KOPS. It’s a CLI for creating and managing your infrastructure resources.
After installing KOPS you’ll have access to the CLI commands for interacting with Kubernetes clusters. Here’s a set of commands to get a cluster up-and-running quickly.
$ export ORGANIZATION_NAME=your-org-name # create state store
$ export BUCKET_NAME=${ORGANIZATION_NAME}-state-store
$ aws s3api create-bucket \
--bucket ${BUCKET_NAME} \
--region eu-central-1 \
--create-bucket-configuration LocationConstraint=eu-central-1
$ aws s3api put-bucket-versioning \
--bucket ${BUCKET_NAME} \
--versioning-configuration Status=Enabled # create cluster
$ export KOPS_CLUSTER_NAME=${ORGANIZATION_NAME}.k8s.local
$ export KOPS_STATE_STORE=s3://${BUCKET_NAME} # define cluster configuration
$ kops create cluster \
--master-count=1 --master-size=t2.micro \
--node-count=1 --node-size=t2.micro \
--zones=eu-central-1a \
--name=${KOPS_CLUSTER_NAME} # if you want to edit config
$ kops edit cluster --name ${KOPS_CLUSTER_NAME} # apply and create cluster
$ kops update cluster --name ${KOPS_CLUSTER_NAME} --yes # validate cluster is running
$ kops validate cluster
Once the cluster is running you can create configuration files for deploying your container image.
3. Deploy the container image
Now we’re getting to the Kubernetes specific stuff. With the kubectl command you’ll create your Kubernetes resources. You’ll need a deployment and a service, to get started quickly. To make it easier let’s create two YAML files. One for the deployment and one for the service.
# node-deployment.yml
apiVersion: apps/v1 # for versions before 1.9.0 use apps/v1beta2
kind: Deployment
metadata:
name: node
spec:
selector:
matchLabels:
app: node
tier: backend
replicas: 9
template:
metadata:
labels:
app: node
tier: backend
spec:
containers:
- name: node
image: <docker_hub_username>/<image_name>
ports:
- containerPort: 3000
strategy:
type: RollingUpdate
rollingUpdate:
maxSurge: 1
maxUnavailable: 1
The deployment will create pods, replica-sets and make sure they work as they should, while the service exposes the deployment to external traffic.
# node-service.yml
apiVersion: v1
kind: Service
metadata:
name: node
labels:
app: node
tier: backend
spec:
type: LoadBalancer
ports:
- port: 80
targetPort: 3000
selector:
app: node
tier: backend
Now you can run the kubectl command.
$ kubectl apply -f node-deployment.yml
$ kubectl apply -f node-service.yml
This will create the pods, replica-sets, deployment, and service. Awesome. You can now see the app running. Ideally, the whole process would be automated in a CI/CD pipeline once you make a push to your code repository. But still, the process is painstakingly long even for someone who has done it before.
Let’s see how serverless compares.
Note: Here’s a GitHub repo where you can check out this configuration. Give it a star if you want more people to see it.
What is serverless?
In terms of definitions, serverless is often assumed to be Function as a Service (FaaS). That’s not entirely true. Serverless is so much more. It should be viewed as an event based system for running code. Meaning, you use various services to create business logic without caring about any servers. You’re abstracting away the infrastructure altogether. Perfect examples can be hosting static websites on S3, using serverless databases like DynamoDB or Aurora Serverless, and of course, running code without managing servers with Lambda.
Serverless is great if you have sudden traffic spikes which need to be detected and handled instantly. The application is even completely shut down if there’s no traffic at all. You only pay for the resources you use. No usage, no costs.
Serverless pros and cons
The first thing that comes to mind when you mention serverless is the fact that you don’t have to manage any infrastructure. There are no operating system updates to install, no security patches, no worries, because the provider handles it for you. Making it much simpler than managing your own infrastructure and clusters. Magic comes with a price, nevertheless. The ease of adding observability to your app with Kubernetes does not apply to serverless. There are only a few viable 3rd party solutions, like Dashbird, IOPipe or Datadog.
For many of my fellow developers, the awesomeness comes with auto-scaling. It’s enabled by default. You don’t have to configure anything, it just works. Because your application shuts down entirely if there’s no traffic, it can be incredibly cheap. But everything is not that great. You will have to live with defined limits for processing power and memory, pushing you to write more efficient code because of the risk to overload your functions, if they grow too large. This can also cause the dreaded nightmare called latency. 😞
Regarding latency, FaaS solutions suffer from what are called cold-starts. The initial invocation of a function will take around a second or two for the container spin up. If this is a problem, you should reconsider using FaaS.
However, deployment simplicity is what makes serverless incredible. You deploy the code to your provider and it works. No Dockerfiles or Kubernetes configurations. Your time-to-market will be amazing, something startups value more than anything else.
Serverless use-cases
I believe you can already draw your own conclusions about the use-cases from reading the pros and cons. Serverless is awesome for microservice architectures. These can be simple web APIs or task runners. The ephemeral nature of serverless functions makes them ideal for processing data streams or images.
You can also use them as Cron jobs where you schedule a function to run at a specific time every day. No need to have a server run all the time for a background task that runs every once in a while. Keep in mind FaaS is viable only for short-running processes. The maximum time an AWS Lambda function can run is 15 minutes. If you have some heavy computing tasks, I’d suggest you use a container-based setup instead.
Deploy a serverless Node.js app to AWS
Would you be surprised there are significantly fewer steps in deploying a Node.js app to a serverless environment? I’d sure hope you wouldn’t.
With the Serverless Framework, you can simplify the development process of serverless applications by miles. You configure all resources in a file called serverless.yml. It’ll essentially be converted into a CloudFormation template, get deployed to AWS and create all the resources you specified. The code itself gets packaged into a .zip file and uploaded to S3. From there it’ll be deployed to Lambda.
The magic of the Serverless Framework lies in the automated process of creating resources and deploying code all in one step. Let me show you.
Note: I assume you have installed and configured the required framework modules and IAM roles for this to work. If not, check this out to get started.
# Framework
$ npm i -g serverless
# Express.js router proxy module
$ npm i serverless-http
1. Configure the serverless resources
Here’s what the same Node.js/Express would look like with minor edits to work with AWS Lambda.
// app.js
const express = require('express')
const sls = require('serverless-http')
const app = express()
app.get('/', async (req, res, next) => {
res.status(200).send('Hello World!')
})
module.exports.server = sls(app)
The only difference is that you’re passing it to the serverless-http module. Moving on, I want to give you insight into the actual resources we need, let’s check out a sample serverless.yml file.
# serverless.yml
service: express-sls-app provider:
name: aws
runtime: nodejs8.10
stage: dev
region: eu-central-1 functions:
app:
handler: app.server
events:
- http:
path: /
method: ANY
- http:
path: /{proxy+}
method: ANY
We’ll deploy an app function with the function handler pointing to the server method in the app.js file. The event trigger for this function will be an HTTP request to any path. The actual routing will be handled inside the Express app, so we can just add the {proxy+} setting.
2. Deploy the serverless resources
Guess what, deploying it all to AWS takes just one command.
$ serverless deploy
Creating a viable CI/CD pipeline for running a single command is significantly more simple than the wild jungle of container commands.
Note: Here’s a GitHub repo where you can check out this configuration. Give it a star if you want more people to see it.
Conclusion
What are the key takeaways here? When to choose what? I’d urge you to choose containers and container orchestrators, like Kubernetes, when you need flexibility and full control of your system, or when you need to migrate legacy services.
Choosing serverless is better when you need faster development speed, auto-scaling, and significantly lower runtime costs. Serverless also ties into legacy systems as support services that are developed apart from the main codebase to handle specific issues or business logic. The Serverless Framework helps you in this regard quite significantly.
With containers, monitoring and proper alerting have already matured enough with tools like Prometheus, while serverless is lagging behind. The most mature tool on the market right now is Dashbird.
There are a few amazing articles in the serverless community you can check out. All of them explain the benefits of both technologies and why the petty squabbles between the container and serverless tribes make no sense whatsoever. I’d suggest you check them out!
If you want to read some of my previous serverless musings head over to my profile or join my serverless newsletter!
I had an absolute blast writing this article, hope you guys and girls enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you liked it, slap that tiny unicorn so more people here on dev.to will see this article. Until next time, be curious and have fun. | https://medium.com/@akira-ito0116/containers-vs-serverless-528356a1552e | ['Akira Ito'] | 2020-12-21 18:17:33.478000+00:00 | ['Container Images', 'AWS', 'Kubernetes Cluster', 'DevOps', 'Serverless'] |
How worried should you be of contracting COVID-19 after being fully vaccinated? | It turns out that how we perceive risk, hazard, and outrage is at the core of the COVID-19 pandemic and our response to it. Consider 62-year old Edward who is at higher risk for COVID-19. He has spent the last 16 months following the recommended public health measures of masking and distancing. Now that he has been fully vaccinated, he figures he is more protected, but not enough to change his habits. Living in downtown Toronto, Edward wants to avoid large crowds, so he typically goes for walks late at night. Edward thinks that he has made a smart decision to protect himself.
But according to the data, Edward’s choice is not smart at all. The risk of being murdered on the street late at night (1 in 19000) versus dying of COVID-19 after being fully vaccinated (1 in 127000) isn’t even close. In fact, Edward is nearly twice as likely to be murdered on the street than be hospitalized with COVID, let alone die from it.
Data from the CDC and FBI. See the notes at the end of the article for context.
So why do we fear contracting COVID-19 more than being murdered on the street? Both viruses and murder are caused by other people; staying far away from others will mitigate risk. While we tend to think that avoiding dangerous strangers will keep us safe, the data shows that the majority of homicides are committed by someone you know (one’s best friend instead of a stranger on the street). Murders also don’t inspire the same outrage as COVID-19 because of the familiarity factor; we don’t have daily counters and graphs of the number of homicides and the homicide rate has not changed dramatically over time.
However, unlike a murderer, COVID-19 can come from anyone; there aren’t sick people who purposefully set out to infect you. The stranger on the street is just as likely to infect you as your best friend, and neither of them have the intention to do so. The thought of a stranger passively infecting you with a virus that might put you in hospital on life support, fill your lungs will fluid, and eventually kill you is outrageous. | https://medium.com/@willassad/how-worried-should-you-be-of-contracting-covid-19-after-being-fully-vaccinated-79b26dd9049 | ['Will Assad'] | 2021-08-07 15:43:36.091000+00:00 | ['Covid Vaccine', 'Covid-19', 'Risk', 'Masks'] |
My Day in a Soup Kitchen by Rudee Mae Carnaje | 02.02.2020 — people say that dates like these are special and rarely occur in the calendar. Well, I totally agree because on this date, I had one of the most rewarding experiences of my life.
The eruption of Taal Volcano last January 12, 2020 has affected and displaced countless families in Batangas and, as an immediate response, a lot of individuals and organizations came to their aid. For one, our company, John Clements Consultants (JC), adopted an evacuation center and built a soup kitchen for 2,000 evacuees. And so, on January 25, 2020, together with 50 of my colleagues, our families and friends, I went to Tanauan Batangas to participate in JC’s initiative of sponsoring warm, prepared meals for a day. It was heartwarming and truly inspiring!
Coincidentally, one of my closest friends asked me for help with relief operations and, to be honest, how it all unfolded came as a surprise. Everything started small — we just had about 20,000 pesos in funds and less than 10 volunteers. Surprisingly, we ended up sponsoring a feast for 3,000 people, with 20 volunteers! We cooked and prepared breakfast — rice, tuyo, scrambled eggs with tomatoes; lunch/dinner — rice, dinuguan, adobo, estofado, fish burgers, and the star of the menu — salmon sinigang.
It was February 2, 2020 and I would be meeting most of the volunteers for the first time. These were professionals, mostly CPAs (the profession I turned my back from),who are on top of their game. At first, I felt really nervous. How can a bunch of millennials pull this off? When our company did it, everything had been planned and laid out well — we met two hours a day for almost a week to make sure everything was clear. When it was our turn, I couldn’t stop thinking about all the things that could possibly go wrong. I worried that everything might turn into a disaster. I had so many questions. Are they going to listen? Are they willing to wash dishes? Would they even trust me and follow my lead?
But I was amazed by their initiative, flexibility, and passion. I expected worse things to happen, yet everything ran smoothly, organized, and so close to perfection. They seriously looked like veterans, considering that most of them also just did this for the first time. They were so hardworking that I needed to beg them to eat and stay hydrated. People kept asking which company, association, foundation, or government unit we’re from and they were always shocked to hear our answer — “We’re just a bunch of friends enjoying what we’re doing.”
My key takeaway from this experience is that you don’t have to be rich, an owner of a company, or even wait to be in your 30s to take action, especially when it comes to social issues. As long as you have the drive and determination to accomplish something, whatever it may be, you can succeed! We may be millennials, who have just starting our careers and earning a decent amount of money, but wow! Who would have thought that we were capable of feeding 3,000 people? Until now, I still feel like I’m on cloud nine! I am proud and happy to have done this with the help of my family and friends. I am looking forward to another opportunity to be able to bring joy and comfort to others. | https://medium.com/the-looking-glass/my-day-in-a-soup-kitchen-by-rudee-mae-carnaje-408f3aeeb1c4 | ['Shiela Manalo'] | 2020-02-21 11:56:52.321000+00:00 | ['Philippines', 'Helping Others', 'Volunteering', 'Charity', 'Advocacy'] |
K-means Clustering Clearly explained | K-means Clustering Clearly explained
We have taken a look at linear and logistic regression and how to implement both algorithms in Python. These algorithms are examples of supervised machine learning algorithms since they take a final value output. We will now go on to look at our first unsupervised machine learning algorithm for this series.
Please consider watching this video if any section of this article is unclear:
Video Link
What is K-means clustering?
K-means clustering is an unsupervised machine learning algorithm, where its job is to find clusters within data. We can then use these clusters identified by the algorithm to make predictions for which group or cluster a new observation belongs to.
Overview
Imagine we recorded some data and made a scatter plot:
The job of K-means clustering is to identify clusters or groups within the data:
This is useful since if we were to record a new observation, we can identify which group this observation most likely belongs to through k-means clustering.
The Algorithm
Step 1:
Choose the number of clusters or groups (k) you wish to put the data into, let us choose 3.
We will later discuss a method in which the computer can find the best number of clusters for us.
Step 2:
Randomly initialise k points, the are called centroids.
Step 3:
Identify the points closest to each centroid:
Step 4:
Calculate the mean distance our centroid is away from each point in each cluster and move our centroid to that position.
Step 5:
Repeat steps 3 and 4 until the mean of the points in each cluster remains the same:
We have successfully identified the three clusters in our algorithm. But this may not always be the case:
Sometimes we have an initialisation of centroids (Step 2) that results in clusters that seem wrong. For example:
To prevent this from happening we ensure we do many random initializations .
. To choose which resulting clusters from our many random initializations suit our data best we look at the objective function.
The Objective Function
To objective function is given by the following formula:
In this formula we are:
Looping over all centroids Calculating the distance each centroid is away from the data points in its cluster Squaring and summing these distances
For each random initialization we choose the final clusters produced with the lowest objective function value. So in the following case:
We would choose the clusters produced from random initialization 1 since this produces the smaller objective function value. In general, for more data, we would do more random initializations. Other initialization methods, which improve the efficiency of the algorithm can be read here: Link.
Choosing the number of clusters
From the above graphs, it was clear to see that 3 clusters seemed suitable for our data. Sometimes this is less obvious, for example how many clusters should we choose for the following data?
It is important to note that in general:
The more clusters or centroids we include, the less the overall objective function value.
the overall objective function value. If our number of clusters or centroids is equal to our number of data points, then this would produce an objective function value of 0. This is because we would have enough centroids to place on every data point.
The Elbow Method
To decide how many clusters k to include we plot our objective function values also known as intertia, against number of clusters K. We may get a result that looks like this for some dataset:
To find the optimal number of clusters, we select the value of K at the elbow of the graph. This is the point just before the inertia (objective function) starts decreasing linearly. So from the above graph we would choose 3 clusters.
Considerations of K-means clustering
Advantages
Simple and quick to implement
Works well on large datasets
Adapts well to new examples (data points)
Easy to interpret
Disadvantages
Must select number of clusters K manually which is time consuming
Clusters are effected heavily by outliers.
Different random centroid initializations may give different clusters — requires many initializations.
In the next episode we will be implementing K-means clustering to a real-life dataset using Python.
Summary | https://ai.plainenglish.io/k-means-clustering-clearly-explained-4b61d013ed46 | ['Mazen Ahmed'] | 2020-12-12 22:00:56.330000+00:00 | ['Unsupervised Learning', 'Clustering', 'K Means', 'AI', 'Machine Learning'] |
Handling stress as a full-time caregiver | by: E.B. Johnson
Life throws a lot of curve balls our way, and there are few events least expected than becoming the full-time caregiver of a partner or a parent. It’s not really a role we think about much as we’re growing up, or falling in love with someone. Blame it on our humanity. It’s much easier to stay focused on the positive, instead of preparing for a future we’d rather not imagine.
Although you didn’t plan for it, you may have found yourself caring for a loved one who is no longer able to care for themselves in a full way. This is one of the most noble roles we can take on, and it transforms us (and our compassion) in innumerable ways. Being the full -time carer of someone is not an easy task, however. If we don’t also take care of ourselves, we can wind up burnt out, miserable, and broken in our own ways.
Caring for self is caring for others.
Becoming someone’s caregiver is a hard choice that is sometimes made out of necessity and always out of love. We have to care for someone deeply to take care of someone on such a real level. After all, taking care of ourselves is a full-time job on its own and one that many of us struggle with. There are few things more noble than committing to being there for someone in this way, but it’s a hard road to travel…especially when you don’t look after yourself well.
In order to be the best possible caretaker we can for our loved ones, we have to remember to love and care for ourselves. As caretakers, we are responsible for both someone else’s welfare and our own. Just because you’ve committed to putting things like a job on hold doesn’t mean you can stop taking care of your body and your spirit.
Failing to commit to a self-care routine, or failing to ask for help, can result in a serious level of burnout that’s hard to overcome. When we burnout, we become emotionally volatile and physically weak. We can’t be as present as we need to be for our loved one, because we’re not even present inside. There’s nothing wrong with taking time for yourself and recharging. It’s the only way, in fact, that you can last for the long-haul and ensure that your loved one has the care they need to lead a happy life.
Undeniable signs of caregiver burnout.
Are you beginning to lose interest in the things you once loved? Are you diving into risky behavior in order to hide unhappiness, or even just to keep your head above water? You could be experiencing caregiver burnout. If you want to keep helping the one you love, you have to confront it and find ways to work through it.
Losing interest in joy
What is your life like on a day-to-day basis? A great deal of your time will be spent looking after your loved one, but what do you do for yourself? Do you still have things that you’re passionate about? Hobbies you pursue? Losing interest in joy and the things (and people) we once loved is one of the most common and telling signs that we may be confronting caregiver burnout and a need to nurture our physical and emotional bodies.
Insomnia and sleep issues
Insomnia and sleep issues are a common sign of caregiver burnout. Think of stress and hardship as a computer program that’s frozen and just won’t close. Although you may have ordered the computer to shut down, it’s frantically trying to work through all its processes first so it can close out the program permanently. Your brain works the same. When you’re worried about something, it frantically works to resolve that thing, but it can’t. Your sleep becomes impacted as the cycles in your brain increase anxiety and activity.
Increased risky behavior
Have you noticed any new behaviors in yourself since becoming a caregiver? As the stress mounts, have you increased your spontaneous purchasing? What about gambling, drinking, or recreational drug use? There are all kinds of risky behavior we can find ourselves getting involved with as we fall into a burnout spiral. We might use these activities to numb or distract ourselves, but they rarely work long and leave us with even bigger problems to resolve.
Dramatic changes in appetite
Stress isn’t something which simply lives in the mind. It lives in the body too. As the cortisol in your system builds up, you can notice a number of physical reactions and responses. Namely, you may experience changes in appetite such as a loss of appetite or a dramatic new hunger which is hard to quell. This inability to eat (or tendency to overeat) wreaks havoc on our bodies, our relationships, and our lives.
Feelings of hopelessness
Feelings of hopelessness and anxiety are a common sign of caregiver burnout, and one which can be devastating if ignored. You’re carrying a heavy load, and there’s not always a lot of reward on the other side. As these negative feelings add up, they start to affect your mental health in ways that will do nothing to improve your ability to care for your loved one. Depression sets in and your job becomes that much more difficult. Happiness helps you thrive, no matter where you are.
Dramatic overreactions
Our moods go a long way to dictate the quality of our lives and the quality of our relationships too. When you walk around in a good mood, you experience a greater amount of positive feedback from your environment — and it feels good. Bad moods, however, elicit a slightly different effect. The constant stress of caring for someone else can lead to shifts in mood, which in turn lead to dramatic over-reactions and blowups which can push others away.
Strange shifts in personality
What is your personality like? Have you (or others) noticed a dramatic change since you shifted into a full-time care-giving role? The stress and responsibility is a heavy load to bear, and it changes not only physically but mentally and emotionally too. A once bright and cheerful personality can become something entirely different when you learn to see the world through the eyes of disability and chronic illness.
How to beat the burnout and deal with your stress.
There is no shame in becoming rundown by the pressures of your role. It’s a tough place to inhabit, and not one that everyone can manage. You need to be kind to yourself and start caring for yourself just as much as you care for the other person in your life. Self-care will transform you from the inside out, but you have to commit to it consistently.
1. Reshape your view of self-care
Take a second to think through your self-care routine. How often do you take time out for yourself? Do you leave the house on your own? Regularly have time to be quiet and present with your feelings? We all need time to rest and recharge ourselves physically and emotionally. It’s the way our bodies are wired. You have to take time out of your schedule to nurture both your physical body and your internal emotional world.
Reshape your view of self-care. It’s not selfish to take a step back and take some time for yourself. It’s not self-centered or wrong to ask someone else to take over your duties for even 15 minutes so you can walk away, quiet your mind, and quickly re-center and process.
Self-care doesn’t have to be a trip to the spa. It doesn’t have to cost you a lot of money, or even take up a lot of your time. The perfect self-care routine is one which we can do daily or weekly, in no more than 15 minutes (though you can take as much time as you wish). Write in your journal before bed. Take a bubble bath every Sunday night. All it needs to do is help you relax and re-balance your inner sense of calm and energy.
2. Set some self-care goals and routines
If you’re new to the self-care game, then you may need to take some time really thinking about what a self-care routine looks like to you. Before diving into the deep end, you need to look inward and really consider what’s going on. Where are you feeling most burnt out? Is it your energy levels in general? Are their feelings of sadness, resentment, or anxiety involved?
Look at yourself and then use that to set some self-care goals which will then help you establish a routine. If you’re simply physically tired, perhaps you’ll set yourself a goal of getting a 20–30 minute nap at lunchtime every day. If your emotions are running high, maybe you’re looking for a goal of finding someone to talk to once a week.
There’s no right or wrong way to go about setting these goals. They are all unique to you and your specific circumstances. Be honest with yourself and don’t try to start out with anything too complex or grandiose. If your self-care is running every day, don’t sign up for a marathon when you haven’t even run around the block in a decade. Look for little ways you can improve your internal happiness slowly, each day (or every week).
3. Limit what’s getting in the way
Figuring out what you need and then setting up a routine, you may find that you come up against some barriers and setbacks. Maybe your schedule isn’t as fixed as it once was, or perhaps you struggle to get up (or going to bed) the 15 minutes earlier. When it comes to setting ourselves a new habit of any kind, we should always seek to make things as easy as possible on ourselves. By getting out of our own way, we find our self-care routines thrive.
Keep a journal of your self-care time and write down any instance in when your self-care routine slips. Why didn’t you take that time before bed? Why didn’t you go on that run, or call that friend? Look at the mistake and then work backward. What factors got in the way of your self-care success?
Identify the factors and then do what you can to limit them. If you set a goal of a morning run — but you regularly fail to meet that goal — perhaps the early starting time is the barrier for you. Rather than giving yourself another hurdle (waking up earlier than your body wants to) make it easier on yourself. What other time of the day can you run? What about a walk? It’s up to you. You can find a solution or you can continue to get in your own way.
4. Take it easy on yourself
Even if you do everything right and carve out tons of time for yourself, things are going to go wrong. You’re going to fall asleep before that massage you booked. You’re going to forget to write in your journal in the morning, or forget to do a meditation before you go to sleep. Mistakes happen and life moves fast. Sometimes there’s not enough time to get to your self-care routine. That’s okay.
Don’t break down every time you mess up with your self-care routine or fall back into your old patterns. We’re human. We can’t be perfect. It’s not possible. We all make mistakes and we all get things wrong. There simply aren’t enough hours in the day sometimes, and we have to put ourselves second.
Take it easy on yourself and keep looking forward. When you’re forced to prioritize the care of your partner or loved on over your own comfort, embrace it and accept it. Then, make a note to take some extra time for yourself once they are comfortable and ready again. While there may not be enough hours in the day, we have plenty more time ahead of us in which to nurture ourselves.
5. Find a way to ask for help
How often do you ask for help when you’re feeling low or like you can’t go on? Do you open up to others? Do you let them see the tired person who lurking beneath that shield of armor? Because make no mistake — breaking down, needing help, feeling like you can’t go on — these are not signs of weakness. You’ve already proven that you are one of the strongest people alive. These are simply signs of exhaustion, and even the greatest heroes needed rest.
If you are the sole caretaker of an elderly loved one, or someone who is chronically ill and disabled, then it’s important that you build up a support system. Beyond finding people who can support you emotionally, you need to find people who can help you with your loved one (even if that help is only sitting beside them while they sleep so you can take a quick nap).
Find people you can confide in. People who don’t judge you and people who open up their hearts to the fact that you’re hurting and in need of compassion. Let down those walls and let go of all those preconceived notions about the image you need to present to others, or the face you have to show to the world. Everyone around you can see that you are human, just like they are. Let them in and let them help you and the person you love.
Putting it all together…
Although we rarely plan to become the full-time caretaker of someone that we love, it’s a situation that occurs more often than we think. Caring for someone in such a complete way is taxing, and it can take a serious toll on our mental and physical health. In order to remain the best possible support we can, we have to make sure we are supporting ourselves and finding healthy ways to resolve our stress and burnout.
Change the way you see self-care and know that there is nothing self-centered or selfish in it. You can’t be the best caretaker if you are not the best version of yourself. You need to reground and recharge. Set yourself some self-care goals and then use those goals to design a routine you can lean into easily and without resistance. Limit the hurdles you have to jump to get some time to yourself and make it as easy as possible to commit to. Take it easy on yourself and remember — there’s going to be mistakes, setbacks, and times when you just can’t get away. That’s okay. Don’t be upset. Just give yourself some extra time later down the road. Hold compassion in your heart and build a support system you can lean on. The road you travel is hard, but it will transform you if you let it. | https://medium.com/lady-vivra/caregiver-stress-bd77cc652d5a | ['E.B. Johnson'] | 2020-12-10 09:29:53.856000+00:00 | ['Mental Health', 'Psychology', 'Family', 'Self', 'Nonfiction'] |
Is mining still profitable? | The Bitcoin exchange rate has ceased to be so attractive, then why is the business still interested in cryptocurrency mining?
Mining is not just cryptocurrency mining. It is an infrastructure organization to maintain the security of the asset registry of millions of independent users. Miners will always receive a reward for adding new blocks, and for verifying transactions in them. Cryptocurrency is simply “points” that can be obtained by contributing to the organization of network security. The cost of these “points” outside the system, of course, can vary, but “points” will always be awarded to miners.
Halving
Halving is a halving of remuneration for a newly found block every 4 years. Previously, it was 25 bitcoins, now 12.5, and in the middle of 2020 it will be, approximately, only 6.25, etc. Therefore, in order for such “shares” to motivate miners, taking into account the growing complexity of the network, their value should pay off both the equipment itself and the costs of its launch and maintenance. You can even calculate how the course should change to restore balance. That is why now there is such a demand for industrial equipment: everyone is trying to recoup capital investments, while the block reward is another 12.5 bitcoins.
Factors
This is perhaps the only industry where the demand for your product depends on a combination of a huge number of factors. Firstly, the speed of the chip. The faster the chip goes through the hashes, the faster you will get a reward from the network. Secondly, in the energy efficiency of the chip. In this case, the chip itself must perform calculations, practically without consuming electricity.
Next is heat dissipation. If this problem is not solved, it will be impossible to organize large data centers, and large production is necessary to reduce operating costs.
Another key factor is cost. Equipment should be inexpensive, large enough to minimize the cost of network equipment and maintenance, be extremely easy to repair and upgrade when new generations of chips come out (be able to upgrade).
And, of course, software. It is necessary to load the silicon chip with tasks as much as possible, monitor their implementation and bring the result to the pool as quickly as possible.
Long money
Creating large centers for processing transactions in a public blockchain network is essentially the same as building bridges, roads, and secure vaults. At the same time, the infrastructure also includes significant investments in electrical infrastructure, security systems, cooling and organization of processes for servicing the entire center. When investing in infrastructure, you should not wait for a return on investment for several months, however, a reward in the form of bitcoins for such a project will be much cheaper than buying someone else’s reward from the market. Another advantage of this approach is the significant benefit with each update of chip generations. It will be enough for a large investor only to replace hash fees, while maintaining and continuing to use all the previously created infrastructure. That is why costs and risks for a long period of time are always less among the creators of factory data centers.
Security as a Service
Bitcoin is just one of the applications, albeit the most commercially successful, which was implemented using blockchain software technology. But it was it that caused great interest in the practical application of cryptography and prompted a huge number of teams and companies in the world to offer their solutions to reduce costs, time, risks in a huge variety of business processes. Property registers, personal data, auctions, voting, supply of goods, distribution of financing — and in each project, the Bitcoin blockchain can serve as the most reliable “bunker” in the world, where you can save the checksum of any local (and therefore less secure) database, thus increasing its protection to the highest possible level without billions of investments in infrastructure.
MTCore Revolutionary Concept
One of the major factors affecting financial sustainability of the conventional mining systems is the high charge of powering the equipment, which in effect continues to increase the cost and lower the value of the digital currency. MTCore utilises BIDERATION software without added impingement of operational energy costs. Therefore, the viability of the digital currency is real face value. The BIDERATION software principal function is to deliver bids to the POB process and generate MTCore (digital coin). The BIDERATION system receives coded BIDS, which are then validated, through MTCore public wallet to the User Wallet.
Increased Financial Viability
The creators of MTCore have developed BIDERATION, which utilizes a new and revolutionary POB (Proof of Bid) software mining system. MTCore developers have made the BIDERATION process viable as a lower energy consumption system, making it a sustainable financial asset resource. For users, the benefit of this simple and very controllable mining method allows for accurate calculations thereby removing any unexpected outcome to the currency acquisition process.
Choose new revolutionary mining and profit with MTCore! | https://medium.com/@mtcore_/is-mining-still-profitable-7035fd2f6db0 | [] | 2020-03-17 23:44:57.697000+00:00 | ['Cryptocurrency', 'Blockchain', 'Trading', 'Mining'] |
4 Building Blocks to Construct an Effective Multi-Cloud Strategy | This post originally appeared on the Atrium blog. Authored by JOHN GORUP.
“There are these two young fish swimming along and they happen to meet an older fish,” David Foster Wallace said in his now-famous commencement speech to the Kenyon College graduating class of 2005. The fable continues: “The older fish nods at them and says ‘Morning, boys. How’s the water?’ And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes ‘What the hell is water?’”
As with any good fable, there is a lot to unpack here. But one deep truth from this story is that our minds quickly take for granted what is all around us.
This story came to mind when I started researching the current state of multi-cloud environments. It wasn’t long ago that cloud computing was considered novel, exciting, and risky. Today, cloud computing is just “computing.” A new programmer in today’s corporate world might be asked her opinion on multi-cloud strategy, and her response might be “What the hell is a multi-cloud strategy?” This is because multi-cloud is increasingly the environment enterprises live in today.
So What is a Multi-Cloud Strategy?
According to AVI Networks (now a part of VMWare), “a multi-cloud strategy allows companies to select different cloud services from different providers because some are better for certain tasks than others.”
As a basic definition, I think this is a good statement. However, the reason why an organization uses different clouds can be more complicated than the idea that some are simply better than others at certain tasks. Of course, a company may use Salesforce for their sales and service functions, while using Workday for HR and finance. But other clouds may come into play simply to avoid vendor lock-in, or because a company wants to build and use internal skills on a certain platform.
As for how common multi-cloud has become, multi-cloud is now the water IT professionals swim in. As a point of data, a survey Forrester conducted on behalf of Virtustream found that 86% of respondents described their organizations’ cloud strategy as multi-cloud. It’s easy to guess that the trend is only accelerating.
4 Building Blocks of a Multi-Cloud Strategy
Before an IT team starts enduring endless demos and whitepapers, it’s important to think about the basic building blocks of a multi-cloud strategy. The following four building blocks will help organizations construct a better cloud strategy.
1. Focusing On User Experience
Going back to the definition of a multi-cloud strategy, the core feature involves tasks. Except for automated tasks, a good deal of these tasks involve people: your employees, partners, and customers. Selecting the right cloud for the right task starts with the users. It begins with understanding their pain points and frustrations. Particular attention needs to be paid to the experience of new employees. How long does it take them to onboard and become fully productive? Does it take excessive training and reliance on tenured employees to complete tasks?
Look for the right cloud mix by starting with user needs, rather than the features and promised future features of cloud vendors.
2. Understanding Data Management Needs
Today there is a fever pitch to find the right AI tools to give employees actionable insights. While there are many great tools out in the market, especially Tableau and Salesforce Einstein, getting your data right should be an enterprise IT team’s highest priority.
A multi-cloud strategy requires teams to be able to identify sources and significance of data and to be aware of insight-killing data drift. Data drift occurs when there are data quality issues that start skewing sets of data. Simple input problems from users or automated processes can make huge differences, especially when machine learning turns this drifted data into actionable insights. Girish Pancha has written a good introduction on data drift and how it can impact informed decision-making.
3. Using Data Economically
Cloud platforms have gained popularity largely because of the underlying economics of the architecture. Concepts like multi-tenancy efficiency, server utilization costs, and the scale of giant data centers have been huge economic advantages over on-premise systems. That said, a multi-cloud environment can help organizations maximize the cost savings and trade-offs for the systems they use to run their business.
Coming out of the data management process, organizations should build a map of the most cost-effective ways to store their data. Snowflake, as a good example, is a platform that has been making waves in IT departments because it has made warehoused data more retrievable and useful.
4. Building a Center of Excellence Rather Than Mediocrity
Cloud platforms allow organizations to move faster and respond to changes faster than ever. That said, a multi-cloud environment needs a team that can operate at a multi-cloud speed. This has little to do with technology and has to do with methodology, organizational change management, and team structure. Agile practices need to be taken seriously and be built-in into how the organization makes decisions and performs actions. Change management should be a part of all technology decisions so that new features are absorbed by the users as seamlessly as possible.
With Elevate, Get Help from Multi-Cloud Experts
Finally, organizations need to understand their internal talent and when to get help from consultants. Consider a programmatic approach to management and optimization — like you get with our Elevate service. Building the human infrastructure to support a multi-cloud environment is as important as the platforms themselves.
Learn more about Elevate and how we can support your multi-cloud strategy. | https://medium.com/@atriumai/4-building-blocks-to-construct-an-effective-multi-cloud-strategy-6ed9eb456e1f | [] | 2021-05-03 14:25:46.570000+00:00 | ['Atrium', 'Tableau', 'Multi Cloud Strategy', 'Elevate', 'Salesforce'] |
DeFi + Universa = United.Fi | Smart.Money Ecosystem — United.Fi
Each day we get messages from our users regarding decentralized finance (DeFi). Indeed, the DeFi market has grown from USD 500 million to 14 billion in the last 12 months.
There you go.
We are launching a closed sale for anchor investors and business angels within a separate DeFi project (independent team, lawyers, support) within the Universa Blockchain universe: Smart Money — United.FI (NANCE)
Join the United.Fi equity pre-sale:
We are going to sell 10% of United.Fi (equity shares in Swiss Asset Management Company + the same value of UNITE governance tokens will be distributed across the participants) using this teaser to deliver this solution in 1–2 months, together with the banks, factoring companies, insurers and algotraders.
The minimum entry point is $10,000; max — $3,000,000.
Closed sale starts 28.12 at 12.28am
The event can end at any moment prior to 31 January 2021.
As usual, early investors get privileged treatment.
Important — No open sale is being planned.
You need an invitation code to participate in equity pre-sale. Ask our most devoted fans — they have them (in telegram groups).
Link to enter is here: mailto://[email protected] or [email protected]
What is United FI -
United FI / nance — replacing banks and financial ecosystem with fastest smart contracts(25,000TPS+) and lowest tx fee (from €0,01)
United.Fi is permissionless and fully decentralized protocol allowing the user to earn interest on any digital asset backed by real-world assets represented on-chain with higher rate than in a bank and cost of transaction of 1 cent or more than 10x less than Ethereum’s. Consider us AAVE on steroids 😉
We have combined our unique technology with the best teams from the world of finance and crypto market to build a bridge between the DeFI ecosystem, non-custodial asset depositaries, asset owners in real businesses and insurance companies to present a unique digital platform that allows digital asset owners to earn interest above that possible with the banks, and allows the owners of real-world assets (such as real estate, yachts or gold) to get liquidity on beneficial terms.
We are planning to deploy the product shortly and approach the $1 billion assets under management with integration on DeFi services — Compound, Aave, Ddex, Synthetix, Instadapp, Curve, yern, Balancer, Uniswap, dYdX, Bancor, Set Protocol, Nexus Mutual, MCDEX, Loopring, Kyber, Melon, pieDAO, Dharma, etc.
EARN MORE
Put all your assets to work. Earn up to 10.13% interest.
You will be able to receive up to 10.13% interest in USD on all your digital assets, from BTC and ETH to UGOLD and UTN, by depositing them into the non-custodial and decentralised ecosystem from UNITED FI based on Universa Blockchain and holding the corresponding uTokens assets. All yield provided to UNITED FI ecosystem participants is backed by real-world assets that generate income greater than interest owed. All of the real-world assets are transparently made available on the Universa Blockchain.
INVEST
United Finance is the simplest and safest way to access the best tokenised assets. From luxury villa in Marbella, Spain and profitable Instant delivery startup in India to pure gold bars in Switzerland. The whole ecosystem of tokenised assets is available for investing either UUSD or native ETH/BTC/GOLD.
YIELD FARMING
Stack UNITE to get FREEDOM. The more we UNITE together, the more FREEDOM we will get! FREEDOM is a special tokens which will be distributed across the UNITE token holders, deposited their UNITE tokens into the United FI protocol.
WHY NON-CUSTODIAL BANK ALTERNATIVE?
• Earn consistent interest
Unlike most deposits, UnitedFi Assets don’t fluctuate in the interest rate they pay, helping you find stability in the volatile world.
• Backed by real-world, income-generating assets
UnitedFi Assets don’t rely on the crypto or decentralized finance space in order to function. They bridge the real and crypto worlds.
• Backed by assets viewable on-chain
The real-world assets backing the UnitedFi are made transparently available, making the ecosystem more trustworthy.
• Always overcollateralized
Income generated by the underlying assets is greater than APY paid by the UFI asset. Real world assets backing UnitedFI are always greater than UFI issued.
HOW IT WORKS
We purchase receivables to be paid by investment-grade companies in 15–60 days. We take ownership of the receivables.The supplier and the buyer agree to use our blockchain technology, which eliminates disputes (transparent, trusted e.g. cannot be changed). Then the receivables get insured. If the buyer doesn’t pay, the insurance company will pay for him. We intend to automate this process by using smart contracts and put it on-chain over time. For additional security, information gets recorded (hashed) to the Universa blockchain.
United.Fi is building a global community to provide a decentralized, transparent and permissionless environment to empower all citizens to earn interest on their currency or assets backed by real-world assets. It is an alternative to a traditional bank account, from a regulated company based in Switzerland. We are creating non-custodial decentralized banking, globally. One day United.Fi will be the most valuable “anti bank” in the world. Universa.Bank ;)
How the EARN works:
1. BTC/ETH/USD/GOLD deposited in exchange for UFI tokens.
2. The deposited assets are used to acquire real-world, income producing assets, all viewable on chain.
3. The assets pay out interest, which is returned to the UnitedFI Ecosystem.
4. UFI Tokens are freely swapped back for the original digital assets deposited plus interest accrued.
Additional info:
Hundreds of other projects have fallen into oblivion since we started our journey back in 2017. Meanwhile, we keep going strong, building our main network https://universablockchain.com and responding promptly to the market trends and the requests of our community.
Here are some of our achievements in this challenging year 2020:
Tunisia government has launched the National Blockchain using Universa Blockchain technology:
Tunisia Internet and Universa launched in Tunisia blockchain-based e-signature service — MyDocuments.tn, available to regular Tunisian citizens to sign their papers officially on top of National Blockchain:
Al Khaleej Sugar, the world largest sugar refinery, together with UAE government and Universa officially announced the launch of sugar trading platform, DigitalSugar.io. This UAE-based platform enables the clients to trade tokenized sugar 24/7 and broker-less, and meets the Emirates-Blockchain strategical targets for 2021:
Universa completed the Natural Gas tokenisation strategy and gas digital payment system project for Bank of Russia.
Universa started the gold tokenisation and gold exchange project for SwissGoldClub.
About our platform:
UniversaBlockchain website — http://universablockchain.com
Main network — https://beta.mainnetwork.io/
Live benchmark https://access.mainnetwork.io/benchmarks
Knowledge Base https://kb.universablockchain.com/
https://unipayments.com/
Press coverage:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/commodity-trading-gets-sweeter-with-blockchain-based-sugar-exchange
https://www.coindesk.com/siberian-region-partners-with-universa-to-create-blockchain-tourism-destination
https://cointelegraph.com/news/tunisia-internet-agency-signs-strategic-partnership-with-blockchain-platform
https://www.forbes.com/sites/larrymyler/2017/11/09/transparent-transactions-how-blockchain-payments-can-make-life-easier-for-b2b-companies/?sh=4a414a5270b5
https://www.forbes.ru/tehnologii/370767-bitkoin-vs-gosudarstvo-10-let-spustya
https://news.bitcoin.com/blockchain-reloaded-how-the-new-matrix-appeared/
https://cointelegraph.com/news/commodity-trading-gets-sweeter-with-blockchain-based-sugar-exchange | https://medium.com/@borodich/defi-universa-united-fi-e8664a6d4b2b | ['Alexander Borodich'] | 2021-01-10 16:10:28.869000+00:00 | ['Universa', 'Defi', 'Decentralization', 'Défi', 'Blockchain'] |
Edition 70: animal crossing the road to happiness | WEATHER
Deadly typhoon leaves whole villages underwater in the Philippines
Sun Nov 15
A deadly typhoon swept through Southeast Asia last week, leaving at least 67 people dead in the Philippines as it continued its destructive path towards Vietnam this weekend. While Typhoon Vamco weakened as it made landfall in Vietnam, the long coastline makes Vietnam susceptible to flooding and attracts dangerous storms.
In Vietnam, Vamco is the 13th storm to make landfall this year. More than 160 people have died since early October due to a series of storms. Disaster relief agencies say every time they start rebuilding, they have been hit again.
Meanwhile in the Philippines, Vamco is the 21st cyclone to hit this year and the deadliest. More than 25,000 homes were damaged and about $9.7 million in infrastructure was destroyed. At least 40 neighborhoods and 20 towns across the Cagayan province in the Northern region were still underwater days after the typhoon hit. The heavy rainfall and strong winds also caused agriculture damage worth about $25 million.
SOURCES: CNN, NBC News, The Washington Post | https://medium.com/belowthefold/edition-70-animal-crossing-the-road-to-happiness-25bba1d545b1 | ['Ellen Minkin'] | 2020-11-25 09:17:28.402000+00:00 | ['Email Newsletters', 'Philippines', 'Archive', 'Newsletter', 'Guns'] |
Building a Design System Package With Storybook, TypeScript, and React in 15 Minutes | Building a Design System Package With Storybook, TypeScript, and React in 15 Minutes
A design system will make you more productive and help you build new features and components faster
Background photo by Nils Johan Gabrielsen on Unsplash.
When building out a UI component library for my own work, I ran into a couple of pain points while searching for how to create a simple workflow that “just works.”
Most tutorials I saw for TypeScript component libraries made use of build tools (which at times caused headaches) and my current job took the opposite extreme of publishing the UI component library as TypeScript and relying on individual projects to transpile it to JavaScript directly from the library itself (if you are from my company… you didn’t read anything). | https://medium.com/better-programming/building-a-design-system-package-with-storybook-typescript-and-react-in-15-minutes-b5fd5711339e | ["Dennis O'Keeffe"] | 2020-12-07 18:17:52.020000+00:00 | ['Programming', 'React', 'Typescript', 'Design Systems', 'JavaScript'] |
... so sorry to hear of what you went through. | ... so sorry to hear of what you went through. Heart-breaking it is... along with all the other horrors of humanity... Comitting to Him (not the Church or religion) holds the answer. I am the way, the truth, life itself... | https://medium.com/@doasyoucando/so-sorry-to-hear-of-what-you-went-through-18ff55518506 | ['Christine Sander'] | 2020-12-25 12:09:51.057000+00:00 | ['Church', 'Exvangelical', 'Christianity', 'Apostate'] |
How to earn money from home — Unique Ideas | Hello friends,I thought of writing this article because now a days it is very much common that females who have very good qualification are not able to work because of so many personal constraints.This article focuses to help them in how to earn money from home.
Sometimes,it becomes very much difficult for an individual to maintain work-life balance.Spending 8–9 hours at office becomes a challenge.
There are scenarios where a female needs to work for longer hours in office only because there are financial problems at home and then after coming back from work she needs to take up home responsibility.
In this article I will introduce you about a website. This website/app can help women to work at their ease.A female can happily work from home using Freelancer.
Freelancer is also available as Android application…
So in order to start working
Based on your flexible timings and hours you can take up a project and earn money from home without comprising your home responsibility.
It’s a best platform both as a mother and as a women. A mother has lots of responsibilities like taking care of child and spend quality time with him/her.
Now let me talk about what exactly Freelancer is? How can you earn money from home using this app?
Freelancer company is world’s largest freelancing and crowd sourcing marketplace that connects employers and freelancers.It has two options either you can hire someone for your project or find work from anywhere in the world.
You can either download an android app “Freelancer — Hire & Find Jobs”or visit their website
Steps to start working in Freelancer
First and foremost,sign up to join freelancer. Login with your credentials. Click on Browse Projects->Search by Type. You can search either by Freelancers/Projects/Contests. Based on your Search Type, you will get results. Say I have selected Browse Projects by Search Type as Projects. There are filters in the page based on your interest you can select the available filters : Project Type, Enter your Skills,Listing Types,Select Fixed Price,Hourly Price,Specific Location and Languages. Based on your selected criteria,it will show a list of projects. Select the project of your interest. You need to fill up Bid Details and Describe your proposal in the section Place a Bid on this Project. After filling up the details,you will be able to edit your bid until the project is awarded to someone. Once you fill up the details click on Place Bid button. Recruiter will contact you if he is interested to hire you based on your skills and bid price. In the Free membership,there are total 8 bids so you can bid for 8 projects. Additionally,you can claim 100 bids for free for 1st month in Freelancer Membership.Only Rs 729 INR per month afterwards,unless cancelled.
You can post a project for free and you will start receiving bids within seconds.Hire any professional at fixed or hourly rates and get your project done.
You can also read below post to upgrade your learning skills and improve your job opportunities.
German Language
To sum up you can now start earning money now from home and have amazing benefits!!!
Additionally please refer the below link to earn money from home
Upwork
Originally published at https://uniqueideas.in on January 14, 2020. | https://medium.com/@support_75837/how-to-earn-money-from-home-unique-ideas-a6d0814af71a | [] | 2020-03-18 18:52:01.585000+00:00 | ['Work Life Balance', 'Earn Money From Home', 'Work From Home', 'Earn Money Online', 'Blogging'] |
What is Location-based Recommendation? | A location-based recommendation engine analyzes the data related to the user location along with other related data to generate more accurate recommendations.
Nowadays, the majority of the online platforms (apps and websites) are adopting location-based recommender systems for the customers. Food delivery, salon services, gaming, and hospitality are some of the online businesses that use such recommendation systems to generate location-based suggestions for the customers.
The location-based recommendation systems are utilizing the growing usage of smart mobiles to collect the location-related data of the users.
Use Cases of Location-Based Recommendation Engine
Some of the use cases of the location-based recommendation engine are-
Location Based Social Networks (LBSN)- An LBSN adds a location to an existing social network. This enables the people in that social network to share their locations as the embedded information. Foursquare, Gowalla, Swarm etc. are some examples of such networks which suggest nearby tourist spots, next place to visit etc.
An LBSN adds a location to an existing social network. This enables the people in that social network to share their locations as the embedded information. Foursquare, Gowalla, Swarm etc. are some examples of such networks which suggest nearby tourist spots, next place to visit etc. Online Social Networks- Nowadays social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and others use location-based recommendation systems to suggest local events, posts, trends etc.
Nowadays social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and others use location-based recommendation systems to suggest local events, posts, trends etc. Online News Portals- Online news portals often use location-based recommendations to provide the relevant local news to the customers.
Location-based recommendation engines are getting increasingly popular among online platforms and it is not just limited to the above use cases but OTT channels, e-commerce stores, e-learning portals, and many more!
Muvi Recommendation Engine Alie provides real-time instant notifications based on the customer data. Alie is scalable, equipped with advanced algorithms and industry-agnostic.
Take a 14-day free trial to know about Alie. | https://medium.com/@streamingexpert/what-is-location-based-recommendation-236137469ac3 | ['Roshan Dwivedi'] | 2021-07-06 09:12:21.544000+00:00 | ['Alie', 'Recommendations', 'AI', 'Recommendation System', 'Business'] |
How to Make Money Online | Make up to $477 per click and qualify for $1,000’s in JV prizes with CBMoneyVine VIP! CBMoneyVine VIP is an ingenious new DFY online income system that sets users up to make autopilot 40%-75% commissions on over 4,000 products. The system features 1 click software that hardcodes users’ affiliate links into all 4,000+ products at once, and also features an “unconventional” website enabling users to generate unlimited passive monthly commissions with these products. Make up to $477 per click and qualify for $1,000’s in JV prizes with CBMoneyVine VIP!
CBMoneyVine VIP is an ingenious new DFY online income system that sets users up to make autopilot 40%-75% commissions on over 4,000 products. The system features 1 click software that hardcodes users’ affiliate links into all 4,000+ products at once, and also features an “unconventional” website enabling users to generate unlimited passive monthly commissions with these products. ….. check out here | https://medium.com/@digishalom24/how-to-make-money-online-c979647657d5 | ['Snl Shalom'] | 2020-12-27 19:43:46.280000+00:00 | ['Affiliate Marketing', 'CPA', 'Ecommerce', 'Make Money Online', 'Business'] |
Spark Structured Streaming w/Kafka and Azure Storage | Clients are increasing working re-architect data pipelines and ETL/ELT activities away from scheduled batch load types. Instead, the focus is on event driven, near real time architectures that allow companies to take advantage of data moments after it is available. This is crucial in limiting the latency between the arrival of data and availability to downstream consumers (business users, application, data scientist, etc).
Apache Kafka (https://kafka.apache.org/) is an open source distributed streaming platform used to build near “real time” data pipelines. Users can write and consume messages with a consistent, fault-tolerant, and proven framework. For the purposes of this demo, we are going to focus on utilizing the producer/consumer architecture with a local instance of Kafka. Then, we can consume messages by pairing Kafka with Spark Structured Streaming (https://spark.apache.org/docs/latest/structured-streaming-programming-guide.html). Developer can use Spark Streaming, but with Spark 2.x, Apache Spark unveiled a DataFrame driven process that proves to be user-friendly. Using spark structured streaming, developers can interact with Kafka streams with DataFrame or DataSet operations. Simply, the spark job will “listen” the prescribed topic and process data accordingly.
The last portion of this example is a cloud based storage destination. In this case, the landing zone is a Microsoft Azure Blob Storage Container however, the concepts displayed here remain true for AWS S3, Google Cloud Storage, and IBM Cloud Object Storage. Simply, all object storage options manage data as “objects” rather than a traditional file system. A pro of this type of storage is high availability, low cost, and ability to distinguish between storage tier access levels. Microsoft does allow users to interact is use object storage with Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2, which adds a hierarchal namespace on-top of blob containers. This solution combines capabilities of both Blob Storage and Azure Data Lake Storage Gen1.
Demo: In this example, we will create a Kafka producer and topic using a python script and an openly available API. Next, using a spark-scala script the topic value will be written to Blob Storage. Note that this demo will require an Azure Account, but as the demo only utilizes raw storage it will be minimal to no costs.
Demo Requirements:
This project was constructed off my local computer (MacOS Catalina) with a few additional software requirements. This demo will not take users though installation. If users need assistance please the open source documentation for installation.
Spark: 2.4.4
Kafka: 2.12
Python: 3.7
Scala: 2.12
Microsoft Visual Studio Code
Intellj IDEA
Microsoft Azure Account
Setting up the Kafka producer — python:
The script utilizes the openweathermap API (https://openweathermap.org/api) to connect to a public available stream. You can create a free account and utilize the current weather and forecast collection which provides free access to an API. Then, using the cityID function, users can select specific cities as desired. Before executing the script, the Kafka topic needs to be created.
./kafka-topics.sh --create --bootstrap-server localhost:9092 --replication-factor 1 --partitions 1 --topic weatherdata
Then the python script can be executed using Visual Studio Code.
# -*- coding: utf-8 -*- """ Created to generate a Kafka steaming process """ import os import json import requests import schedule import time from kafka import KafkaProducer from json import dumps def job(): output = '' l =['5391959','4351977','5128581','4699066','5368361','4896861','4560349','5308655','4684888','5809844','4164138','5419384','4930956','4180439','4053671'] for i in l: url3 = 'http://api.openweathermap.org/data/2.5/group?id='+i+'&appid={insert your appID}' json_data = requests.get(url3).json() producer = KafkaProducer(bootstrap_servers=['localhost:9092'], value_serializer=lambda x: dumps(x).encode('utf-8')) producer.send("weatherdata", (json_data)) # Must create topic before this step schedule.every(1).minutes.do(job) while 1: schedule.run_pending() time.sleep(1)
This python script will generate a streaming process in a topic labeled “weatherdata” running on the local computer. As a user, this can be verified in the terminal using the following command.
./kafka-console-consumer.sh --bootstrap-server localhost:9092 --topic weatherdata
Building a Storage Container:
Before attacking the spark portion, let’s create the storage container. From the Microsoft Azure Documentation (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/storage/blobs/):
Total cost of block blob storage depends on:
Volume of data stored per month.
Quantity and types of operations performed, along with any data transfer costs.
Data redundancy option selected.
In follow on posts, I will take you through the process of building cloud infrastructure with the HashiCorp product Terraform. However, for the case of this demo I would recommend creating a storage account with a blob container in the portal (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/blobs/storage-quickstart-blobs-portal). In the image below, my storage container is illustrated. I would recommend using Microsoft Storage explorer for interacting with the data layer (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/features/storage-explorer/). I would recommend signing in with your Microsoft account credentials.
Spark-Structured Streaming:
Finally, utilizing Spark we can consume the stream and write to a destination location. Yes, in most business applications there is not a need to both create and consume the stream. However, given how this shows the end to end process, we will perform both. Now, spark supports both python and scala variations. However, spark scala proves to both perform better and include new features sooner than pyspark based code. This article will not be a study between scala and pyspark but will acknowledge that either method could be suitable.
Using IntellJ and a SBT project, we can construct a script that reads the spark topic and writes it to Blob Storage.
Then, since the goal of this tutorial is to link spark structured steaming with Azure Blob Storage, we are going to take this step by step. The first step is to establish the maven packages required.
name := "sparkStreamingAzure"
version := "0.1"
scalaVersion := "2.12.0"
// https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.apache.spark/spark-core
libraryDependencies += "org.apache.spark" %% "spark-core" % "2.4.4"
// https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.apache.spark/spark-sql
libraryDependencies += "org.apache.spark" %% "spark-sql" % "2.4.4"
// https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.apache.spark/spark-sql-kafka-0-10
libraryDependencies += "org.apache.spark" %% "spark-sql-kafka-0-10" % "2.4.4"
// https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/org.apache.hadoop/hadoop-azure
libraryDependencies += "org.apache.hadoop" % "hadoop-azure" % "2.7.7"
// https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/com.microsoft.azure/azure-storage
libraryDependencies += "com.microsoft.azure" % "azure-storage" % "2.0.0"
Next, we need to build our spark session. You will see we are using the local compute option.
val spark = SparkSession
.builder()
.master("local[*]")
.appName("sparkStreamingAzure")
.getOrCreate() println("Started Spark Session")
Then, we need to configure our connection to our Azure Environment. You will need your access key associate with the storage account.
val yourKey = "{insert your Storage Key}"
spark.sparkContext.hadoopConfiguration.set("fs.azure", "org.apache.hadoop.fs.azure.NativeAzureFileSystem") spark.sparkContext.hadoopConfiguration.set("fs.azure.account.key.accettadev.blob.core.windows.net", yourKey)
The next step is setting up the Kafka configurations. There are a few items to call our during this step. First, notice that we use the same topic name and Kafka brokers as utilized earlier. Then, we set a destination which is our Azure Storage account. Next, we set a checkpoint location on our local computer. The checkpoint can also be set on the cloud storage account. These features allow streams to recover from failure and saves the state of the process when last stopped. Lastly, the select statement extracts only the data value from the message and converts the value from a binary to string. The columns available to operate with and their respective data types is shown below. This information is gathered from the spark-structured-streaming-kafka-integration guide (https://spark.apache.org/docs/latest/structured-streaming-programming-guide.html). Our raw data is json and we are storing it in the column that shares the same name.
// The Kafka broker hosts and topic used to write to Kafka
val kafkaBrokers="localhost:9092"
val kafkaTopic="weatherdata" // Stream from Kafka
val kafkaStreamDF = spark.readStream.format("kafka").option("kafka.bootstrap.servers", kafkaBrokers).option("subscribe", "weatherdata").option("failOnDataLoss", false).option("startingOffsets", "latest").load()
val format = "json"
val destination = "wasbs://container>@<storage_account.blob.core.windows.net/<container>/weatherdata"
val streamcheckpoint = "$HOME/Spark-streaming/weatherCheckpoint"
val df = kafkaStreamDF.selectExpr("CAST(value AS STRING) as json")
Our last step is writing the stream to the destination. There are obviously more functionality and capabilities of Spark-structured streaming which is not utilized in this example. The goal is simply to get data to our storage blob. It is worth to note that spark streaming supports a variety of structured and semi-structured data types. Best practices would suggest that users select a Hadoop data type like Avro or parquet. Avro is a row based format that supports schema evolution. Then, parquet is columnar storage option which is favorable when compressing data.
val consoleOutput = df.writeStream
.outputMode("append")
.format(format) // can be "orc", "json", "csv", "console", "parquet", "text"
.option("path",destination)
.option("checkpointLocation", streamcheckpoint)
.option("failOnDataLoss", false)
.start()
consoleOutput.awaitTermination()
Now let’s tie the entire piece of code together!
import org.apache.spark.sql.SparkSession
import org.apache.spark.sql.types._
object sparkStreamingAzure {
def main(args: Array[String]): Unit = {
import org.apache.log4j._
Logger.getLogger("org").setLevel(Level.ERROR)
Logger.getLogger("akka").setLevel(Level.ERROR) val spark = SparkSession
.builder()
.master("local[*]")
.appName("sparkStreamingAzure")
.getOrCreate() println("Started Spark Session") val yourKey = "{insert your Storage Key}"
spark.sparkContext.hadoopConfiguration.set("fs.azure", "org.apache.hadoop.fs.azure.NativeAzureFileSystem") spark.sparkContext.hadoopConfiguration.set("fs.azure.account.key.accettadev.blob.core.windows.net", yourKey) // The Kafka broker hosts and topic used to write to Kafka
val kafkaBrokers="localhost:9092"
val kafkaTopic="weatherdata" // Stream from Kafka
val kafkaStreamDF = spark.readStream.format("kafka").option("kafka.bootstrap.servers", kafkaBrokers).option("subscribe", "weatherdata").option("failOnDataLoss", false).option("startingOffsets", "latest").load()
val format = "json"
val destination = "wasbs://<container>@<storage_account>.blob.core.windows.net/<container>/weatherdata"
val streamcheckpoint = "$HOME/Spark-streaming/weatherCheckpoint"
val df = kafkaStreamDF.selectExpr("CAST(value AS STRING) as json")
// Select data from the stream and write to Blob Storage
val consoleOutput = df.writeStream
.outputMode("append")
.format(format) // can be "orc", "json", "csv", "console", "parquet", "text"
.option("path",destination)
.option("checkpointLocation", streamcheckpoint)
.option("failOnDataLoss", false)
.start()
consoleOutput.awaitTermination()
}
}
This allows a user to write a stream from a Kafka topic to Microsoft Azure Blob Storage. From here, the possibilities are almost endless. In later blog I will explore using Azure Functions, linking to Snowflake Data-Warehouse-as-a-Service, and using server-less ETL.
Sources:
https://databricks.com/blog/2017/04/04/real-time-end-to-end-integration-with-apache-kafka-in-apache-sparks-structured-streaming.html | https://medium.com/@waccetta27/spark-structured-streaming-w-kafka-and-azure-storage-967f70899f3 | ['William Accetta'] | 2020-01-23 03:44:53.029000+00:00 | ['Cloud', 'Kafka', 'Spark Streaming', 'Apache Spark', 'Azure'] |
How To Reduce Bitter Taste In Food? | While bitter food may be a healthy resort to quell cravings for sweet food, regulate your diet or protection against cancer and heart diseases, it may not always be what you asked for. Some food may carry an overwhelming sense of bitterness (try a coffee with a high amount of caffeine) which may be off-putting and make it less palatable.
Here are some hacks that can save your taste buds this bitter experience and turn it into a healthy alternative.
1. Add some fats
Here’s an easy way to save that coffee. Adding fats such as milk, cream, cheese, creamy sauce or olive oil (Check out the Big C Store to buy your grocery items at a discounted price!) not only gives a smooth texture to the food but also inherently reduces the bitter taste. It improves the consistency of the food and complements the bitterness rather than eliminating it. Similarly adding some cheese or cream cheese over bitter vegetables balances the taste and turns out to be the perfect combination of healthy and tasty!
2. Vinegar or lemon juice
Food components with citric acidic properties such as lemon or vinegar are known for their properties to cut through bitterness (and add a zing!) in the food. Squeezing half a lemon or a spoonful of vinegar should do the trick. It not merely neutralizes the extent of bitterness in the dish but also brings about the taste of bitter elements such as salads, kale or radishes.
3. Try freezing the food
Colder foods and beverages taste less bitter than dishes that are sizzling hot. If you have an alternative and the time to cool the food sometime before serving it, you can go with this choice. Beverages like cold coffee or iced tea (Check out the Big C Store for exclusive discounts on beverages!) carry this zeal of bitterness in a counterpoised manner and are hence pleasing to drink.
You can try this trick to make children eat salads and food which they resist because of the bitter taste. Store the salad in the fridge for half an hour and which reduces the bitterness and also gives it zeal.
4. Make it spicy!
Who doesn’t love a little extra spice in food? Not only does it enhance the flavour, but it can be used as an effective trick to lessen the bitterness of the cooked dish. For food where adding fat or cream may not be an option, you can simply add a few spices such as red pepper and a variation of other cooking powders (cayenne, black pepper or cardamom etc.) to enliven the taste buds with some fiery heat!
Adding herbs such as coriander, basil, ginger or rosemary is another way to counteract the bitterness since these spices distract the taste buds from bitter to the spicy zing of the food. While fresh herbs such as coriander are an appealing garnish and perfectly complement roasted dishes, dried herbs such as oregano, parsley and sage last longer and enhance the flavour.
5. Add Baking Soda
A pinch of baking soda can save your taste buds a stroll down the bitter lane! Owing to its alkaline nature, it is the perfect way to offset bitterness and lock in moisture. It must be added while you are cooking and sense that it may taste a bit too bitter. This is why it is an important ingredient when it comes to baking, to ensure that the levels of bitterness are checked (and the cake rises just right!).
However, it should be added in restrained amounts since an exaggerated amount of baking soda in the food can be overpowering and ruin the taste.
You can always check out Big C for buying the right ingredients for your food at just the right price! | https://medium.com/@salewake/how-to-reduce-bitter-taste-in-food-81b8ccc056c1 | ['Adam J.Gill'] | 2021-04-29 10:51:23.841000+00:00 | ['Coupon', 'Breakfast', 'Foodies', 'Healthy Foods', 'Food'] |
Gatherers of Words | fighting for the crumbs
as my brain battles for those tidbits,
forgotten or filed for tomorrow,
always thinking I’ll remember
but I don’t.
All okay, cause what I forgot
will flow to someone else,
will be their aha, their remembered
when I didn’t.
Forgetting is releasing
what was mine to someone else
who is ready when I wasn’t.
Cause the words are not mine
or yours but ours, there for the grabbing
or the releasing.
Words don’t linger
or dawdle, speedily
moving from me to you in the moment of
a forgotten idea or phrase or rhyme.
What I lost, you found,
use it well,
for if not, it will
return to me or
someone else. | https://medium.com/scrittura/gatherers-of-words-bd10f3115ff2 | [] | 2021-01-03 17:46:08.992000+00:00 | ['Feeling The Blank', 'Writing', 'Words', 'Writing Prompt Response', 'Scrittura'] |
KYC/QIR Recap & New Webinar Announcement — Priority University Continuing Education Spring Webinar Series | Quick Recap / Did You Know?
KYC was introduced as a normal business practice in 2002. It directs banks and financial institutions to put in place a framework to know their customers before opening an account. The purpose is to prevent money laundering, terrorist financing, and what is most common in our industry ID theft.
KYC became a regulatory rule mandated by the Bank Secrecy Act and the USA Patriot act of 2003.
It is important to complete KYC to help prevent banks from being used to aid criminal elements.
It is important to make sure KYC is completed on all potential customers. Remember KYC can reach out to internal business operations as well. Potential employees should go through a similar vetting process.
According to the PCI Security Standards Council, PCI SSC, a QIR is a
Qualified Integrator or Reseller.
Qualified Integrator or Reseller. A Qualified Integrator or Reseller Company, or Contractor are
authorized to implement, configure, and/or support Payment
Applications and related payment technologies on behalf of
merchants, and service providers.
authorized to implement, configure, and/or support Payment Applications and related payment technologies on behalf of merchants, and service providers. A QIR is used for the purposes of performing secure and
compromise free installations as part of the QIR Program.
compromise free installations as part of the QIR Program. The quality, reliability, and consistency of a QIR Company’s work
provide confidence that the Payment Application has been
implemented in a manner that supports the Customer’s PCI DSS
compliance.
Did you miss the webinar?
You can access this webinar along with other sales and marketing tools via Priority University or view the webinar directly by clicking here.
We’ve also added a new webinar to the Spring Series!
Mark your calendar for The Beneficial Ownership Review Webinar next Monday, May 7th at 10:00AM EST. This webinar will review upcoming FinCen Rule on Beneficial Ownership, impacting Financial Institutions, CDD Rule, and tips for implementing effective Customer Due Diligence programs.
Have Questions?
Contact us at [email protected] | https://medium.com/priority-payment-systems/kyc-qir-recap-new-webinar-announcement-priority-university-continuing-education-spring-webinar-ce538dbc9f2e | ['Priority Payment Systems'] | 2018-05-08 20:44:53.586000+00:00 | ['Continuing Education', 'Payments', 'Kyc', 'Payment Processing', 'Qir'] |
My new adventure at Uber Freight. Disclaimer: The views in this post are… | My new adventure at Uber Freight
Disclaimer: The views in this post are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of Uber or Uber Freight.
Your Uber Freight has arrived…
This post isn’t ground breaking. It isn’t creating a new genre of posts. But it’s not going to be a self validating, the grass is actually greener post about taking a new job. Well at least I don’t think it is, but it probably will be.
I started recently at Uber, and within my first few weeks have already switched roles once from leading our product marketing team, to leading the shipper marketing team here at Uber Freight. In short, Uber is surprisingly a great place to work, and I’m excited for the opportunity ahead. But my biggest hesitation when joining Uber was what the culture of the company was going to be like. I’ve been fortunate to join a team of self selecting individuals who are willing to roll up their sleeves and dive into solving the challenges inherent with moving 80,000 pounds of freight, one truckload at a time.
Leadership
Leading Uber is a thankless job. I’ve been more attuned to it since I joined how every time Dara posts anything on Twitter, he is immediately vilified in the comments — ain’t no ratio like an official Uber tweet ratio. But from my limited experience of seeing him speak at one of our events in my first week on team, and at weekly all hands, he is the type of leader that Uber needs. He is humble, but not to the extent that he undermines the success of the team — he celebrates achievements and generously casts the spotlight on the initiatives and teams that make Uber an inspiring place to work. He is thoughtful and empathetic, and ultimately he understands that we have to win on product. Lastly, he and his leadership team believe in encouraging and enabling a workforce that is free of self-defeating cynicism.
Challenges
The brand and the business are not immune from competition. The growth rate at the company is slowing, and new forms of mobility are in early stages of explorations while these bets are formed. Brand perception is still suffering from years of aggressive, Silicon Valley bro-culture actions that have come to define the company, and unfortunately its employees.
However, I have come to see that this is a company filled with hard working, fundamentally decent and caring people who do truly believe that they are working on something that will outlive them. Painting all Uber employees with the same brush — perhaps as rabid capitalists hell bent on ignoring anything that stood between them and the next dollar (which definitely wasn’t something I ever did…) — does not reflect the diversity of experiences and backgrounds of those working here. And with regards to that diversity, it is refreshing to see leadership at all levels acknowledge that yes, we can do better, and we will do better, and here’s how.
Future
The answer to what does the future of Uber hold, I think, also answers the question: Why did I come to Uber?
In an era when companies are innovating by reconfiguring algorithms, and finding new ways to sell your data, I do believe that Uber is one of the few companies that is willing to make large bets in areas that will affect every single person on this planet — and ideally prevent us from completely destroying what’s left of our planet. You’re welcome to disagree with this, to believe only the TC articles and worst possible stories that come out from a company that has 15 million interactions with consumers every single day. And while all those stories, criticisms, and in some cases, failings, are valid representations, they do not define the culture of the company at which I currently work.
The Uber that I work at is one that is taking its mission of igniting opportunity by setting the world in motion to categories that very few traditional Silicon Valley companies would dare. Fundamentally, my job is helping create opportunities for truck drivers. Are Google, Amazon, Facebook or Apple doing that as directly as building an app with the defined purpose of helping owner-operators build sustainable, small businesses? And it’s not 100% altruistic, I get that, globally, it’s a $4 trillion industry…trillion with a T. But with that massive scale, there is an opportunity to reduce the 200 million tons of emission that the Environmental Defense Fund estimates are generated each year by underutilized trucks just in the United States.
The Uber I work at is building flying cars. No joke. Flying cars. And where everyone expects that team to deliver on their goals of building an entire infrastructure from scratch to support their goal.
Every leader at Uber believes in the mission of igniting opportunity by setting the world in motion, because our constituents aren’t shareholders, or employees, or customers. Our constituents are every single one of us — present and future — on this planet.
And if that means I just wrote a self-validating-grass-is-always-greener-I-just-drank-a-gallon-of-kool-aid™ post, then so be it. | https://medium.com/@nbalaraman/a-new-adventure-at-uber-freight-6dd7dcab86f | ['Nikhil Balaraman'] | 2018-11-16 20:30:31.992000+00:00 | ['Startup', 'Uber', 'Freight'] |
Rico Nasty the Zoomer | Introduction
For better or worse, 100 gecs has emerged as one of the defining voices of Gen Z. Their post-ironic music is polarizing yet catchy. They take the absurdities of modern pop music — boastful lyrics and overproduced tracks — to the extreme. It feels like it should be satirical, like the Gen Z equivalent Lonely Island, but the duo actually revels in the absurdity rather than make fun of it.
This attitude is shared by rapper and self-proclaimed “pop-punk princess” Rico Nasty, which is why they have collaborated on several tracks. Rico Nasty has forged her own unique path to stardom. Although well-established now, she was an outcast in the rap world for a long time and it is her strong connection to other outcasts that has given her such a strong, almost cult following. It is also what has drawn her to 100 gecs and is why they work so well together.
This piece examines the music video for their most recent collaboration on Rico Nasty’s single “iPhone”, and how it perfectly encapsulates the post-ironic attitude of Gen Z.
Context
“iPhone” is one of several singles Rico Nasty has released in anticipation of her first studio album, which is scheduled for later this year. The song is produced by 100 gecs and they were a clear influence on Rico Nasty’s vocals. The music video for “iPhone” was released on August 13, 2020, and was created during the height of the first wave of Covid-19. The video was directed by Emil Nava, who has worked extensively with Calvin Harris, Ed Sheeran, and other big-name artists.
Analysis
“iPhone” is about the dysfunctional and often toxic realities of love in the digital world. She compares each new relationship to the newest social media site and points out how each one promises to be better than the last. She “can’t go back to [her] old ways,” in the sense that once there is a new app it’s impossible to go back to older sites like Myspace, which she references. This also refers to relationships since the flaws of past relationships are brought to the surface, making it clear that you can’t enter into a relationship like it ever again.
This idea of newer is better is why the collaboration with 100 gecs makes so much sense. They, more than any other current band or artist, embody newness. They represent the new generation and their addictive and post-ironic music makes it difficult to go back to the corny and repetitive pop music that preceded them. They are the newer, better version of the music industry, and through this collaboration, Rico Nasty reinvents herself within their new musical reality. In a way, she updates herself to the newer, better model.
All of this brings us to the music video for “iPhone”. The video shows a CGI version of Rico Nasty as she performs the song on different devices while a miniature, also CGI, Rico dances on a kitchen counter.
The video mirrors the layers of meaning behind the song. First, there are obvious references to the iPhone and social media in the shots of Rico Nasty on the phone screen. She visualizes the way communication now exists, through our phones, with holograms and her CGI avatar jumping in and out of the phone.
This depiction of communication brings us to the second layer: relationships. The video shows Rico’s avatar interacting with a male avatar. What’s noticeable about this section is that they meet through the phone and jump back into the phone to go on what can be assumed is a date (riding a rollercoaster). The whole relationship is completely mediated by the phone. This shows how the modern relationship is wholly dependent on technology and suggests that it would be impossible to go back to a way of dating that doesn’t use technology.
This video is about evolution and technology’s connection to that change. Whether consciously or not, technology has changed us on an individual level. Nowadays, our identity is formed equally by our online personality as it is by our real-life personality. The CGI avatar of Rico Nasty is a real part of her even though it only exists in her phone. In fact, the focus on the avatar implies that Rico Nasty believes this part of ourselves is becoming larger and may even be more important than our physical selves. This is corroborated by the “real” Rico Nasty in the video — she has a heavy filter on and looks more like CGI than a real person.
So, we have technology-focused lyrics, an overproduced beat by 100 Gecs, and a CGI-driven music video. All of this, along with the theme of change and growth, seems to point to the theory that we are headed down the path towards fully technologically integrated self-identity.
“He said, “I think my phone is hacked”
I think my phone is tapped
I think you’ve got me blocked
Why won’t you call me back?” — Rico Nasty, “iPhone”
The song makes it clear that Rico Nasty recognizes the dangers of going down this path. Much of the song discusses the toxicity of her relationships with others and with her phone, clearly laying out legitimate issues with the reality she lays out. These issues include paranoia, intrusive surveillance, and more. The music video doesn’t paint a rosy picture either. There are harsh strobe lights, allusions to the horror movie The Ring, and even a quick glimpse of the Devil on her phone.
This is where the collaboration with 100 gecs comes into play. Rico Nasty is aware of the dangers the reliance on technology brings. Just like 100 gecs recognizes and points out the flaws of the music industry yet enjoys them rather than critique them, Rico Nasty similarly identifies the issues without criticizing them. Instead, she makes her peace with them and goes along with it. She still uses the technology to create the song and video, and her avatar continues to dance and have a good time despite the disturbing atmosphere around it.
Conclusion
With “iPhone” Rico Nasty takes away technology’s power by revealing its dark side but continues to take advantage of it by making art and enjoying herself. This is what truly defines Gen Z; they are fully aware of how messed up the world is (due to the failures of older generations), and though they make their voices heard about these issues, they still take full advantage of the positives that accompany the negatives. It’s what makes them post-ironic, as perfectly shown through 100 gecs’ relationship with the music industry.
Although at 23 years old Rico Nasty is on the cusp of both generations, this post-ironic attitude firmly solidifies her as a member of Gen Z. | https://colinhodgson.medium.com/rico-nasty-the-zoomer-b90ad06df377 | ['Colin Hodgson'] | 2020-11-05 21:11:06.826000+00:00 | ['Technology', 'Gen Z', 'Music', 'Rico Nasty', 'Music Video'] |
Variables & Functions in Javascript (JS) | Functions
A function is like a machine that has an input and an output.
Back to baking cookies…
When you bake cookies, you do the following tasks:
Combine ingredients
Scoop ingredients onto a baking sheet
Bake in an oven
Eat them for dinner (true story)
Each one of these tasks are functions that occur to make a cookie. If we had an assembly line to make cookies, we could have one machine that combines ingredients, one machine to put the combined ingredients onto baking sheets, one machine (an oven) that bakes the cookies, and a bunch of happy workers that eat the cookies. — Sorry machines, no cookies for you.
We write a function using special syntax that indicates you are declaring a function and assign it a name. Believe it or not, this function actually gets stored in RAM (like a variable does), so we name it to keep track of where the hoarder put it.
function combineIngredients() = {
//do some stuff to combine the ingredients
}
Parameters
Parameters are inputs to a function
Because a function has inputs and outputs (like ingredients and cookie batter). We tell functions what those inputs are by declaring parameters. Parameters are really just variables (or more specifically, the name of a place in memory like 0x407).
function combineIngredients(ingredient1, ingredient2, ingredient3){
// the parameters in this function are ingredient1, ingredient2,
// and ingredient 3
}
When we pass in parameters to a function, we are telling the function to use the value in the memory location (0x407, 0x1021, 0x3587).
For example, we declared some variables earlier firstIngredient, secondIngredient, thirdIngredient, etc… we can now pass those variables into the function so that the machine can combine them.
combineIngredients(firstIngredient, secondIngredient, thirdIngredient);
When I call the function combineIngredients and pass in the variable (aka the memory location), that function will use the values that are stored in memory at that specific location.
Looking at the function in relation to the memory, it would be something like this: function combineIngredients( value in memory location 1, value in memory location 2, value in memory location 3){ combine the ingredient in memory location 1 with the
ingredient in memory location 2 and the
ingredient in memory location 3
}
Putting it all together…
Writing a function that actually combines ingredients and outputs something would look like this
function combineIngredients(ingredient1, ingredient2, ingredient3){
var batter = ingredient1 + ingredient2 + ingredient3;
return batter;
}
When I call the function using the variables we defined earlier using
combineIngredients(firstIngredient, secondIngredient, thirdIngredient);
The function performs the action to combine the ingredients that are stored in memory as we defined early.
combine the 2 cups of flour with the <-- firstIngredient
1 cup of sugar and the <-- secondIngredient
half of tbsp of baking soda <-- thirdIngredient
The way the function does this, is by creating a new variable that is specific to the function and then executing the operations within the function.
var ingredient1 = firstIngredient;
var ingredient2 = secondIngredient;
var ingredient3 = thirdIngredient; //do something to combine the ingredients such as
var batter = ingredient1 + ingredient2 + ingredient3;
Returning values from functions
Often times we want to return a value from a function (i.e. the output of the machine) so that we can use that value later.
** Note I am saying value not variable **
We do this by using the keyword return
return batter; // returns the value that is in the memory location that the variable batter refers to - it is not returning the memory location
putting this all together, the function and execution of the function would be updated to
function combineIngredients(ingredient1, ingredient2, ingredient3){
var batter = ingredient1 + ingredient2 + ingredient3;
return batter;
} var chocolateCookieBatter = combineIngredients(firstIngredient, secondIngredient, thirdIngredient);
Now that I have a variable defined that assigns the value of combinedIngredients, I can use that in a later function. | https://medium.com/@destrygustin/variables-functions-in-javascript-js-dfea44b25c58 | ['Destry Gustin'] | 2020-12-18 06:56:10.157000+00:00 | ['Javascript Tips', 'JavaScript', 'Development'] |
The Gold Price War Debate HARRY DENT vs JAMES RICKARDS — Summary | The Gold Price War Debate HARRY DENT vs JAMES RICKARDS — Summary Jiagu Apr 25·4 min read
Dent’s points are signified by ‘D’, whereas Rickards by ‘R’. The ‘1s’ are introductory statements, whereas others include both counterarguments, as well as responses to questions given by the presenter. This summary has been made so that the questions are omitted.
Note that I have mentioned only what I thought essential.
R1 Drivers of the price of Gold:
Until 1971 (when Nixon broke the last link between gold and paper currency) gold was a form of money, and we have had 3 bull markets since then (currently in the 3rd, it began in 2015). According to the average by how much gold has risen in the previous bull markets, it would put it at $14.5k/o.z. in 2025. The possibility of a gold standard due to the collapse of the paper currencies (possibly starting with the USD). Considering the global M1 supply of the major economies, and a backing (historically gold standard worked well with 20%) of 40%, gives us ~$13k. The debt-to-GDP ratio is about 130%. Empirical data is suggesting that for a ratio of above 90%, the Keynesian multiplier drops below 1, which means it can’t borrow its way out of the debt crisis. To reduce the ratio, you either inflate or increase the GDP. A 75% devaluation of the USD would put the ratio at 30%, so something similar would put gold at $8k/o.z. Since 2010 central banks became net buyers of gold Mining output is flat High dependency ratio (1 grandchild/4 grandparents in China) due to demographics (can’t be automated) — labor shortage, low productivity, low growth = higher wages (inflation and an increase in the price of gold)
D1 He argues using numerous charts that we are in a deflationary season, and with each year we are getting further into it. Because of this, more QE is required to achieve the same effects, and there’s not much correlation between it and inflation. The current constant increase in debt and financial assets is unsustainable, and deflation is needed to return them to a normal level. Gold rallies in anticipation of QE, but since QE doesn’t cause inflation, gold eventually crashes. An example of the crash would be the halving of the financial assets (e.g. from 6x of GDP to 3x). He then says that gold often runs in 9-Year Cycles, due to its correlation with inflation (as opposed to BTC which is a bad hedge), and based on that it cannot go further than $2200, to eventually crash to ~$1000. According to a megaphone pattern on the S&P 500, every time you make a higher high, you make a lower low, which would be a -47%. The best thing to be in case of a deflation scenario are 30-year T Bonds/Zero Coupon 30-year. Although blockchain is the future (digitization of financial assets), BTC should go suffer a 95% crash (since it’s a bubble). He believes that Asia is going to be the dominant part of the world in the next several decades (India being the biggest growth story of the next 30–50 years), and since they love gold, it makes sense to buy gold after it crashes. If you want to cover all the bases: 40% SQQQ, 30% gold, 30% -bonds, though he himself would take only SQQQ and 30-year T-bonds.
R2 He explains that recessions are 2 consecutive quarters of declining GDP, whereas depressions are when growth is consecutively below trend (meaning you can have growth in a depression). He believes that gold is at an inflexion point where it tips from a deflationary environment into accelerating inflation (2022), and so you can’t extrapolate deflation like Harry does, but instead watch the tipping points.
D2 Depression is the deleveraging of debt and financial assets bubbles. Demographics predict that slowing deflationary workforce growth and its inflationary rise. The central banks will not want deflation to happen, but it will happen anyway as they have no choice in the matter. The rich will lose the most, not the poor.
R3 Money printing doesn’t cause inflation due to velocity — Friedman was wrong, instead of being constant it’s highly volatile. It’s currently low because central banks signal that they are afraid of deflation. The declining labor force isn’t deflationary, it’s inflationary. The only way you can deflate the debt is through defaulting (not possible) or by inflating the currency. 85% of global reserves are dominated in USD and EUR, which means that it’s the only cross rate that matters. To measure the USD, you have to look at gold (opposite price relationship). Gold going down in the immediate aftermath of Lehman, has nothing to do with gold, but the fact that leveraged investors get margin calls, and so they have to sell gold.
D3 You can’t possibly inflate the currency. He says that the data regarding labor growth since 1989 proves him correct (e.g. Japan has the lowest inflation, and has to print at a much higher rate to keep the deflation at bay). What deflates isn’t government debt, but private debt, making default possible.
R4 Central banks can’t themselves inflate the currency, but velocity (which is psychological, and not controlled by central banks) can.
D4 Long-term, yes, but not in a crisis (in which we are now).
R5 Vaccine doesn’t really matter, since the psychological effects will be with us for 30 years (e.g. many restaurants will never re-open, and their equipment will be for sale at fire-sale prices, moreover people won’t suddenly leave their houses the first chance they get). Tether’s printing is behind the BTC rise. BTC’s supply cap prevents its actual usage (no reason to borrow a deflationary currency).
D5 BTC is going to collapse (it isn’t an inflation hedge), but the blockchain will stay (and it makes sense to invest in them as new tech companies). | https://medium.com/@summaries/the-gold-price-war-debate-harry-dent-vs-james-rickards-summary-e8abbbcf1c1b | [] | 2021-04-25 16:48:10.422000+00:00 | ['Dent', 'Gold', 'Inflation', 'Deflation', 'Jim Rickards'] |
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Le jeune Nestrian Finny et sa meilleure compagne Leah, une Grymp, tombent accidentellement de l’Arche et sont sont séparés par une tempête… De nouvelles aventures périlleuses les attendent, mais aussi plein de rencontres extraordinaires… et inattendues!
Sortie: 2020–09–24
Durée: 81 minutes
Genre: Aventure, Animation, Comédie, Familial
Etoiles: Max Carolan, Dermot Magennis, Ava Connolly, Tara Flynn, Mary Murray
Directeur: Toby Genkel, Richie Conroy, Mark Hodkinson, Sean McCormack
Année de production 2020
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La Two by Two: Overboard! se déroule quatre ans après Train to Busan, alors que les personnages se battent pour fuir un pays en ruine à la suite d’un désastre sans précédent.
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Le film est une œuvre d’art sous la forme d’une série d’images en direct qui sont tournées pour produire une illusion d’images en mouvement qui sont présentées comme une forme de divertissement. L’illusion d’une série d’images produit un mouvement continu sous forme de vidéo. Le film est souvent appelé film ou image animée. Le film est une forme d’art moderne et populaire créée à des fins commerciales et de divertissement. Le cinéma est devenu une industrie populaire dans le monde entier, où les longs métrages sont toujours attendus par les cinémas.
Les films sont réalisés de film manières principales. La première consiste à utiliser des techniques de prise de vue et d’enregistrement à l’aide de caméras argentiques. Cette méthode se fait en photographiant des images ou des objets. Le second utilise des techniques d’animation traditionnelles. Cette méthode est effectuée grâce à des techniques d’animation graphique ou CGI. Les film peuvent également être combinés avec d’autres techniques et effets visuels. Le tournage prend généralement un temps relativement long. Cela nécessite également un pupitre de travail chacun, à partir du réalisateur, producteur, monteur, garde-robe, effets visuels et autres.
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On Friday, four days before the US presidential election, the United States recorded 100,000 new cases of Covid-19. This figure recorded the highest increase in cases of corona virus in a day worldwide.
In total, the United States has suffered 9 million cases of Covid-19 as of Friday, or nearly 3% of the population with nearly 229,000 deaths since the pandemic outbreak earlier this year, according to a Reuters report, October 31, 2020.
US health authorities on Friday confirmed that 100,233 people have tested positive for Covid-19 over the past 24 hours.
Friday’s tally set the highest daily Covid-19 record in the US for the fifth time in 10 days, surpassing the previous day’s highest daily spike of 91,248 new cases.
The report also represents the world’s highest national daily casualty toll during the pandemic, surpassing India’s record 24-hour spike in daily cases of 97,894 recorded in September.
On Friday dozens of states individually reported a record number of new daily cases.
Serious cases of Covid-19 are also on the rise, as hospitals in six states report having the most patients with the disease since the pandemic began. The number of Covid-19 patients hospitalized has increased by more than 50% in October to 46,000, the highest since mid-August.
Among the states hardest hit were the states most contested in the campaign between Republican President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden, namely Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
More than 1,000 people died from the virus on Thursday, the third time the daily death toll has exceeded that this month, and the death rate is expected to continue rising. Covid-19 claimed at least 926 more deaths as of Friday.
The University of Washington’s latest prediction model projects the death toll, which had held at a monthly pace of more than 22,000 for most of October, will start climbing next month towards a new record of more than 72,000 in January.
The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation’s January projection would surpass the nearly 61,000 deaths in April when the pandemic first exploded in the United States and flooded New York City hospitals.
Joe Biden and his Democrats in Congress have criticized President Trump for handling his health crisis.
In the US House of Representatives, Democrats released a report on Friday condemning the Trump administration’s pandemic response as “one of the worst leadership failures in American history”.
“At least 6 million Americans have fallen into poverty and millions more are unemployed,” the report said.
The 71-page interim report by Democrat staff from the House Election Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis also said investigators identified more than 60 instances in which Trump administration officials rejected or overruled top scientist advice to advance the president’s political interests.
“The government’s response to this economic crisis has benefited large corporations and wealthy Americans, while leaving behind many disadvantaged communities and struggling small businesses,” the report said.
After being hospitalized for Covid-19 in early October, Trump continued a massive campaign that drew thousands of supporters who gathered and many were not wearing masks. The Trump campaign says rallies are safe and that masks and social distancing are respected.
A CNN investigation found that 14 of the 17 states surveyed showed an increase in the rate of Covid-19 cases only one month after hosting a Donald Trump campaign event. | https://medium.com/@wawamertu/vostfr-hd-two-by-two-overboard-2020-streaming-vf-en-france-bcf0e33e8a4b | [] | 2020-12-17 19:50:57.541000+00:00 | ['France', 'Canada', 'Germany', 'Online'] |
Bridging the Gap: How Tangible and Immediate Solutions Can Help Developing Countries Become Sustainable | A family eats near a coal-fired power plant in China. Credit: Adam Dean/PANOS
Bridging the Gap: How Tangible and Immediate Solutions Can Help Developing Countries Become Sustainable
One of the most significant challenges with efforts to combat Climate Change is the alignment and participation of all nations. Daniel Guelen Follow Mar 25, 2020 · 5 min read
Even though efforts in the United States and Europe are lacking far behind what is necessary, the business climate in these countries is changing as consumers demand more responsible governance and corporate behavior, and the hope is that trends will head in the right direction. The growing importance of the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals as a global framework along with growing consumer power and the outspoken new generations of change agents, create fundamental changes in the economy, business models, and regulations that will drive more positive impact across the world.
However, among developing nations, many challenges remain. As China and India grow, they are driving carbon emissions up. On top of that, recent policy directions taken in countries such as China, Brazil, and India discriminate against ethnic groups, worsen social freedoms and standards, and abuse natural resources degrading their environment.
Contrary to populist talk or discriminating beliefs, this is not always entirely those nations’ fault. Naturally, their efforts to industrialize, the lack of particular technologies, lower thresholds by citizens to afford changes, and the scarcity of financial capital are hindering any attempts to become more sustainable. Although some are investing heavily in renewable energies, the current social, financial, and demographic issues will hinder some of their efforts.
Claiming that these countries should alter their behavior- now that we cannot ignore the catastrophic environmental results of our behavior- is easy when your country is already industrialized.
While those leaders should be held accountable for their abuses of human rights and the increasingly authoritarian policies, there is a lack of understanding of the situations they are facing. Claiming that these countries should alter their behavior- now that we cannot ignore the catastrophic environmental results of our behavior- is easy when your country is already industrialized.
It is not a reasonable expectation to ask other nations- and their citizens- to stop doing what developed nations did for centuries, without some kind of solution to level the playing field.
After all, we previously spent centuries industrializing in the same harmful ways and are now positioned to pivot to a more sustainable economy and governance model. Essentially, it is not a reasonable expectation to ask other nations- and their citizens- to stop doing what developed nations did for centuries, without some kind of solution to level the playing field.
Instead, we need to embrace and provide solutions that help those developing nations achieve the SDGs while stepping away from unsustainable developing models. This would allow time for their investments in renewables and other technologies to mature.
For instance, a solution would be for developed nations to fund the efforts of struggling nations who cannot afford to fundamentally change their industries and behaviors. This solution is regularly discussed and draws heavy political criticism, as it entails one government wiring over a massive sum of money to a developing government. However, this is not necessarily true or the only way to achieve the same results.
At Global Impact we identified the increasing role of organizations, institutions, and individuals in achieving the SDGs.
At Global Impact we identified the increasing role of organizations, institutions, and individuals in achieving the SDGs. Part of these efforts is the ability to fund projects and individuals to enable positive change themselves. Otherwise known as Impact Investing, these projects achieve tangible and realistic goals that can be verified and measured in real-time by Global Impact and its partners across the world.
For example, an aviation business we are helping wanted to become more sustainable and offset its customer’s carbon emissions. One way they can achieve that with us is by funding a project in India to provide an entire village of solar panels. The village steps away from its unsustainable reliance on high-emission sources that damage their environment, health, and economic performances. We proportionally allocate the impact created by this project towards the company, and customers, who funded it and assign the impact to the corresponding SDGs. We call this their Impact Portfolio.
The company can then use this to justify its operations to the public, attract employees who want to help towards certain goals and issues, and show regulators what they do to achieve the SDGs and combat climate change.
We help them doing so on our platform.
Meanwhile, India’s national efforts to become sustainable was indirectly funded by an organization located in the United States who invested in tangible, verifiable, and efficient results without the fear of it ending up in the wrong pockets or being wasted in bureaucratic systems. Additionally, this empowered citizens in India to organize projects and make sustainable choices.
Let me be clear. Also in developed nations the need for change is apparent. The United States has generally been reducing its emissions but is still the current second-largest emitter of greenhouse gasses and leads in per capita and total cumulative emissions. The European Union is making tremendous progress and is on track to achieving its Paris targets but still heavily uses coal and faces cooperation issues.
However, by providing some of the key components for achieving the SDGs- capital- organizations, institutions, and individuals can significantly help those within developing nations to act and become more sustainable.
By incentivizing those with capital to allocate it towards where it is needed most and could have the largest impact, we can effectively speed up efforts to become sustainable and act right now.
At Global Impact we take a lot of pride in what we do and how we help governments, organizations, institutions, and people become sustainable. Creating a bridge between countries is one of the aspects I believe is most promising, as it connects the problems of various stakeholders and brings forth one immediate, verifiable, and realistic solution.
While governments have issues coming to terms with top-down solutions, we facilitate all other stakeholders in society to connect and achieve solutions bottom-up. Ultimately, we help to bring real global impact right now when and where it is needed most. | https://medium.com/global-impact/bridging-the-gap-how-tangible-and-immediate-solutions-can-help-developing-countries-become-429b5c4acf74 | ['Daniel Guelen'] | 2020-03-25 01:29:08.010000+00:00 | ['Sustainability', 'Sustainable Development', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Impact Investing', 'Climate Change'] |
Let them shine | Last Saturday, I had the opportunity to see Roger Waters live in concert for the third time. It was an experience, as always.
If there’s something that characterised Pink Floyd along the years, was the spectacularity of their shows, and a lot of that has always attributed to Roger Waters, making his solo shows not an exception. Great visuals, imposing staging, and of course, a group of incredibly talented musicians; all this in conjunction to his trademarked theatricality, protest, activism and controversy. Just what you would expect from the legendary rock star that contributed to the creation of some of the most iconic albums ever produced.
However, despite all his legacy, reputation and stardom, the show is not just about him, as matter of fact, he doesn’t even sing in all the songs. Just like bak on the Pink Floyd days, David Gilmour was the responsible for a great amount of the vocals, and Waters still sticking to this, having a person to do all of David’s parts. He also has a magnificent guitar player that will make himself impossible to miss, not only due to the perpetual presence of this instrument throughout Pink Floyd’s catalogue (which Waters performances significantly) but due to his astonishing virtue.
Moreover, there’s a plethora of other instruments and sounds that are played along the show as the night progressed. Keyboards, synthesisers, drums, saxophones; each one of them having its time and space, with those performing playing different roles at different scale, but all necessary.
Even support singers, who’s important and harmonic part can go totally unnoticed in many other shows, here they were at the core. A hypnotic duo that was not there just to sing on the back of Roger, but side by side with him, and some times for him, all by themselves. | https://medium.com/thoughts-on-the-go-journal/let-them-shine-28d5a7f54913 | ['Joseph Emmi'] | 2018-07-02 22:45:16.140000+00:00 | ['Life', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Music', 'Growth', 'Business'] |
The Technology of Results | The Technology of Results
Meaningful mastery through Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP)
Image: Simon Migaj/Unsplash
This is the second article I am posting in this series “Inspired Success: Learning From the World’s Best” outlining the teachings of some of the world’s most seminal thought leaders. We have selected those I have personally interacted with, in many cases worked with, and delivered with.
Two madcap pioneers of the human psyche, Richard Bandler and John Grinder, cobbled together and co-created from multiple sources of inspiration (among them systems thinker Gregory Bateson, syntax innovator Noam Chomsky, the father of Gestalt Fritz Perls, family therapist Virginia Satir, hypnotherapist Milton Erickson, and others), a remarkable way of “modelling human thinking and processing” that came to be known as Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP). In essence, it is a study of the ‘languages’ — verbal and non-verbal — that create strategic or recurring responses through the brain and central nervous system. In short, it is a study of “how” we tick and indirectly, “why” we tock.
Though Bandler and Grinder’s colorful lives did not always seem to do justice to the genius of what they created, one of the early researchers, who also served as a foil and a reciprocal therapeutic guide for the founders, was a man called Don Wolfe. Don had an intuitive insight into how to provoke, nudge, and entice change in the moment that, in my experience, surpassed even the “techniques” so brilliantly endowed by Bandler and Grinder. His ability to parlay Gestalt, and naturally wield Ericksonian hypnosis for example, playfully and poignantly, was profound.
Don in turn met a remarkable entrepreneur called Robert Allen, the man who in Real Estate terms, gave us the concept of Nothing Down, and who continues as an esteemed entrepreneurial guide, coach and mentor to this day.
Through a fascinating turn of events, they launched a week long “Wealth Building” experience, focusing on both inner and outer wealth, practical investment ideas from leading business coaches who literally exemplified what they taught, and inner “self-mastery” using NLP, but as a platform for enriching self-esteem and creating dramatic personal and interpersonal transformation.
I attended the session, was smitten and wowed in equal measure, and decided I had to contribute to it. I developed a deep relationship with Don, who became my initial mentor in this area. I learned avidly and in time, I helped them run these sessions, and then added to the insights to create what we introduced in Asia and around the world as Mastery of Self through Neuro-Linguistic Programming three decades ago. “Mastery” takes NLP and uses it in the spirit it was first created.
Start With a “Why”
What Bob and Don’s presentation superimposed upon the NLP edifice, was to leverage change by finding a big enough “why.” If the “why” is big enough, we can find the natural inner drive needed to get past obstacles, rebound from failure, generate or regenerate needed energy. This is because having a sense of “purpose” taps into our deep yearning for meaning and significance, and enriches and vitalizes us in a way that a “task” or a “goal” or an “outcome” just can’t.
So, first locate your purpose. How? Look for the intersection between your greatest gladness (what you love to do, what you have a talent for, what animates you) and the world’s greatest good (where you can sustain yourself, where you can tangibly contribute, where you can be most valuable).
Next state it, crystallize it at least to yourself, simply, succinctly, meaningfully.
The next step is to convert this into “bottom-lines” that extend out for several years in the areas of:
- Being (things that sustain and nourish our spirit) - Body (the health, nurturing and strengthening of our physical vehicle) - Brain (creating learning projects that build the mental sculpture for success) - People (relationships that make me smarter and advance my causes) - Time (where my highest priority time will go) and - Money (the wealth I wish to build to enable my purpose).
We can consider these the “infrastructure” of purpose.
Then each month you create “deliverables” or “accountabilities” to advance “progress” against these bottom-lines, and each day distill Pareto-like “20’s” or locate “the essential few” that build your Purpose and expand its infrastructure. When we do only what we have to do, we are slaves. When we find prime energy and time to choose what we will do, more or less each day, we expand our freedom.
Constituents of a Winning Day
Blending practical entrepreneurial visioning and dedication with the insights of NLP, Bob and Don laid the foundation for our embarking on an exceptionally focused day, whereby each day builds on the last, and each succeeding day, is enhanced by its predecessor.
First, each day, we plug into ‘purpose’, and get our energy flowing to larger callings. Then, look at the “infrastructure projects” and see what you are aiming to advance that week and that day. Finally, look at daily commitments, professionally, personally and those that are explicitly purpose led (and if your purpose is not to some extent naturally infusing your profession or personal life, there’s an issue to address), and decide what the “big rocks” are for the day, the 20% that will give you 80% of the value. Pick “3” of these each day that you will absolutely commit to advancing. Everything else that day is a bonus.
Next, mentally rehearse, vividly experience yourself going through the day as you hope to, not in terms of “outcomes” you can’t control, but “processes,” emotional states, engagement, flow. And particularly experience yourself moving these key goalposts forward.
As you kick into gear that day, whatever you most fear or dread that day, do it first or at least do it early, to claim an early victory and gain some early momentum. This frees up a lovely reservoir of otherwise potentially trapped energy.
Take time to get some exercise, create some “time-outs” to get “time in” with some meditation or prayer or quiet, and ensure you provide yourself with nourishing, delicious energy through your meals.
Get those “top 3” commitments advanced, progressed, done.
Each day, reflect on what you’ve learned that day, what insight you’ve had, what edge you can bring from today to the next day(s) going forward.
And finally do a “replay” where you celebrate your victories, successes and steps forward, and where you learn from your fumbles, foibles and failures, and then “edit” the film so you can rehearse doing them as you would like to, next time. That way you finish the day emboldened and edified, not demoralized and frustrated.
And somewhere during that day, spend time with insights or people or ideas that make you smarter, more competent, more capable. And welcome them in and allow the insights or inspiration to fully integrate into the fabric of who you are.
The Communication Breakthrough
It is mind boggling to me that the rudiments of NLP’s remarkable insights about the nature of communication are not etched into our public consciousness and private psyches. The devastating waste inflicted in all manner of human interaction, from corporate communication, to national influencing and more, due to this ignorance, defies credulity.
Let’s start very simply. The primary insight is that the meaning of your communication is the result it produces in the person being communicated with — very simply, communication occurs at the end of the receiver, finally any way. Hence, perfecting and honing “delivery” without any awareness of how something is “landing” is asinine.
Therefore, the stunningly simple realization dawns on us that virtually all conflict and communication-based misunderstanding stems from a mismatch between my intent and the actual impact on the other person. So, if I intend to be noncommittal and come across as disdainful or indifferent; or intend to be passionate and come across as lewd and presumptuous; or seek to convey a wry sense of humor and it pierces someone to the quick, we have an issue. And what makes this worse is that I always give myself “credit” for my positive intent, no matter how badly I butcher the communication, or how destructively it is received. Yet, I will hold someone responsible to my dying day or theirs, whichever comes first in my experience, for the “impact” of what they said on me, irrespective of having the “intent” clarified.
A compounding issue is that we process the world differently. We use words to “stand for” events or experiences, and we often use them with differing meaning. And if someone happens to be more “visual” (and tends to paint things in pictures and images) and someone else is more “auditory” (and uses quite a few words, and prefers to be descriptive) and still someone else is more “kinesthetic” (flowing with touch or feelings or emotions), then we can be out of sync and out of sympathy and have no idea why someone is sensitive where we are not, or stimulated where we are unfazed and unmoved.
And so “decoding” the communication and emotional landscape of a person, communicating with them in a way that is effective for them, requires great “here and now” acuity, awareness, flexibility and spontaneity. You step into their world and then, and only once rapport is established, invite them into yours.
Changing States and Outcomes
We know the way we feel influences how we act. However, the opposite is as potently true. We feel the way we behave too. And so, if we “act” the way we wish to feel, and if we do so whole-heartedly, if we put our “body” into it, the feeling catches up with the behavior. I have never seen a person not warmed by a genuine smile and someone asking, “How are you?”, and actually stopping to listen to the answer. I have never seen a person dance to upbeat music and claim to be depressed while doing so.
A second way we change states is by “anchoring” peak states, especially those identified with compelling outcomes. So the next time you are naturally elated, notice how you are standing, see what you are seeing in your mind’s eye, notice if there’s any internal dialogue or soundtrack, perhaps apply a certain pressure on a certain part of your body, or pump a fist, or just smile expansively. All of these “anchor” or “link to” that elated state. And if every time you’re in that state, you go through the same sequence, or physical and mental “ritual” if you will, that gets “associated” or “hooked to” that elated state. Then, when seeking the state, when wishing to be in that state, you can “fire off” these various cues (stand that way, see what you see, hear what you heard, feel what you felt and repeat the touch or bodily sensation or facial expression). Perhaps you’ll also generate an inner affirmation like, “Yes!” or “God Bless!” or “I say YES to this” or even just “Welcome!” That can amplify and fortify the anchor.
You can also strengthen the anchor by going back through other similar peak experiences you’ve had in the past, and rekindle them through your physiology, visuals, words, feelings and touch, or other associations and intensify them. As you do, using the same physical and mental ritual earlier created, you “stack” the anchor, intensifying its capacity to have you naturally and radiantly enter that resourceful or high energy state.
Another way to shift states and outcomes is through a “Pattern Interrupt.” That means to discover the reflexive way we are causing a problem. Perhaps we automatically head for a beer and slump in a certain chair when despondent; perhaps we give a certain look to someone before launching into a scathing critique; perhaps we binge eat in front of the TV triggered by that; perhaps being cut off mid-sentence in work by a certain colleague turns us into a raging contrarian; perhaps an untidy child’s bedroom works us up into an nonconstructive and nit-picking lather. So, if we can “interrupt” the pattern, so the reflexive “stimulus — response” game can’t be loaded and we have to actually “look” at the situation, or “listen” to it, or “feel” what’s going on anew, then we are free, we can start with a fresh neurological slate.
It can be as simple as agreeing to empty the garbage and taking a shower before allowing yourself the beer; perhaps when we notice we’ve given that certain look that triggers a reaction, we can say “bingo!” Even if we realize too late, we can go fill out a bingo-like chart. Perhaps we eat at the table, and not in front of the TV, except on weekends. Perhaps you can agree a mutual signal between your colleague and yourself, it will alert you both to the diabolical dance being enacted. Perhaps the untidy child’s bedroom can lead to a duty to be done, and a clean bedroom to being able to nominate a special dish, or show to watch, or family activity to enjoy. You get the idea… break the autopilot.
One executive found that she started the day grumpy, so she rolled back and forth and crawled over her spouse to get out of bed, to initial annoyance, then giggles, and certainly a fresh overture to the day. So, change the automatic “doing” of the problem, by becoming an anthropologist, and studying what attends it. And then do anything else, or do it subtly or even drastically differently, and you will “interrupt” the pattern, and this will leave you free to “be” again.
And finally, there is the combination of “baby steps” and “the stretch.” So, the thousand-mile journey begins with a single step. The question is asked, “How do you eat an elephant?” The answer is given, “One bite at a time.”
So, whatever the aim, create some baby steps, something so simple you cannot possibly fail at it. But then hold yourself wholeheartedly accountable. So, two minutes of raising your heartbeat as a first exercise foundation. But then for those two minutes “stretch” yourself past rationalizations, explanations, excuses, and make it happen. Spend five minutes listening fully to a loved one. Too much? Start with two minutes, but then “stretch” your attention, your intention, your focus, your interest. And when it starts to feel good, do more, go farther, explore further.
Learn a new language. Commit, publicly commit, the no dinner if you don’t type of committing, to 10 minutes if that’s all you can manage, or five, or two, or one to immersing in that language app… eventually the bullshit meter will give up. And then really “stretch” to get all the value out of each selected moment, by stretching past inertia or doubt or inhibition.
You can build a business this way, save for a college fund, run a marathon, whatever… baby step and stretch your way past inertia towards momentum and then onto real capability and progress.
Anything once really “stretched” never quite snaps back to the original configuration, it stays a little bit “stretched.” So, you expand, your aptitude grows, your attitude and conviction flourish, and you also create real credibility with yourself…you start to believe your own commitments. And you therefore flourish vibrantly in congruence, experiencing ever more harmony as you go and grow.
The Essence of Mastery of Self
NLP by itself is a collection of tools, and we’ve shared a few here. What Robert Allen and Don Wolfe did was marshal NLP to make life bigger and richer and esteem more real, and to allow positivity to find real footing through exploring possibility first.
We have heard, “We become what we think about all day long.” Yes, but we also become “how” we think about it. And if we can think about it and experience it in the spirit of real curiosity about what works, with an insatiable commitment to experience all of our capabilities and to model success relentlessly, realizing that like failure, it leaves footprints in the sand, then we’ll find the real riches here.
The masters that Bandler and Grinder modeled with Don Wolfe at their side, were intuitively expressing genius. NLP modeled what they did, so we could learn it and emulate them meaningfully and mindfully. Mastery suggests we also model the spirit, the love, the passion and conviction with which they did it, lest we become the tools of our tools.
We all share the same neurology. If anyone in the world can produce a result, if we study their strategies, learn from their mental and emotional maps, build those habits, and fortify those rituals, summon those states, course correct based on what actually happens, then we can approximate their results. And if we further realize it is the human ecosystems that are the most flexible, the most adaptive, inspired by and driven towards a life purpose worth even failing in rather than succeeding in never seeking to advance, then we will almost inevitably find our own unique formula for success.
This is true of us as individuals, in concert as communities and companies, and even in aggregate, as nations and ultimately a world that will or won’t, ultimately, decide to finally learn how to learn from its own experience, so that successes instruct and failures fertilize. Because then, either way, life wins! | https://omarskhan.medium.com/the-technology-of-results-6e3277cd3432 | ['Omar S. Khan'] | 2020-07-16 03:36:51.238000+00:00 | ['Life Lessons', 'Personal Growth', 'Self Improvement', 'NLP', 'Life'] |
How Having Access to a Mentor from a Young Age has a Compound Effect | Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash
The importance of access is often underestimated, overlooked, or ignored by both the privileged and the unprivileged. After all, we see our daily lives and circumstances as “normal” because that is our daily life experience, regardless of our footing in the world.
Often times I think and rewatch the below video. In a nutshell, the instructor asks the kids to line up to race each other for a $100 bill. Before they can start running though, he asks a series of statements. If the statement applies to the person, then they should take two steps forward; if it doesn’t, then they don’t move. It becomes pretty clear once the instructor starts saying the statements where this is going. It also becomes pretty clear to you as a viewer and to the kids themselves how privilege works in terms of socioeconomics, upbringing, and plenty of other factors, and how that can get them closer to their goals.
So what does access (or this video for that matter) have to do with mentorship? As I mentioned in my previous blog post, there is a difference in getting life achievements between those that have a mentor and those who don’t. Further, according to a recent article published on the Atlantic:
If you talk to successful people about what made a difference in their lives, “it often comes down to the involvement of a caring adult over time and during critical moments,” said the University of Massachusetts at Boston psychology professor Jean Rhodes, one of the nation’s leading experts on mentoring. Mentoring sometimes involves helping you “figure out what you want to do with your life … who are the people who will help you get there … and how do you connect with them.”
There is a number of reasons as to why a person has a mentor or not, one of them is education and socioeconomic standing — which oftentimes go hand-in-hand. According to that same article,
Not all children have equal access to these positive outcomes. According to the National Mentoring Partnership, middle-class and affluent young people often enjoy a network of family and friends serving as informal mentors and can have access to camp counselors, sports coaches, and therapists pushing them to success. About two-thirds of teens in the highest economic quartile receive some mentoring beyond their extended family, while, in contrast, only about a third of youth from the bottom economic quarter do, the organization reported in a 2013 study.
In other words, access to a mentor is mostly available to groups of people with better socioeconomic standing. Although there are plenty of non-profits that strive to extend this access to other groups such as Micromentor.org or Big Brothers, Big Sisters of America, the reality is that there is a lot of work to be done still.
This not only affects youth, it affects people of all ages. Going back to my previous article where I mention levels of education across groups in the US, if we consider the people who are first in their families to graduate college or have a bachelor’s degree, it means that they quite simply outdid their parents and grandparents in terms of the level of education. Who do they turn to for questions and guidance then?
According to Emerson Collective, about 50% of college students are first-generation. This is an outstanding number as it indicates that more and more people have access to education. However, this also comes with a high level of pressure, “especially for low-income communities where attending college is not an expectation, but an exception.” One of the students included in this article mentions, “I didn’t understand what it meant to go to a university, let alone know anyone who had achieved things like that.” It means that these folks are starting from scratch, often left to their own devices to reinvent the wheel.
This lack of access and awareness can continue throughout their professional and personal lives. First-generation college graduates can also be the first in their families to hold a corporate job. We’ve seen the difference it makes to have a mentor in the workplace vs not having one, even if employees have the same level of education. Think of a first-generation college graduate vs those whose parents, grandparents, and extended circle have a college education and take it as a normal milestone.
As time goes on, this has a compound effect. If we compare levels of education and the executives in corporations based on racial/ethnic groups in the US, we can see that representation starts to dwindle. Though there has been progress in getting more folks to attend and finish college across groups, this growth is not apples to apples in senior leadership roles. For example, as of 2016, 15% of the Hispanic/Latino in the US got a college degree, while only 4.3% of senior executives in US companies are Hispanic/Latino.
Of course, this number has a natural lag — graduating college doesn’t automatically land folks a senior executive role across the board (at least not normally). Folks have to gain experience and grow into those roles. But as we think about proportionality, we must think about other factors that influence success, which of course includes mentorship.
In the end, having access to a mentor (sooner rather than later), has a compound effect through time. As a mentee, think about the things you want to achieve in life and look for more experienced folks to help you navigate those questions. To help out as a mentor and giving more folks access to a mentor, I encourage you to enroll as a mentor at your company, community, or an online non-profit. I have done it and not only does this help give access to more folks, but it also has a very rewarding feeling and learning opportunity as a mentor. | https://medium.com/@rodelmo/how-having-access-to-a-mentor-from-a-young-age-has-a-compound-effect-84b41ab36706 | ['Rocio Del Moral'] | 2020-12-13 19:36:08.399000+00:00 | ['Mentorship Matters', 'Mentorship', 'College Graduate', 'Mentoring'] |
~ 63 weeks to my ‘Tees’ (30th) ~ | ~ 63 weeks to my ‘Tees’ (30th) ~
(22–28 July 2019)
Half of this week I was at the HAZMAT course -where we were being trained on how to respond if ever there were a HAZMAT (Hazardous Material) incident in our locality (like the Tokyo Sarin attack or the Bhopal gas tragedy) and what would be the steps we would take as the frontlines of the healthcare system. Whilst training to be an Emergency Medicine physician and being an adrenaline junkie, I find thrill in the acute cases that present to the Resuscitation room -a Mass Casuality Incident of this order wouldn’t be something I’d ever look forward to.
On one hand, we hold hands, talk about ‘One World Family’ and are sincere peace crusaders; on the other hand, some countries are at outright war, while others are ever-ready for attack, including that from terrorist organisations. The sheer dichotomy gets to me sometimes and often, I fail to understand, how despite being an educated species, we still can bring harm to one another. But the poignant truth is that, it all stems from inequality and discrimination, and one’s perception of such unfairness, and the subsequent frustration. The means will never be justified, though the alleged triggers might just be eh? I spent the lone bus rides to and fro, in my own thoughts and how the world could very well be a peaceful place, but perhaps we are just far away from that ideal universe, if there were such a thing at all.
In my own little universe, as ever, I found little moments of peace for myself and my family. Mid-week, met the husband for a foot massage and later, for a cheesy date at this quaint place called “Awesome Cafe” -absolutely loved the vibes and the attentive service there. As the weekend dawned, met a couple of our friends, for cocktails atop Marina Bay Sands; we also handed them some gifts which Prantik had picked up from Wimbledon, their 5 year old was elated to receive a Wimbledon jacket and couldn’t stop smiling :) We also got a chance to witness the (National Day practice) fireworks prior to heading for a movie. The movie wasn’t great, but we did have a good evening together.
Later on Sunday, we finally went for ‘brunch’ — something that has been on Prantik’s mind for a while. We went to this cafe called “Lokal” and enjoyed regular brunch fare, while the little one was kept busy with colouring pencils and puzzles. We then walked over to Wallich residence, and chilled there, enjoying the breeze, while Ayaan ran around, blowing bubbles.
I thought to myself again: We all live in our little bubbles; if not all, most of us. By nature, we are all self-centred individuals and often, our lives revolve around us, our immediate family and a handful of friends perhaps. When at work, at the hospital it often feels like I’m in a different Universe altogether. I oft wonder, what will make that bubble burst? And if and when the bubble bursts, what then? But I guess, we’ll deal with it when it occurs; until then, stay happy, stay peaceful and enjoy your coffee, in blissful oblivion. | https://medium.com/@dipzthoughts/bubbles-a2ffa884f138 | ['Dipti Kamath'] | 2019-09-04 03:00:22.874000+00:00 | ['Universe', 'Training', 'Life', 'Family', 'Dichotomy'] |
Amal totkay.. | Amal totkay..
This one is interesting although everything is going interesting but I love these totkay … it helps to improve our mindsets all of us get benefits from these totkays …
1: self talk
So before revealing any idea first you should to talk with your self.. is it acceptable in our society or is it a need of this time… what is innovative in your idea.
Or is you can do this or not
2: Get out from the comfort zone
If you want to do something new or something unique you should to leave your comfort zone it may be day or night work to achieve your goals .. so you should to go with it… everything that will give you comfort, you need to expel out it from your life.. than you will be succeed
3: create new habits
As we are belongs to poor nation just because of we all do work in our comfort zone first of all we need to change this habit .. than find all your bad habits that give you distraction in your work change it into good ones … If your habit is too sleep late and get up in late morning and your business idea needs to woke up early so you should to change it
4: Ask people for help
When you get work on your plan you need to test it by getting help from other people… with their feedback you know about is it unique or interesting for people.
5: Fake it till you make it
This is very important step .. untill or unless you get achievement in your goal you need to do work … work work and only work is your sloghan for getting achievement..
Thank you Amal 💖 | https://medium.com/@farwa-noor185/amal-totkay-f0ab52bb22ce | ['Farwa Noor'] | 2021-04-09 22:38:46.816000+00:00 | ['Amaltotkay'] |
Parsing Gigabytes of JSON per second | JSON is a popular language-independent data exchange format. It is supported by many database systems and data science frameworks. Also, several document-oriented databases are centred around JSON.
JSON has four primitive types (number, boolean, string, null) that can be embedded within composed types (arrays and objects).
An object is a series of key-value pairs surrounded by braces. An array is a list of comma-separated values surrounded by brackets.
JSON Object: { “name”: “Bill Gates”, “age”: 63 } .
JSON Array: [ 123, null, “abc ] .
JSON objects or arrays can contain primitive types or arbitrarily deeply nested objects/arrays as their values.
JSON example
To read a JSON document, software needs to transform the JSON text into a tree-like structure. This process is called JSON parsing. Parsing large JSON documents is a common but heavy-duty task.
Big-data applications can spend 80–90% of their time parsing JSON documents.
JSON parsing is an intensive process as it involves error checking like:
Objects must start and end with a brace.
Arrays must start and end with a bracket.
Objects must be made of comma-separated pairs of values where all keys are strings.
Outside of string values, only a few ASCII characters are allowed. Within string values, several characters must be escaped.
Numbers must follow the specification and fit within a valid range.
It requires that documents use a Unicode character encoding.
To accelerate processing, we should use our processors as efficiently as possible.
Popular processors (Intel, ARM, AMD) support single-instruction-multiple-data (SIMD) instructions. Hence, on x64 processors, we can compare two strings of 32 characters in a single instruction. We can make use of SIMD instructions to locate significant characters in a JSON document (eg, “ , = ) using a few instructions. Application of SIMD instruction can be referred to as vectorization. Code that generates fewer instructions is faster. Usually, vectorized software uses fewer instructions than conventional software.
Whenever the processor chooses between two code paths, there is a risk of incurring several cycles of penalty, due to a wrongly predicted branch on current pipelined processors. This is referred to as branching.
SIMD instructions combined with minimal branching can lead to new speed records for JSON parsing.
This article summarizes the design and implementation technique of simdjson JSON parser based on this research paper. The simdjson parser in question is implemented in C++ language but the architecture can be implemented in other languages as well.
How fast can this parser be?
The performance of simdjson compared to other JSON parsers is multifold. As you can see from the table, simdjson can achieve speeds of up to 2.2 GB/s on the twitter.json file while others are unable to cross the 1 GB/s speed.
It performs well on a variety of JSON inputs.
Here’s the performance, against the closest C/C++ competitors, on a range of inputs on an Intel Skylake processor (an i7–6700 running at 3.4 GHz in 64-bit mode).
Why is it fast?
The main advantage of this parsing architecture lies in Stage 1. At this stage, it detects the location of structural and pseudo-structural characters from the input. This system operates with large inputs at once and takes full advantage of SIMD operations to perform faster processing. Although the application of SIMD instructions for parsing is not novel, it is underutilized in popular JSON parsers.
Parsing architecture
Most parsers use a top-down recursive single pass technique. This parsing technique uses two distinct passes and at the end of the two stages, all strings are normalized, all numbers have been parsed and validated, and validity check of JSON document is done as well.
The first stage operates directly on the input, processing the data in batches of 64 bytes, making full use of SIMD instructions which is the key to its good performance. It deliberately delays number and string validation to the next stage.
Stage 1 — Structural and Pseudo-Structural Elements
This stage identifies the key points in the input — the structural characters of JSON (braces, brackets, colon and comma), the start and end of strings and other JSON atoms ( true , false , null and numbers). Following are the steps performed at this stage:
Identification of the quoted substrings
This step focuses on identifying strings and not confusing the quotes surrounding the string with the quotes that are meant to be part of the string.
The parser finds all the quote characters ( “” ) and odd-length sequences of backslashes (that will result in escaping the subsequent character). The string inside the quotes is then detected, by filtering out escaped quote characters.
For eg: [ “That was a \“LOL\” moment” ]
The parser will not confuse with quotes around the word LOL because those quotes are escaped using the backslash.
Identification of structural characters
The parser uses SIMD comparison to create a lookup table. This allows it to separate the characters into one of the two categories:
Structural characters ( {} , [] , : and , ). White-space characters.
The algorithm of this step uses only two SIMD instructions and a few logical instructions. No branching is required which makes this parser way faster than others.
Identification of Pseudo-Structural Characters
Pseudo-structural characters are non-white-space characters that are:
Outside quotes Have a predecessor that is either a white-space character or a structural character.
This step uses a feature of JSON: the legal atoms can all be distinguished from each other by their first character: t for true , f for false , n for null , 0–9 for numerical values.
As a side effect, identifying pseudo-structural characters helps the parser validate the input JSON document.
Index Extraction
While identifying all of the above elements and structural characters, the parser keeps on building indexes corresponding to each character. This indexing helps in creating a navigable tree of JSON elements in stage 2.
Character-Encoding Validation
This parser architecture assumes the input data to be UTF-8 character encoded across the whole input. The liberty to discard other encodings is taken because there is hardly any JSON document published out there which doesn’t follow UTF-8 character encoding.
Stage 2 — Building the Tape
At this stage, the parser iterates through the indexes found in the first stage. A goto-based state machine with a stack is used to handle objects and arrays that can be nested. It handles JSON element, number and string validation and, as it goes, constructs a navigable tree of JSON elements called a tape representation.
The JSON Tape — A tree of navigable JSON elements
After the two stages, a JSON input is parsed to a JSON tape which can be easily read by any software. All of this is done efficiently taking advantage of the processor architecture as much as possible. | https://medium.com/@rajat_sriv/parsing-gigabytes-of-json-per-second-9c5a1a7b91db | ['Rajat Srivastava'] | 2019-05-13 00:30:06.924000+00:00 | ['Json', 'Programming', 'Efficiency', 'Parsing', 'Research'] |
Creative People Don't Do These 4 Things | Everyone likes to think they’re an ideas person, but few actually are.
Until you stop doing these four things, you can’t call yourself creative and expect anyone to take you seriously. Avoid these behaviors, and what remains is a future full of brilliant ideas:
1.) Creative People Don’t Worry About The Competition
Coming up with something entirely new is virtually impossible. Someone, somewhere, will already have thought of something similar before.
This annoys some people who think they’re creative. They get obsessed with what their competitors are doing and try to do the opposite.
They’re just falling into a trap which true creatives sidestep gracefully.
The best idea is the one that solves the exact problem in front of you, right now.
If it has attributes in common with someone else’s solution to a different problem in the past, so what?
Don’t break copyright — those rules are there for a reason — but don’t get dragged away from a good idea just because someone else has done something similar once upon a time.
Photo by Victoriano Izquierdo on Unsplash
Come up with the best idea you can in your problem landscape. Execute to the best of your ability. Do it your way. Do it better.
Let the competition worry about itself.
2.) Creative People Are Not Afraid To Let Ideas Go
Come up with ideas long enough, and you realize that ideas are cheap.
People who think they are creative get so wedded to their favorites that they miss opportunities to come up with something even better.
Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
In the creative industries, you meet so many people hung up on an idea they won’t let go. They think the world misunderstands their genius.
Just consider for a moment what a ridiculous attitude this is.
You’re right, and the whole world is wrong? Now and forever? Really?
Come on. Be reasonable.
Truly creative people understand that coming up with ideas is a process — nothing more, nothing less.
Research and practice high-quality creative techniques, and you can generate hundreds of great ideas every day.
Just like any other process, creativity can be learned, practiced, and improved.
Don’t fall for the creative genius myth.
If you look at one Picasso painting and think — he’s just a genius — you’re ignoring his years of graft delivering creations which were less-than-genius before it.
Photo by Khara Woods on Unsplash
3.) Creative People Don’t Get Annoyed By Criticism
I understand it is frustrating when your pet project gets shot down at the final hurdle.
But, guess what? Whoever shot it down just did you a favor. That idea doesn’t work. Great, one more ruled out.
It is now more likely your next version will succeed.
People think it’s sexy or cool to be creative. And those who see themselves as creative (but aren’t) get very defensive when someone questions their genius.
True creatives shrug, smile, take the lessons, then go away and come up with a whole load of even better ideas.
4.) Creative People Don’t Worry About Their Creativity Being Restricted
Fake creatives hate feeling restricted. Try to put any realistic conditions on their ideas (such as cost, time frame, or practicality), and they throw their hands up in frustration.
True creatives relish restriction because it only makes them better.
A mountaineer searches out the most challenging peaks and ascents. In the same way, great creatives search out problem landscapes full of boundaries, where the need for innovation is the most pressing.
Photo by JOHN TOWNER on Unsplash
Let’s say I ask you to come up with an idea for a TV advert for a car (one area of advertising which sorely needs more true creativity).
You can do anything — no restrictions.
You might suggest cars on mountains, sweeping helicopter shots, and rock music.
Boring. We’ve seen it before.
What if the restrictions are — under £500 budget, we can’t get a big film crew due to the pandemic, and there’s no budget for music. Now, what do you do?
You get creative.
How about a battle of the voiceover artists delivering the car maker’s slogan? And the winner is the person you least expect (or the Producer giving the instructions to the actors).
How about making the ad itself about the world’s trickiest brainstorm? Everyone is trying to work out how to do an advert for a car without all the usual tropes (and coming up with more and more ridiculous suggestions).
How about you get the engineers who made the car in a kitchen? Get them to make a cake instead of a car. The end line could be: “We’re much better at making cars than cakes.”
Photo by Toa Heftiba on Unsplash
These are all more original ideas than what currently passes as a car TV ad.
I came up with them in less than a minute. These ideas were easy to generate because of the restrictions in place.
If you get annoyed — instead of fired up — by restrictions placed on you, then you’re not a true creative. | https://medium.com/be-unique/truly-creative-people-dont-do-these-4-things-1aa17aa8b10e | ['Andy Taylor'] | 2020-12-04 08:57:05.189000+00:00 | ['Creativity', 'Creative', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Work', 'Self'] |
Michael, | Michael,
Thank you for your comment. It is truly a story of it’s own. That’s what Medium’s about.
I’m really tired now, because I barely slept last night. I was busy writing about my experience of how I “met” you, read your story, Against Bullying. Stand Tall. and felt compelled to share your writing with my little corner of the world on Medium.
My little corner, my team, your team, our team is about to own some major real estate here on Medium. That’s what I’m planning. And I grew up with a mother whose direct marketing agency was in our house. I grew up reading and writing to an audience. Today, I am standing as tall as I can to create a plan for us to expand our audience, so that we go from owning a little corner, to a neighborhood, to a town, to the big city of Medium. Our team now is the core of our compass, which dictates the direction of our real estate’s values.
This is about integrity and money. And while I’m not a numbers person. I can write an outline for an article in my head, but I can’t solve an equation with numbers in it. However, there are writers on our team who are good with numbers. They know about business, tech and money. They understand things I don’t.
We are all a team, and if we stand tall together and be true to ourselves, acknowledging our gifts and the gifts of others, we will be able to collaborate together to create our dream house on Medium. All of our team, all our voices need to own an exceptionally comfortable home here on Medium.
Michael, thank you for inspiring me to stand up to be true to myself and my motto, “My goal is to help people value who they truly are.”
Soul Surfer | https://medium.com/@surfyoursoul/michael-cd5b1febfd88 | ['Soul Surfer'] | 2019-02-06 00:12:24.948000+00:00 | ['Inspiration', 'Writing', 'Community', 'Values', 'Community Engagement'] |
Interactive Power BI Custom Visuals with R | Interactive Power BI Custom Visuals with R
Sometimes the right Power BI visual just isn’t there. Trying to create an executive summary of project management data recently I hit just this wall.
The idea was a report page that would be a front page to users - a quick signpost before they got into the detail of the other report pages, and something that would easily translate to a slide in a presentation. Attempts at slimmed down Gantt charts were all messy and unwieldly.
A great example from the 2003 SARS outbreak of where causally linked information can be powerful, but often project management data can overload a computer screen. Molecular epidemiology of the novel coronavirus that causes severe acute respiratory syndrome (The Lancet)
The Power BI R Script Visual
After a bit of hard thought (playing) a basic horizontal timeline seemed to work well. It would focus on the project milestones, use colour to describe the project status and try its best to get the project related text as readable as possible.
The R script visual, quick to develop and (sometimes irritatingly) customisable
There didn’t seem to be a ready made visual in Microsoft’s AppSource that would do this, so turned to the R Script Visual. With a bit of R knowledge, these are quick to develop and allow the use of the endlessly customisable ggplot to get it looking exactly how you want it (n.b. other R plotting packages are available).
Here’s how it ended up. Project data has been replaced with the UK’s prime ministers and the project status colour now tells us what party they’re in. It might be handy in your next Zoom quiz. Code here. Thank you to Ben Alex Keen, who has a great article on the construction of this kind of timeline in R.
The R visual dropped into the report as expected. Moving from accessing the JSON data directly in R to dealing with the data from the Power BI R Script Visual needed some variable renaming and formatting .The Power BI friendly code for the visual is here.
The only thing these R plots are missing is a bit of interactivity. You can restrict the data going into them with Power BI’s slicers and filters but you can’t hover over and get a tooltip, or zoom in on an interesting bit.
Plotly
Thanks to the plotly package , we can turn our ggplot object into some html and add at least some of this interactivity.
g = ggplotly(p, tooltip = 'text') %>%
layout(legend = list(
orientation = 'h',
y = 1.1,
x = 0.1
));
Plotly will also host these charts, and you can push them up from within R.
Sys.setenv(plotly_username = 'xxx')
Sys.setenv(plotly_api_key = 'xxxxxxxxxxx') api_create(g)
The Tooltip
As well as a host of other plotly features, we now have a hover over tooltip. Really useful in providing some more information in this fairly compact graph. This was defined using a dummy aesthetic in the geom_text call, named ‘text’ (ggplot ignores this aesthetic).
#Tooltip for plotly
prime_ministers[,text:=paste0(
name, ', ', party, '<br>'
,format(start_date,'%d %b %Y'),' to ',format(end_date,'%d %b %Y')
)] # Show project text
p <- p + geom_text(aes(label = name,
text=text,x=decade
,y = text_position,colour=party),
size = 3, family = 'sans',show.legend = F, fontface='bold')
A custom tooltip is passed from ggplot to the plotly object using the dummy ‘text’ aesthetic in the final call to geom_text
ggplotly quirks
A quick side note on using ggplotly for this task.
geom_label: In our conversion to plotly from ggplot using ggplotly, geom_label isn’t supported, so the transparent rectangles behind each text label have been replaced with font coloring.
Legend naming: There was also some strange behaviour with the legend, ‘Whig’ became ‘(Whig,1)’ etc. This was caused by the ggplot object having both a colour scale (for text and points) and a fill scale (not used, since no geom_label). The manual fill scale was removed, but it would be annoying if a fill scale was needed. The only solution seemed to be manually adjusting the plotly object json.
Package R Code into Power BI Custom Visual
The final step is getting this plotly object into Power BI.
We can’t just paste our R code directly into the R Script Visual. The ggplotly function outputs an HTML object and Power BI is expecting an R plot object.
Well it turns out that with not too much work, we can create our own custom visual to import into Power BI. Here’s a quick step by step.
1 - Install node.js
2 - Install the powerbi-visuals-tools package with Powershell
npm install -g powerbi-visuals-tools
3 - Create an rhtml template
pbiviz new fredTimelineVis -t rhtml
4 - Find the folder and files that this command creates (this depends on the working directory of your Powershell). Then find the script.r file, and replace the ggplot code with your own
On my computer the rhtml files were output to C:/Users/FredTasker/fredTimelineVis. The script.R has an example ggplot chunk, and a ggplotly line, which I replaced with those above.
Packaging up the prime ministers. Replace the ggplot / ggplotly bits of the script.R file that powerbi-visuals-tools creates.
A couple of notes:
Make sure you have the right library declarations at the top of script.R and remember that R packages need to exist in Power BI online if that’s where you are going to use it
The data that’s coming from Power BI is referred to as the Values object in R.
Here’s the script.R file used in this example.
5 - Add author, description and support URL to the pbiviz.json
This is important, as package compiling will fail if you don’t. pbviz.json will be in the same directory as your scripts.R file.
"description":"Horizontal timeline visual build using ggplot and plotly in R",
"supportUrl":"https://medium.com/@fredtasker/interactive-power-bi-custom-visuals-with-r-a6a4ac998710",
"gitHubUrl":"https://github.com/fredwise/PM_timeline"},
...
"author":{"name":"Fred Tasker","email":"xxxx.com"}
... ..."description":"supportUrl":"gitHubUrl":},..."author":{"name":"email":...
6 -Go back to PowerShell, navigate to your script.r directory and package it all up, ready for Power BI to consume.
In my case:
cd C:\Users\FredTasker\fred_timeline_vis pbiviz package
Success!
If you run into issues,here’s the Microsoft help page for R HTML.
Import into Power BI
Now that the custom visual is packaged, we just need to import it into Power BI and drop our data fields into the visual.
Import the pbiz vis file from the dist directory of your compiled package
Well this was all very exciting. A really quick way to build interactive custom visuals in Power BI.
Have a look at the resulting dashboard on the Power BI service, you’ll see that Power BI’s Publish to Web doesn’t currently support the static R visual. To see the static graph in the PBIX file and all other scripts mentioned here head to GitHub. | https://towardsdatascience.com/interactive-power-bi-custom-visuals-with-r-a6a4ac998710 | ['Freddie Tasker'] | 2020-06-04 20:04:10.401000+00:00 | ['Towards Data Science', 'Ggplot', 'Plotly', 'Power Bi', 'R'] |
What Can Islamic Ethics Say About Our Vaccine Distribution Plan? | What Can Islamic Ethics Say About Our Vaccine Distribution Plan?
Last week, the Department of Defense (DOD) unveiled their vaccine distribution plan. It will be implemented through funding allotments in the relief bill which recently passed through the Congress. The most pertinent details in the plan regard who will receive the vaccine and through which entities can the DOD most effectively receive and administer the vaccine. This piece will explore an under-discussed aspect of the vaccine distribution which is no less important for the American Muslim population: the compatibility of the COVID-19 vaccine distribution plan and Islamic ethics.
The most pertinent details in this consideration regard public trust as well as the extent to which current distribution protocols comport with Islamic notions of harm prevention and social responsibility.
The first point was already a source of contention prior to the COVID-19 epidemic. Last year, the World Health Organization (WHO) identified “vaccine hesitancy” as a leading threat to global health, citing low vaccination rates in countries where confusions persisted over whether vaccines were acceptable under Islamic law. At issue is the inclusion of gelatin as an ingredient in many vaccines. Similar concerns persist in affluent U.S. suburbs, though to a lesser extent. In response to these confusions, some drug companies began producing halal vaccines, while other contingents of Islamic scholars persuaded their constituents to consider the Islamic principle of “transformation,” which would permit a forbidden product in the case where it is fundamentally changed, in this case from pork to gelatin. For what it is worth, spokespeople for Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca have confirmed their vaccines do not contain pork products.
However, these vaccines have already been allotted to countries with preexisting deals with the development companies and supranational organizations presiding over distribution. This brings us to the more complicated consideration of the United States’ vaccine distribution plan, titled Operation Warp Speed (OWS), which appears as follows.
OWS comprises a partnership between private firms and federal agencies such as the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) — including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) — and the Department of Defense (DoD).
OWS is a distribution plan which operationalizes the decisions made by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), a 15-member body chosen by HHS Secretary Alex Azar. Secretary Azar recently became the subject of an investigation opened up by House Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC), who is the Chairman of the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis. Rep. Clyburn is concerned that Azar suppressed CDC reports on the coronavirus in an effort to achieve “herd immunity”.
The ACIP members, however, are a group of respected professionals and field experts who have recommended the following distribution schedule:
Phase 1a — recipients include health care personnel and long-term care facility residents
Phase 1b — recipients include persons aged ≥75 years and non–health care frontline essential workers
Phase 1c — recipients include persons aged 65–74 years, persons aged 16–64 years with high-risk medical conditions, and essential workers not included in Phase 1b.
Phase 2 — recipients include all other persons aged ≥16 years not already recommended for vaccination in Phases 1a, 1b, or 1c.
They have already sketched out a set of ethical principles to guide distribution in the event that vaccine supply is limited. Those principles include: maximize benefits (“promote public health) and minimize harms (“death and severe illness”); mitigate health inequities (“reduce health disparities in the burden of COVID-19 disease and death”); promote justice (“remove unfair, unjust, and avoidable barriers to COVID-19 vaccination”); promote transparency (“allow and seek public participation in the creation and review of the decision processes”).
Similarly, the Islamic ethical tradition abides by a focus on and appraisal of actions believed to be “good”, those which God obligates Muslims, and those which lead to Paradise. However, the practical application of these foundational commitments is far from a settled matter among Muslims. This is due to the the present-day decentralization of Islamic religious authority as well as Islam’s long-standing promotion of ethical pluralism. Even still, a budding literature on Islamic bioethics outlines several insights that may be of use for medical ethicists and the American population more broadly, whom the OWS explicitly identifies as participants in “the creation and review of the decision processes.” Imam al-Ghazali sketched out the Islamic consideration of actions in the specific public interest (maṣlaḥah) as a combination of those which accrue benefit and avoid harm. More specifically, they are those actions that conform to the preservation of religion, life, the intellect, lineage, and property, as well as anything which safeguards and guarantees those five principles or removes harms and corruptions of those principles.
As a general principle in the shari’ah, Muslims living as minorities in any country are bound by the law of the land in which they live. No consideration of Islamic ethics supersedes the American political and juridical coda. However, as part of the broader fabric of American pluralism, Islam can check the actions and decisions of the OWS with respect to the higher objectives or aims of Islamic law (maqāṣid), in order to “determine the overall correctness and value of the decision,” or look to Islamic legal principles (qawāʿid) and controls (ḍawābiṭ) as “instruments to guide one’s precision and accuracy in reaching a conclusion.” The general methodology by which Islamic jurists determine the rightness or wrongness of an action (uṣūl al-fiqh), include tactics like differentiation (furūq), preponderization (tarjīḥ), and the consideration of public interest (maṣlaḥah).
Practical application of these methodologies need not justify a revolutionary practice. In fact, even the reformist trajectory of Islamic ethico-juridical thought focuses on “betterment and purification” of society. The idea being that no man can ultimately ascertain divine law, but that collective and focused deliberation over vaccine distribution can ultimately better and purify society.
To this point, the early success of the distribution plan does not account for several key indicators of societal well-being. For one, there is no mention of the connection between vaccine hesitancy and the persistent inequities which exist between and among many Americans. Importantly, vaccine skepticism between Black and African-Americans is intimately connected with the history of American iniquity and exploitation. The DOD has no plan to convince Americans to trust the vaccine, though there is a decentralized effort to swing “willing skeptics” or to publicly vaccinate public servants. On this point, the Islamic ethical tradition can constructively intervene on the vaccine distribution plan in order to reaffirm the public trust that has eroded over the course of this long and difficult year. This may ultimately mean the platforming of a diverse array of Americans who can explain how their choice to take the vaccine (or not) is grounded in their belief system. Such deliberation is central to the redevelopment of a public square which has dissipated over the course of the lockdown.
A more important question to consider is whether the vaccine distribution plan advances the preservation of life universally. If so, then the plan can be a valid devotional law under the Islamic ethical consideration. More importantly, for the purposes of an American audience: the deepening inequality in this country caused by the pandemic necessitates a plan that ensures the universal preservation of life. A diverse array of voices goes a long way toward the betterment and purification of society, but so too would the reallocation of resources back toward those hundreds of thousands of small businesses who closed over the course of lockdown or those whose families were split apart or irrevocably altered during the pandemic. | https://medium.com/@mpac/what-can-islamic-ethics-say-about-our-vaccine-distribution-plan-8327a742322b | [] | 2020-12-24 17:28:36.523000+00:00 | ['Vaccines', 'Islam', 'Ethics', 'Covid 19', 'Pandemic'] |
Your Guide to Migrating From v1 to v2 APIs | Zoom has grown exponentially over the last few years especially with our APIs. We started with our v1 APIs a couple years ago and now have moved on to our v2 APIs to provide greater functionality & enhanced authentication for developers.
Last December, we decided to sunset our v1 APIs to focus more on improving our v2 APIs. In the coming months, we will be expanding upon our v2 APIs with more Core Resources, enhanced Rate Limits, and API versioning. With this new focus, we have decided to end the life of our v1 APIs in April 2020.
This post aims to serve as a guide on the differences between the v1 and v2 APIs, and how to successfully migrate.
Authentication
v1
Using our v1 APIs requires you to use your API Key & Secret within each request.
v2
Starting with our v2 APIs, you can choose between two authentication methods, JWT or OAuth, to authenticate your request.
JWT — Generate your API token based on your API key & secret on the backend then send your JWT within each API request. For example, if you wanted to do an integration with just your company or an server to server integration between Company A and Company B, using JWT would be the right authentication choice. For more information on how to use JWT with API calls, please visit our JWT guide.
— Generate your API token based on your API key & secret on the backend then send your JWT within each API request. For example, if you wanted to do an integration with just your company or an server to server integration between Company A and Company B, using JWT would be the right authentication choice. For more information on how to use JWT with API calls, please visit our JWT guide. OAuth — Using your Client ID and Client Secret, OAuth allows third parties to authenticate and make call APIs. For example if you wanted to build an app to limit the number of scopes for external users who are downloading your app, using OAuth would be the right authentication choice. For more information on OAuth and how to make API calls, please visit our OAuth guide.
RESTful Standard
Our v2 APIs now follow a RESTful standard, meaning that each API call uses HTTP method such as GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, PATCH.
For example, to retrieve a meeting you would use:
Header — GET https://api.zoom.us/v2/meetings/{meeting-id}
To create a meeting you would use:
Header - POST https://api.zoom.us/v2/meetings
Body — {“topic”:”My meeting”, “type”:2, “start_time”:”2019–09–30T18:00:00”}
For more information on how to test our v2 APIs, please visit our Testing Zoom APIs page.
New Core Resources
With our v2 APIs, we have introduced new Core Resources and new endpoints within existing Core Resources to enhance your Zoom experience.
Dashboard — APIs that provide data on Meeting Participants, Webinar Participants, Meeting Participants QOS, Webinar Participants QOS, Client Feedback.
Reporting — APIs that provide data on Poll Reporting, Q&A Report, Operation Log Reports, Sign in/Sign out Activity Reports.
Chat — New Core Resource to allow users to automate their Zoom Chat functionality by sending messages to another user within their contact list, check their contacts list, and list message history.
Groups — Create, update, list all the groups within your Zoom client. Add group members and update group settings.
Phone — Get and update users Phone profile, get the call logs, recordings, and voicemails. Also, be able to assign and unassign phone numbers to user.
Devices — List, create, update or remove your h.323/SIP devices.
Tracking field — Allows you to list, create, update or remove tracking fields which can be used to analyze by various fields within your organization.
More Webhooks
In addition to v2 APIs and enhanced Zoom App Marketplace, we have been able to release more webhooks to deliver data to you faster without having to max out or exceed your API rate limits.
We have new webhooks such as User Sign in, Recordings, Zoom Room , Meeting Sharing and many more listed in our Webhook Reference docs. To learn more and to get started with our v2 Webhooks within our Marketplace, visit our Webhooks guide.
We hope this blog helps to make it easier for you to understand and migrate successfully to our v2 APIs. To get started with our V2 API you can read more on our v2 API introduction page. Happy Coding! | https://medium.com/zoom-developer-blog/your-guide-to-migrating-from-v1-to-v2-apis-d4ded0474c04 | ['Michael Purnell'] | 2019-09-25 19:58:02.700000+00:00 | ['Marketplaces', 'Zoom', 'API'] |
History — Historic Figures: Martin Luther (1483–1546) | Martin Luther was born on 10 November 1483 in Eisleben. His father was a copper miner. Luther studied at the University of Erfurt and in 1505 decided to join a monastic order, becoming an Augustinian friar. He was ordained in 1507, began teaching at the University of Wittenberg and in 1512 was made a doctor of Theology. In 1510 he visited Rome on behalf of a number of Augustinian monasteries, and was appalled by the corruption he found there.
Luther became increasingly angry about the clergy selling ‘indulgences’ — promised remission from punishments for sin, either for someone still living or for one who had died and was believed to be in purgatory. On 31 October 1517, he published his ’95 Theses’, attacking papal abuses and the sale of indulgences.
Luther had come to believe that Christians are saved through faith and not through their own efforts. This turned him against many of the major teachings of the Catholic Church. In 1519 -1520, he wrote a series of pamphlets developing his ideas — ‘On Christian Liberty’, ‘On the Freedom of a Christian Man’, ‘To the Christian Nobility’ and ‘On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church’. Thanks to the printing press, Luther’s ’95 Theses’ and his other writings spread quickly through Europe.
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https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv20.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv19.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv18.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv17.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv16.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv15.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv14.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv13.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv12.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv11.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv10.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv9.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv8.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv7.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv6.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv5.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv4.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv3.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv2.html
https://kagider.org/fujji-tv/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv1.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv20.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv19.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv18.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv17.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv16.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv15.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv14.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv13.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv12.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv11.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv10.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv9.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv8.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv7.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv6.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv5.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv4.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv3.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv2.html
https://www.yukibito.co.jp/editdirect/images/videos-Jap-Open-Golf-liv1.html
In January 1521, the Pope Leo X excommunicated Luther. He was then summoned to appear at the Diet of Worms, an assembly of the Holy Roman Empire. He refused to recant and Emperor Charles V declared him an outlaw and a heretic. Luther went into hiding at Wartburg Castle. In 1522, he returned to Wittenberg and in 1525 married Katharina von Bora, a former nun, with whom he had six children.
Luther then became involved in the controversy surrounding the Peasants War (1524–1526), the leaders of which had used Luther’s arguments to justify their revolt. He rejected their demands and upheld the right of the authorities to suppress the revolt, which lost him many supporters.
In 1534, Luther published a complete translation of the bible into German, underlining his belief that people should be able to read it in their own language. The translation contributed significantly to the spread and development of the German language.
Luther’s influence spread across northern and eastern Europe and his fame made Wittenberg an intellectual centre. In his final years he wrote polemics against the Jews, the papacy and the Anabaptists, a radical wing of the reforming movement.
Luther died on 18 February 1546 in Eisleben. | https://medium.com/@lunapiper888/history-historic-figures-martin-luther-1483-1546-18d007b46cf1 | ['Luna Piper'] | 2020-12-12 13:44:47.696000+00:00 | ['Knowledge', 'History', 'Anthropology', 'Martin Luther', 'Past'] |
Former NFL Super Bowl Champion Najee Goode discusses blockchain, sports tech and the importance of optimizing content at BitAngels LA | Former NFL Super Bowl Champion Najee Goode discusses blockchain, sports tech and the importance of optimizing content at BitAngels LA BitAngels Oct 13, 2020·2 min read
Earlier in August, we had an exciting BitAngels LA event with a special fireside chat moderated by LA city leader, Bill Inman, and featuring Najee Goode, former Super Bowl Champion and co-founder of sports technology company, Veepio.
— -
Najee shared his unconventional journey to the NFL noting he didn’t play any contact sports until high school. He walked-on to the West Virginia University football team and found out he was going to be drafted by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers while eating at an IHOP.
Najee knew he was always interested in technology, because of his time studying technology and business, and being an engineer at West Virginia University. “The academic side of my career has always been intertwined with tech,” said Najee.
He continued to play for the NFL and became a free agent in 2019 and was on the Philadelphia Eagles Super Bowl winning team. Many professional athletes, specifically football players, struggle to find another career after their time on the field comes to an end. Najee has a different story.
“I got wrapped into Veepio the year I was hurt, it was a big year in Philadelphia, we had just come off a playoff season, coming back I got hurt coming into a game. And so I went to see our college play (West Virginia University), I got connected with Jonathan (Ohliger) through another one of our co-founders. We always saw this thing with tech, Veepio as a way to create and capture content and to enhance and optimize it…”
Najee’s role with the company developed from the combination of professional sports and technology to gain a unique perspective on solving the disconnect with fans., “Kind of where my role played in place in fan engagement being a football player, being involved in engineering, being involved with blockchain.”
He says that what is so special about Veepio’s message and what the technology can do is that, “We can optimize any kind of content.” and whilst the company starts with sports it sees potential beyond that vertical.
Najee says the NFL has shifted its focus to digital content, which allows him to work with football, but in a new way. “My interests fell in love with being able to optimize the content that I know as a player, as a fan, and as a person.”
— -
We humbly thank Najee Goode for speaking at our BitAngels Las Angeles 2020 event. Find out more about Veepio here: https://veep.io/
If you enjoyed this post, we invite you to join our membership. It’s open to anyone interested in Blockchain Investment and will give you access to this event’s full video and more: https://www.bitangels.network/membership. | https://medium.com/@bitangels/former-nfl-super-bowl-champion-najee-goode-discusses-blockchain-sports-tech-and-the-importance-of-7db5f123965b | [] | 2020-10-13 23:58:55.251000+00:00 | ['Blockchain', 'Startup', 'Investor', 'Bitangels', 'NFL'] |
Bias at the BBC | Bias at the BBC
Based on “Starry Night” by Vincent Van Gogh (1889): public domain
When defending itself in public, the BBC makes much of its claim to be “balanced”. The problem is: not only is the concept of “balance” dodgy in the extreme — a tool for inserting whatever tinfoil conspiracy theory takes the fancy of editors — but the BBC does not apply its own rules even-handedly. A lack of balance when it comes to balance, so to speak.
Now read on…
In the pink corner, today, we have jane, who will be arguing that the BBC is biased in its coverage of minority issues and bordering on not fit for purpose. And in the very blue corner, we will have Mr Raving-Bigot, who will explain how the BBC is doing no more than abiding by its patriotic duty to weed out all the freaks and weirdos wilfully polluting this Land of Soap and Tory with their Equal Opps Opsession.
So that’s sorted. We have balance. Let us bow our heads in reverence, light the debating touchpaper, and stand back in anticipation of the inevitable fireworks.
“But…
“Steady on!
“I’m from the BBC and…
“…that doesn’t represent our position and…
“…you can’t just create balance by inserting any old tripe that happens to disagree with a thing. That’s not argument. It’s…it’s just contradiction.”
Oh no, it isn’t!
“Oh yes, it is!” (I trust, dear reader, you will appreciate what i did there).
Balance is King
Anyhoo: the claim that every conversation, every story must be balanced, and the accompanying unstated implication that such balance must be binary is the weakest of intellectual gruel! So weak that i now spend a portion of my every waking week wondering when BBC managers will institute a class action against the clearly incompetent educational institutions — the posh schools and fancy universities — that so clearly failed to inculcate even a rudimentary sense of rational coherence during their formative years.
Binary balance. Every argument has two sides. Not three. Or four. Or many. Each such side must be boiled down to what those in charge consider to be its most extreme forms. Thesis. Antithesis. No shade of subtlety. And hopefully, eventually, some sort of all-shake-hands-and-agree-to-differ Synthesis. This is Hegelian Dialectic for the kindergarten: the raising up of rigid, philosophical theory over reality and the messiness of actual people’s lives. They should be burning their degree certificates as we speak!
This is Hegelian Dialectic for the kindergarten: the raising up of rigid, philosophical theory over reality and the messiness of actual people’s lives.
Except, of course, they won’t. Because it is a plausible excuse and cover for bigotry. It sounds good when called out by politicians. And somewhere, perhaps, in the depths of the dark starless night, it provides succour to the soul for these poor agonised BBC executives.
Even if, as thought paradigm, it is about as well-thought-out as buying a one-way ticket for a place on the first spaceship to the red planet, hereinafter to be known as Musk Zero.
Editorial sabotage
It is why, in two recent pieces, simple basic reporting was sabotaged in favour of editorial exposition that turned news into features. It’s a slightly artificial distinction, but one most journalists will get. Back in September, BBC Online put up a simple report of unanimity amongst parliamentary groups which, shocked by the apparent anti-trans views of Liz Truss, came out en bloc to condemn her.
That’s as simple a piece as you might ever write: bunch of noteworthy people call out Equalities Minister: Minister bites back. Or no comments. Sorted! That is news, which comes with its own internal balance provided. And that, as far as i and others familiar with this piece are aware, is what was originally written.
Until someone in editorial decided it needed BALANCE. So stop the presses: update the code! And hey presto! We have a spurious balance introduced that explains why some women (not even a majority) have issues with reform of the Gender Recognition Act. This was no accident, no careless journalist at work: but deliberate sabotage by their bosses. Which is also why folks taking potshots at the Beeb’s LGBT correspondent, Ben Hunte, should really lay off. This wasn’t him!
Fast forward to this week. Another simple piece reporting the fact that a trans teen, backed by the Good Law Project, is taking the NHS to task for failing to provide timely healthcare has had “balance” inserted in the shape of the LGB Alliance. Which is sorta balance. In the sense that the LGBA provide the answer to the question: “If men are from Mars and women are from Venus, which ice giant planet, rhyming with anus, are LGBA from?”
Another simple piece […] has had “balance” inserted in the shape of the LGB Alliance. Which is sorta balance. In the sense that the LGBA provide the answer to the question: “If men are from Mars and women are from Venus, which ice giant planet, rhyming with anus, are LGBA from?”
Because they are so far outside any LGBT consensus and community — insisting your LGB organisation is, well, actually all LGB is so passé — the cold of deepest deep space holds no fears for them. For liquid helium courses through their veins.
And in polite conversation, the terms “insertion” and “LGB Alliance” should not share the same par, never mind sentence!
Again, my understanding is that their contribution was tacked on after: so, second time of asking, PLEASE leave the journo alone! They weren’t even “obeying orders”. Because chances are, the amend was added long after they filed their piece.
Inconsistent , incompetent — or just hypocritical?
But still, the dialectical balance achieved here is plain nonsense. Like, somewhere, i guess, out there in the ideological wasteland, are folks who regard harm incurred by women as they seek to control their fertility as “deserved”. Yet for some reason, i see no great rush by the BBC to platform such folks when doing pieces about health, or abortion rights.
They do not “balance” every issue. Worse, when it comes to trans-related pieces, it is very clear what news demands balance, what does not.
Check out their recent online reporting of the Maya Forstater case: or indeed, the Keira Bell case. Both are pretty relevant, since like the Good Law Project case, they are stories about legal proceedings. Notice anything missing?
Yes. That’s right. Balance. A trans point of view. Because even though these cases impacted directly on every trans person in the UK… the views of the trans community on them were, apparently, not relevant enough to report.
Make your complaint heard…
So, by all means, complain away at the latest BBC excrescence to hit the netwaves. Expect, when you do so, to be fobbed off with a good dollop of patronising guff about balance.
Cat expresses his bewilderment at BBC policy on balance
And when they do, take care to write back, to the Beeb, to Ofcom, to your MP and even, if they will listen, your cat, explaining how arbitrary is the application of this doctrine and how — oh my! — whenever balance is needed, it seems to be in stories with even a slight chance of being positive for trans folk.
Coincidence? I think not.
And no: i’m not up for a balanced debate on that conclusion. | https://medium.com/@jane-67706/bias-at-the-bbc-f821906df46c | ['Jane Fae'] | 2020-11-25 15:31:15.131000+00:00 | ['Transphobia', 'Bias', 'Good Law Project', 'Transgender', 'BBC'] |
Are Friends Still Friends If You Never See Them? | Are Friends Still Friends If You Never See Them?
No calls, no hangs, but you still like them, in theory.
Photo by Kylo on Unsplash
We used to know everything about each other. We shared everything, our fears, our crushes, our lunch. Our Mom’s couldn’t even tell us apart on the phone. We were inseparable.
Then life started moving, one of us went to college here and the other there. We didn’t hang out as much. You met a girl, I worked crazy hours. This is not an uncommon story.
Fast forward several years and I still consider you my friend. We keep up on social media, though rarely like each other’s posts. I still get a Christmas card from you. You would too if I actually sent them.
But are we friends? You aren’t the first person I would call if I locked my keys out of my car or found myself with a free night to go grab a drink. Your kids don’t know my name and I sure as heck don’t go to their birthday parties.
Friends are there for each other. Starting a friendship is pretty cut and dry. You meet, find something in common and talk about it. Sold.
But falling out of a friendship isn’t always as clear. I don’t hate you, you’ve never done anything to cause ill will, we just stopped running in the same circles.
Who knows how that happens, usually its a new relationship. You adopt new friends and new plans and new places to hang out. And they don’t always line up.
Maybe you try for a little while, but then kids and work narrow your availability and you make hard choices.
But we’re still friends right? What makes a friend. Do you have to actually talk every week and spend time with each other? I don’t know anymore.
The internet has clouded it, facebook has muddled it. I have online friends I have never met. I have friended people I went to high school with, but never really hung out with back then or today.
If all I need to be your friend is to like you, then I can extend that logic to Paul Rudd or Patrick Mahomes. One-sided admiration.
It’s really bothering me that you don’t easily fall into a category anymore. I don’t miss you, I don’t invite you to anything and we never talk. But that is no one’s fault. So I’m just supposed to cut you off?
I think I still know your phone number. Maybe I will text you on your birthday, make promises I won’t keep. Tell your our kids should play together.
I won’t do it. I won’t resolve to spend more time with you. It won’t happen, I won’t change my routine or what’s normal for me now. And when I don’t, I will just feel worse about our friendship. You are not my New Year’s resolution.
So where does that leave us? I guess we just go back to knowing we know each other. knowing we don’t hang out as much. Feeling a twinge in our hearts when we see pictures of each other doing something fun with other old friends that “made the cut.”
It sucks. I have a friend that has no place anymore, but I’ll be damned if I’ll turn my back on them. Maybe I’m the problem. I’m too weak to keep the friendship alive. But you don’t call or make an effort either. This is just the way these things work.
It’s not our fault and sure I miss you, but there just isn’t enough time in the day. Life is full of hard truths and sadly our friendship or lack thereof is one of them.
Maybe we’ll get back on track someday, maybe something big in our lives will pull us back together. But for now, you can stay where you are, at a distant on my facebook page living your life while I live mine. Thanks for being there and I’ll see you when I see you, friend. | https://medium.com/the-float/are-friends-still-friends-if-you-never-see-them-44a2cac131a2 | ['Ian Cahill'] | 2020-01-22 20:16:35.799000+00:00 | ['Honesty', 'Friendship', 'Change', 'Personal Growth', 'Past'] |
How to Use Kustomize for Your Kubernetes Projects | 3. Add Changes to the Existing K8s Resource Files
Changing the label of the existing Kubernetes deployment
Inside the resources section, you can add your K8s resource files, such as deployments, services, namespaces, ConfigMaps, etc. At the moment, I only have a K8s deployment. After specifying the resources , you can then move to the next section where you define your changes.
commonLabels:
someName: #some-value
owner: #mike
app: #test
The commonLabels field allows you to define labels/names to your YAML configuration file. As shown above, you can add your labels to it. Once you’re done with the changes, you can run the command below to apply them to your deployment:
$ kubectl delete -f nginx-deployment.yaml
First, you need to remove the existing pod. But before deleting the existing pod, make sure to run the kubectl get all --show-lables command to check what you have in the Labels section in your pod:
// output NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE
pod/nginx-deployment 1/1 Running 0 26s LABELS
app=nginx,pod-template-hash=66b6c48dd5
Then you can apply your changes by running the command below:
$ kubectl apply --kustomize . OR $ kubectl apply -k .
Let’s run the kubectl get all --show-labels command and see whether it has taken the changes:
// output NAME READY STATUS RESTARTS AGE
pod/nginx-deployment 1/1 Running 0 9m14s LABELS
app=nginx,owner=randil,pod-template-hash=6dcc7ddc48 NAME READY UP-TO-DATE AVAILABLE AGE
deployment.apps/nginx-deployment 1/1 1 1 9m14s LABELS
app=nginx,owner=randil NAME DESIRED CURRENT READY AGE
replicaset.apps/nginx-deployment-6dcc7ddc48 1 1 1 9m14s LABELS
app=nginx,owner=randil,pod-template-hash=6dcc7ddc48
Note: If you’re running an older version of Kubernetes, you have to install Kustomize on your computer before getting to this process. Then, you can run the commands below to apply the changes.
$ kustomize build . > test-deployment.yaml $ kubectl create -f test-deployment.yaml
Changing the names of the existing Kubernetes deployment
Kustomize helps you to change the names of your K8s resource files. For that, you can use the namePrefix and nameSuffix fields:
resources:
- nginx-deployment.yaml commonLabels:
owner: randil namePrefix: test- nameSuffix: -dev
namePrefix appends your custom text at the beginning of the name and nameSuffix appends your custom text to the end of the existing name.
// output - extracted only the relevant part NAME
deployment.apps/test-nginx-deployment-dev
Refer to the docs for more options. | https://betterprogramming.pub/how-to-use-kustomize-for-your-kubernetes-projects-42a90c00bd56 | ['Randil Tennakoon'] | 2021-01-06 08:24:40.298000+00:00 | ['Containers', 'Programming', 'Kubernetes', 'Docker', 'DevOps'] |
Alchemy and Individuation | If you bring forth what is within you, what you bring forth will save you. If you do not bring forth what is within you, what you do not bring forth will destroy you. ~ Jesus
Alchemy pertains to the process of transmuting base metals to silver or gold. The search for the ‘gold’ in each person was a fundamental focus of late psychoanalyst Carl Jung’s work. Jung saw in the writings and symbols of alchemy a parallel to his psychological theories. For Jung, alchemy represents the circular process of individuation, in which internal opposing conflicts, and the conscious and unconscious is assimilated and integrated.
The internal process of individuation, aka the journey towards wholeness, is reflected in alchemy.
We begin at the seed level with our prima materia, or primary substance. It is our original material from whence we came, and it is paradoxically where we both begin and end our process of individuation.
Jung remarked, “There is no rebirth of consciousness without pain”.
Accordingly, an internal cross roads may precipitate a willingness to consciously submit the prima materia to the courageous process of transformation.
We fall from grace. The bottom falls out. A harsh awakening occurs which precipitates great psychological change and opens us up to inner exploration. It is then we ask the deeper questions about life, ourselves, and feel compelled to examine our fantasies and dreams. We venture into the realm of facing our sources of oppression, and the illusions, fears, and defenses that prevent the fragile ego from being crushed.
If we are fortunate the fires of calcination attack the ego so that ultimately purification, acceptance, and humility results. Calcination is where material and fire meet so that metal is extracted from ore. Psychologically, it is through this fiery confrontation with the self that volatile elements of the personality are ‘burned out’.
The terrifying primordial process of Calcination brings one’s shadow into conscious awareness for the purpose of integration.
What doesn’t suit our self-image we relegate to a less intrusive place.These rejected parts of us become our ‘shadow’. Our shadow self festers and lurks in the recesses of our subconscious, feared by the ego and split off from conscious expression. Bringing the shadow out of exile allows for an unearthing of vital aspects of the concealed self, in which mysterious gifts and talents and sources of creative potential seek realization.
Jung said, “To confront a person with their shadow is to show them their own light.”
Similarly, Jungian analyst and astrologer Liz Greene stated, “The shadow is both the awful thing that needs redemption, and the suffering redeemer who can provide it”.
We meet our darkness and it humanizes us and allows us to actualize our buried potentials. We can now diffuse our projections and free ourselves of guilt and shame. The ashes from the calcination process represent the inauthentic false aspects of the self. What is artificial has been burned away and all pretentiousness is broken down. | https://sheriheller.medium.com/alchemy-and-individuation-7d7d6ee98dd9 | ['Rev. Sheri Heller'] | 2020-01-05 02:58:13.882000+00:00 | ['Growth', 'Transformation', 'Self', 'Alchemy', 'Psychology'] |
Implementing Action-Domain-Responder Pattern With Symfony | Photo by Ben on Unsplash
Action-Domain-Responder can help you keep your architecture clean, have better separation of concerns, and make your code more reusable.
But what actualy is an Action-Domain-Responder pattern?
Action-Domain-Responder Pattern
It’s an architectural pattern that is a an evolution of a MVC Pattern. It was proposed by Paul M. Jones few years ago. It was created with request-response cycle in mind. It’s based on 3 components:
Action — Takes the input and orchestrates calls to the Domain.
Domain — Contains all of the business logic. Modifies state of the domain.
Responder — It is passed the response from the Action. It’s only role is to create output based on what is returned from the Action.
Why not MVC?
Most of Web Application Developers use MVC architecture pattern to create applications. But when we dive into history, we discover that MVC was proposed way before Web Application were even taken into consideration. It was proposed in 1979 by Trygve Reenskaug. It was designed to handle small parts of desktop applications — a button, textbox, etc. Not a whole application or a whole page. Time passed, this pattern evolved and got adapted to Web Development. We have classes that are suffixed with “Controller”, that operate on some domain objects (Model) and return a View. Sure, it works, but we can do better.
What do we gain by using ADR?
We have well segregated code
We have context agnostic code. The same Action can be called from the console, by Http Request or event by some other action. It’s actually just a service.
Code is cleaner and easier to change. Aligning with business changes is significantly faster.
Reusability
Let’s do some coding
We will make a simple Web App that for the sake of simplicity is only to create an user.
Let’s start with plain symfony/skeleton application.
composer create-project symfony/skeleton adr-example
After installing, change PHP Language level to 7.4.
At first, we have to do some cleanup. Let’s get rid of the src/Controller directory and remove from services.yaml what is below:
App\Controller\:
resource: '../src/Controller/'
tags: ['controller.service_arguments']
We will declare our actions as callable services (with __invoke method).
Now let’s make new directory structure:
src/
Action/
Input/
Output/
Domain/
Infrastructure/
Responder/
ParamConverter/
Action Directory will hold our Action classes
Domain will hold all of our Domain logic which should be completely framework agnostic.
Infrastructure will have ties to our framework.
Responder catalog will hold classes responsible for parsing Action output to desired response formats.
ParamConverter will convert HttpRequest into a DTO.
We also have to make our services public by default (If we want to use autowiring to register our services), so actions can be used as controllers. And add excludes to Input and Output directories. So, services.yaml should look like this now:
services:
_defaults:
autowire: true
autoconfigure: true
public: true
bind:
$salt: 'some_salt' App\:
resource: '../src/'
exclude:
- '../src/Kernel.php'
- '../src/Tests/'
- '../src/Action/Input/'
- '../src/Action/Output/'
- '../src/Domain/Model/'
- '../src/Infrastructure/Exception/'
Now we can get into coding. Let’s create User class. We will make it as a Rich Domain Model, instead of classic Anemic one with getters and setters. You can read more about this in my other article.
Domain
Before we create an action, we need to have Domain objects that we can operate on.
First, we need to create few classes (Click to follow to gists, I don’t want to paste it directly because it could make this article less readable):
User [Our User Class]
Users [Repository Interface]
UserFactory [To create Users from DTOs]
InMemoryUsers [InMemory Implementation of repository, this article does not cover Doctrine usage. You can use anything as persistance layer.]
PasswordEncoder [Interface of Password Encoder]
Md5PasswordEncoder [Implementation of Password Encoder]
Action
Now, when we have our Domain objects ready, we can create an Action that covers our Use Case of Adding an User.
AddUser Action
Besides Action, you must also add Input and Output classes:
AddUserInput [Contains Input of an Action]
AddUserOutput [Contains Output of an Action]
With this, you can already write a Unit Test testing the action! You do not even have to bootstrap Kernel to do this, or even use any of framework components.
Autowire will take care of injecting proper services in places of Interfaces. Thanks to Dependency Inversion, you can switch implementations whenever you will need to.
ParamConverter
To use ParamConverter we need to install SensioFrameworkExtraBundle
to do this, run this composer command:
(For the time for installing this bundle, you have to create src/Controller Directory so the Symfony Recipe executes properly)
composer require sensio/framework-extra-bundle
Now let’s create our converter. We will create generic converter for all our inputs. It will consist of:
ParamConverter itself
DataValidator [Validates the data, explained below]
InputFactory [Transforms Request into our Input DTO]
AddUserInputFactory [Creates our input from Request]
InputFactoryProvider [A contract for a provider of all InputFactories]
For implementation of InputFactoryProvider, we will use a Service Locator. What is nice about it and worth mentioning, is that a Service Locator is lazy loading services. If we would just tag all of the InputFactory Services, and add it using !tagged_iterator, all of the factories would get instantionated every time ParamConverter is called.
ServiceLocator InputFactoryProvider Implementation
Service Locator is lazy-loading Services that are inside of it. But to do this, we first have to add two thing to our services.yaml :
This will tag all of our services, that are instances of InputFactory Interface, with a tag named app.input_factory
_instanceof:
App\Infrastructure\ParamConverter\InputFactory\InputFactory:
tags:
- {name: app.input_factory}
This will inject ServiceLocator with tagged services. What is more, it will use our static method supportedInput as keys for our collection.
App\Infrastructure\ParamConverter\InputFactory\ServiceLocatorInputFactoryProvider:
class: App\Infrastructure\ParamConverter\InputFactory\ServiceLocatorInputFactoryProvider
arguments:
- !tagged_locator {tag: app.input_factory, index_by: 'key', default_index_method: 'supportedInput'}
There’s one thing about ParamConverters that is worth mentioning. If you use autowire, and register a lot of ParamConverters in your application, you can encounter performance issues because by default, all of the Converters are added to a stack and checked one by one if they support the given value. To skip this, we will register our InputParamConverter explicitly in services.yaml. Add this to your services.yaml :
App\Infrastructure\ParamConverter\InputParamConverter:
tags:
- {name: request.param_converter, converter: converter.action_input, priority: false}
What did we do? First, we registered our ParamConverter and named it, so we can use it directly on our Action. By setting priority to false, it will not be registered in the ParamConverters stack, so it won’t be checked if it matches in other situations.
Now, unfortunately, we must use Annotations on our Action. I have ambivalent feelings towards Annotations, but this is the only way to do this. Let’s add this Annotation to AddUser Action:
/**
* @ParamConverter(converter="converter.action_input", name="input")
*/
public function __invoke(AddUserInput $input): AddUserOutput
converter — Name of the registered Converter
name — Name of the variable that ParamConverter will take action on
InputValidaton
As we do not want to mess our Action with the request validation, we will do this in the ParamConverter using Symfony Validator and return any validation errors by throwin an error and catching it with kernel.exception event. But remember, it’s just a defensive validation, you should also guard your domain state inside your Domain Model! But in Domain, you can just throw Exceptions to prevent code from executing, not caring about informing the user what went wrong.
We will use Symfony Validator Component for this job.
Run this command to install it:
composer require symfony/validator
But instead of using it directly in ParamConverter, we will use DataValidator interface created before. We will create:
SymfonyValidator [Performs validation using symfony validator and throws an Exception with errors]
SymfonyViolationListConverter [Converts ViolationList to array of errors]
DataValidationException [It will be used to throw validation errors]
DataValidationExceptionHandler [It will handle the exception and convert it into a Response]
Now, when we have these building blocks, we have to register DataValidationException handler as kernel.exception event listener. This event is thrown, whenever there is an unhandled exception inside a Kernel. To do this, add this to your services.yaml
App\Infrastructure\ExceptionHandler\DataValidationExceptionHandler:
tags:
- {name: kernel.event_listener, event: kernel.exception}
Now we have to assign some validation rules to our DTOs. We can do this using annotations or yaml. In this case, I think annotation is better because it will be easier to maintain. But you can use YAML if you want to.
Example validation rules assigned to a DTO
You will now have your object validated before framework passes it to an Action.
Responder
Our Action already exists. It takes an input and returns a response. But to make it work as Http Endpoint, we need to create a Responder that will convert our plain DTO into a JsonResponse.
To create a Json Responder we will use Symfony Serializer Component. We will use it in a class that will be listening to kernel.view event.
Install it via composer:
composer require symfony/serializer
After installing, register this normalizer in services.yaml
get_set_method_normalizer:
class: Symfony\Component\Serializer\Normalizer\GetSetMethodNormalizer
tags: [serializer.normalizer]
This normalizer is faster than default one, that uses Reflection. But to use this, you have to keep get{FieldName} method names convention. Of course, you could serialize it any way you want — this is just an example!
Now we need to create a JsonResponder, that will handle parsing our DTO into a JsonResponse:
JsonResponder
We check Request Content-Type, to see if it is a desired format. If it is, JsonResponder will serialize DTO using Symfony Serializer and put it into a JsonResponse. We could also create some mechanisms to dynamically assign Status Codes, but for this example, we will leave it as is.
We also need to register it in services.yaml as an event listener:
App\Infrastructure\Responder\JsonResponder:
tags:
- {name: kernel.event_listener, event: kernel.view}
If you need to create response in other format, you just create another Responder that handles parsing into another format and register it as above.
The last thing we have to do, is to add our route declaration to routes.yaml file:
add_user:
path: /user/add
controller: App\Action\AddUser
Implementing Symfony Console Command using the same Action
Our Action [Use Case] is call agnostic. We can use it in our console command. We just have to create a Responder that will write our response data to OutputInterface instead of serializing it to json.
First, we need to create a contract for a ConsoleResponder:
ConsoleResponder
Now we can create an implementation of ConsoleResponder. This will be a simple one, that just serializes an array [without nested ones for simplicity] into an output:
TableConsoleResponder
Note that this is a simple implementation of ConsoleResponder. If you want to create more sophisticated one, dive into it! This is just to show a whole concept.
We also need to add additional method to UserFactory:
UserFactory method
The last thing we have to do is to create our method that will handle input, pass the input to an action, and then pass the output from action to a Responder.
Console command for handling user input
Summary
As you can see, with this implementation you end up with a well separated code, where the application layer is separated from infrastructure and the domain layer is separated from the application layer, and infrastructure. Application Layer and Domain Layer are Framework agnostic. You are less coupled to the framework. Even if you will never change the whole framework, it will be easier in the future to upgrade to newer versions of Symfony. You have less places that interact with the internals of the Symfony.
If you are creating a simple CRUD app, this may be an overkill. If you are completely, completely, sure, that you will never ever have to use the same action in other context, you may choose to use more traditional approach. Just separating controller actions into class per action services (Services with __invoke method) may be just enough. But if your application and the domain are more sophisticated, in the long run you can really benefit from using Action-Domain-Responder architecture pattern. It makes it really flexible and stable.
Here you can get working example project | https://medium.com/swlh/implementing-action-domain-responder-pattern-with-symfony-606539eea3a7 | ['Marcin Dźwigała'] | 2020-12-08 11:59:01.243000+00:00 | ['Software Architecture', 'Symfony', 'Software Development', 'PHP'] |
Chet Hanks: Transracial Jamaican, Appropriation or Delusional Privilege | Chet Hanks: Transracial Jamaican, Appropriation or Delusional Privilege
Photo by Kyle Cleveland on Unsplash
Chester Marlon Hanks (Chet) is the son of millionaire actor Tom Hanks. Chet is also an actor and aspiring rapper, Chet Haze who’s occasionally transracial Jamaican since January 2020. If you’re not familiar with hip hop culture, he’s like the male Amethyst Amelia Kelly, a runaway white girl from Australia that magically morphed into hoodlicious, Black-inspired rapper, Iggy Azelea.
As a woman of African descent with friends and family from Jamaica, I find Chet Hanks’ fascination and use of Jamaican patios to be both annoying and sad, but I don’t totally blame him.
I think the music industry and social media platforms should share the blame because they make millions of dollars featuring white people like Chet and countless others that steal and appropriate Black culture, music and intellectual property. I refuse to use my platform to get them more profitable clicks and views — so feel free to Google a popular Black artist and there’s probably a video of some random suburban teen or adult culture vulture calling it “their new song” (without permission, credit or compensation to the original artists).
Chet isn’t known for having prolific acting skills. As a matter of fact, he seems to be typecast as a problematic dude with ironic roles on Shameless and Empire. He isn’t a masterful lyricist or have a distinctive rap flow. Therefore, he stays relevant and connected to Black culture through social media and his random antics. In spite of his father’s success, Chet is a “struggling” artist that’s why I think Chet’s case is a little deeper. I don’t think he’s doing it for money, because I don’t think he needs it. I think he’s doing to for attention.
Again, I put the bulk of the blame on the music and social media industries because they know what they’re doing — even if Chet doesn’t , but should.
They are marketing a tried and true formula: steal from Black culture and artists and make white-washed versions of their images and songs to market to white audiences so they get inspired wash, rinse and repeat and another white star (and cash cow) is born. Chet is a Jamaican culture vulture. It may be a little funny, but for real artists this is no laughing matter. The money spent to promote Chet and his antics could have gone to real reggae artist.
This is where the phrase “blue-eyed soul” came from. The music industry literally stole the look, lyrics, compositions, music rights even dance routines from Black artist’s songs often leaving them destitute or struggling on the Chitlin Circuit — to segregated audiences. The white record companies would work with white owned radio and television stations, clubs and venues so they could market and promote white artists to the masses. And the rest is literally history.
Unfortunately, there isn’t a Black or African American culture board so there really isn’t anyone to stop this highly profitable, parasitic behavior or hold any of the culture vultures or the companies responsible — unless the artist sues like the Marvin Gaye v Robin Thicke case.
The humanity
As a mother — I feel sorry for Chet. Based on his sincere defense of his bizarre and embarrassing behavior, he is drowning in delusional privilege and doesn’t understand why it’s wrong to profit from pretending or acting like he’s from an oppressed country or culture. Something is clearly wrong. This situation begs the question: Why can’t Chet just be happy being Chester — son of “nice”, rich actor Tom Hanks?
What happened to Chet that made him lose touch with reality in this current social and political climate?
Who is just as delusional and culturally incompetent to cosign Chet’s verbal Blackface with a reggae twist?
When I first saw Chet use Jamaican patios to congratulate his father for his award, I cringed — it was hard to watch because he looked like a kid playing a character. This is the primary reason I think Chet’s case differs from other white performers who have consciously and deliberately made characters for profit. Chet seems to desperately wants to be anyone other than himself and contrary to popular belief — Black people are some the most loving, welcoming and forgiving people regardless of country of origin some of us are letting him slide…
This also explains why Chet isn’t facing a bigger scandal or backlash from the Jamaican community. We are way too nice, tolerant and trusting…How else could colonization started… We gave one invitation and a gift — but predators are going to prey and colonizers are going colonize…You give an inch and they literally take your whole country, steal our art and culture and then tell us we’re uncivilized…but I digress.
True to form, this is where I feel Chet get’s a little mercy. He is in recovery and a loving father of a beautiful, biracial daughter. That’s where he differs from other white “performers” that seamlessly go back to good, ol’ white privilege like Elvis and his hip hop versions:
Marky Mark who is now mega rich actor, and family man, Mark Wahlberg, part owner of Wahlburgers and UFC. Mr. Wahlberg admitted to and has since apologized for his vicious, race related attack on an Asian man that left him partially blind. He tried to get the case expunged, but the incident went public, again.
Picture courtesy of People.com
Then, there’s Vanilla Ice who is now a real estate investor and house flipper, Robert Matthew Van Winkle. Van Winkle has since apologized for his appropriation and caucastic coonery after selling 40 million copies of his single. Yet, he says he was “a puppet”- a puppet that made millions off a culture I don’t think he likes or respects, but hey he’s since bought the rights to Under Pressure (the sample he originally used without permission) so at least the white artists he stole from got some compensation.
Youtube Apology
I would throw Pink in the mix, but her white girl roughneck image was also created by her record label. She’s talked about how record execs wanted to a push a false narrative, but she didn’t comply. She’s always been a bad-ass, white girl and never faked being a “sista” with the fake, stereotypical Black girl accent — and it’s appreciated. She just happens to have a soulful, strong voice — that matches her equally strong, acrobatic body — get em Pink (you rock).
Real and white
But as Dr. Dre said, “back to the lecture at hand”… Chet could easily take a page out of Eminem, Paul Wall or Bubba Sparxxx’s books who are white, rap artists that “don’t front”, have fake accents or gangster back stories. They love and respect hip hop culture and they’re accepted as real hip hop artists that bring their own authentic flavor — as white, American men. Eminem is undeniably a brilliant lyricist and battle rapper. Paul Wall and Bubba Sparxxx bring their southern swag without the messiness of appropriation.
As a matter of fact, Paul Wall gets extra props for being a proud, loving husband and father of two children with his beautiful wife, Crystal and if you question his love of sistas — check out his song with Jill Scott. Bubba on the other hand is a proud, country boy and can kinda be credited for ushering in the age of “new booty” with his 2005 hit song, Miss New Booty. That song is a club banger and still makes me laugh and dance at the same time.
But there is always an enigma and his name is Collie Buddz. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that I have Come Around on my playlist, but I don’t know where he fits in this discussion.
His bio says, “Colin Patrick Harper hails from the tiny island of Bermuda. In the music industry, he is known as the reggae artist Collie Buddz. Buddz was born on August 21, 1984 in New Orleans, Louisiana.”
I don’t know Colin’s connection to Bermuda when he was born in New Orleans and graduated top of his class from Full Sail University in Florida. Yet, even he doesn’t have a full on Caribbean accent in his interviews and he’s worked with some noteworthy Jamaican and Ghanaian artists. Honestly, I put his music in the “weed culture” genre more than reggae so I don’t really see him exploiting Caribbean/West Indian culture and music, but that could just be my colonized mind finding sympathy for colonizers…
Conclusion
I really don’t know how or why white people like Chet aren’t happy with their privilege and love stealing Black and African swagger, fashion, music, food, dialects, accents, culture or lives in general.
It’s like white America is Black people’s Single White Female… They copy what we do out of strange, obsessive flattery, admiration and a tinge of jealousy, but become defensive, aggressive and dangerous when we call them out or ask them to stop.
I hope Chet has some real people from Jamaican and the Black community so he can learn how hurtful and offensive his behavior is, but most importantly — I hope he finds is authentic self. It’s too late for him to be brave like Pink, fight the power to live and push a false narrative, but I pray he finds some clarity, integrity and real cultural competence.
I hope he can find the real Chet, and become a beacon of hope for his fellow white brothers and sisters like Eminem, Paul and Bubba who can love, like and be a part of our various cultures and communities without profiting from our mockery and their proximity to power and privilege. Or at the very least, I hope Chet sees the error of his ways and halfway apologize like Van Winkle…
Thank you for reading.
Sources | https://aninjusticemag.com/chet-hanks-a9e00356e89d | ['Gfc', 'Grown Folk Conversations'] | 2021-01-04 18:16:57.058000+00:00 | ['White Privilege', 'Appropriation', 'Race', 'Hip Hop', 'Chet Hanks'] |
50 Best Free Computer Science Project Topics in PDF 2021 | Free computer science project topics and research materials in PDF download for final year undergraduate and masters students 2020 and 2021. NCE, BSC, MSC, PGD, and Ph.D.
Are you a final year research student looking for topics on computer science? This page is here to assist you with free project topics which are made easy for you to comprehend and assimilate. Kindly preview the link below for 50 free topics on computer science.
CLICK HERE TO SEE ALL TOPICS WITH MATERIALS>>
List of Free Project Topics in Computer Science 2021
1. Intelligent Tutoring System For Learning Object-Oriented Programming Language
2. Generic Animation Tool For Traffic Simulation
3. Design And Implementation Of Online Disaster Report Management System
4. Design and implementation of an online journal management system (a case study of Sokoto international journal of counseling psychology).
5. A Hybridized Recommendation System On Movie Data Using Content-Based And Collaborative Filtering
6. Programs To Access System Resources
7. A Review Of Dimensionality Reduction Methods And Their Applications
8. Enhancing Prediction Accuracy Of A Multi-Criteria Recommender System Using Adaptive Genetic Algorithm
9. Business Educators’ Rating Of Techniques For Improving The Teaching Of Information And Communication Technology In Tertiary Institutions In Anambra State
10. Approach To A Simulation Virtual Machine: Object-Oriented Implementation Of Cdevs And Pdevs
11. Applying Deep Learning Methods For Short Text Analysis In Disease Control
12. A Model View Controller-Based Platform For The Modeling And Simulation Of The Hoist Scheduling Problem
13. The Implications Of Ict On Voting Behavior In Nigeria. A Case Study Of Borno State (2015–2019)
14. comparison of academic performance of students in computer science in the tertiary institution from 2016–2019
15. Design And Implementation Of An Intelligent Traffic Control System
16. Development of A University Document Management System
17. DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF ELECTRONIC LOGBOOKS FOR STUDENTS INDUSTRIAL WORK EXPERIENCE SCHEME (SIWES).
18. Evaluate The Use Of Computer In Teaching And Learning Of Basic Technology At The Secondary School In Orumba South Local Government Area Of Anambra State
19. Design and implementation of a peer to peer network for file sharing
20. Design And Implementation Of E-Learning Platforms For An Introduction To C++ Programming Language
21. Design And Implementation Of Digital Cash Transaction System
22. Design And Implementation Of Course Registration And Result Processing System(A Case Study Of Federal Polytechnic, Ilaro)
23. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Staff Payroll Information System For Kosofe Local Government
24. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Restaurant Menu System (A Case Study Of Aroma Restaurant Bauchi)
25. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Registration Application For School Enrollment (Case Study Of Abia State University Uturu)
26. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Price Checking System
27. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Population Analysis System (Case Study Of National Population Commission Enugu)
28. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Internet Cafe Timer And Monitoring System
29. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Hotel Front Office Management Information System
30. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Hostel Allocation Management System
31. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Guest Information Tracking System
32. Design and Implementation of Computerized Child Care Information System
33. Design And Implementation Of Computerized Bill Of Quantity System For Engineering Project
34. Design and Implementation of Computerized Tourism Information System (Case Study of Owerri In Imo State)
35. Design And Implementation Of Computer-Based Population Census Information System For National Population Commission
36. Design And Implementation Of Computer-Aided Hardware Instructor.
37. Design and Implementation of a Commercial Vehicle Registration and Task Management System in a Campus
38. Design And Implementation Of Campus Wide Wireless Network
39. Design And Implementation Of Campus Online Help Desk Information System
40. Design And Implementation Of Automatic Payment Portal System (A Case Study Of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, Kongo Campus)
41. Design And Implementation Of Automated Patient Medical Record System (A Case Study Of Delhatu Specialist Hospital, Lafia)
42. Design And Implementation Of Automated Nysc Posting System
43. Design and Implementation of an Automated Motor Vehicle Driving System
44. Design And Implementation Of Automated Estate Agent And Property Management System (E-Property)
45. Design And Implementation Of An Online Vehicle And Plate Number Registration And Identification System In Nigeria
46. Design and Implementation of an Online System for Domestic Flight Customer Information Management System
47. Design And Implementation Of An Online Real-Time Parcel Tracking And Monitoring System (A Case Study Of Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST)
48. Design And Implementation Of An Online Legal Practitioners Representation System (A Case Study Of Afikpo Customary Court Afikpo)
49. Design and Implementation of an Online Healthcare System (Case Study of General Hospital, Minna)
50. Design And Implementation Of An Online Crime Reporting System
CLICK HERE TO SEE THE MATERIALS OF THIS TOPICS ABOVE
In Conclusion
These computer science project topics PDF above are the best topics from 2020 to 2021. we also have their complete materials ready for instant download. | https://medium.com/@projectpdf24/50-best-free-computer-science-project-topics-in-pdf-2021-6cbb49ffc56c | [] | 2020-12-10 21:27:46.049000+00:00 | ['Academic', 'Final Year Projects', 'Computer Science', 'Projects', 'Project Topics'] |
Global Antibiotics Market | The global antibiotics market size was valued at USD 35.7 billion in 2019 and is expected to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4.5% from 20 to 2028.
The rising prevalence of infectious diseases and supportive government legislation are the major drivers of the market. Moreover, an increase in antibiotic resistance infections due to misuse or overuse of antibiotics is expected to shift the prescription patterns to novel therapies to treat bacterial infection. According to the CDC, the incidence of antibiotic-resistant infections is more than 2.8 million in the U.S. The pathogens such as Enterobacteriaceae, P. aeruginosa, and K. pneumoniae have a high resistance rate of an average of 40% in developed countries.
Market Drivers
Increasing number of patients suffering from infectious diseases drives the growth of antibiotics market. Ongoing clinical trials are being conducted by many pharmaceuticals’ companies will also boost up the antibiotics market growth. In addition, advances in antibiotics drugs and novel combination therapies to treat antibiotic-resistant microbial infections can advance the treatment landscape can also be a factor that drive the growth this market in the above forecasted period. Furthermore, a special designation from the regulatory authority to various potential pharmaceuticals companies is one of the factors which are expected to drive the market growth.
The rising threat of drug resistance and a weak pipeline of new molecules are leading to the development of combinational formulations. For instance, in countries, like India, the emergence of multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis (TB) is a major factor driving the R&D expenditures. Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) is another bacterium responsible for several infections in humans that are difficult to treat. The MRSA infection is difficult to treat with standard antibiotics, such as penicillin’s (methicillin, dicloxacillin, nafcillin, and oxacillin), and the cephalosporins. In 2014, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved four new antibiotics for the treatment of infections caused by gram-positive bacteria, including MRSA.
Visit https://insights10.com/ for more healthcare industry insights. | https://medium.com/@insightss10/global-antibiotics-market-ee902f4f95b3 | [] | 2021-12-29 09:45:19.604000+00:00 | ['Market Analysis', 'Market Research Reports', 'Antibiotics Market', 'Healthcare', 'Antibiotics'] |
An Iraq War veteran fights for psychedelic medicines | An Iraq War veteran fights for psychedelic medicines
Jonathan Lubecky says MDMA-assisted therapy helped him overcome PTSD. Now he wants to help others.
Jonathan Lubecky, at The Citadel with U.S. Sen. Rand Paul
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is a progressive champion. Matt Gaetz is a conservative firebrand. They don’t agree on much — except psychedelics.
Ocasio-Cortez, a New York Democrat, and Gaetz, a Florida Republican, have joined forces in Congress to try to make it easier for scientists to research marijuana and psychedelic drugs, including MDMA and psilocybin.
Such bipartisan cooperation will be needed to support the growth of psychedelic medicines and end the drug war, says Jonathan Lubecky, a retired Army sergeant and Iraq war veteran who now lobbies on behalf of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies, or MAPS.
“This isn’t a party line issue,” Lubecky says. “The polar opposites in the House came together on psychedelics.”
Voters are coming around as well. Last week, Oregon became the first state in the US to legalize a psychedelic medicine; about 56 percent of the state’s voters supported a ballot measure that will allow the medical use of psilocybin, the active ingredient in so-called magic mushrooms. Washington, D.C., decriminalized the growth and possession of psychedelic mushrooms.
A nonprofit, MAPS has two big goals. It wants to make psychedelic medicines available to those in need; to that end, it is conducting FDA-approved clinical trials to show that MDMA, with therapy, can effectively treat post traumatic stress syndrome, or PTSD. More broadly, MAPS wants to make psychedelic drugs and marijuana safely and legally available.
For Lubecky, these issues are deeply personal.
A Ohio native, Lubecky, 43, served in the Marine Corps for four years after finishing high school in 1995. He re-enlisted in the Army after the September 11 terrorist attacks. While deployed in Iraq, he was knocked out by an enemy mortar attack that left him with a traumatic brain injury and PTSD.
Lubecky tried all manner of treatment — cognitive behavioral therapy, prolonged exposure therapy and antidepressants, among others — to no avail. Depressed and without hope, he tried several times to take his own life.
“Combat takes an emotional toll,” he says. “One of the things we never realized was that a lot of us would be asked to give our life for our country, not in Iraq, not in Afghanistan, but far far from the battlefield at home, in the dark.”
The Veterans Administration estimates that about 8 million Americans have PTSD. Treatments have worked for many, but for others the disease can persist for years. Depression, anxiety and substance abuse disorders often accompany PTSD. An average of 17 veterans commit suicide every day, according the most recent estimates from the VA.
An intern at the VA quietly told Lubecky about MAPS and its clinical trials of MDMA, which is known on the street as ecstasy or molly. (Caution: Drugs sold illegally under those names can be adulterated or dangerous.) He began treatments with Dr. Michael Mithoefer, a psychiatrist, and his wife, Annie, a registered nurse, who are among the world’s leading researchers into MDMA. Lubecky has been living in South Carolina, where the Mithoefers operate a clinic.
His course of treatment, which lasted 12 weeks, included three eight-hour sessions during which Lubecky took MDMA. Each drug experience was preceded by three 90-minute psychotherapy sessions to prepare him, and followed by three more 90-minute sessions to help him understand what had happened.
MDMA is more likely to bring about warm feelings than to trigger the sensory distortions that accompany classic psychedelics like LSD and psilocybin. The National Institute on Drug Abuse — no fan of illegal drugs — says MDMA’s effects include “an enhanced sense of well-being, increased extroversion, emotional warmth, empathy toward others and a willingness to discuss emotionally-charged memories.”
In a clinical setting, MDMA can help build trust between therapists and patients, who then can work through difficult memories. “The MDMA puts the mind, body and spirit in the place where it needs to be for the therapy to work,” Lubecky says. “It disconnects that fear response in the brain, that fight or flight, so you can talk about the trauma.”
The treatment is nevertheless challenging.
“It’s not a bed of roses,” Lubecky says. “You are going through all of the worst moments of your life.”
So far, the findings of MAPS’ research, including a study published by The Lancet Psychiatry, have been encouraging. The FDA has granted MDMA-assisted psychotherapy for PTSD a “breakthrough therapy designation,” which means that early evidence indicates that the drug may demonstrate substantial improvement over existing therapies. The results of MAPS’ first Phase 3 study will be made public any day now, as MAPS recruits volunteers for a second, and final, Phase 3 study. If all goes according to plan, the FDA could approve MDMA as a medicine in 2023.
For his part, Lubecky had returned to college at The Citadel to pursue a lifelong interest in politics, while still struggling with PTSD. Days after a suicide attempt, he listened to a speech by Rand Paul, the conservative U.S. senator from Kentucky, and afterwards lined up to shake his hand.
Lubecky describes what happened next:
He noticed the bandages on my wrists. He asked what happened, and I said, “Oh, a week ago I tried to kill myself and I cut my wrists.” He pulled me aside and said, “Forget I’m a senator. I’m also a doctor. I want to know what’s going on right now.” We talked for 20 minutes, and at the end of it, he gave me his right-hand man’s cell phone number and said, “If you ever feel that way again, I want you to call that phone number, and we will use the full weight of my office and the federal government to fix whatever problem you have.”
Two years later, Lubecky was feeling much better but he called Rand Paul’s aide with a request: Could he work on the senator’s presidential campaing? He landed a job, got more involved with conservative policies and later asked Rick Doblin, the founder and executive director of MAPS, if he could become an advocate for MAPS.
As the organization’s veterans and governmental affairs liaison since 2018, Lubecky has been telling his story to anyone who will listen. “Lots of people are suffering like I was,” he says, and he’d like them to know there is hope.
MAPS has tried to work with the VA for years, offering to help fund research and getting help from former U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller, whose cousin, the late Richard Rockefeller, was a MAPS donor. The VA has kept its distance but Doblin and Lubecky still would like the work with the government to reach more veterans.
As for the efforts of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Matt Gaetz, they did not fare well. Their amendment to eliminate a long-time restriction on federal funds being used to research psychedelics or marijuana came to a vote in the House, but it was defeated by 331 to 91, with a majority of Democrats and Republicans voting no.
The politics will change, Lubecky says, as younger lawmakers come to power and as the evidence accumulates that psychedelic medicines can help those who need them. Last week’s vote in Oregon was the latest evidence that attitudes are changing.
Says Lubecky: “You can’t continue to demonize these drugs when there are studies that show they help people.” | https://medium.com/the-psychedelic-renaissance/an-iraq-war-veteran-fights-for-psychedelic-medicines-e89fe02d493d | ['Marc Gunther'] | 2020-11-10 13:23:10.973000+00:00 | ['Veterans', 'Drugs', 'Politics', 'Psychedelics'] |
Daily Blockchain Use Cases and News #18 | Public blockchain Lisk commenced the release of Lisk Core 1.0 to its Mainnet
Decentralized cloud startup Dfinity raised $102 million from Andreessen Horowitz’s crypto fund (a16z) and other investors
Australian federal agency is working on a national blockchain, enabling business transactions to work with smart legal contracts
Banking company Standard Chartered is cooperating with the financial arm of Siemens on a blockchain pilot for bank guarantees for trade finance | https://medium.com/blockchaincircle/daily-blockchain-use-cases-and-news-18-53b1830a7dea | ['Pavel Romanenko'] | 2018-08-30 10:28:25.510000+00:00 | ['Technology', 'Blockchain', 'Bitcoin', 'Cryptocurrency', 'News'] |
Bravery in the Spotlight | Over the past 24 hours, news has been flowing in regarding comedian John Mulaney’s decision to admit himself into rehab for cocaine and alcohol addiction. Mulaney, who has openly talked about his struggles with addiction and sobriety, has received an outpouring of support from fans and colleagues alike; and while this reaction is absolutely the right one, it provides an interesting opportunity to examine how the reaction to Mulaney differs from how the toxicity of tabloid culture has trained society to react in these sorts of situations.
Seeking help for substance abuse is never easy. But imagine trying to seek help for substance abuse not only having to face your family and friends, but the entire world. With the stigma surrounding addiction beginning to change, I think we all hope that the reaction to Mulaney becomes the new normal and that we won’t have to face more Princes, Robin Williams, Heath Ledgers. But the truth is, that we as a society have not created a space in which it is easy for a celebrity to seek help. We hold them to an impossible standard while neglecting to lend them the support to fulfill it. In an interview with USA Today in 2016, Dr. Paul Earley of the Georgia Professionals Health Program said “Everyone is star-struck; they have problems confronting and pushing a celebrity to get proper treatment. Physicians and friends feed their substance use to be close to the celebrity aura. And then the celebrity dies.” Because even when we invade so far into a celebrity’s life to know about their drug addiction or alcoholism, we make snap judgments instead of offering resources. Because society feels entitled, but not responsible.
But the reaction to news of Mulaney’s decision sparks hope for the future. A future in which individuals, celebrity and otherwise, will receive support and love for taking care of themselves. A future where Instagram accounts won’t have to be deleted, family members stalked, and candid photos poured over for clues into an individual’s personal life. As the pandemic has continued to keep us in close proximity to our psyche, I think many have grown into the realization that self-care is a necessary part of day-to-day living; that, no matter the circumstances you find yourself in, the most important person you report to is you. That we as human beings require love, support, and understanding. And that the reflexes to judge, condemn, and assume that tabloids have been training in us have gone unchecked for far too long. That the humanity of any one of us, rich or poor, public or private, famous or not, cannot be checked at the door.
The reaction to John Mulaney’s decision to enter into rehab holds much promise, both for Mulaney’s future and the future of society as a whole. I think that we as a people are ready to enter into the next phase of our evolution; a space in time where we don’t feel the need to force others down in order to be better than they are, but rather work together to make sure that everyone has the support they need to be the best versions of themselves. The bravery that Mulaney has shown is an inspiration; an inspiration to those who are currently seeking help, those who need to seek help, and those who love them. So thank you, Mr. Mulaney. Your work has helped some of us get through the hardest moments in our lives, and it’s only right that we get to repay the favor. We are all rooting for you, and we can’t wait to see you win this fight. | https://medium.com/@dumeerev/bravery-in-the-spotlight-d5c933bf9d85 | ['Evelyn N. Dumeer'] | 2020-12-24 03:17:33.593000+00:00 | ['Celebrity', 'John Mulaney', 'Addiction Recovery'] |
Comparisons Can Deceive When it Comes to Trusting in Yourself | In Dr. Mel Goodale’s lab where I did my undergraduate thesis research, a big focus of the work involved studying optical illusions to better understand how our brains create and navigate the gap between perception and reality.
Looking at these optical illusions again in recent years, I see them a bit differently. I now look at them and notice new ways our brains might trick us.
When Perception Differs from Reality
Take a look at this image and consider which centre orange circle seems bigger:
Example of an Ebbinghaus illusion. Which centre orange circle appears larger? The one on the left or right?
This is an example of an Ebbinghaus illusion, an illusion of relative size perception.
In reality, both of the centre orange circles are the same size. Go ahead and measure to check if you like.
The perceptual trickery results from the juxtaposition of circles: the orange circle on the left surrounded by larger circles appears smaller than the orange circle on the right surrounded by smaller circles.
Comparison of the image on the left and right is fooling our brains.
Comparisons are Tricky
Visual illusions aren’t the only thing that trips our brains up and gives rise to mismatches between our perception and reality.
We also frequently deceive our brains when we compare ourselves to others, quite often comparing to the best in class or to someone’s highlight reel they’ve curated on Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, or elsewhere.
This is like the two images in the Ebbinghaus Illusion. Your comparison to another person might be giving rise to an illusion that fools your brain and can hold you back. Your contexts — the juxtapositions of the circles — are surely different, which may cause you to perceive things to be more different than they truly are.
This illusion of relative perception can be powerful fuel for the negative self talk that all of us have and few of us talk about. It can amplify the inner voice that says things like “Who do you think you are to try? You’re not good enough.” and “You’re going to fail, so why bother?” This voice is also known as Impostor Syndrome, the inner critic, or the “itty bitty shitty committee” (a name shared with us by a participant in the In Trust virtual workshop). It reflects a lack of trust in ourselves which is often the biggest obstacle we face when we’re seeking to stretch, strive, and grow.
So how do you overcome this comparison illusion that is misleading your brain so you can cultivate more trust in yourself?
A More Trusted Comparison
The trick to overcome the illusion is not to not compare. Comparing is something we all do and can be helpful in our learning journey. A key is in what you are comparing yourself to.
Instead of comparing yourself to others and giving rise to the illusion, you can help your brain help you by comparing yourself to where you were yesterday. In what you’re seeking to learn or achieve, strive to consistently get just a little bit better than the day before and reflect on your progress. Drip, drip, drip, and eventually the bucket gets filled.
Your brain is not deceiving you here. These circles are indeed growing in size from left to right.
This sort of self-comparison can better align your perception with reality. It can help wrangle your inner critic so you can propel yourself forward with greater self-awareness. It can help you notice your progress, trust your process, and better trust in yourself. | https://medium.com/spotlight-trust/comparisons-can-deceive-when-it-comes-to-trusting-in-yourself-c0ef93dd1304 | ['Lisa Lambert', 'Co-Founder At Spotlight Trust'] | 2020-08-12 00:08:18.256000+00:00 | ['Leadership Skills', 'Learning And Development', 'Leadership', 'Leadership Development', 'Trust'] |
The Covid-19 Virus Can Persist for Months: Why? | The Covid-19 Virus Can Persist for Months: Why?
Reason 3: Hiding in the saliva to evade the immune system. And what it means for immunity.
Virus clearance differs between individuals. It is also one reason why some recover from infections quicker than others. And the word recovery can be tricky, referring to either disappearance of clinical symptoms or virus elements, or both. This article will focus on virus clearance (i.e., being tested negative) rather than recovery.
Contents:
- Persistent Infection
- Reason 1: Co-existence
- Reason 2: Low Antibody Production
- Reason 3: Immune Evasion
- Reason 4: Reactivation or Reinfection
- Reason 5: Intermittent Viral Shedding
- The Good and Bad of Covid-19 Persistence
Persistent Infection
Published reports are now saying that positive diagnosis status for SARS-CoV-2 can last for months, despite being symptomless. This is a persistent infection, and they are by no means novel. “Persistent infections are characterized as those in which the virus is not cleared but remains in specific cells of infected individuals,” the Medical Microbiology textbook defined. “Persistent infections may involve stages of both silent and productive infection without rapidly killing or even producing excessive damage to host cells.”
It is not unusual for viruses to persist in the host, often without causing excessive harm.
Viruses cause most cases of persistent infections. Examples are herpes simplex virus, HIV, measles virus, cytomegalovirus, Epstein-bar virus, human T-cell leukaemia virus, hepatitis B virus, etc. Inferring from them, scientists agree that no sole mechanism underpins how persistent infection works. And the same applies to Covid-19 as well; scientists to date have come up with at least four reasons. | https://medium.com/microbial-instincts/the-covid-19-virus-can-last-for-months-why-efb8314b2b98 | ['Shin Jie Yong'] | 2020-07-13 13:40:31.721000+00:00 | ['Health', 'Coronavirus', 'Future', 'Innovation', 'Technology'] |
Romance of blood between Israeli Mossad and Iranian nuclear scientists! | Israeli Mossad is making lot of sound in the mainstream media after the recent assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, although Israel has denied any responsibility for this act.
Exactly three years back, I had written this answer in Quora about the targeted assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists by the combined hit squad of US & Israeli agents.
Assuming Fakhrizadeh had met his fate by the Israeli Intelligence, Mossad is once again making sure that Iran can never be a threat to their existence as far as nuclear weapons are concerned.
List of scientists assassinated by Israeli Mossad!
Dr. Ardeshir Hosseinpour
The first target of Mossad was Professor of Physics Dr. Ardeshir Hosseinpour. He was the renowned man in the Iran’s secret nuclear program. Mossad came to know about his involvement and killed him with radioactive poison. But they made sure that this act didn’t look like a targeted killing! Iran assumed his death to be health issues!
2. Masoud Ali Mohammadi
The next man in the hit list of Mossad was Professor Masoud Ali Mohammadi, a Nuclear physicist. When Prof. Ali was leaving his home to head towards his at Sharif University of Technology, he got out of his home and unlocked his car, the next second rocked with a huge explosion resulting in instant death of Prof. Ali.
3. Dr. Majid Shahriyari
The next man in Dagan’s hit list was Dr. Majid Shahriyari, the scientific head of Iran’s nuclear program. Dr. Majid and his wife was travelling in his car on 29th Nov. 2010, a motorcyclist from the rear end approached his car and attached a device to his rear windshield and seconds later the device exploded killing Majid and injuring his wife.
4. Darioush Rezaei Najad
The next name on the Kidon’s hit list was Darioush Rezaei Najad, a thirty-five-year-old physics professor and a major figure in Iran’s secret nuclear weapons program. He had been in charge of developing the electronic switches necessary for activating a nuclear warhead. He was assassinated by two unidentified gun men when he was about to enter his home.
5. Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan
Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan, Deputy Director of Natanz Uranium enrichment facility, one of the top names in the Iranian nuclear program couldn’t change his fate from Israeli Mossad. He was killed in car bomb blast.
The only major person Mossad failed to assassinate was Dr. Fereydoun Abassi-Davani, another major scientist in Iran’s nuclear project. The plan of assassination was as same as attaching a device to his car but unfortunately it failed. He was injured in his incident and later he was appointed as the Vice President of Iran after knowing that he has a life threat! This was a major blow to Mossad!
So altogether Mossad is known to have delayed the secret nuclear project of Iran from 2005 to till date!
Memorial to the assassinated Iranian scientists
Adding to the above list,
The recent assassination of senior most Iranian nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.
Mohsen Fakhrizadeh would have been called “The father of Iranian nuclear bomb”, if he would be successful in building one but I suppose, Mossad had different plans for him. In the year 2018, Israeli PM Benjamin Nethanyahu had exposed secret Iranian nuclear facility where he had stressed about Mohsen Fakhrizadeh quoting “Remember this name”. Days back he was assassinated from the unknown gunmen near Tehran.
Since the only intention of Iran is to get Israel and United States of America to its knee by developing a nuclear warhead rather than for peaceful purpose, Mossad leaves no stone unturned in stopping Iran from becoming a nuclear state. | https://medium.com/@vikyathrten/romance-of-blood-between-israeli-mossad-and-iranian-nuclear-scientists-9a5a5f630f68 | ['Vikyath Kumar'] | 2020-12-01 06:30:15.664000+00:00 | ['Mossad', 'Iran', 'Nuclear Weapons'] |
Builder Pattern with Java Lombok | Image source — https://stacktraceguru.com/builder-pattern
Most developers use the builder pattern to reduce the complexity of creating complex objects by giving the step by step approach. The builder pattern reduces the boilerplate codes in your program.
What are the problems we are going to solve from the builder pattern?
If we have several parameters on the constructor, it isn’t easy to remember the parameters’ order. Based on the application logic, sometimes we need to write to several constructors.
Suppose you want to create immutable classes, then better to use the builder pattern. The builder pattern gives immutable classes with a large set of state attributes.
If you have mandatory parameters and optional parameters, then you need to maintain several constructors. In this case, better to use the builder pattern.
Traditional way of implementation without builder pattern
public class Person {
private String firstName;
private String secondName;
private int age;
private String address;
private String idNumber;
public Person(String firstName) {
this.firstName = firstName;
}
public Person(String firstName, int age) {
this.firstName = firstName;
this.age = age;
}
public Person(String firstName, int age, String idNumber) {
this.firstName = firstName;
this.age = age;
this.idNumber = idNumber;
}
public Person(String firstName, String secondName, String address) {
this.firstName = firstName;
this.secondName = secondName;
this.address = address;
}
public Person(String firstName, String secondName, int age, String address, String idNumber) {
this.firstName = firstName;
this.secondName = secondName;
this.age = age;
this.address = address;
this.idNumber = idNumber;
}
public String getFirstName() {
return firstName;
}
public void setFirstName(String firstName) {
this.firstName = firstName;
}
public String getSecondName() {
return secondName;
}
public void setSecondName(String secondName) {
this.secondName = secondName;
}
public int getAge() {
return age;
}
public void setAge(int age) {
this.age = age;
}
public String getAddress() {
return address;
}
public void setAddress(String address) {
this.address = address;
}
public String getIdNumber() {
return idNumber;
}
public void setIdNumber(String idNumber) {
this.idNumber = idNumber;
}
}
By looking at the above code, you can see so many code lines (boilerplate code). The above class has several constructors with different parameters and the getter and setters for each variable.
Builder pattern traditional implementation
public class Person {
private String firstName;
private String secondName;
private int age;
private String address;
private String idNumber;
private Person(PersonBuilder builder) {
this.firstName = builder.firstName;
this.secondName = builder.secondName;
this.age = builder.age;
this.address = builder.address;
this.idNumber = builder.idNumber;
}
public String getFirstName() {
return firstName;
}
public String getSecondName() {
return secondName;
}
public int getAge() {
return age;
}
public String getAddress() {
return address;
}
public String getIdNumber() {
return idNumber;
}
public static class PersonBuilder {
private String firstName;
private String secondName;
private int age;
private String address;
private String idNumber;
public PersonBuilder firstName(String firstName) {
this.firstName = firstName;
return this;
}
public PersonBuilder secondName(String secondName) {
this.secondName = secondName;
return this;
}
public PersonBuilder age(int age) {
this.age = age;
return this;
}
public PersonBuilder address(String address) {
this.address = address;
return this;
}
public PersonBuilder idNumber(String idNumber) {
this.idNumber = idNumber;
return this;
}
public Person build() {
Person person = new Person(this);
return person;
}
}
}
Usage —
Person person = new Person.PersonBuilder()
.firstName("Sidath")
.secondName("Weerasinghe")
.age(26).build();
Lombok
Lombok is a small java library tool that reduces the boiler pate code in the java project using annotations. It improves the code readability and helps to reduce the lines of code in the program.
Any performance issue using Lombok ?
Lombok works on the java compile time, so there is no performance issue with the java runtime. Based on the annotations we are putting on the code base Lombok add all the boilerplate code according to that provided annotations to the .class files during the compilation time.
Builder pattern implementation with Lombok annotations
import lombok.Builder;
import lombok.Getter;
@Getter
@Builder
public class Person {
private String firstName;
private String secondName;
private int age;
private String address;
private String idNumber;
}
Usage —
Person person = new Person.PersonBuilder()
.firstName("Sidath")
.secondName("Weerasinghe")
.age(26).build();
Disadvantages of the builder pattern
You cant create mutable objects. (this can be also resolved by using the genetic builder using the java reflection)
Reference — | https://medium.com/@sidath/builder-pattern-with-java-lombok-67c507aeb06d | ['Sidath Weerasinghe'] | 2020-12-27 04:28:06.896000+00:00 | ['Builder Pattern', 'Java', 'Lombok', 'Design Patterns', 'Architecture'] |
Sneak peek into the Habit tracker that helped me out of Depression | On my father’s suggestion, I started Tracking my habits — The good ones and the little joy-giving sins that do more harm than good.
I started tracking my habits almost 2 months back, and just this habit of consciously tracking my habit patterns has tremendously helped me break some of my bad habits and replace them with some positive ones.
Here’s a snapshot of my habit tracker from September and October.
October’s habit tracker is a little more organized and an upgraded version of September’s version.
I also embarked upon the #1000DayChallenge starting in October to build a better version of myself. Lately, I had to suffer a big enough loss to push me deep down into depression and make me question everything that I ever believed in.
This challenge was a self-reminder that “I am not my work, and I cannot, and I shouldn’t tie my identity to my work.”
I know my habit tracker looks messy and overwhelming, but don’t worry — “The only habit you need to keep a check on is to ensure that you are filling up the tracker”
The only habit I had to track was the tracking of my habits which involved me picking this journal up before I sleep, hence I keep this journal under my pillow so that I know if I missed out.
Here’s the physical change brought in because of the tiny habit of tracking my habits, and I think I am 10X better mentally.
And now, I am all set for 2021, cuz I can already see, and feel the difference of tracking habits in just these 3 months, and I like who I am becoming.
If a lethargic procrastinator like me is improving with this tiny habit, I am hopeful that you might find this helpful too.
Good luck.
Drop-in an 🍎 if you’re up for the #1000DayChallenge
If you’re curious about this habit tracker, here’s a short video that explains how you could go about creating your very own Habit-tracker. | https://medium.com/@trippyentrepreneur/sneak-peek-into-the-habit-tracker-that-helped-me-out-of-depression-8b7db8ac4694 | ['Trippy Entrepreneur'] | 2020-11-21 19:48:35.855000+00:00 | ['Mental Health', 'Habit Building', 'Motivation', 'Habits', 'Discipline'] |
What is Process Mining? | Photo by Franki Chamaki on Unsplash
What is Process Mining?
An analytical approach that aims to build an exhaustive and objective vision of processes based on factual data
Context and issues
In a corporate context, many business processes are partially or even completely supported by IT systems: the digitalization of processes represents more and more activities, supported by a growing number of systems that generate ever more data.
That being said, it is legitimate to ask whether traditional ways of studying processes are still sufficient:
Is documenting a vision of the target process sufficient for the process to be implemented in practice?
for the process to be implemented in practice? When a deviation from a model is perceived , is it optimal to seek consensus in a group from subjective points of view ?
, is it optimal to seek consensus in a group from ? Is it possible to measure the actual execution speed of the process from start to finish?
Process Mining provides a new approach to take these elements into account.
A first definition
Process Mining is an analytical approach that aims to build an exhaustive and objective vision of processes based on factual data.
Process Mining is at the crossroads of Data Mining and Business Process Management
Thus, Process Mining is a high value-added approach when it comes to building a viewpoint on the actual implementation of a process and identifying deviations from the ideal process, bottlenecks and potential process optimizations.
How does it work?
Whatever the nature of the process , as soon as it is supported by digital tools, information is created and stored by the corresponding IT systems (ERP, business applications, etc.), in particular via application logs. This stored information often has similarities and makes it possible to trace the path of an “object” through different stages at different times in time.
Process Mining is based on tools that use these digital footprints to reconstruct, visualize and analyze processes, thus providing transparency and objectivity towards the real process.
The process analysis is based on the application logs
Required data
In order to be usable, these digital footprints must at least include:
Object : an instance that will be followed throughout the process, with a unique identifier. The choice of this object influences the scope of the studied process
: an instance that will be followed throughout the process, with a unique identifier. The choice of this object influences the scope of the studied process Activity : a step in the studied process. The choice of activities influences the granularity of the process
: a step in the studied process. The choice of activities influences the granularity of the process Date: determines the order of activities and timing
In addition, it may be interesting to collect additional data depending on the process, for example: supplier, type of product, location, person/management, channel, value…. These will allow further investigation.
Process visualization and analysis
From these data, it is possible to visualize a representation of the ideal process and all deviations from it. This allows for early detection of potential inefficiencies in the process.
Beyond the representation of the process, one can also look at the execution times of each step, or look at a more limited scope in order to identify where, when and why the process deviates from its ideal version.
Example with a purchasing process
For a simplified purchasing process ideally composed of 4 steps (“Record the order”, “Receive the goods”, “Record the invoice” and “Pay the invoice”), the process followed by orders is traced from the digital footprints left in an ERP.
Exploitation of digital footprints:
Process visualization:
You will quickly notice that, compared to Order 1 (black) which follows the ideal process, the other two orders are in deviation:
Order 2 (purple) follows an additional step: “Change price”.
(purple) follows an additional step: “Change price”. Order 3 (blue) follows the right steps, but not in the ideal order
Use cases and benefits
There are three major use cases of Process Mining:
Discovery: building a vision of an existing process when no model exists a priori Verification of the correct implementation and analysis of deviations from a previous model Process improvement
In all three cases, it is the understanding of the actual implementation of processes, based on objective and exhaustive data, that makes the added value of the Process Mining approach.
In addition, this approach represents an improvement in the field of process management:
Acceleration of studies (limitation of time spent and number of interviews) to build a representation of existing processes
(limitation of time spent and number of interviews) to build a representation of existing processes Taking into account more data , or even the exhaustiveness of data, in the measurements
, or even the exhaustiveness of data, in the measurements Opportunity, once a new process is designed, to ensure effective management of its use and to see improvements
Process Mining is not dedicated to a particular sector of activity: the approach will be able to bring value wherever processes are implemented and studied. Within a company, several functions may be interested in the approach:
Operational excellence teams: complementing the methods already used (Lean, Six Sigma, etc.)
Data Scientists: visual representations of data to generate new insights
Process managers: factual analyses to complement their expert vision
CIO: vision of the use of the systems and the corresponding user paths
Audit or internal control: faster analysis and the possibility of relying on the exhaustiveness of cases rather than on a sample
Key success factors
In order to obtain good results, the launch of a Process Mining initiative requires some precautions. It can be noted that it is important:
To identify from the outset the added value objective : cost reduction, improvement of the user/customer experience….
: cost reduction, improvement of the user/customer experience…. To define a well-defined study scope in terms of process
in terms of process To operate iteratively with short cycle analyses, within a fixed total time limit
with short cycle analyses, within a fixed total time limit To ensure the quality of the data on which the study is based. To do this, it is essential to collaborate with the IT experts of the systems used as well as the business experts of the processes studied
on which the study is based. To do this, it is essential to collaborate with the IT experts of the systems used as well as the business experts of the processes studied To accompany the change in case of redefinition of a target process
Moreover, the analyses carried out by Process Mining should not be an end in itself but should serve as a factual starting point for further process studies. Reintroducing a human aspect, for example by using a Design Thinking approach, makes it possible to deepen the results obtained thanks to Process Mining by taking the end users into account.
Sources | https://towardsdatascience.com/what-is-process-mining-8afae06b5c33 | ['Thomas Zarazik'] | 2020-04-01 13:08:55.394000+00:00 | ['Process', 'Data Science', 'Data Visualization', 'Process Mining', 'Business Process'] |
The Black-Scholes formula, explained | Very informally, the two terms in the sum given by the Black-Scholes formula may be thought of as ‘the current price of the stock weighted by the probability that you will exercise your option to buy the stock’ minus ‘the discounted price of exercising the option weighted by the probability that you will exercise the option’, or simply ‘what you are going to get’ minus ‘what you are going to pay’ (Khan, 2013).
For a European put option (contracts for the right, but not obligation, to sell some underlaying asset at a pre-determined price on a pre-determined date in the future) the equivalent functional form is:
Equation 9. The Black-Scholes formula for the value of a put option C for a non-dividend paying stock of price S
Example: Calculating the price of a European call option
In order to calculate what the price of a European call option should be, we know we need five values required by equation 6 above. They are: 1. The current price of the stock (S), 2. The exercise price of the call option (X), 3. The time to expiration (T - t), 4. The risk-free interest rate (r) and 5. The volatility of the stock, given by the standard deviation of historical log returns (σ).
Estimating the value of a call option for Tesla (TSLA)
The first four values we need are easily obtainable. Let’s say we are interested in a call option for Tesla’s stock ($TSLA), maturing the day of its Q3 earnings in 2019, at a price 20% higher than the stock is currently trading. Looking at Tesla’s NASDAQ listing ($TSLA) on Yahoo Finance today (July 13th, 2019), we find a stock price of S = $245. Multiplying the current price with 1.2 gives us an exercise price 20% higher than the stock is currently trading, X = $294. Googling, we find that the day of its Q3 earnings call is October 22nd, giving us a time to expiration/maturity of Oct 22nd - July 13th = 101 days. As a proxy for a risk-free interest rate instrument, we’ll use US 10-year government bonds ($USGG10YR), currently paying off 2.12%. So, we find S = 245, X = 294, T - t = 101 and r = 0.0212. The only missing value is an estimation of the stock’s volatility (σ).
We can estimate any stock’s volatility by observing its historical prices, or, even simpler, by calculating other option prices for the same stock at different maturity/expiration dates (T) and exercise/strike prices (X), if we know they have been set according to a Black-Scholes model. The resulting value, σ, is a number between 0 and 1, representing the market’s implied volatility for the stock. For Tesla, at the time of writing this article, the value averaged at approximately 0.38 for 4–5 different option prices around the same expiry/maturity date. Input into equation 6 above, we find that the call option we’re interested in should be prices somewhere around $7.
Implied volatility
Although it is interesting to understand how options issuers arrive at the price of their call and put options, as investors it’s hard to “disagree” with such prices, per se, and so difficult to turn this knowledge into actionable investment theses.
We can however get a lot of milage out of the Black-Scholes formula if we instead treat the price of an option (C or P) as a known quantity/independent variable (found by looking at different maturity/expiration dates T and different exercise prices X). This because, if we do, the Black-Scholes functional equation becomes a tool to help us understand how the market estimates the volatility of a stock, also known as the implied volatility of the option. This is information we can disagree over, and trade against.
Hypothetical scenario
If we for instance look at the chart for the Tesla stock over the last three months (figure 2), we see a rather (for a lack of a better word) volatile journey from hovering around $280 three months ago, to a low of $180 a month and a half ago, to now on its way back up at $245. This makes sense given the volatility we observed from call prices before ($280–$180 = $100, $100/280 = 0.36, vs 0.38). It does not make sense, however, if we think the fluctuation over the past three months was the mere tip of an iceberg, going into a period of more volatility for Tesla, say, due to an upcoming increase in short-selling.
Figure 2. 3 month chart for $TSLA
Let's say we disagree with an options issuer about the implied volatility of stock's performance over the last three months. We think the ride is going to get rockier. How much? Let's say that instead of 40%, we think the next three months will look more like 60%. Input into the functional Black-Scholes formula along with the same values for S, X, r, and T - t, we get a price of nearly twice of what the options issuer wants, at C(S,t) = $14.32. This we can trade on. We could, for instance, buy call options today and wait for volatility to increase or the value of the stock to go up, before selling at a profit.
American options
Because American options can be exercised at any date prior to expiration (so-called “continuous timeline instruments”), they are much more difficult to deal with that European options (“point in time instruments”). Primarily, since the optimal exercise policy will affect the value of the option, this needs to be taken into account when solving the Black-Scholes partial differential equation. There are no known “closed form” solutions for American options according to the Black-Scholes equation. There are, though, some special cases:
For American call options on underlying assets that do not pay dividend (or other payouts), the American call option price is the same as for European call options. This because the optimal exercise policy in this case is to not exercise the option.
pay dividend (or other payouts), the American call option price is the same as for European call options. This because the optimal exercise policy in this case is to not exercise the option. For American call options on underlying assets that do pay one known dividend in its lifetime, it may be optimal to exercise the option early. In such cases the option may be optimally exercised just before the stock goes ex-dividend, according to a solution given in closed-form by the so-called Roll-Geske-Whaley method (Roll, 1977; Geske, 1979; 1981; Whaley, 1981):
First, check if it is optimal to exercise the option early, by investigating whether the following inequality is fulfilled:
Equation 10.
For S = stock price, X = exercise price, D₁ = dividend paid, t = current date, t₁ = date of dividend payment, T = expiration date of option.
If the inequality is not fulfilled, early exercise it not optimal. If C(・) is the regular Black-Scholes formula for European call options on non-dividend-paying stock (eq x), the value of the American call option is then given by a version of the same equation where the stock price (S) is discounted:
Equation 11. The value of an American call option when inequality (eq.8) is not fulfilled
If the inequality is fulfilled, early exercise is optimal and the value of the American call option is given by the following, awful, mess of an equation (I tried to break it up by each term to make it more readable):
Equation 12. The value of an American call option when inequality (eq. 10) is fulfilled
Where as before S = price of stock, T = date of expiration of option, X = exercise price and r = risk-free interest rate, σ = volatility (standard deviation of the log of the historical returns of the stock), and D₁ is the dividend payout. In addition, ρ is given by:
Equation 13.
a₁, a₂ by:
Equation 14.
Equation 15.
and b₁, b₂ by:
Equation 16.
Equation 17.
Limitations
It should go without saying that Black-Scholes model is precisely that, a theoretical model that tries to estimate how a market behaves, given the assumptions stated above and the inherent limitations of our own numerical estimations of risk-free interest rates (r) and future volatility (σ). It should here be highlighted that not all the assumptions of (especially the original model) are in fact empirically valid. For instance, significant limitations arise from:
The underestimation of extreme moves in the stock, yielding tail risk
The assumption of instant, cost-less trading, yielding liquidity risk
The assumption of a stationary process, yielding volatility risk
The assumption of continuous time and trading, yielding gap risk
These should be accounted for in any and all investment strategies, for instance by hedging with out-of-the-money options, trading on multiple exchanges, hedging with volatility hedging and Gamma hedging, respectively.
Background
As briefly mentioned it was Fischer Black and Myron Scholes who in 1973 showed that dynamically revising a portfolio according to certain rules removes the expected return of the underlying security (Black & Scholes, 1973). Their model built on previously established works by Bachelier, Samuelson and others. Robert C. Merton was the first to publish a paper expanding on the understanding of the model and who coined the term “Black-Scholes options pricing model”. Scholes and Merton was awarded the 1997 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for their discovery of the method of divorcing stock options from the risk of their underlying securities. As Fischer Black passed away in 1995, he would not be eligible to receive the award, but was acknowledged as a contributor by the Nobel Academy. | https://medium.com/cantors-paradise/the-black-scholes-formula-explained-9e05b7865d8a | ['Jørgen Veisdal'] | 2020-07-04 10:37:26.602000+00:00 | ['Finance', 'Math', 'Money', 'Investing', 'Economics'] |
You are not my mirror- You are my mother | You are not my mirror- You are my mother
collage by Yeeve Rayne
As I made that collage with all the white (and a few black)
faces within the outlines of my body,
I felt all the old anger and resentment rise.
I didn’t know what to do with these feelings.
I felt like the art was making me feel worse.
Should I cover the white faces with pictures of myself?
But I’d always had access to pictures of myself
and could look at myself in a mirror.
That was never enough to heal me.
Perhaps pictures of my mom or ancestors?
To honor who I’ve come from?
personal family photos: my mother & grandmother
My grandmother- my mother’s mother-
passed away last year.
What I remember her lamenting about most often
when I was a child was that her perfect skin was becoming wrinkled.
She had beautiful, unmarred skin even until her 60’s and 70’s.
My grandmother grew up in a coastal town
in what is now part of North Korea.
It was famous for its mineral springs,
and my grandmother attributed the quality of her complexion to those waters.
In Korea, my grandmother was
tall, commanding, hard-working, wealthy and vain.
She could also be very generous- but she believed
she was better than most people she met.
She didn’t have any friends and
her relationship to my mother was probably the
closest thing to intimacy she experienced.
Her own mother — my great grandmother-
left her when she was just a baby to make a new life in a foreign country.
My grandmother never really felt supported and loved
by her father or step-mother.
She suffered from this mother wound her entire life.
author’s own image
My grandmother never wanted to
have children or get married.
She wanted to become a singer.
Not only did she marry, she had 8 children!
(She tried to run away several times and suffered from depression throughout her adult life).
All her children were boys, except for my mother.
Like many people in Korea at the time,
she was conditioned to prefer boys
over girls and said things to my mother like,
“If not for you, it would have been perfect
I would have had only sons.”
author’s own image
My mother inherited her mother’s beautiful skin,
pride, hard-working spirit, aesthetic sensibility, perfectionism and generosity.
But, she was much more compassionate
and lived to serve others, including her mother.
Neighbors would comment that she was being
treated like a step-child or a slave.
But my mom never recalls having felt anything
negative towards her mother.
Even now, her brothers complain about the lack
of maternal love they received from their mom.
But my mom only ever felt sorry for her.
author’s own image
My mother was also considered beautiful-
beyond just her complexion.
She attracted attention everywhere she went
for her beauty, style, and grace.
She was also wicked sharp, eloquent, skillful
and physically unstoppable.
So, as a child, of course I looked up to her.
And felt deficient.
I remember sitting next to my mother while she looked at magazines,
and she would compliment the white models,
making comments like,
“Wow, Asians don’t even look like fully-developed people
compared to them. Look at those amazing eyes and legs.”
And I would cry with indignation,
“How can you say that?
You are just as beautiful as them,
You are more beautiful.”
And she would smile, “No, not like that.”
The thing was, she didn’t seem jealous.
She owned her own beauty.
But, I couldn’t stand to hear her say these things.
Not about herself, and not about me.
Because if she- to me, the most beautiful woman in the world-
was not even comparable to these white models,
then where did that leave me?
It was strange.
At the same time that I was being
ostracized and felt ugly for being Asian
I also knew what it was like to be favored
because of my appearance- among Koreans.
I remember my grandmother saying often,
“If we were in Korea, you could be Miss Korea.”
(“Well, we’re not. And here, people tell me I’m ugly everyday.”)
I remember saying to myself as a kid
“If only they (boys I liked) would take the time to get to know me.
If only they could ignore the way I looked and see how great I am.”
Later in college, that became
“If only boys would like for me the real me, and not just for my looks.”
I remember one of my white boyfriends had dated an Asian girl before me,
and I was relentless in my assertion
that he had an “Asian fetish” and that it disgusted me
(while still engaging with him).
I realized this obsession with physical beauty-
beyond racism- was a source of misery.
If you are perceived as beautiful,
you engender jealousy in others.
And you are always afraid of losing your looks,
because it becomes part of your identity
if you are constantly praised for it.
And if you aren’t considered beautiful,
you’re taught to feel less than those that are.
My mom told me stories of how she didn’t have
any friends when she was young because
they were all jealous of her nice clothes and her prettiness
and the fact that all the teachers favored her perfectly obedient behavior.
(There went my theory that if I’d grown up in Korea
I wouldn’t have had any of the social problems I did in the US)
author’s own image. photo by Tony Hitchcock
My mother didn’t have anyone to mirror her inherent value as a girl.
a woman. a human being.
She was only validated in relation to her looks
and her behavior towards others.
When my grandmother’s body was being buried in the ground,
my mother fell to her knees and cried,
“How can you leave me alone like this?
without even a sister?
It’s too lonely to bear.
I am so alone.”
My mother has also suffered from
a lack of maternal love her whole life.
author’s own image
She always desired but struggled to experience
intimacy with other women.
With other people.
With herself.
I am also in this struggle.
I think we all are.
judgment.
separation.
sexism.
racism.
consumerism.
The idea that we are better or less than others
because of external forms.
Because of our sex, our race, our accomplishments, or financial status.
This sense of competition.
That life is a race, and we’ll get left behind if we don’t
look good enough,
make enough money,
get it “right.”
This feeling that we are not OK just as we are.
That we do not inherently belong and have value.
That we are not unconditionally loved.
That we are not held by the universal mother.
by Life.
author’s own image
The story “The Moon Comes Home”
is all about the journey from shame and not belonging
to coming home to unconditional love.
I started creating paintings to make this story into a picture book years ago.
I only did a few and then I got stuck.
I got stuck around the character of the condor.
I didn’t know how I wanted to draw him.
I judged myself for this.
I’m lazy.
Not focused enough.
I’m letting Life/ Mother Earth/ my higher self down
by not completing what I’m “supposed” to.
Ha. The story itself is all about trusting the cycles of life.
And being in total surrender and self-acceptance.
blood art by Yeeve Rayne
I have been delving more deeply into the blood mysteries-
sacred rites around menstruation.
All over the world, when a girl begins to bleed
it is said that she “becomes a woman.”
So how we view menstruation is intimately tied
to how we view women and the feminine.
How do you view menstruation?
Most of us feel it is something to hide,
a nuisance, uncomfortable, painful, perhaps even disgusting.
My periods used to be very painful and I also used to think of it as a nuisance.
But over the last several years,
I think as I became more connected to Mother Earth,
I found myself really enjoying my moon cycle.
I started to feel very empowered and feminine when I menstruated.
I loved bleeding into the Earth directly.
And I would give my plants water mixed with my blood.
But I never thought to add it to my art until recently.
art by Yeeve Rayne
I was guided to paint a yoni with wings.
I painted it with my blood.
Later that night, I kept thinking about the moon story.
And suddenly, I realized the RED condor of my story,
who is an ally and guide for the MOON,
represents this sacred blood of life.
And then I immediately painted the condor with my blood.
And in that moment, I realized (again),
I’d always been perfectly aligned with life.
I wasn’t behind. I wasn’t lazy.
I wasn’t stuck or missing something.
I couldn’t have created the painting
for this story a moment sooner than I did.
“condor” blood art by Yeeve Rayne
We are connected to each other
through love and blood.
Not only our biological family,
but to all of life.
We are all born bathed in blood-it is our first annointing.
This separation from our physical mother
begins our journey of individuation.
But it does not end our relationship
to the constant, loving embrace of
the Divine Mother.
As I open more deeply to the love of the Divine,
that’s always been here,
I am learning to become my own mother.
As my mother learns to become her own mother.
As my grandmother opens
to the love of the Great Mother.
Now is the time for all of us to
become our own mothers.
author’s own image. with my grandmother
To treat ourselves with the patience
kindness, and acceptance that is our birthright-
so that we may embrace one another-
as mothers, as children, as brothers and sisters. | https://medium.com/illumination/you-are-not-my-mirror-you-are-my-mother-54e1e5863da1 | ['Yeeve Rayne'] | 2020-12-24 02:13:44.628000+00:00 | ['Alchemy', 'Healing', 'Racism', 'Korean American', 'Self Improvement'] |
The Best Photo Sharing Experience Starts With the Cloud Frame | The after Christmas joyous feeling when you opened all your gifts is here! You received a Cloud Frame as a gift, now what? Since the Cloud Frame is more than photo viewing and equipped with smart WiFi technology here are a few features you may want to try right now.
Upload Photos from Your Desktop
To get the best enjoyment, you first have to register your Cloud Frame, after you have done the first steps, gather all your favorite photos on your desktop and import them on the Cloud Frame management portal. Here, you can create different albums and slideshows for your viewing preference.
Send Photos Directly from your Phone
If you’re out on a trip and would like to directly share special moments with your family who wasn’t able to make it, you can download the Sungale Cloud Frame app from the Google playstore or apple app store.Your family won’t have to take any additional steps! It’s really that simple and they’ll receive photos to their frame instantly.
Share Photos to a Different Cloud Frame
If you happen to have 2 frames or know a close friend that has one — you can share your favorite photos directly to their frame from your desktop and Cloud Frame app! Learn how here.
Enjoy Movies, Music, Audiobooks and Social Media
Access the Sungale provided APP list or Google Play store to install your favorite apps. Download popular apps, like Netflix, Pandora Radio, Facebook, and more. You’ll have hours of entertainment time, perfect for a nice day in.
Video Chat With Distant Family
Both models CPF1518 and CPF1903 have high definition video chatting capabilities, where you can use Skype to stay connected with the ones that matter.
Didn’t receive a Cloud Frame for Christmas?
Shop Cloud Frames | https://medium.com/@sungaleproducts/the-best-photo-sharing-experience-starts-with-the-cloud-frame-be6e5190f50b | ['Sungale Electronics'] | 2019-01-02 19:33:06.502000+00:00 | ['Family', 'Digital Photography', 'Smart Home', 'Android', 'Touchscreen'] |
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