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How I plan a career in design | How I plan a career in design
I’ve been asked this question a few times now, and each time it’s led to introspection that has shaped how I think of not just my past 12-odd years, but also the coming decades of being a designer. I’m sharing this understanding here in the hope that others may find it useful.
It’s a deeply personal process
It’s tempting to want one’s pay and prestige to grow constantly. However, incessant growth of pay and prestige should not be the drivers of a career. This might perhaps be the most important realization I’ve had — a career is a tool for intrinsic growth, not for the advancement of an extrinsic perception.
Intrinsic growth is authentic, infallible and governed by oneself. Pursuing intrinsic growth can never lead one astray or make one feel guilty. Achieving intrinsic growth makes one a better person and others around them are better off for it. Extrinsic growth is superficial, erratic and governed by others. Pursuing extrinsic growth can make one lust after vanity, commit acts one doesn’t feel naturally inclined to, and make one feel detached from one’s true self. Achieving extrinsic growth often leads to the side effects of losing people and becoming isolated in one’s pride and insecurity of losing the extrinsically assigned value.
Design is part logic and part emotion. In a domain like this, authenticity is important because one’s true, emotional self is invested in one’s work. It’s impossible to detach work from life as a designer, so one’s values in life and work must be one and the same.
There aren’t mutually exclusive sets of goals that map to intrinsic and extrinsic growth. Any goal for growth could be intrinsic or extrinsic. A good thumb rule to identify them is to ask oneself — did the goal arrive first or the opportunity? Intrinsic goals come first and one creates situations to achieve them, making them naturally authentic and healthier pursuits. Extrinsic goals are manufactured as personal goals but are based on what one sees around them, or on validation created by extrinsic structures such as ranks at school or promotions at work.
It’s a wave function
An oft-seen fallacy of youth is to see everything as a linear progression. I have been guilty of it too. When one is young and inexperienced, all plans for the future appear as though they’ll advance in just one direction because there’s just so much left to explore. However, the most important experiences in life are often cyclical, running in phases like wave functions.
The idea of a career progression has reinforced upon us a linear view, serving companies well because it forces employees to chase after higher and higher rewards, ensuring that they constantly add more and more value to the company’s stock. Adding the same amount of value consistently isn’t seen as good enough. If you’ve been in business meetings, you’ll have noticed that folks don’t discuss how the revenue is growing, but how the growth in the revenue is growing. This is seeking growth for its own sake, making growth not the means but an end in itself. It’s a vain pursuit.
Progression must be sought not for one’s career but for one’s own person.
The prerequisite for planning a healthy career is to see it as a cyclical process that strives for personal growth.
The phases of a career
Personal growth is achieved through two kinds of phases that one cycles through in a design career: Structured growth and Unstructured growth.
Structured growth
In the majority of cases, this is where the cycle begins. Structured growth is a phase where one seeks guardrails, guidance and safe spaces to make mistakes so they can learn new things. This phase is often marked by a feeling that one does not know what one does not know. During this phase, one learns by watching others a lot more than by doing.
It is important in this phase to surround oneself with experts in the domain, find mentors that are a great fit (remember — just because you respect someone for their work doesn’t mean that they’re the right mentor for you) and spend time with others who are equally or more talented than oneself.
A good example of structured growth is what one achieves by going to a good academic institution, or joining an organization that’s recognized for its talented pool of employees. A certain level of pedantry and paternalizing is a necessary evil of this role since one often borrows from others’ values to build their own understanding of personal values during this phase.
The end of this phase is marked by what one often might articulate as “I’m feeling too boxed in.” Terms and phrases such as “pigeon-holed”, “bored”, or “stuck in a rut” begin to come to one’s mind. One begins to feel an itch to break free and explore on their own. This is when one is ready for the other phase: Unstructured growth.
Unstructured growth
In many ways, this is the exact opposite of the previous phase, and environments that foster such growth are harder to come by. In this phase, one hungers for freedom and actively repels any kind of framework or restrictions. A need for ‘going back to the first principles,’ ‘wiping the slate clean’ and so on marks this phase.
An important aspect of this phase is that the stakes must be high. The risk must be real. Indeed, it is the need to test one’s preparedness acquired during structured growth that often fuels this phase. One cannot achieve unstructured growth by simply pursuing a new hobby while holding down a safe day-job.
A good example of unstructured growth is found in entrepreneurship and self-initiated projects. No matter how difficult or risky one’s career decisions feel in this phase, one revels in the freedom to make those choices without the burden of a larger system breathing down their neck. Often, in this phase, one is even unable to explain or rationalize their career decisions but makes them anyway.
In this phase, one does not seek mentors, guides or even peers who are talented unless one is clear that one needs them. This phase is marked by knowing what one does not know, and one learns by doing rather than watching others work. This is when one gets their hands dirty by accepting any and every kind of task that may pertain to their domain.
Designers who start a product or a consulting company, those that decide to earn a living as independent artists or those that actively seek out jobs with low security or pay driven by ‘some other feeling’ are often looking for unstructured growth.
The end of this phase is marked by expressions like “I’m feeling like I’m at a dead end” , “I love this work but I feel directionless” or “I feel like it’s time I thought ‘what next?’” One begins to crave stability and grows weary of the chaos around them. A strong need for focus becomes palpable. This is when one is at the end and the beginning of the cycle, and one finds ways to go back into Structured growth.
The role of instinct
While I’ve laid the two phases out as a clean and simple cycle (and admittedly, my own career path has indeed followed that cyclical process), I don’t believe it’s always that clear. Everyone walks their own paths that are unique. A common aspect across all healthy careers though, is the ability to trust one’s instincts.
Being aware of the ‘Structured’ and ‘Unstructured’ taxonomy may allow one to retrospectively make sense of their past but to be able to ensure that one’s future stays healthy, it’s important to develop a strong connection to instinct which then allows one to feel the driving emotions that lead to the change in one’s phase.
I know of several colleagues who sadly have lost touch with their true selves, giving into their status quo and buying into a linear career path. It doesn’t matter if they’re stuck in the structured or the unstructured environment. Being in any phase for far too long or committing to it far too soon is guaranteed to wilt one’s creativity.
An important tool that allows one to stay true to their instinct is what I began this post with — the realization that this is a deeply personal process. Companies, communities and the society at large are designed to impose their values and goals upon individuals because that’s how these collectives survive. While it’s important to participate in such collectives, one must remember that they’re all voluntary memberships and that they need to serve an intrinsic, authentic purpose in one’s life.
The key to planning a career in an emotionally driven domain like design is to find collectives with values that match one’s intrinsic values rather than modifying one’s values to fit with those of the collective one happens to find themselves in. Participation without choice is arrest, and that’s not a career — it’s imprisonment. | https://bootcamp.uxdesign.cc/how-i-plan-a-career-in-ux-6c0b1c0a6763 | ['Milind Kaduskar'] | 2021-04-15 05:39:34.365000+00:00 | ['User Experience Design', 'Design', 'Career', 'UX', 'Growth'] |
4 Profile Changes That Will Lead You to Better Online Dates | 4 Profile Changes That Will Lead You to Better Online Dates
It’s all about the right attitude.
I’ve been dating online on and off for the past two years or so, and I have to say the experience hasn’t always been the same.
In the beginning, I was lost, simply feeling my way in the dark. I made mistakes I didn’t realize were mistakes at the time, but which drastically impacted my results.
I felt what everyone feels, that online dating is a sham, that it’s bullshit, and 100% not for me.
I was feeling pretty discouraged, ready to give up once and for all, until I made a few simple tweaks to my profile that changed everything. I started matching with more interesting people and going on better dates.
My dating life improved drastically, and if you apply these changes to your profile, I’m confident yours will too:
1. Share more of your tastes in movies and music
I used to be a shy online dater. I used to think sharing about my preferences and lifestyle was something better left for conversation. My bio used to be very generic. It read along the lines of, “let’s get a cup of coffee sometime and talk about life.” And that was it.
Back then, a lot of my matches didn’t evolve into good conversation. We would talk about generic stuff, such as where we were from, and what each of us did for a living. It used to be generic and bland, just like my bio.
After I started sharing a bit of my preferences, especially favorite movies and music, I started matching with people who have the same tastes. Not only that, but now they have something to come talk to me about. Opening a conversation with something you both like to talk about, like movies and music, makes for a much more interesting dialog right from the get-go.
It is far more exciting to talk about something you both like than to wade through boring, generic “how are you?” questions. When a match messages me, “hey, I see you like X. Isn’t that the best movie ever? Y is in the same style, have you seen it?” I know we’re off to a good start.
2. Share more about your lifestyle
Before I started sharing a bit of my lifestyle on my bio, I would match with people who simply did not relate.
I usually wake up early. I’m not a party girl, I drink in moderation and I don’t smoke or do drugs. I’m not used to staying up late for whatever reason. I like walking outside and enjoy the sunshine.
Before I shared any of that on my bio, I would match with men who lived the exact opposite lifestyle, and while they could be good short-term matches, I knew we would never make it in the long run.
After I started sharing a bit of my habits, I started matching with men who’d open the conversation with, “your life style sounds so cool. I also like to wake up early/exercise/spend time outdoors.”
Again, offering people reasons to relate to you from the beginning leads to more interesting matches than hoping someone will like your pictures enough to want to get to know you better.
3. Be more selective of the people you match with
I used to swipe right far more often than I do now. As a result, I’d accumulate matches, but I didn’t have enough time to actually talk to them all and get to know them better.
As anyone who online dates knows, not all matches actually turn into a conversation, and not all conversations move on to a real date. Online dating is, to some extent, a numbers game, but there’s a limit to how many people you can keep in touch with. I got to the point of having over 40 matches, but I barely had the time and energy to keep up with 5 of them.
Now, I don’t swipe through 30+ profiles in one sitting. I swipe through about 5 to 10, then I stop. Of those 5 to 10, I’ll swipe right on maybe 3, and match with one or two. I’ll focus on talking with those one or two guys for a couple of days, see if any of those conversations turn into a real date, and if the date goes well. If nothing comes of it in 2 to 3 days, I’ll go back to the app and selectively swipe some more.
This tactic has improved my matches by a lot, since I got used to identifying the types of people I tend to get along with based mostly on their bios. Ever since I became more selective with swiping, I’ve managed to convert far more online messaging to in-person dates than before. Being selective is the real trick to get out of the app and get on to something real.
4. Reject negativity of any kind
Negative profiles are a huge turn-off for me. I used to give some negativity a pass, not anymore.
What I understand as negativity:
“No hookups.”
“If you’re not going to say hi, why match?”
“Not looking for casual sex, don’t insist.”
“If you voted for X or Y, don’t even match.”
When someone demands anything from a match, whether it’s attention (if you match, say hi), or commitment (absolutely no hookups), they come across as negative.
I’m looking for someone who’s interested in meeting new people, getting out of their comfort zone a little and seeing where things go, not someone who’s worried about guaranteeing commitment right from the get-go.
Take it easy
The biggest shift for me has been learning how to relax and take it easy. I’m no longer worried about finding a long-term partner, I’m more interested in meeting new people and seeing where it goes.
That one shift has made the whole online dating process far easier and lighter than I ever thought it could be — and it can be the same for you, if you give it a try. | https://medium.com/mariposa-magazine/4-profile-changes-that-will-lead-you-to-better-online-dates-330c26903cc | ['Tesia Blake'] | 2020-08-15 12:59:36.312000+00:00 | ['Self Improvement', 'Life Lessons', 'Relationships', 'Self', 'Love'] |
Flutter 2.5 — What’s New In Flutter | Some of the Key Announcements In Release are ::>
Performance Improvements:
This release accompanies a few performance enhancements. iOS has less jank, burns-through less CPU and power, wiping out jank from this source in our testing, and is more performant now. Additionally, iOS 8 help is deprecated
Frame lag due to processing asynchronous event results before and after
One more reason for jank is the point at which the garbage collector (GC)pauses the UI thread to recover memory. In this release, memory for unused pictures is recovered excitedly, reducing GCs extensively.
GCs before and after adding the fix to eagerly reclaim unused large image memory
One more performance improvement in Flutter 2.5 is the latency when sending messages among Dart and Objective-C/Swift (iOS) or Dart and Java/Kotlin (Android). Eliminating pointless duplicates from messaging codecs diminished latencies by up to half contingent upon message size and device.
iOS message latencies before and after
Dart 2.14:
This release of Flutter comes with Dart 2.14
> Apple Silicon support
> Dart formatter and cascades
> Pub support for ignoring files using .pubignore
> Pub is much smarter and faster
> Flutter Lints is out of the box now.
is out of the box now. > added a new triple shift operator ( >>> )
Breaking changes
> Removed support for ECMAScript5
> Deprecated dartfmt and dart2native commands, and discontinued stagehand
and commands, and discontinued > Deprecated the Dart VM’s Native Extensions
If you want to explore more about Flutter, please visit Announcing Dart 2.14 to get more information.
Framework:
The Flutter 2.5 release includes several fixes and improvements to the framework.
> Android full-screen support
Android, has fixed a bunch of related issues around full-screen modes. New features: lean back, sticky, sticky immersive, and edge to edge. This change additionally added an approach to listen to fullscreen changes in different modes.
Normal mode (left), Edge to Edge mode (center), Edge to Edge with a custom SystemUIOverlayStyle (right)
> Floating action button sizes updated
As part of Material You, users can configure a larger FloatingActionButton if they choose. With this change a FAB can be configured in 4 sizes: small, regular, large, and extended.
New Material You FAB sizes
> MaterialState.scrolledUnder state added to SliverAppBar
Demo::
SliverAppBar(
backwardsCompatibility: false,
elevation: 0,
backgroundColor: MaterialStateColor.resolveWith((Set<MaterialState> states) {
return states.contains(MaterialState.scrolledUnder) ? Colors.indigo : Colors.blue;
}),
expandedHeight: 160,
pinned: true,
flexibleSpace: const FlexibleSpaceBar(
title: Text('SliverAppBar'),
),
),
MaterialState.scrolledUnder action
> ListView now sends notifications of scrollable areas even if the user isn’t scrolling
scrollbar appearing or disappearing as appropriate based on the underlying size of the ListView
> Material banner supports now to the ScaffoldMessenger
In Flutter 2.5, you would now be able to add a banner to the highest point of your scaffold that stays set up until the user dismisses it.
ElevatedButton(
child: const Text('Show MaterialBanner'),
onPressed: () => ScaffoldMessenger.of(context).showMaterialBanner(
MaterialBanner(
content: const Text('Hello, I am a Material Banner'),
leading: const Icon(Icons.info),
backgroundColor: Colors.yellow,
actions: [
TextButton(
child: const Text('Dismiss'),
onPressed: () => ScaffoldMessenger.of(context)
.hideCurrentMaterialBanner(),
),
],
),
),
)
> Camera and Image Picker plugins got so many new features
Camera: show some features are -
3795 [camera] android-rework part 1: Base classes to support Android Camera features
3796 [camera] android-rework part 2: Android autofocus feature
3797 [camera] android-rework part 3: Android exposure-related features
3798 [camera] android-rework part 4: Android flash and zoom features
3799 [camera] android-rework part 5: Android FPS range, resolution, and sensor orientation features
Image Picker:
3898 [image_picker] Image picker fix camera device
3956 [image_picker] Change storage location for camera captures to internal cache on Android, to comply with new Google Play storage requirements
4001 [image_picker] Removed redundant request for camera permission
4019 [image_picker] Fix rotation when the camera is a source
> battery package moved to battery_plus
Besides, since these plugins are at this point not effectively kept up with, they are as of now not set apart as Flutter Favorite plugins. If you haven’t effectively done as such, we prescribe moving to the in addition to renditions of the accompanying plugins:
Flutter DevTools:
This release of Flutter comes with several improvements to Flutter DevTools. First and foremost is the added support in DevTools to take advantage of engine updates.
> Flutter DevTools utilizes these events to assist you with diagnosing shader compilation jank in your application
> New CPU Profiler highlight that empowers you to hide profiler data from any of these sources.
> Now we can easily distinguish codes with colored bars so that you can easily see what parts of the CPU Frame Chart come from what parts of the system.
> This release of DevTools accompanies an update to the Widget Inspector that permits you to hover over a widget to assess the object, view properties, widget state, etc.
When you select a widget, it consequently populates in the new Widget Inspector Console, where you can investigate the widget’s properties.
> To make DevTools a more useful destination for comprehension and debugging your Flutter applications.
IntelliJ/Android Studio:
The IntelliJ/Android Studio plugin for Flutter has also undergone several improvements with this release.
> Starting with the ability to run integration tests support
> The most recent release likewise incorporates the new ability to preview icons utilized from packages from the pub. dev
> To empower icon previews you need to tell the plugin which packages you are utilizing. There is another text field on the plugin settings/preferences page
Visual Studio Code:
> We can add dependencies without leave the VS Code now
> You may also be interested in the “Fix All” command. This can also be set to run on-save by adding source.fixAll to the editor.codeActionsOnSave VS Code setting.
> VS Code has new test runner integration it’s as yet under see. You need to empower the dart.previewVsCodeTestRunner in settings.
> The Visual Studio Code test runner also adds new gutter icons showing the last state of a test that can be clicked to run the test.
Tools:
> Flutter has a new template skeleton
Uses ChangeNotifier to coordinate multiple widgets Generates localizations by default using arb files Includes an example image and establishes 1x, 2x, and 3x folders for image assets Uses a “feature-first” folder organization Supports shared preferences Supports light and dark theming Supports navigation between multiple pages
> Pigeon is v1.0 now
A Pigeon is a codegen apparatus for creating typesafe interop code among Flutter and its host stage. It permits you to characterize a depiction of your plugin’s API and produce skeleton code for Dart, Java, and Objective-C
Conclusion:
In Flutter 2.5— Apparently Described as the biggest release with the 2nd highest stats Flutter history. The update release has created an igniting spark among the mobile developer’s Community by focussing well on varied Important Aspects.
Though Each New Release Certainly Brings with In Increased usage and momentum It can be easily seen that the 4600 issues closed and 3932 PRs merged from 252 contributors with 216 reviewers. If we look back over the last year, we see a huge 21,072 PRs created by 1337 contributors, of which 15,172 of them were merged.
What makes it more special for us is that Our Country, India now being the #1 region for Flutter developers, having doubled in the last six months
❤ ❤ Thanks for reading this article ❤❤
If I got something wrong? Let me know in the comments. I would love to improve.
Clap 👏 If this article helps you. | https://medium.com/flutterdevs/flutter-2-5-whats-new-in-flutter-58e26074748 | ['Shaiq Khan'] | 2021-09-17 11:57:36.938000+00:00 | ['Mobile App Development', 'Flutter App Development', 'Devtools', 'Dart', 'Flutter'] |
Unsupervised approaches for NMT | Translation is one of those tasks in language where the arrival of deep learning systems, and in particular sequence-to-sequence, has been something like a boon. In less than 4 years since the first paper on Neural Machine Translation, software giants such as Google and Microsoft have already announced that their translation systems have almost completely shifted from statistical to neural. Gone are the days when researchers mulled over complex word and phrase alignment techniques, and yet fell short on several language combinations. With the latest framework, all you need are a million parallel sentences, and your system can then translate between this pair sufficiently well.
A million parallel sentences — that’s a little constraining, though! It is often difficult and sometimes even impossible to obtain a bilingual parallel corpus for many pairs of languages. In such cases, using a pivot language for triangulation has been found to be helpful. However, even in such supervised systems, the performance is still constrained by the size of the training corpus.
Monolingual data, on the other hand, is available in abundance, and a number of semi-supervised systems do use these, but mostly for the language modeling part of translation. For example, a naive system may perform word-by-word substitution and use a language model trained on the target language to obtain the most probable word order.
Recently, there have been 2 very similar papers (both currently under review at ICLR ’18) which propose to perform completely unsupervised machine translation. In this article, I will discuss both of these papers. A similar blog is available here, but I didn’t know of its existence until I was already halfway through this post. | https://medium.com/explorations-in-language-and-learning/unsupervised-approaches-for-nmt-f0b18b12d4d5 | ['Desh Raj'] | 2018-02-26 14:52:02.107000+00:00 | ['Machine Learning', 'Deep Learning', 'Machine Translation', 'Naturallanguageprocessing', 'Unsupervised Learning'] |
UX Case Study: Small Appeal | Objective
Create a website and strengthen the social proof of the work the NGO has done. Create awareness of the initiatives the NGO has undertaken and improve the flow of funds through donations and CSR engagements.
Overview
As a new NGO, SmallAppeal mainly focuses on educational initiatives and food security. SmallAppeal lacked an online presence where it could display and share the work they had engaged in. This became a pain point when a nationwide lockdown was imposed in March to halt the spread of Covid19 and funds started to dry.
Earlier the NGO representatives would schedule meetings with companies for CSR Funds and use presentations as means of showing proof of work. Another pain point was that individual donors were wary of donating funds as the organization lacked a website. In a world connected by the internet, an online presence is a sense of proof.
My Role
I worked on this project as a lead designer and developer.
The Challenges | https://medium.com/novasemita/ux-case-study-small-appeal-337578b619ab | ['Mohammed Abraz'] | 2020-08-06 13:40:10.116000+00:00 | ['Case Study', 'Design', 'UI', 'UX', 'UI Design'] |
Why Your Body Sometimes Jerks As You Fall Asleep | Images by the author (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Ahh… sleep. How nice. You turn off the lights. You close your weary eyes. You sigh. You relax. Your breathing slows down. Your mind begins to wander off, fading into the nightly oblivion.
Then…
You stumble, trip, fall. Your body jolts. Your leg kicks. Your heart pounds. Huh? What happened? Did you mistakenly fall asleep on a trapdoor?
Nope. You simply experienced a hypnic jerk.
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https://zenodo.org/communities/monsterhuntermandarin-24/?page=1&size=20
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What’s a hypnic jerk?
A hypnic jerk, or sleep start, is a phenomenon that occurs when your body transitions from wakefulness to sleep. It involves a sudden involuntary muscle twitch and is frequently accompanied by a falling or tripping sensation. It’s that strange muscle spasm that happens when you’re lying in bed, trying to sleep, and are suddenly jolted awake because you feel like you stumbled over something.
Hypnic jerks are common and benign.
But what causes them? Well, no one really knows. It’s still a mystery. However, researchers have come up with several hypotheses that may explain them, with the following two being the most popular.
Hypothesis 1: Your body twitches as daytime motor control is overridden by sleep paralysis
How is it that a bedfellow of yours doesn’t wake up pummeled and bruised if you have a dream about a boxing match? Is it because they’re having a complementary dream where they’re blocking all your jabs, hooks, and other punches?
Nope. The person sharing the bed with you doesn’t get pummeled because when you’re asleep, your body is paralyzed. This is due to something called REM sleep atonia, which prevents you from acting out your dreams.
REM atonia works by inhibiting your motor neurons. It does so by raising the bar on the amount of electricity the brain must send down a motor neuron to trigger a movement. So, for instance, the little bit of electricity that your brain sends to your finger to make it move when you’re awake is no longer enough when you’re under REM atonia.
When you’re asleep, your body is paralyzed. This is due to something called REM sleep atonia, which prevents you from acting out your dreams.
Now, the thing is that there is no single on/off switch in your body that inhibits all your motor neurons at once. Instead, the subsystems of your brain that handle sleep need to wrestle control from the subsystems that handle wakefulness. And sometimes, during this wrestling match, some motor neurons are fired randomly, causing your body to twitch.
Hypothesis 2: Your brain thinks you’re a monkey falling off a tree
Image modified by the author. Illustration source: Alessandro D’Antonio/Unsplash
Imagine you’re a monkey and the last rays of sunlight have just disappeared behind the green forest canopy. It’s getting dark, and you say to yourself: time for sleep. Your brain begins to ooze some melatonin into your bloodstream and you yawn. Drowsy, you settle down on a comfortable tree branch.
Your eyelids become heavy and your breathing slows. The outside world begins to fade. Sounds become distant.
https://ver-mujer-maravilla-chile-sub-hd.tumblr.com/
https://pokemon-versi-mandarin24.tumblr.com/
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At this point, the subconscious part of your brain takes over. “Perfect,” it says, “time to boot up the dream images.” Your brain initiates the dream procedure, and just when you’re about to nod off completely, it notices that all your muscles have suddenly and unexpectedly relaxed. “Holy Banana!” your brain screams panic-stricken, “Mayday! Mayday! We’re in freefall! Dammit! Wake up! Wake up! Shit, crap! Brace for impaaaact!”
As you’re probably aware, we humans descend from primates who lived and slept on trees. This means that we’ve inherited some monkey brain routines that no longer serve any purpose. Among them, according to the monkey-fall hypothesis, is a reflex that jolts you awake when you’re falling from a tree.
You see, when a monkey is unexpectedly soaring through the air, its muscles no longer have to prop it up and so they go limp. Confusingly, however, your muscles also go limp when you’re sleeping.
So, when you drift off into sleep and your muscles relax a little too fast, your groggy brain sometimes misinterprets this for falling off a tree. As a result, your brain freaks out and triggers a reflex that startles you awake in an attempt to prepare for an imminent crash onto the forest floor. Little does your brain know, in its sleepy state — and that you no longer live in trees.
What’s clear either way
Hypnic jerks are involuntary muscle contractions that occur during the transition from wakefulness to sleep. They’re most likely to occur if you’ve been gulping down too much coffee, have been stressed or sleep-deprived, or did some vigorous exercise before going to bed. About 70% of people have experienced them. Even so, they are not well understood.
Either way, hypnic jerks are benign and nothing to worry about. The worst that can happen is probably an occasional kick against the shin of whoever is sharing the bed with you. | https://medium.com/@iim-amirudin1979/why-your-body-sometimes-jerks-as-you-fall-asleep-65836ab363fa | ['Iim Amirudin'] | 2020-12-25 11:09:50.425000+00:00 | ['Neuroscience', 'Health', 'Sleep', 'Biology', 'Science'] |
ElectrumSV 1.3.0b4 | As the process of polishing ElectrumSV 1.3.0 continues, I am trying to release usable beta releases as often as possible. If you are using one of the previous beta releases, you are encouraged to upgrade to this release. Bugs are fixed, and features re-enabled.
The splash screen for ElectrumSV 1.3.0b4
Find our website here.
Find our issue tracker here.
We do not provide support over Twitter or any other forms of social media. Not only is it not guaranteed we will see your comments, it is a very painful way to do support that we avoid. If you need support, submit an issue on our issue tracker.
What has changed in this release?
If you don’t want to know the details, just read the titles.
Bare multi-signature is the default multi-signature script type
Affects users who are creating new multi-signature accounts.
The previous release was made before the Genesis upgrade and still defaulted to P2SH scripts for multi-signature accounts. As we are now past the Genesis upgrade, the default script type for multi-signature accounts is bare multi-signature.
The account properties for a new multi-signature account.
Commits: #1
Standard accumulator multi-signature script type supported
Affects users who wish to try more miner-friendly multi-signature transactions.
One of the core requirements of the changes that allow the use of bare multi-signature scripts, given that payments to P2SH scripts do not work after the Genesis upgrade, is that an account can choose any viable script type it should use for a new transaction and keep track of it.
With this already in place, it was a minimal amount of work to also add support for the standard form of accumulator multi-signature scripts. These are more lightweight than bare multi-signature in that they specify which signatures to check against which keys.
Initial user interface for switching the script type for an account.
The account properties for this multi-signature account.
In the longer run when these have been more widely used and the implementation tested, we will set this script type as the default one used by new multi-signature wallets.
Commits: #1 #2
Fix opening wallets with accounts that are mid-synchronisation
Affects some users who closed their wallet while it had cleared but not yet settled transactions.
I am surprised we didn’t hear about this happening more often. A cleared transaction is one we know is in the mempool, and a settled transaction is one we know is mined. So it should have been affecting some users who closed their wallet after sending a transaction, but before it had been confirmed. Any user experiencing it, would have encountered an error loading the wallet and the wallet would have been broken until they upgraded ElectrumSV.
Issue: #310
Commit: #1
Account synchronisation has been optimised
Affects both users who are restoring accounts from seed/a master key, and users whose account is being synchronised on opening it.
UTXO caching has been added in 1.3.0 to greatly increase transaction creation speeds but the algorithm for processing new or used utxos was aimed at correctness rather than speed. As a result, updating the utxo set was O(n²) with respect to number of outputs in a transaction. This has been optimised to O(n).
A transaction with 1000 unique outputs creates 1000 new key subscriptions to ElectrumX. The problem was that to update the utxo set, this costly algorithm was iterating over all 1000 outputs for each of these 1000 subscriptions (1 million iterations). To avoid this duplicated computation, a cache was added that maps scripthashes to txo indices in a given transaction and allows processing of only the relevant outputs for a given transaction (usually just a single output if keys are not reused).
Commits: #1 #2 #3
Synchronised messages larger than 1 MB are no longer discarded
Affects users who restore accounts that have previously been externally for writing data to the blockchain.
The connection that an ElectrumSV wallet makes to any server has a default limit of 1 MB, where if it receives a message larger than that, it discards it. With the move to larger transactions on Bitcoin SV, especially those that either pack data into OP_RETURN or pushdata, this is not longer large enough.
The new default is 10 MB. We should ideally handle this better, and even allow the user to customise it either globally in the wallet, or on a per-account basis. But for now, due to resource constraints this is good enough.
Commits: #1
MacOS builds might require Mojave (10.14) or later
Affects all MacOS users who use our builds and have an earlier version of MacOS than Mojave (10.14).
Our builds are created on (almost) every commit we make to Github, using Azure Pipelines. Detecting that we used their 10.13 VM image, they emailed us and told us that it was being removed, and to switch to their 10.14 VM image.
Apparently there’s now a outdated message warning of the change as well.
ElectrumSV Azure Pipelines build artifacts.
ElectrumSV does not devote resources to making sure that all new versions released work on all old computers that people have ever been able to run earlier versions of the wallet on. We focus our limited resources on whether it works on more recent systems.
Commits: #1 #2
Handle BIP276-style BIP21 URLs
Affects anyone who happens to receive a payment URL that contains a BIP276 payment destination. Or wishes to give one out.
With the Genesis upgrade past us, people can give out payment destinations that do not have addresses. This might be bare multi-signature scripts, accumulator multi-signature scripts or for that matter anything else. This is what BIP276 was intended to facilitate until we could support Paymail.
How an ElectrumSV user might give out a BIP276-based URL.
Commits: #1
Add support for Python 3.8
Affects no-one except developers and users who run from source.
ElectrumSV currently requires a subversion of Python 3.6, but at some point we are going to upgrade our minimum Python version to 3.8. What stops us at this point is that PyInstaller does not currently support Python 3.8, and until it does we cannot upgrade because we can’t provide builds.
No-one wants to fund Python 3.8 support for PyInstaller 😢
MacOS builds now use Python 3.6.10. Windows builds now user 3.6.8, and are unable to upgrade as that is the latest version of 3.6 that the Python developers provide the required prebuilt development binaries files for. Otherwise users running from source are required to use 3.6.0 or higher.
It is very possible that we will switch away from PyInstaller, to other solutions before PyInstaller gets Python 3.8 support.
Commits: #1 #2 #3
Change the SQLite database support to use write-ahead logging
Affects users with wallets that have accounts that engage in activities that heavily use the database.
The initial motivation for switching to SQLite was that we had to move away from the JSON wallet storage because in order to use any of it, we had to load all of it. And as it accrued more large OP_RETURN transactions, these were all held in memory and included in any saving of the wallet’s data.
While SQLite is very popular, using it is problematic and requires some degree of faffing about. Without every piece of related high-level logic reconciling the state of database operations in progress, it was necessary to lock lower-level logic so that there could be no overlap and race conditions. This meant that both read and write operations were very slow. In addition, as we let non-overlapping read and write operations proceed, we then encountered the limitation that SQLite could not have multiple concurrent read and write operations. You can read a post by someone else on this topic.
Our first change was to make all write operations non-blocking, and they are now handed off to a writer thread that takes care of all writes. The second change was to switch to write-ahead logging, which removes the remaining issue of reads getting blocked by the writer thread.
The stability of the write-ahead logging and dealing with rare and sporadic issues related to it, was the primary cause of the delay of this 1.3.0b4 release.
In the longer term, we will likely add support for the Postgres database, which will likely be required to provide more scalable backends for those who create a lot of transactions likely programmatically using ElectrumSV as wallet service.
Issue: #340
Commits: #1 #2
Accounts can now have per-derivation path gap limits
Affects advanced users who use ElectrumSV as a wallet server likely via it’s REST API. Normal wallet users should never use this, and have better options for their related issues.
For now, most users just use the standard derivation paths. And if they need additional keys beyond what the standard gap limit provides, they can simply call a function in the console to generate as many as they need for either of the receiving or change derivation paths — while preserving the standard gap limits.
Advanced users can view metadata like generated keys and derivation paths in the Keys tab.
Developers who are building ElectrumSV “dapps” (short for daemon apps) where they run ElectrumSV as a wallet server, and customise it’s behaviour are likely the target audience of this change.
Commit: #1
User interface polishing for the wallet wizard
Affects all users who select an existing wallet or create a new wallet.
The wallet wizard, which is used to select or create wallets, has been refactored to provide a consistent way of entering passwords. Additionally, various bugs have been fixed.
A user can also open a context menu for any of the entries, and use a menu to open their operating system folder view of the wallet directory. On Windows this is called “explorer” and on MacOS “finder”. Linux has no support for this, so users running from source on those operating systems do not get these options.
Selecting a wallet in the wallet wizard.
An initial implementation of in-application contextual help has been added, in the wallet wizard. This is currently in development, and it’s completion will not hold up any final 1.3.0 release.
Preliminary in-application help windows.
Requests for passwords now appear using the upgraded existing dialog. When you enter the correct password, the “OK” button will be enabled and you can simply press the enter key while the focus is still in the password field to submit the “password” you entered.
Use of the standard password dialog.
Similarly, providing a new password uses a standard provide a new password dialog. Once a matching password is entered and confirmed, the “OK” button will be enabled and you can simply press the enter key while the focus is still in the password field to provide the “password” you entered.
Use of the standard new password dialog.
Commit: #1
Completion of the account wizard user interface
Affects all users who add a new account.
The account wizard, which is used to add an account to a wallet, has been completed. The main remaining piece of work was the ability to create new multi-signature accounts.
Account creation options.
Once the user has specified how many cosigners there are, and how many are required to sign off on each transaction, they proceed on to specify who those cosigners are.
Fresh and untouched cosigner specification user interface.
If for instance, this was an observational account and it did participate in signing any transactions, the user could simply paste in the extended public key of each cosigner and proceed to add the account.
If cosigners were signers, or needed to use the user interface to get their public key into this account, they could click on the key button to do so.
There is no restriction on how many of the signers can be handled by this account. The existing multi-signature transaction signing logic does not force itself to only sign for one of the cosigners, so there is no reason the user-interface should either.
Eventually the in-wallet user interface for the account will also let users convert external signers into local signers by replacing their extended public key with either of their extended private key or seed words. This is along the same line as a planned change to allow hardware wallet owners to provide the seed words for their hardware wallet account and convert it into a software wallet account that no longer requires the given device. Resource constraints put these tasks on the back-burner for now.
Commits: #1
Fix transactions remaining unverified until state changes
Affects no-one, but maybe you.
In the rare case that the server notifies the account of events related to mining of it’s transactions before the server sends the headers for the blocks the transactions were mined in, the wallet will never know to verify them and show them as confirmed.
Where you would have noticed this visually.
No-one ever has reported seeing this problem and it was only observed happening in development, so either it is really really rare or it’s one of those things that only starts happening after fixes elsewhere allow it to see the light.
Commits: #1
What changed before this release? | https://medium.com/@roger-taylor/electrumsv-1-3-0b4-d9940b75c0f1 | ['Roger Taylor'] | 2020-04-06 04:48:16.046000+00:00 | ['Wallet', 'Bitcoin Sv', 'Bitcoin', 'Electrumsv'] |
Create Azure AD Users Dynamically With Terraform 0.13 and for_each | Last week Hashicorp released version 0.13 of Terraform which from my opinion ended a journey started in 0.12 with the availability of the ‘for’ expressions.
Indeed before 0.12 it was arduous to write code that iterates on lists or maps without knowing in advance their depth. ‘for_each’ expression filled a gap in term of code factorization. Actually it was very handy until you write modules which were not supported. Yet if you want your code being reusable writing modules can be of help.
Version 0.13 finally offered to use ‘for_each’ in modules so I wanted to demonstrate how to use it in the context of Azure and more precisely with Azure AD. For that, we’re going to dynamicaly create AAD users with the azuread provider. As an input we will use a list of usernames that can be of one to many elements.
First things first, let’s create a terraform projet with a standardized module structure. Here’s how your project folder should look like :
/add-users
|-- /modules
| |-- /aad-user
| |-- main.tf
| |-- variables.tf
|-- main.tf
|-- variables.tf
Let’s take a look at the aad-user module files:
With those two files we should be able to create one single azuread_user instance but we want to do more than that and instead call this module as many times as we have users to create. So let’s call this module and loop on a list of users.
Let’s create a variables.tf in the project root folder with a list of string containing usernames and a string containing the temporary password (this is for demonstrating purpose as you should rather generate random passwords and export them as output but this won’t be covered in this article):
Then create a main.tf and call the module :
Watch the for_each line and see that a toset() function is needed as for_each only accepts sets or maps.
Watch the username line and the each.value expression that loops on the user list.
For the domain_name the data block automatically pulls the default from your connected AAD tenant.
Now let’s terraform this:
az login
terraform init
terraform plan
terraform apply Apply complete! Resources: 2 added, 0 changed, 0 destroyed.
That’s it! We’ve created two new users in our Azure AD tenant with a module that can be shared across templates to create one to many users. | https://medium.com/swlh/create-aad-users-dynamically-with-terraform-0-13-and-for-each-d6e9c1fd4078 | ['Nicolas Barrasson'] | 2020-09-23 18:04:44.114000+00:00 | ['Terraform Modules', 'Azure Active Directory', 'Azure', 'Terraform'] |
dApp Builder at community meetup in Seoul on May 17 | The dApp Builder team in Korea has presented the Platform at its meetup in Seoul on May 17
The has spoken on a topic “dApp Builder: Blockchain App Store and Smart Contracts Marketplace” at the meetup. They also explored how dApp Builder plans to establish a community reviewed smart contract marketplace and make it in a way where anyone can make an Etherium dApp.
What is dApp Builder
dApp Builder is a platform to create Ethereum dApps from prebuilt smart contracts (no coding) and instantly deploy them to blockchain.
dApp Builder establishes a community reviewed smart contract marketplace.
dApp Builder exists to make it so that anyone can start an Etherium dApp.
dApp Marketplace will enable anyone to create, customize, and deploy their decentralized applications.
If you are interested in trying the released functionality please go here https://dappbuilder.io/ and sign up.
Stay in touch for updates via | https://medium.com/ethereum-dapp-builder/dapp-builder-at-blockchain-summit-in-seoul-on-may-17-9870d7ac7ed4 | ['Dapp Builder Team'] | 2018-05-22 17:15:20.178000+00:00 | ['Development', 'Technology', 'Blockchain', 'Ethereum', 'Bitcoin'] |
7 Questions to Ask When Shopping for CBD for Merchant Processing | We often refer to the CBD banking that our company provides as a straight line and the merchant processing component as the roller coaster ride. We are all on this ride together, and these are industry-wide issues. Our one piece of advice to any CBD business owner who is shopping for a merchant processing solution is to not shop for a solution based on rate, but rather ask important questions so that you really understand what you are getting and if it is the right solution for you needs — now and in the future.
What is the Processing Rate?
Although we prefaced this with don’t make your final decision based on rate, it is a good and reasonable first question. You want to know the rate and the per-transaction fee as CBD is categorized as high-risk because, in banking terms, it is a “marijuana-related” business. All of these rates are typically going to be between 3.7% and 6%. If you do see a rate below 3.7%, you will want to confirm if that rate does or does not include “interchange.” Interchange can vary but for evaluating rates, consider it to be around 1.8%. You’ll then need to do the math for the low-rate + 1.8% to get your true processing rate. Now you will start to see that it probably tracks alongside some of the other rates you were quoted as a flat rate that includes interchange.
What is the Per Transaction Fee?
These are typically fixed and can range from $0.20 — $0.50 per transaction. The best way to consider this is based on your average ticket price, the volume per customer check-out, and how many transactions you run in a month. The only time I would spend much time on this figure is if you a high volume of low-priced items to a large number of customers. Otherwise, this fee is just a regular cost of doing business, and other factors should weigh much more heavily on your decision.
What is the Reserve Amount and Length?
The reserve is the amount of money a processor holds back to cover chargebacks. Sometimes a reserve is put in at the beginning of your contract where other times, a processor will add one (as Square has done) if a merchant starts to have a transaction record that bears more risk than the processor is willing to take. The reserve amount for various solutions typically varies between 1% with a three-month rolling reserve (they give you back in month 4, what they took out in month 1 and that keeps rolling forward), all the way to 10% with a six-month rolling reserve. This can be a significant amount of capital that is being held that could be used for operational and other expenses for a growing business. Therefore, the reserve is one of the more important questions — and in some cases, it may be more significant than just looking at the rate or per-transaction fee alone.
What is the Set-Up Fee?
An onboarding fee is pretty standard for all high-risk merchant processing solutions. Onboarding fees can range from $100 — $350, depending on the processor. They are usually in place to pay for the staff involved with managing the application process all the way through a compliance review. As these applications require a significant amount of information and a lot of supporting documentation, there is a fair amount of work to board a customer in a timely manner. Square doesn’t have these fees, which is one of the many reasons customers find it to be an attractive solution, but sometimes there is no timescale for when you will be boarded.
What are the Monthly Fees?
Most of these solutions come with monthly fees. Typically they are a combination of compliance review for website and PCI. These fees can range from $50 — $200 a month, depending on the processor and negotiating with the bank and their compliance partners. Much of this is actually hard costs for the processor to offer and maintain these accounts and meet compliance guidelines. It is still important to ask about these monthly fees so that as a merchant, you can know what to expect.
What are the Additional Fees?
These fees run the gambit and are worth knowing and asking about. For example, some processors ask for a term commitment, and there is a cancellation fee (which typically will be around the same as the set-up fee). There may be penalties if you do not meet certain processing thresholds. These thresholds are often around $5000 — $10000 a month. Some processors want you to commit to using them as your primary processor and will not allow you to use them as a back-up. You should also know the costs of each chargeback. There is a commonly used overseas processor that requires you to have a virtual office and a monthly cost. These are all things to be aware of when you are shopping for a merchant processing solution that often has a bigger impact on your overall costs than rate alone.
What are the Restrictions?
Some also have month volume restrictions, with some processors only boarding clients with >$50,000 of monthly volume. For start-ups, some require either 3 months of merchant processing history of $5000 in the bank. Beyond those requirements, the next question to ask is will the processor allow you to sell what you offer in your eCommerce or brick-and-mortar store. Some processors will not allow for vape or flower, while others have no problem with it.
You want to make sure that they can accept your business because no discount on rate will make up for the fact that they can’t accept you, or will limit what you are aiming to sell to your customers. There are some processors who will only work with topicals, while others are okay with ingestible, but not flower or kratom. There are solutions out there for all combinations of products (including legal THC sales), but you need to be working with the right processor for your line of business. | https://medium.com/@mrbcompliance/7-questions-to-ask-when-shopping-for-cbd-for-merchant-processing-f2067e89b16f | ['Mrb Compliance Group'] | 2021-08-25 23:39:02.692000+00:00 | ['Hemp', 'Shopify', 'Merchant Processing', 'Cbd', 'Merchant Services'] |
Dashboard in PowerBI: II — Loading a complex CSV file with an R script | In this article, we will load a sales table into Power BI Desktop. Unfortunately, the file that we have been given by the client is not a simple table with one header and one body. Instead, the file contains multiple tables concatenated one below another. At least, these tables follow the same format. But how do we import such a table into PowerBI?
Use R
To make things more complicated, we might expect that the number of subtables may change in the future (e.g. when new work groups are established) and our solution should be robust enough to handle such scenario.
We will not get by here by the mere power of Power BI and we will have to call in higher powers. In such situations, one of the script (Python or R) feature will solve our problem. I prefer using R for working with tabular data, thus I will present a solution integrating an R script in the Power BI Desktop.
Step by step
1. Review the table
First, let us review the file in a spreadsheet and see its format.
a. The input CSV file: a table composed of multiple tables in the same format.
The table is composed of multiple tables in the same format. Each of the sub-tables holds sales data for one work group (see the cells B1 and B161).
We want to load this data, cut it into subtables and combine them back into one table with one header and a column specifying the respective work group.
2. Develop the R script outside Power BI
Here comes the point when a bit scripting experience is handy. First, I write a script and test it in RStudio.
b. The R script shown in the RStudio
The script breaks the table down into multiple tables based on the separation rows (those containing the word “Workgroup” in the first field) and combines the subtables into one table with the rbindlist() function.
3. Copy the R code into Power BI
We need to add New Source → R Script in the Power Query Editor and paste our R code into the window. When we then open the Advanced Editor, we will see our code collapsed into one line:
c. R script in the Advanced Editor
4. Optional: Change the data file path
As shown in the part I of this Power BI tutorial, we can change the absolute path to our input data into a dynamic one (e.g. when we need to swap our real data with randomly generated). We can do this either in the Advanced Editor or in the Applied Steps (in the pictures below).
d. Absolute path to our CSV file
e. Dynamic path to the CSV file
Notice the three quotation marks before calling the function PickSourcePath(). Two quotation marks are an escape sequence for a quotation mark in the M language, the third one closes the string.
Summary
In this article, we have seen how to import dynamically a complex CSV file into Power BI Desktop with the use of an R script.
The solution presented in this article can be downloaded from GitHub. | https://medium.com/@jan-46106/dashboard-in-powerbi-ii-b11384d6963f | ['Jan Hapala'] | 2020-12-09 14:33:09.164000+00:00 | ['Power Bi', 'R'] |
My Thoughts on the Year 2020 | (Image by Tite Kubo)
Throughout the Pandemic of Hell
At the start of the pandemic, I unfortunately still had Twitter. Unfortunately, Twitter is infested with toxicity in that along with persisex, allocishetero, abled, and NT dudebro anime fans, it also includes alt-right fascists, Ultraconservatives, and TERFs.
I remember a time where I nearly drank a soup broth raw, and my older sibling was angry at me for being “foolish”, which was understandable since I wasn’t in a good mindset to understand that it was still raw and unsafe to drink and also because I had a sore throat.
I felt ashamed of myself for forgetting to ask and when my older sibling refused to gently guide me. He was also understandably pissed since he was also dealing with his own issues as a lawyer in life and the only thing that he could eat was soup with sweet potato noodles or Dangmyeon in Korean.
He told me to not do it again, so I went to his room and told him that what he said made me feel bad, to which he responded: “Only you can choose how you feel”. I know it is fucked up and ableist, yet there he was doing it, and I angrily and hurtfully whispered: “It will take a long time to love myself”. In reply, he said: “Work on loving yourself.”
This is exactly the type of situation where I have a knee-jerk reaction to Mental and Emotional health advice given by NT people because I know that this shit causes more emotional and mental harm to people who aren’t NT than to anyone else.
I felt hurt, ashamed of myself, and angry at the same time, so I relied on the support of a trusted friend who understood that I meant no harm in this action. The next morning, I became hostile and angry towards my older sibling to the point where I realised how badly I fucked up in terms of my hostile attitudes towards him.
I wasn’t going to keep putting up with his NT BS, along with his internalised misogyny and racism, which is so apparent as he used the n-word to, in his distorted view “playfully”, refer to his friends to sometimes, along with teasing me that he does this., which I absolutely hate
His misogynistic tendencies of disliking feminism for some BS reason along with other things that are really his own problems, he needs to focus on unlearning and diminishing, including him saying the dreaded r-word, along with the words “crazy”, and “stupid”.
However, as he is my brother I still loved him despite his socially unacceptable views, and I felt hurt badly with his opinion of my not learning anything since he had his own biases in his view of me.
Fast forward to August after I have completed my Indigenous Studies course to busy myself with for the summer, which saved my own ass so that I didn’t go ballistic for having to remain at home much longer. My mental health became ruined by fighting with TERFs on Twitter, or as I refer them: “Trans-exclusionary Reactionary Fascists”, since they will never deserve the title of “radical feminists”, and they never will because of how perisex and allocisheteronormative their fauxminism, often referred to as “fake feminism”, is along with how Eurocentric and white it is.
Before I get into this, I will need to explain how the term of TERF was coined. In an excellent Vox article, they related that their origins go back to the late 2000s.
The term was branched out of 1970s radical feminist circles because there needed to be a term that separated trans-inclusive and intersectional radical feminists who see trans women as women and also as female human beings from the fauxminists.
I refer to TERFs rightfully as “fake feminists” or fauxminists since TERFs are basically fascist trade wives who have a sh*t-load of internalised misogyny along with internalised whiteness and perisexism. This discrimination towards people who are born as intersex, over glorifies people who aren’t born intersex. Hence the term perisex/endosex, because the term “dyadic” can have an ableist connotation.
As week the term ”dyadic” even over glorifies the inherently Eurocentric, Christian/Xtian, and white gender and sex binaries that should’ve never existed since those binaries continue to cause more harm.
Cissexism, which is described as: “Discrimination towards people whose sense of gender identity doesn’t align with their designated sex at birth, such as trans, gender-modal, and enby/non-binary individuals”. Cisgender individuals are not subjected to this discrimination as a cisgender individual’s sense of gender identity is aligned with their designated sex at birth.
There are many anti-trans bigoted clowns as they are still upholding the same patriarchal systems that they claim to be against, yet still continuing to be harmful creeps towards women of all intersectionalities, including trans women since they are female individuals.
Along with their being against sex workers for no reason other than their being one of the privileged bourgeoisie, and being xenophobic/racist as hell, I will add. They falsely claim that they’re being “silenced”, and that it is a slur, because that term literally describes those toxic trade-wife wannabes.
Along with the tremendous amount of detrimental harm and deaths their beliefs and actions cause towards many trans women and to many gender-non-conforming cisgender women as well. Their harm also extends toward sapphic individuals, and many people in the MOGAI community who get harmed by TERF-based beliefs that unfortunately exist in the community today.
Hell, exclusionists and gatekeepers are similar to TERFs in the way that they are exclusionary in terms of who is deemed as “passable” – to their standards. TERFs prefer to call themselves “gender critical”. A Discord ex-friend has made a meme, in which it depicts adorable possums that refer to gender-criticals rightfully as eugenicists since they can also be potentially anti-vaccinators or anti-vaxxers, and they’re also ableist as hell, which is another euphemism that is similar to white supremacists or white fascists calling themselves “race realists”.
During the time of when I used to have Twitter, I started to explore my pronouns along with my gender identity, and it went from non-intersex and cisgender lady (I’m cringing at that sorry) to non-intersex and a demigirl (partially identifying as a girl), and demiboy (partially identifying as a boy) to a non-intersex and demigender person and boy.
Since then, I refuse to go back from exploring myself in the future because I am happy with those terms for myself and honestly, f*ck what my in-real-life family thinks of this since I know that I cannot change their conservative and personal beliefs on gender identity because this starts with them.
I’m already doing the hard work for unlearning internalised perisexism, cissexism, heterosexism, and so forth (I’ve already taken the next step by accepting that I will have some days where I feel as if I don’t have the spoons to keep doing more than this, and there will be some days where I feel content with myself for doing the best that I can to unlearn with the number of spoons I have), and honestly, I am fine the way that I am and I don’t need to change myself unlike a certain NT person in my life who thinks otherwise because that has to do with his subjective perception of me, not myself.
I also need to say that this NT society is the one who needs to change their ironic and hypocritical BS since they want to be both ironic and hypocritical in providing their BS versions of “self-love” and “self-growth” as a society that should’ve done better, but decided not to. I’m honestly glad to myself that I started exploring myself because if I didn’t, then I’d be some boring-ass person who isn’t me and I wouldn’t be even me and I’d still be trapped in having to please NT b*stards along with non-intersex and allocishetero clowns who only want me for how I am able to act as “NT’ (gross) to please them.
I have also accepted the fact that it is, and forever a bad idea to even tell my in-real-life family to use my they/them and he/him pronouns because they still want to see what they want to see (me masquerading as a “lady”) since I don’t wish to talk about what happened last times. For example, having an argument with one of my family members while I was being driven to my bodily hair removal appointment, along with two of my family members and one of them not even supporting me and wanting me to not disengage with them while I was feeling hurt (which was a dick move of them, and no I will not mention any names).
Anyways, during one day in August, while not knowing that it was my last day on the hell-site known as Twitter, I fell into a trap (that was used by a self-proclaimed “ally”) that resulted in my getting permanently suspended by it since the “ally” turned out to be a transmisic bigot.
I’ve now realised that I wasn’t at fault for taking the bait (as one of my Discord ex-friends put it when I told faer [said ex-friend went by fae/faer pronouns] about that incident), but it was actually the fault of the fake “ally” who was protected by Twitter since Twitter protects bigots, TERFs, fascists, alt-right clowns, and more.
That incident was detrimental towards my mental and emotional health since I was mentally and emotionally exhausted and in internal agony from Twitter only protecting bigots and TERF clowns.
Fast forward to September, October, November, and December (this month), I’ve had to deal with pointless webinar assignment bullsh*t (as I’ve talked about in detail last time), along with seeing my classmates suffer from the lack of consideration.
I’ve seen from one of my professors (who went by she/her), and she wasn’t even considerate about the technical problems and the personal issues that my friends and peers had to deal with since they’re dealing with family members dying – People, they know in their life, including a professor that another one of my friends disliked for a valid reason.
Her professor got COVID-19 and was also dealing with other sh*t that she didn’t deserve since she is one of the best people to have ever existed. I’m glad to G-d (or Hashem as Jewish people refer to God as, and there is a dash between “G” and “d”) that she is one of the largest parts of my life. I’ll refer to her as C for privacy reasons. So, C, if you’re reading this, I want to let you know that I wouldn’t be able to have the strength to keep going during this sh*t-show of a pandemic without you, and I am thankful that you’re here with me right now.
Fast forward to Hanukkah, I was dealing with an in-group chat conflict, and I was listening to one of my trusted online friends because I understood him and I knew how honest he actually was, unlike one of the admins who turned out to be a toxic TERF (the person goes by it/its pronouns) because he also told me the truth that it didn’t even practise what it preached because it didn’t even check its own biases nor its own internalised misogyny.
I am completely thankful to myself that I made the protective decision (by instinct) to listen to him about it because if I didn’t, I would’ve never been able to live with myself, nor even forgive myself. It was tough because one of my Discord ex-friends betrayed me, and also because fae was completely manipulated and groomed to kiss and lick its boots. | https://medium.com/artfullyautistic/my-thoughts-on-2020-tm-so-far-before-the-new-year-c04e7a215097 | [] | 2021-03-04 00:25:40.500000+00:00 | ['Quarantine', 'Exploring Gender', 'Covid 19', 'Autism', 'Twitter Hell'] |
5 Steps to Make the Law of Attraction Work for You | Do you ever feel like life is happening to you and not for you? Putting the Law of Attraction to work for you will change that. Everything is energy, and we can influence that energy to our advantage. That is what the Law of Attraction is all about. Below are five simple steps to start making the law of attraction work for you.
1. Decide
Before the Universe can give you your heart’s desire, you need to decide what you want. How can the Universe give you what you want when you don’t even know what that is? Decide it, affirm it, tell it to friends or family, write it down, whatever makes it more concrete for you. This sends a message to the Universe that you are ready for miracles.
2. Visualize
Take time to sit and meditate on what you want. Visualize what it will look like. Don’t leave out any details — picture where you are, what you are doing, who is with you, and how you are feeling. Do this on a regular basis and as you go about your day, carry those feelings with you to help keep your vibration in alignment with what you want.
3. Inspired Actions
Taking inspired actions will help your vision manifest that much sooner. If your vision is to take a lavish vacation, start setting money aside and researching locations. If you are looking for a new job, update your resume and start looking at available positions. If you want to move, start looking at available properties and packing or purging, whatever will begin getting you prepared for that transition. These actions keep your vibration in alignment with your vision and will help bring about the manifestation.
4. Let go
That is right, let it go. Let go of any expectations of how or when it will come to pass. Do not place limitations on how the Universe will deliver the desires of your heart. It may come about in ways you never expected. Continuing the visualizations and inspired actions will keep your energy aligned with what you want and you might be pleasantly surprised at how and when it comes about.
5. Gratitude
Be thankful! Even before you get what you want, thank the Universe for paving the way and making it happen for you. Where attention goes, energy flows. If you want the energy to go toward making your dream a reality, being grateful for it keeps your energetic vibration higher and the Universe can work with that.
How It Worked for Me
I personally used the law of attraction to make a big move from my home in Ohio to a new home in Colorado. I knew with all my heart that Colorado is where I wanted to be but the thought of all the logistics on how it would happen would overwhelm and depress me. Then I put these steps into action and what happened next was miraculous.
I decided I was moving to Colorado. Without any knowledge of how or when, I started telling close friends and family that this was happening. I updated my resume and started applying to jobs in the Denver area. I started going through household goods and selling or donating items I didn’t want to haul across the country. I even started researching places to live, an apartment temporarily while my husband and I looked for a place to build a house.
July 2018 is when I started this process. In August 2018, I flew out to Colorado (all expenses paid) for two interviews. One of those interviews resulted in a job offer. And not just any job offer, one of the best job offers the recruiter had ever seen (so she says). The company offered a great salary and awesome benefits, plenty of paid time off, and a fantastic relocation package. They paid for a relocation service that packed up our belongings, put it them in a truck, and moved them to Colorado for us. They also assisted with the selling of our house, making it a painless process. The house sold within two weeks of being on the market. And on September 20, 2018, I left Ohio and made my way to my new home in Colorado.
In less than 3 months, I made my dream come true by utilizing the law of attraction. When you make a decision, do not be surprised by how quickly the Universe conspires to make it happen. The kinds of miracles you can achieve when you believe you make your circumstances instead of being a victim of circumstance will continue to amaze you. There are many resources on this subject and I encourage you to look into it and take a deeper dive. Happy manifesting! | https://medium.com/@jmayo4545/5-steps-to-make-the-law-of-attraction-work-for-you-f276fe5d471d | ['Jaime Mayo'] | 2020-02-07 18:20:40.799000+00:00 | ['Manifestation', 'Energy', 'Law Of Attraction'] |
Habit Becomes a Challenge When It’s Time Bound | When I’m coaching a writer, I try to be mindful of the fact that for some people, the concept of making a big goal can be — fraught.
Some people have anxiety that looks like worrying about the other shoe falling. If something good happens, they are on edge waiting for something bad to balance it.
Some people struggle with feelings of failure if they fall anywhere short of perfect completion of a goal.
Some people are derailed by disappointment.
And guess what. That’s okay. I’m not here to convince you to dream outside your comfort zone. But I am here to share my philosophy with you. Do with it what works for you.
Here goes.
Dreaming is Worthwhile in its Own Right
There’s real value in the act of getting your hopes up. I personally do it every chance I can. It might be the only good thing that will come out of trying something new.
Why would I give that up?
My actually philosophy is this: I get my hopes up as often as possible, and work toward those goals one little step at a time.
I don’t always get where I hoped I would. In fact, let’s face it, usually I don’t. For many reasons. Sometimes I get started and change directions. Sometimes I just can’t make it happen the way I want it to. Sometimes life gets in the way.
But if I take little steps — if I direct my daily habit — toward my goal, I get somewhere.
I started out meaning to be a romance writer. I write children’s books.
I started out meaning to make my living writing novels. I wouldn’t give up teaching for anything.
There are so many unknowns in this business. One of the few things you can control is how much enjoyment you let yourself take from getting your hopes up.
Start Big Picture and Go Small
Here’s how I think about habits.
You start with a BIG idea.
It can be something you want to start, like: I want to write a novel. I want to finish an Ironman. I want to learn to play the guitar.
It can be something you want to stop, like: I want to stop smoking. I want to stop eating processed foods. I want to stop leaving my kitchen a mess after dinner.
The process is the same. You have this lovely, big idea — and then you find the smallest component of it. In the samples above, those components might be:
Writing for ten minutes
Exercising for ten minutes
Practicing for ten minutes
Not smoking a cigarette before noon every day
Not eating processed foods for one meal
Making sure the dishwasher is empty before dinner every night
On their own, there’s nothing very exciting about any of those. Do them once and — yeah, nothing much. But do them over and over and over again? Do that and they become habits that take on a life of their own.
Habit Becomes a Challenge When it’s Time Bound
I know the conventional wisdom says that it takes three weeks. I’ve found that for me it’s more like three months. If I do something every day for three months, I have time to see real progress and it becomes just part of my life.
My favorite way to do this is something I call a 10X100 (or ten by one hundred.)
I pick a thing and do it for ten minutes a day for 100 days. Keeping a log helps with accountability. Blogging about it can be super helpful, if you’re into that kind of thing. Or just write about it on social media, if you want some outside pressure to meet your goal.
Go ahead and get your hopes up about where this might lead. But be open to the idea that your challenge might take you somewhere on day 100 that you can’t even imagine on day 1.
How Will You Challenge Yourself?
So, think about your big picture. What do you want to get your hopes up about. Then choose a little bitty habit that represents the tiniest little component of that goal.
Then do it for 100 days. Don’t worry about where it will lead. Just do it today, then do it tomorrow, and so on. See what happens.
When the habit is set, do it again. | https://medium.com/the-write-brain/habit-becomes-a-challenge-when-its-time-bound-f652e686ae65 | ['Shaunta Grimes'] | 2020-08-16 21:11:50.679000+00:00 | ['Ninjabyob', 'Habit', 'Writing', 'Creativity', 'Productivity'] |
Here’s Why You Can’t Stop Worrying | On my 10-year journey to conquering my Generalized Anxiety Disorder, I learned quite a lot about why we have so many anxious thoughts. One of the most fascinating things I learned was why we just can’t stop worrying, no matter how hard we try.
Worry was, and frankly is (I’m still experimenting on myself to remove worry from my life) running my life, and I want to help you by giving you some more information on WHY we all worry so much even though it doesn’t really help us at all.
Today I’m going to show you exactly why you can’t stop worrying
In this article I will show you how we develop a pattern of worrying, how we cement that pattern, and how we become trapped in something I call “The Mental Worry Paradox” — a pattern of thinking that keeps us from ever being able to stop worrying.
I’m also going to give you an option to join me in some “experimental techniques” I’m using to free myself from worry. I’m a work in progress here, but I’ll get to this at the end of the article so that I don’t leave you hanging.
Without further ado — here is my explanation of why we all worry so much!
We worry first as children because we model others
You’re a six year old and you break something in the house, and your mom frowns at you in worry.
You’re ten and you see your dad watching the news, a frown etched on his face, worried about the state of the world.
You’re fourteen and you hear your parents arguing downstairs, worrying about money.
Worry is everywhere, so it makes sense for you to model it. And throughout your childhood, you do. When something is in jeopardy, you worry. When you are stressed about school, you worry. When you have a sports competition and don’t know how you’re going to do, you worry.
You worry about whether the other kids at school will like you, and you worry whether your parents will approve of your friends once you make them.
In some cases, people even have traumatic childhood experiences that cause them extreme worry, going beyond ordinary worry circumstances.
We worry to try and prevent bad things from happening
When I was in high school, I would actually lie awake in bed and worry that the wind at my window was going to suddenly turn into a tornado and kill me. I’d sit and think “Please don’t blow my house down. I don’t want to die. Please don’t be a tornado.” It made no sense, but I was literally trying to control the outside world with my mind, as if thinking these worry thoughts was going to stop a tornado.
And what was the result? Eventually, the wind would settle down. The storm would pass. And I’d be able to stop worrying and relax.
This happens to us in all aspects of life — we worry, worry, worry, and then once the threat is over and life has gone on, we allow ourselves to relax. We saw our parents do it, and then we do it.
Now, worrying is natural for a child. If you’re 6, or even maybe 16, you still aren’t fully grown. Your logical abilities aren’t fully intact. Your prefrontal cortex that allows you to make decisions for the long term isn’t developed all the way. So, you’re going to do some irrational things, such as worry.
When we grow up, we just keep worrying
What’s really fascinating is that as adults, we just keep on worrying, even though it’s totally harmful to our well-being and helps in no way. When I was sixteen, I worried about a tornado killing me. When I was 25, I worried about someone approving of my presentation at work.
What’s the difference? As a 25 year old adult, I should know that worrying won’t ever help me in life. And yet I didn’t know this, and chances are you don’t. You still worry all the time, or you wouldn’t be reading this article.
Ever since I realized just how prevalent worry is, and just how pointless it is, I’ve become totally obsessed with this simple question:
Why do adults worry even though it’s completely pointless and irrational?
And, as a corollary/subsequent question,
Just how happy could I be if I never worried again?
And, finally,
How can I stop worrying forever?
So, today we’re going to get into all of that. But first I want you to understand my definition of worry.
What exactly IS worry?
When I say worry, I don’t mean just thinking about something in order to solve a problem. I mean trying to negate the very laws of physics by screaming in your own head for something to stop, similarly to what I did when I would think “Please don’t be a tornado” when winds picked up around my childhood bedroom.
This is what we do in real life, even as adults. Okay, here’s a simpler metaphor to explain what I mean by worry. Have you ever watched a sports game, or an election, or anything where you had a vested interest in the outcome? Have you ever held your breath, put your own happiness on hold, and just thought “I don’t want to exist until I know this works out OK!” Just today I watched a replay of an NBA playoff game, and found myself worrying at the highlights because I so desperately wanted the Mavericks to beat the Clippers!
Worrying = Saying “Life is Not Worth Living” until a problem is resolved
That’s what I mean by worry. The act of pointlessly putting your life on hold in order to use your mental energy to wish for things to come true, even though your wishing does nothing to affect the reality of the situation.
Why Do We Accept The Existence of Worry in Our Lives?
Most people accept that they will worry because they perceive that they are irrational. Have you ever been out eating with someone and heard them say: “Well, I’m supposed to be on a diet, but screw it! It looks like my hand is grabbing this donut and I can’t stop it!”
In essence, people give up their responsibility for their own actions, claiming that they are irrational.
I think this is why people accept worrying. They just say “Well, worrying is irrational, but so am I. So I’ll try to manage this worrying thing, maybe try to not do it quite as much, maybe I’ll go to some therapy or get some medication, but ultimately this is part of my life.”
Personally, I refuse to accept that, because I’ve come to know in my studies as a life coach that every single action we take is rational. We ALWAYS do things for a reason. It may be a shortsighted reason, like eating the donut for pleasure instead of eating healthy to lose weight, but there’s a reason.
How can I be a completely rational person and a worrier at the same time, if worrying is irrational?
The answer to this leads us to the deepest insight in this article. Our own human use of the scientific method traps us in worry, simply because we don’t know any other way to live.
If you have studied science, you know that science is defined by the combination of logic and empiricism. For an experiment to be truly scientific, it must not just contain a reason why it will work (logic): it must also be performed and observed in the real world (empiricism).
So, rather than simply looking at the logic of worrying, and why worrying is illogical, let’s look at the development of the human worrying habit from a scientific perspective. Let’s look at the empirical side, our real world experience.
Picture me as 16-year-old Woody again, sitting in my bed, desperately worrying that a tornado is going to blow my house down. I notice a strong wind. I have a fear a tornado will happen. I “negate myself” by just ignoring all other thoughts and emotions except for my worry desire, “Please don’t blow the house down.” I feel horrible, I feel sick, like I’m going to die. Because that’s the way worry feels. And yet, after all of this worrying, what happens? The wind dies down. No tornado comes. I survive. And life goes on.
What am I going to learn from that scenario?
I’m going to learn that since I worried, and then nothing bad happened, worrying might be correlated to preventing bad things.
Think about that for a second!!!
We worry because we see the positive correlation between worrying and life working out OK.
Now, if we were born as 25-year old, fully developed adults, in a society full of people who were completely rational, we might worry once and then never again. We’d hear wind at our window and worry “Oh, I don’t want a tornado to come.” But then we’d stop and think logically: “Wait … this is a new scenario. And it doesn’t seem rational to worry. So I just won’t worry, and if it works out, I will know worrying was unnecessary!”
Then, we’d learn not to correlate worrying with life working out, because the truth is that life works out regardless of whether we worry or not.
But here’s why I brought up all of the childhood worry examples in the beginning of the article — by the time we’re able to think logically as mature adults, we already have thousands, likely millions, of instances of where we “worried” and yet life “worked out OK.” So by the time we can logically realize that worrying doesn’t help, our mind has already empirically learned that worrying is the only way to live, that there is no other option.
We practice worrying so much in childhood that it becomes scientifically learned in our mind.
And when I say learned, I mean scientifically, actually learned. Electrically hard-wired into our neurological circuits. Logically, the mind has drawn a correlation between worrying and life turning out OK. This is not a mild correlation, this is a 100%, perfect correlation.
If you’re reading this right now, that means you’re still alive and life has turned out OK. So every single time you ever worried, you didn’t die — life turned out OK.
Also, if you’re reading this right now, you’ve probably spent ALL of your adult life with a worry instinct. Worrying at everything.
What this means is that you have an EXACT correlation, which has created an AIRTIGHT electrical pattern in your brain, that relates worrying with life turning out OK.
In addition to drawing the logical conclusion, the mind has empirically experienced life turning out OK after worrying. It doesn’t think about the fact that worrying made you sick, made you unhappy for no reason. That’s not the mind’s job. The mind’s job is to keep you from dying, and all it knows is this:
Your mind has a sample size of about 1 million instances where you worried and things turned out OK, and a sample size of ZERO of not worrying and having things turn out OK.
I want to be clear that I believe worrying happens to us in every micro-moment of every day. When you hesitate deciding what food to eat for breakfast, you are worrying. When someone frowns at you and you don’t know why, you worry. When you start walking one way but think about going somewhere else first, you are worrying.
It is my experience from my own life that I was spending every single moment filled with micro-worries.
Ultimately, the habit of worrying, developed in childhood, is cemented electronically in our brains in such a way that we simply can’t overcome it in daily life. Thus, even though we know worrying is irrational, we literally can’t stop ourselves from worrying.
I call this the Mental Worry Paradox.
It makes sense, right? You have no experience doing anything but worrying, so you just keep worrying.
Is your mind blown? Mine was when I realized that this Mental Worry Paradox had been ruining my life and causing me a 10 year battle with generalized anxiety.
The truth is that life always works out whether we worry or not
So how did we end up drawing such a false correlation between worrying and life working out?
We did it because as long as we’re still alive, life ALWAYS works out. Period. We have massive impact bias, believing events are more important than they actually are.
You could believe that eating three ham sandwiches a day was the only way to survive, and chances are, life would work out that way.
Or, you could choose to only eat pea soup every day, and life would work out that way.
Because humans are so resilient and because life is so much larger than any one human, what we do has a very tiny impact on the world, and what we think has no impact on the outside world.
Two Adult Habits That Demonstrate Mental Worry Paradox
How Watching Sports Cements Mental Worry Paradox In Adults
When you watch sports, you worry. This is a great example because it seems so casual and harmless, but creates such a damaging habit. If you’re a sports fan, every moment you’re watching the team you’re rooting for, you’re worrying. You worry that they will lose. You worry that they won’t win by enough. I grew up a University of Kentucky basketball fan, and the team was very good. They often won by 20 or 30 points. Yet, when I was rooting for Kentucky, even if they were ahead 80 to 40, I’d worry if the other team even scored a few points in a row. Worrying is compulsive and happens in every moment.
Another sports example comes from my experience playing tennis. It’s commonly known that in sports players rarely perform as well in competition as they do in practice. Why? During competition, they worry. When I played tennis, I learned from a young age that tournaments and matches mattered, while practice didn’t. So in every match, with every single shot, I would send out a little “worry,” thinking “please don’t miss, please don’t lose,” with each shot. I coded that into my brain. By the time I was 18, I had hit hundreds of thousands of tennis shots in matches with “worry” encoded in, and zero without.
Quick point for re-emphasis: I literally mean hundreds of thousands, or millions of worry moments. In my personal experience, every little tiny thing I do has a “worry encoding” attached to it. So every tennis ball I hit, every shot my favorite basketball team takes, every moment new worries are created and the Mental Worry Paradox is cemented in me.
Here’s what happened with my tennis game once I reached adulthood. Once I was in college, I realized that logically, there was no reason for me to worry or be uptight in a tennis match, since it hurt, not helped. Yet no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get myself to stop worrying. I’d think “just one more hit with worrying.” My mind was addicted, because it had zero sample size without worrying, and so it just couldn’t bring itself to try something that wasn’t empirically tested.
That’s how sports can trap you in mental worry.
How Watching the News Also Cements Mental Worry Paradox In Adults
If you aren’t into sports, I’m willing to bet you cement your mental worry paradox by worrying about the national news. It’s as if you think that sitting in your chair, nervously watching election coverage on Fox/CNN/MSNBC is going to change the results of a national political election. Or as if you think arguing with your friends over politics is going to change the results of an election.
The only thing that’s going to change an election result is your ACTION, such as voting or helping get out the vote for the candidate you favor. Or maybe posting on social media to raise awareness. But one thing that definitely DOESN’T change the world is worrying.
I want to be clear that I’m advocating that you do vote and take other actions to promote civil liberties, but that you spend no time worrying about the parts you can’t control.
You Can’t Just “Stop Worrying” in Daily Life No Matter How Hard You Try
The Mental Worry Paradox, the fact that you’re trapped in worry because it’s been cemented in you electronically, is what’s running your life right now. You have millions of worry repetitions in your brain, hard-wiring your neural pathways to be a certain way. And even when you realize you are worrying, and think “I want to stop worrying,” your mind refuses to listen.
Here’s an analogy that will help further illustrate how the Mental Worry Paradox operates in your life.
Worrying is like Driving — Dangerous But Comfortable
If you drive a car every day to work, and grew up around cars, they probably don’t cause you much anxiety. You can likely get into a car, drive through the crowded city, navigate the multi-lane highways, and then end up at work or wherever you drive to. You do this without fear. In fact, you probably feel comfortable driving around because you are in control of where the car goes.
But here’s the thing: Driving is d-a-n-g-e-r-o-u-s! People die every day in car crashes, and yet since you’ve been desensitized to it, you don’t feel a big sense of fear when you get in a car. Have you ever had a sudden near-collision on the road, dodged it, and thought “Oh, this driving thing really is dangerous!” It happens to us all, but outside of those moments, we feel relaxed and in control even when driving a dangerous motor vehicle, around tons of other drivers who could easily crash into us from a moment’s distraction.
But, you have years or decades of conditioning doing this, so your body isn’t afraid at all. It feels natural.
And while worrying is painful, frustrating, taxing, and stressful, just like driving a car, it is also ultimately comfortable because it’s the only thing you know.
Now, let’s compare riding in that car to another experience. At the Grand Canyon there is something called the Skywalk, a glass bridge which extends over the canyon in a U shape.
Image Credit: Paradise Found Tours
Because the floor of the bridge is made of glass, patrons who visit the bridge can see thousands of feet down to the bottom of the Canyon simply by looking beneath their feet. This structure is seemingly unsupported, but is actually attached securely to counterweights buried deep in the canyon wall.
The walls of this bridge are 6 feet high, also made of glass. It’s completely safe. Short of climbing the wall and jumping on purpose, there’s a 0% chance of falling off of this bridge.
Compared to driving to work, walking on the Grand Canyon Skywalk is infinitely safer. Yet, which one would you feel safer doing?
I might not even want to walk on that Skywalk because it would freak me out. But, even if I did, I know one thing for certain: my heart would race, my body would sweat, and I’d be incredibly nervous, even though I knew I was logically safe. Because no matter what I told myself, my body would have ZERO experience walking on glass above a thousand foot drop.
Leaving worry behind is impossibly disorienting
Starting to live a life without worry is just like walking on the Grand Canyon Skywalk. You have absolutely zero experience at it. Moreover, it inherently looks horribly dangerous. Just as there is no concrete to support you on the glass bridge, living without worry means there are no worries there to support your frame of mind. Your mind feels oddly empty, freaky, in a way that doesn’t make sense. Your electrical circuits don’t support it. Not worrying is devastatingly disorienting simply because you don’t have any experience with it.
When you are walking the Grand Canyon Skywalk, your mind doesn’t care that it is a carefully designed cantilever bridge with millions of pounds of counterweights built deep into the ground, where it could not possibly fall. Your mind cares that it looks like you are stepping onto thin air, and you’ve never done this before.
Now, let’s say you got the courage to walk on this glass bridge. Your heart is racing. Your body is sweating. You look down at the canyon and feel sick because it’s so disorienting. This is not a pleasant experience.
Being Disoriented is Even More Painful Than Worrying, So We Always Turn Back to Worrying
So let’s say you walk around the bridge and go back onto the regular Canyon floor. Once you’re back on solid ground, you think “Phew, I’m so glad to be back on solid ground. I’m glad that’s over.” Unfortunately, if you try to just “stop worrying” in everyday life, this is exactly what you’ll feel. You’ll go through a life experience without worry feeling disoriented, which will actually be more unpleasant than the worrying itself. It’s only because not worrying is new — there’s no reason for living without worry to be painful, just as there’s no reason to be nervous on a perfectly safe glass bridge — but you’ll instinctively pull back to solid ground because it’s your first time and it’s so scary. And when you allow yourself to worry again, you’ll feel relief at those familiar worry thoughts.
When we try to overcome the Mental Worry Paradox in Daily Life, we Actually Make Things Worse
What’s really terrifying about trying to escape worry is that every time we try to escape, we make it worse. We cemented this correlation in our brain that worrying makes us OK. Now, suddenly, let’s say we try to live without worry and we walk on that bridge, just like I described above.
Maybe you try to just go to one meeting at work without worrying. Maybe you let yourself stop worrying about your children for just one date night while they’re safely watched by a babysitter. Whatever it is, when you try to live without worry for the first time, you’ll feel this lurching, disoriented, empty, confusing sensation.
After you experience disorientation like that, your experience with not worrying is even worse than when the sample size was 0. Now you still have a sample size of a million saying that worrying feels comfortable (if painful), and you have a sample size of exactly 1 saying that not worrying feels so disorienting it’s actually worse.
Maybe you persevere, and try again and again. But all you build are more samples of feeling disoriented and scared, and you ultimately end up worrying about: “What if there’s no way to stop worrying?”
That’s where I was for a while. I felt trapped, and I felt that every time I tried to stop worrying, things actually got worse instead of better!
The Mental Worry Paradox Has Trapped You In Worry, and You Need an Intervention
So, you’re trapped in an impossible scenario. The Mental Worry Paradox has you in its grip. Worrying is the only thing you know, and even though worrying is making you miserable, trying to break out of it feels worse than walking on the Skywalk for the first time. It’s too disorienting.
Don’t Worry — A Fix For Mental Worry Paradox is In Progress!
Now that you have an idea of what you’re up against if you want to stop worrying, I want to be transparent with you about what I am doing to remove worry from my life.
I cemented my “knowledge” of Mental Worry Paradox on a walk in the summer of 2020. I was so frustrated about something (I forget what), and so I decided to take a walk to clear my head.
I also noticed that I was quite stressed about posting on social media. I would always WORRY about whether people would see my posts, whether they would care about what I posted, whether they would respond, etc. etc.
So I decided to do an experiment.
My First Anti-Mental Worry Paradox Experiment
I wanted to worry less about social media and how people perceived me. I had this inkling that I was trapped in a worry paradox, because I had worried thousands of times about social media, maybe tens of thousands, and I had never posted on social media without worrying.
I knew that even if I “told myself to post without being afraid”, and I did it, I would fall back into the worry paradox because it would just be too scary.
So I decided to envision making the SAME simple social media post IN MY HEAD hundreds of times, over and over again, until I no longer felt the impulse to worry.
I would walk, and with each step I would go through the following process:
I would envision making the social media post I would envision feeling the same anxiety, fear, and emotional/physical reaction that I would normally feel when making a social media post. I would then choose to NOT WORRY. I want to be clear about what this means. I would still feel anxious and fearful and nervous. Those things aren’t worry. What I would do, though, is I would NOT NEGATE MYSELF. I would not put myself on hold on the inside. I would allow myself to feel everything and all my senses and be at “acceptance” with the way the world is, regardless. I would finish the “mental simulation” and realize that I WAS STILL ALIVE, HAPPY, AND NOTHING BAD HAPPENED WHEN I DIDN’T WORRY!!!!
At first it took some practice just to get one “repetition” of this exercise right. I’d imagine making some post, I’d feel all the feelings associated, I would purposefully NOT self-negate, which is SUPER disorienting, and then I’d celebrate that I’m still alive and everything worked out OK.
The beautiful part of this is that since it’s just a mental exercise, I know the post isn’t real. So I know it’s OK that I don’t worry, because the post isn’t real anyway.
Ultimately, I became fast enough that I could do a “rep” of this exercise in about a second, correlated with a step or two of walking. As I counted my steps walking around my neighborhood, I counted my “reps” of “anti-MWP exercise” as well.
On my first walk I did about 750 repetitions of this exercise, and could already feel the edge come off of my worry instinct towards social media!
Now, I know that sounds complicated, and I don’t expect you to fully understand this process based on one explanation.
I also want you to know that I’m not perfect at this yet. In fact, I’m still very much a beginner. While I’ve managed to isolate some simple things like social media fears, I still would say that I’m trapped in the Mental Worry Paradox the same as you are.
I’ll need hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of repetitions of this exercise to break free. But I do think I will get there, and if I can do a few thousand “reps” a day, then I may be mostly free from worry in as little as a year or two!
I’m Looking for “Experimental Subjects” To See if My Anti-Worry Techniques Will Work On You Too!
If any or all of this “anti-worry” work sounds cool to you, you’re more than welcome to join me in my mental practices.
The coolest thing is that since I’m just at the very beginning of this journey, just experimenting to see if I can totally change my mental health with this perspective, everything is TOTALLY FREE to you right now!
If you want to talk on the phone or Facetime and do a “live practice session” of the anti-MWP exercise, then I’ll happily do a free session with you. Just click this sentence/paragraph, which is linked to a calendar invite.
I’ll also post some on social media, although while I’m in “experimental mode” I might have my head down and might not be posting or writing as much!!
Regardless, I hope that this article has helped you see how worry works more clearly! | https://medium.com/@woodyrini/heres-why-you-can-t-stop-worrying-a28ed3b3465f | ['Woody Rini'] | 2020-12-20 16:48:08.218000+00:00 | ['Anxiety', 'Personal Development', 'Worry', 'Mental Health', 'Stress'] |
All over the place | All over the place
The importance of discipline and the benefit of last-minute panic
There are day s like today when one thing changes everything. One action changes the course of the day, sometimes for good, sometimes not so much. Today feels like the latter, although expectation were like the former.
And when I look back, more than 12 hours later, it all goes back to routine and repetition. It always starts my day in a certain way, there are a series of steps that I follow religiously everyday and prompt me into action; and although I can do things, either way, I can’t deny the lack of order I sense over a day when these steps have not been in place.
It’s like starting a computer and getting the operative system loaded.
The problem is that, it’s not until it is too late that I end up realising what the issues and what do I need to do to “restart”.
It’s not a great feeling seeing most of your day going by without even knowing at time where did the time go and why I’m still in the same place.
However, what I came to learn is not to dwell and let this day follow its course and reach its conclusion, focus on the one ahead. Dwelling will only delay things more with the same results, if not worst.
I have also learned to embrace and make the most of the focus that comes with last-minute panic. Yes. Because when time becomes scarce, we immediately prioritise better, focus on the important and act upon it.
That focus tends to show a couple of available options, from which I tend to work upon or plan ahead. This is the case of this post.
I could have finished a document from work or write this pice. I already know I can only choose one, so I decided this.
Finishing the document could have taken me a similar time that writing this and it was meant to be done today, however, the receiver is not going to review it until tomorrow morning, meaning that I can finish the details on the train on my way to the office. In addition to this, I’m committing myself to write every day again, so if going to the document this piece would have rather cancelled for today or done after the document, which then will jeopardise my sleeping time, and by consequence possibly compromising my awaking time.
See how obvious it is to make this decision based on the fact that the document is not going to be used today? All this rationale happened in a matter of seconds, probably the same amount it would take me in normal circumstances. The problem on a daily basis is exactly that, finding focus.
That’s why booting my operative system at the beginning of every day is so important. It does not except me from distractions or bad habits, but at least sets me in a good direction to be less prone to it, or at least one in where a sense of a lack of structure will not be permeating the day clouding judgement, and ultimately, focus. | https://medium.com/thoughts-on-the-go-journal/all-over-the-place-849af0dbc634 | ['Joseph Emmi'] | 2019-11-22 00:25:27.437000+00:00 | ['Discipline', 'Self-awareness', 'Productivity', 'Self Improvement', 'Focus'] |
Aspirin May Treat Severe Covid-19 Disease, and That Tells Us Something Important | Aspirin May Treat Severe Covid-19 Disease, and That Tells Us Something Important
Aspirin may turn out to be a cheap and effective way to save lives and prevent lasting damage
Back in April, when the first wave of Covid-19 was crashing across the U.S., Michael Mazzeffi received an email from one of his colleagues at the University of Maryland Medical Center.
“One of our surgeons said that when he was drawing blood out of a patient, it literally clotted within five seconds,” says Mazzeffi, who is chief of the division of critical care anesthesiology. “It was pretty clear early on that patients with severe Covid had clotting disorders and that their blood was super coagulable.”
Clinicians around the world noticed this same clotting phenomenon. By mid-summer, autopsies of people who had died from Covid-19 revealed that their vasculature and organs were often suffused with clots and coagulated blood. “What we saw in the Covid ICU is that a lot of the patients would start developing a lot of clotting, and this high burden would lead to multi-organ failure and eventually death,” says Jonathan Chow, MD, an assistant professor of anesthesiology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine.
Because clotting seemed to be a signature of severe or damaging Covid-19 disease, Chow and Mazzeffi started to discuss whether aspirin — a blood-thinning drug that can block the formation of clots — could help improve outcomes. “Aspirin is a very potent antiplatelet agent,” Chow explains. Platelets are blood-cell fragments that, when activated, will clump together to form clots. “As soon as aspirin interacts with a platelet, that platelet becomes inactivated and can no longer participate in the clot-generating process,” he says.
For a study published on October 21 in the journal Anesthesia and Analgesia, Chow and Mazzeffi — along with a multi-university team of researchers — examined the effects of aspirin among people hospitalized with Covid-19. After adjusting their data to account for age, BMI, race, preexisting conditions, and other variables that could muddy their conclusions, they determined that the risk of death or ICU admission was almost halved among people who got aspirin compared to those who did not.
“This is now the second study linking blood thinners of some kind with improved outcomes,” Mazzeffi says. “I think it’s driving home the point that an important part of the disease’s process is clotting in the organs and that intervening in those pathways is something we should focus on.”
What this research tells us about the coronavirus
SARS-CoV-2 is a respiratory virus, and the illness it causes is often described as primarily respiratory in nature. But that’s turning out to be an oversimplification — especially for those who develop severe Covid-19 disease or symptoms that persist long after the initial infection has passed.
“It’s a whole-body virus,” says Girish Nadkarni, a doctor of internal medicine at the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. “It affects the kidneys, the brain, the blood vessels, and the heart. So it’s not just a respiratory virus.”
These anti-clotting and anti-inflammation benefits explain why plain old aspirin is such a widely deployed drug — and also why it may eventually prove helpful in treating Covid-19.
In July, Nadkarni and colleagues published a study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology that looked at the effect of anticoagulant drugs on outcomes among hospitalized Covid-19 patients. Like the aspirin study that would follow a few months later, Nadkarni’s study found that anticoagulants significantly reduced the risk of death among certain groups of people with Covid-19. “We found that both prophylactic and therapeutic doses of anticoagulation led to a lower risk of intubation and mortality,” he summarizes.
Both his research and the aspirin study support the idea that — contrary to early assumptions — Covid-19 may be best characterized as a blood-vessel disease.
Follow-up work and confirmation studies are needed. But Nadkarni says that the idea that a blood-thinning drug like aspirin could protect people from Covid-19 is credible. “Aspirin and anticoagulant drugs both prevent clots, albeit in slightly different ways,” he explains. While aspirin shuts off the clot-forming activity of platelets, anticoagulant drugs act on clotting factors, which are proteins in the blood that help control the rate of bleeding.
Many common and lethal illnesses — including diabetes, heart disease, and several others that are associated with a heightened risk for severe Covid-19 disease — also promote blood coagulation and clotting, Nadkarni says. And along with helping to prevent clots, aspirin also combats inflammation, which is implicated in a wide range of medical conditions. Together, these anti-clotting and anti-inflammation benefits explain why plain old aspirin is such a widely deployed drug — and also why it may eventually prove helpful in treating Covid-19.
“The fact that [SARS-CoV-2] creates this hypercoagulable state is really fascinating because few other respiratory viruses do that to the same degree,” says Mazzeffi. He explains that there are specialized blood cells, called endothelial cells, that line the arteries, veins, and other blood-transporting vessels. “These endothelial cells maintain vascular integrity and help keep blood flow normal,” he says. “SARS-CoV-2 affects those cells and causes inflammation that may cause those cells to express things that cause clotting.”
The coronavirus and the disease states it causes are complex, he adds. But aspirin may turn out to be a cheap and effective way to save lives and prevent lasting damage.
“If someone becomes ill [with SARS-CoV-2] and their doctor says it’s safe for them to take aspirin, I think it’s reasonable for them to take it.”
Should at-risk people consider taking aspirin?
Doctors are usually hesitant to recommend a treatment that does not have a large body of evidence to support it. But Mazzeffi says that aspirin is such a familiar drug and its risks and safety profile are so well established that people who are exposed to the coronavirus may want to consider taking it in low doses.
“The good thing about aspirin is that it’s one of the best-studied drugs in the history of the Earth,” he says. “We know it’s not safe for everyone, but it’s taken by literally hundreds of millions of patients, and it has a great safety record.”
The greatest risk associated with aspirin is gastrointestinal bleeding. “If you have a history of peptic ulcers or bleeding from the stomach, then it may not be safe,” he says. Also, his study didn’t look at the effects of aspirin among children with SARS-CoV-2 — a group that already seems to be at low risk for severe Covid-19-related complications. “People shouldn’t be popping aspirin in kids,” he says.
But for most adults, taking a single low-dose (81 mg) aspirin pill each day for a period of a few weeks may be a low-risk, high-reward proposition.
“If someone becomes ill [with SARS-CoV-2] and their doctor says it’s safe for them to take aspirin, I think it’s reasonable for them to take it,” Mazzeffi says. | https://elemental.medium.com/aspirin-may-treat-severe-covid-19-disease-and-that-tells-us-something-important-fb486dfe3298 | ['Markham Heid'] | 2020-11-05 06:33:29.419000+00:00 | ['Health', 'Covid 19', 'The Nuance', 'Coronavirus', 'Science'] |
The Power of a “Reference” CI/CD Pipeline | On the CI/CD journey within large companies, stakeholders fall into different categories, each presenting challenges when driving top-down change. The first category are individuals that want to adopt CI/CD but have no idea what it really means or how hard it is. Another category are individuals with a “tools only” perspective, who want to automate — which is good — but haven’t considered the people and process side of things. The final category are the we-can’t-do-it-here nay sayers that haven’t yet embraced a transformational mindset.
The common thread for all these archetypes is a lack of a practical understanding of CI/CD. We need a way to demystify the terminology of CI/CD and get past the hype. We need something demonstrable that resonates with the business, and avoids the futile “other companies have done it this way” line of discussion.
Enter the “Reference CI/CD Pipeline.”
What is a Reference CI/CD Pipeline?
A reference CI/CD pipeline is an automated process from Dev to Production for a specific component of a company’s (or line of business’s) software product. It’s the first iteration of an end-to-end pipeline that you want to use as the “standard” to drive CI/CD adoption across teams.
Just as important as the automated pipeline, the scrum team that is responsible for the software component will adopt CI/CD best practices, such as regular code merges, test automation, robust data mocking, etc. This team will be the reference for the people/process changes that other scrum teams need to adopt.
Overall, the reference pipeline defines clearly what the target state technology, organization and processes should be to achieve CI/CD.
What do Reference CI/CD Pipelines Address?
Reference pipelines solve a number of challenges for the enterprise:
Achievable in Near Term (i.e., a Few Months)
Provide a Concrete Vision of the Future
Can be Implemented Separately from Mainline SDLC Activities
Achievable in Near Term (i.e., a Few Months)
Top-down CI/CD initiatives at large companies may fall victim to the “boil the ocean” problem: scope is simply too large to realistically implement successfully. These large initiatives often attempt to implement change across many teams and products at once, and can be expensive from a technology and people perspective, and very difficult to implement.
If done right, the reference CI/CD pipeline is scoped small enough to deliver in a few months.
Provides a Concrete Vision of the Future
Ask 10 people what their definition of DevOps or CI/CD is, and you might get 10 different answers. Many people equate DevOps and CI/CD only with automation or simply with tools, and while automation and tools are a key part of CI/CD, it is only one part. In my opinion, automation and tools are NOT the most important part. The part that can often be missed is the people and process side of CI/CD. A reference CI/CD pipeline makes it “real”, by defining the automation and the people/process changes needed.
Most teams have some level of automation on their pipelines already, which may include build, deployment and possibly test automation. The reference CI/CD pipeline should fill any critical gaps that allow those pipelines to go end-to-end from Dev to Production. For example, new automation capabilities required in reference CI/CD pipelines that I’ve worked on include:
Auto-promotion : establishing artifact promotion rules requires new capabilities that assess if quality gates are met on the pipeline, and then automatically “push” artifacts and relevant configurations to the next environment. The goal is to convert human decisioning — and the subsequent push-button promotion — to system decisioning and auto-promotion, and for teams to trust that decision.
: establishing artifact promotion rules requires new capabilities that assess if quality gates are met on the pipeline, and then automatically “push” artifacts and relevant configurations to the next environment. The goal is to convert human decisioning — and the subsequent push-button promotion — to system decisioning and auto-promotion, and for teams to trust that decision. Additional Automated Testing: in order to certify that one component can be deployed independently of the others, additional testing is likely needed. For example, consumer-driven contract testing will allow teams to feel confident that their API changes won’t impact consumers of that service. Similarly, component-level performance testing may be needed.
People/process changes I’ve observed include:
New Skills : Teams will need to get better at data mocking, performance testing and consumer driven contract testing, and new skills are likely required; new skills also may involve learning new tools, such as Pact and JMeter. In addition, microservices development — which is a lot harder than many people think — requires new skills. In my experience, teams need to internalize the 12 factor app. https://12factor.net/
: Teams will need to get better at data mocking, performance testing and consumer driven contract testing, and new skills are likely required; new skills also may involve learning new tools, such as Pact and JMeter. In addition, microservices development — which is a lot harder than many people think — requires new skills. In my experience, teams need to internalize the 12 factor app. https://12factor.net/ New Processes: teams need to define quality gates for the environments that are on the end-to-end path, including requirements from QA and Ops teams. Other processes include the use of metrics to drive desired behaviors: reducing time to fix bugs, fix broken builds, merge code, etc. The visibility that metrics give can be uncomfortable for teams moving to CI/CD, so a lot of practice is needed with this new process!
Can be Implemented Separately from Mainline SDLC Activities
Implementing technology and process changes can be very disruptive, so limiting the “blast radius” of the reference pipeline initiative is important. Because the scope of the reference CI/CD pipeline is (usually) one team and (usually) one software component, work can be done with little impact on other day to day BAU activities.
Other teams will appreciate that the kinks are worked out before they are asked to adopt the pipeline!
Challenges with this Approach
As one might suspect, driving change through reference CI/CD pipelines has its own challenges, but these can be overcome through smart planning and execution. Challenges include:
Strong Leadership:
Like all change initiatives, top-down sponsorship is needed, as well as a strong leader to guide the team(s) through the change. The absence of sponsorship and leadership will definitely put your reference CI/CD pipeline initiative at risk! Pick a sponsor that you believe is willing to try something new, and a day-to-day leader who is respected by teams, and who understands CI/CD pipelines, perhaps one of your leaders from the DevOps function (if you have one).
Like all change initiatives, top-down sponsorship is needed, as well as a strong leader to guide the team(s) through the change. The absence of sponsorship and leadership will definitely put your reference CI/CD pipeline initiative at risk! Pick a sponsor that you believe is willing to try something new, and a day-to-day leader who is respected by teams, and who understands CI/CD pipelines, perhaps one of your leaders from the DevOps function (if you have one). Tight Scope Management :
When asked “How should we improve our end to end pipeline?” many team members have good ideas, but unfortunately, they can take a long time to implement. In addition, external dependencies can slow down progress. Overall, as the reference initiative moves along, the potential for scope creep increases. I recommend taking a “minimum viable product” (MVP) approach, which Agile scrum teams should be familiar with. Remember that the goal is to deliver MVP in a few months, and iterate from there.
: When asked “How should we improve our end to end pipeline?” many team members have good ideas, but unfortunately, they can take a long time to implement. In addition, external dependencies can slow down progress. Overall, as the reference initiative moves along, the potential for scope creep increases. I recommend taking a “minimum viable product” (MVP) approach, which Agile scrum teams should be familiar with. Remember that the goal is to deliver MVP in a few months, and iterate from there. Keepin’ It Real:
Arguably, the quickest way to get a piece of software end-to-end is to use a fake/dummy software component. This might be a temptation when creating a reference pipeline. On the positive side, there should be very little friction in moving the software through the SDLC, but, in my opinion, this approach should be avoided because it lacks the people/process changes that teams must adopt. Fundamentally, how do we get end-to-end scrum teams to think and behave differently if we don’t use something they are responsible to build, test and operate?
How to Move Forward in your Company
So where to go from here? If you are an executive trying to get your organization to move to CI/CD, and are being stymied by slow progress, I recommend you consider implementing a reference CI/CD pipeline.
Some steps you can take:
Engage your DevOps/Automation team : This team will be the subject matter experts for a reference CI/CD pipeline, and should offer resources in moving it forward. If you don’t have a DevOps/Automation team, ask around and see if you can find any champions for CI/CD and automation.
: This team will be the subject matter experts for a reference CI/CD pipeline, and should offer resources in moving it forward. If you don’t have a DevOps/Automation team, ask around and see if you can find any champions for CI/CD and automation. Pick a Product and a Team : The key is to start small. Select a microservice or API built by a team that is open to doing things in new ways. The team should be following Agile methodology. The product should be a strategic one that would benefit from faster time to market.
: The key is to start small. Select a microservice or API built by a team that is open to doing things in new ways. The team should be following Agile methodology. The product should be a strategic one that would benefit from faster time to market. Draw an End-to-end Picture : In “selling” this initiative to the stakeholders, a diagram can really help to show what you want to do; include enough technical detail that your technology stakeholders understand the vision, and also information that is interesting to the business, such as speed to market and metrics.
: In “selling” this initiative to the stakeholders, a diagram can really help to show what you want to do; include enough technical detail that your technology stakeholders understand the vision, and also information that is interesting to the business, such as speed to market and metrics. Engage the Exec Sponsor : Once you have done the items above, it’s time to engage the executive responsible for the selected product. Are they on-board? Ideally, the sponsor announces this initiative, so all teams are aware and will align with the plan.
: Once you have done the items above, it’s time to engage the executive responsible for the selected product. Are they on-board? Ideally, the sponsor announces this initiative, so all teams are aware and will align with the plan. Ensure the “Big 3” are Represented: Engineering, QA, and Ops are all required for this initiative, so you will need to make sure you have representation from those teams.
Conclusion
Driving CI/CD adoption in large companies is hard. It requires that you start small and iterate. Reference CI/CD pipelines are one important way to define both the end-to-end pipeline automation and the new ways of working. They let you work out the kinks before broader team adoption.
Fundamentally, when you want to drive change with your stakeholders, “Let me show you” is always more effective than “Lets talk about it”! | https://medium.com/@drewmanning/the-power-of-a-reference-ci-cd-pipeline-b1d2e4754627 | ['Drew Manning'] | 2020-02-22 18:12:04.236000+00:00 | ['Ci Cd Pipeline', 'Automation', 'Cicd', 'DevOps'] |
Reasons Why You Make Bad Decisions, According to Science | Our Mind Suffers from Cognitive Fatigue
Our mind works like a muscle. So we are training it with it all the cognitive processes associated with it, such as willpower, decision-making, and even just our way of thinking.
And as happens with the muscles of the body, when we use them over and over again without giving them time for their proper recovery, they tire and end up underperforming.
On a cognitive level, with every decision we make, no matter how minimal, we are consuming a portion of our mental energy.
When our mental energy is almost depleted it is much easier for our brain to go into a “survival” mode in which “no” by default is the easy option. From that cognitive survival mode, it is much easier to start making bad choices that require less effort (even though we know perfectly well what the good choices are).
Let's consider an example. In a research study conducted by Columbia University, a group of research psychologists examined 1,112 trials over a 10-month period.
These trials considered matters of probation, conducted by a specific commission appointed to personally evaluate the case of a convicted criminal and determine whether he was granted parole. Naturally, you would expect the judges of this commission to make their decision based on considerations such as the type of crime committed or what laws had been violated when making a decision.
But what the researchers found was something very different. In fact, they saw that the judges’ decisions had nothing to do with what was happening in the courtroom or with the type of case.
Instead, they were determined by the hours of the day it took for them to make a decision.
Their research indicated that in trials undergone at the beginning of the morning, a criminal had up to a 65% chance of having a favorable judgment. But as the morning progressed and the judge became “worn out” by continual decision making, those odds rapidly decreased to zero.
They found this clear trend after analyzing more than 1,100 cases over a period of 10 months. Regardless of the type of crime committed, it didn’t matter if it was rape, robbery, or embezzlement. A criminal was much more likely to be granted parole if his trial was the first in the morning, or the first after lunch, than at other times of the day. | https://medium.com/the-apeiron-blog/reasons-why-you-make-bad-decisions-according-to-science-e53b061926a8 | ['Desiree Peralta'] | 2020-12-23 11:03:22.975000+00:00 | ['Life Lessons', 'Psychology', 'Advice', 'Education', 'Science'] |
Having a degree in Computer Science from a top university isn’t enough anymore | This is the first time ever, since the 8th grade I guess, that I write in a public forum like this. And although I’m almost certain that little to no readers will stumble upon my stories, it feels nice to imagine having a listening ear and a small audience, so hello to you, my friend.
I graduated from Tel Aviv University with two degrees: Computer Science and Psychology. It took me longer than the usual amount of time to finish my studies, for many reasons that I will not bore you with right now, but eventually I finished. And today I’m taking my first steps in the journey of finding my next and first position in Software Engineering.
You need to stand out. Hundreds of people apply to that job listing that you think fits you so well. Many of them will be better than you in a variety of skills, and you need to somehow stand out.
I hear this a lot, and after applying for over 30 positions in the last few months, and not having a single call back, I think they’re right. I’m not standing out enough, although believe me, I am a catch, but something isn’t working well up ’til now.
And something needs to change.
So I decided to enroll in a Udacity Nanodegree Program (bet you didn’t see that coming).
I mean, let’s be honest, my average is neither good or bad, and unless I put something in my CV that makes up for this somewhat bad disadvantage, I won’t be standing out anywhere (I say somewhat because I don’t think we should measure peoples’ abilities according to their grades, and one day I’ll write more about the subject).
Anyway, I enrolled in the “Full Stack Web Developer” program. In it, I get to work on 5 different projects that I can add to my CV, and that will help me work on my skills and be more involved in this world I’m very eager to become a part of. It took me a good amount of courage to take this step, since it costs a fortune to an unemployed grad like me, but I’m grateful I did it.
In my next story (is this what I should call every piece I write in here?), I’ll be writing about my first steps in the program, how it’s going so far, and some more stuff like that. | https://medium.com/@ayahsgayar/having-a-degree-in-computer-science-from-a-top-university-isnt-enough-anymore-97d11654f3d5 | ['Ayah Abu Sgayar'] | 2021-04-25 18:40:46.074000+00:00 | ['Computer Science', 'Full Stack', 'Nanodegree', 'Udacity', 'Graduate'] |
A Love Letter On The Real Meaning Of Love | I thought I knew what I believed. After listening to His words, I was not sure anymore. Though I tried to dismiss His teaching, I just couldn’t. And then there were the miracles He continued to perform.
Unable to take it any longer, I decided to visit Him under the cover of night. I knew I was taking a big risk by visiting Him but I did it anyway. I simply needed answers to my questions! The risk was worth the reward! Though He spoke many things that I did not understand that night, there was a particular statement He made that struck me. It was His statement about love. He said: For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes Him will not perish but have everlasting life.
I thought more about His words as I walked home that night.
For God so loved the world: The word world stuck with me. Why did God love the world? What did the world do to deserve such love? Shouldn’t He punish the world? As these thoughts ran through my head, I had an epiphany. Love is not a reward but a gift. It is based solely on the heart of the giver and not the performance of the receiver. While a reward can be earned, a gift by definition cannot be earned…it can only be received. I realized that if someone has to deserve my love, then it is not love at all. I could not escape this truth: My ability to love depends solely on the condition of my heart.
That He gave His only begotten Son: This made me realize that love takes action. Love just doesn’t talk about meeting a need, it does something to meet the need. Furthermore, love positions itself to give rather than receive. And it is not just looking to give just anything, it is looking to give its very best. This is what God did concerning His Son — He gave the word His best. Therefore, I should give my best if I truly have love in my heart. Love gives its very best to meet the needs of those who are not deserving.
This really made me think about how I love those in my care. Do I treat them differently depending on their behavior? Do I always give my best no matter what?
That whosoever believes Him: That He used whosoever told me that not everybody accepts love. Though I selflessly sacrifice to meet the needs of others does not mean that my love will be accepted! This was a hard pill to swallow. It showed me that love does not expect a reward for its actions. It also showed me that love is not always a bed of roses. It can involve degrees of disappointment and pain. People may question my motivation for choosing to love them. They might even reject it outright. Yet I should love them anyway. No bed of roses at all.
Will not perish but have everlasting life: This part was beautiful for me. It warmed my heart to know that love succeeds in the end. So, though I might go through pain of rejection, the sacrifice will be worth it in the end. Love not only saves but it has a long-lasting effect in the lives of those who receive it.
By the time I got home, I had come up with two definitions for love. First, love is selfless sacrifice to serve and meet the needs of others. Second, love is determined action to lift people up and give them the best life possible according to our capability.
When I got home, I told my wife I loved her. This time I knew what I was saying and purposed in my heart to show her. Now I want you to consider…do you really love? Are you really in love?
My Relationship Lessons
· Love is not about getting your needs met first, it is first about meeting the needs of your partner
· When you say ‘I love you’, you should mean ‘I selflessly sacrifice to serve you
· Love is a not a feeling, love is an action
· Love is a gift given based on the heat of the giver and not a reward given based on the performance of the receiver
· Love is a committed expression to others of the love we have received from God
Sincerely,
Nicodemus | https://medium.com/@emmanuelogunjumo/a-love-letter-on-the-real-meaning-of-love-8defa793c661 | ['Emmanuel Ogunjumo'] | 2019-02-10 21:49:58.877000+00:00 | ['Jesus', 'Love Letters', 'Christianity', 'Love'] |
How can we leverage ML to predict NBA Championship odds? | How can we leverage ML to predict NBA Championship odds?
Introduction
The NBA offseason is a wild time. There is a ton of volatility from players moving between teams and raw rookies coming in from college to coaching changes and entire front office shakeups. These moves keep the basketball universe on edge. After all, these moves are executed by teams with the ultimate goal of winning an NBA championship.
While many pundits and bookmakers tout their picks for the champion during the offseason itself, I have a different idea in mind.
A better time to predict champions would be before the playoffs begin. A full season of 82 games grants enough time for teams to build chemistry and improve their rosters through mid-season trades. With this thought process in mind, I set about trying to build a machine learning model that could accurately predict who would win the championship.
Data Overview
The dataset consists of the following data for each team dating all the way back to the 1979–80 season. The dataset is of size 1104 x 12.
A sample of the training set
We can classify the columns shown above into one of four categories:
Team Information: Year and Team keep track of the individual rows. Team Composition Strength: The columns from MVP — All Defense measure team strength purely based on its roster. For example, the 2019 Golden State Warriors had 2 MVPs on their roster (Steph Curry & Kevin Durant), so the value under their MVP column is 2. Team Performance Strength: Win % conveniently aggregates several quantifiable performance metrics (Offensive Rtg, Defensive Rtg, etc.) as well as intangibles (Team Chemistry, Synergy). Champion: The million-dollar question — whether a team won the title or not. This field is the target variable for the machine learning model.
Unbalanced Dataset
Before we can go ahead and build a classification model on this data, we need to understand the problems caused by using an unbalanced dataset.
Well, what is an unbalanced dataset? In simple terms, an unbalanced dataset is one in which the target variable has more observations in one specific class than the others.
Comparison between Balanced & Unbalanced Datasets
In our case, we see that the number of records where teams haven’t won a championship is almost 25 times that of where teams have won one.
Using the training set as is would result in an inaccurate model because the algorithm receives significantly more examples from one class (‘Not Winning’) which causes it to be biased towards that particular class. It does not learn what makes the other class different and fails to understand the underlying patterns that allow us to distinguish classes.
Balanced Random Forest
While there are multiple statistical methods (under-sampling majority class, over-sampling minority class, etc.) to deal with an unbalanced dataset, Python, fortunately, provides a library to deal with this specific problem.
The library imbalanced-learn offers several re-sampling techniques as well as ensemble classifiers such as Balanced Random Forest to deal with unbalanced datasets. Balanced Random Forest tackles this problem by down-sampling the majority class such that the classification tree runs on a subset of the training data which is balanced.
Now, after we generate training and test sets by performing a 75/25 split on the original dataset, we can run the Balanced Random Forest classifier on the training set.
Feature Importance
After training the Balanced Random Forest classifier on the training set, we can see which features contribute most towards winning a championship.
A method of the Balanced Random Forest classifier called feature_importances_ quantifies the importance of features. A higher value indicates that this feature is more important.
Feature importances
We can see that the most critical factor is Win % which is a measure of how well the team has performed over the season. The next factor is having an MVP on their team. After these two factors, we see the best offensive and defensive players in the league contribute towards winning it all as well.
In a nutshell, a superstar loaded team that wins many games is more likely to win a championship compared to a team that wins the same number of games but has no superstars.
Evaluating the classifier
Now that we have trained the classifier and seen which features are most important, it is time to check if the classifier is any good.
A very intuitive way of checking the performance of any classifier is by its ROC (Receiver Operating Characteristic) curve and its AUC (Area Under Curve). We can also compare these parameters with that of a baseline model.
ROC Curve for the classification model
Without diving into the theory behind ROC curves, it suffices to say that a classifier performs better if it has higher AUC. In this case, the baseline model has an AUC of 0.5 while our model has a much higher AUC of 0.95.
We can also look at the confusion matrix to calculate Precision and Recall.
Confusion matrix for the classifier
Using the confusion matrix, we get 0.9 as Recall and 0.24 as Precision. The Precision of the classifier is low because it identifies multiple potential championship-winning teams. This behaviour resembles real life where we pick more than one team to win it all at the end of the regular season. So we need not try to optimize Precision.
Predictions
Now that we have completed the model building and its evaluation, let’s dive into what the model predicts.
Firstly, let’s look at how the winning probabilities vary for the teams that actually won the title over the years. | https://towardsdatascience.com/how-can-we-leverage-ml-to-predict-nba-championship-odds-56290e9870e4 | [] | 2020-12-11 19:18:33.220000+00:00 | ['Python', 'Predictions', 'Machine Learning', 'Sports Analytics', 'NBA'] |
Vite Labs Listing OKB with Mining Capability | About OKB
OKB is a global utility token issued by OK Blockchain Foundation. It is currently in the form of an ERC-20 token, but will be transformed to the native token of the OK public chain. OKB is designed to connect prospective digital asset projects to OKEx users and professional investors, creating an ecosystem that advances the development of the digital asset industry.
Related Links
Website：https://www.okex.com/
Telegram： https://telegram.me/okexofficial_en
Explorer： https://etherscan.io/token/0x75231f58b43240c9718dd58b4967c5114342a86c
Twitter： https://twitter.com/okex_
Statements
The asset description is taken from official materials such as white papers issued by the official project team so that investors can better understand and evaluate the project. The content of this article is obtained through legal channels to ensure the reliability, accuracy and completeness of the information as far as possible, but does not guarantee the accuracy and completeness of the information stated in the official materials.
Vite Labs does not provide any investment advice or advice on trading techniques, models, algorithms, or any other schemes, and makes no representations, warranties, or guarantees to you of any kind. The Site and the Services are offered strictly on an as-is, where-is basis and, without limiting the generality of the foregoing, are offered without any representation as to merchantability or fitness for any particular purpose. The contents of this article shall not be used as the basis or evidence of morality, responsibility and law, whether expressed or implied.
Cryptocurrency investment is subject to high market risk and price volatility. Please carefully evaluate your capability of handling potential risks and make prudent trading decisions. | https://medium.com/vitelabs/vite-labs-listing-okb-with-mining-capability-1550af5042e6 | ['Khun Sir'] | 2020-02-24 04:09:57.582000+00:00 | ['Cryptocurrency', 'Blockchain', 'Announcements', 'Vite', 'Vitex'] |
5 Ways to expand your Network when Working Abroad | 5 Ways to expand your Network when Working Abroad
If you plan to, or even think about, advancing in your career globally, then why not leverage the networking opportunities you come across during your travels? We’ve composed 5 tips on how to expand your network while working abroad. Unicorn Workspaces Portugal Feb 21, 2020·4 min read
“By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” ― Benjamin Franklin
Tip #1: Go Above and Beyond the Language Barrier
Tip 1 is dedicated to “the gift of gab”. In today’s day and age, most of us know as a fact that English is the dominant global language — especially in the technology and scientific fields. But, when we find ourselves in foreign lands, your native language doesn’t always make the cut and you’ll soon find yourself in a tiny bubble if you don’t expand your linguistic horizons.
It’s essential that you take the time to learn the “hellos” and “goodbyes” and any other pieces of practical language you can absorb while in another territory. This will help you be more sociably accepted by the locals and to gain access to non-tourist streets, shops, restaurants, and take you to the next level when holding a conversation with a future prospect. Trust us, it’s charming and a show of respect — no matter how goofy you may sound in the beginning.
Tip #2: Empower Yourself through Social Media
With the ability to reach the masses at your fingertips in our own home, still in our pajamas and slippers, social media has made a global impact. Social media offers extraordinary tools that can set the right circumstances for your business, and yourself, to be seen all over the world — building an international following through just a few clicks. Admittingly, you will have to invest a good deal of time to build a booming social media presence on the multiple platforms available. It’s definitely a good place to start to connect to like-minded individuals and businesses.
Tip#3: Scout Coworking Spaces and Business-oriented Social Activities
Once you’ve established a firm grip within the social media universe — use this powerful tool to scout for meet-ups, coworking hot-spots, and other social activities within your desired field. Keynote speakers, workshops, and interesting topical lectures can be discovered on a weekly basis if you search for them — seek and you will find.
Once you’ve found your niche, make good use of that cozy coworking space to interact with other like-minded individuals, or specialists, that will continue to expand your horizons of the city, town or wherever you find yourself. This will be of quintessential value to you in the long run. Plus, it’ll be a good spot to take your clients, prospects or future partners to get a feel of your environment.
Tip #4: Engage in the Local Ecosystem
Two keywords: Observe and Absorb — this is your homework in the newfound country you inhabit, in order to be able to behave as a local and to assimilate the environment. Catching up on current events, news, pop culture, and local media will give you an in-depth view of what goes on at a micro and macro level of the country you now reside in. Not only will you know what is currently trending in your respective area, but you’ll also have an insiders scoop to markets in and out of your business territory.
This is a very important point. Imagine yourself in a meeting with a local native who might be of great help to achieve your goals — if you demonstrate know-how about the region you’re looking to expand into, it shows your prospect that you’re serious and have a strategy regarding your target area. Identity is the key to empathy in these make-or-break situations.
Tip #5: Manage Your Time — and more important— Your Expectations
Time is the ultimate currency of life — the more you invest, the more your expectations grow that you get something positive in return. So, if you plan on living on the other side of the planet, then it’s worth your while going for an extended period of time in that destination.
Sure, a month or two will be beneficial for your language skills and you’ll be able to meet some interesting people — but, it may not be enough time to build a solid base and really benefit from the networking aspect of working abroad. Spend as much time as you may need, move on once you’ve invested enough, in order to get your business to the next level. Networking to get a foothold in the global marketplace is no different.
As the world becomes ever more connected through the internet and the globalization, it’s very notable that networking is a major key when roaming in other countries or working around the globe.
Follow Unicorn Workspaces Portugal for more insights and news on the #FutureofWork ;) | https://medium.com/@UnicornPortugal/5-tips-on-how-to-expand-your-network-when-working-abroad-876715111f0 | ['Unicorn Workspaces Portugal'] | 2020-02-21 15:24:00.997000+00:00 | ['Future Of Work', 'Digital Nomads', 'Living Abroad', 'Networking', 'Coworking'] |
Bitcoin, The Greatest Revolution That Could Have Been…. | Disclaimer:
** This article is written from a perspective of a bitcoin supporter for over ten years, software engineer, and distributed network supporter. **
Cypherpunk Movement
In the 1970’s and 1980’s the use of encryption and cryptography was not widely available for the average person. It had been long reserved for military and spy agencies. This would change once the United States government publication on Data Encryption Standard were made public. This would begin to change the mindset of many and the would begin a slow beginning to the movement.
David Chaum’s paper in 1985, Security Without Identification, would be the technical roots of the cypherpunks. By the end of the 1980’s the cypherpunks had begun to resemble something like a movement, but there was still a lot of work ahead both on the legal and technical side. There would always be an uphill battle for the movement, whether legal, technical, or user adoption.
Cypherpunks advocate for the use of cryptography and strong encryption for privacy and anonymity. In 1992 the movement began a mailing list and some monthly events where some of the early members of this movement would meet, talk, and brainstorm. A Cypherpunk’s Manifesto was posted on March 9, 1993 by Eric Hughes. Eric would also be the cypherpunk who coined the motto “Cypherpunks write code”. It also important to note the cypherpunk movement is one that does encourage civil disobedience and to defy policies and laws that erode your privacy. The story of the cypherpunks is ever evolving and the evolution of software is ever evolving.
SSL is a common form of encryption used by almost everyone daily. From email to websites and other services.
2007–2008
Prior to the Great Financial Crisis, banks were taking huge risks and issuing loans in such a way that was very predatory. This led to an influx in housing values as well as a fall in securities tied to real estate assets. The United States housing bubble began to burst, with the filing of bankruptcy of the Lehman brothers in September of 2008, and sprinkle in an international banking crisis and you got a recipe for disaster.
As this financial crisis kicked off, it had begun in 2006 with mortgage delinquencies rising and a list of other problems that were all coming to a head over years of lack of regulations and deregulation. As with all things, what goes up must come down. Housing prices and values had skyrocketed along with it the average person would be taking loans to which banks would provide knowing they could not reasonably pay back, this would blow up in the form of housing crash. Along with this, many hedge funds were liquidated, filed for bankruptcy, or received bailouts.
The bailouts and attempted salvaging giving by the United States governments and others to attempt to save the financial system led to many being extremely disgruntled with the system. Very few people were charged with any crimes and even less were convicted even though clearly crimes had committed and this would be a catalyst to a change. This change would be the culmination of years of evolution within an existing idea, just they could never get all of the pieces together the right way. Bitcoin, not the first in digital currencies and certainly not the last.
The title and abstract of the whitepaper published in 2008.
Bitcoin
Bitcoin began as a project in 2008, for the whitepaper(October 31st, 2008), published to the Cypherpunk mailing list by Satoshi Nakamoto(pseudonym) and January 3rd, 2009 the genesis block was forged. On January 9th, 2009 we saw the beginning of blocks being mined on the network and this is visible in any block explorer. Many have asked why the six day gap and much of that could be contributed as any actual software engineer knows, to life and experimentation. Bitcoin was not birthed of immaculate conception. This is visible from varying times from blocks 1–35 in the blockchain. The difficulty is at 1, however, many confuse this as if no other members on the network for about a year, which is inaccurate. The reason this difficulty is at 1 is because miners at the time were only able to self submit, meaning there was no accurate way of detecting difficulty. For those not familiar with self submission(solo mining), it is the process of submitting hashes for the current block to your own peer. This does not add to network difficulty and since mining pools did not exist at the time there was no accuracy in this information. This is also why there were many orphaned blocks during this time.
Over time there were changes to bitcoin in the first year, the evolution of no longer sending to IP address, the changes to allowing to sync without needing to do so from IRC. Also after the first year there would be huge changes in the overall performance and a growth in miners would begin to permit GPU mining and the inception of mining pools. But let’s not forget in year two bitcoin was hacked with VOI, Satoshi was warned. Also in 2010 , Satoshi would leave after this post. There was a series of events prior to the final post, one of which involved Wikileaks, and the first real use case of Bitcoin’s power.
Bitcoin started to become known the world over, good and bad perceptions were had.
Bitcoin power
Bitcoin’s power was first demonstrated in 2010, by Wikileaks. It was during the banking embargo placed on them that bitcoin was accepted. This was demonstrating the censorship resistant power of bitcoin. This was also would be the topic of the last thing that Satoshi would comment on via bitcointalk. Keep in mind that during this time the world was much different, and regardless of how you may see it now, things were not the same a decade ago.
There was an embargo against donating to Wikileaks, to prevent supporters using PayPal, Mastercard, and Amazon to donate to the organization. This would pave the way for accepting bitcoin as Julian Assange recognized the true power of censorship resistant digital money. There are also a number of other interesting things going on at this time with Anonymous and others. This time more and more were worried about privacy and the Tor usage was on the rise. Satoshi would disappear and in the following year we would see the rise of darknet markets, which it is important to note Silk Road was not the first or the last of these markets. It became more widespread known thanks to sensational media coverage. Once it became known about, it grew to be seen as an amazing marketplace thanks to the merging of technology gaining attraction at the time.
During this time the bitcoin community was mostly comprised of cypherpunks, developers, and anarchist types. Then we also saw one of the first bitcoin exchanges, Mt. Gox in summer 2010, which used to be a platform for buying and selling Magic: The Gathering cards. Roger Ver at this time(2011) was also getting involved in bitcoin, and contrary to what you may feel about him now he did do quite a bit on getting more people involved in bitcoin. Now that would change later, but I will not be getting over into forks and other issues in this article. After the news of the Silk Road hit every local news in the country for drug buying and selling, everyone got their second dose of hearing about bitcoin. Bitcoin at this point was gaining traction but perception to most was that it was used to be disobedient to controlling systems, which is back to the ethos of the cypherpunks.
Bitcoin price had long been just aspirations to see price gains, and after the 2013 run and crash many thought bitcoin price was going to be permanently low. A number of factors led to this notion, Silk Road bust, Mt. Gox, and other factors of how regulations would begin to be imposed had severely impacted the price and overall view of bitcoin. During this lull of a lot of bitcoin price action from 2014 through 2017 we would see the creation of many altcoins, services working to add bitcoin as payment options, but we would encounter our greatest enemy to bitcoin, KYC.
KYC Adoption
Many services and exchanges started requiring KYC because of legal pressures or as a secondary monetization channel. As with most applications we use on our devices they sell our data and use this as a way of profiting off of the use when the application or service is free. Many exchanges have tried to circumvent regulations by operating in regions that do not require KYC or they try to circumvent this with another currency for the trading pairs and models. This has led to a number of large exchanges now becoming KYC and requiring it to withdraw when requesting your bitcoin or other cryptocurrency to be exchanged into the fiat currency you request. KYC and Anti-Money Laundering Laws have created a number of issues for exchanges and the users of the exchanges. There are also a number of non exchange services that are attempting to normalize the use of KYC. This poses problems for the user, regardless of whether it is a perceived issue or an actual issue for the user it does exist. Understand that all sats, are able to be tracked with time if they are not used with mixers such as Whirlpool.
Mixers or CoinJoins do solve some serious problems with the privacy associated with bitcoin as it is transparent and psuedo-anonymous it is not private by design. This distinction is important and has led to a number of arrests over the years, IRS problems, and issues with people tracking down an individual via their wallet and usage. Many are not privy to understanding just how much information is available to anyone with the internet on tracking down your bitcoin usage, purchases, spending, and to whom. It is also important to note that there is also a large number of exchanges now freezing withdrawals and deposits coming from CoinJoins.
KYC to a third party poses a number of threats for your data and the security of your holdings of bitcoin or any other asset if you are not using privacy by design. You can also check OXT Research on transactions and begin to understand what tools are available for chainanalysis. The road ahead is very dangerous as many are now accepting with the concepts of KYC to “stack sats” with services that provide rewards at the cost of your information. This can be a great way of one to obtain bitcoin, however, the real devil is in the details going forward. Those sats are now KYC’ed and unless you are mixing properly you might as well just be sure to properly report. Bitcoin is supposed to be digital cash, we should treat it as such, if we are to rely on company’s to control our money, then why did we even go through the hoops and the struggles?
Banks and institutions bitcoin was to replace, yet they are gaining the control.
Software, what Bitcoin is
Software is computer code and data for a computer. Bitcoin is written
in the C++ Programming language. Software can be configured in a variety of ways and modified accordingly to your needs based on whatever that may be if you have access to the source code. You will also need to be concerned with the license, of the source code if you wish to modify, distribute, sell or brand as your own. Bitcoin ships with a very permissive open source license, the MIT license. This is part of the reason so many coins have forked the code base and shipped their own versions of bitcoin or bitcoin like software. The lightning network daemons and others are also under the MIT license. This allows for unhindered modification even for commercial use. This is where things get a little interesting.
There are a number of ways that code can be controlled, from known configuration models to even some at the server side if the server is hosting said service they can run configurations to change things and modify what you can or can not do. Take note as this applies with plenty of services you currently use. This is extremely noticeable with a number of other services and do not think bitcoin is immune from this. As currently discussed with regards to exchanges freezing assets that are using CoinJoins aka Mixing. This has serious implications over privacy and control of funds within Bitcoin. From a user perspective if you are using your own peer and your own wallet this will not apply to prevent you on how you send or receive, but if everyone is not doing this, it could prevent you from sending bitcoin to someone. It could also prevent you from being sent bitcoin from an individual who is using a custodial service in the future. Configuration and code does not care about your feelings, they control the network and processes, YOU DO NOT.
Bitcoin’s power will be eroded slowly, but surely, it is evident. Just take a look around and you can see the writing on the wall. If you do not then you are allowing your bag bias to blind you from the realities. Just like with everything we create or have good intentions with, we destroy because of greed. Bitcoin is no different. At the end of the day software can be changed and configurations can control the software and networks, do not think it can not.
A view of large corporate towers, they will end up controlling bitcoin.
Bitcoin is distributed?
Censorship resistance only applies when using your own node, it does not apply when relying on other peoples equipment and software. The same can be said about email, social media, or just about any type of services.This is why the argument has always been about distributed versus centralization, decentralized, or distributed networks. Decentralized implies that there is some grouping of services that may rely solely on a number of peers/nodes to process accept traffic and or to facilitate certain functions. Distributed networks imply that you must run the software yourself in order to full participate in the networks, there is a level of understanding on the technical side that is needed in order for the user to actively and safely be a part of that network.
This applies to Tor, Bitcoin, and i2p for example. It may not apply to using some distributed messaging applications as most attempt to simplify this flow for the user. As we simplify for the user there are compromises. These compromises result in loss of some freedoms for the user, this applies on each facet of the argument. Distributed model puts more responsibility on the individual, decentralized offsets some of those responsibilities, and centralized removes all responsibility from the user at the cost of the ownership of data for the user. This is very important to understand as we begin to really analyze the vectors against bitcoin that are not network related. The current community forgets bitcoin is still just software and is vulnerable to everything software is vulnerable to.
The Rise of Custodial Services
Bitcoin was started to combat controlling of financial system by institutions and banks.The belief was that in time that they would play a role with using it as a possibly another asset but at no point should they be able to control it or the use of bitcoin. Obviously that time is upon us, as recently PayPal has ultimately deployed the future model for most people that are outside of the
currently niche cryptocurrency community. Essentially it will act as a custodian and you can buy or sell bitcoin but you have no control over it. This will be the standard going forward regardless however you may feel. The harsh reality is this goes back to what bitcoin is, SOFTWARE.
As banks can hold cryptocurrency wallets, similar to what PayPal is doing the banks will roll out their own versions. I also wrote an article about this last year when I was privy to some information and given a demo. Now, they may hold and act as a custodian and PayPal is demonstrating what that will now be like. The user may buy or sell bitcoin but have no control over the sats that they may purchase. I have seen a lightning like implementation for banks, it is heavily censored and runs their own versions of the networks, this includes the ability to censor transactions. This is important to understand, the need for the institutions to control the flow from start to finish as they currently do with the fiat. Bitcoin will be easier for the masses to obtain but at the cost of the power of bitcoin. You may argue that they can not control your non KYC sats and to some level this is true, however, they can prevent merchants using their services from accepting your sats.
Banks and institutions are quite aware they can not control bitcoin users, as long as they are not in their system. However, as demand may increase through the custodial services offered by them they will accumulate through exchanges and end up killing off competition. With this they will create regulations and policies preventing the sale from miners to anyone other than to them with proper documentation. This will be seen as a good thing as the price will go up, for a while, however it will pervert and destroy the initial ideals and power of bitcoin. For some, the revolution of bitcoin will be their couple of hundred of dollar investment returns dividends, for more it will result in them again being under control of the very institutions and banks that was sought to be stopped with bitcoin.
One can argue that this simply will not happen, however, look at PayPal, now purchasing BitGo and looking into other options. Each company buying into bitcoin and being championed is further bolstering of this movement to a controlled bitcoin. They are riding on the fact that the maxis and cheerleaders welcome the attention in hopes of a little clout on Twitter. Which is ironic as even Jack Dorsey a big supporter of Bitcoin does not support a censorship resistant model and has been very clear about this. Understanding this attack surface has largely been ignored even when individuals such as myself and others have brought it to the public. Bitcoin will be controlled if this is not stopped, you can live in a pretend world to which you may deny this but it is approaching faster each passing day. There are only a few ways to combat this and many are not going to fight it as long as Number Go Up, they will see it as a net positive, even as it erodes the power of Bitcoin.
A topology view of a network and it’s routes.
Closing
Cash is still king, regardless of what anyone thinks cash is still mostly used for criminal activity. Bitcoin and others may be used in some cyber crime
like ransomware, however there is a number of organizations that will refuse to switch to cryptocurrency. Price fluctuations impact the value and this poses problems when you are dealing with operational cost. Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies offer plenty of opportunities for individuals which is very important to it’s success. But we can not be naive as to think that software can not be manipulated via outside sources. As you process this remember, you were willing to sacrifice more and more for the opportunity for various other platforms at the cost of your freedom. Bitcoin is no different. The only way to combat this is to stop supporting institutions and banking to get involved, they will end up controlling it all as they accumulate and force others out. As the meme goes, money printer goes Brrrr! They can print to control and force regulations on miner operations, control who you can send and receive from and to, as well as control who has access to the sats without them being prevented from participating. It does not take as much now to make this possible as it did in 2009–2014, the stage is now set. What side will you be on?
I would also like to point out that this is not speculation, this is information directly available to everyone. You are seeing this all unfold daily with each passing day. The hard reality is that for some the revolution could be the price increase regardless of the sacrifice of the core values of bitcoin. I think it would be a great injustice to our society to allow this to happen, but if it were then everyone would begin moving to Monero, privacy by design and is being scrutinized and in some cases they want to outlaw. This is a great sign for the individual, be sure to watch all surfaces and vectors, be aware of other options. Remember software is a tool, use the right tool for the job and what works for you. Bitcoin was not the first digital currency and will not be the last. It did hit several things right and I still support it, just I am not blinded by bag bias to not see the writing on the wall. Remember what happened when we trusted banks, it started the downfall that led to the creation of bitcoin. Now, they are gaining control over it.
You should ask yourself this question, if you do, then cryptocurrency is probably not ideal for you.
TL;DR: Banks were the inspiration to create bitcoin as they mismanage the economy and destroyed lives for many. Now, we are giving them bitcoin to control and perverse for their needs. Stop supporting that move and stop cheerleading for it. Only you can stop bitcoin from losing it’s power.
You can find me on Twitter, Signal, and Tox. Feel free to message me. | https://medium.com/@nixops-56291/bitcoin-the-greatest-revolution-that-could-have-been-24b1264ca693 | [] | 2020-11-05 03:34:05.833000+00:00 | ['Cypherpunk', 'Bitcoin', 'Kyc', 'Cryptography', 'Privacy'] |
Testing The Hypothesis: Think like a scientist to defeat your self-doubt | When to Test the Hypothesis Instead of Worrying
Testing the hypothesis is based on the traditional CBT technique of challenging your thoughts. In this process, we attempt to notice automatic negative thoughts and reframe them into something more positive.
Hypothesis testing is a slightly less common variation in which we notice an unrealistic thought pattern, assess it rationally, and then actually test our assumptions. This can be powerful for stubborn, action-based thought patterns such as the “I can’t do [x]” statements listed above.
You should consider hypothesis testing when you are trying to form or break a habit but notice that a recurring, counterproductive thought gets in the way. Let’s look at an example.
Hypothesis Testing Step By Step
Identify the Goal: Hypothesis testing is usually, but not always, used when you have a goal. Some therapists suggest hypothesis testing for compulsions while others use it for smaller-scale problems such as procrastination. For this example, consider the following scenario: you are a graduate student studying for an exam. You’ve been studying for hours, but you can’t bring yourself to take a break. The goal, in this case, is to get out of the library and clear your head. You know this is good for you, but cognitive distortions are telling you that you’ll fail if you stop studying. Identify the Stumbling Block: If you’re driven to hypothesis testing, there’s some kind of recurring thought or fear preventing you from taking an action. Be as specific as possible: what are you afraid will happen if you don’t take this step? Why can’t you go to dinner, send an email, talk to your partner about a conflict?
These first steps form your hypothesis: If I do [x], then [y] will happen.
If I leave the library for an hour, I won’t get through all the chapters and I will fail my test.
Now, you can do one of two things:
Evaluate the hypothesis logically. Drawing on your past experiences, background knowledge, or advice from friends, decide whether your hypothesis actually makes sense. Write it out if you have to, but here’s a hint: if you have anxiety, the answer is usually a resounding no way. If you can talk yourself into this truth, congratulations! Go forth and do the healthy thing with less fear. If not…
Photo by Houcine Ncib on Unsplash
Test the hypothesis. If you can’t reason your way out of the anxious thought, give yourself permission to test the hypothesis on a small scale. In the library example, you might formulate a very specific plan: you will leave the library for ten minutes and walk around outside. At the end of those ten minutes, you will see if the break really impeded your progress like you’d feared. Be objective. The goal of this exercise is to confront your brain with concrete evidence that it’s being irrational (which, if you’ve gotten this far, you probably know subconsciously that it is.) Feeling a little stressed when you get back does not prove the hypothesis that you would surely fail your test if you took a break.
Whether you outline your hypothesis or actually test it, the outcome should be similar. That is, you develop an experience that counteracts the anxious thought, making it easier to resist that line of thinking in the future.
What if the Hypothesis is True After All?
Photo by Aarón Blanco Tejedor on Unsplash
Being brave doesn’t mean you aren’t scared. Being brave means you are scared, really scared, badly scared, and you do the right thing anyway. — Neil Gaiman
In testing a hypothesis with a scary outcome, you’re accepting the possibility that the outcome could, theoretically, come true.
Now, most of the time, when you’re using this strategy to combat anxiety, that’s not going to happen. In fact, if you’ve done the first step of assessing how realistic your fear is, you’ll almost never run into a situation where the hypothesis is correct.
That’s the beauty of this strategy: you trust yourself enough to do something uncomfortable, even though you’re afraid something bad could happen. Each time things go right despite that fear, you reinforce your ability to sit with difficult emotions and push through irrational thoughts. And each time things go right despite that fear, you start to reroute the cognitive distortions that got you there in the first place.
In other words, the more hypotheses you test, the less anxiety you feel about similar choices in the future.
And if something does go wrong, that doesn’t mean that you made the wrong choice in challenging your assumptions. Let’s say you were too afraid to send a draft to your editor because they might not like it. You decide to challenge this hypothesis and send the draft anyway, only to find that they don’t like it. In fact, it turns into your worst-case scenario: they critique the concept, the execution, the length…you never should have sent it at all, right?
Right?
Wrong!
Anxiety initially had you believe that you wouldn’t be able to bear it if your editor didn’t frame this draft as award-worthy. In reality, while you might feel like crap for a little while, those emotions aren’t going to kill you or even end your writing career. You are not your emotions, and although you’ve put yourself into a vulnerable position, you now know that you can handle such situations when do happen. | https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/testing-the-hypothesis-think-like-a-scientist-to-defeat-your-self-doubt-865651db52b7 | ['Dani Weiss'] | 2020-06-06 23:31:00.897000+00:00 | ['Mental Health', 'Self Improvement', 'Productivity', 'Anxiety', 'Psychology'] |
Carroll Gardens and Dry Erase Wires | May 23rd, 2014
A Story Each Day
I unlocked my bike from the handrail and precariously carried it down the tight stairwell, down the five flights of stairs and out onto fourth avenue. I looked down toward 22nd street. The sky churned and taunted me, threatening to grow dark, but this was my chance — I wouldn’t have another free day to bike the across the bridge into Manhattan, and so whether it rained or not, this was it. I stepped onto my bike, and was off.
22nd street, 21st street, 20th street — all the way down to 9th street, past the Brooklyn Hot Dog shop that I’d have visited if I had less respect for calories. I biked past all of the roaring dusty construction near Smith Street, and north, through the tree shrouded streets of Carroll Gardens.
Someday.
I thought. Someday, I’ll live here, in a nice, clean brownstone with trees on my street, two blocks from a fancy restaurant, and a block from a bookstore, with a nice wife and two kids.
I biked past Mercury Coffee, and that chocolate shop that I’d have visited if I had less respect for my bank account. The rich aroma wafted through the streets and made me wish that I was inside, slowly easing my afternoon away, instead of racing like mad toward the Brooklyn Bridge.
The serenity of Carroll Gardens slowly gave way to the densely packed streets of downtown Brooklyn, and I snaked my way through the traffic, leaving my desire for a clean, calm, and rich-smelling brownstone far behind.
I raced onto the bike path in between the two lanes and saw the bridge ahead of me — massive, strong, ancient and durable in the billowing clouds, not like the last bridge crossed.
The last bridge that I crossed: I’m still not sure if I want to tell you where it was, or even if I could. It was fragile, and rickety, even though I’m sure that it wasn’t always like that. I used to cross that bridge every single day, until it slowly wore out.
My mind snapped back to the Brooklyn Bridge as I jerked out of the way to avoid a tourist. I stole a glance over my shoulder and heard a British tourist apologizing for trying to snap a picture while standing in the bike lane.
The last bridge I crossed was never as busy as the Brooklyn Bridge — if it was, it would’ve broken down much sooner.
I paused underneath the first tower to look up at the expanse of wires, netting the bridge together like dry erase marker on a whiteboard sky. I thought about snapping a picture to remember, but I have no trouble remembering bridges that I’ve crossed. I reached the second tower quickly, and passed squad upon squad of tourists who stopped to buy candy at the end of the bridge. I let my bike glide down the ramp and onto the busy streets of Manhattan.
The last bridge I crossed didn’t take me to a frenetic city, brimming to the edge with a corrupt density of people. The last bridge I crossed took me to her, and the last time I crossed it, I had already let it grow old and decay and sag. The Brooklyn Bridge and the Manhattan Bridge have the city of New York to repair them and watch out for them, replace the broken boards and fill in the cracking asphalt. But our bridge only had us. We had built it ourselves; starting from the moment we saw each other. And with the first words we said to each other, we started to lay the foundation. Our eyes built the bridge that our hearts slowly crossed, and we found ourselves standing above open water, looking down at the crashing waves.
But then, one day, we stopped crossing it. We found other ways to get to where we wanted to go. The asphalt cracked, and the wooden boards on the pedestrian path started to rot. The bridge started to sag and the waves below us started to eat away at the foundation.
The last time she crossed it, she’d visited me, in Brooklyn — Or at least, I thought she did. She was there in person, with her smooth humble smile and her rich quiet laughter — but her mind was somewhere else.
We talked for six hours. Riding the subway through Manhattan like it was an attraction at Disney, and we were nine-year-old gluttons for entertainment with an all-day pass to the amusement park.
Something finally came into focus, like I’d been using a cheap lens set on auto focus, when I should’ve just been adjusting the focus manually all along. I’m not sure if it was my god, or her skepticism, or if it was her family, or my loneliness. Or my desire to settle down in a calm, clean brownstone in a neighborhood like Carroll Gardens, when all she wanted was anything but that. Someday, I told her, but she didn’t want to hear any of that. And no matter how many more times I wanted to cross the bridge that we had built, it had already been crumbling beneath my feet, and I was hanging onto the dry erase wires with both hands.
I said goodbye to her at the airport. She turned, and left, and that was the last chance I had to cross that bridge before it finally crumbled to pieces and fell into the waves below it.
And so I paused, caught my breath, and turned my bike around, back across the Brooklyn Bridge, for the very last time. | https://medium.com/a-story-each-day/carroll-gardens-and-dry-erase-wires-5e31bc997dcd | ['A Story Each Day'] | 2015-05-24 03:03:54.419000+00:00 | ['Short Story', 'Fiction', 'A Story Each Day'] |
How Pedigree Cleverly Used a Classic Pet’s Game to Tackle Depression | How Pedigree Cleverly Used a Classic Pet’s Game to Tackle Depression
A reminder that dogs can indeed be your best friends
Screencapture from Brings It Back.
264 million.
According to the World Health Organization, that’s the estimated number of people suffering from depression in the world.
To put that into perspective, that’s equivalent to the entire population of Indonesia — the fourth largest country on the planet.
What’s more, up to 800,000 people take their own lives each year. That’s a shocking statistic to even think about.
Clearly, depression is both a significant mental and societal issue that needs to be dealt with seriously by everyone — and thankfully, there are some brands that graciously take on part of that incredible responsibility.
In fact, one particular pet food brand’s campaign did it so well, they managed to seamlessly integrate a timeless game that you play with your dog with the overarching issue of depression.
I’m talking about Pedigree Petfoods and their 2019 campaign “Brings It Back.” Let’s take a look at exactly how they pulled this off, and what we all can take away from this amazing campaign. | https://medium.com/better-marketing/how-pedigree-cleverly-used-a-classic-pets-game-to-tackle-depression-b4d3c19f531d | [] | 2020-12-02 14:02:59.556000+00:00 | ['Marketing', 'Strategy', 'Culture', 'Social Media', 'Pets'] |
Time travel is easy | I time travel all the time. Now, for those of you who know me, no I am not micro-dosing again and getting the doses wrong, I am talking about Meditating and getting into a time that has passed, along with a time in the future.
Photo by RODRIGO GONZALEZ on Unsplash
Memories are tricky; in the present world, I feel when you remember something, you really only see a version of the last memory which is adjusted and not the actual events. In meditation though, I find that a very different memory surfaces. When in a meditative state, I find that you actually see the past as an observer, whereas your real memories are more in the first person (you see the memory from your eyes instead of looking at you and others from a vantage point).
I think it is the exact same thing when you manifest in life. It is hard to believe that even though I was trained in Transendential Meditation years ago, it took the shock of something to get me to do it again.
I try to “time travel” every day, when I can. I make a point of doing it before I do anything else in the morning. Lately it has been hard as my living conditions were not the best, but as I move into a new place, it has the perfect setting for meditating. On day two in the place and I have found it so good, it has taken the “travel” to a new level, which is a wee bit scary.
Over the past month, there have been four people who have come back into my life out of the blue. Each of them, I shared both a physical and an emotional connection at some point in life over the past several years. Each of them ended and each of them drifted back in my life at the exact same time. Given the time of massive retrograde we are currently in, I expected one or two would, but four is a lot for me.
W hen something ends for me, it is over. “End” is simply when I make the decision, “Ok, enough. Time to move on.” That point in time could be a much different point than what the other party to the equation believes it to be. Either way, I move on completely at some point and never look back. This is ususally after I attempt to either make something work or apologize, but in the end, I go into the woods to never return to that humans life.
What is wonderful about time traveling in meditation is you see yourself in the third person which shows you how good or bad you were. This retrograde of people forced me to revist their times. Over the course of the last eighteen months, I have been doing a ton of regression meditation and have begun to understand those periods where things go wrong and why. Being a narcissist for a period of time is usually the trigger that creates the lows while being more of an empath creates the highs for me. Given that knowledge, it is easy to then project my future through manifesting what it is I truly want to live like by starting from the right jumping off point. It is working better than I could have dreamed.
All this leads me to the four humans who came back into my life this month. It was fascinating to see the difference in the people and how they approached me. Two were clearly in the present to point out the shitty things I did to them. I already knew what I did and they were not wrong. I was not a good human to these two and they had a good time explaining it to me. I took it and got the chance to apologize and I suspect that will be it. The other two, we did not part ways badly, but we did part ways. They did not want to vent to me, they wanted to catch up. They wanted to time travel and be made to feel like they did during “our” time.
It is really hard to go back to the past and not feel different. We change, we mature and we experience different things. One of them realized that after about five minutes chatting, but the last one, the fourth and most recent to this post, simply wanted to experience a connection to a person they thought would be there forever. They wanted to feel what I feel when I meditate, but they wanted it in reality.
She wanted to physically travel in time back to when we were happy together. She wanted to live in that time again.
Was it the isolation of Covid that drove that or was it something more? She lived in Paris through Covid, which was where we met years ago. It was hard on her. She like so many others wanted to feel “connected” to someone that was familiar. I understood it and tried to help, but it is hard to time travel in reality. All you “feel” and “see” are memories. Those memories are a bastardization of the good and bad, not a realistic view of who we both were.
Growing as a human is hard. I think the world, especially the US, right now, has a very hard time realizing how wrong we are about so many things. How “memories” are not real. How many people refuse the vaccines for whatever reason, but still see their loved ones die and yet blame the Doctors for “killing” them or letting them die because they would not flush their stomachs with bleach or give them horse medicine?
State of mind, is just that, a state. You have the power to change your state of mind any time you desire. You have the power to go back in time and see yourself for who you really are and you have the power to travel forward and manifest who you “are”. To do that, you need to look in the mirror and first ask yourself,
“Am I ready to see the unvarnished truth about myself? Am I really?”
Realizing who you are is much harder than most think. They see themselves for who they think they are, yet others see a very different picture. I am blessed to be living with my youngest son who keeps me busy chatting with me about all things in his life and his world. I never had any idea just how smart he was and is. He is that way because he is constantly evaluating his own being. I am starting to teach him how to time travel. It is a skill everyone should learn if you want to improve who you are to yourself. Other people's opinions of you are completely irrelevant. You are the person you make.
In this time, the holiday time, it is easy to feel sad, happy, fortunate and all those things that may be masked by “activity”. If you really want to know how you feel, go back in time. | https://medium.com/@paul_harkins/time-travel-is-easy-3691b75555f5 | ['Writer At Large'] | 2021-12-29 17:08:25.370000+00:00 | ['Memories', 'Love', 'Relationships', 'Paris'] |
21 DAYS Healthy Smoothie Program For Weightloss Guidance | 21 day smoothie diet before and after nighttime smoothie for weight loss
THE SMOOTHIE DIET is a revolutionary new life-transformation Program that not solely ensures that can assist you to lose extra pounds and really feel higher than you’ve in years, it additionally guarantees to remove extra physique fats in 3/7/21/30 days— sooner than something you’ve tried earlier than. Your belly can become 10 flat belly
Smoothie recipes for weight loss
Don’t You Want to Be a SLimmer Sexier You!
Delicious & Easy-To-Make Healthy Smoothies For Rapid Weight Loss ThatIncreased Energy, & Incredible Health!
WHAT MAKES THE SMOOTHIE DIET DIFFERENT?
This Is NOT only a large guide of smoothie recipes. You are getting the identical confirmed 3-Week weight reduction and well being enhancement program I share with my non-public purchasers.
The key that makes the Smoothie Weight-reduction plan so efficient is the Customized 3-Week Weight Loss Schedule. All of the smoothies are given in a really particular sequence and frequency to maximize your outcomes.
For instance, the nutrient and ingredient ratios differ week to week to verify the burden retains coming off and stays off.
I’ve used my information as a Wellbeing Coach and what I’ve realized from all my purchasers to verify this program delivers speedy outcomes.
I’ve meticulously researched particular elements and nutrient properties to maximize the effectiveness of this program.
All it’s important to do is change sure meals with the smoothie recipes I present after which watch because the kilos soften effortlessly off your physique and your vitality ranges skyrocket
EVERYTHING YOU GET
In only a few minutes from now, you will have entry to all of the instruments it’s essential to shed extra pounds and get wholesome as rapidly as attainable. I’ve left nothing as much as probability, everything is laid out step-by-step so you can begin at present and shed extra pounds by tomorrow!
THE SMOOTHIE DIET 21-DAY PROGRAM
You are getting the FULL 21-DAY WEIGHT LOSS AND HEALTH IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM I frequently use with my non-public teaching purchasers.
Over 36 DELICIOUS FAT-MELTING MEAL-REPLACEMENT SMOOTHIE RECIPES
SHOPPING LISTS FOR EACH WEEK To Make It Tremendous Easy To Get Every part You Want
SMOOTHIE MAKING TIPS & PREP GUIDE To Make Positive there may be ZERO trial and error and to make sure you spend much less time within the kitchen and extra time having fun with your new confidence and vitality ranges!
May Some questions’s Answer are running in your mind Given Below
I NEED TO LOSE MORE WEIGHT, HOW DO I CONTINUE AFTER THE 21 DAYS?
The very best part of The Smoothie Weight-loss plan is that you need to use it for so long as you want, to lose as a lot of weight as you need.
I make it tremendously easy to proceed to utilize everything you be taught within the first three weeks to increase this system for the subsequent few weeks and even months.
And every extra week will likely be simply as fulfilling as the primary three!
My aim is to offer you all of the instruments it’s essential to proceed dropping pounds and getting wholesome for so long as it’s essential to.
WON’T I JUST GAIN ALL THE WEIGHT BACK?
In contrast to different diets, this isn’t a “quick-fix”. 21 days is just the start to a lifetime of higher well being and a slimmer physique.
The 1 remark I get on The Smoothie Weight-reduction plan is that after just a few weeks, the cravings for sweets and junk meals have basically disappeared.
This makes it very simple to maintain the burden off.
I additionally present you precisely the best way to transition again into your common consuming patterns after the 21 days whereas nonetheless incorporating smoothies into your weight loss program to maintain the burden off. In truth, most individuals love the smoothies a lot they don’t wish to give them up after 21 days! As a few of my purchasers have mentioned, it is a full life-transformation program.
I HAVE TYPE-2 DIABETES, WILL THIS WORK FOR ME?
Recent, complete fruits, in addition to blended inexperienced smoothies not solely present a wholesome manner for diabetics to get extra vegetables and fruit of their weight loss program, inexperienced smoothies additionally could assist reverse among the weight loss program and way of life issues that exacerbate diabetes, or contributes to its development.
The wonderful thing about the Smoothie Weightloss diet plan is that it kicks off a chain-reaction of the way of life adjustments that cut back or remove the elements that exacerbate the illness, and reverses the situation in some people.
Please be aware that whereas I’m a diet professional, I’m not a physician. In case you have diabetes or ANY different well-being situation, it’s best to at all times consults along with your physician first earlier than making any dietary adjustments.
I DON’T HAVE A LOT OF TIME IN THE DAY, IS THIS HARD TO FOLLOW?
When you don’t have numerous time within the day, then this program is PERFECT for you.
My splendid buyer is a busy mother who works, goes to high school, has errands to run, youngsters to drop off/decide up, and many others. I designed this program to be tremendously easy and take minutes a day.
I even present tips about the best way to minimize corners to shave some worthwhile additional minutes off your smoothie prep.
The recipes are fast to make and you’ll both get pleasure from them proper after you make them or take them with you.
You’ll at all times have a scrumptious, filling meal with you. And should you can press one button in your blender then you may comply with this program :)
DO I NEED AN EXPENSIVE BLENDER OR ARE THE INGREDIENTS HARD TO FIND?
With the elevated recognition of smoothies, blender costs have gotten very aggressive.
An important factor is to have a blender with a robust motor. Whereas the bender you’ve now will most likely work simply high-quality, If you’re critical about making an enormous change in your well being, then I present you among the top-of-the-line blenders.
However, I additionally present you with cheaper fashions that may work simply high-quality and are underneath $50.
The elements aren’t arduous to search out and if they’re, I present a full “Swap Checklist” that reveals your simple substitutes to make use of should you can’t discover one thing.
IS THERE ANYTHING THAT COMES IN THE MAIL?
This can be an absolutely digital product. You’ll not obtain something within the mail. The wonderful thing about that is that you’ll have entry to it in minutes.
You do not have to attend for something to reach your doorstep. I wish to harness the thrill you feel proper now and get you began instantly.
You may even do your week 1 procuring at present and begin tomorrow…or begin at present! The recordsdata are in PDF format. After you checkout, you’ll routinely be taken to a web page the place you may obtain and examine everything in your laptop, pill, or smartphone.
For these of you who would like a printed guide, the Quickstart Bonus is designed for this. It’s a 20-page shortened model of the primary information that may be printed out and adopted similar to a printed guide.
Some Common Question Answer
Are smoothies a good way to lose weight?
How much weight can you lose in a week on a smoothie diet?
How long can you go on a smoothie diet?
Note: Click here for more information for the 21 DAYS Healthy Smoothie Program For Weight loss | https://medium.com/@essaystories/21-days-healthy-smoothie-program-for-weight-loss-guidance-931efb19d1bb | [] | 2021-02-20 12:22:10.887000+00:00 | ['Weight Loss Program', 'Weightloss Recipe', 'Weightloss Foods', 'Health Foods', 'Healthy Lifestyle'] |
TensorFlow está muerto, que viva TensorFlow | Head of Decision Intelligence, Google. Hello (multilingual) world! This account is for translated versions of my English language articles. twitter.com/quaesita
Follow | https://medium.com/datos-y-ciencia/tensorflow-est%C3%A1-muerto-que-viva-tensorflow-f18c86ca5515 | ['Cassie Kozyrkov'] | 2019-10-10 02:43:27.155000+00:00 | ['Artificial Intelligence', 'Ciencia Y Datos', 'Data Science', 'Technology', 'Machine Learning'] |
Prisoner 5 | *Prisoner 5 is a serial science fiction story released every Saturday*
Chapter 3
The numbness returns after a time. Numbness of the body and the mind.
The timelessness of the day to day, hour to hour is torture worse than the beatings. The beatings are real, everything else seems a vague illusion of a nightmare.
The voices in my head, the voices of my neighbors; they blend making it hard to know what’s real. What’s not. Either way I go with it. Questions are questions I have also, so it’s hard to answer wondering if I’m asking myself or if 22 asked. Is there even a 22? Are my speculations based on delusion? My neighbors input, is it also my own thought. Am I really alone and imagining the voices around me? I couldn’t imagine going through this alone. Maybe I don’t want the answer to that question. Either way it’s horrific.
I moved to the corner and sat. Moving still hurt but like the old saying — still alive for what it’s worth. Sitting the numbness set back in. Mind and body.
The grey made it easier to go numb. The floor and the walls came together in a way that blended, seamlessly causing a nauseating illusion at first but at least now my mind has wrapped around the perception. Round, in my head it’s round. A bubble of misery.
The screams, getting further away, echo. The size of this place must be immense. How many tens or hundreds are here? Thousands? Where is here?
Closing my eyes, leaning my head back against the cold wall I inhale deeply. Pressing my back against the wall, the healing cold. Soothing. Now. Now? I wait. Waiting for…I don’t know. Just waiting.
Fire-ants? I can’t stop thinking about fire-ants. Two words I seem to know but I can’t remember them together and why associate with pain? Fire burns. Ants. Burning ants? Ants that burn. Bite. Ants that sting like fire when they bite. Yes! Fire.
It hurts so much to remember. I hold my head, squeezing helps — it hurts. Hurts differently.
I am Prisoner 52781 — 340 but my neighbors call me 5.
Chapter 4 | https://medium.com/@j-leegraves/prisoner-5-459a12fbbe61 | ['J. Lee Graves'] | 2021-01-09 18:41:08.480000+00:00 | ['Mystery', 'Serial Fiction', 'Fiction', 'Science Fiction', 'Creative Writing'] |
When art is open sourced | In the software technology world, we’ve seen a massive trend towards open-source technology.
Before I get into a deeper discussion, I want to define “open-source”, which is code made available globally — that is, for every developer or anyone who knows how to access and use the code. Open source platforms provide a method for collaboration on a global scale.
Some examples include Google’s open-source machine learning library TensorFlow, and the open sourced cloud computing infrastructure as a service platform — OpenStack. While open-source is nothing new, it’s certainly a trend that seems to be continuing.
The result has been rewarding as many companies are building products off the backs of existing technologies. With borderless access and democratization of ideas and information, the rates of progress that we’re seeing are unprecedented.
For the first time in history, every human citizen has a chance to tap into existing systems of thought and borrow code to build entirely new types of technologies and services.
However, while we’ve seen this become popular in the computer software space, this “open-source” phenomenon hasn’t been widely adopted in the mainframe of entirely different disciplines outside of software.
I realized this recently after coming across a video on YouTube last week. In this video, a songwriter sings a song with no background music and has trouble finding the right melody.
What happens next is incredible.
Over 20+ musical instruments from Piano, Bass, Drums Swing, Drums Beat, DoubleBass, Classic Guitar, Keyboard 1, Cymbal, Saxophone, Tuba, Keyboard 2, String, Cello 1, DoubleBass, Keyboard 3 submit their instrumental melodies across the globe via YouTube to support and bring the lyrics and the songwriters’ original song to life called “Give it up”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoHxoz_0ykI
In this case, what started as a simple song with no instruments turned into a beautiful masterpiece with the contribution of other artists.
Imagine what we could create if the entire world and all disciplines were open-sourced and adopted this model.
For those of us who have half written stories, a canvas that remains partially painted, or a design that could benefit from a global audience — how many new ideas do you think would emerge if we were to open-source our art?
Who knows what possibilities exist?
We might very well find our individual artistic endeavors turn into global symphonies. | https://medium.com/the-ascent/when-art-is-open-sourced-cc0d28c6f4d2 | ['Yasmeen Turayhi'] | 2017-03-07 14:50:15.349000+00:00 | ['Art', 'Creativity', 'Hacks', 'Music', 'Open Source'] |
Binance & The Ongoing Evolution of Security | This is nothing new within the cryptocurrency industry as we are well aware. With the creation of any currency, be it decentralized or not, comes with it the possibilities of nefarious actions by many individuals and groups across the globe.
One would be remiss if not to note that the security vulnerabilities of an exchange are entirely different from that of a specific token or currency. In this case, the security integrity of Bitcoin (BTC) was not affected, nor targeted. Exchanges are a complex conglomeration of numerous technologies and services that operate within a structure of both traditional networking services, as well as blockchain based development and design. The end goal of blockchain technology is, of course, to meet, as well as exceed, the speed and efficiency of traditional networking services. This, however, has not occurred yet at this time, and is yet to be seen within the evolution of blockchain as a whole.
As directly made mention within Binance’s own statement:
We have discovered a large scale security breach today, May 7, 2019 at 17:15:24 (UTC). Hackers were able to obtain a large number of user API keys, 2FA codes, and potentially other info…
A common issue in traditional network security was the “Security by Obscurity” mindset. This has been proven time and time again to simply not work. This concept could be thought of as burying your money under sand in a vast desert. People may not know where this desert or location is, nor even know where to start looking. With that said, you can guarantee that with any possibility of financial incentive, people will pursue, and many times find, these erroneous and simple blunders.
In the case of the recent Binance exploit, that’s not to say this is the case. Binance undoubtedly develops and progresses it’s own security measures.
Suffice to say, it was not enough.
Exchange vulnerabilities have continued a proven track record of being targeted by the possibility of least resistance. Time and time again we’ve seen new, lower volume, or even existing exchanges targeted as these security vulnerabilities have presented themselves.
This points to an ongoing responsibility of all exchanges to ensure that security compliance is rigidly met, tested and increased as necessary. | https://medium.com/@latium/binance-the-ongoing-evolution-of-security-ce9f87b423a8 | [] | 2019-05-09 21:01:56.972000+00:00 | ['Binance', 'Hack', 'Exchange', 'Bitcoin', 'Cryptocurrency'] |
Kafka Streams with Java 15 | Kafka Streams is a Streaming library similar to Spark and Flink which works with Apache Kafka. Kafka stream can be useful to process historical and near-real-time big data workloads but also for non-realtime analytical computations at scale for the online world as well. Kafka-Streams is elastic, highly scalable, fault-tolerant, and fully integrated with Kafka. You can use Kafka Stream with Java, Scala, Kotlin JVM applications and also have exactly-once processing semantics. Kafka-Streams is being used by the New York Times, Pinterest, Line, Trivago, Zalando, and many other companies. Today I want to share a video of Kafka-Streams running with Kafka 2.6 and Java JDK 15. So Let’s get started.
The Video
The Code
Cheers,
Diego Pacheco | https://medium.com/@diego-pacheco/kafka-streams-with-java-15-2febdb6fba12 | ['Diego Pacheco'] | 2020-11-24 00:26:26.642000+00:00 | ['Java', 'Kafka', 'Kafka Streams', 'Java15', 'Streaming'] |
Solo Bowling | They first met at the Dragon Boat Festival on one of those cloudless summer days lifted straight from a postcard. Li-min, in an effort to get a clear view of the boats racing through Victoria Harbour, tiptoed and jumped to get her eyes over the shoulders of the crowd. It had worked until an excitable American photographer with his eye pressed to the viewfinder knocked her backwards in an attempt to take an action shot. The only person to notice her on the ground was Jiwu, and he helped her up. They spoke a bit and introduced themselves, but their conversations were cut short by the races.
During a lull in the program, Li-min bought Jiwu a pork bun from a nearby cart, and they found a bench in a less populated stretch of the canal. They spoke about the weather and movies, and despite the trivial nature of the conversation, Jiwu could feel his heart beating faster. He looked at her pale white hands and listened to the odd raspiness in her voice.
“If only I were a bit taller,” Li-min said at one point, “maybe I wouldn’t get pushed around just trying to watch.” She smiled and swung her legs, as her feet didn’t even touch the ground.
Jiwu swallowed nervously and said, “I can’t help you grow, but I can be there to pick you up next time you’re knocked down.”
Li-min didn’t say anything. She just smiled and looked away.
She gave him her phone number before they parted. | https://medium.com/the-junction/solo-bowling-4cb411efc7af | ['Raymond Sosa'] | 2020-02-26 19:49:01.786000+00:00 | ['Writing', 'Haruki Murakami', 'Bowling', 'Hong Kong', 'Fiction'] |
Mobile News Information And Updates | Get The Latest Home Appliances, Mobiles, Auto Mobiles News And Updates For The Latest Launched In India And Around The World. https://topten2day.com/ | https://medium.com/@topten2day/mobile-news-information-and-updates-ed9d699bca36 | [] | 2020-12-24 17:31:29.992000+00:00 | ['Mobile', 'Smartphone', 'Phones', 'Androiedphone', 'Mobilephone'] |
Why we Still Need Bookshops in the Internet Age | Dare the question: do we really need bookstores (or even libraries) today? In theory, no. If you’re in search of a book a simple click on the Internet can satisfy it: within 24 hours it is delivered in your mailbox. Better, you can have it immediately in its digital version. Better yet, lying in your couch you can ask your personal assistant — Alexa, Watson, Siri whatever… — to take care of the purchase. Better yet, it can advise you on your next reading. Better still, the machine can even read it to you.
An access to the planet’s library without moving from your sofa.
A dream comes true …
Except this dream is not yours.
It’s Jeff Bezos’s.
And it’s a lure. This infinite choice is a mirage. From our sofa, with our laptop, space is shrinking ever more. The algorithm of the machine is in tune with our “inner algorithm”, a force that pushes us to choose the same dishes to a buffet displaying thousand meals.
Anice book published in England in 2014 reveals what the use of a bookstore in such a context.
It’s called The Unknown Unknown by Mark Forsyth. The title is an allusion to a quote from Donald Rumsfeld — the Secretary of Defense George W. Bush himself. Entangled in the scandal of the war in Iraq, in order to justify the merits of military strikes, he had given journalists an improvised course of epistemology. He subsumed human knowledge in three broad categories, three continents of knowledge: the “known known”, these things that we know we know (for example, I know that Umberto Eco wrote the Name of the Rose, that Napoléon was a French Emperor, that the Beatles were four …); the “known unknown”, i.e., the things we do not know about (like I know that I do not know the exact number of the population of Tanzania, or how to say “Thank you” in Japanese …); and, finally, “the unknown unknown”, those things we ignore we do not know (and of which I could give no example since precisely I do not know that I do not know it)
This third continent — let’s call it Terra Incognita Incognita — is the hugest continent. Almost infinite. And contrary to what we believe this continent remains out of reach via the Internet. It remains a blind spot of our computers and our smartphones. Yet, we live in the illusion that all the knowledge of the world is directly accessible to us on the Internet. In theory, it is. But actually, it’s a different story.
Internet serendipity — this ability to make us discover new things— is partly an illusion or a myth. It certainly exists — denying it would be absurd — but it is a smooth serendipity that proceeds from what we already know based on the same principle as « Italy-alley cat-cat and dog-dog leg » …
In fact, when we are surfing on the infinite expanses of the Internet, we remain, even reluctantly, bound to what we already know. We do not move very far from familiar shores, stuck to our echo chamber: for comfort, we trample the “known known” and we explore on tiptoe the “known unknown”. But “the unknown unknown” stays out of our sight beyond our horizon. How can we manage to google something whose mere existence is unknown to us?
Actually, the Terra Incognita Incognita is a country almost unreachable by our own means. It is precisely the bookshoper’s or the librairian’s mission to welcome us to this third continent: a leap into the “unknown unknown” through books we did not even suspect they existed. Towards unsuspected promises of reading pleasures. And that’s the very definition of the good bookstore: the one we always go out with what we did not come to get.
More than ever at a time when algorithms confine us to our own choices, when we tend to duplicate our own tastes, we need bookstores or librairies able to take us out of our “cultural bubble”.
Otherwise more sophisticated than the stupid algorithm of Amazon — which blindly follows our course and stupidly aggregates the books bought by other customers — the bookseller’s algorithm is a key that opens us to our own desire, the one that we do not know yet. Not a desire that we would have checked in advance — as on a dating site or an order online — but a novel desire, that is to say, an unknown unknown desire.
An absorbing mission of exploration that requires to immerse in the plethora of editorial production in order to detect the nuggets. A risky mission too that involves coming out of the comfort of the mainstream recommendations.
But an essential mission for the sake of the culture diversity. Because, contrary to what the giants of the Internet claim, they dismiss acting for the “long trail”. Book shops and libraries do it by delivering an accessible diversity pledged by the Internet — by making it alive, by ensuring both plurality and duration in books curation. By passion, too.
Lately, an advertising campaign in France compared booksellers to superheroes. Indeed, they are. Their superpower is that of taking us to the unknown unknown … It’s up to us to help them to keep on. By pushing the door of a bookshop—wide open on the unknown— rather than clicking comfortably seated on our sofa browsing on what we already know. ¶
This text is an extract of our new essay “Délivrez-vous!” published in France at Les Editions de l’Observatoire. | https://paulvacca-58958.medium.com/why-we-still-need-bookshops-and-librairies-in-the-internet-age-87d971bb7ab2 | ['Paul Vacca'] | 2019-04-27 15:04:01.871000+00:00 | ['Serendipity', 'Technology', 'Books', 'Reading', 'Libraries'] |
A Mother Becoming | Birth Story | Is it odd to say I knew the moment in which we conceived her? Because I do. It was the middle of May 2019, and my husband’s and my relationship had grown strain. As much as we were becoming undone, there was this energetic pull to hold on a little while longer — like the work between us was not quite done. A couple of weeks later as I anticipated my moon cycle, I felt a surge up my right breast. I knew it was happening. I rushed to the pharmacy to get a pregnancy test, and once it was confirmed, I called the woman who would become my doula, Andrea Blanton. I wanted my child’s birth to be a spiritual process not a medical procedure, and I knew Andrea could support that as well as meet me where I was at this particular time in my life.
My pregnancy was delightful although I groaned through the uncomfortable changes in my body and utter exhaustion I sometimes faced. And although my husband and I physically separated during this time, I discovered a deeper meaning of support as my community of friends and family gathered around and held me in the warmest and safest way. It was in these months that I grew to know love deeper than I had ever known.
I arrived at my 38 week check up feeling wonderful, a little impatient as I had work to get back to and a nursery to finish organizing. After checking my blood pressure a few times, my midwife instructed that I go to the hospital immediately. I laughed nervously, thinking to myself that this couldn’t be serious. It must be one of those false alarms you see in the movies, I thought. My midwife assured me that this was serious, and to call someone to pick me up at once. I called my husband and without any preparation or my hospital bag, we were on our way.
We were taken to a triage room where they put an IV in my arm, took my blood, and started monitoring my blood pressure. It was elevated and only getting higher, peaking at 182/110. I still felt fine, only anxious from being plugged up to machines in a cold hospital room. After a few hours of monitoring, the midwife on duty, Janet, came into the room and introduced herself. She sat down and told me calmly that I would need to be induced. That I had preeclampsia, and the only way to get my blood pressure back down to a healthy range was through having the baby.
I refused at first still in total disbelief. I had a plan for my birth. She would come by water, easefully and naturally. After a few moments of talking it through with my husband and midwife, I remembered that this was my child’s birth, and I had to surrender to how she had chosen to be born.
My doula and mother arrived that evening and along with my husband, setup the space. I felt gifted by the level of support I had around me, the phone calls I received, and the skyline that could be seen through my room window felt like a kiss from God herself.
The nurse and midwife encouraged me to take a magnesium sulfate drip to ward off a seizure or stroke. I refused again. While my defiance could have been seen as pure foolishness, I was still grasping to hold on to any part of my plan to have an empowered birthing experience. They told me the drip would likely make me dizzy and sick. All I could imagine was a delirious me not being present for the most magical moment of my life. As more time passed, I was warned that my blood pressure would most likely continue elevating after they induced my labor and it could be fatal.
Finally, I surrendered, remembering that surrender is power too.
Around 8PM that evening, the nurse gave me a pill to place underneath my tongue to induce labor and by 11PM, it had begun. The contractions were bearable at first, more uncomfortable than painful, but they kept me up through the night. At 4:20AM, I allowed myself to close my eyes, and I started calling upon my ancestors. One by one, I would say their name and envision them circling around me in my hospital bed. It was in this meditation, I felt a pop in my womb and a gush of water suddenly came pouring out. I woke up my husband to tell him to alert the nurse. My water broke.
The contractions got worse almost immediately. I wish I could describe it in words, but the pain was deeper than physical. It was terrifying and the only thing I could do was breathe. And I breathed deeply. I found a tone that helped me suffer through and I belted it with every contraction. As the hours progressed, I longed for rest, I couldn’t see how I was going to live through this experience and give birth to a child. I was desperate for relief and growing more and more delirious coming in and out of a dream state. My husband stayed with me the whole time, rubbing my back and coaching me through the pain until my doula returned later that morning. Around 11:30AM, my midwife entered my room with a few nurses in tow. It was time.
Although I was only 8cm dilated, she instructed me to start pushing. I pushed and I pushed, changing positions often and eventually taking off my hospital gown in a frustrated haste since I couldn’t unhook myself from all the machines that were monitoring me along with the magnesium drip. My midwife setup a birthing bar, wrapped and tied a bed sheet around it, gave my husband and me either sides and we pushed and pulled our child down the birth canal. I could tell she was almost out. I finally turned around on the bed, hands gripping either side of my pillow, squatting on my knees completely naked. I had avoided this position since Janet instructed me to start pushing. It felt too vulnerable, too exposed. But atlas, it was the posture I needed to let go. So I surrendered again. I pushed and pushed again and finally her head was out. After her shoulders emerged, my husband supported her as she came through earth side.
The moments were so long but when I look back, it all happened so fast. I still don’t have the words for the amount of gratitude I have for my community, my amazing midwife, my body. I feel like WE gave birth that day to a healthy and divine child. Three months later, Melanie Yahweh Morrissette is gorgeous, healthy and thriving. | https://medium.com/@lcmorrissette/a-mother-becoming-birth-story-ece41f6d24f4 | ['Leeann Chisolm Morrissette'] | 2020-04-25 06:23:35.956000+00:00 | ['Birth', 'Induced Labor', 'Black Mother', 'Birth Story'] |
Tuning In — The Final Frontier for Enterprise | Announcing CRV’s Investment in Storyboard
Now that we’re just two weeks away from the end of 2020 — the infamous pandemic year — it’s worth reflecting back on the myriad ways our lifestyles have changed — perhaps permanently. More online workout classes, more cooking, more virtual visits, more screen time, more video conferences, and… way more podcasts. Our collective voracious appetite for podcasts is why I’m excited about CRV’s $4.5 million investment in Storyboard. Storyboard is an enterprise podcast and audio platform that over 1,700 companies around the world (including Delta Air Lines, DHL, HelloFresh and many others) are relying on to stitch their workforces together.
The podcast world, most often a vestige of the commuter experience — showed no signs of stopping even after our commuting did. In fact, despite an almost complete halt to the world of public transportation, podcasts became our at-home entertainment sidekick. These spoken words often come across as more colorful, and strangely more intimate than the video — which left us fatigued and overwhelmed. Spotify, a heavy acquisitor in the space, also reported that more than 21 percent of Spotify listeners now use it for podcasts, and that the podcast content they are consuming has more than doubled.
The consumerization of the enterprise is not a new trend — some of the most innovative software companies in the world have borrowed meaningful design and workflow decisions from the consumer world:
Video Messaging
Live Streaming
Video Conferencing
Text-Based Messaging
Web Chat
Newsletters
But the ability to record, distribute, and track the engagement on an internal podcast is hard to do. Most businesses want to build this functionality into their internal communications toolkit, but are unable to find one tool that aggregates this functionality easily. Podcasts are an indisputable part of our consumer lives, why haven’t they made the jump over to enterprise?
Which brings me to Storyboard, an incredible team and product that joined the CRV family today. Storyboard solves this problem in a world where more businesses are trying to communicate better and more effectively with their remote workforce. Even in pre-pandemic times, the distributed workforce is quadrupling and fewer workers are sitting at their desks, primed to read an email to attend a video conference. Audio is seamless, unattached, and therefore more powerful. Emma Rodera, a communications professor, told The Atlantic: “Audio is one of the most intimate forms of media because you are constantly building your own images of the story in your mind and you’re creating your own production.”
When I met JP Gooderham — the founder of Storyboard- for the first time, his energy was contagious. Having commuted down the 101 for seven years on the Google bus, he was used to reading pages and pages of company wide emails, project overviews, and dialing into video conferences (even pre-pandemic!). It was hard to concentrate, manage, and feel connected, despite being “hyper-connected.” The feeling he got at the end of the day, plugging in one of his favorite podcasts, was an altogether different feeling. It felt like going on a walk with a colleague — more intimate, more personal, more important — it was a feeling that he wanted to extend to businesses and employees all around the world.
Storyboard was founded in November 2019, and in just over a year thousands of large companies like Abbott Pharma and DHL have already come to rely on Storyboard to keep their employees connected and informed. Tired of low open rates on emails, and video call drop-offs — they want their workforce to feel engaged and valued. Employees are raving about the experience:
“There is a draw towards audio for a sense of intimacy and the ability to consume in a less expensive way in terms of attention. There is too much video saturation in companies these days.”
“We’ve only been customers for 3 months and 500 people are on the platform”
“We keep video for much more condensed messages. Podcasts are different — they hit the company all at once.”
“We have a distributed workforce, and today our training is not mobile. You can’t really watch video in a car. We want people to listen to training content on the go, which is easy to access mid job.”
What’s even more extraordinary is that Storyboard works across multiple organizations within a business. JP and his team often begin working with the Head of Communications or Marketing — but then Storyboard quickly gets adopted across the organization from the executive team, to engineering stand ups, and even amongst compliance teams for training across the organization. It truly spreads through the company virally — as the new, audio-focused communication platform. Below you can see a quick glimpse of this extraordinary growth:
Storyboard Seats Over Time, since inception of Company
I’m thrilled to join the board at Storyboard, and excited to partner with other incredible investors like Operator Partners, Dave Ambrose, Matt Ziskie, and The Slack Fund. Harry Stebbings, the King of Podcasts himself, also joined the round as an angel investor!
We, at CRV, believe audio is the future — and we can’t be more excited to be on this journey with JP and the rest of the Storyboard team.
P.S. We are hiring :) | https://medium.com/@annarchyy/tuning-in-the-final-frontier-for-enterprise-b9eb02080232 | ['Anna Khan'] | 2020-12-16 18:40:26.337000+00:00 | ['Los Angeles', 'Technology', 'Venture Capital'] |
How Web 3.0 Will Change Brands Forever | I had a meeting with the CMO of Nike early this month, and during the meeting, they asked me the hardest question I’ve heard: “Jade, what do you do to prepare for Web3?”
It caught me off guard. For one, we’ve entered a time where you can do productive work at your bed, invest in shitcoins, and throw all your marketing dollars at some 16-year-old TikToker. And two, Web 2.0 enabled digital connection to consumers and kickstarted the creator economy. However, that still isn’t enough for the evolution of the internet.
Enter Web 3.0 — the newest phase of the internet revolution. The industries hit hardest by the COVID19 pandemic include clothing, footwear, and goods; how will the emerging shift align with the recent impacts of the global pandemic? The good news is that consumerism is on track to recover but at a slow incline.
WTF is Web 3?
In Web3, developers don’t build and deploy applications that run on a single server or that store their data in a single database, instead of on blockchains, decentralized networks of many peer-to-peer servers.
How Will Web 3 Change Brands?
Web 3.0 is more than just the physical future. Web 3.0 and Crypto go hand in hand. The shift from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0 has the same effect on companies from Nike to small businesses that it does your local coffee shop. Everything will be impacted, it’s just a matter of the scale at which businesses will experience and adapt. A Costa Rican-based cryptocurrency called Verdes Coin is dedicated to promoting environmentalism and good climate change behaviors, and there are only around 2,000 people invested in it. And in using this coin, people can exchange recycling for food, which in turn builds a community around this coin. In the US, Dogecoin is huge, with a billion-dollar market cap. However, in the same way, Web 3.0 doesn’t adapt based on company size. Companies adapt to Web 3.0; the scale at which may vary.
Why is Web 3.0 important to brands as big as Nike or Redbull?
Sales don’t happen if you don’t have a community and culture around your company. As two big shifts occurred — first being the COVID-19 pandemic — apparel and clothing companies experienced a loss of consumers… When brands experience that sort of impact, they adapt to certain cultures.
In the creator economy, Web 3.0 will give creators a fair way of making money that we haven’t seen in previous years and provide longevity to an exasperated industry. Instead of making money through merchandise and creator funds, influencers will break out from saturated markets and begin working with tokens or cryptocurrencies. When you diversify your income in several layers, you have a steady and more reliable source of income, sometimes working fewer hours and focusing on other forms of content.
The biggest challenge for brands heading into the new phase of Web will be navigating what to do when consumers spend less money on buying products and more on community ownership.
In Web 2.0, brands monetize by selling a product, where they’re paid for a shoe, sock, or service on a regular basis. In Web3, brands will monetize through the issuance of a social token or NFTs, with non-fungible tokens acting as digital media ownership.
What Can Brands Do to Stay On Top of This Shift?
The best thing brands can do leading up to this new age of the internet is to partner with a DAO. A DAO stands for a decentralized autonomous organization, meaning they aren’t controlled by a single institution. Partnering with a DAO not only removes a middle man from revenue streams, but it requires reflection on the community surrounding the brand.
Brands need to keep these three questions in mind:
What kind of work do you want to incentivize your consumers?
Who are your current community leaders?
What rewards does your community want, aside from the product?
Depending on the brand’s mission, they want to collaborate with something that stands for their same values. They need to have the answer to the question, “what does your brand stand for?”. Understand the culture around the brand and go from there to make sure the target audience has the same goals and values that they do.
Examples
Jamm Session: a social token for crypto-natives who are experimenting with tokenized community tools to pave the way for new creator economies.
Global Coin Research: a social currency (cryptocurrency) that provides members high-quality and direct access in the crypto space, ranging from content and analysis on GlobalCoinResearch.com to community events.
Friends With Benefits: a community of crypto-curious creators exploring the future of web3 culture.
Web 3.0 isn’t far from the future, in fact, it’s already happening. That’s why I built CRE8, a GenZ focused DAO that bridges Web2 audiences to Web3 through educating and collaborating.
That’s why I’m building CRE8. CRE8 is a GenZ focused DAO that bridges Web2 audiences to Web3. Our goal in 2021 is to launch two projects within the top TikTok animators to encourage audiences to prepare and understand Web3.
What’s My Strategy for Preparing for Web 3.0?
My strategy for this next advancement in Web is to simply stay involved and educate myself through reading articles such as this one. It’s important for creators to absorb all of this information in order to prepare for new ways of monetizing and making money. When the time is right — maybe in the next five years — the majority of creators will have their own cryptocurrency, their own wallet, and be invested in a few communities’ or creators’ currencies. Until then, it’s useful to experiment and learn.
If you want to become more involved in the new world of Web 3.0, I recommend getting started with a community I started called CRE8 Club. We post job opportunities as well as send out an email newsletter each week with the latest creator economy news. CRE8 is also hosting an event this August called CRE8chella and speaking at other cryptocurrency events. And starting soon, we will even be launching our own coin called Nuts with Nutshell Animations. So we’re teaching creators, but we’re also implementing to adapt our community to the evolving economy.
This post is for brands who want to prepare for and navigate Web 3.0. Feel free to message me @jadedarmawangsa on Instagram and Twitter. | https://medium.com/@cre8club/how-web-3-0-will-change-brands-forever-67fceafd1384 | ['Jade Darmawangsa'] | 2021-06-17 18:13:51.482000+00:00 | ['Brands On Social Media', 'The Creator Economy', 'Web3', 'Creator Economy', 'Cryptocurrency'] |
2020 proved the ‘relatable’ celebrity was always a myth | By Anne Helen Petersen
A thrill ran through me when I first saw the images of Dominic West and his wife, Catherine FitzGerald, posing for paparazzi outside their Wiltshire home, armed with a handwritten note that read, “Our marriage is strong and we’re very much still together.” Days earlier, West had been caught “very at ease” with Lily James, his co-star in an upcoming BBC series, on the streets of Rome.
It wasn’t bombshell gossip, but the pictures of West and James — and the transparent attempt to correct the narrative — were exactly the kind of low-stakes celebrity content I had been craving. It felt like a throwback to the rise of the paparazzi, back in the 1960s, on those same Roman streets, when photographers trailed Elizabeth Taylor, still married to Eddie Fisher, during her nascent romance with Richard Burton.
But the photo op outside West and FitzGerald’s home was also reminiscent of the way Jennifer Garner would take paparazzi strolls and park trips with her young children whenever rumors of Ben Affleck’s infidelity began to swirl, or pretty much everything to do with Tom Cruise’s relationship with Katie Holmes. It was transparent yet messy, like so many celebrity machinations in the pre-social media 2000s.
As Lainey Gossip pointed out, Dominic West lacked an Instagram account, which was part of what forced this move; any other celebrity would have written that announcement in their Notes app and screenshotted (or posted directly in the app) and been done with it.
Instead, here was a celebrity who wasn’t savvy enough to behave badly in private, trying to repair the damage from a burgeoning scandal with a badly choreographed show for the paparazzi. It was awkward and hackneyed, but besides from the people involved — we don’t know anything about the parameters of Dominic West’s marriage — there were no larger ramifications, and no public health concerns, unless you count Lily James’ poorly placed face mask.
Dominic West and Catherine FitzGerald walk out for paparazzi, letter in hand. Photo: GlosPics/MEGA/GC/Getty Images
In a year when every celebrity scandal felt bound up in larger political and pandemic-related fears, this one felt contained. It did what celebrity gossip is supposed to do: provide a morsel of distraction.
The fact that this moment stuck out at all was indicative of what a weird, largely unwinnable year it’s been for celebrities. In 2020, the self-styled “authenticity” empire collapsed. The celebrities didn’t give up broadcasting their “genuine” selves. But audiences reached a point where they refused to tolerate what had already become a tedious game.
Under the harsh light of the pandemic and all the horror that has spun out of it, we’ve been reminded that all celebrity is, to some extent, artifice and performance — the framing of wealth, beauty, and power as not just admirable, but accessible. When a celebrity’s image is properly calibrated, reading about them feels like a mild diversion, not an invitation for outrage. But when it collapses, as so many are now, it curdles.
Social media, once the key to the kingdom, became a hand grenade
Over the last ten months, stars have watched the walls of their own image slowly close in around them. Those poorly constructed structures, however, are their own design.
Over the last thirty years, the pendulum of image control has swung from powerful publicists in the ’80s and ’90s, over to upstart gossip bloggers wreaking havoc in the 2000s and early 2010s, and then pulled back, via social media, to celebrities themselves. Beyoncé helped lead this shift — first on Tumblr and in self-produced documentaries; now through carefully curated interviews — but thousands of others, from Taylor Swift to Barack Obama, have followed.
Social media allowed celebrities to bypass the media gatekeepers they had relied on for so long to convey messages, apologies, recoveries, and all manner of other narratives to the public. At the same time, influencers, reality stars, YouTube stars — and now, TikTok stars — collapsed the separation that provided the raison d’etre of the industry.
Before, you read TMZ or People to try and get a sense of who a star “really” was when they weren’t on-screen. But this new crop of celebrities pledged there was no self save the one available to the consumer, and, as a result, there was no need to go anywhere else except their own social media feeds.
As celebrities became their own paparazzi, the publications that covered them realized they couldn’t compete. They began dedicating massive swaths of space to celebrity social media material — but why spend $4.99 on a magazine when you can just follow the celebrities you actually care about on Instagram? Subscriptions and ad revenue tanked. People, once a gem in the Time Inc. crown, was unceremoniously sold to Meredith Corp. Us Weekly, arguably the most influential glossy magazine of the 2000s, has withered on the vine under the control of American Media, best known for publishing the similarly shriveled National Enquirer.
Photo: Mary Altaffer/AP
Perez Hilton was kicked off TikTok after trying to stir controversy about the dancing style of its most popular star. Crazy Days and Nights, a longstanding source of celebrity blind items, has descended down a Jeffrey Epstein wormhole. TMZ has lost much of the shine that once made it a trusted, if widely loathed, destination. The most compelling forum for celebrity disclosure is the Red Table Talk, itself an exercise in image control for Jada Pinkett Smith and her family.
These shifts happened in fits and starts over the course of the last decade, but led us to our current celebrity reality: with quiet assists from agents, publicists, and stylists, celebrities have obtained unprecedented control and authorship of their own images. And for the last year, they’ve largely been exercising that control in isolation.
Therein lies the heart of the problem: the vast majority of celebrities don’t understand what’s interesting about them, or just aren’t interesting in the first place. That’s part of the utility of the larger celebrity publicity apparatus, so long as it doesn’t insist that the most interesting thing about every celebrity is that they’re hot. But celebrities in charge of their own images often can’t see what others find compelling about them.
More importantly, the thing that makes them compelling is just, at least in this moment, untoward. They’re the most glamorous, the most extravagant, the most beautiful — and no one wants to think about that, aspire to that, even see that right now. And they especially don’t want to listen to these celebrities’ rarified thoughts on (or negligence of) COVID-19.
The celebrity clownery became clear just days into the pandemic
Vanessa Hudgens called coronavirus deaths “inevitable” on an Instagram Live feed and got immediately roasted. The Gal Gadot-organized rendition of “Imagine” was a boondoggle. Kristen Cavillari got fake stuck in the Bahamas. David Geffen posted a picture of his quarantine set-up (aka, his $590 million super-yacht) and the backlash was so forceful he deleted his Instagram account. Madonna bathed in rose petals and called Covid-19 the great equalizer. The way forward, it seemed, was either staying out of sight — or making themselves genuinely relatable in some way.
It’s a difficult task. There’s a reason that at the peak of The Great Depression, Shirley Temple became the biggest star in the world. As Charles Eckert has argued, Temple was conceived of as “untouched” by the larger economic deprivations. But instead of making her an object of scorn, it transformed her into a sort of innocent ideal, the cherubic, cheery future you could imagine for your own children.
In her films, Temple operated without avarice or guile, aiming simply to entertain, delight, or generally lift the spirit of everyone she encounters. You can’t begrudge Temple her good cheer, and you don’t even consider her significant salary or success. Her age made it so easy to love her.
Jimmy Fallon, Gal Gadot, and Pedro Pascal participated in the year’s most cringe-worthy singalong. Photo: @gal_gadot/Instagram
But the closest we have to a coronavirus-era Shirley Temple are cute TikTok babies. The bar for making something charming or non-alienating from your lavish home — that will then be consumed by millions and millions of people trapped in their far less lavish homes — is very high.
Posting about your relationship is cloying. Posting about exercise is annoying. Get weird or GTFO. Robert Pattinson went feral in isolation; Mandy Patinkin dadded out in his cabin; January Jones, already a master of weird Instagram, seemingly never leaves her home; Leslie Jones can’t stop watching MSNBC. Ben Affleck seemingly just gets iced coffee with girlfriend Ana de Armes everyday.
All of those celebrities had some measure of practice with the larger, and often unforgiving, publicity machine. Those with less — Dominic West, Hillsong pastor Carl Lentz, “Real Housewife” Teddi Mellencamp, and liberal mayors unaccustomed to national scrutiny of their dining and Thanksgiving travel choices — screwed themselves. Those whiffs were embarrassing and infuriating, but not that surprising.
The fall of a fame queen
More surprising is how badly Kim Kardashian, who, with the help of her mother, has long been a master of her own publicity, bungled her pandemic 40th birthday. When Kardashian posted pictures of her party to her social media accounts, the framing suggested she thought she’d done everything right: “After 2 weeks of multiple health screens and asking everyone to quarantine,” she wrote, “I surprised my closest inner circle with a trip to a private island where we could pretend things were normal just for a brief moment in time.”
Shirley Temple was always playing pretend. She gave audiences permission to pretend, too. But Kardashian’s moment of pretend is exclusionary — my inner circle; a private island — offered up for public consumption.
So much Kardashian content is always, in a way, a taunt, but none have been quite so bold as this one. A masked staff member at the island, visible in the background of one of the photos, drove the point home. Freedom, and the feeling of normal, is for celebrities. Caution is for poor people.
Pre-Instagram, a celebrity might have had the event, and tried to keep it legitimately private. Paparazzi would have trailed her, and she would have found herself at the center of a scandal outside her control. In this scenario, Kardashian serves as her own paparazzi, gets to pick the best (and best edited) photos to publish, and weathers the blowback on Twitter.
On the surface, the outcomes aren’t that different. But the photos evidence a profound lack of self-awareness, even for a Kardashian. An untold number of celebrities have been gathering on private islands, in private villas, and on private jets over the last year. They just have the good publicity sense not to post about it. But Kardashians, and celebrities in their mold, have internalized self-surveillance as their primary mode of existence: their proof of life. If Kim didn’t post the photos on social media, did it even happen? Did she?
Kim Kardashian, Nicky Hilton, Paris Hilton and Kellie Pickler attend a fashion show in the halcyon days of 2009. Photo: Amy Sussman/Getty Images for IMG
It’s difficult, in other words, to imagine Kardashian not hosting the party, or not posting the photos — the event and its documentation is a natural manifestation of the logic at the core of her image. For years, that logic was so compelling that millions of Americans watched nineteen seasons of it in action. Part of the reason was that Kardashian, like her old pal Paris Hilton, has never bothered with hiding the scaffolding of celebrity.
In Kardashian World, there’s no difference between doing sponcon for a laxative/appetite suppressing tea and selling a lip kit. They aren’t famous for “being famous,” as the old half-insult goes. They were famous for their ability to establish their bodies as ideals — and then sell products that promise the consumer the ability to transform themselves to match them.
Stars have been pursuing similar strategies with soap, makeup, and hair dye brands for decades. The Kardashians just had fewer compunctions about the optics of selling waist trainers. While other celebrities posted pictures of themselves without make-up, the Kardashians embraced “authenticity” by leaning into the exploitative capitalist ethos that’s at the heart of all celebrity.
Was it all a bit craven? Sure, but it felt like we all knew the rules of the game they were playing. This positioning allowed Kim, in particular, to become both chronically over- and under-estimated. It was so easy to frame criticism as simply unenlightened. Kim got it; she wasn’t just in on the joke, she was telling it.
In recent years, that belief became more difficult to maintain — and the 40th birthday party unravelled it entirely. The joke, this time, was on all of us, and maybe it had been for some time.
In this moment, everyone’s actions have direct effects on others; no one, not even a Kardashian turning 40, operates in a vacuum. The self-obsession that has typified their worldview feels not just off but vaguely pathological. The Kardashians haven’t changed. And that’s the problem. Looking at those 40th birthday photos now, I feel nothing but great, echoing distance.
Grief, not excess, is the connective tissue of the moment
Just weeks before, Chrissy Teigen had posted a very different set of photos, taken in the immediate aftermath of her September pregnancy loss. The immediate response was an outpouring of support, but some criticized the photos as publicity-seeking, suggesting Teigen had arranged for a photographer to be in the hospital. (Many hospitals have photographers for these moments, as families often find themselves desperate for some record of their lost child.)
Like Kardashian, Teigen’s celebrity is, at least in part, rooted in her perceived savviness; the second act of her celebrity in particular has been powered by her adept use of social media. She’s navigated a dynamic course through the landscape of fame: she’s been a model, a host, half of a celebrity couple, a cookbook author, and, ultimately, a brand.
That brand is on cookware at Target, but its less tangible core is a mix of warmth, flip, and very relatable social media habits. In her posts, she can be sloppy, and deeply funny, and periodically ruthless; her grimacing “that’s awkward” face from the 2016 Oscars remains one of the most popular reaction GIFs on the internet.
But unlike the Kardashians, whose approach to celebrity increasingly feels like an artifact of a previous era, Teigen’s has felt resilient, dynamic — even, well, authentic.
The photos from the hospital are part of that larger constellation: they’re devastatingly intimate, and, for millions, they portrayed a palpable, deeply familiar grief. And that, Teigen said, was the point. “I cannot express how little I care that you hate the photos,” she wrote in a post on Medium. “How little I care that it’s something that you wouldn’t have done. These photos aren’t for anyone but the people who have lived this or are curious enough to wonder what something like this is like. These photos are only for the people who need them. The thoughts of others do not matter to me.”
“The thoughts of others do not matter to me” could have been the caption for so many celebrity moments this year, Kardashian’s especially. It’s a statement that belies the twin isolation of contemporary celebrity and quarantine, a cluelessness that makes a star image sour and go vile before our eyes. But it’s ultimately the opposite of what Teigen did with the hospital images.
Instead of widening the distance between herself and those who power her fame, she worked to close it. It didn’t feel like a publicity grab. It didn’t feel exploitative, or an example of the sort of “performative authenticity” that’s fallen so flat over the last months. It felt like a rare and invaluable recognition of unspeakable grief.
For some celebrities, industry logic has long been stifling. Freedom from “best wisdom” of the publicity apparatus — because of the coronavirus, because of the shift to self-determined management — means freedom to live as you are, as you like. The results can create profound, unprecedented connection, broader success and adoration. But the reverse is also true. The last year has clarified so much — including what, exactly, emerges when you indulge a celebrity’s clearest, least adulterated vision of themselves.
Anne Helen Petersen writes the newsletter Culture Study.
For more great stories, visit Insider’s homepage. | https://medium.com/insider/2020-proved-the-relatable-celebrity-was-always-a-myth-a3845c1ed5df | [] | 2020-12-25 19:02:23.868000+00:00 | ['Hollywood', 'Celebrity', 'Social Media', '2020', 'Pandemic'] |
Is China a capitalist country or a communist one? | The market economy is the economy of capital operations with private ownership. As a result, when China adopts the market economy, it is a kind of capitalism. Yet, we cannot say that China is not towards communism. China is still towards communism. As Marx concluded, communism comes only after capitalism. China still has many rural populations and has a long distance to a fully developed capitalism that is needed to realize communism. China is a developing country. Its GDP per capita is far behind the developed countries. China needs to develop capitalism to prepare for communism.
Marxism, Leninism, and Maoism
Marxism is a science. A scientific theory can be falsified. Science is an open theory that can be modified according to new evidence, new finding of knowledge, and new discovery of facts. Marxism as a science is also an open theory that the theory develops based on the new reality due to the evolution of the human society that Marx himself did not experience in his life.
Marxism undergoes three phases of evolution. The first phase is Marx and Engels. Marx proclaimed that communism could only be reached in the world as a whole and be reached when the material is abundant due to a high level of productivity. This claim is still valid. Phase two is Lenin and Stalin. Lenin said that the proletariat can take power in one country in the imperialist stage of capitalism even though other countries are still capitalist.
Phase three is Mao and Deng. China was not capitalist yet before 1949. The proletariat in China was not a political power as China was not industrialized, and the number of workers was negligible. According to Marxism and Leninism, China should first have a capitalist revolution, then industrialization, then a proletarian revolution.
The capitalist revolution failed in China before 1949 because western powers kept invading and dominated China such that wealth kept flowing out of China that China can never accomplish capital accumulation for industrialization. Chinese national capitalists could not become independent political power. The capitalists in China became an attachment to western imperialists and colonialists that China was quasi-colonialized.
Mao wrote ON NEW DEMOCRACY, saying that the capitalist revolution in China can only be accomplished under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, So the Chinese Revolution is the democratic capitalist revolution led by the Communist Party of China. The demographic body that carried out the Chinese revolution is not the proletariat but the peasants. China just barely finished the industrial revolution today, 2020. For about 100 years, China has been carrying out a capitalist revolution under the leadership of the Communist Party of China. Developing capitalism is part of the task in China toward communism. The path to communism in China is first to become capitalist and industrialized, then to communism. From a capitalist society to a communist society, the second step is yet waiting for the whole world to develop into capitalism fully.
Today, the world is dominated by the US, the hegemony capitalist. Hegemony capitalist hindered capitalist development in the developing countries, just as China had difficulty developing capitalism before 1949. The proletariat can liberate themselves only by liberating the whole Human Being. Communism can only come in the world as a whole and after capitalism is well developed. The BRI is to help developing counties develop capitalism. Hegemon has a monopoly on the world economy. The US is taking monopoly profit, which destroys the market competition, prevents the developing country from being industrialized. So China is pushing capitalism, such as globalization and against hegemony, in the world, the necessary step towards communism. In this sense, China is toward communism via capitalism.
Surplus Value
One of the great discoveries of Marx is the Surplus Value. Marx discovered surplus value through the study of capitalism. Surplus value at the individual level is that a worker creates more value than his consumption for labor reproduction (or living cost in layman’s terms). On the ideological aspect, the concept of surplus value restores the dignity of laborers, claiming that workers create wealth. This concept sets a solid foundation for the spirit of revolution. That’s why capitalists hate Marx.
As a scientific discovery, however, surplus value can be applied beyond and outside the capitalist society. Surplus value, what a society produces more than it consumes, is a necessity for expanded reproduction or a necessity for human progress. Humans make progress by producing more than consuming, so to accumulate wealth, the accumulated wealth in the production process in capitalist society is capital. Accumulated capital, or solidified labor, is the material foundation for technological advancement. If human consumes all it produces, then the society can reproduce only at the same scale, and stop progressing.
Exploitation is different from surplus-value. It is fine to have profited by harvesting surplus value, as long as the capitalists do not suppress the workers' living standard to squeeze more surplus value from its production. Exploitation is to suppress the living standard of the workers to have more profit. A production entity may produce no surplus value due to its low efficiency but still profit by suppressing the salary. That’s exploitation. If a capitalist consumes his profit, then that part of the profit is not a surplus value from society’s point of view. Because that portion of the profit is consumed and not be used for expanded reproduction. For society as a whole, there is no accumulation of capital and no progress. That’s the unequal distribution of wealth that exploits the poor to enrich the rich.
China makes a profit in Africa but also builds infrastructure (the solidified labor, the formation of real capital) for Africa. It is good for economic development and good for human progress. Surplus value is well used for Africans because it accumulates capital in Africa and for Africa. Infrastructure is the accumulated capital, and it is in Africa for the development and progress of Africa. BRI does create surplus values, and the more surplus value created, the more progress in the society where BRI projects are implemented.
The determination factor for realizing communism is to raise the productivity level. What China is doing today is raising the productivity level inside and aboard. Marx concluded that communism would come only after the productivity level is high enough. What China is doing is irreversibly pushing forward communism by raising the productivity level without exploitation. China is making a profit not by the imperialist invasion and occupation, not by the slave trade, not by the opium trade, not by imposing its system and will on other peoples, not by colonialism, not by making others suffer in order to make a profit. Even though it does not eradicate relative poverty, it does eradicate absolute poverty. If China is a capitalist country, then it is a capitalist country under the leadership of the Communist Party of China as the necessary step towards communism. China is a capitalist country without exploitation. Capitalism without exploitation is capitalism for communism.
Class Struggles
The Communist Manifesto states:” The history of all existing societies so far is the history of class struggle. “ The existence of class struggle in our society is a reality, whether you want it or not.
What should a communist do after the proletariat taking power in one country? Russian Revolution established a Soviet Russia. Soviet Russia eliminated private ownership. The planned economy has state-owned enterprises and collectively owned farms. Because of the state or collective ownership, there should be no class struggles, right?
There was, however, social stratification. The elites got more power, and the mass doesn’t have. If social mobility is blocked, then social stratification will be solidified into classes. Classes exist. This is an unavoidable phenomenon before communism comes.
Are there classes and class struggles in countries where the communist party is in power? That’s the question that Khrushchev and Mao held different opinions. To this question, Khrushchev is negative while Mao is positive. This difference made China split from USSR. And Mao is right. When Soviet Russia collapsed in 1992, the Russian people are apathetic to the fall of the communist party. The cadres in Russia formed a privileged class. Mao was alarmed and launched the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, a class struggles within the Communist Party of China. Mao’s Cultural Revolution might be overdone and hurts many innocent elites. Yet, Mao did successfully prevented China from collapse together with the USSR. Even today, the west is futile in its intended color revolutions in China, thanks to the Cultural Revolution.
Deng disagreed with Mao. He thought class struggle within the Communist Party is absurd. The difference between Mao and Deng is a very fundamental problem for Marxists.
Marxism does recognize that the raising of productivity level is the most fundamental force to promote human progress.
Marxism also recognizes that class struggles play a key role in advancing human progress, as stated in Communist Manifesto. Mao correctly believed that class struggles were the most important task of establishing proletarian power when imperialists seriously threatened red China. Deng was also right. After the peaceful development environment had secured, the main task should be economic development, not class struggles. The key achievement of the Cultural Revolution is culture. Mao educated the Chinese people on the danger of social stratification being solidified into rigid classes. Mao’s cultural revolution saved China from collapse together with the USSR.
The old mode of production does not end with class struggles. A new mode of production replaces the old mode of production as the productivity level is advanced.
Marx predicted that communism would come when capitalism fulfilled its historical role, and he never told how the transition from capitalism to communism would proceed. He did not know that the proletariat could take power in a country. How socialist countries realize communism is a myth around China.
If China is a capitalist country under the Communist Party of China, what should China do toward communism? Making another proletarian revolution by the violent class struggle? Is the Cultural Revolution not class struggle enough and not violent enough?
Socialism with Chinese characters is capitalism led by the Communist Party of China. The task of China is to transcend from capitalism to communism. Communist society means the elimination of class. Class struggle reinforces the classes in a society. Capitalists in China today are from the poor, from the fluid social mobility in China, from the capitalist revolution led by the Communist Party of China. They do not accumulate capital through bloody exploitation. Some of their initial accumulation may come from the misappropriation of State or collective property during the transition from a planned economy to a market economy, while others may come from the accumulation of surplus value. This capital is clean. Virtually all of them are not from exploitation. It makes no sense for China to use violent revolution to deprive the property of the capitalists of modern China.
China has set an example that one can get rich without making others suffer. One can accumulate capital without exploiting others. One can be relatively poor but still has a decent and dignified life. In other words, society can progress without relying on class struggles. When people are organized through the Communist Party to take charge of their own fate and their own country, they recognize the social stratification, maintain social mobility to prevent the stratification solidified into classes, downplay the role of class struggles, focus on economic development, classes will vanish in due time, and capitalism will transcend into communism.
Class struggle is a fundamental concept in Marxism, especially to justify the revolution against exploitation. However, we should not overemphasize class struggles when there is no exploitation.
Marx was influenced heavily by Hegel philosophically. He considered that social progress is propelled by class struggle. That’s Hegel’s philosophy that the conflict of Being and Nothing causes motion. Communist manifesto stays that human history is the history of class struggle. Of course, communist society has not classes and therefore cannot propel social progress by class struggle. Human progress is not propelled by class struggle in the long history of primate communism and communism in the future. Taoist philosophy is also a dielectric philosophy. Taoism considers motion is not by conflict but by the harmony of Yin and Yang. Xi promotes harmony domestically, and the Shared Future of Man Kind internationally is by Taoist philosophy. Classes exist in Human society for the last five thousand years of private ownership of property. Deng and Xi downplay the role of class struggle represent the Marxism development in China or Marxism with the Chinese characters.
With globalization in a monopolistic capitalist world, the conflict between classes is less important than the conflict between nations. The Chinese revolution is more of a national revolution than a class revolution. Communist Party of China united all classes in China to resist the invasion of Japanese imperialism. If class struggle is still a correct Marxism theory, then classes are categorized as nations in the globalized economy. If WWI and WWII were wars between imperialist countries fighting for control of resources and sphere of influence, then the struggle between imperialist countries finished after WWII. After WWII, America consolidates the developed countries, the imperialist powers, to exploit developing countries together. America established the world order of the structure of the north and the south. The developing countries can never finish their industrialization and modernization due to the so-called middle-income trap. Wall street can assassinate a country’s economy by creating a regional or national economic crash to make a sudden wealth transfer from that country or countries to the north. After the collapse of the USSR, huge wealth flowed to the west in the name of the free movement of international capitals. The developing countries are experiencing what China experienced from 1840 to 1949 that their politics and economy are dominated by imperialist countries and keep being exploited. So if the class struggle is still a valid Marxism theory, then today’s class struggle is the conflict between G7 and South-South Cooperation. China advocates the international relationship of mutual respect and win-win cooperation without attaching any political or ideological condition. China is a Marxism country in that it helps the developing countries get rid of the influence of the imperialist powers to develop their economy, industrialization, and modernization. China is, therefore, a communist country that is pushing capitalism without exploitation in the world.
Alienation
Alienation is a crucial subject in Marxism theory. The most important alienation is capital. Man created capital but is controlled by the capital. Capital has its will to pursue profit. In a capitalist society, the society functions according to the will of capital, not the will of Man. The alienation is the result of the division of labor. According to Smith, the economy advances through the increasing division of labor. As a result, the production of human society is a social production. One produces not for his or her own consumption but for market realization. The market provides the mechanism for a division of labor and social production. The alienation of capital is the conflict of social production and private ownership of the means of production. So, to get rid of alienation, according to Marx, is the abolition of private ownership. In other words, communism is eliminating the alienation of capital.
Marx got this conclusion because Marx did not perceive that proletariat get into power in one country. If Man can control the moving of capital in the market according to Man’s will, then there will be no alienation, and we will reach a communist society without the abolition of private ownership. How can we tell whether the capital has its will or Man has his will in the market? One important trait is that there are cycles of economic boom and crash in the capitalist society. Man does not want war, does not want hunger, does not want an economic crash. Yet Man cannot avoid these disasters because it is the capital’s will for profit running the world, not Man’s will running the world.
The 2008 financial crash shows that America is a capitalist country. In America, the government is controlled by capital. Money makes the election. The lobby makes policy. Capital always asking the government not to interfere market, yet, in 2008, it asked the government to save Wall Street. American politicians say that China has no freedom; they really mean that China has no freedom of capital. China, amazingly, had no economic crash since it adapts to the market economy. That’s the sign that the market economy in China is running according to the will of Man, not the will of capital. In a sense, China eliminated the alienation of capital. In this sense, China is a communist country. China is the People’s Republic of China. People are in power, and people can determine their own fate. The Chinese government is constituted to carrying out people’s will. Chinese government representing people’s will. In China, the government control capital. In America, capital controls the government. In China, the capital obeys the will of the people. In America, people obey the will of capital. China is a communist country. America is a capitalist country. No mistake. We say it every day. And it is indeed.
China eliminated the alienation of capital and reconciled the conflict between private ownership and social production without abolishing private ownership. This is a Marxism of Chinese characters. | https://medium.com/@xguoforwaterloo/is-china-a-capitalist-country-or-a-communist-one-f0bfbf16fc11 | ['Xiaoming Guo'] | 2021-06-19 20:05:37.901000+00:00 | ['Lenin', 'Marxism', 'Maoism', 'Communism', 'Capitalism'] |
The Mess Congress Could Make score | hree days ago, I retired this daily report. I was convinced this was settled. I am convinced now that was wrong. We need to recognize — urgently — just how dangerous what’s happening is. The other side needs to recognize — urgently — just how dangerous it would be if they succeed.
This is Birtherism all over again: Obama wasn’t President because he was born in Kenya; Biden can’t be President because he didn’t win the election. When Trump launched his birther campaign, he was politically irrelevant. As he launches his birther campaign against Biden, he is the most powerful political actor in America. His rallies and tweets and campaign — coordinated now with an Attorney General and leaders in Congress — aim at the very least to discredit the next administration. It aims as well for what is still within the realm of possibility : that Mike Pence acts on January 6 to rule Trump into the presidency.
Last week, I was optimistic that this couldn’t happen, because last week, the emerging consensus seemed to be clear, and the idea of moving against that consensus seemed literally crazy. Yet we have to remember that the same was true of birtherism. And this time, the crazy conspiracy theorist will be the President for two months and ten days at least. Lindsey Graham has declared that there will never be another Republican President if Trump concedes. McConnell is now defending Trump’s challenging of the results. And the Attorney General has launched an “investigation” into the election, leading his chief deputy for elections in the Department of Justice to resign. All of this is extraordinarily ominous. Every alarm bell for this democracy needs to be ringing.
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We need now, more than ever, to collect a solid 10 Republican Senators who declare they will not support any effort to subvert this election. Mitt Romney and Ben Sasse were early on this list. Susan Collins has joined as well. Likewise with Republican governors. And likewise with leaders from business: Wall Street needs to get Washington to recognize the economic catastrophe that would result if the United States falls into a practical civil war in January. Not because Wall Street is the most important voice: but it is a voice that Republican leaders would listen to.
I’ve been writing (in the Atlantic The Mess Congress Could Make) and recording (the podcast: Another Way (to elect a president)) about how this could go south for months. MTV has repeated the story. Vice did as well. Ned Foley has a terrifying piece in the Washington Post last week. Van Jones has a new talk on TED that does the same. These accounts more need to understand. Understanding here will innoculate us against this virus.
All this many will think is just overblown. I hope the many are right. But if they are not, it will be catastrophic. This is not a time for quiet confidence. The virus of this birtherism is spreading again. Think COVID in January. Birtherism didn’t lose before, even if it didn’t remove Obama. Unchecked, it won’t lose this time either.
None of this is yet to say that they will stop the inauguration of Joe Biden. That would require Congress (or more precisely, the VP, with a Congress divided) recognizing alternative slates, the critical one from Pennsylvania. (Pennsylvania legislative leaders initially said they were not going to appoint an alternative slate. Yesterday, there was talk of a special commission to review the election.) Yet whether or not it stops the inauguration, it steals from Biden a presumptive legitimacy.
Trump supporters will say that’s exactly what happened in 2016. Many genuinely and honestly believe there is no difference. But we should remember the clear differences: This time, the putative winner didn’t lose the popular vote by 3 million, he won the popular vote by close to 5 million. This time, there is no plausible suggestion of world-class foreign interference. That time, when the recounts were done, Democratic leaders did not question the results. That time, no credible Democratic leader was suggesting a massive domestic fraud. And finally, that time, Hillary Clinton was not holding rallies to deny the legitimacy of the process or the results.
This time is not that time. This time could well be worse. It doesn’t take a Stephen King to glimpse what happens if they succeed in reversing what all now assume is the result. Seven percent of America turned out to protest the murder of George Floyd. What does America look like if legislatures vote to ignore election results, and then defeat Joe Biden’s election? (Here’s why legislatures shouldn’t be seen to have that power — anymore.) We thought 2020 was bad. 2020 will seem as nothing compared to this.
The President is entitled to a process to determine whether the results that are reported are the results that were. He is entitled to recounts where the tallies are close. He is entitled to assurance that no fraud produced this overwhelming result. To many, the very idea seems just bizarre. Even Karl Rove said it would “require a conspiracy on the scale of a James Bond movie.” Yet that doesn’t negate the President’s right to ask.
But when that process is complete, we need leaders with the courage to accept those results and to defend them. We have seen some of those leaders. We desperately need more. No one should trust Donald Trump to do the right thing here — he has everything to lose. But we can demand leaders who do the right thing — or at least inspire them. This is the moment when that demand could matter.
(And oh, by the way: Let no defender of the Electoral College EVER say again that the virtue of the College is that it produces clear results. This is the second election in 4 years in which there was a clear national result, but many questions raised by tiny differences in multiple slates. Where or not the College was stabilizing before, it is deeply destabilizing now. | https://medium.com/@xxezze1xx/the-mess-congress-could-make-score-1f2a0c1a8501 | [] | 2020-11-11 06:46:40.333000+00:00 | ['Live'] |
Open Source Investing: Announcing the AirTree Explorer Program | Angel investors are the lifeblood of a healthy startup ecosystem. They’re often the first port of call for new ideas, and they play a critical role in supporting founders.
But while most parts of the Australian tech ecosystem are growing in leaps and bounds, the seed and angel investment ecosystem is at risk of sliding backwards. Angel and seed-stage investing have dropped off a cliff in the last three years, and despite a few notable exceptions, the level of diversity amongst angel investors is still very low.
We’d love to help change this.
So today we’re announcing something new — the AirTree Explorer Program.
It’s a pilot program to help support the next generation of diverse technology investors in Australia and NZ, and we couldn’t be more excited about it. We want to work with you to find, fund and support great Aussie and Kiwi founders, and along the way give you real skin in the game and help you build an investment track record of your own.
We’ve been running the program in stealth mode for a few months now with a small group of people — but as we open it up to more and more future angels, we’ve decided to talk about it a little more publicly.
Why now?
We’re acutely aware that it’s bloody hard to become a tech investor. Existing Aussie VC funds are still small (at least compared to overseas), and while jobs do come up from time to time, there’s only ever going to be a small number of roles available. But if you want to go out and start a new fund, investors will usually want to see that you have some sort of investing track record. And that often means making investments with your own money. But let’s be honest — few people have the sort of cash lying around to invest in tech startups, especially early in their career. Once you’re done with rent, food and the rest of Maslow’s hierarchy, you either need to come from a pretty privileged background, or have had some real professional success (or luck).
And of course this means it’s pretty hard for a lot of people to even think about dipping their toes in the investing waters. We’re excited to see a shift in the types of people who can bring new ideas and understandings to the table though. And we know there are a whole bunch of people in Australia and NZ from very diverse backgrounds who would be great investors, if only they had the opportunity.
Who’s this program for?
We’re looking for people who are curious and hungry, who spend time with great founders and have a unique lens into the highs and lows of startup life. They might be a founder themselves. Or they might just be smart, curious people who are already in the ecosystem but want to start investing.
We believe these are the sorts of people that have a great chance at identifying and supporting the next generation of category-leading startups.
Does that sound like you? If so, we want to hear from you!! And we want to help you develop the skills to become a great investor.
The Explorer Program
We will initially pilot the program with 20 explorers from across NZ and Australia.
Here’s what it would involve:
Open source investor education program — We will host a series of private angel investing seminars and events for our Explorers. These will include fireside chats with some of Australia and NZ’s best angel investors such as Kylie Frazer, Suze Reynolds and Matt Allen and deep dive sessions focused on startup trends and markets, from Agtech to AI, from cybersecurity to fintech and everything in between. We want to help you answer questions like:
“How do I find great opportunities?”
“How do I evaluate markets?”
“What is the right valuation?
“Do the terms make sense?” and loads more.
Funding to invest — Many of our Explorers won’t have their own capital to invest, but we still want to help them build a track record of their own. So for any Explorer that introduces us to a company that we invest in, we’ll bring you in on the investment alongside AirTree by giving you a small cheque to invest. There are no weird complications — you become like any other shareholder on the cap table, and you maintain your own relationship with the founders. You can start to build your own track record — but without needing piles of your own cash to invest.
Many of our Explorers won’t have their own capital to invest, but we still want to help them build a track record of their own. So for any Explorer that introduces us to a company that we invest in, we’ll bring you in on the investment alongside AirTree by giving you a small cheque to invest. There are no weird complications — you become like any other shareholder on the cap table, and you maintain your own relationship with the founders. You can start to build your own track record — but without needing piles of your own cash to invest. Open source IC meetings — From time to time we’ll invite members from our Explorer network to join our weekly investment committee (IC) meetings. The IC meeting is where a lot of the juicy stuff happens — it’s where we discuss new opportunities, markets and trends. For most VCs, what goes on in those meetings is usually a closely-guarded secret — but we’d rather open them up and invite our Explorers to come and play an active part. We all learn a tonne from each other in these meetings and would love to learn from our Explorers too. And if we wind up doing a deal together, we’ll invite you to take part in our full internal investment process including diligence, partner presentation etc.
— From time to time we’ll invite members from our Explorer network to join our weekly investment committee (IC) meetings. The IC meeting is where a lot of the juicy stuff happens — it’s where we discuss new opportunities, markets and trends. For most VCs, what goes on in those meetings is usually a closely-guarded secret — but we’d rather open them up and invite our Explorers to come and play an active part. We all learn a tonne from each other in these meetings and would love to learn from our Explorers too. And if we wind up doing a deal together, we’ll invite you to take part in our full internal investment process including diligence, partner presentation etc. Network — As part of the program you’ll get to meet the other Explorers, as well as the extended AirTree team and some of Australia and NZ’s best early-stage investors. It’s a great environment to learn from one another and share deal flow.
One more thing… our diversity pledge
As one of the biggest funds in the country, we feel it’s important to drive diversity on every level. This includes within our own team and the investments we make — both of which we continue to be very focused on. But it also includes the people we invest with.
That’s why alongside this pilot, we’re making an important pledge. For every investment we lead, we will bring at least one investor from an underrepresented group on to the cap table, provided the founder is ok with it. From now on, we will be adding this pledge to our term sheets for each investment that we lead. We’re also hoping that our Explorer program will help us build a deep bench of potential co-investors that we can bring into these rounds.
Our community is one of the things we love the most about the work we do, and we know that great ideas come from all kinds of places and from all kinds of people. If you’ve always wanted to know what goes on under the hood of angel investing, apply to be part of our Explorer Program and help shape the thriving startup ecosystem.
How to apply
If you’d like to get involved in the AirTree Explorer Program — apply here by 30 September. | https://medium.com/airtree-venture/open-source-investing-announcing-the-airtree-explorer-program-c0508cd5d251 | [] | 2020-09-11 03:09:16.588000+00:00 | ['Startup', 'Insights', 'Venture Capital', 'Resources', 'Angel Investors'] |
Running a Dash App 24/7 on Heroku with a Scheduled Worker | Options to make clock working
There are three options for getting a clock or scheduler running in the background on Heroku while your Dash app is running:
1. Frontend-hacky but fairly customizable way
Create a connection of the frontend dash app with the background clock through a function import and call the job in de dash Python file within a thread (see main.py).
A webpage in Heroku will idle after 30 minutes if there are no visitors, so the clock will stop after 30 min if there are no visitors if you connect your clock to your frontend in this way. There is an elaborate post about this issue on StackOverflow this.
You can change this by paying or you can use another third party that pings your website to keep the website from idling. Kaffeine is the most workable solution described within the above StackOverflow post in my opinion. Kaffeine is a web app that uses Heroku itself for pinging the Heroku URL you give it as input, thereby preventing your app from going into the idle stage.
2. Official and friendly but imprecise Heroku way.
Create a Scheduler job in Heroku. Click on Resources within your app and in the text field of add-ons fill in “scheduler”. Start a Scheduler. You have to give your credit card number, but you won’t be charged if you don’t go over the limit. Next, run your job according to a schedule by filling in a command like:
python clock.py
You can check whether you have passed the non-pay limit with the command “heroku ps”. The Scheduler works well but is not very accurate due to its dependency on the availability of background processes within the Heroku system. It was hard to set my clock schedule according to a specific time interval with this option.
3. The professional fully customizable Procfile way
This third option is probably the most professional one: you use the processes file, named Procfile, to set up your clock. What is a Procfile?
“A Procfile is a text file named Procfile placed in the root of your application that lists the process types in an application. Each process type is a declaration of a command that is executed when a container of that process type is started.”
The Procfile contains three lines of code that refer to three files:
web: gunicorn dash_app_name:server
This is the reference to Dash main app file. Gunicorn is the Web Server Gateway Interface (WSGI) HTTP server, I think this is a complex piece of code that makes it possible for a request of your URL to get referred to your working Dash app. worker: python do_something.py
Reference to the file with the function that does something and is supposed to do the scheduled work. clock: python clock.py
This is the reference to the clock file that is supposed to run on the Heroku server continually.
If you use this option you have to start your clock and worker manually after the first time when you’ve pushed it with git with the commands:
heroku ps:scale worker=1
heroku ps:scale clock=1
The first line, the web process, in the Procfile runs automatically after pushing your project to the Heroku server with git.
The downside of option 3
Unfortunately, there are two downsides. First, you can only implement a limited amount of processes as a non-paying user. If you run your clock in this way you have no other options for other processes such as starting a Heroku command-line interface from your Linux prompt, which takes an additional process within a container.
The second problem is that it’s impossible to let the Dash app in the web container create a JSON file that is used to interactively adjust the clock that coordinates the clock container. According to the Heroku website:
“During the dyno’s lifetime its running processes can use the filesystem as a temporary scratchpad, but no files that are written are visible to processes in any other dyno and any files written will be discarded the moment the dyno is stopped or restarted.”
If these two issues don’t pose a problem to the functioning of your project then running a clock process is the best option. If not, I would suggest going for option 1.
Things to keep in the back of your mind
If you see your app running twice at every scheduled run this could be caused by two things:
1. You need to set your web_concurrency to 1:
heroku config:set WEB_CONCURRENCY=1
2. You need to set your debugging mode at the end of your Dash app file to False.
One last thing
If you only want to schedule something without a GUI to control the scheduling you can easily do that by creating a worker process that runs a Python file with apscheduler or another schedule module within it.
Although there will not be a way to interact with the worker process, the worker process is quite reliable in my experience and runs 24/7. Here, you can find an example of Python code that gets financial data and stores it every 15 minutes on the google cloud via firebase.
Hope this saves you time. Good luck! :-)
More content at plainenglish.io | https://python.plainenglish.io/dash-app-with-background-scheduler-in-heroku-93c255470b37 | ['Kelvin Kramp'] | 2021-05-15 22:51:20.252000+00:00 | ['Programming', 'Heroku', 'Python', 'Dash', 'Software Development'] |
Mikel Arteta Was Never The Man For The Job At Arsenal | Management
The board have got to take some blame. Arsene Wenger, a football legend did receive the most backing during his time at the club. An even Unai Emery was handed a £72 million winger in Nicholas Pepe. So signings have been made, and big ones. Long story short the club has had signings. But the issue lies in the specific signings they have made. £72 million for Pepe or £35 million for Leroy Sane, the price Man City paid for Sane in 2016? Anyone will say Leroy Sane. This isn’t a special case. Liverpool’s Mane and Salah cost around £40 million and £30 million respectively. Both are top tier attackers in the league right now. Even Mahrez, a proven league winger went to City for £60 million. So what is the issue. Well Pepe has seriously under performed for Arsenal. Arsenal’s best wingers have been academy products, Saka (who I love watching) and Martinelli, a great talent but unfortunately injuries have held him back. It isn’t just Pepe that I am pin pointing this on. But questions have to be asked. Spending that kind of money on a player to honestly do the bare minimum. The scouting in this club needs to be questioned.
Arteta wanted Gabriel, Thomas Partey, Willian (on a free transfer) and Houseem Aouar. He got 3 out of those 4 players. To say he hasn’t been backed is a little bit of a stretch. But it isn’t the correct backing. 3 year contract for a 30 something year old winger who lets be real isn’t Gareth Bale quality. Gabriel was needed fair. But was Partey really needed? He is a great player don’t get me wrong. In Arsenal’s 1–0 victory over Man United at Old Trafford Partey absolutely ran riot against United. But again injuries set him back. But the type of player Partey is is not the one Arsenal needed. They have created virtually nothing this season. Aouar would have been a better pick. Sure they might concede 2 but with Aouar’s creativity they would score 3. It is gone now. Whoever manages the transfers, the scouting of these players and the owners themselves all need to take their heads out of their asses. I know I am a Man City fan but I have always said that I love when there is competition in the league. As much as I love City’s 2017/18 centurion season, the 2018/19 season which saw us go head to head with Liverpool and saw City win the league on the last season was the most satisfying league win. If the big clubs made the league more competitive it would be more fun trust me.
Players
I will be honest. I am 19 years of age, I have been watching football since I was 7. I have seen bad performances and discipline over the years. But this Arsenal side are not simply a bad performance. They are for starters the most boring team to watch. They create absolutely nothing. Man City (at the time of writing this) beat Arsenal 4–1 in the EFL cup yesterday. With the exception of Martinelli, I never felt threatened when Arsenal were on the ball. Under Wenger and honestly even (to a degree) Emery this was not that big of a problem. And even up until September 2020 Arsenal had a lethal press deploying Aubameyangs threatening pace both down the middle and the wide areas during counter attacks caused major problems for clubs. But the players themselves need to take a big look at themselves. How it has fallen to 19 year old Saka to take responsibility is shocking. Senior players running around like headless chickens. The lack of discipline in the team is appalling as well. They have the most red cards in the league (I think at least at this time). Stupid challenges and reckless behaviour. Xhaka grabbing someone by the throat… seriously? That doesn’t even need a VAR viewing. The players don’t seem to have a key quality. It is not pace. Or creativity. Or finishing ability. The majority of them lack a major quality. Pride. They don’t seem to have pride in being a footballer, let alone an Arsenal player. Again let me use my team as an example. John Stones at the beginning of this season would have never been in contention for the starting XI. I would have laughed at you. Stones, an error prone player replace Laporte, one of the best defenders in the league are you smoking? Now in December I am hoping to see Stones start alongside Ruben Dias every game. He grinded. He proved why he deserved to be in the starting XI. In the summer there were talks of him being sold. After seeing his form now, I hope he signs an extension. Pride can influence a lot in both a player and a team. And with a few exceptions I don’t see any pride in this Arsenal side.
Mikel Arteta
Which brings me on to Arteta. An inexperienced manager. Why would a big club sign an inexperienced manager? He is more of an Everton legend and Everton did not bat an eye to hire him. Yet at the end of the 2019/20 season he proved everyone wrong. Winning two trophies in the span of around 7 months. He took a mess of a team and squeezed out a trophy winning side. So why did I say it makes sense to bring someone else after he won two trophies. It wouldn’t make sense. HE HAD JUST WON THEM TWO TROPHIES WHY DEMOTE HIM? I can hear people ask. Let us break it down.
For starters the style of football they played was very beginner like. Essentially it was to hit teams on the counter attack using Aubameyangs pace to cut through the defences of teams. The fact that only he scored in the Semi-Final and Final of the FA Cup says something. At the time it wouldn’t look like a problem. But using 3 at the back only one name comes to mind… Mourinho. Their enemy of a manager. His very sit deep style of football is something only he can pull of to the best of its ability. I saw Pep Guardiola lose to Lyon in the Champions League Quarter Finals just because he couldn’t deploy City to do the same. Pep, a tactical genius could not pull it off. Ole tried it at somepoints in his career and it backfired. It worked for Arteta for a while. Then reality hit, or in this case Aston Villa. 3–0 they lost to Villa at home. They had also lost to City and Liverpool prior to that, but 3–0 to a team which struggled to stay alive last season at home is not great. And it proved that Arteta was out of his depth. His 3 at the back system failed, and that is the beginning of their poor run of form. If the management of Arsenal are content with defensive style of play then they should have gotten Maurizio Sarri or Mourinho. But Arteta wants to attack as do the players. Which brings the next issue Areta has.
What is his next plan should things go south? If Aubameyang can’t score what is his next move? Both City and Liverpool are set up so there are at least 7 goal scorers in their teams. Arsenal only seem to have 1. But that is how Arteta seems to have set the system up. In his post match interview in the FA Cup final he said he wanted to build the squad around Aubamenyang. That should be worrying. His plan for a new season was solely based off Aubameyang. If there is one thing he should’ve learnt under Pep is to never build a squad around someone. Aubameyang has 3 goals (at the time of writing) in 14 games. For someone who wanted to build his squad around that is clearly failing. If that was his plan all along, then unless Aubameyang turns into Messi then Arsenal could very well get relegated. Even prime Aubameyang in the premier league of 2018/19 would not be able to drag this around. Because Arteta is showing another issue.
His decisions have been a joke. They were losing to Everton 2–1 and he decides to bring on a midfielder for an attacker. Not only that, but Pepe was their best player that match. Then he got substituted off. Why Willian is getting all this game time is funny. Even Ole would have dropped him after 5 games not let him continue for another 10 or so. And the exile of Mesut Ozil. Say what you want about him but he would create way more than what they are right now. But he isn’t even allowed to be an option. Why not use Emile Smith Rowe? I saw him last night against us in the EFL cup and he looked bright. Saka has been their most creative player this season, and he is 19. Arteta is in a predicament that is challenging for even experienced managers let alone an inexperienced manager. | https://medium.com/@alushanialbi56789/mikel-arteta-was-never-the-man-for-the-job-at-arsenal-446f4c635ddb | ['Albion Alushani'] | 2020-12-23 21:33:07.483000+00:00 | ['Entertainment', 'Arsenal', 'Football', 'Sports', 'Soccer'] |
Let’s Usher in 2021 With a Twerk | Okay, I’m putting you on. I don’t really mean “dirty,” as that would be untoward and we all know I don’t go there, right?
With that said, I couldn’t help but think, when I was letting my fractured brain do its own thing the other day, how much fun it would be to throw a virtual dance fest with our Medium buddies.
Maybe it’s the quarantine and the fact that I love to dance but rarely do it, except for when my hubby vacates the premises, or maybe I’m just in a riled-up mood and need to let off some steam, but think about it. Imagine cutting loose with the likes of Helen Cassidy Page, James Knight, Suzanne V. Tanner, Rasheed Hooda, Sterling Page, Kristi Keller, Robin Klammer, Stephen Sovie, P.G. Barnett, Terry L. Cooper, Gayle Kurtzer-Meyers, Don Feazelle, Kim McKinney, Jezebel Feast, Estacious(Charles White), Dawn Bevier, Tina L. Smith, Greg Prince, or any number of Medium “influencers.” You all know who you are.
We might have to actually dress, you know, put on some decent clothes, or whatever still fits, anyway. But that’s a measly price to pay for getting down with our bad selves with some of the baddest asses on Medium.
Imagine the nostalgia of combing the knots out of our hair, shaving (you guys), slapping on a bit of blush, or a swipe of lipstick (we women). And no masks necessary!
Also, everyone would be invited, even the half-assed tipsters, who probably wouldn’t attend anyway. Too busy conjuring up more useless advice for how we losers can “make it” on Medium. Or dreaming up yet another workshop. Still, they’d be welcome. Or not.
Naturally, this would have to be a BYOB affair. Definitely wine for me as I prefer to remain upright when I dance, yet, I wouldn’t turn down the occasional shot with like-minded imbibers.
Snacks? Totally your call but keep in mind what happens when we drink on an empty stomach. I would hate for Helen to see me purging into my fake ficus.
As for music, I propose that we nominate one lucky person to be our DJ. Of course, your input is not only welcome but needed, here. Maybe we all submit ten of our favorite ass-shaking tunes to whoever is going to do the spinning and let him or her work it out. Unless we turn this into a rage and keep it going for days. But just know that whoever falls out first, gets “unfollowed.”
Kidding. I’m kidding, here.
I’m just feeling so, boxed-up. Aren’t you? Along with mentally constipated and physically…soft. Think of the calories we could burn off from countless bags of Cheetos and loaves of sourdough bread.
Having a “plus one” is up to you but for me, I can’t imagine having my mate watching CNN upstairs while I gyrate in front of my iMac for hours. We could just respectably ask our partners to “get the fuck out, for a while.” But again, that’s your call.
Now, here’s where it gets tough: The technical stuff. How many dancers would we be able to “fit in?” Do some of us take breaks? Drop-in and out? We need to figure out the logistics before we get down.
Also, what’s the vehicle? Do we Zoom? Skype? Or what? Would any of you want to take this essential element on? Perhaps Ev Williams could lend a hand to his loyal Medium minions.
“Ev, what do you think, buddy? Most of us aren’t making squat here so can you help throw us a party?”
I’m getting excited just thinking about a Medium dance party. I’m sure many of you have some pretty impressive moves. And I for one want to see them. Yes, I’m a bit of a perv, but it’s all good. I just want to get sweaty with my friends.
So what do you think? Can we do this?
By the way, twerk and/or floss at your own risk. If you throw your back or hip out, I can’t be held responsible. | https://medium.com/rogues-gallery/lets-usher-in-2021-with-a-twerk-9d2e1a3b3528 | ['Sherry Mcguinn'] | 2020-12-29 22:43:24.571000+00:00 | ['Humor', 'New Year Party', 'Dance', 'Writers On Medium', 'Music'] |
Are You A Good Leader? How Do You Know? | One of my favorite interview questions is, “How do you know that you are succeeding as a new leader? How do you know that you are doing a good job?” Okay, that was two questions, but they are asking the same thing in two different ways. This question is testing the candidate if they have wrapped their heads around what it means to be a leader and that success is very different compared to other roles, like being a Software Engineer or Product Owner.
As a Software Engineer, my success comes in the form of the problems I solve and the speed and quality at which I solve them. As a Product Owner, I can easily point to the metrics of my product and talk to users to understand if I am succeeding or not. As a Leader, I don’t have something tangible that I can point at and say, “I built that!” I can’t feel or see success in the same way as someone who produces something.
As a Leader, I need to update my definition of success. I also need to change how I find out if I am succeeding or not because it’s no longer binary like it was in my previous role when I was contributing to a solution or product.
What is the definition of success as a leader?
One month ago, we were interviewing a potential new software engineering leader. I asked this candidate the question about what their definition of success was and at the end of the interview, they turned the question back on all of us. They asked us, as experienced leaders, how did we know if we were succeeding or not? First, well-played candidate. Second, this is where we see that the answer to this question is not simple nor clear. Here’s what everyone said.
The team is growing — This was my answer. I led off by saying that I know I am doing my job well when everyone on the team is growing in their careers and that we are getting better each and every day. It was a little fluffy and lacking details, but that’s what I said. Not my most inspirational answer ever but hey, we’re human, right? The team is happy and fulfilled — This is a much better answer in my opinion compared to what I said. This leader cares deeply about their team and they wanted to emphasize that when everyone on their team feels safe, fulfilled, and enjoys what they are doing and who they are doing it with, she knows that she’s doing her job. We are executing effectively — This answer is what most leaders focus on. We are here to make sure our teams do their jobs, to produce, and to impact the outcome. Yes, without achieving this, we will be out of the job. How we achieve this is something entirely different. We’ll cover this another day. We are making an impact — This answer was great because we can have the happiest team on the planet and we can be the most efficient team ever to exist, but to what end? If our teams are not impacting the outcome by helping our clients and solving our business problems, then we are not doing our jobs. We need to help our teams spend their time and energy on things that drive value. By focusing on this, our teams are more engaged because they know that what they are doing matters. Great answer! We build things the right way — This was the technical version of answer number three listed above. We need to make sure that our teams not only execute effectively but do so in the right way. We cannot take shortcuts or introduce poor quality into our product, otherwise, our client’s experience and our business will suffer. Absolutely true statements and again, as leaders, if we let this happen, we will get fired.
This concluded our round table response to the candidate’s question and upon reflecting, I realized that answering this question is really hard and there isn’t just one answer. Additionally, we could have easily mentioned something related to setting a vision for the team or said that we are growing other leaders as part of our answers. There isn’t a clear answer to this question.
You’ll notice though, all of our answers had something in common. Every answer was about the team. The team was growing. The team was happy. The team executed. The team makes an impact and the team solves problems the right way. Not once did anyone say that success was about the Leader themselves. There wasn’t mention of being promoted within a number of years or obtaining a bonus as part of their success.
As a leader, your success is attached to the success of the team. Our job as leaders is to help the team succeed. Our job is to help the team grow. Our job is to help the team make a lasting impact. Achieving these outcomes may come in many flavors but ultimately, our success is no longer ours alone, it’s dependent on the success of the team.
Let’s put it to practice
I am going to use the analogy of a soccer team for this example. A team is made up of many different types of players. There’s offense, defense, midfield, and a goalie. This maps well to our teams. We have Software Engineers, Product Owners, Designers, UX Researchers, etc. When I played soccer, I was a forward on offense. My job was to score goals and to help others score goals! I was recognized by my stats and at the end of the year, I won awards to the goals and assists that I made. This is the same as being a Software Engineer. At the end of the year, I was recognized for the problems I solved and how I helped others solve problems.
Now, let’s take a look at the coach of the soccer team. The coach spends most of their energy during practice where they work with the players one on one, in pairs, and in groups. They’ll stop and restart sessions to focus on skills, thought processes, and behaviors. They’ll push the team's endurance to the max during practice and it’s in preparations for the game.
When the game begins, the coach is basically out of the picture. They can do minor things during the game, like sub people in and out, or give an inspirational half-time speech, but their job was to prepare the team to win. The coach can’t step onto the field and score a goal for the team, it’s up to them. This maps directly to leadership. As a Leader, I focus on preparing my team to win the game or to solve problems the right way. To have the skills, mindset, and behaviors to succeed. Similar to a soccer coach, when the team loses, the coach loses, the same goes for leadership. When the team fails, the leader fails.
So, are you a good leader?
This is a hard question, right? If you are focused on building the best team you can and invest in helping them succeed, you’re probably headed in the right direction. Getting feedback from your team, business, and your data will help you know for sure.
Remember, Leaders, are coaches. Our job is to help our team learn and develop so that they can win. Our success hinges on theirs. | https://medium.com/leadershiplife/are-you-a-good-leader-how-do-you-know-c1f634ac7cba | ['Calvin Bushor'] | 2020-07-28 16:01:00.948000+00:00 | ['Tech', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Startup', 'Leadership', 'Technology'] |
Essentials To Pack When Travelling To Fiji For A Week | When you are travelling to Fiji for a stupendous vacation, you should know that you won’t be just doing one thing. You will be diving, you will be enjoying the long walks on the beach and savouring cocktails parties. And for all that, you need to be ready.
Even a packing ninja makes mistakes and forgets things to pack. Don’t take chances. Here is a packing list for you to reference when you are travelling to Fiji.
Packing List For One Week’s Trip To Fiji
Fiji’s climate is a tropical marine but is usually warm year around. You will be enjoying a temperature between 18–25 °C in the evening and 24–31 °C during the day. So your packing list highly depends on this sort of a climate, especially the clothing style. So here is the list for you.
You can ignore what you think is unimportant for you in the list below.
High SPF Sunscreens
A high SPF sunscreen is a must when travelling to Fiji. Sun can be really harsh in Fiji. Also, if you are planning to stay on the beach for a long time, you might have to reapply the sunscreen every two hours. A broad spectrum sunscreen is must for the packing list for Fiji.
Insect Repellants
A tropical insect repellant is a must for Fiji packing list. Resorts usually provide insect repellents but its better to take your own with you that suits your skin and is not allergic. Mosquitoes can be really cruel. Always use a repellent that does not contain diethyltoluamide. Diethyltoluamide can be allergic when applied with sunscreens.
Camera
Fiji is undoubtedly a beautiful place with beautiful islands. It’s too hard to not capture this beauty in the camera. I would suggest not to just rely on a phone camera but take a good quality camera. An underwater camera will be a good option to capture this spectacular beauty. Don’t forget to get a spare memory card just in case you are not tired of clicking. Carry a tripod with you if you need.
Mask And Snorkels
If you plan to do snorkelling, you might consider packing your own mask and snorkels. No doubt you will be getting masks from the resorts. But these masks are frequently used and can be stretched due to this. It will be good to carry an anti-fog mask so that you don’t miss anything.
Reef shoes are split toe surfing boots that are made from 92% Nylon/Polyamide, 8% Elastane that makes it waterproof. Nuts and bolts are made from F’N Lite neoprene which is a cell-rich limestone and is used for lightweight warmth. They are the best shoes for surfing and since they are porous, they dry quickly for the next use. They will help you avoid the cuts form the sharp rocks.
You might be staying in some resort that is far from the city. And in case of emergencies, you can not wait to reach a hospital or a nursing home. Keep some of the emergency medicines or aids with you.
Seasickness
Diarrhoea
Antiseptics
Painkillers
Bandage tape
Bandaids
scissors
thermometer
sunburn treatment
Already prescribed medicines if any
Sarong
There is no point in changing every two hours and then again going to the beach. Instead, take a sarong with you so that you can cover-up while having lunch and then directly head to the beach.
Tote Bag
Tote bags for beaches is a nice option. They are washable and easily available in the market. Also, they are spacious enough to keep all your important items like sarongs, sunscreens, sunglasses etc.
Sunglasses and Hat
Make sure you don’t forget the essentials, when in the sun. Hats are a necessity on the beach. That will help you save your face, neck and shoulders from the fierce sun. Sunglasses will also be helpful on the beach. Your eyes need protection from the sun.
Your phone and your camera will be used a lot since you will be uploading pictures and clicking pictures. Do not forget the chargers with you or else you will be clicking pictures for just a day and not more than that. If you are carrying a laptop, then don’t forget to carry their chargers as well.
If going to a village tour in Fiji is a part of your itinerary, it will be good to carry small gifts with you for children or for the teachers at the school. Books and stationery are a good option for gifting the students.
Clothing
Make sure you wear comfortable clothing when you are travelling to Fiji. Here is a list that you can carry with you. This list will be helpful for a week’s packing for Fiji.
Tops
Tunics
Sundress
Swimsuits
Buttondown Shirt
T-shirts
Modest Skirts
Undergarments
Sleepwear
Short Sleeve Shirts
Socks
Trousers or Pants
Toiletries
It is always good to carry your toiletries with you even if the resorts or hotels provide you with the toiletries.
Toothbrush
Toothpaste
Comb
Facewash
Bodywash
Shaving kit
Handwash soap
Walking Shoes
There are walking trails in Fiji that you can not miss because you don’t have the correct footwear. Carry the footwear and enjoy the trek. To enjoy the waterfalls and national parks you need good footwear.
There might still be a few items that you need apart from this list. Think and pack! This might be a lazy job, but it’s always good to do the lazy part rather than regretting later.
Start planning your adventure and tell us your stories in the comments section below. | https://medium.com/@Travel.Earth/essentials-to-pack-when-travelling-to-fiji-for-a-week-7322be8e8c24 | [] | 2019-05-24 09:46:14.771000+00:00 | ['Vacation', 'Fiji', 'Travel', 'Travel Tips', 'Travel Packing'] |
To Speak of Perdita | The seasons stopped being seasons
just before her story ended.
But now, the present circumstance
makes my memory of her stale.
And the winter never comes,
nor the Spring, the Summer, or the Fall
in her stead.
The weather never changes,
and there’s no rain to wet the asphalt
beneath my bare and blistered feet.
And I have no roof to settle under,
nor a pillow, nor a chair,
to put my guilty conscience at rest.
All I have is ceaseless motion
without sleep,
“cause sleep is the cousin of death”. | https://medium.com/the-junction/to-speak-of-perdita-efae3f21c02c | ['Dylan Kelly'] | 2019-11-13 20:21:42.472000+00:00 | ['Sleep', 'Poetry', 'Memory', 'Literature'] |
Are Apple’s Stock Apps Worth Using? | You’ve heard it all from unapologetic Apple critics: Chrome is better than Safari, Apple Maps is… the worst, even some video pros refuse to use Final Cut Pro for some reason.
Apple’s first-party apps aren’t necessarily terrible, but I’m just not sure that they’re totally worth it. Obviously, it depends on who you are and what sort of biases you might have towards each product, but today I thought it might be worth going through Apple’s apps and actually breaking them down, just to see what they actually offer.
I was first inspired to do this story after reading this one by Paul Alvarez, but wanted to approach this a little differently. For one, I’ll be comparing different apps for each Apple first-party app. I’ll also dive into Apple’s macOS apps to see if there are any benefits for those.
The main benefits to running native Apple apps on Apple hardware are just that: they perform much better, especially on macOS. Another huge benefit is integration with other Apple products, like universal Apple Music support on Siri (you can use Spotify with Siri, but instead of “hey Siri, play blink-182” you’d need to say “hey Siri, play blink-182 on Spotify”).
I don’t really mix-and-match that much — I have an Apple keyboard and mouse for Pete’s sake — but it does add a lot of value to the tech I use every day. So without further introduction, let’s test some of these first-party apps against my favorite alternatives.
The apps I’m trying out include: | https://medium.com/macoclock/are-apples-stock-apps-worth-using-5a62918f1d89 | ['Brad Laplante'] | 2020-12-17 10:56:18.106000+00:00 | ['iPhone', 'Apple'] |
Why We All Need to Stop Hating on “Busyness” | Why We All Need to Stop Hating on “Busyness”
The Honest Weekly Digest, 28–3 December
Photo by Nick Morrison on Unsplash
Hello, honest creatives!
This week we published three amazing articles. | https://medium.com/honest-creative/why-we-all-need-to-stop-hating-on-busyness-5dfad05dcf0d | ['Yeva Volkova'] | 2020-12-04 11:57:47.417000+00:00 | ['Honest Creative', 'Content Creation', 'Weekly Report', 'Weekly Digest', 'Creativity'] |
Steady as a Rock | Steady as a Rock
That time is now at Hand
Photo by Nuno Silva on Unsplash
We are fools who believe You are there,
if You are not there;
Otherwise, if You are there, we must wait confidently and patiently. . .
to see what it is that You will do.
Who is right and who is wrong
only time will tell.
You must be happy to look down and watch
as we sniff to investigate the terrain,
trying to discern the territory
as our senses, emotions, instincts and intelligence
try to sway our thinking,
battling amongst themselves and then against
each other, in our hopeless pursuit to discover
who will come out on top.
Those who believe or those who do not.
Much is invested in this age-old question,
and each side is certain it is right.
Photo by Japheth Mast on Unsplash
How long will we wait …
the further time goes forth,
the more unbelievers become victorious,
and those of us who believe wait and wonder,
unperturbed.
For You have called it long ago,
that we must remain steadfast, for nobody is to know …
That the time is now at hand.
Our leaders have sold us out to a world
of Your non-existence. | https://medium.com/illumination/steady-as-a-rock-52f9d8f28452 | ['David Cenicola'] | 2020-12-25 06:23:53.624000+00:00 | ['Mental Health', 'Productivity', 'Facebook', 'Family', 'Social Media'] |
The Vanishing of Nan Dixon | Missing for 40 years
Nan Dixon, NamUS
Nancy “Nan” Cecile Dixon was born August 4, 1905, in Charlottesville City, Virginia. She was the eldest of nine children. Nan was tiny at 4'10", and only 118lbs. Her family describes her as “strong and lively” even at 72 years of age. She made her home in Grass Valley, CA, with her third husband, Bob. She knew how to drive, but typically avoided it if she could. Nan was feeling lonely in her old age, and often asked her brother why he didn’t visit her.
Disappearance
In 1961, Nan’s brother Harry and his wife, Lula were leasing property in Seven Troughs, NV. They were some of the only residents left in the wildly remote mining community. Harry and his brother, Dan, planned to open a gold mining operation and asked the other siblings for money to fund the business venture. Nan graciously loaned $6,000. However, nothing came of the mine, and no one paid Nan back. This, understandably, caused turmoil in the family. So much so that Nan and Harry didn’t speak until their brother Paul’s funeral in 1976. After several years of arguments and hurt feelings, the Leighton’s decided to forgive the debt for the sake of keeping the peace.
Looking N-NW from Signal Peak to the ghost town of Seven Troughs, Pershing Co., NV. Courtesy QKC. The area where Nan went missing.
Nan made plans to visit her brother in the remote and defunct town of Seven Troughs, Nevada. She begged her husband to accompany her on the trip, but he refused. She asked her friend Martha to join her on the road trip, but she had other plans. September 21, 1978, Nan tossed a tote full of clothes, a hand-drawn map, and her husband’s .22 handgun into her lime green 1976 Datsun B210 Sedan, and made the trip alone. The three-hour drive was a small price to pay, as she was desperate to see her brother. Nan stopped in Boomtown, NV, to have dinner. She then purchased $4.18 of gas at a Texaco station in Lovelock, NV. Then, she vanished into thin air.
It didn’t take long for Nan’s family to realize that she was missing. Her family and law enforcement scoured the desert but were unable to locate any trace of Nan. Rumors of foul play or suicide were rampant, but there were no substantial leads. Either way, Nan was missing.
A Possible Break
Four years passed without any developments in the case. On a crisp Thanksgiving morning in 1982, Coyote hunters discovered Nan’s vehicle on an unused area of the Eagle Picher mining property. The car was rusted and infested with pack rats. The car had a half a tank of gas in it. Scuffed tires and a burnt-out clutch indicated that the driver veered off the road into the ditch and became stuck.
Nan’s Car from NaMUS
Law enforcement found several pieces of evidence that they believed were signs of foul play. A single strand of gray hair found on the steering wheel had what officers assumed was human tissue on it. A roll and a single length of electrical tape were found in the Datsun. This lead investigators to suspect that Nan was forcefully bound. There appeared to be stains on the car’s trunk liner, and tire rim that investigators assumed were blood. Police found several empty diet cola bottles outside of the vehicle as well as empty cartons of cigarettes that were not Nan’s brand. The missing person case was shaping up to be either suicide or homicide as far as Pershing County Sheriffs were concerned.
Nan’s remains never turned up despite extensive search and investigation. There are no suspects in the Nan Dixon case. Facts that would have helped the investigation are only now coming into light. Unfortunately, the car was auctioned off, and evidence recovered by the police lost.
Popular Theories
The Family Did it
This theory stems from a rumor that Nan’s trip was to recover the $6000 she loaned her brothers Harry and Dan. Nan’s husband certainly would have accompanied her on such a confrontation. She was just 4'10" tall and didn’t stand a chance in a physical altercation. She brought the gun because she was vulnerable without it in the middle of nowhere. The family aided in the search, despite their advanced age and declining health. They offered a $100 reward for anyone who could produce her car. They reconciled the 17-year-old loan long before Nan’s visit. Again, Nan often talked about how she missed her siblings and desired a closer relationship with them. That was the point of her trip.
Harry’s son, Butch, has been mentioned by Leighton descendants as a potential suspect in Nan’s death. He was a shady character, to be sure. However, there is nothing concrete that points to any involvement in Nan’s disappearance.
Victim of a Serial Killer
As with any wilderness area in America, there have been bodies found in the general vicinity of Seven Troughs. Nan’s family waited patiently as DNA testing excluded Nan as a potential unidentified Jane Doe found in the area. These separate deaths were isolated incidents with no commonality other than the location of the deceased. It is in the realm of possibility, but not the most likely of scenarios.
Did Nan Take Her Own Life?
Nan’s behavior before her disappearance was not that of a woman who wished to end her life. Firstly, she asked two people to accompany her, which would make no sense if she intended to end her life. She did not enjoy driving, and this would have been a rough solo trip for an older woman. Journalists and law enforcement officials report that Nan penned a suicide note. This incomplete, somewhat cryptic letter found at the car was only partially readable at the time. Handwriting and restorative experts have been able to give a complete translation of the partial letter. What remains of the tattered note reads as follows:
“…keeps telling me to get the gun and end my nightmares, but this I’ll never do. God gives life, only God can take life. Committing your own suicide is the unbearable shame and I’ll never be left by a just God far from habitation with a beat in my heart…”
These are not the words of a suicidal woman. The note states that she would not take her own life.
A Survival Situation
Nan Dixon was a 72-year-old, incredibly petite, arthritic woman, with a hernia. The area where hunters found her car was searched by air and by land four years prior. This fact led investigators to believe someone planted the Datsun at the location. The remoteness of the area cannot be understated. The site is vast and desolate. The lime green car, peppered with rusty oxidation and tucked into the shadow of a hill, made a seamless camouflage into the desert terrain and missed by searchers.
Stains in and on the car tested negative for blood, according to the evidence reports. An empty six-pack of diet soda was found on the ground by the abandoned vehicle, along with four cartons of cigarettes in the back seat. To me, this suggests that Nan ran her car off the road, into a ravine. Nan tried her best to drive out, but the harder she tried, the deeper the tires burrowed in the sand. In her efforts, she burnt out the clutch. Nan was lost and decided to stay put in hopes of a rescue. She drank soda to keep herself hydrated. Nan was a light smoker. While she was stranded, she chain-smoked to prevent herself from feeling as hungry. Nan spent her time writing down her account of what happened. Eventually, Nan decided to venture out and seek help. Recently, the father-daughter YouTube team, EploreWithUs, located an empty bottle of diet cola approximately one and a half miles from the location of Nan’s car. It appears she at least made it that far, and likely passed away.
The fact that coyote hunters found her car suggests there were predatory coyotes in the area and enough that hunters would make an effort to destroy them. At the time of this writing, Nan would be 114 years old. She will not be found alive. The harsh desert and predatory animals would have reclaimed Nan’s human remains.
Aftermath
Nan’s family never gave up in their search. To date, they have spent over $40,000 to hire private detectives and even psychics to bring Nan home. Older women who go missing are grossly under-reported by the media. Let Nan’s story be a caution. Visit the elderly in your life, and make sure they aren’t lonely. Offer to travel with them if you are able. This case is a tale of good intentions and bad decisions that ultimately resulted in the death of a woman who was very much loved. May her memory continue to be a blessing.
If you have any information leading regarding the disappearance of Nan Dixon, please contact the Pershing County, NV Sherrif. Special thanks to ExploreWithUs for keeping Nan’s case alive.
Further Reading
Nan’s Find a Grave Memorial
Nan on The Doe Network
Nan on NamUS
Watch this video to see newly released documents pertaining to Nan’s case. | https://heathermonroe.medium.com/the-vanishing-of-nan-dixon-d14688cf2712 | ['Heather Monroe'] | 2019-08-24 03:00:57.663000+00:00 | ['Unsolved', 'True Crime', 'Crime', 'Mystery', 'Missing Persons'] |
God’s Interest | Jonah 4:11 (KJV)
And should not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their left hand; and also much cattle?
I view the book of Jonah from the perspective of about three thousand years of history. If we were to simply consider the negative impact of Assyria upon future generations of the children of God, then Jonah’s attitude seems like it would have been better in the long haul.
God, not Jonah, knew the future. Jonah’s grudge was with the current generation of Ninevites. He could not have known that these people would be the enemies of his own for thousands of years.
He didn’t but God did.
God’s interest was in the saving of the current generation. Having the advantage of perfect knowledge, God chose to save those who would be saved rather than to condemn them for what their fathers, themselves, or the progeny would do.
God is interested in saving the souls of individuals right now. He knows the future and has it handled. He is interested in what we are doing to reach people right now.
We should be too.
To my readers:
First of all, thank you! It is a great joy to me to know you read the thoughts and lessons God has given me in His word. Secondly, I would love to hear from you. Please feel free to leave comments.
Donate to Bible Baptist Church every time you make an Amazon purchase through this link, https://smile.amazon.com/ch/91-1265824
For this and more than 5100 earlier Daily Visits with God visit https://mckenzie-visit-with-god.blogspot.com. There you will find daily visits going back to 2005.
If you have been blessed by this blog, please subscribe to my feed and share it with others.
For more resources from Pastor Marvin McKenzie visit http://puyallupbaptistchurch.com.
My books are available at:
https://marvinmckenzie.org
Jonah 4:11 (KJV) God’s Interest
photos from pexels.com. | https://medium.com/daily-visit-with-god/gods-interest-950574aebf01 | ['Marvin Mckenzie'] | 2020-12-17 15:44:03.953000+00:00 | ['Bible Study', 'Christianity', 'Christian Living', 'Faith and Life', 'Christian'] |
Europe starts Covid-19 vaccination as new virus strain spreads | Europe starts Covid-19 vaccination as new virus strain spreads
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A 78-year-old French former cleaning lady, a 96-year-old Spaniard in a care home and a 29-year-old Italian nurse became some of the first people in the EU to receive the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine against coronavirus, as a new, more infectious strain of the virus spreads across the bloc. In co-ordinated actions on Sunday, countries including France, Germany, Italy and Spain began vaccinating older, at-risk people and frontline medical and care staff, while warning that in the immediate future restrictions were likely to be tightened rather than relaxed. France launched its vaccination programme on Sunday morning with elderly patients and medical staff in Sevran near Paris — the first to receive the injection was Mauricette, a 78-year-old retired cleaning lady — to be followed by a geriatric ward in Dijon in Burgundy in the afternoon. Others vaccinated on Sunday included Araceli Rosario Hidalgo, a 96-year-old in a care home in Guadalajara, who became the first to receive the injection in Spain, and Claudia Alivernini, a Rome-based nurse, the first person in Italy to receive the jab. Araceli Rosario Hidalgo, a 96-year-old in a care home in Guadalajara, became the first person to receive the injection in Spain © Pepe Zamora/POOL/AFP/Getty Images In Germany, Edith Kwoizalla, a 101-year old woman, had already been vaccinated on Saturday in the state of Saxony-Anhalt — leading the national health ministry to complain that the regional authorities’ decision to start the jabs a day early undermined the co-ordinated EU rollout. The vaccination campaign started after the EU’s medicine regulator approved the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine, the first Covid-19 shot to get the green light, on Monday. UK and the US regulators have also authorised the vaccine and begun its rollout this month. The EU has ordered 300m doses of the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine — enough for 150m people, as two doses are required for each person, as well as hundreds of millions of doses of vaccines yet to be approved, including those made by AstraZeneca, Sanofi-GSK, Johnson & Johnson, CureVac, and Moderna. “If you had told me six months ago that it would happen this fast, I wouldn’t have believed it,” Olivier Véran, French health minister, was quoted as saying in Le Journal du Dimanche. But he also warned the French government could not rule out a third national lockdown to slow down infections and called on people not to celebrate New Year’s Eve. German authorities issued similar warnings, calling on citizens to refrain from the tradition of setting off fireworks to avoid large gatherings in the street and jamming up hospitals with injuries. France, like Germany and Italy, has already detected a case of the new, highly transmissible variant of coronavirus that has become widespread in parts of southern England and has led several countries to restrict or ban travel with the UK. Spain on Saturday said it had identified four cases, all of them people who had arrived from Britain. The new variant has also been detected in other countries including Israel, where prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu decided on a third nationwide lockdown starting on Sunday evening. Israeli residents will be restricted to within a kilometre of their homes, but schools up to fourth grade and after the tenth grade will remain open. There is no definitive evidence yet that the new vaccines offer protection against the new variant. But experts maintain it is highly likely to do so, since the part of the virus that the jabs target, the so-called spike protein, is likely to not have changed. However, scientists have also cautioned that vaccination campaigns and lockdowns are likely to inflict “evolutionary pressure” on the virus in the long run, meaning tweaks to highly efficacious vaccines will still be needed. Health authorities have already reckoned that vaccination campaigns are likely to be necessary yearly to offer lasting protection against future outbreaks. There also remain questions about how many citizens will ultimately accept vaccination. France is among the most sceptical countries in the world about vaccines. In a 2018 study, one in three disagreed that vaccines were safe, the highest proportion of any country. In Germany, according to a YouGov poll, about two-thirds of people are willing to take the vaccine, while about 19 per cent are against a vaccination, and another 16 per cent are undecided. Of those who said they were willing to be vaccinated, 33 per cent said they would take the vaccine after waiting to see the impact on those first vaccinated. But Jens Spahn, health minister, trumpeted the vaccine as a national achievement. “The vaccine was developed by BioNTech, a German company,” he said. “This vaccine, made in Germany, means hope for us and for the world.” Additional reporting by Donato Paolo Mancini, Davide Ghiglione in Rome and Mehul Srivastava in Tel Aviv
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . | https://medium.com/@fionacowsix/europe-starts-covid-19-vaccination-as-new-virus-strain-spreads-1997271a0a83 | [] | 2020-12-27 23:15:43.877000+00:00 | ['Europe', 'Startse', 'Covid 19', 'Virus', 'Vaccination'] |
Georgiana Houghton Visualized A World Beyond Death | Georgiana Houghton, “Glory be to God” (1868) (courtesy Victorian Spiritualists’ Union, Melbourne, Australia)
For four months in the summer of 1871, the New British Gallery on Old Bond Street in London was filled with paintings unlike any the city had seen before. Swirls of overlapping, whirling lines in a rainbow of effervescent colors filled each of the 155 watercolor and pencil drawings. The first major Impressionist exhibition was still three years out and the absence of figuration in these dynamic compositions was beyond anything being produced in that disruption of academic painting. And it would be decades before full-on abstraction would emerge in the European art scene of the early 20th century, yet here was a whole show of artwork that would not be out of place in 1960s psychedelia. Furthermore, the drawings were created by a woman at a time when paintings of flowers, pastoral landscapes, and portraiture were deemed acceptable artistic subjects for a lady — and she claimed to be guided by the spirits of the dead.
Georgiana Houghton, “The Flower and Fruit of Henry Lenny” (1861) (courtesy Victorian Spiritualists’ Union, Melbourne, Australia)
Witnessing the art of Georgiana Houghton today is a visually cataclysmic experience. Looping lines bound across each spiraling composition and the energy behind her hand is palpable across time. These vivid drawings appear prescient, anticipating European artists like Wassily Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, and Kazimir Malevich who would rattle art with their non-objective forms, bold colors, and geometric experiments in the early 20th century. Art historian Rachel Oberter in a 2006 article on Houghton in the journal Victorian Studies notes that she never employed the word “abstract” to describe her art as it was not present in Victorian artistic vocabulary, still “she most likely adopted an abstract mode of artistic production for a similar reason as many of the pioneers of transcendental abstraction in the twentieth century such as Kandinsky and Malevich: since it does not depict mundane objects, her art is less tied to the natural world, and more able to evoke a less tangible plane of spiritual existence.” In other words, to depict her channeling of the spirits, she needed to create a visual language that portrayed an unseen force rather than the visible world.
Born in 1814, a full century before Mondrian wrote that to “approach the spiritual in art, one will use as little of reality as possible,” Houghton can seem like an artist out of time. Yet her work was very much part of a 19th-century artistic moment, just one not often examined in the rise of abstraction in art. One of many “artistic mediums” active in the 19th century, she created her art as a direct part of her participation in Spiritualism. Along with fellow artists like Anna Howitt Watts who surrounded religious figures with luminous organic forms and Jane Stewart Smith who spent years on her tableaux of mystical scenes, she engaged in séances and trance-states to create her art, albeit work that was much more radical than her contemporaries. All of these spirit artists used their media, whether drawing, painting, or sometimes embroidery, to give a form to something which many people doubted was there.
“Catalogue of the Spirit Drawings in Water Colours exhibited at the New British Gallery, Old Bond Street by Miss Houghton, through whose mediumship they have been executed.” (1871) (courtesy State Library of Victoria)
That many spirit artists were women is significant. In Spiritualism, they attained places of power, opportunities, and community when options for women were few, especially for those like Houghton who chose to stay unmarried. As artists, they worked in alternative spaces that have been ignored or not taken seriously in cultural history. When they were not welcomed into the art salons, they achieved expressive freedom in séances; when they were not invited into the art schools, they came together in collective ritual. When rejected by the Royal Academy and other galleries, Houghton organized and paid for her own exhibition.
Most days of the 1871 show, Houghton was there in the gallery, ready to share the intricate meaning behind the watercolors in discussions with visitors. Holding up a magnifying glass to the vortexes of color and line, she would explain how the works were channeled through her contact with the spirit world. Some of her earlier pieces featured organic forms like flowers, but even these were symbolic, often expressing the life and actions of a deceased person who guided the drawing, whether a departed family member or late luminaries like the composer Felix Mendelssohn. If viewers were to see the back of these drawings they would find extensive explanations made through automatic writing. “The Eye of God” — an exultant work of lines unfurling like fern fronds — has text stating that it was guided by Italian Renaissance artist Correggio who “endeavored through Georgiana’s hand, to represent The Eye of God, in the Three Persons of the Trinity.”
It was very important to Houghton that visitors to the 1871 exhibition would have this context. An over 30-page catalogue was printed for the show and included an extensive index on color symbolism, such as crimson lake for love, orange cadmium for moral courage, emerald green for self-control, and cobalt blue for truth. Houghton wrote that she offered this guidance not just for comprehension of the tangles of vibrant forms; it was also presented “[i]n the hope that many will follow my example and strive to develop themselves as drawing mediums.” Her work may have been singular in its exuberant expression, but she hoped others would follow on this path where she’d found so much fulfillment and joy. Still, as she explained, the drawings only “faintly shadow forth” the “glorious hues” of “a speech transcending mortal language.”
Georgiana Houghton, “The Eye of the Lord” (reverse) (1864) (courtesy Victorian Spiritualists’ Union, Melbourne, Australia)
Visitors probably would have already known something of Spiritualism, which had by then rapidly spread from the United States to England, bringing table rapping, tapping, and tilting in its communications with the dead. The movement’s genesis is largely placed in upstate New York in the 1840s where two young sisters — Kate and Margaret Fox — knocked on their bedposts and heard thudding noises in response from a presence believed to be a ghost. As the sisters toured the United States, they conducted wildly popular séances and inspired others to take up mediumship. Arriving alongside advances in communication like the electrical telegraph and transatlantic cable, Spiritualism caught on as a religious innovation that broke down the barriers between earth and the afterlife. In the 1850s, just as messages that formerly took days to cross the Atlantic by ship were transmitted in only minutes via Morse code (a tapping not dissimilar from the rapping of a séance), Spiritualism gained prominence in England. One of the methods that materialized in Spiritualist séances was automatic drawing, in which a medium’s hand was guided to sketch by spiritual contact, which was how Houghton created her art.
Many Spiritualist mediums were Christian women who had few options for leadership within mainstream religion. Houghton herself was very religious and her spirit drawings frequently referenced doctrines like the Holy Trinity through “sacred symbolism” and included biblical passages in their accompanying texts or titles. She found solace in Spiritualism after the sudden death of her beloved sister Zilla in 1851. In her grief, Houghton, who had some training as an artist, lamented, “I felt as if I should never again use pencil or brush.” Then in 1859, she discovered Spiritualism and a way to “be thus reunited to the many dear ones whom I had lost.” Two years later, she also recovered her artistic voice.
Georgiana Houghton pictured in the 1881 ‘Evenings at Home in Spiritual Séance’ (via Wikimedia)
Houghton had heard about a medium practicing automatic drawing and inquired through planchette whether Zilla, who was an artist, could guide her hand. Instead of her sister, she was put in contact with the spirit of “a deaf and dumb artist” named Henry Lenny, who led her pencil through the movement of the planchette “to form various curved lines” first in black, then in blue. Gradually, a strange flower was taking shape on the paper. It was the first of many artistic collaborations Houghton would have with the spirits. In the years that followed, she would encounter the spectral presences of Renaissance artists like Titian and Caravaggio (although never producing anything similar to their work) and archangels who ushered Houghton deeper into phantasmagorical expression. In 1861, she painted “Zilla’s Flower,” with blue petals “because she was true and steadfast” and yellow lines representing her late sister’s actions that erupted from the flower’s center, some going down for her errors, but many going upwards for those “which led her towards Heaven.”
In her 1881 book Evenings at home in spiritual séance, Houghton ecstatically described her art as something channeled, a force that flowed through her: “No one can figure to themselves my delight when […] I beheld the lovely array of the whole of those works that had grown under my own hand, with daily new revelations of unknown beauties and unsuspected truths.” She added that she rarely paused to closely inspect these drawings, often moving on to the next once the séance was complete. Later, “I discovered forms, and designs, and distances, that had been utterly undreamed of, and I realised yet more fully the Love that had bestowed such a gift upon me.” She emphasized that these compositions were never planned and completely spontaneous. While this perspective seems to disregard her artistic agency, it resonates with the 1920s Surrealists who would follow in adopting this automatic style of drawing. Historian Marco Pasi, who has worked on exhibitions of Houghton’s art, proposed that this “transferred authorship” allowed her a liberty of creation: “In doing so she could radicalise her artwork and make alien objects that could not be placed at the time in which they were made.” Whether or not it was her intent, by dismissing her authorship, Houghton was able to publicly create art that never would have been acceptable for a Victorian lady.
Some 1871 critics were awed by these otherworldly drawings, with one proclaiming them the “most astonishing exhibition in London at the present moment.” Others, however, did not quite know what to make of this art that was so different from the rest of Victorian visual culture, especially with its accompanying whiff of the occult. One bemoaned that “a visitor to the exhibition is alternatively occupied by sad and ludicrous images during the whole of his stay in this gallery of painful absurdities.” Houghton took this in stride, writing that “my Exhibition baffled them utterly, therefore they sometimes took refuge in unseemly words about what they did not understand.”
Georgiana Houghton, “The Eye of God” (1862) (courtesy Victorian Spiritualists’ Union, Melbourne, Australia)
The spirit art display was a failure financially, too, consuming most of Houghton’s savings. Perhaps it was not a surprise, as other recent, if less extreme, experiments with abstraction had been similarly ridiculed. When J. M. W. Turner exhibited his whale paintings in 1846, in which the dark shapes of the great cetaceans were blurred in tumultuous seas, there were caricatures of him painting with a mop and the complaint that there was “no form for the eye to dwell upon.” James Abbott McNeill Whistler’s moody Nocturne works were viciously attacked by critic John Ruskin who declared in 1877 that the artist was “flinging a pot of paint in the public’s face.”
Spirit photographs from ‘Chronicles Of The Photographs Of Spiritual Being’ (1882) by Georgiana Houghton (via Bryn Mawr College Library, Special Collections/ Internet Archive)
Nevertheless, Houghton was committed to Spiritualism and visually manifesting a contact that defied death. Shortly after the exhibition, she began collaborating with England’s first spirit photographer, Frederick Hudson. Together they created numerous spirit photographs — images in which an apparition appears on the developed picture — with Houghton acting as a medium. She also encouraged the practices of other artistic mediums, such as Alice Mary Theodosia Pery who sketched torrents of enigmatic faces in pencil. Despite this strong attachment to her community, after she died from a stroke in 1884, her singular work was soon largely forgotten. A substantial number of those pieces exhibited in 1871 are now lost. The largest known group of her drawings is held by Australia’s Victorian Spiritualists’ Union, acquired after they were brought to the country for a 1910 exhibition.
It’s often in collections and archives outside of mainstream institutions where work by artists like Houghton survives. And almost 150 years following the 1871 exhibition, she finally received London’s acclaim in a celebrated show at the Courtauld Institute of Art in 2016. It followed an exhibition featuring her art at the Monash University Museum of Art in Melbourne, Australia, in 2015, and led critics to ask if she should be considered as the first abstract artist.
While Houghton would not have called her art abstraction — it was a protocol for contact with another realm — it’s important that the reassessment of her legacy has caused a shift in the understanding of the long-dominant narrative about modern art. Recently, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York hosted a blockbuster exhibition of the work of a fellow spiritualist — Swedish artist Hilma af Klint (as covered for Nightingale by Jason Forrest) — who similarly engaged in abstraction years before Kandinsky’s compositions. Houghton and af Klint did not know each other, but they both acted as mediums in séances, and each found in abstraction a way to express experiences that were transcendent. The art world may not have been ready for Houghton in 1871, but by finally recognizing her vision in using art to portray something divine, that history can expand to reconsider artists long pushed to the margins. | https://medium.com/nightingale/georgiana-houghton-visualized-a-world-beyond-death-f3666dddd9ef | ['Allison Meier'] | 2019-09-27 16:56:22.460000+00:00 | ['Spirituality', 'Dvhistory', 'History', 'Data Visualization', 'Art'] |
Press release: senseering joins GAIA-X as Day1 Member | Dieser Artikel ist auch auf Deutsch verfügbar.
With the GAIA-X concept, the German federal government, among others, has drawn up a proposal for the design of the next generation of a data infrastructure. The goal of GAIA-X is a secure and networked data infrastructure that meets the highest standards of digital sovereignty and promotes disruptive innovation. In an open and transparent digital ecosystem, data and services are to be made available, brought together and shared with confidence.
From today on senseering is a Day1 member
As of today, senseering is an official Day1 member of the GAIA-X Association, as announced at today’s GAIX-X Summit on November 18th, 2020. This now ensures and officially certifies that the development of senseering’s MyDataEconomy already meets the values and goals of GAIA-X and will continue to do so in the future. We are very proud to contribute to the GAIA-X movement with our solution.
What is MyDataEconomy?
The MyDataEconomy platform is senseering’s interpretation of a digital value network or a digital data marketplace, not exclusively for, but especially developed for industrial data sources and large data volumes. The goal is to ensure secure, cross-network data availability for all players in order to optimize their own processes using digital twins. The MyDataEconomy ecosystem digitizes, in a very simple way, very complex and still difficult to network (industrial) data sources with and among each other. The special design of the MyDataEconomy platform enables the secure and efficient exchange of data across network and company boundaries. With one mouse click, the participants of the MyDataEconomy platform are enabled to develop disruptive innovations in unprecedented collaborative networks and to design their own digital transformation.
Preliminary work and working groups
Senseering had previously participated voluntarily in important GAIA-X working groups. Among others, senseering is a formative member of the working groups Data Exchange Interoperability, Identity and Access Management (IAM) and Self Description.
Working Group Self Description
The aim of the group is to provide and develop descriptions of the different actors in the GAIA-X ecosystem. The descriptions enable a smooth and automated exchange of data. Senseering uses its existing knowledge about data exchange of industrial IoT applications to identify problems early and to incorporate the know-how already gained into the development of the group.
Working Group Data Exchange Interoperability
The goal is to create a concept that combines different concepts and implementations of meta models and makes them interoperable. As a decentralized network of nodes, which can exchange data among each other and with third parties, senseering brings in the existing knowledge about interfaces, protocols and meta data models, especially from industrial IoT.
Working Group Identity and Access Management (IAM)
The goal is to define a governance trust framework and to create a framework model for authentication and authorization. A central goal of the MyDataEconomy is the trustworthy handling of digital assets and to release them to the right participants at the right time. Senseering brings the existing experience of applying such a framework in a data marketplace. | https://medium.com/senseering/press-release-senseering-joins-gaia-x-as-day1-member-a0b810dda61b | ['Daniel Trauth'] | 2020-11-18 16:20:04.501000+00:00 | ['Industry', 'Blockchain', 'Manufacturing', 'Mydataeconomy', 'Gaiax'] |
Focus on structuring your blog posts with these tips — The Blog Movement | As your eyes move down this blog post (assuming you have eyes and are not a bot), you’re probably not reading. You’re skimming. Scanning for information that’s relevant to you and to get the overall idea of this blog post.
15 seconds — that’s the average time a reader spends focusing on a blog post before they move on to other parts of the site. Statistics may suggest that 55% of users are prone to this type of behaviour.
In light of this, it’s easy to see how important it is that you keep your site’s visitors constantly engaged. Consistent content that adds value can ultimately convert casual readers into warm prospects. So; how exactly can you create engaging blog posts?
While an array of factors may be involved, one of the most integral components of a great blog post is structure. With proper structure, readers will probably be more willing to sit through and share your posts, subscribe to your social media channels and become loyal followers of your brand. Here are a few basic tips to help ensure that your blog posts are well-structured and ready for your audience and for enhanced brand awareness.
Craft a captivating headline
Plenty of content specialists who deal with organic digital marketing may tell you that the bulk of your article’s bite lies in the catchy title you give it. Until you can come up with a great headline, you might as well not start writing your blog post just yet.
There are several reasons for this. Firstly, even if you have great content, readers probably won’t be compelled to read through it (or even look at it) if the title is bland. Secondly, SEO (Search Engine Optimization) often requires that keywords be incorporated into titles and content in order for your articles to get picked up. If, for instance, your keyword is cooking tips, get this keyword to appear in your title and early on in the body of your content.
When you write longer posts, you can leverage the power of long-tail keywords and latent semantic indexing. The spread of keywords creates a more effective matrix for potentially getting ranked on search engines.
Follow up with a good intro
Once readers are engaged with your headline and click on your post, the introduction of your write-up should maintain the same magnetic rhythm. Creating an engaging introduction can be a little tricky, but you don’t have to come up with an award-winning masterpiece. Just make sure that you have a fairly effective hook, in order to keep your readers engaged.
There are three main ways to give your intro a juicy hook. Either present a problem that your reader can relate to, use statistics or solid facts to evoke an emotional response (like fear), or ask a simple but thought-provoking question. Set the tone for the rest of the article.
Apply a variety of keywords throughout
Remember that SEO is a big part of writing blog posts for businesses. They should be used to build an online presence and gradually rise up the ranks in search. An array of different keywords that are related to your industry (and the article) should be included.
Don’t just apply a keyword to the title and introduction. Distribute a variety of them throughout the body. The longer your post is, the more opportunities there are for you to use different keywords. In order to pull readers through SEO, you should think like your readers. What would they be searching for? How many ways can you search for that particular subject? If “writing good headlines” is one search term, consider “creating killer headlines”, “how to write titles” and “effective headlines”.
Use plenty of links in your body
Search engines are more inclined to pick up on posts that contain links. These can be links to other related posts within your site or to external sites and resources that add value to the topic. Let’s say that you mention a certain marketing term in the body of your article that’s about digital marketing.
This can be a great opportunity to either link that word to another post within your site or an external source that delves deeper into the explanation of the term. This can do wonders for your SEO and your post’s structure and your visitors will likely appreciate the additional information as well.
Use other forms of media
As long as you don’t overdo it, multimedia can enhance and add value to your blog post. A picture or videos can complement your written content beautifully. Just be careful not to leave your blog post section crowded with too many distractions. In fact, be sure not to clutter your entire site with too many Call To Actions and Advertisements, because these issues can reduce the readability of your blog posts.
Sub-Headings and Lists are great too
It may be a very common format, but it’s probably common because it works. Using subheadings (H2 and H3) can help make your post easier to read and let people focus on key points. List articles (also known as listicles) are also fantastic ways to structure a blog post — simply list down a bunch of options (like places to eat or tips in numerical order). People appreciate this clean and simple approach to blog posts.
Blog posts. These digital marketing tools can make for powerful additions to your content marketing arsenal. Use a proper structure that optimizes readability, engagement, and simplicity. If you get structure right, you may just garner more traction than you ever expected.
Feel free to mix and match, pick and choose. Like parts of a car. Just try not to deviate too far from this core structure
____
Palindrome is on a mission to revolutionise blog posts and change how businesses get their blogs run
If you’re looking to outsource blog writing, check out the professional blog writing services provided by Palindrome, an SEO company in Malaysia. Visit the Palindrome website now! | https://medium.com/@palindromecommunications/focus-on-structuring-your-blog-posts-with-these-tips-the-blog-movement-aded189a3e9e | ['The Blog Movement'] | 2020-05-13 13:54:52.166000+00:00 | ['Startup Marketing', 'Blogging Tips'] |
Trading: Profit or Loss | Stock market is a platform where investors come together to buy and sell shares. Shares are various kinds of securities which are traded in a controlled and secure environment. History of trading dates back to 13th century when venetian bankers started trading government securities.
In stock exchange, companies get their stocks listed to attract potential buyers. A buyer bids a particular price for a stock and the seller asks a specific price for the same stock. When the bid matches the asked price, a sale is made. In case of multiple buyers, process of sale works on the first-come, first- served basis.
By investing in shares, profit can be earned in 2 ways:
· Capital appreciation: If a person buys shares of a particular company when prices were low and if the price of those share rises then he can earn profit by selling those shares. There is no guarantee of capital appreciation.
· Dividends: One can earn in the form of dividends. Company distributes its profit to the shareholders. Mostly company partially distributes profits and keep the rest for purposes like expansion. For eg. If a company decides to give Rs.100 per share and the face value of the share is Rs.100 then it is called a 100% dividend.
You all must be fascinated after listening to the profits in share market but that is not the case always. The probability of market prices remaining lower than the buying prices always exist. Many lives got ruined because of trading without knowledge. During the market crash in 1992, many people who lost their everything in trading committed suicide. The bottom line is that trading without complete knowledge and expert consultancy is too risky, although these too are not the assurance of profit. | https://medium.com/@beglobal04/trading-profit-or-loss-87d7aa6aa52f | ['Tarun Yadav'] | 2021-07-23 17:14:07.476000+00:00 | ['Stock Market', 'Profit', 'Trading', 'Loss', 'Risk'] |
Bach Ma temple Hanoi (or White Horse Temple) is one of the recommended tourist destinations in… | Bach Ma temple Hanoi (or White Horse Temple) is one of the recommended tourist destinations in Hanoi Old Quarter because of its special meaning and architecture. This is also believed to be the oldest temple in Hanoi.
You might want to visit some attractions nearby:
>>> Hanoi Ancient House — Ma May heritage house
>>> French quarter Hanoi attractions
>>> Dong Xuan market — The biggest market in the old quarter
>>> Water puppet show in Hanoi
1. Bach Ma temple history
This was built in the 9th century to worship Long Do (Navel Dragon). This is one of the four sacred protecting temples of Thang Long ancient citadels.
• Voi Phuc temple (Protect in the West)
• Kim Lien temple (Protect in the South)
• Quan Thanh temple (Protect in the North)
• Bach Ma temple (Protect in the East)
After leaving the capital from Hoa Lu to Thang Long in 1010, the King asked the troops to build the citadel higher, but whenever they built the citadel, it’s collapsed.
He sent someone to ask local people to know there was a sacred land, so the King organized the ceremony.
The King held a ceremony to worship Long Do God. Then, he saw the white horse coming out of the temple. The King traced the horse’s footsteps and then built a citadel.
The citadel was built very firm. To express the gratefulness to the deity, the King asked for carving a white horse for worship and conferred the title of “Thang Long tutelary god.” The white horse has become a sacred symbol, and Bach Ma (or white horse temple) has been known from that.
At present, this still preserves many valuable antiques such as stone stele, ordination, bronze bell, procession, incense, altar crane. The unique vase is decorated with elaborately crafted altars with red-yellow and white-black contrasts as the primary colors.
During the resistance war against the US, B52 bombs were scattered in the North of Vietnam. Everything around the old quarter is destroyed except this temple. Currently still kept original architecture event restored and renovated many times.
Nowadays, the Bach Ma temple still organizes a festival on February 12th and 13th of the lunar month, meaning seeing off the winter and welcoming the new spring. People pray for a bountiful harvest and a happy and prosperous life for the people and commemorate the merit of the Long Do God.
2. Bach Ma temple opening hours and entrance fee
From Tuesday to Sunday:
Morning: 07:00 to 11:00
Afternoon: 02:00 to 05:00
On the 1st and 15th of every lunar month: 8 am to 9 pm
Visitors do not need to pay anything. It’s FREE
3. Bach Ma temple address and how to get there
Address number 76–78 Hang Buom Street, right at the center of Hanoi’s old quarter. Very easy to find. Just a few minutes if you are staying in the old quarter.
The main gate
4. Bach Ma temple dress code
Like other worship areas in Vietnam, visitors should wear formal clothes, not smoke, and bring food and drinks.
With all information above, we hope you will have a great tip visit to Hanoi. If you need any more help, please do not hesitance to contact us.
>>> Read more: What to see in Hanoi old quarter | https://medium.com/@goviettrip/bach-ma-temple-hanoi-or-white-horse-temple-is-one-of-the-recommended-tourist-destinations-in-db5fa112abf0 | ['Go Viet Trip'] | 2021-10-10 12:40:23.592000+00:00 | ['Goviettrip', 'Bachmatemple', 'Hanoi', 'Vietnam'] |
“You Shall Make A Parapet”: Facing our Fears | Rabbi Sara Mason-Barkin, 9.13.19
Parashat Ki Teitzei
Congregation Beth Israel, Scottsdale, Arizona
Shortly after our family moved to Arizona, I posted a picture on facebook of our kids eating lunch in the backyard after a Sunday morning swim. They were, of course, adorable, holding up their sandwiches, still dripping from the pool while sitting at their little kid sized table. I added caption that said something like ‘loving our new AZ life!’ I received two distinct kinds of comments. Category A, mostly smile emojis and phrases like ‘cute kids!’ Category B came from their grandparents and my friend who is a pediatrician: ‘where is the pool fence!? Please install ASAP!!’
Of course, they were right — and while we already had an appointment scheduled with the pool fence guy for the following week, the future appointment would not prevent an incident in the present. And, now, a year later, everyone can relax as the pool has been well fenced since last July, about 5 days after the picture was taken, and the kids have been in weekly swim lessons since our arrival. We also have a special out-of-reach doorknob to get out to the backyard, and clear rules that the kids know to respect. You can all exhale, everyone is doing just fine.
However, it’s in our nature to worry. I always tell my kids that my number one job is to keep them healthy and safe — even when they aren’t happy about it. And the same goes for every job that I’ve ever had working with children, and adults for that matter: health and safety — the Jewish value of briut — is always the first priority.
And this isn’t even modern coddling or helicopter mom-ing — it’s right there in the Torah, found in this week’s parasha. Ki Teitzei includes a long list of rules describing family dynamics, daily living, and intimate relationships also includes this first mention of building codes:
Ki tivneh bayit chadash v’asita m’a’keh l’ganecha,
v’lo-tasim lamim b’veitecha ki-yipol hanofeil mimenu.
When you build a new house, you shall make a parapet for your roof,
so that you do not bring bloodguilt on your house if anyone should fall from it.[1]
The crenellated parapet on a bastion of Kyrenia Castle, Cyprus
In other words, when building a home, especially one with an attractive flat roof or a balcony perfect for picnics or sunbathing — make sure you install a parapet –a protective wall, or perhaps a fence, or at the very least a railing. Because if someone falls off that roof, the guilt — and the blame — will lie with you.
This is a biblical example of our instinct to stay safe. We don’t need to be taught to protect ourselves and our loved ones from danger, and we don’t seek to put others in harm’s way. We all remember that the Torah also teaches us not to ‘place a stumbling block before the blind.’[2] It is in our nature when danger is imminent — and even when it isn’t — to protect the value of health and safety, of briut.
At the end of August, in the days leading up to Hurricane Dorian, Florida declared a state of emergency. First responders delivered sandbags in several counties. Residents prepared their own evacuation routes, or made arrangements to shelter-in-place with stocked cabinets of bottled water, batteries, and non-perishable food. In Jacksonville, bridges closed. Emergency shelters opened.[3] In the end, the impact of Hurricane Dorian in the continental United States was limited. In some ways, the ‘parapet’ that was built, or the protection measures that were put in place worked: for the most part, people were able to find their way to safety. They were also lucky.
When the hurricane touched down, the greatest impact was not in the US, but in the Bahamas where the storm was destructive — including catastrophic damage to homes, a flooded airport, buildings swept away and a death toll that is still on the rise. No matter how many sandbags were provided, or how many shelters were open, it was not possible to implement adequate protection from the storm. It is not always possible to build the wall high enough or make the fence strong enough to prevent every danger.
Some dangers catch us off guard. Taking our breath away, changing our lives.This week we remembered September 11th, 2001. It’s hard to believe that it was 18 years ago when we felt this tangible shift in our sense of safety. The day before the attacks, on September 10th we were comfortable in public spaces. By September 12th, once we had seen the news and understood what had happened, we learned just how vulnerable we are to the unknown and unanticipated. When there are those who seek destruction, there is always a way around, over, or through even the most sturdy parapets.
Everyone who remembers 9/11 remembers where they were when the towers fell. We remember the first images that we saw, the moment we understood this new reality. And we also have the story of the days that followed, and how we coped with our fear.
I was living in Boston at the time, a student at Brandeis University. I was scheduled to fly out of Logan airport just a few days later to be home in Chicago for Rosh Hashanah. The planes had departed from Logan airport. In my youth and in my grief and in my fear, I cancelled my trip. This was how I installed my first parapet: Rational or not, a part of me believed that if I didn’t fly, I would be safe. But eventually that became impractical, I had to go back to Chicago sometime. So I installed my second parapet: I refused to fly out of Logan, choosing instead to drive an extra hour in order to fly out of Providence, Rhode Island. I wasn’t the only one who developed a new flying routine: TSA protocols changed. No more meeting people at the gate. Stricter rules regarding carry-on luggage. After another incident we all were instructed to remove our shoes at security. More fences. More rules. More parapets. More structures in place to keep us safe all the while acknowledging: we are vulnerable.
At the core of our very humanity is the recognition that we can’t protect ourselves from every unseen danger. We can eat healthfully and still get sick. We can look both ways before crossing the street and still get hit. We can prepare for the storm and still be in the path of the hurricane. We can take every precaution, uphold our commitment to briut, build every parapet and follow every rule: but no fence can make us immortal. Life is still uncertain.
This is the essence of the prayer that we say on the High Holy Days — Unetaneh Tokef — when we wonder out loud ‘who shall live and who shall die, who shall reach the ripeness of old age and who shall not.’ The prayer acknowledges plainly and clearly — that we are vulnerable. That we are human. That we are mortal.
And it also seeks to offer us a nechemta, a comforting thought: that return to the right path, prayer and righteous giving — u’teshuvah, u’tfillah, u’tzedakah, ma’avirin et roah ha’gzeirah. We can soften the severity of this inevitable ending.’
When we think back to the most difficult moments we have encountered as a community, these words ring true. After the devastating floods in Houston and damaging fires in California, this community brought in tremendous tzedakah to help those in need. After the horrific tragedy at the Tree of Life congregation in Squirrel Hill last October, we gathered in prayer, for t’fillah, with words of comfort and the embrace of one another. And in just a few very short weeks we will come together for the Days of Awe, for the purpose of t’shuvah, reflecting on the ways our commitment to a good and holy path will help us to endure what comes in the year ahead.
The month of Elul ticks forward towards the month of Tishrei. And every year now, for the last 18 years, this passage and coincidence of time encompasses the message of 9/11. The words ‘never forget’ ring in our ears this time of year.
I noticed this week that the stories that we tell from 9/11, and the stories that we tell from the floods or fires or any of our own countless personal tragedies -are most often not the stories of the tragedies themselves — but the hopeful stories of people being their best selves on our darkest, most vulnerable days.
When we say ‘never forget,’ what we mean is never to forget the stories of t’shuvah — the ways people changed for the better. We mean to ‘never forget’ the stories of t’fillah, the way communities came together. And we mean the stories of tzedakah, the ways that people gave what they had emotionally, financially, and spiritually to help those in need.
Each of these: t’fillah, t’shuvah, tzedakah — these are our parapets. These three things are the raw materials we need to build structures and systems for protection. This is how we cope with the severity of the inevitable. This is how we keep ourselves from being paralyzed by our very real, very human, very beautiful vulnerability.
We build this parapet — not for protection, but for connection. Return to the right path, prayer, and righteous giving won’t keep us from an unexpected slip off an unprotected roof, but they can help us grasp hands, and move together away from edge of our fear. | https://medium.com/rabbinic-writing/you-shall-make-a-parapet-facing-our-fears-549bdb9602bf | ['Rabbi Sara Mason-Barkin'] | 2019-10-13 23:26:02.258000+00:00 | ['Fear', 'Teshuvah', 'High Holidays', 'Prayer', 'Unetaneh Tokef'] |
It’s Over | A gathering place for stories to be told, read and appreciated.
Follow | https://medium.com/the-story-hall/its-over-fb77e75bf9f0 | ['Jeff Bailey'] | 2018-09-03 16:46:26.292000+00:00 | ['Communication', 'The Message', 'Photography', 'Failure', 'Broken'] |
Disney Is Going To Be Next Netflix! | Disney revealed several days ago that its media and film divisions are being restructured to concentrate on streaming platforms — a field that is already prospering with the effect of the coronaviral pandemic, as is the case with other areas of the Walt Disney group. Indeed, after the Disney+ launch was introduced at the end of last year, CEO Bob Chapek has shown that Disney+ had risen to 100 million subscribers by August, according to the company’s third-quarter income report.
In reality, it sounds like Disney’s next big step is being pioneered by Netflix, the three major groups for the production of content covering studios, general entertainment, and sports, “who are responsible and responsible for creating and distributing content for teaching, linear and streaming, with the main focus on the business’s streaming platforms.“
Chapek told Closing Bell during an interview,
We are putting the consumer first. In fact, it will be the customer who will make this decision. They will lead us in the way they determine their transaction. At the moment, they vote with the pocketbooks and they vote for Disney+ really strongly. The consequences of the global health crisis are undoubtedly felt in Disney companies as companies need to respond to the current social dissociation mandates and to take sufficient precautions. Bob Chapek
Many of her films seem to be in a kind of ambiguous limbo, like those of other major studios, amid theatre closing and changing constantly release screens. The park system is a mess and, due to limited capacity due to social distancing requirements and continuous ambiguity regarding the duration of the outbreak, Disney recently laid off 28,000 of its employees.
Without the immediate end to the pandemic insight, the studios were compelled either to release movies to modest audiences in currently open theatres, transfer their big-budget releases or release movies in their respective streaming platforms as premium fixtures. For a highly integrated business like Disney and with such a successful channel, streaming releases give the chance, by recharging you $30 to download the popular movies before they formally scatter over Disney+ months later, to bring something back into a movie.
Right now, Disney seems to be doing what almost every other content producing streaming service is doing right now. Hopefully, Disney would prevent Netflix from showing the kind of depraved material that brought us the series Love Is Blind. But what can stop it? Is there really any stop?
For more blogs visit Tretech Media Blog | https://medium.com/@tretechmedia/disney-is-going-to-be-next-netflix-d774f784ea7e | [] | 2020-12-21 05:35:44.771000+00:00 | ['Movies', 'Disney', 'Netflix', 'Film', 'Social Media'] |
The Evolution of My Smile | The Evolution of My Smile
An account of transitioning and self acceptance
Photo by dusan jovic on Unsplash
I am 40 today. Birthdays in my past had always been an exercise in despair. A feeling of old age followed up with musing of my eventual mortality. I have looked ahead to this day in fear for over 20 years. After all, I’m 40, time to start dying, right?
I haven’t written for a while, which I regret, but the break had been necessary while I transitioned and still balanced the rest of my life. I felt, however, that today was a good day to break my silence. I am indeed 40, but I feel even more alive than I have ever felt in my existence, and mostly I can’t help but smile lately, in excess! People have noticed at work, passing me in the halls, at the coffee stand I regular, and especially on Facebook when I post my selfies
That’s not to say shit hasn’t gotten real these last 16 months. My life has turned upside, and my world has shrunk. People I have known most of my life up and abandoned me, and I struggle every day to prove to the rest of the world I am a valid human being and not a tragedy incarnate. I cry a lot, I feel rejected, suffer from Dysphoria and Isolation, and the soul-crushing loneliness of this pandemic. Yet, despite all that, I still smile a lot.
Despite popularly held beliefs about trans people, I don’t seem to be the only one who experiences this either. Why is that?
The truth, for me, comes down to self-love. I have hated myself most of my life. I always blamed it on my weight, social class, or the fact I felt I never fit in with the groups I got involved with. It seemed whether it was a church, or my co-workers, or my friends, I always had a reason to be miserable. When I looked into the mirror or someone complimented me, I instantly felt uncomfortable. I thought I could never take a compliment,” if only they knew how useless I was, they would have to take it back.” I thought.
So what changed? I’m still fat! I have the same job, the same people in my life (just less of them), and yet sometimes I feel a happiness I can’t contain from merely realizing that
I am FINALLY myself.
Some of that is Gender Euphoria, but there is something deeper, more permanent.
Let’s start with the mirror, as we have a sorted past. As a result of my lifelong dysphoria, my reflection caused an instant feeling of revulsion. I saw a sad, pathetic male staring back at me even from a young age. It only got worse as the weight started to come and the depression. Eventually, I got to a place where I would avoid the mirror at all costs. Mirror avoidance became difficult in my home because my bathroom is almost mostly all mirrors, so I got in the habit of looking down to avoid them altogether. Even after losing 153Lbs, I still felt uncomfortable looking in the mirror.
“I could begin to see a glimpse of the person I was supposed to be. All of a sudden, my reflection and I had a new understanding.”
As I started to experiment with my gender and finally accept my true self, the mirror became a portal to hope. With experimentation and the right amount of imagination, I could begin to see a glimpse of the person I was supposed to be. All of a sudden, my reflection and I had a new understanding. I started hormones and started to feel out who I truly was. I began to look for that person in the sea of male imagery that greeted me every morning. It was small changes at first; a line here, a crease there, a little more life in the breasts. I would look for Constance in the shell of a man I had once existed as. Eventually, the course of time brought a shift. Instead of the old man, Constance would greet me in the mirror. Instead of looking for ‘her’ in my old self, I looked for the remnants of who I was In Constance. I would look for those remaining fragments that would impede me from being seen as who I had become. Eventually, even that exercise turned into a futile attempt to nitpick old me into obscurity.
One day I got out of the shower and felt odd. The man who usually presented to me was gone, and it was just this stranger — a woman. I know the narrative is getting thick here, but I want you to understand, something happened; there was a tipping point where I mentally accepted that the person I was had vanished. In a more meta way, I already knew this as I had felt my personality changing. From the moment I accepted my true self to the moment I began hormones, I was becoming new, free, hopeful. This external validation just told me I wasn’t waiting to become a woman; I was already there. In the way that matters most, I always was one, but this allowed me to remove the restraint on my true self, and then eventually to correct the mistake made at birth with my physicality. | https://medium.com/an-injustice/the-evolution-of-my-smile-6765a56e997 | ['Constance Rowan'] | 2020-12-15 16:42:30.588000+00:00 | ['Humanity', 'Transgender', 'Self Love', 'LGBTQ', 'Positive Thinking'] |
Blockchain and AR are going to rock the Gaming Industry | Merging the virtual and real world is the development which becomes common within gaming industry. That feeling of Alternative reality while playing such games drives players’ imagination to the new stages. This phenomenon is described as AR.
What about RTS-games? Geopositioning that integrated into mobile games allows players starting to complete tasks and quests around their immediate physical environment. Real world interactive games motivate people to move and explore near places, communicate and interact with other players and get rewards thanks to Blockchain.
A typical example of AR implementation is the Worldopo dApp mobile game which is a location-based Augmented Reality (AR) mobile game that is based on real estate.
”Worldopo” — is a simulator of the crypto-economic strategy in the real world based on the Blockchain, Augmented Reality and Geopositioning.
Main features of the game:
Virtual Mining Opportunity
Tradable hexagons inside and outside the game
Collectible and limited game items
Objects tokenization protocol inside the game
All game assets inside the game can be tradable on external game exchanges
Advantages of a Blockchain based games
We can list for a long time the advantages we found and what we integrated to Worldopo, so let’s see the most significant things in our opinion.
* Ownership — players have real ownership for items and in-game currencies. As soon as something is bought, exchanged or sold, the record about transaction saves forever and it cannot be hacked. All your digital purchases will be really yours, and useful outside the game. Your game money can be stored on your wallet next to real money or other altcoins.
* Valuable items are truly valuable — item value heavily depends on its uniqueness in lots of games, for example, Diablo game series. Here the item’s value is backed up also by tokenization, and its exchange or sale for both players is a real deal. Here you can conclude great deal, or not so good one (for example, selling a really valuable item (building, street, etc.) for a cheap price and then watch as someone sells it in 10 times expensively.
* Unique items are truly unique — the uniqueness of anything both in real and virtual worlds today provides a triple price at the expense of the fact itself, and sometimes it is very difficult to ascertain the true uniqueness of the item. It is especially acute while buying — or exchanging the same item.
* Decentralized gaming economy — blockchain creates a direct connection between developers and players in games and any other developments. Players can monetize their progress, skills and accumulated property.
* Transparent exchange of items — this is all about safe transactions and confirmations when the ownership of item is going to be changed.
Solving the problems of the gaming industry
Each industry has many problems that require solutions and improvements; it is enough to say about the most pressing problem in the gaming industry: ”’the time spent and the loss of interest”’. Loss of interest in the game leads not only to the loss of money spent in the game, but also to the fact that the player loses time irrevocably, and the items he bought depreciates. In our game, as nowhere else, tokenization helps to monetize the time that player spent, the skills he owned and all the previously purchased items.
In Worldopo, as in many popular games, Grinding game mechanic is implemented. Grinding is a thing when the player performs a monotonous or routine work, it exists in almost every game and it is a part of the game process. In our opinion, Grinding is mining in the virtual world. And you also need “Proof of Work” to achieve the result. For example, while waiting for the building or any event.
”’The value of virtual currency”’ — in games without blockchain has a “pseudo value”, because it has practically no pricing factors and can be emitted an infinite number of times. If there’s blockchain or DAG, the game currency has value and depends on the pricing factors automatically.
Summarizing all, an in-game blockchain implementation determines the value of time spent, because game results can be converted into real and valuable things. It’s also important that everyone can see info about others’ property and don’t care about security or transparency problems.
The game is already released and available in Google Play and Apple Store | https://medium.com/worldopo/blockchain-and-ar-are-going-to-rock-the-gaming-industry-513f06ea80a3 | [] | 2019-01-15 07:37:45.215000+00:00 | ['Blockchain', 'Augmented Reality', 'Gaming', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Startup'] |
Essential guide for newborn shopping | Your one stop shop for all things newborn!
I had my first baby, Oliver, in October 2019, and thought I’d share my favorites (and not so favorites) for new moms. I hope it’s helpful to you!
Chill
Swing : Fisher Price Cradle ‘n Swing was an instant hit with our baby. It’s an absolute must! He used it daily from when he was a newborn up until he was around 5 to 6 months old, when he started to want to sit up more. While it’s not as sleek as the 4Moms Mamaroo, pretty much all babies like it.
: Fisher Price Cradle ‘n Swing was an instant hit with our baby. It’s an absolute must! He used it daily from when he was a newborn up until he was around 5 to 6 months old, when he started to want to sit up more. While it’s not as sleek as the 4Moms Mamaroo, pretty much all babies like it. Bouncer : Another baby (and parent) favorite is the BabyBjorn bouncer with the toy bar. I’ve seen babies bounce back and forth like crazy, and while Oliver hasn’t really gotten into it, this bouncer is great to place him vertically after eating (to reduce spit up). It’s very lightweight and you can take it around the house to have the baby close to you. The toy bar is stupidly expensive but is entertaining.
: Another baby (and parent) favorite is the BabyBjorn bouncer with the toy bar. I’ve seen babies bounce back and forth like crazy, and while Oliver hasn’t really gotten into it, this bouncer is great to place him vertically after eating (to reduce spit up). It’s very lightweight and you can take it around the house to have the baby close to you. The toy bar is stupidly expensive but is entertaining. Play gym : We got the Baby Einstein one — the musical star was an instant hit. I’ve also heard great things about Lovevery, so I think I’ll try it with baby #2 (not yet baking).
: We got the Baby Einstein one — the musical star was an instant hit. I’ve also heard great things about Lovevery, so I think I’ll try it with baby #2 (not yet baking). Exersaucer : The Skip Hop activity center is great to place the baby safely, and entertained. We started using it when Oliver was 6 months and could stand with his feet flat on the base — occupational therapists do not recommend using it before that due to concerns with hip dysplacia. You can get a lot of use out of the Skip Hop because it becomes a table to play or draw on when they’re toddlers (you can even buy adorable little matching chairs).
: The Skip Hop activity center is great to place the baby safely, and entertained. We started using it when Oliver was 6 months and could stand with his feet flat on the base — occupational therapists do not recommend using it before that due to concerns with hip dysplacia. You can get a lot of use out of the Skip Hop because it becomes a table to play or draw on when they’re toddlers (you can even buy adorable little matching chairs). Swim diaper: We started to take Oliver to the pool when he was 2 months old and were concerned that any swim diaper that fit well and, ehem, did its containment job, would be too small for him a few weeks later. Beau and Belle have it all figured out with these absolutely adorable adjustable swimsuits that babies can use until they’re 3 years old. A-ma-zing!
We started to take Oliver to the pool when he was 2 months old and were concerned that any swim diaper that fit well and, ehem, did its containment job, would be too small for him a few weeks later. Beau and Belle have it all figured out with these absolutely adorable adjustable swimsuits that babies can use until they’re 3 years old. A-ma-zing! Tummy time: It’s very important for babies to have daily tummy time from the time they are born, but for some reason most really, really, really dislike it. I have two recommendations for that: visit CanDo Kiddo’s site to understand the many creative ways you can do tummy time that your baby will not hate, and buy the Boppy. It helps you place the baby with a slight incline rather than fully flat, which they seem to tolerate better. You can also buy this adorable water play mat for your baby to smack — I mean play with — fish :).
Clean
Tub: I recommend getting a baby tub that fits in the sink, your back will thank you for it. We used the Angelcare one first and loved it, and are now using the Munchkin Sit and Soak in the bath tub (it also fits in the sink). Babies are slippery and you want them to be comfy and safe during bath time!
I recommend getting a baby tub that fits in the sink, your back will thank you for it. We used the Angelcare one first and loved it, and are now using the Munchkin Sit and Soak in the bath tub (it also fits in the sink). Babies are slippery and you want them to be comfy and safe during bath time! Duck thermometer : It’s cute and gives you the temp, also alerts you if the water is too hot. Not a necessity but it doubles up as a bath toy, so why not.
: It’s cute and gives you the temp, also alerts you if the water is too hot. Not a necessity but it doubles up as a bath toy, so why not. Washcloths : We love the ones by KeaBabies, have a million, and use them for everything — burp clean up , wiping Oliver’s hands and face clean…
: We love the ones by KeaBabies, have a million, and use them for everything — burp clean up , wiping Oliver’s hands and face clean… Burp cloths : Find really absorbent ones like these muslin ones from Aden + Anais. We had no luck with the Burt’s Bees ones because they’re not as absorbent, but we still find use for them (babies are messy!).
: Find really absorbent ones like these muslin ones from Aden + Anais. We had no luck with the Burt’s Bees ones because they’re not as absorbent, but we still find use for them (babies are messy!). Grooming / baby essentials: The FridaBaby Bitty Bundle of Joy comes with a brilliant snot sucker, great clippers, a peri bottle (for the mom after giving birth), and Windi (for gas). A must have.
The FridaBaby Bitty Bundle of Joy comes with a brilliant snot sucker, great clippers, a peri bottle (for the mom after giving birth), and Windi (for gas). A must have. Baby cleanser and moisturizer: My favorite is Mustela, perhaps because it’s what my mom used for my brother and I when we were babies. The newborn arrival set is really handy and has everything you need to bathe and moisturize your baby. Their shampoo is known to prevent and treat cradle cap. Oliver never had it, so perhaps there’s something to it? The only product I haven’t tried yet is the diaper rash cream, because Oliver has not had a rash (crossing fingers to keep it this way!). A note about diaper rash to follow….
My favorite is Mustela, perhaps because it’s what my mom used for my brother and I when we were babies. The newborn arrival set is really handy and has everything you need to bathe and moisturize your baby. Their shampoo is known to prevent and treat cradle cap. Oliver never had it, so perhaps there’s something to it? The only product I haven’t tried yet is the diaper rash cream, because Oliver has not had a rash (crossing fingers to keep it this way!). A note about diaper rash to follow…. Diaper rash cream: Oliver hasn’t had a diaper rash, but sometimes he has a bit of redness in his folds. Our pediatrician recommended Aquaphor, so whenever we see a bit of redness we pat his bum dry and apply Aquaphor. I would also recommend applying Aquaphor to your baby’s bum before bedtime, in case he poops during the night, since Aquaphor creates a protective barrier that will prevent the poop from sticking to the skin and irritating it. If your baby has frequent diaper rashes then I would probably try either the Mustela cream (if you get the newborn set) or Desitin, which my friend swears by for her twins. Of course, consult with your pediatrician and perhaps try different wipes and diapers.
Diapering
Changing pad and liners: You can buy either one like this from Summer Infant (we like it a lot) or the Peanut or something like that. We cover ours with a disposable changing pad from Munchkin which makes it the most hygienic (we don’t throw the disposable liner every time, there’s no need), and it’s cute. They pads also fantastic for on the go.
You can buy either one like this from Summer Infant (we like it a lot) or the Peanut or something like that. We cover ours with a disposable changing pad from Munchkin which makes it the most hygienic (we don’t throw the disposable liner every time, there’s no need), and it’s cute. They pads also fantastic for on the go. Diaper pail: After much research, we settled on the bestseller Ubbi. It contains smells really well and we haven’t had any issues with it, except for dying a little every time we open it — the stench is appalling. Goes to show how well it works, because there is no smell when it’s closed. We use the Ubbi bags, but you can use your standard trash bags instead. UPDATE: my husband couldn’t deal with the stench when we opened the Ubbi, so we bought the Munchkin. It’s plastic, so not as nice, but I have to say, it works better. I think it’s because the bags are smaller than in the Ubbi so we change them more often, but my husband thinks it’s because of how the bag seals after you close the lid. If I had to do it again I think I’d buy the Munchkin. One thing I don’t like is that the lid doesn’t lock, and our son likes opening it. Sigh.
Feeding
High chair: Stokke Tripp Trapp is THE high chair, highly recommended by occupational therapists and parents. You won’t need it until you feed your baby at ~6 months, unless you buy the newborn set, which we didn’t get. It looks great and lasts years and years. We didn’t buy any of the cushions because it’s something else to clean, and because your baby’s butt will be padded with the diaper anyways. They’re cute though. If you don’t want to splurge, there are many other good options out there. Just make sure they have a footrest for proper body alignment when eating (I’d hate to eat dangling my feet and assume it’s the same for babies; but more than that, wrong body alignment increases the risk of choking, parents’ #1 fear when starting to introduce solids).
Stokke Tripp Trapp is THE high chair, highly recommended by occupational therapists and parents. You won’t need it until you feed your baby at ~6 months, unless you buy the newborn set, which we didn’t get. It looks great and lasts years and years. We didn’t buy any of the cushions because it’s something else to clean, and because your baby’s butt will be padded with the diaper anyways. They’re cute though. If you don’t want to splurge, there are many other good options out there. Just make sure they have a footrest for proper body alignment when eating (I’d hate to eat dangling my feet and assume it’s the same for babies; but more than that, wrong body alignment increases the risk of choking, parents’ #1 fear when starting to introduce solids). Bottles: We haven’t really used bottles to feed Oliver, but we tried and liked the Comotomo ones. It might be trial and error, there isn’t a consensus on what the best bottles are. I’d say a lot has to do with the technique — look up “paced feeding” videos to learn how to feed newborns with a bottle.
We haven’t really used bottles to feed Oliver, but we tried and liked the Comotomo ones. It might be trial and error, there isn’t a consensus on what the best bottles are. I’d say a lot has to do with the technique — look up “paced feeding” videos to learn how to feed newborns with a bottle. Sterilizer: You will definitely need to sterilize pacifiers and bottles, but the method you choose is up to you: boiling water, in the microwave, or with an appliance. I was gifted the Philips Avent 3-in-1 and have used it a lot. It’s quite large and therefore conveniently fits a lot of bottles, however if you’re concerned about counter space it might not be the right fit for you. Had I not gone the appliance route, I would’ve likely bought these Medela sterilizer bags.
Gear
Stroller: We bought the Nuna Mixx 2019 and LOVE it. It has large wheels which are great for the city, it’s pretty, light, less expensive than others, and works seamlessly with the top rated infant car seat, the Pipa. Tip: we bought ours during 30% off during Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale during the summer.
We bought the Nuna Mixx 2019 and LOVE it. It has large wheels which are great for the city, it’s pretty, light, less expensive than others, and works seamlessly with the top rated infant car seat, the Pipa. Tip: we bought ours during 30% off during Nordstrom’s Anniversary Sale during the summer. Car seat: We bought the Nuna Pipa which is a top rated car seat. My favorite features are its sun shade (we use it all the time) and that it can be used without a base (handy for shared car rides). Note that the two lighter versions of the Pipa, the Light and the LX, do need the base, which is why we bought the standard one.
We bought the Nuna Pipa which is a top rated car seat. My favorite features are its sun shade (we use it all the time) and that it can be used without a base (handy for shared car rides). Note that the two lighter versions of the Pipa, the Light and the LX, do need the base, which is why we bought the standard one. Baby carrier — newborn: The BabyBjorn Mini is super snug, perfect for the newborn stage. It’s small, easy to pack, and extremely easy to put on and take off, however it doesn’t offer the best back support (you’ll feel your shoulders getting uncomfortable after a while). I tried using a wrap instead and wanted to love it for so, so many reasons (light, feels yummy, doubles up as a nursing scarf…) however I never figured out how to wear it and not hurt my lower back. Kudos to you if you figure it out!
The BabyBjorn Mini is super snug, perfect for the newborn stage. It’s small, easy to pack, and extremely easy to put on and take off, however it doesn’t offer the best back support (you’ll feel your shoulders getting uncomfortable after a while). I tried using a wrap instead and wanted to love it for so, so many reasons (light, feels yummy, doubles up as a nursing scarf…) however I never figured out how to wear it and not hurt my lower back. Kudos to you if you figure it out! Baby carrier — baby: The Ergobaby is bulkier than the BabyBjorn Mini but also better for when the baby is a bit older, even a toddler. It has good lumbar support which is key, and is easy enough to put on and take off. We did not use it when Oliver was a newborn but you can with an insert, which you have to get separately.
The Ergobaby is bulkier than the BabyBjorn Mini but also better for when the baby is a bit older, even a toddler. It has good lumbar support which is key, and is easy enough to put on and take off. We did not use it when Oliver was a newborn but you can with an insert, which you have to get separately. Diaper bag: We bought a backpack, the SkipHop Mainframe Wide Open in green, which fairly unisex (vs a tote); it’s large and can hang from the stroller. Love it.
Nursery
Glider: I’d say a glider is a must, especially if you get one with a moving ottoman (key: don’t buy a static ottoman; we didn’t realize what a game changer the rocking ottoman was until we tried it). You’ll spend many hours on the glider nursing, reading books before bedtime… it’s comfortable and looks great in the baby’s room. We bought ours at Buy Buy Baby because we were able to try several — it’s heavy and big and not something we’d want to have to return.
I’d say a glider is a must, especially if you get one with a moving ottoman (key: don’t buy a static ottoman; we didn’t realize what a game changer the rocking ottoman was until we tried it). You’ll spend many hours on the glider nursing, reading books before bedtime… it’s comfortable and looks great in the baby’s room. We bought ours at Buy Buy Baby because we were able to try several — it’s heavy and big and not something we’d want to have to return. Dresser: We had considered the Babyletto Hudson (beautiful!), however we opted for this one from Delta Children — it’s pretty and has great reviews, and we’re very happy with it! A dresser is up to personal taste as well as size. This one is the perfect width for Oliver’s room, and there is a little room left next to the changing pad where we put some of his creams. We put the wipes there too, but there isn’t enough space for a wipe warmer, if you choose to get one (we didn’t buy a wipe warmer and are glad we didn’t, but just an FYI if you plan on using one).
Nursing
This section is just in case you decide to breastfeed your baby — skip right through if this is not you!
Nursing pillow: My Brest Friend is great. The key features I appreciate are a flat surface to put the baby on so he doesn’t roll off, different widths so the pillow wraps around you and is not uncomfortable while you sit (this is great for the football hold where the baby is on your side), and that it ties with an easy click and therefore doesn’t fall off (and the baby doesn’t slide off through a gap either). I used it a lot at first and deem it to be an essential, however a few months in I switched to the cradle hold and can basically nurse standing, laying down, and upside down!
My Brest Friend is great. The key features I appreciate are a flat surface to put the baby on so he doesn’t roll off, different widths so the pillow wraps around you and is not uncomfortable while you sit (this is great for the football hold where the baby is on your side), and that it ties with an easy click and therefore doesn’t fall off (and the baby doesn’t slide off through a gap either). I used it a lot at first and deem it to be an essential, however a few months in I switched to the cradle hold and can basically nurse standing, laying down, and upside down! Nipple cream: This is one of those products that I didn’t even know existed, but I’m glad it does. It’s especially helpful at first when both mom and baby are figuring things out. I like the Motherlove Nipple Cream, which has a great, smooth consistency. I also used the lanolin cream from Medela, which the lactation consultant at the hospital gave me, and it worked really well. It’s thicker and doesn’t glide as easily so I ended up using more of it (you will NOT want to rub anything onto your nipples). I’d see if you can get a few samples at the hospital and see what you think. In my case, I think it was great to start with the lanolin and then move to Motherlove.
This is one of those products that I didn’t even know existed, but I’m glad it does. It’s especially helpful at first when both mom and baby are figuring things out. I like the Motherlove Nipple Cream, which has a great, smooth consistency. I also used the lanolin cream from Medela, which the lactation consultant at the hospital gave me, and it worked really well. It’s thicker and doesn’t glide as easily so I ended up using more of it (you will NOT want to rub anything onto your nipples). I’d see if you can get a few samples at the hospital and see what you think. In my case, I think it was great to start with the lanolin and then move to Motherlove. Nursing cover: I’m all about nursing anywhere and everywhere and like wearing a cover while I do. This one from Bebe au Lait is cute and lightweight (don’t want to overheat the poor baby!) and the best thing is that you can look down at your baby to see him nurse and check his latch.
Sleep
Bassinet: We love the Snoo! I felt so relieved knowing that Oliver was safe, and the motion helped put him to sleep and soothe him. But don’t forget you’re still having a baby, and babies cry and wake up multiple times to eat… If you get the Snoo, buy two swaddles in size S, you’ll need them!
We love the Snoo! I felt so relieved knowing that Oliver was safe, and the motion helped put him to sleep and soothe him. But don’t forget you’re still having a baby, and babies cry and wake up multiple times to eat… If you get the Snoo, buy two swaddles in size S, you’ll need them! Crib: We decided to splurge on the Snoo instead of the crib. I’d recommend buying one that is safe, with 3 heights, and that fits your style. We were looking at the Babyletto Hudson which is so pretty but decided against it because we like the one we got (Union 3-in-1) and spent more on other things.
We decided to splurge on the Snoo instead of the crib. I’d recommend buying one that is safe, with 3 heights, and that fits your style. We were looking at the Babyletto Hudson which is so pretty but decided against it because we like the one we got (Union 3-in-1) and spent more on other things. Baby monitor: The key decision is whether you want wifi-enabled or not (there are security concerns with wifi-enabled monitors being hacked); if you go to wifi-enabled, there are a lot of options. We got the Arlo, and what I love is that I can see Oliver from wherever, even if I’m not home. What I don’t like is that it doesn’t come with a separate monitor so I have to use my phone, and I’d prefer to have a monitor propped up to see at all times. The gold standard of baby monitors is the Nanit by the way — in case you want to splurge!
The key decision is whether you want wifi-enabled or not (there are security concerns with wifi-enabled monitors being hacked); if you go to wifi-enabled, there are a lot of options. We got the Arlo, and what I love is that I can see Oliver from wherever, even if I’m not home. What I don’t like is that it doesn’t come with a separate monitor so I have to use my phone, and I’d prefer to have a monitor propped up to see at all times. The gold standard of baby monitors is the Nanit by the way — in case you want to splurge! Mattress: The Milliard Hypoallergenic has good reviews, is firm (which is a must for babies), and is not crazy expensive like other mattresses out there. It’s waterproof and should last long. Oliver sleeps through the night so I guess he likes it. In case you’re curious, the Rolls Royce of mattresses is the Newton one and retails at around $350.
The Milliard Hypoallergenic has good reviews, is firm (which is a must for babies), and is not crazy expensive like other mattresses out there. It’s waterproof and should last long. Oliver sleeps through the night so I guess he likes it. In case you’re curious, the Rolls Royce of mattresses is the Newton one and retails at around $350. Mattress pad: Oliver’s mattress is waterproof but just in case… haven’t really needed the mattress pad but I’d still buy one. It stays very flush to the mattress. We like ours, the Cozy Caterpillar one.
Oliver’s mattress is waterproof but just in case… haven’t really needed the mattress pad but I’d still buy one. It stays very flush to the mattress. We like ours, the Cozy Caterpillar one. White noise machine: All sleep consultants agree that a white noise machine is an absolute must. We got the Hushh, which is lightweight and portable. We had another one that was always plugged in and we liked it too, but it broke and now we use this one. It doesn’t have anything dangerous for the baby (like yarn or cables) which is great.
All sleep consultants agree that a white noise machine is an absolute must. We got the Hushh, which is lightweight and portable. We had another one that was always plugged in and we liked it too, but it broke and now we use this one. It doesn’t have anything dangerous for the baby (like yarn or cables) which is great. Swaddles: My best advice is to try several and see which one your baby likes best. At first it was easy to just burrito Oliver in a large muslin swaddle, but as he started to move more he would houdini out of it, which poses a risk (you don’t want your baby to have anything loose around that could suffocate him). Our favorite swaddles were the Halo ones — both the fleece and the lighter cotton one when it got warmer. You’ll have to transition your baby out of swaddles at 8 weeks or when they start rolling so they have full freedom of movement. While this might sound like a non-issue when you’re reading this, many parents dread this moment — the last thing you’ll want is to get your baby to sleep, only for him to wake himself up because of an involuntary jolt. But it’s for their safety. You might still want them to be covered, which brings me to wearable blankets...
My best advice is to try several and see which one your baby likes best. At first it was easy to just burrito Oliver in a large muslin swaddle, but as he started to move more he would houdini out of it, which poses a risk (you don’t want your baby to have anything loose around that could suffocate him). Our favorite swaddles were the Halo ones — both the fleece and the lighter cotton one when it got warmer. You’ll have to transition your baby out of swaddles at 8 weeks or when they start rolling so they have full freedom of movement. While this might sound like a non-issue when you’re reading this, many parents dread this moment — the last thing you’ll want is to get your baby to sleep, only for him to wake himself up because of an involuntary jolt. But it’s for their safety. You might still want them to be covered, which brings me to wearable blankets... Wearable blankets: These come in once you have to transition out of swaddles, as an extra layer over pajamas. Loose bedding is a safety hazard — you must never place a blanket in the crib with your baby until they’re at least 12 months old. After much research we chose the Zipadee Zipp, and we absolutely love it. It reduces the startle reflex (which jolts babies awake) while giving babies freedom to roll around. Because their hands are covered they don’t scratch themselves. An overall win-win.
These come in once you have to transition out of swaddles, as an extra layer over pajamas. Loose bedding is a safety hazard — you must never place a blanket in the crib with your baby until they’re at least 12 months old. After much research we chose the Zipadee Zipp, and we absolutely love it. It reduces the startle reflex (which jolts babies awake) while giving babies freedom to roll around. Because their hands are covered they don’t scratch themselves. An overall win-win. Pacifiers: Oliver uses a pacifier when he goes to sleep. We tried several and finally landed on the Mum ones as his favorites. My friends back home in Spain actually recommended these and they were right — finally pacifiers that Oliver keeps in his mouth! The other pacifiers we liked a lot, which we got from the hospital, are the ones from Philips Avent which either come with the cutest little stuffed animal (for when they’re awake) or without (as per the CDC’s recommendation on safe sleep). We also liked the Evenflow ones for a bit. In the end, like with many, many things, it’ll depend on what your baby prefers.
Now to the things that didn’t work for us….
Obviously this does not imply the products are bad, but more that Oliver did not take to them or we did not choose to get them for him.
Baby lounger: Our friends graciously lent us their Dock-a-Tot, which their daughter had loved. We were excited for Oliver to chill in it next to us in the living room, but he HATED it. Cried instantly upon being placed in it. The Dock-a-Tot itself is beautifully made, so if you’re going to buy a lounger I’d recommend it (or the SnuggleMe, which I never tried but seems well built too).
Our friends graciously lent us their Dock-a-Tot, which their daughter had loved. We were excited for Oliver to chill in it next to us in the living room, but he HATED it. Cried instantly upon being placed in it. The Dock-a-Tot itself is beautifully made, so if you’re going to buy a lounger I’d recommend it (or the SnuggleMe, which I never tried but seems well built too). Cloth carriers: As I mentioned previously, I loved the idea of the Solly wrap for many reasons, but it didn’t work for me (it hurt my hips, and this is when Oliver was tiny). I tried the K’Tan and it felt bulky so I didn’t like it either. I preferred the BabyBjorn carrier mentioned above which was also very small and portable and did not hurt my hips.
As I mentioned previously, I loved the idea of the Solly wrap for many reasons, but it didn’t work for me (it hurt my hips, and this is when Oliver was tiny). I tried the K’Tan and it felt bulky so I didn’t like it either. I preferred the BabyBjorn carrier mentioned above which was also very small and portable and did not hurt my hips. Wipe warmer: We’ve always used room temperature wipes, and it works well for us — Oliver doesn’t mind them at all. One less thing!
We’ve always used room temperature wipes, and it works well for us — Oliver doesn’t mind them at all. One less thing! Owlet: The Owlet sock tracks your baby’s heart rate, oxygen levels, and sleep to give you peace of mind that everything is ok, and it alerts you if something is off. Our friends have it, love it, and highly recommend it, however we opted to not buy one because many people complain of false alerts, which are anxiety-inducing. And if you can’t trust the alerts, then what’s the point? It’s also expensive and has to be charged (yet another thing to charge daily!!). And I don’t know, there’s something off-putting about attaching a monitor to Oliver’s foot every night.
The Owlet sock tracks your baby’s heart rate, oxygen levels, and sleep to give you peace of mind that everything is ok, and it alerts you if something is off. Our friends have it, love it, and highly recommend it, however we opted to not buy one because many people complain of false alerts, which are anxiety-inducing. And if you can’t trust the alerts, then what’s the point? It’s also expensive and has to be charged (yet another thing to charge daily!!). And I don’t know, there’s something off-putting about attaching a monitor to Oliver’s foot every night. Hatch changing pad and baby scale: Let me start by saying that I’ve only read good things about the Hatch. I just didn’t find the need for it because Oliver regained his birth weight within the first couple of weeks. Had there been any issues that required continued, frequent monitoring, I would’ve likely bought it.
As you probably noticed, I haven’t included my recommendations for PJs (all I’ll say is zippers are your friends!), diapers, clothes… I have recommendations for everything, so comment here if you’d like me to elaborate! Oh, and I also have recommendations to prep for a natural, unmedicated birth. Let me know if that’s of interest! | https://medium.com/@vivibcn/essential-guide-for-newborn-shopping-c824ffbad35c | ['Vivian Zeldis'] | 2021-02-26 18:31:24.374000+00:00 | ['Baby', 'Newborn', 'Recommendations', 'First Time Mom', 'Baby Products'] |
Alone II | Alone I sit in a room barren of sentiment. There’s no love left in this house that was once a home. It’s every corner whispers of memories far lovelier than the present. What we had, what brought us all together, has been picked apart, one cosmically microscopic piece at a time. This home we built, and with our passion, adoration, and affection serving as the mortar to our foundation, was once a sanctuary from the chaos all around us. Now it’s just another cookie cutter shell with windows and shingles. I wonder, will the next tenants feel the vacuum of despair, destruction, and destitution? If so, I hope they have more love than I was capable of protecting. This house needs a new remodel. Something with more endurance for the storms that are known to roll through here from time to time. Some new paint for certain.
Promises were made, futures were planned, love was made like cupcakes from scratch. It should then follow promises were bent and broken, futures burned to ash and scattered to the wind, and the memory of making love cannot be guaranteed accurate.
Before I vacate, I’ll leave a note: “The windows, once steamy and offering a warm, safe hovel to anyone looking in from the yard, now cry when it gets cold. Their tears have warped their frames and the glass has sunken to a shallow and fragile state. Consider replacing at once.”
I could just tear it down. Start anew. But these old bones don’t have enough life in them to start again. Better to shove some spackle in the holes of the walls. Holes created in heated passion, negligence, and anger. Just the bare minimum. Cash out and spend the rest of my days a vagabond, exploring roads that don’t exist, destined to cry alone, reflect alone, grow alone, and someday in the not-too-distant future, die alone. | https://medium.com/@tonycraidon/alone-ii-5298eb3f62b | ['Tony Craidon'] | 2020-12-20 04:58:57.014000+00:00 | ['Death', 'Short Read', 'Home', 'Sadness', 'Alone'] |
Build a Contact Form with VueJS, Firebase & Postmark | Saving to the Firestore Database
With the form built and validation implemented, we just need to add a submit handler to call our custom submit function. To do this, add a @ submit parameter to your form tag and set it's value to the name of your custom function.
<v-form ref="form" v-model="valid" method="POST" lazy-validation @submit="saveContactMessage" >
Now, add the following code to the methods: area of the export block in your page's script section.
methods: { saveContactMessage: function (e) { e.preventDefault() const messagesRef = this.$firebaseDatabase.collection('message') messagesRef.add( { name: this.name, email: this.email, message: this.message, time: new Date(), }, ) this.name= '' this.email = '' this.message = '' this.submitted = true this.snackbar = false }, }
When a user submits the form, the saveContactMessages() method is called automatically and the forms event object passed to it. Calling preventDefault() on the event object, prevents the default behaviour (submitting the form to the default target).
const messagesRef = this.$firebaseDatabase.collection('message')
The above section of code assigns a reference to a database collection with the name message. If you haven’t already created the collection manually, within the firebase cloud console, it will be created automatically when the first set of data is saved.
// Info
// Note that this.$firebaseDatabase is a reference to the instance // property that we set previously in the main.js file. The $ prefix // is a convention used by Vue to indicate a property that's
// available to all instances. This is primarly to avoid naming
// conflicts with local variables.
The add() method is called on the collection reference to which we pass an object containing the data we wish to save. In my example, we save the contents of the three input fields and a Date object, so we can refer to the time the message was added in the email that we are going to send out to the form's recipient.
Finally, we reset the form’s data to empty strings and trigger any further UI changes to indicate the form has been submitted. For example, it would be a good idea to implement a try/catch to pick up any errors during the database save process and show a snackbar alert to confirm success or failure to the user. A common reason why a database write might fail is because the database rules do not allow writes. To fix this, open the Firebase Cloud Console and select the Rules tab while in Database view.
/*
* Important
* Firestore security rules provide access control and validation in
* a code style format. For this example we are giving write
* permission to any successful database connection.
* When building a production app, it’s imperative to fully
* understand how firestore security rules work in order to keep
* your app secure. The above snippet is only an example for
* demonstration purposes.
*/
Submitting the form should now result in the form data being saved to the database. This will appear in the Data tab of the Database sections of the Cloud Console. | https://medium.com/swlh/build-a-contact-form-with-vuejs-firebase-postmark-510f484f15b | ['Mat Wright'] | 2020-04-21 11:53:36.821000+00:00 | ['Vuejs', 'JavaScript', 'Vue', 'Firebase', 'Web Development'] |
The Revolutionary Impacts of Karl Marx’s Visionary Theories | Political philosophers often leave ambiguous messages revealing the realities of our society and the ways to address them. Karl Marx was one such philosopher who, although he desired to change the entire structure of society and create a more egalitarian one, never really predicted a utopia awaiting humanity in the future as people generally credit him for. Instead, he warned society of the severe repercussions that will undoubtedly be caused by the ongoing capitalist production model. Marx was born in the house of Heinrich Marx, a Protestant lawyer who was a man of the Enlightenment, in the Kingdom of Prussia. As a classical liberal, Heinrich was heavily interested in the ideas of German Idealism forwarded by the likes of Immanuel Kant and Voltaire.[1] Heinrich actively participated in several agitations and demonstrations demanding for a constitution in Prussia. His involvement in such proceedings contributed to the philosophical development of the young Karl Marx who witnessed strong socialist ideologies at such a young age.[2] Moreover, Marx was born merely thirty years after the famous French Revolution. The intellectual environment of Europe was going through a massive shift, in both its ideologies and its figures.[3] The role of religion in the society had taken a turn for the worse. Christianity had become a central constitute of the rising German nationalism. Marx’s father himself converted to Christianity from Judaism in order to be included in the higher sections of the society. Such activities linked religion and classism and motivated Marx towards atheism.[4] As Marx describes in his revolutionary Communist Manifesto, by the time humanity entered the 19th Century the majority of social classes and hierarchies had vanished, leaving behind just the bourgeoisies and the proletariats. The power was even more unevenly distributed amongst the different sections of the society than it was a few decades ago. This situation led to Marx’s belief that since society has finally been divided into two drastically different parts, it is time for the proletariats to rise against their oppressors.[5]
Marx, being an inquisitive philosopher and economist, was deeply moved by the works of his predecessors and his peers alike. Marx was heavily influenced by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel in his youth. Hegel’s theory of idealism, which promoted the moral outcome of society based on the moral thoughts of its members, baffled Marx as he could only observe the influence of materialism in his surroundings. This motivated Marx to develop his theory of Historical Materialism which argued that the historical development of the society is a result of materialistic actions rather than ideological movements.[6] While historical philosophers such as Hegel definitely shaped Marx’s theories, a major influence on him was the work of his long-time academic partner and friend, Friedrich Engels. Engels’s 1845 publication The Condition of the Working Class in England provided one the earliest structured studies of England’s industrial working class, which informed Marx about the realities of the class struggle and imprinted in his mind the idea of proletarian revolution as the only solution to end this struggle.[7]
Karl Marx’s political ideologies progressed and transformed over the years of his life, leaving behind a vast collection of socioeconomic analysis methods. Unlike his influencer Hegel, Marx believed that a human being’s “active nature (is) embodied not in thought alone, but in ‘sensuous human activity’.”[8] Since humanity is dependent on materialism, Marx believed that the progress towards a more idealistic society can only be approached through materialistic interventions, that is by getting actively involved in the development process. Marx believed that the materialism theorized by him differed from the existing ‘contemplative’ materialism because according to him, “the chief defect of all hitherto existing materialism is that the thing, reality, sensuousness, is conceived only in the form of the object, or of contemplation, but not as sensuous human activity, practice, not subjectively.”[9] Marx’s theory of Alienated Labor stemmed out of his theory on materialism. According to this, when a worker in a capitalist society realizes that the fruits of their labor are not under their control, but their employer’s, they feel alienated from, even dominated by, the products of their own labor. This leads to an eventual alienation from the labor, then their self and finally, society itself. The only freedom that remains is in the consumption of commodities.[10] According to Marx, the capitalist society not only alienates the workforce but also exploits them. This is done systematically by extracting ‘surplus value’ from them. Marx theorized that the “surplus value is the difference between the value a labor produces and the value of his labor power.”[11] While the theories described so far portray the working class’s miseries, Marx’s theory on Historical Materialism deals with the relationship between an individual and the constituents of the economic force, namely the forces of production (raw materials, land, machines, labor power) and the relations of production (ownership distribution, owner-worker relations). According to this theory from Marx, an individual unwillingly and indispensably enters into these relations with the constituents of the economic force, forming the economic structure of the capitalist society. Moreover, this economic structure is the basis of the entire socio-political structure of that society. Hence, materialistic actions, and not ideological movements, have contributed to the historical development of the society.[12]
The Theory of Class Struggle is considered to be Marx’s most popular and profound theory. Marx begins the Manifesto of the Communist Party with his most memorable quote, “the history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”[13] Marx describes that since the beginning of civilizations, the story of mankind is the story of the clash between different classes — “freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf … in a word, oppressor and oppressed”.[14] According to this theory, the actual barriers in society are not religion or language, but class itself. Marx believed that it is this clash between the classes that leads to the identical thought process of the working class all over the world with a common interest against the oppressing ruling class.[15] Building on his theory of class struggle, Marx formulated his theory of the state and the revolution. Marx observed that throughout history, whenever a new property owning class brought about a revolution in the mode of production, that too in the name of the entire society, that particular class ended up being the ruling class once the new modes of production had been established. Hence, Marx believed that the proletariat class was the universal class and the only hope to revolutionarily establish a classless society with no private ownership, which will only be achieved by capturing state power from the bourgeoisie.[16]
Karl Marx’s ideologies have been thoroughly misinterpreted and travestied by some of the leading powers of our world leading to orthodox, oppressing ideologies — namely the Chinese and the Soviet communism. Both of these communist governments have failed to provide a free, classless society which is favored towards the proletariats. On the contrary, both of these nations are governed by an authoritarian regime. On a separate note, despite several predictions from Marx regarding an impending proletariat revolution, the capitalist societies have not been disheveled — either due to the long-lasting colonialism or the welfare state established by many capitalist societies.[17] With the introduction of stock ownership and the disaggregation of workers into different types, modern economies have increased the involvement of more individuals in the capitalistic ownership of production. This contradicts Marx’s prediction that the proletariat class would increase in numbers because of the ever shrinking ruling class, leading to a massive proletariat revolution.[18]
Marx has been criticized by several modern political analysts for believing that class struggle is the only flaw of a capitalist society. Critics believe that social movements, such as the fight for women’s equal rights, should be at par with the struggle for a classless society since women not only faced discrimination based on their class, but also their gender.[19] Although Marx has been criticized for many of his theories, it cannot be denied that most of “the 20th century sociology or political economy has been a response to Marx’s questioning of class”.[20] Marx was also farsighted enough to predict the inevitable inequality of distributed wealth in the future. For instance, “in the United States, the pay of chief executive officers of companies has increased by 300 percent over the last 15 years, whereas wages have increased in the same period by only 5 percent and minimum wage workers have seen their pay fall by 6 percent.”[21] Marx is undoubtedly one of the most prolific visionaries in humankind’s recorded history. It is a feat to be able to forecast the future that the capitalist society holds, that too in such an excruciatingly detailed manner. Nevertheless, that does not justify the avid misinterpretation that his theories promise an egalitarian future. Society should instead take heed of his warnings and sincerely avoid the practices that continually create differences, inequality, and suffering all over the world for the working class, the everyday people.
[1] “Karl Marx.” History.com. A&E Television Networks, November 9, 2009. https://www.history.com/topics/germany/karl-marx.
[2] Lewis S. Feuer, and David T. McLellan, “Karl Marx.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, inc., May 4, 2020, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Karl-Marx.
[3] Lewis S. Feuer.
[4] “Karl Marx.”
[5] Lewis S. Feuer.
[6] Shefali Jha, Western Political Thought — From the Ancient Greeks to Modern Times, 2nd ed (Noida: Pearson India, 2019), 224.
[7] Lewis S. Feuer.
[8] Jha, Western Political Thought, 217.
[9] Karl Marx, “Theses on Feuerbach”, Essay, In Early Writings: Karl Marx (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1981).
[10] Jha, Western Political Thought, 220.
[11] Jha, Western Political Thought, 223.
[12] Jha, Western Political Thought, 224.
[13] Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party (Chennai: Indian Universities Press, 2019).
[14] Manifesto of the Communist Party.
[15] Jha, Western Political Thought, 227.
[16] Jha, Western Political Thought, 228.
[17] Jha, Western Political Thought, 229.
[18] Jha, Western Political Thought, 229.
[19] Jha, Western Political Thought, 229.
[20] Jha, Western Political Thought, 230
[21] Jha, Western Political Thought, 230. | https://medium.com/illumination/the-revolutionary-impacts-of-karl-marxs-visionary-theories-2e3e718073b7 | ['Shashwat Jha'] | 2020-08-05 12:25:17.921000+00:00 | ['Marxism', 'Economics', 'Communism', 'Politics', 'History'] |
SHA-256 is a new generation Bitcoin Cloud Mining | Sha-256.io is a cloud mining platform for anyone to start mining cryptocurrencies without purchasing any mining devices, spending time & effort on mining or being negatively affected by price volatility of crypto assets.
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In order for bitcoin miners to actually earn bitcoin from verifying transactions, two things have to occur. First, they must verify 1 megabyte (MB) worth of transactions, which can theoretically be as small as 1 transaction but are more often several thousand, depending on how much data each transaction stores.
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LITECOIN ADDRESS: Lc3M2MSQ55qGpHucjx7fcf6PWarBpfkrTP | https://medium.com/@cadpot/sha-256-is-a-new-generation-bitcoin-cloud-mining-44240f1cd71d | [] | 2021-01-22 15:44:32.069000+00:00 | ['Sha 256', 'Mining'] |
Wearing A Mask Is About Respect and…Yes, Freedom | Wearing A Mask Is About Respect and…Yes, Freedom
Respect for the healthcare system, respect for each other, and freedom from COVID-19
Photo by Anshu A on Unsplash
As we are learning more about this virus and its transmission, it is becoming clearer that wearing masks can make a big impact in reducing the person-to-person spread of SARS CoV-2.
Unfortunately, the recommendation to wear a mask has led to significant anger (and even violence) among some of our fellow Americans. “It’s about freedom,” some say. “I have the freedom to not wear a mask, and no one can make me wear one.” I understand this sentiment. At the same time, we are all in this together, and each of us has a role to play in fighting this virus.
My colleagues and I — the doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, and others — are directly on the front lines, risking our lives to take care of the sickest patients afflicted by COVID-19. Our other American brothers and sisters not on the front lines can play their part by wearing a mask when out in public spaces. This is especially essential now that most of the country is emerging out of lockdown.
Now, we in the healthcare field did not answer the calling to get respect. While it is nice no doubt, receiving respect is not why I became an ICU doctor. I became an ICU doctor because I love helping people survive their critical illness, which is why the overwhelming death we have seen from COVID-19 has been quite distressful for my colleagues and me.
If I only have 35 ventilators and all are occupied by COVID patients, and you are patient number 36 that needs a ventilator to survive, I can’t help you.
Photo by Javier Matheu on Unsplash
And so, when I say wearing a mask is showing respect, it is the respect for the healthcare system and its capacity to take care of everyone who may need medical care. Now, this term, “healthcare system capacity,” is abstract and may not be clear what it means.
And so, let me put it this way: let’s say I am taking care of patients in the hospital in your city or town. Let’s say I only have 35 ventilators, and everyone is occupied by a COVID patient. If you are patient number 36 gasping for air and needing a ventilator to survive, I can’t help you.
This is a nightmare scenario for me as an ICU doctor, and I do not want to ever face this scenario. This is what “flattening the curve” means on a practical, “on the ground” level: it is allowing me to always be able to take care of every patient that comes to my ICU door that needs care. And wearing a mask when we are out in public helps lower the transmission of COVID-19 and keeps the healthcare system intact.
In addition, wearing a mask is about respect for each other. More and more evidence is emerging that people can spread COVID-19 either before they develop symptoms or without developing symptoms at all.
And so, when I wear a mask, I am protecting you from myself. The reverse is true as well. When I am wearing a mask, I am showing that I am doing what I can to protect everyone around me from this horrible disease. And while I’d much rather shake your hand in person, wearing a mask can be seen as the “new handshake” of the COVID-19 era.
Moreover, wearing a mask is truly about freedom: freedom from contracting this horrible affliction. Nothing in life is 100% except death and taxes. There is no guarantee that this measure or that will prevent us from contracting COVID-19 with 100% certainty.
Still, it is clear that wearing a mask makes a tremendous impact, and it can mean freedom from getting this disease.
Photo by Kristina V on Unsplash
And that means freedom from fever, body aches, fatigue; it means freedom from dangerously low oxygen levels that can threaten your life; it means freedom from gasping for air and possibly needing a ventilator. It means freedom from being alone in a hospital possibly for weeks on end; it means freedom from risking death — all alone without family at your side — from respiratory failure or kidney failure or heart attacks.
It means freedom from having our children possibly getting a mysterious and dangerous inflammatory illness, which has been fatal; it means freedom from young people — in their 30s, 40s, and 50s — getting and dying from strokes (which many of my colleagues have seen). Getting this illness will take away many of our freedoms which we take for granted.
When we wear a mask, it is not encroaching upon our freedom; it is doing what we can to preserve our freedom from a truly frightening scourge.
It is truly unfortunate that a mask has become a symbol of oppression. That was never the intention. A mask is a very simple way that all of us in the American family can protect each other and help protect our precious healthcare resources. It is the very least we can do. | https://medium.com/beingwell/wearing-a-mask-is-about-respect-and-yes-freedom-5576e1cc7861 | ['Dr. Hesham A. Hassaballa'] | 2020-06-09 01:27:22.526000+00:00 | ['Society', 'Healthcare', 'Health', 'Medicine', 'Coronavirus'] |
Creating Despair Was Not a Side Effect of Trump’s Debate Performance; It Was the Intended Effect | If you are at all like me, the first debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump left you feeling icky. Very little of substance was said and very few actual questions were answered. I would have rather spent the evening watching chimpanzees throw poop at each other because at least chimpanzees have some sense of irony about what they are doing. This was a dumpster fire inside of a train wreck, and all I wanted to do when it was over was never think about politics again.
To win re-election, Trump must convince Americans that the system is so broken that there is no reason to vote and the future so bleak that there is no value in hope.
For one of the participants in the debate, despair was actually the intended effect. We were supposed to feel dirty. We were supposed to feel depressed. And we are supposed to be so turned off by our broken system that we want nothing more to do with it. Because that is the only way that Donald Trump can win.
Presidential debates have never been about policy issues. At their very best, they have been image contests about who can look the most presidential. But last night’s debate was not even about that. The sitting president acted like a kindergarten bully. He taunted, jeered, provoked, and interrupted both Biden and the moderator until they both responded in exasperation. If this had been any kind of contest with enforceable rules, it would have been stopped, and Trump would have been kicked out of the game.
But it was not a contest with enforceable rules. The moderator had no power to moderate, and the normal social imperatives about civil behavior in public have never applied to the current president. But this was not simply Trump being Trump. It was a well-executed strategy to gain the low ground and force Biden to engage him on his own terms. Whenever Biden responded in kind, Trump doubled down. He didn’t ever say “I know you are, but what am I” — but it would not have been out of character if he had.
If you are not already a Trump supporter, then everything you have seen so far in the president’s campaign has been designed to convince you not to vote.
But why did Trump do this? Why would he take the risk of appearing so unpresidential and bad-tempered just a few weeks before the election? To answer these questions, we need to step back and consider two related questions: 1)Where does Trump stand in the current race? and 2) What role debates play in presidential contests?
The answer to the first question is that Trump is seriously behind. Polls currently show him 7–10 points behind Biden in the national election and behind by similar margins in most battleground states. Yes, Trump was behind Clinton in 2016, but only by 2–3 points, well within margins of error. No presidential candidate since the invention of polling has made up as much ground as Trump needs to make up in the time that is left.
But perhaps the more important fact is that Trump has never once in his presidency had an approval rating above 50%. Most presidents fluctuate over a wide field in the course of four years. Trump has remained fairly steady, never going over 50%, but never falling very far below 40%. And there are almost no undecided’s left. Just about everybody int he country has made up their mind about the President, and their minds have changed surprisingly little in four years. Polling has also revealed an “enthusiasm gap” between Trump’s and Biden’s supporters. Trump supporters are more enthusiastic about their candidate and more likely to vote.
So, the shape of each candidate’s support looks like this:
Some portion of the electorate that is below 50% supports Trump no matter what he does, and this segment of the population is highly likely to vote.
Another portion of the election that is above 50% does not support Trump and supports Biden, but are less committed to Biden than Trump’s supporters are committed to Trump.
When we frame the question in the terms of Trump’s current standing, we can see that the best way for Trump to win it to convince people not to vote. In theory, this should disproportionally disadvantage Biden, since Trump’s voters are more committed and more enthusiastic about voting than Biden’s voters. If you are not already a Trump supporter, then everything you have seen so far in the president’s campaign has been designed to convince you not to vote. This is why Trump has railed against mail-in voting during a pandemic. It is why he has called out to armed militia groups to intimidate voters. And it was the only thing he was trying to accomplish in the first debate.
You see, if you are not going to vote for Trump, then it does not matter to Trump why you stay home. The best way to prevent people from voting is to make them think that there is nothing to vote for — that the system is so irredeemably broken that there is no hope of ever making it better. If the system is hopelessly broken, then there is no reason to try to fix it. If politics are ugly and disgusting, then we might as well do something fun. If we despair for our country, then there is no reason to participate in civic life. A candidate who profits from low voter turnout has every incentive to make our experiences with politics hopeless, disgusting, and depressing.
When Americans watch a debate between two presidential candidates and see nothing but bickering pre-schoolers, our natural reaction is to reject the entire system that they represent and cry in despair for our broken country. This is not a side-effect; this is the intended effect. To win re-election, Trump must convince Americans that the system is so broken that there is no reason to vote and the future so bleak that there is no value in hope. We all need to remember that this is just another one of Donald Trump’s well-documented lies. | https://medium.com/discourse/creating-despair-was-not-a-side-effect-of-trumps-debate-performance-it-was-the-intended-effect-93976bc529b6 | ['Michael Austin'] | 2020-10-01 14:50:16.261000+00:00 | ['Politics', 'Trump', 'Elections', 'Debate', 'Biden'] |
Investing 201: Laying the Foundation | This will be one of a series of posts where I will write about my thoughts about and experience with investing. I have never been a professional investor nor have any plans to do so¹, but find the topic of personal interest (and growing importance, as we will see). My objectives with this series are as follows:
- Share my somewhat limited learning in a concise format with my peers who may want to exchange notes
- Serve as an “educational” material for a novice to medium-level investor and those earlier (or in mid) in their careers². That said, there is tremendous amount of great material and classes on the internet, and my posts are informal and personal — exactly the way I want them to be — and not meant to be academic or necessarily accurate to the point, to the extent a certain level of accuracy can indeed hold true in the world of investment (investing is not a natural science after all). Much of what follows are my opinions, and can easily be challenged.
Each post will typically focus on a particular “bucket” of asset classes. The way I characterize these buckets and asset classes is what suits my needs and what I find helpful for my own research and planning. They may not perfectly fit with a stricter definition of an asset class(es). Moreover, while I consider each bucket separate, there are definite conceptual overlaps between them (which I will do my best to point to). But at least in my head, it is clear where a specific investment lies in my classification (which is not very far from most popular definitions).
Which path you follow will obviously depend a lot on how much money you have at your disposal, your short-term needs, your risk appetite, amongst other things. In addition, I assume, that you do not have enough money to tap into private banking, though even if you do, I hope you can learn a thing or two from my posts.
It may help (and also feel good) to think of yourself as a Chief Investment Officer — that is you cannot outsource everything to private banking, financial advisor, or a portfolio manager. This is sort of akin to the job of Chief Investment Officer of say a large endowment fund³, where she may outsource certain types of investing to respective experts (Hedge Funds, Private Equity, to name a few), but she still needs to decide how to allocate capital at the top level (of course, a CIO of an endowment fund is a full-time job, and one that “manages” billions of dollars if at one of the top tier schools — I just find the analogy interesting, despite a massive difference in terms of money being managed or the time required).
Before discussing each bucket in detail, let’s lay the foundation.
1) Your goal for investing may take different forms — from saving aside funds for education of your kids, to travel plans, to retirement. My primary goal is to build comfortable wealth and to be able to retire when I want; it does not mean I would want to retire. Moreover, I enjoy investing as a “hobby”, while making decent money (I hope).
I like the well known 4% rule. Very briefly, what it means is what you think your annual needs will be, multiply it by 25 (100/4). That should allow you to withdraw the 4% of your liquid investments/savings each year after you turn 59, and adjust it up by inflation as well. For example, if you think you need $10,000 post retirement, every year, post taxes:
- Assume inflation between now and when you turn 59 will be 20%. This means you will need $12,000, post taxes, in the first year of your retirement.
- For simplicity sake, assume a tax rate of 40%. This implies, you will need $20,000, pre-taxes in year 1.
- The 4% rule would imply, you will need $20,000 * 25 = $500,000 saved up when you retire.
This is not an accurate prediction but a rather safe assumption. Add cushion to it if you want to play more conservative.
2) Earlier in life, take more risks — save, but invest in higher risk, higher reward investments. You can take more risks in your 20’s while you do not have many personal and family obligations. By you 30’s though, if you have not been successful in saving much (perhaps your high-risk investments went down the drain), start balancing the risk.
Ironically though, if you are able to accumulate a little wealth into your late 20’s or early 30’s, it should allow you to set aside some of your wealth for a rainy day, and take higher risks with the remainder of the capital.
3) Investments can be roughly divided in three types:
- Income. They focus on generating income. Bonds, dividend stocks, savings accounts, and rental real estate are some examples. These generally have lower risk and lower potential for growth.
- Growth. They may generate no income but optimize for growth. Of course they are also higher risk.
- Balance. These try to generate some income, but also focus on growth.
4) Even in my 40’s, I tend to largely focus on Growth, with some Balance. The idea is to build enough reserves that when I switch to Income, even at a low yearly return, my “passive” income can sustain my lifestyle.
Last but not least, I recommend you set aside enough cash (or another very liquid and near zero risk investment) that if you were to lose your job and your investments collapsed to zero, you’d still be able to go on for at least three to six months. | https://medium.com/@saadfazil/investing-201-laying-the-foundation-6ee870c87aaf | ['Saad Fazil'] | 2021-01-07 11:46:03.880000+00:00 | ['Hedge Funds', 'Stocks', 'Investing', 'Venture Capital'] |
AI-powered Spell-check and Grammar-check in Business Applications | Wud yu read this artcle if it was ful of speling mistaks ? Ofcourse not. Incorrect spelling are not only limited to personal life, but unfortunately also exists in business applications.
Now-a-days most of our writing is via a word processor like word or using mobile phones. And they already have features built in to highlight spelling mistakes and even correct them using autocorrect feature
However in the business world, there are many applications such as master data management, call-center applications, resource planning, customer relation applications etc.., which do not have any autocorrection features. This allows spelling mistakes to creep into the system and it creates many problems while using these applications
Let us look at some of the common problems scenarios in businesses
Incorrect text in master data
Master data , such as product master data, customer master data and others are a key piece of information necessary for smooth working of business applications. Generally master data has a key, attributes and description. For example a product master data will have the product identifier, attributes (such as color, weight, size etc..) and product description. Out of all these fields, the product description is one of the most important as it is the only field which gives information about what the product really is. Also it is highlighted on e-commerce websites and is one of the first thing seen by prospective buyers
As the origin of the product description data is from humans, it is prone to mistakes. These mistakes occur simply because of human nature, attempt to find abbreviation for long product names , or trying to combine two different words into one
Some of real-life examples of such mistakes in product names are PINK NEW BAROQUECANDLESTICK CANDLE, PINK OVAL JEWELLED MIRROR, LUNC BAG RED RETROSPOT, PAPER CHAN KIT 50’S CHRISTMAS, LIGHT GARLAND BUTTERFILES PINK
When such mistakes are highlighted on company websites, it can put off clients from buying the products
Wrong spelling, words and grammar in business communications
Business communication mainly involves B2C (business to client), B2B (Business to business) and internal communications. With rise in different communication channels such as classic email, web-chat, support service , social media etc.., the amount of text being communicated has gone up in recent years. This means that the chances of errors in spelling, words as well as grammar has also gone up
Many of the business applications , such as web support services or B2B portals , might not have the basic orthograph or grammar check. Also there are many cases where automated spell checkers would not be able to catch the errors. Here are some real-life examples of business communications where spell check was either not active or did not work
Let’s us meet tomorrow morning an then we can present you our offering
We will send you male with detail description on how to solve the issue
We will dedicate tile to understand your pan point
With the ever increasing workload and stress, not all humans proof check or re-read all communications.
Such mistakes does not create a good impression with clients, customers as well as internal employees and sometime can lead to losing business, trust or cultural non-acceptance. Just by having an end-note “Please excuse for any typos” would not help as it conveys the message that the person is not very meticulous and is more of a sloppy person.
Unchecked AI generated text
There is a rising number of AI based applications which generate text such as automated personalized emails or chatbots. Generally one would expect that spelling or grammar mistakes would not occur in such automated text generation, but there are chances of such errors.
The main reason for an AI generated text to go wrong is insufficient training data or incorrectly parameterised AI architecture
So generally it is good idea to put an AI based spell and grammar check on top of AI generated text. You can think this as an AI program controlling another AI program
Making machine learn to predict correct spellings and words
Can a machine learn how to spell a word correctly within a given context ? For Example can it recognize the error in the word male in the sentence : “We will send you male with detail description on how to solve the issue” . The answer is yes.
AI can be used to go beyond what existing spell-checkers can provide. They can not only identify spelling mistakes, but also identify correctly spelled words but used in a wrong context.
At the center of advanced spell-checking or autocorrection lies algorithm to recognize sequential pattern of characters or words. For example the word “sequential” is orthographically correct but the word “sequentialy” is mis-spelled even though the first ten characters (“sequential”) are correct.
AI programs are very good at sequential pattern detection and can help differentiating between the right pattern (“sequentially”) from a wrong pattern (“sequentialy”).
The type of AI architecture which works on sequential pattern data are called Recurrent Neural network (RNN) or Long Short Term Memory (LSTM). Let’s look at these techniques with help of an example to identify a right character which follows a sequence of characters. As an example given the pattern “sequentiall”, it can identify that the next letter would be “y” and not anything else.
A simplified representation of RNN or LSTM would be an input sequence and an output sequence. For example, we can train the RNN to have input as “sequentiall” and output as “y”. The input is fed into neurons, which are represented by circles.
Simplified representation of RNN or LSTM
We need to train our network on various sentences and words, for which we need data. One possibility is to take already available correct text such as from Wikipedia or any other sources. For each line in the source, break it up into various lines in order to use it for RNN or LSTM training purposes.
Once the RNN or LSTM is trained on sufficient data, it will create a weight matrix for each letter. This weight matrix is kind of latent representation for each letter. It represents what the artificial intelligence has learned about each letter.
The size of weight matrix is number of characters * number of features. The number of characters is unique number of characters occurring in text corpus used for training. The number of features is up to us to select. If for example number of features is chosen to be 128, then each character will be represented by a bunch of 128 weights.
This weight matrix can be seen as “understanding” which AI developed looking at the text corpus. Here is the weight matrix created after training a RNN or LSTM based on randomly selected Wikipedia data (around 100 GB). The rows represent different characters and the columns represent the 128 weights for each character. Lower the weight, more black is the color. Higher the weight, more blue is the color
AI brain internal representation is a weight matrix
The weight matrix is an internal representation of what AI has learned about each character. This matrix is a bit difficult to understand by humans. However we can apply some data science techniques to this matrix in order to understand what AI has learned
One such technique we can apply is called clustering, which will group together characters which have similar weights. After applying clustering algorithm (called K-Means) to weight matrix , we see the following clusters
AI learns to differentiate between alphabets, numbers and punctuations
These cluster results are very interesting. Just by looking at the corpus text, AI has learned to differentiate between alphabets, numbers and punctuations. This shows the self-leaning power of AI and how it can think like human by just looking at the text
This “knowledge” of characters represented by weights is used in the RNN or LSTM architecture to predict the character. This process is shown here
RNN or LSTM process
For each character , the weight matrix is read and hidden state corresponding to the neuron is updated. The hidden state for one neuron serves as input to the next neuron. The process continues with the output of last neuron is used to predict the last letter.
The architecture can be used in a similar fashion to predict the next word. Example the input can be “we will dedicate” and the architecture can predict the word “time” has more probability to occur next rather than the word “tile”
Integrating business applications with AI model
So once we have our AI trained to predict correct spellings or next word, there are different ways by which we can leverage it. One of the common ways is to develop an API which wraps the AI logic (also called as model) and exposes it via an API service.
Any business application which would like to use spell-check or word check can make a call to the API and see if the predicted word is equal to word in the business application. For example the business application can send the word “sequentialy” and the API can send back response that the word would be probably misspelled as well send back the possible right word “sequentially”.
Based on the business application there could be different possible scenarios on how to leverage the AI model
Concluding thoughts
Spell-checks, grammar-checks, autocorrection should not only be restricted to mobile or productivity applications. It is very important that all these basic sanity checks are also integrated into business applications. Various state of the art AI algorithms and techniques can be used to achieve this and ensure that you have a smooth business functioning as well as to have a good external image
Hope you have enjoyed reading this article. | https://pranay-dave9.medium.com/ai-powered-spell-check-and-grammar-check-in-business-applications-6dc316224ab0 | ['Pranay Dave'] | 2018-08-25 07:27:07.244000+00:00 | ['Business Apps', 'Business Value', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Machine Learning'] |
How Blockchain will change the world of auditing | How Blockchain will change the world of auditing
It is a fact that technology is transforming the mode of business operations, from fast mode automation to flawless output, everything is a blessing of technology. One such technology that has impacted businesses like never before is Blockchain. This distributed ledger technology paves the way for a new set of developments that will improvise the conventional technological platforms.
As per IBM, around 66% of all the banks will have commercial Blockchain products; however, the application of Blockchain is not merely limited to finance. As per the Market and Markets report, the worth of Blockchain is expected to become more than $2 billion by 2021. Amongst the different industries that will be impacted by Blockchain Technology, we have the work of auditing.
How will Blockchain impact auditing?
Blockchain’s impact on different businesses is evident from the fact that most of these are trying to use it for their benefit. Here we are highlighting how will it show its impact on auditing work:
1. Change in the role of auditors: One of the first changes that Blockchain is going to bring in the world of auditing is that the role of the auditors will change to the analyst. They will be interpreting the data that is recorded on the Blockchain and will deduce the inferences from the same. Compliance auditors will assist in handling the identities of the individuals, companies, and linking the same with the assets.
Besides, traceability with the provenance of goods will also allow the auditors to trace an asset over time and will also provide proof of transactions in real-time.
2. No data alteration- One of the key works of any auditor is to ensure that every information on the ledger is right and unaltered. With the conventional system, there is no guarantee of authenticity, as there is a greater potential to impact and alter the data. But with Blockchain, you don’t have to ponder over this fact. All the information entered in the DLT is encrypted cryptographically, thus assuring that the data is absolutely safe and free from a data breach.
3. Data security- What makes Blockchain so imperative for auditing work is that it allows data security. One of the prime concerns of any auditor is to ensure that all the data in the ledger is correct and free from any errors. The best way is to opt for a method that is infallible and secure. Blockchain is that platform. Since the data is encrypted and is time-stamped. Any change or alteration in data will be easily reflected in the ledger, thus ensuring complete data security.
Conclusion:
With all these features, it has become evident that Blockchain is one of the best choices for auditing and allied work. Every finance professional would be required to know about Blockchain and how to use the same for auditing work. | https://medium.com/the-capital/how-blockchain-will-change-the-world-of-auditing-becf3d15c39b | ['Sophia Casey'] | 2020-11-18 03:01:06.624000+00:00 | ['Blockchain', 'Blockchain Technology', 'Blockchain Application', 'Blockchain Startup', 'Blockchain Development'] |
Man, I don’t feel like working out, maybe Tomorrow… | Credit goes to the one who made the Original Meme
Man, I don’t feel like working out, maybe Tomorrow…
Our mind has a way of always rationalizing procrastination, we don’t have to look at any statistics, deep down most of us already know how true this is.
“You see, stagnation is the process of thinking you are not yet ready, one day, but not yet.” -Your World Within
Unless there is a deadline of some sort, the brain rationalizes postponing the inevitable. Even though this only results in regret, we continue to repeat this dilemma, over and over again.
Procrastination is a very common thing.
Almost like a pandemic, it is there in almost all of us, and it is very real.
Unless we choose action overthinking, we always fall prey to it.
Relaxing and Procrastinating are two totally different things…
Now, this post is not a “push” that you may need to get that work done, it’s simply a reminder that there is always a reason to postpone, yet there is always also a reason to take action.
The question is what will you choose?
Will it be the pain of discipline?
Or perhaps, the pain of regret?
Just the choice alone may change the trajectory of your life. | https://medium.com/@chibitalha/man-i-dont-feel-like-working-out-maybe-tomorrow-ac7444093891 | ['Talha Ahmad'] | 2021-02-02 23:47:00.886000+00:00 | ['Self Improvement', 'Dailymotivation', 'Daily Thoughts', 'Self Improvement Tips', 'Procrastination'] |
The Trump peace plan, a white coffin and the Exodus from Egypt | There is one reason why I am sceptical towards the attempts by the European Left to bring an end to the conflict between Israel and the Arab world.
Not because the same people who believe that they know how to bring peace in the Middle East, so far have not been able to end conflicts in their own home, in Europe, such as in Ireland or in the Balkans. I mean: if you are not able to keep your own house in order, why do you think you are entitled to sort other people’s houses. It’s just common sense.
But this is not the specific reason why I do not trust the European Left’s intervention in the conflict in the Middle East. The reason why I don’t trust them is actually very small, and white. It is a baby size white coffin that was left on the stairs of the Great Synagogue in Rome in 1982, during a Trade Union’s rally.
A small coffin. White. Empty.
A few weeks after that hateful rally, a Palestinian commando assaulted the Great Synagogue in Rome. It was Shabbat. It was Shemini Atzeret, the day when children receive a special blessing, according to the Rome custom. The synagogue was packed with 300 worshippers and among them 50 children. The terrorists threw bombs and opened fire with machine guns. 37 people were seriously wounded. A child, two years old, was murdered. Stefano Taché, z’’l. That white coffin, left empty by the Trade Unions a few weeks before, was now full.
The terrorists escaped: five Middle Eastern men managed to escape after an attack, in the centre of Rome, with police literally at every corner, in full light, actually at noon (because of terrorist threats, remember? This was the 80s, in Italy). Not to mention the police surveillance car, that was in front of the Great Synagogue every day but, for some strange reason not on that day, 9 October 1982, Shabbat, Shemini Atzeret, when the synagogue is always full of children.
Another strange coincidence: a few weeks before the attack, Yasser Arafat visited Italy. He was welcomed as a head of State (which he was not). He gave a speech in Parliament, with the gun in full view under his belt. A gun in Parliament, yes. And then he went on to the Vatican, to receive the same kind of hospitality.
This is precisely the reason why I cannot trust the European Left. That small white coffin.
I do not want to judge the Palestinian terrorists. It’s not my job. I am not Palestinian. I was not born in a refugee camp. I don’t want to judge; that is the job of the justice system (hopefully of the Israeli judges. My gut tells they are more reliable than the Italian police). My judgement, more: my condemnation is for those trade unionists, who left that white empty coffin in front of the Synagogue. For those militants who shielded their comrades while they were delivering their gift to the Jewish community And I judge in the same way, in the harshest way possible, those Leftist militants who went on TV, after the terror attack, and the murder of a 2-year-old Jewish child, and declared that they were regretting having protected persecuted Jews during WWII, “because now I see what they do in Palestine”.
I cannot judge the terrorists. I do not know why they have chosen this way. I can judge their actions, not their personality. Perhaps they did not have a choice. But those Leftist anti-Semites who supported the terrorists, who justified them, who offered the Palestinian terrorists their understanding, and the empathy that they denied to their fellow Italian citizens, they, to me, are unforgivable. I don’t forgive. I don’t forget.
They did not grow up in the misery of a Palestinian camp. They had access to the same source of information as I had. They could read the same books I read. Nonetheless. their ideology had blinded them to the point that they consider morally justifiable shooting Jews in a Synagogue, and murdering a child, “because of what the Jews do now in Palestine”.
Rome, 9 October 1982. My generation of Italian Jews has grown up in the shadows of that terror attack. That was, and is, on our minds whenever we see the police stationed outside the Synagogue. The first thought is always: Thank God they are here, today.
The bitterness and the disappointment, that many British Jews feel today towards the Labour Party, is what we experienced 40 years ago, and the peak was exactly at that time: Rome, 9 October 1982. And so, if you ask me whether we should trust an orange-haired American President, who seems to be able to persuade the main sponsors of Palestinian terrorism to spend their money elsewhere; or the leaders of that European Left who, some decades ago were more on the side of Palestinian murderers than on the side of the Jews and of the Israelis, I have no doubt: whatever comes from the American president seems more reasonable and doable than whatever comes from the friends of Hezbollah, Hamas or Yasser Arafat, may his name be forgotten.
The Torah portions we read during these weeks narrate the foundational event of the history of the Jewish people: the exodus from Egypt. As everybody knows, the Israelites had to go through the desert before reaching the Land of Israel and becoming free. Why is the desert needed to conquer freedom? I mean: God is Omnipotent, why didn’t He choose to liberate the Jews in any other way? Like overthrowing Pharaoh, and putting Moses in his place? Why did the Israelites have to wander through the desert?
The reason is that they had to get rid of Egyptian culture, of Egyptian ideology and of Egyptian mentality. In the contemporary world, this is equivalent to shutting up the media, the news report, the Internet… all the sources of information that want us to believe that the Jewish State cannot live in peace with its neighbours unless all the requests of the Palestinians are met.
Unfortunately, this is the message from the media. Israel must give up, the Palestinians must receive, however, whatever Israel gives up, it will never be enough. But we do not have to listen to the media and to the monotonous, eternal blaming of Israel. In my own personal desert, walking towards the Land of Israel, this time I choose to trust the American President. And hope for the best.
Brighton & Hove Reform Synagogue, 1 February 2020 | https://medium.com/@rabbiandrea/the-trump-peace-plan-a-white-coffin-and-the-exodus-from-egypt-18d39ae6a694 | ['Rabbi Dr Andrea Zanardo'] | 2020-10-12 18:42:44.863000+00:00 | ['Left Wing Violence', 'Palestine', 'Israel', 'Italy', 'Anti Semitism'] |
Real time Face Mask Detection System | Real Time Face Mask Detector
“Productivity is being able to do things that you were never able to do before.” — Franz Kafka
The recent coronavirus pandemic has pushed humans all around the world to the new challenges. In this context of uncertainty, we can all play our role by contributing to the fight against this disease. This is an excellent opportunity to put technology at the service of humanity. So, we can contribute towards this epidemic by implementing the productive things in its favour.
What if we had a system that could monitor whether people around us are complying with all the safety measures? So why not to build a very simple and basic Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) model using TensorFlow with Keras library and OpenCV project to detect if you are wearing a face mask to protect yourself, which also shows you accuracy of it.
Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) — Deep Learning
Neural network with many convolutional layers
CNN’s are inspired by the structure of the brain but our focus will not be on neural science here as we do not have any expertise or academic knowledge in any of the biological aspects. Also to note they are nowhere close to the actual human brain. CNN’s are a class of Neural Networks that have proven very effective in areas of image recognition, processing, and classification.
As per Wiki — In machine learning, a convolutional neural network (CNN, or ConvNet) is a class of deep, feed-forward artificial neural networks, most commonly applied to analysing visual imagery.
They exist already for several decades but were shown to be very powerful when large labeled datasets are used. This requires fast computers (e.g. GPUs)!
This network is a great example of variation for multilayer perceptron for processing and classification. It’s a deep learning algorithm in which it takes input as an image and put weights and biases effectively to its objects and finally able to differentiate images from each other.
TensorFlow with Keras Library
TensorFlow with Keras
In this , we’ll be talking about two of the many libraries and frameworks — TensorFlow and Keras.
What is TensorFlow?
TensorFlow is an open-sourced library. It is one of the most famous libraries when it comes to dealing with Deep Neural Networks. The primary reason behind the popularity of TensorFlow is the sheer ease of building and deploying applications using TensorFlow.
TensorFlow excels at numerical computing, which is critical for deep learning. It provides APIs in most major languages and environments needed for deep learning
What is Keras?
Keras is a completely Python-based framework, which makes it easy to debug and explore. It is a high-level library that’s built on top of TensorFlow. It provides a scikit-learn type API for building Neural Networks. Developers can use Keras to quickly build neural networks without worrying about the mathematical aspects of tensor algebra, numerical techniques, and optimization methods.
The key idea behind the development of Keras is to facilitate experiments by fast prototyping. The ability to go from an idea to result with the least possible delay is key to good research.
This offers a huge advantage for scientists and beginner developers alike because they can dive right into Deep Learning without getting their hands dirty with low-level computations.
OpenCV
OpenCV is a cross-platform library using which we can develop real-time computer vision applications. It mainly focuses on image processing, video capture and analysis including features like face detection and object detection.
OpenCV was built to provide a common infrastructure for computer vision applications and to accelerate the use of machine perception in the commercial products.
Implementing our COVID-19 face mask detector in real-time video streams with OpenCV
Let see how to detect face with real time video stream. First install necessary packages.
Importing Necessary Packages
Function which detects the faces and then applies our face mask classifier to each face.
Function to detect faces and appling mask classifier
The above mentioned detect_and_predict_mask function accepts three parameters:
frame: A frame from our stream
faceNet : This is the model used to detect the faces inside the image
maskNet : The face mask classifier model
Inside, we construct a blob , detect faces, and initialize lists, two of which the function is set to return. These lists include our faces (i.e., ROIs), locs (the face locations), and preds (the list of mask/no mask predictions).
From here, we’ll loop over the detections of faces:
Loop over face detection
Now, we can implement the mask predictor created for predicting the faces.
Next, defining some of the command line arguments:
The command line arguments mentioned above includes:
face: The path to the face detector directory
model: The path to our trained face mask classifier
confidence: The minimum probability threshold to filter weak face detections
With our imports, convenience function, and command line args ready to go, we just have a few initializations to handle before we loop over frames:
Here we have initialized :
Face detector
face mask detector
Webcam video stream
Now, we’ll proceed to loop over frames from the live webcam video stream:
Loop over frames from the stream
All the above mentioned code snippets are for detecting the face mask in live webcam video stream. It is just for understanding the Detection through live stream part. Thus, implementation of real-time face mask detector with Python, OpenCV, and deep learning with TensorFlow/Keras can be done. | https://medium.com/analytics-vidhya/real-time-face-mask-detection-system-8d8254c86cfb | ['Saumy Srivastava'] | 2020-09-22 13:48:34.645000+00:00 | ['TensorFlow', 'Face Mask Detection', 'Covid 19', 'Opencv', 'Keras'] |
How To Beat Procrastination for Good | Step 2: Fix the Underlying Issue
After you have analyzed yourself, you should be able to identify patterns in your procrastination behavior. The next step is to fix the biggest underlying problem (aka the reason why you are procrastinating). If you have multiple big reasons, start with fixing the biggest one first and then deal with the others one by one.
Here are some strategies you can try to fix potential underlying issues. But be aware: only you can know the real reason why you are procrastinating and find the best strategy to deal with it.
Setting expectations and goals too high:
Break down your goal into doable milestones and make a proper action and time plan. Be careful with your time estimations as things will always take longer than you initially think. Focus on one step at a time without obsessing too much about your overwhelming goal as a whole.
Perfectionism
The key to keeping perfectionism from severely impacting your productivity is to develop an awareness of when you are going overboard. Before starting a project, define how doing it right 100% and 80% will look like. Then, when you are sensing you’re getting into perfectionism mode, ask yourself “is obsessing about this important in the grand scheme of things? Is this contributing to making progress on the 80% or is it about the last 20%?”. Then, take a deep breath, remind yourself that “done is better than perfect,” and move on. If your perfectionism is keeping you from getting started in the first place, tell yourself “I start with where I am and what I have.” Trust that you have prepared enough and are ready to execute.
Lack of purpose:
Two options: 1) Don’t do it and focus on the things that are actually more important in your life or 2) Find a strong enough reason why you want to do it (for example: because it makes your mum happy or it builds relationships that you can later build on).
Fear (of failure, success, judgment, or the unknown):
There are different strategies for different fears, but what usually works very well are the following fear-busting strategies:
Get clear about what exactly you are afraid of : Imagine the worst case scenario, realize that it is not that bad and make a contingency plan for what to do if it actually happens.
: Imagine the worst case scenario, realize that it is not that bad and make a contingency plan for what to do if it actually happens. Practice mindfulness through meditation, yoga, and journaling to calm down pointless worrying and overthinking.
through meditation, yoga, and journaling to calm down pointless worrying and overthinking. Make it a habit to go out of your comfort zone: The more steps you take towards the things you are afraid of, the more your fear will turn into confidence and catapult you forward.
The more steps you take towards the things you are afraid of, the more your fear will turn into confidence and catapult you forward. Develop a deep trust in god/the universe. Trust that you are on the right path, that you are being guided every step of the way, and that everything that is happening is for your ultimate good.
Bad time management and self-organization.
Structure your day by scheduling everything into your calendar — even your commute, grocery shopping, cooking, and free time. This forces you to estimate the time that things will take as well as set actual priorities in your day. To push yourself, impose artificial deadlines and gamify the process by giving yourself rewards or punishing yourself for not meeting your goals. If that doesn’t work, get an accountability partner. Even better: give him control over the punishment (like donating a significant amount of money to a cause you absolutely don’t support or coloring your hair blue). | https://bettermarketing.pub/how-to-beat-procrastination-for-good-caf0c7009fd6 | ['Liz Huber'] | 2019-07-10 18:46:09.222000+00:00 | ['Self Improvement', 'Productivity', 'Work', 'Self', 'Procrastination'] |
How to make the most out of Cmd+J — Mentees | How does Cmd+J work?
Once you’ve signed up on the homepage of the website, you can simply sign in using your email and password, anytime. You would schedule time with Mentors through a page that lists all the mentors on the platform together in one place.
You have 4 opportunities to schedule time with various mentors every month, to make sure that nobody misuses the facility and it isn’t overbearing for our mentors as a whole. The counter will be reset at the end of every month at which point you may schedule time with 4 more mentors.
So make sure you take time to go through their bios, their work and choose your mentors well!
This was a short summary — You find out more details about how the platform works here.
(Note: With every platform with potential for good, there is potential for misuse, please note we absolutely do not tolerate badgering, stalking or treating Cmd+J as a job portal to ask for jobs among other things which violate our Code of Conduct)
What Now?
So you’ve set up your Cmd+J account, and already have a good idea of how the platform works. But you’re still unsure about your first conversation with a mentor? Thinking about it gives you the heebie-jeebies?
We get it. We’ve been there, having some amazing designers who have volunteered their time to talk with you, can be anxiety-inducing. 😬
But here’s the thing, even if there are a couple of things which might not work out or go wrong… There are so many things which can be magical!
We’re here to make sure you can make the most out of the opportunity you have and have the best experience possible. 🌟
Here are a couple of good practices which will ensure that-
1. Be that Enthu-cutlet
A lot of the mentors are giving their time while being in a job or being a student. Sometimes things get busy. They might not have seen your calendar event, it might’ve passed the radar, or they might’ve forgotten about it. It happens to the best of us.
Always make it a point to follow up with the mentor either once you’ve booked a call with them or anywhere between a day to an hour before your call is scheduled. Sometimes this small reminder really helps, especially when something shows up last minute. That way, your mentor can tell you in advance and you can reschedule for a better time. ⏳
This isn’t the only reason why an email before your call is scheduled can be helpful… You can use it as an opportunity to tell the mentor about what you’re looking to get out of the call or a little bit of background on yourself.
One example of the same —
Subject: Looking forward to our Cmd+J conversation today Hi Anjana, Really looking forward to chatting with you today at 5:00–5:30 PM IST about my doubts regarding finding an internship in Industrial Design. Since we decided on having the video call over Hangouts, here is my email ID so that it’s easier for you!
([email protected]) Thanks,
Pranjal
Make sure you don’t overdo it though. Enthusiasm can very easily be perceived as a little too much. Keep your emails short, and save some information for the call as well!
2. Punctuality is the best 1st Impression
Make sure you’re on time. If your call is from 2:30 pm, make sure you’re ready by 2:15 pm with all the materials and information you need. You can always spend time making sure your connection is alright and going over what you want to ask.
Don’t underestimate the duration of your conversation. 30 mins might feel like a lot but it can go by in a flash. You don’t want to have wasted it because you were late for the call. Everyone is quite busy, don’t expect that because a call started late it’ll also go on for as long.
If you start 10 mins late into a call which was meant for 30mins, you’ll only be going on for 20 mins (at the discretion of the mentor). Be on time, that’s the first impression your mentor has of you — you don’t want to ruin that.
3. “Tell me About Yourself”
We know, its a cliché, but it’s also one of the most common questions you’ll be asked first. This helps mentors gauge you a little better, so that they can be more helpful. Who knows you might have something in common with the mentors! 😄
Regardless of how long you‘ve scheduled a meeting for (15,30 or 60 mins), a short self-introduction is a great way to practice quickly presenting yourself — think about how you would introduce yourself at an interview or how you would deliver an elevator pitch, and consider this conversation practice for the same .
And remember, you’re not being graded! So keep it as genuine as possible. Mentors don’t want to know if you’re a team player or a go-getter they want to know you — your interests, hobbies, passion etc.
4. Do your Research. Period.
No one likes someone who is underprepared. We don’t mean stalk the mentor and figure out their entire life trajectory, but at least know where their interests and focus lies, read about them wherever they’re active. Know which parts of their life coincide with what you’re looking to get out of the call.
The last thing you’d want to be doing is asking a mentor the same questions she has already answered in an interview. It’s a massive waste of both your and their time 😐
While some mentors might include a short bio on themselves on the Cmd+J site, but it never hurts to google the person you’re about to chat with and familiarize yourself with their experience so that you can ask them questions which they’ll be able to help you best with. (More on this below)
5. Vocalize, then Prioritize
Prep 3–5 great questions, and prioritize them. If you’ve done your research, you’re sure to come across a lot of points that make you naturally inquisitive about how the mentor went about doing a certain something. Your questions can be based on the mentor’s background (ex: “What was the biggest difference you noticed when you transitioned from a big corporation to a startup?”) or about a specific topic/crossroad that you’ve been pondering (ex: “What informed your choice while selecting the major for your Masters in Design?”).
Having good questions is half the job done. But you only have a limited amount of time with the mentor. No matter what questions you have, you should prioritize them ahead of time. Sometimes conversations take a more meandering turn which isn’t really in your control. In such cases, you’ll have made sure you ask your most pressing questions first!
6. Take Notes, Not Quotes
What? Notes? How do we talk to people and stay focused!!? While this isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution, taking notes is a great way to stay attentive, indicate your interest, and obviously to record any major points that come up in the conversation ✨
By making notes we don’t mean make long detailed notes about everything the mentor says! (doing this and paying attention to what the mentor says can get hard, however, if you’re capable enough, go ahead)
You can make sketchnotes, write in shorthand, take audio-transcribed notes (with consent) or just go figure out something that works best for you! There is no one right way. Prep your notebook/computer ahead of time if you’re planning on writing things down.
7. The Power of the Follow Up
Following up with a mentor seems simple– sending them an email thanking them for their time after the call! (after all, they are volunteering time for you out of their busy schedules)
But you’d be surprised at the power of a well written follow up message.
Prep your followup before you even begin the conversation. Writing down a followup email or Linkedin message can help you focus on how you’d like to guide the conversation during the time you have, and after the chat is over, you can add your biggest takeaways from the discussion before sending it over.
Not only is this is a great way to indicate your interest to the mentor, but it also gives them something to refer to if you ever reach out to them in the future again. You can always reply in the same email thread or reference something from the chat history which will help the mentor remember you and some of what was discussed. | https://medium.com/cmd-j/mentee-best-practices-how-to-make-the-most-out-of-cmd-j-b96c702bcb69 | ['Anshuman Dhar'] | 2019-10-19 11:44:25.937000+00:00 | ['India', 'Best Practices', 'Mentorship', 'Design', 'Advice'] |
Your Partner Makes Significantly More Money Than You. Congrats, Man! | There’s a case to be made for Friday as the best day of the week. For 9-to-5 workers, it marks the end of a workweek, with all the fun, freedom, and limitless possibility of the weekend shining their way. There’s even a classic film franchise named in its honor. And for those of us on a biweekly payment schedule, Friday is the day when direct deposit hits your account — along with the bonus dopamine hit to your system.
But how would you feel knowing that every time you get paid, your partner is raking in three times as much? Would your ego be able to take it? Would Fridays still be so sweet?
Let’s flip it and reverse it: How would you feel if you were bringing in significantly more money than your partner? Would you encourage them to try to make more, simply hope they contributed in other ways — or do neither, and let it be?
Money issues are the number two cause of divorce, right after infidelity. It can be a form of real or perceived power in a relationship, and when that power isn’t equally distributed, the resulting imbalance can cause miscommunication, resentment, acting out, even depression.
I’ve been in relationships where I literally begged my partner not to look for a higher paying job because his time and presence at home was far more valuable than a little more money — which would inevitably have gone to cover added expenses like commuting and childcare.
If you’re not bringing home nearly equal slices of bacon — or if one person has a clearly defined nonprofessional role, like stay-at-home parent — things can get sticky. Here’s how to keep the difference in dollars from leaving your relationship with a negative balance.
1. Consider what each person contributes — outside of money
It’s important to understand how your household operates and what’s most important. If you make significantly less than your partner — and their financial contributions take care of your material needs — try to calculate your value in other ways, and find ways to make their life easier. That could mean domestic responsibilities like laundry and driving the kids to school, or it could mean stepping up to coordinate things both fun (date nights and vacations) and not (household budget).
This goes in both directions; partnership is partnership, and outdated ideas of who’s “supposed” to handle which relationship duties thankfully disappeared long ago. I’ve been in relationships where I literally begged my partner not to look for a higher paying job because his time and presence at home was far more valuable than a little more money — which would inevitably have gone to cover added expenses like commuting and childcare.
2. Have a frank conversation
Disclosing your salary with your partner can be a big step in the relationship. But at some point, it needs to happen (especially if you’re planning to shack up). That conversation can open the door to determining each person’s monetary contributions. The only way you can truly work as a team is if you’re both on the same page — which requires both parties knowing what’s on the page in the first place.
That doesn’t mean everything is smooth sailing. Significant financial decisions like buying a house or making a big investment become even more complicated when one person earns more — and thus contributes more. Big outlays come with big stress, and not being aligned only adds to that stress.
3. Make a plan and stick to it
If you’re out of work and your job hunt hasn’t been fruitful, talk to your partner about pausing the search, if possible. One or two months of building a better résumé, taking a class toward a certificate, and doing some additional training in your field could make the search less stressful — and likely work out better for your professional future in the long run.
4. Join forces
This one isn’t for everyone. But if you can pull it off, more power to you. If you and your partner are in similar fields, think about establishing an LLC or an S Corp and having all earnings combined. When a singular entity like a corporation is bringing in the money, it’s not as critical to itemize where it’s coming from. Again, it’s the rare couple that can pull this one off (*waves at fiancée*). Not only must the jobs be complementary, each person has to be ready (and qualified) to fully support the other in their projects. My partner is way more valuable for our company as a producer of three of our podcasts and three for other folks than he would be at a 10-to-6 job similar to mine.
5. Check your ego and chip in where you can
You know your partner is frustrated with carrying the load financially. And you know there’s pressure for you to contribute. Consider work that puts something on the table. Paying one bill consistently is better than paying no bills. If your partner truly doesn’t want you to, then don’t. But it’s worth a try. The effort has value, too. | https://level.medium.com/your-partner-makes-significantly-more-money-than-you-congrats-man-e5bd014c5d34 | ['Aliya S. King'] | 2020-10-17 18:38:46.294000+00:00 | ['Work', 'Dear Level', 'Relationships', 'Money', 'Personal Finance'] |
Want to become a Web Developer? Here are the things you have to learn. | Web Developer is a programmer who specializes or is engaged in the development of World Wide Web applications. The Client-Server model is used in the development of these types of applications.
Fundamentals of Web Development
Understanding how the internet works.
Understanding how websites work (understanding how HTML [Hyper Text Markup Language], CSS [Cascading Style Sheet], and JavaScript contributes to it. ).
Starting to code with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Learning Debugging and Key troubleshooting.
Learning to use command line basics to become a power user.
Learn and understand git, Github, and version controls.
Educational Requirements for Web developer.
Modern web applications often contain three or more tiers, and depending on the size of the team a developer works on, he or she may specialize in one or more of these tiers — or may take a more interdisciplinary role.
A web developer is usually classified as a Front-end web development or a Back-End Web Developer. Meanwhile, the other developer might focus on the interaction between server-side frameworks, the web server, and a database system.
Below I have given a list of things that you will have to learn to become a Web Developer.
# Front-end Development
1. HTML / HTML 5
Learn the anatomy of HTML syntax to structure your websites.
Understand the HTML boilerplate and HTML doctypes.
How to structure text in HTML.
How to structure HTML lists to create unordered and ordered lists.
How to insert images using HTML
How to create hyperlinks using anchor tags.
Understand how to use HTML tables for content.
How to use tables for layout.
Understand HTML forms and create a simple contact form.
HTML Divs and how to separate content for CSS styling.
2. CSS / CSS 3
Understanding what are Cascading Style Sheets and how you can use it to style your website.
How to use CSS selectors and properties.
Learning how to use inline, internal, and external CSS.
Understanding CSS coding best practices.
Learning about CSS sizing methods.
Learning the anatomy of CSS syntax and structure.
CSS specificity and implementing style hierarchy.
Class vs. Ids and how to target each.
CSS display and how to implement the layout.
How to use CSS static, relative, and absolute positioning systems.
Font styling using CSS and web-safe fonts.
Website design fundamentals and typography.
How to use CSS float and clear.
How to combine CSS selectors and understanding selector priority.
3. BOOTSTRAP 4
Learning the fundamentals of implementing responsive web design.
How to use Balsamiq to mockup and wireframe websites.
The fundamentals of UI design for websites.
How to install the Bootstrap framework.
Understanding the Bootstrap grid layout system.
How to use bootstrap containers to layout your website easily.
Learning to use other Bootstrap components such as buttons.
Adding symbols using Font Awesome.
Learning to use Bootstrap carousels.
Adding Bootstrap cards to your website.
Using Bootstrap navigation bars.
4. JAVASCRIPT ES 6
The Fundamentals of Code
Starting code with alerts and prompts.
Understanding Variables and Data Types in JavaScript
Variable naming in JS
Working with strings and numbers
Randomization and logical operators
Loops, collections, and Conditionals.
Functions and invocation patterns
Discussion of ECMAScript
Intermediate JavaScript
Learning to use JS Expressions, Operators, Statements, and Declarations
Object-Oriented Programming
JS Objects and Prototypes
‘This' , Scope and Closures
, Scope and Closures Objects and Prototypes
Refactoring and Debugging
5. DOCUMENT OBJECT MODEL (DOM)
Learning the tree structure of HTML based websites.
Traversing through the document using object notation.
Separation of concerns and coding best practices.
Manipulating and changing the HTML elements using your understanding of the DOM.
6. JQUERY
Installing and using the jQuery framework.
Learning about jQuery functionality.
Introduction to Functions in jQuery.
Manipulating text, styles, and attributes with jQuery.
Creating animations and customizations with jQuery.
Using your jQuery knowledge to make your website interactive.
Responding to user-initiated events with jQuery.
7. UNIX COMMAND LINE
How to use basic bash commands in a Unix/Linux Terminal.
How to manipulate files and folders without needing a graphical user interface.
How to download and install to your computer using the command line.
8. GIT GITHUB and VERSION CONTROL
Using git for version control and collaboration.
Git forking, branching, and cloning.
Using GitHub as a remote repository.
Checkout and rolling back changes with git.
# Back-end Development
1. NODE. JS
Explore the components of back-end development, working with an MVC framework.
Apply concepts like data types, objects, methods, object-oriented programming, and classes in the context of backend development.
Server-Side JavaScript.
Using Node on the command line.
NPM.
JavaScript Build Processes.
Event Loop and Emitters.
File System Interaction.
Modules.
Native Node drivers.
2. EXPRESS. JS
Understanding how to install and use express in Node applications.
Creating Node and Express based servers.
RESTful Routing with Express.
Understanding and use middleware for Node applications.
3. APPLICATION PROGRAM INTERFACES ( APIS )
Understanding what APIs are and how they work.
HTTP in Depth.
Calling APIs.
Reading API documentation.
Basic API Authentication.
Server to server communication, JSON vs. XML, sending data over the wire.
4. EJS
Understanding what EJS does and how to use it with Node and Express.
Templating with EJS.
Running code in EJS templates.
Passing data from server to template and vice versa.
Creating layouts/partials with EJS.
# Databases
1. DATABASE FUNDAMENTALS
Data Relationships.
Designing a Data Model.
Relational Databases.
Alternative Databases.
Entity Relationship Modelling (ERM) and Object Relational Mapping (ORM).
2. SQL DATABASES
Working with Database Schemas.
Create-Read-Update-Destroy (CRUD).
Database Joins.
Querying SQL databases.
3. NO SQL DATABASES with MONGO DB and MONGOOSE
Serialization.
How to model NoSQL data.
Document Databases (MongoDB).
Create-Read-Update-Destroy (CRUD).
NoSQL Best Practices.
Mongo Shell and command-line use.
Installing MongoDB.
Mapping relationships with MongoDB.
Using an object-data modeling library (Mongoose) to work easily with your data.
4. DEPLOYMENT
Understanding hosting and deployment.
Hosting static websites with GitHub Pages.
Deploying server-based applications with Heroku.
Deploying Databases with Mongo Atlas.
5. BUILDING RESTful APIs
Understanding REST and guiding principles behind API design.
Learn to work with a MongoDB GUI Robo 3T.
Implementing GET, POST, PUT, PATCH, and DELETE by creating a public API from scratch.
Understanding and using chained route handlers from Express.
6. AUTHENTICATION and SECURITY
Understanding the need for authentication and keeping user details secure.
Learning about Encryption and use encryption to keep your database secure.
Learning and implement Hashing and Salting with bcrypt.
Using Sessions and Cookies to persist user login sessions.
Setting up local authentication from scratch.
Implementing Passport to authenticate users quickly and effectively.
Understanding and using environment variables to keep secret keys secure.
Understanding and using OAuth 2.0 to log in users using Google and Facebook.
7. REACT. JS
Learning front-end development with React.
Understand when and how to use React Components.
Learning to pass Props and work with them.
Learning to write JSX and understand JSX syntax.
Learning about the React DOM.
Learning State Management in React.
Learning about React Hooks.
Learning about conditional rendering in React.
Understanding the difference between class and functional components.
8. JAVASCRIPT ES 6
Arrow Functions.
Map/Filter/Reduce.
Find/FindOne/FindIndex.
Import/Export and Modules.
Object and Array Destructuring.
Spread Operator.
Learning the topics of this list will definitely help you become a fully-fledged Web Developer. But there are also other things that a Web Developer can use such as CMS (CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM).
To learn more about CMS click here.
Thank You for Reading and HAPPY LEARNING.
If you like coding and want to know some awesome programming languages to learn, then click here. | https://medium.com/@nirdhum.n/want-to-become-a-web-developer-here-are-the-things-you-have-to-learn-2266c42906ba | ['Nirdhum Narayan'] | 2020-11-21 14:46:09.013000+00:00 | ['Database', 'Web Development', 'Backend', 'Web Developer', 'Front End Development'] |
I Know I Shouldn’t get Worked up Over a Meme | There is a reality where visionary billionaire Elon Musk is satisfied with his money, and fame, and place in history as a commercial spaceflight and electric car pioneer. In that reality, he is content, or as content as a driven captain of industry can be.
But welcome to our little slice of the multiverse, a place where our version of Elon Musk spends his valuable time tweeting memes that mock people who aren’t billionaires or celebrities or particularly powerful, really. Yesterday the dude who could potentially get humanity to Mars tweeted out a meme to his 40.8 million followers mocking people who put their pronouns in their social media bio.
The meme features a crude drawing of a British redcoat wearing a hat that says “I love to oppress” against a painting of the American Revolution. The soldier is wiping blood on his face. The caption above the image reads, “When you put he/him in ur bio.”
I know I shouldn’t get worked up over a meme, they’re basically bumper stickers. And this one is… muddled. But the underlying message is clear: it is okay to hate people who just want a little public respect. Elon is telling his faithful that being asked to be nice is oppression. That a person who tells you who they are should be despised. This is horseshit, but these are the times we live in. Heterosexual, cisgender men, a ruling caste who clearly dominate politics and business and culture, are and some kid standing up for who they are is the enemy.
I have trans and non-binary friends. I like them. They want me to refer to them by their pronouns**. She or he or they. I’m not a hero because I use their pronouns. It’s literally the very least I can do. A sweatless effort. Easy peasy. I accept my friends so of course, I say things that make them feel secure and happy. If I can make a rando feel that way, then wouldn’t I?
I’ve been a gratuitous asshole before but it’s not my preferred state of being, you know? Men should be kind. It’s difficult but worth it. Look, I have misgendered someone before. I apologized and did my best not to make that mistake again. It was not a big deal. None of this is a big deal. Unless you insist that it’s a big deal. There is no greater sign of a comfortable life than a person obsessed with someone else’s gender.
It never occurred to me until right now that I don’t put my pronouns in my bio. But I guess I have to do it now because it pisses off so many dudes who will break if they have to be polite to another person. Like, they’ll shatter if they even read what someone would like you to call them. Unbelievable. Sometimes I think of masculinity as a floating bedsheet worn by a ghost. Pull the cover off quickly and there’s nothing underneath, except screams.
So, scream. But do it into a pillow, not on social media. Also, gender is a bedsheet.
I don’t want to censor Elon Musk. I think SpaceX is an incredible company. Same with Tesla. I don’t think the dude should be canceled, but for fuck’s sake get a hobby that doesn’t hurt other people. Like, drive to one of your hangars and stare at a rocket; they’re amazing. Can someone introduce Elon to baking? It boggles my mind that a person who is changing society for the better doesn’t have better things to do than bully people from the safety of one of his mansions.
It depresses me that the man who could potentially get humanity to Mars is a toxic nerd who needs the cheap dopamine rush of trolling people who just don’t deserve it online. But, like, I absolutely think Musk should be allowed to speak his mind, even if he has the mind of a spoiled brat.
Musk reminds me of Orson Welles’s brilliant co-creation with Herman J. Mankiewicz, Charles Foster Kane, the main character in Welles’s spectacular feature film debut about the emptiness of capitalism, Citizen Kane. In that movie, our anti-hero is a modern-day emperor who has everything, except love. Maybe if Kane had a Twitter account, he could have found it.
Right now, Elon Musk is finding love online. He is in a co-dependent relationship with a legion of extremely online men who are not rich and famous. He is loved by a legion of mostly men who are not rich and famous who harass strangers on his behalf. I have been warned that any criticism of Musk will invite passionate defenders. Welcome, I guess? Your dude is going to be fine no matter what I write.
His anti-pronoun tweet was a familiar dance with his fans where the attention is like a glass of warm milk before bed. But in order to get that attention he has tweet something casually cruel. It’s a vicious cycle. I wish I lived in a reality where Elon Musk was happy with his accomplishments because, friends, tweeting out a shitty meme meant to make other human beings feel bad is not an accomplishment.
**I had used the term “preferred pronouns” and someone in the comments politely pointed out that is incorrect because pronouns aren’t about preference — you are who you are, it’s not really a choice. Anyway, I got that wrong and corrected it and that’s okay because now I know better now. Isn’t that nice? And I can already tell I’m going to get comments like “my pronouns are helicopter” or something like that, written by funny people who know, deep down, they’re on the dipshit side of history but can’t manage their fear. Okay, so now I’m going to write directly to my dudes. Look, I’m a cis straight man too and I don’t understand what it’s like to be anyone other than a cis straight man and guess what, I like being who I am. Wanting to be seen for who you are shouldn’t inspire rage, it’s weird. My dudes, stop.
! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! | https://medium.com/@yoshiro2amine-harrac/i-know-i-shouldnt-get-worked-up-over-a-meme-b1391c2a8c42 | ['Yoshiro Amine Harrac'] | 2020-12-16 15:57:38.723000+00:00 | ['Politics', 'Tweet', 'Gender'] |
Mighty Morphin’ Power Morphism | We’re all great
Now, many years later looking at what junior designers create in Figma I’m happy to say that digital product design has gone forward in an incredible way. The resources, the sharing, feedbacking — we’re living in a world where you can always find some nice designers to share your work with. And that helps with your growth.
We’re doing amazing things. Building products used by thousands or millions of people. Stop and appreciate that! You deserved it!
Where did the fun go?
But there’s very little “fun” in it anymore. It’s like Material Design “consistency fiasco” all over again. Sure — it’s pretty accessible. But those MD apps are boring. They’re safe but uninspiring.
And in a way that’s good too — design should be useful first, beautiful second. But the problem with many of these super-high-contrast, useful interfaces is that they’re ugly.
So while they serve their purpose, they’re not something most people use with any joy.
Let’s explore! Neumorphism.
When I first noticed Skeuomorphic elements (in actual UI, not icons) coming back in 2019, I wanted to name that new style, because it was a great way to “open it to others”.
If it has a name, you can find it easier.
If it has a name, you can discuss it. And yes — also cry about the lack of accessibility.
Some called Neumorphism a “Dribbble only trend” with contempt in their voices. It’s almost as if it was a waste of time to try and recreate the look of a soft, extruded plastic in your UI.
Now, even if it doesn’t make much sense in real products (and it doesn’t) that wasn’t the point of it.
Nobody was pushing it at you, it was all about exploration. Because from these explorations great things emerge and we won’t get stuck with another safe-but-boring Material Design product.
The first viral design in this style by Alex Plyuto
We need to try new things and we need to have fun with them. That’s the whole point of exploration, design, and also it’s a cornerstone of loving what you do. Because that’s the only way to excel at it. And as a bonus, loving what you do makes you happy while doing it.
So don’t worry (about accessibility). Be happy. Explore. Make some extruded cards, post it online, and create a buzz! Then, on a real project find a way to combine what you’ve learned with good contrasts and readability.
And you — accessibility folks — chill out. The fact that people are making these is not an assault on accessibility. It’s them testing the limits of their imagination and having fun. So don’t be so grumpy and try it sometime!
Glassmorphism
The frosted glass effect has been around for a long time. Honorable mentions should include Mac OS X, Windows Vista, iOS 7, and Mac OS Big Sur. But the problem with this effect is that every company using it had a different name for it. Some didn’t even bother to name it.
The goal of naming it was the same as before. To create a trend, a hashtag, a way to find other designs done in this style. To have fun, experiment, grow, and try new things.
Smart Calendar App by Ghani Pradita
Glassmorphise!
Mix a frosted glass panel with a soft, blurred color splash and enjoy the way it looks. Chances are, that you’re not going to use any of this in your daily work after a while.
But knowing it and doing it at least once, opens you up to something new. Something exciting, even if flawed. And once again many designers took to Dribbble, Behance, and Twitter and shared their explorations on it.
They’re stepping outside their comfort zones and making cool things. That’s great! Let’s do more of this! | https://uxdesign.cc/mighty-morphin-power-morphism-93e1f2160022 | ['Michal Malewicz'] | 2020-12-20 22:07:50.625000+00:00 | ['Design Process', 'User Experience', 'UI Design', 'UX', 'Design'] |
Side Journeys And Early Rarities | The internet is a terrible place and it is a remarkable place.
Staying in one place long enough leads to discoveries of the less and more savory characters of life. If you’re lucky, that sort of rabbit hole leads to a treasure of time capsules we never expected to unearth.
It’s time to go back in time for a bit. A rock and roll family history that remains not entirely written. The CroMagnons and associated members have been around for quite some time in various acts. Very little can be found on my side of the world but I have put together such a family tree.
We’ll call it a work in progress for now.
Sorry for the chicken scratches. All adds to the character I say.
The early eighties were a time to be alive for music fans in many parts of the world and Japan was no exception. As we climb the family tree we notice some of those early songs in one band would be demos for songs used later in their careers. One such example is this clip from an early rock show of The Breakers. Interestingly both these songs of very similar melody have different lyrics! Different style, same tune really.
Compare and contrast with a song from a later project:
There are still many songs only available in the one release, so far as I’m aware. Here’s another upbeat tune from The Breakers:
I heard it said if a rock band decides to remove the word “The” from their name, every album after is somehow less great. Fortunately, these guys never did and these songs from The Coats and The London Times are pretty good jams to dance to on a Saturday night, or any night.
Sadly all these punchy Beatles-esqe punky songs would be lost to much of the world and history without those willing to archive them on the internet. A well of video libraries just waiting for someone to drink from. It’s been quite an interesting journey, someday perhaps more will find the time to travel. | https://medium.com/@papercadebeth/side-journeys-and-early-rarities-87119f7a8eaf | ['Beth Annotated'] | 2020-11-06 22:59:52.625000+00:00 | ['Music', 'Culture', 'History', 'Rock', 'Japan'] |
Satellite Orbits: Types and Definitions | In these times, humanity uses several different orbits to place satellites. Most attention is focused on the geostationary orbit, which can be used for “stationary” placement of the satellite over a particular point of the Earth. The orbit chosen for the operation of the satellite depends on its purpose. For example, satellites used for direct broadcasting of television programs are placed in geostationary orbit. Many communication satellites are also in geostationary orbit. Other satellite systems, in particular those used for communication between satellite phones, rotate in low Earth orbit.
Similarly, satellite systems used for navigation systems such as Navstar or the Global Positioning System (GPS) are also in relatively low Earth orbits. There are countless other satellites — meteorological, research, and so on. And each of them, depending on its purpose, receives a “residence permit” in a certain orbit.
Earth’s gravity and satellite orbits
As the satellites orbit around the Earth, they slowly move away from it due to the Earth’s gravity. If the satellites were not orbiting, they would gradually fall to Earth and burn up in the upper atmosphere. However, the very rotation of satellites around the Earth creates a force that pushes them away from our planet. Each of the orbits has its own calculated speed, which allows you to balance the force of gravity of the Earth and the centrifugal force, keeping the device in a constant orbit and not allowing it to gain or lose altitude.
It is quite clear that the lower the orbit of the satellite, the more it is affected by the attraction of the earth and the greater the speed required to overcome this force. The greater the distance from the Earth’s surface to the satellite, the lower the speed required for it to stay in a constant orbit. For a spacecraft orbiting at a distance of about 160 km above the Earth’s surface, a speed of about 28,164 km/h is required, which means that such a satellite orbits the Earth in about 90 minutes. At a distance of 36,000 km above the Earth’s surface, a satellite requires a speed of just under 11,266 km / h to stay in a constant orbit, which makes it possible for such a satellite to orbit the Earth in about 24 hours.
Definitions of circular and elliptical orbits
All satellites orbit the Earth using one of two basic types of orbits.
Circular satellite orbit: When a spacecraft orbits the Earth in a circular orbit, its distance above the Earth’s surface remains always the same.
Elliptical satellite orbit: The rotation of a satellite in an elliptical orbit means a change in the distance to the Earth’s surface at different times during a single orbit.
Satellite orbits
There are many different definitions associated with different types of satellite orbits:
Center of the Earth: When a satellite orbits the Earth-in a circular or elliptical orbit — the satellite’s orbit forms a plane that passes through the center of gravity or the center of the Earth.
Direction of motion around the Earth: The ways in which a satellite orbits our planet can be divided into two categories according to the direction of this rotation:
Prograde orbit: The orbit of a satellite around the Earth is called an acceleration orbit if the satellite rotates in the same direction as the earth rotates; Retrograde orbit: The orbit of a satellite around the Earth is called retrograde if the satellite rotates in the direction opposite to the direction of rotation of the Earth.
The track of the orbit: A satellite’s orbit path is a point on the Earth’s surface where the satellite is directly overhead during its orbit around the Earth. The track forms a circle in the center of which is the Center of the Earth. It should be noted that geostationary satellites are a special case because they are constantly above the same point above the Earth’s surface. This means that their orbital path consists of a single point located on the Earth’s equator. You can also add that the orbit of satellites orbiting strictly above the equator stretches along this very equator.
For these orbits, as a rule, the displacement of the orbit path of each satellite in the west direction is characteristic, since the Earth under the satellite turns in the east direction.
Orbital nodes
Orbital nodes are the points at which the path of the orbit passes from one hemisphere to the other. For nonequatorial orbits, there are two such nodes:
Ascending node: This is the node where the path of the orbit passes from the Southern hemisphere to the Northern hemisphere. Descending node: This is the node where the path of the orbit passes from the Northern hemisphere to the Southern hemisphere.
Conclusion
Humanity has not yet exhausted the possibilities of using near space to build communication systems for various purposes.
It is expected that promising low-orbit communication systems will absorb new types of services such as remote sensing of the Earth, monitoring, etc., which will optimally balance satellite capabilities and bring low-orbit systems to a level of profitability that is not inferior to geostationary systems. The same applies to systems with highly elliptical satellites. | https://medium.com/zeba-academy/satellite-orbits-types-and-definitions-928dd43bf891 | ['Zeba Academy'] | 2021-03-03 10:47:48.468000+00:00 | ['Satellites', 'Earth', 'Science', 'Solar System', 'Technology'] |
Seven | ‘I’ve told you it wouldn’t work! They’re coming! We should’ve spent our money to hire the usual mercenaries, not some ridiculous witchcrafts!’ shouted a furious-faced man, with a hint of fear in his eyes, almost blaming the fat leader who sits in the carriage with his head protruding out of the window.
‘Shut your hole and listen,’ said the fat man, softly.
Right after, thudding sounds could be heard from all over. Bodies were falling from the surrounding trees and bushes. Seven bodies, to be exact. A frightening high-pitched scream, which unlikely was from a human’s mouth, transmitted from afar, as though it was moving away from the scene.
‘Is that…it? The witch’s doing? Look! One is fleeing!’ the furious-faced man shot his arrow, and it hit right on the left-back of the fleeing man. He fell dead.
‘Let’s go, it’s overcast, I think the rain will follow soon. We can’t lose the daylight either.’
The merchant company moved along the dirt path in the middle of the thick, moisty forest. Gryd, the fat leader, sighed softly and went back into his carriage. The problem of bandits had occupied his mind for the past two years. His income had been declining because of these bandits. Mercenaries from all over the country had been hired, but none was effective. Those bandits were experts in this terrain. Most of the mercenaries weren’t used to a misty forest with limited visibility like this.
‘Do you not think there will be repercussions, maybe that demon who killed those mercenaries will need something from you in return?’
The man who shouted before was his brother, Rodrick. He wasn’t really fond of the idea of using witchcraft from that unknown witch. He thought those kinds of deals, even though his brother had paid the witch generously, still demanded something that would result in misfortune or even a curse.
‘How come? I’ve paid the witch. It should not be a problem. Let’s not discuss this matter any longer, brother. Your chirping gives me a headache.’
Rodrick went silent. He was too tired to debate with him, again. His brother loved gold too much. All these years his ambition was still the same; to be the richest man on the entire country. If he didn’t know any better, he would think that his brother’s love for gold coins was bigger than his love for his wife.
The next year, Gryd’s business was booming. His wealth grew exponentially. This made him work even harder than before. Months he went away far from his family to expand his business. Even Rodrick was physically too tired to keep up and had to come back home to rest.
On a summer’s day the next year, Gryd decided to visit his family since he had just made a massive deal in his business and wanted to celebrate. His six children and wife were so happy with the news of him coming home. They held a huge party, and invited the whole town to celebrate. People were smiling and laughing, and not a sight of the gloomy and depressed face could be seen.
But, near dawn, Gryd’s youngest started to get sick. His mother thought he had eaten too much last night, and made him rest. His body was boiling hot and he felt lethargy all over. Unfortunately, the evening of that day, he died with his eyes opened, blood was coming out of his eyes’ sockets. Gryd was devastated.
A month had passed, Gryd decided to take care of his business again and was going to go, when his eldest, this time, went sick and suffered the same symptoms as her youngest brother. They didn’t want to take chances and called a doctor immediately. But when the doctor was on his way, she died.
The same thing reoccurred the next month, it was Gryd’s fifth child.
Rodrick was furious. He was absolutely sure this was the curse he was talking about.
‘I told you! I told you it was a bad idea!’ He shouted. Gryd, who was in grief, didn’t even react. He simply stared at his child’s dead body. He buried his child next to the other two, under an oak tree, on a hill not far from his house.
After burying his child, he asked Rodrick to accompany him to the witch’s hut. He wanted to seek answers.
When they arrived at the village in which the witch lived, the hut was already gone. There was only a patch of empty land with tall grasses covering the place in which the hut used to stand. He asked around, but nobody knew any witch. According to the villagers, that place was always been a patch of land covered with grasses.
‘This is impossible. You remember it was here, don’t you Rodrick?’
‘She was a witch, brother. What did you expect?’
For a week Gryd couldn’t sleep nor eat properly. He walked around the house like a madman, talking to himself. Three weeks had passed, he now looked like a skeleton without flesh.
‘Husband, you should rest and eat more. We are worried about you.’
‘How could you worry about me? Our children could be next! It’s almost a month, Martha. Are you not frightened?’
His wife had been crying almost every single night. She tried to hide it from her beloved husband, not wanting to worsen the situation.
‘Martha, tomorrow is exactly a month after our child died. What should we do?’
‘Let’s pray, husband. Let’s ask God’s forgiveness! I will invite a priest to visit tonight. We will pray together, husband. I am confident God is merciful!’
After saying this, Martha ran towards one of her servants, asking them to go to the priest’s house.
‘Oh Martha, believe me, God has abandoned me…’ Gryd murmured faintly. ‘There is only one way out. I caused this curse, I shall end this too.’
Gryd, with a stick to support his weak body, rode a horse for hours to the forest where the demon killed those bandits. He left his horse on the entrance of the forest and walked inside.
‘I have come; I am what you wanted.’
He took out a rope, climbed a tree, and tied it to one of the branches. The round knot he put around his neck. He stood on that tree’s branch, and took out a dagger.
‘I shall wash this with blood and soul. Please leave my family be.’
He stabbed his own stomach, and pulled his guts out. Then his body fell, hanging under the branch, held by the rope which smothered his neck. Blood was dripping from his belly, and his guts were pouring out to the ground, some still stuck on his body.
His family looked for him all night until morning came. But what they found, shockingly, was Gryd’s second eldest, laying on the field soulless, with blood dripping from his opened eyes. | https://medium.com/@samueladek/seven-3037160d297a | ['Samuel Ade'] | 2020-02-20 17:12:27.212000+00:00 | ['Literature', 'Fiction', 'Imagination', 'Short Story', 'Story'] |
How to Not Suck at Design, a 5 Minute Guide for the Non-Designer. | 6. Use a list view for results, if order is important
Most mobile and web apps have some type of search and there can be some healthy design debates on how to display the results.
If order is important then a list view is most effective.
If order doesn’t matter and you would like to encourage discovery (like Pinterest or AirBnB) then a grid view will encourage a gaze pattern to support discovery.
7. Design in black and white first, add color later
Designing in black and white will keep the focus on solving and designing the core experience of your app.
Color evokes strong emotional responses and often interrupts our ability to focus on the core design problem.
8. Create comfortable design
Hand strain is a real issue, consider the graphic below from Luke Wroblewski’s amazing article: Responsive Navigation: Optimizing for Touch Across Devices.
Luke lays out the areas of a phone that are easiest to reach and use (at least for right handers) — I’d love to see apps have a setting where you can switch the interface from right hand dominant to left hand dominant.
Many effective mobile apps keep navigation and core actions in the bottom third of the phone.
Image Credit: Luke Wroblewski Responsive Navigation: Optimizing for Touch Across Devices
9. Borrow Color Palettes
Color is a bit of an elusive dark art. I highly recommend heading over to Dribbble and searching for “Color Palettes” or use a color palette generator like Coolors or Color Claim.
Save yourself the hours of endless debate and second guessing.
10. Use Apple and Google OS Conventions
Apple and Google have created incredible resources for anyone building software for Android or iOS.
For example, the Google Material spec has guidelines, resources, colors, icons and components to help jump start the design of your app.
Apple has the HIG — their Human Interface Guidelines, which outline everything you need to know on how to design an iOS app. | https://medium.com/startup-grind/how-to-not-suck-at-design-a-5-minute-guide-for-the-non-designer-291efac43037 | ['Marc Hemeon'] | 2020-08-13 16:56:29.187000+00:00 | ['Design', 'Innovation', 'Marketing', 'UX', 'Business'] |
Why This Liberal Opposes Critical Race Theory | Why This Liberal Opposes Critical Race Theory TaraElla Follow Dec 7 · 6 min read
Welcome back to the TaraElla Report. To kick this new season off, let’s talk about one of the most controversial topics right now: critical race theory. In particular, some things left-wing commentator Vaush said in his recent video titled ‘Conservative Snowflakes Terrified by Anti-Racist Powerpoint’ has prompted me to respond. As I promised, this season will be all about quality conversations on a higher intellectual level, and that’s what we will be doing today.
The main angle Vaush seems to be taking is that conservatives fear critical race theory because they don’t want to acknowledge racism exists, and they don’t want to fix racism. To be intellectually vigorous, there are many points to unpack there. Firstly, is it just conservatives who oppose critical race theory? Secondly, is the rejection of critical race theory based on not wanting to fix racism? Finally, is critical race theory even a good framework to fix racism in the first place? Let’s look at these things one by one.
Let’s start with the common misconception on the Left that the opposition to critical race theory is driven entirely by conservatives. Indeed, in the comments, they were talking about Trump supporters a lot. While it is true that conservatives often shout the loudest in this conversation, partly because they are often very well-funded, there are plenty of people who are not political conservatives who oppose critical race theory. For example, myself. I certainly don’t support Trump, in fact I have been a bigger supporter of Biden this year than most so-called progressives. I also certainly oppose racism in all its forms. I oppose critical race theory entirely from a liberal philosophical perspective. Indeed, as a committed liberal, the way I practice my anti-racism is completely incompatible with critical race theory.
I guess this means the discussion must then turn to what critical race theory is. Vaush initially said that it’s just a term to describe a collection of theories to describe our understanding of racial inequality, which I think is misleading. It’s misleading because critical race theory specifically refers to a subset of critical theory, and critical theory has a foundation in a worldview that is incompatible with liberal philosophy. Therefore, a philosophically liberal theory to understand racial disparities could not be a critical race theory, for example. To be fair, Vaush then went on to say something along the lines that critical race theory being about analyzing power structures that relate to race, where race is part of a wider system of such power dynamics. Now, that’s a much more accurate description of critical race theory, even though it’s still a bit vague, like descriptions of critical theories often are.
At this point, I should make it clear that I oppose critical race theory because it is a form of critical theory. I mean, in recent months there has been a unbalanced focus on critical race theory as opposed to other forms of critical theory. Indeed, it could arguably be racist to only oppose critical race theory, while not opposing other critical theories. I would at least be suspicious about the intentions of someone with that position. Now, let’s look at what critical theory is. Officially, critical theory is about analyzing power structures. But that’s not the whole story. You see, when critical theory was first invented in the 1930s, it was invented by a group of Marxist academics, who intended it to be an application of what they believed to be the ‘method of Marx’ to areas other than economics. Indeed, the word ‘critical’ in critical theory comes from the subtitle of Das Kapital by Karl Marx. Critical theory is hence supposed to be like Das Kapital, but for things other than economics. As I sometimes like to say, critical theory is ‘Marxism as methodology’, as in like how each academic paper needs to have a methodology section.
My first problem with critical theory is that it divides people along lines like race and gender into rigid groups, with conflict between them inevitable and even desirable. My second problem with critical theory is that it gained its prominence on the back of Marxism’s dominance in certain parts of academic humanities in the 20th century, not because it delivered useful outcomes for humanity in the real world. Finally, as a liberal, specifically a Moral Libertarian who believes in Equal Moral Agency for every individual at the individual level, I cannot abide by critical theory’s conclusions, which would often justify the unequal treatment of individuals based on their supposed class privilege, this being a direct consequence of its Marxist inheritance.
Indeed, to understand critical theory, we need to look at Marxism, because that’s what it’s based on. In Marxism, specifically its Leninist manifestation, there is an aspiration to a society of equals at the end of the road, but before we get there people have to be treated unequally sometimes. For example, the so-called dictatorship of the proletariat requires the suppression of various classes of people. This can be pretty ugly in practice, as Stalin showed the world. Critical theory operates in a similar way. It aspires to liberation for all at the end of the road, but to get there, individuals in the oppressor groups will need to be treated less favorably sometimes. It could even entail taking away their free speech. Not only is this unacceptable to a Moral Libertarian like me, history has also taught us that grand schemes that sacrifice individual dignity in its pursuit of utopian goals will never end well for anyone.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I fully acknowledge the ugly reality of racism, and I’m committed to the elimination of racism. Indeed, I’m so committed to anti-racism that critical theory’s way of essentially using racist means to resolve racism, justified on Marxian philosophical grounds, strikes me as an immoral step backwards. So how can we move towards the elimiation of racism? The answer is the continued application of liberal principles, liberal procedures, and liberal philosophy. Liberals aim to eliminate racism directly in everyday life, not through Marxian philosophies of making it worse before it somehow magically gets better. And the liberal way works. No matter what you think about his policies, the election of President Obama was made possible by progress towards an anti-racist, colorblind society. The fact that America couldn’t seriously consider voting for a black president in 1988 but actually did so in 2008 is real progress made. I’m not saying you have to support Obama, what I’m saying is that it has recently become possible for America to vote for a black president, whereas in the past it was unimaginable, and this is real progress, all of it brought by liberalism and not critical theory. Of course, we still have a long way to go to eliminate racism, and there’s hard work to do. But we’ll do it the liberal way, not the critical theory way.
Finally, let’s address the point that people are opposing critical race theory because they don’t want to fix racism. Is that true? I think it’s certainly true in some cases, unfortunately. The failure to take racism seriously is a serious moral failing, and the existence of critical race theory is not an excuse at all for this moral failing. We should call out racism whenever we see it. But it’s very clear that you can be fully anti-racist, and still oppose critical race theory. Let’s not allow certain activists to paint an either-or picture of this. | https://medium.com/taraellas-liberal-conversation/why-this-liberal-opposes-critical-race-theory-e78952089be9 | [] | 2020-12-07 02:47:54.794000+00:00 | ['Politics', 'Marxism', 'Critical Race Theory', 'Critical Theory'] |
All about @RequestHeader in Spring Web | Here is a basic syntax of @RequestHeader annotation. In this value of key “firstName” will be taken from the incoming request header and will be mapped to the variable “name” of type string. No matter how many keys are there in the incoming request header spring will try to search for the key which is equal to “firstName”.
RequestHeader can have four optional fields :
name (String) : tells the name of the request header key to bind to and it’s default value is empty string (“”)
tells the name of the request header key to bind to and it’s default value is string (“”) value (String): it is an alias to name
it is an alias to name required (Boolean) : it tells whether the header is required or not. By default it’s value is true so if you want any header to be optional then you should set the required field as false.
it tells whether the header is required or not. By default it’s value is so if you want any header to be optional then you should set the required field as false. defaultValue (String) : it is used to assign a default value to a header key. so in above case if “firstName” is not present in incoming header then default value of “firstName” will be “bob” so name will have a value of “bob”. If defaultValue is not provided then its default value will be “
\t\t
\t\t
\ue000\ue001\ue002
\t\t\t\t
”. | https://medium.com/@samalsatya990/all-about-requestheader-in-spring-web-c112ff748171 | ['Satya Samal'] | 2020-12-20 19:52:33.547000+00:00 | ['Spring Boot', 'Http Headers', 'Annotations', 'Http Request', 'Spring'] |
(S01>E09) Power Book II: Ghost Series 1 Episode 9 || [“ONLINE”] | ☆~Stream : Power Book II: Ghost Season 1 Episode 9 Full ☆ Power Book II: Ghost Season 1 Episode 9 Full Episode ☆ Watch Power Book II: Ghost Season 1 Episode 9 Full Series ☆ Power Book II: Ghost Season 1 Episode 9 Full Episodes ☆ Power Book II: Ghost Season 1 Episode 9 Stream Online ~☆
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Overview
Picking up just days after the “Power” finale, this sequel series follows Tariq navigating his new life, in which his desire to shed his father’s legacy comes up against the mounting pressure to save his family.
❏ STREAMING MEDIA ❏
Streaming media is multimedia that is constantly received by and presented to an end-user while being delivered by a provider. The verb to stream identifies the process of delivering or obtaining media in this manner.[clarification needed] Streaming refers to the delivery method of the medium, instead of the medium itself. Distinguishing delivery method from the media distributed applies particularly to telecommunications networks, as almost all of the delivery systems are either inherently streaming (e.g. radio, television, streaming apps) or inherently non-streaming (e.g. books, video cassettes, music CDs). There are challenges with streaming content on the Internet. For instance, users whose Internet connection lacks satisfactory bandwidth may experience stops, lags, or slow buffering of the content. And users lacking compatible hardware or software systems may be unable to stream certain content.
Live streaming is the delivery of Internet content in real-time much as live television broadcasts content over the airwaves with a television signal. Live internet streaming takes a form of source media (e.g. a video camera, an audio tracks interface, screen capture software), an encoder to digitize the content, a media publisher, and a content delivery network to distribute and deliver the content. Live streaming does not need to be recorded at the origination point, although it frequently is.
Streaming is an option to file downloading, a process where the end-user obtains the entire file for this content before watching or listening to it. Through streaming, an end-user can use their media player to get started on playing digital video or digital sound content before the complete file has been transmitted. The word “streaming media” can connect with media other than video and audio, such as live closed captioning, ticker tape, and real-time text, which are considered “streaming text”.
❏ COPYRIGHT CONTENT ❏
Copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to make copies of a creative work, usually for a limited time.[1][2][3][4][5] The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself.[6][7][8] A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States.
Some jurisdictions require “fixing” copyrighted works in a tangible form. It is often shared among multiple authors, each of whom holds a set of rights to use or license the work, and who are commonly referred to as rights holders.[citation needed][9][10][11][12] These rights frequently include reproduction, control over derivative works, distribution, public performance, and moral rights such as attribution.[13]
Copyrights can be granted by public law and are in that case considered “territorial rights”. This means that copyrights granted by the law of a certain state, do not extend beyond the territory of that specific jurisdiction. Copyrights of this type vary by country; many countries, and sometimes a large group of countries, have made agreements with other countries on procedures applicable when works “cross” national borders or national rights are inconsistent.[14]
Typically, the public law duration of a copyright expires 50 to 100 years after the creator dies, depending on the jurisdiction. Some countries require certain copyright formalities[5] to establishing copyright, others recognize copyright in any completed work, without a formal registration.
It is widely believed that copyrights are a must to foster cultural diversity and creativity. However, Parc argues that contrary to prevailing beliefs, imitation and copying do not restrict cultural creativity or diversity but in fact support them further. This argument has been supported by many examples such as Millet and Van Gogh, Picasso, Manet, and Monet, etc.[15]
❏ GOODS OF SERVICES ❏
Credit (from Latin credit, “(he/she/it) believes”) is the trust which allows one party to provide money or resources to another party wherein the second party does not reimburse the first party immediately (thereby generating a debt), but promises either to repay or return those resources (or other materials of equal value) at a later date.[1] In other words, credit is a method of making reciprocity formal, legally enforceable, and extensible to a large group of unrelated people.
The resources provided may be financial (e.g. granting a loan), or they may consist of goods or services (e.g. consumer credit). Credit encompasses any form of deferred payment.[2] Credit is extended by a creditor, also known as a lender, to a debtor, also known as a borrower. | https://medium.com/@ximicij204/s01-e09-power-book-ii-ghost-series-1-episode-9-online-be10526204a2 | [] | 2020-12-27 13:36:55.931000+00:00 | ['Crime', 'Drama', 'Television', 'Power Book Ii Ghost'] |
Optimize your resume for ATS | Things we read but ignore. | This is not an article to discuss resume “building”, there are a lot of resources available online for that already. This article is to discuss resume “optimization” techniques. Techniques that might help bridge that little gap.
Here are some of the things I read online multiple times whilst building my resume but didn’t know of the impact they can really make.
Implied Things
All of the points mentioned below are something to be taken care of after the implied points like,
Clean and concise resume structure.
Consistent and readable font-style.
Highlight where necessary to emphasize.
Proper date formats.
Link everything. Everything!
Add links to your profiles on other platforms. (Github, Linkedin, Leetcode etc)
and any more…
ATS Friendly
Whether we like it or not, our resume will be scanned by a bot first. So we have to make sure our resume is readable — by a bot! .
. There are tons of websites available online that will scan and analyze your resume. Use them.
However, sometimes these websites tend to make suggestions you’d absolutely hate to use in your resume. At that point, go with your instinct. You have to make the resume ATS friendly, not anti-self.
Look for the ease with which the ATS will be able to segregate your skills, projects, job titles, internships and then aggregate them under appropriate labels.
Metrics DO Matter.
I read articles online that asserted on the fact that one should build a data driven resume. All of the activities you mention must have a number attached to them.
Data driven resume can directly point to the impact your effort/role created without relying on the recruiter/interviewer to imagine the circumstances.
In order to explain this useful technique, most of the articles online give you the following example:
“…for example, write something like — ‘By using X algorithms with Y technique, reduced Z by 50%’ “
However if you are somebody like me, this example will baffle you. BAFFLE!
So my suggestion here is to focus on small things. As a student I focused on: number of active users on my website, size of the team I managed during a university event, number of students who attended my lecture series, number of participants in the virtual event I was invited to as a speaker. etc.
These are the things that matter to us at the current stage (student) and I suppose we should feel free to mention them.
Format Of The Resume File
Apparently, it’s easier for the ATS if your file format is .doc, .docx instead of a pdf. So try and test this one online!
I didn’t pay much attention to these but after I failed at hearing back from some of my dream companies I decided to try something different and used them.
And modifying my resume wasn’t a problem for me because I felt the urge to optimize it at least twice every month (😅)
I hope this helps!
All the best.
Note: | https://medium.com/@monanira/optimize-your-resume-for-ats-things-we-read-but-ignore-20a88b7778f0 | ['Rinku Monani'] | 2021-06-08 17:14:01.694000+00:00 | ['Software Engineering', 'Microsoft', 'Google', 'Resume', 'Ats Software'] |
7 Best Courses to learn UI and UX Design for Beginners in 2021 | 7 Best Courses to learn UI and UX Design for Beginners in 2021
My favorite online training courses to learn UI and UX Design from Udemy, Pluralsight, and Coursera in 2021. javinpaul Follow May 23 · 9 min read
Hello guys, If you want to learn UX design and become a UX designer in 2021 and looking for the best UI/UX design online courses to start with then you have come to the right place.
In the past, I have shared the best web design courses and web development courses and In this article, I am going to share the best UX online courses and certifications you can join to become a UX designer in 2021.
The demand for UX/UI and Web Design professionals continues to increase in today’s job market. Learning UI or UX skills can open doors to many jobs both local and remote. It goes without saying that certification in any discipline will give you a leg up on your job hunt.
Getting trained is a viable strategy for any UX designer to get ahead and stand out from other applicants who are uncertified or self-taught. A quality UX training program doesn’t only make you look good on paper but should also give you more in-depth skills and techniques that go beyond the surface.
Not only that, but those who are already confident with their UX design capability can also use a certificate to better market their current knowledge to get clients or jobs.
With that said, unlike some other digital skills like cloud computing, no universally recognized UX certification can guarantee you a place anywhere. In that case, picking a reputable and trustworthy provider is the first significant step.
To make your search easier, we’ve listed some of the best UX/UI certification programs and online training courses with excellent features to make your learning experience more valuable. The following courses can help you build and grow the skills and knowledge you need to succeed in the UX field.
7 Best UI/UX Design Online Courses for Beginners in 2021
Without wasting any more of your time, here is a list of the top 5 online training courses to learn UX design in 2021. These are the best online UI courses from Udemy, Coursera, and Pluralsight and trusted by thousands of learners.
They are also completely online, which means you can take them now from the comfort of your office and home. Whether you want to work for a multinational company or just want to do some remote UI/UX gigs, these courses will provide you the skills you need to do your job well.
This is one of the best courses to learn UX and web design on Udemy. IT provides a stable ground for those who are just starting to learn the fundamental skills behind UX design.
Created by Joe Natoli, this course is quite comprehensive, so you can prevent annoying gaps when you try to learn something more advanced later on. He teaches the basics to his students in an engaging way, encouraging retained memories rather than passing knowledge.
In UX and Web Design Master Course: Strategy, Design, Development, you won’t be just learning about fundamental UX topics, but also practical sections aimed to guide you on implementing UX design to either basic websites or CMS-driven websites (like WordPress).
The course is perfect for those who might be interested in developing their own product with UX in mind.
Here is the link to join this course — UX and Web Design Master Course | https://medium.com/javarevisited/7-best-courses-to-learn-ui-and-ux-design-for-beginners-bc71c3e7499e | [] | 2021-05-23 11:26:44.889000+00:00 | ['UX', 'Design', 'UI Design', 'UX Design', 'Ui Ux Design'] |
Map Design for Hotel Bookings | Overview
This is a feature I redesigned for, Makemytrip.com (MMT), India’s premier online travel aggregator(OTA). Over a period of time we have been improving the way location related information is shown on our hotels product funnel.
That’s because location is one of the main things users consider while choosing, comparing & finally booking a travel accommodation. Research by the Boston Consulting Group on the indian travel market suggests maps are the 3rd most visited touchpoint after OTAs and Google Search for Indian travellers. And travel websites with maps show lower visits to google maps.
On our platform too, location is the second most used filter after price. Our data insights also revealed that users travelling internationally rely heavily on maps.
Problem Statement
Improving the MMT map experience was an exceptional challenge for 2 reasons:
The gold standard for mobile map interaction is google maps. But user expectations and goals on a travel website are different from those on Gmaps. So far, no other major OTA in India or outside had really cracked the map experience. In the domestic travel market, MMT sets the standard for OTA design and the majority of our user base is Indian. But with Indians taking international trips increasingly, our product is compared to global giants like Airbnb and Booking.com. To compete with them we must have feature parity with them. And a map view is a basic tool international travellers expect to have on the OTA of their choice.
Our aim was to improve visibility of maps on the hotel listing page and resolve usability issues in the current design of our android & iOS map view.
Users & Audience
Though we already had a map feature, users hardly interacted with it. As a product team we started to believe that perhaps our customer base is not tech savvy enough to use this feature. However, that was a false belief because a vast percentage of the same user segment interacted with map centric products like Uber and Google Maps on a daily basis.
For the sake of explaining the task flows of this project, let us consider the below 2 personas:
Scope & Constraints
Search limitations
Our current tech stack does not support multi-city search in the hotel funnel, i.e. users cannot search for “hotels in Kerala” or “hotels in Thailand” because the results would be ranging across different cities. So far this gap in our search functionality has been considered an edge case because most users search for hotels in particular cities.
The destination autosuggest on the Makemytrip.com home page
But this constraint also applies to the map view, where we cannot populate hotels that are outside the city or district that the user has searched for.
Impact of Covid19
This project was released in the beginning of 2020 and its growth and usage has been hampered greatly due to the impact of Covid19 on the travel industry.
Process
Step 1: Guerilla testing the existing feature
We started by conducting a round of guerilla testing with 12 users to observe how they interact with maps and identified the key usability issues in the existing feature. Here are the issues we discovered:
#1. No information about landmarks or localities: Maps have moved from physical to digital medium but their function remains the same — to give a lay of the land. Even when maps were physical, landmarks were an integral part of them because they act as identifiers that users can navigate with. People use maps to get contextual information like:
“how far is this hotel from the city centre?” or “are there any 5 star hotels on this beach?”
Especially when users are new to a destination, the major guiding points become the sights they will see and the landmarks they want to visit. Our map was a birds eye view of a city with hotels populated on it. It did not show any landmarks or locality related information — as a result users found it hard to navigate.
The previous map on android which we tested
#2. Poor Discoverability: In the map view, functions like search, area guide were hiding behind ambiguously worded touch points. It’s important to get progressive disclosure right. By showing too much information at one stage we risk overwhelming the user. But by showing too little, we might hinder discoverability of information because users don’t get motivated to explore further.
In this map we’ve made the second mistake. Rather than surface relevant functions and content upfront we hid away everything behind a tap — which a user may or may not even make! Just 3 out of 12 users discovered the search on the map. And none of the users interacted with the “area guide” CTA
Tap 1: location, Tap 2: search page, Tap 3: actually type in your search!
#3. Carousel added clutter: The order in which the hotel cards were shown was the same as the listing page — sorted by popularity. That meant hotels which are next to each other in the carousel can be kilometers apart on the map. We observed, most users in our guerilla tests interacted with the carousel by swiping it but lost interest soon after. To view a particular hotel they tapped on its icon on the map, zoomed in and then tapped on other hotels near it.
While browsing on map, users expect to view properties that have a geographic proximity. So while the carousel put more information in front of the user — it was not relevant.
This hotel is a 100% match! For what though?
#4. Information provided on the Hotel cards: Though our hotel cards are constantly present on the screen, the information they provide is broken and not enough motivation for users to tap on them and move ahead in the funnel.
Step 2: Competitive Analysis
We also conducted a competitive analysis of apps with map centric task flows like google maps, Uber, booking.com, agoda.com etc. This helped us understand what the basic expectation of users could be in a map feature. | https://medium.com/swlh/map-design-for-hotel-bookings-ae3e97a44e36 | ['Srishti Gupta'] | 2021-01-25 09:47:58.242000+00:00 | ['Mobile App Development', 'Case Study', 'UX Design', 'Maps', 'Interaction Design'] |
Food Sources For An Effective Weight Loss Diet Plan | Introduction
What is the best weight loss diet plan? This is a highly frequent question asked by many people who are looking for a proper weight loss diet that boosts calorie burn and aids in muscle gain. The type of calories you consume have a drastic impact on the level of your metabolism and your weight. Many people often fear that eating fat will make their body store fat cells immediately thereby gaining weight. But this is not true. In fact, eating the right types of fat can even aid in weight loss and it has been scientifically proven that diets which contain moderate amounts of fat lead to better results vs. diets that do not include any fat.
Our ultimate goal in a natural and healthy weight loss diet plan is to take the type of fats which aid in weight loss whilst building muscle mass in the body. When it comes to choosing the right type of fats, eating unsaturated sources of fat should be our main focus.
Saturated fats mostly found in animal products should only contain about 10% of your total calorie consumption. Also, trans-fats which are mostly found in processed foods should be completely avoided. A good example of trans-fats are hydrogenated types of oils.
Some examples of good sources of fats are avocado oil, olive oil, coconut oil, nuts and omega-3 rich fatty acids like salmon fish. Let’s start by talking about the top sources of foods to help us achieve the best weight loss diet plan results. | https://medium.com/@healthvibes11/food-sources-for-an-effective-weight-loss-diet-plan-f891c24d1af2 | [] | 2019-11-14 13:14:05.517000+00:00 | ['Weightloss Foods', 'Health', 'Weight Loss', 'Weight Loss Tips', 'Fat Burning Foods'] |
Riot Forging New Paths. On December 5, 2019, Riot Games… | Ruined King: A League of Legends Story Cover Art (Courtesy of Riot Games)
On December 5, 2019, Riot Games launched its new publishing label, Riot Forge. Riot Games created the label to work with third-party studios in developing new games that expand the League of Legends universe. Just a week later on December 12, 2019, Riot Forge announced a new game in collaboration with Airship Syndicate, developer of Battle Chasers: Nightwar and Darksiders: Genesis. That game is Ruined King: A League of Legends Story, a story-driven, turn-based RPG starring some of the most iconic champions from League of Legends. More recently, Riot Forge released an official trailer for the game on October 31, 2020 and an expected game release period of early 2021.
CONV/RGENCE: A League of Legends Story Trailer Thumbnail (Courtesy of Riot Forge)
Riot Forge also announced the development of CONV/RGENCE: A League of Legends Story immediately after revealing Ruined King in December 2019. CONV/RGENCE is in collaboration with Double Stallion Games, developer of Speed Brawl. Even less is known about this game, but what we do know is that it’s a single-player, action platformer game in which players will play as the time-manipulating League of Legends champion, Ekko, and explore the Runeterra region of Zaun.
This is all, of course, great news for fans of League of Legends. Both games have been very well received by the League of Legends community, even with very little known about either game. Fans are very excited to learn more about Runeterra from official lore while playing some of their favorite gaming genres. Why is the development of these games such important news? Well, for one, Ruined King will mark the first single-player game ever published by Riot. Secondly, the existence of Riot Forge and these games is expanding opportunities for independent video game development studios. Riot Games is rising up by branching out, and it is giving smaller studios the chance to rise with it, further cementing the precedent for independent developers working with large gaming companies. Riot Forge serves as a beacon of hope for both players and developers. Whether you’re excited for these new games or couldn’t care less, this is a great sign for the gaming industry. | https://vgcommittee2020.medium.com/riot-forging-new-games-c1c58f983b56 | ['Bcec Video Games Committee'] | 2020-12-08 11:17:16.557000+00:00 | ['Riot Games', 'Riot Forge', 'Video Game Development', 'Third Party'] |
Interoperability is often good — but should not be mandated | Note: this post was first published via my LinkedIn Newsletter. Please subscribe (here) & also join the comment & discussion thread on LI
Context
I’m going to be spending more time on telecom/tech policy & geopolitics over the next few months, spanning UK, US, Europe & Global issues. I’ll be sharing opinions & analysis on the politics of 5G & Wi-Fi, spectrum, broadband plans, supply-chain diversity & competition.
Recently, I’ve seen more calls for governments to demand mandatory interoperability between technology systems (or between vendors) as a regulatory tool. I think this would be a mistake — although incentivising interop can sometimes be a good move for various reasons. This is a fairly long post to explain my thinking, with particular reference to Open RAN and messaging.
Background & history
The telecoms industry has thrived on interoperability. Phone calls work from anywhere to anywhere, while handsets and other devices are tested & certified for proper functioning on standardised networks. Famously, interoperability between different “islands” of SMS led to the creation of a huge market for mobile data services, although that didn’t happen overnight in many countries.
Much the same is true in the IT world as well, with everything from email standards to USB connections and Wi-Fi certification proving the point. The web and open APIs make it easier for cloud applications to work together harmoniously.
But not everything valuable is interoperable. It isn’t the only approach. Proprietary and vertically-integrated solutions remain important too.
Many social media and communications applications have very limited touch-points with each other. The largest 4G/5G equipment companies don’t allow operator customers to mix-and-match components in their radio systems. Many IT systems remain closed, without public APIs. Consumers can’t choose to subscribe to network connectivity from MNO A, but telephony & SMS from ISP B, and exclusive content belonging to cable company C.
This isn’t just a telecom or IT thing. It’s difficult to get different industrial automation systems to work together. An airline can’t buy an airframe from Boeing, but insist that it has avionics from Airbus. The same is true for cars’ sub-systems and software.
Tight coupling or vertical integration between different subsystems can enable better overall efficiency, or more fluid consumer experience — but at the cost of creating “islands”. Sometimes that’s a problem, but sometimes it’s actually an advantage.
Well-known examples of interoperability in a narrow market subset can obscure broader use of proprietary systems in a wider domain. Most voice-related applications, beyond traditional “phone calls”, do not interoperate by default. You could probably connect a podcast platform to a karaoke app, home voice assistant and a critical-communications push-to-talk system…. but why would you? (This is one reason why I always take care to never treat “voice” and “telephony” synonymously).
Hybrid, competitive markets are optimal
So there is value in interoperable systems, and also in proprietary alternatives and niches. Some sectors gravitate towards openness, such as federation between different email systems. Others may create de-facto proprietary appoaches — which might risk harmful monopolies, or which may be transferred to become open standards (for instance, Adobe’s PDF document format).
And even if something is based on theoretically interoperable underpinnings, it might still not interoperate in practice. Most enterprise Private 4G and 5G networks are not connected to public mobile networks, even though they use the same standards.
Interoperability can be both a positive and negative for security. Open and published interfaces can be scrutinised for vulnerabilities, and third-parties can test anything that can be attached to something else. Yet closed systems have fewer entry points — the “attack surface” may be smaller. Having a private technology for a specific purpose — from a military communications infrastructure to a multiplayer gaming network — may make commercial or strategic sense.
In many all areas of technology, we see a natural pendulum swing between openness and proprietary. From open flexibility to closed-system optimisation, and back again. Often there are multiple layers of technology, where the pendulum swings with a different cadence for each. Software-isation of many hardware products means a given system might employ multiple layers at the same time.
Consider this (incomplete and sometimes overlapping) set of scenarios for interoperability:
Between products: A device needs to be able to connect to a network, using the right radio frequencies and protocols. Or an electrical plug needs to fit into a standardised socket.
A device needs to be able to connect to a network, using the right radio frequencies and protocols. Or an electrical plug needs to fit into a standardised socket. Within products or solutions (between components): A product or service can be considered to be just a collection of sub-systems. A computer might be able to support different suppliers’ memory chips or disks, using the same sockets. A browser could support multiple ad-blockers. A telco’s virtualised network could support different vendors for certain functions.
A product or service can be considered to be just a collection of sub-systems. A computer might be able to support different suppliers’ memory chips or disks, using the same sockets. A browser could support multiple ad-blockers. A telco’s virtualised network could support different vendors for certain functions. Application-to-application / service-to-service: An application can link to, integrate or federate with another — for instance a reader could share this article on their Twitter feed, ormobile user can roam onto another network, or a bank can share data access with an accounting tool.
An application can link to, integrate or federate with another — for instance a reader could share this article on their Twitter feed, ormobile user can roam onto another network, or a bank can share data access with an accounting tool. Data portability: Data formats can be common from one system to another, so users can own and move their “state” data and history. This could range from a porting a phone number, to moving uploaded photos from one social platform to another.
There’s also a large and diverse industry dedicated to gluing together things which are not directly interoperable — and acting as important boundaries to enforce security, charging or other functions. Session Border Controllers link different voice systems, with transcoders to translate between different codecs. Gateways link Wi-Fi or Bluetooth IoT devices to fixed or wireless broadband backhaul. Connectors enable different software platforms to work together. Mapping functions will eventually allow 5G network slicing to work across core, transport and radio domains, abstracting the complexities at the boundaries.
Added to this is the entire sphere of systems integration — the practice of connecting disparate systems and components together, to create solutions. While interoperability helps SIs in some ways, it also commoditises some of their business.
Coexistence vs. interoperation
Yet another option for non-interoperable systems is rules for how they can coexist, without damaging each other’s operation. This is seen in unlicensed or shared wireless spectrum bands, to avoid “tragedies of the commons” where interference would jam all the disparate systems. Even licensed bands can be “technology neutral”.
Analogous approaches enable the safe coexistence of different types of road users on the same highway — or in the voice/video arena, technologies such as WebRTC which embed “codec negotiation” procedures into the standards.
Arguably, improving software techniques, automation, containerisation and AI will make such interworking and coexistence approaches even easier in future. Such kludginess might not please engineering purists who value “elegance”, but that’s not the way the world works — and certainly shouldn’t be how it’s regulated.
In a healthy and competitive market, customers should be able to choose between open and closed options, understanding the various trade-offs involved, yet be protected from abusive anti-competitive power.
A great example of consumer gains and “generativity” in innovation is that of the Internet itself, which works alongside walled-garden, telco or private-network alternatives to access content and applications.
Customers can have the best of both worlds — accelerated, because of the competitive tensions involved. The only risk is that of monopolies or oligopolies, which requires oversight.
Where does government & regulatory policy fit in this?
This highlights an important and central point: the role of government, and its attitude to technology standards, interoperability and openness. This topic is exemplified by various recent initiatives, ranging from enthusiasm around Open RAN for 5G in the US, UK and elsewhere, to the EU’s growing attempts to force Internet platform businesses to interoperate and enable portability of data or content, as part of its Digital Services Act.
My view is that governments should, in general, let technology markets, vendors and suppliers make their own choices.
It is reasonable that governments often want to frame regulation in ways to protect citizens from monopolists, or risks of harm such as cybersecurity. In general, competition rules are developed across industries, without specific rules about products, unless there is unfair vertical integration and cross-subsidy.
Governments can certainly choose to adopt or even incentivise interoperability for various reasons — but they should not enshrine it in laws as mandatory. If you’re a believer in interventionist policies, then incentivising market changes that favour national champions, foster inward investment and increase opportunities can make sense — although others will clearly differ.
(Personally, I think major tranches of intervention and state-aid should only apply to game-changers with huge investment needs — so perhaps for carbon capture technology, or hydrogen-powered aviation).
Open RAN may be incentivised, not mandated
A particular area of focus by many in telecoms is around open radio networks. The O-RAN Alliance and the TIP OpenRan project are at the forefront, with many genuinely impressive innovations and evolutions occurring. Rakuten’s deployment is proving to be a beacon — at least for greenfield networks — while others such as Vodafone are using this architectural philosophy for rural coverage improvements.
Governments are increasingly involved as well — seeing a possible way to meet voters’ desires for better/cheaper coverage, while also offsetting perceived risks from concentrations of power in a few large integrated vendors. This latter issue has been pushed further into the limelight by Huawei’s fall from favour in a number of countries, which then see a challenge from a smaller number of alternative providers — Nokia, Ericsson and in some cases Samsung and NEC or niche providers.
This combination of factors then gets further conflated with industrial policy goals. For instance, if a country is good at creating software but not manufacturing radios, then Open RAN is an opportunity, that might merit some form of R&D stimulus, government-funded testbeds and so on.
So I can see some arguments for incentives — but I would be very wary of a step to enshrine any specific interop requirements into law (or rules for licenses), or for large-scale subsidies or plans for government-run national infrastructure. The world has largely moved to “tech neutral” approaches in areas such as spectrum awards. In the past, governments would mandate certain technologies for certain bands — but that is now generally frowned upon.
No, message apps should not interoperate
Another classic example of undesirable “forced interoperability” is in messaging applications. I’ve often heard many in the telecoms industry assert that it would be much better if WhatsApp, iMessage, Telegram, Snap — and of course the mobile industry’s own useless RCS standard — could interconnect. Recently, some government and lobbying groups have suggested much the same, especially in Brussels.
Yet this would instantly hobble the best and most unique features of each — how would ephemeral (disappearing) messages work on systems that keep them stored perpetually? How would an encrypted platform interoperate with a non-encrypted platform? How could an invite/accept contact system interwork with a permissive any-to-any platform? How would a phone-number identity system work with a screen-name one?
… and that’s before the real unintended consequences kick in, when people realise that their LinkedIn messages now interoperate with Tinder, corporate Slack and telemedicine messaging functions.
That doesn’t mean there’s never a reason to interoperate between message systems. In particular, if there’s an acquisition it can be useful and imporant — imagine if Zoom and Slack merged, for instance. Or a gaming platform’s messaging might want users to send invitations on social media. I could see some circumstances (for business) where it might be helpful linking Twitter and LinkedIn — but also others where it would be a disaster (I’m looking at you, Sales Navigator spamming tools).
So again — interoperability should be an option. Not a default. And in this case, I see zero reasons for governments to incentivise.
Interoperability between technology solutions or sub-systems should be possible — but it should not be assumed as a default, nor legislated in areas with high levels of innovation. It risks creating lowest-common denominators which do not align with users’ needs or behaviours. Vertical integration often brings benefits, and as long as the upsides and downsides are transparent, users can make informed trade-offs and choices.
Lock-in effects can occur in both interoperable and proprietary systems. I’ll be writing more about the concept of path dependence in future.
Regulating or mandating interoperability risks various harms — not just a reduction in innovation and differentiation, but also unexpected and unintended consequences. Many cite the European standardisation of GSM 2G/3G mobile networks as a triumph — yet the US, Korea, Japan, China and others allowed a mix of GSM, CDMA and local oddities such as iDen, WiBro and PHS. No prizes for guessing which parts of the world now lead in 5G, although correlation doesn’t necessarily imply causation here.
There’s also a big risk from setting precedents that could lead to unintended consequences. Perhaps car manufacturers would be next in line to be forced to have open interfaces for all the electronic systems, impacting many automakers’ potential revenues. Politicians need to think more broadly. As a general rule, if someone uses the obsolete term “digital” in the context of interop, they’re not thinking much at all.
I’ve written before about the possible risks to telcos from the very “platform neutrality” concept that many have campaigned for. Do they imagine regulators wouldn’t notice that many have their own ambitions to be platform providers too?
In my view, an ideal market is made up of a competitive mix of interoperable and proprietary options. As long as abuses are policed effectively, customers should be able to make their own trade-offs — and their own mistakes.
As always — please comment and discuss this. I’ll participate in the discussions as far as possible. If you’ve found this thought-provoking, please like and share on LinkedIn, Twitter and beyond. And get in touch if I can help you with internal advisory work, or external communications or speaking / keynote needs.
Note: this post was first published via my LinkedIn Newsletter. Please subscribe (here) & also join the comment & discussion thread on LI
#5G #openran #regulation #telecom #mobile #interoperability #competition #messaging #voice #innovation | https://medium.com/@disruptivedean/interoperability-is-often-good-but-should-not-be-mandated-8537cac8221 | ['Dean Bubley'] | 2020-11-25 09:04:55.785000+00:00 | ['Interoperability', '5g', 'Regulation', 'Telecom', 'Messaging Apps'] |
It’s OK to be Human in a Machine-Learned World | Nhi Ngo
Data, data,…humans?
What do you do when an A/B test can’t tell you what to do with your ML product?
I have always been a believer in data. As a social psychologist, I spent many years quantifying emotion through behavioral experiments. As a mixed-method user researcher, I always make product recommendations based on insights from data, from qualitative (e.g.user interviews, surveys) to quantitative (e.g. AB test results). In my experience working at Google, Netflix & now at Spotify, I have learned that data-informed decisions work especially well for products that rely heavily on personalization algorithms–most often, the models we build are so complex that relying on data is the only way we could make confident decisions.
And yet, I learned recently that we could become over-reliant on data, when it doesn’t even give you the full picture. We can build better ML products that are both impactful for the business, benefit the users, and delight them, if we use something else other than data alone: a human understanding of how other humans think, see and experience the world.
I hesitate to call this approach “intuition” — which implies it lacks reasoning, or even “empathy”. Remember that empathy is difficult, sometimes impossible, and most often overrated. Making decisions based on interpersonal human understanding, or cognitive & affective perspective taking, is rational, complementary to a data-driven approach, and increasingly important in a world where metrics dominate conversations. I learned a lot about this somewhat counterintuitive process of making decisions not entirely based on data through my recent work at Spotify with my team, Home Personalization.
ML-powered Shortcuts on Spotify Home
Earlier this year, we launched a feature internally called Shortcuts on the Spotify Home tab. It’s a dedicated space that showcases what Spotify algorithms have learned to be the user’s current favorites. You can read more about how this feature was developed here.
Product Insights partnered closely with engineering, product, and design throughout the entire product development cycle. Along with my data scientist partner, we used 1- to 2-week longitudinal user studies and AB tests to evaluate the usability of the design, the quality of the recommendations, and the overall value of this space for Spotify users. A few questions we answered were, how much gain did the ML model offer compared to the best heuristic model? Are these gains valuable and recognizable to the users? Is the grid format — which is different from the usual carousel format on Home — a better user experience?
Throughout this development cycle, qualitative data inspired hypotheses for AB tests, and qualitative data contextualized test results. It felt like we always had the answer somewhere in the data we collected to make the decisions we thought were best for the product and the users.
Until we tested the user-facing name of this feature.
What’s in a name?
Among all the evaluations that we did, this was the “simpler” one. No complex model to deal with. However, it was crucial in helping users understand what Shortcuts is, and what to use it for. In early user testing, we found that users could not always explain why Shortcuts was recommending to them the things it did. They also couldn’t predict how these recommendations changed over time. This created confusion and also hurt the value proposition of Shortcuts. This is not surprising, as explainable recommendations improve effectiveness and satisfaction with recommendation systems, so the lack of explainability hurts these systems.
Along with improvements to the model that we identified through research to address the explainability problem, we also wanted to aid the user with recsplanation — an explanation for our recommendations in the Shortcuts space. A few candidates that were tested were “Listen Now” (the objective that the model optimizes for), “Shortcuts” (the user-facing functionality), “Quick Access” (a UX goal of this space), and last but not least, a daypart greeting, “Good morning” (that would change with the time of day to Good afternoon or Good evening).
We had a few debates about these names, as there were branding and technical constraints we had to consider, and each key member of the team also had their own preferences. We were counting on the AB test to help us make this important decision.
The test returned neutral.
What that meant was, over our typical 2 week period of letting the AB test run, we did not observe any significant change in our consumption metrics — the success criteria that we previously set all our tests to optimize for. It was “too close to call” — and surprisingly, this happens very, very often in the product world. As much as we rely on AB tests, they don’t always give us the answer — or any answer!
Our designer recommended we go with the daypart name, much to my reservations. In user research sessions, we observed that participants really need a straightforward explanation of what this very visible space at the top of Home is. However, our product designer was passionate in his belief that “Good morning” would create a more human and personal experience for users. The daypart greeting would be a strong indicator to users that this is their Home, and especially, that Shortcuts is theirs, a personalized space we created just for them.
Indeed, participants were most often positively surprised in our interview sessions whenever they opened their phone and saw the greetings, even though it was followed by confusion about the recommendations. Convinced by our designer’s humanistic approach and recognizing the intangible benefits of providing users with this joy of being “greeted by Spotify” observed in these user sessions, we decided to go with our perspective-taking as humans to humans, and chose the daypart name.
A human decision by humans, for humans
What we didn’t realize at the time was that choosing this name forced us to work harder and consequently make the recommendations more intuitive and explainable for the users. Participants in follow-up studies expected the recommendations to change with the daypart greetings and time of day — obviously, if Spotify says “Good morning” and shows a sleep music playlist, that does not make a good impression. So the team incorporated more time-based features in the model that helped the content become more time-sensitive for those users with time-dependent habits.
We also improved the recommendation models with the vision that Shortcuts, being the only “fixed” space on Home, would become a space with Shortcuts that will give you Quick Access to content you want to Listen Now without us having to tell you. Indeed, after the product launch, we conducted a post-launch evaluative diary study for over a month and observed that users not only came to understand Shortcuts very quickly but also became emotionally attached to and frequently delighted by the daypart greetings. Shortcuts, by all accounts 6 months after launch, is a resounding success, both quantitatively and qualitatively.
This experience was a sobering reminder for myself as a researcher that data doesn’t always tell the whole story, especially since we most often test — both qualitatively and quantitatively — at a much shorter time scale than how long people live with our products. The decision to go with a more human “recsplanation” that didn’t win a test or follow a strict convention of explainability has larger implications than just choosing the right name for a feature. We need to think humanistically to be better researchers, designers, and product owners, simply because a human perspective pushes us to build better products and experiences that benefit both the business and the users long-term. It’s an intentional attitude we adopt when designing interfaces and recommendation systems at Spotify
When data can’t give you a definitive answer, it is ok to be human and make a human decision. Prioritize user joy; treat them as you would any human in your life.
And with that, I bid you Good morning, Good afternoon, and Good night.
Written by Nhi Ngo, Senior User Researcher at Spotify | https://medium.com/spotify-insights/its-ok-to-be-human-in-a-machine-learned-world-4ad62a947a9e | ['Spotify Insights'] | 2020-11-04 10:22:39.385000+00:00 | ['A B Testing', 'Machine Learning', 'User Research'] |
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