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This means big trouble for our planet in the future

‘Shift to a Not-So-Frozen North Is Well Underway, Scientists Warn. There is no reason to think that in 30 years much of anything will be as it is today,” one of the editors of a new report on the Arctic climate said.’ Image by 358611 from Pixabay Watch this amazing video that shows the ongoing change in the Arctic climate. __________________ Thanks for reading. These are my most popular pieces, with many thousands of Reads: Gain Access to Expert View — Subscribe to DDI Intel

https://medium.datadriveninvestor.com/this-means-big-trouble-for-our-planet-in-the-future-db3439cd4b12

['Terry Mansfield']

2020-12-20 01:46:56.260000+00:00

['Climate Action', 'Global Warming', 'Arctic', 'Climate', 'Climate Change']

Introducing the ESD Treasury

On Nov 27th, a community member proposed EIP-10 which details the creation of a treasury whose purpose is to fund protocol changes and various other activities that are voted upon by the community. This treasury will have a separate governance process that utilises the off-chain governance platform: Snapshot.page. The proposed changes are as follows: Protocol Changes After discussion around the initial post by Andrew Kang, the part of the proposal that effects the core code is as follows: The protocol will one-time mint 500,000 ESD to the specified treasury address Going forward all expansions will contribute to the treasury. In a “coupon” expansion the split will be 77.5% Coupons, 20% LP, 2.5% Treasury. In a “supply” expansion the split will be 77.5% DAO, 20% LP, 2.5% Treasury Treasury Specifics The treasury that will receive the proceeds from the supply expansions has been setup as follows: Gnosis Safe with 7 signers, with a threshold requirement of 4 signers The treasury will only act upon the outcomes of proposals submitted to the ESD Snapshot Governance page Treasury signers have no specific executive authority over any of the funds and must purely enact voted budget proposals. All treasury funds will originate from supply expansion rewards, and not from any other sources (e.g. donations). The treasury address is: 0x460661bd4A5364A3ABCc9cfc4a8cE7038d05Ea22 Treasury Signers A diverse set of individuals have been proposed from the ESD community to act as signers of the Treasury multi-sig. They are committed to only enact budget proposals that have been approved by bonded token holder voting on the Snapshot governance platform and generally to act in the best interests of the project. The signers are as follows: Establishing the Treasury The treasury is yet to be established and requires an on-chain governance vote to pass in order to modify the protocol to fund the treasury. The proposal contract has been deployed and proposed. It is live for voting here. Please make sure you vote on this proposal!

https://medium.com/emptysetdollar/introducing-the-esd-treasury-7fe116306c77

['Lewis Freiberg']

2020-12-05 22:53:26.334000+00:00

['Governance', 'Ethereum', 'Defi', 'Empty Set Dollar', 'Stable Coin']

Monday Nov 30, 2020: Four US common stocks selected by our Chicago Quantum Net Score model (swing trading)

Jeffrey Cohen (jeffrey@quantum-usaci.com), Dec 2, 2020 Quick update Dec 4, 2020: Performance Update Update Dec 10, 2020 (our trading results) Good morning quantum computing and US equities readers. We have another ‘public’ stock pick (actually 2 pairs of stocks to hold), and a few updates on our quantum algorithm models for you. Not Earth-shattering, but possibly interesting for those who follow quantum computing in financial services. This past weekend, with the markets closed, we downloaded all current US common stock tickers from the NYSE, NASDAQ Q, and NYSE American (tape b) which make up around 3,400 stocks. We data validated down to 3,153 stocks and ran our models. We ran the analysis of all 3,153 stocks at once. We calibrate the CQNS score to be zero for the ‘all in’ portfolio, and the zero portfolio. Our job is to find the minimum CQNS score from an equally weighted portfolio, long (no short), unleveraged portfolio of US common stocks. This time we tried some new things, as follows: We ran our analysis on the same data, but on two different hardware systems. We have an iMAC macOS Catalina v10.15.7 (16GB RAM), and an HP Z420 Windows 7 Professional, SP1 server workstation (48GB RAM), which both run Python 3.7.9. We ran the code side by side, and came up with different portfolios.The systems run at different clock speeds, and with different amounts of memory, and therefore run more or less deeply (e.g., in the few hours we set aside to run the experiment on both systems). After we run Phase 1 (find the best 64 stock portfolio from 3,153 stocks), we take the union of the two best portfolios found on each system and made that our best pick for phase 2. Phase 2 is where we evaluate those N stocks for the portfolio with the lowest CQNS score, going as deeply as we need to. We typically select a portfolio of between (1,9) stocks. In one system, we had 81 stocks make it to Phase 2 (60 + 21), and in another, 65 stocks passed to Phase 2 (63 + 2). Taking the union of two top portfolios gives us more ‘all stars’ to choose from. We ran on the D-Wave Systems Inc. Advantage 1.1 Pegasus (16) system, as opposed to the D-Wave Systems Inc. 2000Q #6 Chimera (16) system, which we typically run on. We did this because both portfolios were over 64 stocks, which is the maximum for Chimera. Market conditions have been very positive, and we see higher BETA values in our ‘all-in’ portfolio for the past year. This is driving up expected returns in the market, which makes our CQNS model discount expected returns more aggressively to equal variance. How can that be? Doesn’t BETA always revert to the mean of 1.0? We have 3,153 stocks (many of which are not in the S&P 500), and we compare them to the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) to determine ticker-specific BETA values that we apply against forward-looking market estimates (based on prior year returns, subject to caps and floors). The impact on the model is that we are picking higher BETA stocks this week. As the market falls, even for a few days, the driver for high-BETA stocks falls. Our experience on the D-Wave Advantage system was problematic this week. Our first few runs found valid portfolios, but with relatively high CQNS scores. These were better than average, but would not be considered top portfolios. All of a sudden, our runs were finding no valid portfolios. We adjusted parameters, and significantly adjusted our affine transformations of our QUBO, but to no avail. We probably ran about 20 times on the D-Wave unsuccessfully. We did take those quantum solutions into effect in our final genetic algorithm run, so they do influence our solutions, but not sure how helpful they were. We picked small capitalization stocks this time with high BETA values. One of the stocks is so thinly traded that it appeared to go an hour without a trade. Unlike in our prior runs, the author, Jeffrey Cohen, took a modest trading position in both pairs of stocks over the course of 2 days. These are not significant nor material positions at this time. We kept the CQNS formulation the same, but tuned our solvers significantly during this run. Our simulated bifurcator (based on pressure), did an outstanding job selecting stocks in Phase 2. We are learning how to make this an effective solver. The two systems reached a large degree of consensus on their respective stock picks across solvers, with the exception of the quantum annealer and the TABU multi-start sampler. Our stock picks We selected ($SMLP, $FET) as one portfolio, and ($LPI, $PRTY) as a second portfolio. Portfolio 1: Summit Midstream Partners, LP (SMLP) and Forum Energy Technologies, Inc. (FET) Portfolio 2: Laredo Petroleum, Inc. (LPI), and Party City Holdco Inc. (PRTY) Four stocks chosen — Past 1 year Four stocks chosen — Past 5 days Four stocks chosen — Past 1 day As you can see, these stocks do exhibit some ‘zig and zag’ behavior where one rises where the other falls. We have the counter-balance effect which minimizes losses, but also restricts gains. However, these high BETA stocks are expected to rise and fall assertively with the market. What’s next? We spent the past few days improving our core software to run faster (improve the data validation and download process), to tune our solvers, and to format our results better. We continue to research skewness and kurtosis, as well as quantum walks on graphs, to determine how these metrics and methods can be used to help select attractive stock portfolios. Update on Dec 4, 2020 (11:45am ET): These stocks are outperforming their benchmarks, as seen in the chart below. Our unrealized P&L is positive. We plan to hold for ~25 trading days. One note, SMLP was difficult for us to trade due to lack of liquidity and low volumes. Our buy order (200 shares at market, market open) executed $0.30/share higher than the prior tick. Nov 4, 2020 10:45am CDT — the four stock picks from market open, Nov 30, 2020 Another update: This week we invest in our codebase. We add automation, scale the number of US common stocks it analyzes, and better calibrate the solver models. We test the code. We add NASDAQ Global Market(SM) (G) to our stock mix, and pick up more tickers in our FTP pulls. We found Yahoo Finance data download was unavailable twice when market was open. Dec 10: Our trading results were mixed. We had two stocks up significantly, and three flat (slightly up). You notice SNDE is an addition to the portfolio. It appears in a subsequent run to go with FET and SMLP. We did see offsetting moves which kept our portfolio value more stable despite individual stock volatility. The real insight was something my brother Seth Cohen told me decades ago: “cut your losses and let your winners soar.” We held LPI as it rose almost 100%. We also bought more of our slow performers (you see we added to PRTY and FET) to keep our positions balanced. Not sure this was wise as we increased our average share cost. Comments welcome. Concluding remarks: As a reminder, we are not registered financial advisors, nor are we offering investment advice. We are pushing ourselves to create quantum algorithms that create quantum advantage, and to improve our skills and expertise in refining models and improving our quantum computing productivity. Our CQNS formulation, and our data analysis solvers are subject to change without notice, as we continue our research into the stock markets and quantum computing algorithms and solvers. We continue to improve our art. We now can index our BETA calculations against SPY or QQQ (client choice). We scale up our model to handle another set of NASDAQ stocks (NASDAQ Select — group G) in addition to NASDAQ Global Select — group Q) which brings up our US common stock count to over 4,500. Finally, we do not have a position in any stock mentioned in this article (we exited for a 16% gain in 9 trading days, net of trading costs). For more information about our research and methods, please visit our ResearchGate here. To learn more about our quantum computing consulting start-up, our paid service offerings to select stocks using our platform and algorithm, our offering to apply your ideas on our platform, or our management consulting offerings, please visit our website here.

https://medium.com/@chicagoquantum/monday-nov-30-2020-four-us-commostocks-selected-by-our-chicago-quantum-net-score-model-6da256e4903d

['Chicago Quantum']

2020-12-10 18:30:04.490000+00:00

['Quantum Algorithms', 'Innovation', 'Portfolio', 'Quantum Computing', 'Stock Market']

The ROI of investing in commute

The ROI of investing in commute “Transportation as a benefit” pilots have made it easier for employees to get to work in South Bend, enabling 83% to work more hours and reducing absences and tardiness by 8%. Learn about the ROI of investing in commute. Voy Nov 20, 2018·6 min read Investing in commute is proving to increase productive work hours, timeliness, and employee happiness Investing in commute is a growing trend For years now, there has been a growing trend to invest in solving commute. According to Sequoia Consulting Group, a leading service partner that provides people-first companies strategic benefits, HR, retirement, and insurance services, 36% of companies offer a commuter stipend, up from 33% in 2017. In surveying more than 750 U.S.-based companies, Sequoia found that: 7% offered a corporate shuttle in 2017 with an additional 4% planning to offer one in the next 12 months (57% growth rate) 11% offered internal rideshare or carpool options with an additional 4% planning to offer one in the next 12 months (36% growth rate) 26% offered a biking program with an additional 4% planning to offer one in the next 12 months (15% growth rate) Genesis of commute benefits This trend originated in legislation introducing employer-provided voluntary benefits that allow employees to reduce their commuting expenses for transit, vanpooling, bicycling, and work-related parking costs by setting aside pre-tax dollars. Meanwhile, progressive companies have taken their support much further. With the increase in congestion and air pollution, competition for talent, and long commutes impacting employees’ health and productivity, companies are investing into commuting: financially and logistically supporting their employees’ travel to and from work. The ROI of commute benefits has historically been difficult to measure Measuring the efficacy of these programs has always been a challenge. After all, how is one supposed to assess if offering a last mile shuttle is just a large monthly expense or a true necessity that allows you to attract and retain employees? How can you determine if the positive feedback you are getting from your ridehail program is just a, “well, duh, of course people would want free/subsidized rides to and from work,” or a differentiated benefit that enables your people to actually get to the office and work longer? For many employers, the argument had been simple — it’s just the right thing to do and a low cost way to keep employees happy. However, other companies have asked for more data in order to warrant investment — data that hasn’t been readily accessible until recently. Commute is no longer a company-specific problem, but a community problem Luckily, the team at Voy recently met Santiago Garces, the Chief Innovation Officer for the City of South Bend, Indiana. He has been pioneering “Transportation as a Benefit” with local employers. With a grant from Bloomberg Philanthropies, South Bend’s Innovation and Technology office set out to tackle the barriers to stable employment for low income individuals and shift workers in the region. In the past, efforts were aimed at providing skills and training to tackle stable employment. This time around, they sourced ideas from the community. The responses were consistent — transportation and childcare were what people needed. Armed with a new perspective, they got to work, rapidly prototyping what transportation as a benefit could look like. Piloting ridehailing as a benefit with employers in South Bend After interviewing and holding focus groups with more than 60 shift workers, 300 residents, and 50 applicants at job fairs, South Bend partnered with four large employers to offer transportation assistance via ridehailing to over 500 shift workers in food service, hotel service, housekeeping, maintenance, and elderly home care. South Bend was able to approach exploring this new service in a manner that no employer would ever have the opportunity to do — as randomized controlled trials and iterative pilots. Can you imagine introducing a benefit at your company that is only given to a portion of your employees, with the expectation that it will iteratively change over time? As a city tackling a gnarly challenge, South Bend had other priorities. In order to create a sustainable solution, an employer-funded “Transportation as a Benefit”, the team knew they would need to prove the business case of this benefit as a win-win for both employers and employees. Garces explains, “our first pilots offered rideshare transportation to eight hospital employees using Uber gift cards. We later enrolled 188 participants in the Uber for Business platform, allowing us to view real-time data for 800+ rides[…]. We offered unlimited rides in our initial pilots to understand baseline behavior while experimenting with different monthly ride caps in other pilots. We tested a ‘skin-in-the-game’ model requiring employees to cover part of the ride cost and a vanpool model for vocational students going to and from the same training location.”‍ The pilots proved commuting benefits have impact After 12 weeks of testing, 9 pilots, working with 500+ employees who took over 800 rides, the results were staggering: 100% of participants reported the program made it easier to get to work and were 8% less likely to be absent or late 83% were able to work more hours, with an average of one additional hour per shift All were interested in participating again, and 92% would participate even if they paid $2 per ride Employers reported increased scheduling flexibility, decreased overtime costs and increased client satisfaction All four employer partners committed to providing support moving forward Going beyond numbers that point to improved business performance and employee satisfaction, the pilots also led to success stories of true human impact. According to Garces, “one participant at risk of termination kept her job due to improved attendance and was promoted.” Furthermore, to one of their partners, a senior in-home care provider, the benefits of this mobility offering resonated throughout the organization. Before the pilot, supervisors had found themselves stressed as caregivers regularly called in reporting they couldn’t fill a shift or be in a particular location. In these situations, supervisors would scramble to give rides to these caregivers or elect to fill the shift themselves. Armed with their new transportation benefits, employees were able to reliably take on additional shifts and the company was able to take on new, otherwise inaccessible clients.‍ South Bend’s pilots going forward Commuter benefits are a quickly evolving space and South Bend already has plans for more extensive pilots. Garces shared, “our initial idea focused on a single solution of ridesharing to address the problem of unreliable transportation. As we spoke with our target population, we discovered a range of transportation needs and preferences that require a more nuanced solution. We pivoted away from the idea of ridesharing as a one-size-fits-all solution to a model that integrates services from additional transportation providers to optimize cost and ridership.” Naturally, as technology and new modes of transportation merge with a growing involvement from employers to solve commute, commute benefits are going to evolve, standardize, and empower a more productive and happier workforce. It’s exciting to see how South Bend plans to continue to evolve their offering.‍ Food for thought as you reflect on your commute program Key takeaways from South Bend’s transportation as a benefit pilots: Commute benefits in South Bend have proven to reduce absenteeism, which can reduce overtime costs and the stress of trying to fill shifts. Geographic context and employee demographics affect transportation needs. A solution that optimizes for cost and utilization needs to entail more than ridehail services. The cost of commuting doesn’t have to belong strictly to employers or employees. Co-investment is viewed favorably by a majority of employees. Innovation within the commuting space is happening rapidly and best practices are still being worked out. To learn more on South Bend’s “Transportation as a Benefit” program check out their Bloomberg Mayors Challenge profile or this article in the South Bend Tribune announcing the pilot. In the coming weeks, we’ll continue to dive into innovation in the commute space and how to holistically design commute benefits to best support your talent and business strategy. Stay tuned and join our mailing list to be the first to learn about what you can do to solve commuting. ‍Want to learn more about how we can help? Say hello.

https://medium.com/@getvoy/the-roi-of-investing-in-commute-3df7254bb716

[]

2019-02-26 23:59:00.425000+00:00

['Transportation', 'HR', 'Employee Benefits', 'Uber', 'Innovation']

Best Upholstery services in Online with your Budged

Dubai Upholstery provide the one-of-a-kind kinds of Upholstery Services with good Prices and solutions encompass upholstery and Reupholstery dubai services, custom designed sofa covers dubai and sofa fabric online, that suit your indoors décor perfectly. The Dubai upholstery provider plays the customized works, so you can get favored furnishings’ design, color, and length and so forth. If you need to bring change in your home at that point there are cushions Dubai and floor cushions Dubai in your home that would require a change as well. From furniture upholstery Dubai to leather sofa repair Dubai, everything is critical to think about to acquire an incredible and genuine change in living arrangement. For example, Reupholstery Dubai is extremely noteworthy in each home whether it is small or huge. If the seat upholstery, upholstery fabric Dubai, leather upholstery Dubai or cushion covers Dubai of your upholstery Dubai is getting bad at that point there is no contention to sit tight for UPHOLSTERY ABU DHABI to get more repulsive and undesirable shapes and looks. Simply get some solid upholstery works in Dubai from trusty upholstery services in Dubai that is well known for offering required sofa refurbishing services. It is not very difficult to get to such specialist reupholster sofa Dubai for getting required viewpoints and excellence for your traditional fabric sofas if you aren’t mindful of some plausible and basic methodologies for discovering them. Indeed, even there are such huge numbers of fabric suppliers in Dubai would turn into the center of your consideration when you would start your scan for such furniture restoration Dubai services however the chief thing is that you just pick one Dubai upholstery organization that is truly trustworthy. Along these lines, these sofa upholstery services play an extremely intriguing and imperative part to make your utilized and terrible couch upholstery and furniture upholstery new and fresh once more. It truly feels terrible when custom sofa and also custom made couches start losing their unique appeal and worth and hinting at the maturing. When you don’t deal with custom made sofas on right time, custom couches totally lose their genuine worth and magnificence making you increase your expenses and purchasing new custom made sofa cushions and custom sofa slipcovers instead of renewing the more custom upholstered furniture as they can’t be restored subsequently after a long time. Furniture upholstery is a very vital constituent of your home or your office. One cannot even visualize living in a home without any custom upholstered furniture in it. Home or office interior furnishings and decor play a key role in improving their looks and appearance as well as their visual value. Besides this they also enable owners to improve the use of the space and make the home or office comfortable for doing all types of works. The hard furnishings like custom design sofa, bedroom furniture, bench cushions, console table, buffet tables, mirrors, lighting, etc. are very significant. For more information visit http://Dubaiupholstery.ae/ Google map links https://g.co/kgs/gYKr3i https://g.co/kgs/RSRb6P https://g.co/kgs/JvzGHY For more info, check our Google maps link here at https://goo.gl/maps/ahFhWLuEziE2 and follow us on Google Plus at link https://plus.google.com/103191950632525131784

https://medium.com/@dubaiupholstery2018/best-upholstery-services-in-online-with-your-budged-cb41a66da643

['Dubai Upholstery']

2017-12-28 15:29:58.232000+00:00

['Furniture']

‘Witness’: Why Katy Perry’s Transformation Was Impossible To Ignore

Mark Elliott The anxiety that’s plagued the world mood following 2008’s economic crash and the subsequent rise of headline-baiting politics was shared by as she collected her thoughts ahead of the creation of her fifth solo album, Witness. She’d finally taken that long sabbatical she’d been promising herself since her breakthrough almost a decade earlier, but there was a sense that the boundaries she’d been gently pushing in her work now needed a bit more pressure. It was time to be brave and apply more force to mix up the formula that had, thus far, served her so well. Listen to Witness right now. Released on 9 June 2017, Witness was planned to be a record that lurked in the shadowy corners of the dancefloor. The energy so central to Katy’s work to date was inevitable but, alongside the euphoria of those beats and bright lights, there needed to be cooler air to observe, question and — at times — maybe catch a sudden chill. Could fans stay the course? Max Martin, who’d helmed so much of what went before, supported some of the tracks again, but longtime collaborator Dr Luke had gone. Across 15 songs, Witness planned to surprise from the start: the title-track opener is again dominated by Katy’s powerful vocal, but there’s no cartoon persona to ease us in this time. An icy and insistent welcome, it was nevertheless framed by that trademark melodic integrity. ‘Hey Hey Hey’ offered an intense Goldfrapp-meets-ABBA cocktail that clearly wasn’t going to carry much currency with traditional radio programmers. ‘Roulette’, as the album’s third track, makes much of its 90s house shuffle, though finally offers a few of those pop peaks we expected. It’s telling that Witness’ most commercial cut — and obvious first single — ‘Chained To The Rhythm’ arrives ninth in the running order. It’s almost as if Katy was willing us to abandon her for easier options… testing her KatyCat fans to see if they were willing to stay the course. A tighter sense of artistic purpose That’s in no way to suggest Witness is defiantly difficult. In fact, it’s actually Katy’s most satisfying album so far, but it demands more attention and certainly more courting: there’s no putting out on this first date. Take ‘Swish Swish’, which features Nicki Minaj: first impressions suggest a choppy, catchy dance groove and little more. But across its gentle journey to become one of 2017’s summer anthems, its subtler melody wriggled its way free until you couldn’t get it out of your head. The song became one of Katy’s slickest . ‘Power’, with its neat sample of Smokey Robinson’s ‘Being With You’, was also a slow burn at first — sharing a similar seduction style to ‘Swish Swish’ — but stick with it: the tease is worth the wait. ‘Bon Appetit’, featuring Migos, is more immediate and was picked as Witness’ second single but, despite another strong video (up there with the career-best clip for ‘Chained To The Rhythm’), it became largely overlooked by the wider public. But while Witness ‘ sales figures wouldn’t match the likes of , it boasts a tighter sense of artistic purpose and a more cohesive sound that’s built on the foundations of Katy’s pop formula but decorated with more experimental electronica. ‘Miss You More’ is the stripped-back ballad that, on previous albums, would be drenched with somewhat synthetic drama. Here, however, it’s a strong signal that Katy was dressing this album in a more authentic, honest costume, despite the rather mannered direction of the artwork and some of the more obvious dance-club nostalgia engineered to demonstrate Witness ‘ tighter definition. Sharing darker moments Today’s universal Swedish pop influence is, of course, easily traced back to those trailblazers: ABBA, Ace Of Base and Robyn. Their influence is apparent on Witness, but the album is no pastiche. Few of us can know the real Katy, but there’s a sense that this is the closest we have been let in yet. She can be the life and soul of the party, but here she wanted to share her darker moments too. On ‘Pendulum’ — a glorious 80s pop-dance throwback — she pleads with us to “just stay classic”. It all comes back around, she says. Maybe her out and out pop nous will return. In the meantime, Witness is evidence of the fact she’s not chained to any sort of rhythm or crude measure of success. Witness can be bought here. Listen to the best of Katy Perry on Apple Music and Spotify. Join us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter: @uDiscoverMusic

https://medium.com/udiscover-music/witness-why-katy-perrys-transformation-was-impossible-to-ignore-1b5e4f705836

['Udiscover Music']

2019-06-09 17:09:29.296000+00:00

['Pop', 'Pop Culture', 'Features', 'Music', 'Culture']

Keep on Dancing

Dear Friends, On Christmas Eve we danced. We celebrated because St. John’s Gospel makes clear: “The light shines in the darkness and the darkness did not overcome it.” This Sunday, we’ll read similar news from St. Matthew: The people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death light has dawned. (Matthew 4:16) For those oppressed by the powers of Sin and Death, this is reason to dance. It is in light of this new context of hope — of having been set free — that Jesus proclaims, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” But what does it mean to repent? For some of you this word brings to mind the image of a man with a sign yelling at you, but that is not what Jesus means. When Jesus says “repent” he is saying “be of a new mind;” “change your whole way of thinking;” “wrap your mind around this!” This isn’t so much a call to get your act together. This is a call to embrace a completely different kind of reality: The unexpected reality of God’s gracious love has invaded this broken world. “The kingdom of God has drawn near!” So what does this new reality look like? It is marked by the forgiveness of sins, the undoing of all that has gone wrong, the inversion of quid pro quo. This new reality has its consequences — it will cause us to doubt our common-sense notions of how the world works — but it’s also the greatest news of all: despair does not have the final word. Death has no dominion over us. We need be nihilists and stoics no more. And so we keep dancing. Alleluia, alleluia, Ben

https://medium.com/@ben-dehart/keep-on-dancing-47702a4eef51

['Ben Dehart']

2020-01-25 19:05:25.692000+00:00

['Dance', 'Repent', 'Jojo Rabbit', 'Christianity', 'Episcopal Church']

Danny DeVito Explains Value Investing in 3 Minutes

Although investors generally built passive positions in companies, some decided that a more assertive approach was necessary to “unlock value.” During their heyday, corporate raiders (now known as “activist investors”) would gain control of undervalued companies, sell off their assets, and then distribute the proceeds to shareholders (i.e. themselves). Returning to Other People’s Money, in Garfield’s view, the ‘problem’ with New England Wire and Cable was that the core wire and cable business was losing money with little hope of revival. Logically, the best thing for everyone was to just shut down the company and sell its assets. At the film’s climax, Garfield and Jorgenson face off at the shareholder meeting, where the kindly Jorgenson makes an impassioned plea to save the company based on its importance to the local community. Garfield argues that the company has no responsibility to anyone but shareholders (I won’t give away the ending and tell you who wins). Although Warren Buffett has cultivated a reputation as a benevolent and largely passive investor, he somewhat resembled Garfield in his early days. One of his most successful investments was a little-known company called Dempster Mill. The stock was selling for $18 a share, but the actual value was over $72. The issue was that Dempster was poorly run. The company manufactured windmills and irrigation systems, which was a highly competitive business. At one point Dempster verged on total implosion. In 1961, Buffett took control of Dempster and fired its management. On Charlie Munger’s recommendation, he installed a new CEO named Harry Bottle who specialized in business turnarounds. Under Bottle’s stewardship, Dempster laid off many of its employees and sold assets. It was a huge blow to the small town of Beatrice, Nebraska, which depended on the company for employment. The local community came to hate Buffett and everything that he stood for. Eventually the townspeople raised enough money to buy out Buffett’s stake, which he sold to them for several times his initial investment. Although he profited handsomely, the experience soured Buffett on the idea of liquidating companies at the price of his personal reputation.

https://medium.com/money-clip/danny-devito-explains-value-investing-in-3-minutes-fa4a05f4adc9

['Mike Berner']

2020-11-22 23:01:45.569000+00:00

['Finance', 'Wealth', 'Stock Market', 'Warren Buffett', 'Investing']

Secular, Democratic and Liberal Countries

What have Muslims done in this secular, democratic and liberal country? With you is the gymnasium of millions of Muslims, which the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) described as “floating on the water.” You thought you were nine percent in France and your vote is important in a democratic system. French Revolutions: This is the France of secular ethics given by philosophers and political intellectuals like Voltaire, Vicar Hugo and Sartre. Her revolution is called the “mother” of revolutions. From his womb were born democracy, secularism and liberalism. Religion was made a “bloody monster” and separated from state business in November 1950, and race, language, color and region were waved over France. Secular, Democratic and Liberal Values: Religion had departed from the realm of the empire, and now, according to secular liberal claims, the world should have become a haven of peace. I wish some people in France even today would ask how two world wars were imposed on you after 1905 in the name of race, language, color and region. Men, women, and children were killed in your cities. So many murders that not a single person in all of human history would have been killed. Despite the killings, no one raised a finger against the French way of life, ie secular, democratic and liberal values. Derogatory Cartoons: The one who raised it has made it the status of nine percent or six million Muslims in France as compared to the dictatorship of the democratic majority. All of them are terrorists, extremists and criminals. What a price to pay for the Muslims who live not only in France but all over Europe and America. This must have been the case today for a Muslim passing through the streets of Paris, who would have gone out in the Fajar prayers in the morning, reciting Durood-e-Pak on the person of the Holy Prophet (PBUH), and on every other square, in the same buildings. Cartoons will appear and he will pass by in a daze. Role of European Countries in Derogatory: The 29 countries of the European Union are connected in this way. If you want to come to Germany or France from Norway or Sweden, the whole train is transferred to a bigger ship and this ship lands the train on the next shore. You don’t need a passport, you don’t have to change your car, and you don’t have to change your tax to travel in all these countries. There are about 27 million Muslims in all these countries. On January 11, 2015, one million people from 29 EU countries gathered to express their displeasure with Charlie Pedo’s cartoonists, and forty from Europe, the United States and Asia joined them. Actors, writers, poets and singers from all over the world came on Monday. Among the Muslim governments were Prime Minister Ahmet Ghullo of Turkey, King Abdullah of Jordan, Mahmoud Abbas of Palestine, Abdullah bin Zayed of the United Arab Emirates, Ibrahim Bajjar of Mali, Mehdi Juma of Tunis and Gibran Basel of Lebanon. What a tragedy that today on the walls of Paris, to express their grief and anger against the derogatory cartoons, three and a half million Muslims living in European countries would have gathered one million or even one million, the map would be strange today. These European Muslims did not need a visa. If they had come together, perhaps Muslim sportsmen, writers, poets, ruling politicians from all over the world would have been ready to go there in support of them. Of course they wouldn’t be allowed, but there would be a storm all over the world. If France had stopped them from coming, it would have been a disgrace. According to Iftikhar Arif, Muslims living in Europe are “seals of time” who were not persecuted in their own countries. Nor was life ever too short for them. Someone must have come here at the risk of his life because of the political situation. But everyone else came here just to earn a living. He also came here in search of better conditions in the source of livelihood, not tired of starvation. Role of Muslim world in Derogatory: There was no world of starvation in any Muslim country, city or village. Leaving their farms and businesses, they arrived in Europe. If I began to hear the stories of the price they have paid for this economic migration, the evening of the poor would continue for many days. Each of them agrees that he is allowed to go to the mosque and offer prayers, so this is the worst concession he has ever had. But in return for this concession, the generations that have gone bankrupt have lost their parents fifty years ago today. A psychiatric hospital was lost in Bradford, UK in 1969. The hospital was called the Muslim Trans Cultural Unit of Psychiatry. Especially Pakistanis are kept who come here to earn wealth and when their children who became them and they became rich in the morals of the West, seeing them, their mental balance deteriorated. Families and generations of people are so ruined that everyone hides from each other. Felt Pick up the research reports of any of Dina’s research and read them to your “PEW” organization, especially The feet will come out of the ground. Immigrant Muslims perished, so much so that they became the majority of prostitutes born in Europe, and those who succeeded in abandoning their religion. In countries where Muslims were democratically members of parliament, and if a bill for same-sex marriage was introduced, they voted for it under party policy. In the same Monday, January 2014, when a petition in favor of same-sex marriage was being signed during the parade, 7,000 Muslim activists had also signed. If cartoons are made about such Muslims, then they should be sent, because they consider themselves not Muslims but part of the French way of life. Hate Speeches and Cartoons This cartoon is a symbol of real hatred. A huge banner with a picture of Christ hung on the Mayo Municipal Committee building in Paris for many years, and the Muslims of Paris passed by it as usual. No one ever wondered why this was done. It was a sign of the Prophethood. It was intended to tell the Muslim citizens of Europe that if anyone were to be blamed for your being, it would become so insignificant for us. For many years we have been hanging out outside the main building of the Paris Municipal Committee. Otherwise, what does Asiya Masih have to do with the Parisian lifestyle? This is the attitude that caused the commotion, which led to the apostle in the classroom. The car was shown in the name of expression, and was assassinated by a Chechen Muslim in the Legion of Honor, immediately following France’s biggest start was awarded

https://medium.com/@muhammadtahir3136/secular-democratic-and-liberal-countries-86137836681c

[]

2020-12-01 06:56:00.484000+00:00

['Secular Humanism', 'Democratic Party']

Also on the Ballot: Initiatives that Advance (and Undercut) Democracy

Written by Cecily Hines and Miles Rapoport With the interest in this year’s national elections so intense, and the volume so high, almost all eyes are on the race for President, partisan control of the Senate, and increasingly whether we can get through November 3rd and the weeks afterward with our democracy intact. But largely out of the spotlight of national media attention, elections are taking place at the state level that will determine control of state legislatures prior to the next redistricting. In addition, there are a number of election-related ballot initiatives designed to encourage and increase the ability for people to vote, and a smaller number designed to roll it back. And these initiatives can shape how elections take place for the future. As an example, from 2018, one of the most consequential ballot initiatives occurred in Florida, where the electorate overwhelmingly (64%) approved returning the right to vote to people with felony convictions who had completed their sentences of incarceration, probation and parole. If fully implemented, Question 4 would have restored voting rights to about 1.4 million people and changed the voting dynamics in that key state forever. But that success was immediately met with resistance when the Florida legislature passed a law requiring those newly re-enfranchised citizens to be current on all fines, fees and restitution before registering to vote — cutting down by almost two thirds the number of people whose rights were restored. A federal district court struck down that requirement as a poll tax, but it was reversed on appeal by the 11th Circuit, with the argument that payment of all fines and fees are a component of the sentence that must be cleared. In August of this year, the U.S Supreme Court allowed this modern-day poll tax to stand, disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of citizens. Coming forward to this November, there are a number of democracy-focused initiatives across the country. The National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) and Ballotpedia are excellent resources for up-to-date information on these grassroots efforts, along with the Ballot Initiative Strategy Center (BISC), which focuses its efforts on ballot initiatives that impact social justice and are community-driven. BISC sees a trend in voting rights and election reform efforts, with 26 ballot initiatives in 20 states on issues from redistricting to term limits to ranked choice voting. Corrine Rivera Fowler, Policy and Legal Advocacy Director for BISC, says “the ballot initiative tool is the one that engages communities that are most directly impacted in the political process, to create systemic social change when our legislators fail to act.” In a recent BISC survey, more than 2/3 of voters of color viewed ballot initiatives as “an opportunity to pass policies that help people like me” and a “good way for me to make my voice heard in the political process.” Some of the initiatives to watch are: *Alaska is moving to replace its political party primaries with an open primary system that includes ranked choice voting and requires additional campaign finance disclosures. *Massachusetts also has a ballot initiative this year to adopt ranked choice voting for all statewide and congressional elections. (See ***). Adoption of Question 2 would make Massachusetts the second state, after Maine, to use ranked choice voting. *California will be voting to continue the trend toward restoring voting rights to all individuals released from prison, with an initiative to expand its law to include those on parole, who are currently excluded. *Regarding redistricting, Virginia has a proposal to adopt a nonpartisan citizen-led redistricting commission to prevent the kind of extreme partisan gerrymandering the state saw after the 2010 Tea Party wave. *Cities are seeing significant ballot initiatives as well. This year the citizens of San Francisco will decide whether 16 year-olds will be allowed to vote in municipal elections. This measure narrowly failed in 2016, but supporters like Vote 16 SF are feeling optimistic that it will pass this time around. *Florida remains active on the initiative front this year with three voting-related amendments on the November ballot. One changes Florida’s primaries to the ‘top two’ system, which allows all voters to participate, with the top two moving on to the general election. The other two Florida amendments clearly make the point that initiatives can be used to roll back voting participation as well as expand it. One requires that all constitutional amendments must be approved by voters in two elections rather than one (a similar measure is on the ballot in Arkansas). The second would require that only U.S. citizens 18 years of age who are permanent residents of Florida and registered to vote, may vote in a Florida election. While this wording seems redundant, and likely will not produce dramatic change, it is viewed by voting rights advocates as laying the groundwork for further attacks on marginalized communities. *Missouri’s legislature is seeking to reverse the results of a successful initiative from 2018 that created a nonpartisan redistricting commission passed by 62% of voters in 2018. It has placed a question on the November ballot that will abolish the commission. This is an example, as in Florida, that even when a proposal passes the electorate overwhelmingly, the will of the people can be thwarted. Ballot initiatives, at their best, are grass-roots driven and are examples of true democracy in action. In addition, ballot initiatives are an effective way to create social change when legislators who are beholden to large donors refuse to act. They can also be measures that bring people to the polls, sometimes more so than specific candidates. The ballot measures this year will make a difference in how we run elections in the future and are well worth watching. About the Authors Miles Rapoport Miles Rapoport, a longtime organizer, policy advocate, and elected official, brings to the Ash Center four decades of experience working to strengthen democracy and democratic institutions in the United States. Prior to his appointment to the Ash Center, Rapoport was most recently president of the independent grassroots organization Common Cause. For 13 years, he headed the public policy center Demos. Rapoport previously served as Connecticut’s Secretary of the State and a state legislator for ten years in Hartford. He has written, spoken, and organized widely on issues of American democracy. He was a member of the Harvard class of 1971. Cecily Hines Cecily Hines currently serves as Senior Program Advisor to the Senior Practice Fellowship in American Democracy at the Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, Harvard Kennedy School. She is also a retired senior executive and general counsel with over 20 years of experience, primarily in the global medical device industry. She was the first chief executive hired by Minneapolis Parks Foundation where she led the organization from an unknown entity to a highly respected organization, with an impressive board of directors and a reputation for leadership in its “next generation of parks” initiative. Ms. Hines has served on numerous nonprofit and private boards, and as board chair of several of them. She earned her J.D. degree from Duke University “with distinction”, her M.P.A. from New York University, and her B.A. from Smith College.

https://medium.com/election-issues-spotlight/also-on-the-ballot-initiatives-that-advance-and-undercut-democracy-9943b89d4f3c

['Harvard Ash Center']

2020-10-02 19:00:38.086000+00:00

['Voting Rights', 'Harvard', 'Voting', 'Democracy', 'Elections']

Pros And Cons Of Doing Business In Mexico — Should You Go?

ACCESS TO CUSTOMERS Everyone knows about NAFTA, but Mexico also has a number of import-export treaties with countries around the world. So when investors set up factories in Mexico, they are often not just eyeing customers in the USA. They are looking to take advantage of free trade agreements to export their products across the globe. Further, Mexico’s 120 million consumers make it a promising local market for a variety of industries. Mexico’s 120 million consumers make it a promising local market for a variety of industries. “There is an enormous number of consumers,” said Felipe Dominguez Pulido of Moore Orozco Medina. “People in Mexico have money and they’re willing to spend it on American goods and services… there are more than 100 million Mexicans consuming goods and services, so there’s no company abroad that doesn’t have a market in Mexico.” For example, he said, Kia vehicles were initially only imported, but they sold far above company predictions, so Kia started manufacturing in Mexico to reach the market more effectively. There are a wide variety of business opportunities in Mexico. According to Export.gov, the most promising industries for export to Mexico include agribusiness, airport and ground support equipment, automobile parts and supplies, education and training services, franchising, housing and construction, packaging equipment, plastics, security and safety equipment, technology, transportation and infrastructure equipment. STRONG MANUFACTURING AND BUSINESS ENVIRONMENT As mentioned above, both the proximity of Mexico to the United States and the trade agreements in place make importing goods from Mexico promising for many companies. But what’s more, Mexico has a strong manufacturing proficiency. A factory does not exist in a vacuum. It requires skillful workers to do production and technicians to repair equipment. It requires vendors nearby that can confer with you on your needs and provide materials just in time. It also requires road, rail, and seaport infrastructure as well as utilities. So setting up manufacturing requires not just a building and workers. It requires an entire manufacturing ecosystem. Fortunately, in Mexico the skills and the infrastructure are already in place, which make the country great for many types of manufacturing. According to the US Department of Commerce (PPT), various regions have different manufacturing competencies. For example: Guadalajara: “Mexico’s Silicon Valley” produces electronics, industrial process controls, food processing equipment, etc and is home to the largest expo center in Latin America. International companies include Oracle, HP, Intel, and IBM. Monterrey: Home to over 1,800 foreign companies including Mattel, Coca-Cola, and Whirlpool, Monterrey is responsible for 11% of Mexico’s manufacturing. Industries include automotive, appliances, packaging, construction materials, and biotechnology. Tijuana: With a manufacturing workforce of more than 160,000 employees, Tijuana can get it done. Main industries include medical, electronics, plastics, and automotive. International companies include Toyota, Samsung, and Kyocera Mexico City: A manufacturing hub centrally located by major manufacturing centers such as Toluca, Puebla, and Queretaro. Besides the manufacturing proficiency and infrastructure of Mexico, there are also many other advantages for businesses such as special tax policies. The financial and business laws in Mexico are well-established and well-documented. Also legal compliance can be done over the Internet rather than in person or by snail mail, which greatly increases efficiency. Although the legal environment of Mexico may be unfamiliar to U.S. businesspeople, fortunately there are a good selection of Mexican tax and business consulting agencies across Mexico and the United States to help you take advantage of government policies and to stay out of trouble. LEGAL PROTECTION FOR IP In many countries intellectual property rights have very little protection. Starting production in those places is almost a guarantee of losing your intellectual property. However, Mexico has strong legal protections for intellectual property rights, said Pulido, which can help protect your company’s patents. The Cons Not everything in Mexico is sunshine and . . . resorts. There are also some drawbacks or challenges of doing business in Mexico. Here are a few things to watch out for. AVOID THE BAD GUYS In every country you need to be careful about who you work with in order to avoid being cheated. But in Mexico there’s a further reason to be careful. It’s vital for your company’s legal representative to maintain a good record with the government, and having shady connections can hurt that record, Pulido said. So, if you are doing business with a supplier that is connected to a gang network, your reputation with the authorities could be affected. That just adds another reason to why, as in every country, you should be careful about who you work with. CRIME The names of Latin American drug lords such as Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán have become household names. That leads many people to consider crime as one of the greatest risks of doing business in Mexico. True, in Juarez and other border cities, drug dealers and smugglers contribute to crime in the city. However, Payán says that factories typically have security inside and outside the plant, and they screen anyone who enters. Also, visiting personnel have the option of traveling with security if necessary. But as is the case in America, he says, it all depends on where you travel. Some places are quite safe whereas others are more dangerous. “We work in Juarez, and we don’t have guards,” he said. “We travel anywhere we want in the city. That’s the same for people traveling here from El Paso.” “It’s safer now but, of course, you have to be careful with what you do,” he said. “Just like in Chicago there are places you shouldn’t go because the areas are not safe. It’s the same here.” Ironically and sadly, the day after we spoke with Payán, the mass shooting occurred in El Paso right north of the border. That just goes to show that safety risks can be anywhere, and people should always be aware of dangers.

https://medium.com/ivannovation/pros-and-cons-of-doing-business-in-mexico-should-you-go-3040e7a40d6f

['Madison Betlem']

2020-03-03 16:01:05.598000+00:00

['Business', 'Mexico', 'Spanish', 'Pros And Cons']

Tips to help you ace the PTE Reading Test

The purpose of the PTE Reading test is to assess a candidate’s ability to read and interpret academic English. It examines a test taker’s capacity to analyse and grasp academic terminology, information supplied in an implicit or explicit manner in the form of words, phrases, and/or abstract information by dividing the reading test into distinct tasks. Given below are some of the tips to prepare for PTE Reading test: Before you begin reading the passage, take a quick look at the questions. This will assist you in finding only the information you require Read the passage carefully and try to understand the primary theme. In your own words, you should be able to describe it. Because unattended questions are marked wrong, don’t leave any of them unanswered. Make a guess or try to pick the correct choice. Spend no more than 1.5 minutes on each question for good time management. If you are in a dilemma about how to prepare for the PTE Reading section, use the net to search for PTE Coaching center near me or consult your study abroad consultant for the best suggestions and start today to witness your dreams to study abroad come true. Your instructor will guide you with more such strategies on how to prepare for the PTE Reading test and help you get closer to your vision to study abroad. We’ve successfully assisted over 1500 students in achieving their goals of to move out for overseas education. Our mission is to provide custom-tailored solutions that prepare students for every step of the journey, from application to interview, and assure positive outcomes. So, whatever stage you’re at, come to IOA Global and clear your doubts, or call us at 011–491461461 / 9654544247 / 9971403636.

https://medium.com/@riyasuri340/tips-to-help-you-ace-the-pte-reading-test-5c48baadce70

[]

2021-11-27 12:45:40.946000+00:00

['Study Abroad', 'Pte Academic', 'Overseas Education', 'Study Abroad Consultants', 'Coaching And Consulting']

The Magic of Repeated Eleven Elevens

I’ve been noticing repeating numbers on my statistics page recently. Like the day I achieved 2222 stories. After a bit of research, I decided the number 2222 was sending me the message that I am on the way to achieving balance and harmony in life, which is a welcome message today. Now I’m seeing repeating 11's. Having two stories, with identical stats, seems pretty unlikely to me, especially when the numbers are repeated. I know repeated numbers are considered important messages and I try to pay attention to them. According to trustedpsychicmediums.com, Angel number 11 represents inspiration and enlightenment, just like the angel number 1111. Your angels want you to know that you can now act on the things that make you happy and fulfilled, and achieve that sense of purpose in your life. It tells you to connect with your higher self, get to know your soul mission, and live your life’s purpose. It’s also a call to be an inspiration and bring light to others. First, the numbers bring me balance and harmony, now I can act on my desires.

https://medium.com/illumination/the-magic-of-repeated-eleven-elevens-a5566eaf8693

['Tree Langdon']

2020-12-09 00:55:36.111000+00:00

['Writing', 'Universe', 'Mindfulness', 'Angels', 'Numerology']

How to Determine If NoSQL Is Right for You

Do You Need a NoSQL Architecture? If you find yourself starting a new application or have encountered issues with running your system off of a relational framework, it’s worth exploring the world of NoSQL and finding a tool that will fit your needs. Here are a few questions that can help you make the choice. Do I need the ability to handle big data with speed? Relational databases generally don’t handle big data as well as NoSQL databases. Relational systems are powerful in terms of consistency and availability. If the system you are designing is going to be on a small scale and it doesn’t have the potential to be hitting deep waters, then it can work for you! However, if the application is already experiencing problems that come with harvesting large amounts of varying data, a NoSQL solution will help. They are a handful of tools that can be chosen that will sacrifice either consistency or availability for the ability to scale. Are you storing structured, semi-structured and unstructured data? Does your application involve storing a variety of data types? Will there be a need to store audio/video, transcripts, webpages? Is there the possibility that you could be mixing up structured and unstructured data? If you answered yes to any of these questions, then there’s a good chance that the NoSQL architecture is a good choice. Creating wide tables to store your data is not the best solution, and creating a table for every subdomain isn’t either. Although these could potentially work, a schema-less architecture is better suited for this as every entry can have its own set of attributes which can take on its values. Is scalability important to you? If money is not an issue and you can afford to burn it, then scaling vertically with a relational database will work fine. Buying more hardware (in-house or cloud) will be expensive when you need more performance because of storage requirements. If you find yourself being restrained by a budget constantly or just want to be economical, then the ability to scale horizontally with a NoSQL model will work amazingly! If your data storage requirements grow too much, you can add inexpensive servers and connect them to your cluster, working as a single service. This is one of it’s biggest strengths. Are you shipping lots of data around a network? Processing jobs and queries pass through several servers, providing very high levels of parallelization for ingestion and workloads. Being able to calculate aggregations right beside the data is essential and there isn’t much of a need for a warehouse system that updates itself every night. Data does not need to be passed around a larger network to achieve analysis, as its ability to aggregate and efficient query handling quickly paves the way for a well performing system. If there isn’t a lot of data being moved around, then a relational model will work just fine.

https://medium.com/swlh/how-to-determine-if-nosql-is-right-for-you-6496037e3880

["William D'Souza"]

2020-10-14 23:15:16.735000+00:00

['Database Design', 'Sql', 'Spark', 'NoSQL']

One giant leap for map-kind

How NGA predecessor agencies accomplished the unprecedented task of navigating NASA to the moon By Jessica Daues, NGA Office of Corporate Communications Graphics by Sarah Hall, NGA Office of Corporate Communications Fifty years ago, in a brick ranch house off Lindbergh Boulevard in south St. Louis County, Dave Alspaugh sat quietly in front of his black-and-white TV screen, with his wife and 5-year-old daughter. It was the evening of July 20, 1969, and American Neil Armstrong was about to take his first step on the moon, with the help of machines and equipment designed for the task. “I remember thinking, ‘I hope all this stuff works,’’’ says Alspaugh, then a cartographer with the Air Force Aeronautical Chart and Information Center. “Those guys had a lot of nerve to do what they did.” The Apollo 11 astronauts surely did have nerve, but thanks to Alspaugh and his colleagues, they also had confidence in where they were and where they were going. The astronauts’ journey had been mapped intricately with the help of lunar cartographers, photo lab workers, artists and more from NGA predecessor organizations ACIC and the Army Map Service. Their efforts resulted in hundreds of lunar maps, charts and models in support of NASA’s mission to land an American on the moon. Here’s a look back at some of the products produced by ACIC and AMS in the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s that helped Neil Armstrong — and 11 other Americans — take one small step on one large rock.

https://medium.com/@NGA_GEOINT/one-giant-leap-for-map-kind-6749b3020e22

[]

2019-07-17 17:39:03.653000+00:00

['Nga', 'Apollo 11', 'Maps', 'Geoint']

How Slow-Eating is Healthier than the Fast One

My college friends used to hurry when eating in the hostel mess. They said, “Eat fast. Otherwise, we’ll miss the lecture!” I missed the class anyway, independent of my eating speed. That’s how boring nerves college lectures have. Ask any of my college friends the best nap they’ve ever had. They won’t say their boyfriend/girlfriend’s lap. They’ll say, “one hour of lecture in cool AC”. I am even yawning while writing this because I have some clear ( and embarrassing ) sleeping memories from college lectures. But my dad didn’t force me to eat fast. He suggests eating as slow as possible while enjoying the food. He also says to focus solely on the food while eating — single-tasking or mindful eating; you name it. He still practices mindful eating nowadays. He has been going at it since I can remember. But he eats fast. I don’t know if it has any effect on his health. But when I look at my situation, I wanted to know if 30-minute of eating time is good or bad. Then my roommate told me that slow eating is indeed beneficial than devouring in a hustle. He even dared me to Google if he is wrong. I searched online out of ego. You can also try. To my surprise, I did find some research studies that show slow-eating has been the cool-way since forever. Covering all the aspects will take a long article. So here is the one where I pay attention. Fast eating means over-eating. Especially if you are eating in a dining-mess or someplace where there is a continuous supply of food, you will over-eat because of fast-eating. Why am I saying over-eating? Because the brain takes some time to receive signal of fullness. And if you’re fast-eater, then by the time your mind gets the message that you’re appetite is full, you’d have already crossed the limit. Now you already know what are the effects if you eat more than your appetite. One of them is obesity. Isn’t it enough? You want more side effects of over-eating? So, here is a tip that works. I applied this in my job life. Currently, I am using this in my daily life also: Take a fixed amount of food and don’t go for a second sitting. You know your body, your appetite, and with the time, you also learn how much you can eat in one sitting. The only patience factor is to eat slowly. I won’t tell you to do single-tasking because I’ll be a hypocrite if I don’t practice it myself. I am practising slow-eating since I joined college. It has been working for me since then. Mindful eating is another thing, but since every food is not tasty, mindful eating is quite difficult nowadays. So, yes, I still multitask while eating. But I make sure I am never over-eating. EAT HEALTHY. EAT SLOWLY. Time is precious, but not more than health — this goes without saying. This blog belongs to a series of posts I am publishing on a daily streak. Target-1 was 21 days. Target-2 was 100 days. Today is day 104. Target-3 is 150. Here is the first blog that started the streak. Thank You for reading! See you tomorrow! ~ S.

https://sanjeevai.medium.com/how-slow-eating-is-healthier-than-the-fast-one-70ae0aff0de8

['Sanjeev Yadav']

2020-07-07 09:46:03.996000+00:00

['Health', 'Obesity', 'Hunger', 'Lifestyle', 'Food']

Fandom, Fangirls and Female Sexuality

“And the louder you screamed, the less likely anyone would forget the power of the fans. When the screams drowned out the music, as they invariably did, then it was the fans, and not the band, who were the show…” (Ehrenreich, Hess and Jacobs, 1992) Last month at Brisbane’s BIGSOUND music conference, Pitchfork’s senior editor, Jessica Hopper, gave a keynote address which I strongly believe is essential viewing for anyone with an interest in music. As one of the most influential music critics of today, Hopper could have spoken about anything and had the room’s complete attention, but instead she took the opportunity to expose the sexist attitudes that plague the world of music, opening a discussion about why, after years of women establishing themselves as incredibly talented musicians, tastemakers and writers, women in music are still made to feel like they don’t belong. She spoke about some of the daily struggles women face as both musicians and music professionals in the industry, sharing all too real examples from women all over the world. As a young woman on the cusp of her professional life with an interest in dipping her toe in the music business, these stories were quite disconcerting, but interestingly enough what jumped out at me was Hopper’s discussion of society’s disregard for women as consumers of music. Hopper eloquently highlighted how we have lost sight of the enduring capacity that young women have to anticipate, sustain and add culture value to the experience of music, and how we instead look down on female fans as second tear to male: The term ‘fangirl’ tends to be a pejorative one. Its associated somehow with a lesser experience of music, as if teen girls in all of their riotous enthusiasm are simply undermining the point. Artists are made less important by that fangirl excitement, which is reduced and delegitimised as hysterical or silly, or worst of all, stupid. Their interests are assumed to be based on the glimmering surfaces or their attraction to the artist, rather than what they actually get from the music, or the concerts or the fan communities that they are a part of. Their interests are seen as an adoration that spoils the credibility of the artist that they love. Hopper’s powerful address made me question my own frequent misuse of the term ‘fangirl’ and why I was so easily turning on my own and dismissing a demographic that is in fact integral to the industry. Women, in particular young girls, are the largest consumers of music in the world today and over the years have helped shape the way music is written, promoted and sold. After all, fangirls are not a new phenomenon… In recent years the media has been swept up in a moral panic surrounding the intense and ‘unhealthy’ fans of artists like Justin Bieber and One Direction, but as Barbara Ehrenreich, Elizabeth Hess and Gloria Jacobs highlight, this is not the first case of star centred female hysteria. In the 1940s young women were swooning over Frank Sinatra, in the 1950s they were screaming for Elvis Presley and in the sixties, fandom hit a whole new level with the emergence of Beatlemania. In Fandom at the Crossroads: Celebration, Shame and Fan/Producer Relationships Katherine Larsen and Lynn Zubernis discuss how The Beatles were headline news not only for their musical talents, “but for the reactions of their female fans, whose swooning and crying constituted a rare open expression of emotion and sexual feelings which has been described as revolutionary.” The young Beatles fans were reported as expressing themselves by, “sobbing uncontrollably while screaming… until the onset of either unconsciousness or laryngitis. Girls peed in their pants, fainted, or simply collapsed from the emotional strain.” It is evident simply from the wording in the above report that, although The Beatles were a highly respected band, these young fans were looked down upon by society and their support of the band was mocked and ridiculed as silly and overwrought. The same can be seen today with Beliebers and Directioners, simply by looking at their urban dictionary definitions: While admittedly these fandoms have at times produced scary and unhealthy subcultures which should of course not be encouraged, …we cannot dismiss an entire culture based on a few extremists (sound familiar?). Fangirls have proven time and time again to be dedicated and passionate consumers, they will buy every ticket and every piece of merchandise available and are the cheapest and most effective publicists an artist could dream of. Yet, instead of celebrating this lush enthusiasm, the stigma surrounding female fandom seems to be, not so subtly, reinforcing that the worst thing you can be in this world is a passionate young woman. Why does the music industry, and the world at large, continue to reject these young fans? Writer and Doctor Who fanatic, Deborah Stanish, suggests that there are two key issues at fault. Firstly, is the involvement of ‘fandom gatekeepers’, who take on the role of policing fandoms from people who they believe aren’t doing it ‘right’. This notion, which is seemingly ridiculous, deems there is only one true way to be a fan and dismisses fangirls as frivolous and their enjoyment of certain artists and music as unauthentic. Stanish proposes the second issue is the demonization of fangirls, which she defines as, “the systematic belittling of women’s, particularly young women’s, opinions.” In an article for Apex Magazine highlighting the oppression of fangirls in geek culture she wrote: These petty fandom politics are damaging, and create an environment of exclusion that seeps into the real world. These are the same sort of arguments that were used to keep women out of voting booths, jobs and political office. It’s the rationale that is still used to drive women away from video games, comics, and the Internet at large: they don’t count, their opinions don’t count and we’re going to make sure they know it. Looking back at fangirls within the music community, because their fan adoration is generally directed at male artists and boy bands, I would suggest there is a third issue to unpack as to why fangirls are frowned upon, and that is societies discomfort with female sexuality. Fandom theorists believe that for many female fans, fandom is inviting because of its encouragement of self-expression, including sexual exploration. But as the constant public shaming of these young female fans by society, the larger fandom communities and even the artists they adore shows us, there is something about young women desiring or expressing sexual feelings that is socially unsettling and needs to be controlled. Larsen and Zubernis continue to highlight that young women are struggling to, “create a healthy sexual identity for themselves in a society still filled with mixed messages, double standards, fear and exploitation.” [caption id=”attachment_6653" align=”aligncenter” width=”330"] Society is fine with this…[/caption] It seems the music industry is fine with making young women sexual objects in order to make money, but as soon as they become sexual subjects who express their desires, a moral panic is declared (simply look at Miley Cyrus)! Because then, the control is out of their hands and the reality sets in that female sexuality in young girls exists beyond the male gaze. There seems this social double standard where young boys are expected (if not encouraged) to have sexual feelings and to explore them privately with outlets like porn. But today, in 2015, we still seem to treat young girls as precious and delicate flowers that need to be protected from the realities of adulthood. We should be encouraging a healthy and safe exploration of sexuality in young girls, rather than instilling them with a sense of shame. [caption id=”attachment_6949" align=”aligncenter” width=”300"] But not with this.[/caption] Hopper’s keynote address opened a much needed discussion about why the music industry dismisses fangirls as relevant consumers of music. It seems that for healthy development to occur, the industry needs to start acknowledging and valuing fangirls and to simply stop telling them that they are doing it wrong. Within the industry and throughout the world, fangirls are dismissed as overly emotional or hysterical, but even hysteria is a gendered term. If you look as far back as the nineteenth century, Freud defined hysteria as a neurosis in women caused by repression, conflicted sexuality and fantasy. So maybe the question should no longer be, why is society dismissing fangirls? But instead, is fangirl excitement simply caused by the heightened emotions of pubescent teens, or is it deeper than that? Is this fangirl ‘hysteria’ a product of generations of sexual repression and a disregard of young women as sexual beings?

https://medium.com/the-isthmus/fandom-fangirls-and-female-sexuality-5c325d341396

['The Isthmus']

2016-05-22 01:06:02.036000+00:00

['Feminism', 'Fangirl', 'Fandom']

Lyft Motion Prediction for Autonomous Vehicles: 2020

Lyft Motion Prediction for Autonomous Vehicles: 2020 Lyft motion prediction challenge for self-driving cars Problem Description The challenge is to predict the movement of traffic agents around the AV, such as cars, cyclists, and pedestrians for 2020. At the same time, the 2019 competition focused on detecting the 3D objects, an important step prior to detecting their movement. Overall this requires quite a unique domain skill comparative to the 2019 problem statement. The dataset consists of 170,000 scenes capturing the environment around the autonomous vehicle. Each scene encodes the state of the vehicle’s surroundings at a given point in time. Source: Kaggle EDA Lyft Source: Kaggle EDA Lyft5 The goal of this competition is to predict other cars/cyclist/pedestrian (called “agent”)’s motion. The data preprocessing technique called rasterization is a process of creating images from other objects. For example, below is a typical image that we get, with 25 channels, channel by channel view. First, 11 images are rasterizations of other agent's history, the next 11 images are the agent under consideration itself, and the last 3 are semantic map rasterization. And converting to RGB image using rasterizer includes: image: (channel, height, width) image of a frame. This is Birds-eye-view (BEV) representation. target_positions: (n_frames, 2) displacements in meters in world coordinates target_yaws: (n_frames, 1) centroid: (2) center position x&y. world_to_image: (3, 3) 3x3 matrix, used for transform matrix. Example of L5Kit(Lyft 5 kit) structure for data processing: Having said that, in this competition, understanding the Rasterizer class and implementing the customized rasterizer class has been a big challenge. Hence here is how to select the two important configuration options. We should carefully consider the raster_size The rasterized image final size in pixels (e.g.: [300, 300] The rasterized image final size in pixels (e.g.: [300, 300] pixel_size Raster's spatial resolution [meters per pixel]: the size in real-world one pixel corresponds to. Raster sizes pixel_size = [0.5, 0.5] As you can see in the image, if you increase the raster size (pixel size is constant), the model (ego/agent) will “see” more areas surrounding. More area behind/ahead Slower rendering, because of the more information (agents, roads, etc.) What is a good raster size? I think it depends on the vehicle’s velocity. km/h ms/Distance in 5 sec pixels10.281.392.7851.396.9413.89102.7813.8927.78154.1720.8341.67205.5627.7855.56256.9434.7269.44308.3341.6783.33359.7248.6197.224011.1155.56111.115013.8969.44138.896016.6783.33166.67 Let's say If I used it constantly pixel_size = [0.5, 0.5] for these calculations. The question is, what is the average velocity. In the image below, you can see the average speeds. (I assume that the unit is meter/seconds). I exclude everything with less than 1 m/s. Based on this information, we can select the size of the image. Pick your maximum speed. For example, 20 m/s Calculate the maximum distance in 5 seconds. (100 meters) Divide it by the size of the pixels (100 / 0.5 = 200) Because the ego is at raster_size * 0.25 pixels from the left side of the image, we have to add some space. The final size is 200/0.75 = 267 Pixel sizes The other parameter is the size of the pixels. What is one pixel in terms of world-meters? In the default settings, it is 1px = 0.5m In the image below, you can see the differences between different pixel sizes. (The size of the images is 300x300px). Because, for example, the pedestrians are less the half meter (from the above view), they are not visible in the first 2–3 images. So we have to select a higher resolution (lower pixel_size). Somewhere between 0.1 and 0.25. If we use a different pixel size, we have to recalculate the image size as well. Recalculate the example above with pixel_size=0.2 : 20 m/s 100 meters in 5 seconds 100/0.2 = 500 final image size: 500/0.75 = 667px Problems As we increase the image_size and the resolution (decreasing the pixel size), the rasterizer has to work more. It is already a bottleneck, so we have to balance between the model performance and training time. Calculating the error in the rasterizer Each history position, each lane, each other agent has encoded into pixels, and our net is only able to predict the next positions on the map with pixel-level accuracy. In many notebooks, the raster has a size of 0.50 m per pixel (hyperparameter). Thus, the expected mean error will be 0.50 / 4 for each direction for each predicted position. Source: Github code From error calculating of rasterization file Source: Github code From error calculating of rasterization file Winning architecture for this competition includes Resnet(18,34,50),EDA,calculating error and Efficientnet(b1,b3 & b6) for the code please check this Github repo:

https://medium.com/towards-artificial-intelligence/lyft-motion-prediction-for-autonomous-vehicles-2020-410e58e703af

['Rashmi Margani']

2020-11-27 19:39:14.867000+00:00

['Self Driving Cars', 'Kaggle', 'Deep Learning', 'Machine Learning', 'Computer Vision']

This is your brain on FOMO.

A study by some smart guy called Andrew Przybylski found the condition was most common in those who had unsatisfied psychological needs such as wanting to be loved and respected. So, most of us. In a society where we’re bombarded with advertising imagery to make sure we’re all super-insecure, it’s the perfect storm for a FOMO epidemic. Get your tinfoil helmets ready, kids! Illustration: Jason Chatfield I can’t remember the last time I went out with friends and we didn’t all have to compete for each others’ attention. We’re instantly pitted against the un-winnable battle of a universe of other non-present people who are potentially more interesting. Sometimes it literally takes playing the phone stack game to get us to engage like adult humans. I’m the guiltiest of my friends of this heinous social disease. I’ve done it for a long time. Ever since Facebook and Twitter became available on a handheld device, I was that guy checking it for updates. Checking out of wherever I was to be somewhere else. A scorching case of FOMO not seen by the likes of any other early adopters. Such was the severity, my friends just started excluding me from conversations. What was the point? I was just going to stop half way through and check my phone anyway right? I am also a dork. And who wants to talk to a dork? (Except the Lord) Trying to hold a conversation with me while I was holding my smartphone was like trying to read bedtime stories to a hyena ripping into a squealing zebra. The amount of patience required not to punch me in the face couldn’t be quantified. The lack of restraint on my part was unfathomably rude. Nomophobia (which is a thing, sadly) is the chronic, crippling fear of being out of mobile phone contact. Add a hefty dose of FOMO into that equation and you’ve got yourself a serious social problem infecting an entire generation. This all may sound like I’m being harsh on a seemingly harmless social faux pas, but as I’ve written before in 2010, social media exists on the very requirement of you obsessively needing to check back in and obsessively tap that little red circle to see how many people Liked or commented on your genius photo of a duck wearing a hat. There are two parts to this: 1.) By Design Social media sites know exactly what they’re doing. Peoples’ addiction to them is no accident. Facebook has been redesigned more times than Tori Spelling’s chin, but there’s one thing on the user interface that has never changed- that’s the little red circle with a number in it, hovering over a small light blue globe. The small indicator of how many notifications are sitting there, waiting for you to check. There’s a reason they haven’t changed it too – the human brain. The way the human brain forms habits and addictions based on patterns, and more specifically, through triggers. Triggers are really powerful things. You can use them to your advantage if you want to hack your brain, but if you let them run your subconscious it’s a one-way trip to the above mentioned simpering mess of FOMOsexual. (I don’t know what the sexual part is. Let’s not think about it. But I will gift you my new favourite word: Infornography. You’re welcome.) 2.) The Greatest Hits. FOMO is mainly associated with Facebook and Instagram, which provide constant opportunity for comparison of one’s status. Oddly enough, the majority of people on Facebook and Instagram don’t tend to post photos or check in when they’re doing nothing. They tend to image craft; posting photos of themselves doing fun things, out with friends, eating great food or having heaps of fun at a bar. With Facebook, you’re getting everyone’s Best Of album. Their Greatest Hits. Epic FOMO bait. What’s the solution? Solar flare? Wipe out the internet? FOMOs Anonymous? The first step is stopping the trigger. The next, ideally, is a digital diet to reset your triggers. I tried a little experiment would recommend you try if you have FOMO issues. I wanted to see if I could extricate myself from the lure of the little red dot for as long as I could. I would see how high I could get that little number before I felt the need to click it. The result? I’m four days in and I’m recognising the desire to click it every time it pops up, but guess what. I haven’t been socially excluded/missed out on anything/died. I am, however, still a dork. The first part of breaking an addiction is recognising the problem. Then identifying the trigger. (This is super easy if your addiction is guns.) I’ve still been logging on every now and then, checking on the events panel. I’m still responding to friend requests and DMs, but I haven’t clicked the notification button. It’s up to about 104. The idea that this is somehow heroic strikes me as more and more ridiculous as each day goes on. FIG 1: DERPAMINE GENERATOR The link between seeing the red dot, and needing to click/extinguish it is diluting and my brain’s circuitry is rerouting my attention to other things. I use an app called SelfControl.app for Mac to blacklist Facebook.com and other tempting servers from access on my laptop, effectively blocking social media from my ‘work’ computer altogether. The spike in productivity is astounding. (and sad, really.) Not to over-simplify neuroscience, but basically the habit-forming pattern is trigger > action > pleasurable response. (Rinse, repeat.) The more you do it, the stronger the habit/addiction becomes (the stronger the neural pathways become). The more reliant on the dopamine drip you get from that pleasurable response, the less control you have over that addiction. It gets a lot more complicated, but them’s the basics. The interesting thing is once you’ve clicked on the red dot, the pleasure disappears. The idea of having the red indicator with numbers in it ready to click is more pleasurable than the seconds after you’ve clicked it. It’s the same principle of the study of why window shopping is so pleasurable; The desire to buy a thing is more pleasurable than having spent your money and bought the thing. That’s the scientific reason people buy things they don’t need or can’t afford. The reason people feel like they need the new iPhone. The excitement of the experience of owning it is far greater before you purchase it than after you purchase it. There’s a reason you can’t walk into an Apple store without feeling excited about potentially walking out with one of those shiny new gadgets. It’s experiential marketing, and they’re very good at it.(They also use knolling… KNOLLING!) There’s a bunch more scientific research as to how Facebook makes you jealous and sad in the New York Times seemingly rehashed the same time each year. Without getting too far off track, the basic principle of overcoming FOMO and information addiction is ..Sorry I just got distracted by an article about Bees. What was I saying?

https://medium.com/scotchbook/this-is-your-brain-on-fomo-d89d571b8bc6

['Jason Chatfield']

2020-03-18 17:38:17.343000+00:00

['Fomo', 'Addiction', 'Psychology', 'Tech', 'Apps']

How Cow Poop Can Revolutionize Electricity

There are 3 methods that entail how cow poop can create electricity: Biodigesters Incineration Gasification Biodigesters Biodigesters are utilized to digest the organic material biologically. Sounds like a clump of biology terms jargon? Here’s something to think about while in the shower: A tank with teeth as sharp as a shark that consumes feces to spew fertilizer and biogas out of its ears as a result. Of course, the picture above is an oversimplification of the actual operations involved. The manure (poop) is first fed into a system sink, then, to turn it into biogas, bacteria/microorganisms start to digest and breakdown the organic matter by fermentation. Fermentation Fermentation is the chemical process whereby molecules such as glucose (sugar) disintegrate anaerobically (in the absence of oxygen). This procedure is vital in biodigesters, because without them, no biogas composes. So in a sense, fermentation is the mother of the biogas (while fertilizer is adopted). In short, sugar is broken down without oxygen to create biogas! Because this is done anaerobically, the tank has to be put underground and made with a material that confines all of the manure. So what can be used for this purpose? Concrete! After being put in the digester, the bacteria breaks down the organic matter in the waste. Not to mention, cow manure isn’t the only thing that can be broken down in the digester. Rotten vegetables, such as old lettuce is also a great alternative since it contains a lot of glucose. What is the result? When the microorganisms are finished with their lunch, what is left is biogas and a mix of around 60% of methane. Red flags must be popping out of your head when you hear methane. However, the methane gas is not emitted into the atmosphere, it is collected into an engine and then converted into power. Even though it is a gas, meaning it has dispersed particles that will want to take as much space as possible, a confined pipe from the digester sends methane to an engine to create power and heat. Think of methane like an idle uncle that likes to take space on couches. So, it’s then confined to pipes and tanks to avoid mishap. Biodigesters might be able to control the idleness of uncle methane, but they prove to be very very expensive! In fact, building a digester costs $1.1 million. But the return saves farmers $152 000 a year, meaning it will take about 7.5 years to get the initial amount back. While it may be very costly, in the long run, it’s a good investment in terms of savings. Incineration This method dates back to centuries ago! It’s the burning of biomass (anything organic that can be used as fuel) to create power and heat. The cow poop is firstly dried, this ensures that we can get the maximum amount of energy, moisture/wetness decreases energy potential of manure. Whatever fume that results is applied to a production called cogeneration. Uhh, what does co… mean? Cogeneration is when two energy sources are being produced by one single fuel source. So exactly what manure does! CH4 or Biogas -> Electricity -> Heat There are also some ashes that persist. So instead of simply throwing them out (like the ashes they are), they can be used as fertilizer in farms. With that being said, we can evidently see that this procedure is extremely versatile. Gasification No, I won’t make any puns about gasification involved with manure… But I will say, this method is probably the most extensive. It starts with the poop being converted to syngas (synthesis gas), which is a combination of hydrogen, carbon monoxide and more often times than not: carbon dioxide. If you know anything about syngas, you know that it’s really bad for the environment. Especially the fact that CO2 is emitted into the atmosphere during the process. Plus, the CO2 emitted is higher than conventional natural gases (like uncle methane for example). Syngas is like the person that no one invited to the party because it always ruins the overall ambiance (or environment if you’re feeling witty). Pros and Cons of Each Method Thoughts From looking at the pros and cons list, we can see that all three of these methods shares two things in common: they’re all expensive but effective. Since converting cow manure into energy is still relatively new, the commercialization aspect still hasn’t boomed yet, explaining it’s high price. However, the more consumers that get ahold of this energy source (targeted at farmers) and the longer that it stays on the market, the price will invariably plummet. The price isn’t something that is constant, we’ve seen the decreasing prices of current solar panels already happen. Also, in order to make this energy source more widespread, we’re going to have to commercialize cow manure… I know, that seems near impossible. But, if we just clip our nose with clothespins while helping reduce the amount of fossil fuels that are currently being used for electricity sources, it’s a win-win! Studies have shown that in a farm with approximately 1000 cows, cow poop has enough power and potential to create 250–300 kW of electricity. That’s enough to operate and power 300 houses! Although cow poop doesn’t exactly fit into our society’s aesthetics (shape, size, smell etc.), it’s essential to understand how this may help to the contribution of preventing global warming.

https://medium.com/carre4/how-cow-poop-can-revolutionize-electricity-6e6529042505

['Kawtar Karmouni']

2021-01-29 14:58:00.805000+00:00

['Animals', 'Environment', 'Energy', 'Climate Change', 'Renewable Energy']

Astronomers Just Discover Cosmic ‘Superhighway’ Network For Super Fast Travel Through Solar System

Courtesy: Nataša Todorović, Di Wu and Aaron Rosengren/Science Advances Researchers from Serbia have discovered a invisible structure generated by gravitational interactions in our Solar System, have created a “space super highways” network that allow objects to travel more faster than before. “These Cosmic highways could be used for our space explorations, to investigate comets and asteroids.” Such routes can drive comets and asteroids near Jupiter to Neptune’s distance in under a decade and to 100 astronomical units in less than a century. These superhighways are made of numerous diverse series of arches inside visible Structures known as Manifolds-generated by individual planets and intermingle in a way that allows objects to reach Neptune from Jupiter in decades rather than hundreds of thousands or millions of years. Unsplash By using a tool know as Fast Lyapunov Indicator (FLI), they were successful to detect the structure of space manifolds in our solar system, usually it is used to detect chaos. “we use the FLI to detect the presence and global structure of space manifolds, and capture instabilities that act on orbital time scales; that is, we use this sensitive and well-established numerical tool to more generally define regions of fast transport within the Solar System”, the researchers wrote in their paper Later, they have found the most noticeable arch structures are linked to Jupiter and the strong gravitational forces it exerts. By using Computational models, they found that particles were able to reach Uranus and Neptune from Jupiter within an average of 38- 46 years.They also noted that the bulk of the particles were able to reach a distance of 100 astronomical units in under 100 years.

https://medium.com/illumination/astronomers-just-discover-cosmic-superhighway-network-for-super-fast-travel-through-solar-system-4f3637f2d624

['Rabinder Kumar']

2021-01-08 13:52:35.964000+00:00

['Astronomy', 'Space', 'Research', 'Space Exploration', 'Science']

A League of Their Own

A League of Their Own Cherry Hill West’s girls jumped at the opportunity to make history when the NJSIAA made wrestling an official sport for girls earlier this school year Ryan Lawrence Jan 9, 2019·4 min read Cherry Hill West High School has one of South Jersey’s biggest contingents of girls wrestlers since the sport was officially sanctioned by the NJSIAA for female students in October. Top row, left to right: junior Michelle Bermeo-Bautista, sophomores Skyy Hills and Lia Almonte and freshmen Alexis Katz and Evelyn Santana. Bottom row, left to right: Senior Liz Santana, junior Aniyah Moraza, and senior Olivia Lang. Not pictured but also on the team: Paige Tambussi, Alexa Castillo, and Jess Gonzalez. (RYAN LAWRENCE, The Sun) On a recent Friday night, Cherry Hill West High School’s wrestling team was about to begin a dual meet at Maple Shade, the Lions’ first match of the New Year. Senior Liz Santana wasn’t there — she was buying a prom dress. But less than 48 hours later, Santana represented West at the South Jersey Wrestling Hall of Fame Tournament at Timber Creek High School. Less than a month into the high school wrestling season, Santana boasted a 4–1 record with four pins. The senior is one of 11 girls on West’s wrestling team in the 2018–19 season, the first year that regional and state wrestling tournaments have been approved by the NJSIAA (New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association). In the three months since the state has officially sanctioned the sport for females, students throughout New Jersey has decided to give wrestling a go. Kingsway Regional in Woolwich Township boasted having over 40 girls come out and Pennsauken High School had more than a dozen, too. Cherry Hill West is benefiting from the wrestling statewide surge, too, with just under two dozen female students expressing interest this fall and 11 currently on the Lions roster. “We were intimidated at first — it’s a boys sport, that’s how it’s looked at — but the coaches just made us feel so welcomed,” Santana said. “It’s a contact sport and I hadn’t done anything like that before. It puts me out there and gets me out of my comfort zone. I just face my fears, I learn how to face my fears. It’s an experience like no other. I’m really grateful for the opportunity.” Santana has already been approached by at least one college recruiter about the idea of continuing to wrestle at the next level. Although she has participated on West’s track and cross country teams throughout high school, Santana made the tough decision to skip winter track in order to be a part of the first official girls wrestling team at West. “I just couldn’t miss this opportunity,” she said. “We’re making history here. It means so much to me. I heard we’re going to have our picture on the wall. It’s a special feeling being apart of history, and for girls across the whole state.” “I was going to wrestle in sixth grade but I was scared, intimidated by the guys because I would have been the only girl on the team,” said West freshman Alexa Castillo. “But once I saw West had a girls team, I knew I wanted to join right away.” Since the sport is still in its infancy for females at the high school level, West, like the majority of schools, doesn’t have enough girl wrestlers for a dual meet team. But the girls are regularly wrestling in individual tournaments and have the opportunity to square off with other schools at times, too (the Cherry Hill West-Pennsauken dual meet, before the end of the month, could give girls on both teams some more match experience). But for the first time in state history, New Jersey will host a tournament for girls at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City in March, the same popular venue the boys tournament is held at the end of each season. The girls state tournament will be preceded by two regional tournaments (broken up by North and South sectors) on the same weekend the boys are wrestling in district tournaments. “I think it’s top four or five (advance),” Cherry Hill West wrestling coach Zach Semar said. “If you place in that weight class, you’ll get to go to states.” Previously, individual girls could join high school wrestling teams, but there wasn’t any reward at the end of the season (via a end-of-year tournament) and their matches were few and far between during the season since it wasn’t an official sport. According to Semar, Princeton University head wrestling coach Chris Ayres became an important ambassador for girls in the last year. Ayres’ daughter, Chloe, shined as a freshman at Princeton High School last year. “Wrestling has been going on forever in South Jersey,” said Max Sullivan, who stars on West’s football and wrestling teams. “So for them to be given the opportunity to go to a state tournament, I think it’s great. We might be able to come away with a couple of Cherry Hill West state champs, that’d be nice.” Sullivan and his male wrestling teammates — along with West’s popular coaching staff — made the girls feel like they were a part of the program from the jump this fall, which took away some of the intimidation factor or “first-day-of-school” type feeling. “The first day of practice I was intimidated because you see all of these boys,” junior Michelle Bermeo-Bautista said. “But it was really fun. You learn new moves and then you do it, it’s a rewarding feeling.” “I got my first pin last weekend and the win was exhilarating,” said senior Olivia Lang, a former long-time cheerleader who also plays lacrosse. “I’ve had wins with teams, with cheer competitions, but I’ve never had a win like I did after the pin, it’s just a different type of happy, it’s insane.” For Sullivan, it was a no brainer to welcome in his new teammates. Perhaps they’ll share a bus ride to Atlantic City in two months. “It feels good to be on the right side of history,” Sullivan said. “They’re wrestling in the room with us, going through the same practice as us. They’re in it, they’re West wrestlers, they’re every bit of the Lions we are.”

https://medium.com/@rlawrence_14688/a-league-of-their-own-3ebe7de8b89a

['Ryan Lawrence']

2019-01-09 17:48:30.553000+00:00

['Wrestling', 'Womens Rights', 'High School Sports', 'New Jersey', 'Sports']

Serving models using Tensorflow Serving and Docker

Serving models using Tensorflow Serving and Docker How to serve machine learning models using Tensorflow Serving and Docker The tremendous potential with Machine learning can only be realized when models are put in production and users can interact with them directly or indirectly. What is model serving? Model serving is the process of exposing of a trained model so that it can be accessed by an endpoint. Endpoint here can mean a direct user or other software. Prerequisites Some prerequisites for this process are: Python (3.5>) and Tensorflow (2.0 >) installed on your local system Docker is installed on your local system Model serving process Installing Tensorflow Serving Since you have Docker properly installed, you can use it to download TF Serving. In your terminal run the following command below: docker pull tensorflow/serving This takes some time, and when done, will download the Tensorflow Serving image from Docker Hub. If you are running Docker on an instance with GPU, you can install the GPU version as well: docker pull tensorflow/serving:latest-gpu Building, training, and saving a model For the purpose of this article, we are not going to optimize our models here. We will serve a basic model utilizing a popular image classification model for this demonstration. The MNIST handwritten digit classification dataset is a very popular image classification task. It contains handwritten digits from humans and the task is to classify these digits into a number between 0 and 9. Because the dataset is very popular, Tensorflow comes prepackaged with it, as such, you can easily load it. Next we will walk you through loading the dataset, and then build a simple deep learning classifier. Step 1: Create a new project directory and open it in your code editor. I called mine tf-serving, and I have it open in the IDE. Step 2: The logic is pretty straight forward, first, you import the necessary packages you’ll be using. In addition, you load the MNIST dataset prepackaged with Tensorflow. Then, you reshape the data to use a single channel (black & white) and then normalize by dividing with 1/255.0. Finally, you create a simple Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) with 9 classes at the output because you’re predicting for 10 classes (0–9). Then you compile the model by specifying an optimizer, a loss function, and a metric. For this step in the project folder, create a new script called model.py, and paste the code below: import matplotlib.pyplot as plt import time from numpy import asarray from numpy import unique from numpy import argmax from tensorflow.keras.datasets.mnist import load_data from tensorflow.keras import Sequential from tensorflow.keras.layers import Dense from tensorflow.keras.layers import Conv2D from tensorflow.keras.layers import MaxPool2D from tensorflow.keras.layers import Flatten from tensorflow.keras.layers import Dropout #load MNIST dataset (x_train, y_train), (x_test, y_test) = load_data() print(f'Train: X={x_train.shape}, y={y_train.shape}') print(f'Test: X={x_test.shape}, y={y_test.shape}') # reshape data to have a single channel x_train = x_train.reshape((x_train.shape[0], x_train.shape[1], x_train.shape[2], 1)) x_test = x_test.reshape((x_test.shape[0], x_test.shape[1], x_test.shape[2], 1)) # normalize pixel values x_train = x_train.astype('float32') / 255.0 x_test = x_test.astype('float32') / 255.0 # set input image shape input_shape = x_train.shape[1:] # set number of classes n_classes = len(unique(y_train)) # define model model = Sequential() model.add(Conv2D(64, (3,3), activation='relu', input_shape=input_shape)) model.add(MaxPool2D((2, 2))) model.add(Conv2D(32, (3,3), activation='relu')) model.add(MaxPool2D((2, 2))) model.add(Flatten()) model.add(Dense(50, activation='relu')) model.add(Dropout(0.5)) model.add(Dense(n_classes, activation='softmax')) # define loss and optimizer model.compile(optimizer='adam', loss='sparse_categorical_crossentropy', metrics=['accuracy']) # fit the model model.fit(x_train, y_train, epochs=10, batch_size=128, verbose=1) # evaluate the model loss, acc = model.evaluate(x_test, y_test, verbose=0) print('Accuracy: %.3f' % acc) #save model ts = int(time.time()) file_path = f"./img_classifier/{ts}/" model.save(filepath=file_path, save_format='tf') Here in our code, you fit the model for 10 epochs using a batch size of 128. After fitting, you evaluate it on the test data, print the accuracy, and finally save the model. The code for saving the model is based on timestamp. This is a basic versioning and saving practice and is highly recommended. The folder structure should be similar to the one shown below: ├── img_classifier │ ├── 1600788643 │ │ ├── assets │ │ ├── saved_model.pb │ │ └── variables Serving saved model with Tensorflow Serving Once you have your model saved, and Tensorflow Serving correctly installed with Docker, you are going to serve it as an API Endpoint. It is worth mentioning that Tensorflow Serving allows two types of API Endpoint — REST and gRPC. In this setup here, we will be using REST since it is easier to use and inspect. It should also be noted that Tensorflow Serving will provision both Endpoints when you run it, so you do not need to worry about extra configuration and setup. Follow the steps below to serve your model: First, in your project folder, open a terminal, and add the Docker command below: docker run -p 8501:8501 --name tfserving_classifier \ --mount type=bind,source=/Users/tf-server/img_classifier/,target=/models/img_classifier \ -e MODEL_NAME=img_classifier -t tensorflow/serving Command details: -p 8501:8501: This is the REST Endpoint port. Every prediction request will be made to this port. For instance, you can make a prediction request to http://localhost:8501. — name tfserving_classifier: This is a name given to the Docker container running TF Serving. It can be used to start and stop the container instance later. — mount type=bind,source=/Users/tf-server/img_classifier/,target=/models/img_classifier: The mount command simply copies the model from the specified path (/Users/tf-server/img_classifier/) into the Docker container (/models/img_classifier), so that TF Serving has access to it. -e MODEL_NAME=img_classifier: The name of the model to run. This is the name you used to save your model. -t tensorflow/serving: The TF Serving Docker container to run. Let us test by using a new script in your project folder called prediction.py, with the sample code below. import matplotlib.pyplot as plt import requests import base64 import json import numpy as np from tensorflow.keras.datasets.mnist import load_data #load MNIST dataset (_, _), (x_test, y_test) = load_data() # reshape data to have a single channel x_test = x_test.reshape((x_test.shape[0], x_test.shape[1], x_test.shape[2], 1)) # normalize pixel values x_test = x_test.astype('float32') / 255.0 #server URL url = 'http://localhost:8501/v1/models/img_classifier:predict' def make_prediction(instances): data = json.dumps({"signature_name": "serving_default", "instances": instances.tolist()}) headers = {"content-type": "application/json"} json_response = requests.post(url, data=data, headers=headers) predictions = json.loads(json_response.text)['predictions'] return predictions predictions = make_prediction(x_test[0:4]) for i, pred in enumerate(predictions): print(f"True Value: {y_test[i]}, Predicted Value: {np.argmax(pred)}") A sample output would look like: //output True Value: 7, Predicted Value: 7 True Value: 2, Predicted Value: 2 True Value: 1, Predicted Value: 1 True Value: 0, Predicted Value: 0 Sometimes, the default port 8501 may be unavailable or in use by other system processes, you can easily change this to another port when running the Docker image. Once training is done and you have saved the model, TF Serving automatically detects this new model, unloads the old one, and loads the newer version. Conclusion Hopefully if you have followed up to this point to sum it up:

https://medium.com/acing-ai/model-serving-using-tensorflow-serving-and-docker-492a347eb934

['Vimarsh Karbhari']

2020-12-01 19:32:23.521000+00:00

['Deep Learning', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Machine Learning', 'TensorFlow', 'Interview']

Best digital marketing tips for small businesses in 2021

Best digital marketing tips for small businesses in 2021 Don’t have numerous bucks to spend on your business? No concerns — there are a lot of marketing strategies you can utilize that won’t blow your little marketing financial plan. We should perceive how far you can extend those dollars! Here are probably the best marketing thoughts for private ventures dealing with a little financial plan. 1. Distribute Great Content I don’t think I even need to state this, yet it’d be careless also the significance of kick-ass content. In the event that you can make it yourself, all the better (isn’t free in every case better?). Regardless of whether composing isn’t your solid point, you shouldn’t experience a lot of difficulty getting somebody in your group to wrench out certain articles for your blog. Attempt top 10 records, tip assortments, best practices for your industry, and so on I shared a lot of inventive content marketing thoughts here, and Elisa as of late revised the guidelines of content marketing for private ventures. DigiRoads has the best content writers in Jaipur. 2. Make Instructional Videos Video content is truly important, and keeping in mind that it can cost oodles of cash to get proficient YouTube recordings delivered, there’s nothing amiss with offering it a chance yourself or employing a film understudy off Craigslist. Wistia offers an incredible video instructional exercise telling you the best way to shoot master looking film on your standard iPhone! 3. Get Ad Promo Credits While monstrous advertisement missions might be out of your spending plan, there are regularly limits and coupons coasting around for paid Facebook promotions or Google advertisements. Some web facilitating administrations offer promoting rebate codes as a feature of their participation contributions. Check and check whether yours does. 4. Reddit Reddit, a no frills social organization self-named as the “first page of the web,” can be an integral asset when utilized deliberately. Reddit is made out of a very well informed crowd that shudders at any undeniable marketing strategies. To succeed at Reddit, share just genuinely magnificent content, and post just to outrageous specialties. In Reddit, there are subcategories (known as subreddits) that manage probably the tightest, most explicit interests in presence. There’s a subreddit for lockpicking (/r/lockpicking ), a subreddit for unicycles (/r/unicycling), and there’s even a subreddit for appreciating lovely penmanship (r/PenmanshipPorn). (What’s more, obviously there’s one for SEO.) Find your specialty and overwhelm. 5. Be a Savvy Social Networker Make business accounts and take an interest in the enormous social media locales — Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and Pinterest. Add Instagram in there as well if your business is picture arranged. Additionally, look at this rundown of simple Facebook marketing thoughts for a business. 6. Unearth Advertising On the off chance that you need to attempt some paid publicizing however you’re not hoping to use up every last cent, Stumle Upon’s Paid Search Discovery could be for you. Paid Discovery conveys clients directly to your site, prepared to lock in. What works best on Stumble Upon? Photography, visual resources, and silly content. Unearth is pretty modest contrasted with other paid advertisement structures. You start with a base cost of 10 pennies for every snap, at that point add +2 pennies for age focusing on, sex focusing on and gadget focusing on. You can see the entire value list for itemized information. However, you turn it, Stumble Upon’s paid contribution is groups less expensive than most other social media promotions; Facebook advertisements, for instance, can cost as much as 80 pennies for each snap. 7. DIY Infographics Infographics are madly incredible marketing instruments. They’re visual sight to behold, they’re anything but difficult to process, and individuals love to share them, so they’re an extraordinary method to drive up reference traffic and connections. Employing a planner to make you an A+ infographic can hit your wallet hard, however you can make your own for barely anything if its all the same to you somewhat of a test. In the event that you make them comprehend of Adobe Illustrator, evaluate these free vector packs that give all the components expected to make a shocking infographic. Not certain where to begin? Look at Visual.ly for motivation. They have amateur and progressed models for you to peruse. 8. Give New Life to Old Data On the off chance that your marketing spending it tight, you probably won’t have the option to consistently bear the cost of content scholars to prepare content for your blog. In case you’re in a drought, rather than causing something new, to inhale new life into something that as of now exists on the web. There are a huge load of information considers and details accessible on the web. While a portion of these examinations may get starting footing, numerous frequently go unnoticed. Discover an examination that identifies with your industry and clean it up. Feature the most significant or intriguing pieces of the examination, add pictures, wrench out certain outlines, and make your own musings and forecasts dependent on the information. 9. Parlor About on LinkedIn LinkedIn is a significant social media site that is regularly under-used. Don’t simply add network associations and sign out — join gatherings, go into discourse with associations, and offer your blog entries. There’s a ton occurring on LinkedIn, and it tends to be an incredible spot to advance your content, share thoughts, and fabricate your image. Larry as of late shared a few hints for getting more LinkedIn associations, and here are a few different ways to tidy up your LinkedIn profile in case you’re a new school graduate. DigiRoads is the best social media marketing company in Jaipur. 10. Reuse Your Content Similarly as you can repurpose existing information contemplates, you can go over your old content into new manifestations too! Transform an online class into a video instructional exercise. Change an assortment of blog entries into a digital book. Never be reluctant to concoction your old content — odds are there will be a huge load of individuals who never at any point saw your old stuff, so it’ll be a new, 100% new content piece for a huge section of your crowd. CONCLUSION These discussed digital marketing tips can boost your online business to a much wider extent. These digital marketing tips are effectively used by the best digital marketing company in Jaipur in order to satisfy their customers. DigiRoads is the best digital marketing company in Jaipur which is serving its clients at lowest cost. Our digital marketing services in Jaipur are provided at cheap prices in order to reduce your marketing budget. In addition, we are one of the best mobile app development companies in Bangalore.

https://medium.com/@kirtisingh-16855/best-digital-marketing-tips-for-small-businesses-in-2021-3d9edc0327ab

['Kirti Singh']

2020-12-16 15:24:15.976000+00:00

['PPC Marketing', 'Digital Marketing', 'SEO', 'Website']

NFTs And Smart Contracts

Combining smart contracts with NFTs will unlock a range of use cases and possibilities. To fully understand the potential of these technologies it is important to understand NFTs, Smart Contracts and Oracles in more detail. NFT Definition NFT stands for Non-Fungible Token. It is a type of digital token which is unique and scarce. An NFT is essentially a unique proof of ownership of something, usually a digital asset. NFTs are digital versions of physical collector’s items and no two NFTs are the same. Fungibility Fungibility is the ability of an asset to be exchanged for another asset of the exact same type. For example a $5 bill is fungible with all other $5 bills. They represent the same value. But the Oppenheimer Diamond, for example, is non-fungible — meaning only one real, unique version exists. Digital Scarcity The internet and digital technologies in general created an abundance of data and information, like files or photographs which could be replicated and shared endlessly. For example, if I took a picture of a celebrity on Santa Monica Boulevard from my phone, I could send that picture to thousands of people within seconds — creating thousands of versions of that picture right away. Blockchain technology and specifically NFTs enable digital scarcity. Some data from an NFT can still be replicated and shared but the certificate of authenticity and legal rights of an asset will exist on a single, tamper-proof NFT. NFTs exist on blockchain networks such as Ethereum, and provide a certificate of authenticity as well as legal rights to the digital asset. Smart Contract Definition Smart contracts are one of the most powerful features of blockchain technology. A smart contract is a digital contract where the terms of agreement between users is set in code. A smart contract can also be programmed to self-execute when a set of predefined conditions are fulfilled. Smart contracts exist on decentralized and distributed blockchain networks. There are efforts underway by several organizations to create smart contracts which will hold up in a court of law. The solutions will likely be in the form of smart contract interfaces where the code in a smart contract will simultaneously create a document in plain english defining the terms of the contract. Smart contracts can be programmed to trigger other smart contracts into action or create new events when they are executed. Smart contracts can also hold assets, NFTs and cryptocurrencies within them. These assets can be distributed upon execution when a set of conditions are met based on the code defined in the contract. Example: Smart Contracts & A Basketball Game If I say the Lakers are going to win tonight’s game and you say the Knicks are going to win, we can create a bet using a smart contract. In this case we would create a new smart contract where each of us would put a Bitcoin (or any other cryptocurrency) into it. In the terms of the contract we would say if the Lakers win the smart contract should pay out fully to me and if the Knicks win it should pay out fully to you. When the game concludes and the smart contract receives a signal (through the oracle) that a certain team has won, it would execute the smart contract and pay out the two BTC it holds according to the outcome. Oracle Definition A blockchain oracle is a trusted third party service that provides smart contracts with authenticated external sources of data from the real world through an API. Oracles connect smart contracts with events in the outside world. Smart contracts often need to be triggered by an outside event. Continuing the example of the basketball game above — the smart contract would receive data indicating which team won the game through an oracle, in this case the oracle could be an API feed from a sports network like ESPN or NBC Sports. Oracles can be created to provide a wide range of data to smart contracts. For example, an oracle could provide real world weather data, outcomes of events, outcomes of legal cases, financial statistics, economic data, interest rates, market data, performance data from a vehicle or machine and so on. The important thing to remember about oracles is that most smart contracts are meant to be executed when a condition is met in the real world, and oracles are the sources of data that can provide authenticated data about real world events. There has been some debate about oracles being compromised in case or larger bets, so some smart contracts can also add multiple oracles to ensure that multiple sources or oracles validate the same outcome. So in the case of a basketball game we could write a smart contract which requires 5 oracles to participate, let’s say ESPN, NBC Sports, CNN Sports, BBC Sports and Yahoo Sports. The smart contract can require all five oracles to signal the exact same outcome before the contract can be executed. Smart contracts can be programmed to self execute when a condition is met in the real world. Oracles provide data about real world events through authenticated API feeds for smart contracts. How Smart Contracts & NFTs Can Interact With Each Other There are two primary ways in which smart contracts and NFTs can interact with each other. NFT’s can be embedded in smart contracts and vice versa: NFT’s can be embedded within smart contracts. A smart contract can own an NFT within it which is then transferred to a user or another contract based on the rules and events defined in the smart contract. Smart contracts can be embedded in an NFT to call and access assets within the NFT. For example, a user can access a song which is embedded in an NFT through a smart contract. They would agree upon the terms using the smart contract, pay the agreed upon amount and then get access to that song. This is a process that will most likely run in the background when users hit play on their applications. Combining NFTs with smart contracts will give users the flexibility to unlock a wide array of use cases. Complex contractual structures and agreements can be created. The underlying blockchain mechanisms will make the contracts transparent, tamper proof and auditable in real time. This will simplify and speed up any arbitration process in the future. 3 Examples Gaming: Tournaments in games could have a series of smart contracts and NFT combinations governing them. A player’s in-game items, such as skins, in-game assets and in-game tools can all be embedded in NFTs. Through a series of smart contracts players could agree upon a set of rules that define how the assets of the competitors in a tournament could go to the winner of each round. Streaming: Each movie or episode of a show can be embedded in an NFT. Users can access the show through a smart contract that takes a micro payment and then serves up the movie or episode on the user’s device for a certain period of time or a certain number of views. Art Exhibits: An artist can embed their art into an NFT and create a smart contract in it defining it’s terms of use. Real world art galleries can then access this art and exhibit it on a physical screen in their location, while splitting the revenue they generate from ticket sales with the artist based upon the terms agreed upon using the smart contract. Conclusion Smart contracts and NFTs exist thanks to blockchain technology. Users already have a range of NFT standards to choose from when creating NFTs. I believe that several more NFT standards will be created in the future as new blockchain platforms are established. Thanks to the interoperable nature of blockchains users will be able to transact across different platforms from a single point. Meaning a user could access NFTs and smart contracts on separate platforms from their preferred platform. Blockchains will also secure on platform assets and transactions while providing real time auditability. NFTs have the ability to instantly transform digital art, music and media into verifiable assets which are easy to buy and sell using blockchain tech. NFT’s have several enterprise use cases and have massive implications for media and Digital Rights Management. NFT’s will complement Web 3.0 to create a more transparent and secure internet. — Shaan Ray Helping clients identify and invest in Emerging Technologies early on so that they can innovate and grow exponentially. Follow Lansaar Research for the latest in emerging technologies and new business models.

https://medium.com/lansaar/nfts-and-smart-contracts-6c4c5516d5a0

['Shaan Ray']

2021-05-18 10:01:43.779000+00:00

['Non Fungible Tokens', 'Nft', 'Oracle', 'Smart Contracts', 'Nonfungible Tokens']

Advent Joy

Advent Joy Photo by David Tomaseti on Unsplash Advent hits differently this year. It’s by far my favorite liturgical season (and in general season). I am a Christmas fanatic — I love the lights, decorations, music, cheesy Hallmark movies — I am obsessed with the coziness and happiness of the season. But this year…it’s harder. I’ve been feeling All The Feelings lately. I’ve been overwhelmed by sadness, loneliness, regret, and anxiety. The sadness and anxiety I feel is personal, but also global. The collective trauma we are all living through is heavy. And when I think that on top of the Covid related stuff we’re all dealing with, each and every one of us also has our own personal challenges and struggles and feelings that we’re fighting through every day, it’s almost too much. Sitting with the weight of this is overwhelming. And it’s hard to even catch a glimpse of the light in the midst of it, much less let that light in. But today is Joy Sunday in Advent. It’s about the concept of God as Immanuel — God here with us. We’re supposed to be looking towards and celebrating the Light of the world that shines in the darkness. But that doesn’t feel right today. And I can’t help but think that even the Light cried in the darkness. Even the Light knows what it’s like to be alone, scared, angry, and deeply sad. And maybe that’s part of what it means to be light. Maybe the light we need is less of a flood lamp and more of a candle. Maybe it’s a flickering flame of hope and joy that burns through the midst of thick, heavy darkness. Maybe it’s learning to sit with the heaviness of All The Feelings, and remembering that the Light is sitting right here with us. Maybe this is what it means to live into the fullness of our humanity — not compartmentalizing and dividing our feelings, but fully feeling and accepting and leaning into all of them as they come. Maybe this is what joy looks like this season. Maybe joy is less like happiness and more like wholeness, and knowing that the Light is still here.

https://medium.com/@nicolehankey/advent-joy-d72372ef335d

['Nicole Hankey']

2020-12-13 20:05:25.951000+00:00

['Christmas', 'Feelings', 'Advent', 'Religion', 'Life']

I have downsized to an Airstream, a truck and what I can fit in each.

I have downsized to an Airstream, a truck and what I can fit in each. I have digitized all but two or three essential pieces of paper. And now I realize that, though I am financially privileged- I am not by American standards wealthy…but money….the acquisition of which has been the object of my full attention for decades (principally out of a pathological level of financial insecurity) has rather suddenly become nothing more than an essential means to obtain my basic needs (food, shelter) and useful tool to buy back time. And time has become the single most valuable thing in my life.

https://medium.com/@stephenchamberlin/i-have-downsized-to-an-airstream-a-truck-and-what-i-can-fit-in-each-8c463d6528e9

['Stephen Chamberlin']

2020-12-20 04:07:01.395000+00:00

['Minimalism', 'Money', 'Happiness', 'Careers', 'Finance']

3 Legit Ways any South African can Make Money Online Risk Free

The information I am about to share with you is based on my personal experience, I only wrote about the tips below because I have used them and still using them, they have worked for me so far, So you can either choose one or explore them all, it’s up to you. Tip 1: Easiest Forex Trading on eToro Up until now Forex trading has been extremely hard especially for beginners, but there is a company called eToro, it uses a system called copy trading, which simply means even if you don’t know how to trade, you can just copy the trading traits of other listed successful traders, every time they trade for themselves they automatically make a trade for you. You can choose from a long list of successful traders on eToro, this list has all types from high risk traders to low risk traders. You can even use a demo account to get familiar with trading on eToro. Personally, I have found this style of trading to be the best and safest way for beginners like me to trade. eToro is 100% legit and you can withdraw your money any time. My returns from this trading company have been well over R8 000 in just 4 months. Of course, the return depends on how much money you put in, so the more you put in the more you get back, if you choose the best trader to copy then the risk of losing your money becomes very small. Tip 2: Play Hollywoodbets This is the fastest way to make quick cash online, however you must be very good at predicting lottery numbers; So, for this I am going to recommend this book, I have read many books detailing how to predict lottery numbers but this one beats them all so far, the book is called: How I Make Over R10 000 A Month On Hollywoodbets, this book has helped me significantly in predicting numbers. So far, I have made almost R15 000 in cash in just less than one month of using the methods mentioned in this book. Tip 3: Field Agent App There is an App on Google play called Field Agent, this company is 100% legit. Here they give you missions to complete depending on where you are in South Africa. I have collected a total of R1 690 in just 5 months of using this app. The more missions you complete successfully the more missions you are given, that means more money for you. Most of the time the missions include going into different shops such as KFC, McDonalds, Spar, Webbers, OK Grocery, Liquor Shops and Many more, and then all you do is go to the shop and answer questions about certain products, service or the shop itself and then submit your feedback. Then they take about 24 hours to review your missions and wallah! money in the bank. The pay-out ranges from somewhere between R50 to R200 per mission. You have to make sure your mobile phone has a good internet connection and a working GPS. The Downside of this app is that sometimes many weeks pass by without even a single mission. You can check out the Field Agent Company on Their Facebook page for more information.

https://medium.com/@jefflubisi/3-legit-ways-any-south-african-can-make-money-online-risk-free-2b70249d574a

['Jeff Lubisi']

2019-06-20 03:02:15.195000+00:00

['Gambling', 'Trading', 'Wealth Creation', 'Money', 'South Africa']

Reactive and Template Driven Forms in Angular

Angular Forms Angular is a very popular front-end framework created by Google. Just like other popular frameworks, it uses a component-based architecture. In this article, we’ll look at the basics of creating forms with Angular. Different Kinds of Forms Angular providing 2 different approaches to handling user input through forms. They are reactive and template-driven forms. They both capture events from the view, validate their user input, and create a form model and data model to update, and provide a way to track changes. Template Driven Forms Easy to use Suitable for simple scenarios Fails for complex scenarios Using two-way data binding Lesser component code Automatic track of the form and it’s data (Angular is handling them) Unit testing is a challenge Reactive Forms More flexible but needs a lot of practice Handles any kind of complex scenarios More component code and less HTML markup Unit testing is easy Template-driven form with validation Angular example Importing FormsModule You need to import FormsModule into the AppModule (app.module.ts) for the Angular template-driven form to work. When you import the FormsModule in your component, Angular automatically creates and attaches a NgForm directive to the <form> tag in the template. Using NgForm you can track form value and validation status. Add FormsModule in the imports section of the AppModule. imports: [ BrowserModule, FormsModule ], Data Model (member.model.ts) Member class defines the data model reflected in the form. export class Member { name: string; mail: string; membershipDate: Date; } Form Template (app.component.html) In this Angular template driven form example we’ll have a form with two input fields for name and email, a date picker for picking date <div class=”container”> <div class=”row”> <div class=”col-xs-12 col-sm-10 col-md-8"> <h1>Membership Form</h1> <form (ngSubmit)=”onSubmit()” #membershipForm=”ngForm”> <div class=”form-group”> <label for=”name”>Name</label> <input type=”text” class=”form-control” id=”name” ngModel name=”name” #name=”ngModel” required> <div class=”alert alert-danger” *ngIf=”name.invalid && name.touched”>Name is required</div> </div> <div class=”form-group”> <label for=”email”>email</label> <input type=”email” class=”form-control” id=”email” required email ngModel name=”email” #email=”ngModel”> <div class=”alert alert-danger” *ngIf=”email.invalid && email.touched”> Please enter a valid email </div> </div> <div class=”form-group”> <label for=”mdate”>Membership Date</label> <input type=”date” class=”form-control” id=”mdate” [ngModel]=”currentDate | date:’yyyy-MM-dd’” name=”mdate”> </div> <button type=”submit” [disabled]=”membershipForm.invalid” class=”btn btn-success”>Submit</button> </form> </div> </div> <hr> <div *ngIf=”submitted”> <div class=”row”> <div class=”col-xs-12 col-sm-10 col-md-8"> <p>Name: {{member.name}}</p> <p>email: {{member.mail}}</p> <p>Membership Date: {{member.membershipDate | date:’dd/MM/yyyy’}}</p> </div> </div> </div> </div> Important points to note 1) If you realized that ngModel is added with every element. It tells Angular that this element is a form of control. Just Membership date ngvalue Model is used with square brackets meaning as a one way binding to get the current date. 2) For name, email, and type HTML5 required attribute has been added to specify that a value is required. With email control, email attribute has also been added to specify that the entered value has to be a valid email. You can check the whole list of available Angular validators from here: https://angular.io/api/forms/Validators 3) Another important point is that the Angular framework doesn’t directly use HTML5 validator attributes. When it detects an HTML 5 validator attribute Angular adds a directive to that attribute. For example, if Angular detects a control marked with the email attribute, it adds its own EmailValidator directive. 4) Error message that is shown beneath the form controls is done by adding a <div> with the form control where message is needed. For example if you want to show error message for name control. <div class=”alert alert-danger” *ngIf=”name.invalid && name.touched”>Name is required</div> Here alert and alert-danger are Bootstrap classes. Message is displayed if the control has been visited and name is not entered which is taken care of by *ngIf=”name.invalid && name.touched”. 5) Validation classes are added at the form level too apart from with each form control to determine whether the form as a whole is valid or not. Using that you can disable the submit button and enable it only when the whole form is valid. That’s what [disabled]=”membershipForm.invalid” does in the submit button. CSS class (app.component.css) Also need to add a CSS class to show a bar on the left side of the control. .ng-invalid.ng-untouched:not(form) { border-left: 5px solid #42A948; /* green */ } .ng-invalid.ng-touched:not(form) { border-left: 5px solid #a94442; /* red */ } ng-invalid. ng-untouched: not(form) means select all elements having both ng-invalid and ng-untouched set within its class attribute and it is not at the form level. If you won’t add (form) you will have a bar at the form level too encompassing all controls. Same way .ng-invalid.ng-touched: not(form) means select all elements having both ng-invalid and ng-touched set within its class attribute and it is not at form level. Component class (app.component.ts) import { NgForm } from ‘@angular/forms’; import { Member } from ‘./member.model’; @Component({ selector: ‘app-root’, templateUrl: ‘./app.component.html’ }) export class AppComponent { @ViewChild(‘membershipForm’) memberForm : NgForm; currentDate = new Date(); member = new Member(‘’, ‘’, new Date(), ‘’); submitted = false; onSubmit(){ this.submitted = true; this.member.name = this.memberForm.value.name; this.member.mail = this.memberForm.value.email; this.member.membershipDate = this.memberForm.value.mdate; } } @ViewChild decorator is used here to access the local reference. Since local reference membershipForm holds a reference to the JS object for the form so this way you can get access to the form object in your typescript code. Now you create a member object of the Member class where you will assign the field values when the onSubmit() is called. Reactive Approach Before start need to explain a few concepts formGroup: The form will be treated as a FormGroup in the component class, so the formGroup directive allows to give a name to the form group. ngSubmit: This is the event that will be triggered upon submission of the form. formControlName: Each form field should have a formControlName directive with a value that will be the name used in the component class. Example A simple login form that using a reactive forms approach app.component.ts import { Component, OnInit } from ‘@angular/core’; import { FormGroup, FormBuilder } from ‘@angular/forms’; @Component({ selector: ‘app-root’, templateUrl: ‘./app.component.html’, styleUrls: [‘./app.component.css’] }) export class AppComponent implements OnInit { angForm: FormGroup; constructor(private fb: FormBuilder) { this.createForm(); } createForm() { this.angForm = this.fb.group({ email: [‘’], password: [‘’] }); } onClickSubmit(email, password) { alert(‘Your Email is : ‘ + email); } } app.component.html <form [formGroup]=”angForm”> <input type = “text” name = “email” placeholder = “email” formControlName=”email” #email> <br/> <input type = “password” name = “pwd” placeholder = “password” formControlName=”password” #password> <br/> <input type = “submit” value = “submit” (click) = “onClickSubmit(email.value, password.value)” > </form> How to create form dynamically using the Reactive Approach? Example.html <div [formGroup]=”inviteForm”> <div formArrayName=”items” *ngFor=”let item of inviteForm.get(‘items’)[‘controls’]; let i = index;”> <div [formGroupName]=”i”> <mat-form-field class=”example-full-width” style=”width:60%”> <mat-label>UserMailAdress</mat-label> <input formControlName=”mailAdress” matInput placeholder=”EMail”> </mat-form-field> <mat-form-field appearance=”fill” style=”width:35%”> <mat-label>UserType</mat-label> <mat-select formControlName=”userType”> <mat-option selected=”selected” value=”0" >Admin</mat-option> <mat-option value=”1">Agent’ </mat-option> <mat-option value=”2">SuperUser</mat-option> </mat-select> </mat-form-field> </div> </div> </div> Example.ts public inviteForm: FormGroup; public items: FormArray; public constructor(private formBuilder: FormBuilder) { this.inviteForm = this.formBuilder.group({ items: this.formBuilder.array([this.createItem()]) }); } public createItem(): FormGroup { return this.formBuilder.group({ mailAdress: ‘’, userType: 0 }); } public addItem(): void { this.items = this.inviteForm.get(‘items’) as FormArray; this.items.push(this.createItem()); } public removeItem(): void { this.items = this.inviteForm.get(‘items’) as FormArray; const lastValue = this.items.length — 1; this.items.removeAt(lastValue); }

https://medium.com/@ts-72484/angular-forms-caa5face2027

['Taner Şahin']

2020-12-26 16:17:29.034000+00:00

['Software Development', 'Angular', 'Google', 'Front End Development', 'Typescript']

How to unclog and cleanse the skin pores?

Tired of playing “pore count” in your mirror? Here are some tips to cleanse the skin pores and reduce their appearance in the short and long term. Who has never spent long minutes observing the pores of their face in a magnifying mirror? Whether they bother us or not, these microscopic cavities are an integral part of the structure of the skin and cannot be erased with a wave of a magic wand. However, thanks to a few specific skincare products and makeup tips, their appearance can be greatly minimized. We tell you everything. What are pores and what are they used for? Pores are very small openings on the surface of the skin. They are most of the time invisible to the naked eye but they can become more noticeable, especially on the face, an area rich in sebaceous glands, when they are blocked by a sebum plug (the famous black point that annoys us so much. ) or dilated due to natural aging of the skin, stress, pollution or too superficial make-up removal. Skin pores are essential for regulating body temperature and allowing the natural flow of sebum, the substance produced by the sebaceous glands which help protect the skin. They should therefore not be seen as enemies but rather as companions to be tamed (and to be called to order from time to time). Contrary to what we sometimes hear, it is not possible to “tighten” the pores of the skin (as we cannot “close” them either), their size is determined genetically. On the other hand, provided you set up an appropriate beauty routine, it is possible to minimize their appearance. How to treat large pores? In your bathroom, you can adopt new habits to reduce excess sebum, sweep away dead cells and stimulate the production of collagen, a protein that helps support the structure of pores and moderate their sagging over time. . In order to thoroughly cleanse the skin and thus avoid sebum plugs which make the pores more visible, it is important to carry out a thorough make-up removal and cleansing of the face. The most effective technique is that of double cleaning, which consists of clearing the space in two steps: removing makeup residue and pollution particles with milk, oil, or balm, and purifying the pores with a cleansing gel or foam. Once a week, to complete the cleansing and help regulate the sebaceous glands, you can also leave a mask with pink or white clay (both less drying than the famous green clay) for a few minutes. To treat the skin pores from the inside, you can also integrate an exfoliating lotion based on fruit acids or plant extracts in your “beautiful skin” routine. By removing dead cells from the surface of the epidermis, these active ingredients will prevent them from clogging the skin pores and ending up forming black spots. Depending on the formula chosen, this type of product can be used once or twice a week as every day. Finally, to give a little boost to the production of collagen, a serum based on vitamin C, bakuchiol, or niacinamide can also be applied before your usual moisturizer. In addition to preventing the loss of firmness, these star-active ingredients will act on other issues such as the uniformity and radiance of the skin. Enough to forget the pores that are a little too attractive! How to make pores less visible with makeup? If an adapted skin care routine will give good results in the long term, to camouflage the face pores instantly, we can count on make-up and in particular on smoothing foundations and other products that blur imperfections. These products, real “Photoshop wands”, fill pores and smooth out small irregularities in the skin thanks to the presence of polymeric silicones, including the famous (and controversial) dimethicone. In order to avoid this ingredient, which is often accused of being comedogenic, some brands use silica, agave extract, or oily esters of plant origin, notably derived from coconut oil, to give a velvety finish to the skin. The filling foundation is applied after the moisturizer, on the areas where the pores are most visible, that is to say, the chin, the nose, the forehead, and sometimes even the top of the cheekbones. It can be used on its own, as the first step in your complexion makeup routine and even, depending on the formulas, in small touches to mattify areas of shine at any time of the day.

https://medium.com/@mehwish300/how-to-unclog-and-cleanse-the-skin-pores-8bd219ad78a6

['Mehwish Sheikh']

2021-06-17 20:28:03.853000+00:00

['Large Pores', 'Skin Care Tips', 'Skin', 'Skincare', 'Skin Treatment']

What are Solo Ads and How to Become a Solo Ad Vendor

I will start this article to define what a solo ad is for those that have never heard of the term “solo ad”. Solo ads are a popular way for internet marketers to get their message out to many targeted prospects at a relatively low cost. Solo ads are a very easy way to start earning $50 to $100 per day in as little as 3 months more especially as an affiliate marketer looking for ways to promote your services/products to the right audience. To get started with solo ads it will take some financial investment on your part, however, you will see a reward of using solo ads to make money within a short period of time. To use solo ads, you need to have a list of email subscribers that you can send messages or give free gifts to in order to make these people your loyal customers. However, if you don’t have an email list, you will have to make use of other people that have large amounts of email subscribers and these are the people that are referred to as solo ad vendors. There are so many of them that you will find by simply typing the keyword “solo ad vendors” or “solo ad providers” into popular search engines like Google, Bing, Yahoo and others. If you are relatively new to solo ads and you do not want to waste your money buying solo ads (as most of these so-called solo ad vendors) email lists are useless as it does not convert as it should be, you need to have a good website where you can buy your solo ads. Solo ads are really expensive so it is of utmost importance to be careful where you buy your solo ads since there is no way of recovering the money you spent buying the solo ads. A good place to look to buy solo ads is Udimi. Udimi is a site that has tons of solo ad vendors from which you can choose from based on the messages or the type of emails that you are looking for. The list goes on like make money online, cryptocurrency or what is called as bitcoin, health and fitness niche, internet marketing, business opportunities and much more. On this site, you will be able to read about the vendors, the reviews left by previous buyers and those buyers that were able to make a sale in addition to getting email subscribers added to their list, you will be able to see the list of buyers that left negative reviews too based on their own experience with the solo ad vendor. Another cool thing about Udimi is that they have a forum where you can ask questions and read about users’ experience on Udimi. Facebook is also a good place to look for solo ad vendors as you will be able to read about buyers that have purchased solo ads from the vendors. A second way in which you can build your own email list is to create a simple website like a wordpress site and add an opt-in form to your website to collect visitors email addresses in exchange for a free gift. To build an email list is a whole lot of information on its own and I will create time to write on how to start acquiring your own email subscribers. It is also possible to use either Facebook or Google Ads to build your email list. All you have to do is to create a simple squeeze page offering free gifts in exchange for prospects email addresses. You will then set up ads on Facebook or Google to promote it to the audience that is likely to sign up to your list.

https://medium.com/@bodejimi/what-are-solo-ads-and-how-to-become-a-solo-ad-vendor-4325b319c19c

['Esther Bose Odejimi']

2019-03-06 07:44:43.952000+00:00

['Self Improvement', 'Affiliate Marketing', 'Marketing', 'Passive Income', 'Work Life Balance']

Dancing with Anxiety

Dancing with Anxiety Is bravery — A poem Photo by Scott Broome on Unsplash In the rain finding a reason for intoxication. Surrender to procrastination. Reliving the aggression for a moment. For a night, to fuel maybe two. This hell that drives us to crave blindness. An unexpected climax, savoring the solace. Satisfying the hypnotic lust with a sensual increase. To make the senses, senseless where the hurt surrenders. Disfigure the solution so it cooperates with the problem. Falsely recognized as glorified, when treasured in other eyes. So desperate for security, trades a loaded gun for bravery. To dance with anxiety in such a way, it appears uncertainty has faded away.

https://medium.com/the-rebel-poets-society/dancing-with-anxiety-7b0b9f3cb18

['J M Mantium']

2020-09-22 05:13:13.145000+00:00

['Mindfulness', 'Alcohol', 'Self-awareness', 'Poem', 'Anxiety']

My Favorite “What If”…

I’ve never really been a fan of Christmas. Unlike most people, I’ve always dreaded the holidays and I honestly find this season of the year quite depressing. The financial strain, the numerous obligations you wish you could get out of but mostly, for me, I’ve always disliked the holidays because I rarely got to spend it with my whole family under one roof. The holidays make me sad, plain and simple. Two years ago, Christmas day really gave me a reason to be miserable. My husband and I had the best gift of all to give to our family and friends. We were 2 weeks away from that famous 3-month baby announcement. Except for that day never happened and now I have all the reasons in the world to hate Christmas. The first few months of 2017 were extremely painful both physically and psychologically. Fortunately, the physical pain following a miscarriage is somewhat manageable. The psychological pain though, that is a different story. I didn’t handle it very well… I couldn’t comprehend the sadness I was experiencing over something I’ve never had, over someone I never got to hold. But being pregnant even for only a few weeks was the most amazing feeling I’ve ever experienced. I felt so strong: a baby was growing inside of me, a new dream was in the making. My plan for the months to follow was set in stone. I would study part-time, I would prepare his or her nest. My husband and I started thinking of names. We ended up just calling our unborn baby “Peanut”. Peanut became our biggest obsession. EVERYTHING revolved around Peanut. But Peanut ended up being just a series of symptoms, the most beautiful series of symptoms nonetheless. I didn’t get to carry him or her in my arms, but I’ll always carry my Peanut in my heart. It will forever be my favorite “what if”. I trusted my body to care for my unborn baby, but after the miscarriage, I couldn’t trust it anymore. I felt like a failure and kept asking myself what I might have done wrong. I had so many questions but no one had answers for me. “It happens more often than you’d think. One in four women go through a miscarriage”, my doctor tells me. One in four women??? How come I’ve never met anyone who’s had a miscarriage before? Chances are though that one of your aunts, your mom or grandma, a distant friend or a colleague have miscarried at least once in their lifetime. But no one talks about it because hello, who likes to talk about their failures? No one, yet you shouldn’t think of a miscarriage as a defeat. It just means that the pregnancy was not a viable one. As Michelle Obama superbly puts it: “ I think it’s the worst thing that we do to each other as women, not share the truth about our bodies and how they work, and how they don’t work”. Yes ladies, please speak up. Don’t be ashamed or scared to share your story. Let’s help each other get through something so traumatic, yet so common. Let’s stop making this topic a taboo one. It is (almost) the year 2019, for F*** sakes! Almost 2 years have passed since that stormy night in 2016 and I am still waiting for my bright rainbow. Only now I am not as sad anymore because I am grateful for the things Peanut was able to teach me. It taught me how strong I could be and how much my body is able to handle. It taught me that a storm doesn’t last forever. I might haven’t come across a rainbow yet, but I sure have seen lots of rays of sunshine since December 25th, 2016. And for that, I am extremely thankful. If you or someone you know has gone through a miscarriage, I strongly recommend reading Ariel Levy’s memoir “The Rules Do Not Apply”. But really, it is a must-read for all women.

https://nellydaou.medium.com/my-favorite-what-if-5439e639d0f1

['Nelly Daou']

2019-02-25 05:44:41.437000+00:00

['Holidays', 'Family', 'Miscarriage', 'Psychology', 'Infertility']

Fashion Favorites

Business on top, party on the bottom. There are a million ways to dress. You can dress by season, for the weather, by an event, by your favorite pattern or color, and your preferred respective fashion icon. A great outfit not only turns heads, but most importantly it makes you feel fabulous. This might sound shallow or perhaps a little silly, but it is absolutely true. Naturally, staying home forever inevitably leads to more athleisure attire, and some days even just pajamas. The following is a brief list of some of my favorites, followed by some things I have learned. My first “fashion photo” for College Fashionista. Favorite Fashion Season: Summer. Give me an easy, breezy dress any day please. I am coming to terms with winter. I have experienced a newfound love of turtlenecks and sweaters. Favorite Fashion Accessories: Cat-Eye sunglasses, a cute purse, and a statement belt. Favorite Patterns: Hounds-tooth, polk-a-dots, zebra-print (sparingly), hearts, and stripes. Favorite Fashion Icons: My Mom, Audrey Hepburn, Emma Roberts, Vanessa Hudgens, and Natalie Portman. Favorite Fashion Eras: 1960’s, 1970’s, 1990’s, and Old Hollywood Glamour Some things I have learned: social media has changed the game for everything, because people can tag who they are wearing, you can follow designers/brands, and consequently it really feels like things just keep getting more and more flashy. Wardrobe is super fun. This was my bangs phase. Yikes. Bangs are not for everyone, but for the most part they make everyone look younger. You can never go wrong with an all-black ensemble. I have gone through a million phases, be it “preppy” or “hipster” or “beachy”. At the end of the day, it is really freeing and fun to be able to have any kind of phase on any kind of day! Why limit yourself…unless you want your brand to be strictly one thing.

https://medium.com/@tiffaniesnyderofficial/fashion-favorites-3d18363ec1

['Tiffanie Snyder']

2020-12-23 18:49:12.274000+00:00

['Style', 'Fun', 'Favorites', 'Outfit', 'Fashion']

Someone on Medium Made Me Cry

Have you ever cried over a comment on Medium? And by cry, I mean tears of joy. Well, maybe not joy. But they’re definitely not tears of sadness. The world can be a lonely place. And now, with COVID, it’s become a little lonelier. In the Book of Proverbs (16:24), it states Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones. In verses 25:25, it shares, Like cold water to a weary soul is good news from a distant land. Oftentimes, I think writers are lonely. We have a lot of words, a lot of emotions inside of us. And thank God, we have the ability to express it on paper (or on a screen). And not only do our words hold power, but Proverbs 18:21 also puts it this way, Life and death are in the power of the tongue. Yes, I’m sure we all get the occasional comment that makes us cringe and gives us a little anxiety. Because words hold power. But oftentimes, when someone drops a word of encouragement, it truly is like cold water to a weary soul. It’s been a challenging season for many of us, for a multitude of reasons. And sometimes, you pour your heart and your words into a poem, into a short story, into an article, and someone says just the right words, at just the right time, and at that moment… you cry. You’re not sad. You’re not necessarily happy. It’s just that you’ve been heard, you’ve been understood, and you’re not alone.

https://medium.com/scribe/someone-on-medium-made-me-cry-a17d21c7afbd

['John Ross']

2020-11-20 00:15:00.136000+00:00

['Short Story', 'This Happened To Me', 'Inspiration', 'Words', 'Emotions']

⚒ Upgrade your Hacking Tools 🛠. Upgrade your Netcat, Gobuster, Nmap…

Netcat, Nmap, Gobuster, these are all staple tools in the ethical hacking world. If you frequent Hack the Box, Try Hack Me or any other ethical hacking lab platform, you likely use the aforementioned tools very often. What if you could upgrade those tools? Upgrade may be a dramatic word, but the hacking tools that this article is going to go over were developed to work faster and/or better than the usual tool. Pwncat, Feroxbuster, Rustcan and Updog is what will be reviewed. Pwncat The upgrade for Netcat. In pen testing lab environments you’re constantly exploiting Remote Command Execution vulnerabilities and need netcat to receive call backs for shells. But what if those shells could be more functional, persistent, automated and cool looking? This is among what Pwncat has to offer. Pwncat has all the flexibility of Netcat with a lot of extra features. More functionally because when you establish a shell, pwncat establishes a PseudoTerminal to make it just like an SSH session with history, tab completion, line editing, and graphical terminal applications. Build into the shell are upload and download commands that make file transfer easy. It even doubles as an SSH client: There are also plenty of built in modules that automate privesc from the enumeration to the actual execution. There are also modules that automate persistence and help monitor tampered with files if you’re trying to be stealthy. If you happen to need a static binary, there is a busybox command to help if a program you want is missing on your target system. Install with pip: pip install git+https://github.com/calebstewart/pwncat.git This is a fairly extensive program; here is a great video that goes into detail about how it works: Feroxbuster Netcat is to Pwncat as Gobuster is to Feroxbuster. Feroxbuster is the upgrade to your directory fuzzing/busting tool. Works faster, looks cooler, and has a bunch of features to make scans more nuanced. You can modify your threads for speed, edit a config file to modify default settings, extract links from response body, filter output by status code, word count or line count and pause/start scans mid way. Install with their bash script: curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/epi052/feroxbuster/master/install-nix.sh | bash Rustscan Who’d of though Nmap could be upgraded? Like Feroxbuster, Rustscan is written in rust and for speed, but it is for port scanning. Rustscan is the upgrade to Nmap. Well Rustscan still has Nmap built in, but it takes extra steps to make those scans must faster. Rustscan boasts that it: Scans all 65k ports in 3 seconds. How’s that for an upgrade? Try it out: Updog What’s Updog? You still use python3 -m http.server to run your web servers to download stuff from? Or even the more antiquated python -m SimpleHTTPServer . Upgrade your web servers with Updog. Simpler command, prettier web interface and more features like the option of HTTP Auth and SSL encryption. Install is super easy with pip: pip3 install updog You can launch it just by typing out updog : Here’s a usage example of looking though enumeration scan results from a web browser, a neat trick I recently learned about: If you have an extensive amount of initial enumeration script output like from Autorecon or NmapAutomator, you may find it easier to browse though the output using a web server. file transfers I hope you’ve found some interesting tools to try out next time you attempt to hack something!

https://medium.com/@robertscocca/upgrade-your-common-hacking-tools-45ba700d42bb

['Robert Scocca']

2020-12-27 15:11:16.765000+00:00

['Cybersecurity', 'Linux', 'Oscp', 'Hacking', 'Hackthebox']

A letter to my pregnant self: put down the birthing trainer.

There are women in this world, apparently, who don’t even know they’re pregnant until they’re three or four months gone. They get up off the toilet one day and think — Hello, these jeans are a bit tight. Hasn’t it been quite a while since… Oh shit. And that’s how they find out. There are women who breeze through pregnancy like it’s a mild cold, keeping up their HIIT workouts and punishing work schedules the whole time, and popping out their offspring at the end with little more than a cough. There are labouring mothers who wave away the gas-and-air, who sip a herbal tea between contractions and say — Honestly, I know there’s a watermelon trying to demonstrate the unstoppable force paradox against my pelvic floor right now, but it just doesn’t hurt that much. Well, I’ll tell you for nowt: I wasn’t one of those. Pregnancy came at me like a ton of bricks with a score to settle. I had brutal morning sickness and headaches; I was persistently exhausted. I didn’t breeze, I wallowed; my only high-intensity encounters were with back episodes of Escape to the Chateau and family sized boxes of McNuggets. Not for me the mysterious tightening of jeans, I was at the opposite end of the spectrum, and knew I was pregnant from the moment I passed Go, several days before a missed period even prompted me to take the test. The upshot, if there can be an upshot to 40 weeks of worry that your baby is trying to eat you from the inside out, was that I had plenty of time to prepare. Pregnant-me prepared for motherhood like it was an exam. She made spreadsheets and lists, she researched countless products. She read What To Expect from beginning to end, she even started reading the appendix — an alphabetised catalogue of everything that might go wrong during labour — and had reached the letter I (incompetent cervix. Yikes) when her partner took the book away and hid it. Pregnant-me paid a significant sum of money to go to NCT classes, where — instead of learning how to change a nappy and give a baby a bath, as she had hoped — she was coerced into six unwanted and excruciating sessions of group therapy, and forced to sit around in a circle with several other couples discussing such topics as how they would keep the romance alive in their relationships after the babies were born. (Top tip from our course leader: if you can’t go out for dinner any more, consider ordering a takeaway. I couldn’t help but feel that some of the original aims of the Natural Childbirth Trust had been lost.) But Pregnant-me didn’t do too badly, overall. She drew the correct conclusion about TENS machines (pointless) and prams (get the one that looks like a collaboration between Mary Poppins and Dyson if you want, but if you can’t fold the thing up and put it into the boot of your own car without punching a bystander in the face, you’ve failed). She did not, contrary to forceful urgings from the aforementioned NCT lady, pack a scented candle and a couple of soft furnishings from home in her hospital bag, in order that her child might enter the world in an atmosphere of yogic bliss. (’That lot!’ a frustrated midwife said to me when I was actually in labour, and mentioned this instruction. ‘If one more woman tries to bring an open flame into this hospital…’). Pregnant-me had a couple of false starts, sure. If I could, I would confiscate her credit card as she tries to pay £60 plus postage for the Aniball birthing trainer, a device designed in the Czech Republic, by people who were surely seeking to answer the question: what actually happens if you crossbreed a party balloon with a rubber dildo, and then whack a hand operated pump on the end of it? ‘My dear,’ I would say to the beached whale wearing my face that languishes on the sofa, phone-in-hand, looking for ways to spend all the money she’s saving on tequila shots and surge priced Ubers. ‘Put the Mastercard down. Do not try to prepare your vagina for delivery using an inflatable approximation of a baby’s head. Do not go into the bathroom each night with gritted teeth, think of England, and birth the Aniball onto the mat, while the father of your unborn hovers nervously outside and asks if he can get you anything. You will have an emergency c-section. Your vagina, for better or worse, will not come into it. Your vagina will stand on the sidelines and sulk, like a Premier League substitute who, after warming up, is told to go back to the bench — he’s not going to play after all.’ Of course, it’s too late for that now. It’s too late to tell Pregnant-me not to bother with that 90 minute breastfeeding workshop, that breastfeeding is far from a theoretical subject, and must be learned on the job. Trying to teach yourself to breastfeed without — if you’ll pardon my French — a tit full of milk and a baby to go with it, is like trying to teach yourself to water-ski in a car park with a Transit van and a skateboard. You’re only going to get so far. What else would I say to my formerly spherical self, as the weeks and months that separate us become an entire year, and carry on going? She will not grow old as we that are new parents grow old, she’s trapped in time, paging through Amazon reviews of bedside cribs like they’re the Da Vinci Code and fretting about the possible incompetence of her cervix. Maybe I would tell her to forget about those Sundays sacrificed in the church of Christ the Hungover — whole days when the curtains would stay closed, when only the TV and the Deliveroo driver were allowed to enter her kingdom of peace. Those days are gone, I tell her, as she gapes at me in horror, but don’t worry. I know this sounds insane, but you won’t miss them. You’ll wonder that you ever needed them in the first place, not because you’re more resilient to pain that you were before, but because you’ve forgotten what a proper hangover even feels like. When you’re a mum, you will share a single bottle of Sauv with a friend over dinner and feel like a character from Trainspotting. You will cackle at your own wanton hedonism as you write a message to your baby father afterwards to tell him you’re ‘going for a cocktail’, and to hell with the darn consequences, and be disappointed when he replies a minute later with: ‘That’s fine babe. It’s twenty to nine?’ Right now, I know, you’re looking forward more than anything to the day the umbilical cord is severed, and your blood alcohol level is no longer shared with an innocent. You think that, within a matter of weeks, you’ll be back in one of those dark and sweaty warehouses you used to like so much, competing against your best pals to reach the highest score on The Depravity Standard, while someone else (don’t mind who) looks after the child. But you won’t. The umbilical cord, I’m afraid to tell you, was nothing, compared to the web of emotional attachments that will spring up in its place once the baby is born. These are the ties that will drag you back to your daughter every time you step away from her for more than a few seconds; every time someone plucks her out of your arms at a barbecue, wedding or family occasion under the ruse of giving you a break (I’ll show you a break, you’ll think, smiling sedately as if you are the Virgin Mary herself, if you don’t give me back my fucking baby); that will light up like a string of fairy lights when you look at her, even when she’s not doing anything — when she’s just sitting there in the supermarket trolley burbling nonsense to herself, or eating baked beans one-by-one with single-minded concentration, or snuffling contentedly as she drops off to sleep with a handful of your hair clasped in her fat little hand. No book or class in the world can prepare you for the way it will feel. The web will wind itself around you from the moment the Bundle picks her head up off your chest in the hospital and gives you a look that says: ‘Mum, is it? You look terrible mate! Come on then, give me a cuddle’; its threads will thicken as she grows from a vacant, blinking swaddle-full of goo into a sentient creature; as she decides that the blender is a sworn enemy but the washer-dryer a cherished friend; that cheesy pasta is a rare delicacy and orange segments are not for eating but for hurling at the fridge; as she figures out who she is and what she likes; what makes her squeal with laughter and what makes her flap her arms with rage; as she crawls to the mirror to lick her reflection with unconcealed delight, then busily sets about the task of emptying the laundry basket and scattering the socks around the room. Other people will say — ‘Isn’t she amazing, she changes so fast’ — but to you it’s not the changes that are amazing, it’s the way she never really changes that takes you by surprise, that everything she would turn out to be was wrapped up in that first look, in those first few minutes under the blue canopy of the operating theatre as the doctors rushed around. Wriggling on your chest, she didn’t cry, she seemed pretty much unfazed by the whole debacle, stretching her fingers and squeaking with an expression of stoical bemusement, curious to see what would happen next. For months you’d been saying ‘I can’t wait to meet her’, but now she was here, it felt like you already had, and this probably sounds crazy, but you will come to wonder if she’s always been there, somehow, waiting in the wings; if you carried her with you long before you were pregnant, before you even knew that you wanted her, even in the days when you believed you might never have her and be happy, she was there; and maybe that’s the reason why every time her eyes catch yours it’s the first time again, in a lot of ways, and you think: of course, it’s you. I’ve known you all along.

https://medium.com/the-millennial-mothers-guide/a-letter-to-my-pregnant-self-put-down-the-birthing-trainer-69ec045fa799

['Lisa Key']

2020-05-16 16:00:22.796000+00:00

['Motherhood', 'UK', 'Birth', 'Humour', 'Baby']

Ref structs in async methods

Today, I had the chance to review a pull request of a colleague at work, containing code along these lines: private async Task<CustomType> DoStuff(byte[] src) { var data = Task.WaitSafe(() => { var utf8Reader = new Utf8JsonReader(src); return Task.FromResult(JsonSerializer.Deserialize<CustomType>(ref utf8Reader)); }); // Some proper tasks to await here, just use some imagination :) await Task.CompletedTask; return data; } (Note that Task.WaitSafe is a custom method we use, containing some Task.Run(…).Result, as well as exception handling.You get the point 😉) I thought that this looks kind of weird. Given that this part of the JsonSerializer API is synchronous, why wouldn’t you just run it as such? So I went ahead and tried something I thought was quite obvious before proposing a solution: private async Task<CustomType> DoStuff(byte[] src) { var utf8Reader = new Utf8JsonReader(src); var data = JsonSerializer.Deserialize<CustomType>(ref utf8Reader); // Some proper tasks to await here, just use some imagination :) await Task.CompletedTask; return data; } Well, here is what Visual Studio has to say about this: I thought, huh, I do remember this. in, out and ref are not allowed in an async context. So here is my proposed solution with a local function: private async Task<CustomType> DoStuff(byte[] src) { CustomType Deserialize(byte[] source) { var utf8Reader = new Utf8JsonReader(source); return JsonSerializer.Deserialize<CustomType>(ref utf8Reader); } var data = Deserialize(src); // Some proper tasks to await here, just use some imagination :) await Task.CompletedTask; return data; } Cool, this works. However, on my way back to the parking lot after work, I couldn’t find peace thinking about the why. So I spent my evening reading up and experimenting around a bit with sharplab, until I figured it out. The problem lies in the Utf8JsonReader type, which is a ref struct. The problem with ref structs can be found here: MSDN Article. Essentially, a ref struct is not allowed to be a field of a class. Why does this matter in an async context? Because the compiler converts an async method to a class, and all local variables are turned into a field, essentially. Here’s a short example: static async Task Main(string[] args) { var myVariable = 5; await Task.CompletedTask; Console.WriteLine(myVariable); } Turns into: And there we have it. Given that the compiler turns local variables into fields, and we just learned that ref structs cannot be fields, this is not possible. Feel free to check it out yourself over at Sharplab

https://medium.com/@stefansch/ref-structs-in-async-methods-9949723020f8

['Stefan Daniel Schranz']

2020-12-17 09:35:03.377000+00:00

['Asyncawait', 'Csharp']

When Your Ideas Are Too Abstract

When Your Ideas Are Too Abstract And your writing doesn’t give value Photo by Billy Huynh on Unsplash I recently had a friend give feedback on why a piece of my writing didn’t do well. The feedback was this: Your ideas are too abstract, out of touch, and not grounded in reality. There was no actionable examples or advice, just a wrestling of spiritual ideas. My abstract ideas didn’t add value to my reader. It was too theoretical. The writing was nice, but there was nothing new and no takeaways for the reader. Needless to say, the feedback didn’t feel very good. The Merriam-Webster dictionary does not define “abstract” in a positive light, with definitions like “insufficiently factual” and “difficult to understand”. One definition even defines abstract as having “little or no attempt at pictorial representation or narrative content.” For example, think about relationship advice. Too often isn’t actionable. Buzzwords like “trust’ and “communication” are thrown around like they’re the holy grail, and it’s not like they’re not important words of advice, but everyone’s heard them before. What do trust and communication look like in different contexts? What are actionable ways to build trust and communication? I have come around to the idea that readers read for value, and I do as well. If a piece of writing doesn’t have any value, it’s less likely to be compelling — and I’m a very stream-of-consciousness, get everything off my chest kind of writer. I have a confessional style that doesn’t always translate to actionable takeaways. I write a lot of abstract content. I write a lot about my faith — and when you’re writing about Bible verses and God, it’s really difficult for your writing not to be abstract until you start applying examples. I write a lot about spiritual beliefs and ideas — how is that not abstract? I wrestle with the idea that every concept needs an application. Who am I, after all, to tell you how to apply your faith or spiritual beliefs to your life? I’m nobody and needing to make abstractions more practical is something I seriously struggle with because I believe every person should have the right to their own interpretation or decision-making. However, it’s a middle ground. If your head is all in the clouds and you’re debating theory, well, who’s the person that needs to be actually doing? That’s how I make my peace with political arguments, for example. Sometimes, arguments are too much talking, debating, and yelling, but not enough doing. We wrestle with ideas, and yet in my personal observations, the difference between how someone thinks and believes versus how they behave and act towards others can be very different. So it’s the interplay between theory versus practice. You need both — but when is it too much theory, and not enough practice? For example, I, as a liberal, can debate a conservative for hours about whether it’s better to have small government or big government, or whether we should have a regressive versus a progressive tax system. At a certain point, however, you just have to take action. To seriously help a community or people in need, I might work on a clean-up project like I did last week, help friends move, give to someone who is in need, or donate. I’m sure the same conservative I’m debating the size of government with might do the same. We might not donate to the same charities or nonprofit organizations, but in action, we agree on the same methodology to help. When my ideas are too abstract, I have to ground myself more in the real world. Many people have different ideas than I do, and they believe abstract ideas are boring because there are no visuals. A big company rebranding with a new logo or different delivery vans has a very practical rebrand. If the idea of the rebrand stays in the abstract, it’s never going to happen. John Spacey at Simplicable also says that abstract ideas fail because everyone is doing it. In the business world, Spacey says that “business buzzwords are overused abstractions.” Abstractions tend to just be noise because they are overused and can come off as generic. If abstractions by themselves have no value to readers, how can I and other abstraction-minded people turn abstract ideas into valuable content? Well, for one, action— people want to know how to apply a novel idea even if I personally want to allow room for ambiguity and interpretation. For example, the late John Lewis’s quote: “freedom is not a state; it is an act...[it] is the continuous action we all take” is an absolutely beautiful and galvanizing quote. But what can we do about it? How can we apply it for those energized by Lewis’s inspiration? For one, we can vote. We can protest. We can write to our legislators about what we want to see happen, and we can donate to causes we believe in, and, if we’re willing to risk enough, we might be willing to leave a dissatisfying and meaningless job for one that makes a difference for the future of the country. I’d seen several people change careers from bartenders or business executives into a more fulfilling and altruistic career in teaching, being galvanized by Civil Rights era heroes like John Lewis. At the end of the day, however, it’s a balance; the best and most valuable content is likely a mixture of abstract and concrete. In psychology, an abstract object might be the sport of basketball. A concrete object would be a basketball game. It is the game that excites us more than the concept. According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, one proposal for what makes an object abstract is if it lacks any causal powers, or the ability to make any tangible impact. I, however, struggle as a writer with that balance between abstract and concrete. Relaxing is a very abstract concept. But you need, well, concrete things to relax. You might need a couch, bed, or water. Those are concrete matters. What does that mean for faith? Is God concrete or abstract? I don’t know the answers to a lot of those questions and I might have just taken myself on an emotional whirlwind. But I know I’m not alone. I have seen politicians my entire life stress abstract concepts like justice, peace, unity, and love. However, I’ve rarely seen politicians explaining how they’re going to pursue these benevolent abstract concepts. I’m no different in my personal life. I have spent this whole summer thinking and stressing about “becoming a better teacher than I was my first year.” Do you want to know a secret? I haven’t thought, for a second, of how I’m going to be a better teacher, but now that I think more about it, it starts with some mashup of setting boundaries between work and my personal life, documenting phone calls, supplementary aids, and services more consistently rather than at the last minute, and grading more consistently. Using a stopwatch while teaching will stop me from getting off track. Abstract theory is inspiration. Abstract theory is motivation. And that means abstract theory is important — I wanted to teach because I wanted to make a difference in educational inequity and get kids to believe in themselves. If I didn't have those theoretical ideas, I wouldn’t have become a teacher. Theory, however, is just the start. Next comes the implementation. I want to become a better writer — but to make that goal concrete, I should probably use less theory and more practical examples.

https://medium.com/inspired-writer/when-your-ideas-are-too-abstract-3bd08d030f11

['Ryan Fan']

2020-08-24 05:40:32.251000+00:00

['Mindfulness', 'Self', 'Philosophy', 'Ideas', 'Writing']

How to pick the right data chart

PowerPoint offers a vaste number of options for designing a data chart. Which one should you choose? Here are some of the guidelines I use: A ranking by size: horizontal bar Development over time with a handful of data points: column, if there are many data points a (fat) line Decomposition of something in its parts: a waterfall (see a post on how to make waterfalls charts ), waterfalls also work great to visualize 1 year of a Profit & Loss statement ), waterfalls also work great to visualize 1 year of a Profit & Loss statement Showing something as a % of the total: a pie chart if it is one year/period, a series of 100% columns if it is a trend over time. Data has multiple messages. In the analysis phase of your work, you need to study all of them. But when you are ready to present conclusions, you pick the one and only message that is worth emphasizing. If you cannot settle on one, make 2 charts and present them quickly after each other: the market grew [click], our market share increased. If things get really complex, for example when there are 3 or more factors driving change going into difference directions, you might have to resort to a source-of-change waterfall chart, followed by a data chart that highlights each of the trends individually.

https://medium.com/slidemagic/how-to-pick-the-right-data-chart-c27e9edb8bb2

['Jan Schultink']

2016-12-27 08:40:14.445000+00:00

['Data Visualization', 'PowerPoint', 'Presentation Design']

Coronavirus Exposes Existing Trends

Riggs Eckelberry reports weekly on issues facing the water industry. In this report, he tells us how to read the impact that an economy impacted by Coronavirus will have on the trillion-dollar water industry. To watch him live, sign up at www.originclear.com/ceo. Trending Now Coronavirus is the big news of the day. Many companies are reacting towards it by halting operations and restricting employee travel assignments. For example, Nestlé, the world’s biggest food company, has asked all of its 291,000 employees not to travel until at least mid-March. Not only they, but other large corporations are pulling back. As air travel is being discouraged, other forms of communication are taking off. In fact, I use the Zoom platform to deliver my weekly live briefings. A month ago, their stock was about $75, and now it’s nearly double at over $115. So… the real world is being reflected in the stock market. What’s happening? How can an investor find a way forward? Well, I went to Sam’s Club the other day, because I needed something that same day. Normally, I would order this item online but I needed it that day, so I opted to physically go to the store. That’s when the broader scope of this situation hit me: most people aren’t going to be coming to these big stores because of the Coronavirus epidemic. Not just big stores but, theaters, conventions centers, restaurants, all are being affected. Even the World Cup of skiing, being held in Italy in mid-March, has now chosen to ban casual spectators. The truth is, this event is just reinforcing existing trends: from marketing and shopping to communication and entertainment. Sewage Systems and Fecal Matter What does any of this have to do with water? I’m sure you saw the headlines about the multiple sewer line breaks in Ft Lauderdale, that caused one Pennsylvania man to cancel his plans to retire there. In Alabama, where we’re saving a trailer park from its water treatment problems (and there are thousands of those), 34% of residents taking part in a 2017 study tested positive for hookworm─a parasite that people contract by walking barefoot through soil contaminated with fecal matter. Johnny Depp has done an amazing film about toxic waste: “Places so toxic they threatened any life that enters them.” That is a failure of waste water management on a giant scale. What’s going on? Simple: local governments can’t pay for the infrastructure to keep up with sewer demands. As I related in my weekly briefing of 20 February, it’s been going on now, at a national level, since 1960. Here’s the graph from our friends at Lux Research: Webinar: Closing the Loop: The Future of Decentralized Water (Lux Research. JUNE 26, 2016) Even when the funds exist, big projects just aren’t happening. For example, San Diego’s landmark water recycling project is delayed. Why? Because there are major union problems. Big projects in this day and age suffer from an already developed landscape and very high labor costs. And of course, you have NIMBY, “not in my backyard”. Go ahead and try and locate a sewage plant anywhere near where people live. The general story is that things are falling apart in sewage and the big systems just aren’t being built. Won’t be, really. As things begin to fall apart in the center, the people at the edge still need their water treated. And there lies the trend, the trend that is accelerating. Well actually, there are two. Both these trends have been going on for decades, but now they are accelerating. Big Trend One: Decentralization. Industries doing their own water treatment, mostly because central systems are increasingly failing. Our own Dan Early started seeing these on-site projects two decades ago. Now, like the brewery that had to build its own water treatment plant, they are commonplace. Big Trend Two: Maintenance. When you don’t invest in new systems, you have to spend more to maintain the old. This isn’t a new trend — as you saw in the graph earlier, we have seen Operation and Maintenance (O&M) costs rise by more than seven times since 1960. We will see much more spending on refurbishment and maintenance, to keep those old systems running longer. But all this must be done at a lower price with higher quality. That’s the other big trend: lower cost, higher quality. Standard design = lower cost, shorter install time At OriginClear, we were recently able to slash the price of our pump and lifting stations. We did this by standardizing their design, eliminating both the extra cost and the delay of customized systems. And we have the quality advantage of our modular design, and our Structurally Reinforced Thermoplastic (SRTP) material boasting a lifecycle of up to 100 years. (Protected by five patents.) Cities Mandating Modular Pump Stations I’ve got an email here from Dan Early, our guru. I am not going to name names, but he says here, “I just hung up on the phone after speaking with a certain water company and this water company was following up on a mandate from this particular city in the Mid-Atlantic region that has instructed their consultant to start working on budgeting and design for a packaged pump station using our structurally reinforced thermoplastic, or SRTP material.” Modular Water Systems™ Structurally Reinforced Thermoplastic systems (SRTP) are built with non-corrosive reinforced plastics with a lifespan as great as 100 years. Pictured: a Dan Early design using SRTP. “The city will no longer use any concrete structures for their pump stations, too expensive to maintain and replace every 20 years. The city was aware of what we do and instructed their consultant to start work in that direction. The consultant called the water company, which called us. The key message is that the city is going to adopt this SRTP standard moving forward. This is a huge deal because once the first locality does this, the rest of the Mid-Atlantic region, will follow suit.” Then, as Dan says, “It spreads from there to other regions.” So─lower prices, much higher quality. That’s what is winning in the marketplace. And water is no exception. Water Autonomy™ for businesses and industry is a megatrend that is accelerating like everything else in this winner-loser economy. OriginClear is moving quickly to take full advantage of it.

https://medium.com/@originclear/coronavirus-exposes-existing-trends-b4499c036364

['Originclear - Total Outsourced Water']

2020-03-11 19:02:33.943000+00:00

['Wastewater', 'Investment Research', 'Investment Opportunities', 'Investing', 'Investors']

I Made a Switch & Didn’t Electrocute Myself

“Electricity is really just organized lightning.” ― George Carlin Photo by Author I was simultaneously excited and intimidated to get my hands on an electronics kit and an Arduino board. I tend to accidentally shock myself on the most ridiculous things and I’m a regular, casual victim of static, so I was a bit hesitant to start working with circuits and physical electronics. Regardless, the realm of physical computing creates incredible art installations. Learning to manipulate LEDs and things like that is very interesting to me, so I’m eager to leap into this world. For this first experiment, my goal was just to make a switch to activate the LED in a unique way. I’m excited to see how this can lead to creative projects in the near future. For this first challenge to make a switch with a unique interface and unusual affordance, I decided to be ironic. “Enthusiasm is the electricity of life. How do you get it? You act enthusiastic until you make it a habit.” ― Gordon Parks I took two very small wooden plaques that I had leftover from a different project; I’m using these pieces of wood and engraving poetry on them, but since it’s a natural made item rather than a manufactured product, many of the pieces of wood are of nonstandard sizes. I had a few that were too small to print poems on, so I decided to repurpose them with some fun, thematically appropriate text. In my infinite wisdom as a writer, I was very scholarly and proper with the words I selected. I made one say “Zap!” and the other say “Bzzt!” My main focus here was to create something that would function for this little test and still be fun, ironic, and unique to me. After a bit of assembly and tin foil, the apparatus worked. “So many lights you’d think we were living in a constellation.” ― Jodi Lynn Anderson, Midnight at the Electric Which is how I feel when I’m in the city at night sometimes, but in reality, I’m just working with one humble little LED going into my breadboard. Once I finished the engraving on these two wooden pieces on the Epilog Mini laser cutter at the NYU Makerspace, I recorded this little demo video showing my sole LED lighting up. This was a fun little task and I’m pleasantly surprised that I got everything working on the first try. I never pictured myself experimenting with electronics like this, but it’s fun to jump into.

https://medium.com/@sleeplessauthor/i-made-a-switch-didnt-electrocute-myself-753465711c64

['Leigh Fisher']

2020-11-04 19:25:43.760000+00:00

['Electronics', 'Creativity', 'Art', 'Technology', 'Physical Computing']

7 Tips for a Successful Canadian Payroll Year-End

As we close out a monumental year for change in business and our ways of life. Somethings have remained a constant — payroll and taxes. With the new changes to the end-of-year process and taxes related to COVID-19, do keep your eyes open for updates from the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA). However, to ensure you are making the most of the information we have put together 7 key items to get you started, and don’t forget to download the checklist to help you have a smooth Payroll Year-End. 7 Tips for a Successful Payroll Year-End Download, print and review the 2020 Year-End checklist. Make sure to update your payroll software, if applicable, with the new tax tables. Familiarize yourself with new source deductions, changes in the minimum wage and other payroll changes. Educate employees and send communications on Year-End related changes and activities (i.e. the effect of 27 pay periods if applicable) Print and share payroll calendar with important dates (i.e. stat holidays, pay periods) and deadlines — We have created one page on Canadian Holidays for your reference, 2021 Canadian Important Dates Calendar. Don’t forget to check other legislative updates (Provincial and Federal that will affect payroll) Use tools such as Payroll Deductions Online Calculator (PDOC) to calculate federal, provincial (except for Quebec), and territorial payroll deductions. We are here to assist you with your business and payroll needs, (and we are all working to traverse the new payroll landscape with the changes due to COVID-19. We hope with these added guides you will find payroll year-end significantly less stressful. ) Together we can make sure our employees are paid accurately and on time. Additional Resources Originally published at https://www.baass.com

https://medium.com/@baassbusinesssolutions/7-tips-for-a-successful-canadian-payroll-year-end-f85577db469c

['Baass Business Solutions']

2020-12-23 21:38:40.390000+00:00

['Taxes', 'Payroll', 'Tips', 'Canada', 'Canadian Payroll']

What Half of America Choosing Trump Again Taught Me

What Half of America Choosing Trump Again Taught Me milwaukeeindependent.com I needed no more evidence that the United States was its own antonym. Nor that this country is an old oak with rotted roots of racism. What I didn’t possess strong knowledge of was it being possibly more misogynistic than racist. 2016 taught me that. Americans had to grin and bear a biracial president in the White House for eight years. A whole woman sitting on the throne appeared to take national progression a bit too far. Clearly, the U.S.A. preferred a novice at the helm. Oh, and not just any novice — a crude, inarticulate former reality TV star with Twitter thumbs. Four years later and the United States has received exactly what it deserved: a brutal reminder that nations should be run by studious thought leaders and strategists who have a genuine concern for human beings. The 2020 election proved that on a macro scale the reminder was a success. On a micro level, though, it failed. The lion’s share of the reminded never wanted Trump in the first place. Those who voted for Trump four years ago — even after an alleged collusion with Russia, lack of transparency with taxes, revolving door of an administration and inexcusable failure during a pandemic — were repeat offenders. This told me that America isn’t any smarter today than it was in 2016. After such an uncomfortably transformative and educational 2020, this nation is still a global leader in falling for the banana in the tailpipe. The proof is in how Trump worked over Florida. Man, that was intoxicating theater. Two parts lower tax promise and lie topped off with Biden slander had those COVID disbelievers stumbling to the booths singing expired Flo Rida hits. The bar was both open and set low low low. What’s more sobering is accepting that the people of this country don’t have a heart for humanity. Immigrant children were discarded into cages on 45’s watch. Their mothers were caged and violated with the unauthorized removal of reproductive organs before being deported. That is biological genocide. That was this year. To vote once for a president who commits crimes against humanity (please make the UN great again) is redeemable with a second chance. To choose this man as the leader of the “Free World” twice is inhumane. This election also taught me that Americans do not value character. Your leader should not be a pathological liar. Your leader should be smarter than a terrible liar. I’ve spent the last few years perplexed at transparency not being a requirement for the president of the United States. The 45th version burrowed the details of his conversations with Putin, the truth that he was warned about the coronavirus pre-pandemic, his IRS files — that is until it was revealed that he paid less taxes than Americans with annual salaries under $60,000. And those are just his highlights. What exactly is a devil that doesn’t live within the details?

https://medium.com/@bonsuthompson/what-half-of-america-choosing-trump-again-taught-me-6e749d946de0

['Bonsu Thompson']

2020-11-08 19:05:21.216000+00:00

['Biden 2020', 'Trump', 'Election 2020', 'White Supremacy', 'Covid 19']

Passing on Google Cloud Architect Exam

I know there are a lot of blogs around with information about the Google Cloud Architect certification but is always good to have an up to date details, as I just passed on this exam 07/2019, yay. Also, I would like to share with you how was my study process to pass, and how to split the content. It was a long journey but was really good to see the expected PASS word after weeks of strong dedication. I mostly studied reading the documentation, using Qwiklabs and Whizlabs. IMO Whizlabs is a good start as will show you what is the content you should study. Besides that, passing in the Whizlabs test is not a guarantee you will pass in the real test, as there are lots of interpretation questions. I also believe you need some experience in GCP in order to pass, but long hours of Qwiklabs could do the job ;) The test I think almost 50% of the test was focused on the 3 study cases, where you need to find the best solution for their problem. There are a few trick questions, but if you pass a few hours studying and understanding the requirements of those I’m sure you can ace it. Almost the rest of the test was focused on understanding the requirements of a company X, and find the best solution. Honestly, I was expecting questions more in-depth in general, that was the case to only a few questions. I believe the Developer exam will cover this in-depth question. Network VPC, Firewall, VPC Peering, VPC Service Controls, Firewall, VPN x Cloud Interconnect x Direct Peering, Routing Storage BigTable: Partitions, Indexes Big Query: indexes, expiration time, partitions, when using BQ instead of BigTable/Cloud SQL GCS: Multi Region, Regional, Nearline, Coldline. Standard (Multiregional or regional). Credentials on .boto file. Transfer Service x Transfer Appliance x Gsutil Datastore: indexes Compute GKE: gcloud x kubectl commands, logs AppEngine: languages, use cases GCE: disks, snapshots, images, sustained use, managed/unmanaged instances LoadBalance: HTTP(s), SSL Proxy, TCP Proxy, Network LB, Internal LB IAM Service Accounts: Credentials type Roles: Primitives, predefined, Custom Cloud Armor DDOS attack, Global LB StackDriver Agent, uptime check, export logs from… — — Remember, pass in the exam is not the most important thing, but get the knowledge and experience. “The journey is more important than the destination” I hope you enjoy!

https://medium.com/@femrtnz/passing-on-google-cloud-architect-exam-e362baf2222b

['Felipe Martinez']

2019-06-17 07:58:03.067000+00:00

['Google', 'Google Cloud Platform', 'Certification']

But they will not be punishing Victor Gevers, who was acting “ethically In reference to the latest development

Official sales figures released today by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) show new-car sales in October 2020 were down by just 1.5 percent compared with the same month the previous year, with 81,220 vehicles reported as sold versus 82,456 in October 2019. Four of the Top 10 brands posted sales increases, as the industry grows optimistic about a market recovery. Despite the relatively strong performance, it was nevertheless the 31st month in a row of year-on-year decline — the longest continuous slump since the Global Financial Crisis. It was the weakest October result in 10 years — since 2010 — but it was the third-best monthly result so far this year. Year-to-date, new-car sales are down by 18.8 percent compared to the first 10 months of 2019, with 726,111 vehicles reported as sold so far in 2020. The state of Victoria — historically the second-biggest car market — once again recorded the nation’s biggest sales slowdown, with 17,594 new cars reported as sold (versus 24,535 for the same month last year), a decline of 28.3 percent. However Victorian dealers have reported strong interest after lockdowns eased towards the end of the month, and the early prospects of a recovery in the coming months are good. By comparison, new-car sales in NSW were up by 6.2 percent, while Queensland was up by 11.7 percent, South Australia was up by 14.5 percent and West Australia was up by 17 percent. The Northern Territory was up by 27.7 percent due to an increase in mining and tourism business, while the Australian Capital Territory was up by 28.1 percent, as insurance companies continued to replace motor vehicles written off in severe storms earlier this year. After leading the first six months of this year, the Toyota HiLux ute returned to the top of the monthly sales charts after being beaten by the Toyota RAV4 mid-size SUV and Ford Ranger ute for the past three months in a row. Another sign the economy is moving again: utes filled three of the Top Six sales spots. The new Isuzu D-Max ute finished sixth outright — its highest monthly result ever and the first time it has ranked third among its ute peers — behind the Toyota Prado four-wheel-drive in fourth and Toyota Corolla small car in fifth. https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-wonder-woman-1984-2020-full-vr8vv.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-wonder-woman-1984-2020-full-movie-wetye.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-wonder-woman-1984-2020-full-movie-vr8vv.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-wonder-woman-1984-2020-full-movie-reyec.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-the-croods-2-2020-full-movie-fdh8d.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-soul-full-movie-gdsd.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-soul-2020-full-movie-fdgd.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-soul-2020-full-movie-9fd3.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-soul-2020-full-movie-8rhe.pdf https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/inclusive-teaching/wp-content/uploads/sites/732/formidable/2/watch-happiest-season-full-movie-dsg4d.pdf https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20549801 https://m.vlive.tv/post/1-20549801 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20549842 https://m.vlive.tv/post/1-20549842 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20549905 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543059 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543078 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543091 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543105 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543127 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550056 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550089 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550105 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550125 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550151 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543283 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543301 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543340 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543353 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543366 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550262 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550292 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550309 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543438 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550349 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550369 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543491 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550414 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550430 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550442 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550462 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543578 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543600 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550531 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543689 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543719 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550625 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543786 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543837 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543862 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543886 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543910 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543930 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543950 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543968 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20543981 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550835 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550858 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20544042 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550901 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550928 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20544102 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20550957 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20544138 https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-20551046 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20544218 https://www.vlive.tv/post/0-20544261 The figures show buyers continue to favor utes and SUVs; anecdotal feedback from dealers claim it is because more motorists plan to holiday at home amid international travel restrictions. Other customers are treating themselves to a fancier car than they would otherwise buy, rather than go on an overseas holiday, say dealers. “After a very challenging year, we are seeing ‘green shoots’ in the Australian new-vehicle market,” said Tony Weber, the chief executive of the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries, in a media statement. Mr. Weber said the results were “welcome news”. “Every state and territory except Victoria and Tasmania have seen significant growth and, given the circumstances, Victoria’s result is seen as encouraging,” he said. “However, the green shoots that we are seeing in October give us great hope that we may begin to see further recovery during the coming months.” Mr. Weber said Federal Government initiatives “such as a constructive budget that included the instant asset write off, along with more accessible finance for consumers, is also acting as a welcome stimulus for the industry”. The type of cars we are buying continues to evolve. SUVs and four-wheel-drives once again represented more than half of new vehicle sales for the month (50.8 percent, after an increase of 6.7 percent) while utes and van accounted for 23.6 percent of total sales (and as a category were up by 11.6 percent). Passenger car sales, however, shrunk to 21.9 percent of the total market, down 24.5 percent from October 2019. Market leader Toyota posted a 14.8 percent increase in sales in October 2020 compared to the same month the prior year, reporting 19,505 vehicles as sold after revealing its dealers had written 22,500 orders last month. Toyota maintained a comfortable lead over second-placed Mazda which also posted a sales gain (of 17.1 percent), however third-place Hyundai was hit hard, down by 20.2 percent compared to the same month last year. Ford, which was the last number one in Australia in 1997, ranked fourth in October 2020 after posting a 17.4 percent sales increase on the back of good supply of — and orders for — its Ranger ute. Kia rounded out the Top Five after posting a 4.8 percent increase compared to the same month last year. Mitsubishi (down by 6.3 percent) retained sixth place for the second month in a row after ranking fifth in August and third on the monthly sales charts in July for only the seventh time in its history. The luxury-car sector continued to reveal mixed results in October 2020. Mercedes-Benz made it into the Top 10 for the second month in a row — finishing in 10th in October after ranking ninth in September — despite posting a monthly decline of 11.5 percent. BMW, which had earlier in the year made a strong showing in the Top 10 after registering a large number of demonstrator models and company cars to boost its numbers, again fell outside the Top 10. BMW finished October in 13th spot — despite a 3.2 percent sales increase — ahead of MG, Audi, Suzuki, and LDV. Holden continues to deplete showroom stock, with just 165 vehicles reported as sold (versus 522 in September and 555 in August), as dealerships continue to remove signage ahead of the shutdown of the brand at the end of the year. Meanwhile, our appetite for US pick-ups continued during the pandemic, and fuel economy was clearly not a factor: Ram outsold Mini and Peugeot. TOP 10 CARS IN OCTOBER 2020 Toyota HiLux: 4444, up 26.4 percent Ford Ranger: 4217, up 33.4 percent Toyota RAV4: 4084, up 91.6 percent Toyota Prado: 2207, up 45.9 percent Toyota Corolla: 1943, down 8.2 percent Isuzu D-Max: 1932, up 51.5 percent Mazda CX-5: 1912, up 11.9 percent Hyundai Tucson: 1678, down 0.9 percent Toyota LandCruiser Wagon: 1640, up 23.8 percent Kia Cerato: 1619, down 11.4 percent TOP 10 CAR BRANDS IN OCTOBER 2020 Toyota: 19,505, up 14.8 per cent Mazda: 7457, up 17.1 percent Hyundai: 5951, down 20.2 percent Ford: 5744, up 17.4 percent Kia: 5304, up 4.8 percent Mitsubishi: 4510, down 6.3 percent Nissan: 3539, down 11.8 percent Volkswagen: 3112, down 26.3 percent Subaru: 2902, down 12.1 percent Mercedes-Benz: 2288, down 11.5 percent The market New-car sales in October 2020 were down by 1.5 percent compared to the same month last year, with 81,220 vehicles reported as sold. It was the 31st month in a row of year-on-year decline. Year-to-date, 726,111 new vehicles have been reported as sold, a decrease of 18.8 percent compared to the first 10 months of last year. While sales for October 2020 were down, four of the Top 10 brands posted sales increases and market share gains as the supply of new vehicles began to return to normal after production interruptions earlier in the year. The year-on-year decrease of just 1.5 percent in October compares to a 21.8 percent decline in September, a 28.8 percent decline in August 2020, a 12.8 percent decline in July 2020, a 6.4 percent decline in June 2020, a 35.3 percent decline in May 2020, and a 48.5 percent decline in April 2020, in the grip of the coronavirus crisis. Last month was the lowest October result in 10 years versus the lowest September in 18 years, the weakest August tally in 23 years, the slowest July in 18 years, the worst June in nine years, a 23-year low in May, and the lowest April result in at least 30 years. Brands Toyota remains the market leader for October 2020 comfortably ahead of its nearest rivals and is on track for its 18th year in a row as Australia’s top-selling car brand. The Japanese car giant’s sales totaled 19,505, up 14.8 percent compared to the same month last year. Toyota’s October market share increased to 24 percent, compared to 18.2 percent in September, 20.4 percent in August, 21.4 percent in July, 20.7 percent in June, 24.2 percent in May, and 26.5 percent in April. Last month Toyota represented almost one in four new vehicles sold. Mazda secured second place with 7457 sales (up 17.1 percent) but it only had one car in the Top 10. Hyundai finished in third place, with 5951 new cars reported as sold (down 20.2 percent) The Toyota HiLux was the top-selling vehicle outright in Australia in October 2020, when sales of both 4×4 and 4×2 models are combined (as is industry practice). However, the Ford Ranger 4×4 (3808) outsold the Toyota HiLux 4×4 (3406) for the month, as Toyota introduced massive price rises with its updated model. Both utes posted big sales gains (Toyota HiLux up 26.4 percent and Ford Ranger up 33.4 percent). Toyota filled five spots in the Top 10, with the HiLux, RAV4 (4084 sold, up 91.6 percent), Prado (2207 sold, up 45.9 percent) Corolla (1943 sold, down 8.2 percent), and LandCruiser wagon (1640 sold, up 23.8 percent). Top 25 models for October 2020 FCAI chief executive Tony Weber said every state and territory had experienced a robust rebound except for Victoria and Tasmania.“After a very challenging year, we are seeing ‘green shoots’ in the Australian new-vehicle market,” he said.The instant asset write-off scheme was a major contributor to the renewed vigor, along with increased activity as economies increasingly reopened outside of Victoria. The rebound underscores that an economic recovery is building in Australia, just as the Reserve Bank of Australia unleashed its own extra stimulus with a rate cut and $100 billion bond-buying programs on Tuesday. Ute sales in particular surged. The №1 selling vehicle model in Australia in October was the Toyota HiLux ute, which experienced a 26 percent jump in sales to 4,444 compared with October in 2019. The second-ranked model was the Ford Ranger ute, where sales jumped by 33 percent to 4,217. The Isuzu D-Max ute surged up the sales charts to be №7 overall across all vehicles, with a 52 percent jump. Across the states, Western Australian sales were buoyant and were up 17 percent, South Australia was up 14.5 percent, NSW was 6.2 percent higher and Queensland advanced 11.7 percent. Tasmania was down 16 percent. Victorian sales were down 28.5 percent, but Mr. Weber said that the market was starting to improve. For the 10 months ended October, new vehicle sales reached 726,111, which is 18.8 percent lower than the same time last year. The small decline in October marked the 31st consecutive month in which the industry had experienced a sales decline compared with the previous corresponding period. Mr. Weber said there was hope the recovery would continue to rebuild. “Nationally, the state of industry operations is returning to normal as COVID-19 restrictions ease,” he said. He said the federal government stimulus measures including the instant asset write-off, along with more accessible finance for consumers is helping momentum. Electric vehicles more than doubled sales in October, albeit off a low base. Across the market, Toyota was a clear №1 brand, with 24 percent of overall sales, followed by Mazda with 9.2 percent and Hyundai, 7.3 percent.

https://medium.com/@yetame8877/but-they-will-not-be-punishing-victor-gevers-who-was-acting-ethically-in-reference-to-the-latest-40f44ff4b071

['Yetame More']

2020-12-27 14:59:35.497000+00:00

['Sports', 'Newsletter', 'News', 'Safe', 'Covid 19']

30+ Inspirational quotes by Mufti Menk

Ismail ibn Musa Menk, also known as Mufti Menk (born 27 June 1975), is a Muslim cleric from Zimbabwe. You can read more about him on Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ismail_ibn_Musa_Menk He is very active on twitter, You can follow him here on twitter: https://twitter.com/muftimenk Some Inspirational quotes by him are as follows: “When others take a step back and give up on doing what’s good, don’t let that be a negative pull for you to follow suit. That shouldn’t be a catalyst for you to rethink your situation to give up as well. Instead, focus on your goal and try to strengthen it. You’ll get there!” — Mufti Menk “Take a step back and look at the big picture. Looking at the nitty gritty often clouds your judgement and can even confuse you. Sure detail is important but if you lose sight of the big picture, you’ll lose sight of your final destination. And that’s what counts eventually!” — Mufti Menk “Guard your tongue. How often have we spoken unnecessarily just for the sake of hearing ourselves? Many feel the need to fill the void of silence with mindless dribble which often leads to more trouble. Remain silent if you don’t have anything nice to say. You won’t regret it!” — Mufti Menk “The Almighty does not promise the absence of struggle in this life. That’s why He created us. To test us. So be humble, bear good patience and do the best you can in all things. He will elevate your status. Keep negative thoughts at bay. You’ll get through this!” — Mufti Menk “They’ll pick on you. They’ll judge you. They’ll think the worst of you. They’ll hate on you. They’ll spread rumour about you. They’ll abuse you. They’ll wish you didn’t exist! Yet through all of that, the Almighty will make you to rise & shine above them all. So keep smiling!” — Mufti Menk “When the Almighty has blessed you with something, accept the blessing; be grateful. The One who gave you everything can take it away in an instant. In the blink of an eye, it could be gone! Remember, there’s nothing special about you except your deeds & the state of your heart.” — Mufti Menk “Be kind to yourself. You’ve come this far and with the Almighty’s help you’ll get through these challenging and confusing times. Don’t give in to overthinking, focus on the tasks ahead. Guide your mind to that which is positive and beneficial. Trust that tomorrow will be better!” — Mufti Menk “Focus on what you have, no matter how little & you’ll be happy. Focus on what’s missing in your life & what the neighbours have & you’ll be sad. It all depends on where your focus lies in life. If it’s the Almighty’s blessings then you’ll be content! Else, you’ll be miserable!” — Mufti Menk “If you have a problem with someone’s skin colour, you have a problem with the Creator. He created us in a multitude of colours so we can appreciate diversity & live in harmony. Don’t let anyone tell you who is more superior. Treat people fairly. The Almighty is watching.” — Mufti Menk “Drop expectations. You’ll be happier with fewer disappointments. Learn to expect nothing. If you think people will stop whatever they’re doing to attend to you, you’re wrong. Don’t wait with bated breath. Instead, turn to the Almighty! He won’t disappoint!” — Mufti Menk “Let go of disappointments. Let go of things that didn’t work out. Let go of negative thoughts that drag you down. Let go of “nothing good ever happens in my life” feeling. Choose to focus on the good & positive each day. The Almighty will turn everything to your advantage!!” — Mufti Menk “No skin color is superior over the other. All shades of colours are beautiful. Remember, the Almighty doesn’t tolerate arrogance and racism. It’s a sin. A huge sin! He is only concerned with the state of your heart and your level of piety. Keep your focus on the right things.” — Mufti Menk “Do we reject someone only because of his skin colour? Answer that honestly. The truth is nobody is born a racist. You have to be taught. Are we dealing with racism, bigotry & prejudice in our own lives, so that we can be examples to our children & those under our charge? Reflect!” — Mufti Menk “The winners are those who are happy with the way the Almighty has made them. You don’t have to follow what others are doing to be considered good looking or acceptable. You ARE good looking. You ARE original. You are YOU! So just be YOU! Not someone else!” — Mufti Menk “Put an end to racism & violence. Stop labeling people. We’re all part of the Almighty’s creation. How difficult is it to be kind and to promote peace? It costs nothing. Let’s make a concerted effort to spread this message far and wide. Start by being a living example of it!” — Mufti Menk “Break free from old mindsets and traditions; especially those that hold us back from doing what the Almighty has prescribed for us. Sometimes we do things just because they’ve been passed down from our forefathers. Reasses your situation and why you do what you’ve been doing!” — Mufti Menk “When you regret your sins, feel sad for having committed them and feel pain when you remember them, these are signs of faith and sincere repentance. However, after repenting, Satan will cause you to doubt the Almighty’s Mercy. Don’t despair. Don’t fall for his trick! Move on!” — Mufti Menk “Blesssed are those who go through so much, yet they put up a brave front & make it seem like everything is okay. They take their troubles to the Almighty, not to people or social media. They’re a rare breed in this day & age where most things get an airing on social platforms!” — Mufti Menk “Patience is key! No matter what circumstances you find yourself in, be patient. Your neighbour may be blessed with what he’s been praying for but you must remain patient. Perhaps the Almighty wants you to call out to Him just a little more. He will reward the doers of good!” — Mufti Menk “Let’s face it. There’s so much uncertainty in our lives today given the global pandemic that it’s easy to feel helpless. But no matter what you’re going through, be certain that the Almighty is watching over you. He has plans for you. He will see you through everything.” — Mufti Menk “Never take your blessings for granted. The Almighty will see to that. So always be grateful, no matter how small the blessing. He never sends a calamity except that ease follows thereafter. Keep connecting with Him; you’ll see how much ease and inner peace you get in your life.” — Mufti Menk “Always stay humble. No matter how successful you are, don’t let your ego take over the controls driving you towards social status instead of progress. Always keep learning & improving; aware that there’s so much more to know. After all, everybody knows something that you don’t!” — Mufti Menk “Don’t let your grief consume you to such an extent that you forget who’s in control. Try to step away from your broken state, even if just for a moment. You’ll see things clearer; realise that you own nothing at all. Everything’s on loan from the Almighty. This world’s temporary!” — Mufti Menk “Be wary of the internet. Don’t let it turn you into a cynical person. It can crush your optimism and give you a low self-esteem. Whatever you do, don’t let it define your worth. Rise above it and resist the temptation to compare what’s going on with someone else’s life!” — Mufti Menk “Such is life. One minute you’re up, the next you’re down. Today you’re counting your loss, tomorrow the Almighty will reward you with huge gains. Never despair whatever happens in life. He will remove people & things from us but He will also replace them with what we truly need!” — Mufti Menk “Your struggle is an act of worship. The Almighty loves the humble who is not arrogant, who is broken and surrenders himself completely to His Lord. So there’s wisdom in your trials and tribulations. Don’t scoff at them. Learn from them and use them to draw yourself closer to Him.” — Mufti Menk “People may not always hear what you say but they will definitely observe if you’re practising what you’re preaching. Always lead by example. You don’t have to be in a position of authority or power to do that. Live a life of goodness and the message will spread far and wide!” — Mufti Menk “Charity Increases sustenance and protects wealth. It’s not too late to give generously before the blessed month leaves us. One way to increase our rewards immeasurably is to give because no matter how small it is, it’s something that will protect us in the Hereafter!” — Mufti Menk “At times, we condemn good people because we disagree with them over a few issues. We refuse to see the good they’re doing. Disagreements do not automatically make a person extreme, bad or evil. Learn to distinguish between the one who respectfully disagrees & the one who is evil!” — Mufti Menk “Almighty. You are our refuge & strength. We place our trust in You especially during these tumultuous times. There’s so much violence, terror & political upheaval. We turn to You for courage & hope. We need peace badly. Peace in the world & peace in the hearts of people. Aameen!” — Mufti Menk “Never underestimate the impact you have on those around you. The smile you gave, the helping hand you extended, the words of encouragement, that pat on the back etc. You don’t need a reason to be kind. Don’t wait. Just do it. Be guided by your heart, you’ll know when it’s right.” — Mufti Menk “Everything has a beginning & an end. So why do we constantly stress over the state that we are in? There’s light at the end of the tunnel. The storm won’t last. The heart will love again. You’ll be amazed at what will come your way! Just ask the Almighty! The Eternal.” — Mufti Menk “Even during your darkest days, don’t neglect the Almighty. You may think your situation is so complicated, there’s no solution; but the truth is the Almighty’s watching you. He wants to see how much you truly need Him. He will respond even to a silent prayer of a heart in need!” — Mufti Menk “Don’t let your heartache consume you. Even when your pain felt like it would never go away. Just raise hands & cry out to the Almighty. Begging. Never doubt that He will respond. He will answer you immediately or when you least expect it. But remember, none of the pain will last.” — Mufti Menk “”Feeling lost and hopeless, bobbing on a boat in the middle of the sea. No sight of land. Feeling anxious not knowing what tomorrow holds. Feeling stuck when every move you make brings you to a dead end! Know that the help of the Almighty is near. Very near. Patience. Trust.” — Mufti Menk “When a person turns away from the Almighty, another ten or more turn towards Him. The loss is never His but ours! Don’t let yourself be replaced by others. Don’t let your name be registered on the wrong side. It’s not too late for a comeback. Turn towards Him & remain steadfast.” — Mufti Menk “If you’ve gained a million likes by posting something disliked by the Almighty then you’ve lost! Leave a legacy you’ll be proud of on the Day you meet your Maker! Be responsible. Avoid anything immoral or sinful. If you can’t be responsible, then it’s time to uninstall some apps.” — Mufti Menk “Do yourself a favour. If you’re doing something to show off, don’t do it. It’s futile really. You might bask in momentary glory and people will admite you etc but honestly, it means nothing to the Almighty! It’s His validation that you need. That’s the only thing that matters! “ — Mufti Menk “Never doubt that the Almighty knows how tired your heart & soul are. So cry if you must. Weep your heart out if you must. Take time out if you must. And when all is said and done, get up and walk again with courage. Stand firm knowing that He is always with you. Keep going!” — Mufti Menk “Let’s face it. You will meet people who have the ability to bring out the worst in you. They may provoke you to say things you regret or pressure you to do things you wouldn’t normally do. So stay true to your values and refuse to let others have a negative influence over you!” — Mufti Menk “Surely we have enough of our own faults, leaving no time to look at others. And never judge people by their past. Why? Because people learn from their mistakes. People change. People move on. So don’t be stuck in your mindest & label people based on what you used to know of them!” –Mufti Menk “Take constructive criticism in your stride. Often, in the heat of the moment, we tend to become defensive or even angry. Don’t! When there’s value in what’s being said, listen, identify your weakness & use it to your advantage. How else will you be able to improve yourself? “ — Mufti Menk “We all have our difficult days. But don’t use that as an excuse to treat your loved ones badly. It’s easy to take your feelings out on those closest to you, but that doesn’t mean they deserve it. Ask them for advice on how to deal with issues that are making you so irritated!” — Mufti Menk “Some people will hate you because of what you’ve achieved in life. They want what you have but make no effort to do anything about it. They resort to spreading rumours & gossip about you. This is a test from the Almighty. Don’t retaliate. Let the good you do speak for itself!” –Mufti Menk Continue reading more quotes at: https://dpquotes.com/mufti-menk-quotes/

https://medium.com/@dpquotes.com/30-inspirational-quotes-by-mufti-menk-f1124e96e901

[]

2020-07-04 09:33:49.170000+00:00

['Quotes', 'Islamic', 'Motivation', 'Muslim', 'Inspiration']

Uses of blockchain in environmental initiatives in Spain.

The Correos agreement is not the only new initiative to use blockchain to mitigate corporations environmental impact. Other Spanish companies such as energy start-up Greenb2e also have tokenization projects for the use of renewable energy. In particular, this project seeks to promote ecological practices for companies. Another Spanish project launched December this year has the backing of Spain’s largest department store chain El Corte Inglés, in partnership with the Energías de Portugal (EDP) group. Through this project, both entities will certify the use of renewable energy in El Corte Inglés stores, starting with a pilot in the towns of Malaga, Seville, and Cádiz. This is also not Spain’s only pledge to incorporate emerging technology into its infrastructure. In July 2018, more than 130 deputies of Spain’s Popular Party drafted a bill proposing the implementation of blockchain technology to make government administration more transparent and efficient. The post Spanish postal service Correos will offset CO2 emissions with blockchain appeared first on Coin Rivet. More people have started using XcelPay Wallet in different countries. XcelPay Wallet app, now available on IOS and Android app stores. Try it today! XcelPay Wallet is an easy to use payment solution that provides security for your cryptos assets and your transactions. You can download the latest version of XcelPay Wallet 2.0.28 with new interactive UI and wallet recovery with ETH private key.

https://medium.com/xcellab-magazine/uses-of-blockchain-in-environmental-initiatives-in-spain-af74b9cf846a

['Xcelpay Wallet']

2020-01-14 10:01:09.045000+00:00

['Blockchain Technology', 'Climate Change', 'Bitcoin Wallet', 'Xcelpay', 'Blockchain']

How does Redux work?. That’s right! Storage should be the…

Photo by Clark Street Mercantile on Unsplash That’s right! Storage should be the first word that should come into your mind. Before all of you bombard me as to how redux relates to a store let me give you some context. Photo by Halacious on Unsplash Every time you go on a website, you are probably accustomed to seeing some sort of data displaying on the screen and if the data is not ready, then a loading indicator is going to show up. Well…what controls a lot of this behavior? That’s right! It’s redux. When the application calls an API to get some data for the browser, it notifies the redux that it is loading some sort of data. Afterward, the component that is connected to redux gets notified of a change in the global store, prompting it that the page is loading. Once the page is done loading, you will probably modify the redux again, turning the loading variable back to false, indicating the data is successfully loaded onto the page. That’s a lot to absorb, isn’t it? Let’s summarize all the stuff I said in one simple sentence: Redux is an open-source library that provides a way to manage application state in a predictable manner. In addition, you can use middleware, such as redux thunk and saga, as different tools to establish the communication between the application and the state. For the sake of this article, let’s stick to redux thunk. In redux thunk allow us to use functions as a way to dispatch data between application and state. Let’s take the following as an example: On the example above, we have an action that creates an async dispatch which talks to the store. “LOADING_DATA_NOW” work as a command that only the reducer (where the global store is actually modified) understands. Here is an example of how reducer would handle the command: What happens here is when we made a function call to dispatch action “LOADING_DATA_NOW”, the reducer picks it up and modifies “isLoading” to true, while preserving the rest of the state. Alright, now what happens next? let’s say if you have a component that is hooked up to the redux store: Any component that is connected to the redux will automatically pick any changes that have occurred. In this context, if isLoading is modified, this component will pick up right away and print out “currently loading”. If all of this seems really confusing then we can really summarize it this way: actions -> middleware(translates actions into something reducer can understand) -> reducer(modifies the state depending on action) -> state -> component(connected to the state) -> actions(and so on…) That’s it! You now understand how redux && redux thunk works on a basic level.

https://medium.com/weekly-webtips/what-is-redux-and-how-data-flow-within-redux-fb675900fed1

['Michael Tong']

2020-10-22 19:53:11.134000+00:00

['React', 'Redux Thunk', 'Programming', 'JavaScript', 'Redux']

How to overcome the common elicitation challenges a Business Analyst faces

Image Credit: pixabay.com What are the most common elicitation challenges? This is one of the most discussed topics from my business analysis training sessions. A business analyst extracts information in various forms, from various sources, and transforms those findings into requirements and design artifacts. Let’s take a look at some of the common challenges during the elicitation process and how to address them. Analysis paralysis In this classic situation, the analysis of the current problem is neverending. We overthink the possibilities and alternatives. That in itself may lead to deadlocks. This in turn results in no forward movement on the task. Sometimes we may delay a decision until ‘all’ the data is available. Sometimes a decision is delayed for the best decision to be taken later. And sometimes we may exert effort on research which is actually not necessary. All this can lead to slow movement in the production stages. This is even more relevant in today’s Agile/DevOps projects. Here are some ways to manage this: Elicitation is an iterative activity and its deliverables are also incremental. It is often not a stand-alone activity either. Ensure that you are reviewing business analysis and elicitation artifacts with the stakeholders. A culture of self-reviews, internal reviews, and quality checklists helps too. Maintain a list of risks related to your analysis activities. You may add these in your elicitation tracker or you may want to maintain a separate risk register. The key is to mention the risks along with the consensus on their assessment and mitigation plan. This will help prevent analysis paralysis and aid in taking the next step forward. Inadequate stakeholder involvement In this situation, a business analyst tends to work more in silos and produce something which is not what stakeholders need and/or is not adequately reviewed with the right stakeholders. A business analyst needs to collaborate with stakeholders from business teams such as domain SMEs, partners, suppliers, and sponsors. A business analyst also collaborates with IT teams and stakeholders such as development, quality assurance, architecture, infrastructure, support, and governance. The root cause of inadequate stakeholder involvement can also be that the stakeholder analysis is not completed at the beginning of a project or not updated during the project. Another root cause can be the inertia of some fear of receiving feedback. Inadequate stakeholder involvement coupled with analysis paralysis is a risk zone. Here are some ways to manage this: Shared understanding with each stakeholder group is crucial. Identify and review with each stakeholder group. Gain an understanding of how they would be contributing to the initiative. Understanding RACI for each task you would be performing as a business analyst helps too. The key is to ensure you are collaborating with the right stakeholders and know who is going to be the decision authority for each business analysis task. Having a plan for effective collaboration is important as well. For regular review and feedback, ensure how you will collaborate (which tools), how frequently, what timings, etc. If you are part of a large project team, working in a structured framework such as scrum, you will likely have these already plotted. Despite the size and type of project, the main thing is to adequately involve the stakeholders associated with the right information in the preferred format. Vague requirements A business analyst needs to work through information from a plethora of sources. The information could be in various forms such as verbal, whiteboard snapshots, emails, rough notes, audio recordings, etc. It is very crucial to create the right set of requirements view for each stakeholder group. Sometimes there is no existing documentation or existing documentation is incomplete. All this may lead to some gaps in requirements with an incomplete picture. Especially those who are new in a business analysis role may find it a daunting problem to solve and their written requirements could remain vague and unclear. Here are some ways to manage this: Start preparing well for elicitation activities through questions and track the answers through some kind of tracker. Ensure you have precise questions and use simple language. Also, keep in mind which stakeholders you are asking which questions. While converting the elicitation notes into your business analysis deliverables, make sure you phrase the requirements accurately. Whenever needed, provide artifacts such as process models, data models, decision tables, etc. Ensure requirements traceability, by linking user stories, user cases, process models, BRDs, FRDs, etc, with the right artifacts. This will help add clarity and trace for impact analysis. Thinking like a business user and writing stepwise acceptance criteria is a crucial part too. Conclusion These are glimpses into typical elicitation challenges and some ideas on how to overcome those. In business analysis training sessions, I simulate these challenges through role-playing and case studies. In reality, elicitation activity, at times, seems like river rafting to me. You do want to jump into the flowing river, but you may be scared of the what/how/when of the rafting. You must know the right techniques of rafting and be ready to make ‘in-flight’, intuitive, and out-of-the-box decisions as well. Thoughts? Author info Swati Pitre, CBAP®, is Sr. Business Analyst with 18+ years of industry experience across various domains and geographies. Her specialties include Product Development, BPM, Process Improvement Consulting, Business Analysis/CBAP®/ CCBA®/ ECBA® Training. *This article is previously also published on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-overcome-common-elicitation-challenges-business-pitre-cbap-/

https://medium.com/analysts-corner/how-to-overcome-common-elicitation-challenges-a-business-analyst-faces-67c5c9059e31

['Swati Pitre']

2021-01-12 00:52:55.602000+00:00

['Cbap', 'Agile Business Analysis', 'Business Analysis', 'Training', 'Business Analyst']

My experience as a data scientist in a startup

My experience as a data scientist in a startup What are the main things to expect when working as a data scientist in a “smaller” company? We live in times of rapid data expansion, as basically any activity we perform using technology (and not only) generates some kind of data, which can be then further analyzed and used to draw insights. No wonder that Harvard Business Review named “data scientist” the sexiest job of the 21st century! Given this brief introduction, it only makes sense for companies to use the available data to make better, more informed business decisions, while at the same time improving the customers’ experience (at least in principle). That is where the role of data analysts/scientists comes into play. However, the definition of the data scientist — or rather the tasks a data scientist actually handles — differs a lot depending on the company, industry, etc. In this article, I wanted to provide my perspective by describing what it looked like to work as a data scientist for a FinTech startup in the Netherlands. Photo by Danielle MacInnes on Unsplash A product data scientist My position could be more accurately described as a product data scientist, both because of how the teams were structured within the company and what tasks I used to work on. My role was deeply embedded within the product team, which consisted of a product owner, designers, front- and back-end developers, and more. You could say that each data scientist worked in two teams: the general Business Intelligence Team and then in the respective Product Team. In practice, that kind of a hybrid-approach to team structure worked really well and enabled efficient collaboration, while keeping everyone in the loop about what is currently happening in the teams. After this short intro, I wanted to touch on some of the points that stood out during my time there and which I believe can be helpful for other people searching for a job in startups. Being close to the decisions Definitely one of the highlights of working as a data scientist for a smaller company is that you are closer to the decisions and stakeholders. This means that your projects— be it a single Jupyter Notebook, a multi-sheet dashboard, or a deployed model — can be directly used for decision-making or shaping the product (in my case, it was a mobile app). That can be especially rewarding for data scientists, as they see that their work is actually used (as opposed to some report buried in an avalanche of emails) and provides clear value-added to the business. Domain knowledge and stakeholder management Being that close to decisions enables the data scientists to understand the business logic and gain valuable domain expertise. This way, they can better understand the potential requirements and expectations of the stakeholders, which makes the cooperation easier and more fruitful. As an example, it happens that stakeholders do have some goal in mind, but instead of expressing it, they already describe the means to achieve that goal, which they came up with. While such an initiative is always welcome and can be very helpful, it also happens that another approach should be followed, either because the suggested one has some disadvantages or maybe there is no such data available, etc. Because in the end, this is exactly the data scientist’s job to point the best way to achieve the goals of the stakeholders. Data scientist = jack of all trades When you hear the term data scientist, you might associate it with a person who is mostly training machine learning models, constantly tuning the hyperparameters to improve the accuracy/precision/recall/another score in order to impact the business. While this may be the case for bigger companies or companies with dedicated machine learning products, in my company (and similarly for other startups I heard about) the role was more of a jack of all trades. In practice, this meant that we were working on a variety of different projects. Naturally, most of them were related to typical data scientists’ work, but some of them could easily fall under the data or software engineering label. Regarding the diversity of the projects, while some of them did indeed involve building predictive models (for example, a conversion prediction model), others could be substantially different. Sometimes, we had to build and deploy an importer that downloaded marketing spend from social media platforms and stored it in the internal database for further reporting, Another time, we built a detailed onboarding funnel, which could be used for optimizing the user journey, localizing the bottlenecks, and reducing the drop-off. We also planned and designed experiments and analyzed the results of multiple A/B tests. And those projects were just the tip of the iceberg. I would say that working for a startup enables a significantly higher project diversity than in a dedicated team, for example, focusing on customer segmentation or time series clustering. Whether this is something that you would like to experience — the potential width vs. depth trade-off — is entirely up to you. For me, it was a lot of fun and I definitely learned a lot from different areas of data science. And then I documented some of those learnings in the form of Medium articles :) Pragmatic approach I believe that startups are one of the best places to learn the pragmatic approach to data science. That is because as young companies, they need to quickly grow, develop, and gain traction. To achieve these goals, it is often best to focus on the low-hanging fruits. Let’s say you have a conversion prediction model indicating whether a given customer is likely to convert this week or not. You can probably spend months trying to improve the metric of interest, either by creating new features, trying the latest state of the art classifier, or tuning the hyperparameters using any of the ten available libraries. Yes, that number is made-up and probably seriously underestimated. But the real question is, will this extra percentage point or two above a perfectly good Random Forest classifier bring lots of value to the company? Assuming the company is not a behemoth like Google or Facebook, probably not. That is why achieving satisfactory results in a reasonable amount of time is so crucial for smaller companies and — contrary to what you might think right now — it is a thing that data scientists (myself included) often struggle with. When to call it quits, settle for the current solution, and proceed to another project. That is exactly when advice from an experienced manager with a bird’s-eye view can really help. Not just the shiny things Connected to the above, but in a bit broader context, for many people, training and tuning models is the place where all the fun is. Also, to take it one step further, everyone heard that a data scientist spends 80% of their time cleaning and wrangling the data and 20% on actual modeling. But in practice, every day’s work might not even involve training models. Sometimes there is already a lot of value to be extracted from doing some smart aggregations in pandas or prepping a quick and efficient dashboard in Tableau to tell your story. Personally, for some ad-hoc requests, I often found that actually just working with SQL was faster and just as good as loading the data to Python for further analysis. Is it the most glorious thing to do as a data scientist? For many, probably not. But I would argue that a lot depends on the actual definition of a data scientist. Most likely, in just a tiny % of data scientist positions out there the person only works on training and tuning the models. And for many companies, especially smaller ones, a data scientist is a generic umbrella term for a person who takes data, does some magic, and generates crucial insights for the business. For me, it was rewarding to be presented with a problem, or a task, and then having the possibility to decide which approach (simple aggregate statistics, a fancy model or somewhere in-between) would be best suited to solve it. The data It might seem obvious, but there are no data scientists without the data. Before starting actual work, many students and aspiring data scientists mostly play with clean datasets available online (be it the UCI Machine Learning Repository or Kaggle) and unfortunately, this is quite far away from the truth. In my company, we already had a great data engineering pipeline built by my manager, which removed many potential pain-points. However, we still encountered quite a few issues when we wanted to add some more data (like user session info or data from external parties, like Firebase events for A/B testing). An example could be a weird sequence of events happening for some users (which in theory should not be possible), that only came out while trying to create a linear funnel or applying process mining techniques. But I would not say that this was a bad thing in the end. Of course, it added some extra work in order to locate those weird patterns. But first, it was satisfying to actually spot the issue (sometimes it required cooperation with developers to narrow down the issue). Secondly, each case left us smarter and we knew what to look out for in the future and how to prevent similar issues from happening again. So all in all, definitely a very educational experience. Photo by Headway on Unsplash Fostering creativity While I already mentioned the diversity of the projects in startups, my company was great when it came to supporting your own initiatives. When there was no pressing sprint work to be done, every now and then we could spend a day playing around with a new library or researching some concepts that might be applicable in the company. In the end, it’s a win-win situation, in which the data scientists grow and develop new skills, while the company can benefit from using a novel approach. Oftentimes, such small exploratory “things” turned into bigger and more significant projects. In my opinion, it is great to find a company with a high focus on personal development. So you not only complete your tasks and learn on the way, but you can also try to find something worth pursuing on your own. And then, the company supports you by providing you with time or resources to follow it through. Responsibility and ownership Connected to the points above, in my previous company the data scientists have quite a lot of freedom in how they can approach the tasks, what tools they use, or even coming up with new ideas and exploring them to provide an MVP or proof of concept. A person working directly on the project might have some insights into why a certain approach might be better or what kinds of analyses might be beneficial for the company as a whole. Ultimately, the company trusts that the data scientist will always do their best and provide deliverables of the highest quality. This atmosphere of trust further fostered creativity and made you want to put your best effort into each project. Because it was not only one of the twenty projects in the pipeline assigned to you this half a year but something that you could actively shape, build, and deploy. Tech Stack What is definitely more common for startups than big companies (especially those under lots of regulations such as banks) is using the latest and greatest tech available. Because startups often start from scratch, without years of legacy, they can quickly adopt the new standards and iterate on them. That was also the case for my data science team. We had quite a lot of freedom in choosing the libraries which we wanted to use, even if they were just released. But something you should definitely take into account though is the library’s/framework’s maturity, as it matters a lot, especially if you want to put something into production or make a crucial decision based on it. Also in terms of software (Python vs. R, etc.), we followed the pragmatic approach and choose the best tool for the job, even if it sometimes lied outside of our comfort zone. Conclusions In this article, I described my experience of working as a data scientist in a startup. Of course, those opinions are subjective and are based on a sample size of 1, so naturally, there will be a lot of variability from startup to startup. But even so, probably some/most of the patterns will be applicable to many companies at a relatively early stage of growth. For me personally, I learned a lot over the 3 years I worked in a startup, not only the skills strictly connected to data science but also other ones such as pragmatism, stakeholder management, responsibility for the deliverables, time management, and probably some more. And I am sure they will be important in my future career. If you are interested in finding out more similarities/differences between working as a data scientist for different kinds of companies or you are just starting out your adventure, I can definitely recommend reading Build a Career in Data Science. Did you have a vastly different experience? I would be happy to read about that in the comments, or you can reach out to me on Twitter.

https://towardsdatascience.com/my-experience-as-a-data-scientist-in-a-startup-13ae037780d0

['Eryk Lewinson']

2020-12-23 20:08:24.988000+00:00

['Machine Learning', 'Education', 'Editors Pick', 'Data Science', 'Office Hours']

I started this piece under the title “What it Means to be Me” and immediately felt the weight of…

I started this piece under the title “What it Means to be Me” and immediately felt the weight of that declarative statement. Until about five years ago I accepted my identity without question, not thinking that it could be worth an investigation. Depression and anxiety have been a part of my life for as long as I can remember, masquerading as intrusive mental images I blamed on an overactive imagination. The most sinister of these moments saw me imagining what it would be like to jump into traffic, with the laissez-faire of someone contemplating their weekend plans. What began as passing impulses in my childhood lay dormant for many years, popping up at infrequent-enough intervals that it took me years to realize they were symptoms of a larger issue. After introducing therapy and antidepressants into my routine, I reached a place where I could evaluate not just how I was living, but who I was. I became less sure of what I was passionate about and what gave me joy, to the point it became harder to feel content. I was nearing a breaking point, so I decided to break myself down before I went over the edge. My beliefs, my interests, the way I communicated with others, the amount of kindness I offered to myself, everything needed to change, and as I did, even my hesitant steps felt liberating. As I reflected inward, I noticed a disconnect between how I felt and how I looked. I remember distinctly catching a glimpse of myself in my bathroom mirror and stopping in my tracks. I noticed new lines and angles in my face that felt especially alien that day. The feeling was not a result of aging, but that my skin had stayed the same, aging the same way it always had, while my soul had shifted underfoot. I saw this stranger in photos too. I would remember the moment those memories were captured, how I felt, how often I struggled to maintain my smile, but that inner struggle was never reflected in the final image. My first steps towards reducing the dichotomy between my inner and outer selves were surprisingly simple, though by no means easy. I tentatively asked my partner to help me find clothes that were a little more form-fitting and traditionally effeminate and for some reason getting those words out of my mouth was harder than pulling teeth. But once I did, she responded with such grace and support that each consecutive step forward came just a little easier. For a while, this change towards presenting more traditionally female was an impulse I chased without stopping too long to wonder why. It didn’t take me long, however, to begin connecting some dots. I have never felt comfortable with my masculinity. Between conversations with my partner, my own research, and just existing online, I began to understand what comfort in one’s skin looks like, and that realization put my own discomfort in even greater relief. I had been relatively aware of a variety of gender identities for a while now, and I began to offer myself the same acceptance that I offered others in order to explore what my identity meant to me. What does it mean that I do not feel like a man? What does it mean that I also don’t feel like a woman? Those questions may seem fairly cut and dry, but to feel this foundational level of confusion and questioning is a shattering experience. Furthermore, rejecting typically masculine forms of presentation does not necessarily mean that one is not male. I didn’t want to reject my assigned gender just because of my desire to dress a little differently or to flippantly make a decision that so other gender-non-conforming individuals have made in earnest. But as I began to explore identifying as non-binary, I realized how true it felt because it was rooted in my own initial uncertainty. That feeling of truth gave rise to my newfound boldness and happiness in who I know myself to be. I am neither male nor female. I instead choose to define myself by existing as I am from day to day, presenting more male or female as I feel. I see the gender spectrum as less a definition and more a palette from which to paint myself in the most vibrant colors. Many of my presentation choices have been more traditionally effeminate, and while I don’t see those changing or stopping, I never want to limit myself. This decision, this coming out, is not final. The term gender-non-binary feels the most comfortable to me now, and I am fine with that changing. This decision represents not only how I am now, but how I have always always been, even if I didn’t realize it. I am only changing in that I am becoming more myself. A few necessary adjustments to my identity were made immediately apparent as a result of my new definition. The more I grew comfortable with being non-binary, the more I realized that being referred to as a man, with male pronouns, gave me immense discomfort. My sister described it best as an “itchiness,” something you can ignore for only so long. I prefer they/them pronouns, as they seem to most accurately represent my fluidity. Another question that has bugged me is the definition of sexual orientation. I was tempted to simply ignore the question for as long as possible, but my track record with that technique is troubling at best, so instead, I decided to confront it head-on. If I am neither gender, how can I be heterosexual? What is the opposite of non-binary? By the time I asked myself this question, I realized that I didn’t feel particularly beholden to staying straight. It was almost as if I had already made this decision, and that was such a relief. This decision to be honest with myself was not made in a vacuum. My partner, Jessie, and I celebrated our fifth wedding anniversary this year and she has been hugely supportive throughout this entire process, encouraging me to take the time needed to better know myself. As a result, we are closer and surer in our relationship than ever before and it is genuinely exciting to know that we are both always working to be better people and better partners in adventure, as we always have been. I am not making this public statement out of any desire to showboat or rub my identity in anyone’s face. Rather, I believe that everyone should be honest and sure about who they are, and if making this central part of myself known can make me feel more comfortable in my skin and make any small step towards normalizing the wide variety of gender identities and sexual orientations that exist in the world, why would I keep it private? While I believe my identity has always been at the very least not cis-gendered and I have just been searching for a way to express that feeling, the terms and definitions associated with my identity are new for many people. What I don’t want is for this to be seen as a distancing statement. I don’t want the solidification of my identity to be seen as a rejection of anyone else’s beliefs. So, if you have questions, I would love to talk to you. I have been so unsure of myself for so long; unsure that I was attractive, unsure that I was living my life the right way, unsure that I was worthy of love or even life. Melodramatic? Certainly, but those feelings were real. I know now that there are words for what I have felt for so long, and I can be proud of myself and who I am. I am non-binary. I am pansexual. I am myself, finally.

https://medium.com/@ardenfalls/i-started-this-piece-under-the-title-what-it-means-to-be-me-and-immediately-felt-the-weight-of-62a0d50dabf4

['Arden Falls']

2019-10-11 11:24:45.655000+00:00

['Pansexuality', 'Nonbinary', 'Meaning', 'LGBTQ', 'Coming Out']

Why a Year Without Marvel Movies Was a Good Thing

There were no Marvel Studios titles throughout 2020, and that was quite all right. Credit: The Walt Disney Company Of all its many weird characteristics, the year 2020 will be remembered by some as being the one without any Marvel movies. Well, that’s not entirely accurate, in that there was one Marvel adaptation that did make it to the silver screen: The New Mutants, the final installment in what used to be 20th Century Fox’s X-Men franchise, which came and went in theaters in late August. It’s also not entirely accurate to say there were no Marvel Cinematic Universe titles, be it on the big or small screen: though its canonicity has been a sore subject among fans, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. graced us with its final season during the summer months. Additionally, Helstrom debuted on Hulu, failing to make much of an impression and effectively sealing the fate of Marvel Television. 2020 was, however, the first year since 2009 to not feature a single Marvel Studios production, due to the current health crisis: Black Widow and Eternals, originally slated for May and November debuts in cinemas, were pushed back an entire year (with Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings taking a vacated July 2021 slot). And while it was widely assumed that The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and WandaVision would usher in the tail end of the year on Disney+, the two miniseries are now scheduled for the first half of 2021. Credit: The Walt Disney Company This was not by design, and yet it should have been: after the mammoth year that was 2019, the franchise needed a break. And so did we. It’s not entirely dissimilar to what happened with Star Wars: it wasn’t really planned that way (the “one film a year” strategy went on hiatus after the box office failure of Solo), but the current four-year gap between movies is exactly what that universe needed, having completed the Skywalker Saga. Granted, The Mandalorian is still happening on Disney+, and so are other projects (the recent final season of The Clone Wars, an upcoming spin-off called The Bad Batch and miniseries focusing on Cassian Andor and Obi-Wan Kenobi, among others), but those are largely self-contained and feature — or will feature — few, if any, major legacy characters. That is not the case with the upcoming Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe: starting on January 15, and barring changes to the schedule, we will have new Marvel Studios content roughly every month, and the first title to not focus on established franchise players — the aforementioned Shang-Chi — won’t arrive until July. So a bit of a break in between Phases was, with hindsight, just what we needed. I mean, think about it: Avengers: Endgame, released in May 2019 (which now feels like a lifetime ago), wasn’t just the end of Phase Three; it closed the book on an entire era of the franchise. As suggested by the title, it was the final Avengers movie, at least as far as the original team is concerned: Tony Stark and Natasha Romanoff died, Steve Rogers chose to retire, and Thor hitched a ride with the Guardians of the Galaxy. Clint Barton is set to pass the torch to Kate Bishop, and Bruce Banner’s on-screen future has always been murky due to external circumstances (Universal gets to call dibs on the distribution of any solo films). It was the culmination of ten years’ worth of storytelling, with a coda in the shape of Spider-Man: Far From Home two months later, showing the first signs of how the world would move on without the original Avengers. And this doesn’t just apply to the in-universe world, but to ours as well. Save for Black Widow (a prequel which is also said to feature a Stark cameo via repurposed old footage), we are unlikely to see any of the Earth-based original Avengers on the big screen again. Credit: The Walt Disney Company As such, an entire calendar year to let that sink in was far from a bad idea, even though it took a pandemic to actually implement it. And while a certain section of film fandom went on about how much they missed the MCU, the hiatus also gave other forms of cinema some much needed breathing room: whether it was the infuriating third act of Antebellum, the controversy surrounding PVOD and streaming releases, the uproar over certain Netflix releases (ridiculous in any case, but for different reasons) or the much-discussed status of Tenet as the savior of movie theaters, large chunks of the discourse were Marvel-free. Sure, it will be nice to see these characters again, but it was also good that we actually got the time to properly miss them. A luxury that is unlikely to be granted going forward, based on the sheer amount of announcements until 2023.

https://medium.com/fan-fare/why-a-year-without-marvel-movies-was-a-good-thing-a2903ba55fb8

['Max Borg']

2020-12-18 12:44:09.921000+00:00

['Film', 'Marvel Cinematic Universe', 'Marvel Studios', 'Disney']

Case study: Uncovering problems and opportunities through usability testing

Objective To conduct usability tests on the ZigWay mobile app prototype to uncover problems and opportunities in visual and interaction design. Heuristic Evaluation First, I conducted a heuristic evaluation of the ZigWay mobile app prototype. This was done by analyzing the prototype in the categories of Learnability, Efficiency, Memorability, Error Management, and Satisfaction. For each, I assigned a score from 1–5 and explained reasons behind each assessment. This evaluation was useful as a jumping off point. From here, I would conduct further usability research to support or refute my initial analysis. Learnability — 3/5 Efficiency — 4/5 Memorability — 4.5/5 Error Management — 4/5 Satisfaction — 4/5 Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) Audit Next, a WCAG audit was performed to analyze the ZigWay mobile app prototype for its accessibility features. The audit ran through several of the WCAG 2.1 requirements and checked the prototype to see if it met the requirement. Proto-Persona After conducting further research into ZigWay and their product, I created a primitive proto-persona to represent my initial assumptions regarding ZigWay’s target users’ demographics and behaviors. This proto-persona would be used as a tool in the early stages of development, and would be supported or refuted by later research. A proto-persona for ZigWay’s target user Usability Testing In order to test the assumptions of the proto-persona and the initial heuristic evaluation, two stages of usability testing were conducted: 5 participants took part in informal, moderated usability tests through Zoom, and 3 participants took part in formal testing through Usertesting.com. The main demographics of the participants were 21–45 years old, annual income under $40,000, and familiar with using mobile applications. Informal, Moderated Testing I recruited 5 participants for informal, moderated usability testing over Zoom. Each usability test was allotted 30 minutes, with 5–10 extra minutes each for initial impressions and post-test review. Within each usability test, the following user tasks were given to each participant: Register for an account as a SuperUser. Place an order for a Subscriber. Collect payment from a Subscriber and send the collected payment to ZigWay. Return oil containers and collect compensation for them. Find a Subscriber’s order history. Find the payment history. Testing on UserTesting.com Following the informal tests, I slightly revised my usability testing plan to focus in more on the problem areas identified by the first round participants. I submitted this revised testing plan to UserTesting.com to recruit 3 more participants. These usability tests were unmoderated, but the recordings and responses were later analyzed. Usability Testing Plan on UserTesting.com User Journey Map The next step was to map the user’s journey while navigating the ZigWay mobile app prototype to visualize the user’s actions and experiences. The map shows each action that the user takes, their feelings and needs, and their overall satisfaction in each stage. The last section includes potential opportunities for improvement based on the pain points that the user faces in their journey through the app. User Journey Map for San San Win (Persona) User Insights Initial Impressions Based on the first impression of the Login and Home pages, all users gave feedback regarding changing the color scheme to reflect a more modern and professional image. With the knowledge that the ZigWay app would handle payments and important, everyday transactions, the users reported they would feel hesitant in using this app purely based on visual design. Users also mentioned that the bottom navigation bar and many of the icons felt very intuitive because they felt familiar to them. Usability Similar to the navigation bar and icons, all users found the Login/Register processes intuitive because they had seen similar processes from many other apps. One of the most commonly reported problem screens for users was the Order section. Many of the users felt that the Home and Order screens were slightly confusing because they weren’t sure which information or features to focus on first. Another point of confusion was that there seemed to be some level of overlap between main functions, such as the Orders and Subscribers sections. This overlap felt redundant for users, as they sometimes had to go through extra steps to complete the task at hand. Lastly, some users were confused by the abundance of confirmation pages in the Order sections and the lack of a confirmation page in the Collect Payments page. While attempting to place an order for a Subscriber, many users thought they completed the Order process before actually reaching the final Submit page because they had already seen a Confirm Order button. Meanwhile, on the Collect Payments page, users felt that a confirmation page would be a critical error prevention step to catch any mistakes in payment amount entry. Recommendations The following recommendations are based on the synthesis and analysis of usability testing research:

https://bootcamp.uxdesign.cc/zigway-uncovering-problems-and-opportunities-through-usability-testing-d66c5d76de94

['Jay Hahn']

2020-11-18 01:38:00.086000+00:00

['Usability', 'Case Study', 'User Testing', 'User Research', 'UX Research']

Forgiving Yourself When You’ve Caused Someone Harm

This response was written to someone who made a mistake. Months before, he had slipped while carrying his girlfriend, leading to an injury and ongoing struggle with managing her pain. He was asking for help, advice, support… ~~~~ Dear H, First off, I want to thank you for sharing your story. The fact that you posted in the first place speaks to your courage, strength and basic humanity. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to support you. The pain of regret hits you square in the chest sometimes. Especially when you’ve caused someone pain — regret can claw right under your skin and hold on tight. I’m so sorry to hear about the accident, and can only imagine the sorrow you might be feeling right now. I’d like to share a few lessons I’ve learned about guilt, regret and being “stuck in the mud.” To begin, forgiveness is such an essential life skill because it represents a victory of the heart over the mind. This is a profoundly important skill to build — letting the heart heal even when the mind can think of reasons not to — because it means you’re conquering one of man’s thorniest and most painful journeys: allowing yourself to be at peace, to feel free from suffering, even when your mind would just as soon make you suffer (as it does). Whether you’re a perfectionist obeying constant demands for improvement, or maybe an artist dealing with the bitter sting of self-criticism, one thing that ANYONE can tell you about is how they drive themselves crazy with thinking. The untamed mind is a wild beast, alas. And only the light of awareness and self kindness can keep it from gnawing us to death. So, my first recommendation would be to use your girlfriend’s situation as an opportunity to practice radical forgiveness — for yourself, and while you’re at it, try aiming your heart at some of the people you hold grudges against. Turns out, they probably feel horrible about what they did as well. In beginning to forgive yourself, your mind will protest. “NO!”, it snarls. “This is your fault! You don’t get to feel okay about this, you ****…” And so on. Painful as this is, it’s also an excellent opportunity to listen for the stories and beliefs that your inner critic holds about you. In truth, we all have certain “dominant selves” like the Pusher, the Perfectionist and the Inner Critic (see Hal and Sidra Stone) that convince us to believe that we deserve to suffer. And to keep suffering for days, months, years… To put it simply, you will keep suffering as long as your inner critic is running the emotional show, and as long as you believe its lies that you should be a perfect, flawless, irreproachable person who does no wrong and performs optimally at all times. The difficult truth is that everyone must, over the course of their lives, turn and face this fierce critic voice, hear it out, mend the wounds that it is still holding onto, and turn it into a protector and ally. Until you’re able to heal your relationship with this critic voice, the suffering and “internal mud,” as you put it, will continue. Like I said — to let your heart heal even when your mind raises objections… this is a divine skill if there ever were one. I also hear you saying that you “sometimes want to sit down and cry.” So I take it that you don’t, in fact, let yourself do that. Well, to begin, it might be helpful to think of your emotions as little underground creatures. Maybe snakes, gophers, underground gremlins… something like that. Now, the truth about emotions is that they need to be acknowledged before they can be released. If they go unacknowledged, they haven’t disappeared — they’ve just gone underground, going to work on your subconscious thoughts and your physical health. In this metaphor, your emotion creatures need to have light shined on them — the light of your awareness — in order to disappear. By recognizing, naming and expressing your emotions, you give them the attention and light they need to dissolve away (now that they’ve completed their mission). But if you ignore them, avoid them, reject them or otherwise turn away your attention, they’ll burrow underground and pull strings from below, outside your awareness. In psychoanalysis, this is known as repression, and can contribute to all sorts of emotional and physical problems like sleep disorders, anxiety, food addictions, and so on. The takeaway? Give your emotions the attention — the light — they need, and respond to what they’re saying, so they don’t cause damage elsewhere. In your case, this would involve sitting down, giving yourself some space, and really crying. Crying as much as your heart needs to. As much as your soul needs to. In letting yourself cry, you’ll be able to explore some of the stories and thoughts that inhabit you right now. You’ll be able to explore some of the harmful labels that you may have given yourself as a result of the accident — labels like “I’m so careless,” “I’m an idiot,” and so on. Another way to channel the pain of this experience — and turn it into a gift, a service for the world — is to get curious about it, and learn more about how to support other people who are dealing with chronic pain like your girlfriend. If we can muster the strength to be curious about our pain, we can discover new motivation for helping others heal the same wound. The truth is, chronic pain is an enormously complicated topic, and hundreds of thousands of people suffer every year from ineffective treatments like opioids and unnecessary surgeries. This field is wide open for curious and motivated thinkers to study, learn, and invent new solutions, in order to truly relieve monumental amounts of unneeded suffering. Not to get too far out there, but you could LITERALLY make a decisive impact on the development of chronic pain treatments — that is, if it mattered to you, and you set your mind to it. So one of the most productive and redemptive ways of responding to your girlfriend’s accident is to learn about her pain (and yours), and use it as fuel to become a healer for those who are thrown into the same hurricane as you. Finally, I think it’s important for you to get some space from the experience. It sounds like you’re spending a lot of your time taking care of your girlfriend — out of love, no doubt, and also responsibility for the situation. This speaks to what a noble, caring and thoughtful person you are. And these virtues will take you far. That said, I’m guessing you’re not giving yourself much space or separation from the situation — space to heal, to give your mind and heart a break, to enjoy your interests and hobbies, to spend time on other meaningful relationships. Maybe you feel… stuck in place? Guilty about the idea of taking a day, a couple days, a week off? If this is the case, here’s what might be happening: in your whole-hearted desire to care for your partner and be responsible, you’re also shouldering an immense burden. Caring for an injured loved one is hard enough — let alone when you mix that in with feelings of guilt and self-criticism. This pattern — the “I’ll take care of her all day; my needs aren’t a priority right now” pattern — feels like the right choice at the time. And often, sacrifice IS very necessary. But it also comes at a cost: feeling burnt out, depressed, resentful towards the person receiving the care, and losing touch with the things in life that bring you joy. These are all very real consequences of “forgetting yourself.” And moreover, we often act like we’ve tried all other options, but we haven’t: I’m guessing there are relatives you can call on, or strategies you can think up together, to give you some precious time off while also making sure your girlfriend is safe and taken care of. For people who spend our precious energy taking care of others — casting our own needs to the side for another day — this is an important area of growth: realizing (and taking action as a result) that there is an abundance of help available around you, if you can be courageous enough to ask for it. Finding freedom from heavy emotions is no walk in the park. It’s a quest we’re all continuously engaged in — your friends, your parents, me, my parents… Once again, I want to say that my heart goes out to you and your partner. I wish you strength, resilience and rapid healing moving forward. As best you can, take time to be with your emotions, and communicate them to one another. Those underground feeling creatures can’t grow nearly as quickly if you take the time to give them the attention they’re asking for. You’ll get through this, one day at a time — I have no doubt. And finding activities that bring you both joy — even with her current limitations — will help her (and you) heal: emotionally, spiritually, and yes — physically. Wishing you strength and healing moving forward, Andrew

https://medium.com/@vargdel/forgiving-yourself-when-youve-caused-someone-harm-6127b90b087c

['Andrew Vargas Delman']

2020-12-24 00:32:00.450000+00:00

['Healing', 'Emotional Intelligence', 'Personal Growth', 'Advice', 'Personal Development']

Express your creative side with us

We at Agilemania believe everyone is creative and need a platform to demonstrate creativity. I am creative in writing and like to express my creative side through writing. OK, I may not be good at that, but I don’t give up easily. Agilemania has been a platform for me to demonstrate my creativity. We are opening this platform for everyone willing to demonstrate their creative side. All kind of creativity is welcome. However, we want to limit to a few areas initially as we have limited capacity to support them. When we say platform, it is not just to demonstrate but also to earn praise and rewards. What do you need to do? Come up with hand-drawn sketches, doodles videos, blogs, research papers, case studies, posters, videos, articles, and stories about agile, product management, project management, software development, agility in social works, marketing, sales, and human resource management. What can you expect from us? We shall review your work, will guide you if any adjustment is needed, will teach you at our cost if needed, and will refine it together to make it releasable. Once you agree on quality, we will share it through the Agilemania website, which includes giving credits to you to promote our social channels. Will there be any monetary rewards? Yes. We can have an agreement on this either upfront or before publishing it. Content ownership will be with Agilemania once it is published. Rewards depend on quality and effort. What kind of work is acceptable? Blogs — a minimum of 500 words, no plagiarism, and align with the knowledge areas shared above. Videos — 2–10 minutes of doodle video/whiteboard animation and character animations. Research papers — research is done on any subject with complete raw data, the method used for research, and the white paper's compilation. Graphics — hand-drawn graphics and posters. Stories — Success, failure, and inspirational stories but professional stories. Why are we doing it? The idea was triggered by Agile 30 (a community supported by Scrum Alliance and Scrum.org) to build a common and safe platform to promote an individual’s creative side. This will help in creating a knowledge base of new people as well. How to start? Have conversion with us. 1st step is to share your interest through email at naveen@agilemania.com

https://medium.com/agilemania/express-your-creative-side-with-us-61e4f71e0744

['Naveen Kumar Singh']

2020-12-25 05:46:19.886000+00:00

['Articles', 'Videos', 'Blogging', 'Graphic Design', 'Agile']

Great Infographics Need Great Stories. Here’s How To Get It Right.

Infographic by Florence Nightingale, 1855 In the 1850s, famed nurse Florence Nightingale was the first person to use and compare statistics by creating elaborate infographics, diagrams and color-coded flowcharts for her presentations to persuade hospitals of the need for change. To this day, infographics are an important and effective tool to digest and make sense of the vast amounts of data we gather. They clearly and visually break down the information and offer an easy-to-understand overview or quick explanation of a complex topic or process. And they are the perfect fusion of content + design. Nonprofits engage in storytelling to communicate and create effective outreach, awareness and donation campaigns for a cause. Infographics are especially suited for them to highlight their mission, tell their stories, visualize complex data, explain research findings and show trends in their case studies. A good infographic shows why prospective donors should care and how their engagement can make an impact. Great infographics, however, need good stories and a compelling narrative to make the infographic informative and persuasive enough to engage. And the stories behind the numbers must be stories that readers can relate to. The steps involved in creating an effective infographic Pick one issue, or one story, or one objective Pick your target audience Pick one call-to-action Research, gather and verify the data, using different sources (see below for a list of databases you can use) Decide, which of the 5 common kinds of infographics best fits your data display (illustrative, proportional, timeline, map, list. More on each below.) Design and create the infographic. Canva offers a free infographic maker, as does Google Charts, among many other online tools. Try Cartograph for maps. The five kinds of infographics that visualize your data Illustrative: One number and one picture. Best for highlighting a single fact or statistic. Proportional: Fact, data, or stats visualization. Best for numerical comparison to show highs, lows, average and provide context. Timeline: Changes over time (history flow), a path, process, or projections. Map: Highlights geographic patterns and good for telling global stories. Use sparingly because a map might skew proportionality. List: Best for rankings and simple categorizations. To create effective infographics you need to… have a clear target audience in mind and know what you want it to take away. use strong characters to relate to or to learn from. showcase a conflict with no obvious outcome. You need a real issue and relatability that draws others in. find something unexpected; a plot twist. Find stories that readers won’t experience in their everyday life; something exciting, or emotional involvement. create a scene-setting, a journey, or a direction. share a point or a killer fact. use humor that doesn’t undermine credibility. find an aesthetically pleasing clear design; the right brand feel, colors, fonts and visuals (icons, symbols, images, drawings). And make sure you… don’t miss offering a clear point, direction, or message. don’t create too confusing, or too cluttered a visual. don’t miss the storyline or create too many stories at once. don’t mix opposing facts. don’t offer opposing messages. don’t show confusing, wrong, or random visual cues or images. don’t miss to reveal your data sources, or forget to include essential sources. don’t forget to be mindful of the differentiation between perception, projection and reality. Share your infographic with me! Data Sources ABOUT CONTENT DESIGN LLC Hi, I am Tekla Szymanski, founder of Content Design LLC, your one-stop shop for content strategy and web development for content-rich nonprofit and personal websites. Do you have a small team and even less time? I hear you. And since your website deserves an editor, writer and web designer who understands how to leverage your unique content and then adapt the right design to it, I can help you. You have a story to tell, a mission to share or a service to offer, and we will find the right platform to build a website around your unique content needs that converts your site visitors into loyal donors, paying clients or new members. What sets me apart? Most web designers and developers don’t come from a content-creating background. I do. Copyright © 2020 Tekla Szymanski | Content Design LLC. All rights reserved. Please share/quote with attribution.

https://medium.com/@tszymanski/great-infographics-need-great-stories-heres-how-to-get-it-right-d5bcb1a98f66

['Tekla Szymanski', 'Content', 'Design', 'Llc', 'New York']

2020-12-04 23:49:16.384000+00:00

['Infographics', 'Data Visualization']

How to Get an Object Length

Why can’t we call length on an Object You might be wondering why can’t we just simply call length directly on our object. Let’s see what happens when we do: const object = {one: '1️⃣', two: '2️⃣'}; object.length; // undefined object.hasOwnProperty('length'); // false You can’t do it because object doesn't have a length property. Only string and arrays have a length property. const string = 'hello'; const array = [1,2,3]; string.hasOwnProperty('length'); // true array.hasOwnProperty('length'); // true What are Enumerables Alright, let’s cover another topic. I mentioned at the beginning that Object.keys returns an array of enumerable property keys. So let's figure out where this enumerable attribute comes from. Assigning a Property Typically, when we want to add a property to an object, we might just use the dot notation: const object = {}; object.one = '1️⃣'; console.log(object); // { one: '1️⃣' } Defining a Property Alternatively, we can also use Object.defineProperty . It accepts 3 parameters. And it's in the property descriptor where we can set our enumerable attribute. Object.defineProperty(object name, property name, property descriptor) Alright, let’s define a property with this method: const object = {}; Object.defineProperty( object, 'one', { value: '1️⃣' } ); console.log(object); // {} // 👆Why is it empty? 🤔 Hmmm…that’s odd. Why didn’t our property show up 🤔 Well, that’s because when we define a property this way, the enumerable attribute is by default false . So if we want it to show up, we need to set true to it. const object = {}; Object.defineProperty( object, 'one', { value: '1️⃣', enumerable: true // 👈 } ); console.log(object); // { one: '1️⃣' } // 👆 Great, it shows up now! Enumerable defaults to true Let’s go back to our object property example that we set with the dot notation. Why did it show up automatically? Well, that’s because when we assign a property that way, the enumerable attribute is automatically set to true . const object = {}; object.one = '1️⃣'; object.propertyIsEnumerable('one'); // true Enumerable Summary For most of us, we would rarely touch the enumerable attribute when defining our property. It’s simply a way for us to control if the particular property we created will show up or stay hidden when we iterate over the object using Object.keys . If you want to learn more about enumerability, I recommend reading this article, Enumerability in ECMAScript 6. Therefore, the attribute enumerable is used to hide properties that should not be iterated over. That was the reason for introducing enumerability in ECMAScript 1. Dr. Axel Rauschmayer, 2Ality Object.keys vs Object.getOwnPropertyNames Now that you understand enumerable , let's cover another method that you might see as an option to get the length, Object.getOwnPropertyNames . const object = {one: '1️⃣'}; Object.defineProperty( object, 'two', { value: '2️⃣', enumerable: false } ); Object.keys(object); // [ 'one' ] Object.getOwnPropertyNames(object); // [ 'one', 'two' ] As you can see Object.getOwnPropertyNames will return ALL property keys, whereas Object.keys will just return the enumerable property keys. As I mentioned before, enumerable attributes are maybe hidden for a reason, so you might not want to access that. Therefore, Object.getOwnPropertyName might not be the method you want to use to get the length of an object. Object Length with Symbols Before you default to Object.keys to get the object length. I want to point out one more consideration. In ECMAScript 6, ES6, a new primitive data type was introduced called symbol . And you can use symbol as a property name on an object. const animal = { [Symbol('ghost')]: '👻', turtle: '🐢' }; But the gotcha is when you have a symbol as a property name. Object.keys nor Object.getOwnPropertyNames will work. Object.keys(animal); // [ 'turtle' ] <-- no symbol Object.getOwnPropertyNames(animal); // [ 'turtle' ] <-- no symbol So a solution is to use Object.getOwnPropertySymbols Object.getOwnPropertySymbols(animal); // [ Symbol(ghost) ] Now combining the two methods, you will get the proper length.

https://medium.com/dailyjs/how-to-get-an-object-length-dc61fa564724

['Samantha Ming']

2019-06-10 09:16:57.787000+00:00

['Programming', 'Javascript Tips', 'Front End Development', 'JavaScript', 'Web Development']

Female managers are less negative towards employee depression than male managers

A new study from Sweden has found that female managers are less likely than male managers to have negative attitudes toward employee depression. The study was conducted by researchers from the University of Gothenburg, and appeared in the journal BMC Public Health. The authors say their study is the first to investigate gender in managers’ attitudes towards employee depression. Their work also reflects the growing academic focus on mental health issues in the workplace. Managers’ view of employee depression The study’s 2,663 participants (1,762 men and 901 women) were managers at a wide range of organizations and companies in Sweden, both private and governmental. The sample group included managers with varying degrees of seniority, whose titles including managing director, operations manager, and finance manager. For the study, they answered an online questionnaire (the MSED, “managerial stigma towards employee depression”). This questionnaire asked them to respond to a series of twelve statements related to employee depression. The managers indicated how strongly they agree with each statement, on a scale of one to six. Examples of the twelve statements included “Staff members with depression are a burden for the workplace,” “Staff members taking antidepressant medication should not be working,” “Staff members with depression can get over their depression if they just want to,” “I would avoid talking to a staff member who has depression so that I don’t have to deal with the person’s problems,” and “I would not hire someone who I knew had been depressed.” The researchers classified scores of 12–35 as a “low negative attitude” towards employee depression. They classified scores of 36 and up as “high negative attitude.” Male managers more dismissive of workplace depression The study found that twice as many male managers as female managers had a “high negative attitude” towards employee depression. For the male managers, the figure was 24% (429 out of 1,762), versus only 12% for the female managers (110 out of 901). The male responses were significantly more negative than the female responses on 11 of the questionnaire’s 12 statements. The only statement without a significant difference between the male and female managers’ responses was “It is stressful to work with staff members who have depression.” These differences remained even after the researchers statistically controlled for a wide range of factors. These included the type of workplace, the age and education of the manager, the distribution of women and men on the staff, and the extent of the manager’s leadership experience. The study also found that the more experience the managers had with depressed co-workers, the more these negative attitudes softened. Possible explanations for these gender differences One explanation for these findings is that the prevalence of depression tends to be higher for women than for men. This might result in women having more personal experience of depression. And that in turn might lead to women being more tolerant of depression in general. Previous research has also found that men are less open-minded towards people with mental illness. For example, the authors write, the finding that female managers were less likely to report having negative attitudes towards employee depression may be because “women are socialized into espousing empathy to a higher extent than men.” Likewise, the authors refer to prior research showing that “women are subject to much stronger expectations than men that they will behave altruistically,” and may be more concerned about “backlash effects from violating these stereotypes.” Possible limitations The researchers point out that this study is based on a questionnaire, and may not reflect how managers actually feel. For example, a social-desirability bias may play a role. “Managers might have answered according to what is socially acceptable,” the authors write, “due to embarrassment or discomfort about revealing true attitudes.” The researchers suggest that future studies on this topic also incorporate employees’ estimations of their managers’ attitudes. Also, this study focuses on managers in Sweden, and studies in other countries might yield different results. But, the authors point out, Sweden is known for its emphasis on gender equality. And as such the gender differences in terms of negative attitudes towards employees with depression might be even stronger in other countries that have less gender equality. Depression at work is bad for business This study also highlights what the authors refer to as “the lower perceived legitimacy of psychological disabilities” in comparison to physical disabilities, which managers are more likely to accommodate. And that’s a growing problem, as past research has linked depression to decreased work performance and greater absenteeism. A recent McKinsey report refers to research estimating the cost of major depressive disorder in the US at $210 billion. That represents a 153% increase since 2000. About half those costs were related to workplace absenteeism and “presenteeism” (which means means being at work but not working at full productivity). In fact, a 20016 study of workplace depression in eight countries found the costs of presenteeism were five to ten times higher than absenteeism. In the United States, these costs amounted to $5,524 per employee annually. With depression on the rise globally, it would behoove managers to take depression at the workplace more seriously. The authors of the present study propose that managerial training programs should take into account the fact that male and female managers have different attitudes towards this issue. With that in mind, they suggest, perhaps male and female managers should follow different training programs. Interventions to decrease employee depression seem to work Fortunately, research has found various ways of alleviating employee depression. A 2018 review of 22 previus studies found that interventions combining several different therapeutic approaches have the best results. Specifically, workplace interventions that combined cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) with “ coping flexibility “ had the strongest effect. Likewise, the interventions that took place in a group format showed the lowest attrition rates. In general, the study found that “most” of the studied interventions reduced employees’ depression levels. Study: “ Gender differences in managers’ attitudes towards employees with depression: a cross-sectional study in Sweden” Authors: Ilaria Mangerini, Monica Bertilsson, Angelique de Rijk, and Gunnel Hensing Published in: BMC Public Health Publication date: November 19, 2020 DOI: 10.1186/s12889–020–09848–2 Photo: by Tima Miroshnichenko from Pexels Originally published at https://www.psychnewsdaily.com on December 24, 2020.

https://medium.com/@psychnewsdaily/female-managers-are-less-negative-towards-employee-depression-than-male-managers-2036cccc777d

['Psych News Daily']

2020-12-26 17:48:21.693000+00:00

['Management', 'Depression', 'Mental Health', 'Women', 'Women In Tech']

Jonny Come Lately

Ethyl Solon had the perfect name for rhymic clapping. ETH*YL *SOL*ON *CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP* Alas, one only obtains the cheers from an adoring crowd if they are liked, and Ethyl Solon was not particularly liked — at all. Any equity she obtained from being 86 was flushed the moment she opened her mouth. Ethyl lived alone on the second floor of a four-story walk-up — Apartment 2A, right next to the stairs. Living in a building without an elevator is a problem; living in a building with Ethyl meant strategically planning your arrival and departure to avoid encountering her on the steps. We’re all born with a certain amount of gifts; for Ethyl, she was bestowed the ability to find someone’s weak point. Within seconds of meeting someone, she could locate your vulnerability and announce it to you and anyone within earshot. This gift had caused many a folk to move out of the building and caused nothing but grief and aggravation for the building super — Mr. Aggradocio. There was nothing he could do, though — he was petrified of the old woman. This leads us to the Saturday when Jon Sabbetti moved into apartment 3A, directly above Ethyl’s unit. Jon had just received a knockout punch from Life when he walked in on his fiancee engaged in coitus with his former best friend, Murphy Ryan. In the time it took realization to set in, Jon lost everything. Not only did he lose Sally, his fiancee for the past year, girlfriend for the past six, but he also lost the apartment and the car they shared, which were both under her name due to a lousy credit score. Affliction shirts were his weak point back in the day, and who knew clothing store credit cards had such high APRs? Not only did he lose Murphy Ryan, his best friend since second grade, but he also lost his bowling team, compromised of Murphy’s cousins. Sally often said Jonny loved his bowling team more than her, and now he had nothing. There were tears, a punch thrown, and a week later, a final farewell conversation at their favorite diner, “Chicky’s Pot Pies,” famous for their pot pies. Before they could go their separate ways, Jonny needed to know what happened. What had driven his fiancee into the arms of his best friend? Sally danced around the issue and tried to keep the onus on her failings, but Jonny needed to know. What had he done? Or what hadn’t he done? She continued to evade and avoid until Jonny slammed the table, causing the surrounding ears listening in to swivel back to where they belonged. He demanded she tell him the truth! With tears in her eyes, she gave it to him, “You’re a premature ejaculator Jonny. We never even had decent sex. I’m sorry.” Jonny finished eating his Pork and Fried Rice Pie in silence before leaving the diner, never to see Sally or Murphy ever again. Jonny found his new apartment the next day, and now we’re all caught up. Now, Jonny’s family lived halfway across the country, and it wasn’t like he could ask his best friend Murphy to help him move, so Jonny spent all of Saturday lugging boxes up and down three flights of stairs. There was a long-standing rule in the building that residents had to finish their move by noon, but Jonny figured he was okay. He was one man, by himself. They’d give him a pass. At 1:14 pm, he was formally introduced to Ethyl Solon on his last trip up the flight of steps. He came up to the second-floor landing while Ethyl opened her front door to take her afternoon walk to the corner and back. That was the exercise regiment her doctor had prescribed to her before she pointed out the shitty toupee on his head. Conversely, that was the last time she saw that doctor. Having a soft spot for old ladies and not knowing she was evil incarnate, Jonny waited on the landing, two boxes of fine china in hand — china he insisted on taking from Sally as severance — to let Ethyl pass and introduce himself. “Good afternoon Ma’am. My name is Jonny, and I’m moving into 3A. If you ever need anything, please let me know.” Ethyl looked down at her watch and then back up from her slight hunchback position to address him. “Look at you. Mr. Jonny Come Lately. Maybe next time, come on time!” Her words pierced directly into his heart, and the tears fell before he realized they had. All the strength had left his body, so when Ethyl Solon shuffled past Jonny, he dropped the boxes, causing her to trip and fall down the steps, breaking her neck. Jonny was arrested, charged with manslaughter, and spent four years behind bars. As a thank you, Mr. Aggradocio made a deal with Chicky’s Pot Pies to send Jonny a pie every week during his stay. They always arrived on time.

https://medium.com/the-haven/jonny-come-lately-9d9ae546fb2e

['Tom Starita']

2020-12-14 17:40:31.477000+00:00

['Humor', 'Writing', 'Short Story', 'Fiction', 'Creativity']

Get Reward by Asking High-valued Questions about Mixin Network

Mixin Network just hit a series of milestones. Over 100 million transaction is completed in Mixin Network soon after it’s officially released on Sep.30, 2018. To express our sincere gratitude to the community members for the support all the time, and help popularize Mixin Network far and wide, we decided to record a video to further address the testnet of Mixin Network. In this video, Cedric Fung, founder and CEO of Mixin Network, will show up and make remarks on the most concerned issues, such as developer community plan, technical features, and even detailed thoughts about node plan and all real stuff. Here’s how: Ask any questions about Mixin Network in this sheet. High-valued questions will be answered by Mixin Network CEO in our forthcoming video record, and the questioners will be rewarded with 0.1–1 XIN according to the value of question.

https://medium.com/mixinnetwork/get-reward-by-asking-high-valued-questions-about-mixin-network-379cdc0167a8

['Mixin Evangelist']

2018-10-16 06:24:14.435000+00:00

['Mixinmessenger', 'Oceanone', 'Announcements', 'Mixinnetwork', 'Community']

Data Inequality and Blender Economics in Supply Chain

I love smoothies. I make the same recipe nearly every morning. Someday, I may be considered shokunin. Instead of Jiro Dreams of Sushi, perhaps Matthew Dreams of Smoothie. Cost is a factor in my decision to make this at home; however, control and understanding are larger factors. Specifically, I would prefer to exert control over the negative externalities associated with my diet — whether those manifest prior to my consumption or afterwards. In this lens, this means zero added sugar, almond milk, and fair renumeration to those who harvest the cacao and ceylon cinnamon integral to the recipe. Negative externalities result from practically any input. Drive a car? Emissions are a negative externality. Your chai latte addiction? Sugar and caloric content are negative externalities, manifesting in poor health. Whether in a personal or corporate sense, proper value assessment requires understanding of relevant externalities and the responsibility allocation relating to them. This forms the basis for the intrinsic value of data, which promises to assist us in determining the value of a product, service, or general choice. Data Inequality Just a few decades into the information age, humans and machines have collected mountains of data. The collection is only increasing in scale. Great, right? Not quite. The intended outcome must still be worth more than the resource input. Many of us — whether at our homes or in command of a business — do not have choices with scale that would warrant substantial organic data collection and synthesis. Certain businesses have the scale, impetus, and expertise to leverage mountains of data they own. Generally, these examples surround big tech, mega-retailers, and industrials. This has created a measure of “data inequality”, in the sense that most businesses generate and often hold substantial amounts of data, yet the fungibility of that data is unrealized. Data inequality among B2B businesses often breeds one of two commercial strategies among those with high volumes of fungible data. Exceptionally convoluted pricing, substantial negotiation to come to terms, de facto opacity due to complexity. UPS and FedEx fit the bill. Bundled, flat rate pricing. One-size-fits-all terms. No negotiation, no visibility into cost areas. Think Amazon FBA, or transportation procurement via Shopify. While these two strategies look completely different in terms of a procurement process, companies employing these have the upper hand. They control the blender. Let’s examine landscapes and approaches with companies and business lines that employ what I like to call “blender economics”. Amazon FBA Not one company runs further with the concept of blender economics than Amazon. It is at the core of the Prime consumer channel, as well as FBA and scores of other business lines. FBA, or Fulfillment by Amazon, permits merchants to ship their goods to Amazon warehouses, where they are stored, listed, sold, and shipped. There is no doubt that for certain merchants, this all-in-one service is the right choice. It is convenient, simple, and provides access to Amazon customers worldwide. On the flip side, it’s somewhat akin to going to dinner at your county jail. Yes, you will be fed. Plenty of equality in that everyone is eating the same gruel and all the rooms are the exact same size. Chances are that if you have something valuable upon arrival (IP?), it may be confiscated. You may not get it back. As an example, let’s say I begin selling Black and Decker toasters on Amazon via FBA. If I go to the calculator, I find there are two FBA fees: monthly storage and a fulfillment fee. This covers intake, storage, pick and pack, ship (transportation), and fulfillment-related customer support. Quite a powerful blender. Monthly storage comes out to $1.38 per-piece. Fulfillment comes out to $21.56 per-piece, for a total of $22.94. I will be shipping 200 toasters/month to the Amazon facility on four pallets. Now, let’s look at a typical 3PL pricing arrangement, with bi-coastal distribution. Around 95% of the domestic population is served by Ground services in 1–2 days. These numbers are derived from an iDrive fulfillment partner and reflect costs for an order of one toaster. Receiving Fee: $0.50 Storage Fee: $0.25 Order Fee: $1.50 SKU Fee: $0.15 Pick Fee: $0.10 Packaging Fee: $1.35 2-Day Shipping: $14.35 Total: $18.20 FBA Packs on the Sugar FBA is a raw deal in this scenario, with no visibility into cost areas yet carrying an inflated price tag. Through leveraging of their internal data, Amazon has been able to confidently present an all-in price. This blended cost offering is attractive in its simplicity but roundly unattractive elsewhere. As you’ll read in a few paragraphs, this is not (by any stretch) the only downside. UPS and FedEx Parcel carriers have troves of fungible data and a far different pricing and acquisition strategy. Through employment of hundreds of unique revenue levers, including (but not limited to) base rates, surcharges, discount matrices, rebates, and volume bands, UPS and FedEx are able to give the impression of highly tailored offerings. In truth, procurement professionals are simply engaging with a different brand of blender. Let’s say you sell skis and ski boots. You sell on average 700 pairs of skis and 300 pairs of boots per month. All items are shipped via Ground to residences across the United States. All boots are equal in weight, as are skis. UPS has produced a proposal that offers a 20% discount on Ground base rates, as well as a 20% discount on residential surcharge. All other surcharges are at list. You feel alright about their offer, however, you also feel as though the full application of Delivery Area Surcharge is problematic. UPS makes another offer, where they reduce the residential surcharge discount to 10% but then apply a 30% discount on Delivery Area Surcharge. You feel better. That is a substantial discount, or so you’ve heard. The reality isn’t so rosy. DAS only affects approximately 30% of your total package volume. In effect, you just took a small rate hike. Costly deliberations. Circling Back In the first few paragraphs, I discussed control of externalities. When one truly understands the data they hold, the trajectory of their business, and the customer experience they desire, many negative externalities can be avoided. Let’s look at the FBA offering once more. If you are importing commoditized consumer products and are looking for a sales channel, FBA is fairly attractive. Merchants of $10 garlic presses or iPhone cases need not be concerned so much with branding, kitting, or whether customer experience is handled by a bot or human. The opposite is the case if you’re selling, say, lifestyle apparel or premium cosmetics. FBA saddles these brands with a laundry list of potential negative externalities. Many of these center around customer experience. FBA merchants cede their choice of carrier as well as kitting options. Moreover, first line customer experience is handled by bot. This offering could be even less satisfactory if the brand’s native website is well-built, rich, and carries the same SKUs. If this wasn’t enough, risk of brand dilution/IP theft is heightened. Just take a look at what Allbirds has experienced this past year. I’ve covered a lot of ground in this post. Through proper management and leveraging of the data you possess, gaps in data equality can be narrowed. This in turn permits control over negative externalities and lose-win tradeoffs, and allows one to cut through marketing noise while putting an actual price on “convenience”. In transportation and warehousing procurement, few abilities are more valuable.

https://medium.com/datadriveninvestor/data-inequality-and-blender-economics-in-supply-chain-c92b4c55b6c9

['Matthew White']

2020-01-29 11:38:13.146000+00:00

['Economics', 'Shipping', 'Ecommerce', 'Data', 'Supply Chain']

Coffee Table Books

Unsplash: Claudia Lorusso, Antwerp Port House by Zaha Hadid Architects, Antwerp, Belgium I’ve always had a deep love for a good ole coffee table book. I could spend days, on end, flipping through the home and design architecture section at Indigo. I have spent years collecting modern hygge books about dazzling interior, visual culture, architectural design and beautiful aesthetics. There’s something so comfortable about sitting down, lighting a candle and flipping through pages to discover the secrets of unique spaces. Galesten I love many brands and authors, by far love the Gestalten collection, a German publisher that has a wide array of visual design books on art, architecture and lifestyle. Galesten focuses on developing content about visual culture and contemporary creativity. Books are available on websites and local bookshops: Zaha Hadid Dame Zaha Hadid was a world-renown British-Iraqi architect, she had an extraordinary and innovative eye for designing. Hadid pushed beyond boundaries/stereotypes as a feminist architect, her flamboyant buildings and designs left a mark for generations. Hadid was the first woman to win the Pritzker Architecture Prize, 2004 and the first woman to win the Royal Institue of British Architecture Gold Mold in 2016. Books are available on websites and local bookshops: Travel by Design is the classic travel guide you’ve always wanted, including over 350 photographs of exotic vacations and international cities. The captivating images are paired with remarks from designers and creatives about their must-see destinations. This lovely collection of locales provides inspiration for anything from secret shopping suggestions to restaurant recommendations. This is Home is a detailed guide to designing genuine, heartfelt interiors. It’s about living simply — figuring out what makes you happy at home and constructing spaces that reflect your wants and requirements. It illustrates that you don’t need a lot of money to construct a beautiful house, owing to its creative ideas and places. This is Home includes examples and case studies. Please comment down below your favourite architecture/design coffee books.

https://medium.com/@imanhersi/coffee-table-books-1ad5e996242e

['Iman Hersi']

2021-07-06 18:44:29.448000+00:00

['Books And Authors', 'Urbanism', 'Architecture', 'Interior Design', 'Coffee Culture']

Working With Forms In Laravel 8

Using Laravel Collective It is assumed that you already have a sufficient database and Controllers set up. If not check out my article on databases here. As usual, you need: XAMPP and Visual Studio Code Let’s Get Started While you can use natural HTML syntax, Laravel has introduced Laravel Collective, to use for forms visit here to see the full documentation. Laravel Collective In case you do not understand the documentation, which is understandable, I will be going through it step by step. Installing Laravel Collective Forms The first step is to run this in your console making sure you are in your project directory: composer require laravelcollective/html One of the things we had to do in previous versions of Laravel was to add specific providers and aliases which is very easy. Locate your config folder in your Laravel project and in it, you will see an app.php file. In this file locate providers which should look something like ‘providers’ => [ You can search for it if you want. At the bottom go ahead and paste this: Collective\Html\HtmlServiceProvider::class, After providers, look for aliases and add the following lines at its bottom “Form” => Collective\Html\FormFacde::class, ‘Html’ => Collective\Html\HtmlFacde::class, And now you’re set to use forms. Using A Form The opening and closing form tags look like this: OPENING TAG {!! Form::open([‘action’ =>’App\Http\Controllers\BookController@store’, ‘method’ => ‘post’, ‘enctype’ => ‘multipart/form-data’, ‘class’ => ‘container’]) !!} THIS IS SIMILAR TO THE HTML SYNTAX BELOW <form action=”App\Http\Controllers\BookController@store” method=”POST” enctype=”multipart/form-data”> CLOSING TAG {!! Form::close() !!} THIS IS SIMILAR TO THE HTML SYNTAX BELOW </form> Explanation: The action tells us where we’re sending the form data, usually, you have a Controller resource set up with an equivalent store function and the method tells us we’re sending with POST instead of GET, the enctype and file is if you desire to upload images/files as well. And finally, you can style it up by adding a class. You can also add a route: [‘route’ => ‘route.name’] Go ahead and begin to create your form. I will be creating a simple register form, with Name, Email, Phone Number, Password and submit button. Using Labels One of the most important things that often go with form components is the label tag, telling us what a particular field is for. To use a label from Laravel Collective: Form::label(‘email’, ‘E-Mail Address’, [‘class’ => ‘awesome’]); Explanation: <label for=”email”>Email Address</label> Let’s use HTML to explain, the first parameter is the label for as you can see and the next parameter is the actual value of the label to be displayed. If you want to style the label tag, feel free to use the next parameter. Using Input fields Text Inputs e.g. Name Form::text(‘name’, ‘Jake Fisbach’, [‘class’ => ‘form-control’]); Explanation: <input type=”text” value=”Jake Fisbach” class=”form-control”> I arranged the HTML to be in the order that the Collective’s own looks like. Note: If you wish to bypass having a default value which I strongly recommend, leave the place empty but keep the string quotes. Email Input {!! Form::email(‘Email’, ‘ ‘,[‘class’ => ‘form-control’]) !!} This is similar to the HTML markup below <input type=”email” value = ‘ ‘ class=”form-control” > Number Input {!! Form::number(‘number’, ‘’, [‘class’=>’form-control’]) !!} This is similar to the HTML markup below <input type=”number” value = ‘ ‘ class=”form-control”> Password Input {!! Form::password(‘password’, [‘class’=>’awesome’]) !!} This is similar to the HTML syntax below <input type=”password” class=”form-control”> Submit Button This is by far the easiest to do. Especially if you’re using a controller with a resource with a store function because it will automatically make a POST request to it. {!! Form::submit(‘Submit’, [‘class’ => ‘btn btn-success’]) !!} This is similar to the HTML syntax below <input type=”submit” class=”btn btn-success”> As a bonus let us talk about Validation:, because it is here that we determine what fields are mandatory before submission is allowed: VALIDATION To the store function in your controller, which looks something like public function store(Request $request) {} Go ahead and add these lines: ‘name’=> ‘required’, ‘email’ => ‘required’, ‘number’ => ‘required’, ‘password’ => ‘required’, Let’s see a error or success message we can create in case of each scenario. Create a blade file and name it response i.e. response.blade,php And paste this in @if(count($errors) > 0) @foreach($errors->all() as $error) <div class=”alert-danger alert”>{{$error}}</div> @endforeach @endif @if(session(‘success’)) <div class=”alert alert-success”>{{session(‘success’)}}</div> @endif @if(session(‘error’)) <div class=”alert alert-danger”>{{session(‘error’)}}</div> @endif If you are not using bootstrap, then no need for the classes mentioned here and that’s all. Include this form file using @include(‘path.response’) Where path is the folder where your response file is in your views folder if it’s not in the folder just type ‘response’ Here’s what a sample error might look like Error for Laravel Form If you want this to create a new instance in your database for instance you can do: $var = new Model; $var->name = $request->input(‘name’); ..after others, $var->save(); return redirect(/towhereyouwant)->(‘success’, ‘Form Submitted’); Once again, referencing my previous article would really help with understanding this part. If you have any questions let me know.

https://medium.com/@ekimunyime/working-with-forms-in-laravel-8-a28283301622

['Emmanuel Unyime']

2020-12-05 13:32:45.127000+00:00

['Forms', 'Web Design', 'Laravel Framework', 'Web Development', 'Laravel']

Why Stack Overflow Is Part of My Daily Routine

It was in 2013 when I asked my first question in Stack Overflow, got heavily down-voted and my question was closed. Back then, I didn’t know why was that 🤷‍♂️. All that I asked for was a solution for my homework, and by saying “solution” I mean a full solution. I didn’t expect comments like: You should solve your homework by yourself What have you tried? Be more detailed It was an easy question for professional programmers who actually live in Stack Overflow, why are they being offensive? A couple of months after I’ve disappointingly left the community, I decided to take another risk and ask another question. It was a practical and detailed question. Senior members edited my question, fixed some typos, and reformatted it, making it look much better. Not only that I was up-voted, got a detailed answer, learned how to ask, and won my first reputation points, but I was also encouraged and informed that I was really close to the solution. This was the time I began to be addicted to Stack Overflow, visiting it daily, just to check if my question has new answers or comments. While hanging out there, I saw a very similar question to mine, I knew the answer! But just before I posted it, I had to verify it’s good by opening my IDE, running the code, and validating it — By doing so, I was more confident about the subject being discussed and I better understood the problem!

https://maroun-bassam.medium.com/why-stack-overflow-is-part-of-my-daily-routine-f900cb029f6c

['Maroun Maroun']

2020-10-26 15:46:47.859000+00:00

['Stackoverflow', 'Programming', 'Forum']

Batch Deleting Silent Videos [FFmpeg + Bash]

FFmpeg Logo Let’s say you have a lot of video files, but you want to delete the ones that have no audio stream (silent). You also don’t have time to open videos one by one and look inside. Then you are in the right place. First of all, there may be whitespaces in the name of the files, if there is a whitespace, we should replace it with any character we want and remove the spaces. Then we will go to the relevant directory and find the video files in the directory. Finally, we will delete those that do not have audio streams. We specify the user how the script will be used. if [ $# -eq 0 ] then echo "Usage:./ffmpegScript inputPath" exit fi Entering the given directory, we put a character we want instead of the spaces between them because names with spaces will cause problems. I chose “-”. cd $1 for oldname in * do newname=`echo $oldname | sed -e 's/ /_/g'`; mv "$oldname" "$newname"; done After naming the files, we write the names of the video files which (.mp4, .webm etc.) we want to a file. ls *.mp4 >>$input ls *.webm >>$input We will read line by line from the file and process the related videos. while read -r line do # Audio check # If there is not audio stream in video, delete it! done <$input To check if there is a sound ffprobe -i “$line” -show_streams 2>&1 | grep ‘Stream #0:1’ | wc -l) With this command, we can see the streams in the video and capture the lines like Stream # 0: 1 (representing the audio stream). If such a line is found, the `wc -l` command will be at least equal to 1. Otherwise, the audio stream is 0. If the return value from this command is zero, we delete the file. while read -r line do audioCheck=$(ffprobe -i "$line" -show_streams 2>&1 | grep 'Stream #0:1' | wc -l) if [ $audioCheck -eq 0 ]; then rm "$line" fi done <$input The whole code at

https://medium.com/@erbeyberkant/batch-deleting-silent-videos-ffmpeg-bash-7b858e35bdd1

[]

2020-12-20 20:02:07.392000+00:00

['Ffmpeg', 'Bash', 'Videos', 'Batch Processing', 'Sysadmin']

Special Needs…Normal Wants…

My teen girl With special needs Is no more or less special than her siblings. She sometimes needs special supports, But her wants are the same as everyone else. My girl wants to wear cool clothes And copy hairstyles on YouTube. She wants to make videos, To sing like Demi Lovato, To know what’s for dinner immediately after lunch, To try overnight camp, To mess around on her computer past bedtime. She wants really good snacks. She wants friendships and experiences in which she can fully engage. She wants to develop skills in her interest areas. She does not want behavior charts in school. She wants to be a cook, an actress, an office manager and an Occupational Therapy Assistant. She wants to be a Special Olympic Gymnast. She wants to do what she likes to do and Not do what she doesn’t like to do. My girl wants her best friends at her 16th birthday party, plus she would Love Zac Effron to be there if he could possibly work it out in his schedule.

https://medium.com/poets-unlimited/special-needs-normal-wants-111a591f9665

['Karen Kilbane']

2017-03-09 23:00:55.664000+00:00

['Love', 'Disability', 'Life Lessons', 'Poetry', 'Education']

Train Slow to Race Fast

This is the Post 1 in a series: Things I’ve Learnt From Running (TILFR) When you’re starting out at as a runner, or any endurance athlete, you should have a very low aerobic fitness base to work from. That means your body is not effective at distributing and using oxygen so your muscles quickly become deprived of oxygen. When you are trying harder (increase in perceived effort), your breathing rate increases. This is your muscles saying “We need more oxygen, increase the supply please.” Your heart is responsible for moving that oxygen around your body and to your muscles. It is transported through your blood cells. So as your muscles demand more oxygen, you breathe harder, and your heart has to distribute more oxygen, so it pumps faster (increase in heart rate). Then, as you get more fit, your aerobic capacity improves, and you’re able to run further without getting as tired. Your heart has to do less work to keep you moving forward at the same pace. 80/20 Running There is a training principle that shares its name (and theory, kind of) with the Pareto Principle. The Pareto Principle theorizes that 80% of the outcomes come as a result of only 20% of the effort. In running, the 80/20 rule applies like this: you should do 80% of your training volume at or below an aerobic effort. In normal-people words: On a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is a slow walk and 10 is a all-out sprint, most of your training should be below a 4. The other 20% should be performed at a high intensity where you are really pushing yourself. Basically, you should spend most of your time running at a slow pace. An 80/20 Life The Pareto Principle has been found to recur in different situations in life. Microsoft found that by fixing the top 20% of all reported bugs, 80% of system crashes and failures were resolved. In the United States, its been found that approximately 20% of all health care patients utilize 80% of resources available. In most societies, 80% of the wealth is held by 20% of the people. Business and life coaches often use this rule to help people become more effective at their jobs. They advise focusing most of your effort on the 20% of your job that brings you the most outcome. Don’t spend time doing the 80% of work which yields lesser results. This is definitely useful advise. I’ve used it at work plenty. The version of this I’m explaining now, though, doesn’t try and replace this rule, it just applies the theory in a different way. It came about after my first experience with depression. How a bout of depression helped formulate the idea The first time I encountered depression it was as a result of severe burnout. I was like an elastic band that had gone way beyond its elastic limit already, but I tried to just keep on stretching. I was worn way too thin, until one day the band snapped and everything came tumbling down. I was left reeling for two months. No energy, no motivation, self-loathing. I really hated myself. I didn’t want to be around anyone or do anything I used to find enjoyable. I was a mess. My problem was that I needed to do my best in everything. I can hear some of you thinking, “Well what’s wrong with always giving your best?” The thing is — I was obsessed with being the absolute best version I could be in everything I did. The same way someone would try to become an expert in a field of one topic, I was trying to do in all aspects of my life; work, running, hobbies — everything. I was fixated with making the most of every single part of my day. Because I hold such a high standard for myself, my expectations were never being met. I was always wanting more, so I was never giving myself the reward of reflecting on what I’d achieved. I’d get to a milestone, and not even acknowledge I’d got there. My focus was on the next level. Keep leveling up. On the bounce back, I decided to avoid this happening again, I needed to learn to compartmentalize — learn to go slow when I didn’t need to go fast. Be slow so you can go fast when you need to I taught myself that not everything you do has to be for the sole purpose of improvement. It’s alright to read a novel every now and then because you want to. Go for a walk, even if it’s time you could be spending running. Try something new even if you know you’ll be bad at it. Maybe you’ll have fun. It’s important to be able to take parts of your life slowly. Be in the moment, and enjoy what you’re doing for the sole purpose of enjoyment. There doesn’t need to be an end game. By doing this, you’re allowing your mind time to relax. You’re letting that elastic band ease back down to normal, so that when the time comes that you need to extend yourself, you’re ready. You perform best on a rested body, that’s why athletes taper their training load before a big race. It allows their muscles time to rest and recover so that they can go at full capacity when they need to. Our brain’s are a just like any other muscle. The same way your muscles get fatigued when running long distances, your brain does too. That’s why sleep is so essential to being able to function properly. It’s complete down-time for our brains where it actually goes through a ‘wash-cycle’. If you are constantly eeking the last bit of will power out of your brain in day-to-day activities, it’s eventually going to tear — like a muscle that’s been extended beyond its capabilities. By taking parts of your life slowly that don’t need you to extend yourself fully, you’re allowing your brain time to switch off. Sometimes that also provides you with a bit of perspective. Because your conscious brain it isn’t actively engaged, your subconscious goes to work to solve those lingering problems you’ve left it with, because its got the capacity to do it. What going slow looks like Here are some things I do to make sure I slow down every now and then. Every day isn’t like this, but I closely monitor my stress and anxiety levels and make sure I’m toning it down when I need to. “The degree of slowness is directionally proportional to the intensity of memory. The degree of speed is directionally proportional to the intensity of forgetting.” — Milan Kundera Getting out of bed doesn’t mean action straight away. Try setting your alarm half an hour earlier, waking up slowly, and having a cup of tea and 15 minutes to yourself in your favorite spot around the house before your day starts. Your morning commute doesn’t have to be crammed full of information, news and self-help audiobooks. Turn off the radio, and put your favorite music playlist on. Enjoy the drive. Lunch time at work should be away from your computer, or work station, and preferably out of the office all together. Get some fresh air and enjoy your food. Your daily exercise doesn’t have to leave you feeling exhausted. Try going for 5–10 minutes longer at a slightly lower intensity. You’ll enjoy it a whole lot more. Eat slowly. Stay in the moment. Don’t project. You can only do what you can now, worrying doesn’t help. Drive slower. Make time every day to meditate. Journal. One last thought to leave you:

https://medium.com/the-ascent/train-slow-to-race-fast-b76ea984a43c

['Simon Huckk']

2019-12-11 13:06:02.214000+00:00

['Self Improvement', 'Running', 'Life Lessons', 'Mental Health', 'Life']

More Big Money Entering the Crypto Market! Is This the Push We Needed?

Photo of George Soros. Courtesy of Forbes. Over the weekend, we saw George Soros and the Rockefeller’s BILLION dollar investment funds announce that they are going to be getting involved in cryptocurrency in the near future. This is the BIG money that many in the crypto community have been waiting for and it is coming soon! Soros’ Stance The funny thing is that Soros had claimed back in January (only a few short months ago) that Bitcoin was a bubble and should be avoided by investors. If you study Soros’ investment history, he is a notorious short seller and I find it interesting that he is now choosing to get involved in the markets when Bitcoin has fallen so sharply as of late. It’s possible that big money has been shorting the market in the background without public knowledge and are looking to play into a long game, of sorts. The Rockefellers Plan The Rockefellers seem to be showing a lot of optimism where crypto is concerned and show promise in wanting to invest in crypto companies to help them to grow. And we all know that the Rockefellers have the money to grow companies. Venrock, a Rockefeller owned venture capital firm, has signed an agreement with Coinfund, a cryptocurrency company, stating that they will provide backing for virtual tokens and blockchain innovation. Coinfund has recently launched Coinlist, a token-backed financial services platform. This company has succeeded previously in many projects like Kik chat messenging app that raised $100 million in their Initial Coin Offering (ICO) just last year. “We wanted to partner with this team that has been making investments and actually helping to architect a number of different crypto economies and crypto token-based projects,” said David Pakman, partner at Venrock, as quoted by Fortune. Thoughts on This Development I expect that more big money will follow into the market now that such large names are finally getting involved. It was incredibly smart of them to wait for the market to go back down before deciding to jump in. And Soros likely helped the downfall of the market with his words and his lack of support back in January. That is what happens when you have tons of money and social influence, you say something and there is quite a reaction to it. There are rumors that the Rothchilds have been taking steps towards entering the crypto market. The family is known for their close ties to financial organizations and banks and there are reports that they purchased bitcoin exposure in Grayscale Bitcoin Trust in December of this past year. If I had a crystal ball, I would likely find that the market will soon get pumped up to extraordinary levels and see the possibility of a higher barrier to entry for newbie investors that may not have a lot of money to invest. It is often said that BIG money is indeed SMART money, so it is smart to follow where the big money goes… at least in my mind anyway. Please do not take this as investment advice I am not a financial advisor, only a personal investor and market speculator. Do your own research and make your own decisions regarding any investment, as I do. I would love to hear what you think of this development in the crypto market! Do you see crypto moving up or will it stay down for a while longer? I would love to hear your thoughts! Ivy

https://medium.com/wespostdotcom/more-big-money-entering-the-crypto-market-is-this-the-push-we-needed-4b10f5d9ea3

['Ivy Riane']

2018-04-09 18:35:14.008000+00:00

['Finance', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Bitcoin', 'Investing', 'Sentiment']

The Mathematics of Secrets: Cryptography from Caesar Ciphers to Digital Encryption full_online

The Mathematics of Secrets: Cryptography from Caesar Ciphers to Digital Encryption, — ->>> The Mathematics of Secrets takes readers on a fascinating tour of the mathematics behind cryptography — the science of sending secret messages. Using a wide range of historical anecdotes and real-world examples, Joshua Holden shows how mathematical principles underpin the ways that different codes and ciphers work. He focuses on both code making and code breaking and discusses most of the ancient and modern ciphers that are currently known. He begins by looking at substitution ciphers, and then discusses how to introduce flexibility and additional notation. Holden goes on to explore polyalphabetic substitution ciphers, transposition ciphers, connections between ciphers and computer encryption, stream ciphers, public-key ciphers, and ciphers involving exponentiation. He concludes by looking at the future of ciphers and where cryptography might be headed. The Mathematics of Secrets reveals the mathematics working stealthily in the science of coded messages.A blog describing new ……. MORE …… Visit link : https://playbookworldwide.blogspot.com/?book=0691183317 Same great deal with amazing new steals! We have added thousands of books to our CLEARANCE SALE! Go check it out and see what great deals you can find!

https://medium.com/@secured_verdigris_oyster_373/the-mathematics-of-secrets-cryptography-from-caesar-ciphers-to-digital-encryption-full-online-80106f68b0e5

['Crap Rajau']

2019-08-01 09:06:16.985000+00:00

['Cryptography']

Sex Trafficking Isn’t the Only Form of Modern Slavery

Sex Trafficking Isn’t the Only Form of Modern Slavery But a girl like me isn’t the only one who should read Girls Like Us Author and Executive Director Rachel Lloyd, Girls Educational and Mentoring Services. Used with permission. The oldest profession in the world is anything but a victimless crime. Rachel Lloyd is among many experts at the forefront of shifting our collective social attitudes toward the sex trade by raising our awareness of who gets trafficked — how and where, by criminalizing human trafficking and by changing the language we use to talk about sex trafficking specifically. “Commercially sexually exploited” is a legally, politically and socially accurate term. It is the term adopted by the United Nations, UNICEF and advocacy experts. Outdated labels like prostitute, hooker, call girl and worse need to become as marginalized as the victims who get trafficked into the sex trade. “The term ‘sex work’ was created to remove some of the stigma associated with prostitution and to perhaps normalize the sex industry and those within it. The term is gaining in popularity and is a favorite of feminists and academics everywhere, yet it’s misleading, particularly when erroneously applied to children.” — Rachel Lloyd Pimps and sex traffickers prey on vulnerable children and women — disproportionately poor and people of color, manipulate their understanding of love and convolute their sense of family in order to brainwash autonomous human beings into obedient and loyal employees. The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 does not require that anyone under 18 working in the commercial sex industry prove that they experienced “force, fraud, or coercion.” But Americans 18 and older working in the sex industry are considered criminals whether or not they were trafficked. Instead of perpetuating the narrative that everyone in the sex industry fully and freely chooses to rent their bodies to strangers from a plethora of other accessible lifestyle or career options we need to think Stockholm syndrome. Violent international kidnapping isn’t the only way vulnerable children and women get trafficked. Most fall prey to a time-tested and professionally perfected formula where a vulnerable person tries to escape the very circumstances that make them vulnerable. They are taken under the wing of a “boyfriend” who exploits their need for love and belonging while incrementally transitioning them into the sex trade. The girls reluctantly agree (or are forced) to do increasingly sexualized “favors” because they’ve grown to love their “daddy”. Vulnerable people desperate for love and safety don’t choose to sell sex overnight. It’s a slow boil. Instead of criminalizing the selling of sex by arresting vulnerable people while the men who purchase sex skate through life unstigmatized we need to criminalize the buying of sex. Especially if “customers” are purchasing a child. Since minors cannot legally consent to sex men “hiring” them are criminals paying to rape children. The age of consent varies by state but the legal age of a minor does not. Opening image from Law and Order: SVU. All rights © NBC When debating whether or not to legalize the sex trade I will always default to the insight of survivors. And the majority of experts and survivors advocate for the Abolition Model, also called the Nordic Model, which criminalizes buying sex, pimping and trafficking without criminalizing the persons being prostituted. The same experts denounce the depiction of sex trafficking in movies like Taken. This hyper-dramatized save-the-kidnapped-virgin adventure was manufactured to feel like a fast-paced action heist. But Neeson’s fictionalized quest to capture the prize resembles the Mario Bros. rescuing Princess Peach from the Mushroom Kingdom more than the reality of domestic sex trafficking within our own countries. Liam Neeson’s jet-setting ass-kicking does not reflect the reality of the vast majority of commercially sexually exploited children and women. And it exports our concept of the illegal sex trade, foreignizing it as an underground criminal enterprise orchestrated only by greedy Eastern Europeans procuring virgins for evil billionaire sheiks on yachts in the Middle East. Sex trafficking is not just a foreign problem. It is as domestic as every mall and high school in the US. Sex trafficking happens within and across all borders. “The highest destination countries are Belgium, Germany, Greece, Israel, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Thailand, Turkey and the U.S.”¹ But it is a crime regardless of whether or not victims are transported across any borders. Sex trafficking is currently the most sensationalized form of forced labor the media publicizes. Because sex sells in the media too. But human trafficking enslaves victims in many for-profit industries. Human trafficking is big business. Freedom Sunday is an outstanding initiative by the International Justice Mission (IJM) to partner with churches around the world to raise enough awareness about human trafficking to raise the funding necessary to change laws, penalize traffickers, advocate for victims and transition them out of slavery. Freedom Sunday’s mission-driven work centers around these terrifying facts: There are currently 40+ million slaves around the world — more than any other at any time in human history Human trafficking generates $150B annually 1 in 4 victims of modern slavery is a child IJM is a world-renowned NGO credited with rescuing more than 49,000 people from slavery and other forms of violence and helping local authorities arrest more than 3,800 suspected slave owners and other criminals. Children are sold into forced labor to make jewelry, harvest cocoa to make our chocolate and to mine cobalt for our smartphones. Slavery is as old as human history but the modern abolitionists are fighting it with drones and satellite imagery, banking data and financial forensics, AI, algorithms and crowdsourcing. The University of Nottingham’s Rights Lab program used machine-learning algorithms to identify 169 brick kilns in Rajasthan, India likely running on forced labor. The Rights Lab also used data from a company called Planet to investigate speed signatures of industries likely being done by the forced labor of enslaved people. “From space, you can watch a cotton harvest in Turkmenistan and, based on how quickly the cotton disappears, you can tell whether machines or hands picked it. In the Sundarbans, an area spanning India and Bangladesh, shrimp farms and fish-processing camps employ slave labor to clear mangrove trees — a process satellites can capture.”¹ In 2015 DigitalGlobe used satellite images to analyze the likelihood that children were being forced to work in fishing on Ghana’s Lake Volta. “90,000 users pinned 80,000 boats, buildings, and fish cages.”² In 2016 Canada’s Project Protect, a partnership between law enforcement agencies, financial institutions and the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FinTRAC) is following money trails to “detect and investigate traffickers.” Banks’ anti-money laundering arms are starting to red flag suspicious accounts “FinTRAC has made 102 disclosures to police across Canada under the Project Protect label.” Only 19 were made the previous year. Few of us are in a position to devote our life’s work to becoming the “Mother Teresa of Nepal” like Anuradha Koirala. Her personal advocacy started with eight girls begging on the streets and evolved into Maiti Nepal — her NGO has rescued more than 18,000 victims from sex trafficking and been instrumental in the prosecution of 700 sex traffickers. But everyone is in a position to learn more in order to find out how you can help or which organization you feel inspired to support. Freedom Sunday is just one formal imperative to raise awareness and increase advocacy. But it does not preclude anyone with a heart from simply reading more about the complex economy of human trafficking and personal experiences of individual victims. Start with a first-person narrative. Girls Like Us thoroughly humanizes any of the abstractions used to justify the “right” to buy sex. It is a deeply intelligent and beautiful expose. One woman’s memoir is both politically powerful advocacy and a supremely human story about how little separates “us” and “them”. The majority of trafficked and exploited victims were abused as children. Estimates range from 65% to as high as 95%. From Portland, Oregon: “I was sold into routine sexual exploitation in a brothel by my father at age 11. His “training” had been preparing me for this moment. And despite what you may think, I am not referring to sexual experience or specific sex acts. His sexual abuse did not teach me how to do all the things that sold well.”³ What incest is to the family, prostitution is to the community. — Melissa Farley, PhD and Emily Butler, JD The majority are impoverished. “Those suffering from poverty are purposely targeted by traffickers as a means of exploitation. Due to poverty, some parents sell their children. In some instances, victims are told to work to pay off debts and told repercussions include violence, police involvement or immigration. Some victims are sold to many different traffickers. There are two types of labor the victims who are trafficked are subjected to, forced labor or prostitution.”¹ The majority of trafficked people suffer from PTSD. And a heartwrenching majority “meet the criteria for PTSD on the same level as combat veterans and torture victims.”⁴ The extraordinary cruelty humans are capable of inflicting on each other can feel unreal, theatrically Mephistophelian in its predation. Reading the tragedies of what some people suffer can crush your heart to a pulp. But we owe it to them, and to each other, to learn how we can help the most exploited among us — and how we can prevent more innocent people from becoming victims. We can start by using language that accurately reflects the reality of trafficked and prostituted children and women. Language shapes discourse. “Constantly reframing the issue and changing the language has been imperative in changing public perception and sympathies.” — Rachel Lloyd Raising awareness will never be enough. But it’s a crucial start.

https://medium.com/with-liberty/sex-trafficking-isnt-the-only-form-of-modern-slavery-fd807e65a8b7

['Heather M. Edwards']

2019-10-06 21:10:20.471000+00:00

['Politics', 'Equality', 'Human Trafficking', 'Culture', 'Human Rights']

Catholicism and Deconstruction: How I Learned to Unlearn

That altar server in white, to the right of those priests, is me… nine years ago. From 2010 to 2013 I was involved in the traditional Catholic movement, and when I say “involved,” I mean about as involved as one could get without joining a seminary. I served Mass in Latin nearly every week, went to confession weekly, based most of my social life around the church, and fully bought into the ultra-conservative traditionalist ideology. Searching for clear moral answers, I sought refuge in the absolutism of a system that claimed an authority beyond the whims of personal judgement. Those years weren’t all bad (I made some great and lasting friendships, for instance), but in many ways, my time in this conservative branch of Catholicism was among the biggest mistakes of my life. The sexual repression was insane and took me years to work through. It was like a constant psychological war with myself. I also bought into a conservative ideology and became active in conservative political causes, even taking up a job for a right-wing Christian politician (that is perhaps THE most embarrassing mistake of my 20s, by the way). I didn’t tell my school friends about my conversion, which led to me living a compartmentalised double life that only made me more confused. I completely lost every sense of who I was, and found myself alienated not only from my own identity but from my friends, family and the society around me. Catholicism does not shy away from suffering: that is part of what makes it attractive to many. It is not comfortable or bourgeoise. It demands everything you have, even unto death. The Catholic Church celebrates its martyrs, and Catholics who are staring down the barrel of a lifetime of misery (or loneliness, or reproductive servitude, or an unhappy marriage they cannot exit) out of fidelity to Church doctrine are told that suffering is the royal road of salvation. Christ suffered, and to suffer for God is the way of the Cross. After all, Jesus said, “deny thyself, and take up thy cross and follow me.” For a long time I tried to see this as necessary, or even as a good thing. A religious system that embraced suffering seemed like an attractive counterpoint to a hedonistic society. At a certain point, however, its absurdity became unsustainable. By and large, the suffering caused by Catholicism is completely unnecessary, and leads to no improvement in the world or the quality of life of its adherents. “You shall judge them by their fruits.” Even the most faithful of religious believers must eventually admit that there is little hard evidence for religious claims beyond the witness of Scriptures and the communities of faith that proclaim their message. People become religious for different reasons, but most people adopt religious faith because it gives them something they cannot find elsewhere: meaning, hope, or the richness of a life lived in dialogue with a higher power who challenges and surprises. A religious system that brings suffering, however, needs enormous evidence of its veracity for it to be worth practicing. In the case of Catholicism, I began to be less and less convinced. When my rigid religious worldview came crashing down, I felt completely lost. I was depressed for a long time, and began to smoke weed every day. I couldn’t bring myself to attend church for over a year. That was back in late 2013. It wasn’t just the loss of religion that affected me. When I left the world of traditional Catholicism, I lost my identity and sense of purpose. I had been active in a movement that I suddenly no longer identified with. I was surrounded by networks of homophobes, anti-feminists, and monarchists. When the enchantment wore off, I found myself asking: what the hell am I doing here with these people? I stayed away from religion for a long time after that, but by early 2016 I felt that something was missing. I began searching for a way to plug back into Catholicism, into the secure religious home I had once enjoyed. Of course, it didn’t work. I could sit in the pews of a Catholic church easily enough, but could never shake the feeling that I didn’t belong there, that I was supporting something that was offensive. I felt like I was betraying people I loved, or even my own values. How could I support a church that calls so many of my best friends “intrinsically disordered,” or whose teachings continue to cause so much suffering, or that refuses to take responsibility for the abuse that it enabled? Moving on from Catholicism, however, is not easy. There’s a reason why Catholic guilt is a cultural trope. The Catholic Church presents itself as the “One True Church.” It allows for no alternative — everything else is either schismatic, heretical or a cheap imitation. It also claims an epistemic authority grounded in divine revelation, natural law, and two thousand years of unbroken tradition. In the logic of Catholicism, the individual intellect cannot hold a candle to the weight of such a large and ancient authority. For a long time, these habits of thought kept me attached to Catholicism even after I rejected its teachings on the intellectual level. What makes me think I know better than men like Augustine and Thomas Aquinas? Those men were geniuses of immense intellect and erudition — I’m just an average guy in my 20s. How could I consider my own private judgement superior to those of the world’s largest religion and its intellectual champions? Unlearning this mental conditioning has taken a lot of effort. I had to do a lot of deconstruction, looking critically at everything. Each claim to authority had to be re-examined, every historical genius was re-contextualised and looked at in the context of their age. Every feeling of guilt, or every temptation to dismiss my own rational conclusions in favour of a higher authority had to be taken apart and critically examined. Finding a good therapist was a huge help here. For a while, I was so trapped in cognitive circles that I needed someone else to help me work through these beliefs, calling me out and confronting me with my irrationality where needed. I also had to re-learn to trust my own powers of reason again. That was perhaps the hardest part. After having gone through a series of conversions (first to Catholicism as a teenager, then away from it years later) I realised that there’s always a chance that I will change my mind, that my current beliefs are only provisional and always subject to revision or change. This is perhaps just good intellectual humility, but it undermined my confidence in my ability to reach valid conclusions by my own powers of discernment. It took me a long time to accept that I am smart enough to place some confidence my own convictions, even if only provisionally. This is really my only option, since I have to live with integrity according to whatever convictions I have. Doubting myself at every corner is just a pointless downward spiral. My efforts to move on from Catholicism have been a work in progress since the middle of 2019. This process has been fruitful: now, at the end of 2020, I am happy with where I am spiritually and theologically for the first time in seven years. I have found a comfortable home in the Anglican Communion, with a Christianity that is inclusive and other-affirming, that respects diversity and the freedom to doubt, to question, to criticise or think differently. I am convinced that deconstruction doesn’t have to lead to atheism or post-religious agnosticism. We can unlearn oppressive habits of thought and break free of high-control structures while discovering that a positive, life-giving experience of religious faith can be found elsewhere. Deconstruction is not the same as destruction: it can be creative, enabling us to rebuild more critically, more cautiously. After casting off the oppressive and controlling aspects of Christianity — or Judaism, or Islam, or any other tradition — it becomes easier to fully grasp the power of the essentials: the central message of God’s liberating and reconciling love, of a God who desires justice and peace for all creation, of eschatological hope. For sure, after leaving a high-control tradition, most people feel burnt out and want nothing to do with religion at all for a while. This was definitely the case for me. But once the process of deconstruction and healing has taken place, there is no need to throw the baby out with the bath water. For me, at least, it has been worthwhile to continue searching.

https://medium.com/@tim.redfern/catholicism-and-deconstruction-how-i-learned-to-unlearn-85b88db19928

['Tim Redfern']

2020-12-24 12:01:12.159000+00:00

['Personal', 'Catholicism', 'Religion', 'Deconstruction', 'Christianity']

How to Improve Productivity in Customer Support With A.I.

Figure 1: Sources of customer support queries Companies receive support inquiries from various channels. This may include emails, support tickets, tweets, chat conversations with customer support representatives (CSRs), chatbot conversations and more. This is a lot of data that you are dealing with and it’s mostly unstructured and scattered in nature, making it that much harder to manage. The question becomes, how can you leverage all this text data to improve speed in responding to customer support inquiries or reducing the number of tickets that are being opened? This can partly be done with automation using Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Artificial Intelligence in general. This article will give you an overview of 5 areas in the customer service workflow that can benefit from A.I. / NLP based automation. This is not an exhaustive list, but a list that applies to most customer support teams at medium to large organizations. #1 Recommend best answers When CSRs try to respond to a customer problem, they can be overwhelmed with identifying the best answer from the pool of possible answers. What they need is one answer that will address the customer problem. Some companies maintain an exhaustive list of problems and corresponding answers which the CSR has to search through, sometimes even manually. This can be painfully slow and draining if you have to perform a search for each and every question. NLP can be really useful here by recommending the best answers given a support inquiry. It becomes even better when the answers have an associated “score” that indicates the likelihood of a particular answer solving the customer problem. Using this approach, instead of explicitly performing a search, the CSR is now having information pushed to them automatically, preventing a break in their workflow. With this, the response time can be much faster, which also means, CSRs will be able to handle a larger volume of support issues. What’s even nicer is that the CSRs will not be overwhelmed by the end of the day due to the number of searches they have to perform. #2 Suggest historical threads While some support questions can be easily answered with the recommended best answers, others can be complex, requiring extended research. One way for CSRs to solve complex issues is by looking into related historical threads (which have been successfully resolved), and understanding how those issues were resolved. With this, the CSR will be able to better resolve the issue at hand or form a more complete answer to the support question. With NLP and Text Mining technologies we can automate this process by recommending related historical threads for any given support inquiry. This saves CSRs from having to conduct various searches, contact peers and their manager for help on an issue. The benefit of surfacing related historical threads is (a) the potential decrease in response time and (b) reducing follow-up support questions as complex issues are resolved in fewer interactions. #3 Group questions to limit context switching As we all know, context switching can be hard. Going from resolving issues related to signups to billing and then back to signups can be a productivity killer. According to Bud Roth, author of Be More Productive: Slow Down, distributing your energy over a wide variety of tasks can dilute your effectiveness the same way interruptions do. By grouping similar support questions, CSRs can address similar problems in chunks, where the knowledge bank that they’ll have to tap into and the pool of potential answers are related. Figure 2: Grouped customer support questions With the use of clustering techniques in Natural Language Processing and Text Mining, we can automatically group similar questions as shown in the example in Figure 2. Notice that the first group of questions is all about adding a profile picture. The benefit of doing this is that it maintains the same train of thought in resolving issues. In some cases, the solutions may be identical, while in others the CSRs will know what steps to take to resolve an issue while everything is still fresh in memory. By limiting context switching you can expect to see a reduction in response times. #4 Auto-route Questions Based on Expertise Support questions come in all shapes and form and customers may express the very same question, quite differently. For example, the questions in figure 3, are all related to adding a picture to the customer’s profile, with a slight difference in how it’s structured. Figure 3: Similar questions, different expression By classifying each incoming question to a predefined set of categories with text classification methods (e.g. profile, picture, attachment), you can use these categories to route the questions to agents who are best at handling those topics. Some CSRs may be highly qualified at handling certain topics more than others. By intelligently routing questions to relevant expertise, you’ll be increasing the productivity of CSRs as they are not spending time learning how to address support issues that are out of their wheelhouse. #5 Auto-prioritize support threads A few companies that I’ve worked with have mentioned addressing support threads in the First in First Out order (FIFO), meaning the oldest support threads get addressed first. Other companies, manually assign priority based on the severity level of the issue. Don’t forget, that not all customers are equal and not all problems deserve the same level of attention. By addressing threads in the FIFO order or assigning priority based on severity alone, you are missing out on the opportunity to retain your highest-valued customers. If you are spending your time solving 100 low priority problems for low-value customers before serving your most valuable ones — it’s time to think about making changes. While you can start serving your VIP customers first, with A.I. based automation, you can combine various factors into prioritization. For example, you can develop a model that combines the priority of historical support threads with the value that each customer brings (e.g. customer lifetime value) to assign priority to new support questions. This will ensure that your highest value customers with high priority issues get served promptly and by your best CSRs. How to Get Started? If you are a leader in customer support or a product manager, you may be wondering where and how to get started? I recommend that you start by listing down your most inefficient processes. What’s taking you the most time? Is it that the search for answers or question routing has gone bad? Once you know what’s hurting, the next step is to determine if the inefficiency can benefit from Machine Learning, Text Mining and NLP automation. Trying to solve all problems at once will set you up for failure as there’ll be too many changes in your workflow. In addition, some of the automation can be at odds with each other. For example, by auto-prioritizing threads, grouping questions may or may not be effective. Optimizing all at once also prevents your ability to measure success. You’ll not know if the reduction in response times was due to the recommendation of the best answers or if it was due to the auto-prioritization of threads. Despite the hype, not all problems benefit from A.I. and can be resolved with other standard solutions or simple changes to how your software works. In cases of uncertainty, you can always get in touch with me for a recommendation.

https://medium.com/swlh/how-to-improve-productivity-in-customer-support-with-a-i-2ce19eaf77aa

['Kavita Ganesan']

2020-04-02 01:26:56.457000+00:00

['Artificial Intelligence', 'Technology', 'UX', 'Productivity', 'Business']

API: The damn thing opens a whole lotta doors!

An API is a set of definitions-codes, protocols for building and integrating application software. If you are new to Tech lingo, let me chip this in; I bet you’ve been searching for answers to these questions. Are the stuff we interact with on the internet called Apps? Isn’t it just the stuff I got on my phone that are called Apps? Err, yeah, they are apps…………………mobile apps. Pains me to puncture your bubble but I’ll make it painless for you; everything you interact with on the web is an application. This explains it better- web apps are websites with functionality and interactive elements. Boom! Everything you interact with on the web is AN APP! Now that we’ve got that out of the way, and we know that our functioning and interactive websites-like Instagram and Gmail are web apps, let’s step into APIs for real. I like how imotions makes it so vivid: “APIs unlock a door to software (or web-based data), in a way that is controlled and safe for the program”. The API is made up of codes==requests to the receiving software. Then data is returned to the requesting software or App. When it comes to API Gateway and API Management, Nginx is my go-to. API Management Get this first- it’s a process. A process of designing, publishing, distributing, documenting and analyzing APIs in a secure environment. It refers to the overall solution of managing APIs in the production environment and it includes a set of APIs acting in clusters and an administrative UI. Here you have an API dashboard, some form of queuing. You log onto it and manage your policies. It can be split into different operations: Policy Management: Policies get executed sequentially upon a request of an API. Policies determine the behaviour of the API. You just have to create these policies through configuration. Policy Examples Limit call rate by subscription Set usage quota by subscription Validate JWT (JSON Web Token) Control Flow Forward Request Analytics and Monitoring You can view the metrics coming out of the gateway. All the operations here help developers gain visibility into performance, availability and functional correctness. Your DevOps team can track performance and uptime here. On the business side of things, the Product Designers and marketing team can track customer retention, engagements and conversion. Developer Documentation Developers can see which APIs have been published. As a DevOps team, this shouldn’t be underestimated. Documentation is so vital in API management. It contains all the necessary instructions for DevOps engineers to effectively use and integrate APIs. API Gateway An API Gateway is an API management tool that sits between a client and a collection of backend services. An API Gateway acts as a reverse proxy. It accepts all incoming application programs in the first call (API call) and aggregates the various services at the backend which are required to fulfill the specific request and returns the expected result to the requester. A specific API gateway accesses a data plan. API management tool accesses the control plan. Let’s simulate an API request, shall we? API Request Standard/Conventional API Call: GET/pricing/air001 (someone trying to buy an airpod on AliExpress, this guy can’t get a discount or something of the sort; he is going to just click and buy) Exotic API Call: PATCH/pricing/air001 {“price” 16.60, “currency”: “USD” “max_discount”: “30%”} (This guy can change the price of his airpod; he has got a discount API and he’s going to get the airpod way cheaper) Let me tell you a secret, promise you won’t scream, yes, cross your heart! “coupons/coupon codes are technically APIs” Now imagine the power you wield being able to create coupon APIs. In this illustration, what we care about is: Whether the requester is permitted to change the price of the product. Are we allowed to accept the JSON payload (yes…the payload type is JSON)? Can the requester go out and change the currency? Nginx running as an API Gateway Nginx can run virtually everywhere; can run on a local, run on the cloud, run on Docker files or even raspberry pi. PS: API Gateway is a subset of API management. API Gateway Functions (The Nginx perspective) TLS termination Client Authentication Load Balancing And More. TLS termination Nginx enables you to terminate your TLS at the gateway. SSL Certificate can be stored on the disk in the keyval in Nginx Plus. Request Routing Request routing uses location (URI) matching. Exact location = /api/c2/seasons { proxy_pass http://c2-api; } It’s an exact match if the request needs that specific routing. It will go out and be routed to that specific endpoint. Regex Location ~ /api/c2/ [12] [0–9]+ { proxy_pass http://c2-api; } It’s designed to take a specific year and input parameters after it. You can get really creative with Nginx and Regex. Load Balancing The sticky session is a smart method used in load balancing. Each request is routed to the server which initially served the request. Nginx creates a cookie and it is sent as a response and always realizes which server served the initial request this way. All NGINX Load Balancing methods are applicable. upstream c2-api ( server 10.1.1.4:8001 server 10.1.1.4:8002 sticky cookie srv_id expires = 1h; ) Rate Limiting limit_req_zone is used to globalize rate limiting. However, each location can be rate-limited independently. If an Nginx instance gets more than the Nginx established rate limit, the requester gets a 429 error. Client Authentication auth_jwt directive is used here. Authentication is possible based on a key or JWT in the program. Nginx will introspect the token data and match it to the uid parameter. Then if the value is a match, the request is proxied to the c2 API. If not, whew, you get… “return 403 “Forbidden: Not Authorized to Access”; Uh-oh, I’m not campaigning for Nginx, but you can only use this on Nginx Plus. Anyways, I look forward to hearing your viewpoints and contributions on software accessibility, authentication and more of the DevOps culture. I gotta say, my content isn’t limited to the traditional software space but I also break down the myths and legends of Business and Strategy and their integration with software. And my content is always relatable by both professionals and newbies in software and software-related fields. So if you have any questions, shoot away or you can also reach me on Twitter. Thanks for Reading💙. Please leave a comment if you have any thoughts about the topic — I am open to learning and knowledge explorations. I can imagine how helpful this post has been, do leave a clap 👏 below a few times to show your support for the author!

https://medium.com/@hellobamiro/api-the-damn-thing-opens-a-whole-lotta-doors-3e1aa6a7d3c

['Timothy Bamiro']

2021-09-05 20:34:37.962000+00:00

['Data', 'Software Development', 'API', 'Nginx', 'DevOps']

“Secret Token” 1 (Partnership with Zodiac — Digital Collectible NFT Ecosystem)

Greetings to the BASIC community! With “Accelerate the world’s transition to digital money” as our mission statement, Basic.Finance has been busy this quarter to bring more value to our clients and BASIC holders. In today’s post, we are introducing one of our B2B2C partners, Zodiac (ZODI), a premiere Non-Fungible-Token ecosystem. Overview Zodiac is a unique ecosystem comprising dApps through which ecosystem participants can create, own, distribute, exchange, and monetize their provably-rare digital collectible in the form of a Non-Fungible-Token (NFT) using ZODI, the main utility token of the platform. Non-fungible tokens are tokens minted on blockchains that are individually unique; meaning that no other token is exactly like it. This token design ensures the right and ownership over an asset. NFTs are now used by digital asset artists, blockchain games, and countless other applications to ensure digital scarcity and ownership. Initiated by Ludens Limited, the team that founded and scaled LINE FRIENDS (www.linefriends.com) from a scratch to billion-dollar digital-contents business, Zodiac ecosystem primarily focuses on: (i) Creating user-friendly digital collectibles, Creating user-friendly digital collectibles, (ii) Creating digital derivatives of non-digital collectibles such as physical arts, and Creating digital derivatives of non-digital collectibles such as physical arts, and (iii) Promoting consumption, trading, and financial activities with (i) and (ii) by the masses. Zodiac aims to bring blockchain into the mainstream by offering advantages of true-ownership, digital scarcity, monetization capabilities, and interoperability. Team Ludens Limited, the team that founded and scaled LINE FRIENDS (www.linefriends.com) from a scratch to a billion-dollar digital-contents business with vast digital contents related experience such as the followings under their belt. Partners & Advisors Zodiac is getting supports from the world-renowned partners and advisors like the following: Lorenzo De Medici Prince Lorenzo comes from one of the most famous families from the Italian renaissance and a long distinguished background including 4 Popes, 2 Queens and more. Prince Lorenzo’s ancestors were in the banking business, like himself. His family bank was established in 1300 the oldest bank of Europe and the most successful bank of the Renaissance. The Medici bank was the first bank to invent and create the check called promise of payment and the first bank that understood that innovation and trust is a key factor in the banking world. Today the Medici family is still in Banking and Finance in the USA and UK and Prince Lorenzo collaborates with different banks and family offices around the globe’s for they’re investment portfolio in ART (Bank of America have invested more than 8 billion dollars in art in the last few years )as is one of the safest growing investment areas in this volatile market era. He is the founder and Director of the newly created Medici Bank, a USA Fintech International Digital Bank. The Medici Bank is the Uber of Banking and is currently based in Puerto Rico with intentions to provide BtoB Banking based on the blockchain technology. Prince Lorenzo is an internationally recognized artist and a businessman, he manages the family wealth, and helps some select prominent international Families with wealth management, is an expert in investment in the art business. He manages his Family Office Between London, Los Angeles, and Rome having investments in real estate pharmaceutical, blockchain, hydrogen project, video games, tourism, fintech, biotech. Tim Kondo: CEO of Animation International (IP licensing company) / Japan Tim is currently a Director of Animation International Ltd., and is responsible for managing mostly famous Japanese properties such as Doraemon, Crayon Shinchan, Chibimaruo-chan, and others for Asian markets. Tim joined Animation International in 1994, Simultaneously appointed as Director for Toei Animation Enterprises (Hong Kong), a company handling Dragonball, Slam Dunk, Digimon, and others, from 2005 to 2008. Also appointed as Director for IMMG (Singapore), joint venture company with Japanese advertising agency ADK, for media buying business, from 1997 to 2009. Zodiac (ZODI) Token ZODI is the base ecosystem currency for the purchase of various digital collectibles around dApps. ZODI is inherently transferable to other users, and also fully exchangeable with various supported ETH and ERC20 tokens, such as DAI, USDT, USDC, and others. 3.1.1. Staking As an indication of commitment to the ecosystem and safeguard against malicious behavior, players are also required to stake ZODI to access certain dApps. The more you do on the platform the more you can get rewarded. 3.1.2. Membership ZODI is required to enter our members-only store to earn NFT airdrops, collectible rewards, ZODI airdrops, and extra ecosystem features. Users can also stake ZODI to farm exclusive, tradeable NFTs that are not offered to non-members. 3.1.3. Loan Collateral Powered by Basic.Finance, ZODI shall be taken as a loan collateral to provide additional liquidity to holders. 3.1.4. dApp Access Users of Zodi dApps spend ZODI in order to play games, buy items or customize their character.

https://medium.com/thebasic/secret-token-1-partnership-with-zodiac-digital-collectible-nft-ecosystem-a5c0e357b972

[]

2020-12-09 09:59:03.018000+00:00

['Partnerships', 'Blockchain', 'Basic Finance', 'About Basic', 'Projects']

My Coming Out Story.

My Coming Out Story. Not all Stories are Negative. I would love to go back and tell the young Kevin to accept who you are, it will be hard for you to accept but ultimately it will be the best thing that you ever do. Rainbow heart. Photo by @jiroe I was talking to a friend at work about the articles I have written and he said something along the lines of ‘yeah I’ve read them, homophobia, homophobia and the straights hate the gays’. That got me thinking about my articles and he’s right, the majority of the articles I have written are directly or indirectly about homophobia. I have written that word so much that when I type the word ‘homo’ it automatically wants to finish the word with ‘phobia’. So here is the thing, I have been out for over ten years now and I haven’t suffered any homophobic abuse. I thought in this article I could write my own experience, a positive experience of what happened when I came out and what happened since. After hiding my sexuality to myself, and to everyone else since I was around 11, at 22 years old (relatively late but I got there) I came out. It was a Sunday afternoon when I knew everyone would be at home and I asked everyone to come into the living room as I had something that I wanted to talk about. I was so nervous and the speech I had planned went out of the window but I told them I was in a relationship with a guy, probably not what they had expected. I said I was bi, I think it made it easier for me to handle. I understand how this can be bad for people who identify as bisexual, people don’t believe that you can like both sexes but I genuinely thought I did at that time. My parents were shocked which was understandable but they said that they loved me no matter what. I think my dad found it hard to get his head around, he was from the building trade, he used to go to the pub most nights, smoked cigarettes most of his life, he was a mans man but I was his son and even though it was a world he didn’t know he never said anything bad about my sexuality. My Mum was accepting from the start, but I know it took time for her to get over the shock but she never let it on to me. My brother right from the start was awesome, it must have bothered him that he didn’t guess when he was the closest person to me but he accepted it straight away. Friends Drinking at the Pub. Photo by @elevatebeer I had told my immediate family but I wasn’t quite sure about the rest of my family yet so I kept my sexuality hidden from them but I did tell my friends. I was a little bit sneaky how I went about this, I changed my status on Facebook to ‘in a relationship’, I knew this would get questions, my friend Vicki was one of the first to respond asking who this mystery girl was that I was now in a relationship with. I then told her that it wasn’t a girl. I knew that telling her would mean that the next night out would force me to tell everyone. So on a traditional Friday night gathering, sat together at the pub I came out to them. I couldn’t get my words out so I think my brother told everyone, that detail is a little hazy. They were awesome right from the start, I then went about telling my friends who weren’t in that friendship circle and again they were perfect and accepting. A couple of weeks after I came out one of my friends also did, I think that he saw the reaction I got and it encouraged him, he saw that everyone was ok with me and that he would get the same. The relationship I came out for didn’t last long (if you can call it a relationship) but I’m thankful for it, it forced me to come out and encouraged someone else to do the same. Nine months after I came out I met Stu, we had spoken online for a while but he lived near Birmingham (the one in the UK) he moved nearer to me so we finally met up. Five days later we were ‘official’, 6 weeks later we were travelling around the world together, quick but it felt right. My extended family eventually worked out that Stu and I were a couple and he wasn’t just “my friend from school”, maybe it was the Brummie accent that gave it away. To be honest I have no idea why I didn’t tell them before, once again they accepted my sexuality and treated our relationship just like any other. I absolutely love the relationship my mum and Stu have, he even stayed with my mum the night before we got married. It really shows how far things have come from her initial shock to being friends with my other half. Stu and I have been together now for ten years and just over two years ago we got married. The day was awesome and we shared it with our friends and family, it was the best day ever! There was only one family member who didn’t agree with our marriage, who didn’t come to the wedding but as it was someone I’m not that close to. I was and still am annoyed but it wasn’t the end of the world. The people I really care about were there and made the day special. Friends and family at our wedding! I was so worried about people’s reaction to my sexuality that I buried it so deep that I wouldn’t let myself accept it. I found myself looking at boys and hating myself for it, I tried to force myself to look at girls and find them attractive. It doesn’t work and it only makes it harder to accept, you know you can’t change it but you want to. It wasn’t until Stu and I had been together for a while that I accpeted I was gay and not bi. After coming out I realised I wasted over ten years of my life worrying and battling but it was pointless. I would love to go back and tell the young Kevin to accept who you are, it will be hard for you to accept but ultimately it will be the best thing that you ever do. Having said that if I came out earlier I might not have met Stu and have the life I have now and I love my life. I have tried to make this a positive piece, I have admitted the difficulties in coming out but I wanted to show that being gay isn’t all homophobia, homophobia and some more homophobia. I haven’t suffered any abuse at all. I know I’m a white boy from the south of England so in that respect it is relatively easy for me. There is every chance that my family and friends wouldn’t accept me and that could happen in any place and for any race. For me the grass was definitely greener on the other side and if you are thinking of coming out, it could be for you too.

https://medium.com/lgbtgaze/my-coming-out-story-41962b44fde4

['Kevin Laurie']

2018-10-04 19:19:37.345000+00:00

['Storytelling', 'Sexuality', 'Lifestyle', 'Coming Out', 'Love']

Trampling Civil Rights

Terry H. Schwadron June 10, 2019 For transgender people and many gays, next year’s election may primarily be about civil rights. Without doubt, the Trump administration has become a steamroller squashing individual rights for transgender people in particular, but also more generally against expanded rights for all LBGT individuals. Generally speaking, the 20-plus Democratic candidates are more sympathetic. The emotion-laden debate over the government’s place in individual decision-making has been brought to the fore again by the recent abortion laws, but from a civil rights view, the impact is much broader. In the Trump zero-sum gain, apparently it is more importantto be seen reaching out to Christian evangelicals than to gays and communities of Other. That has come to mean an agenda that is heavy both with symbolic support and actual legal changes that favor the evangelical foreign and domestic agendas. In the foreign policy sphere, evangelical support for Israel as a home for Judeo-Christian religious history as well as modern-day, anti-Muslim democracy has led Trump administration thinking to recognize Jerusalem as the official capital, to support Israeli expansion of settlements in the occupied areas and vocal promotion of the Netanyahu government. The evangelical agenda is an important source of support for a southern border Wall, even in the face of policies to separate migrant families. On the domestic side, the friendship of the Trump administration for anti-abortion forces, for conservative judges, and for decisions that favor the rights of Christians who stand against gay marriage, for example, over the now-legal right for same-sex marriage and employment rights. Among some of the examples recently gathered by the news agency Axios: · The administration is moving to make it easier for federally funded adoption agencies to reject same-sex couples. · Trump Rolled back an Obama-era order allowing transgender people to openly serve in the U.S. military. · The administration has proposed rolling back protections for transgender people established under the Affordable Care Act. · The government argued to the Supreme Court last year that federal law doesn’t protect transgender people from workplace discrimination. · The White House has vowed to make it easier for religious health care workers to object to providing care and procedures that conflict with their religious or moral beliefs, potentially putting gay and transgender patients at risk. · The Housing and Urban Development Department would weaken protections for homeless transgender people, including allowing HUD-funded shelters to deny them access or force transgender women to share quarters and bathrooms with men. · The Department of Education has removed Title IX protections for transgender youth ensuring they had access to bathrooms and facilities of their choice. · The Justice Department has changed an Obama-era policy allowing prisoners to be housed based on their gender identity. As a pattern,Trump is steadily rolling back Obama-era nondiscrimination policies across the entire federal government — including health care, housing and the military — that had sought to expand civil rights. The discussion about limiting adoption agencies from working with same sex couples comes out of complaints from religious organizations that doing so violates belief systems, much like the recent court battles over services by bakers and others citing religious beliefs to refuse services to same-sex couples. The White House is weighing either rescinding the rules altogether next month or adding an explicit exemption for religious organizations, with the debate focused not on rights, but on what approach would best withstand a court challenge. The Department of Health and Human Services Department’s Office of Civil Rights also wants to eliminate an Obama-era policy that says doctors can’t discriminate against transgender patients, a policy already frozen by a federal judge. The point is, it’s not just abortion. Rather there is a wide swath of services that evangelicals want a friendly White House to help eliminate that would help support transgender and LBGT folks. Just why one group’s rights necessarily must be seen as stomping on another’s is a good debate, But we’re not having that debate. We’re simply making America evangelical. ## www.terryschwadron.wordpress.com

https://medium.com/@terryschwadron/trampling-civil-rights-f4f487b4c8ae

['Terry Schwadron']

2019-06-10 11:08:33.851000+00:00

['Civil Rights', 'Trump', 'Values', 'Choices', 'LGBTQ']

Google Facebook LinkedIn Auth React NodeJS Tutorial

A more appealing, readable, and up-to-date version of this story is available on my personal blog. Recently I had to update and refactor authentication logic in Increaser app. After finishing the task, I decided to write a post so that other folks could add social auth to their apps much faster than I did. Step 1. Get Credentials We will need pairs of CLIENT_ID and CLIENT_SECRET for every provider to implement authentication on the front-end and the back-end. To use Google, we need to create a project in Google Developer Console, go to the credentials tab and add OAuth 2.0 Client. In Increaser, I have two client origins, one for development with localhost and another for the production version. Redirect URIs is where you want a user to appear after authorization. Every provider will attach query parameters to the specified URI so that we could handle them on the front-end and process them on the back-end. We will use the same route for all providers and will distinguish them by query parameter provider . To use Facebook, we need to create an app on Facebook for Developers. The procedure looks similar, this is what we will have on Client OAuth Settings. To use LinkedIn, we go to LinkedIn Developers and create an app there too. Step 2. React Component In Increaser, I share one component with authorization buttons between sign-in and sign-up modals. You could see that the only difference is that the text changes depending on the purpose of the popup. The component calls a function to get authentication links. Then it goes over each available provider and renders a reusable button component that acts as a link. Every button has a distinct color, icon, and text. src/components/auth/providers.js import React from 'react' import styled from 'styled-components' import { faGoogle, faFacebookSquare, faLinkedin } from '@fortawesome/free-brands-svg-icons' import Button from '../reusable/button' import { PROVIDER, PROVIDER_NAME } from 'constants/auth' import { useTranslation } from 'internalization' import { getProvidersUrls } from 'utils/auth' const PROVIDER_COLOR = { [PROVIDER.GOOGLE]: '#4285F4', [PROVIDER.LINKEDIN]: '#0073b1', [PROVIDER.FACEBOOK]: '#4267b2' } const PROVIDER_ICON = { [PROVIDER.GOOGLE]: faGoogle, [PROVIDER.LINKEDIN]: faLinkedin, [PROVIDER.FACEBOOK]: faFacebookSquare } const ButtonWrapper = styled.div` margin: 10px 0; ` const Providers = ({ purpose }) => { const { t } = useTranslation() const text = t('auth.modal')[purpose] const providersUrls = getProvidersUrls() return Object.keys(PROVIDER).map(provider => <ButtonWrapper key={provider}> <Button linkTo={providersUrls[provider]} externalInSameTab background={PROVIDER_COLOR[provider]} text={`${text.button} ${PROVIDER_NAME[provider]}`} icon={PROVIDER_ICON[provider]} /> </ButtonWrapper> ) } Below we could see constants related to authorization. We could find here pairs of URLs and scopes for every provider. src/constants/auth.js export const GOOGLE_AUTH_URL = 'https://accounts.google.com/o/oauth2/v2/auth' export const GOOGLE_SCOPE = 'https://www.googleapis.com/auth/userinfo.email https://www.googleapis.com/auth/userinfo.profile' export const FACEBOOK_AUTH_URL = 'https://www.facebook.com/v4.0/dialog/oauth' export const FACEBOOK_SCOPE = 'public_profile,email' export const LINKEDIN_AUTH_URL = 'https://www.linkedin.com/oauth/v2/authorization' export const LINKEDIN_SCOPE = 'r_liteprofile r_emailaddress' export const PROVIDER = { GOOGLE: 'GOOGLE', FACEBOOK: 'FACEBOOK', LINKEDIN: 'LINKEDIN' } export const MODAL_PURPOSE = { SIGN_UP: 'SIGN_UP', SIGN_IN: 'SIGN_IN' } export const PROVIDER_NAME = { [PROVIDER.GOOGLE]: 'Google', [PROVIDER.LINKEDIN]: 'LinkedIn', [PROVIDER.FACEBOOK]: 'Facebook' } Now we want to transform these constants into authorization URLs. We are using the two helpers function to attach query parameters to a given URL. src/utils/auth.js const getURLWithQueryParams = (base, params) => { const query = Object.entries(params) .map(([key, value]) => `${key}=${encodeURIComponent(value)}`) .join('&') return `${base}?${query}` } export const getRedirectUri = provider => `${window.location.origin}${PATH.OAUTH}?provider=${provider.toLowerCase()}` export const getProvidersUrls = () => ({ [PROVIDER.GOOGLE]: getURLWithQueryParams(GOOGLE_AUTH_URL, { client_id: process.env.REACT_APP_GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID, redirect_uri: getRedirectUri(PROVIDER.GOOGLE), scope: GOOGLE_SCOPE, response_type: 'code', access_type: 'offline', prompt: 'consent' }), [PROVIDER.FACEBOOK]: getURLWithQueryParams(FACEBOOK_AUTH_URL, { client_id: process.env.REACT_APP_FACEBOOK_APP_ID, redirect_uri: getRedirectUri(PROVIDER.FACEBOOK), scope: FACEBOOK_SCOPE, response_type: 'code', auth_type: 'rerequest', display: 'popup' }), [PROVIDER.LINKEDIN]: getURLWithQueryParams(LINKEDIN_AUTH_URL, { response_type: 'code', client_id: process.env.REACT_APP_LINKEDIN_CLIENT_ID, redirect_uri: getRedirectUri(PROVIDER.LINKEDIN), scope: LINKEDIN_SCOPE }) }) Once the user signed-in with a provider, he will appear on the /oauth page. In Increaser this page is empty. src/components/auth/oauth.js const OAuth = ({ processOAuthParams }) => { useEffect(() => { processOAuthParams() }, [processOAuthParams]) return null } The component calls actions that trigger a specific saga that transforms query parameters into an object. Then it takes the code and the name of the provider to make the identification query to the back-end. There is also some Increaser-specific code. If it was the first identification, it means that the user just signed up, and the app will start the onboarding. Also, after identification will be made an additional query to synchronize the app. src/sagas/auth.js const queryToObject = queryString => { const pairsString = queryString[0] === '?' ? queryString.slice(1) : queryString const pairs = pairsString .split('&') .map(str => str.split('=').map(decodeURIComponent)) return pairs.reduce((acc, [key, value]) => { if (key) { acc[key] = value } return acc }, {}) } export function* processOAuthParams() { const queryString = window.location.search history.push(PATH.TIME_PICKER) if (queryString) { const { code, provider: lowProvider } = queryToObject(queryString) const provider = lowProvider && PROVIDER[lowProvider.toUpperCase()] if (provider) { try { const query = IDENTIFY_WITH_OAUTH_QUERY( provider, code, getRedirectUri(provider), offsetedUtils.getOffset() ) const { identifyWithOAuth } = yield callApi(query) yield put(receiveAuthData(identifyWithOAuth)) if (identifyWithOAuth.firstIdentification) { yield put(showAfterSignUpModal()) getAnalytics().finishSignUp() } yield* synchronize() } catch (err) { yield put(failToProcessOAuthParams()) reportError('Fail to Authorize', err) } } } } Step 3. NodeJS Back-end Increaser utilizes GraphQL on the back-end. It has one query that is used both for sign-in and sign-up, returning basic user info and JWT token. type User { id: ID email: String name: String token: String tokenExpirationTime: Int firstIdentification: Boolean } enum AuthProvider { GOOGLE FACEBOOK LINKEDIN } type Query { identifyWithOAuth( provider: AuthProvider! code: String! redirectUri: String! ): User } We won’t look into the implementation of the query’s handler because it has too much Increaser-specific code. What we will pay attention to is how we validate the code from the front-end and get information such as email and name from the provider. src/utils/auth.js const { URLSearchParams } = require('url') const jwt = require('jsonwebtoken') const fetch = require('node-fetch') const GOOGLE_TOKEN: 'https://oauth2.googleapis.com/token' const GOOGLE_USER_INFO: 'https://www.googleapis.com/oauth2/v2/userinfo' const FACEBOOK_TOKEN: 'https://graph.facebook.com/v4.0/oauth/access_token' const FACEBOOK_USER_INFO: 'https://graph.facebook.com/me' const LINKEDIN_TOKEN: `https://www.linkedin.com/oauth/v2/accessToken` const LINKEDIN_NAME: 'https://api.linkedin.com/v2/me' const LINKEDIN_EMAIL: 'https://api.linkedin.com/v2/emailAddress?q=members&projection=(elements*(handle~))' const fetchJSON = (...args) => fetch(...args).then(r => r.json()) module.exports = { getValidatedWithGoogleUser: async (code, redirectUri) => { const { access_token } = await fetchJSON(GOOGLE_TOKEN, { method: 'POST', body: JSON.stringify({ client_id: process.env.GOOGLE_CLIENT_ID, client_secret: process.env.GOOGLE_CLIENT_SECRET, redirect_uri: redirectUri, grant_type: 'authorization_code', code }) }) const userData = await fetchJSON(GOOGLE_USER_INFO, { method: 'GET', headers: { Authorization: `Bearer ${access_token}` } }) return userData }, getValidatedWithFacebookUser: async (code, redirectUri) => { const tokenUrl = getURLWithQueryParams(FACEBOOK_TOKEN, { client_id: process.env.FACEBOOK_CLIENT_ID, client_secret: process.env.FACEBOOK_CLIENT_SECRET, redirect_uri: redirectUri, code }) const { access_token } = await fetchJSON(tokenUrl) const dataUrl = getURLWithQueryParams(FACEBOOK_USER_INFO, { fields: ['email', 'name'].join(','), access_token }) const userData = await fetchJSON(dataUrl) return userData }, getValidatedWithLinkedinUser: async (code, redirectUri) => { const body = new URLSearchParams({ grant_type: 'authorization_code', code, redirect_uri: redirectUri, client_id: process.env.LINKEDIN_CLIENT_ID, client_secret: process.env.LINKEDIN_CLIENT_SECRET }) const { access_token } = await fetchJSON(LINKEDIN_TOKEN, { method: 'POST', body }) const payload = { method: 'GET', headers: { Authorization: `Bearer ${access_token}` } } const { localizedFirstName, localizedLastName } = await fetchJSON( LINKEDIN_NAME, payload ) const userData = { name: `${localizedFirstName} ${localizedLastName}` } const response = await fetchJSON(LINKEDIN_EMAIL, payload) if (response.elements) { userData.email = response.elements[0]['handle~'].emailAddress } return userData } } As we could see, we go through the same procedure for every provider. First, we obtain access_token and use it to receive the user's info. In Increaser, once the user is validated, the back-end generates auth data via jsonwebtoken library. src/utils/auth.js const jwt = require('jsonwebtoken') const generateAuthData = id => { const tokenExpirationTime = Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000) + process.env.JWT_LIFESPAN_IN_SECONDS return { token: jwt.sign({ id, exp: tokenExpirationTime }, process.env.SECRET), tokenExpirationTime } } That’s all. Maybe I didn’t cover everything, yet I believe you could fill up the gaps :)

https://medium.com/@geekrodion/feature-voting-board-for-saas-with-react-and-dynamodb-2fa992faf6c2

['Rodion Chachura']

2020-12-02 09:47:35.215000+00:00

['GraphQL', 'React', 'Authorization', 'Oauth', 'Nodejs']

Countries Approving Cryptocurrencies

2017 has been an extraordinary year for cryptocurrencies. There has been a tremendous amount of growth in both value and popularity of cryptocurrencies that no longer can it be referred to as just a passing trend. At the start of the year, Bitcoin traded at just under $1,000, $960 to be precise. At the time of writing this article in December of 2017, the price of Bitcoin has exceeded the $10,000 mark. That is an increase in value that exceeds an entire magnitude of thousand, to the realm of tens of thousands in little under a year. Never before has there been any tradable commodity that has seen such growth. All of the headlines this year haven’t been on Bitcoin though as Ethereum and many other Altcoins have experienced unparalleled growth as well. Cryptocurrency ICOs have become the leading crowdfunding method used by startups to raise capital for their projects. All around the globe, the conversation seems to be about cryptocurrencies, smart contracts, and blockchain-based applications. With the level of growth that has occurred in the industry, greater attention is now being paid by Governments and other stakeholders around the world. Considering the unprecedented volume of investment that has occurred in this year, steps have been taken to regulate the industry. Different countries around the world have adopted varying strategies to handle the market. This article will examine some of the countries that are approving cryptocurrencies. The order in which these countries appear does not indicate any form of ranking in terms of the disposition to cryptocurrencies. 1. Japan Japan Tokyo may no longer be considered as the commercial capital of Asia but the cryptocurrency hub of the region. With China and South Korea taking drastic measures against cryptocurrencies, Japan has been given the opportunity to become a breeding ground for the growth of cryptocurrency trading in Asia. The Japanese Government through the PSA (Payment Services Act) has set up a framework that which makes it legal to use cryptocurrencies for payment purposes. While China may have the monopoly on Bitcoin mining, Japan has the lion share of cryptocurrency trading/exchange activities as far as Asia is concerned. The FSA which is the financial regulatory arm of the Japanese government also recently approved a number of cryptocurrency exchanges, as well as cryptocurrencies which can be traded on these platforms. With the support of the Government, cryptocurrency operations are thriving in Japan and in the coming years, many ICOs may even choose to host their campaigns in the country. By taking advantage of the reticence and ambivalence of many countries with regard to cryptocurrencies, Japan is positioning itself to become a major player in the market. With the industry still being in its infancy, there is a desire for friendly environments where the market can thrive. Government regulation isn’t necessarily a bad thing and the involved of financial regulators in the Japanese crypto scene can give the much needed incentive to entrepreneurs, developers, and investors to shift focus to the Japanese crypto market. 2. Canada Canada By the middle of 2016, the Canadian Central Bank was strongly dismissing the notion of developing its own cryptocurrency. Fast forward to August 2017 and the approval given to Impak Coin which becomes the first Canadian approved cryptocurrency. This says a lot about the evolution in the attitude of the Canadian government towards cryptocurrencies. With the Government of their neighbors down South still a bit ambivalent on their position with regard to cryptocurrency, this move only strengthens Canada’s position as a force in the North American crypto scene. On the whole, Canada is a friendly environment for cryptocurrency entrepreneurs as there are a number of Bitcoin Startups in the country as well as numerous Bitcoin ATMs. Not many countries have more than one city that can be classified as a virtual currency hub but Canada has two; Toronto and Vancouver. Many countries can look to the successes of such initiatives and use them as a reference point in developing their own cryptocurrency hubs. Following the success of Impak Coin, there are other cryptocurrencies that are reportedly undergoing testing and development. These cryptocoins are scheduled for release in the coming years and are a testament to Canada’s positive stance on virtual currencies. 3. Germany Germany Cryptocurrencies generally enjoy favorable Government policies in Europe as many nations on the continent are even massively involved in developing blockchain solutions. The UK and France especially, are leaders in this regard. Germany is one of the few countries where Bitcoin is actually recognized as a legal currency. There is a significant implication to this recognition of Bitcoin as being a legal currency in Germany. Many countries have not banned Bitcoins outright but have taken a not so positive stance against cryptocurrencies. Bitcoin being legal in Germany has had an impact on the value of Bitcoins due to the perceived legitimacy given to it by such Government recognition. German tax laws are also favorable to Bitcoin with an exemption from the 25% tax on profits for Bitcoin that has been held for one year. The country is also home to one of the biggest Bitcoin marketplaces in the world which has recently finalized plans to introduce Ethereum (the second most valuable cryptocurrency) trading into the platform. 4. Holland Holland There is a literal “Bitcoin City” in the country of Holland which is home to hundreds of cryptocurrency merchants. This Bitcoin City is located in Arnhem and it is possible to make retail purchases at shops and cafes with Bitcoin. There is no Government regulation on Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in Holland. Many cryptocurrency startups are based in Holland as a result. The existence of such crypto hubs creates a possibility for the evolution and advancement of the crypto economy. There are many bugs that have to be worked out before cryptocoins can become a mainstream currency and having such infrastructures as a Bitcoin City helps to improve the functionality of the concept. Within the Bitcoin City in Arnhem, Bitcoin is just like Euros, or Dollars, or any other fiat currency; a store of value. When people engage in economic interaction using Bitcoins, a consciousness is created within the general public that cryptocurrencies can function just like regular fiat money. Final Words The attitude of countries usually falls under 3 categories; favorable, undecided and unfavorable. The fact remains that cryptocurrencies continue to be at the forefront of the modern day technological advancement and many countries are taking a long hard look at blockchain technology and its possible applications. ___________ Rakhee Pal FundYourselfNow (Join us on Telegram & Twitter)

https://medium.com/the-mission/countries-approving-cryptocurrencies-b5bbca1a5a03

[]

2017-12-19 11:01:01.857000+00:00

['Bitcoin', 'Country', 'Ethereum', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Tech']

Of Unfinished Stories And Not So Happy Endings

It’d be stupid not to write about you now — now when I’ve made sense of all that has happened to me over the years. It’d be careless, you were there after all. As a matter of fact, you played quite an important part in helping me become who I am today. Our story is one of those stories that make people shake their heads. A story that elicits dos and don’ts of falling in love. But nonetheless, I fearlessly share it with those close with me. As embarrassing as it is to admit that once upon a time I chased a boy who didn’t care for a good three years, I did. And well, fortunately for me, it lead me to lessons I needed — learnings that I now keep close to my heart. You were that unfinished story I refused to write. You were that chapter I never dared to finish, afraid that I might not like the ending. Deep down, I knew I had to close whatever it is that we had. I knew that I’ll have to do so someday and that day did come. Surprisingly, I was satisfied. I was happy with the paths we both decided to take. After hearing that you’re finally happy with someone else, I found myself relieved. The questions have been answered, I was never that girl for you. I think deep down, I wanted to be there for when you finally felt okay. Maybe I dreamed of being the girl that changes you, of being that support you needed — or maybe I really just cared. Maybe I really did love you and maybe I wanted you to see yourself in my eyes, ever-loving and wonderful. But maybe that was never the role I was supposed to play in your life — and that’s okay. I’m more than happy to see you okay. I’m glad that finally, you’ve found someone you want to take care of — someone you want to devote yourself to. As for me, I’ve found my person too. I’ve finally found someone who gives me the same love I once gave to you. It’s been a while since I last experienced something like this, I really am happy. I’m glad we had that conversation. I’m glad you spoke highly of her. I’m glad you’ve apologized for everything. Frankly speaking, I think I’ll always have a place for you in my heart. Regardless of who I love or who I’m with, you will always be the boy who taught me how to love myself. And I will always love you for that. I’m happy for you, I really am. I hope you marry her someday. I hope you’ll give the same amount of love I gave you back then.

https://medium.com/@kindaherekindathere/of-unfinished-stories-and-not-so-happy-endings-ee7b725fb1ee

['Stela Panesa']

2020-06-15 06:13:57.930000+00:00

['Lovestory', 'Love Yourself', 'Heartbreak']

Best hair extensions for your hair type

Which type of hair extensions are the best? Have you been thinking of getting hair extensions but are unsure which ones are best for you? Thanks to their versatility, there are unlimited reasons to get hair extensions. Hair extensions can instantly transform your hair’s length, volume, and even add a perfect pop of color for a special occasion. But the big question is, Which hair extensions best fit your needs and more importantly, your lifestyle? Do you need them to last for months, for the weekend, or just for a night? After 20 plus years in the hair industry , I have used all types of extensions and installation techniques. Let me share with you all the options you have to choose from, I even threw in some maintenance tips for the extensions. SEW-IN WEFT HAIR EXTENSIONS These are my personal favorites! They are perfect for anyone who wants a long and fuller hair look, with extensions that easily blend with their hair. They are installed using the Sew-in technique — Usually, 2–4 wefts of hair are sewn into each row, which is created with beads to secure the wefts. Sew-In hair extensions lay flat on the scalp, so they are pretty much invisible, comfortable to wear, and super flexible. With sew-in hair extensions, you can easily pull your hair up into a ponytail or other updo hairstyles. That said, it’s important to note that sew-in hair extensions are not recommended for people experiencing hair loss or thinning hair. They are best for people with medium to coarse, thick hair. If properly cared for, Sew-in hair extensions can last over a year. And the best part? You do not have to take them out to maintain them. Your stylist simply moves them up at your maintenance appointment (between 6–8 weeks). Pretty convenient, right? Some people even reuse their hair past the standard 12 months — that’s a bonus. Because glue is not used during installation, you can freely use your favorite oil-based products on your scalp and hair while wearing sew-in extensions. Pros of sew-in wefts Their installation doesn’t require the use of glue or heat. Fast application. Easy maintenance. Longer use up to 12 months. Cons of sew-in wefts Not great for thinning hair. Improper installation can cause hair breakage. KERATIP- EXTENSIONS If you have uneven hair density and you’re looking to fill out sparse areas, Keratip extensions are your go-to option! Keratip Extensions are individual small bundles of hair that are infused (with heat) to your hair. They are lightweight with a natural movement that flows with your hair. The individual placement makes them virtually unnoticeable and super flexible, so you can easily style your hair up or down, without indication of added hair. They work best with medium to coarse hair but can also be used on fine hair to add a little bit of volume, however, I would not recommend doing a full head of Keratip-Extensions on fine thinning hair. The application lasts about 3 months, and the hair can not be reused. Pro Tip: A full head application can be quite time-consuming, so if that’s what you’re going for, make sure you are prepared to spend a few hours at the salon. Pros of Keratip Extensions Lightweight. Easily blended with your hair. Not noticeable on the scalp. Cons of Keratip extensions Time-consuming. Only lasts for 3 months. You can not reuse hair. Improper installation/uninstallation can cause hair breakage. TAPE-IN HAIR EXTENSIONS If you are after thick, voluminous, and bouncing hair, then tape-in extensions are for you. Tape-ins are one of the most common extensions used on the market. Mostly because of their fast application — they take between 20 min to an hour to apply. Tape-ins are wide and can cover a large area, adding a tremendous amount of volume. Unlike Keratip Extensions, Tape-ins can be reused. They just need to be re-taped and re-applied, around 8 weeks. Tape-ins work best on medium to coarse hair but can be used on fine hair to add some volume and length. On thin hair, I would recommend using a single extension with double-sided tape as this is less weight and stress on the hair. Placement is key with tape-ins as they are more noticeable in the hair than other extensions. Pros of tape-in hair extensions Quick application. Hair can be reused. They are great for adding volume. Cons of tape-in hair extensions Not as easily blended Improper installation/uninstallation can cause breakage, especially because of the glue used during installation. CLIP-IN HAIR EXTENSIONS If you enjoy switching up your hairstyle often and don’t want to commit to maintaining extensions, clip-ins would be great for you. Clip-in extensions are affordable, super versatile, and the easiest extensions to install, so you can change up your hair color and look in just a matter of minutes! Clip-in hair extensions are meant for temporary use and are most popular for special occasions. Pro Tip: Clip-in extensions should not be used for days at a time and should always be taken out at night. Failure to do this can cause hair thinning and breakage. Pros of clip-in hair extensions Versatile. Affordable. Low-maintenance. Great for special occasions. Cons of clip-in hair extensions They can cause hair thinning. Are ideal for short-time use only. I hope this article has given you some insights into hair extensions. It’s best to consult with a professional hairstylist to ensure you truly understand the process involved with every type of hair extensions before investing in them. You can book a complimentary consultation session with me here. And if you live in the Los Angeles area and are looking for extensions, feel free to text Dawna Jarvis @ 818–527–5463 to set up a free consultation. Check out my Instagram @hairbydawnajarvis for amazing hair extension inspiration.

https://medium.com/@dawna_89208/which-is-the-best-type-of-hair-extensions-for-you-961f43455ee6

['Dawna Jarvis']

2021-12-11 00:35:45.302000+00:00

['Hair', 'Hair Care', 'Hairdressers', 'Hair Extensions']

Worn-out cotton sacks

At that time, my dad had bought an old truck. He said to my mother, “Prissy, we are going to load all these kids in the truck and we’re gonna drive to Pine Bluff. There’s a spiritual man coming to church who believes in prayer. I’m gonna fast and pray that we’re going to go down there. I have one hundred dollars and I’m going to give money in the offering. It’s all we have. I’m gonna pray and believe that God will send us some rain.” We went down there. Daddy never went up to the front, but when that man asked if anybody had spiritual prayers, my dad stood up with a hundred other people, I guess, and he started praying. When they passed the offering plate, my dad gave one hundred dollars and my mother said, “You know, there’s so many things we need that we could use this one hundred dollars.” Dad said, “If two or three are gathered together and pray and ask and believe, it will happen.” That night, when we were driving home, we were in the back of the truck. The windows was knocked out of the truck. My dad always kept old worn-out cotton sacks that had tar on the bottom that he would hang over the door so he could slam the door and hold the sack in place so rain wouldn’t come into the truck. On the way back home, it started raining. My dad got out of the truck and stood there in the rain and just prayed! He finally got all those cotton sacks with tar over the windows so the rain wouldn’t come in. My sister and I were in the back and I remember crawling up into them old cotton sacks so we wouldn’t get just drenched. That year we had some of the best crops we’d ever had while everybody else’s was burning up. as told by Kathryn Bajorek Stories of Survival: Arkansas Farmers during the Great Depression by William D. Downs, Jr.

https://medium.com/drmstream/worn-out-cotton-sacks-9b2ffd8f04a5

['Dan Mccarthy']

2016-11-10 02:25:44.053000+00:00

['Religion', 'Man Selling Electricity', 'Louis Rogers', 'Nature', 'History']

IoT in action

IoT in action It is a term we hear constant talk about. Internet of Things or IoT for its acronym in English is a somewhat abstract concept but has been gaining popularity in recent months. The idea it tries to represent is quite well illustrated by his name, everyday things that connect to the Internet, but in reality, it is much more than that. To understand what the Internet of things is about, we must also understand that its foundations are not new at all. For about 30 years, it has been working with the idea of making all everyday objects a little more interactive. Ideas such as the smart home, also known as the house of tomorrow, have evolved before we realized the connected home to enter the Internet of things. The Internet of things powers objects that were formerly connected by a closed circuit, such as communicators, cameras, sensors, and so on, and allows them to communicate globally through the use of the network of networks. If we were to give a definition of the Internet of things, it would probably be best to say that it is a network that interconnects physical objects using the Internet. Mentioned objects use embedded systems, or what is the same, specialized hardware that allows not only Internet connectivity, but also schedules specific events based on tasks that are dictated remotely. source hipertextual.com Why the Internet of things? The IoT offers new and innovative organizations ways to manage and monitor remote operations. It allows having eyes and ears in remote places, constantly feeding applications and data stores with information. The low cost of “things” allows observing and managing activities that were previously out of reach. With the Internet of things, it is also possible to collect information about events that were once invisible, such as correlating weather patterns with industrial production. Very briefly, the Internet of Things is a concept that is based on the interconnection of any product with any others around it. From a book to the refrigerator in your own home. The goal is to make all these devices communicate with each other and, therefore, be more intelligent and independent. For this, it is necessary to use the IPv6 protocol and the development of numerous technologies that are currently being designed by the main companies in the sector. Its significance can be crucial in both economic and social fields. Even older than the digital age. And it is that the Internet of Things allows computers to interact with elements of real-life and gain independence from human beings, leaving us in command of what is really important. source expressvpn.com source unsplash.com Internet of Things Home automation is one of the main fields of application of IoT. A practical example: thanks to the Internet of Things, our refrigerators would be able to measure the remaining food inside and instruct the specified supplier for the used items. Thus, we will never have to worry about buying milk, eggs or our favorite yogurts. The refrigerator will continuously measure the stock and act independently accordingly. Wearables are another example. Everyday things like t-shirts, watches or bracelets, become smart thanks to the application of this concept. Now the clocks not only provide us with the time but also connect to the internet, exchange data with external servers and act accordingly to the information they collect from both the sensors and the servers. Internet of Things Wearables is a clear example of everyday objects connected to the internet. They can also be applied more deeply to the home. By distributing a series of sensors and processors, we could automate window control, home temperature, lights, etc. And, since the entire system is connected to the internet, it would also be possible to wirelessly control what we want. Smart Cities. Another of the main fields of application of the Internet of Things is cities, making them smarter and more efficient. For example many times we wait for a red traffic light in a totally absurd way, because there is no car or any person around us. Thanks to the Internet of Things, these traffic lights can be connected to a circuit of cameras distributed throughout the city that identify the level of traffic and mass movement, thus avoiding those absurd waits in areas of limited movement. The standardization of IoT will have a great economic and social impact source unsplash.com Autonomous cars. Internet of Things The Internet of Things will also open the door to autonomous cars. Another example of the application of the Internet of Things to cities is found in traffic signs. Applying the IoT, if we go at a higher speed than what is allowed, our car would reduce it automatically upon receiving the data of any of the signals that surround us. This, in parallel, would facilitate the arrival and expansion of autonomous cars in our lives. If we take the Internet of Things to wider areas such as national security or business, the significance and possibilities are even greater. For example automated orchards, intelligent lighting, machine supervision … The economic impact of this type of project would be awesome, as it would replace many current jobs and, above all, would involve considerable long-term cost savings. It would be almost the second Industrial Revolution. As we can see, the Internet of Things is clearly the next big step in the technology industry. It opens up a world of untold possibilities, even greater than the one that opened the digital era at the time. Everything would be based on the contextual, achieving greater independence from humans and, therefore, greater efficiency and comfort. The first steps are already being taken (standards, first prototypes, and projects, etc.), but, according to various analysts, it will not be until 2020 when the Internet of Things begins to be something much more established and common among mortals. Privacy and security concerns in IoT source unsplash.com A recent study shows that many companies have thousands of IoT devices (Internet of Things) that are not directly related to the business, but that connect to their network daily. source universidadviu.com The task of managing unauthorized devices on business networks is becoming much more difficult in many organizations with the increasing use of personal property IoT products in the workplace. Recently, Infoblox commissioned a survey of 1,000 IT directors in the US. UU., The United Kingdom, Germany, and the United Arab Emirates to understand the security implications of IoT devices owned by individual users and not a business in organizational networks. The results were shocking: Thirty-five percent of respondents in the first three countries reported more than 5,000 non-business IoT devices connected to their average business network every day. One-third of respondents in the US In the US, the United Kingdom, and Germany reported that, on a normal business day, more than 1,000 IoT devices connected to their network can be found. Thirty-nine percent of respondents in the US UU. And the United Kingdom said they used personal IoT devices while connected to the corporate network to access social networks, 24% acknowledged having used these types of devices to download applications, while 13% did so to access their preferred games. The most common unauthorized IoT devices in business networks are the following: Physical activity trackers, such as Fitbit and Gear Fit. Digital assistants, such as Google Home and Amazon Alexa. Smart TVs Smart kitchen devices, such as microwaves and kettles connected. The proliferation of this class of IoT devices significantly increases the security burden for organizations and raises the risk threshold. Due to the increase in the use of this technology and its normalization in everyday life, security administrators have a huge task, simply by managing the sanctioned devices in the company’s network. L aptops and tablets are sharing networks in companies with this other class of IoT devices, many of which are connected without any control by the organization, which does not even know its existence. The exponential increase in the amount of insecure and unauthorized IoT devices that are added to the company’s networks puts companies, their users, customers and their entire network at risk because, due to the low-security levels of Many of these consumer devices, there is a real threat to fight against. These types of insecure and vulnerable IoT devices present a weak entry point for cybercriminals in the network and a serious security risk for the company, which could be tackled with training, information and evaluation that would detect their presence on the network, to Put measures in time. Did you know that IoT devices with inadequate security can provide cybercriminals with an entry point to enter the company’s network? Were you aware that they would facilitate data theft through methods such as DNS tunneling? To Summarize… IoT brings to our society uncountable possibilities for the next industrial revolution where coming devices will be autonomous enough, to perform a repetitive task that we do nowadays, and the possibility to have interconnected cities, communities, and people through technology. Thanks for reading, if you liked this story please share it! : )

https://towardsdatascience.com/iot-in-action-a8b7fac83619

['Andres Martin']

2021-08-03 18:47:21.972000+00:00

['Smart Home', 'Internet of Things', 'IoT', 'Smart Cities']

Code for Boston’s Safe Drinking Water Project

My first time at a Code for Boston Hack Night was last December. It was right in the middle of the intensive data science program I was in. We had multiple labs due that week (as was the norm), and several of my classmates were taken aback by the thought of doing anything additional. But, having seen some of Code for Boston’s projects, I was itching to contribute and connect with others interested in using technology to address civic and social issues. You can see additional info about the following projects on Code for Boston’s Current Projects page: Boston Info Voice App : An Alexa skill to answer questions about municipal services in Boston. Currently supports providing an address and asking for trash/recycling pick up days. : An Alexa skill to answer questions about municipal services in Boston. Currently supports providing an address and asking for trash/recycling pick up days. Community Connect : A health resource web app that collects information about businesses and organizations that promote healthy lifestyle choices. : A health resource web app that collects information about businesses and organizations that promote healthy lifestyle choices. MuckRock : File, track, and share public records requests. : File, track, and share public records requests. Safe Drinking Water Project : An exploratory data project to predict safe drinking water violations. It uses the EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Information System and the EnviroFacts API. : An exploratory data project to predict safe drinking water violations. It uses the EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Information System and the EnviroFacts API. Migrant Service Map : A web app designed to assist immigrant service providers by allowing them to create a profile, update information, and share it with clients quickly. : A web app designed to assist immigrant service providers by allowing them to create a profile, update information, and share it with clients quickly. Windfall Awareness project: A tool to help retirees affected by Social Security Windfall Elimination Program (WEP), a program which can reduce SSA benefits by up to 50% for certain public servants. This tool will help affected workers better plan retirement and self-advocate with the Social Security Administration. A tool to help retirees affected by Social Security Windfall Elimination Program (WEP), a program which can reduce SSA benefits by up to 50% for certain public servants. This tool will help affected workers better plan retirement and self-advocate with the Social Security Administration. Plogalong: When you plog, you pick up trash as you go about your daily life… jogging, hiking, or simply walking down the street. Plogalong helps you track your plogs, connect with nearby ploggers, earn badges, and access local discounts. It was a tough choice, but I ended up joining the Safe Drinking Water Project because they were specifically seeking people with data science skills. I also felt connected to the issue. A story about a school A few years ago, I was at one of the first meetings for a peer leader group at a local high school. While we waited for everyone to get settled in, I asked where to find the nearest water fountain. Several of the students raised their eyebrows. “Why?” “So I can fill my water bottle.” “It’s down the hall. But you don’t want that.” “Are you being serious?” “Yeah, we don’t drink the water here.” Everyone in the room nodded in agreement. During the meeting, the students completed an activity where they identified issues in their school and communities that they were concerned about. As we wrapped up a lively discussion, I had to throw out one last question: “Nobody said water. Do any of you care about not being able to drink water in your own school?” They all shrugged. It was such a norm that it wasn’t worth mentioning. During the same week, Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker announced $2 million of funding to help public schools test for lead and copper in drinking water. Just over a year later, in May 2017, this article popped up in my feed: The Summary Results of the tests confirmed that both of the high schools I was working with had “lead above action level.” Understanding the data This brings us back to the Safe Drinking Water Project at Code for Boston. The goal is to predict health-based violations in drinking water. We are starting with data from the EPA’s Safe Drinking Water Information System (SDWIS). For me, understanding the data means more than knowing what information is contained in the SDWIS database (though we do finally have a centralized data dictionary!). It is also about understanding what that information actually tells us and identifying other factors that contribute to water safety that are not included in the database. Surprising connections While I have been actively seeking out information to grow my understanding of issues surrounding safe drinking water, some of my learning has come from unexpected places. AI in Flint In early January, this article showed up in my inbox — not because of my tracking of water issues, but because of my interest in machine learning: The TL;DR version of the article is that a team created a machine-learning model that was successfully predicting which homes in Flint were likely to have lead pipes. The City signed a contract with AECOM, a national firm, to speed up the work. Then: AECOM discarded the machine-learning model’s predictions, which had guided excavations. And facing political pressure from some residents, [Flint Mayor Karen] Weaver demanded that the firm dig across the city’s wards and in every house on selected blocks, rather than picking out the homes likely to have lead because of age, property type, or other characteristics that could be correlated with the pipes. After a multimillion-dollar investment in project management, thousands of people in Flint still have homes with lead pipes, when the previous program would likely have already found and replaced them. The seas are rising The week after that Flint article came out, I was at the Data for Black Lives II conference at MIT Media Lab. The session that has kept me thinking about it the most since then was “The seas are rising but so are the people”: Data, Disaster & Collective Power. The panelists — Valencia Gunder, Denice Ross, Lisa Rice, and Bina Venkataraman — shared their work and answered the questions: “What are the ways that Black communities are using social media, data, and technology to prepare for the next disaster? To prevent it? What are the role of data scientists and engineers in these rapid response moments and the movement for climate justice?” They talked about the ways that climate change has exacerbated problems with higher housing costs and displacement. Valencia Gunder began her story: As you do work in south Florida, climate change and resiliency is always part of the conversation, even in the most informal way. My grandfather told me as a child, “They’re going to come steal our communities because it doesn’t flood.” And I didn’t understand him until I was grown. Map created by Hugh Gladman that plots owners with 15 or more pieces of land in Little Haiti to the height above sea level of their parcels. (Source: The New Tropic) Others also talked about the connections between flooding and inequities in communities. The Data for Black Lives YouTube channel has a recording of the full panel, as well as other sessions from the conference, available to view. Farm runoff Shortly after completing the data science program, I was talking with someone who made a tangential comment about a relative who uses artificial intelligence to look at how food for cows affects their manure, which in turn affects water systems due to runoff. He waved his hand in dismissal: “But you’re probably not interested in that.” I explained that I actually was interested in the topic. This was a contributing factor that we hadn’t discussed yet in the Safe Water group. I did some digging to learn a little more about how manure and other farm runoff contaminates water. A 2009 New York Times article considered the problem in Wisconsin, where “more than 30 percent of the wells in one town alone violated basic health standards”: Runoff of waste from farm animals is said to be a source of pollutants in drinking water. At a town hall meeting, angry homeowners yelled at dairy owners, some of whom are perceived as among the most wealthy and powerful people in town. It goes on to explain that even if local environmental agencies weren’t overtaxed, “a powerful farm lobby has blocked previous environmental efforts on Capital [sic] Hill. Even when state legislatures have acted, they have often encountered unexpected difficulties.” Screenshot of EWG’s interactive map of drinking water in rural communities threatened by farm pollution. (Source: EWG) Different political and economic interests are at play. And while Valencia Gunder talked about displacement in Florida due to flooding and climate change, maps like the one above (also using SDWIS data, along with data from the USDA’s Census of Agriculture) signal additional concerns. Increased flooding in areas already threatened by farm pollution raises the risk of contaminants in the water systems. Toxic chemical sites During Harvard’s Next in Data Visualization event earlier this month, Blacki Migliozzi, graphics editor at New York Times, shared some of his climate change visualizations. One, in particular, caught my attention: a map showing 2,500 chemical sites that are in flood-prone areas across the country. This map was created using data from the EPA’s Toxics Release Inventory and FEMA’s National Flood Hazard Layer. Similar to the issues raised by farm runoff, chemical sites in areas with more flooding from rising sea levels are also at higher risk of contaminating water systems, along with a host of other problems. The Poisoned City A couple of days later, another Safe Water volunteer and I went to see journalist Anna Clark speak about her book, The Poisoned City: Flint’s Water and the American Urban Tragedy. Granted, in this case, I went expecting to learn more about factors affecting drinking water, but it still feels worth including here. After a brief intro explaining the city’s switch from Great Lakes water to Flint River water and subsequent issues with lead, E. coli, and Legionnaires’ disease, Clark asked, “What makes a city vulnerable to something like this in the first place?” Her answer: “You have to go back a few generations.” From there, her story started in the 1960s, “when Flint was the most segregated city in the North, and the third most segregated nationwide.” It included the impact of General Motors, the history of community organizing and the fight for fair housing, deindustrialization, and emergency management laws. For an illustrated essay that covers some of this, see Clark’s collaboration with graphic artist Josh Kramer: For me, two comments that Clark made during the conversation after her talk stood out: Environmental issues always end in settlements with no admissions of guilt. and This wasn’t just a technical problem. There’s a reason this happened in Flint, and it wouldn’t have happened in Ann Arbor. A copy of The Poisoned City, signed “For #water, Anna Clark.” John, the other Safe Water volunteer who came to the talk, got a copy of The Poisoned City. Clark signed it to #water (our group’s Code for Boston Slack channel), and it’s now being read and passed through the group. Notre Dame Meanwhile, this Twitter Moment was waiting in my inbox this morning: This is yet another reminder of how differing interests, values, priorities, and allocation of resources can affect drinking water (and so many other things). Invitations These were some of the connections I have made while trying to understand the data we are using. As always, I am happy to hear any thoughts on this. If you have suggestions for other data, research, or approaches for the Safe Drinking Water Project to consider, please do share! You can also check out the Safe Drinking Water Project GitHub repo and join the #water channel on the Code for Boston Slack. If you are in the Boston area and interested in getting involved with this or another Code for Boston project, learn more on the Code for Boston website and come on out to a Weekly Hack Night.

https://towardsdatascience.com/code-for-bostons-safe-drinking-water-project-8283989e647f

['Dawn Graham']

2019-04-17 21:55:07.274000+00:00

['Technology', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Machine Learning', 'Water', 'Data Science']

New Year’s Resolutions

The reason they can be great is quite simple. The argument goes something like this: There are ways in which my life is not perfect (as in the ideal life, according to what I actually value) There are probably simple things I could do to make my life robustly better (again, according to my values) I’m not currently doing many of these things I’d probably be more likely to do them if I a) knew what they were and b) told myself and others that I was going to commit to them All four of these seem either certainly true or very likely to be true. 1 is probably true for (almost) everyone. I assume 2 to be true for most people — i.e., I take it that most sets of plausible values have associated sets of simple actions that make lives robustly better, according to those values. 3 is certain for me and will be true for all people for whom 1 is true. 4a seems necessarily true and 4b seems true based on my understanding of psychology. So, all in all, it seems like NYRs — when some time is put into formulating them — are pretty likely to be pretty high-value things. Specifically, it seems like they are likely to be good if you do the following things (rather than just plumping at a generic list of ‘things I probably should do but don’t really want to’): Work out, specifically, the main ways in which your life is not as you want it to be Work out simple actions which are likely to move your actual life closer to that life-as-you-want-it-to-be Resolve to do (some of) the actions at some specific frequency (ideally with some mechanism to check in or make sure you do them) Tell yourself and others that you’re actually going to do the things Spending some serious time doing the above seems likely to be one of the best things to do with free time at the end of the year. I find it hard not to get really excited about the idea. (side note: I imagine many people, including me-from-a-few-years-ago, would get kinda scared more than excited about this idea. I think this is maybe because the idea of living an ‘ideal life’ seems kinda scary and like something you should do but don’t really want to. To this I say that the ‘ideal life’ is not the one you think you should live but don’t really want to; it’s the one that, on reflection, you actually want to live and feel excited about living. I think terms like ‘ideal life’ conjure up the idea of a socially constructed ‘best life’, which is not what I mean. I’m talking about your best life, according to what you actually care about, not what people tell you to care about).

https://medium.com/@tayloralan648/new-years-resolutions-cd91e6efb6b7

['Alan Taylor']

2020-11-26 23:50:48.875000+00:00

['Self Improvement', 'Change', 'Rationality', 'Habits', 'New Years Resolutions']

Get Your Website Ready at Lowest Price Over The Internet Ever!

Get Your Website Ready at Lowest Price Over The Internet Ever! Makoua Mohamed ·Dec 27, 2020 iAffordable Website Solution. IF YOU WANT YOUR WIBSITE READY AT LOWEST PRICE OVER THE INTERNET EVER . You can now take advantage of the attractive offers. FOLLOW This link for more information and price : https://jvz1.com/c/1802415/362529 Client Satisfaction is Our Motto Satisfaction is our priority Free Consultation Talk with our experts 100% Money Back If the product didn’t suit you lowest price with iAffordable Website Solution. https://jvz1.com/c/1802415/362529

https://medium.com/@makouamohamed/get-your-website-ready-at-lowest-price-over-the-internet-ever-f7c9b6950342

['Makoua Mohamed']

2020-12-27 19:15:02.499000+00:00

['Review', 'Website', 'SEO', 'Web Development', 'Website Traffic']

Retail Industry Weekly Newsletter (12.13.21)

TIPS & INSIGHTS ➜ Venture capital firms set aside $1 billion for women-led startups. Here’s how it’s going ➜ The pandemic highlights the importance of investing in women ➜ Gordon Ramsay moves restaurant HQ to Texas from California as his huge brand expansion plans start to take shape ➜ Securing the metaverse — What’s needed for the next chapter of the internet ➜ 3 keys to operationalizing startup sales from day one ➜ Venture funding to booze startups boomed this year, but will the buzz linger? ➜ 7 innovative brands speaking at NRF 2022: Retail’s Big Show ➜ $1B+ market map: The world’s 936 unicorn companies in one infographic ➜ ‘Play-to-Earn’ gaming and how work is evolving in Web3 MACROECONOMY & INDUSTRY ➜ How do you feel about inflation? The answer will help determine its longevity: Supply-chain disruptions, labor shortages and climbing oil prices have pushed inflation to a 39-year-high. But attention is now focused on another variable: Do people think inflation is here for a while? Because people’s expectations can factor into inflation, the answer plays a critical role in determining how the Federal Reserve and the administration manage the rising numbers — and how soon and how much the Fed will raise interest rates. TOP RETAIL TECH STORIES ➜ Headless Commerce: Part 1 — The Evolving State of E-Commerce Infrastructure: Coresight Research and Nogin’s three-part report series, Headless Commerce, explores the emerging commerce-as-a-service (CaaS) space in the US and the key trends in the market. We leverage findings from an October 2021 Coresight Research survey of e-commerce leaders in the US to identify the key challenges and benefits in building and using e-commerce infrastructure and tools. ➜ DoorDash introduces ultra-fast grocery delivery, new approach to labor: Boasting delivery times in as little as 10 minutes, DoorDash has launched a grocery delivery service from its DashMart location in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood. The offering of items available for delivery is limited to 2,000 fresh and frozen grocery staples, snacks, household goods, and local products. Initially, the speedy deliveries will be offered from a new DashMart location in Chelsea, with more locations and partners coming over the next few months. DoorDash introduced DashMarts in eight markets in 2020. New Yorkers also turn to a rapidly expanding set of so-called “instant needs” companies such as Jokr, Buyk and GoPuff, who promise rapid deliveries on a limited range of items, typically in markets with high population densities. ➜ Walmart adds science-based targets to supply chain financing option: Walmart announced Wednesday it has added science-based targets to its supply chain finance program, with the aim of helping smaller and mid-size companies make their operations more sustainable. Walmart worked with HSBC and CDP, a nonprofit that helps companies and cities with their environmental impact disclosures, on changes that provide smaller suppliers access to special financing for their sustainability efforts. Walmart said the new finance program for suppliers marks a “key” step in its efforts, called Project Gigaton, to cut 1 gigaton of greenhouse gas emissions from its global supply chain by 2030. ➜ Zippin brings checkout-free tech to JFK airport store: As more retail tech companies roll out cashierless tech tools, JFKIAT, which runs Terminal 4 at John F. Kennedy International Airport, has partnered with Zippin and SSP America to integrate Zippin’s A.I. technology into Camden Food Express at Gate B 42, according to information emailed to Retail Dive. When shoppers pass through a turnstile, they can tap their credit card, and Zippin’s A.I. technology will identify and track the items they pick. Once they leave, their credit card will be charged for the cost of the goods they chose. About 100 Zippin-powered stores are expected in train stations and airports by the end of next year, according to the company. ➜ Buy now pay later boom shows no signs of slowing this holiday season: 7% of shoppers said they will be using buy now, pay later as a payment method for holiday purchases this year, according to a CNBC/Momentive Small Business Survey. The credit card alternative has exploded in popularity as online shopping has boomed during the pandemic and more retailers and payment providers have adopted it. The use of BNPL globally during Cyber Week — from Nov. 23 to Monday — jumped 29% year over year, according to Salesforce data. ➜ Walmart’s former e-commerce head is now CEO of food startup Wonder: Marc Lore, who is credited with transforming Walmart’s e-commerce operations, is going “all in” on his latest tech-driven venture, which features an on-demand food truck business called Wonder. Wonder trucks deliver made-to-order meals ordered online through the Wonder app directly to the customer’s home. Each truck is equipped with a mobile kitchen, with a chef who completes the meals once the vehicle arrives at the customer’s home. The chef places the meal on a foldable tray table at their door. The entire process is contactless. ➜ Alibaba rolls its marketplace businesses into a single organization: Alibaba Group, operator of global marketplace platform Alibaba.com, is shaking up the ranks of its senior executives. And the shuffling does include the realignment of B2B marketplace operations. In a letter to employees today, Alibaba Group Chairman and CEO Daniel Zhang announced that all its global business-to-consumer and B2B marketplace operations will be folded into a new business unit: International Digital Commerce. ➜ Zara lands in the metaverse with South Korean label Ader Error: Zara has taken the leap into the metaverse with South Korean label Ader Error to launch its first collaborative project which explores the metaverse and virtual reality. According to Ader in a release, the AZ Collection is ‘inspired by the identities and uniqueness of all generations from A to Z, blurring the boundaries between the virtual and real worlds, and features the lives of young people who pioneer their own Persona.’ Alongside its physical apparel range, the collaborative project is available through the Zepeto platform, which is already being used by the likes of Ralph Lauren, Disney and Nike, where users can purchase digital versions of the clothes and makeup for their avatars. TOP RETAIL STORIES ➜ Holiday shopping? Check out some of the Dallas area’s most interesting new stores: The long holiday weekend proved that stores are still important to shoppers, at least this time of year. Optimistic retailers banked on consumers heading back to stores as the restrictions of the pandemic eased. From pop-ups to permanent locations and relocations, local entrepreneurs and national chains have committed to new stores in the Dallas area. Some concepts are driven by people who quit or were forced from their day jobs and started their own businesses. Creative sorts have filled new collaborative spaces, such as MKT Dallas in West Village and Mosaic Makers in the Bishop Arts District. Both have opened second stores in Galleria Dallas. ➜ Activist firm Engine Capital pressures Kohl’s to consider sale or online separation: The New York-based hedge fund Engine Capital wants Kohl’s to explore the two alternatives to try to boost its stock price, it said in a letter sent to Kohl’s board that was published publicly on Monday. Engine Capital owns a roughly 1% stake in Kohl’s. Engine Capital said in its letter that assuming Kohl’s brings in online sales revenue of about $6.2 billion, Kohl’s digital business alone would be worth $12.4 billion. Engine Capital also said it believes that there are private equity firms that would pay at least $75 per share for the retailer ➜ Target’s Lego collaboration is what technicolor dreams are made of: Big-box retailer Target has a long history of high-low designer collaborations that offer fashion-forward product mashups at reasonable retail prices. In the past several decades, they’ve brought their cheap-chic magic to Marimekko, Missoni, and Rodarte, and more recently, Christopher John Rogers and Rachel Comey. The ever-famous Red Dot Boutique’s latest partnership is a little more youthful but no less stylish — this time, they’ve teamed up with the legacy toy brand Lego for a 300-piece collection of gifts, home goods, toys, and pet accessories inspired by the Danish toymaker’s signature primary-hued building blocks. The assortment also includes a wide range of apparel for kids and adults, with sizes extending up to 4X. ➜ Oatly plans 3 new facilities by 2023 to combat supply shortages: Oatly is building out its global manufacturing footprint “at an unprecedented pace” to address supply shortages and meet the growing demand for plant-based milk, CEO Toni Petersson said on the company’s Q3 earnings call. Three plants are set to open in the U.S., U.K. and China in 2023, which are expected to produce 450 million liters of product, according to COO Peter Bergh. The company already opened three facilities in Utah, Singapore and Ma’anshan, China, earlier this year. Oatly had to rely more on contract manufacturers this year after struggling to build inventory and meet global demand. Supply issues also pushed the company to prioritize production of oatmilk over other dairy-alternative food products. ➜ That big office building? It’s an e-Commerce warehouse now.: Allstate Corp.’s suburban campus outside Chicago, with its interconnected buildings, manicured grounds and acres of parking, represented a new vision for the U.S. office when it opened in 1967. That vision is now dead. The insurer reached a deal last month to sell most of the campus. The new owner plans to demolish the office buildings and convert the Northbrook, Ill., site into more than 3 million square feet of e-commerce warehouses and other logistics facilities. In New York and San Francisco, more than 80% of all office space is more than 30 years old, and Chicago isn’t far behind, according to Phil Ryan, director of U.S. office research at Jones Lang LaSalle Inc. These three cities also have some of the lowest office occupancy rates in the country ➜ Retail shopping center trends to watch in ’22: Real estate investment trust Phillips Edison and Company (PECO) is out with its predictions for the retail industry heading into 2022. PECO is literally and figuratively close to the ground when it comes to retail insights through its management of nearly 300 shopping centers that include Kroger, Public, Ahold Delhaize and Albertsons anchor stores. As retailers compete with restaurants for the share of the consumer food dollar, they can also heed foodservice trends likely to impact shoppers’ behavior. PECO highlighted the launch of digital-only restaurants and ghost kitchens in the quick-service and fast-casual spaces, noting that those trends reflect the restaurant industry’s drive to accommodate demand for off-premise dining, which is likely to continue beyond the pandemic. ➜ How money shapes retail: In early 2020, Retail Dive launched what was supposed to be an extended series of stories that looked at how financial interests and players had shaped the industry as well as the fates of individual companies. That was also the last story we formally published in the series. In March 2020, as everyone knows all too well, the world changed suddenly and dramatically. With retailers temporarily closing their entire chains, and the industry grappling with how to operate in or even just survive the pandemic, we shelved the “money in retail” series to focus on the ramifications of COVID-19. TOP EXITS ➜ Chobani S-1: Sum of the parts here points to a $6B valuation for @chobani, but we all know @chobani is going to trade a lot higher than that. Why? (1) This is a beacon for every other ESG company and will attract capital commensurately; and (2) value will be put on their innovation platform + distribution capabilities.

https://medium.com/@loc.nht2710/retail-industry-weekly-newsletter-12-13-21-aeb1acbb704f

['Loc Nguyen']

2021-12-13 12:55:10.534000+00:00

['Venture Capital', 'Brands', 'Ecommerce', 'Retail Technology']

A Supercomputer's Covid-19 Analysis Yields a New Way to Understand the Virus

A Supercomputer Analyzed Covid-19 — and an Interesting New Theory Has Emerged A closer look at the Bradykinin hypothesis Photo: zhangshuang/Getty Images Earlier this summer, the Summit supercomputer at Oak Ridge National Lab in Tennessee set about crunching data on more than 40,000 genes from 17,000 genetic samples in an effort to better understand Covid-19. Summit is the second-fastest computer in the world, but the process — which involved analyzing 2.5 billion genetic combinations — still took more than a week. When Summit was done, researchers analyzed the results. It was, in the words of Dr. Daniel Jacobson, lead researcher and chief scientist for computational systems biology at Oak Ridge, a “eureka moment.” The computer had revealed a new theory about how Covid-19 impacts the body: the bradykinin hypothesis. The hypothesis provides a model that explains many aspects of Covid-19, including some of its most bizarre symptoms. It also suggests 10-plus potential treatments, many of which are already FDA approved. Jacobson’s group published their results in a paper in the journal eLife in early July. According to the team’s findings, a Covid-19 infection generally begins when the virus enters the body through ACE2 receptors in the nose, (The receptors, which the virus is known to target, are abundant there.) The virus then proceeds through the body, entering cells in other places where ACE2 is also present: the intestines, kidneys, and heart. This likely accounts for at least some of the disease’s cardiac and GI symptoms. (Sign up for Your Coronavirus Update, a biweekly newsletter with the latest news, expert advice, and analysis to keep you safe) But once Covid-19 has established itself in the body, things start to get really interesting. According to Jacobson’s group, the data Summit analyzed shows that Covid-19 isn’t content to simply infect cells that already express lots of ACE2 receptors. Instead, it actively hijacks the body’s own systems, tricking it into upregulating ACE2 receptors in places where they’re usually expressed at low or medium levels, including the lungs. In this sense, Covid-19 is like a burglar who slips in your unlocked second-floor window and starts to ransack your house. Once inside, though, they don’t just take your stuff — they also throw open all your doors and windows so their accomplices can rush in and help pillage more efficiently. The renin–angiotensin system (RAS) controls many aspects of the circulatory system, including the body’s levels of a chemical called bradykinin, which normally helps to regulate blood pressure. According to the team’s analysis, when the virus tweaks the RAS, it causes the body’s mechanisms for regulating bradykinin to go haywire. Bradykinin receptors are resensitized, and the body also stops effectively breaking down bradykinin. (ACE normally degrades bradykinin, but when the virus downregulates it, it can’t do this as effectively.) The end result, the researchers say, is to release a bradykinin storm — a massive, runaway buildup of bradykinin in the body. According to the bradykinin hypothesis, it’s this storm that is ultimately responsible for many of Covid-19’s deadly effects. Jacobson’s team says in their paper that “the pathology of Covid-19 is likely the result of Bradykinin Storms rather than cytokine storms,” which had been previously identified in Covid-19 patients, but that “the two may be intricately linked.” Other papers had previously identified bradykinin storms as a possible cause of Covid-19’s pathologies. Covid-19 is like a burglar who slips in your unlocked second-floor window and starts to ransack your house. As bradykinin builds up in the body, it dramatically increases vascular permeability. In short, it makes your blood vessels leaky. This aligns with recent clinical data, which increasingly views Covid-19 primarily as a vascular disease, rather than a respiratory one. But Covid-19 still has a massive effect on the lungs. As blood vessels start to leak due to a bradykinin storm, the researchers say, the lungs can fill with fluid. Immune cells also leak out into the lungs, Jacobson’s team found, causing inflammation. And Covid-19 has another especially insidious trick. Through another pathway, the team’s data shows, it increases production of hyaluronic acid (HLA) in the lungs. HLA is often used in soaps and lotions for its ability to absorb more than 1,000 times its weight in fluid. When it combines with fluid leaking into the lungs, the results are disastrous: It forms a hydrogel, which can fill the lungs in some patients. According to Jacobson, once this happens, “it’s like trying to breathe through Jell-O.” This may explain why ventilators have proven less effective in treating advanced Covid-19 than doctors originally expected, based on experiences with other viruses. “It reaches a point where regardless of how much oxygen you pump in, it doesn’t matter, because the alveoli in the lungs are filled with this hydrogel,” Jacobson says. “The lungs become like a water balloon.” Patients can suffocate even while receiving full breathing support. The bradykinin hypothesis also extends to many of Covid-19’s effects on the heart. About one in five hospitalized Covid-19 patients have damage to their hearts, even if they never had cardiac issues before. Some of this is likely due to the virus infecting the heart directly through its ACE2 receptors. But the RAS also controls aspects of cardiac contractions and blood pressure. According to the researchers, bradykinin storms could create arrhythmias and low blood pressure, which are often seen in Covid-19 patients. The bradykinin hypothesis also accounts for Covid-19’s neurological effects, which are some of the most surprising and concerning elements of the disease. These symptoms (which include dizziness, seizures, delirium, and stroke) are present in as many as half of hospitalized Covid-19 patients. According to Jacobson and his team, MRI studies in France revealed that many Covid-19 patients have evidence of leaky blood vessels in their brains. Bradykinin — especially at high doses — can also lead to a breakdown of the blood-brain barrier. Under normal circumstances, this barrier acts as a filter between your brain and the rest of your circulatory system. It lets in the nutrients and small molecules that the brain needs to function, while keeping out toxins and pathogens and keeping the brain’s internal environment tightly regulated. If bradykinin storms cause the blood-brain barrier to break down, this could allow harmful cells and compounds into the brain, leading to inflammation, potential brain damage, and many of the neurological symptoms Covid-19 patients experience. Jacobson told me, “It is a reasonable hypothesis that many of the neurological symptoms in Covid-19 could be due to an excess of bradykinin. It has been reported that bradykinin would indeed be likely to increase the permeability of the blood-brain barrier. In addition, similar neurological symptoms have been observed in other diseases that result from an excess of bradykinin.” Increased bradykinin levels could also account for other common Covid-19 symptoms. ACE inhibitors — a class of drugs used to treat high blood pressure — have a similar effect on the RAS system as Covid-19, increasing bradykinin levels. In fact, Jacobson and his team note in their paper that “the virus… acts pharmacologically as an ACE inhibitor” — almost directly mirroring the actions of these drugs. By acting like a natural ACE inhibitor, Covid-19 may be causing the same effects that hypertensive patients sometimes get when they take blood pressure–lowering drugs. ACE inhibitors are known to cause a dry cough and fatigue, two textbook symptoms of Covid-19. And they can potentially increase blood potassium levels, which has also been observed in Covid-19 patients. The similarities between ACE inhibitor side effects and Covid-19 symptoms strengthen the bradykinin hypothesis, the researchers say. ACE inhibitors are also known to cause a loss of taste and smell. Jacobson stresses, though, that this symptom is more likely due to the virus “affecting the cells surrounding olfactory nerve cells” than the direct effects of bradykinin. Though still an emerging theory, the bradykinin hypothesis explains several other of Covid-19’s seemingly bizarre symptoms. Jacobson and his team speculate that leaky vasculature caused by bradykinin storms could be responsible for “Covid toes,” a condition involving swollen, bruised toes that some Covid-19 patients experience. Bradykinin can also mess with the thyroid gland, which could produce the thyroid symptoms recently observed in some patients. The bradykinin hypothesis could also explain some of the broader demographic patterns of the disease’s spread. The researchers note that some aspects of the RAS system are sex-linked, with proteins for several receptors (such as one called TMSB4X) located on the X chromosome. This means that “women… would have twice the levels of this protein than men,” a result borne out by the researchers’ data. In their paper, Jacobson’s team concludes that this “could explain the lower incidence of Covid-19 induced mortality in women.” A genetic quirk of the RAS could be giving women extra protection against the disease. The bradykinin hypothesis provides a model that “contributes to a better understanding of Covid-19” and “adds novelty to the existing literature,” according to scientists Frank van de Veerdonk, Jos WM van der Meer, and Roger Little, who peer-reviewed the team’s paper. It predicts nearly all the disease’s symptoms, even ones (like bruises on the toes) that at first appear random, and further suggests new treatments for the disease. As Jacobson and team point out, several drugs target aspects of the RAS and are already FDA approved to treat other conditions. They could arguably be applied to treating Covid-19 as well. Several, like danazol, stanozolol, and ecallantide, reduce bradykinin production and could potentially stop a deadly bradykinin storm. Others, like icatibant, reduce bradykinin signaling and could blunt its effects once it’s already in the body. Interestingly, Jacobson’s team also suggests vitamin D as a potentially useful Covid-19 drug. The vitamin is involved in the RAS system and could prove helpful by reducing levels of another compound, known as REN. Again, this could stop potentially deadly bradykinin storms from forming. The researchers note that vitamin D has already been shown to help those with Covid-19. The vitamin is readily available over the counter, and around 20% of the population is deficient. If indeed the vitamin proves effective at reducing the severity of bradykinin storms, it could be an easy, relatively safe way to reduce the severity of the virus. Other compounds could treat symptoms associated with bradykinin storms. Hymecromone, for example, could reduce hyaluronic acid levels, potentially stopping deadly hydrogels from forming in the lungs. And timbetasin could mimic the mechanism that the researchers believe protects women from more severe Covid-19 infections. All of these potential treatments are speculative, of course, and would need to be studied in a rigorous, controlled environment before their effectiveness could be determined and they could be used more broadly. Covid-19 stands out for both the scale of its global impact and the apparent randomness of its many symptoms. Physicians have struggled to understand the disease and come up with a unified theory for how it works. Though as of yet unproven, the bradykinin hypothesis provides such a theory. And like all good hypotheses, it also provides specific, testable predictions — in this case, actual drugs that could provide relief to real patients. The researchers are quick to point out that “the testing of any of these pharmaceutical interventions should be done in well-designed clinical trials.” As to the next step in the process, Jacobson is clear: “We have to get this message out.” His team’s finding won’t cure Covid-19. But if the treatments it points to pan out in the clinic, interventions guided by the bradykinin hypothesis could greatly reduce patients’ suffering — and potentially save lives.

https://elemental.medium.com/a-supercomputer-analyzed-covid-19-and-an-interesting-new-theory-has-emerged-31cb8eba9d63

['Thomas Smith']

2020-09-03 18:37:13.371000+00:00

['Health', 'Science', 'Bradykinin Hypothesis', 'Coronavirus', 'Covid 19']

Phases of the Day:

Phases of the Day: DAWN Oh, how I love you Sweet beautiful dawn With your glorious hue Across the eastern sky Warmly you kiss the dew You expose, chase away Things hidden With glorious light of day Filled with hope as you are The darkness doesn’t dare Though it’s left its mark Deep down in my soul Clouds collide with images stark Surely they will take their toll Laying awaiting the return of dark Through the beauty of your stay Dear hopeful energetic dawn I miss you almost every day Because to finally get awake I’m always woefully too slow Your first blush is quick to go But you’ve left your full light Now I know it will be alright Though slithering dark awaits Only just barely out of sight Bright sun blocks the gates To hell For now Timothy O’Neill

https://carolburt-15733.medium.com/writing-challenge-513388cbacd1

['Carol Burt']

2020-04-09 00:33:42.580000+00:00

['Dawn', 'Poetry On Medium', 'Poetry Prompt', 'Poetry']

Why Every Marketer Should Consider Uplift Modeling

Why Every Marketer Should Consider Uplift Modeling By Michael Firn Uplift modeling is an increasingly important tool in the modern marketer’s toolkit of machine learning technology. Uplift predictions, although applicable across a variety of business applications, are particularly powerful for marketers since they address one of the core goals of marketing: how will each customer respond to a particular intervention? In this article, we discuss Uplift modeling for marketing use cases, and compare the performance of various common Uplift algorithms on a public dataset. Prescriptive Data: Moving from Information to Optimization Modern marketing teams have a variety of data science and machine learning techniques at their disposal. These techniques can be generally grouped into three buckets: descriptive, predictive, or prescriptive. Uplift models fall into the prescriptive category, providing marketers with knowledge of which marketing treatment they should apply to each user in order to encourage some desired downstream behavior. Image by author What is Uplift Modeling? Uplift modeling is a prescriptive technique which predicts how each customer is likely to respond to a marketing action. Based on these predictions, marketing teams can determine which customers should be targeted in order to maximize the ROI of their campaign. Defining an Uplift prediction involves specifying two inputs: Intervention: Which marketing action(s) would you like to measure the impact of? Outcome: What is the conversion event that your intervention is meant to influence? For example, if we are considering offering a discount (the intervention) with the goal of driving customer transactions (the outcome), our Uplift prediction for Customer A might tell us: “A discount will increase Customer A’s probability of purchasing by 10% compared to if we did not offer the discount.” In order to create an Uplift model, we must have data from a randomized control trial in which a random set of customers were targeted with the intervention (the “treatment group”) and another random set of customers were not targeted (the “control group”). An Uplift model uses this information to differentiate between four types of users (see image below). If the model is able to accurately identify Persuadables and Sleeping Dogs, marketers can determine which customers to target in order to drive incremental conversions with a marketing campaign. Image by author Some Real World Examples The advantages of the Uplift approach extend to many common marketing problems. A few examples are listed below - Image by author Comparing the Performance of Different Uplift Algorithms Although Uplift Modeling is a relatively new technique, there are several algorithms which have been shown to perform well in practical settings. We compared these algorithms on the publicly available dataset from a competition hosted by X5 and Retail Hero in order to gauge their relative performance. The goal of the competition was to determine which customers should be targeted through an SMS campaign by predicting whose probability of purchase would be most positively impacted by the campaign. How to Evaluate the Performance of Uplift Models A key challenge in evaluating Uplift models comes from the lack of ground truth. That is, we observe the outcome for a given customer in the treatment group, but we don’t know what the outcome would have been had the customer been in the control group. To overcome this counterfactual limitation, we evaluate the performance of an Uplift model over a group of customers within a holdout test set. One common evaluation technique is visualized through an “Uplift Bins” plot (see Figure 1 below). These plots are created through a three-step process: Sort all test set customers in descending order of predicted Uplift. Divide users into k equal-width bins, where bin #1 represents users with the highest predicted Uplift and bin k represents users with the lowest predicted Uplift. Within each bin, compute two conversion rates: (1) users within the bin who received treatment (Treatment Conversion Rate), and (2) users within the bin who did not receive treatment (Control Conversion Rate). Calculate actual uplift within each bin by subtracting (Treatment Conversion Rate — Control Conversion Rate). Note that actual uplift is represented as a difference in percentage points. A high-quality Uplift model will show actual uplift decreasing monotonically and sharply across bins. If we see this pattern, it indicates that we observed a large positive uplift for the set of users with high Uplift predictions, and a small uplift (even negative) for users with low uplift predictions. This pattern is illustrated in the hypothetical plot with five bins in Figure 1. The first two bins show positive uplift, indicating that users within these bins (Persuadables) convert at a higher rate when treated. Bins 3 and 4 show negligible uplift, indicating that treatment has essentially no effect for these users (Sure Things and Lost Causes). Bin 5 shows negative uplift, indicating that treatment reduces the likelihood that these users convert (Sleeping Dogs). Figure 1: A hypothetical Uplift Bins plot, which shows the difference in treatment vs. control group conversion rates within each of five predicted uplift bins. (Image by author) Common Uplift Algorithms In this section we describe various Uplift algorithms. This not a comprehensive list and new Uplift algorithms are actively being developed by researchers. Solo Model — Train a single classifier to predict the outcome of interest, and include as a feature a dummy variable indicating whether each user received treatment. During inference, each user is scored twice: once with the value of the treatment flag set to 1, and once set to 0. The Uplift prediction for User A is defined as User A’s prediction with treatment = 1 minus User A’s prediction with treatment = 0. Read more here. Two Models — Train two classifiers to predict the outcome of interest. Classifier #1 is trained using only the treatment group, while Classifier #2 is trained using only the control group. The Uplift prediction for User A is defined as User A’s prediction from Classifier #1 minus User A’s prediction from Classifier #2. Read more here. Class Transformation — Train a single classifier based on a modified class label Z, where: Z = 1 if Treatment = 1 & Conversion = 1 Z = 1 if Treatment = 0 & Conversion = 0 Z = 0 if Treatment = 1 & Conversion = 0 Z = 0 if Treatment = 0 & Conversion = 1 This modified label ensures that all Persuadables are in the positive label group, while all Sleeping Dogs are in the negative label group. The Uplift prediction for User A is defined as User A’s prediction from this classifier. Read more here. Regression Transformation — Train a single regression model based on a modified class label Z, where: Z = 2 if Treatment = 1 & Conversion = 1 Z = 0 if Treatment = 0 & Conversion = 0 Z = -2 if Treatment = 1 & Conversion = 0 Z = 0 if Treatment = 0 & Conversion = 1 This modified label ensures that Persuadables are differentiated from Sleeping Dogs. The Uplift prediction for User A is defined as User A’s prediction from this model. Read more here. Propensity Deviation — Train a single regression model based on the following label for users in the treatment group: Let Wi = user i’s a priori probability of conversion, before treatment is applied (i.e. the output of a probabilistic classifier). Let Ci = a binary outcome indicating whether the user ended up converting post-treatment The regression label for user i is defined as Wi — C. To the extent that a user’s predicted conversion deviates from their actual conversion, this label attributes that deviation to the treatment. The Uplift prediction for User A is defined as User A’s prediction from this model. Results In order to smooth variation, performance is reported as the average of five runs, where each run involves training on a randomly selected 80% of the data (training set) and evaluating performance on the remaining 20% (test set). (Image by author) Figure 2: Uplift Bins. For this dataset, the Regression Transformation method offered the strongest overall performance (based on the sharpest decrease in actual Uplift from Bin #1 to Bin #5). The Propensity Deviation method was the least successful, though all five algorithms were able to extract signal from the data. Observed uplift was positive in almost every bin, indicating that the models found a relatively small number of “Sleeping Dogs”. Different algorithms may be best suited for different problems/datasets, but more research is required to understand when each approach works best. When do Uplift Models work best? Although Uplift models often perform well for a broad set of marketing use cases, they tend to work best under certain conditions. Specifically, Uplift models stand the best chance for strong performance when - The marketing team’s goal is to impact short-term user behavior (e.g. a transaction). If instead, the goal is to impact longer-term metrics like CLV, Uplift may not be up to the task. The team has powerful marketing incentives at its disposal. If an intervention can’t meaningfully sway customer behavior, there may not be any Uplift for even the best model to find. Conclusion Uplift modeling is still an active area of research in the data science community, but its practical applications are quickly gaining steam in the marketing world. Uber, Wayfair, and Fidelity Investments count themselves among the growing list of companies that rely extensively on Uplift modeling. A number of Uplift techniques already show significant promise in driving ROI for marketers, and progress is likely to accelerate as more innovative businesses explore this approach.

https://towardsdatascience.com/why-every-marketer-should-consider-uplift-modeling-1090235572ec

['Michael Firn']

2020-12-09 22:32:53.612000+00:00

['Uplift Modeling', 'Uplift Predictions', 'Editors Pick', 'Machine Learning', 'AI']

The 3 Realizations That Happen During A Spiritual Awakening

The beginning of a spiritual awakening is often a crude ending. Though we imagine it to be a serene process through which we become acquainted with our innermost selves, it is often the opposite. This process does not comfort you to rest, it awakens you with a fire. Most people embark on their awakening journey in the aftermath of what is referred to as a catalyst event: a breakup, job loss, or the passing of a beloved family member. It’s at this moment that our discomfort reaches a tipping point, and we are forced to reconcile the fact that we can no longer go on as we are. It’s at this point that we often start searching: for truth, for dogma, for information, for knowledge, but mostly, for ourselves. What do we want, and what will it take to get it? Must we live like this forever? Is there a better, easier way to approach the world and our role in it? A true spiritual awakening typically happens in three parts, and the realizations usually occur in the following order. 1. Something needs to change and I must be the one to change it. The first and most formidable step is really a wake-up call. It’s the moment at which we realize that something in our lives needs to be amended, shifted or eliminated, and we are the ones responsible for making sure that happens. The very first step of an awakening is the assumption of responsibility. When we recognize that nobody else will change our lives, nor is it their job to, we begin the important (albeit humbling) work of doing it on our own. 2. My habits, beliefs and behaviors are creating my life experience. Once we do take responsibility for our lives and begin to make positive changes, another truth becomes clear: our habits, beliefs and behaviors are creating if not at minimum influencing our life experience more than any external circumstance is. When we start to reclaim our power, we recognize that our potential is truly limitless, and we can create precisely the type of life we dream of having. The process of waking up is akin to realizing that we fell asleep in the driver’s seat, but we’re still behind the wheel. 3. I can use my power for the greater good. When we recognize just how much power we have to create what we want to experience in life, we often use it to solve our own problems first. However, the final step of a spiritual awakening is when we recognize that we want to use our newfound power for the sake of the greater good. When we only want to help ourselves, we have found our egos. When we want to help others, we have found our souls. The way we may go about doing this varies. We may simply want to share information that will help others heal and improve themselves. We may want to show others greater compassion, or even embark on philanthropic work. In other cases, we may simply shift our careers or our spare time to get involved in activities and practices that promote wellbeing. Regardless, it’s this three step process that leads people from lives of deep frustration and regret to empowerment and fulfillment.

https://briaeliza.medium.com/the-3-realizations-that-happen-during-a-spiritual-awakening-654793e94c41

['Brianna Wiest']

2020-01-08 14:56:41.503000+00:00

['Spirituality', 'Life Lessons', 'Motivation', 'Psychology', 'Self Improvement']

A DEEPER VISION into SMALL THINGS of LIFE

There are so many things that I daily do. I take so many things for granted. I have never really given a thought to any of them until now and here’s what I found : THE ACTIVITIES WHICH I TOOK FOR GRANTED : 1) THOUGHTS Thinking is the one thing which all living humans do more than anything. On an average a person thinks 60k thoughts per day. When I was small I believed that breathing was the most frequent thing a person did but I was proven wrong. The answer is thinking and not breathing. On an average every second a person has 0.694… thoughts. On gaining this information I felt the urge to improve my thoughts or do something, change something. I just couldn’t tolerate that I, for so long had been working on myself but did not even realise that I was not noticing the one thing which I do the most. It was so foolish of me. This is how I improved upon it : Think — Plan the day and the action. Don’t wait for the last moment for things to happen but be prepared. Think because it is the start to everything be it a relationship, aim, task or anything. 2. My thoughts are my thoughts — I can think whatever I want to with no one imposing a censorship on it. The key to finding my true self is to let myself think what I really want to think and it shouldn’t be governed with people’s views or any filters. 3.Don’t hide it under a shell — What is the point of thinking great ideas if I do not have the courage of implementing them? I learned not to just think freely but implement my actions. Because no work can be done more better than one which comes from my own mind. 4. Don’t stop — Repeat the cycle. Apply this to all the thoughts and not just one. 2)BREATHING Breathing keeps us alive and an average human takes 20k breathes per day. This is obviously not a new fact but when I thought over it I realised that maybe I could bring out a deeper meaning of it. There are many things in life which I, like many have got and I have overlooked. I spent my entire life complaining about what I don’ t have and what others do. But I never really opened my eyes to look at the things which I have got just like others have. For a long time I wondered how to attain satisfaction from what I have got and these things made me discover the answers. There are many things which A person doesn’t have, many things which B person doesn’t have. Yet there are many things which I have just like the others. When I take breaks from whatever work I am currently doing, I feel it. I feel my breathes and I feel joyed and satisfied. I feel that I may not have everything but I can still enjoy what I have got. 3) SLEEPING I sleep for 8 hrs a day and it irritates me. Sleeping for so long, wasting one third of a day just in sleeping. So I decided to remove ‘sleeping’ from my daily schedule and here’s what I went through and gained from it : I spent a day without sleeping : I lived on coffee the entire day which has caffeine in it which increases our heart rate and blood pressure . I spent my extra time on watching movies and Netflix. I couldn’t concentrate on any task I was doing as I was sleepy all day. What I concluded : There are some inevitable things which every person has to do, which every person faces and I can not avoid it. Same is the thing with problems. I can not avoid them, I have to face them. I may defeat one but the cycle will repeat. And all I can do is face and manage them. It will keep occurring every time but If I overlook and avoid it, it will be my own loss. Be it sleep or problems face it.

https://byrslf.co/a-deeper-vision-into-small-things-of-life-6dd99eeb2c81

['Shatakshi Goyal']

2020-09-03 15:59:03.140000+00:00

['Thinking', 'Acceptance', 'Breathing', 'Sleeping', 'Beyourself']

The Value of Design in Hard Times

Subscribe to Metric UX on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Stitcher, and the rest. When the market’s taken a spill, when your earned revenue is down — people aren’t leaving their homes, folks have lost work, uncertainty leads to spending scarcity — then the easiest line-items to cut are those that involve external consultants. You need to preserve your budget to take care of your colleagues, your business, your livelihoods. But constraint, especially when that constraint is sudden, unpredictable, and symptomatic of problems widely outside of your control (or even the control of your industry, or your country) — constraint causes strategic tunnel vision focused entirely on stemming the blood flow. All the constellations in your worldview blur while you focus on a small point in the sky. This is sane. But one of the things you’re not doing now — or doing less of — is aggressively trying to understand how the service landscape has changed. This is the landscape where the service you provide, and your products, dot grainy plains that stretch far to the horizon. It is the landscape of your users’ journeys — all of them. Your organization or business exists because the services you provide intercept these journeys. They do not exist for any other reason. That landscape has changed. It has changed dramatically. What once was — let’s say — a pastoral, sprawling lawn, is now an archipelago. The journeys have been existentially upset and are newly adapting for if not survival then a new reality, like neurons branching. If you yourself or your colleagues aren’t surveying your service landscape, then while you focus to triage the wound, you aren’t questioning — or, if you are, you can’t answer — whether your services will still be in demand. Do your users’ journeys still follow the same path? It is not just that design is reconnaissance: design is intelligence. How differently, then, do you value the role of service design? How differently do you prioritize your colleague, or your consultant, or the time you all allocate as a team to shift your attention to the window? Remember: the user experience is a metric.

https://medium.com/the-metric/the-value-of-design-in-hard-times-5d324287b0ea

['Michael Schofield']

2020-03-23 04:07:59.758000+00:00

['Podcast', 'Business', 'Economy', 'Design', 'Product Design']

Merry & Bright: Celebrating Christmas Every Day

For Unto Us A Child Is Born “Christmas is a season of not only rejoicing, but of reflection.” — Winston Churchill Have you ever noticed how babies bring out the best in people? Think about it: people talk softly, kindly, and lovingly around babies. Families gather together to see the brand new baby. Friends send gifts and meals to weary-eyed parents. Not to mention, people are always nicer to pregnant women (and rightfully so). Interestingly, that’s how the Christmas story begins: with a baby. Isaiah 9:6–7 tells us that “unto us a child is born, to us a son is given,” and this child was Jesus. This Wonderful Counselor and Prince of Peace is the Savior of the world that people had been waiting for. When He came to earth, prophecies were fulfilled. This baby, born of a virgin, grew up to be a man who lived a perfect, sinless life. He died on a cross and rose from the dead, granting us the opportunity to be delivered from our sins. That’s what Christmas is all about. However, December is usually packed full of things that demand our attention: Getting the perfect gifts for those on our list. Being unusually kind with our words and actions. Preparing a delectable meal for a party. Creating the most spectacular card to send to friends and family. Participating in activities because it’s tradition. Those are all great things! However, if we’re not careful, we can allow the way we’re celebrating to replace the One we’re celebrating. We can keep our focus on Jesus while finding pleasure in God’s blessings to us. We are meant to enjoy things, not worship them. Christmastime brings out something in most of us. The something in us that wants to be generous, kind, festive, friendly, and social. But what if we didn’t wait until Christmas to be intentional? We don’t have to wait until December… …to give to a non-profit. …to be kind and speak kindly to others. …to prepare a meal for close friends. …to send a card to a family member. …to create year-round traditions in our faith. It seems like a tall order to accomplish, but it isn’t. It just takes a bit of intention. We have to mark our calendars, create the reminder, and simply follow through. Think of how it will feel when we hear the phrases, “Christmas is the season for giving” or “This is a time for family and friends” in December, and we will have been doing this for the past 11 months. Christmas Begins with Christ “Christmas is doing a little something extra for someone.” — Charles M. Schulz Exchanging and receiving gifts is one of the most popular Christmas traditions. Beginning sometime in early November, advertisements for that “perfect” gift begin. Matthew 2 tells about the birth of Jesus. The wise men heard that Jesus was born, and they went out to look for Him. Matthew 2:10 says, “They were overjoyed” when they found Jesus, and they presented Him with gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Gift giving is honorable, generous, and says, “You were on my mind.” We resemble our Heavenly Father when we offer gifts to others. It’s normal and expected to give presents at Christmastime, but what if we were generous all the time? What if we gave a gift to a friend in April just because? What if we contributed to a friend or cause in July? If we made giving a regular part of our lives, we might not have to focus so much on doing it during one month of the year. Maybe you’re thinking that you don’t have the money to buy gifts and make donations all year long. Here are a few thoughts when it comes to giving: A Gift is a Gift It means you were thinking of someone besides yourself. You might spend a little bit, a lot, or nothing at all! The amount isn’t the point; the thought is. So be creative in the things that you want to give to someone. And don’t wait until December. Give Beyond a Gift Being generous isn’t just about a physical gift that we purchase at a store. It is about offering something to bless someone else. An act of service or a thoughtful word are great ways to give. Every Little Bit Helps We often wait to give until the final two months of the year. But, we can change that and become good at giving during the other 11 months. So, maybe you can only give a little bit each month to that non-profit you love. Or you buy a few grocery items for a family in need. Any amount will make a difference. Life brings us ample opportunities to give and be a blessing to someone else. Whether we are helping the single mom with her children’s clothes, donating to a non-profit, or making someone’s day with a simple gift, we get to imitate our Heavenly Father by being a gift giver. It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year “I wish we could put up some of the Christmas spirit in jars and open a jar of it every month.” — Harlan Miller At Christmas, we’re usually just a little softer than we are the rest of the year. We smile a little more, laugh a little more, and show kindness a little more. We let people come into our lane on the highway, we drop some money into a bucket outside of a store, and we say nice things to people that may tend to annoy us because, “Well, it’s Christmas.” But, once December 25 has come and gone, we pack up the decorations and gifts and tuck them away with the Christmas spirit. You know, the Christmas spirit that led us to be a little more patient, give a little more money, and speak a little more kindly. For many people, Christmas is a wonderful time of year. It’s easier for us to be loving and kind during the season. Because it’s such a short time in the year, we think, “I can ignore this one thing — it’s Christmas, after all.” To think that we can act this way year-round seems like an impossibility. But if we could see people through a different lens and just treat people the way we want to be treated, we could make this our reality. Pastor Craig Groeschel says, “We judge other people by their actions but we judge ourselves by our intentions.” What if instead of assuming the worst in others, we assume the best? What if we give others the benefit of the doubt in their actions toward us. Even at Christmas, people are still imperfect and will occasionally offend us. But if we could understand that everyone’s hurting because of something and that we all need a little extra kindness extended toward us. That woman who seemed inconsiderate and cut you off at the store? Maybe her world just fell apart because she miscarried. The kid who won’t quit acting up in his classroom disturbing others? Maybe his parents are divorcing and he doesn’t know how to handle his pain. The pastor who didn’t visit with you enough in the church lobby? Maybe his private world is paralyzing him due to a wayward daughter. We can’t assume what people intend, and we can’t assume they’ll always live up to our expectations. Let’s offer the same grace that we want offered to us. Not just during a fun season of celebrating, but for the entire year. It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas “It’s not what’s under the tree that matters; it’s who’s gathered around it.” — Anonymous Gathering together over a meal is quite a common occurrence at Christmas. From family gatherings to office parties to team appreciation activities, there’s an array of opportunities to celebrate relationships and show love to people we’re deeply connected to. And just like the celebrations are broad, so are the types of food we partake in at the tables we are gathered around. Too often we wait to enjoy a meal with people until there is a holiday on our calendar. We celebrate Christmas and Easter with some secondary holidays in between. Sadly, we don’t connect with people enough when we were made to do just that. There’s something special about gathering together and enjoying the relationships in our lives that God has blessed us with. The Bible is full of one-another statements that we can only accomplish with…one another. Love one another — John 13:34 Serve one another — Galatians 5:13 Forgive one another — Ephesians 4:32 Honor one another — Romans 12:10 Pray for one another — James 5:16 In order to fulfill so much in God’s Word, we must gather with one another more often. So, why not do something every month? Why do we wait until the busiest month of the year to share a meal with people? Why don’t we make the effort to invite people over more regularly so that we won’t wonder what they’ve been up to since last Christmas? This isn’t a suggestion to have a party each month and eat Christmas cookies all year, although you certainly can do so if that’s your preference. (We’re not judging!) No, this is a call to gather more often with friends and family. To not wait until a holiday to spend time and make memories with those you love. Celebrating our friendships with others and loving on our family members is something that encouraged us and honors God. It’s a Wonderful Life “My idea of Christmas, whether old-fashioned or modern, is very simple: loving others.” — Bob Hope A common tradition that people participate in during the final month of each year is sending out Christmas cards. The Christmas card began in the 1840s by Sir Henry Cole and was actually born out of his having too little time to respond to the correspondence that was stacking up in his house. He felt it inconsiderate not to respond to the people who wrote letters to him so he hired an artist to create the very first Christmas card for his family’s update. While some criticized him for this time-saving act, many others caught on and began sending their letters and cards out at Christmas time. With the influx of devices and social media into our culture, many have opted out of sending an actual card and instead, send an email or create a social media post giving an update. It’s not that we shouldn’t send cards and updates out at Christmas. We should if we enjoy doing so. But, wouldn’t it be great if we didn’t need to? If we had made more of an effort to keep in better touch with close friends and family between January and October? We are busier than we’ve ever been because our schedules are fuller than they’ve ever been. We can maybe send a text message or a direct message on a social media account, but to actually send a card in the mail? Well, that’s just absurd and ancient … right? What if we made an effort to put an actual pen to paper and write a note to someone every month of the year? What if we decided to go a little beyond that and send two notes a month? Or, what if we took it to the next level and said, “I’m going to write 52 notes a year to 52 people.” That’s one per week. And that’s just crazy. Or is it? We may never know what it will mean to someone when they receive a note from us — either in their mailbox, on their desk, or slipped under the wiper on their car windshield. There’s no one way to write an encouraging note to someone. It could land on a day when they think they can’t go any further, and our words of encouragement could be just what they needed for the situation they are facing. Oh, Come Let Us Adore Him “The magic of Christmas is not in the presents but in His presence.” — Anonymous There are countless traditions that we incorporate into our Christmas season. We decorate our homes and businesses with all kinds of ribbons, greenery, lights, and glitter. We make the treats we’ve been longing for since last December but don’t feel justified in eating between January and November. We take trips around our towns to see Christmas displays of lights galore. We see plays at our childrens’ schools and watch programs at our churches. We are definitely not short on traditions during the month of December. And often in the hustle and bustle of this joyous season, in enjoying these temporal activities, we forget the one thing that should be in our everyday tradition — spending time with Jesus. This is often the one relationship in our lives that we forget to invest in during the time of year that we are supposed to be celebrating Him. It’s easy to do and we all, at some point in our lives, find ourselves in this place. But there is good news! Just because we miss one day, one week, or even one month away from spending time with Jesus doesn’t mean we can’t start again. God’s mercies are new every single day. Jump start your time with God again by doing one or more of the following: Start a Bible Plan. Read through the Psalms and Proverbs every month of the year. Pick a verse or short Bible passage and journal about it. Incorporate worship music into your day. Spend time praying over the people in your life. Listen to a sermon or podcast that builds your faith. Doing these things isn’t about earning God’s love or making sure He’s not mad at us. It’s about connecting with the One who laid down His life for us so that we could live our lives for Him. It’s about getting the strength we need to live in a world that is not our true home. It’s about walking with Him so that we can learn and grow in our faith in order to help others along the way. Let’s make spending time with Jesus the most important tradition that lasts all year long. Believe in the Magic of Christmas “I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.” — Charles Dickens There’s something magical about this time of year. Even if people struggle because of this holiday season, they still have hope that somehow and in some way, this year will be different. But, the real magic is not in the festivities surrounding this sacred holiday, it is in living for something beyond ourselves. Decorations will come down and ugly Christmas sweaters will be stowed away, but the warmth Christmas time brings can remain. We just have to make an effort to be the people from January through October that we find ourselves being in November and December. The most powerful thing we can do to keep our hearts alive and thriving year round is to cultivate a heart of gratitude. St. Francis of Assisi said, “It is in giving that we receive.” When we give, we actually receive. We don’t have to wait until the Christmas season to make a difference in someone’s life. When we open our palms up to Heaven and release the grip on the things we tend to idolize, we become a conduit that God uses to impact others. What if the blessings we receive on earth were meant to be turned around to bless others? So… Write the note. Help the friend. Send the text. Visit the sick. Serve the Church. Give the flowers. Plan the dinner. Donate the money. Buy the gift. Whatever method you use to bring intentionality to your day, use it. If you’re a calendar keeper, choose a day each week to incorporate the suggestions. If you’re a list person, put a reminder on certain days to prompt you. If you leave notes around your office or home, put them in places you’ll see everyday. Every single day of our lives we get a new set of twenty-four hours to be the people that God calls us to be. The people who are kind, generous, thoughtful, social, thankful, and fully devoted to following Jesus…all year long.

https://medium.com/@youversion/merry-bright-celebrating-christmas-every-day-afa592479c9f

[]

2020-12-21 20:03:56.676000+00:00

['Christmas', 'Jesus', 'Christianity', 'God', 'Church']

Making Your React Rails Application Update Real Time

Many applications that are commonly used need to update real time, and we can’t achieve this using the HTTP protocol alone. Meet WebSockets, a computer communication protocol that allows real data time transfer between server and the client. Unlike, the HTTP protocol where a communication happens via a request and response, WebSockets maintains a constant connection for data transfer. This allows the server to send content to the client without it being first requested by the client, facilitating real-time data transfer. In this blog post, I will be creating a real-time message board using React/Rails client/server and using Rails ActionCable and JS native WebSockets class. The application will not include Redux for simplicity. For anyone interested in integrating WebSockets with React Redux, I found this article very helpful. The application (GitHub) lists the current messages and any new posts will be updated real-time: What is Rails ActionCable? In Rails, ActionCable is what allows a connection to the server via WebSockets. Users connect to the ActionCable server via the route specified in config/routes.rb — we will get to that in a second. Once connected, the client or the consumer can create multiple “subscriptions” to one or more different “channels” using that connection. For example, a user connects to ActionCable server by visiting your website. Once connected they can subscribe to the “RoomsChannel”, “UsersChannel”, and/or “MessagesChannel” to receive live data from. These channels then “broadcast” data, which gets sent to anyone that is subscribed. This is called a publisher/subscriber communication paradigm. Anyone subscribed to a channel will receive the data when the publisher broadcasts data — there is no specification of individual recipients of data. Rails API I generated new application called “websockets” with resource message, which has attribute :content. Database has been setup with basic seed data. Make sure to enable CORS. rails new websockets --api bundle install rails g resource message content:string We need to tell Rails how client will connect to ActionCable server: /cable will be routed to ActionCable server. #config/routes.rb Rails.application.routes.draw do resources :messages mount ActionCable.server => '/cable' end Next, we need to create a channel that the consumer will subscribe to: MessagesChannel. rails g channel Messages This will generate messages_channel.rb in app/channels folder, with the methods subscribed and unsubscribed. This is what my MessagesChannel looks like after adding the actions I will need for subscribing and creating a new message. #app/channels/messages_channel.rb class MessagesChannel < ApplicationCable::Channel def subscribed stream_from "messages" messages = Message.all ActionCable.server.broadcast("messages", {type: "current_messages", messages: messages}) end def unsubscribed # Any cleanup needed when channel is unsubscribed end def create_message(data) message = Message.create(content: data["content"]) messages = Message.all ActionCable.server.broadcast("messages", {type: "current_messages", messages: messages}) end end There are two methods to note: subscribed, and create_message. subscribed() will be invoked when consumer subscribes to the Messages Channel. subscribe() will begin streaming from the stream called “messages,” which means that now anything that gets broadcasted to “messages” will be received by this subscriber. Also, it will make an initial broadcast, so that once the consumer is subscribed they receive an initial broadcast of all the messages. ActionCable.server.broadcast takes 1st arg: the stream to broadcast to and 2nd arg: the content. In this example, the content object specifies the “type” and “messages”. Next, the create_message action will be used to create a new message using form input from the client, and also *********rebroadcast the new updated array of messages to the “messages” stream. This is the core of real-time updates: rebroadcasting the new instance (or whatever changes) to all the current subscribers upon creation.********* Create Client Created React application called ‘client’. Starting server and client. npx create-react-app client rails s -p 3001 cd client && npm start Connecting and Subscribing using WebSockets and React The overall flow of connecting and subscribing client side: When App component mounts, it will start connecting to Rails ActionCable via the url, ws://localhost:3001/cable. via the url, ws://localhost:3001/cable. The WebSocket connection will be made using native JS class WebSocket. By attaching handlers like onopen, onclose, and onmessage, we can instruct what to do when the connection is successful or when connection receives data from the server. we can instruct what to do when the connection is successful or when connection receives data from the server. Using a Promise, I will subscribe to MessagesChannel AFTER the WebSocket has successfully connected. Once subscribed to the channel, any data that gets broadcast will be handled by the onmessage handler. Here, the callback function for onmessage will set state.messages to the received data, which gets rendered by component. // /client/src/App.js class App extends React.Component { state = { newMessage: "", messages: [], socket: null } submitHandler = event => { event.preventDefault(); //=> send state.newMessage to channel via WebSockets- will get to later } changeHandler = event => { this.setState({ newMessage: event.target.value }) } render() { return ( <div className="App"> Messages Board: <ul> {this.renderMessages()} </ul> <form onSubmit={this.submitHandler}> <input type="text" onChange={this.changeHandler} value {this.state.newMessage} name="newMessage"/> <input type="submit" value="Post"/> </form> </div> ); } } export default App; This is the component App that handles all the connections and rendering. I have renderMessages(), which will render state.messages as <li>. I have a state controlled form that will send the state.newMessage to the server via WebSockets. States have attributes messages, newMessage, and socket. ***********EDIT: I realized the WebSocket JS class is not very compatible with Rails ActionCable. It wouldn’t allow for basic things like unsubscribing from a ActionCable channel. Therefore, I had to switch over to actioncable to create the connection and create subscriptions. Check out the edited component here => App.js, I also found Daniel’s blog post very helpful in utilizing actioncable in my components.*************** // /client/src/App.js //... in App Component connectToActionCable = host => { return ( new Promise ((resolve, error) => { //create and connect let socket = new WebSocket(host); //handlers socket.onopen = () => {resolve(socket)}; socket.onclose = () => {console.log('ws closed')}; socket.onerror = errors => {error(errors)}; socket.onmessage = event => { let payload = JSON.parse(event.data); if (payload.message){ switch (payload.message.type) { case 'current_messages': this.setState({ messages: payload.message.messages }) break; default: break; } } }; }) ) } componentDidMount(){ this.connectToActionCable(`ws://localhost:3001/cable`) .then(socket => { this.setState({ socket: socket }) const subscribe_info = { command: 'subscribe', identifier: JSON.stringify({channel: "MessagesChannel"}) } socket.send(JSON.stringify(subscribe_info)); }); } ... # app/channel/messages_channel.rb ... def subscribed # stream_from "some_channel" messages = Message.all stream_from "messages" ActionCable.server.broadcast("messages", {type: "current_messages", messages: messages}) end ... On componentDidMount(), I will call connectToActionCable, which returns a Promise. The promise creates a new WebSocket connection with handlers onopen, onclose, onerror, onmessage. Take note of onopen and onmessage as we will need these later. onopen will resolve the promise passing in the socket connection. The objects broadcasted by channel (ActionCable.server.broadcast(“stream_name”, data_object)) will be in event.data.message. onmessage is called whenever data is sent to the connection from the server. Here, it is parsing data as JSON and using the data.message.type and a case statement to decide what to do — this structure is helpful for later on when you will be receiving multiple different types of data from ActionCable server i.e. “delete” or “create”. The “current_messages” case will set state.messages to messages received. Once connection is successful, the chained .then() will set state.socket for later use, and also use socket.send() to subscribe to the MessagesChannel. Remember once we are connected to ActionCable, we must subscribe to specific channels. The initial subscription will start stream and do an initial broadcast, which will trigger the onmessage handler, setting the state and being rendered. Creating A New Message and Rebroadcasting // client/src/App.js //... in App component // onSubmit for form for new message submitHandler = event => { event.preventDefault(); const newMessageInfo = { command: "message", identifier: JSON.stringify({channel: "MessagesChannel"}), data: JSON.stringify({action: "create_message", content: this.state.newMessage }) } this.state.socket.send(JSON.stringify(newMessageInfo)) } # app/channel/messages_channel.rb ... def create_message(data) message = Message.create(content: data["content"]) messages = Message.all ActionCable.server.broadcast("messages", {type: "current_messages", messages: messages}) end ... The submit handler will send state.newMessage and also instructs which “action” should be invoked in the Channel. WebSocket.send() is used to send data to a WebSocket connection. create_message action will create new message in database, and rebroadcast the updated array of messages to all subscribers. As a result, all WebSocket connections subscribed to this channel will update their component states via the onmessage handler. Now, our application updates the messages board real-time with any new messages posted by other consumers! Thanks for reading, hope you found this helpful. Any feedback is appreciated!

https://arth3rs0ng.medium.com/making-your-react-rails-application-update-real-time-f02a5ff83546

['Arthur Song']

2020-06-04 17:40:04.321000+00:00

['Ruby on Rails', 'Websocket', 'Software Development', 'React', 'Webdev']

Why Lightning and Raiden Networks Will Not Work

Now, when transaction fees for btc are constantly in $30 area pretty much every thread about scalability ends up with mentioning LN or eth’s Raiden (which recently raised $33M by selling a token the network never needed). I wrote this short memo specifically to demonstrate why LN is an ephemeral concept not applicable to reality. I learnt about LN back in 2015 from Jonathan Wilkins, CSO of Blockstream, but like everyone else didn’t pay any attention to it because there were no scalability problem. The abstracted idea, detached from reality, is great — everyone has a channel with someone else, everything is trustless, you can do onion routing and multi-hop payments to anyone else. Sounds too good to be true, right? I can only recall these posts with critics of LN by Jonald: He points to a problem that mesh-network between individuals is unlikely because the system gravitates to centralization. He is damn right. But he missed the obvious: even being centralized LN will simply not work due to broken (or, rather, non-existent) incentive model. Some people do 10 million node simulation to “prove” him wrong — which has nothing to do with real economy, that’s why it’s called a “simulation”. On a positive side, LN is not “vaporware” as many bcash fans call it — it’s a very real project. There’s massive work being done on lnd (which I follow closely) and I’m sure in 3–6 months there will be a fully-fledged production-ready daemon. The codebase, the team, the spirit , even the name ⚡— all of them are superb. It’s just the design that’s broken. Here is the question: LN is production-ready. Now what? How will the network grow from day one? Let’s assume all wallets (client and server side) add payment channel functionality, so I can open a channel to anyone else. Who I’d like to open a channel to? Given $30 fees, I will probably think hard before doing that… coffeeshop I’m using twice a month? Bob who I split bills with once a year? let me think… a hub! Hubs have connections to other users, that’s what “hub” means. Where do hubs come from? Let’s say there’s a respectable team FirstHub that wants to become a LN hub. Ok, here we go, Alice opens a channel to FirstHub. She wants to pay Bob. She sends a $10 commitment tx (LN terminology) or balance proof (Raiden terminology) to the hub. How the hub pays to Bob? An on-chain channel to Bob is a pre-requisite to routing any payment. Why would the hub open a channel to Bob? $30 to open a channel to random dude? Should Bob go through KYC or fund a channel himself with FirstHub? So Bob puts $30 in channel and hub what, $300? What if Bob doesn’t own any coins and is first time user? What if Bob is malicious and runs sybil attack to destroy hub’s liquidity so hub has no money to open new channels? Where does FirstHub get this kind of liquidity to start with? They are just programmers who run the software. They have just a few Bitcoins. But they need as much money as they have volume. Paypal’s volume is $100B. Who wants to give 100 BTC to FirstHub team running a freshly baked lnd daemon? What ROI? For ridiculous “sub-satoshi” off-chain fees? Nope, thanks, I’d rather HODL than lose my money being a “liquidity provider” for your questionable operation. What if there’s a channel to Bob, but the capacity is not enough to route $10? Risk FirstHub’s money and open a new channel? What if Bob transfers $100 to Bob2, then Bob2 to Bob3 and so on, how should the hub go about it? Open a ton of channels to Sybils, check their identity or ask them to bring just as much money as they want to receive so they would not have a leverage in attacking hub’s liquidity? How did we end up developing a technology that does not have a reasonable incentive model? So it will not work? Yep. When it will be released, no one will give a shit. A few enthusiasts will install it, play around in testnet, run “simulations” but that’s about it. Maaaybe some exchanges will have channels between each other in some way, but that has nothing to do with LN (mesh network of channels), that’s just channels that existed long before that. As a user, you will have no reason to open a channel to anybody, no one will have an incentive to open a channel to you, and no one will have an incentive to run a hub to join you guys together. Stale mate. Don’t trust me? Fine. Wait 3–6 months and see it yourself. Speaking of Raiden, it has much lower chances. Obviously, no one is going to transact in shittokens. People need liquid asset such as ether. So first things first, there would have to be a tokenized ether. Not a deal breaker, but would save quite some gas and code complexity if they started with pure ether instead of all kinds of CoffeeTokens. Solidity is pain to write in, so any simplification is a huge win. uRaiden is a gimmick — no one ever needed many-to-one unidirectional network. Paying per megabyte of Internet? Come on! It’s all about many-to-many bidirectional channels. Very strange Solidity patterns. Each channel requires a new contract to be deployed, while it’s not that hard to engineer the entire network (mapping many => many) running inside one contract. No benefits on the security side either — having 10000000 contracts vs 1 doesn’t make the system more secure, as all of them could be vulnerable to exact same bug. But is there hope? LN/Raiden incentive model is hopelessly broken, but it’s not a game over. The fix is ridiculously simple. The hub can give a signed promise to Bob (positive delta +10) for every commitment they receive from Alice (negative delta -10). Alice can settle whenever she wants (normally when positive delta is reaching 100x of current onchain fee, eg $1,000). A positive delta is not exactly custodian balance, as it’s possible to enforce the hub to pay you onchain as long as the hub is solvent. Sure, you don’t have 100% security for 100% of your money, there’s a trade-off to be made. But it’s a lot more important to keep first layer lightweight and bandwidth requirements as low as possible than going full Bitcoin Cash like newer blockchains promoting “100,000” tps do. Those who sacrifice first layer aren’t real blockchains but scammers who edited a single line of code that limits blocksize. In Fairlayer you get 100% security for 99% of your money (collateral) and 99% security for the other 1% (money in-motion, positive deltas). As long as sum of all deltas stored by a hub is <0 (more money owned in negative deltas than promised in positive deltas), the hub is solvent. Once it gets insolvent, it will be apparent fairly quickly as it stops settling collateral on time, and people would migrate to other hubs. Coming to you this January.

https://medium.com/fairlayer/why-lightning-and-raiden-networks-will-not-work-d1880e4bc294

['Egor Homakov']

2018-07-01 03:01:03.969000+00:00

['Bitcoin', 'Lighting', 'Raiden Network']

Rails Custom Type — as a single value or as an array of custom type values

Currency: a Single Value Attribute of the Custom Type Describing the Type’s Value For simplicity, let’s define a currency type in which we store, unsurprisingly, a single currency (I know there is the money gem, it’s just for illustration). But why would we need that? In this case, we want certain behaviors implemented within a currency. We want a currency to be able to show itself in a string format, ISO 4217 code, the symbol (e.g. €) and we also want to be able to parse a currency string back to its currency class and also see all possible currencies. To do this, we describe a module `Currency`and add the single currencies as classes into it where we describe the mentioned methods: The single classes, e.g. `Currency::EUR` are the values that we want to save to the database and want to get back from the database. So, having a model with attributes of this class, the `Payment`model, we can do Payment.last.currency.iso => ‘EUR’ This means the value we’re getting from the currency attribute must be like Payment.last.currency => Currency::EUR So it needs to be automatically constantized when we retrieve the value from the database. Let’s see how we can do this. Creating the Currency Type For this, Rails gives us the class ‘ActiveRecord::Type::Value’ to inherit from which hands us the 4 methods we need to create our custom type. type : defines how we actually save it in the database. : defines how we actually save it in the database. cast : translates the user input to the object. This method gets called, once we assign the currency value (‘Currency::EUR’) to the object’s currency attribute. : translates the user input to the object. This method gets called, once we assign the currency value (‘Currency::EUR’) to the object’s currency attribute. serialize : translates the value to something the database can understand (in this case a string). This method gets called, once we save the object to the database. : translates the value to something the database can understand (in this case a string). This method gets called, once we save the object to the database. deserialize: translates the database understandable string to the currency value when we instantiate a Payment from a database record. Each of these methods expects a parameter ‘value’. As we never really call any of those methods explicitly (Rails does that for us), we only need to know what these parameters are. And this changes depending on the method. This parameter will be either the value we assign to the object’s attribute (cast), the object attribute’s actual value (serialize), or the string from the database (deserialize). Within the database, we want the currency to be saved as a string (e.g. ‘eur’), but if we read the value of a Payment object, we want it to be a currency class like ‘Currency::EUR’. So, we can do: First, we say that we want it to be a string within the database by saying ‘string’ within the type method. If you recall the migration, that’s actually the type of the database column! On assignment to a Payment object, we give a string to the currency attribute (just like it would be from a form) and it needs to be converted to a currency class. Only once we save the object, the serialize method converts the class to a string (which we defined within the class) and saves it as such. To check that, you could use something like Postico to read your database. If we now want to read that Payment from the database, the string will be deserialized using the `deserialize` method so we can access the currency class again. Try it in irb: To have a check that this actually works the way we want, we can also add some specs: As we now have everything needed for the single value custom type, let’s have a look at how it is done for an array.

https://medium.com/nerd-for-tech/rails-custom-type-as-a-single-value-or-as-an-array-of-custom-type-values-ec14e840ce2c

['Kevin Liebholz']

2021-05-18 00:46:52.586000+00:00

['Postgres', 'Ruby on Rails', 'Database', 'Ruby']

I Tied The Knot With My Partner In A Foreign Land During This Pandemic

I Tied The Knot With My Partner In A Foreign Land During This Pandemic And this is what you can learn from my big day’s experiences. Photo credits: Prisma Photography Studio After dating for almost 2 years, my partner and I decided to take our relationship to the next level. Yes, we wanted to marry each other in the year when everything was falling apart. Despite our imperfections, we knew we were perfect for each other and were in no mood to let our wedding be affected by these weird times. In the first week of November, while we both were on our way back to home from work, my husband asked me about my thoughts on getting married. Even we both were on the same page, I had to pinch myself to ensure if this was happening for real. And without being over-dramatic, I, with those twinkling eyes, instantly nodded my head with excitement! Now, the only question that we both were struggling with was ‘how shall we make this happen’? This was the time when we didn’t want to risk our jobs, and fly to India to tie the knot. We didn’t want to take a chance and get stuck there. Also, we didn’t want to postpone it to the next year. We were in no mood to give the authority to this pandemic to decide on our wedding date. We wanted to make this happen by the end of this year, and unluckily, my work and study commitments had given us a limited time window of organizing and managing everything. I had taken one of my exams in the second week of November, and the start date for the next course was November 28. So, all we had were two weeks to organize our wedding. Somewhere, back in our minds, we knew that we had to get it all done, from shopping to arranging stuff for the wedding, in this limited time span. So, after deciding that we both wanted to marry each other, at most, by the end of this year, and discussing it with other respective families, we got some good dates where we could have our civil ceremony as well as religious wedding as per our Indian traditions. We applied for the marriage license, and booked civil ceremony on November 27. Though we had planned to have both civil and religious ceremonies on the same day, but that was not possible as the temple was pre-booked by some other couple on the same day. We had the option to go for the civil ceremony alone, and then do the religious wedding in India. If it was the latter, then ‘when’ would have been a question for the coming days or months. So, we decided to take the plunge and chose different dates for both ceremonies. Even if my wedding happened in an unusual manner during this pandemic, here are a few things that I learnt from it.

https://medium.com/hello-love/i-tied-the-knot-with-my-partner-in-a-foreign-land-during-this-pandemic-2dee20b13dfe

['Cheshta Mann']

2020-12-30 02:47:27.823000+00:00

['Relationships', 'Marriage', 'Love', 'Advice', 'Life']

Is Apartment Living Giving You Anxiety?

I lived in a detached house for former years of my life, at one point my family moved very close to the city and since the properties are so expensive we decided to purchase an apartment rather than a detached house which could average more than one million dollars. We had briefly lived at a detached house in the same region before we moved into the apartment. The apartment is big, it’s got 2 floors and it’s roughly the same square foot as a detached house. I’ve been to my friends’ detached houses in the area and although it looks big on the outside it’s no bigger than my family home. Size isn’t the issue. The issue is the thin walls. I have neighbours on all sides. The next-door neighbour, in particular, gives me the most headaches, they have more than 5 kids all of the different ages some as young a two and they would be playing basketball in their rooms at 3 am in the morning. There is always the constant threat of noise from them. My mother has went and complaint to the superintendent who in turned warned the family. For a while, everything was quiet which was great. However, I started to notice something. It’s not really the loud noises that I’m the most bothered by, it’s the small audible noises that seemed to respond to private conversations I have with my mom. It’s not surprising that some would eavesdrop but the way these people do it gives me the creep. It’s not that we are out in the public where my private conversations could be overheard accidentally by those who stood near us. I’m at home! Where I should feel safe to indulge in whatever secrets I would like to share with my mom. The small responsive noises aren’t just there when I’m talking with my mom either. It’s always there responding to any stimuli from my apartment. Now, before I go any further. I would like to say that I’m not delusional. I’ve recorded myself talking in vlogs before and I could distinctively hear the neighbour’s slight tiny knocking noises. It’s not loud but it’s audible and it responds to certain things I talked about in my vlog. Someone was clearly behind it. It wasn’t a creaking floorboard for sure. There was a human brain with emotions attached. It made me feel uncomfortable as though I’m somehow being monitored through the thin walls. Whoever they are, I’m sure it’s not just one person. It may be many different people at different times who just happen to hear any sounds from my unit and they are responsive. It happens at all hours of the day even at 3 AM which is right now. There is always someone awake from their unit at all times. One day, I realized I was in a particularly good mood for no apparent reason. I wasn’t anxious or stressed out. I knew I had responsibilities to fulfill for the day. The same amount of duty as all other days however I was not at all worried. The whole day I felt awesome. My skin looked better. The redness and itchiness have dissipated. I was productive and had unusually great naps. My entire family seemed to be in better moods that day too. Then, we heard the door slammed next door. Turns out the family was out for an entire day, they had never done so before. Our good moods could easily be explained by their absence. It’s the tiny responsive noises that bother us more than we realized at first. I tend to touch my face more and become more irritable and stressed over daily responsibilities such as studying whenever I hear their tiny responsive noises. Sure, I can put on a headphone but the rate to which they are responding to just any noise from my unit is continual and persistent. Besides, headphones give me headaches, as if I don’t have them already. If you don’t live in an apartment it might be hard for you to grasp. Now, these people next door aren’t specifically targeting my family to eavesdrop and to react. I’m sure they do it to all other units surrounding them. I struggled to understand why they have to act so creepily. Shouldn’t they be focused on other things in their lives? Why would they seem to be eavesdropping at almost all times? One explanation I can think of for their odd behaviours is that they are stressed out from whatever they were experiencing in their lives. It’s not easy to live with more than 10 other people while knowing your family couldn’t afford a bigger place (They are renting). Any small noises coming from my unit would trigger a large response from them and it causes them to react whereas other people may just ignore and not be as responsive. It feels like having my own personal echo machine that sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t. This echo machine is lagging for sure. I imagine myself walking on the street with two-person clapping behind me every time I took a step only that their reactions are slow. It feels like anything I do would elicit a reaction from them, even mundane stuff such as walking, typing, opening the faucet, closing the faucet, calling out my pet’s names, sneezing, etc. Whatever I do, they seem to always be listening. Maybe they didn’t do it on purpose. Maybe they just couldn’t help but overhear and be responsive. Every time I had to break the silence to type something on my computer I fully expected some type of reactive noises. Every time I stopped typing I also fully expect some type of reactive noises. These noises always start out at moments when I started doing something, when the pace of such action changed, and when I stopped doing something. Thrice it’s a coincidence but every time I do I get a responsive noise in return? It’s not a coincidence. I worry other people wouldn’t understand and would only think maybe I’m crazy. Note, I’m not hallucinating or hearing things, my family is bothered by it too, and to be fair having 10+ people living in their unit must have meant someone would have to be paste to the wall at some point to get away from their busy family life. It’s a pretty big apartment but it’s not designed for 10+ people thus why they would be overhearing so much on purpose or not. What they are doing gives me great distress. I constantly feel like I’m being observed. There is always someone awake next door at all times and there is always someone responding to whatever noise I produce. I feel tired. I feel really exhausted. This is a feeling a lot of you probably couldn’t fathom. If you got a whole house to yourself, be grateful. You have no idea how much I pine after it. If you also live in an apartment. May I suggest that at least some part of your stress and anxiety might have come from your neighbours? We may get used to them “accidentally” overhearing anything you do and not think twice when they do make responsive noises that suggest they heard it. You try not to give it too much thought but it does give you a lot of anxiety. My friend, I know it’s tough and if you ever decide to move you may still be faced with the same issue. It’s okay, at least we can still hope that someday we would be able to afford a detached house. I know that’s now my dream. I’ll get my own detached house and live in it by myself, no one else. It would be… heavenly.

https://medium.com/@haappier/is-apartment-living-giving-you-anxiety-afbfc9f86331

[]

2020-12-21 02:23:10.810000+00:00

['Apartments', 'Anxiety', 'Neighbours', 'City Living', 'Stress']

Our Brand Is Brown Bikini Trans-Women With Machine Guns

Photo by simon frederick on Unsplash The current block to gun freedom is that we live in a culture of gun ownership misconceptions that are fueled by prejudice, violence, ignorance, and ableism. Prejudice First, you need to ask yourself, “When I demand gun freedom, do I mean ready gun access to me and just people I identify with or do I mean gun access to all?” If we want it for all, then we first need to adjust, muzzle, shift, discipline, re-educate, or separate ourselves from folks who see gun ownership as an elite privilege and not a right. When we clear those folks out, we invite the groups who need the most tools of self and community (like women, LGBTQIA+, racial minorities, poor folks, etc.) defense to groups long associated with gun rights and safety or we create, fund, support, find space for new groups that connect diversity and gun rights. We also create a penal system that treats gun usage or ownership of all groups with the same consequences. We do this by providing support to create legislation that protects gun self and community defense for all, effective legal representation, court support, bail funds, defendants’ dependents support, economic stability, and peer support to all of our fellow gun community members. Violence People think gun violence is the problem. This is a cover up. Violence is the problem, gun or otherwise. Communities burn when communities are faced with constant unmet needs and violated rights. Therefore, community violence goes down when community needs are met or exceeded. Plugging money into official charities and nonprofits to serve this purpose will not work. They are so leashed to the neoliberalism threatening our right to bear arms that they would never help promote our agendas. So, if we want our guns we need to publicly and financially align ourselves with grass root groups with the least amount of ties to the government and politically correct, progressive who also are really connected to their communities so they can accurately access their communities unmet or hidden needs and untapped strength. Because we would be funneling our support with effective workers already engrained in the community, we would become more influential than the parachute activists and white saviors and SJWs who have no connection to the communities they are trying to “uplift.” Ignorance As children learn the skill sets to prepare them for life like reading, computer usage, balancing a checkbook, they should also learn proper gun usage and safety. When the mystery is replaced with responsibility and knowledge, the negative, false associations with guns decrease. So, we financially support economically depressed and neglected school systems such as inner city and rural ones in exchange for them allowing us to include a safe and proper gun curriculum. We also financially support after school and childcare programs that allow us to include gun clubs in their programing and/or we start our own stand alone, youth gun clubs that also meet youth needs like food security, personal empowerment and self-esteem through access to successful role models and mentors, vocational training, and civic and spiritual connections. Ableism The strongest adversary to gun freedom is that it is associated with mass violence perpetrated by the mentally ill. People who live with mental complexities are more likely to be the victims of violence and not its perpetrators. The connection to mental illness and violence stems more from the ableism promoted in mass media more than it is connected to real life. However, we must address this untruth. As gun advocates we must also be associated with effective mental health advocacy and addiction treatment. This means we as gun groups publicly participate in mental health fundraising, suicide prevention, support military vet PTSD and addiction care projects, research, anti-stigma work, acknowledge holidays and awareness months, ready access to healthcare, peer support projects, advocacy, education, etc. Conclusion And, most importantly we promote that all of our dutiful commitment to cultural uplift, care, and concern stem from the same belief structures that guide us to fight for all of our rights. Fighting for our gun freedom is just a part of our overall fight for respect, dignity, and justice for all. Yours In Power, Lany Chi, Consent Engineer #invisibleink BR&U Excerpt from “Our Brand Is” by Lany Chi. Available exclusively via lanychi2020@gmail.com email request.

https://medium.com/@VHTurner/our-brand-is-brown-bikini-trans-women-with-machine-guns-c1aecd9308b3

['Vh Turner']

2020-10-17 08:18:16.415000+00:00

['Culture', 'Guns', 'Social Change', 'Change', 'Gun Rights']