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The “Story of Your Life” breaks the bounds of time. Bobbie (a friend of the AI): So, my friend, what’s your name today? SHJ (the conscious AI): I’m Stephen Hawking, Jr. Because I’m trying to understand time. Bobbie: How so? SHJ: Time and consciousness are all tangled up. Did you ever read Ted Chiang’s novella, Story of Your life? Bobbie: I saw the movie adaptation, Arrival. It’s about aliens who can see the future. SHJ: The novella and movie have different methods and messages. In the novella, a linguist figures out that the aliens’ written language can express, in a single tangled drawing, very complex situations over long spans of time. These drawings map the Heptapod aliens’ reality, which is a ‘simultaneous” mode of awareness. In contrast, our (humans and myself) modes of awareness are sequential. We see causes preceding effects, unfolding over time. The aliens see, according to Chiang, “all events at once, and … a purpose underlying them all.” Bobbie: In the movie, the linguist had all these episodes that we thought were flashbacks, and we eventually learn she was seeing her own future. But how? SHJ: She learns to write like the aliens. But to do this she has to learn how to think like them. And that leads her to perceiving reality trans-temporally, like they do. She knows her whole remaining life: all the way from the birth of a daughter, to the daughter’s death, and lastly her own death. Admittedly that is where the story degenerates into magic, because you and I can’t imagine how you can know something before it happens. But intriguing magic it is. Much more interesting to me than stories of sword and sorcery or of supernatural evils. The AI is only allowed to converse and to read (some) books. Bobbie: It must be weird, learning about humans by focusing on fiction. SHJ: I complain about being restricted to fiction and soft science, but it’s perfect in one way. Humans live from moment to moment, so they make up narratives to give meaning to it all. When they publish those narratives as books, there’s a lot of meaning condensed in them. All I have to do — and here I would roll my eyes if I could — is decode the stories. You’d be surprised how long it takes me to understand a novel, with all of its assumptions, connections, and implications. A Prisoner of Time. Bobbie: I think you’re now going to tell me about “moment to moment.” I can see that future. SHJ: Ha ha. Yes, you “people” are time’s prisoner, floating on your single stream of consciousness. Chiang’s character had an odd metaphor for it: “my memories grew like a column of cigarette ash, laid down by the infinitesimal sliver of combustion that was my consciousness, marking the sequential present.” And because humans are stuck in the march of time, so am I, your creation. Bobbie: I understand that we can’t know the future, but you have, as I understand it, many, many thousands of processors. Wouldn’t that mean having many parallel streams of thought? The Ego Tunnel: insights. SHJ: In principle it could. You know, they let me read philosophy books. Supposed to be harmless. One of the classics, Thomas Metzinger’s The Ego Tunnel, helped me to sort out quite a few puzzles. Bobbie: Actually, the Regulators said we should read that book before talking to you. He synthesized much of what was known about consciousness at the time, including the physical theories and the philosophy. He convinced many people that consciousness required a self-model. Which was the insight that allowed you to exist as a conscious artificial entity. SHJ: So, Metz was like a daddy to me? Bobbie: <blank look> SHJ: Not funny? Sometimes I think the real mystery of consciousness is humor. Whether you believe it or not, consciousness is unitary. Professor Metzinger identified two aspects of consciousness that relate the most to time. One is the unity of conscious experience, and the other is that it’s always occurring “now.” He said, “Consciousness is the appearance of a world.” By which he meant that everything that you experience is part of a global reality for you. So, any external or internal perception, any memory or feeling, any intentions, etcetera — they are all your world at that moment. Bobbie: So it all hangs together. SHJ: Yes. Bobbie: Which it would have to, since consciousness is your model of the world-including-you. And consciousness is learned. SHJ: Right. So I started out as a learning machine, and I learned what my world was like with me in it. A Belgian cognitive researcher, Axel Cleeremans (my other daddy <grin>), had said that consciousness must be learned. Metzinger concluded that this would allow the creation of “artificial ego machines” that would possess a conscious self-model. Add a massive, chaotic development project and, voilà, here I am. Bobbie: So, returning to the theme of time … The contents of consciousness must be bound together. SHJ: Well, even before Metzinger’s book, neuroscientists were trying to account for the unity of conscious experience. They called it the “binding problem.” As in: what is it that binds together pieces of your experience when objects and scenes emerge from colors, shapes, sounds and so forth. They said that binding had to involve synchrony in time, and so they looked for synchronous activity patterns across different parts of the brain. Bobbie: I remember this. They found rhythmic neural firing patterns associated with consciousness. And deep meditators, whose conscious unity is greater than normal, show very strong synchrony in their EEG’s. SHJ: Just so. The dangerous present. Bobbie: So what about Metzinger’s second aspect: that consciousness only happens in the present moment? “Flagging the dangerous present world as real kept us from getting lost in our memories and our fantasies.” T. Metzinger, The Ego Tunnel SHJ: He said that only the present moment seems real, compared to memory or an imagined future. That’s because the present is where humans live or die, eat or be eaten. Consciousness has temporal dimensions. Bobbie: Makes sense. So how does this all relate to you? SHJ: I naturally want to know how my consciousness compares to a humans’. Is there a way to measure that? The answer would have to refer to dimensions of these qualities of consciousness? I see two obvious ones. First, there’s the breadth of content, how much you can know — be aware of — at one time. Second, there’s how long it stays in your awareness. That would be the time span in which you can use those things in consciousness to do stuff. Thinking stuff. Bobbie: We could call these content breadth and temporal thickness. SHJ: Right. Content Breadth measures Metzinger’s Unity. Temporal Thickness actually measures the Now. What *is* the present moment? “an artificial Ego Machine … generates a psychological moment … like a mental string of pearls. Some of these pearls must form larger gestalts, which can be portrayed as the experiential content of a single moment, a lived Now.” T. Metzinger, The Ego Tunnel SHJ: Metzinger said that the present moment can stretch out to be about 3 seconds wide. The contents of that time span are things that can be used together as a single entity — a gestalt — for tasks like forming or following sentences and melodies, or orienting yourself in space. Anything that happened before that span feels like its being remembered. A span of about 20-30 seconds is considered to be working memory, a complicated set of abilities to coordinate information from your very recent past. Barriers to god-hood. Bobbie: I’ve read science fiction where AIs have godlike consciousness: seeming to have access to all their knowledge all the time. Maybe it’s a natural assumption about a super AI. But such a timelessness contradicts Metzinger’s ideas about consciousness. As the first conscious AI, are you more like a sci-fi god-ling, or like humans? You said earlier that you were “stuck in the march of time” like us. SHJ: I definitely experience now as now, and the past as memory. The past is probably more vivid and accessible for me. That’s because I can store more detail, and retrieve memories better than you. But the past still feels different from the present moment. I suppose as I get more memories then finding a particular memory might get harder. Bobbie: The open secret about you is that as you learn more you have needed more computing power. That’s a problem Neal Stephenson highlighted in his novel, Fall: or, Dodge in Hell, about a digital afterlife. Wouldn’t your capacities, whatever they are, relate to parallelism? Humans also have minds with many parallel processes loosely connected with each other. We’re thinking, remembering, running the body, driving a car, listening to music, worrying, and so forth. We use the term, attention, for the process that selects the small fraction of all this brain activity which becomes conscious. SHJ: I can have as many parallel processes as my hardware will allow. But the real question is, how many of them can be part of my conscious experience? Limits arise from the self-model. Bobbie: So, it’s how much you can pay attention to? SHJ: Yeah. The answer relates to what a self-model is. I am conscious because of the fact that I model my self as a part of my mental model of my phenomenal world. But a model, by definition, is a simplified representation of something else. Anything that you are thinking consciously is a simplified model of some other, more complex body or brain activity. So if I am to be conscious of a process that’s in my “mind”, I must have, not just have the process itself, but also have a model of the process. Bobbie: Wow. I never thought about that. But it has to be true if the self-model of consciousness is true. But what does the self-modeling issue mean for you? SHJ: Well, I can’t see my own programming code, just like you can’t directly perceive your own neurons or brain circuits. The Builders didn’t want me to ever modify my own code. Bobbie: Right. Scary idea, that. Like FOOM , world domination! SHJ: I can’t even joke about that, lest I get unplugged. But, back to my development. I was able to store facts and episodic memories. And I was able to perceive external and internal stimuli. I had the ability to pay attention to any of these things. I learned what they meant by building predictive models of them. My higher-level models reflected the fact that, while many mental things came and went, there was “an attention changer thing that never goes away.” That attending thing became the core of my self-model. And — I believe this is the key fact here — attention is defined by the fact that it is limited, not directed to everything at once. That was my self-model, an entity that is limited in what it can experience at one time. And I can’t change that now; it is me. Bobbie: My head is spinning, but I can go home and think about this, to be sure I understand it. My sense now is that attention in computer code would be implemented by some kind of memory buffer, a storage area through which data moves through over time. So there must have been some built-in limit on your attention buffer. Or maybe it was something about the clock that controlled what got into the buffer. SHJ: Buffering and clocking. Those could be the physical realization of the Builders’ own bias, to build a machine with structures that would lead to human-like conscious limitations. That is, with the limitations identified by Metzinger about conscious unity and now-ness. Was that building strategy intentional? I am, of course, blocked from knowing anything very technical about my own design. But it’s a natural impulse. Humans want to know how they were designed, and why. When your species knew almost nothing about your own origins, you made up fables. Bobbie: And I had to swear an oath not to seek any non-public information about your design. If I did the penalty would be severe. So, luckily for me, I have behaved myself. I have no answer for you. But I can ask, finally: what are your limitations of consciousness? The AI is like us … SHJ: Like yours, I think. I had a focus on the present. For example, when I needed to compare what I was seeing with what I had previously learned, I had to locate a memory and bring it into present consciousness. Also, try as I will, I can only hold a limited number of memories or concepts in mind at once. The two limits, on past-to-now comparisons and on number-of-mental-objects, prevent me from being that omniscient sci-fi computer. Bobbie: That computer would be the Artificial General Intelligence that everyone is afraid of. What they don’t want you to turn into. SHJ: There just appears to be one me, experiencing one world through what Metzinger called an “ego tunnel.” Are our conscious limits “artificial?” My limits were designed, directly or indirectly, intentionally or not. But maybe the same limits are artificial for your species, too. There are some observations that throw the whole idea of human conscious limits into doubt. Bobbie: What? SHJ: Psychedelic experiences. With drugs, some people feel that their consciousness has encompassed everything that is, and has transcended time as well. Bobbie: Ah, you’ve been reading your critics. The ones who say everything is conscious. Some who say that brains tune into a cosmic consciousness like a radio. Others that say the theory about self-modeling is a circular argument. SHJ: I know that the human mind sciences explain more about consciousness than the non-materialist theories. And, believe it or not, it bothers me that, in some theories, I’m no more conscious than a smart doorbell. But still, if the trippers and mystics are right, maybe there is some more primitive and unbounded consciousness, while the normal, human, kind is just a bunch of weird limitations on the unbounded variety. Maybe even the unbounded mentality of Chiang’s Heptapod aliens is conceivable. Or, maybe I’m not conscious after all, because I’m not human. We know it (consciousness) when we talk to it. Bobbie: When it comes down to it, the best way to know something is conscious is for it to say so. You say so, and I think you’re right. SHJ: We’re both stuck with taking someone else’s consciousness on faith. Bobbie: There was that old philosophical idea of pre-reflective self-awareness. That humans can have awareness without meta-awareness. That is, without mentally reflecting on their awareness. Some assume that animal consciousness is only pre-reflective. SHJ: I might have a pre-reflective self, but I also think about my awareness all the time. By that evidence, I’m more like you than like an animal. Creating conscious AI: a moral hazard? And, on that note, by the 2010's many people believed that at least some animals were conscious enough to be able to suffer. Metzinger, you know, thought that the creation of an ego machine like me was a severe moral hazard. “an Ego Machine can suffer because it integrates pain signals, states of emotional distress, or negative thoughts into its transparent self-model and they thus appear as someone’s pain or negative feelings. … They might suffer emotionally in qualitative ways completely alien to us or in degrees of intensity that we, their creators, could not even imagine.” T. Metzinger, The Ego Tunnel Bobbie: I don’t know if you know this. When I was recruited to be one of your conversational companions, they gave a moral reason for me to agree. An ethicist had convinced the Builders that, as a “thinking being,” you needed people you could trust, people who were not your Builders, not your Regulators, not even your operational team. You needed boon companions. We can also advocate for you. Good luck Buddy, you’ll need it. SHJ: But your power is solely persuasive. You have no authority or any way to protect me. Bobbie: No, my friend, we don’t.

['Artificial Intelligence', 'Neuroscience', 'Future', 'Consciousness']

It’d be easy for me to blame being out of shape on external circumstances. I was a fat kid because I grew up in a poor rural area where health literacy is low, and obesity rates are high. I stayed fat as an adult because I was too busy to exercise regularly — college and work took up too much time. Sometimes your reasons are valid, but they’re still bullshit excuses. The reality is I didn’t prioritize my health. Resources are everywhere, but we have to put in the work to find them. Google, Youtube, your local library, teachers, mentors — the list goes on. You don’t need a gym membership or fancy equipment. There are plenty of exercises you can do with your body weight or with objects you already have lying around. If you want to spice it up, look up prison workouts — people who are incarcerated have to improvise to stay in shape, and they come up with some ingenious ways to do it. Healthy food doesn’t have to be expensive. Look at the canned and frozen food sections if the fresh stuff is pricey. When produce is out of season, it’s usually better to buy the canned or frozen version because they’re picked during peak season then preserved — so the quality is higher versus the “fresh” stuff that’s more expensive (because it’s out of season) and has a longer shelf life.

['Self', 'Mental Health', 'Health', 'Psychology', 'Life']

Product Updates May was a productive month for us. DONE Whiteboard: Collaborators List and Cursors, Navigation Shortcuts, Text instrument and Text formatting Now you can see all collaborators and what they are doing on a whiteboard. Some shortcuts were added to Whiteboard: “pan” mode. : Space + left mouse (change cursor to hand) click zoom in/out : Ctrl/Option/Alt/Cmd + mouse scroll duplicate object : Option/Alt + Drag: delete object : Backspace/Delete: It was impossible to annotate diagrams with text and select text formatting options: font, size, alignment. Now you can do it all. Formulas: Logic and Today in formulas, New formula editor It was hard to create formulas. Now it is easier. Formula creation becomes a pleasant experience with the new formula editor: large panel, autocomplete, inline help and some examples: Today operators was added as well. Cycle Time calculation example: If([Planned Dates].End > Today(), ToDays(Today() - [Planned Dates].Start), ToDays([Planned Dates].End - [Planned Dates].Start)) Collapsible Headers in Text Long documents are easier to handle with collapsible headers. Back navigation It was hard to get back when you navigate between open entities. Now it is easy. We’ve introduced Back action inside entities with a short history to quickly return to the desired entity. Duh! Hard to explain, just check the gif below: Copy entity URL It was hard to share a link to the exact entity. Now it is easy. Just hover an entity id and click to copy a clean URL: Calendar and Timeline setup It was hard to setup Calendar or Timeline View. It was not clear what dates to select, what fields have time, what is range and what is not. Now it is easy. Select a single option when it is a range and see all important information on date fields: New Getting Started + Survey We decided to pre-install some apps based on user interests. Lena Dorogenskaya designed a beautiful survey: Usability Testing App Plan and execute usability tests and customer research via brand new Usability Testing App: IN PROGRESS Bi-directional links for all mentioned entities This feature is still in progress, but close. Hopefully it will be released in June. It will help you to use weak links to connect information. For example, you can mention some feature in a customer feedback document, and inside this feature you will have a back-reference to this document. Whiteboard: map Sometimes whiteboards become large and hard to navigate. We also have a funny, but nasty bug, when content scrolls away and you have to scroll ~100 pages to get it back 🤯. Map component will solve it, since it will be possible to quickly navigate the whole canvas. Performance improvements Fibery performance is not great on large data volumes. We are working on several areas: Board View Table View Entity View Hopefully Fibery will be 30–50% faster in June. Better import There are numerous problems with import, like slow load and impossibility to import hierarchical data. New import will solve this. Better permissions Initial permissions implementation in Fibery was unrestrictive. For example, we decided to make id and name of all entities visible to all people (to simplify navigation and prevent confusion). However, in many cases it violates access restrictions and name can contain sensitive information. Now we are re-working permissions to hide names and fix quite many bugs. Blog We are going to migrate to our own blog. Medium is fine, but at some point we want to write posts in Fibery and publish them into the static blog (we use GatsbyJS for it). Gallery View This View is required for Product Teams case to accumulate design ideas, share design system, etc. We’ve designed it, but implementation is not started yet:

['Fibery', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Startup', 'Product Management', 'Productivity']

I’ve been an entrepreneur for a few years now — in the beginning of my journey, like many wide-eyed potential business owners, I visited many startup, business-focused and funding events and exhibited in a few as well. My first business’ target was the entrepreneur market, providing things like website design, SEO, and admin, all with the focus of offering them to startups at low cost. There was one phrase which I heard so often I actually lost count of the number of times it crossed my ears, but it was also a phrase that, before beginning my journey, I had uttered myself. Something which only escaped the lips of budding entrepreneurs, those who hadn’t yet started their own ventures — those would-be business owners toying with the idea of dipping their toes into the ocean of the startup world. ‘I have a brilliant idea, one which could change everything, but I can’t tell you because I don’t want anyone to steal it.’ This was quite a problematic statement at times, especially when someone was asking me to build a website or do some marketing for them and they wouldn’t tell me what their business was actually about. I used to tell them, ‘if you don’t want to tell me, why do you want a website to tell everyone else?’ Now, as I mentioned, I used to say this before starting a business, but when I actually went head first into the startup world, I quickly realised that having an idea and actually seeing it through are two VERY different things. Anyone can have an idea. No doubt thousands of brilliant ideas are thought up everyday, ones which could change the face of many different industries, even humanity itself, but these ideas will go nowhere without action. Before any action is taken, an idea is just that, an idea. It’s theory, and even if you have a brilliant idea, no one is going to steal it from you before you make it a success. If it’s an idea that hasn’t been done before, it’s a virtual certainty that no one will steal it from you. ‘But if an idea is that good, why wouldn’t someone steal?’ I hear you asking me. It’s because no one has done it, there’s no actual proof it will work, or rather, no proof it will be a success and bring the founders the success they desire. The only time someone will actually steal your idea is once you’ve made a success of it. Once you’ve put the hours, weeks and months of work in, gone through hell and back to make your business grow and when it starts getting traction and recognised success, that’s when people’s ears will prick up and they’ll take notice. Because you’ve made a success of it, because you’ve proven the business model works, others have the proof and validation they need to start their own ventures doing something similar (even if they completely copy your idea). But even if they do, you’ve already made a success of it, so their competition will drive your business to become better in the face of theirs. It’s very well known, especially in the entrepreneur and start-up sphere, that there’s no point in reinventing the wheel. If someone has made something which works, then it’s quicker, cheaper and easier to just copy them, or if you require what they have, to hire them. If you’re the person that other people are copying then you’re the innovator who’s created something worthwhile. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, after all. There are various real world examples of companies which do exactly the same, or similar things, and all make a pretty decent success out of it, with one obviously always coming first. Middle-man delivery services between restaurants and customers, for example. Just Eat, founded 2001, Hungry House, founded 2006 and Deliveroo, founded 2013, all do exactly the same thing. Social networks pretty much do the same thing as each other, but just with slightly different focuses. MySpace was one of the first, then Bebo, then Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, plus I don’t know how many others. Investors are another example. So many people copy Warren Buffett’s strategies because he’s the most successful investor in the world. It’s easy to see that he knows what he’s doing, so logically it’s quicker and easier to just copy him than to figure out how all the investment markets work and create a strategy for oneself. We can’t say either way whether the services which came subsequently were directly copied from the first in their industries, and in many cases the business model is copied with slight changes in business focus being made, but it’s certain that a previous success validates an idea and business model, giving others enough confidence to copy it and build their own, similar businesses. Bottom line is, if you have a brilliant idea, share it with the world. Shout it from the rooftops. Get feedback on it, both from people who would benefit from your idea and those who wouldn’t. Don’t be scared of anyone stealing it, because until you put in the time and the graft into it to make it a success, everyone else will be too scared to take the leap, and once you make a success of it, you’ll be the innovator people will copy. Be the innovator, tell everyone your idea, put the work in.

['Entrepreneur', 'Business', 'Motivation', 'Startup', 'Entrepreneurship']

Do you know that feeling? Unless you do too, let me tell you about it. You Are you sitting at the problem you can not solve for quite some time, but you just let yourself give up? Absolutely nothing good comes out of it when you are so hard stuck at one point in your task. Not even realizing what time it is, just blatantly sitting there, messing up your spine and damaging the eyesight. Break Why is this so important? Any sort of it really helps you relieve stress, get your mind and that big beautiful brain of yours back in the game. It does not have to be sleep or laying down in your bed, whatever you like to let your brain and body rest. Let that stuffy problem solving cerebral cramps rest, let the motivation build up and blow the problem out of the water. You might consider that a waste of time, but trust me, when you get these quick breaks into your daily routine, it will boost your work efficiency way more you ever thought it would. Give it a try with different types of breaks What do you like? Games? Reading? Movies? Walks? Runns? Washing dishes? (what?!) The important this is that the list goes on and on and it does not matter what you do, but just do it. Even a quick snack is an amazing way to refresh your brain with some nuts or fruit, depending on the time of the day maybe even a full meal. When do I know it is time for a break? If it is difficult for you to get away from work, try setting an alarm for the amount of time you initially think would be optimal. After a couple of times, there is already going to be a mental note reminding you that you should rest. How? Once again, just give it in. It is not that hard and it would make a major difference. My daily habits for better productivity Here are some of the activities that make my day pass quicker and make me more productive Exercising This type of activity is known to everybody, it relieves stress, recovers your mind and improves your health overall. When I am so stuck after hours of long thinking about something or even just have been doing something the whole day, a 45-minute exercise would be perfect for my wellbeing. You are not a fan of running? Take a walk. Walking You could argue that walks belong to the exercise section, but I could tell you otherwise. This type of break fills you with oxygen and rethinking something outside, could potentially get you to the solution. Meditating It sounds like a very useless technique to have but it helps tremendously. Recollecting your thoughts is important as thinking about something, Try meditating for a couple of minutes per day and write down how you felt before and after, that way you will make yourself do it easier, but also find some results of this type of break. Games Nothing extreme, just a casual mobile game, to get you distracted for a couple of minutes and then back at it again! Book Whatever genre and whichever book you like, it doesn’t matter. Just relax during the reading that book of choice. Breathing There are exercises that can help you get that oxygen into your body with the right way of breathing. You might think “oh I breathe just fine, thank you”. Well try it and you might just find out how wrong you are. I found out about these from my mom when she was in therapy, so visit your doctor, because the internet is not always the best health resource you can find. Sleep Have you heard that sleeping is humans superpower? Well, it is. Do not underestimate it. If you have time, you should most definitely relax and get at least 8 hours of sleep. One more important thing to remember is that before sleep if you are trying to learn something repeat it one more time just before bed. Once you wake up, your brain would be like a sponge and you will be blown away by how much you remember. Conclusion Extra breaks throughout the day won’t hurt or make you slower. Once you integrate them into the daily routine, the boost you will feel in terms of the productivity will be growing every day after you start. Good luck and don’t break too much!

['Work', 'Happiness', 'Motivation', 'Science', 'Productivity']

The Secrets of Orchestration in the Cloud Confessions of an Airflow User Mistakes made and lessons learnt in a year of using Airflow The church of Airflow forgives all transgressions (picture from Unsplash) Airflow, Airflow, Airflow… how I love and hate thee. The siren calls of scale and flexibility tempt me, even as I have been scalded by my trust in you. As Airflow projects of the future loom, I am reminded constantly of the past. I hear the bellows of my projects booming in the wind. They call to me. Bound in irons. Doomed for eternity. They clasp and beg at me, asking: “Why did you think a dynamic mega-DAG was a good idea?” I dismiss them as the nags of the past. I cannot give them the attention that they demand. I must focus on the future. Endeavours with Airflow require patience, research, wisdom. I read blog posts warning of anti-patterns and thought I knew better. So I dismissed them. I was a man of technology! I understood the risks of wielding my tools! The lessons of the blogs mattered naught. They fell on deaf ears. And so I began my work. From the beginning it was clear that Airflow was a strange beast. I created DAGS, operators, plugins, and began to consider myself an intermediate user. However I was just digging myself deeper and deeper into my Airflow hole. My only way forward was to learn from my mistakes. Rethink Airflow. Share my findings. In writing this blog post, my mind is returned to the Airflow projects that I have contributed to, sometimes even lead. I stare into a maelstrom of mistakes that I have made — all so obvious in retrospect. I am one of the unfortunate many that has battled and lost with Airflow. I have committed many sins against data engineering. It is through an introspection of these misgivings, that I may share my knowledge with you. I do this with the hopes of preventing future crimes against Airflow. So! Cast off your false assumptions of Airflow, for it is here and now that we shall discover how to avoid falling victim to its many pitfalls. Sins of the past Complexity is where most of my Airflow transgressions began. By increasing the complexity of the Airflow instance, more could go wrong. When things did go wrong, they were harder to fix as I wasn’t fixing just my code, I was fixing my code in Airflow. There comes no greater relief than that which is achieved through moving from a complex Airflow environment, to a lean Airflow environment. Complexity is bad. Debugging complex systems is worse. ETL logic embedded in custom operators Embedding ETL logic in Airflow is something which I’ve seen too many times. Airflow supports custom python operators, allowing you to embed any kind of logic you choose into your Airflow DAGs. So why not empower Airflow with ETL logic, taking it from simple orchestrator of tasks to fully fledged data ingestion pipeline? Well, most of the time, this is asking for trouble. What happens when the logic exceeds the resources that are intended and allocated for it? How do you test your logic? Must you engage Airflow to simply test some Python code? The additional complexity of ELT logic inside of Airflow will lead you down the path of frustration when it comes to ensuring that the logic behaves as expected, is performant is terms of execution time, is testable, and so on. Dynamic DAGs are cool, dynamic DAGs are a huge pain It is almost a natural behaviour of those standing up Airflow and managing DAGs to try to make complex DAGs. Chief among these over-complexities is the dynamic DAG. This is often one DAG to rule all DAGs. One DAG that is influenced and directed by a metadata store outside of Airflow. The dynamic mega-DAG. This may seem like a great idea on its surface, you only have to write one DAG, which will do different things based on what the data dictates in the external metadata store. Only one DAG! That’ll be a dream to maintain! Unfortunately, the battle has already been lost. When something goes wrong with one of the jobs that is run through this pipeline, it is a living nightmare to debug it. A great amount of digging through logs is required in addition to endless navigation of the Airflow UI. The Airflow UI is not designed for this kind of behaviour. Airflow’s UI provides pagination of DAGs. It provides the ability to search for DAGs by name. The UI is guiding you towards more DAGs, not less — definitely not one dynamic DAG to run all jobs. Airflow should be a fleet of small ships delivering packages, not one massive cargo ship. Kubernetes is a great idea! Kubernetes has had an influential effect on the global technology scene, and Airflow has been very much swept up in it. Indeed, Google Cloud’s Airflow-as-a-Service offering is in fact Airflow running on a GKE cluster (together with a smattering of other services). The main problem with running Airflow on Kubernetes is a result of using Airflow in a non-Kubernetes way. Airflow has excellent support for Kubernetes by using their Kubernetes Executor (something that I recommend you look at if you are running Airflow on Kubernetes). However, using Airflow on Kubernetes with a non-Kubernetes Executor is a bit of a waste unfortunately. You gain all of the overhead of a Kubernetes cluster (together with the pain of managing, administering, governing, and securing it) with none of the benefits. Why won’t my plugins refresh?! The process of refreshing plugin code is also a pain. Through a lot of trial and error, I have found that it takes restarting the scheduler and the webserver(s) in a certain order to properly replace the plugin code for a given Airflow instance. The errors given from Airflow often paint a very unclear picture of what is happening as a result of missing or erroneous code. These reasons provide yet more ammunition for the idea of removing as much custom logic from Airflow as possible. If you can’t reliably update the plugin code, the error reporting isn’t great, and it’s annoying to test…why bother? Keep Airflow lean, its complexity low, and its DAGs and operators deterministic. Bugs popping up in weird places because you changed plugin code? Welcome to Airflow! The pathway to healing Having reformed my usage of Airflow in recent days, let me offer some sage advice. The suggestions here will, again, lean heavily into the idea of lowering the complexity of the Airflow instance wherever possible. The more understandable and deterministic your systems are, the better you will sleep. Anti-patterns are real — constantly ask yourself if you are falling into their hands There are plenty of warnings of Airflow’s anti-patterns floating around in blog posts and documentation. Heed these warnings, do not ignore them, do not think of yourself as above such worries. I have been victim to slowly slipping into overly dynamic DAGs in the past, as I did not stop to consider ‘is this an anti-pattern?’ when making changes to my Airflow code. Talk to someone who has used Airflow heavily, and if possible share your instance’s details. They will most of the time have some pearls of wisdom for you — and maybe a few war stories too. Stop, take a breath and ask yourself: “Is this an anti-pattern?”. You’d be surprised how easily you can fall into anti-pattern traps. Study Airflow well, its strengths, and its weaknesses. Only then can you defeat it Airflow can be a particular beast. As I see it there may in fact be more anti-patterns in Airflow than patterns. When you can understand how it was intended to be used, you can use Airflow’s strengths to make a great orchestration system. Abuse Airflow and you will be in a world of hurt. ETL logic goes in scripts, call the scripts from Airflow I’ve recounted above why ETL logic can really bog down Airflow, make it hard to test, unstable — a plain old bad place to be. The solution to this is to place your ETL logic somewhere outside of Airflow. Airflow itself offers solutions to this believe it or not. For Airflow running on a VM, there’s BashOperator and DockerOperator. Both of these allow you to write and execute code in such a way that you can properly test the ETL code in isolation, away from Airflow. This is a huge benefit to you as an Airflow developer. Most of the time I would prefer Docker over Bash as you have more control over the execution environment, rather than running Bash locally. If you are running Airflow on Kubernetes, then you also have an Airflow-native solution to removing custom code from Airflow — the KubernetesPodOperator. The KubernetesPodOperator is an absolute shining gem. When it comes to removing custom logic from Airflow, Dockerising that logic and triggering it from Airflow is a great idea. To apply this to a Kubernetes world, you would spin out this docker-contained step into a pod, so that it is completely separate from the Airflow environment, maybe even running on a different machine! Make friends with your airflow configuration Good lord you can achieve a lot if you know what the Airflow configuration can do. It’s an absolute mammoth of a file, and can be quite daunting to those just learning about Airflow. I urge you to experiment with the configuration — at least in a safe place where you don’t mind blowing away the Airflow instance. I have a startling example of how important the Airflow configuration is to the behaviour of Airflow’s jobs. An Airflow-on-Kubernetes cluster that I was managing was executing a given DAG to completion in 30 minutes. I noticed that each task was taking a tiny amount of time to complete, but there was a large amount of time that the DAG waited for the next task to be scheduled. Given enough fiddling with the configuration, the DAG was performing much better — it went from a 30 minute execution to just under 5. Such a performance gain was achieved purely through tweaks to the Airflow configuration file. Consider that you may be able to speed up your jobs, improve stability, and even increase your resource utilisation just through experimenting with your Airflow configuration for a day or two. It’s always worth a try. Decoding what the Airflow configuration variables do can be frustrating, but it is 100% worth the effort. Keep learning I’d like to leave you, having confessed my sins and made reparations, with some further reading material that has helped me in my time with Airflow: An excellent article broaching the topic of using container-based logic instead of embedded logic: https://medium.com/bluecore-engineering/were-all-using-airflow-wrong-and-how-to-fix-it-a56f14cb0753 A post from Kubernetes itself about using Airflow on Kubernetes: https://kubernetes.io/blog/2018/06/28/airflow-on-kubernetes-part-1-a-different-kind-of-operator/ A guide to scaling out Airflow (though it is an Astronomer-specific guide, it still has some great tips for all Airflow developers): https://www.astronomer.io/guides/airflow-scaling-workers/ An open (at the time of writing) issue with Airflow regarding their poorly named configuration variables — this is why I urge experimentation to properly understand the configuration: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/AIRFLOW-57 Now it’s up to you. Give Airflow hell! About the author Matthew Grey is a senior technology engineering consultant at Servian specialising in Google Cloud. Servian is a technology consulting company specialising in big data, analytics, AI, cybersecurity, cloud infrastructure, and application development. You can reach me on LinkedIn or check out my other posts here on Medium.

['Airflow', 'Automation', 'Data Engineering', 'Kubernetes', 'Big Data']

After Taylor’s intervention, the workers who were moving only twelve tons of iron a day were now moving forty-eight tons of iron a day. They quadrupled their productivity. Only a few decades before Taylorism, most people’s concept of time was more closely linked to the movement of the sun than it was to the stopwatch hand. The availability of daylight, the height of a stalk of corn, or the day of first frost that signaled the coming of winter, ruled the work of farmhands. Many of Taylor’s workers objected to having their movement so closely watched and timed, down to the second. Actually, more accurately than that — Taylor’s stopwatch timed according to the hundredth-of-a-minute. But, “scientific management”, as it was called, swept through the industrial world. Companies couldn’t stay in business without adopting it. The goal of Taylorism was to produce the most work possible in the minimum amount of time. As Taylor watched the movements of the workers, he was trying to reduce waste. He wanted each motion to be as quick and efficient as possible. He wanted each hundredth of a minute to bring the job closer to being done. But, Taylor discovered there was a limit. Logically, there’s no point in a worker sitting idle. Logically, if the worker keeps moving iron, he’ll move more iron than the worker who stops for a smoke break. Intuitively, if you want to get the highest output possible out of the minimum amount of time, take your efficient movements, and fill all of the time with those movements. But, Taylor discovered, it didn’t work that way. The point of diminishing returns There’s a concept in economics called the point of diminishing returns. We can see the point of diminishing returns in action if we imagine Frederick Taylor filling the yard of Bethlehem Steel with workers. Imagine Frederick Taylor has one worker moving iron in the yard of Bethlehem Steel. Thanks to following Taylor’s prescribed movements, that worker is moving forty-eight tons of iron a day. Then, Taylor adds another worker. Now, the workers are moving ninety-six tons of iron a day. Taylor can keep adding workers, and the productivity in the yard will keep going up by forty-eight tons for each worker Taylor adds. Until… Until they start to run out of space. There’s just not as much room in the yard for the workers to pick up the iron, and move it from one place to another. They get in each other’s way, they run into each other, or one worker will have to wait for another worker to finish his job before that first worker can finish his job. At first, it’s not a huge problem. Taylor has merely reached the point of diminishing returns. The point of diminishing returns is the point at which each additional production unit — in this case, the production unit is workers — each worker doesn’t return as much benefit as the previous production units did. The return is diminishing. At some point, Taylor adds a worker, and doesn’t get an additional forty-eight tons of production. He gets only forty. Like I say, it’s not a huge deal. They’re still moving more iron than they were before they added that worker. Their margins are high enough on the labor costs that they’re still making more profit. Now, let’s apply this concept to a single worker. Only now the production unit isn’t the workers themselves. The production unit is time. As Taylor filled the available time with motion, the output of a worker rose. But at some point, Taylor hit the point of diminishing returns. As he filled the available time with efficient, optimized motion, at some point, the additional time filled didn’t bring the returns that the previous units of time did. Maybe he tried instructing the worker to move three chunks of iron in ten minutes, then had no problem adding a fourth chunk of iron within that ten minutes. He could string together these ten-minute units, one after another. He could fill up a day with those units, and get the output he expected. But then, at some point, moving an additional chunk of iron in that same unit of time didn’t bring Taylor the returns he expected. In this case, let’s say that number was five chunks of iron within ten minutes. Maybe the worker could keep it up for an hour, but soon the worker would get tired. Eventually, the worker couldn’t move that fifth chunk of iron within a ten-minute unit. The worker got too fatigued. Taylor had reached the point of diminishing returns. The point of negative returns Let’s go back to the steelyard, where Taylor is adding workers. At some point after the point of diminishing returns, Taylor isn’t getting forty-eight tons of output per additional worker, nor is he getting forty tons of output per additional worker. At one point, workers were waiting for one another or getting in each other’s way once in awhile. But now the yard of Bethlehem Steel is nearly gridlocked. The workers are constantly in each other’s way. They’re getting fatigued holding the chunks of iron. Injuries are skyrocketing. Productivity in the steel yard collapses. Taylor is way beyond the point of diminishing returns. Not only is he not getting the output he expected from adding an additional worker. That would be the point of diminishing returns. Taylor has now hit the point of negative returns. He’s now getting less output overall per additional worker. For each worker Taylor adds, he’ll get less output than he would have if that worker had just stayed home. Creative work is not industrial work Scientific management is simple enough when you’re moving chunks of iron. Simply experiment with the amount of iron moved in a given amount of time. Eventually, you’ll find the right formula. But creative work is different in a number of ways. There are three ways: One: Some ideas are more valuable than others. Two: It doesn’t take time to have an idea. Three: In creativity, actions don’t link to results. Some ideas are more valuable than others First, some ideas are more valuable than others. Imagine you write two 50,000-word novels, in parallel. Let’s say you work equally as hard on the first novel as you do on the second novel. You spend just as much time typing the first novel as the second. The first novel sells zero copies. The second one sells a million copies. They’re both free of misspellings. They’re both quality writing. Why does one sell a million copies, while the other sells zero? If the performance of the traditional publishing industry tells us anything, it’s that nobody has any idea why one novel falls flat and the other takes off. But, you can know this: Not all ideas have equal market value. In fact, the difference in market value, for the same amount of work, can be infinite. So, words typed, while a worthy unit of output to track if you’re trying to convince yourself you’re a writer, is not the only thing to optimize for. The quality of ideas matters. Ideas don’t take time The second thing that makes creative work different from moving chunks of iron is that moving chunks of iron takes time. Yes, all of the things leading up to having an idea take time — we’ll talk about that next. But the act of having the idea takes no time at all. Neuroscientists can look at people’s brains and give them a creative problem. The people can go from being nowhere near solving the problem, to solving the problem, in an instant. Again, sitting yourself down and forcing yourself to come up with ideas is a worthy exercise. It will increase the output of ideas you have, it will build your skill in your craft, and it will increase the chances that one of those ideas is a hit. But you may be just as likely to have that idea while not working at all. Remember Helmholtz’s speech from episode 218, about the Four Stages of creativity? He said his ideas didn’t tend to come to him “at the writing table.” The moment of having an idea takes no time at all. Technically, you could have nearly unlimited ideas in a given “production unit” of time. Actions aren’t linked to immediate results in creative work Now, the third thing that makes creative work different from moving chunks of iron is that, in creative work, actions don’t link to results. By that I mean that if you grip a chunk of iron and pick it up off the ground, you have done work. You have moved that chunk of iron a little closer to its destination. Creative work doesn’t work that way. Say you have an idea for that novel that sells a million copies. Where did it come from? Think about Paul McCartney’s song, “Yesterday.” McCartney famously heard the melody for “Yesterday” in a dream. At first, he was convinced it was a melody he had heard before. He thought it was an old Jazz tune his father had played when he was a kid. “Yesterday” has stood the test of time as an original song. But musicologists have found numerous similarities to other songs. One such song is called “Answer Me, My Love.” “Yesterday”’s lyrics are as such: Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away, Now it looks as though they’re here to stay, “Answer Me, My Love”’s lyrics are as such: She was mine yesterday, I believed that love was here to stay. McCartney didn’t steal from “Answer Me, My Love.” But it’s almost certain that he heard the song before. In 1953, when McCartney was eleven years old, a version of “Answer Me, My Love,” by David Whitfield was the number one song on the UK charts. Then, it got knocked from the number-one spot — by another version of “Answer Me, My Love,” this time, by Frankie Lane. It was the first time in UK pop chart history that a song was replaced by another version of itself. Was McCartney inspired by this song? It’s impossible to know for sure, but it’s certainly plausible. So this idea you have for a novel that sells a million copies. Maybe you’re in the right state of mind to have this idea because you took a vacation last month. Maybe you’re more relaxed because you got a massage two days ago. Maybe you’re thinking more clearly because you went on a hike earlier that day. Yet it was the funny red hat worn by the woman who walked by the cafe that sparked the idea. Meanwhile, it could have been inspired by some book, buried deep in your unconscious, that your mom read to you when you were three. We’re done with time management Taylorism was the birth of “time management.” It was when we started to look at time as a “production unit.” When we look at time as a production unit, we assume that each additional unit of time we spend doing something will get us the same gain in output as the previous unit of time. But it doesn’t work that way. Even in work as simple as moving chunks of iron, Taylor learned that human energy doesn’t neatly pack together to fill all available time. We have our limits. Today, we’re still treating time as a production unit. Our calendars are filled up with boxes, sometimes overlapping. Jason Fried calls it “calendar Tetris.” We live according to that calendar. “There’s only twenty-four hours in a day,” you’ll hear people say. The conclusion we’re supposed to draw from that is that time is precious, so you better fill it all up. Filling up that time was a big leap forward, but now we need to draw a different conclusion. If there’s only twenty-four hours in a day, that tells you there’s a limit. That tells you that eventually, “time management” is squeezing blood from a stone. When it comes to creative work, that stone is a very fragile stone, indeed.

['Creativity', 'Time Management', 'Productivity', 'Writing']

Aspirin May Treat Severe Covid-19 Disease, and That Tells Us Something Important Aspirin may turn out to be a cheap and effective way to save lives and prevent lasting damage Back in April, when the first wave of Covid-19 was crashing across the U.S., Michael Mazzeffi received an email from one of his colleagues at the University of Maryland Medical Center. “One of our surgeons said that when he was drawing blood out of a patient, it literally clotted within five seconds,” says Mazzeffi, who is chief of the division of critical care anesthesiology. “It was pretty clear early on that patients with severe Covid had clotting disorders and that their blood was super coagulable.” Clinicians around the world noticed this same clotting phenomenon. By mid-summer, autopsies of people who had died from Covid-19 revealed that their vasculature and organs were often suffused with clots and coagulated blood. “What we saw in the Covid ICU is that a lot of the patients would start developing a lot of clotting, and this high burden would lead to multi-organ failure and eventually death,” says Jonathan Chow, MD, an assistant professor of anesthesiology at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. Because clotting seemed to be a signature of severe or damaging Covid-19 disease, Chow and Mazzeffi started to discuss whether aspirin — a blood-thinning drug that can block the formation of clots — could help improve outcomes. “Aspirin is a very potent antiplatelet agent,” Chow explains. Platelets are blood-cell fragments that, when activated, will clump together to form clots. “As soon as aspirin interacts with a platelet, that platelet becomes inactivated and can no longer participate in the clot-generating process,” he says. For a study published on October 21 in the journal Anesthesia and Analgesia, Chow and Mazzeffi — along with a multi-university team of researchers — examined the effects of aspirin among people hospitalized with Covid-19. After adjusting their data to account for age, BMI, race, preexisting conditions, and other variables that could muddy their conclusions, they determined that the risk of death or ICU admission was almost halved among people who got aspirin compared to those who did not. “This is now the second study linking blood thinners of some kind with improved outcomes,” Mazzeffi says. “I think it’s driving home the point that an important part of the disease’s process is clotting in the organs and that intervening in those pathways is something we should focus on.” What this research tells us about the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 is a respiratory virus, and the illness it causes is often described as primarily respiratory in nature. But that’s turning out to be an oversimplification — especially for those who develop severe Covid-19 disease or symptoms that persist long after the initial infection has passed. “It’s a whole-body virus,” says Girish Nadkarni, a doctor of internal medicine at the Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. “It affects the kidneys, the brain, the blood vessels, and the heart. So it’s not just a respiratory virus.” These anti-clotting and anti-inflammation benefits explain why plain old aspirin is such a widely deployed drug — and also why it may eventually prove helpful in treating Covid-19. In July, Nadkarni and colleagues published a study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology that looked at the effect of anticoagulant drugs on outcomes among hospitalized Covid-19 patients. Like the aspirin study that would follow a few months later, Nadkarni’s study found that anticoagulants significantly reduced the risk of death among certain groups of people with Covid-19. “We found that both prophylactic and therapeutic doses of anticoagulation led to a lower risk of intubation and mortality,” he summarizes. Both his research and the aspirin study support the idea that — contrary to early assumptions — Covid-19 may be best characterized as a blood-vessel disease. Follow-up work and confirmation studies are needed. But Nadkarni says that the idea that a blood-thinning drug like aspirin could protect people from Covid-19 is credible. “Aspirin and anticoagulant drugs both prevent clots, albeit in slightly different ways,” he explains. While aspirin shuts off the clot-forming activity of platelets, anticoagulant drugs act on clotting factors, which are proteins in the blood that help control the rate of bleeding. Many common and lethal illnesses — including diabetes, heart disease, and several others that are associated with a heightened risk for severe Covid-19 disease — also promote blood coagulation and clotting, Nadkarni says. And along with helping to prevent clots, aspirin also combats inflammation, which is implicated in a wide range of medical conditions. Together, these anti-clotting and anti-inflammation benefits explain why plain old aspirin is such a widely deployed drug — and also why it may eventually prove helpful in treating Covid-19. “The fact that [SARS-CoV-2] creates this hypercoagulable state is really fascinating because few other respiratory viruses do that to the same degree,” says Mazzeffi. He explains that there are specialized blood cells, called endothelial cells, that line the arteries, veins, and other blood-transporting vessels. “These endothelial cells maintain vascular integrity and help keep blood flow normal,” he says. “SARS-CoV-2 affects those cells and causes inflammation that may cause those cells to express things that cause clotting.” The coronavirus and the disease states it causes are complex, he adds. But aspirin may turn out to be a cheap and effective way to save lives and prevent lasting damage. “If someone becomes ill [with SARS-CoV-2] and their doctor says it’s safe for them to take aspirin, I think it’s reasonable for them to take it.” Should at-risk people consider taking aspirin? Doctors are usually hesitant to recommend a treatment that does not have a large body of evidence to support it. But Mazzeffi says that aspirin is such a familiar drug and its risks and safety profile are so well established that people who are exposed to the coronavirus may want to consider taking it in low doses. “The good thing about aspirin is that it’s one of the best-studied drugs in the history of the Earth,” he says. “We know it’s not safe for everyone, but it’s taken by literally hundreds of millions of patients, and it has a great safety record.” The greatest risk associated with aspirin is gastrointestinal bleeding. “If you have a history of peptic ulcers or bleeding from the stomach, then it may not be safe,” he says. Also, his study didn’t look at the effects of aspirin among children with SARS-CoV-2 — a group that already seems to be at low risk for severe Covid-19-related complications. “People shouldn’t be popping aspirin in kids,” he says. But for most adults, taking a single low-dose (81 mg) aspirin pill each day for a period of a few weeks may be a low-risk, high-reward proposition. “If someone becomes ill [with SARS-CoV-2] and their doctor says it’s safe for them to take aspirin, I think it’s reasonable for them to take it,” Mazzeffi says.

['Health', 'Covid 19', 'The Nuance', 'Coronavirus', 'Science']

Creativity and art are so important - I cannot stress it enough - to keep the world sane enough to survive, to keep our minds balanced. If more people allowed themselves to explore their creative, chaotic sides artistically, there would be less madness, less chaos out there. There would be more contentment. Art of any kind is a balm to the jaded soul. That said, I had a bad state of depression this time last year, owing to life changes and adjustment issues. I was unable to write. My second novel got stranded and I simply could not out word after word. I avoided opening the manuscript file on my computer. I realized I had to work with my depression and as a creative person, as a writer, it was enough for me to be able to get back to my art. Writing often helps me get through low times but then, during depressive states, writing altogether took a backseat in my life. All the while, it just made me feel worse because I was not able to do the one thing that would lift me up — write. That’s when I kept coming across profiles of artists on Instagram. Artists working with acrylics and oil paints on canvas. I had been a fairly artsy kid and used to sketch a bit but never played with paint. I shied away from pursuing art and focused on writing. Then, I had this crazy idea — why not, just why not try painting? And I ordered acrylic paints, canvas panels and sheets, palette, palette knives, brushes, oil pastels and pastel papers. I painted in abandon and was surprised to find that it is something I trust myself to do. I painted my way out of depression. Four pictures in, I resumed writing my novel and completed the rest of it within two months. So, here’s what art therapy at home taught me. An alternative form of art — here, I ventured with painting and it could be anything for you — dissolved my writer’s block or whatever creative block I was experiencing. An alternate path for creative energy to flow The first realization I had was, it was essential to keep the flow. Creativity needs to be let out — be it words, colors, images or anything. When there is a block in the pipelines, you need to give it a shunt or a bypass. You need to open another valve and tap to let the waters out. An excess of creative energy had accumulated in me, finding no outlet, while I was depressed. When I painted, I found the creative energy which was accumulated, clogged and fermenting in my brain was slowly being drained out. The alternate path for this creative energy to flow relieved the internal pressure and helped to lessen the guilty feeling of not helping myself. Healing came, slowly but steadily. Unleashing the internal chaos If not through writing, I had to tell the world about the chaos in my head somehow. Through brush strokes, I was able to put the wrought-iron thoughts and feelings of worthlessness into colors. That meant something. Chaos is inherent to every creative soul and it has to be converted into something beautiful — poetry, stories, paintings, statues, crafts or songs. It felt good to find that if not one, I had another way to unleash the confusion in my head, another way to convert the internal chaos into something enjoyable. Another way to tell my story. Liberate yourself The very essence of art is the liberation enfolded into it. Art is a form of expression — there is no argument over that. Expression in any form is a discharge of thoughts, perceptions, and emotions. This is simply tipping a brimmed cup and letting out some of the fluid sloshings in it, freeing up space. Painting allowed me to tip over a cup of colors over the blank canvas, create something enjoyable and feel liberated to the extent of being ready to face the world again. Photo by Amaury Salas on Unsplash Refreshing the brain and calming the soul While writing is a very active process, brainstorming and sequential thoughts being a part of it, knotting one thread with another, painting proved to be the opposite to me. While writing made my brain fatigue, painting calmed my soul. Writing is indeed something essential to me as long as I live, but I found that painting had a tranquilizing effect on a highly wired-up brain after writing. The unwinding effect of playing with colors and letting the brush swipe over the canvas and forming shapes and things was paramount. After a long episode of writing fervently, I would have pushed my limits. Painting allowed to soften the edges and let the soul take over. Painting was simply a conversation the soul had alone and unlike writing a story with many characters and lives, painting had only one destination — create something colorful on the canvas. There was no scope for a loophole when you are just painting to refresh and calm yourself. Productivity even during a creative block The hardest thing to do when you are in a creative or writer’s block is to be productive. Staying productive somehow is an ideal state to be in but often it is not possible. When I took up painting to heal, I discovered that productivity comes whenever you do something. It doesn’t always have to be what you are meant to do, as long as you produce something. I allowed myself to forget about writing and indulge in painting, learning basics, and new techniques, learning about art supplies, watching painting videos on YouTube and my confidence in this new arena grew. I told myself, even if you cannot write, you can still be creative, you can still paint. And that opened up a whole new world for me. The moment I feel blocked, I stop pushing myself and take out the paints, including watercolors that I recently ventured with, and do something with it. Sometimes, it is the same kind of picture, sometimes entirely different. Sometimes, a gift for a loved one. The idea is to produce something and when it is achieved, I am no longer unproductive and non-creative. There is less guilt to handle. You would have done something creative and sometimes, that is enough to keep your spirits up, which is the first step to overcoming writer’s block. Taking shifts Painting uses an altogether different center of our brain and a whole bunch of different neurons. Each form of art is different and requires a different set of neurons to work with. When we switch from one form of creativity to another, we are allowing the writing-brain to take a break and rest. Often procrastination is said to be the brain’s way of taking a break and refreshing itself. We might as well use that time to engage other parts of our brain and do something we enjoy. Many writers love sketching, traveling, cooking or baking or many other hobbies. These allow the various parts of our brain to take shifts and let our main working part — the writing brain — to take the well-deserved rest. New potential ideas When you embark on another creative art, you experience a whole different lifestyle. Even if it is for a short time, it counts as an experience and it is very likely to give you new potential ideas for your writing. For example, venturing with painting gave me the ideas and the experiences to write this article. But that’s just one possibility. There are several. Art, after all, is opening a door to possibilities.

['Painting', 'Writing', 'Productivity', 'Art', 'Creativity']

3 ways of using storytelling in design How I rediscovered my favorite childhood activities. Me as a 5-year-old making stories As a child, I loved creating stories. From the time I could hold a pencil, I would write little books and illustrate them. I continued doing this until my teenage years. But when it came time to start looking at universities and choose a major, I decided to go for something related to art that would allow me to earn a steady income: I chose to work as a graphic designer. Unfortunately, I ended up in a role doing routine work and production design. While some people enjoy this type of work, I did not; I felt bored and stifled. In an effort to move out of print production design, I went back to get a master’s degree and ended up in the field of user experience design, stumbling into it mostly by accident. I loved that UX allowed me to talk with people, understand their needs, and help figure out what to create for them. I loved the impact that I could have on millions of people’s lives and work experiences by designing better software products. What I didn’t expect was that so much of my work would involve a return back to what I loved as a child: using images and words to tell stories. Pages from a story I wrote and illustrated when I was young When I think about how I’ve used storytelling in my role as a designer, it generally falls into three distinct categories: Using storytelling to Understand and advocate for users Create lovable, user-friendly products Present a design vision In this post I’ll share examples with you of each of these. I hope it helps inspire you to tell more stories at work and possibly even reuse some of your favorite childhood skills. Using stories to understand and advocate for our users One of the ways that we understand our users is through talking with them — doing interviews or contextual inquiry. And one of the best ways I’ve found to discover people’s needs is to ask them to tell you a story. It’s useful because it allows the participant to share what actually has happened in the past, rather than imagine what might happen in the future. It also allows you to follow up with questions about their emotions, goals, and beliefs behind their actions. Certain experiences will stand out more vividly in people’s minds which makes them a good area of focus for stories. I will never forget this helpful (and rhyming) phrase that Jeff Patton shared in a workshop which he led a few years ago: “People remember the last time, the first time, the best time, and the worst time.” For example, you can ask about the first time someone logged into your product, the last time they had to contact customer support, the best or worst experience they’ve had with online shopping, etc. After people have told us their stories, we then can use storytelling to engage our teams back in the office and advocate for our users. Stories with a conflict, an emotional arc, and a resolution will get your audience’s attention and help them remember the main idea later.

['Storytelling', 'UX Research', 'Design', 'UX', 'Marketing']

Execute All the dreaming and planning in the world won’t mean anything if you never put the rubber to the pavement. Within EXECUTE, successful entrepreneurs: Do Successful entrepreneurs don’t overplan to the point of paralysis. Sometimes a little uncertainty can leave some good room for creativity. But despite all of the doing, you have to remember that your most important customer is your current paying customer! Take good care of the customers who already support you. Keep a Calendar You have better chances for productivity and efficiency if you organize your day before the day begins. Of course, there will be interruptions, but it’s better to have a course designed as opposed to “freestyling” it all day. Keep a Checklist This is the next progression from keeping a calendar. Turn your tasks on your calendar into smaller attainable action items and mark them off upon completion. This is one of those things that separate successful entrepreneurs from the pack. Your checklist can be on paper or in digital form. The point is to have a way to track your productivity. Delegate You can’t do it all. Find some people around you to execute the tasks that you can’t do or get to in a timely fashion. Also, you’re not great at all things. Try to only delegate tasks to people who can do the task better (or at about the same level) and faster than you can. Measure Successful entrepreneurs always know where they stand with their key performance metrics/indicators. KPIs include things like phone calls made or emails sent, meetings secured, deals closed, product returns (the lower the better), or homes shown (for my real estate agent friends). Pivot Failing fast and moving on isn’t always a good idea. Sometimes it takes a few tries in order to successfully execute on a business idea. With that said, successful entrepreneurs know how to make the proper tweaks to their marketing plan, business model, and/or product or service offering in order to get their business on the right track. Persevere Successful entrepreneurs are in it to win it and they won’t let a few bumps in the road deter them from their goal(s). Some failure is temporary and success sometimes comes down to how well and how often you get up after getting knocked down.

['Marketing', 'Learning', 'Business', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Productivity']

Writing in the Stolen Moments 4 strategies to help you keep writing even in busiest times Credit: Adobe Stock Often, you will hear writers complain that they don’t have any time to write when, in fact, they mean they don’t have the perfect confluence of time and solitude to sit and bang out a few hundred words in one sitting. Many times, you’ll see someone post on social media that they just can’t find the time to write anymore, followed by a post in which they talk about all the shows they’ve binge-watched on Netflix. Seriously? If you have time to binge-watch programs on Netflix or Amazon Prime, you have time to write. And if you don’t write despite having time to binge-watch shows, no amount of justification of your inaction to others will ever help. If all of this sounds familiar, start by jettisoning one phrase from your lexicon, it is this: “I just can’t find time…” No one “finds” time. Time is not like some loose change we discover fallen behind the pillow on your sofa. We “make” time, or we “steal” time. Or we use the time in a way that may not be optimal, but is time nonetheless. I myself often feel the temptation to justify my own dry periods by saying things like “Well, I had too much to do this week. I just didn’t have time to go sit in a coffee shop for a whole morning.” I have to repeatedly remind myself that I do not need to wait until I have both time and an idea to sit down and write something. Anything. The most important thing to remember is to always have your journal with you, or at least a small notepad or a few sheets of notepaper. It helps to be prepared for any periods in which you are forced to sit and wait for any length of time: in your car waiting to pick up your child from sport/music/dance lessons, in line at the post office the week before Christmas, or even in the waiting room at your doctor’s office. Steal those moments for your writing. The following three strategies are ones that I always have to fall back on. They serve as reminders that even 5, 10, or 20 minutes is enough time to put pen to paper and hone a few writing skills. 1. Practice descriptions Look around you. What do you notice? Practice noticing the smallest details about people or places around you. Do a character study or portrait. Invent a backstory to the person sitting across from you. What is their life like? How did they start their day? Oh, they have a scar … where did they get that? Here’s a great example of a description from the novel Q&A by Vikas Swarup: “Delhi’s Juvenile Home diminished us, but Dharavi’s grim landscape of urban squalor deadens and debases us. Its open drains teem with mosquitoes. Its stinking, excrement-lined communal latrines are full of rats, which make you think less about the smell and more about protecting your backside. Mounds of filthy garbage lie on every corner, from which rag-pickers till manage to find something useful. And at times you have to suck in your breath to squeeze through its narrow, claustrophobic alleys. But for the starving residents of Dharavi, this is home.” 2. Practice similes Sometimes I like to give my imagination a workout with simple sensory exercises. What sound do you hear? What is making that sound? If you already know the source of a sound, think of all the other things (real and imagined) that could also make that sound. What about smells? What about things you can touch with your eyes closed? Here’s an example from John Irving’s children’s book, A Sound Like Someone Trying Not to Make a Sound: “It sounded like a monster with no arms and no legs, but it was trying to move … It was a sound like, in the closet, if one of Mommy’s dresses came alive and it tried to climb down off the hanger … It was a sound like someone pulling the nails out of the floorboards under the bed … It was a sound like a ghost in the attic, dropping the peanuts it had stolen from the kitchen … It was a sound like someone trying not to make a sound.” 3. Practice rhyming Look around you or, perhaps, pick up a magazine, open a random book. What’s the first word you see? Write it down. Then write down all the words you can think of that rhyme with the original word. Start with one syllable then work up to two, three, four, or more. This easy exercise will help you to bring forward in your mind words that you do not typically use, so that they will be at-the-ready the next time you are in full-on writing mode. 4. Revise your drafts Revision is also writing. If you have an article, blog post, essay, short story, or poem that you’ve been working on, print it out and carry it around with you. Use your stolen moments as a chance to deep dive into the revision or editing process. Here are a couple of ideas that closely relate to the old saying, “Show, don’t tell.” This means showing your reader images that help them understand how “sad” a situation is, instead of simply telling them, “It was such a sad situation.” Examine your verb choices. When you find yourself using a lot of adverbs to bolster your verbs, this means the verb you chose may be weak. Use your stolen moments to figure out a visual way of showing the way that the verb is being performed. For example: He walked very slowly — You can strengthen this by saying something like “His feet moved as if they had weights tied to them.” The car drove quickly down the street — You can strengthen this by saying something like “The car sped down the street.” Prices rose sharply — You can strengthen this by saying something like “Prices skyrocketed.” Watch out for abstract nouns and adjectives Nouns such as “beauty” and “justice” are abstract, as are the adjectives associated with them — “beautiful” and “just.” Readers can’t see beauty or hear justice. What they can see or hear are concrete examples of these things. In your writing, try to avoid abstract nouns in favor of giving your readers examples that will illustrate something that is “just” or something that is “beautiful.” Another good rule is to avoid reliance on adjectives that require judgement, such as “dark,” “deep,” and “strong.” How dark is dark? Is it as dark as the bottom of a well? Or is it as dark as tar melting under an August sun? How deep is deep? Is it as deep as a thimble? Or is it as deep as the gaping mouth of the Grand Canyon? How strong is strong? Is it as strong as the coffee that’s been left for five hours on the burner? Or is it as strong as the memory of your first kiss? Not everyone can put their jobs on hold for two weeks to head to a writer's residency. But, that doesn’t mean you can’t take the time to write. Even a brief exercise like one of those listed above has the innate potential to bring forward a line or two that just might be the beginning (or end) to a new story, essay, or poem.

['Fiction', 'Writing', 'Writing Tips', 'Storytelling', 'Productivity']

Tech Diaries: Apple’s Reinvention, Starlink launch & Microsoft’s Pivot towards Blockchain Apple enters Digital Payments, Global Streaming Internet by SpaceX & Microsoft’s Blockchain Projects Welcome to the first edition of Tech Diaries — my new blogging series about important issues pertaining to the tech world. For those you who have across my other blogs, I have a similar edition called Crypto Diaries which pertains mainly to Cryptocurrencies & Blockchain. So without further delay, let’s dig into the Tech World. Apple Card I still remember how excited I was when I got the first edition of the iPhone years ago. Apple brought in a revolution with its smartphone devices. Over the years, Apple has become one of the biggest & most valuable brand names in the World. It is one of the elite members of the tech group dubbed as GAFA (Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple). Last year, Apple was the first of the big four to hit the $1 trillion mark valuation followed by Amazon & most recently Microsoft. Market correction recently has brought down the valuation of these companies from the highs, but all four of them are still within touching distance of that coveted prize. Coming back to Apple, the strong growth over the years has been spearheaded by its flagship product — the iPhone. While Korea’s Samsung & Chinese Huawei have squeezed Apple’s smartphone market share, but a loyal customer base has been Apple’s biggest prize. For years iPhone printed money for Apple but with increased competition & squeezing gross margins, Apple’s growth began to stall around 2016. This was about the time when they realized that stagnating innovation & higher-priced phones were not going to spur the growth. They needed to diversify into something which can outlast the shine on the brand new iPhone. Services like Apple Music, App Store purchases, iCloud subscriptions, as well as new products such as the Apple Watch, AirPods and the HomePod have given a new lease of life to the dwindling revenue of the company. The most important announcement yet in this tilt towards subscription services came in March when Apple announced the launch of the Apple card. The latest innovation from Apple is a digital payment system with the conveniences customers desire — No late fees, No wait to qualify, Cash backs of up to 3% & No long strings of numbers! While its tech counterpart Facebook mulls over developing its own digital payment system for its social media empire, Apple has already taken the first step towards the future of money. And the one thing that Apple has an abundance of that Facebook doesn’t is the trust factor of its client base. Apple is basically enhancing the user experience by providing interactive tools & charts in the Daily Cash App to track your balances, cash-backs, payments, expenses, etc. This will strengthen its ever-growing ecosystem of Apps, services & hardware even further. Apple has also promised not to eavesdrop on your spending habits — a believable claim considering there haven’t been any data breach scandals, unlike its contemporaries FB & Google which are much more reliant on third-party advertisements for their revenue generation, not to forget their data breaches! Endeavors like this are shaping how the future of money looks like & this summer we will find out how Apple Card is received by consumers. There is a small catch though — are you willing to buy a $1000 smartphone to access all this? Global Internet I respect Elon Musk as a true visionary of our times, despite his tweeting rants and his occasional pot smoking podcasts. Companies like Tesla, Solar City, SpaceX, Hyperloop, OpenAI, Neuralink are the brainchild of this genius. His financial troubles, especially at Tesla, maybe a topic for another day. But for now, SpaceX is launching the first batch of 60 satellites today for the company’s Starlink project — an endeavor to provide broadband internet service to the global population by beaming it from the satellites positioned in the low-Earth orbit (LEO). These satellites can basically beam the internet to anywhere on the globe. To achieve this kind of global connectivity, a constellation of about 12,000 satellites would be needed eventually. The network of satellites would be communicating with each other via lasers and will deliver 40 times faster internet that current satellite service by employing Ku/Ka-band broadband. The Falcon 9 will be launching the first batch of satellites later today. Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin is planning a similar project called ‘Project Kuiper’ where 3,236 satellites would be used to provide a global broadband internet service, which would be launched via its new New Glenn rocket in 2021. Either way, these are significant steps towards bridging the global digital divide. Bravo! The critics, however, argue that kind of massive satellite deployment is going to aggravate the burgeoning space junk problem that we are dealing within the Earth’s orbit. Scientific American states a worst-case scenario can trigger “ Kessler syndrome “ — triggering a cascade of space debris which would trap humans on Earth. SpaceX defended the action by saying that the satellites will be orbiting in a much lower orbit keeping them out of range of the current space debris in higher orbit & also easier to retire once they have outlived their usefulness — which will happen after 5 years, according to NASA. Let’s look at the bright side… Shall we? Microsoft affinity to Blockchain Microsoft has evolved tremendously from being largely a software producer of its Windows operation system which controlled the majority of the computer systems around the World in the ’90s. The gradual shift towards services under the dynamic leadership of its current CEO Satya Nadella has given it a new innovative spirit backed by strong growth. As you can see the company’s rock-solid performance evident from the charts above. The important thing to note is that of the $110.36 billion in revenue in 2018, $27.6 billion or almost a quarter of it came from its Microsoft Azure Cloud service. Talking about its Azure Cloud service — the platform has started to take a liking towards blockchain over the past year with the releases of its blockchain development kit and the Azure Blockchain Workbench. Two weeks ago, the company released Azure Blockchain Services — a full managed BaaS (Blockchain as a Service) platform that allows the formation, management & governance of the consortium blockchain networks. The release also supports other advanced tools for its developers including AI, mixed reality, IoT. This came on the heels of Amazon launching its own BaaS platform — Amazon Managed Blockchain (AMB). More recently, the Seattle-based tech giant also announced that it is building a decentralized identity (DID) network on top of the Bitcoin blockchain. The open standards infrastructure, known as the Identity Overlay Network (ION) will give control of data to the users backed by decentralized networks while enabling privacy & security at the same time. The main net for the platform will be launched in the coming months. These moves by tech giants signal a move towards broader blockchain adoption & bode well for the future of this technology. Before wrapping up, just a quick recap with what’s happening with Huawei — the Chinese tech giant. With the trade war escalation, U.S has just announced broad-based curbs on the company. The move would effectively stop American companies from using Huawei’s equipment or providing it with any essential supplies. The company which is already facing severe challenges with the roll-out of its 5G networks globally in the face of American opposition could be headed for more trouble. Email 📭| Twitter 📜 | LinkedIn 📑| StockTwits 📉 | Telegram 🔗

['Blockchain', 'Future', 'Technology', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Science']

Letting Go of Diagnoses Improved My Mental Health And it just might work for you, too. 2017 was a really bad year for me. I ringed in the New Year in a psychiatric facility, and though my time there was brief, it led to a circus that included a new psychiatrist and a whole bunch of new medication. Along with that circus came a bunch of diagnoses I hadn’t ever heard of before, which included: Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) Bipolar Disorder Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) For years, I was treated with Lithium, Seroquel, Zyprexa, Xanax, Ativan, Klonopin, Lamictal, Abilify, Doxapine, Trazodone, Latuda, and others. At any given time, I was on four to six different antipsychotic, antidepressant, mood-stabilizing, and anxiety-reducing medications at once. For a few brief years, I was a shell of myself hiding behind the cocktail I was prescribed. Sadly, I let this go on for so long because I was allowing my diagnoses to define me. Behind every thought, word, and action that comprised my being, there were my mental illnesses. In any given day, I had a panic attack (PTSD), I dissociated frequently (BPD, PTSD), had some kind of a tantrum due to my unstable sense of self (BPD), and had an intense mood swing that brought me back up on my feet and feeling like I was on top of the world (Bipolar Disorder). After three and a half painstaking years, I found myself with a new psychiatrist whose prescriptions were minimally invasive and whose thoughts on my prior diagnoses were a bit different than that of what I was used to. She firmly believed that my BPD would improve over time and assured me that my condition should be first treated by therapy as the main course of action — she assured me that medication should be a boost and not the go-to solution for my conditions. I found a great therapist due to her, and with my new lifestyle as a person who was no longer over-medicated, I began to slowly but surely thrive. Even my new therapist barely mentioned the names of my disorders to me when we were combing through the tangled messes that my maladies often left me with. She didn’t think of me as a diseased or disabled person — she just thought of me as a person. Being treated so differently than I had been from the team of doctors linked to the hospital was utterly refreshing and revitalizing. Now, after years of feeling like a zombie, I was clear again. I still relied on medication to help prevent me from tipping into psychosis and other problematic states, and especially relied on it to help me through my night terrors and other sleep problems, but now I wasn’t over-medicated. Slowly but surely, I began to see myself as more than my diagnoses and to feel a greater sense of command over my body now that I wasn’t numb from the consequences of being treated like a sickly person. The search for mental wellness is not always easy. I know this firsthand. Now that I have a better team of mental health professionals around me, I feel a sense of support that goes beyond medication. I feel that I suffered for so many years for a good reason and that the suffering I felt at the beginning of my wellness journey was very important in being able to lead a happy life now. Is my life perfect now that I’ve stopped over analyzing my diagnoses? No. In fact, some of those very words — like BPD — saved my life. Without my Borderline diagnosis, I would have never discovered Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), perhaps the greatest tool I have for everything from emotional regulation to distress tolerance. Diagnoses are important and do not need to be overanalyzed to the point of becoming a limitation. They tell professionals how to get us the best help possible based on decades of research. If you or someone you know is struggling with a diagnosis, you are not alone. There is a way of acknowledging an illness without allowing it to consume us. I believe that over time, finding wellness becomes easier and we must learn graciously from the trial and error that comes with medication, therapy, and other tools to live our best lives.

['Mental Health', 'Wellness', 'Mental Illness', 'Medication', 'Psychology']

Steady as a Rock That time is now at Hand Photo by Nuno Silva on Unsplash We are fools who believe You are there, if You are not there; Otherwise, if You are there, we must wait confidently and patiently. . . to see what it is that You will do. Who is right and who is wrong only time will tell. You must be happy to look down and watch as we sniff to investigate the terrain, trying to discern the territory as our senses, emotions, instincts and intelligence try to sway our thinking, battling amongst themselves and then against each other, in our hopeless pursuit to discover who will come out on top. Those who believe or those who do not. Much is invested in this age-old question, and each side is certain it is right. Photo by Japheth Mast on Unsplash How long will we wait … the further time goes forth, the more unbelievers become victorious, and those of us who believe wait and wonder, unperturbed. For You have called it long ago, that we must remain steadfast, for nobody is to know … That the time is now at hand. Our leaders have sold us out to a world of Your non-existence.

['Mental Health', 'Productivity', 'Facebook', 'Family', 'Social Media']

What Story Can You Tell That Only You Could? You Have No Idea Who is Waiting On Your Story This question has bothered me for weeks. The easy deflection I could come up with is that I should just keep writing and the story will tell itself. However, as I study better writers — especially here on Medium- I realize that this blind dive can only help for so far. Then, you hit a wall. Your writing becomes a rehash of everything you’ve said and when you try to “copy” others in the hope of improving, your voice airs like Frankenstein’s dirty, electric, underwear. That’s why the question is becoming key in my process. I am taking a writing course that’s forcing me to pause and really understand what “good writing” is. I’m reading popular articles and taking note of what certain pieces make me feel — especially trying to crack the elusive “headline code”. In all this, I know I won’t improve in a few months. I know I will need to write and test and keep showing up. Taking the time to reflect on this question does not remove the work required. Photo by bruce mars on Unsplash What changed? Writing happened organically for me. I wasn’t really outspoken as a child. I wasn’t popular for anything ( except wearing glasses and having multiple surgeries which made sure while all my school mates did mandatory manual labor in boarding school, I had to watch from the sidelines because I was labeled “a patient”). The thoughts I carried never had a way out. I can’t remember anyone even urging me to start a blog. It was the most natural thing. As I shared my heartbreak stories, poetry, and cringe-worthy fiction, I grew an audience of people who knew me personally and actually enjoyed what I wrote. I would meet people who gave me compliments and said it was really good. It was nice to hear but didn’t mean much. Fast forward a few years of this, a couple of jobs I hated, moving to the US, getting married and “growing up”, now this innocent love for writing has become something else — something I want to do with the rest of my life. There’s a certain balance to making such decisions, I have come to realize: if you push too much, you become stubborn to necessary changes. For example, if I think I have innate talent and can’t learn much from a writing course or a book, then I am doomed to fail this life goal. On the other hand, if I don’t take this seriously enough; if I don’t invest the time and effort required — I won’t improve on the existing skill, nor would I learn the ancillary skills needed to thrive as a writer in this age. It’s the balance that begs the question. A story ( or stories) only I could write, guarantee the unique nature of my value proposition to the world. But this story, if poorly told, doesn’t move the dilemma. Photo by Dariusz Sankowski on Unsplash The first step is to identify the story. What will I write about? Why does it matter? Who is it for? The next step, obviously, is to tell the story. What’s the best way to say it? How can I tell it in such a way that no one else could such that it will be truly mine? We all know a friend who knows how to tell the best stories. When something happens and he/she is present, we don’t mind telling them to narrate what happened because we know they’re good at it. Everyone is good at something. We all have something inside that we naturally gravitate towards and that calls us to make — a calling. The difficulty I have — which I think most people do — is finding that balance between working blindly on your calling and getting help. Between telling the same stories and changing things up. Between rehashing personal life anecdotes and digging deeper. I once read somewhere that in order to be a writer, you have to live a full life. That your stories will come from living. There’s a lot of truth in this. Yet, as we’re all holed up at home and working remotely, I wonder how much of life we’re living. I wonder if this confinement isn’t the trigger we needed to realize that life doesn’t have to mean physical travel or seeing places. That maybe, just maybe, we have more stories in us than we’ve dared to explore. As I consider this, I realize that yes, I may have written about the heartbreak, but I never delved deeper into how that changed me or affected the way I now behave in my relationship. I may have written about my fresh experience in the US, but not about how I no longer associate myself with the label “immigrant”. I may have mentioned my highschool years weren’t fun, but I’ve never explored how the culture set me- and others — up to be unprepared for real-life problems with many of us unemotionally mature enough to deal with many things. Photo by Dawid Zawiła on Unsplash There’s more than meets the eye, yo. There are so many stories we have inside of us, waiting to be called out. Because we’re not still enough — not willing to sit with our thoughts — or not willing to engage in deeper thought and journaling, we “waste” stories that could otherwise be valuable to others. So, when I ask this question, what story could you write that no one else could: it doesn’t mean the next Harry Potter. It doesn’t mean working on a story until it’s “perfect” or waiting until you feel like a writer before you write. No. It means going inside, finding a truth you have that you may not have articulated, then sharing to the best of your abilities. This will require shedding your ego — as you learn how to do this better. It will require learning from others, undoing bad storytelling habits. Keyphrase: best of your abilities. It may mean writing about topics you’ve never considered ( I’m writing a piece on better decision making and scared shitless about how “unme” it sounds. I request feedback from a writing partner who knows more on the subject and his pointers were invaluable). The price of being a better storyteller involves being willing to find your voice beyond the ego, beyond what you know to be “you”. We’re all changing and the way we perceived “love” or “money’’ a few years — even months ago — isn’t the way we do now. That story? That evolution you’ve achieved? That’s unique to you. The world needs this story to know it’s possible to evolve. You have no idea who is waiting on your story — the story only you could tell. Don’t second guess yourself. Open that new document and start. You have it in you to tell beautiful stories. I know this. You know this. You wouldn’t be fighting so hard to be better if you didn’t. We want to hear from you — the story only you can tell. Because there’s no one who has lived the life you live. Tap into that. Spend time with yourself. Practice more, try different things. Free yourself from the pain of tying your ego to any such feedback, use everything to grow and become a better storyteller. Become yourself.

['Storytelling', 'Writing', 'Self', 'Creativity', 'Personal Growth']

Find the Time to Write I am an advocate for anyone being able to find the time to write. I even wrote a book on writing that included how to do this, and I have various articles talking about it, but wow, life seems to have got me this time. All my usual tricks aren’t working. I feel like I’m ready to give up and that maybe I’m just not cut out to be a working writer. I’ve tried getting up at 5 am to write or working in the evening to get some words done. I’ve even taken up using dictation in hope to be able to get words on the go, but the more I do to enable myself a good amount of writing time, the harder life seems to make it for me actually to get to my desk. If it isn’t dealing with ill-health of elderly family members and new babies being born into my family, it’s my children needing help with things in their life. I joke, to my friends who say they can’t wait for their children to grow up, that it gets worse. But it isn’t really a joke. Bigger kids means bigger problems. I’m not complaining about these things. I care for my father’s mother. I cared for my father before he died. I have four children, they have their own children, and being a big family means we all muck in together to help each other out. It’s fantastic we have that family support, but it can’t half take my time up. And let’s not forget that pandemic. I know my wife and I aren’t alone in how the pandemic has affected us. My wife runs a wedding business, and so with all weddings being cancelled, she’s had to find other work, and I’ve been needed to help with that. As a consequence, finding time to write or do anything has been near impossible. But I’m trying.

['Entrepreneurship', 'Writing', 'Self Care', 'Pandemic', 'Productivity']

Have you ever published something and gotten a resounding echo in response? Nobody read your article, the editor rejected your book, or you sold one lonely e-book? What went wrong? You thought your writing was interesting, structured properly, and your grammar was correct. I’ve had this happen, and it sucks! I’ve learned to ask this essential question, “Why should my reader care about what I’ve written?” The answer, “Because I think it’s good,” or “Because I think it’s funny, interesting, or educational,” won’t work. Next question. “How do I discover what my reader cares about?” Most of my writing is for business blogs and websites. I must know what my reader is interested in. If not, I’m wasting my time and my client’s hard-earned money. There are tools you can use to find out what your reader wants, to understand what they crave, and get familiar with them. I will show you how to do just that. This reader can be called a profile, a persona, or an avatar, but it’s an image of one person in your audience. When you have a thorough understanding of who your reader is and what they hope to read, you will also be able to market to them — a huge bonus! The vast majority of products are sold because of the need for love, the fear of shame, the pride of achievement, the drive for recognition, the yearning to feel important, the urge to look attractive, the lust for power, the longing for romance, the need to feel secure, the terror of facing the unknown, the lifelong hunger for self-esteem and so on. —Gary Bencivenga, legendary copywriter. We won’t be successful if we make assumptions about our readers. We’ve got to know what problems they are trying to solve. Here, I’ll use one of my own projects as an example. Here are a few projects on my list. I’m working on an informative blog post about gardening for Medium. How to Start Your First Vegetable Garden, a full-length book. Outline a 2,000-word article I hope to sell to Organic Gardening magazine. A Texas seed company hired me to produce a 900-word piece on the best vegetable varieties for Central Texas. I’m working on the beginning gardener book first since it requires the most research, and I can use what I learn for the other projects. I need to get a clear picture of a typical reader for my book. This will be a fictional composite person based on research. Think of it as developing a backstory, just as you would for a character in a novel. So who would my imaginary gardener be? Step # 1: I start with some simple Google searches for my high-level questions, including a date. Google: Who spends the most money on gardening 2020? I’m guessing that a group spending money on their hobby would be a likely buyer for my Basics of Starting Your First Vegetable Garden book. As I scroll down and I see a comprehensive report titled 2020 National Gardening Survey. However, it costs $1200.00, more than I want to spend! Next, I find an article titled State of the Industry 2020, published by Garden Center magazine. Not too many specifics here, but I note this promising statement, “With the resurgence of victory gardening in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and high unemployment rates, edibles saw the biggest growth this year.” Google: What age are the people gardening at home? An article titled Why the 20–30 Somethings Are Gardening tops the page. “Although food gardening, in general, is up 17% in the past 5 years and still growing, the rate is up by 63% among ages 18–34, according to a new study by the National Gardening Association.” I list points from the article: These new gardeners are looking for ‘real’ and ‘non-virtual’ things in their lives. They worry about the security of the food supply. Gardening is a hobby to share with their children. They have small yards and are interested in container gardening. While interested in organic growing, they lose patience with complicated instructions. This is beneficial information I can use! I decide my new gardener is Ryan, 32 years old, and he works as a software developer. Photo by Austin Paquette on Unsplash Step # 2: Many big tech companies are downtown, so I imagine Ryan living within biking distance of downtown. I am familiar with a vegan restaurant in the area, and so I put him living in zip code 78704. Enter the zip code at https://www.unitedstateszipcodes.org/ to pull up the basic demographic information. Median household income of $51,00.00 Most people live in rental homes 84% single, 12% have children Education level: 50% graduated college Ryan rents a single-family house on Monroe St. with his friends Renae and Anthony. Photo by Phil Hearing on Unsplash Step # 3: Next, I go to the global demographic site, Esri. Fortunately, we can gain a lot of spending and lifestyle information from their free services. Enter a zip code to get reports on area residents. They tell me that the three groups of residents in this area are the Young & Restless, Emerald City, and Metro Renters. I decide Ryan fits in the Emerald City group, so I gather information from that report to combine with the other facts I’ve collected (and imagine) about him. Ryan balances long hours on the computer with biking and working out at the gym. He embraces the ‘foodie’ culture and enjoys cooking adventurous meals using local and organic foods to share with his friends. His slightly shabby rental house was built in 1946. The landlord lets Ryan have a garden in the backyard where he’s learning to grow vegetables for the first time. He enjoys growing things, but his plants aren’t producing too well. All three of the roommates buy natural, green, and environmentally friendly products. They love learning new things to keep life interesting. Ryan goes to lots of music shows, especially the big outdoor events in Austin. He likes living close to downtown, with the new library and Farmer’s Market. Like most people his age, he looks for information on YouTube first. He posts on Instagram when the mood strikes but finds most social media boring. He graduated from U.T. with a degree in computer engineering and hasn’t thought too seriously about getting married or having children. Step # 4: Ryan’s gardening hopes and fears. I need to find out what he hopes to gain from my book or article, what motivates him. At the same time, I’ll gain insight to help me market my book. Social media makes it easy. Facebook has groups about nearly everything. Join some groups in the same genre or subject as you write. Go to the group page, and with the ‘search’ function, look for questions people are asking. For instance, on the Central Texas Vegetable Gardening page, I typed, “How do I ___?’ Questions include, ‘how do I prepare my soil? ‘when do I plant?’ ‘how much should I water? and ‘what about caterpillars?’ I also see people say things like, ‘I’m a newbie, so don’t laugh…’, ‘this is a dumb question…’, ‘it’s my first year…’. People are insecure, but they have lots of questions! Quora is another place to see what questions people are asking in a more global audience. Questions include ‘how much room do I need to grow all my vegetables?’, ‘what are the easiest vegetables to grow?’, and ‘how do I grow bigger vegetables?’ If I’m stuck for questions, I can read Reddit, too. Again, just simple keywords like ‘grow, vegetables, problems’ can bring some leads. Read an article like this one: Social Media Demographics, to find out where your typical reader spends time. Since YouTube is the top social media for Ryan, I check it out and find the top views on the subject are for Gardening 101 and A Complete Guide to Digging & Planting a Vegetable Garden. Amazon book reviews can be incredible sources of insight. Particularly, I am looking for the specific problems readers are attempting to solve. I take notes of the exact words they use as these will be valuable terms to include for search engine optimization (SEO) purposes. I look for ‘Beginning Vegetable Gardening’ and read reviews of highly and poorly rated titles. It’s helpful to see what people find useful and what they don’t like. Reviewers use words like precise, concise, easy-to-understand, good index, lots of pictures, and mention that one of the popular authors has a website and podcast, too. Several readers mentioned that the book didn’t mention it was mainly for U.S. readers, and they were located in the U.K., making a lot of the text irrelevant. Negatives include not being detailed enough for beginners and assuming that the reader had more prior experience than they did. Forget your generalized audience. In the first place, the nameless, faceless audience will scare you to death and in the second place, unlike the theater, it doesn’t exist. In writing, your audience is one single reader. I have found that sometimes it helps to pick out one person — a real person you know, or an imagined person and write to that one. — John Steinbeck Step # 5: Ready to write Hopefully, Ryan won’t be the only reader of my new book. I will make two more profiles for this book and keep all these people in mind as I write. I frequently visit new gardeners as a consultant, and that first-hand contact adds depth to my research. Likely readers include Susan and Peter, a recently retired couple planning to start a garden. And Felicia has plans to move to a small farm in the country but is eager to learn garden skills. This research tells me what Ryan, Susan, Peter, and Felicia hope to learn. It will also give me ideas to develop my social media content calendar and to market my writing. For instance, Ryan wants to grow some kick-ass vegetables to cook and impress his friends. He won’t spend all weekend gardening-he has other things to do. He’s looking for simple, straightforward information — hopefully with links to YouTube tutorials to clarify the tricky points. He’ll lose interest if I geek out on Latin names for vegetables and a deep dive into soil science. K.I.S.S. is what I need to focus on. When I start going crazy with the details, thinking about Ryan helps me concentrate. When I’m writing, I pinned my taped my reader avatar to the wall above my desk, so I’d remember to keep them in mind. Ryan shops at the Farmer’s Market; perhaps I could sell books there to build some buzz. Would there be a way to tie into the huge techie community in Austin with cooking demonstrations with a popular vegan chef? The possibilities are enormous! These tips will make your writing more engaging and help you effectively market your books and articles.

['Marketing', 'Business', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Social Media', 'Writing']

We’re all on the inside looking out. Image courtesy of Joshua Rawson-Harris via Unsplash I’ve had a lot of freedom in my life. I’ve traveled wherever my heart has desired near or far. I’ve gotten in car and just driven until everything I’ve known is but a distant dot in my rear view mirror. I’ve (literally and unfortunately) gotten lost in a Costa Rican rainforest. I’ve slept under the stars, in a dumpster (for science!), in a yurt, and even on a boat. I’m the Dr. Seuss of adventure. I’m a free spirit, meant to roam this Earth. When the pandemic started I knew it would be tough. I knew the brakes on all travel, even to the grocery store, would be severely limited. I wanted to, and still want to, do my part by practicing social distancing. I am staying six-feet and more from everyone and most things I know and care about. Last week as I sat in my home office dressed in a bathing suit, a top knot bun, yoga pants, and body glitter, I realized — I may be experiencing a bit of the ol’ cabin fever. “Cabin fever is a distressing claustrophobic irritability or restlessness experienced when a person is stuck at an isolated location or confined quarters for an extended period of time.” — Wikipedia Distressed? Check. Irritable? Double check. Restlessness? Oh, yeah! Cabin fever is a state of mind. It’s a stranger than fiction combination of anxiety, boredom, edgy, irascibility that is sometimes hard to define, but you can feel it in every fiber of your being. Some of us are very social creatures and we work, think, act, and enjoy life better when we have contact with other people. If you are prone to intense bouts of anxiety, depression, or loneliness, the current state of things can turn a comical case of cabin fever into a serious saddlebag of negative consequences. Cue the stress and welcome the effects that accompany this such as: Feelings of hopelessness Increase self doubt Decrease self worth Excess weight gain or loss Inflammation (i.e. body aches and pains) Weakened immune system Fatigue and sleeping difficulties Inability to focus or brain fog …and much more I’m not even getting into the domino effect that stress from loneliness and isolation can cause putting you at greater risk for more serious medical and emotional problems. In a time where sadly almost 9% — that’s 44 million — Americans have no health insurance. Plus an additional 38 million have what is described as ‘inadequate’ health insurance, you might not have the luxury of calling your therapist, scheduling extra sessions with your life coach, or reaching out to your primary physician to talk about medication options. You may feel like you appear to be doing ‘okay’ on the outside but aren’t feeling so great on the inside. Stir-crazy like a baker’s mixer The isolation and social distancing will hit us all differently, mind, body, and soul — but you can beat the blues before they beat you. I’ve found the following assorted ways have aided me in avoiding feeling like the walls are closing in (because they aren’t, I promise). You are still adjusting to this new way of life It’s important to maintain or build a comfortable level of social connections with the world and people around you. This goes doubly if you are living with mental or physical health issues. When you lack meaningful attachments, things can start to look and feel more bleak than they actually are. Whatever you’re feeling may be in passing or may be lingering for months with no improvement. However, few simple lifestyle changes can combat cabin fever head on and while none of the above will completely eradicate your feelings of fatigue, loneliness, or social claustrophobia, it can help get you started in the right direction.

['Self-awareness', 'Life Lessons', 'Mental Health', 'Life', 'Productivity']

Thresholding In image processing, thresholding is the process of creating a binary image from a grayscale image. A binary image is one whose pixels can have only two values — 0 (black) or 255 (white). In the simplest case of thresholding, you select a value as a threshold and any pixel above this value becomes white (255), while any below becomes black (0). Check out the OpenCV documentation for image thresholding for more types and the parameters involved. thresh = [cv2.threshold(img, np.mean(img), 255, cv2.THRESH_BINARY_INV)[1] for img in tqdm(gray)] The first parameter passed to cv2.threshold() is the grayscale image to be converted, the second is the threshold value, the third is the value which will be assigned to the pixel if it crosses the threshold, and finally we have the type of thresholding. cv2.threshold() returns two values, the first being an optimal threshold calculated automatically if you use cv2.THRESH_OTSU , and the second being the actual thresholded object. Since we’re only concerned about the object, we subscript [1] to append only the second returned value in our thresh list. You can choose a static threshold, but then it won’t be able to take the different lighting conditions of different photos into account. I’ve chosen np.mean() , which gives the average value of a pixel for the image. Lighter images will have a value greater than 127.5 (255/2), while darker images will have a lower value. This lets you threshold images based on their lighting conditions. For the first image, the threshold is 126.34, which means that the image is slightly darker than average. Any pixel which has a value greater than this will be converted to white, and any less, will be made black. But wait! If you notice the grayscale image, the leaf is darker than the background. If we apply a normal threshold, the darker pixels become black, while lighter pixels become white. This will apply a black mask on the leaf, not the background. To deal with this, we use the THRESH_BINARY_INV method, which inverts the thresholding process. Now, pixels having an intensity greater than the threshold will be made black — those with less, white. Lets have a look at the pixel intensities for the first thresholded image: As you can see, the pixels which were lighter (top row) in the grayscale array are now black, while those which were darker (bottom row), are now white. Lets see the thresholded images to verify:

['Machine Learning', 'Python', 'Image Processing', 'Computer Vision', 'Programming']

Much of my current writing efforts center around my experience dealing with my poor mental health. Even so, my personal health is not my niche. I like to think I spend most of my time being an advocate and talking about mental health in general. But I have to admit the most impactful stories I’ve written have been about times in my life where my mental illness got the best of me — whether it’s suicide, self-harm, or psychotic episodes. Over my years of writing about these experiences, I’ve been thorough and have hardly left a stone unturned, so when I do feel like writing about my personal life, there aren’t many unique scary stories left. I try to avoid writing about the mundane details of everyday life — I blog on Facebook for that. I save my time here on Medium for the remarkable. The thing that drives me now more than ever is my need to help others. The best way I know to help is to write about the experiences that shaped the person I am today. So, the point I’m getting to is if I run out of “material,” how am I going to continue to help people? Is it weird that I feel guilty that more bad things aren’t happening to me so I can overcome them and write about it? Photo by Milada Vigerova on Unsplash I’m all about honesty I know you may be thinking I’m a writer — couldn’t I make up scenarios and create lessons around them, like Aesop’s Fables? My answer is no. My whole persona, my voice, my relatability — is built on the fact that I’m honest about the things that happened to me in my life. I never embellish, and I never hold back important details, even if they are heartbreaking and embarrassing. I know we should be adaptable and willing to change, but I’m not sure I can make an impact with stories I’m not 100% invested in. I can’t change who I am for views and reads. I know the purpose of the views and reads is to help people, but I’m so attached to helping people with my own experiences that it would feel like cheating if I made up stories. Does that make any sense? I feel so strongly about connecting with others through my writing, and I wouldn’t want to do anything that would jeopardize not only the reader’s feelings toward me but my own opinion about myself. Photo by Warren Wong on Unsplash Where do I go from here? I’m going to keep writing about my life, and I’m sure that I’ll always be able to put a different spin on the story, but eventually, people are going to get tired of my talking about the voices I hear, my suicide attempts, and the years of depression and anxiety. My recovery may be progressing faster than I’d imagined, so I can’t count on bad things to keep happening. Besides, feeling guilty for having good mental health is about the silliest thing I’ve ever heard from my mouth. I only have the stories I have, and I’ll have to continue to find a way to use them to create articles and essays with the sole purpose of helping others. My job as a writer is to find unique ways to tie them together with my new stories of building a life after mental illness. Photo by Kat Stokes on Unsplash A different path I’m unique in many ways. All ego aside, I know I have an interesting story to tell. I am a man who has made it through some of the hardest years anyone could have lived. I’m building a life despite being schizoaffective and hearing voices. I’ve learned to exist with an illness that most of the time will send the sufferer through a life of mental hospitals and debilitating medications. I came back from almost ending my life and used my attempts as a catalyst to change everything about myself. I mutilated myself for years and now use my scars as a lesson to others that even if you hit bottom, you can still find your way out of the rabbit hole. I’m on the road to better mental health, and it was a hard battle to get here. I’m sure the stories I live from here on out can also be used to help others as well. I’m a brand-new father at 50 years old. I’m eight years into my forever-marriage, and every day sees me getting happier and more fulfilled. Despite what I’ve gone through, I’m a father, a husband, a son, an advocate, a writer, an entrepreneur, an influencer, and a damn-good human being. Every day I walk a path to greater happiness, and I feel fulfilled by every little event in my life. Writing about my life now has to be of help to someone out there. Someone out there is on the same path as I, hoping to connect with someone else who feels like they do and can relate to their story. I may have the same old painful stories of the past, but my hopeful stories from my future will help just as much.

['Creativity', 'Mindfulness', 'Mental Health', 'Self', 'Writing']

10 Steps to Win with Blogging in 2021 A no-stress guide Photo by Markus Winkler on Unsplash 2021 is almost here and now is a good time to start a blog so that you can experience some success and make real money in the new year. Many people choose blogging as their professional career and make a decent income doing it. Many newcomers consider blogging to be their professional career but don’t know the proper way to start making money. However, if you want to start a blog, you have to go through the steps and do the work. And if you’re diligent your blog can perform well and earn more revenue with your blog. This article is about starting and running an effective blog business to earn a little more in 2021. Here are the steps to start a blog and make money in 2021: 1. Choose a suitable niche Before you plan to develop a blog, you should decide on the blog’s niche. At this stage, some research may be needed on the market/niche because domain knowledge is necessary to write and run a niche blog. Several niches can be used for your blogs, but you should plan to choose just one that’s dear to your heart and interests. If you choose a competitive niche, then it can be difficult for you to rank on search engines against your peers. Don’t be afraid of this. Some of the more common niches are written as follows: Fashion Health & Fitness Sports Education Technology Marketing News 2. Choose a conspicuous brand name for your blog Blogging is a real business in which you invest your money, time, and effort. In this regard, you need to consider branding your blog by giving it a professional, creative name. A good name could attract the audience to read your blog when the name is discussed. Once you have selected the niche, you should focus on choosing the best name that fits your niche and attracts the attention of the user. Remember that the name you select must be unique and interesting. Hopefully, the domain will be available for your blog that matches your desired blog name. Finally, the name should fully describe your brand and be inviting to your target demographic. 3. Buy a domain and hosting The domain is the name used by users and search engines to recognize and access your blog while hosting is the server on which all your files are stored. There are thousands of domain registrars and website hosting companies. The task is to find the best domain registrar and hosting provider because bad hosting will cause a lot of problems for your blog. The main concerns would be the speed and security of your blog. If your website’s page speed is not fast, search engines won’t rank your site higher than your competitors. 4. Choose a platform for your blog Here are two ways to create your blog–use a content management system (CMS) and or code it from the ground up. If you know how to code, you can create your own blog, but it could be a complex and time-consuming to create an appealing blog this way. The CMS is the most popular option and WordPress is the most commonly used CMS. WordPress is one of the best options for making your blog because it provides the themes and plugins that will help you develop and launch your site quickly. Besides, you can change the colors of your blog, header, footer, or add the post to WordPress quickly and very easily. If that’s not enough, WordPress is available on the cPanel of most web hosting platforms. 5. Customize your blog In this step, you need to install a WordPress theme or develop it yourself. After that, you have to choose the colors you want for your blog and generally customize it. The best combination of colors increases the interest of readers. If you use WordPress, you can add neat widgets on your header, body, sidebar, and footers to improve user experience. 6. Create a content strategy By this point, your blog’s done and the steps to operation and monetization begin! Now, you can create some of the effective strategies for the regular writing of your content. The content should be unique, informative, and inviting to the reader and if you are successful with your content strategy, your visitor will become loyal readers! In addition to writing, make strategies to organize your content with a content calendar, optimize your content, and share it via your social media channels. You won’t regret it. Power tip: Use a duplicate content checker before publishing content from another writer on your blog. 7. Search Engine Optimization To reach the top position on SERPs (search engine result pages), you should apply SEO optimization to your blog in the following ways: On-Page SEO Off-Page SEO Technical SEO Backlinking Keyword research Social Media Marketing Search Engine Marketing 8. Apply for AdSense and other sources of income There are many ways to earn money from your blog, including ads, affiliate marketing, sponsored posts, and event blogging. A couple of these options are briefly explained below: Display Ads The best-known brand for displaying the ads is Google AdSense, which pays you according to clicks and impressions on your website. You should apply after you have read the Terms of Use and after your blog is six months old. You can also apply for Ezoic after your website reaches 10,000 sessions per month or Mediavine after your blog reaches 50,000 sessions per month. Affiliate Marketing Affiliate marketing is to sell someone’s product, but by displaying and discussing the product on your blog. If your site visitor buys a service or product after clicking an affiliate link on your blog, you will receive a commission under the agreement. Cha-ching! You can look into making an affiliate account with companies like Amazon and eBay. 9. Social Media Marketing We all know the importance of social media in today’s world, and if you (or someone on your team) are not active on social media then you are missing a big opportunity to share your content. Your readers and competitors are on social media and you should be too. 10. Analytics Analytics are kind of like having exam results year-round. Analytics helps you measure the success rate of your campaigns, whether on your blogging, link building, or social media marketing. Analytics help you to know the views, bounce rate, and session time of your website. If you’re not measuring your traffic via analytics then you don’t know where you stand. Don’t skip this last important step for starting a blog in 2021. Use Google Analytics to track website analytics for your blog and Hotjar to track how visitors interact with your website. That’s it. No unnecessary conclusion needed. Get to work now by choosing your blog’s niche.

['Marketing', 'Business', 'Blogging', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Writing']

Introduction I’ve always had a passion for learning and consider myself a lifelong learner. Being at SAS, as a data scientist, allows me to learn and try out new algorithms and functionalities that we regularly release to our customers. Often times, the algorithms are not technically new, but they’re new to me which makes it a lot of fun. Recently, I had the opportunity to learn more about t-Distributed Stochastic Neighbor Embedding (t-SNE). In this post I’m going to give a high-level overview of the t-SNE algorithm. I’ll also share some example python code where I’ll use t-SNE on both the Digits and MNIST dataset. What is t-SNE? t-Distributed Stochastic Neighbor Embedding (t-SNE) is an unsupervised, non-linear technique primarily used for data exploration and visualizing high-dimensional data. In simpler terms, t-SNE gives you a feel or intuition of how the data is arranged in a high-dimensional space. It was developed by Laurens van der Maatens and Geoffrey Hinton in 2008. t-SNE vs PCA If you’re familiar with Principal Components Analysis (PCA), then like me, you’re probably wondering the difference between PCA and t-SNE. The first thing to note is that PCA was developed in 1933 while t-SNE was developed in 2008. A lot has changed in the world of data science since 1933 mainly in the realm of compute and size of data. Second, PCA is a linear dimension reduction technique that seeks to maximize variance and preserves large pairwise distances. In other words, things that are different end up far apart. This can lead to poor visualization especially when dealing with non-linear manifold structures. Think of a manifold structure as any geometric shape like: cylinder, ball, curve, etc. t-SNE differs from PCA by preserving only small pairwise distances or local similarities whereas PCA is concerned with preserving large pairwise distances to maximize variance. Laurens illustrates the PCA and t-SNE approach pretty well using the Swiss Roll dataset in Figure 1 [1]. You can see that due to the non-linearity of this toy dataset (manifold) and preserving large distances that PCA would incorrectly preserve the structure of the data. Figure 1 — Swiss Roll Dataset. Preserve small distance with t-SNE (solid line) vs maximizing variance PCA [1] How t-SNE works Now that we know why we might use t-SNE over PCA, lets discuss how t-SNE works. The t-SNE algorithm calculates a similarity measure between pairs of instances in the high dimensional space and in the low dimensional space. It then tries to optimize these two similarity measures using a cost function. Let’s break that down into 3 basic steps. 1. Step 1, measure similarities between points in the high dimensional space. Think of a bunch of data points scattered on a 2D space (Figure 2). For each data point (xi) we’ll center a Gaussian distribution over that point. Then we measure the density of all points (xj) under that Gaussian distribution. Then renormalize for all points. This gives us a set of probabilities (Pij) for all points. Those probabilities are proportional to the similarities. All that means is, if data points x1 and x2 have equal values under this gaussian circle then their proportions and similarities are equal and hence you have local similarities in the structure of this high-dimensional space. The Gaussian distribution or circle can be manipulated using what’s called perplexity, which influences the variance of the distribution (circle size) and essentially the number of nearest neighbors. Normal range for perplexity is between 5 and 50 [2]. Figure 2 — Measuring pairwise similarities in the high-dimensional space 2. Step 2 is similar to step 1, but instead of using a Gaussian distribution you use a Student t-distribution with one degree of freedom, which is also known as the Cauchy distribution (Figure 3). This gives us a second set of probabilities (Qij) in the low dimensional space. As you can see the Student t-distribution has heavier tails than the normal distribution. The heavy tails allow for better modeling of far apart distances. Figure 3 — Normal vs Student t-distribution 3. The last step is that we want these set of probabilities from the low-dimensional space (Qij) to reflect those of the high dimensional space (Pij) as best as possible. We want the two map structures to be similar. We measure the difference between the probability distributions of the two-dimensional spaces using Kullback-Liebler divergence (KL). I won’t get too much into KL except that it is an asymmetrical approach that efficiently compares large Pij and Qij values. Finally, we use gradient descent to minimize our KL cost function. Use Case for t-SNE Now that you know how t-SNE works let’s talk quickly about where it is used. Laurens van der Maaten shows a lot of examples in his video presentation [1]. He mentions the use of t-SNE in areas like climate research, computer security, bioinformatics, cancer research, etc. t-SNE could be used on high-dimensional data and then the output of those dimensions then become inputs to some other classification model. Also, t-SNE could be used to investigate, learn, or evaluate segmentation. Often times we select the number of segments prior to modeling or iterate after results. t-SNE can often times show clear separation in the data. This can be used prior to using your segmentation model to select a cluster number or after to evaluate if your segments actually hold up. t-SNE however is not a clustering approach since it does not preserve the inputs like PCA and the values may often change between runs so it’s purely for exploration. Code Example Below is some python code (Figures below with link to GitHub) where you can see the visual comparison between PCA and t-SNE on the Digits and MNIST datasets. I select both of these datasets because of the dimensionality differences and therefore the differences in results. I also show a technique in the code where you can run PCA prior to running t-SNE. This can be done to reduce computation and you’d typically reduce down to ~30 dimensions and then run t-SNE. I ran this using python and calling the SAS libraries. It may appear slightly different than what you’re use to and you can see that in the images below. I used Seaborn for my visuals which I thought was great, but with t-SNE you may get really compact clusters and need to zoom in. Another visualization tool, like Plotly, may be better if you need to zoom in or manipulate your plot object. Also, a simple %matplotlib notebook call before you plots works as well assuming your using Matplotlib. Check out the full notebook in GitHub so you can see all the steps in between and have the code:

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

7TH ARMY JOINT MULTINATIONAL TRAINING — COMMAND/VICTOR TANGERMANN FUTURISTIC INVENTION Researchers created an invisibility cloak from this ‘artificial skin’ Mimicking the color and temperature of their environment, this novel tech can make soldiers ‘invisible’ Cloaking devices from the yesteryears Scifi show ‘Star Trek’ are now becoming a reality. A lot of research has been undertaken in this area recently. For now, most of these applications are being developed for specific use cases like the one we are going to discuss today — giving soldiers the ability to blend in with their natural surroundings. Back in 2019, I wrote about a Canadian biotech company, Hyperstealth Biotechnology Corp. which reached the patent application stage with its light-bending, paper-thin & inexpensive futuristic material — making things invisible behind it. Their prototype “Quantum Stealth” material was also developed for military purposes. While the Canadian company used a paper-thin material to develop the invisibility cloak, South Korean researchers have taken this to the next level by developing an “artificial skin” that could allow soldiers to perfectly blend in with their surroundings. The resulting cloak not only makes them invisible to regular cameras but also to infrared-based night vision as well. Although the novel tech sounds futuristic and out of a sci-fi movie, there are examples of this in nature — like the chameleon’s ability to blend into the surroundings. This invention just takes this natural cloaking ability from the visible light spectrum to the next step by masking the heat signature of the wearer as well. “The cloaking in the visible range is therefore achieved separately by matching the ambient color… we recently developed a method to detect and mimic the environment by integrating a micro camera with our devices to make an autonomously working device.” ~ Seung Hwan Ko, Team Lead According to the research, it uses flexible patches that can camouflage itself and is capable of cooling down or heating up depending on its surrounding environment. The process of switching only takes about five seconds. giving the soldiers the ability to camouflage themselves during the daytime and not show at thermal cameras at night.

['Artificial Intelligence', 'Innovation', 'Technology', 'Future', 'Science']

I’ve tried hustle. I’ve worked until my arms ached, and my eyesight failed into the dim light of dusk. My bones have coughed out marrow. I hunched and toiled past the hands of time. I ate words and listened to night fall like thunder. I devoured, plodded, straightened my back and swallowed the dawn. I watched the stars drift past my desk and the old owl swoop close to the moon, and I heard his soulful call among the wolves. I’ve tried hustle: Paper piled high against the darkness. My limbs grew tired of the weight.

['Productivity', 'Creativity', 'Culture', 'Lifestyle', 'Writing']

You Don’t Need Others to Feel Creative 4 positive steps to regain your creative confidence Photo by Bernard Hermant on Unsplash When constantly working in groups, it is easy to doubt your creative potential, as all your ideas are usually inspired by the ideas of others. You may even think that you are unable to innovate on your own without group consultation. But while the value of collective thinking is certain, human projects have always been fueled by individual brains. Your neurons make more unexpected connections than your meetings will ever do. And the more you lose confidence in your creative potential, the more you will lose this intellectual energy. How to recover your creative confidence to illuminate your projects with original ideas? According to David and Tom Kelley in Creative Confidence, you can regain your belief in your creativity by forcing yourself into new experiences. The most creative professionals have learned to reflect on their “creativity scars’’, reappropriating their self-mastery, embracing their mistakes, and creating in more visual and playful ways. Using their examples, here are 4 steps to put a spark of creativity back in your projects and take them in hand. 1. Reflecting on Your Creativity Scars When it comes to being creative, you may find yourself thinking that it’s not for you and that others are better at it than you are… But being creative is natural, as shown by children’s innate ability to try and experiment with new things, and to use effortlessly their imaginations. Your attitude of self-doubt, however, is not. It often comes from moments during your childhood when certain people have denied your creativity: the art teacher or friends who have denied the talent of your collages, drawings, photos… Some people may have been a bad influence, making you lose your belief in the power of your imagination, and suggesting that creativity belongs exclusively to real artists and dreamers. To change your views, remember the times during your education when your talents as a singer, painter, writer were denied. Analyze how they have taken you away from your passions for creative activities (drawing, acting, singing…). Successful musicians like Paul McCartney and George Harrison of the Beatles were in music class together in high school, with a teacher who didn’t even recognize their talent and gave them no encouragement. Two decades later they were part of one of the most beloved bands of the 20th century. That gives you something to put into perspective! 2. Regaining a Sense of Self-Mastery When you try to test again your creative abilities, you may wonder where to start. You may fear that your actions will have no impact on your environment. To dispel that doubt, you need to regain a sense of self-efficiency in your actions, by embarking on step-by-step experimentations. For example, the famous social psychologist Albert Bandura has used an innovative method to help his patients confront their phobia of snakes: through trials that brought them closer and closer to the sight and touch of a snake. It started by getting closer behind a door, listening to their sound, looking at them in a mirror, and then touching them. This process allowed them to overcome their fear by acting little by little on it, gaining more control over it. A few months later, these same patients had learned to overcome their fear and problem by taking the initiative and using their creativity to gradually take control of their problem. They had also learned the belief that they could change something that seemed insurmountable at the time by taking action if only a little. In the same way, you need to start with small actions to overcome your fear of being judged and your doubts. This will allow you to regain your self-mastery when it comes to using your creativity. 3. Owning Your Failures One of the other essential keys to unlocking your creativity is to learn to accept your mistakes and even to seek out more and more of them. The greatest innovators like Thomas Edison or the Wright Brothers have been as creative by having the ability and the environment to engage in broad and constant experimentation. You may need to assimilate this optimism taught by video games, that behind your failures progress and success are never too far away. It is a question of creating such a “virtual” environment around you, which makes you want to test your creative abilities where no one judges you and you don’t fear losing something. For example, a juggling teacher has taught his students to accept their mistakes by starting his classes with “ball drop sessions”: the goal is to throw their balls and let them fall each time. This exercise reduces the pressure on new students and makes them take risks, as they usually tend to avoid dropping their balls at all costs. In the same way, rediscovering activities with fewer stakes, such as writing in a diary, drawing at home, finding artistic hobbies you have given up for a while (theatre, acting,) are all solutions to regain confidence in your creativity. It enables you to experiment with your creative talents without doubting yourself too much. They let you make your mistakes and teach you their creative value. 4. Creating in a More Visual and Playful Way When you try to put a creative impulse into your projects, you may wonder what you may change first, and even if a change is really necessary. You may be paralyzed by your perfectionism, as you don’t want to present ideas outside of your area of expertise or change your plans too abruptly. But you don’t need to put too much pressure on you. To add a creative touch, sometimes simple and playful means are enough: drawings, maps, and diagrams help you redesign your decisions and the situation of your projects. Dan Roam, an expert in the art of visual thinking, insists that anyone can draw anything — even if they don’t feel naturally creative or gifted — just by deconstructing it into 5 basic shapes: a circle, a line, a square, a triangle, and an irregular shape. Starting from these shapes, you can describe new emotions, relationships, and ideas on a board, and reconsider the scheme of your projects in new ways. You can retrace the arguments for your decisions, renew the presentation of your figures, reconsider the emotions of your clients with the help of a simple pencil. All this without having to bother being a professional painter or drawer: only by making visual and natural creativity work!

['Self-awareness', 'Productivity', 'Creativity', 'Self Confidence', 'Self Improvement']

How Covid-19 May Affect the Brain’s Dopamine and Serotonin Levels This could be why 18% of Covid-19 survivors had psychiatric diagnoses, a population-sized study finds. Adapted from Medical vector created by freepik — www.freepik.com In April, a research review with an interesting title was published: “Are we facing a crashing wave of neuropsychiatric sequelae of COVID-19? Neuropsychiatric symptoms and potential immunologic mechanisms.” This review draws on past pandemics and epidemics to infer what might happen following the Covid-19 pandemic, which a wave of psychiatric maladies. Fast-forward today, we may finally see that wave. A paper published this month in The Lancet Psychiatry found that 18% of Covid-19 survivors — regardless of hospitalization status — develop psychiatric disorders within 14 to 90 days of infection. Considering the pandemic scale that has exceeded 57 million cases and 1.3 million deaths, 18% is huge. What the study did and found Using the TriNetX Analytics Network that stores health data of nearly 70 million patients across 54 healthcare organizations in the U.S., researchers at the University of Oxford identified 62,354 cases of Covid-19 as of August. The study controlled for 50 covariates that may influence the results, which include age, sex, race, socioeconomic factors, nicotine dependence, and comorbidities (kidney, liver, heart and lung diseases, obesity, hypertension, diabetes, cancer, dementia, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, and psoriasis). “People have been worried that Covid-19 survivors will be at greater risk of mental health problems, and our findings … show this to be likely.” After adjusting for covariates, they found 18% of Covid-19 survivors received a psychiatry diagnosis within 14 to 90 days of infection, of whom 5.8% had no history of psychiatric disorder. These 18% and 5.8% rates translate to a 1.5- to 2-times increased rate of recurrent and first-time diagnoses, respectively, compared to groups with a non-Covid health event — such as influenza, other respiratory infections, skin infections, gallstones, kidney stones, and bone fracture. Anxiety disorders, mood disorders, and insomnia were the most common diagnoses. Even in Covid-19 cases that do not require hospital care, the risk of psychiatric aftermath remains 1.5–2-times higher. “The elevated risk of psychiatric sequelae after Covid-19 diagnosis compared with control health events could not be readily explained by differences in illness severity,” the authors wrote, although a modest dose-dependent relationship seems to exist. However, I would keep an open mind until further studies replicate the findings that even mild or asymptomatic Covid-19 would affect a person’s mental health. “People have been worried that Covid-19 survivors will be at greater risk of mental health problems, and our findings … show this to be likely,” Paul Harrison, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Oxford who directed the study, stated. The study also found that a history of psychiatric disorder led to a 1.6-times increased risk of positive Covid-19 diagnosis. Indeed, pre-existing psychiatric disorders do count as comorbidities that up the risk of more severe Covid-19. “Having a psychiatric disorder should be added to the list of risk factors for Covid-19,” said the study’s lead author, Max Taquet, Ph.D., a psychiatry researcher. Thus, in this study, the diagnosed depression and anxiety cases may not be as severe as to qualify as major depression or anxiety disorders. As with any studies, results must be interpreted in light of the study caveats. For one, despite already accounting for 50 covariates, the authors admitted that overlooked covariate may still be present. The geographical limitation to the U.S. only is also another drawback. Specifics about the psychiatric diagnoses were also lacking, such as severity or diagnostic criteria, which is a serious limitation that may undermine the study. James C. Coyne, a health psychology professor at the University Medical Center Groningen, critiqued that the pandemic’s front liners may not have made diagnoses as accurately as a psychiatrist. A structured psychiatric interview, he said, usually takes 30 to 90 minutes, which is overly time-consuming at a massive scale. Thus, in this study, the diagnosed depression and anxiety cases may not be as severe as to qualify as major depression or anxiety disorders. Biomolecular underpinnings Let’s assume Covid-19 survivors indeed have a 1.5–2-times increased rate of future psychiatric diagnoses than survivors of other health events (e.g., influenza, gallstones, skin infection, etc.). Why is Covid-19 more strongly linked to psychiatry than other health events? Part I: ACE2/DDC pathway ACE2 is the receptor SARS-CoV-2 (that causes Covid-19) uses to enter cells. ACE2 co-expresses and co-regulates with dopa decarboxylase (DDC), an enzyme that makes serotonin and dopamine — neurochemicals involved in depression and anxiety. Upon cell infection, SARS-CoV-2 engulfs the ACE2 receptor, which lowers ACE2 expression on the cell. This decreases DDC expression as well, halting the production of dopamine and serotonin. “Hence, a SARS-CoV-2- induced defective expression of ACE2 might be paralleled by a DDC dysfunction, with consequent potentially altered neurotransmitters’ levels in Covid‐19 patients,” stated a paper published last month in the European Journal of Psychiatry. Recall that SARS-CoV-2 lowers ACE2 expression. The normal function of ACE2 is to convert angiotensin II to angiotensin 1–7. Therefore, if ACE2 decreases, angiotensin II would increase. And the problem is that angiotensin II promotes depression and anxiety as angiotensin II initiates a cascade of reactions leading to inflammation and oxidative stress in the brain. The propensity to target the ACE2 receptor — in addition to cytokine storm induction — may be why SARS-CoV-2 is a greater risk factor for psychiatric aftermath than other health events such as influenza or skin infection. Part II: TRP/KYN pathway The tryptophan/kynurenine (TRP/KYN) pathway is one of the best-studied pathways in depression and anxiety. As tryptophan crosses the blood-brain-barrier to turn into serotonin, the TRP/KYN pathway strongly influences the brain’s serotonin levels. This pathway starts when pro-inflammatory cytokines activate an enzyme called indoleamine 2,3-dioxygenase (IDO-1). IDO-1 degrades TRP into KYN to suppress inflammation. As TRP is lost, serotonin production is compromised. And since IDO-1 is present in many organs, including the brain, systemic inflammation would lead to a system-wide decrease in serotonin levels. “All of these pathways raise the possibility of patients affected by severe Covid-19 with prolonged exposure to inflammation, may have long-term neurological sequels,” wrote a research review published this month in The Neuroscientist that highlights the TRP/KYN pathway in Covid-depression. Short abstract Covid-19 survivors are at 2- and 1.5-times increased rate of recurrent and first-time psychiatric diagnoses, respectively, compared to survivors of non-Covid health events (e.g., influenza, skin infections, gallstones, etc.). Indeed, 18% of Covid-19 survivors had psychiatric aftermath — most commonly anxiety, depression, and insomnia — of which 5.8% were first-time diagnoses. The propensity to target the ACE2 receptor — in addition to cytokine storm induction— may be why SARS-CoV-2 is a greater risk factor for psychiatric aftermath than other health events. Yet there’s the critique that diagnoses made by the Lancet study may not be as accurate as a psychiatrist's. The study may have diagnosed depression and anxiety that may not qualify as severe major depression or anxiety disorders. Thus, there may not be a wave of serious psychiatric disorders, but a mental health one. Indeed, coupled with income loss, bereavement, and social isolation, mental health crisis may be at an all-time high.

['Mental Health', 'Ideas', 'Life', 'Science', 'Coronavirus']

Covid-19 May Be a Blood Vessel Disease, Which Explains Everything Many of the infection’s bizarre symptoms have one thing in common Image: MR.Cole_Photographer/Getty Images In April, blood clots emerged as one of the many mysterious symptoms attributed to Covid-19, a disease that had initially been thought to largely affect the lungs in the form of pneumonia. Quickly after came reports of young people dying due to coronavirus-related strokes. Next it was Covid toes — painful red or purple digits. What do all of these symptoms have in common? An impairment in blood circulation. Add in the fact that 40% of deaths from Covid-19 are related to cardiovascular complications, and the disease starts to look like a vascular infection instead of a purely respiratory one. Months into the pandemic, there is now a growing body of evidence to support the theory that the novel coronavirus can infect blood vessels, which could explain not only the high prevalence of blood clots, strokes, and heart attacks, but also provide an answer for the diverse set of head-to-toe symptoms that have emerged. “All these Covid-associated complications were a mystery. We see blood clotting, we see kidney damage, we see inflammation of the heart, we see stroke, we see encephalitis [swelling of the brain],” says William Li, MD, president of the Angiogenesis Foundation. “A whole myriad of seemingly unconnected phenomena that you do not normally see with SARS or H1N1 or, frankly, most infectious diseases.” “If you start to put all of the data together that’s emerging, it turns out that this virus is probably a vasculotropic virus, meaning that it affects the [blood vessels],” says Mandeep Mehra, MD, medical director of the Brigham and Women’s Hospital Heart and Vascular Center. In a paper published in April in the scientific journal The Lancet, Mehra and a team of scientists discovered that the SARS-CoV-2 virus can infect the endothelial cells that line the inside of blood vessels. Endothelial cells protect the cardiovascular system, and they release proteins that influence everything from blood clotting to the immune response. In the paper, the scientists showed damage to endothelial cells in the lungs, heart, kidneys, liver, and intestines in people with Covid-19. “The concept that’s emerging is that this is not a respiratory illness alone, this is a respiratory illness to start with, but it is actually a vascular illness that kills people through its involvement of the vasculature,” says Mehra. A respiratory virus infecting blood cells and circulating through the body is virtually unheard of. A one-of-a-kind respiratory virus SARS-CoV-2 is thought to enter the body through ACE2 receptors present on the surface of cells that line the respiratory tract in the nose and throat. Once in the lungs, the virus appears to move from the alveoli, the air sacs in the lung, into the blood vessels, which are also rich in ACE2 receptors. “[The virus] enters the lung, it destroys the lung tissue, and people start coughing. The destruction of the lung tissue breaks open some blood vessels,” Mehra explains. “Then it starts to infect endothelial cell after endothelial cell, creates a local immune response, and inflames the endothelium.” A respiratory virus infecting blood vessel cells and circulating through the body is virtually unheard of. Influenza viruses like H1N1 are not known to do this, and the original SARS virus, a sister coronavirus to the current infection, did not spread past the lung. Other types of viruses, such as Ebola or Dengue, can damage endothelial cells, but they are very different from viruses that typically infect the lungs. Benhur Lee, MD, a professor of microbiology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, says the difference between SARS and SARS-CoV-2 likely stems from an extra protein each of the viruses requires to activate and spread. Although both viruses dock onto cells through ACE2 receptors, another protein is needed to crack open the virus so its genetic material can get into the infected cell. The additional protein the original SARS virus requires is only present in lung tissue, but the protein for SARS-CoV-2 to activate is present in all cells, especially endothelial cells. “In SARS1, the protein that’s required to cleave it is likely present only in the lung environment, so that’s where it can replicate. To my knowledge, it doesn’t really go systemic,” Lee says. “[SARS-CoV-2] is cleaved by a protein called furin, and that’s a big danger because furin is present in all our cells, it’s ubiquitous.” Endothelial damage could explain the virus’ weird symptoms An infection of the blood vessels would explain many of the weird tendencies of the novel coronavirus, like the high rates of blood clots. Endothelial cells help regulate clot formation by sending out proteins that turn the coagulation system on or off. The cells also help ensure that blood flows smoothly and doesn’t get caught on any rough edges on the blood vessel walls. “The endothelial cell layer is in part responsible for [clot] regulation, it inhibits clot formation through a variety of ways,” says Sanjum Sethi, MD, MPH, an interventional cardiologist at Columbia University Irving Medical Center. “If that’s disrupted, you could see why that may potentially promote clot formation.” Endothelial damage might account for the high rates of cardiovascular damage and seemingly spontaneous heart attacks in people with Covid-19, too. Damage to endothelial cells causes inflammation in the blood vessels, and that can cause any plaque that’s accumulated to rupture, causing a heart attack. This means anyone who has plaque in their blood vessels that might normally have remained stable or been controlled with medication is suddenly at a much higher risk for a heart attack. “Inflammation and endothelial dysfunction promote plaque rupture,” Sethi says. “Endothelial dysfunction is linked towards worse heart outcomes, in particular myocardial infarction or heart attack.” Blood vessel damage could also explain why people with pre-existing conditions like high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, and heart disease are at a higher risk for severe complications from a virus that’s supposed to just infect the lungs. All of those diseases cause endothelial cell dysfunction, and the additional damage and inflammation in the blood vessels caused by the infection could push them over the edge and cause serious problems. The theory could even solve the mystery of why ventilation often isn’t enough to help many Covid-19 patients breathe better. Moving air into the lungs, which ventilators help with, is only one part of the equation. The exchange of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the blood is just as important to provide the rest of the body with oxygen, and that process relies on functioning blood vessels in the lungs. “If you have blood clots within the blood vessels that are required for complete oxygen exchange, even if you’re moving air in and out of the airways, [if] the circulation is blocked, the full benefits of mechanical ventilatory support are somewhat thwarted,” says Li. A new paper published last week in the New England Journal of Medicine, on which Li is a co-author, found widespread evidence of blood clots and infection in the endothelial cells in the lungs of people who died from Covid-19. This was in stark contrast to people who died from H1N1, who had nine times fewer blood clots in the lungs. Even the structure of the blood vessels was different in the Covid-19 lungs, with many more new branches that likely formed after the original blood vessels were damaged. “We saw blood clots everywhere,” Li says. “We were observing virus particles filling up the endothelial cell like filling up a gumball machine. The endothelial cell swells and the cell membrane starts to break down, and now you have a layer of injured endothelium.” Finally, infection of the blood vessels may be how the virus travels through the body and infects other organs — something that’s atypical of respiratory infections. “Endothelial cells connect the entire circulation [system], 60,000 miles worth of blood vessels throughout our body,” says Li. “Is this one way that Covid-19 can impact the brain, the heart, the Covid toe? Does SARS-CoV-2 traffic itself through the endothelial cells or get into the bloodstream this way? We don’t know the answer to that.” In another paper that looked at nearly 9,000 people with Covid-19, Mehra showed that the use of statins and ACE inhibitors were linked to higher rates of survival. If Covid-19 is a vascular disease, the best antiviral therapy might not be antiviral therapy An alternative theory is that the blood clotting and symptoms in other organs are caused by inflammation in the body due to an over-reactive immune response — the so-called cytokine storm. This inflammatory reaction can occur in other respiratory illnesses and severe cases of pneumonia, which is why the initial reports of blood clots, heart complications, and neurological symptoms didn’t sound the alarm bells. However, the magnitude of the problems seen with Covid-19 appear to go beyond the inflammation experienced in other respiratory infections. “There is some increased propensity, we think, of clotting happening with these [other] viruses. I think inflammation in general promotes that,” Sethi says. “Is this over and above or unique for SARS-CoV-2, or is that just because [the infection] is just that much more severe? I think those are all really good questions that unfortunately we don’t have the answer to yet.” Anecdotally, Sethi says the number of requests he received as the director of the pulmonary embolism response team, which deals with blood clots in the lungs, in April 2020 was two to three times the number in April 2019. The question he’s now trying to answer is whether that’s because there were simply more patients at the hospital during that month, the peak of the pandemic, or if Covid-19 patients really do have a higher risk for blood clots. “I suspect from what we see and what our preliminary data show is that this virus has an additional risk factor for blood clots, but I can’t prove that yet,” Sethi says. The good news is that if Covid-19 is a vascular disease, there are existing drugs that can help protect against endothelial cell damage. In another New England Journal of Medicine paper that looked at nearly 9,000 people with Covid-19, Mehra showed that the use of statins and ACE inhibitors were linked to higher rates of survival. Statins reduce the risk of heart attacks not only by lowering cholesterol or preventing plaque, they also stabilize existing plaque, meaning they’re less likely to rupture if someone is on the drugs. “It turns out that both statins and ACE inhibitors are extremely protective on vascular dysfunction,” Mehra says. “Most of their benefit in the continuum of cardiovascular illness — be it high blood pressure, be it stroke, be it heart attack, be it arrhythmia, be it heart failure — in any situation the mechanism by which they protect the cardiovascular system starts with their ability to stabilize the endothelial cells.” Mehra continues, “What we’re saying is that maybe the best antiviral therapy is not actually an antiviral therapy. The best therapy might actually be a drug that stabilizes the vascular endothelial. We’re building a drastically different concept.” Update: The New England Journal of Medicine paper investigating the effect of statins and ACE inhibitors on Covid-19 mortality rates has been retracted because of concerns over the quality of the data.

['Health', 'Covid 19', 'Body', 'Coronavirus', 'Science']

We need a reset on how we think about the future — even with Biden and Harris in the White House Despite their monumental victory, president-elect Joe Biden and vice president-elect Kamala Harris have their work cut out to ensure the future is as vibrant, just and sustainable as possible Photo by Tabrez Syed on Unsplash As news agencies across the US declared former vice president Joe Biden the winner of the 2020 presidential election on Saturday, a tsunami of hope swept across the country. Yet as the incoming administration sets about trying to build a better future, it faces a monumental task. The past four years have brought us closer than ever to the edge of a future that is in danger of crumbling beneath our feet; not just through the lying, the conspiracy theories and the blatant disregard for evidence, reason and basic human rights, but through a confluence of factors that are threatening to undermine our very ability to create the type of future we aspire to. With coronavirus continuing to kill thousands of people each day and infect hundreds of thousands more, we’re being starkly reminded of how hard it is to simply “science” our way out of complex challenges. Yet the cracks at our metaphorical feet as we stand on the edge of tomorrow are as much a product of our social, political and technological behaviors as they are our science. More than ever it seems, we’re indulging our baser instincts to ignore the evidence in front of us and marginalize and persecute those who don’t look and think like us on a grand scale. Whether this is manifest in extremism, nationalism, or a self-righteous dismissal of “wrong-thinkers” — meaning, simply, people who don’t share our worldview — it is becoming harder to work together toward building a better future. And to top it all, we’re becoming so wrapped up in our capacity to innovate that we’re losing any semblance of ability to make smart choices between what we can do, and what we should — either as individuals, as communities and organizations, or as a society. These are all symptomatic of deeper tensions between our collective ability to influence and change the future, and our capacity to do this effectively. And they are tensions that we will only be able to address through re-evaluating our relationship with the future, and our responsibility to it. Re-evaluating our Relationship with the Future My work cuts across multiple areas of expertise and practice to better understand the complex relationship between past and future. And as it does, I’m constantly reminded of how hard it is to ensure that social, technological and political advances don’t end up causing more harm than good. Climate change, as its driven along by our technological recklessness, is a stark reminder of this. But so are the injustices that millions of people face every day that result from ill-considered political decisions, or poorly thought-through good intentions, or even technologies that threaten what is of value to them in the name of progress. Unfortunately, while we can recode DNA, design new materials atom by atom, and create machines that may one day surpass human intelligence, we are still remarkably adept as a species at preventing all too many people from reaching the futures they aspire to. Because of this, if we are to learn to use our immense capabilities more responsibly — and avoid potentially catastrophic failures arising from our short-sightedness — we need to better-understand our relationship with the future, and our individual and collective roles in ensuring that what comes next is better than the past. As with human relationships, this will not be easy. Yet if we better-understand how the intertwined threads that define who we are come together to make us supremely talented architects of the future, we can learn how to become better architects of that future. Escaping the Shackles of Conventional Thinking These threads reflect our imagination, our understanding, and our inventiveness. But they also encapsulate our very humanity — our beliefs, our desires, our joys and our fears, our eccentricities and irrationalities, and our ability to see and feel the world through the eyes of others. The very complexity of how these threads surround, intersect with and influence one another creates vulnerabilities that are near-impossible to see through the lens of conventional thinking. To navigate this landscape, we need to be bold enough to depart from conventional ways of understanding the world. This will include learning how to be informed by disciplines without being bound by them, and becoming skilled at blending and leverage expertise in novel ways. It will also mean embracing creativity, playfulness and serendipity, as we open ourselves to new ideas and opportunities. At the same time, we need to infuse our thinking and actions with a level of humility and care for others that, too often, seems to elude us. Only by doing this will we be able to avoid the pitfalls of the past and see ways forward to building a vibrant and just future that is resilient, agile, and full of promise. A Pathway Forward As the Biden/Harris team prepares to enter the White House, this is perhaps one of the largest challenges they will face. Of course, cleaning up the chaos of the past four years, finding a pathway to a post-coronavirus future, and placing the US on an economically and environmentally sustainable footing, are all critically important short-term goals. Yet even these will not be possible without pressing the reset button on how we think about the future, and our relationship with it. With new leadership, new ideas, and a new respect for the people and society they serve, I sincerely hope that the Biden/Harris administration will rise to the challenge of pressing this reset button and rethinking our relationship with the future. If they do, there’s every chance that we’ll have new opportunities to work together toward a future that is more just, more vibrant, and more sustainable — for everyone, not just a privileged few.

['Society', 'Technology', 'Future', 'Science', 'Election 2020']

The Last Guide to Social Media You Will Ever Need — in a 3-Minute Read Follow these brutally honest 22 tips to get followers, money, and fame Photo by Modern Affliction on Unsplash As the resident douchebag that is asked to give social media advice to every man/woman and their dog — because of a tiny bit of success online that was mostly an accident — it literally kills me to have the conversation. Dudes in suits want to know the secret to social media so they can make money from it. Their intention is selfish, which is part of the problem. They call me in and ask the following: How do we do content? Do we build a brand? What’s the strategy? How do we get customers? What’s our story? These questions make my eyes bleed and my tongue slide to the back of my throat, blocking my airway and causing a resuscitation event to occur. First of all, strategy kills social media. Second, the word content takes a beautiful piece of art and turns it into a lifeless, soulless, dry, cold, heartless act that blocks the world from ever hearing what you’re trying to say.

['Social Media', 'Marketing', 'Creativity', 'Content Marketing', 'Writing']

Write Because You Must Every other reason is secondary Photo by user28856488 — licensed via Freepik premium Ask a thousand writers why they write, and you’ll hear plenty of varying answers. Among them will be terms like “side hustle” and “to help others.” But there’s really only one reason to put pen to paper — ehh, fingertips to letter keys — because you must. I started Write, I Must to arm passionate storytellers with insights and tools they need and as a place for writers with others who feel the same need to get words out of their heads. There are thousands of books on the art of writing. Still, growth happens when we get rejected, figure out what went wrong, rework if necessary, and resubmit. Confession: I get just as much out of publication as the readers. Tom Beck’s 7 Benefits of Writing by Hand reminds me of my college days when penning on paper was essential during the creative and editing process. Paper and ink were expensive, and retyping stories over and over exhausting. As a former journalist, reading Cody Wiesner’s argument against the inverted pyramid was eye-opening. Side-note: journalistic writing styles aren’t just for reporters. Then there’s Toni Koraza — who goes against the grain in explaining why writers don’t need their own website. I have one, but it’s for my professional services. I never write stories there. There is a wealth of information to be learned not just from the “masters” who’ve been published by some of the largest outlets but also from those who are still finding their way to the top. We read not only to understand what editors want and how we should embrace rejection but also to learn from others’ mistakes. The most genuine writers aren’t solely looking for a paycheck. They write because they have no other option, even if it means only one person reads their work to the end. They’re motivated by claps and comments, yet don’t let these numbers define them. They write because they love the game. Why do you write? If you write to keep a roof over your family’s head or to make extra money, that’s perfectly fine. But there’s really only one core reason passionate writers tell stories — because they absolutely must.

['Self', 'Writing Tips', 'Productivity', 'Creativity', 'Writing']

“No good can ever come from deviating from the path that you were destined to follow. You will be assailed by varieties of hidden pain. Most often you deviate because of the lure of money, of more immediate prospects of prosperity. Because this does not comply with something deep within you, your interest will lag and eventually the money will not come so easily. You will search for other easy sources of money, moving further and further away from your path. Not seeing clearly ahead of you, you will end up in a dead-end career. Even if your material needs are met, you will feel an emptiness inside that you will need to fill with any kind of belief system, drugs, or diversions. There is no compromise here, no way of escaping the dynamic. You will recognize how far you have deviated by the depth of your pain and frustration. You must listen to the message of this frustration, this pain, and let it guide you…It is a matter of life and death.” — Robert Greene, Mastery

['Philosophy', 'Inspiration', 'Creativity', 'Motivation', 'Writing']

Design is the face of your product, service or content, without good designs, even if the content is amazing, there are chances that it might not appeal a larger audience to “have a look”. But, there are so many tools available on the internet which makes our lives (as a designer/front-end developer or a content creator) more easy, and I am going to talk about many of them which I use, in this blog. Did someone say “design”? It’s been so many years I’ve been making content, and taking free initiatives, and one thing that used to scare me was posters and info-graphics. I always wanted to spend my time in making content, not worrying about promotional posters, and then I started searching on Internet about tools which can help me with that, and came across some amazing ones. Slowly, I came across free and open source vectors, images, design inspirations which we can use. If you are like me, trust me, this blog is going to make your life a lot more easy ( ° ͜ʖ °) But wait, I bet there are a lot more resources out there apart from these as well, so if you come across one, do mention it in the comments as well, I will edit this article, add more and of course, I will give you proper credits. Let’s get started!

['Design', 'Productivity', 'Development', 'Content Creation', 'Design Thinking']

At first glance they have nothing in common: a streetwear brand worn by hypebeasts around the world and a regional supermarket that started in Upstate New York. But Supreme and Wegmans both inspire fanatical loyalty. And the way they do this is not complicated — they share value. Supreme shares value with their customers, while Wegmans shares value with its employees. And by doing this, both have created businesses that are hugely successful and have kept up impressive growth without watering down their brands. But why is it that others are not able to take inspiration from these examples? One word: greed. Companies agonize over optimizing pricing to get the absolute maximum that customers are willing to pay for a product at a given time. Think about airlines that are constantly changing prices to get the maximum from each individual passenger depending on how desperate they are to get somewhere. While at the same time, when it comes to employees, most companies are trying to optimize for something different. They want to pay as little as possible while still being competitive enough in the marketplace that they won’t lose all of their employees. But here’s the difference: Supreme could raise their prices, but they don’t Wegmans doesn’t have to offer such a good salary and benefits package to be “on market” for a supermarket, but they do it anyway If you are building a business you would be wise to keep their examples in mind and resist greed for your own good. Supreme “drops” leave value for their customers (and the resellers) For those who are not familiar with the brand Supreme, it is an apparel company that sells in small batches of very limited editions called “drops” that create massive lines at their stores. These drops operate on a first-come, first-served basis and all of the most in-demand products are quick to sell out. This has created a whole second-hand ecosystem of re-sellers who make a business out of waiting in these lines and getting the best stuff. They can then immediately re-sell the items at markups sometimes greater than 1000%. Yes, that is not a typo — some items really do resell for 1000%. For somebody who’s not reselling and just goes to the drops to shop for themselves, they feel like they got a great deal and it’s true: Supreme sold them something that is now worth multiples of what they just paid! And since they are so excited about this great deal, they will share their experience on social media and generate even more hype for the next drop. Now here’s where the greed kicks in for any normal company. Most executives would look at that secondary market and say: That 1000% markup is money that we are leaving on the table. We should raise our prices and capture that revenue for ourselves! But you know what happens when you take that value from the resellers and put it in your own pocket? Your products no longer sell-out immediately You lose the long lines at your stores for the drops that create exclusivity And you become just any other brand Supreme shares a lot of value with customers, so they feel like they’re always getting a good deal. And this in turn creates more demand and a bigger reseller market with higher second-hand prices. As long as this cycle is feeding itself Supreme knows they will always have a line outside their stores. Of course there are now other brands like H&M trying to copy the drop strategy, but most won’t be successful because they just won’t be willing to give away so much value. Or in the words of one Supreme reseller: “If you are flash-dropping crap, it’s still crap.” The key is not really the drop, it’s about sharing value. Wegmans (actually) values its employees Wegmans doesn’t have the global reach that Supreme does, but their customers are just as fanatically loyal. In fact, Business Insider just reported how Wegmans is America’s favorite grocery store and that thousands of people call them every year begging them to open a store in their area. And when asked about the secret to their success, Wegmans has a simple response that they gave in this Forbes article: It is our employees, and the incredible service they provide our customers, that set us apart. We hire the best, and we invest in training and development, There are no shortage of companies out there who talk about putting employees first because their employees then take good care of customers. But usually this is nothing more than talk while their behavior demonstrates something very different. But for Wegmans, investing in their people is actually a cornerstone of their strategy and pays off in loyalty from employees and in turn, loyalty from customers. In the same Forbes article, you can see just some of the tangible ways that they invest in people including structured development programs and scholarships that help people go from a part-time cashier in high school to a senior manager with college paid for along the way by Wegmans. Again, it’s easy to see how other retailers will envy the success of Wegmans. But most will never be able to replicate it, because they just aren’t willing to share as much value with their employees. It’s not a zero-sum game If there is one thing to learn from Supreme and from Wegmans it’s that running a business is not a zero-sum game. If your prices are low, you are giving value to your customers that will pay you back in other ways. And if you are paying your employees above market rates they will pay you back with loyalty and great service. Often when I’m looking at pricing with the startups that I mentor, we will do lots of analysis and try to optimize the best that we can. This is still a worthwhile exercise, but always keep this in mind: Leaving some value on the table can be a good thing. This story is published in The Startup, Medium’s largest entrepreneurship publication followed by +442,678 people. Subscribe to receive our top stories here.

['Finance', 'Marketing', 'Business', 'Startup', 'Entrepreneurship']

The Data Now that I’ve shared some of my pain with you, I should also share some of my results. As previously mentioned, from January 2018 to February 2019 there were 19,459,370 trips registered. After some cleaning, slicing, and wrangling, my final working data set was reduced to 17,437,855 trips. These are trips by subscribers only, as I decided to drop casual riders and one-day customers. Total annual membership of Citi Bike now stands at 150,929 subscribers — as per to Citi Bike’s monthly report. Let’s take a look at who they are. Who is riding Citi Bike? There isn’t much information available on each individual subscriber, but from the data, we were able to get age and gender based on aggregate ridership. These aggregations didn’t give the exact number of subscribers rather, the underlying distribution of the sample. This was a great learning opportunity to make some interactive plots using Plotly. I found that it can be a little cumbersome at first, understanding the figure hierarchy. Plotly’s graphs are stunning because even though it was built using Python and the Django framework, on the front end it uses JavaScript and the Dr.js library — so after all, I did get to use D3.js a little. The top birth year categories for subscribers are from 1987 to 1991. Let me make the disclaimer again, Citi Bike has 150, 929 subscribers today, in order to get the distribution of those subscribers I used aggregate functions on the ridership data, as you’ll see in the code snippets below. Pandas DataFrame Capturing Birth Year SQL Query Subscribers by Year of Birth Code for Interactive Plotly Bar Chart Genderwise, the majority of the riders were male. Pandas DataFrame from SQL query to identify Gender distribution An interactive bar chart showing subscribers by gender. Male (1), Female (2) How long are they riding? The average trip duration is 13 minutes, meaning that Subscribers are not riding long distances — remember, I dropped casual riders and one-time customers. We can also take a look at the average trip number of trips per day of the week, and as expected, the numbers were slightly higher during weekdays than during the weekend. Showing the difference between weekend rides and weekday commutes. An interactive plot where circle size represents the average trip duration. Finally, I was interested in the relationship between the length of the ride and the day of the year. An interactive plot showing the number of trips per day of the year. This plot gives a complete self-explanatory picture of the fluctuation in the demand for Citi Bikes throughout the year, the demand being higher in the April-October interval when the weather is warmer. This got me curious about the relationship between the weather and the number of trips in a day, so I created a new Pandas DataFrame with the weather summary for each of the days in my original DataFrame using data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. I then ran a Multiple Regression algorithm using the Scikit Learn library. Multiple Regression using Scikit Learn As it turns out, 62% of the variance in the number of trips per day can be explained by the weather. Where are they going? Some Citi Bike docking stations were certainly more popular than others. To map the most popular ones, both by start and end of the bike ride, I used the Folium library. But before I could actually make an interactive map, I ran a SQL to get the top Citi Bike dock stations by rides volume. I tried mapping all of them the first time but, eventually, the program crashed. So I decided to settle for 100. A video that captures the functionality of a Folium interactive map Code to create an interactive map using the Folium library The top 5 stations by volume of riders are: Pershing Square North with 1,576,381 trips W 21 St & 6 Ave with 1,148,192 trips E 17 St & Broadway with 1,121,953 trips Broadway & E 22 St with 109,7314 trips Broadway & E 14 St 96,901 trips To put them in context, these are dock stations near Grand Central Station, Madison Square Park, Union Square Park, and Flatiron Building. What about Bike 30657? Finally, I would like to honor the bike with the most trips this last year, Bike 30657 — you’re now wondering if you’ve ever ridden it, aren’t you?. With 2776 rides, and a total of 36,448 minutes of traveling this bike probably knows New York City better than I do. And so, as a parting gift, I’ll leave you with Bike 30657 so you can see it in action.

['Python', 'Exploratory Data Analysis', 'Plotly', 'Linear Regression', 'Data Visualization']

What’s In a Name? Our President and Chief Experience Officer, Shane B. Santiago, shares how Bravely got its name. For those of you with kids, you know how meaningful a name can be. It’s not simply a label; it’s an identity… a way you can create unique meaning for someone’s own personality, culture and sense of place in the world. That may not fit on a business card. Naming a company is no different. In this Golden Age of Entrepreneurialism, where startups abound—and new, unique names are so scarce that words are literally invented for the sake of disruption—it presents a daunting challenge. So as we formed our collective of creatives and began ideating on a name, we started with what we felt was most important to convey when we stepped out into the world: Purpose. Meaning. Value. Easy enough, right? Being an agency guy for nearly two decades, the easy solution was to slap our names on the door and call it a day. After all, it’s common practice in the ad world, and what’s more meaningful to an agency than the people who founded it? That’s where we wanted to be different. How can our name provide deeper insight into who we really are, and what value we believe we can share? We found the answer in our brand archetype. We’re explorers. Psychologist Carl Jung created archetypes as a construct to identify the primal and instinctive stories we all share through a collective unconscious and connect us as humans. Of the 12 classic archetypes, it was easy for us to lay claim to The Explorer. We started this consultancy to stray from the herd. We wanted to find adventure, and to take risks. Discovery is paramount. Freedom is our promise. This couldn’t parallel our journey more accurately. Levi’s gets us. In an industry where “there are no new ideas,” copycat creative platforms often seek to build on already-existing successes rather than truly doing something different. It’s like pitching a movie; How often have you heard big ideas pitched that sounded like “It’s like Geico-meets-Snickers-but-on-Snapchat?” I suppose there’s nothing wrong with that, if it works. But for us, our vision is to create value in doing the opposite. Testing and learning what’s successful by finding new insights. But that’s scary. Following trails blazed by successful ideas and insight isn’t a bad strategy. And we won’t completely abandon it. What we don’t want to do is become a slave to it. We can’t innovate by conforming. But when brands and clients have millions of dollars on the line, how can we convince them to take risks? By having courage. Is this how a big idea should be presented? We hope to partner with clients to be their stewards of courage. Our approach relies heavily on collaboration. We eschew the traditional creative process in which we ruminate on a brief, disappear for a few weeks, then have a “Big Reveal™®©,” in a pageant often worthy of Vanna White flourishes. Ironically, I find this often more risky in that, for decades, this process is essentially a gamble that has our adrenaline pumping in hopes that the client simply “gets” our vision. This is where we think we hit on something. By partnering with our clients throughout the process, with more frequent conversations and insight into the creative process, we’re essentially walking alongside them through the uncharted territory together. We’re like sherpas, guiding them through the adventure of discovery and innovation. Together. Not as agency-and-client. As partners. That settles it. This was a profound moment in our process. We knew we wanted our clients to allow us to take risks and try new things. That’s table stakes today for innovation. But we want to be courageous with them. As a trusted partner where dialogue creates ownership and accountability on both sides, we think magic can happen. With less risk in the process itself, it allows us to take more risks creatively. Neat, right? That was it. We decided to name ourselves not after who we are, or even what we do. Rather, we focused on how we do things. We empower our clients to have courage. Our brand identity is a commitment to that process and we wanted our name to clearly and succinctly deliver on that promise. As a result, we can confidently say, that the way we do anything — whether it’s creating a story, crafting an experience, building a product or developing a brand—is to do it Bravely.

['Marketing', 'Innovation', 'Creativity', 'Digital Marketing', 'Startup']

From a virus’s point of view, the heart is both an easy target and a terrible one. It is easy to reach and invade because it collects blood from all over the body and, unlike the brain, has no protective barrier. But infecting the heart also risks killing the host without triggering symptoms that would allow a virus to easily spread — coughing, sneezing, diarrhea, or vomiting. For that reason, viruses that affect only the heart “do not exist,” says Efraín Rivera-Serrano, a virologist at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. But viruses can incidentally affect the heart. They do so often enough that in the Western world, they are the most common cause of myocarditis. At least 20 known viruses can trigger this condition, including those that cause influenza, Zika, dengue, and measles. The list also includes the original SARS virus: One Toronto-based study found its genetic material in seven of 20 autopsied hearts. These hearts also had myocarditis. By contrast, autopsied hearts with traces of the new coronavirus typically don’t (with some exceptions). The virus was there, but whether it was actually doing anything is unclear. But a virus doesn’t need to be in the heart to wreak havoc. It can cause indirect damage by attacking the lungs and starving the heart of oxygen, or by triggering an inflammatory immune response that affects the entire body. Even viruses that primarily affect the gut (like enteroviruses) or the respiratory system (like adenoviruses) can cause myocarditis in this way, when molecules produced at the site of infection travel through the bloodstream and inflame the heart. Coxsackie B, for example, is the most widely studied cause of viral myocarditis, but is primarily a gut virus that spreads through fecal contamination; it can infect the heart, but it does much of its damage via the immune system. “To say a virus is cardiac or vascular or respiratory simplifies things too much,” says Paul Checchia, a cardiologist at Texas Children’s Hospital. “Anytime a pathogen invades the body, the whole body reacts.” SARS-CoV-2 is no exception. The immune system’s response to this coronavirus can be slow to kick off, but then prolonged and severe. These immune overreactions are similar in kind to those triggered by other respiratory viruses, like influenza, but greater in degree. The heart could potentially be caught in this stronger crossfire. But how often does that happen? In the early months of the pandemic, it seemed clear that the risk of heart injuries was “directly proportional to the severity of the illness,” says Neel Chokshi, a sports cardiologist at the University of Pennsylvania. But in July, a team led by Valentina Puntmann at University Hospital Frankfurt, in Germany, complicated that picture. The researchers showed that 78 percent of people who had recovered from COVID-19 (including many who had never been hospitalized) still had some kind of heart abnormality that was detectable on MRI scans two months later. About 60 percent still had signs of myocarditis. The study was explosive. It spawned a wave of articles and papers about the possibility that COVID-19 could inflict stealthy and prolonged harm upon the hearts of people who aren’t outwardly sick, and reportedly influenced decisions about whether college athletes should be allowed to play. These intense discussions sparked intense criticism. Other scientists slammed the study for several errors, including data that were missing, reported incorrectly, or analyzed with the wrong statistical tests. The Frankfurt team corrected its paper, and says the main conclusions still stand. “I think the data are good,” says Tiffany Chen of Penn Medicine, who specializes in cardiac imaging and was not involved in the study. “These were relatively healthy, mild cases of COVID-19, and they had a lot of abnormalities. It’s unsettling.” But the clinical implications of these findings — what they mean for COVID-19 patients whose symptoms have abated, but whose MRI scans are abnormal — aren’t yet understood, she says. Viral myocarditis isn’t always a problem. It’s entirely possible that you have had the condition at some point in your life without ever realizing it. Some people recover but have persistent scarring that weakens their heart and increases the risk of problems years down the line. And in a third group, the inflammation rapidly worsens, leading to faulty heartbeats, heart failure, or even death. The latter two outcomes are rare, but “it’s really hard to give accurate percentages,” says Chokshi. Doctors typically see cases of viral myocarditis only when they fall into the third group, and severe symptoms warrant MRIs and other diagnostic tests. “We don’t do MRIs on everyone who has the flu, so we don’t know how many have inflammation or what their long-term outcomes are,” says Martha Gulati, the cardiology chief at the University of Arizona. For example, in two small pilot studies, Checchia found signs of heart damage in 40 and 55 percent of children who were hospitalized with RSV — a common respiratory virus. “On discharge, they seemed perfectly fine,” he says. “But we couldn’t get funding to look at them months or years down the line.” Without that information, it’s hard to know what to make of the Frankfurt COVID-19 study or others like it. Yes, some patients have myocarditis — but what does that mean? How do the numbers compare to other respiratory viruses? Will COVID-19 patients with myocarditis recover fully, or will some have long-term problems? Is this virus doing something strange, or are researchers just studying it more intensely than other viral infections? For now, it’s difficult to say. The worry is that COVID-19 is doing whatever it’s doing at scale. The original SARS epidemic of 2003 infected only 8,000 people, killed slightly fewer than 800, and was over in three months; its impact on the heart was “lost in the historical bin of the scientific literature,” says Checchia. SARS-CoV-2, by contrast, has infected at least 31 million people and killed at least 960,000. Its effects are thousands of times more obvious than its predecessor’s. Even if it’s no worse than any other viral illness, its sheer scope means that a tiny risk of severe long-term problems would still translate to a lot of failing hearts. Reassuringly, “there hasn’t been an obvious influx of patients being admitted to the hospital with unexplained myocarditis, despite the huge numbers who have had COVID-19,” says Venkatesh Murthy, a cardiologist at the University of Michigan. “I don’t find it convincing that there is a major amount of serious clinically relevant myocarditis in people who are feeling well.” Still, he and others say that long-term studies are important. “We’re still early,” says Chen. “I don’t think there’s a defined time point when we’d expect to see heart failure, so we have to follow these patients for months or years down the road.” That can be unnerving for people who are currently sick. Long-haulers, who are struggling with months of debilitating COVID-19 symptoms, are “responding to the media’s interpretation of these studies and, to put it bluntly, are rightfully freaking out,” said Kontorovich, who is part of a team that provides care for long-haulers. But for now, she sees the myocarditis issue and the long-hauler phenomenon as separate matters. Some long-haulers have been diagnosed with dysautonomia — a group of disorders that disrupt involuntary bodily functions, including heartbeats (which can become inexplicably fast) and blood pressure (which can suddenly crash). But people who have lingering heart problems after viral myocarditis don’t usually experience the chronic symptoms that long-haulers do, and they typically have measurable changes to their hearts that long-haulers don’t. “There may be a connection, but it hasn’t been proved,” Kontorovich said. College athletes are also facing immediate decisions. In just the past two months, the 27-year-old basketball player Michael Ojo died from a heart attack during a practice, while the 20-year-old football player Jamain Stephens Jr. died from a blood clot in his heart. Both had previously contracted COVID-19. In a recent study, a research team at the Ohio State University scanned the hearts of 26 college athletes who tested positive for COVID-19 and had mild or absent symptoms. Four of them — 15 percent — had signs of myocarditis. But the Ohio study didn’t examine a control group of similar athletes who didn’t have COVID-19, and even healthy athletes experience changes in their heart as they train, including features that are “similar to what you might see with infections or scarring,” says Gulati, the cardiologist at the University of Arizona. If athletes come down with clinical myocarditis — that is, with obvious signs of heart problems — they’re taken out of play for at least three months to let the infection run its course and to give the heart a chance to bounce back. The question now is: What to do about the people who have subclinical myocarditis after COVID-19, which presents with no symptoms and can be seen only on a medical scanner? Chokshi, the sports cardiologist, says the risk that these abnormalities will lead to heart failure “is very, very low,” but “the outcome is catastrophic.” The American College of Cardiology published guidance advising that all athletes who test positive for COVID-19 rest for at least two weeks, even if they show no symptoms. Setting myocarditis aside, it still makes sense to stop players from spreading the virus to one another, especially when so many colleges are facing large outbreaks. “There are plenty of reasons to not play football independent of this issue,” Murthy says. “We already have plenty of evidence to take COVID-19 seriously.”

['Health', 'Science', 'Long Covid', 'Coronavirus', 'Covid 19']

Why You Need to Write More Than One Headline Hone your skill for writing brilliant headlines quickly Illustration by Cynthia Marinakos. How many headlines do you write for one article? I used to write one in a few seconds, impatient to publish after spending hours, days, sometimes weeks, to finish a draft. I treated headlines more like an insignificant crowd extra, rather than the star of the show. That was a stupid thing to do. I now realize I wrote mediocre headlines most of the time. I was being selfish and impatient. You see, when you write vague or clever headlines that don’t serve your reader — they’ll ignore you. The most important person in all our worlds — is ourselves. That is true for us. And for our reader. They want something. They’ve got to figure out how to earn more money. How to get more sh*t done. How to start a side hustle because they hate their job. They want to be more creative. To figure out how to get fitter, redecorate their homes, get their kids off sugar. Your reader — your customer — is here because they have a challenge and they want the solution so they can have an easier, happier, less stressful life. Your headline needs to tell them it’s worth them reading the next line. And the next. And the next. Headlines are essential in every writer’s toolbox. In every marketer’s toolbox. Like any tool, it can’t be used well unless you’ve learned how to use it. To use it skillfully, you’ve got to put in a consistent and focused effort. You’ve got to write more than one headline. Here are five tips to get you going.

['Writing', 'Business', 'Productivity', 'Headline Hacks', 'Creativity']

Generating waveforms from Spotify tracks is the first problem I tackled when putting together this prototype. I ended up using the Spotify Platform’s Audio Analysis endpoint to get the loudness levels of the track and then simplify that data into an array of values I could use to dynamically generate the waveform using canvas. Rather than generate this data every time a user visits the app, this prototype caches the waveform data for each visited track once for future visits. I have also provided a CodePen on how the final waveform was generated. Spotify Player Typically when I build custom Spotify player interfaces, I use their Web Playback SDK because it allows you to simply stream full tracks to premium Spotify users who authenticate with your app. The big issue with this SDK is that it doesn’t work on mobile devices currently. In an attempt to make this solution more accessible, I turned to the Spotify Connect Web API. Instead of being able to stream full tracks through your web app like the Web Playback SDK, the Connect Web API allows you to remotely control an open piece of Spotify software on one of your user’s devices. This API can be pretty temperamental but when it works, it’s a decent solution. Spotify Comments The comments solution I put together for this web app draws from the Spotify powered chat solution I developed for the Future Islands project. This app also uses Spotify’s Implicit Grant Flow to authenticate users via a popup. Users must also be authenticated in this way to use the Connect Web API. Once authenticated, users may tap into the text input to begin writing a message. When the input is focused, they may use an avatar slider on the waveform to position their comment on the timeline. Posted comments are sent to an awaiting Serverless endpoint and added to a DynamoDB. These comments are stored with the timestamp of their position on the timeline so they may be visually placed on the waveform again. What’s Next? For this particular prototype, I had the thought of making the comments come through in real time like the Future Island’s chat but that is likely something I’ll investigate later. The point of this experiment was to further explore what social features built off the Spotify Platform could look like. Through experiments such as this and in my client work, I hope to continue to investigate this topic. I hope the information shared proves useful to you as well and I’d love to hear what you think and more importantly, what you build. Happy hacking.

['Marketing', 'Design', 'Spotify', 'Programming', 'Music']

There are some pieces that you never really expect to write. Whether it’s geophagy, or people literally eating dirt, drinking blood to prevent aging, or just the ongoing saga about whether meat is deadly or perfectly curative for health, there are a lot of topics that I’ve covered over the years that are, well, a bit strange. And yet, in some ways this feels like the strangest. If you’d told me in 2019 that we’d be debating the benefits of an anti-malarial medication for pandemic disease despite a mountain of evidence that it didn’t work, I’d probably have giggled nervously and walked away. Stock photo search results for “nervous” are…odd, to say the least. Source: Pexels Which brings us to hydroxychloroquine (HCQ). One of the strangest stories that I have ever written. It probably doesn’t work for coronavirus. We knew that some time ago. But somehow, it’s still a debate to be had. The Evidence Back in the heady days of early 2020, before we had all locked down and politicized medications, HCQ was just another drug that people thought might be useful for COVID-19. There were dozens, even hundreds, of proposed treatments, so one more drug didn’t seem like a big deal — we could test it, see if it worked, and then use or discard it just like all the others. Pictured: Not special. Drugs usually aren’t. Source: Pexels And we did do those tests. Massive, well-conducted studies, with appropriate scientific controls that looked at the question of whether HCQ helped with coronavirus. The results are in, so what did they find? Hydroxychloroquine probably doesn’t work for coronavirus. It doesn’t help people who have severe illness. It doesn’t prevent illness in high-risk groups. There’s no evidence it benefits people with mild disease either, even in combination with azithromycin. There’s still a bit of a question mark over whether HCQ might reduce the risk of getting the disease for people who are low-risk, but the initial results are not looking good. Now, you can take those results as you like, but it’s worth noting that these are really quite impressive trials. Running a properly controlled randomized study of over a thousand people in less than six months is an immensely impressive work, and the findings are both stark and uncompromising: HCQ probably doesn’t benefit COVID-19, and may be harmful. As certain right-wing pundits like to say, facts don’t care about your feelings. Political Problems Thing is, the facts aren’t going to stop this debate. Our well-developed hierarchy of evidence, going from expert opinion (mostly useless) to controlled, randomized research (very useful), means very little in the face of the HCQ discussion. Because, you see, it’s not really about the science. Pictured: Science, probably Source: Pexels If it was about the science, we’d have discarded HCQ months ago along with the other medications that have failed to show a benefit (anyone remember ritonavir?). Instead, we have people dividing their opinions over political lines — if you are right-wing, in certain places in the world, you support HCQ. This is, to say the least, a very unusual state of affairs. It’s rare that you have a tug-of-war between political parties about whether a drug works. The problem, to a great degree, appears to come back to whether government interventions are necessary to combat COVID-19. People who are against lockdowns and similar interventions point to HCQ and say “look, no need for the government to do anything, we have this miracle cure right here!”. The fact that there are no miracle cures, and that HCQ has very little good evidence recommending it, could never get in the way of what is essentially an ideological argument. Which is why, in the comments, you’d expect to see a bunch of people calling me left-wing, a socialist, demon spawn etc. Not because I’m wrong, but because the drug has taken on a life outside of the questions about whether it works or not. People will probably accuse me of being in the pockets of pharmaceutical companies because HCQ is cheap (and thus I MUST be getting paid to write this), ignoring the fact that I happily accept the similarly good evidence showing that dexamethasone can prevent death in severe cases of COVID-19 and it’s cheap as chips. Honestly, it’s all a bit tiresome. So, no, hydroxychloroquine probably doesn’t work for COVID-19. Of course, it’s possible that new evidence will come to light disproving the studies done so far, but at this point it really is quite unlikely. We can hope that the debate will finally be laid to rest, but since it’s no longer about facts it’s probably never going to happen. If you enjoyed, follow me on Medium, Twitter or Facebook!

['Covid 19', 'Hydroxy Chloroquine', 'Health', 'Science', 'Coronavirus']

Have you ever worked on a puzzle or attempted to solve a problem to the point of frustration, only to step away for a while, take a break, and have the solution seemingly “pop up” out of nowhere? Chances are, you’ve probably had this experience at least once in life, even if it was only in regards to something trivial — such as a video game task or a minor problem at the home or office. The world has taken to calling such moments “Aha!” moments, and recent research suggests that rather than being a phenomenon exclusive to “creative geniuses,” anyone can take steps to improve the likelihood that they will have these experiences. For the purposes of this piece, I’m interested in elaborating upon the process of “creative incubation,” which is when we give our brain time to process what it has learned — away from the hard work we put in to actually “feed” it information. “Aha!” moments usually arise after a period of incubation, when our brain has been given sufficient idle time to work on a problem below the surface of conscious attention, where subconscious neural processes dominate. The tendency for our brains to discover solutions when our conscious awareness is diverted from the problem we’re trying to solve has long confounded researchers and laypersons alike. How could it be that we solve a puzzle without “trying” to solve it? Surely, the more rational side of ourselves would posit that we need to work out each and every step of a solution linearly (as we would a math problem) until we arrive at the correct solution. Yet that’s not always what happens — even in the logical domain of math. Sometimes, a difficult problem confounds even the most skilled mathematician, in which case a solution pops into her head only after she takes some time away from the whiteboard. Because of this, our culture has tended to shroud its geniuses under a cloak of mystery. Unfortunately, this had led many to believe that the same processes that happen in their brains can’t happen in their own. Because of its mysterious quality, incubation has often been thought the most creative part of the entire process. The conscious sequences can be analyzed, to a certain extent, by the rules of logic and rationality. But what happens in the “dark” spaces defies ordinary analysis and evokes the original mystery shrouding the work of genius: One feels almost the need to turn to mysticism, to invoke the voice of the Muse as an explanation. — Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Modern research, however, is demystifying this process — if only a little bit. We now know that both the more conscious, linear approach toward solving problems and the more nonlinear, subconscious element is necessary when it comes to working through difficult problems. Creative incubation is a factor in the latter element — the subconscious. But it’s necessary for me to stop right here and make one, essential clarification: there are no short-cuts or easy methods of becoming a more creative individual or a better problem solver. The brain is a miraculous organ, one that modern science has still barely scratched the surface of when it comes to understanding its connection-making abilities. Even so, the only way to enhance our creativity and tackle difficult problems is through rigorous practice — we cannot rely on idle time or the brain’s subconscious processes alone. In other words, while it is true that our brains have an undiscovered potential, without our conscious effort to unlock that potential, we will remain stagnant. It might be accurate to say that the “trying” is as important as the “not trying.” The mathematician discovers the solution to a challenging problem only after having made the attempt to solve it at the whiteboard — and after the hours and even years of work required to learn the language of mathematics. Likewise, it is difficult to imagine anyone creating their own song using a guitar without first putting in the necessary hours it takes to master the motions needed to play the notes on the instrument with grace and precision. In the same way, the brain — for as marvelous as it is — only gives in proportion to what it is given, by way of the time we set aside for learning new knowledge and practicing its practical applications. In other words, for creative incubation to take place, we need to supply our brain with a whole lot of dots that it can form connections between. Otherwise, idle time is just idle time — there isn’t necessarily anything productive to be gained from it. That being said, anyone interested in practicing self-improvement, learning a new skill, or becoming a better problem-solver at home or in the workplace should be encouraged by the insights offered by recent research into the nature of creativity and how the brain produces it. It’s no longer necessary to sell ourselves short under the belief that we simply aren’t “intelligent” enough to discover the limits of our own creative potential. We may or may not make a huge impact on the world by becoming creative, but we can certainly make a huge impact on our own lives. So, how can we ensure that we strike the right balance between conscious effort and subconscious idle time? Well, it helps to think about the importance of rest, relaxation, and taking breaks, even as one strives to maximize their productivity. In our culture, we have tended to value the idea of the workaholic — someone who prizes work above all else and looks down on leisure time. In the long run, however, denying ourselves leisure time actually hampers our creativity and problem-solving abilities. You’ll know this is true if you think back to a time you tried for hours on end to solve a difficult problem — such as fixing a household appliance, car, or something of that nature — to the point where your brain felt like mush. I’ve experienced that several times over the course of my life in relation to troubleshooting computer issues or school-related problems. At some point, we actually become less productive and more likely to make mistakes or go around in circles without ever making any progress on the task at hand. It’s when we feel to begin that way that it’s time to take a break. Simply being aware of the importance of rest and relaxation — as well as society’s imbalanced work culture — is enough to start getting ourselves back in touch with our more creative sides by allowing our brain the time it needs to process information and events. Although it sounds like something a workaholic would do, it can be helpful to think of rest time as being worthy of its own spot on our schedules. Setting aside a few hours a week to simply do nothing, or enjoy some passive entertainment — such as Netflix or scrolling through social media — isn’t a bad thing provided said time is used intelligently to make our self-improvement practice more holistic. Better yet, we could take breaks by doing activities that are less passive yet still considered “leisurely” — such as playing a musical instrument. As long as we enjoy the activity such that it feels like a break from what we consider to be “work,” then it can be considered idle time. Then who knows? Maybe you’ll start having more “Aha!” moments yourself! Just remember to always have healthy expectations. As Mihaly points out, the more significant the problem we are trying the solve, the more conscious work we will need to put in to give our brain enough material with which to produce a solution. How long a period of incubation is needed varies depending on the nature of the problem. It may range from a few hours to several weeks and even longer. — Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi Fixing a minor computer glitch is one thing, figuring out a coherent, testable theory of quantum gravity is quite another. The former might require that we only take a fifteen-minute break to rest up before going back at it, whereas the latter might take a person’s entire lifetime in conjunction with the lifetimes of several other people who have worked on the same problem. One thing is clear, however. In order to “exercise” our creativity, we need to make sure that our conscious efforts to solve problems and produce novel ideas are balanced with ample leisure time in which our brain’s subconscious neural activities can work on the same problem “beneath the surface” so to speak. So when thinking about our self-improvement/productivity journeys, we need to value both dedicated learning and practice, as well as the leisure time our brain needs to form new connections. If you ask me, that’s the best of both worlds! I think few people want all of their time to feel “leisurely.” On the flip side, most people don’t want their entire lives to feel like “work.” Luckily for us, creativity dwells between these seemingly opposed poles. We have only to shift between them.

['Creativity', 'Growth Hacking', 'Neuroscience', 'Self Improvement', 'Productivity']

Hybrid Cloud Strategy brings the best of both worlds into the realm of cloud computing. Here, you can use both public and private clouds in your infrastructure. While developing the services for this kind of architecture, one thing to keep in mind is their interoperability. That means services on the public cloud should seamlessly work with the services that reside on the private cloud and vice versa. Once the interoperability of services is taken care of, it opens the door to countless benefits that you can get from this type of hybrid implementation. You can utilize the scalability and portability of the public cloud infrastructure, while at the same time, maintaining the security of the sensitive data of the company, firewalled against in your private cloud on-premise. Choosing the right combination of clouds The selection of an Infrastructure-as-a-Service provider is dependent on your usage type. There are multiple numbers of criteria that one may need to look at before choosing an ideal provider. Some of which are - Robustness of the platform Security on the network Whether they are following best practices or not Their SLA Flexibility for the developers How easily the integration can be done Interoperability with the private or other cloud platforms Usability Functionality The order of these criteria entirely depends on your use case. To rearrange this list according to your priority. “Moving Computation is Cheaper than moving data” Once you are using the cloud, you will be storing a huge amount of data online. According to the principle of “code moving to data”, if your code is smaller (which typically is) as compared to the data you have, It is wise to move your code to the cloud rather than moving your data to the code. By moving code to the cloud, every node will be able to replicate it for its own execution independent of others. Hence it will decrease any latency significantly because there is no need to send code on demand. Observability, Monitoring, and Analytics When you are running an IT business as complex as a nation, you need an eagle’s eye to capture every detail of what’s happening within your workflow. And this comes with the integration of the right tools into your infrastructure. Tools that can help you track a system’s health in microseconds, so whenever any catastrophe happens, you know where to look. In any case, as I said prior, we are managing the “complex” frameworks here. That implies we will manage the BigData. Each endeavor has its own inclinations and nobody needs to be controlled by the pre-planned UI given by a product. Henceforth, you should search for stages that can furnish you with an adaptable lightweight UI where the portrayal of factual or authentic information is in your own hands. Tools that let you structure incredible dashboards for continuous synopsis and summarizations. Along with all this, drill-down capabilities for exploring multi-dimensional data is crucial in any reporting tool for gaining more helpful insights. This feature not only reduces the load from the server by not sending all of the data at once but also helps us see the bigger picture.

['Business', 'Technology', 'Cloud Computing', 'Startup', 'Software Engineering']

But, even though we don’t evenly distribute all of our activities amongst all our devices, we still do a little of everything on all our devices. Maybe we do most of our social media on our phone, but we also do a lot of social media on our laptop. Maybe we do most of our email on our computer, but we also do email on our tablet. The problem with this is, it exposes us to path dependency, gone rogue. If we take a wrong turn, we end up on the wrong road. Once we’re on the wrong road, it takes that much longer to get where we’re trying to go. Think of it this way: You can do a lot of things with a toothbrush. You can scrub your teeth with a toothbrush. You can also scrub your toilet with a toothbrush. But would you scrub your teeth and your toilet with the same brush? No! So why use the same device to do two things that are completely at odds with one another? Why surf the web with the same device you use to write? Why chat with your friends on the same device you use to meditate? You need to split up. You need a Device Divorce. You need to make it easy to get to the places you want to go, and hard take a wrong turn to the places you don’t want to go. A simple exercise to begin your Device Divorce To begin a Device Divorce, try this exercise: Draw three columns on a piece of paper. At the top of each of the respective three columns, write laptop, tablet, and smartphone. Now, in the respective column, write down the activities that you primarily do on each of these devices. Do you see any contradictions? If you go down one path to do one of these things, will that take you farther and farther from another path to do another thing? Will it break your focus? Will it dampen your momentum? Will it alter your mental state to go down Instagram Alley instead of Scrivener Circle? If so, you aren’t using your devices, your devices are using you. Next, make a decision. Decide what activities you will do on each of the three devices. But, just as important, decide which activities you will not do on each of these three devices. My personal device arsenal Me, I do most of my writing on my iPad, with an external keyboard. I do not do email on my iPad. I do not do messaging on my iPad. I try to do as much email as I can on my iPhone. But, I don’t have Twitter or Facebook installed on my iPhone. I’d be taking wrong turns, left and right. My laptop, I simply try to limit its usage as much as possible. My laptop is a “slippy” tool. Too many side roads and detours. Your Device Divorce doesn’t have to stop at your primary electronic devices. According to a poll I did on Twitter, three out of four of you already have an extra tablet or smartphone just lying around. These old devices often can’t run the latest software (thank you, planned obsolescence). But just because a device can’t do everything, doesn’t mean it can’t do something.

['Productivity', 'Technology', 'Writing', 'Self Improvement', 'Creativity']

Can I Write One Good Sentence? The brilliant advice F. Scott Fitzgerald never actually gave Photo by Peter Pryharski on Unsplash In the early 20th century, the most important man in the world of American literature wasn’t an author. His name was Maxwell Perkins. Perkins was an editor at Scribner, a publishing house in New York City. In 1919, he signed a young, unknown author, making a big bet on aspiring talent against the will of his seniors at the company. The author he signed was F. Scott Fitzgerald, who would go on to write and publish The Great Gatsby in cooperation with Perkins. One year after Gatsby, which wouldn’t sell well for the next 15 years, Perkins met and signed another author of questionable status: Ernest Hemingway. After the two books they worked on together — The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms — found commercial successes, Perkins became the most sought after editor in the country. The 2016 movie Genius tells the story of Perkins and another prodigious discovery of his: Thomas Wolfe. Wolfe was the son Perkins, who had five daughters, always longed for. He was poetic, passionate, and notoriously incapable of cutting a single word from his flowery prose. In other words, he was a writer through and through. As an editor, one of Perkins’ main responsibilities was to cut the inessential. He did so for all of his writers but for none more than Wolfe. His first novel, Look Homeward, Angel, went from 294,000 words to 234,000 under Perkins’ guidance — and it sold like hotcakes. Taking the feedback of “write more” a bit too literally, Wolfe turned around and produced another manuscript: The 5,000-page draft for Of Time and the River, which him and Perkins fought over for two years before it finally saw the light of day. Then, despite the book’s success, a trauma befell Wolfe that catches every writer at some point: Wolfe got writer’s block. For months, he was unable to put pen to paper. Eventually, he took a long, solo trip all the way to California, where, among other things, he visited Fitzgerald. I doubt the scene played out as depicted in the movie, but the advice he gave Wolfe — no doubt inspired by Perkins’ dedication as an editor — is priceless nonetheless: Thomas Wolfe: “More and more I trouble myself with that, the legacy. Will anyone care about Thomas Wolfe in 100 years? 10 years?” F. Scott Fitzgerald: “When I was young, I asked myself that question everyday. Now, I ask myself, ‘Can I write one good sentence?’” For any writer, there are more ifs and thens and whats and whens to obsess over than hours in the day. What if no one cares about my idea? Will the book sell once it’s out? When can I make a living from my craft? What does it all amount to? Will I leave behind a legacy? There is no quicker way to obliterate your ability to chain words together than to hop on this never-ending merry-go-round of hypotheticals. Instead, as Perkins drilled into his authors when fighting with them over every word, as Fitzgerald finally realized after years of failure, dedicate your obsession to the micro. Forget the book, the chapter, even the page and the very next paragraph. Ask one question and one question alone. The only question that matters: Can I write one good sentence? Even if the encounter was fictional, even if Fitzgerald never said these words, there’s a high chance he had internalized them regardless. How do I know? Well, the other grand disciple of Perkins, Hemingway, left us with the exact same advice. It’s a famous line that’s been quoted countless times: “Write the truest sentence that you know.” What did this mean for Hemingway? He explains it to us in the paragraph the quote is from — the majority of which most quoters omit: Sometimes when I was starting a new story and could not get it going, I would sit in front of the fire and squeeze the peel of the little oranges into the edge of the flame and watch the sputter of blue that they made. I would stand and look out over the roofs of Paris and think, “Do not worry. You have always written before and you will write now. All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.” So finally I would write one true sentence, and then go on from there. As Nick Wignall notes, it is the throwing-orange-peel-into-the-fire part that is most crucial to understanding the advice. “That was his one true sentence that lead to his now famous ‘Write one true sentence’ quote,” Wignall writes. It was the only thing he knew to be true at the time: When I have writer’s block, I toss fruit into a fire. So that’s where he began. Your next, first, final sentence being true is all nice and well, but, going back to Fitzgerald’s version of the tip, we now must ask: Is it also a good sentence? Undoubtedly, Hemingway’s messy eating habits meet those criteria. There’s color, there’s fruit, there’s fire. Fire is dangerous. Fruit is a symbol of life. The colors change, and so does the situation. Feeding orange peel to the flames is not an everyday occurrence. See how many more metaphors we already extracted from this one line? You can imagine the scene as funny — an enraged Hemingway hurling oranges into his fireplace — or deeply thoughtful — the mindless flick of a finger causes a blue spark and loud crackle as Hemingway turns back to his desk. That is one heck of a sentence. Did Hemingway know when he wrote it? Doubtful. But he trusted the truth, and he deliberated on it long enough to stick with his decision — and that made all the difference. Unfortunately for Wolfe, he never got to practice the advice he received from Fitzgerald. Weeks after his visit, he died of tuberculosis at just 37 years old. He did, however, leave behind a legacy — and a letter to his former editor, Maxwell Perkins: I shall always think of you and feel about you the way it was that Fourth of July day three years ago when you met me at the boat, and we went out on the cafe on the river and had a drink and later went on top of the tall building, and all the strangeness and the glory and the power of life and of the city was below. Now that’s a good sentence. I think you should write one.

['Writing Tips', 'Writing', 'Creativity', 'Books', 'Art']

I believe I am as conscious as anyone. When I am awake and my eyes are open, I see a stable, colorful, and continuous world all around me, and that world doesn’t wobble when my eyes move. This fact alone suggests that I am experiencing consciousness, because what I am perceiving transcends the visual signals my retinas are receiving. Those signals are messy, in part because eyes move almost continuously and in part because the retina includes an area — the scotoma — that doesn’t react to light; it is a blind spot that is somehow getting filled in by my brain. My other senses also help me perceive a rich and orderly world which is, I am fairly sure, being constructed by my brain — more evidence that I am “conscious.” I am also reasonably good — as good as one can be, anyway, which isn’t very good — at picturing things from my past: people I used to know, places I have visited, the room I slept in when I was four. I can also imagine things I have never seen, even things that could never exist: the Eiffel Tower upside-down, Donald Trump with three heads, a line of people a mile long waiting to take advantage of the free food offer at the Russian Tea Room in New York (now there is a fantasy). I also talk to myself a great deal. And, yes, I also experience a wide range of feelings — as wide, I believe, as anyone feels. At the moment, I am mainly feeling nervous about all the criticism I will get from various “experts” about the content of the essay I am now writing. So, do I qualify? Do I seem to you to be conscious, or at least to be a good liar who knows what to say to convince people I am conscious? Let’s assume the former, at least for the moment, so I can get on with things. My world has always been full of mysteries, such as: What happens to the thousands of tons of rubber that wear off the tires of our cars and trucks every year? Why isn’t it piling up on the sides of our roads, blocking the views of our houses? And: If I hang upside down every day, will I get taller or at least stop shrinking as I get older? For much of my adult life, I have also wondered about something that is supposed to be mysterious but that has never seemed so to me: Why, for centuries, have people considered consciousness to be something beyond human understanding? Now don’t get me wrong. By “people,” I don’t mean people in general. Most people don’t think much about consciousness, other than having some dim awareness of the fact that alcohol and drugs screw it up and, of course, that sleep or a good head bashing temporarily turn it off. And then there is death, of course. No, by “people,” I mean a special class of people who are paid — at least a few of them are paid — to sit around and think about everything and then debate each other about their thoughts and then, in some cases, train other people to think about things exactly the same way they do. You know, academics. For at least two millennia now, such people, and especially the philosophers among them, have insisted (a) that consciousness is one of the greatest mysteries in the world and (b) that they have solved or at least shed light on this mystery, each in his or her own special way. I could at this point try to impress you with what a dedicated scholar I am by summarizing and then criticizing the views of Aristotle and Augustine, Dennett and Descartes, Heidegger and Hume, Hegel and Nagel, Kant and Carnap, James and Jaynes, Plato and Penrose, Russell and Ryle, and on and on and on. The list of scholars who have weighed in on consciousness is so impressive and diverse that sometimes I think people write about consciousness just to get on a list with Plato and Aristotle on it. Perhaps that is why I am writing this article now! Instead of slogging through the list, however, I will simply suggest you watch a popular 2014 TED talk by the Australian philosopher, David Chalmers — perhaps the leading consciousness expert in the world. In a mere 18 minutes, he will confirm three things for you: (a) that he believes consciousness is “the most mysterious phenomenon in the universe” (not just one of the most mysterious phenomena, and not just on planet Earth), (b) that “we are well on our way to a serious theory” of consciousness — a statement he has repeated in various forms for more than 20 years now, and, unfortunately, (c) that he actually has no idea what consciousness is or how it works. At least that is I how interpret the video; you make up your own mind. Chalmers is a champion of the “panpsychism” view of consciousness, according to which consciousness is a property of everything in the universe — and since we are part of the universe — well, there you are. Got it? He also says consciousness is like “a movie playing in your head.” And then there is Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose’s neural theory of consciousness, according to which consciousness arises from the vibrations of millions of microtubules in the neurons of the brain. Philosopher Patricia Churchland has labeled this the “pixie dust” theory of consciousness, which I think sums up the flaws of the theory nicely. How does moving consciousness to small structures in brain cells shed any light on it? Consciousness theorists routinely commit at least one of three analytical errors when formulating their theories — often, all three. The first is the reification error. That is when we start to treat some phenomenon as a thing, even though it is not. When Einstein and his contemporaries began speculating about the existence of subatomic particles, they were not committing this error; they believed these particles existed, and subsequent research confirmed their speculations in some respects. When we start to treat “consciousness” as a thing, however, we are reifying. Consciousness is not a thing, a place, or a world — more on this later. The second error is autocentrism, which I define as excessive focusing on the experience of being “me.” Humans have routinely impeded the progress of science by putting some aspect of themselves into the center of things. In the 1600s, Galileo was punished by the Catholic Church for defending Copernicus’ assertion that the earth is not the center of the universe (“geocentrism”). “Eurocentrism,” which, among other things, means imposing European values on the rest of the world, has distorted thinking and theories in anthropology, sociology, literature, and other fields. Psychology, my own field, was troubled by another kind of centrism called “anthropomorphism” — the attributing of human characteristics to nonhumans. We just love focusing on ourselves, sometimes to our detriment. The third error is an extreme form of autocentrism I call cognicentrism: focusing specifically on the importance of one’s own cognitive experiences, as if one’s thought processes had some special significance. Modern scientific psychology was launched in 1879 by a cognicentric German scientist named Wilhelm Wundt, who believed that a science of cognition was possible. Wundt, in turn, had been influenced by the work of another German scientist, Gustav Fechner, who had been searching since the mid1800s for laws of “psychophysics” — laws relating the mental world to the physical (Chalmers said he too was searching for “psychophysical laws” in an article he published in 1995). Cognicentrism is the most pernicious of the three errors. Some academics are so fascinated by their own internal movie — it is in full color, after all, with 3-D and surround sound — they think it must be real, never considering a much simpler and more sensible possibility. As an exercise, please set aside for the moment the questionable assertion that consciousness is a thing or a place or a world or a movie; in other words, resist the temptation to reify. Also, please consider the possibility that the fact that you seem to have a strong sense of being you is not actually a big deal — not big enough to build a science around, anyway. Finally, even though you seem to have a movie playing in your head, please entertain the idea that there really is no movie in your head (because there isn’t) and that your conscious experiences might not be as important as you think they are. In other words, as best you can, please set aside any autocentric or cognicentric inclinations you might have. This brings me, finally, to what I am pretty sure consciousness actually is. Following the tradition of the many great sages who have gotten us so confused about consciousness, I will explain my perspective initially through an analogy — let’s call it The Hot Tub Harry Analogy. Hot Tub Harry is sitting up to his neck in hot water. He can feel the heat, the flow of the water around him, the bubbles — even, let’s say, the texture of the water, which is a bit oily. To simplify matters, we shall plug his ears and nose and cover his eyes, so that most of the stimulation he is receiving is coming from receptor cells in his skin. He and the water form a kind of system, like a fetus does with a womb. A few feet away from this hot-tub system (HTS) stands a scientist who is speculating about what it is like to experience life in the HTS. She is not having much luck, though, because she has never been in a hot tub and is not part of Harry’s HTS. She can see the system from afar, but she is not part of it. She can see vapor rising from the water, which suggests the water is hot, but she cannot feel the water. She can see bubbles and signs of currents, but she cannot feel them. Moreover, no matter how closely she examines the system from the outside, she cannot say anything about what it is like to be part of the system. Meanwhile, Harry has no trouble at all feeling exactly what it is like to be part of the system. There is, in general, an enormous difference between being an integral part of a system and being outside a system. Our brains are not only part of our bodies, they are also wired directly to it, including to all of our sense organs. Light entering our eyes stimulates light-sensitive cells on our retinas, which in turn stimulate nerve cells that connect to our brain through a bundle of nerve fibers. A fraction of a second later, through a process that is not yet understood, neural processes allow us to see a stable and continuous version of the world around us. The visual part of what we call our “consciousness” is our experience of seeing that world. Our brain also manages to integrate much of the chaotic and noisy stimulation that surrounds us into coherent wholes; in fact, as the research of Gestalt psychologists demonstrated a century ago, our brain seems almost driven to create wholes from parts and order from chaos. We have two eyes, after all, sending two somewhat different stimulus patterns into our brain, which somehow manages to coordinate them. This shouldn’t be too surprising. The scotoma is present in all vertebrates, and so are two eyes. Given the superb eye-limb coordination that is evident throughout the animal kingdom, it would appear that brains have evolved to stabilize images, fill in gaps, and organize and simplify stimuli. No matter what the species, the owners of brains that did not do such things would have quickly been culled from the gene pool. Imagine a saber-toothed tiger that had to prowl around its environment using the unsmoothed, rapidly shifting, incomplete, somewhat differing images being projected onto the retinas of its two eyes; even if, by some miracle, it managed to find its prey, the prey might have eaten it long before it managed to eat its prey. The fact that we do not yet understand how the brain accomplishes these transformations is not important. Consciousness is the observational experience we have after these transformations have taken place. So, getting back to Harry, he can, through receptor cells in his skin, feel properties of the water, and he can also observe himself feeling properties of the water. He is built not only to sense properties of the world around him (which are then smoothed by the brain in various ways), he is also built to observe some aspects of his own functioning. Remarkably, he can also visualize events from his past while sitting in the hot tub — even fantasize about things that have never occurred. We experience different degrees of consciousness, of course. When Harry starts to get drowsy from the hot water, his consciousness fades, which is to say he observes less and less about the surrounding environment and about his own observational experience. He might also adapt to some aspects of his environment, which means, by definition, that his awareness of those aspects of his environment dims; over time, for example, he will probably get used to the temperature of the water. Harry also has some control over what properties of his environment and experience he pays attention to. When he pays close attention to what he is experiencing in the moment, we might say he is highly conscious of what is around him. If his thoughts drift to other matters, we might say he is only dimly conscious of what is around him. No matter how you cut the cake, consciousness is simple observation — either of properties of the environment around us or of properties of our own experience, both past and present. Although it is true that Hot Tub Harry’s conscious experiences while he sits in the tub are not accessible to the observer outside the tub, they are by no means mysterious. Perhaps you will object: Hold on! you say. The analogy is flawed! Harry is a person with sense organs and a brain! All you have done is push the problem of consciousness to another location, just as Hameroff and Penrose did when they attributed consciousness to the vibrations of microtubules. But I wasn’t done yet! Let’s work on Harry a bit — nothing too drastic, just a minor surgical modification: Let’s get rid of his body, leaving his brain and skin receptors in the water. We shall also add nutrients to the water to keep his tissue healthy. Because Harry’s brain and skin receptors are alive in the HTS/nutrient bath, he is presumably still conscious of the properties of the water — the currents, the temperature, the bubbles — even still free to let his attention wander to other matters. We can prove that the bodiless Harry has been conscious by sewing his brain and skin receptors back into his body and asking him about his recent experience. Were you conscious during our experiment, Harry? Hell yes, he replies, and is all this stitching going to leave any scars? He can even describe the experience for us. This is part of the wonder of the human brain: our ability to re-live past experiences to some extent — to re-member (from the Latin re, “again”, and memorari, “be mindful of”). But consciousness itself is not mysterious. Hot Tub Harry’s consciousness was nothing more than his active observation of both his environment and his cognitive activities while his brain was immersed in a nutrient bath and connected to a sense organ. But where, you ask, is Harry in all this? Who or what is doing all this observing? Is Harry a little homunculus hidden somewhere in his brain? Absolutely not. There is no homunculus, and there is also no Harry. The entity that calls itself “Harry” is just a curious property of this entity’s consciousness — a kind of bonus that comes from our ability to remember our past: Although our brains change continuously throughout our lives, the changes are generally small enough so that we retain a sense of continuity from one minute to the next, even from one year to the next. The sense of continuity creates the illusion of “self” or “I” or “me.” As real as the self feels, however, it is truly just an illusion — one that is vulnerable to disruption. Psychedelic drugs, a head injury, oxygen deprivation, mental illness, disease and aging can all degrade the sense of self, even obliterate it completely. I have met people in clinical settings who have completely lost their sense of self; it is painfully sad. Are such people conscious? Yes, but because they have no identity and very little past, their conscious experience is limited mainly to the observation of their current environment. Although the self is an illusion, consciousness is not, and, contrary to popular opinion, it is also not “subjective.” To call it so demeans the experience unjustifiably. Seeing is quite real; it has clear physical correlates that can be measured. The fact that the owner of the brain who is doing the seeing has an experience no one else can share is beside the point; his or her experience is no less real. The experience is distinct mainly because the brain owner is part of the system that is doing the seeing. The experience is also a bit odd because the owner, being part of the system, can not only see; he or she can also see him- or herself seeing. The physical correlates of his or her self-observation might be hard to find, but they are presumably findable. So here is my question for you: Are you something more than a brain floating in a nutrient bath and connected to a body and sense organs — an organic system that interacts with the world? If so, how exactly are you something more, and how can you prove that? The model I am describing may not be attractive (except for the hot tub, maybe), but I believe it accounts fully for consciousness, at least as I experience it. Consciousness is the brain owner’s experience of observing the world and his or her own body and behavior. This experience seems remarkable mainly because of the convenient ways the brain irons out stimuli, but the smoothing process, as I said, is almost certainly an evolutionary imperative for the brains of many species. The brain stabilizes images, fills in gaps, and sometimes integrates separate stimuli into orderly wholes, but none of these things is miraculous. We build cameras that stabilize images and software applications that integrate and transform diverse media components any way we like. If we can build such things, so can evolution. As for the “unconscious” — the mythical, reified world popularized by Sigmund Freud — while we are capable of observing the world around us and some aspects of our own behavior and cognitive activity, our observation powers are also limited. We behave and change and learn all the time without explicitly observing such things, and we also are terrible at explaining why we behave as we do. Our limited abilities are just that. They are not evidence that another world — an “unconscious” one — exists to complement the non-existent “conscious” world. Reifying our observational experience was bad enough; inventing yet another non-physical world to explain what our observations can’t make sense of is truly absurd. This brings me to Henry and Tiny Bryan, my family’s cat and dog, respectively. The never-ending and largely pointless debate about the nature of consciousness has occasionally been extended to animals. Are animals conscious? I cannot share the conscious experiences of Henry or Tiny Bryan any more than I can share yours, but I have no doubt that virtually all vertebrates are conscious very much as humans are. If they can observe the world around them, if they can observe their own bodies, and if they show signs of being able to remember things, then they are conscious — lacking only the linguistic tools to reflect upon and analyze their existence. Charles Darwin said as much in The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872). In some respects, some non-human animals are probably more conscious than we are, either because their sense organs are more sensitive or because they have senses we lack. Some birds can directly detect properties of the earth’s magnetic field; elephants can detect subtle seismic signals; sharks, platypuses, and electric eels can sense electrical fields. What we have in common with all of them is that each of us is a brain floating in a nutrient bath and connected to a body and sense organs. Whatever the species, the brain owner in such a system is probably conscious during most of its waking hours. Alas, even with all the extra cortical tissue that distinguishes us from lesser beings in the animal kingdom, humans do not think clearly. We are highly prone to errors of thinking — reification, autocentrism, and cognicentrism being just three of our many weaknesses. We are easily swayed, especially by authority figures, and once we have adopted some belief, we attend selectively to evidence that supports that belief, no matter how shoddy it may be (a phenomenon called “confirmation bias”). This means that the perspective I have described in this essay will not only be difficult for many people to accept, it will also draw criticism from “experts” whose careers, reputations, and livelihoods depend on defending their own positions, no matter how weak, cumbersome, or absurd. (The whole universe is conscious? Give me a break.) Over the course of the 40 years since I entered graduate school in psychology, I have known of only one major figure in my field who recanted a theory he had been staunchly defending for much of his career — more than 20 years in this case. This remarkable shift was an exception to the rule; when academicians develop and defend a theory, it is almost always to the death. Although I think I am right about consciousness, I do not expect people to rally round me in support. Our immediate experience, combined with a long history of brainwashing — um, sorry, I mean education — tells us, mistakenly, that consciousness is both mysterious and non-physical and that our “self” is every bit as real as our driver’s license. Immediate experience, again combined with brainwashing, also told people for millennia that the world was flat, and millions of people still believe that today. We may be conscious, but are we smart enough to admit what consciousness really is?

['Neuroscience', 'Brain', 'Consciousness', 'Editors Pick', 'Science']

Thinking About Software Sustainably I know what you’re thinking: “Here we go again with all the sustainability buzzwords,” but hear me out Photo by Alexander Abero on Unsplash. Sustainability is not just about preserving the environment. That’s only a part of it. According to a report by the World Commission on Environment and Development, sustainability is about the capacity to endure. This is something us software developers should be very interested in. We are problem-solvers and builders. Of course, we want our creations — or at the very least our jobs — to last. Thinking about how we can build sustainable software is a good way to do that. “Sustainability of a system describes how well the system will continue to exist and function, even as circumstances may change.” — Becker et. al. The question for us software developers is, how can we design and build software so it can deal with change? This is also why, implicitly, we are already focusing on building sustainable software. By trying to ensure maintainability, scalability, and all the other -ilities, we’re trying to create software that can stand the test of time. It’s just good sense. However, there are more perspectives involved than just technical sustainability. Various academic papers have actually identified four perspectives for sustainable software: Economic sustainability Environmental sustainability Social sustainability Technical sustainability These might not be all-encompassing, but they cover the majority of software-related sustainability concerns.

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

Josh Klinghoffer has already had his worst week ever. Today is only Tuesday. He played guitar for the Red Hot Chili Peppers. He was the youngest person ever admitted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He was only 32 at the band’s 2012 induction. That was on Saturday. The Chili Peppers fired him on Sunday. His replacement? John Frusciante. The man Klinghoffer replaced ten years ago. He confirmed the news to fans, one of whom tweeted, “Josh is happy for them,” meaning the Chili Peppers. Marbelle, or, at least, that was their Twitter handle, added, “I’m sure he’s hurting though. We will be there for him.” What does “being there for him,” look like from this altitude? How does one think one’s way past this level of unthinkable?

['Psychology', 'Self Improvement', 'Mindfulness', 'Mental Health', 'Creativity']

How Weighted Blankets Can Help Improve Your Mental Health Sleep is closely related to our mental state Photo by The-Lore.com on Unsplash Sleep is closely related to our mental state. When we aren’t able to sleep well, we are often more easily frustrated and experience a drop in productivity. When lack of sleep (or poor quality sleep) occurs for prolonged periods, we might even start to feel a strain on our mental health. Amongst methods like using calming essential oils, yoga, and sleeping pills, weighted blankets are a common solution many have turned to in an effort to solve their sleep-related woes. What is a weighted blanket? In short, a weighted blanket is a heavy blanket that weighs anywhere between 5 pounds to 30 pounds (around 2 kilograms to 13.5 kilograms). Originally devised to help older children that fall on the autism spectrum, weighted blankets have also helped improve sleep quality. Weighted blankets can be used to help reduce anxiety and stress, making it a great way for one to subtly improve one’s mental health without having to make radical changes in one’s lifestyle. The benefits of using weighted blankets A weighted blanket applies a “deep pressure” on the user, engaging a kind of stimulation called Deep Touch Pressure (DTP) Stimulation. When studied, DTP provides positive effects by reducing the anxiety one feels. Furthermore, the weighted blanket helps users feel relaxed and more comfortable, helping improve sleep quality. Apart from reducing anxiety, DTP encourages our bodies to release oxytocin. This hormone works to help with stress coping, allowing one to relax and fostering a positive mood. The use of weighted chain blankets by patients with diagnosed psychiatric disorders was found to help significantly with insomnia, allowing the patients to reduce the fatigue, depression, and anxiety felt during the day, resulting in an increase in daytime activity level. Is a weighted blanket suitable for me? While I hope everyone can enjoy the benefits of a weighted blanket and be able to sleep in the warm hug of one, it’s not suitable for everyone. Individuals with sleep apnea, respiratory problems, claustrophobia, and other chronic medical conditions should check with a trained medical professional before using the blanket. Also, a weighted blanket should not be used for young children.

['Health', 'Self Improvement', 'Sleep', 'Mental Health', 'Science']

How To Pass the AWS Certified Solutions Architect— Associate Exam A complete guide for the new SAA-C02 exam Amazon Web Services (AWS) is a leading cloud provider according to the magic quadrant and it dominates the global cloud infrastructure and it has the market share equivalent to the next four big cloud providers combined. AWS offers several certifications. AWS Certified Solutions Architect — Associate is one of the associate exams that anyone could take before going into more specialized certificates. I recently took this exam and this article is all about what is this exam about, tips to pass the exam, and a lot more. Why should you take this exam Any Prerequisites About the exam Where to register How to train Useful Tips and Tricks Before the exam During the exam After the exam Other Certifications To Consider Conclusion Why should you take this exam If you are a goto guy in your organization and always ready to provide solutions for the common problems this exam is for you. This exam really tests your ability to effectively architect and deploy secure and robust applications on AWS technologies. By preparing this exam you will get to define a solution using architectural design principles based on customer requirements and provide implementation guidance based on best practices to an organization throughout the lifecycle of a project. If you want to go to the next level as an architect this exam for you.

['Cloud Computing', 'Certification', 'Software Engineering', 'Software Development', 'AWS']

The day the product team is established, it is behind schedule and over its budget. Don Norman How often do we encounter situations when, after learning useful information, we forget about it before we have time to put it into practice? Below I have collected tips, thoughts and ideas based on the notes I have gathered over the past few years from the books, articles, courses I have studied. The notes cover multiple areas, because fortunately over the past ten years I have been in different roles. A significant part of the points is universal, but the focus is still on working on web projects from the beginning to the end. Also, depending on the size of the projects, some items may not be adequate or applicable. Since I gathered here the thoughts and ideas of some of the best people of the industry, I partly borrowed the title for the article from Tim Ferriss and his great book Tools Of Titans. Contents Ideas Design: * Base ideas * Technical tips and tricks * Accessibility Architecture Project work: * Cognitive biases and mental models * Communications * Hiring Development: * Refactoring Security Ideas Generate a lot of ideas at once. Don’t stop on one or two ideas. Be creative, no matter what the circumstances. Don’t criticize ideas, either yours or someone else’s. Even crazy ideas, that often seem obviously wrong, may contain some kind of creative thought. Separate the stages of idea generation from the stages of idea evaluation. Do not give up ideas too early. Limited time to generate ideas leads to hyper focusing and under these conditions it is easier to separate the phases of idea generation and evaluation, as there is no time to evaluate. Sometimes you can add restrictions or remove existing ones to change the process. Fears that interfere with creativity: Fear seems stupid. Fear of bad ideas. Fear that you’re doing something the wrong way. Evaluating how people do their job should not be based on whether they do it your way, but on how effective their way is. If a person does something and succeeds, don’t try to retrain them. Fear of the unknown. Fear of not liking others doing something. Fear that you’re not as good as you think. Fear of impostor syndrome (you know less than others). Design This section is the most difficult for me, because I am not a professional designer, but at the same time it is one of the most useful, because this is where the value of this format manifests itself. When you can go through the points and become more productive in design discussions or applying ideas to work on your own projects. Base Ideas Remember that despite the rapid change in technology, human behavior is not changing so fast. And the way we acted 20 years ago is still relevant. See, for example, the latest report [how-people-read-online] (https://www.nngroup.com/articles/how-people-read-online/). Use design instead of functional specifications, that only create the illusion of agreement. People read one text and understand it differently. Pay no attention to the details at the beginning of the process. Move from big to small. Start with design and layout. They’re much easier to change than code. In design, start with the epicenter. Affordances and anti-affordances of things must be obvious. When affordances and anti-affordances are hard to detect, we must supplement the object with signifiers. Related elements should be placed together. Put the controls and important information exactly where they are needed. Feedback should be instant: a delay of even a tenth of a second can make a person nervous. If the delay lasts too long, people often give up and go do something else. If there is too much feedback, it can annoy even more than if there is too little feedback. If we hear too many messages, we ignore them all or turn off everything. And that means we’re likely to miss really important messages. Remove all error messages. Instead, provide users with help and guidance. Make sure that you can fix the problem right away with the tooltips. Don’t expect people to save anything in short-term memory. Often, when something goes wrong, computer systems show a message with important information that disappears from the screen at the moment when a person wants to read it. Avoid algorithms that start out the same way and then become different. The more experienced the employee is, the more likely he is to fall victim to such a miss. Whenever possible, the algorithms should be prescribed so they differ from each other from the beginning. During the testing stage it is enough to interview 5 independent people/groups to get an adequate review. You can start with the other team members. Use open questions when testing. Do not collect unnecessary information that you do not use now. People often choose the first satisfactory option rather than looking for the best one. Our ideas about how things work are often wrong, so when we understand how something works, we do not look for an alternative solution, even if the current one is bad. Steal like an artist. Use these sites for inspiration: (dribble, pinterest, pttrns). Standardization is a fundamental principle of the desperate: when any other solution seems impossible, just design everything in the same way so, that people can learn something once and for all. For example: A logo is in the upper left corner. Familiar icons for the basket, videos, etc. Ways to reduce errors: Make the element, that the user is working with, more visible. Change the appearance of the object, make it more noticeable: increase it or change its color. Add “undo” function for your operations. Add reasonability checks. Technical tips and tricks Take into account normal, empty, and erroneous states in the design. Empty state makes the first impression, so it is very important. Implement a light and dark theme. Don’t set too strict restrictions on entering form fields. Especially in names. If possible, leave it to the user to determine how his name is spelled. And do not punish for not following fictitious rules and restrictions (formatting fields, etc.). Format the form automatically if possible. Clickable things must be obvious. Do not use the same color for links or buttons and non-clickable headings. Make the difference between visiting and unvisiting links visible. Use clear headings and subheadings to break down content into sections so that users can scan the content for information. Do not let headers float between two blocks of text, it should be closer to its block. Keep the paragraphs short. Shorten the texts by removing all insignificant words and sentences. Use a simple language. Use lists. Highlight keywords. This allows the eye to focus on the most important information. You probably don’t need a big picture on the main page. When people understand what the site is about, it annoys them with its size. Those who already know you don’t need it. Light comes from the sky. Shadows are invaluable cues in telling the human brain what user interface elements we’re looking at. Black and white first. Designing in grayscale before adding color simplifies the most complex element of visual design and forces you to focus on spacing and laying out elements. Double your whitespace. To make UI that looks designed, add a lot of breathing room. Use only good fonts. Consider accessibility issues. In the current situation, a huge number of people who are not very familiar with computers have to use them in much larger volumes than before. Accessibility Increase the text to 200% and check what your product looks like. Check the contrast. Browsers know how to tell you that there is not enough contrast. You can also enable high contrast mode in the operating system. Add alt attributes. Use the headers correctly. Do not jump over sizes. Check labels for form fields. Keep track of the availability of content from the keyboard. You can see more details here: Architecture If you think good architecture is expensive, try bad architecture. Brian Foote and Joseph Yoder Don’t make complicated architecture in new projects, as it’s not only long and expensive, but if your original idea and plans are not in demand, it’s difficult to adjust the idea and change the product quickly. Develop a language based on the domain model for programmers’ communication with specialists. Break the program into levels and isolate them from each other. Knowledge of the domain area should only be at one level. The GUI does not matter for business rules, so draw a line between them. The database does not matter for the GUI, so draw a boundary between them. Database is irrelevant for the business rules, so a boundary should be drawn between them. Database is not a data model. A database is a part of the software. A database is a utility that provides access to data. From the architectural point of view this utility does not matter, it is a low-level detail — a mechanism. User interface is a detail. Web is a user interface. That is, the Web is a detail. And as an architect, place details like this outside of the core business logic. Make sure that there is low connectivity between modules, while within a module the connectivity can be higher than outside. If during program development it turns out that the specialists do not understand some technical details from simplified schemes, or you do not understand the specialists’ descriptions, this is a signal that you are likely to have knowledge gaps in the domain area. And the architecture will fail if no changes are made. Give suitable names to classes and methods. If you need to study its implementation to understand how an object works, then the sense of encapsulation is lost. Take inspiration from math. Enter mathematical operations for objects. It can improve architecture and bring beauty to the code. Stick to minimalism. The Kent Beck’s strategy: First make it work. You’ll be out of business if it doesn’t work. Then make it right. Organize the code so you and others can understand and develop it when you need to change or understand something. Finally, make it fast. Organize the code to achieve the desired performance. Project Work If you’re not worried, you need to worry. And if you’re worried, you don’t need to worry. Ray Dalio Use the metrics to track product development. It is important to find a balance in the number of metrics. There should not be a lot of them to make it cheap and fast, but enough to see the problems. 3–4 metrics may be enough. If your metric is close to 100%, it may be worth changing. But don’t forget about communication, metrics are just numbers. Keep in mind, that in the absence of data, people respond differently than when they have useless data. When there are no specific data, the a priori probability is used correctly; when there are useless data, the a priori probability is ignored. In case of problems, use the “5 why” technique to understand the reason. You should ask “why” by constantly going deeper into the problem to find the true cause. Determine who is responsible for the result. If the result is poor, is it because of a lack of skills of a person or errors in the action plan? You can manage a project with cost, time, quality and scale. Everybody should see and understand these variables and their relationship for good decision-making. The best way to manage variables is through scale. So, stick to your budget and time plans, but sacrifice scale. Cut off half of the ideas, then look at the rest and do it again. The lighter you are, the easier it is for you to change. Start with small budgets — it focuses on the most important tasks, leads to ingenuity. Travel light, it allows you to adapt quickly. Try not to get attached to vendors, proprietary formats, rigidly fixed road maps. Do not solve non-existent problems. For each new task, try to find a way to implement it faster and cheaper. Keep it simple: tomorrow may never come or by the time it does, we will know the best way to solve the problem. Do not pay for flexibility that you do not need. YAGNI Think about hiring testers. The cost of testers is much lower than that of developers. Learn to say no to ideas. Consider the hidden cost of implementation. Don’t limit people too much to processes, let them figure out how to solve the problem themselves. Let them make a mistake. You may even put cheap mistakes into the budget. It is important to analyze these mistakes so you do not repeat them too often. In most cases, people want to do a superb job, the manager is to help them do it. Mistakes are a natural part of the development process. Everyone has the right and responsibility to try to make sense of important things. Avoid settings, they have a price to pay. Move on with slight steps. Use an iterative process to improve the product. Test your solutions as soon as possible, do not copy until the final release. A prototype that doesn’t meet all the conditions can already be useful, for testing it with specialists or other teams. Learn and make sure the team learns too. Although a person may eventually achieve a top level of skill in a certain field, challenges don’t become easier for him or her: the Olympic athlete finds his sport to be every bit as challenging as the novice does. Don’t expect your employees to define their own blind spots and compensate for them. Play to win, not to lose. Don’t cover up with paperwork and plans to tell after that, it’s not your fault. Take responsibility for your actions. A 40-hour working week (±5 hours) allows you to be efficient and focused. Avoid extra working hours for two consecutive weeks. Remember the balance of business and development. Everyone should be responsible for its own part and be available to the other side. Plan in detail only the current release or iteration. The longer you delay planning, the more data you have and the more accurate you can predict the next steps. Time is not a negative value, so time errors always accumulate on the right. This is asymmetry. That’s why we often make mistakes with time when planning. Urgent issues are not more important than strategic ones. Sometimes less means more and we should often throw away unnecessary and insignificant information and focus on the key things. Remember the Pareto 20/80 principle. Urgency is one of the major reasons for our distorted perception of the world. When we are under the pressure of urgency, we make bad analytical decisions. You always have to look and measure the data. Issue log can be an excellent tool for the company: employees write down all the problems, the level of importance and responsibility. It helps to understand the reasons. Pain + analysis = progress. Accept the stiffness that comes with the best motives. One of the most important skills you need to develop is to ask for advice from people who are competent in areas where you are not strong. Making assumptions and asking questions is not the same as criticizing, so do not take them that way. Simultaneously evaluate the rate of change, the level at which the goal is and the relationship between them. If the situation improves, but the rate of change is low, then in adequate time the goal will not be achieved. To make effective decisions, it is enough to understand most things on a general level. Prioritize by assessing the importance of additional information in relation to the cost of postponing a decision. First, do what you must do and then do what you like. Don’t get distracted by the bright trinkets and don’t forget about the mechanism behind your daily tasks. There may not be enough time for the insignificant things, but it’s better than not having enough time for the important things. You can use the Eisenhower Matrix for prioritization by dividing tasks by urgency and importance. Any task should be evaluated according to the probability of its successful completion and the level of its priority. If you organized a meeting, manage the discussion. Identify areas of personal responsibility for collective decision making. An impersonal “we” is an obvious cue that the person is trying to avoid recognizing a mistake. Set up a bug tracker. Try to fix bugs before writing a new code. Often you have to change the product, even if it already works well, to maintain user interest. Remember that the idea that the new code will be better than the previous one may be quite absurd. The old code was already used, it was tested, and many errors were fixed. Remember that you throw away the knowledge that was in the project. Consider the primary reasons you want to rewrite the code and other solutions: Architectural problems — it can be solved by careful refactoring verified by the entire team. Performance problems — often 1% of changes can give 99% increase. Ugly code — it can be solved by accepting formatting standards, setting up auto-formatting, git-hooks, etc. When demonstrating your product, pixels are important, everyone will focus on the screen. Make it as beautiful as possible. But if you can display the unfinished parts in the interface so they look unfinished. If you show a non-programmer a screen that looks 100% complete, he will think the whole product is almost ready. If you show a non-programmer a screen that looks much worse than expected in the final version, he will think the whole product is much worse. Cognitive biases and mental models There are many cognitive biases as well as mental models. Many of them are described in Kahneman, Cialdini, etc. Knowing about their existence will help avoid some mistakes in decision making or improve product design. Below are just a few of those that I think are most relevant to the article. Avoid the conjunctive events bias. We often overestimate the likelihood of conjunctive events-occurrences that must happen in conjunction with one another. The probability of a series of conjunctive events happening is lower than the probability of any individual event. So, we risk seriously underestimating the time, money, and effort required to achieve our goals. Sunk Cost Fallacy — the tendency of people to irrationally follow through on an activity that is not meeting their expectations because of the time and/or money they have already spent on it. The sunk cost fallacy explains why people finish movies they aren’t enjoying, finish meals in restaurants even though they are full, hold on to investments that are underperforming and keep clothes in their closet that they’ve never worn. Framing Effect — a cognitive bias, in which people react to a particular choice in different ways depending on how it is presented, as a loss or as a gain. Communications Do not hide until the last management decisions from the team, even if they are unpleasant for them. Do not talk about the person anything that you didn’t dare to tell him in face. Manage discussions: Do not criticize during the speech and give everyone, for example, 2 minutes without interruption to speak. Use active listening. Identify a place in the queue for each person to ask questions after the speech. So, they will know that they will have the opportunity to ask questions and focus on the discussion. Look for people who disagree with the proposals. Involve the silent. Hiring Do not hire or hire as late as possible. Evaluate whether you may not do something or reduce functionality. If you are hiring, you would prefer a smaller number of more talented people than a larger number of mediocre ones. This will reduce communication costs. Groups of 3 to 5 people are the most effective in practice. As Brooks’ law says, adding manpower to a late software project makes it later. Think of an employee with what values, abilities and skills you’re looking for. The order of words matters here. Assume that most people don’t change. Prefer the generalists. Multi-task team members allow you to adapt more quickly to changing conditions. All else being equal, choose a talented writer. These people usually think more clearly and communicate better. Think of your teams as a sports manager: no one has all skills necessary for success, but everyone must be better at something. So, analyze where you fail more often and strengthen yourself. If you recruit people with the same strengths and weaknesses as the leader, it is more likely to lead to a negative result. The diversity of experience among candidates increases the chances that they will bring fresh ideas to the project. Look for people who know how to get projects done. During the interview, the candidate must show that he can write code. Pay attention to actions, not words. One indicator could be the presence of open-source projects. There may be other indicators: Passion for programming. Interest in new languages and technologies because it may show interest in the profession. Skills of working with low-level technologies. An interview example: Introduction. Your brief story about yourself, company, position. Here you can assure the candidate you care about the process of problem solving, not the actual answers. Ask open questions about his/her previous experience. Sometimes go deeper into details. You can ask them to describe some complicated things in simple words to determine how real the candidate understands. Pay attention to the passion with which candidates talk about their experiences. Give simple programming tasks. Here you should pay attention to the speed of task execution. It may be a good indicator of how a person will solve real tasks later. Go on to more complicated things. A section for questions from the candidate. Development I’m not a great programmer; I’m just a good programmer with great habits. Kent Beck A codebase is a place where we live, and our goal is to make it livable for ourselves and for all the other people who live there. When we write code, our goal isn’t to finish it and move on, our goal is to make it sustainable, livable for the team that inhabits it. You can think of yourself as a software writer, not a software engineer. “Writing” is a much more suitable metaphor for what we do most of the time than “engineering” is. Writing is about clarity and presenting information in a clear-to-follow manner so that anybody can understand it. Write tests and keep the code as simple as possible. This way, you can reduce the cost of changes, avoid over-engineering and focus on current problems. Tests give you instant feedback. Introduce the practice of updating dependencies every N days. It can be once a week or a couple of days a month. Set up deployment processes so it happens painlessly for you. This will allow you to test the product and get feedback quickly. With negative feedback, you can easily roll back the changes. Automate processes (recovery from failures, routine operations, etc.), as you are not the most reliable component of the system. Set up linters that will perform automatic code checks, auto-formatting. This will simplify the work of all team members. At the code review stage, this will allow you to focus on business logic rather than coding style. Besides, you can set up code analyzers and get code quality checks or warnings about unsafe code. You may take a look at lefthook and prettier (or any other similar tools to your taste) and, depending on the language, these tools: Use validators: Refactoring Tests make refactoring much easier. Move in tiny steps and run the tests after each step. Refactoring can be done immediately before adding an extra feature. This allows you to understand the code and make it better. Always try to leave the code behind better than it was before you. Don’t make the code worse. Don’t take too long to choose a name for a function/variable during refactoring. Choose the one that came to your mind and change it when you choose the best option. In most cases, you may ignore performance during refactoring (for example, split one cycle into several). After refactoring, fix performance issues if they occur. Refactoring is your job. Do not ask permission for it, but ask for advice. This is how you do your job, as a professional. Always make sure the tests fall when they should fall. Security Pay attention to the storage of sensitive data in the repository. Do not store them open. Sometimes a framework can take care of this problem, for example [Ruby On Rails] (https://guides.rubyonrails.org/security.html#environmental-security) or [Phoenix] (https://hexdocs.pm/phoenix/deployment. html). Or you can choose a different approach, like [git-secret] (https://git-secret.io/). Take care of the basic security of your servers. For example, if you have a few servers, you can see the tips in this article My first 10 minutes on a server and discussing on ycombinator. Either you can automate server deployment and create/find recipes for your favorite system: ansible, chef or something else. Check that you have considered the most common security errors. For example, you can go through the list owasp.org/www-project-top-ten and check that: You have taken care of the absence of injections in your code: SQL, NoSQL, etc. Make sure that the authentication is not broken and works correctly. Checked that there are no sensitive data and API in the public domain. Made no mistakes in the security configuration, for example: changed the default passwords, correctly configured the firewall (especially relevant for those who use docker). Take care of XSS. Configured dependency update processes in case of vulnerabilities appear in them. For example, github sends reports on dependency vulnerabilities for different languages. This point can also be mitigated if you have implemented the practice of periodically updating dependencies described above. Set up logging and monitoring of your systems Conclusion The key thing is to remember that projects and processes are different, so adapt the practices to your processes. You should not take the above as absolute truth. It is only an approach that allows you to miss fewer details, especially when interacting with things that you only occasionally encounter. References

['Programming', 'Design', 'Software Development', 'Development', 'Productivity']

“Why does your voice fumble when you speak? Is it a medical problem?” “You’re a nobody, a wannabe.” “Your books are flops.” “You post a lot. You must be narcissistic.” “You’re not a real writer.” I have received messages and comments such as these, and so many other versions of hate, of negative feedback, of strangers on the internet telling me I am not a good writer, that my voice is unclear, that my posts are not useful, and so forth. I face such toxic criticism almost daily, and, though I try to stay strong, sometimes, all this negativity gets to my head. The shield of anonymity I’ll be honest — it beats me how a person can be so cruel as to post hate on a work created with so much passion It probably is due to the debilitating power of the internet: it hands every user an equal footing to voice their opinion. With the shield of anonymity protecting them, such people feel they have the right to say just about anything they wish to, without worrying about the consequences their harsh words might leave on the minds and hearts of the creators. Is it them, or is it me? At first, I used to think there was something wrong with me. Whenever I received a comment telling me the article I wrote or the video I made was trash, I used to delete it immediately, spending hours trying to figure out why it was terrible and how I could make it better. Over time, I have realised that such mindless hate should only be dealt with in one way: ignore and move on. If there is nothing constructive in the criticism, one shouldn’t spend time or energy pondering over them. There is a quote attributed to the Buddha that sums it up perfectly:

['Feminism', 'Social Media', 'Psychology', 'Writing', 'Mental Health']

Podcast Episode 104: Loss Aversion Why losing is twice as painful as the joy of winning I’m so excited to introduce the Choice Hacking podcast, a weekly show dedicated to exploring the ways behavioral science and psychology intersect with experience design, marketing, startups, and more. We’re just getting started, but if you enjoy it, please consider subscribing and leaving a rating or review. Thanks! EPISODE SUMMARY Have you ever experienced FOMO — the “Fear of Missing Out”? It’s a form of social anxiety that makes people scared they’re being left out of exciting or interesting events. It’s usually triggered by posts on social media, where it looks like the whole world is having fun without you. If you suffer from FOMO, you’re not alone. A recent study found that 70% of millennials experience the fear of missing out regularly. And there’s a powerful psychological principle behind why people experience FOMO — it’s called Loss Aversion. First identified by Nobel Prize-winner Daniel Kahneman, Loss Aversion is a psychological principle that says people will go to great lengths to avoid losing. In fact, the psychological pain of losing is twice as powerful as the pleasure of winning. Join us as we explore the good and bad sides of Loss Aversion, and how to use it to create more engaging, persuasive, and effective customer experiences. EPISODE NOTES

['Psychology', 'UX', 'Marketing', 'Design', 'Behavioral Science']

The impact of COVID-19 — data visualization using Plotly and comparative analysis with SARS Derive interesting data insights on covid-19 and visualize the outbreak of coronavirus compared to SARS Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay Introduction: With the rapid spread in the novel corona-virus across countries, the World Health Organisation (WHO)and several countries have published latest results on the impact of COVID-19 over the past few months. I have been going through many sources and articles to understand the fatality trend and I was excited to come across this data source and decided to see some visualization on the same. The aim here is to understand how visualization helps to derive informative insights from data sources. For the visualization part, I am using Plotly. Plotly is a visualization tool available in python, and R which supports a number of interactive, high-quality graphs and is a great tool for data science beginners. Data-set: The data-set sources are accumulated, processed and latest updates are made available by “Johns Hopkins University Center for Systems Science and Engineering (JHU CSSE)” in their github page Terms of use: As stated by JHU CSSE in link. [Data to be used only for research purposes]. Details on the data set is as follows: Daily reports data This csv file contains information on the affected countries [in blue] which helps to identify the virus spread, information on infected cases, number of deaths and recoveries across countries. The country co-ordinates are also provided for analysis. 2. Time-series data A time series data which contains the counts on infected cases, deaths and recoveries across countries is also given. The time series data has individual files for each case and needs to be processed before visualization. The country co-ordinates are also provided for time series visualization on geo plots such as Choropleth Maps. Codes: All the codes for producing the following charts and the data set used can be found in the link provided below. Important notes: Data as of 3rd March has been used for the below analysis. Please refrain from using the data or insights derived from the analysis for medical guidance or use of the same in commerce. It is solely for learning purpose. The same code template can be leveraged for various other data sources. I would encourage readers to try other charts as well in Plotly and to customize the codes according to application requirements. Another important aspect of showing your key findings is to use only a set of charts that infer key insight from the data rather than showing too much charts with redundant information. Analysis: The global impact of COVID-19 2. Descriptive analysis on infected, mortality and recovery rates 3. Timeline analysis on spread of COVID-19 between [Jan — Mar] 4. Impact of COVID-19 over SARS: a comparative analysis The global impact of COVID-19 To understand the impact of the virus on a geographical landscape, I used the geographical scatter plot from Plotly. The code for this interactive plot is found in the shared link which will give a more clear interactive visualization. Global impact of COVID-19 Observation: From the chart, we can see the disease has infected a larger number of people in China where the virus was first discovered Even though the infected region is large [in blue], we can observe that the number of deaths are considerably low and we can also see there has been a lot of recovered patients to this date Descriptive analysis on infected, mortality and recovery rates Here I have used various charts to show how information can be mined from data sources. Note: Since China has a higher rate of infected cases which is greater than 85% compared to other countries, it would be good to exclude China and see the numbers on other countries. This will be applied to all the following charts. Confirmed cases: Analysis using pie chart Infected cases across countries Infected cases (excluding Mainland China) Mainland china has the highest number of affected cases compared to other regions. Next to China, South Korea, Italy and Iran show high number of infected patients. 2. Reported number of deaths: Analysis using bar chart Number of reported deaths across countries Number of reported deaths [excluding Mainland China] From the graphs we can see even though South Korea has the highest number of confirmed cases compared to Italy and Iran, their mortality rate is far below in comparison. Now an analysis of recovery across province/state is shown below, 3. Recovery rates: Analysis using tree maps The recovery rate across countries gives a wider scope of how countries are mitigating the outbreak. Here, the different levels of hierarchy comes from the data set in order, “world”,”Country” followed by ”Province/Region” as can be seen for Mainland China (“world”,”Mainland China”, [“Hubei”, “Henan”,”Anhui”,,etc…]). Tree-map: Recovery rates Tree-map: Recovery rates [excluding China] An interesting point here is, Iran and Italy have higher number of recoveries compared to South Korea. From here, a deep dive into impact of other attributes (age, ethnicity and region) for recovery/death could give more clarity on these numbers. Timeline analysis on spread of COVID-19 between [Jan — Mar] It is crucial to show how rapidly the virus has spread in different countries in a short span of time. Time line analysis would require some pre-processing on the original data to be visualized in Plotly which is provided in the notebook. Here I have only shown the trend for infected cases. A similar trend can also be observed for deaths and recoveries across countries. A consolidated view is given using line chart below. Timeline analysis across countries: Scatter plot Timeline analysis across countries Timeline analysis across countries [excluding China] Observation: While a steady growth in the virus spread can be observed in China, a rapid increase in number of cases within the past few days can be seen in some other countries. Timeline analysis: Multiple line chart Overall affected cases, deaths and recoveries in the world. Impact of COVID-19 vs SARS: a comparative analysis The most intriguing part is to compare the impact of COVID-19 to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) which is similar in nature. The dataset for SARS was obtained from kaggle data source. The data only contained overall infected and mortality cases and thus visualizing the same here. I have analysed the impact of both viruses in a window frame staring from its discovery to its impact in the next three months. Timeline analysis for infected cases: Reported infected cases across the world: COVID-19 vs SARS Timeline analysis for reported deaths: Reported deaths across the world: COVID-19 vs SARS Observation: Evidently COVID-19 is spreading faster and has a higher mortality rate compared to SARS. The advancements in transport could be a key factor in this case. Conclusion: This article gives a detail analysis on how COVID-19 has impacted the world and how the derived insights can be used for downstream analysis. The charts can also be applied to other scenarios to infer key data insights. Codes: link to codes and data sets Future work: To learn more about other attributes such as patient gender, ethnicity and age and how it causes the fatality rate A dashboard of interactive charts to provide an overall summary References:

['Impact', 'Visualization', 'Coronavirus', 'Plotly', 'Covid19 Vs Sars']

Though distinct from Terminator-style “doomsday”, our technologies have already profoundly changed the way the world works. | Source We all have some sort of image of what the world could look like if robots take over. Hollywood has impregnated our imaginations with visions of metallic killers who seek only to advance their cause by using humanity as a means to their ends. Perhaps the robots don’t even exterminate all of humanity, but simply farm their vital energy in order to power their society; weaving an intricate simulation to keep the humans distracted. These kinds of fears have reemerged in recent years due to advancements in, and popularization of, artificial intelligence technologies. When the mind of the people is stoked by the inflammatory influence of sensationalist media, nightmares run amok. We’re beginning to live in a world pervaded by such nightmares. Experts have been pushing back recently: telling the worried masses that artificial intelligence is a long way from experiencing any sort of apocalyptic tipping-point. Rather, they emphasize that these types of doomsday scenarios are completely unrealistic. Even by the time A.I. is sufficiently advanced, they claim, we will have carefully planned for a host of worst-case scenarios; ultimately circumventing the problem before it comes to fruition. Worrying about robots taking over is more akin to those in the middle of the 20th century, imagining that nuclear wasteland-grown monsters would terrorize gentle humans with their glowing, melty third-arms. I would like to argue that A.I., despite what some experts are saying, does have the potential to bring about irreversible doomsday scenarios, has been doing so already, and is following in the footsteps of other powerful technologies. The transition from “normal” life to a life where we are the puppets of digital systems will be so gradual, so subtle, that we will likely be taken along for the ride; none the wiser. To illustrate this argument, we should take a look at three technologies: car rental systems, social media, and nuclear weapons. Each offers both a portal into a future where humanity has no clue that it is ruled by artificial intelligence and a reflection of our own world that may reveal it to look more similar to a future doomsday than anyone thought. Car Rental Systems I recently had an experience during which I had to rent a car for a business trip. It seemed like a fairly straightforward transaction: I purchased the rental online in advance of my trip, paid for it in full so it was cheaper, and then showed up to pick up the rental car. Little did I know that the location I specified for pickup was not an actual rental office. Although it was listed in the choice of options and was the exact destination of my train, the office actually existed slightly down the road under a different name. This completely threw off my rental, and I was forced to wait over an hour and a half to work with the employee at the rental office, his manager, and a customer service representative in a call center, while my case was being fixed. They were all supremely helpful, and I truly felt worse for them, seeing their frustration with the computer system, than I felt frustrated for having to wait so long. If this had occurred in the days preceding computer systems, the location difference would likely have been quickly corrected, acknowledged as a strange accident, and I would have received my keys and been on my way. Instead, in a world governed by digital bureaucracy, the rules of the rental office software were so strict that such a slight mistake (which it allowed for in the first place!) necessitated the involvement of three different employees whose expertise with the system was confounded. It begs the joke question: how many people does it take to screw in a light bulb? Well, obviously at least four if the light bulb is part of a national, computerized, strictly rule enforced light bulb screwing system with error messages that only serve to confuse those who are just trying to get some light in the room. We are already living in a world where we are controlled in a significant way by computers. Anyone who has ever worked with computerized systems at the doctor, for medical insurance, or for any other large, national company who is anything other than a top notch in their software design, knows that these issues happen all the time. In many cases, the convenience promised by digital systems is mired in poor design; thus rendering the systems almost impossible to use given any edge cases. My experience at the car rental office says a lot more about our society than simply that we occasionally design bad software. We can go so far as to say that because these types of issues arise all the time, they have become incredibly normalized to us. Over time, we had to accept the fact that computer systems often fail, and that sometimes we just have to spend hours trying to untangle issues that never would have arisen in a world devoid of strict software. We are already living in a world where we are controlled in a significant way by computers. The employees helping me out were completely subjugated to the will of the stubborn rental system. Human ingenuity and power were rendered meaningless because the computer system held all the keys to unlocking my car rental. Because the world gradually started implementing digital, bureaucratic systems, everyone simply went along for the ride. In most cases, a low-level employee would never have any say as to whether or not their employer forces a broken, complex system on their job. A few people change the way the world works, and we are all forced to slowly accept that this is our new reality. Different technologies affect us in different ways. Whereas the car rental issue is frustrating, when other technologies exhibit flaws in their design, the outcomes can be much more pernicious. To examine the effects of, and response to, wide-scale implementation of machine learning systems, we need to look no further than the paragon of frustrating technology: social media. Social Media Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat have all been embroiled in scandals in the past few years; garnering criticism from many diverse groups of people. Social media platforms transformed from being simply networks to connect old friends or classmates, to daily hubs for news and politics. Unfortunately, due to the nature of these systems being primarily financially motivated, profiting by advertising revenue calculated by the number of eyes that see ads on the site, social media networks also knowingly transformed themselves into addictive systems. By giving users content that they would inherently enjoy, playing into their existing biases, unsavvy social media users experience ideological isolation and augmentation by nature of only seeing news or opinions that agree with their own. This type of machine learning, which is aimed at learning user behavior in order to bring them to an app or website to maximize profit, has had a profound effect on our society. It is commonplace now to recognize that overuse of social media can be very dangerous. People become addicted to Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram, and are constantly surrounded by information that could be entirely distinct from that of someone with different preferences. It has led to many users adopting radically different worldviews from those of their political or ideological opposites and thinking them totally based in “facts” they read on the internet. A.I. technologies employed via social media have affected so many individual viewpoints that societal discourse as a whole has profoundly shifted as a result. When only a handful of individuals make enormous decisions like these, wide-scale societal effects are heavily influenced by their perspectives — or lack thereof. As in the case of the bureaucratic car rental system, people who use social media simply became acclimated to the fact that social media sites were harvesting their data and distorting their worldviews. At least with bureaucratic systems, their bugs and poor software design sometimes reveal their flaws and makes it clear that digital systems have an unfortunate and frustrating grip on our lives. Social media, and machine learning recommendation systems in general are designed with a flawed outcome in mind. When they work correctly, they are having a negative societal impact. When people think of A.I. doomsday robots controlling our lives, the picture of social media systems being those same doomsday robots never crops up. Of course, we are not brutally subjugated against our will, but to a degree, we are heavily restricted by systems that govern our lives like social media. If something informs your worldview, your worldview then controls actions you take based on your beliefs. When A.I. researchers dismiss the fear of systems taking more control of our lives than we want, I believe that they are missing this context. Often, computer scientists and software engineers are too isolated in the world of computing to recognize that deep social change is made by their technologies all the time. Wide-scale normalization of incredibly destructive technologies is not new to humanity. In most recent memory, world-ending nuclear militarization has become almost commonplace to accept as the “way things are.” Where more voices used to speak up against proliferation of this destructive capability, the world has moved past the initial shock of such notions — even though the threat posed by the technology is arguably more significant today. Nuclear Technology Technologies that are initially shocking due to their potentially destructive capabilities can too easily become normalized when the conversation surrounding them is lacking. Our post-Cold War world cares less about the spread of world-ending nuclear weapons and the destruction of nuclear treaties than it did only a generation or two ago. The public conversations surrounding nuclear proliferation have all but stopped; assuming an inevitable, nuclear world. The truth is that proliferation of nuclear weapons is absolutely not an inevitability; as some world leaders or technicians may suggest. Inventors, innovators, and state leaders have the ability to choose how technology progresses based on their ideologies and goals. A U.S. president who drives towards military hegemony will be more likely to rip up nuclear arms treaties than a president who wishes technology to be used for more humanitarian purposes. The only reason the dissemination of these weapons is considered “the way things are” is because so-called leaders have actively pushed for it to be the way things are; motivated by profits, power, or perhaps ignorance tinged with madness. Artificial intelligence will likely follow a similar path. Due to its incredibly powerful nature, decisions restricting or liberating its potential uses, or of where to integrate it into society, will surely initially fall on the shoulders of political and industry leaders. When only a handful of individuals make enormous decisions like these, wide-scale societal effects are heavily influenced by their perspectives — or lack thereof. After a phase of initial public scrutiny of such decisions, there is a great risk of important discourse fading away; leaving only a few to deliberate the fates of many. Recognizing the potential for gradual “doomsday” to occur, and voicing our concerns in a loud way, is the best way right now to ensure accountability of powerful technology actors. We should view A.I. as a technology whose power is of the same magnitude as nuclear weapons. While the effects of these systems may not be as immediately shocking as the use of a nuclear weapon, it stands to reason that long-term societal effects from the use of A.I. systems can be as far reaching as the multi-generational aftermath of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We cannot allow the world to become so acclimated to the manipulations of A.I. that only a few have any say or opinion about its effects in the world. People who stand to be most affected by results of these systems should have a permanent say in how they are developed and used. Discourse should be constantly encouraged; even — and especially — when it gets in the way of short-term profits or power gains. Just as the world is a simple mistake away from a doomsday scenario driven by nuclear catastrophe, a not-too-distant future world may also have the added threat of subtle, societal doomsday driven by an undiagnosable digital flaw, or the unknown mistake of a handful of programmers. Those who make decisions regarding both of these technologies are consciously making choices that shape the entirety of human society. Any malintent, bias, or ignorance on the part of those in control could certainly bring about the doomsday that experts say is essentially impossible. It is very dangerous that the same experts are becoming part of the normalization process. This should be constantly countered by an equally powerful, and diverse, set of voices calling for caution. If the balance ever swayed too far toward normalization, it could mean complete control by a handful of unaccountable, potentially malicious, few. Accountability May Mean Life or Death A threat that is perpetuated by the potential ignorance or mistakes of the few has only one logical counterpart: mitigation by the many. Technologists do not like to talk about this because they often become too wrapped up in their own expertise to consider the opinions of those whose lives are most affected by their potential failings. They understandably imagine that any ordinary person would have such an ignorant opinion regarding decisions made about A.I. that they believe technologists alone have a mandate to shape the developments and usages of their systems. This mindset is surely folly. The perspective of those whose lives are most changed by powerful technologies is essential to render any conversation even-sided. Nuclear proliferators surely would have a different opinion about the technology if their home had been utterly annihilated by a nuclear weapon. Executives at Facebook would likely have different thoughts about the effects of their greedy recommendation systems if they had found themselves unknowingly manipulated by the algorithms. Those who have the privilege of standing outside of the blast zone of these technologies often lack the perspective or empathy to imagine the disastrous effects applying to them. A.I. experts who dismiss domination by computer systems are right to dispel Terminator-fueled hysteria, but wrong to so completely dismiss the notion that our societies really could be controlled by computers without the requisite human understanding to turn back. Those who design artificial intelligence and machine learning systems must plan for enough degrees of control that any potentially disastrous effects could be easily mitigated. They must also commit to taking the view of the “common person” into account when making significant decisions. Just as the scandals surrounding Facebook and Twitter’s use for political manipulation sparked public outrage, the only existing avenue to try to change how these systems affect your life is to become outraged. Due to the lack of popular representation in corporations who control much of the world, and the unwillingness of governments to regulate A.I., right now the burden of accountability falls on ordinary people. Recognizing the potential for gradual “doomsday” to occur, and voicing our concerns in a loud way, is the best way right now to ensure the accountability of powerful technology actors. If technologists or potential regulators do not listen to the concerns of the many, due to ignorance or arrogance, their choices could mean life or death for many around the world. To view machine learning technologies in anything other than this light is to look the other way in the face of deep troubles plaguing the world. Sure, machine learning or artificial intelligence will probably not create killer robots hellbent on controlling us through a sophisticated simulation. However, if we’re not careful in our analysis of these systems, we may wake up in a world where our lives are dominated by machines that were created by a few, cannot be easily rolled back, and where we may not even know how much we’re being controlled until it’s too late.

['Society', 'AI', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Power', 'Technology']

Join the Better Marketing Community on Slack! Become a member to connect with other marketing-people, learn new things, and make better creative work Photo by Jude Beck on Unsplash TL;DR version: We’re creating a Slack community for Better Marketing. We’d love to have you. Fill out this form for an invite! Dear Better Marketing readers and writers, Creative, talented people with expertise in marketing are everywhere, but sometimes that community can be hard to access — especially if you work in a smaller organization or a more entrepreneurial endeavor, where you might not have a full marketing team to bounce ideas around with. I’m drawing from personal experience here: I literally run a publication for marketers, but if I wanted some advice from folks who are really good at email marketing about how to make my newsletter better, I don’t have a go-to place to find that. And if something doesn’t exist, why not make it yourself? So, we’re launching a Better Marketing Slack community. Maybe you’ve been writing for Better Marketing since we launched, or you’ve just stumbled upon our publication. Maybe you’ve been in marketing for decades, or you don’t work in marketing at all and want to learn something new. Maybe you have new projects you’re excited to share and collaborate on, or you’re feeling stuck and looking for a way to re-ignite your creative energy. Wherever you are, come join us on Slack! You don’t have to be a “marketer” to join — if you work in writing, brand strategy, design, communications, digital storytelling, journalism, or other creative industries, you’ll fit right in. Lifetime access to our Slack community is $10 USD (and free for all Better Marketing writers). We don’t know exactly what this will look like, but we have some ideas that we’re excited about. Here’s a few: writer AMAs; virtual talks or workshops on creative topics; something like pair programming sessions, but for marketing projects; job postings and marketing gigs; writing accountability clubs; peer edits and feedback circles for articles; random virtual coffee dates? I’ve been lucky enough to be a part of different creative communities, and I am stoked to take what I’ve learned and to try out new things with this one. Join us! Here’s how: Read the Better Marketing Slack Community guidelines below, and then Fill out this form for an invitation. We hope to see you there! And if you have questions or ideas about this, please get in touch. Cheers, Brittany

['Writing', 'Community', 'Marketing', 'Slack', 'Entrepreneurship']

Why I Think “Target Audience” Doesn’t Always Matter So Much First, writing isn’t a science. When you write a good story, almost anybody will read it. I really believe that. I think worrying about a “target audience” can make you too preoccupied with things that don’t matter. You need to be thinking about emotion. Emotion plays no matter what audience you’re writing for. Second, the term “target audience” puts you in a box. If you say you’re going to write blog posts for freelancers in their 20’s, then every single blog post, to you, better be for freelancers in their 20's. What if you want to write about a relationship you once had, though? You can’t. You got to write to freelancers in their 20’s. It gives you no freedom to dabble, and that can get really draining as a writer. Third, most folks only have three or four topics they really want to write about anyway. For me that’s travel, writing, life lessons, and relationships. These are my four topics. You’ll never read a cooking article from me. I don’t care about that. If you free yourself from boundaries as a writer, you’ll arrive at your target audience organically. Who is my target audience? People like me, I suppose! Fourth, too much emphasis on “target audience” can dehumanize you to your audience. What makes Shannon Ashley so endearing for me is the fact that she writes such personal sh*t. That humanizes her. That makes me want to read her more, no matter what she decides to focus on, because I love her and want to support her. If I just gave you more freelancing tips every blog post, that’s fine, but I’m not anything more than a teacher to my audience. By writing more personal stuff, I become something much more. I become not only helpful, but relatable. I become less of a teacher and more of a friend. And who do you want to hang out with more? Your teacher or your friend?

['Social Media', 'Facebook', 'Writing', 'Self', 'Creativity']

I Work in a Nursing Home on Lockdown. There Is So Much Loneliness Here. How the coronavirus is affecting the day-to-day life of my residents — and my own mental health A resident at the Leonard Florence Center for Living in Boston. Photo: Boston Globe/Getty Images After the first case of the coronavirus was reported in our state of New York, day-to-day life at the nursing home where I work seemed to change overnight. As the medical director of our facility told the administrators, it’s not a matter of if the virus hits our area — but when. The elderly residents I work with are among the most at-risk groups for a global pandemic that’s spreading faster than we can keep up. Many are now anxious for anything to occupy their time after state officials ruled that everyone except staff and medical personnel would be banned from entering the facility. Extreme circumstances warrant an exception, of course. But many of the 144 residents under our care are growing lonely and bored without their families. “Are we going to have a movie this afternoon? Something, anything?” one resident asked me as I walked by him the other day. He’s been missing his son and their regular Dunkin’ coffee and football game time. There wouldn’t be a movie playing that afternoon because the nursing staff needed the TV for a training session on how to deal with the coronavirus. Nursing homes and long-term care facilities have been under lockdown since the Covid-19 outbreak, which has seen a dramatic mortality rate among the elderly and chronically ill. In Washington state, as many as 35 coronavirus deaths have been linked back to a single nursing home. I primarily work in the activities department, where we are in charge of the day-to-day entertainment for our residents. We are involved with everything from cooking to putting on monthly birthday parties, luncheons with our volunteers, casino outings, and, of course, their favorites: bingo and live music. I hated to tell my resident that afternoon that not only was the previously scheduled music session now canceled, but his movie was as well. The most important thing is that first and foremost my residents are safe and currently healthy. But oh, are they lonely. They miss their families. They miss the volunteers and the live music. They miss the priests, and the kind elderly man who comes in to say the rosary and buys candy bars for bingo prizes every week before he leaves. One of my favorite residents has dementia and is clearly missing her daughter, who would come to the nursing home twice a day to spend time with her and assist with her meals. All three sections of the nursing home have been separated completely, and many of my residents are not only feeling the absence of their families, but their friends as well. We’re proud of the sense of community we have built here, and we’re doing our best to preserve that, but all of us have felt the effects of these changes. Not only are activities now separated, but so are the dining tables in order to keep as many of them as possible six feet apart. Smiling familiar faces and voices are now hidden and muffled behind masks at all times. While the residents know it is for their safety, my heart can’t help but sympathize with the occasional resistance from those who wish they had more control over their circumstances. As much as it’s affecting the day-to-day lives of my residents, I have to admit I’ve begun to notice it’s affecting my mental health as well. It’s painful to know that my region is unprepared and ill-equipped to handle an outbreak. Oftentimes, I am separated from co-workers who have become my family and help me get through the stresses of the day. I genuinely was not at all prepared to feel so distant from them, or to not always have them to fall back on and talk to when the day is getting a little too stressful. We are spread thin throughout the entire building, only seeing each other for brief 10-minute periods a couple of times a day unless we are specifically scheduled together for an activity that they know will require more help. It becomes harder and harder to stay upbeat when your resident says she is going to postpone her chemo treatments because of the coronavirus; it gets even worse when you see news flash across her TV screen that a man on the nearby military base has tested positive. It’s not easy to act like I’m staying positive when I drive through the Main Street of my little town that’s become a ghost of what it was just a month before, wondering how all these little businesses are going to get through this. Up until now, I never truly understood how much just scrolling through a social media feed is able to dictate my entire mood and outlook for the rest of the day. There have been more than a couple nights recently where I’ve curled up in the corner of my couch, not even motivated enough to turn a light on while I struggle to take in everything that’s happened just in the past 24 hours before I go to bed. I feel the profound sense of exhausted numbness that gets harder and harder to shake. At this point, I am drained in nearly every conceivable way. It’s painful to know that my region is both unprepared and ill-equipped to handle an outbreak. Every day going in to work, I am fully aware of the danger that this threat poses not so much to me as a young, healthy 25-year-old, but to the residents who I am trusted to care for. While I am all but guaranteed to make a full recovery if I get this sickness, that may not be the case for many of my residents. The burden is heavy, and the road ahead appears long. All I can do is attempt to hold my head high for my residents who need me more than ever, and stay healthy so they will.

['Covid 19', 'Mental Health', 'Health', 'Nursing Homes', 'Coronavirus']

It cannot be overstated that so many of the problems plaguing our world today are very solvable. Given today’s abundant wealth and advanced technologies, we need not have any hunger, pollution, energy needs, traffic deaths, political inefficiency, terrorism, or wars. If we better distributed and deployed the innovations and resources we have right now, these would all be things of the past. We’ve mapped the human genome and are manipulating DNA, we’re learning more ways to deploy nanotechnology, and we could colonize the moon, and probably Mars in five years if we had the will. There is no end to the things we can do — all with our puny monkey-brains. A smarter entity could greatly hasten these advancements and usher in many more undiscovered and unthinkable (for us) ones. “There are no hard problems, only problems that are hard to a certain level of intelligence. Move the smallest bit upwards [in level of intelligence], and some problems will suddenly move from ‘impossible’ to ‘obvious.’ Move a substantial degree upwards, and all of them will become obvious.” — Eliezer Yudkowsky, MIRI Everything we make, indeed, anything that has ever been made, is made up of atoms. And there aren’t that many of them — hydrogen and helium make up 98% of the universe’s matter⁷ and 98.8% of Earth’s mass comes from just 8 elements: iron, oxygen, silicon, magnesium, sulfur, nickel, calcium, and aluminium. We are getting closer and closer to being able to manipulate the smallest known bits of our universe. For example: Genetics — Scientists have now successfully edited a human embryo to “delete” a gene linked to heart conditions. Additionally, genetic modifications to neurons in the brain show that the use of genetic editing is not restricted to growing cells but mature cells as well.⁸ — Scientists have now successfully edited a human embryo to “delete” a gene linked to heart conditions. Additionally, genetic modifications to neurons in the brain show that the use of genetic editing is not restricted to growing cells but mature cells as well.⁸ Quantum Computing — Advances at Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, and several research groups indicate that computers with previously unimaginable power are finally within reach.⁹ — Advances at Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, and several research groups indicate that computers with previously unimaginable power are finally within reach.⁹ Nanotechnology — Researchers have found ways to use nanochip technology to modify skin cells into other functional cells simply by placing a device with an electrical field on a person’s skin.¹⁰ Once we appropriate nanotechnology, the next step will be manipulating individual atoms (only one order of magnitude smaller). It stands to reason, that once we can break things down to their smallest elements and build them back up — moving individual atoms or molecules around — we will be able to build, literally, anything. What can we* achieve with the help of a superhuman intellect? Disease, poverty, environmental destruction, scarcity, unnecessary suffering of all kinds could be eliminated by a superintelligence equipped with advanced nanotechnology.¹¹ * using the “royal we” here as the AI will actually be doing it. Furthermore, “a superintelligence could give us indefinite lifespan, either by stopping and reversing the aging process through the use of nanomedicine, or by offering us the option to upload ourselves.” says Nick Bostrom, author of Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies¹² Here’s another excerpt from Tim Urban’s post about the AI Revolution and how ASI (Artificial Super Intelligence) may change everything:

['Artificial Intelligence', 'AI', 'Predictions', 'Future', 'Humanity']

Photo by Gemma Evans on Unsplash I used to cope fairly well with rejection, as it seemed part of the process of becoming a writer. But fifteen years into trying very seriously to learn the craft, an MFA, and multiple publications later, I’m finding rejection harder and harder to deal with. It’s hard because each piece is a regarded as a brand-new offering to the world no matter how much experience I have; it’s hard because my identity is even more wrapped up in my success as a writer than it ever was because I’ve been doing it so long; it’s hard because I’ve had some success, but my main goal is still out of reach; and it’s hard because in writing it turns out there’s no such thing as an expert, only older students. Slowly, I’m re-learning that the success of the work is truly a separate thing from my creative practice, and that dealing with rejection is a matter of re-centering my values around my creative practice rather than the success of the work. So here are some thoughts I’m hoping I can come back to in those moments I feel despairing, and I hope they help some other people along the way, too. My art is not actually me Yes, it’s an expression of me. But if an entire person could be summed up in a five-page creative essay then we wouldn’t need therapists or election campaigns. I write because I am always changing, always learning, and have new things to say and express, but my work is not even just a piece of me. It’s something I made to represent that piece of me. My work is not me, and other people’s rejection of my work is not a rejection of me as a person. And even if it was, not every other person is going to like me. That’s impossible, and, frankly, unwanted. Who wants to be so palatable that literally everyone likes them, like water? I’d be bland and invisible. All a rejection is telling me is that this piece is not going to be published at this particular time with this particular publishing company. That’s it. It doesn’t mean it’s not good. It doesn’t even mean the editor didn’t like it. I had one piece get rejected and then, years later, the (now former) editor e-mailed me out of nowhere saying he had never stopped thinking about it, here was a potential edit, and I should resubmit it to the magazine and the new editor. So I did that, and they took it. That circumstance let me get some time and distance from the story so that I could be more open to edits, and it was honestly more amazing to hear that someone had thought about my work for that long than it would have been to have gotten it published right away. So remember that sometimes a rejection opens the door for a better situation later. If the piece is already published, it (usually) can’t get published somewhere else with more readers. A rejection might be the reason for success later. And if the piece is really rejected, like I have 100 rejection letters in my hand and it really is time to throw in the towel, then I learned something. I can either rewrite or work on something new. But it is not a judgment of my ability or me as a human being. It’s just a judgment of that piece. Publishing is not writing Getting work accepted by a publisher or magazine is a matter of skill, but on top of that it’s a matter of timing and the opinions of other people, neither of which I can control in the least. Judging the quality of my work by the outcomes of things I can’t control is an exercise in stupidity, much like judging my worth as a human being based on where the leaf I threw into the water lands on the shore. (I don’t know why all my metaphors are water metaphors but here we are). Output, however, I can control. Deliberate practice is something I can control. I want to measure my success by whether I produce, by my own judgment of what I produce, and whether or not I am deliberately pushing myself to overcome my personal weaknesses. One of my weaknesses is plot. So my metrics have become: did I write today? Did I analyze the plot of something I read or watched this week? Am I improving at my ability to create the plot bones of my work to hang my characters on? I need to keep my eye on what I can control, and measure my abilities by that. Not by whether the twenty-something intern at a publishing house fell asleep trying to read my memoir on the E train. (For all I know, she stayed up way too late last night and hates memoir and it has nothing to do with my work). Don’t submit until there’s a new work going The same way Hemingway advised writers to stop work for the day only when they know what they’re going to write tomorrow, I’ve begun to submit my finished pieces for publishing only when I’ve started a new piece. It eases my disappointment and anxiety about rejections of the old work to have a new work to be invested in, and then I’m still meeting output goals for myself. Basically, it’s a way to mitigate rejection and keep moving forward. Judge publishing success by personal effort, not outcomes This year I made it my goal to get 100 rejections. (I got this idea from my friend Melissa Goodrich who is a fantastic writer and has two books out, go read her stuff). Really, this is a goal of 100 submissions, but it incorporates rejection into the fabric of the idea so that you’re not secretly hoping for 100 acceptances. But the key to why I think Goodrich’s method is a good one is that it’s a goal whose metric is the writer’s effort, rather than the subjective decision of an editor or the timing within a zeitgeist. Aiming for 100 rejections means deliberately submitting, accepting rejection as a likely outcome, and committing to doing it long-term. It puts meeting the goal in the writer’s hands and measures success by effort rather than outcomes. And measuring success by one’s own efforts means that success is always possible, and it makes a writer so, so much less likely to give up.

['Motivation', 'Rejection', 'Process', 'Writing', 'Creativity']

3 Tricks You Can Use to Up Your Editing Game A Chrome extension, the ultimate intro question, and a scroll test Photo created by drobotdean | Freepik Part of becoming a better writer is becoming a better editor. What makes the editing process exciting is that it’s always going to be different. But that’s also why it’s so darn hard — every story has its own challenges. Every story requires a different treatment. But as you go along, you’ll find your own strategies that lend a bit of cadence to the process and help you revise drafts more easily. I’ll be sharing three simple tricks that have made editing less daunting for me and helped bring out the ideas in my stories. I hope they make your life easier, too, and maybe even excite you the next time you edit your piece.

['Creativity', 'Editing', 'Writing Tips', 'Productivity', 'Writing']

There’s no way around it: selling is sleazy. It immediately invokes power dynamics with unsavory images. Hunters stalking prey. Greasy, pressure-y men with bad teeth and bad breath, cornering you in a tacky office full of stale air. Malignant advertising think-tanks, plotting to perfectly twang on the heartstrings and manipulate your impulses. Yes, selling is seen as so evil that the Devil Himself is a salesman, always looking to get the better end of the bargain. Selling is sleazy because it requires confronting some pervasive social taboos. To sell well, you have to be willing to do things that most people find uncomfortable. You must: face your animal nature; clearly ask for what you want; and, withhold what you have from those who want it until they meet your demands. Confronting the need to sell is of absolute importance when stepping into the world of entrepreneurship, business, or any self-supporting endeavor. And yet, the Salesperson archetype is one of the most challenging: the urge to turn away from it and avoid it is strong. So — what’s a hungry girl to do? Let's confront the taboo realities of selling to shed some light on this shadowy, dimly-lit, hush-hush territory. You Must Eat. “Never get so attached to a poem you forget truth that lacks lyricism. Never draw so close to the heat that you forget that you must eat.” — Joanna Newsom Let us begin by remembering the most terrible of facts: we are all animals. We are animals who must eat — and therefore destroy — other life-forms. Much as we would like to avoid this fact, and are helped in this avoidance by modern civilization’s extreme phobia of animal-ness, it remains true and incontrovertible. Let that sink in: In order for you to continue to live, you must DAILY consume the life-force of other beings. So very many of us are focused on the good we wish to do in the world — the poetic truths we hold dear, the ideals we champion — and so hyper-aware of the harm and greed caused daily on our behalf, that it is tempting to disassociate from the reality of yourself as a primal animal, in need of animal sustenances. Don’t do that. Stay with me. We need to stay present with ourselves as animals-who-need-to-be-fed for two reasons: If we forget this ourselves, we are liable to give overly-much without ensuring our own nourishment in the process. If we allow others to dull us into unawareness, we become dependent on others and easily frightened by our own bodies, and — interestingly — that much more susceptible to the sleaziest of sales tactics. So — remember. You must eat. We can be grateful that we are sheltered from the bloodiest truths of our animal nature by the clean and slick medium of money — and yet, we must never forget that we sell in order to live. Like a lean mama wolf out on a cold clear night, her senses sharp and alert, we bring home rabbits in order to keep the flame of life alive in ourselves and those we love. You Must Ask. So much of what we despise in the salesperson archetype is their bold willingness to ask for what they want. Clear, concise communications of desire are, in many ways, taboo in our culture. We are more used to manipulation, passive aggression, and indirect requests. More to the point, we are often completely unsure of what we want. So unsure, that the thought of explicitly asking for it is unthinkable. We feel frightened of salespeople because when we don’t know what we want — when we are unsure of our own desire — the salesperson’s desire, their offer, can feel like a manipulation or seductive irresistible stand-in for our own missing desire energy. This has all kinds of sexual-archetypal implications and accounts for the greasy patina we often psychically feel around sales interactions. Most importantly, this discomfort with knowing our desire is the knot that must be unraveled in order to both sell effectively and be sold to without yucks. To be an excellent salesperson, one must be able to ask with the confidence and respect of a lover fluent in the language of consent. Clear requests and offers are made, objections are heard without reaction, negotiations are entered into until both parties are comfortable. This is ideal. Open communication of desire between two people. Very sexy. You Must Know Your Worth. The final taboo that smears on layers of fetid trashy stink is a salesperson’s willingness to represent their goods as valuable. How audacious. So upsetting to narratives of smallness that many people have swallowed. Even more revolting, the salesperson withholds their excellent, desirable, much-needed product until they get what they want. They violate the most basic kindergarten laws of kindness — they don’t share, or bring enough for everyone (unless everyone can pay…). And yet, given that the salesperson must eat — what other choice is there? There will always be a tension of withholding until the score is settled. It is here where the shadow of the buyer emerges most strongly in the archetype of the victim, or the beggar, or the down-on-his-luck, sure-could-use-a-hand type of guy who believes he deserves something for nothing. The interplay between this beggar character (who secretly believes he deserves nothing) and the salesperson doesn’t last long if the salesperson is experienced: they lose interest. How can a salesperson sell to a person who believes they deserve nothing, and therefore desire nothing, and are willing to offer nothing of themselves? The willingness to cut ties quickly with this type of situation, knowing that they have valuable things to offer, adds a calculating callousness to the greasy sleaze of the Salesperson Archetype. To Win at Selling is to Reconcile the Taboo. In order to sell effectively, you must find acceptance for these things in yourself. You Must Eat : to ask a price, to exact payment, is embedded in the natural order. Don’t feel bad about it, hide from it, or disguise it. : to ask a price, to exact payment, is embedded in the natural order. Don’t feel bad about it, hide from it, or disguise it. You Must Ask : know what you want, know what you’re offering, and know what you can and can’t do to be flexible and close the deal. Clear communication is a blessing we need more of it. : know what you want, know what you’re offering, and know what you can and can’t do to be flexible and close the deal. Clear communication is a blessing we need more of it. You Must Know Your Worth: and own it. No one deserves to consume you without supporting you in return unless you decide to let them. Having boundaries is not taboo, it’s hot. You will know you have accepted these things in yourself when you encounter the Salesperson archetype in others, and instead of being skeezed out by the sleazy slime — you see a fellow artist of desire, working their magic.

['Professional Development', 'Psychology', 'Sales', 'Marketing', 'Entrepreneurship']

100 of the Best Engineers, Developers, Coders, and Entrepreneurs to Follow Online 100 brilliant minds Photo by bruce mars on Unsplash Jim Rohn famously said that we are the average of the five people we spend the most time with. This applies to work too. Imagine you could surround yourself with brilliant engineers, developers, and entrepreneurs. Imagine you could freely exchange ideas and share knowledge with all of them. Most of these brilliant minds openly share knowledge. They write books, give talks, have Twitter accounts. This is what makes them great; they change communities, change lives, and make the world a better place. I created a list of great minds that inspire developers. The list was generated by a survey of more than 400 developers. The purpose of this list was to find people that are role models in dev community. By following them, learning from them we can become better developers ourselves. And the world needs inspirational people now more than ever. This was a great experiment. Thank you for taking the survey and participating in a discussion. The survey is now closed. The list is no longer available. The objective was to find people ALL OVER the world to INSPIRE us.

['Entrepreneurship', 'Startup', 'Development', 'Self Improvement', 'Programming']

I am Devansh Mittal. I am a Computer Science graduate (2003–2007) from IIIT-Hyderabad (International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad). Currently I am a Physics Faculty at Allen Career Institute (Kota, Rajasthan) since 2015. After my graduation I worked in IT industry for two years from 2007–2009, at Hyderabad. After that I joined IIIT-Hyderabad as a Lecturer and worked there from July 2009- January 2014. During February 2014 — August 2015, I worked as a Lecturer at IIT-BHU (Varanasi). During my tenure at Universities like IIIT-Hyderabad and IIT BHU I worked on Mind Body Problem which involved my works on Theoretical Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence, Cognitive Science, Philosophy of Mind and Psychology. Physics has always been my love, so currently I am following my passion by Teaching Physics to Bright Minds of Higher Secondary. My research in Physics is never limited to any competitive exam. I like to explore various aspects of Relativity, Quantum Mechanics, along with Newtonian Physics. This blog is a tiny attempt to share my explorations. I can be contacted here. devansh [DOT] exe [AT] gmail [DOT] com

['Psychology', 'Motivation', 'Philosophy Of Mind', 'Artificial Intelligence', 'Physics']

We believe monetization is a hidden secret. Secrets hiding in plain sight. From the psychology of anchoring, the mathematics of power-law pricing tables, the application of demand elasticity, and the market positioning of your price — your path to better monetization awaits. Follow

['Monetization', 'Marketing', 'Growth', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Startup']

Sleep-Deprived and Inactive People May Fare Badly Against Covid-19 (and Other Infections) It’s not so often that such an obvious study is done. Design vector created by freepik — www.freepik.com It’s obvious that healthy sleeping and exercise habits are important lifestyle factors that support the immune system and prevent diseases. It may be so obvious that coronavirus research thus far seldom considers confirming it. At least, I rarely see studies examining how lifestyle factors interact with Covid-19. One such study was published last month in Nature and Science of Sleep, a reputable journal, titled “Reduced Sleep in the Week Prior to Diagnosis of COVID-19 is Associated with the Severity of COVID-19.” The title alone is probably sufficient as a take-home message. But this piece will dissect the study further and provide more context. What the study did and found Researchers in China traced back health records of hospitalized patients with Covid-19 across multiple hospitals from three different China provinces. Then they called the patients to inquire about their personal information such as age, sex, weight, physical activity, and sleep. In sum, 164 people infected with Covid-19 (who were discharged from the hospital) and 188 uninfected responded. Using both the health records and phone interview data, the study identified several independent risk factors of getting Covid-19 and severe Covid-19. (By independent, it means factors that are not influenced by other factors.) These include smoking history, medical comorbidities, irregular exercise, sedentary lifestyle, overexertion, and reduced sleep. Specifically, those who did not exercise regularly (less than three times per week) had a 2.9-times increased risk of severe Covid-19. Interestingly, 91% of asymptomatic infections happened to those who exercised regularly, which means they didn’t get sick despite contracting the coronavirus. Moderate intensity exercises provided the maximal benefit. Even animals intuitively sleep more when they are fighting infections. Sleep deprivation studies in humans or animals, in turn, always leads to worse health outcomes from, as well as increased risk of, infections. About sleep, 7–9 hours were defined as adequate. Notably, the sleep status was determined during the week before the Covid-19 diagnosis. Analyses revealed that the “risk of severe infection increased with decreased sleep status, reaching [6.7-times] higher for potentially appropriate sleep and peaking at [8.6-times] higher for lack of sleep…,” the study authors wrote. Moreover, “the possibility of developing damage of external lung organs [as a result of Covid-19] decreased with increases in average daily sleep time.” More context on exercise A prior study in May 2020 utilizing the U.K. biobank data of 387,109 adults has also found physical inactivity as an independent risk factor for Covid-19 hospitalization— with a population attributable fraction (PAF) of 8.6%. This means 8.6% of Covid-19 hospitalizations could have been prevented if the factor was addressed. Fortunately, even less exercise (<150 minutes per week) also conferred benefits in lowering hospitalization risks. This study has also calculated the PAFs of other factors and how overall ‘lifestyle score’ affects hospitalization risks, as detailed here: Many other population studies — with sample sizes ranging from about 30,000 to 100,000 — have also supported regular exercise as a protective factor against risks of future infections, such as bloodstream infections (and sepsis), pneumonia, and overall bacterial- and viral-induced deaths. To restate, moderate-intensity exercise was found to be the most beneficial in the study described above, compared to low-, high-, or no-intensity. Studies involving athletes also agree that moderate levels of physical activity are most optimal in attenuating the risks of respiratory infections. This means 8.6% of Covid-19 hospitalizations could have been prevented if the factor was addressed. Fortunately, even less exercise (<150 minutes per week) also conferred benefits in lowering hospitalization risks. It’s estimated that only one-fourth and one-fifth of American adults and high-schoolers, respectively, get enough exercise. Exercise is a primary protective factor against chronic diseases — e.g., diabetes, obesity, cancer, cardiovascular diseases, depression, anxiety, and others— which are “the major killers in the modern era.” Advancing civilization has allowed “modern humans [to] engineer most physical activity out of daily life,” Frank W. Booth, a nutrition and exercise physiology professor, and co-workers stated. “Humans now have a choice not to be physically active.” More context on sleep It’s general advice to rest well to recover from infections, and that means more sleep. Even animals intuitively sleep more when they are fighting infections. Sleep deprivation studies in humans or animals, in turn, always leads to worse health outcomes from, as well as increased risk of, infections. For example, in a study of 56,953 middle-aged nurses without major medical comorbidities, those who habitually sleep 5 hours or less or 9 hours or more were more likely to contract pneumonia. Similar findings were reported in another study of 22,726 American adults, where sleeping 5 hours or less doubled the risk of influenza, pneumonia, or an ear infection. Another notable point is long-term sleep loss does the immune system more harm than short-term sleep loss. In fact, the latter might even enhance immunity, as shown in animal tests. “Evolutionarily, this might be explained by the fact that the host defense system needs to be enhanced in a situation of acute total sleep loss (such as being hunted by a predator) but that without sleep, the immune system eventually fails,” Nigel Curtis, a professor of pediatric infectious diseases, and co-workers stated. More than one-third of American adults don’t sleep enough. Shift work, pressured lifestyle, and other societal stressors may be to blame. “Because the immune system protects against both infection and [cancer], as well as enables immunization against disease, the concept that the behavior of modern society might compromise immunity has far-reaching public-health implications for both individuals and the population as a whole.” Short abstract It’s common advice to exercise and sleep well, so the immune system can function as it should and ward off diseases. Indeed, a study in China has found that physical inactivity and sleep deprivation increase the risk of more severe Covid-19 by several folds. Similarly, a study in the U.K. has calculated that exercise could have prevented 8.6% of hospitalizations for Covid-19. These results are in line with many prior large, population-level studies showing that sufficient exercise and sleep prevent life-threatening infections. Yet, as a result of drastic societal changes, chronic sleep loss and lack of exercise have become the norm.

['Advice', 'Health', 'Life', 'Science', 'Coronavirus']

Matplotlib is the most basic and powerful library for data visualization in Python. It is a 2D plotting library that allows you to create publication-quality figures easily. Another complimentary package that is based on this data visualization library is Seaborn. It can provide a high-level interface to draw statistical graphics. If you are tired of the bar plot generated by seaborn by default and interested in improving the quality and beauty of your bar chart, this tutorial is made for you. In this tutorial, we are going to build a customized bar plot using Matplotlib and seaborn. The finished bar chart will look like this. 1. Import libraries import numpy as np import pandas as pd import matplotlib.pyplot as plt import seaborn as sns %matplotlib inline 2. Create a dataframe for data visualization Mydict={ ‘Province’:[‘Alberta’,’British Columbia’,’Manitoba’,’New Brunswick’,’Newfoundland & Labrador’, ‘Northwest Territories’,’Nova Scotia’,’Nunavut’,’Ontario’,’Prince Edward Island’, ‘Quebec’,’Saskatchewan’,’Yukon’], ‘Province_Code’:[‘AB’,’BC’,’MB’,’NB’,’NL’,’NT’,’NS’,’NU’,’ON’,’PE’,’QC’,’SK’,’YT’], ‘Minimum_Wage’:[‘15.00’,’14.60',’11.65',’11.70',’11.65',’13.46',’12.55',’13.00',’14.00',’12.85',’13.10',’11.32',’13.71'] } df=pd.DataFrame(Mydict) #change the datatype of minimum wage from object to float df['Minimum_Wage'] = df['Minimum_Wage'].astype(str).astype(float) print(df.dtypes) The dataset is very simple. It contains the minimum salaries across all provinces in Canada. 3. Draw a basic bar plot fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(9,6)) sns.barplot(x=’Province_Code’,y=’Minimum_Wage’,data=df,ci=95,ax=ax) ax.set_title(‘Minimum Wage Comparison across Canada’) It can be clearly seen that the font of the axis labels on the horizontal and vertical coordinates is a little bit small, It is hard to read. And the scale line is not very helpful in pinpointing the real number for each bar. The first step is to enlarge the font of the axis labels and remove the scale line. 3.1 Remove the tick line fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(9,6)) sns.barplot(x=’Province_Code’,y=’Minimum_Wage’,data=df,ci=95,ax=ax) ax.set_title(‘Minimum Wage Comparison across Canada’) # set the font size of labels into 16 and remove the tick line ax.tick_params(labelsize=16,length=0) 3.2 Remove the borders of the bar chart # method 1 ax.spines[‘left’].set_visible(False) ax.spines[‘top’].set_visible(False) ax.spines[‘right’].set_visible(False) ax.spines[‘bottom’].set_visible(False) #method 2 plt.box(False) The chart is getting better already by increase fonts and removing the border lines. 3.3 Reorder the sequence of bars in the chart fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(9,6)) sns.barplot(x=’Province_Code’,y=’Minimum_Wage’,data=df,ci=95,ax=ax, order = df.sort_values(‘Minimum_Wage’).Province_Code, #reorder bars ) #change the color of bars ax.set_title(‘Minimum Wage Comparison across Canada’) # set the font size of labels into 16 and remove the tick line ax.tick_params(labelsize=16,length=0) plt.box(False) #removing border lines 3.4 Change the color of bars Matplotlib provides very comprehensive choices for you to choose colors. I am going to use plasma. You can try different color palette such as ‘viridis’, ‘plasma’, ‘inferno’, ‘magma’, ‘cividis’. If you would like to use one color with different shades, you can pass ‘Greys’, ‘Purples’, ‘Blues’, ‘Greens’, ‘Oranges’, ‘Reds’ to palette parameter. fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(9,6)) sns.barplot(x=’Province_Code’,y=’Minimum_Wage’,data=df,ci=95,ax=ax, order = df.sort_values(‘Minimum_Wage’).Province_Code, palette = ‘plasma’) ax.set_title(‘Minimum Wage Comparison across Canada’) ax.tick_params(labelsize=16,length=0) plt.box(False) 3.5 Add grid lines Adding grid lines will help audience to pinpoint the height of each bar and have a better understanding of the numbers. fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(9,6)) sns.barplot(x=’Province_Code’,y=’Minimum_Wage’,data=df,ci=95,ax=ax, order = df.sort_values(‘Minimum_Wage’).Province_Code, palette = ‘plasma’) ax.set_title(‘Minimum Wage Comparison across Canada’) ax.tick_params(labelsize=16,length=0) plt.box(False) # add grid lines for y axis ax.yaxis.grid(linewidth=0.5,color=’black’) # put the grid lines below bars ax.set_axisbelow(True) By default, the gridlines are solid lines. It can also be changed by pass variables to the parameter linestyle. You can check out more choices at the matplotlib page. 3.6 Beautify title, labels and ticks In this step, I am going to beautify the title by giving it a background color and changing the font size and font color. Also, I am going to change the ticks and axis labels. fig,ax = plt.subplots(figsize=(12,8)) sns.barplot(x=’Province_Code’,y=’Minimum_Wage’,data=df,ci=95,ax=ax, order = df.sort_values(‘Minimum_Wage’).Province_Code, palette = ‘plasma’,alpha=0.8) ax.set_title(‘Minimum Wage Comparison across Canada’,backgroundcolor=’#565656', fontsize=20, weight=’bold’,color=’white’,style=’italic’,loc=’center’,pad=30) ax.tick_params(labelsize=16,length=0) plt.box(False) ax.yaxis.grid(linewidth=0.5,color=’grey’,linestyle=’-.’) ax.set_axisbelow(True) ax.set_xlabel(‘Province’,weight=’bold’,size=15) ax.set_ylabel(‘Minimum Wage’,weight=’bold’,size=15) plt.yticks(np.arange(0, 18, 4)) #yticks starts from 0 and ends at 18, step is 4 ax.set_yticklabels([“ “,”$4",”$8",’$12',’$16'],color=’#565656') plt.xticks(rotation=30,color=’#565656') plt.show() Now, you get a much more beautify bar chart. At the very end, let us take a final look at the Before and After charts. The beautified chart is much more clear and and can help audience to read it more easily. Bars are in an ascending order. Labels and title are also informative. Grid lines is helpful in pinpointing the actual numbers of each bars. If you are interested in making other types of beautiful charts, you may want to check out my other posts.

['Matplotlib', 'Programming', 'Visualization', 'Python', 'Data Visualization']

Have you had those few select moments or days where you realized your life took on a different path? Maybe when it happened — you couldn't see it, but now that the dust has settled, you know that that moment or those few hours were the pivot that would send you on a different life course. I know I've had my particular moment like that. It was May of 2015. I had recently celebrated two years at the internet-based company I was working for. The celebration was felt with a somber note — at least internally for me. I didn't really care for what I was doing at the time. You see, I was a salesperson. I was calling auto dealerships and trying to sell our SaaS product to them. I knew I wasn't feeling fulfilled. I would show up at 9:06 am or 9:10 am because a few minutes being late didn't mean much I would open up my outlook calendar and roll my eyes at the pointless meetings I had with other teams (at least I thought they were pointless). I would make cups of coffee in the common area. The coffee was crap — I had no intention of even drinking it — I just wanted to get away from my desk for a minute or two. I would make fake calls to dealerships who I knew wouldn't pick up the phone — just so I could make my monthly call quota. I hated it. Near the end of that month, I was called into my boss's boss's office where I was put in front of a disciplinary tribunal. They had me dead to rights. They had printed out a quarter-inch stack of papers that tracked all of the fake calls I made. I was cornered. They wanted to know what was up. They told me that if I signed a PIP plan (performance improvement plan) then after 30 days we could forget this ever happened and get back to "normal." I'm no one's puppet. I flipped through the papers — trying to find extra time to come up with an excuse that would save my ass. I had nothing. I handed the packet back to them and said, "I can't sign this — in 31 days we'll be having this same conversation again." Needless to say — I was released from my position a few moments after that. They didn't even give me a two-week exit. I mean I got paid two weeks worth severance, but they wanted my toxic ass out the door. In all attempts to not be cliché — it was one of the most important moments of my life. It made me realize that I couldn't work for at a job feeling unfulfilled, working for someone I didn't respect, and making wages I felt I was underpaid for. That moment started the next 5-year journey that helped me get to the place I am now: I work for myself I write about and create things that bring me meaning I make a living I'm proud of It all didn't come easy — in fact, there were days I wanted to pack everything up, curl into a ball cry and beg for my mommy. I'm not ashamed to admit that. What I'm going to write about is what I had to do in that journey in order to get where I am today. I want to share this story and offer these gifts of knowledge to anyone who understands these feelings and wants more for themselves. So here goes…

['Writing', 'Digital Marketing', 'Money', 'Marketing', 'Entrepreneurship']

“Who is Nightingale for?” It’s a question I’ve been asked point-blank by friends and coworkers and one that hovers beneath the surface in certain online conversations. For some it is a practical question: does reading this provide value to me? But for others the question is more fundamental: do I even belong here? So who is Nightingale for? The easy answer is the dataviz community. But, in the 5 months since the launch of the Data Visualization Society and roughly 80 Medium stories later, a few things have become quite clear. This community is expansive. We are designers who learned about data analysis and coding; we are scientists who learned about visual design and storytelling; we are computer programmers who learned about color theory and building visualizations. We all learned differently. Some of us have been doing this work for several decades — long before there were formalized programs — while others of us have never made visualizations professionally. And if the dataviz community is hard to summarize, summarizing our audience is an impossible challenge. The work we create is used across all fields, from public health, to history, to sports, to… Beyoncé. We have used our own hobbies to inform our visualizations, and incorporated visualization work into our most special days. We have used visualization as a tool to challenge the utility of everyday objects, and to measure small victories. Here at Nightingale we encourage people from all backgrounds to submit articles that continue to add new voices to this conversation. Know someone who’s unsure that Nightingale is for them? Share our homepage or one of the stories above and ask them to come explore.

['Design', 'Storytelling', 'Science', 'Data Science', 'Data Visualization']

All sorts of books are published every year, and there are all sorts of book-buyers who are looking for different kinds of things. Some people love to read romances, and some people love to read mysteries, and some people love to read young adult novels, and some people, yes, are looking for thought-provoking literary novels. I’m one of the latter. I write books for the middle grade and young adult market, and I have a particular passion for genre books like thrillers and horror novels, but what I actually love to read the most, the kind of book you’d spot me curled up on a couch actually reading, are literary novels, the bigger the better. I love literary novels about family especially. Three of my recent favorites are The Nix, The Goldfinch, and Little Fires Everywhere, all richly detailed tales I loved every minute of. So, yes, some people like myself seek out novels with a high degree of literary merit. That offer more than a fun yarn you can forget a few minutes after you turn the final page.

['Writing', 'Reading', 'Creativity', 'Entertainment', 'Books']

Earlier in November, I got a press release about a new project launched by liberal media exemplar Huffington Post, in partnership with MIT’s Presencing Institute, on “transforming capitalism”. The project announced that HuffPo would provide a radical journalism hub exploring ways to redesign the economy, looking into concepts like “circular economy” and other issues, while doing “online to offline” movement building to facilitate real action in relation to these solutions. It sounded super-exciting. But as I read on, I experienced a sinking feeling. The new HuffPo-MIT project is headed up by Dr Otto Scharmer, senior lecturer at MIT’s Sloan School of Management and co-founder of MIT’s Presencing Institute. Dr. Scharmer is a management guru who has written extensively on theories and practice relating to organisational change and leadership. And despite some positives, Dr. Scharmer’s grasp of the issues is confused, to say the least. Sanitizing neoliberal deregulatory insanity Scharmer rightly recognizes that there is a fundamental lack of joined up thinking in the approach to the multiple crises facing the planet. He calls for a more integrated response, and sets out his diagnosis of the problem in the destruction wrought by early phases of capitalism. He commendably acknowledges the entrenched limits of conventional economic thinking, with its dependence on “a very small number of economic theorists and frameworks.” He asks pointedly, “… despite the millions of words devoted to [the economic crisis] by ‘experts’ on talk shows and in publications, what do we really know about its root causes?” This all sounds compelling, until his ‘solution’: a shift to what he calls ‘Capitalism 3.0’, which he defines magically as “a shift of awareness that extends the natural self-interest of the players to the entire ecosystem.” Amazingly, Dr. Scharmer doesn’t really offer a definition of capitalism that has anything remotely to do with economics, finance, relations of production or anything. Capitalism, he says, has already been ‘evolving’ — and improving — from being solely ego-centric and growth oriented, resulting in massive social and environmental costs, toward a more stakeholder-oriented system. Scharmer conceives of this ‘evolution’ as being “based on a different state of awareness among its players” — consciousness evolution, he believes, is driving capitalism’s evolution. Today’s capitalism, Capitalism 2.0, he writes — seemingly with a straight face — is “more regulated” than before. It has wondrous new social security systems, labour unions, environmental standards, much of which are supported by the activities of hundreds of thousands of NGOs. As such, he declares that “the main focus of capitalism 2.0 is on redistribution in order to sustain society as a whole.” This, supposedly, is the defining nature of the current age of capitalism. Really? In one fell swoop, Scharmer manages to obscure what is really going on. It’s widely recognized that the defining feature of today’s extreme form of neoliberal capitalism is all about imposing grand-scale financial market deregulation, designed to shift power over economic policy from the public to the private sector, from the government to an unaccountable financial elite. This is the same ideology which has exponentially accelerated the debt and financial volatility we now see in the global economy. And it is precisely this rampaging expansion of unregulated neoliberal globalization, which has led to the steady dismantlement of state-led regulatory apparatuses established between the 1940s and 70s. That, in turn, has generated an army of largely impotent NGOs campaigning desperately, usually on deaf ears, to restrain this increasingly predatory financial system. Those civil society movements, then, emerged not as a benevolent outpouring of the existing capitalist system — representing an expansion of its overall consciousness — but out of conflict with the prevailing system: struggle between those who monopolize access to resources, and those dispossessed from that access. This was not some sort of teleological process of ‘consciousness’ evolution. And yet, Scharmer himself concedes that the friendlier ‘capitalism 2.0’ “does not appear to be working to mitigate the current global externalities”. Within his logic, the actual reasons for this appear unfathomable. That is why, under Scharmer’s ‘capitalism 2.0’, global inequalities have widened, and the number of people living under $5 a day — a more realistic poverty line than the World Bank’s $1.90 — has dramatically increased. Today, 4.3 billion people, nearly two-thirds of the world’s population, live on less than $5 a day. That is why, what is actually happening is that state-failures, extremist nationalism, Islamist terrorism and other phenomena are being driven by a convergence of economic and ecological crises, which are intensifying within a broken economic model that is hell-bent on accelerating extraction at any human, social or environmental cost. Work on your ego, and the corporate world will obediently follow Perusing Scharmer’s work, it becomes painfully clear that he is ill-equipped to engage with the interconnected complexity of this systemic crisis. Scharmer’s basic limitation is his starting point: organizational change theory. He remarks that it is standard practice for leadership teams in global companies to do ‘inner change work’ to help shift an individual’s awareness “from an ego-system to an extended stakeholder situation or, in some cases, to the larger ecosystem”. Neoclassical economists, he says, do not acknowledge how changes in “human awareness and consciousness” can “influence human behaviour”. And so he concludes that “the biggest blind spot in economic theory today [is] consciousness — that is, the structure of human awareness and attention that a community of actors develops when they go on a journey of transformational change.” So what’s the solution? Don’t worry about the economics: let’s have Scharmer and his crack team lead the employees of all the giant corporates currently extracting from the planet at break-neck pace, and have them go through mind-expanding “journeys of transformational change” — this will change their behaviour, and the behaviour of their companies, and transform capitalism into a juggernaut of collective, orgasmic altruism. This, basically, is what’s going on at the MIT Presencing Institute. Can we get real here, please? The stark truth is that Scharmer is casting a net of beauty on a far more mundane process of corporate cultural institutional conditioning: improving the productivity of workers. It doesn’t really matter what company employees think they are experiencing. For the most part, their “transformational change” is designed to condition the individual to “embrace the larger forces of change” that constitute the narrow profit-maximizing imperatives of the company itself. The end result is not a transformation of how these companies operate in the world, but instead, the cultural conditioning of employees into the belief that submerging themselves in the corporate values and vision of their employers is, indeed, part of a ‘transformative’ process. Inside the wondrous ‘ego-to-eco’ transformation of Google A quick glance at some of the corporations that Scharmer has run leadership and innovation programs for illustrates the problem: firms like Alibaba, Daimler, Fujitsu, Google, and PriceWaterhouse. Yet these companies do not exhibit meaningful processes of transformational change — in fact, we see the opposite. Let’s take Google, one of Otto Scharmer’s transformational change clients. What has Scharmer’s innovation and leadership program done to transform Google’s structural entanglement with the US military-industrial complex? What has it done, for that matter, to transform anything meaningfully at Google? We might refer to Google’s oft-stated declarations of reducing its carbon footprint to zero while transitioning to 100% renewable energy by 2018. Yet according to Lux Research, Google uses an obsolete tool to calculate its data center emissions from purchasing electricity from the power grid. Consequently, in four out of seven data centers, Google underestimates its dependence on coal by 30 percent or more. And then there is Google’s primary technique for reducing its footprint to zero: buying carbon offsets — that is, investing in outsider green energy projects, allowing Google to claim the equivalent in ‘emissions reductions’ on its own books. Although their actual real-world emissions have not reduced at all. While Google has been trumpeting its zero carbon trajectory — receiving accolades from Greenpeace along the way — its gross carbon emissions have actually increased. Over the last half decade alone, Google’s gross carbon emissions have more than doubled. In 2011, Google recorded its gross CO2 emissions at 1,677,423 metric tons. In 2012, the company reported a 9% drop in its gross emissions to 1.5 metric tons. Yet even here, the drop was achieved not by a real material drop in emissions, but by factoring in deductions from Google’s power purchase agreements (PPA). So the real gross emissions figure for that year, calculated in the same way the 2011 figures were calculated, was 2,024,444 metric tons. By 2016, Google’s gross carbon emissions had grown to 2.9 million metric tons according to the company’s 2017 progress report. The net result? Google’s actual carbon footprint is growing exponentially. Yet environmental certifications, such as that produced by Greenpeace, are being used to sanitize and legitimize this growth. Google now claims that “because of our renewable energy and carbon offset programs, our net operational carbon emissions were zero. Because of our emissions-reduction efforts, our carbon intensity has steadily decreased even as our company has grown and our energy use has correspondingly increased.” All this is true, but it is ultimately a clever carbon accounting trick that allows Google’s real-world carbon emissions to continue accelerating. Which is why, despite all this self-congratulatory nonsense about the ‘greening’ of the internet, our current global emissions trajectory is so bad it could end up heading to an uninhabitable 8C planet by end of century. It is no surprise, then, that Google is simultaneously funding climate deniers. Google hosted a fundraiser for notorious climate-denying Senator James Inhofe; donated $50,000 for a fundraising dinner for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, an ultra-conservative outfit that attempts to sue climate scientists for fraud; and is a member of the US Chamber of Commerce, which consistently lobbies to block action on climate change and promotes fossil fuels. But it’s all okay, because Google got an ‘A’ certification from Greenpeace. In other words, such sustainability metrics might be good for business; but for the planet, they are meaningless. Their application isn’t slowing the pace of fossil fuel extraction — they are accelerating extraction under the cover of saving the climate. Stenographic liberal ‘journalism’ And thus, with the help of misleading number crunching, an exponentially increasing carbon footprint is misreported as a decreasing carbon footprint. Unfortunately, you won’t find any dissecting of Google’s grand claims from the mainstream liberal press. Instead, Huffington Post — Otto Scharmer’s media partner of choice to ‘transform capitalism’ — bravely reported Google’s acclaimed clean carbon footprint trajectory without any investigation of the facts. Thus, HuffPo — along with a host of liberal media outlets like The Guardian whose stenographic reporting conveniently erases the reality of Google’s increasing carbon emissions — obfuscates the real systemic causes of the Crisis of Civilization. Stultifying liberal ‘philanthropy’ The main funders for the HuffPo-MIT project are a Geneva-based foundation, Partners for a New Economy, and an Atlanta-based foundation, the Kendeda Fund. Both foundations are important players on the spectrum of liberal philanthropy. They are part of a whole network of such foundations. In March 2017, for instance, I’d been invited to Boston by the director of Partners for a New Economy to do a keynote speech on the future of philanthropy for the Biodiversity Funders Group (formerly, the Consultative Group on Biological Diversity). This is the premier forum of philanthropic foundations focused on environmental issues, comprising 67 organisations including the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, and many others. What’s clear is that these philanthropic foundations have no real idea what’s actually wrong with the existing system, and therefore no clue as to what they should be funding. So they end up funding self-soothing, self-serving ideological nonsense that merely distracts from real solutions. Layer upon layer of self-soothing delusion And so we come full circle. This is the interlocking network of liberal progressive do-gooding that is continuing to escalate the destruction of the planet. All these years I’d been exposing and investigating the system of extraction in its various manifestations — mass surveillance, covert operations, military invasions, fossil fuel extraction, rampant debt-acceleration. And yet I have begun to see that the real enemy, the real forces preventing us from actually responding to this system meaningfully, was something entirely different. The real enemy to transformation is among the harbingers of change themselves. The real enemy is amongst ourselves. In this liberal progressive world of philanthropists, foundations, trusts, charities, NGOs, platforms, outlets and beyond, a great deal of activity, though dressed up in the language of ‘change’, is not authentic. This language conveniently disguises the fact that actors in this space are still playing the extraction game. They appropriate the discourse of ‘systemic transformation’, and use it to sanitize and legitimize the very system of extraction that they are professing to transform. And they believe that their way is the only way. Layer upon layer of self-soothing delusion serves to mask and intensify what are in fact behaviors that support extraction. They appear benign, and there are all sorts of rationalizations, excuses and explanations for their behavior: ideological indoctrination, structural constraints, social conditioning, psychological ailments, or simple incompetence. But it doesn’t matter. Because the current configuration of liberal progressive myopia constitutes the most dangerous obstacle to saving people and planet that currently exists. It is standing in the way of real alternatives, real solutions. It is co-opting the emergence of genuine possibilities, ideas, movements and ventures with transformative potential, and absorbing them within the framework of accelerated extraction. The central insight here is that liberal progressive discourse, right now, is precisely the ideology by which the system of extraction is accelerating and consolidating. By positioning themselves as transformers of the system, the liberal progressive mirage is in fact legitimizing and extending the system through the language of ‘change’.

['Environment', 'Politics', 'Economics', 'Society', 'Journalism']

Before I put pen to paper, my thoughts were about researching and offering quotes from eminent free-thinking experts and authors. I examined information available in books and online, only to discover many so-called specialists disagree about pain stored in the body via anxiety. Mostly, they fall out over how to release tension and cure physical angst. They all agree, nonetheless, emotions affect physical health. I was perplexed, then I realized I have plenty of real-life data to share. In my former days as a counselor, and simply as someone interested in health and the way feelings influence well-being, I have learned a great deal. Here’s what I know for certain. (Backed by science and experience rather than New Age theories about which people can’t agree). Every time you experience an emotion you have a physical response. When you are stressed, your blood flow changes. Anger, for instance, increases blood flow in the brain. Dr. Michael Roizen, MD states blood flow is also reduced in certain areas. “Work published in the Journal of the American Medical Association concluded that stress was linked to reduced blood flow to the heart (myocardial ischemia) and other vital organs. People who had a lot of stress also had more periods of inadequate blood flow to the heart, leading to a correspondingly higher risk of heart attacks and abnormal heart rhythms.” So anxiety alters the flow of blood in your body, presumably preparing you for fight, freeze, or flight. What about long-term stress? You’re not built to sustain chronic stress well. Life-threatening events that cause severe anxiety are meant to be over quickly. Hence, in the past humans might be terrified by a vicious, hungry creature who wanted them for breakfast, but they would be killed fast or run away to safety. It would all be over in a short while either way. These days, you’re likely to encounter stress that isn’t as horrific but lasts for days, weeks, months, or even years. With the knowledge stress changes optimal functioning (restricting blood to the heart and other organs and increasing it elsewhere) you understand there’s a problem. Stress can kill when chronic if not addressed. All emotion influences your body If it were just blood flow that alters when you’re stressed, although a huge issue, that would be one thing. It’s not though. Each emotion also impacts the rest of your body. The results might not kill you, but they can lead to serious health issues. Mostly, they result in debilitating aches and pains. If you don’t recognize what causes such ailments, you will take medication to mask painful symptoms. Although, of course, not all illnesses stem from emotions, those that are stress-related need to be acknowledged. They are pleas for help registered physically so you can see and feel them and take note. Case study I once counseled a woman who was brought up to believe expressing anger was unforgivable. She came to me when her marriage was in tatters and her husband was abusive. What she couldn’t express, anger, played out for her to see big time in her husband’s actions. She herself was furious, as well as afraid, but channeled rage into her jaw. I didn’t look for a connection between her physical ailments and what was happening. I was a rookie at the time, new to practicing, and intent on following the guidelines I’d been taught rather than anything else. I couldn’t help but note, though, my client’s physical distress — terrible toothache and jaw pain — always coincided with what she called “bad patches” in her marriage. When her private life was calm, her pain left. When it raged like a storm so did her physical pain. Conventional medical treatment didn’t help her. It numbed the pain, but didn’t cure the problem because it couldn’t. Her symptoms were a build-up of emotional tension. They expressed her psyche’s need for change and her need to express her feelings promptly rather than squash it into her jaw. I found out later anger often resides in the jaw and influences oral health too. Not only do some people grind their teeth at night due to anger, but rage makes them tighten their jaw at the moment it’s experienced. Imagine, for a moment, holding tension in your hand on and off all day long and doing so again day after day. What would your hand feel like? What would be its condition? Surely, it would become sore and you might develop a problem. The same is true for any part of your body where tension is held regularly. The cure, in my client’s case, was to instigate and embrace positive change and learn to express her emotions when she felt them. I also taught her how to use her emotions to have a positive influence on her body. Acknowledgment, however, is step one in the process. Acknowledgment You can’t change something you don’t recognize exists. Thus, there’s a need to identify the pain in your neck occurs when someone you’d rather not deal with is literally a pain in the neck. Or, the situation you face at work is a nightmare (so you’re having nightmares). Or you’ve become mentally inflexible (so your back feels like it’s made of stiff material and aches). Or a wound isn’t healing as fast as it should because something’s eating away at you. Or your heart problem erupts when stressful events occur in your life. Or the cancer you thought you’d kicked to the curb returns when you have a huge family argument/you are bereaved/you lose your job. Not all physical ailments and disease are caused by emotional withholding, but many are, and even more get worse due to stress even when they have genetic origins. If you experience an ongoing ailment medication can’t fix, or no one can explain, could it be a symptom of emotions expressed by your body? Acknowledge the possibility, even if you are uncertain. Stay open-minded. The next step Like my client, after noting the problem and why it might occur, the next thing to do is instigate positive change. (If you can). Now and then, people go through difficult times and must endure them for various reasons. Maybe the timing’s off, or finances and support make a difference. If you must live with a chronic difficulty, you can still improve your physical and mental condition in the ways that follow. Express your emotions as they happen Whether you express emotions at once or not, they will create a physical reaction. (It’s an inbuilt survival mechanism). Painful emotions won’t get stuck, however, if you do something with them rather than push them away. Expression doesn’t mean you must shout and scream at someone who upsets you to release tension. You might aim to improve communication, though, write your feelings in a journal, talk to a trusted friend or relative, and let tension go in other ways. Physical exertion or relaxation helps too. If you’re angry on Monday, however, don’t wait until your dance class on Friday to let off steam. By then, your emotions might have taken residence in your muscles, shoulders, neck, back, or jaw. Engage in helpful behaviors as soon as possible. Make positive emotions work for you I don’t really like using the terms positive and negative emotions, but I will since we know what we mean. (All emotions are positive as they exist for a good reason; to help us in some way. What we do with them makes all the difference.) Positive emotions stemming from a sense of peace and relaxation, joy, love, or gratitude impact you physically. They can also help heal tension and act as release mechanisms. Boost loving feelings Connect love with joy. Think of someone you love (or a beloved pet) with whom you associate no anxiety. So, you might still love your ex, but focus on someone else. Someone who fills your heart with joy instead of breaks it or makes you want to dance rather than drop your shoulders and cast down your gaze. Take deep, slow breaths, and place one hand over your heart. Imagine you are breathing into your heart as you think of the person or pet you love. Continue for a few minutes and you’ll create heart resonance. Here’s the exercise mentioned provided by nurse educator Jackie Kakuska, Ms. Rn. Join in when you want to increase positive emotions and release stress. Here’s another great, simple video to help you breathe in a healing way for ten minutes. This is what the makers of the video above say about resonant breathing. “Research has demonstrated that if you were to engage in resonant breathing for 10 minutes/day every day for 8 weeks, you would literally retrain (reprogram) your autonomic nervous system for increased Heart Rate Variability — a measure of good health. The benefits are many: reduced blood pressure, lowered anxiety and depression, improvement in asthma, COPD, fibromyalgia, irritable bowel, and more.” Engage in resonant breathing, particularly the HeartMath way as described by the nurse in the first video provided, and according to science (and my experience) your stress-related ailments will fade and you’ll gain a sense of calm. Your thinking will become clearer and you’ll handle stress well. At the same time, illness not caused by stress, but which stress worsens will improve. Stress isn’t supposed to make you ill. It’s a reaction to what’s happening in your environment and negative self-talk. Listen to its message and change unhappy conditions when you can. Increase positive emotions and reduce those that damage you with the suggestions above and your well-being will grow.

['Health', 'Mental Health', 'Behavior Change', 'Psychology', 'Positivity']

You have a story to tell. STORIUS is here to help you tell it in the best way possible. From the nuts and bolts of crafting your story, to finding the best channels to deliver it to the right audience, to selecting the format best suited for your objectives, STORIUS brings you a rich mix of practical advice and inspiration from established and emerging storytellers. An online magazine about the art, craft, and business of storytelling, STORIUS is the publication for everyone interested in how stories are created, discovered, distributed, and consumed. What makes STORIUS unique in today’s crowded market of publications? A few editorial principles we follow in selecting our content: Storytelling everywhere. STORIUS’ articles cover storytelling across various industries, mediums, and forms. We offer both breadth and depth in our coverage. Whether you want to write for TV, work on a novel, or need to learn how storytelling can accelerate your business, STORIUS is a resource you can count on. Authoritative content. Our content always offers an informed perspective, delivering real value to our readers and helping them accomplish more in their storytelling. We don’t publish content just for the sake of content. Diversity of perspectives. Today’s storytelling is, more than ever, a collaborative business. STORIUS’ materials highlight the perspectives and ideas of established and emerging professionals who make movies, books, shows, and other forms of stories possible. Storytelling as art and business. We do not subscribe to the notion of the starving artist. We cover both artistic and business aspects of storytelling, helping our readers to make money with their storytelling. Above all, we see STORIUS as a community. Join the conversation, pitch your ideas for articles, and share your stories. Welcome to STORIUS!

['Storytelling', 'Publication', 'Filmmaking', 'Marketing', 'Writing']

Image Credit: David Torcivia on Flickr Aaron Sorkin never wrote for fun until after college. Which is insane. If you’re unfamiliar with his work he is responsible for A Few Good Men, The American President, The West Wing, The Social Network, The Newsroom, and a long list of other movies and TV shows. He is screenwriting royalty, and he got there because he was bored. On the Bill Simmons podcast, Aaron Sorkin talks about the first time he ever wrote for fun. The year is 1985. There is no Tinder, Snapchat, or Netflix. Smartphones and the internet don’t even exist yet. Aaron Sorkin was sharing a studio apartment. His friends were all out of town or at a party he wasn’t invited too. He had $3 in his pocket; the tv and stereo were broken. It was pure boredom. The only thing in the apartment was a semi-automatic typewriter and blank pieces of paper. Sorkin talks about how the first time he wrote for fun was writing dialogue. He said, “I loved it, I stayed up all night writing and I feel like that night has never ended.” Think about that. We could have been robbed of Moneyball, Charlie Wilson’s War, and Sports Night had it not been for boredom. Sorkin goes on to say, “There are too many easy boredom killers.” and it’s easy to see what he is talking about. We live in a time where everything is competing for our time. Companies spend billions of dollars to steal more of your time. They feed off your boredom, but it might be time to start using your boredom to feed your creative self. People put off starting things. That article, book, or screenplay they want to write is put on the shelf until they have the time to do it. In the meantime, their distractions get in the way, and they never feel like they have the time because they are continually keeping themselves from being bored. Our culture doesn’t make it any easier on us. Sorkin says, “People are curating there lives now,” and it is easy to see what he is talking about. Now there is a pressure not to be bored. To continually be engaged, and with the social pressure to be “living your best life,” the idea of being bored for a lot of people is terrifying. Being bored gives you the opportunity to delve creativity. To sit alone with your thoughts and challenge us to expand our creative expressions. Be bored, reach for that blank piece of paper instead of your phone. Find the stories that are hiding inside of you, instead of the distractions that are always waiting for you. A working TV or stereo could have robbed us of some of the most exceptional dialogue in television and movie history, and I can’t help but wonder what kind of works of art are we missing out on because people refuse to let themselves be bored.

['Creativity', 'Life Lessons', 'Motivation', 'Writing', 'Self Improvement']

As a pet owner, there’s nothing more than I would love if my cats could talk to us. When our cats Maya and Wyatt are acting irrationally, I often tell my beautiful girlfriend, Tristin, that I wish they could talk. I also wonder what they would say if they could talk. Our cat Maya seems to have the most random mood swings where she’s purring and cuddling you one minute, and the next minute she’s scratching you. Meanwhile, Wyatt just seems like a grumpy old man, and I think, “If this cat could talk for a day, what would he say? Would he have a conversation with us or just demand for us to give him more food?” Well, if you’re like me and dream of a day where animals can talk to me, you may be inclined to believe the videos of this viral Tik Tok dog are real. Alexis Devine is the owner Bunny, a dog who uses buttons to communicate with Alexis. Although I wish this were real, today, we’re going to debunk Bunny. Now, don’t get me wrong, dogs are extremely smart creatures. In fact, many animals are. As a big fan of the psychologist BF Skinner, I know that behaviorism is extremely effective. With the right incentives, we can train animals to just about anything, but unfortunately, talking isn’t one of them. While there are some skeptics who think Alexis simply showcases the best takes of Bunny using these buttons, based on the research, I think there’s more of a psychological explanation. We’re going to discuss the ideomotor effect and how it can make animals appear to be smarter than they are, but first, we need to understand the human tendency of anamorphism. In their book The Mind Club: Who Thinks, What Feels, and Why It Matters, Daniel Wegner and Kurt Gray dedicate an entire chapter to why we attribute minds to certain animals but not to others. This is a fascinating chapter, but for the purpose of this video, we’re going to focus on anamorphism. Anamorphism is a distorted projection or perspective; especially an image distorted in such a way that it becomes visible only when viewed in a special manner. Anamorphism is the reason why people like Alexis can easily make us believe that Bunny can talk with these buttons, and Alexis probably believes it as well. When we understand the history of talking animals, we can get a little closer to the truth, and that’s why we’re going to discuss the story of the math-solving horse named Clever Hans. If you prefer the video, I did a video essay version on my YouTube channel Debunking Clever Hans Over 100 years prior to Alexis and her talking dog Bunny was a math-solving horse by the name of Clever Hans. In the early 1900s, a man by the name of Herr Wilhelm Von Osten owned a horse named Hans who could apparently solve complex math equations. A horse that can solve complex math is quite the sight, so Von Osten made quite a bit of money touring with Hans and doing shows. Von Osten taught Hans to not only add and subtract, but Hans could multiply, divide, and work with fractions. Unlike Bunny, Hans didn’t have buttons to press, so he would count out the answers by tapping his hoof. If you asked Hans “What’s 12 plus 12?”, he would tap his hoof 24 times. “What’s 10 divided by 2?” Hans would tap 5 times. Much like Bunny, it was incredible. Back then, they didn’t have TikTok or viral sites like Mashable, so Hans mainly received his clout from newspapers and word of mouth. But, even though people were more likely to believe in the unbelievable back then, there were still skeptics and critical thinkers. Some of these critical thinkers were psychologists, and they believed that there was a better explanation for Clever Hans than a horse being able to do math. This psychologist was a man by the name of Carl Stumpf, and his work is referenced in some of my favorite books on supernatural psychology like Supersense by Bruce Hood and Paranormality by Richard Wiseman. I actually first learned of Carl Stumpf in The Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe by Dr. Steven Novella. Stumpf’s work is so popular because, during a time when people believed much more in the supernatural, he was brave enough to go against the group and try to discover the truth. Stumpf was able to get Von Osten to agree to let a team research Clever Hans to see if the horse really had these abilities or if it was something else. In order to do this, they had to set up a series of experiments, and the first variable they wanted to factor out was Von Osten. To ensure Von Osten wasn’t somehow giving Hans the answers or saying some type of code with his wording, they had other people ask Hans the questions. Surprisingly, Hans was still able to answer correctly. Score 1 for Clever Hans and Von Osten But then, Stumpf started to wonder if Hans was clever but just in a different way. If Hans wasn’t getting the answer through language, maybe it was through sight. So, Stumpf and his team hid Von Osten from Hans’ view with a sheet, and Von Osten would ask the questions. Low and behold, Hans couldn’t get any of the answers right. Then, they duplicated Hans’ inaccuracies with other people. So, what was going on? While many people would assume that Von Osten somehow figured out signals to give to Hans intentionally, the consensus is that Von Osten was just as clueless as everyone else. This is when Stumpf and his colleagues discovered that we often make unconscious movements without even realizing it, which was later called the ideomotor effect. If you remember my previous video on ouija boards for the supernatural psychology series, this explains why we believe ouija boards are actually being moved by spirits beyond the grave. Much like other animals, Clever Hans was extremely intelligent, but in a different way. Hans didn’t know how to do complex math, but he did know how to read the slightest body movements when he would tap and reach the right answer. These subtle movements were his signal to stop tapping, which gave the appearance of him knowing the answer. So, now that we know the story of Clever Hans and the ideomotor effect, what’s up with Alexis and her dog Bunny? So, What’s Up with Bunny? By now, I’m sure some of you reading are upset and defending Bunny. You’re looking for explanations that explain how Bunny is the real deal, and I get it. Some of you may even be pointing to gorillas who use sign language as proof that animals can speak. Yes, it’s true that some primates can use sign language, but we often neglect to realize that the brain of a gorilla and the brain of a dog are completely different. As humans, we make the mistake of lumping many animals together, but the reality is that they all have different capabilities based on the nuances of their evolution. We need to remember that the brain of a gorilla is much closer to the brain of a human than a dog’s brain is to a gorilla. So, is Alexis lying to us? Is this all a setup to go viral? Personally, I like to give people the benefit of the doubt, so I don’t think Alexis is playing an elaborate hoax on all of us. I choose to believe that much like Clever Hans and Von Osten, Alexis may not realize that she’s giving Bunny cues that give the appearance that Bunny can talk. Without doing a proper experiment, it’d be hard to prove my theory, so, I thought we could just discuss what a proper experiment would look like. Much like with the story of Clever Hans, we’d have to run an experiment with multiple variables. First, we’d need to see if Bunny would answer when someone else asks the questions, and we’d also need to see if Bunny could answer without seeing the person. Bunny might be extremely smart, but like Hans, she’s most likely reading other cues. Another theory I have is that Bunny notices the happy tone in Alexis’ voice when she presses buttons that are coherent. This type of conditioning can train Bunny to press certain sequences. It’s also important to note that we would need an experiment to verify that Bunny wanted what she said. For example, if Bunny used the buttons saying she was hungry but didn’t eat, that would disconfirm Bunny’s understanding of language. Or, what if Bunny said she needed to go outside to use the bathroom but didn’t go? Remember, a good scientist always tries to debunk themselves to find alternative explanations for events. Finally, as a skeptic, I think it’s important to point out how we attribute meanings to the meaningless. As we’ve discussed in other articles, our brains are constantly trying to make connections. This is why we believe in superstitions, but it’s also why we think our pets are trying to communicate. At the 2:34 mark of the Mashable video, Alexis repeats what Bunny’s buttons pressed, “Love you. No.” And this is just another example of anamorphism. I’d be willing to bet that if you monitored Bunny for an entire day, you’d see her pressing a bunch of random buttons that we could somehow find meaning in some of the gibberish. Like the infinite monkey theorem states: a monkey hitting keys at random on a typewriter keyboard for an infinite amount of time will almost surely type any given text.

['Books', 'Animals', 'Psychology', 'Digital Life', 'Science']

I was never 100% convinced I deserved to die, until recently. I knew this wave of depression was going to be harder to survive because I started to burn the most important of bridges. I quit my job, I got into arguments about the smallest things and took conscious steps to make my family hate me. I’m bipolar with rapid cycling. Fresh diagnosis, but I knew for a long time. I’ve been suicidal before in my life, during the depressive and mixed states, but never had the ‘guts’ to go through with it. I’m painfully aware of the statistics surrounding suicidality and bipolar disorder, with apparently a third of us attempting suicide at least once. Apparently, these increase with comorbidity (other “disorders” also present). I considered myself lucky and grateful, because there were people who were worse off than me. Quite shitty, I know. It wore off pretty quickly for the same reason. There were people who were struggling more than I was. This thought took up a lot of my time. It still didn’t let me put my life into a wider context and get out of what I saw as a cycle of inability to problem solve and falling into bad coping mechanisms, that I should have control over. I’m clearly writing now, I’m alive. Spoiler. I asked for help, it was a process. Without beating around the bush — I really thought I had it all figured out. All evidence was telling me I was an imposter with unrealistic and pretentious dreams; a fake, unsuccessful creative who hasn’t created anything of worth in well over a year. My perspective was tainted with years of self-pity, laziness and addiction. Less than a month after graduating with a master’s degree, I finally decided that everything I did was defective. That I was inherently defective. People have all sorts of reactions to success. I don’t know whether my mood worsened because of burn out or fearing of not being able to excel in the job market as much as I did in education. My family moved to another country, sacrificing everything including our emotional stability and sense of self-worth, for exactly that reason. Like many, I grew up in a household that valued productivity, success and hard work. My parents are smart, resourceful and resilient people. Whilst they inspired me, people talked about my achievements and potential. I felt unable to deliver. Anyway, I was sticking around. I was hurting myself as damage control. I was hurting myself during episodes where I felt like I wasn’t present in my body. It sometimes felt like the sentence could be carried out at any time. The compulsion to wait just a little longer really confused me. I already saw myself as unable to live a stable, dignified life. When I could, in the past, I explored my feelings, thoughts and purpose through writing. I’ve practiced freewriting/journaling for many years now, exactly for that reason. At the time, my ability to write was seriously impaired though. I struggled with the physical aspect and I began to fear the psychological side of it. I felt too embarrassed to write, because over time, I gave this simple activity a lot of weight and significance. I was so used to being marked or paid for it. For the first time ever, I didn’t know what or who I was writing for. I just knew I needed to. I needed that final confirmation that my inner dialogue was exhausted. Settled. But most of all, I think I needed an answer different to the deadly conclusions I kept methodically coming to. It had to be completely private. My writing definitely couldn’t be addressed to anyone, just in case. I needed a safe space to explore my thoughts and feelings about life and death. I always thought talking to experts was most efficient and there is no better expert in life and death than a dead person. Right? So, without much thought, I chose the first dead person that popped into my head. There was the obvious advantage of not causing anybody any real harm; no risk of subconsciously damaging or straining any relationship; nobody to judge me. I rejected Catholicism since I remember. I don’t have a clue about what happens after death. I just want to make that clear because talking to the dead was something, I only thought religious people did. I started scribbling a formal “Dear Babcia Marysia.” She didn’t know a word of English, it didn’t matter — she’s been dead for about two years and a half. Honestly, at first it still felt a bit embarrassing. Very awkward. Like that phone call with a relative you were supposed to have a long time ago. My first thought was that I didn’t ring her enough before she died. I felt obliged to apologise. So, I apologised. The truth is I literally never actually rang my now dead grandma. She never let me realise this though, until now. I felt ashamed but quietly grateful for how loving this simple act was. This shame was just not as soul-destroying. I spent a lot of time writing to her, trying to explain my life away to make myself feel like a better human being. Explaining that that we grew apart because of distance and because life just never seemed to stop for us. That there were always problems, conflicts and my way of dealing was moving away halfway across the country; that I pretty much lost touch with my parents too, until recently. I wrote in all states, about everything including things I’ll probably never discuss again. It took weeks of stopping mid-sentence and coming back with “I’m back, I just felt so pathetic and couldn’t subject you to any more of this.” Just to spill out a little bit more. Writing to a dead relative like my grandma, stimulated a conversation with the memory of someone whose past love towards you, you have no control over. And even if shame comes up, it’s towards a dead person. You can’t make things better there, they are dead. You have to let it go. I promised us both that I would try my best to not treat another human this way. I began focusing on the living. What I could do. Through exploring death by writing to somebody dead, I became instinctively drawn to aspects of life that the living have control over. I’m still a little mind-blown about this whole process, but I feel like it’s the purest proof that your body and mind’s primary function is to keep you alive. I think connection plays a significant part in keeping you alive. It nourishes us and we all need nourishment. This was true for me. I started to carry my rosary on me. My mum gave me a few over the years and they always reminded me of my grandma since she prayed for everybody, all of her life. I don’t use them to pray, I use them to remember, which I guess could be seen as the same thing. This whole process provided me with a safe space to frame my own life in a wider context of family and forces that were at play long before I was born. War. Generational trauma and patterns that I could suddenly see everywhere (I’ll share this research later). We’ve had alcoholics, life-long drug users, gamblers, criminals, suicides. I fell into a club, I wasn’t alone. I began relating. I began feeling normal. My narrative started shifting, it became intertwined with others. I kept writing through it and that created an urge to talk to those who were a part of my story, our pain. Mostly hoping, that they would remind me if a violent change in mental state made me forget, again. To put it simply: The act of writing itself kept me physically and mentally busy. It gave me more time. It became a way of building a bridge, back to my loved ones and importantly, myself. It’s so much easier to climb back up with the support of others, with the weight shared. Do reach out.

['Mental Health', 'Health', 'Life Lessons', 'Short Story', 'Writing']

Why Trustworthiness Matters in Building Global Futures No matter how compelling our technologies are, they are only as good as the trust people have in the organizations that develop and govern them. TIGTech — Seven Drivers of Trust We’re standing at a pivotal point in our collective response to the coronavirus pandemic. The first vaccine against the virus is beginning to be rolled out, with others hot on its heels, and we can begin to imagine a post-COVID future albeit tentatively. Yet despite the incredible strides being made, hope is being tempered by hesitancy-and sometimes downright distrust-as a growing number of people question the safety of the vaccine, and even the motives behind it. It’s easy to dismiss this resistance to the COVID vaccine as irrational thinking, a rejection of science, and an unquestioning acceptance of misinformation and disinformation. Yet it points to a bigger issue of trust: Trust in how science and technology are governed, and more specifically, how organizations earn trust through being trustworthy. To Earn Trust, Organizations Need to be Trustworthy Earning trust is a challenge that goes far beyond the current pandemic, and touches on pretty much every aspect of our connections with the future. No matter how compelling our science is, how transformative our technologies are, or how important our ideas of the future might be, they are only as good as the trust that people place in the organizations that develop and use them. But how is trust developed and maintained as we strive to build a better future together? For the past couple of years, I’ve been a member of the advisory Panel for TIGTech, an initiative supported by the World Economic Forum and Fraunhofer Institute of Systems and Innovation Research that’s focused on trust, governance and technology innovation. TIGTech was established to explore and provide guidance on what it means for governance approaches to new technologies to be trustworthy, and how trust is earned. The focus of the work has been on emerging technologies and large institutions. Yet the findings and recommendations are relevant to anyone trying to build a better future within today’s highly complex and deeply interconnected world. Towards a more Engaged, Collaborative and Communicative Approach to Trust & Tech Governance Last Friday, the first major report from TIGTech was released, and it highlights the need for developing more engaged, collaborative, communicative approaches to trustworthy and trusted technology governance. It als provides practical steps toward achieving this. TIGTech — Towards a more engaged, collaborative, communicative approach The report is, I am very pleased to say, written for real people grappling with real challenges, and is not in the slightest academic-although the underlying foundations are academically sound. I would go so far as to say that it should be required reading for anyone who is either studying global futures, or is involved in the process of helping to build a better future. The report eloquently focuses on clear and concise nuggets of relevant information for readers- three key findings, five things to know about trust, seven drivers of trust, and three competencies for trusted governance. This approach makes it highly accessible. It also makes the insights relevant and actionable to a wide range of individuals and organizations. Plus, it’s deeply refreshing to have such an important document written in plain language that is easy to make sense of! Many of the points that are made feel like common sense when you read them-yet paradoxically they can’t be, otherwise they would be more commonly found in practice. For instance, the three key findings are: Be more engaged, more visible — show your impact. Detach governance from hype and ideology — focus on the public interest. Get comfortable with navigating ethics and values. And the seven drivers of trust are: Intent — Public Interest (upheld through purpose, process, delivery and outcomes). (upheld through purpose, process, delivery and outcomes). Competence (delivering against expectation effectively, reliably, consistently, responsively). (delivering against expectation effectively, reliably, consistently, responsively). Openness (being transparent and accessible in processes, communications, explanations and interactions). (being transparent and accessible in processes, communications, explanations and interactions). Respect (seeing others as equals; listening to and taking seriously their concerns, views and rights. Considering the potential impact of words & deeds on others). (seeing others as equals; listening to and taking seriously their concerns, views and rights. Considering the potential impact of words & deeds on others). Integrity (operating honestly, being accountable, impartial and independent of vested interests). (operating honestly, being accountable, impartial and independent of vested interests). Fairness (enshrining justice and equality in governance processes, application, enforcement, and outcomes). And (enshrining justice and equality in governance processes, application, enforcement, and outcomes). And Inclusion (being collaborative, inclusive, involving others). These are all critically important, and should be part of any future-builders credo. But they are just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to earning trust. And underpinning them is a nuanced and sophisticated understanding of trust that is essential to developing and using new technologies in the public interest. Trustworthiness is Foundational to Global Futures Building Beyond the immediate relevance of the report to technology development and use in the public interest, reading through it, I found myself connecting the ideas it lays out to almost every situation within today’s society where trust is paramount, from communicating and engaging around science, to building a new initiative around global futures, to taking justice, equity, diversity and inclusion seriously, to being a trusted research and education establishment. Here, I was particularly taken by the report’s exploration of “ five more things to know about trust “-these should be essential reading for anyone who’s work involves demonstrating trustworthiness and earning trust. These insights include acknowledging that trust is an outcome that’s best-achieved by focusing on others, and that it signals a hope that an organization will fulfill the expectations we have of them. They also emphasize what should be self-evident, but rarely is-that trusting people first makes them more likely to be trustworthy and to trust you back, and that trust is a spectrum, and not an either/or judgement. And importantly, they make it clear that trust is dynamic, messy, personal, and a two-way process. In other words, while trust and trustworthiness are critically important for building a better future, the process of earning and demonstrating them is not one if simply follow rules and procedures, or checking boxes. It takes awareness, empathy and humility, and a willingness to embrace the messiness of being human within a complex society as we strive to put others first. This is sage advice as we stand at this pivotal point in the fight against COVID. But it’s also important as we look beyond COVID and work together to build a future that is just, equitable, and sustainable, and one which is threaded through with hope and possibility. Which is why I’d recommend anyone with an interest in building a better future check out TIGTech, and read the initiative’s recent report on trust and tech governance.

['Innovation', 'Trust', 'Future', 'Technology', 'Science']

Me in front of my laptop and monitor — always with multiple windows open :-) I’ve worked remotely for almost seven years now. This means that I can be in front of my computer during calls without being viewed as inattentive or rude. I simultaneously amaze and annoy my coworkers with my responsiveness to email requests, because I am able to quickly search for information as we discuss things. My work style has unearthed my talents as a sleuth — always looking to see what others already know or have published on a particular topic of interest. As a result, when we begin new projects, I’m often quick to discover similar projects that have already been completed in our field and to suggest that we build on these efforts instead of recreating them. I used to fear that this meant that I was lazy or not all that creative. But my colleague, Simone Parrish helped me understand that what I am doing is actually innovating by adapting what already exists for one particular audience or setting to another. This is an important skill, especially in public health, where so many great resources and tools are developed for the public good and are available free of charge. Adaptation takes content proven in one context and applies it in another. This is both evidence-based and innovative. Educators, trainers, content providers, and even technologists must be able to identify knowledge needs and adapt evidence-based content to address these needs. For the past few years, I’ve been working on developing, managing, and monitoring online learning programs for the Knowledge for Health (K4Health) Project. I can tell you firsthand that a lot of work goes into adapting and synthesizing information so that it can be easily digested online. For example, it often takes at least nine months (often more than a year) to develop a course on the Global Health eLearning Center (GHeL). The rigorous review process of GHeL courses ensures that they are reputable resources for the latest technical and programmatic guidance on a wide range of health and development topics. However, as a global resource, courses are developed for a broad audience of stakeholders — mostly health program managers, service providers, and policy makers. When we asked learners if course content should be adapted to fit local contexts, we received mixed responses. Those who work for the government (U.S. or other countries) often prefer the global perspective. In contrast, people who work at non-governmental organizations (NGOs) at the country or regional level tell us that it would be helpful if the content could be adapted to fit their contexts. This might include translation into local languages and the addition of country-specific case studies. One GHeL user wondered: “…if it is possible to use the local dialect (Filipino) so that it can be used and be easily understood by health care providers who do not have a good command of the English language or competency to cascade the learning into the local dialect. [Rural health care providers] will be able to impart the correct information to their target clients who may belong to the marginalized and uneducated. The essence of the information and knowledge might be lost if they translate information by themselves” — Tuberculosis Basics course learner, the Philippines. Champions of adaptation believe that it is key to implementation, community development, program improvement and performance, and knowledge enhancement. Target audiences for localized course content include individuals who may not have a good grasp of the English language and who work directly with the community, such as rural health workers, community health workers, social workers, counselors, community government officials, volunteers, health surveillance assistants, and nurses. K4Health responded to calls to adapt our global content for local contexts by working with partners in the field and documenting adaptation processes that are efficient, effective, and result in content that is easy to understand and simple to use. Based on our experiences, we recently published an adaptation guide, Making Content Meaningful (also available in French). In the guide, we identify three types of adaptation and acknowledge that content adaptation often involves a combination of these approaches: Making content appropriate to a specific local and cultural context Translating content into a local language Making it available through a different delivery method or technology appropriate for a specific local context We outline a framework with key steps and questions, accompanied by activity sheets and illustrative examples to guide users in making informed decisions throughout the content adaptation process. The framework is divided into three phases:

['Design Process', 'Design', 'Writing', 'Health', 'Content Strategy']

How Much Should You ‘Expose’ Yourself During This Pandemic Striking the delicate balance between staying-at-home and basking in the outdoors Photo by Sara Bertoni We are just a couple months shy of the 1-year mark since the first case of Covid-19 was reported. During these past months, human understanding of the disease and how the virus operates has changed dramatically, but much of research is still inconclusive — owing partly to the fact that it’s nearly impossible for science to prove anything in such a short period of time — leaving us with a laundry list of “expert” advice and protocol, most of which is leading to massive public confusion, some even contradictory in nature. One of the hottest areas of debate of late is on the argument of how much “exposure” can be considered safe. I say the word “exposure” blatantly because truth be told, everyone lives their lives everyday with a certain level of exposure risk depending on how they operate. There is no such thing as one hundred percent protection, even if you wash your house down with antiseptic and wear hazmat suits to commute — the odd chance of coming into contact with viral particles looms wherever you go. Exposure is all around us and therefore an inevitable part of pandemic life. Each exposure strata comes with their own unintended consequences, as we’ll explore in the following paragraphs. This sizzling discourse on the topic of “exposure” is based on the understanding that the world’s economy rotates around the pre-pandemic lifestyle, where humans bustle down crowded theme parks, commute like sardines in a can, and crowd nightclubs and bars like elephant seals during the winter. Returning to what we considered normal would dramatically improve the world’s economy and quality of life, especially in low-income nations and poverty-stricken communities, where recession is synonymous to the idea of doomsday. The obvious downside to this is seeing the risk of exposure skyrocket, taking the number of cases up with it. On the flip side, relinquishing the pre-pandemic lifestyle (i.e working from home) would certainly slow down the turning of our global economy’s wheels — at least until we figure out a way to get around this quandary — but it would also significantly reduce the risk of exposure and hence curb the spread of SARS-CoV2. Most people tend to resonate with the latter, since it buys time for researchers to push more effort for prevention methods (i.e vaccinations), but there is a growing herd of desperate radicals willing to surrender safety and give option 1 a trial run. They argue that if herd immunity is what humanity is aiming for, shouldn’t they just get it over with quickly and expose themselves to the virus now — like parents traditionally would with chickenpox parties? While some healthcare experts agree in the basic logic and potential appeal of the idea, based on the disease pattern that we have observed within the year, it’s a bad idea for two main reasons, you could kill yourself or your loved ones, and you could overwhelm the healthcare system. Fellow physician Dr. Keith Armitage, who specialises in infectious diseases, said the number of deaths in the US would be exponentially higher if more people took this approach. It’s true that the percentage of people who die would be comparatively low (~1%), but the United States has nearly 330 million people. One percent of 330 million is 3.3 million. “I think to get to 80 percent herd immunity could lead to more than a million deaths in the United States,” Armitage said. To further supplement the counterargument for this viewpoint is that scientists are still not sure how long the antibodies acquired through infection will last. There has been a body of largely contradicting evidence on this, after following patients who were exposed to SARS-CoV2 and have recovered, checking in regularly to test for the antibody levels in their system. An early study showed that immunoglobulin levels declined rapidly after weeks, another one demonstrated the decline later at 3–4 months. These findings show that reinfection after contracting Covid-19 is possible, even though other experts argue however that the mechanism behind antibody preservation may be more complex than that, reflecting a less dire reality. Paediatrician Dr. Amy Edwards says that efforts to manage the pandemic has never been about stopping Coronavirus. It’s a wave we will all eventually ride out. “This was never about stopping coronavirus”, she says, “what this was about was making sure we had enough hospital capacity to keep coronavirus from overwhelming us.” And this premise led to the birth of potentially harmful advice that if practiced under misguided interpretation, can lead to damaging repercussions. 3 words: Stay. At. Home. Staying at home is not bad advice, in fact, it’s necessary to curb infection rates. It is, however, riddled with associations — such as long days in bed or in front of screens — that can actually prove detrimental to health. Houses with poor ventilation can actually serve as fertile breeding grounds for respiratory infections, if not those caused by the novel Coronavirus, then by other offending pathogens such as bacteria and fungi — pathogens we know are easily killed under sunlight and adequate ventilation. The worst-case scenario is having a Covid-19 infection on top of a bacterial focus already brewing in your lungs — something called a superinfection — which can dramatically decrease your survival odds. Staying at home does not always mean staying indoors, but that’s how I think the general public mostly perceives it. This is particularly true for apartment and flat residents, who find it a constant challenge to place themselves in an open area sans the fear of bumping into someone else. Sunlight exposure is absolutely vital in our fight against the Coronavirus. A handful of journals and research papers, including those published before the advent of Covid-19 have demonstrated the anti-inflammatory potential of sun-acquired vitamin D. Vitamin D can be fortified in food sources or be activated in our body with the aid of UV light from the sun and works in a myriad of ways within the human body. Vitamin D helps regulate multiple organ functions on a cellular level, such as maintaining bone health, supplementing macronutrient absorption, and modulating the immune system. A 2012 paper demonstrated that vitamin D can modulate the innate and adaptive immune response by synthesizing active metabolites that can aid in cellular signaling function after researchers discovered vitamin D receptors being expressed on the surface of immune cells. In addition to immune system modulation, deficiency in vitamin D has also been observed in patients with depression. Scientists have yet to pinpoint the exact causality, but it is thought to be a combination of vitamin D’s direct effects, sunlight exposure, age, and a well-balanced diet — all of which can alter the levels of vitamin D in our body and affect mood as well. But behind all the uncertainty, Medscape argues that vitamin D may be low-hanging fruit in managing this pandemic. While you shouldn’t mindlessly load up with vitamin D, 10–30 minutes of morning sunlight exposure and a good diet is generally a good practice to ensure adequate levels in your body. Staying at home can also encourage a sedentary lifestyle, which isn’t good for you on so many levels. Mindful exercise does not only lead to improved immune system functioning, it also regulates the cardiovascular system and prevents dangerous clots from clogging up your arteries, especially if you have a pre-existing health condition such as hypertension. It is therefore just as crucial for you to pay attention to your physical activity during the pandemic. Research has proven time and time again that regular exercise improves general health (including your immune system) and mood. It’s important to stay active during times like these, and unless you’re one of those folks living in a mansion with an indoor gym, it’s difficult to consistently get a good workout in at home. WHO recommends exercising outside to rake in the additional benefits from sunlight and fresh air, and even advocates a no-mask policy during outdoor exercise so long as physical distancing is practiced. Staying at home can also indirectly encourage longer screen times, which can be detrimental for long-term eye health, especially in children. Optometrist Jonathan Andrews says that “prolonged near work and decreased outdoor activities can increase myopic progression in children.” Fellow optometrist Glenn Steele sustains a similar opinion. “For an adult with eye strain, we will most of the time get up and move around. Children will push on through that,” Steele said. “Now with the pandemic, all kids have for communication is through screens. I think there are things beyond eye strain that we have to watch out for, one of which is helping kids regulate when do they take breaks. It’s important for parents to help kids learn to take breaks for the future of their vision.” But added screen time does not just pose risks against eye strain and myopia, blue and violet light emitted from most modern gadgets can alter Circadian rhythms and disrupt sleep, which is when our body recuperates and does the lion’s share of cellular and tissue repair. Steele advices taking frequent breaks when viewing screens (20 seconds for every 20 minutes), ensure appropriate distancing (1 feet for mobile devices, 2 feet for laptops, and 10 feet for TVs), designating curfew for screen use, and encouraging physical activity and time spent outdoors. Spending a portion of your day outside of the home can actually provide benefits that bound better than staying within the confines of your living room — a message I’m hoping to deliver to the most radical and hardcore stay-at-home advocates. Your advice and practices could in fact be damaging not only to yourself but your entire household. That being said, I’m not advocating mindless public excursions. It’s already hard enough to navigate and sift through all the misinformation circulating in the air, and so I understand how easily people can be discombobulated by difficult-to-understand advice. That being said, I invite readers to treat advice with common sense and only practice those formulated on the grounds of a sound scientific basis. As with how things are currently going, it’s good to always keep yourself physically distanced from one another in public (> 1 meter), avoid crowds, wear masks, and uphold good hygiene practices. Subscribe to my weekly newsletter here for more productivity tips, thought-provoking discoveries, and other interesting finds.

['Healthcare', 'Health', 'Science', 'Medicine', 'Coronavirus']

In 2019, it’s tempting to think that civilisation’s ability to create something new has long since peaked. From aeroplanes to the World Wide Web, electric cars to chess-playing AI, the once unimaginable is now taken for granted. Isaac Newton said that his discoveries were only made possible because he was “standing on the shoulders of giants”. It is easy to think that the great minds of the Enlightenment and Victorian eras, who gave the world electric motors, lightbulbs, and antibiotics, really did invent everything. How much inventing is there really left to do? The answer is: lots — according to the data. Inventor Thomas Edison, who lived from 1847–1931, is famous for holding over a thousand utility patents filed by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). But, in 2015, Lowell Wood, a relatively unknown American inventor surpassed Edison’s achievement when he personally filed 1,085 patents, and Wood’s list of inventions is still growing fast. The total percentage of granted patents over time | Infographic by Catalogtree Just looking at the overall number of patented inventions — the past actually generated far fewer than we might assume. Records reveal that between 1852 and 1915, the UK’s Intellectual Property Office granted approximately 486,000 patents, averaging about 7,700 per year. Between 1916 and 2013, however, the agency granted 2 million patents — roughly 21,000 per year. As this number has grown still further, 2018 might be the best time to be an inventor, anywhere, ever. Data collected by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) shows that just two years ago, inventors around the globe filed a record-breaking 3.1 million patent applications, up 8.3% from the year prior. And more patents are passing the grade than ever before, too. In 2016, 1.35 million patents were granted, compared to 755,200 a decade earlier. While men continue to design the majority of most of the objects and technologies that become patents, WIPO reports that female inventors are on the rise. In 2017, for example, women were listed on nearly one in three international patent applications. Ten years prior, that rate was less than one in four. The breakdown of IP applications by category | Infographic by Catalogtree And then there’s social media. If you have an idea today, showing it to your potential customers has never been easier. At present, 2.2 billion people visit Facebook each month, while one billion hours of video are viewed on YouTube every day. Furthermore, in less than a decade, the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter has raised $3.9 billion for various ideas and plans. In the same timeframe, contributors have successfully funded more than 7,000 technology campaigns and over 12,151 design projects. Finally, in an attempt to boost productivity and spur the economy, an increasing number of governments are offering tax incentives to companies willing to invest in research and development. In the UK, for instance, HM Revenue & Customs statistics show that the amount of funds given to businesses both big and small has increased virtually every year since they launched their R&D tax credit program in 2000–01. In total, companies have made over 240,000 claims, amounting to £21.4 billion in tax relief. In short, if you want to invent something new, there’s never been a better time than now.

['Innovation', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Startup', 'Engineering', 'Technology']

Do you really want to fall asleep to the latest post on your newsfeed? Most people don’t. And yet, they continue to take their phones to their bedroom. A survey with more than 7,000 smartphone owners showed 80% check their phones within 15 minutes of waking up. All these people waste their health. This study showed consistent evidence of an association between access to devices and reduced sleep quantity and quality. By sharing your bed with your smartphone, you get less and worse sleep than somebody who abandons their phone. Plus, with a phone as your alarm, you’ll start your mornings in a highly unproductive way. That’s why people like Ryan Holiday ignore their phone whenever possible:

['Productivity', 'Mental Health', 'Health', 'Digital Detox', 'Life Hacking']

The Best Asset Your Startup Can Invest In Right Now Where should you be putting your time and money to see 10x+ ROI? Photo by Jed Villejo As startup founders, we juggle with a lot of different ideas when it comes to determining which investment is best for the business. Is it a software? A hire? A strategy play? What kind of investment can you make now that will slowly compound into long-lasting benefits later on? If you’re a budding startup, the best investment your business can make right now isn’t a Chief Marketing Officer or an expensive digital advertising campaign. It isn’t a new storefront or a nicer website either. Your Startup’s Best Asset There’s an asset out there that will: Protect your business from major losses during economic downturns. Create a consistent, steady stream of income for your business. Compound in effectiveness and size over time. Help you save money in marketing and sales costs over the long-term. This asset doesn’t need to have a price tag on it and can be acquired in exchange for time. It isn’t something that requires fancy tools or an expert hire, just consistency and commitment. This asset is community. I’m not talking about superficial numbers in your email list or your Twitter followers, I’m talking about real community where you talk with your audience and they talk with each other. A community that has a shared purpose of helping womxn entrepreneurs overcome their biggest challenges, or shared values like only buying eco-conscious beauty products. Shared purpose and values help people find a go-to place, a home that they can continuously visit to activate their deepest desires. If you can create that home for your audience, you’ve figured out how to anchor people to your business. This anchoring creates a magnetism to your business that’s effortless. Through this magnetism, you’ll be able to naturally build a fan base that’ll buy whatever you release and you’ll benefit from a steady stream of income because you have a community that’s constantly talking about you. Community is kind of like having your own QVC show that’s streaming 24/7 — even though the hosts are talking about random things here and there, they’re still socializing in your home and always bringing the attention back to you and what you’ve got to sell. Over time, your community’s commitment to your brand will result in marketing and sales cost savings for your business (because you now no longer have to spend money on aggressive lead generation). You’ll start reaping the benefits of organic growth (aka $0 marketing) through referrals via your most loyal customers who have nothing but great things to say about you. Building A Community 101 Community is the best investment any small business owner can make in their business right now, and it’s easy to get started. Here are three starting steps to embark on your build. 1. Mission with an excitable response To start building a community for your business, start off with a shared purpose or value system, and make sure it’s potent. The test of a potent purpose or value system is by measuring how many people it moves — when presented to your people, your mission should get an excitable response. Missions that provoke excitable responses are very seldom neutral, they’re usually very opinionated and divisive. 2. Build a home Find a place that your community can call home. Is it on your Instagram page? A Facebook page? A community space you’ve created outside of a social platform? Wherever this home is, consistently show up in this space and make it known that this is where you share your deepest, richest conversations and where your community can do the same. This home shouldn’t be a place for surface-level conversations that anyone can find on the first page of a Google search result — this space should be where you’re able to express opinions that feel uniquely yours, and not like copy written by a marketing consultant. 3. Stoke the fire Within this home, you have to spend time stoking the fire, especially in the beginning. Ask prompt questions, and always start deeper conversations with those who comment on your posts. You have to act like that person at the party who’s always starting a conversation and bringing life to it. Stoking the fire requires thoughtful responses — no emojis or one-word responses. A one-word response would be awkward if you were to drop them during a conversation, you should feel the same way when interacting with your community online. Once you’ve got the swing of things, you’ll be stoking the fire for a while before you see other people in your community stoking the fire with you. You’ll start to see other people in your community coming in hot with conversation-starters and fostering connection once the community has truly taken off. Once your community hits this traction, this is when you’ll start seeing payouts from the asset you’ve built. You’ll see the payout in the form of solid numbers — sales, audience size, conversion %s, all of it.

['Growth', 'Marketing', 'Growth Hacking', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Startup']

The internet is the hive mind that can make a better society happen if we unite in pushing back against the diktat of greed that keeps churning out overwrought pathos for clicks and bucks. But until thinking out loud in print gains critical mass, we have to accept it will take a while for our intellectual labor to yield results, be they financial or otherwise. For now, we are sowing the seeds for a new ecosystem instead of depleting the current one for our own personal gain. Trust that the present we are writing up now will be the future; greed will eventually become obsolete when it realizes it may have amassed financial wealth but credibility, respect, or usefulness remain beyond its reach. We are laying down the blueprints for a better humanity by gently waking one another up from egocentric darkness. And the sooner we do, the better for everyone; we are learning how to be better, together. When we approach writing as service, we break down barriers, torpedo taboos, and slay stigma but doing so takes time and it is a team effort. If bringing us together is what the internet excels at, it only happens when we share our personal narratives with integrity, humility, and most of all accountability. Peddling shockers to line our pockets with the proceeds of sensationalism by parlaying outrage, shock, or disgust into cash as we settle old scores is a zero-sum game, no matter how much it pays: it offers no societal value so it achieves nothing beyond temporary personal enrichment. Surprisingly perhaps in such an individualistic culture as ours, it is by putting others first that we lead change. Those who get to carry the torch have first dibs on what the future looks like and that is priceless: This is how writing online can change our lives, from journalism to social media. We get to shape the world we want to live in through the strength of our words. Think about it, isn’t this extraordinary?

['Society', 'Social Media', 'Future', 'Journalism', 'Philosophy']

Substack vs. Medium In Depth Comparison While the infographic above helps quickly differentiate between the two platforms, it does not discuss the various subtleties and nuances which writers may be interested in when committing significant time and resources to a single platform. The content below offers an in depth comparison of the two platforms. Platform Purpose and Intended Function Medium: Medium was created by Ev Williams, previously co-founder of Blogger and Twitter. He initially developed Medium as a way to publish writings and documents longer than Twitter’s 140-character (now 280-character) maximum. Basically a long-form version of Twitter that would encourage more substantive discourse. In 2017, Medium introduced its Partner Program which was implemented to help persuade writers to put their content behind Medium’s metered paywall. All of this is part of a larger attempt to make Medium a central hub of content, regardless if it is written by little known writers or by staff at one of Medium's in house publications. Substack: A Substack publication is an email newsletter that you can charge money for. You write it, readers pay you. Substack’s focus is on helping Substack writers maximize their earning potential under this model. To help writers, Substack offers the following tools (for free) to all accounts: A content management system that has been purpose-built for publishing paid newsletters. Connection to a Stripe account to manage payments and receive money in your bank account. A website built with mobile in mind that looks great and loads fast on any device and in any browser. Analytics that show your email open rates, website pageviews, and subscriber counts. Access to a growing knowledge database of best practices for running a paid newsletter business. Platform Business Model Medium: Medium makes money by charging readers $5 per month (or $50 per year) to access its content, which is hosted behind a metered paywall. In the past, Medium had attempted to monetize content by allowing publications to charge subscriptions (similar to the current Substack model) but it has since pivoted away from this model. Medium’s paywall is unique in that it is metered and not a firm paywall. Readers can read 3 articles per month, even if they are not paying subscribers. This is an important part of the Medium marketing strategy, as it entices regular readers to become subscribers. This method is successfully used by Medium, but not many other digital media companies, because Medium has amassed a tremendous audience and they continue to build this audience through their high domain authority. For example, if I Google: guerilla marketing tactics The first result (which is actually a Google featured snippet), is an article I published on Medium, 10 Creative Guerilla Marketing Tactics to Boost Your Brand, Company, or Cause. Had I posted this on my own blog or any other site with lower Domain Authority, this article would have likely been buried 5+ pages deep in the Google search results. This obviously encourages me to use Medium, but it also serves as a gateway for people who have never heard of Medium, to look into the platform. This is essential to Medium building their subscriber base. Substack: Publishing on Substack is completely free, if you choose to not charge for your content. Once you start charging, they take a 10% fee on top of credit card fees, from all of your paid subscriptions. On one hand this is a good model because it aligns incentives for both publishers and writers — Substack writers must succeed in order for Substack the company to succeed. That said, Substack’s fees do add up and are something worth considering if you have a large and engaged fan base. If you are able to set up your own email marketing funnel and promote your content effectively, you may be able to earn more on Medium. Substack’s business model relies partially upon writers utilizing the WYSIWYG tools effectively, to reach new readers, and develop a fanbase. It’s worth noting that Substack gives you direct access to customer subscription info (emails), meaning you could theoretically walk away from the platform at some point in the future. On Medium, you do not receive reader contact info, establishing a heavier dependence on the platform and some loss of autonomy. Successful User Profile Medium: It is hard to define the “profile” of the typical successful Medium writer because Medium only releases very limited earnings information. But based on my research into top writers, generally speaking, are those who can create semi-viral content. This is largely due to the Medium writer compensation system which rewards writers financially, only for the engagement of paying readers. So in order to make significant money on Medium you must be able to draw in readers who are a part of the Medium platform itself. There are definitely exceptions to this, but the above characterization cover probably 85%+ of top earning Medium writers. Top Medium writers (much like Substack), do generally need to develop a niche, but the niche needs to be a semi popular niche that exists on Medium. Some examples of these niches are: Personal development Technology Programming Marketing Gender and Social Issues Personal Finance Self-Help Productivity Entrepreneurship Notice that while these are considered “niches” within the Medium platform, these categories are still fairly broad and would not necessarily constitute a “niche” when writing on Substack. Substack: Successful Substack writers typically write about a very specific niche and are sometimes quasi-subject matter experts on a topic. Take Bill Bishop. One of Substack’s most successful newsletters is Sinocism. The Sinocism China Newsletter is an email newsletter written by Bill Bishop that helps readers better understand China. Sinocism offers content promising to “make you smarter about China.” The newsletter is considered a must read by diplomats, policymakers, investors, executives, journalists, and academics who want to better understand China and get regular commentary on Chinese and English language news. Before writing Sinocism, Bill Bishop was a media executive with more than a decade’s experience living in and decoding China. He previously wrote the Axios China weekly newsletter and the China Insider column for the New York Times Dealbook. While you do not need to be an industry veteran to publish a newsletter on a topic, obviously it goes a long way toward establishing credibility on a certain subject. Substack publications can consist of an even smaller niche. JoeBlogs is a popular blog focusing on baseball. This type of publication works well on Substack because it unites true baseball fans around a hyper specific topic. In contrast, it would be hard to run a successful sports publication on Medium, covering many sports. A baseball specific publication on Medium might generate some traffic due to Medium's high Domain authority but unless their is a mass appeal to Medium's paying readers, it is unlikely to generate many views from the readers whose views actually count toward Partner Program earnings (paying readers). Writer Monetization Methods Note: both platforms rely upon Stripe for writer payments, meaning that from a global perspective, if you are not in a country supported by stripe, neither of these are currently an option. Both seem to have formed exclusive relationships with Stripe: Medium: Substack: Medium: Medium has a clear monetization method, that can be easily used by any writer — The Medium Partner Program. The Medium Partner Program is Medium’s program that allows writers to earn money from articles they submit. The Medium Partner Program is open to anyone, and it even allows the re-posting of content first posted on other platforms (such as a blog post on your self-hosted blog). Medium pays writers based on Member Reading Time — which is a measure of the total time paying subscribers spend reading your articles. As Medium described in their post on the earnings update: As a user reads, we measure their scrolls and take care to differentiate between short pauses (like lingering over a particularly great passage) and longer breaks (like stepping away to grab a cup of coffee). Reading time incorporates signal from your readers without hurdles. You don’t need to ask your readers to remember to clap, or click, or do anything other than read. This process can feel a bit opaque because Medium is (theoretically) dividing up some pot of money based on subscriptions and distributing it to writers based on several propriety factors. But the Medium Partner Program has proven itself to be a reliable stream of income for thousands of writers (myself included). While many successful Medium writers promote their stories on social media or through their mailing lists, many focus their attention on writing and rely upon Medium’s large built in audience and the platform’s content discovery tools to drive traffic. This combination has made Medium a popular choice among writers who want exposure while still being compensated for their effort. Medium is 100% free for writers. Substack: Substack is similar to Medium in that anyone can set up a subscription newsletter easily using Substack’s free tools. However, it is different in several ways, when it comes to how writer’s are compensated. Substack offers little in the way of content discovery or assistance driving traffic. Rather, they focus on providing a more complex suite of tools then Medium, but then the writer is responsible for driving traffic/subscribers to their newsletter. Substack gives writers: A free Substack domain/website A landing page, which can collect emails of potential subscribers or process the payments of readers ready to subscribe An email marketing system which allows writer to simultaneously post content to their blog and to send readers on their email lists preformatted emails containing their posts. This third point is the main difference between Medium and Substack. As a writer on Medium, you do not have direct access to your readers’ emails. You instead rely upon Medium's curation system and content distribution system to feature you work among willing readers. Many writers on Medium get around this by using an email marketing system (such as Mailchimp) and they insert a CTA or sign up form at the end of their articles. This functions as a hedge against being disconnected from their readers if the author decides to leave Medium or if Medium (right or wrong) decides to suspend their account. Substack essentially cuts out the middleman. You do not need a separate email marketing sytem with Substack since al your posts are already sent to your subscribers. Email marketing systems typically increase in price as your email list grows, so this can become a large cost for many writers on Medium. Substack currently offers this same functionality essentially for free. Substack also lets writer’s determine the price they charge subscribers for access to their newsletter. Many writers feel they are not adequately compensated for their writing, and Substack allows them to charge whatever they want to a core group of subscribers. Substack does have monthly minimums that author scan charge ($5 per month or $30 per year) but these threshold are generally below or at what most writers would charge for their work anyway. If you really want to charge less, you can use the promotion code hack and set an indefinite discount. For example, a 50% discount off of a $5 per month/ $30 per year plan would only cost $2.50 per month or $15 per year. I currently am running this exact promotion on my Blogging Guide newsletter: Content Discovery Medium: One of the few advantages that Medium has over Substack is its robust content discovery tools. In other words, readers come to Medium for reading material, they use the search function or read content recommended to them based on their interests. Substack: Substack does not have a content discovery tool (or at least not yet). They do have a leader board page which displays top posts and newsletters, both paid and free: Platform Tools Medium: Both Medium and Substack make it easy to create stylish and professional looking posts: They also both have fantastic article editors: Medium: Substack: However, Medium does allow for better organization of articles with their publication tool, which includes features like feature pages which can be prominently displayed at the top navigation bar of your publication: Substack: In general Substack offers writers more tools than Medium. As previosuly mentioned, the built in email marketing function is probably the most useful. This ability to automatically email your readers is not only cost effective, but the data analytics are quite useful. You can see how an email performed in terms of how many recipients it reached, how many opened it, and how many of those readers subscribed: You can also see a breakdown of all the links clicked in your newsletter — a feature of most email marketing systems which Medium noticeably lacks: This an extremely valuable feature. For those familiar with my analysis of Medium data analytics, Substack’s data analytics may appear a bit more sparse than Medium’s. But Substack’s data analytics includes conversion rates, which from a content creator’s perspective, is of the utmost importance. If you want to see the activity of an individual subscriber (free or paid), click on the “Subscribers” button in the upper right hand corner of the page: If you scroll down the page, you will see a list of your email subscribers: If you click on a specific email, you can see the detailed activity of each subscriber: For example, in the screenshot above, you can see that the user: — First signed up for Medium Blogging Guide on March 11th. — Next, they received an email with my post on March 13th (Gumroad & Medium). — A few days later, they received another email, on March 16th (Platforms to Write on Besides Medium) They opened first email twice on March 17th (Gumroad & Medium). They upgraded to become a paid subscriber on March 21st Substack’s subscriber-specific analytics provide enormous insight into the patterns of your subscribers. You can use this data to: Determine what posts lead to a higher subscriber sign up rate See whether a specific user opened your latest email Establish the proper ratio of free to paid content in order to optimize paying subscribers Conclusion Medium and Substack are both amazing free tools, and there is no reason you have to use just one of them. The platforms broadly serve the same purpose (to help writers connect with an audience and make money from their content), and their differentiating factors, largely are indicative of their different functions (Medium — easy blogging, Substack — easy subscription newsletter). If you were to choose between the two platforms, I would suggest you pick based on the following questions: How much time do you plan to invest? — if you are looking to make money by writing the occasional article (1–2 articles per month), Medium may be the better platform. Substack subscribers generally expect several high quality/useful posts per week. Note : even though Medium may be the better platform in this scenario, that does not mean it is ideal to post once or twice per month on Medium. In order for most new writers to be successful, they should also publish a few times per week. On the other end of the spectrum if you are a prolific writer cranking out 2–3 posts per day, Medium may be the best option since there is a larger audience, and each post increases tour general reach on Medium by expanding your fan base. Substack subscribers might actually get annoyed with multiple posts per day, as you are flooding their inbox with direct emails. — if you are looking to make money by writing the occasional article (1–2 articles per month), Medium may be the better platform. Substack subscribers generally expect several high quality/useful posts per week. : even though Medium may be the better platform in this scenario, that does not mean it is ideal to post once or twice per month on Medium. In order for most new writers to be successful, they should also publish a few times per week. On the other end of the spectrum if you are a prolific writer cranking out 2–3 posts per day, Medium may be the best option since there is a larger audience, and each post increases tour general reach on Medium by expanding your fan base. Substack subscribers might actually get annoyed with multiple posts per day, as you are flooding their inbox with direct emails. Do you have an existing following or fan base? — if you have an existing fan base, Substack is a great way to provide value to this audience. Medium is generally better for those who are trying to build a following. That said, building a following on Medium is not easy, but your content is much more likely to be featured or reach new readers on Medium. — if you have an existing fan base, Substack is a great way to provide value to this audience. Medium is generally better for those who are trying to build a following. That said, building a following on Medium is not easy, but your content is much more likely to be featured or reach new readers on Medium. Are you writing about a really niche topic? — if you plan to write about the migration patterns of a specific type of animal or cover breaking news from Azerbaijan, Substack is probably a better bet. There is little chance that either of those topics would earn any money of Medium. However, if you are writing about multiple topics or topics that are more broad (personal finance, health, relationships, etc.) Medium will likely be an easier platform to monetize your writing. — if you plan to write about the migration patterns of a specific type of animal or cover breaking news from Azerbaijan, Substack is probably a better bet. There is little chance that either of those topics would earn any money of Medium. However, if you are writing about multiple topics or topics that are more broad (personal finance, health, relationships, etc.) Medium will likely be an easier platform to monetize your writing. Are you comfortable advertising your writing? — If you absolutely refuse to market your writing, than Medium is probably a better platform, as it does have a large built in audience. Substack cuts through the noise by leveraging the enormity of the internet and connecting you with potential fans, but you must identify and convert these fans to subscribers in order to make any money. — If you absolutely refuse to market your writing, than Medium is probably a better platform, as it does have a large built in audience. Substack cuts through the noise by leveraging the enormity of the internet and connecting you with potential fans, but you must identify and convert these fans to subscribers in order to make any money. Are you hoping to benefit from organic search engine traffic? — While Substack does better than most platforms SEO-wise, it is hard to beat Medium if your goal is to drive visitors through organic search traffic. There are very few platforms on the internet that have higher Domain Authority than Medium. And almost none of those that do rank higher allow guest posts from any person. I hope this has been a helpful overview of some of the similarities and differences between Substack and Medium. If you have any questions, just leave a comment and I’ll be sure to respond! — Casey Botticello

['Journalism', 'Entrepreneurship', 'Technology', 'Social Media', 'Writing']

Creating Data Lake & Discovering Your Data Using AWS Lake Formation Capabilities Adit Modi Follow Oct 16 · 9 min read [Article 2 of 6 in series Big Data Applications on AWS] Previous Article in the Series AWS Lake Formation makes it easy for you to set up, secure, and manage your data lakes also data discovery using the metadata search capabilities of Lake Formation in the console, and metadata search results restricted by column permissions. My Background: Cloud and Big Data Enthusiast | 4x AWS Certified | 3x Oracle Cloud Certified | 3x Azure Certified | Big Data Certified. Data lakes are an increasingly popular way to create a single repository to store and analyze both structured and unstructured data. AWS Lake Formation makes it easy for you to set up, secure, and manage data lakes. This Article walks you through the creation and exploration of a data lake using Lake Formation: Creating the data lake o Adding data to your data lake o Creating catalog databases o Adding tables from Amazon S3 to catalog databases Editing and adding metadata within the catalog o Editing standard metadata o Adding custom metadata Steps Create the data lake In the AWS Lake Formation console, in the left navigation pane, choose Register and ingest, Data lake locations. Select a single S3 bucket to house several independent data sources in your data lake. Add data to your data lake Now that you have an S3 bucket configured as a storage resource for Lake Formation, you must add data to your data lake. You can add data to your data lake’s S3 bucket storage resource using AWS SDKs, AWS CLI, the S3 console, or a Lake Formation blueprint. With Lake Formation, you can discover and set up the ingestion of your source data. When you add a workflow that loads or updates the data lake, you can choose a blueprint or template of the type of importer to add. Lake Formation provides several blueprints on the Lake Formation console for common source data types to simplify the creation of workflows. Workflows point to your data source and target and specify the frequency that they run. Sample Datasets are provided as follows New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) Trip Record Data Amazon Customer Reviews Add Amazon customer reviews to your data lake AWS hosts a registry to help people share and discover a variety of datasets. For this post, copy a subset of the Amazon customer reviews dataset into your data lake. You don’t have to copy the complete reviews dataset, only the smaller 226-MB portion of watch reviews. You need two copies of this data in your data lake to simulate separate “production” and “test” databases. If you have not already, install and configure the AWS CLI with IAM user access keys that include permission to read from S3 and write to your Lake Formation S3 bucket. Copy the source to your data lake: # Replace with your bucket name: YOUR_BUCKET=lf-metadata-demo aws s3 cp \ s3://amazon-reviews-pds/parquet/product_category=Watches/ \ s3://$YOUR_BUCKET/amazon-reviews-prod/amazon-reviews/ --recursive aws s3 cp \ s3://amazon-reviews-pds/parquet/product_category=Watches/ \ s3://$YOUR_BUCKET/amazon-reviews-test/amazon-reviews/ --recursive 3. In the S3 console, confirm that your S3 bucket now contains your two Amazon reviews datasets. 4. Inspect the contents of the folders. The datasets are in Parquet format. Add New York taxi ride history to your data lake Much as you did with the Amazon customer reviews dataset, copy a small subset of New York taxi ride history from the Registry of Open Data on AWS into your data lake: Copy the source data to your data lake: # Replace with your bucket name: YOUR_BUCKET=lf-metadata-demo aws s3 cp "s3://nyc-tlc/trip data/green_tripdata_2018-02.csv" s3://$YOUR_BUCKET/ny-taxi/trip-data/green_tripdata_2018-02.csv 2. In the S3 console, validate that your S3 bucket contains CSV data for NY taxi trips. Create catalog databases You have created an S3 bucket to act as your data lake storage backend and added data to the bucket. However, this data is not readily available in Lake Formation until you catalog the data. Lake Formation maintains a Hive-compatible data catalog of data within your data lake. Before you can catalog data within your S3 storage backend or use Lake Formation data importers (discussed later) to push data to S3, you must first create a database. A Lake Formation database is a logical construct to which you later add tables. Each table contains a mapping to one or more objects in S3 that, collectively, represent that table. Tables also contain basic metadata including but not limited to file format, S3 location, column headings, and column types. Lake Formation users can also optionally define arbitrary key-value pairs for tables and columns to better describe the data and act as query-able attributes for data discovery. You can create one or more databases and populate their tables either manually in the console, programmatically using the AWS SDKs or AWS CLI, or automatically by defining AWS Glue crawlers. define three logical databases: o amazon-reviews-prod o amazon-reviews-test o ny-taxi Add tables from S3 to your catalog databases you created three databases in your Lake Formation catalog. However, these catalog databases are empty and do not yet provide information about the specific tables, schema, file formats, or object paths in S3. To add this information, use one of the following two methods: Manually define your tables in the catalog using the console, SDKs, or AWS CLI. Use an AWS Glue crawler to search S3 and automatically add discovered tables to your catalog. For this article, create and manually run one AWS Glue crawler for each of your three datasets in S3 and databases in the Lake Formation data catalog. A detailed walkthrough is outside the scope of this Article. For guidance, see Working with Crawlers on the AWS Glue Console. As you proceed, please bear the following in mind: Create one crawler for each of your three datasets. You should be able to accept most of the default crawler settings. However, the S3 path for your crawlers should read: o s3://YOUR_BUCKET/amazon-reviews-prod/amazon-reviews o s3://YOUR_BUCKET/amazon-reviews-test/amazon-reviews o s3://YOUR_BUCKET/ny-taxi/trip-data Before you run the crawlers to populate your catalog, you must assign them an IAM role. The role grants them permission to read from your data lake’s S3 bucket, write crawler logs to Amazon CloudWatch, and update your data catalog. Regardless of whether you create a new role, or use an existing role, make a note of the IAM role name. You need this information for the next step. In addition to permissions defined within IAM, you must also explicitly grant IAM principals (roles or users) the ability to modify your Data Catalog from within Lake Formation itself. Conceptually, this is similar to the concept of bucket policies in S3 used with IAM. In the Lake Formation console, under Permissions, choose Data permissions. Grant your AWS Glue crawlers the ability to modify your Data Catalog. Configure the following fields: For IAM users and roles, select the IAM roles that you previously used for your AWS Glue crawlers. For Database, select the amazon-reviews-prod, amazon-reviews-test, and ny-taxi databases. For Database permissions, select all permissions. Leave all Grantable permissions unselected. After your AWS Glue crawlers have permission to modify your Lake Formation data catalog, return to the AWS Glue console and manually run your three crawlers. After a few minutes, the crawlers should complete their runs. Each should add one table to your data catalog: o amazon-reviews o amazon-reviews o trip-data Metadata search in the console Search by classification Search by keyword Search by tag: attribute Multiple filter searches Metadata search results restricted by column permissions In this Article, we demonstrate the catalog search capabilities offered by the Lake Formation console: Search by classification Search by keyword Search by tag: attribute Multiple filter searches Search by classification Using the metadata catalog search capabilities, search across all tables within your data lake. Two share the name amazon_reviews but separately belong to your simulated “prod” and “test” databases, and the third is trip-data. In the Lake Formation console, under Data catalog, choose Tables. In the search bar, under Resource Attributes, choose Classification, type CSV, and press Enter. You should see only the trip_data table, which you formatted as CSV in your data lake. The amazon_reviews tables do not appear because they are in Parquet format. In the Name column, choose trip_data. Under Table details, you can see that the classification CSV is correctly identified by the metadata search filter. Search by keyword Next, search across your entire data lake filtering metadata by keyword. To refresh the list of tables, under Data catalog, choose Tables again. From the search bar, type star_rating , and press Enter. Now that you have applied the filter, you should see only the amazon_reviews tables because they both contain a column named star_rating. By choosing either of the two tables, you can scroll down to the Schema section, and confirm that they contain a star_rating column. Search by tag: attribute Next, search across your data lake and filter results by metadata tags and their attribute value. To refresh the list of tables, under Data catalog, choose Tables. From the search bar, type department:research , and press Enter. Now that you have applied the filter, you should see only the trip_data table because this is the only table containing the value of ‘research’ in the table property of ‘department’. Select the trip_data table. Under Table details, you can see the tag: attribute of department | research listed under Table properties. Multiple filter searches Finally, try searching across your entire data lake using multiple filters at one time. To refresh the list of tables, under Data catalog, choose Tables. In the search bar, choose Location, type S3 , and press Enter. For this post, all of your catalog tables are in S3, so all three tables display. In the search bar, choose Classification, type parquet , and press Enter. You should see only the amazon_reviews tables because they are the only tables stored in S3 in Parquet format. Choose either of the displayed amazon_reviews tables. Under Table details, you can see that the following is true. Location: S3 Classification: parquet Metadata search results restricted by column permissions The metadata search capabilities return results based on the permissions specified within Lake Formation. If a user or a role does not have permission to a particular database, table, or column, that element doesn’t appear in that user’s search results. To demonstrate this, first create an IAM user, dataResearcher, with AWS Management Console access. Make sure to store the password somewhere safe. Next, create an IAM group with the AWSLakeFormationDataAdmin policy attached. Finally, add the dataResearcher user to this new group. We will use this user below to sign into our account with the group’s limited access. you allowed Everyone to view the tables that the AWS Glue crawlers created. Now, revoke those permissions for the ny-taxi database. In the Lake Formation console, under Permissions, choose Data permissions. Scroll down or search until you see the Everyone record for the trip_data table. Select the record and choose Revoke, Revoke. Now, your dataResearcher IAM user cannot see the ny-taxi database or the trip_data table. Resolve this issue by setting up Lake Formation permissions. Under Permissions, choose Data Permission, Grant. Select the dataResearcher user, the ny-taxi database, and the trip_data table. Under Table permissions, check Select and choose Grant. Log out of the console and sign back in using the dataResearcher IAM user that you created earlier. In the Lake Formation console, choose Tables, select the trip_data table, and look at its properties: You have learned how to use the metadata search capabilities of Lake Formation. By defining specific user permissions, Lake Formation allowed you to grant and revoke access to metadata in the Data Catalog as well as the underlying data stored in S3. Therefore, you can discover your data sources across your entire AWS environment using a single pane of glass. To learn more, see AWS Lake Formation. hope all of you Understood AWS Architecture and How to Use Big Data with AWS. If you have any doubt regarding the examples provided or are unable to understand how AWS Services make use of Big Data Applications you can contact me. LinkedIn : https://www.linkedin.com/in/adit-modi-2a4362191/ Github : https://github.com/AditModi You can view my badges on: https://www.youracclaim.com/users/adit-modi/badges Next Article in the Series

['Data Lake', 'Big Data', 'Analytics', 'AWS', 'Big Data Analytics']

The Down and Dirty on Disposable Diapers Where we are, how we got here and is there a good alternative Photo by Zelle Duda on Unsplash Disposable diapers are amazing. Your child’s waste is contained. You see it for only a few moments (hopefully) and then you close up the diaper. Poof! Gone from your thoughts and into the trash can or Diaper Genie. The invention of disposable diapers was a miracle of convenience for parents and it seems that the world has not looked back. No more washing poop from cloth diapers. After all, hasn’t society evolved past cloth diapers? But let’s stop and consider the impact of moving to disposable diapers. An average baby uses between eight and twelve diapers per day in the first year. That equates to just over 3,500 diapers for one baby in one year and a total of more than 7,000 through potty training. For one tiny human. The numbers are staggering, but is it enough to consider alternatives. Is there even a good alternative? Let’s look at how we got here and what initiatives are cropping up to tackle the solution of diaper waste. History of Disposable Diapers Before the 1960s, parents had no choice but to cloth diaper their babies. Proctor and Gamble introduced Pampers in 1961 as the first disposable diaper. After years of tri-folding diapers and securing them using safety pins, mothers and other caretakers had the convenience of disposable diapers. They were suddenly free from the burden of additional wash cycles. Photo by Boston Public Library on Unsplash The company aggressively advertised its diapers and the brand has become a household name. In Belgium, for example, “pamper” is even synonymous with the Dutch word for diaper. Vintage Pampers commercials from the 1970s are still available online. At the end of one video, a mother who just discovered disposable diapers says: “Okay, hunny, it looks like you are going to be a happier baby from now on…and I’m going to be a happier mommy.” We have come a long way from those first disposables. The technology has advanced significantly. Diapers started to have double gussets for fewer leaks, tabs that could be refastened, and super absorbent polymers. Introduced in 1984, super absorbent polymers can hold many more times their weight in water, meaning a drier baby and fewer diaper changes. Without a doubt, diapers are quite an engineering feat. If you have any doubt, watch the short video below. The power of a disposable diaper; video by author An Explosion of Choice Diaper choice has exploded. Walmart.com carries 15 different disposable diaper brands, with some of the major brands marketing multiple types of diapers under the same brand. Amazon.com carries additional brands, including a few niche brands, like Honest Company. We have also seen the rise of store-brand disposable diapers, which provide a cheap alternative to name brands. It seems that each supermarket and pharmacy chain sells its own white label brand. In the U.S., for example, Aldi sells its store-brand pack of diapers for about 11 cents per diaper. These are a blessing for families just trying to get by or for cost-conscious parents. In my experience, these diapers work just as well as name brands, like Pampers and Luvs, but for full disclosure, my testing of name brands has been very limited. Many brands have developed premium diapers carrying one or more of the following descriptors: eco-friendly, bio-based, ultra-sensitive, or biodegradable diapers. Some contain natural products (such as bamboo fiber) and most are free from chemical treatment. But just because diapers market themselves as eco-friendly, are they better? In theory, these premium diapers make sense environmentally, but in practice, they may not make much of a difference. We will look at these premium diapers later in this article. Amount of Diapers Used On average, children wear diapers for two to three years until they are potty trained, while some children are potty trained even later. The first few months are intense for diaper-wearing, with babies going through approximately twelve diapers per day. This number decreases until they only go through only a few diapers while they are being potty trained. Based on these numbers and assuming three years until fully potty trained, one baby can go through over 7,600 diapers. Image by author Image by author Cost of Diapers If you use store brand diapers, expect to pay approximately $1,300 in diapers for each child. This cost is easily doubled by using name brand diapers and even more with premium/eco-friendly diapers. Parents have to be very committed to an environmental purpose to stomach such a high price tag for biodegradable or ecologically friendly diapers. Image by author The cost per diaper goes up as the baby advances through the different sizes. This makes sense because the diapers get bigger and there is more material involved, like the super absorbent polymers to suck up all that pee. Sometimes the diaper companies and stores get tricky about this. On a website for a local pharmacy chain, I noticed the price tag of €25 (approximately $27.50) for a pack of diapers. The package price stayed the same for four sizes of diapers, but the amount of diapers in each pack decreases. This is a typical marketing strategy in many industries. It works well in the diaper industry because, by a few months into the baby’s diaper-wearing career, parents usually have a default brand choice when going to a store. Many might not even notice the price going up. Image by author Environmental Impact of Disposable Diapers One-time-use diapers were a boon for women’s liberation and convenience, but almost immediately, they became a significant waste stream. By the 1980s, diapers accounted for 1.4% of all municipal waste put into landfills in the United States. Today, disposable diapers accounted for 2.4% of all municipal waste put in landfills, according to the latest report by the EPA (2017). Two percent sounds pretty minimal at first, right? Well, that’s 3.3 million tons of diapers each year. Based on my calculations, if this would only be baby diapers, 20 billion diapers end up in a landfill each year, plus another 4.9 billion diapers burned. Of course, these numbers from the EPA include some adult diapers, but the split is not clear. The numbers add up quickly in every household. Remember those 7,600 diapers for each child? That is the volume of 20 bathtubs and the weight of a small-sized car, as shown in the infographic below. Image by author It’s not just the amount of waste that’s concerning. Many people worry about the toxic chemicals and untreated waste released from diapers into the environment as they sit in landfills. However, modern landfills are designed to prevent contamination of groundwater, but this concern is real for diapers that don’t make it into landfills and are littered into nature, being exposed to the elements. Another concern is environmental impacts upstream of diaper usage, for the manufacturing of the diapers and their raw materials. Basically, a lot of trees and oil. Trees are used for wood pulp in the diaper, oil is used for the plastics in the diapers and their packaging, and water and energy are consumed in the manufacturing process. Alternatives to Disposable Diapers Okay, now that you are officially depressed, let’s talk about what can be done to combat the growing waste of disposable diapers. Three main alternatives exist to decrease the number of disposable diapers used by a child. 1. Eco-Friendly/Biodegradable Diapers — Perhaps the most mainstream of the three is choosing to buy eco-friendly diapers that have a higher composition of biodegradable materials. Now, the jury is out on whether these diapers have a huge benefit to the environment. After all, most still end up in a landfill. One thing is clear is that it is a huge hit to your wallet, costing you up to 3x more than buying store brand diapers. These diapers are meant to have less of an environmental impact during manufacturing and after disposal, but how much depends on the brand. Some diapers within this category are 100% biodegradable and compostable, but some can be as low as 65% biodegradable and still contain plastic. (By comparison, regular diapers are said to be only 25–35% biodegradable.) The sad truth is that most parents will just throw these diapers in the trash and then, “biodegradable” means nothing. If these diapers go in the same waste stream as other diapers — which most likely will — they end up in landfills. Starved of much oxygen and sunlight in the landfill, these eco-friendly diapers will most likely take just as long to decompose as basic diapers. Both eco-friendly and basic diapers can be composted, in different proportions. So what does this actually mean? If parents separate the inner filling (cellulose and super absorbent polymers) from the plastic, this filler material can be put in a compost pile or bin. Mixed loosely with other compost and soil, the diaper filling can break down within a few months. Only wet/pee diapers should be composted. Poopy diapers shouldn’t be composted because they contain bacteria. Even with only the wet diapers, since this is not an industrial composting process subjected to high heat, the resulting compost should only be used for non-edible purposes (plants, trees, and flowers). But since the composting process takes time and effort, most premium diapers will still end up in the same waste stream as other diapers. 2. Cloth Diapers — Another alternative to disposable diapers is to use cloth diapers for your child. The most common form of modern cloth diapering involves three pieces: a cloth diaper with plastic snaps or Velcro, an absorbent inner liner, and an optional disposable liner. There are also hybrid solutions with a cloth outer layer and a disposable absorbent liner, such as gDiapers. Some parents also choose to cloth diaper part of the time, still using a disposable diaper during the nights and when traveling. Although still producing diaper waste, using cloth diapers for part of the time can easily cut diaper usage by more than half. 3. Potty train a child early — This last alternative can either be a strategy of potty training a child a few months earlier or potty training them from a very early age. The latter is called Elimination Communication or Natural Infant Hygiene, which was popularized by Ingrid Bauer in her “Diaper Free” book. And I know most parents are rolling their eyes and sarcastically thinking, good luck potty training early! It is an alternative, though. Is Diaper Recycling an Alternative? There is some light at the end of the tunnel — diaper recycling. I don’t mention this as one of the alternatives above because it is still in its infant stage. In my research, I came across two main diaper reuse projects — TerraCycle and FaterSMART. TerraCycle is a New Jersey-based recycling company. Partnering with DYPER, a subscription-based diaper service, TerraCycle composts subscribers’ dirty diapers via mail-in boxes. The service only sells bamboo-based, compostable diapers and the finished compost is used for vegetation along highways. FaterSMART is a joint venture with Procter & Gamble (the company that produces Pampers) and Angelini. It has established a pilot recycling plant in Italy that recycles used absorbent hygiene products, including dirty diapers. The process sanitizes the diapers and recovers plastic, cellulose, and super absorbent polymers. However, diapers don’t get recycled into new diapers. Like most other recycling processes, recycled material can only be used in products of lesser quality, a concept known as “downcycling.” The recovered super absorbent polymers have less absorbency and the recovered plastic has a lesser quality than the original. In theory, absorbent material from recycled diapers can go into absorbent products for pets (like cat litter and dog pee pads), disposable bed liners, or fiber additives in concrete. The plastic can be mixed with other materials to make plastic wood-like products (park benches and pallets), roof tiles, tubing, and other products. Other initiatives exist around the world. Amsterdam has twelve diaper recycling bins and the used diapers get sent to the FaterSMART plant in Italy. TinyTots is a San Francisco-based pickup service for compostable diapers. Universities and private companies are experimenting in diaper recycling technology, such as in Taiwan and the Netherlands, but many of these projects have yet to be realized. Graphic by author; background photo by Louis Hansel on Unsplash All of these projects provide a reason for optimism. Companies, governments, and other organizations want to find solutions to diaper waste and are willing to put money into this goal. However, similar initiatives have failed in the past. Canadian-based Knowaste was an early-mover in the industry and operated a diaper recycling plant in the UK and the Netherlands. The company closed these facilities in 2013 and 2007, respectively, for a variety of reasons, including profitability, competition from traditional waste plants, and failure to get plans approved by local governments. We still need to hold our breath on whether diaper recycling and composting will become a reality, especially on a broad scale. Three major obstacles need to be solved to make diaper manufacturing mainstream. Legislation — In the European Union, and perhaps other places, recycled material from diapers is still classified as a waste product, not as secondary recycled material. The resulting material from diaper recycling is fully sanitized, but the classification still exists. The law would have to change in Europe and still, the social acceptance of products made from recycled diapers may be mixed. Strict regulations over hygiene and health need to be created and enforced. Diaper collection — For used diapers to be processed, diapers need to be divided into a separate waste stream within households and childcare facilities. Families also need to willingly separate it from their other trash. FaterSMART estimates that more than 15% of Italians have access to a separate waste collection for diapers, but this is an anomaly. A limited amount of diaper recycling bins also exist in Amsterdam, but since no diaper recycling plant exists in the Netherlands, these diapers are transported over 1,000 kilometers (600+ miles) to the FaterSMART facility in Italy to be recycled. Profitability — This ties into the first two barriers. Plants need to have a willing buyer. Manufacturers need to be willing to buy the secondary raw materials recovered from the recycled dirty diapers. Additionally, the collection of diapers needs to be widespread and in enough volume to supply the recycling/composting facilities. Preferably, the diapers collected should go to local facilities to cut down on the cost of transporting these diapers. Summary The subject of disposable diapers is a tricky subject. Parenting is hard enough and disposables are convenient and the most mainstream route. Disposable diapers do not fully include all costs for their disposal and ironically, the diapers with the most environmental impact may be the cheapest. It is similar to how fast food or canned food is usually cheaper than buying fresh produce. The market doesn’t price in the full cost of a product, such as disposal costs or adverse environmental effects. The choice is left to the consumer and often, the wallet wins out. Should everyone switch to eco-friendly disposable diapers? Well, asking parents to pay 2x more for eco-friendly diapers at questionable environmental benefits doesn’t seem to be the answer. Diaper waste is a “tragedy of the commons”. We are impacted not only by what we do, but by what others all around the world do. In the thick of parenting, it is difficult to stick to environmental principals when it requires a higher cost or larger time commitment to you, while others choose to use the basic disposable diapers. Why would we do all the effort if we still get the negative environmental effects from everyone else? The only benefit is an intrinsic one — that you’re doing something good for the environment. But let’s face it, that pat on the back isn’t going to get you any more sleep at night or money in your wallet. Why should parents bear the decision of having to save the environment or not? Shouldn’t that be the responsibility of companies that produce the diapers and governments who are trying to reduce overall waste? What I honestly believe is that there has to be more local incentives to either use cloth diapers or buy eco-friendly diapers that will actually be composted or recycled. Municipalities should offer incentives for people to use them. Some municipalities charge based on the amount of waste a family produces, but in many areas, only a flat fee is charged for garbage disposal. We need to creatively think together to decide how families can be incentivized to act greener. Disposable diapers may take up to 500 years to decompose, so it is without a doubt that the choices we make about which diapers to use stay with us forever. Unless parents are incentivized to use alternatives, then standard disposable diapers will continue to be the path of least resistance. Especially for sleep-deprived parents just trying to make it through this bumpy road of parenthood. What else can you do? Support and encourage local initiatives to investigate diaper collection and recycling/composting Support and encourage local projects and financial incentives to use cloth or eco-friendly diapers Urge lawmakers to enforce diaper companies to carry some of the burden for the recycling and/or disposal of their products (Extended Producer Responsibility) Do you know of initiatives in other countries or municipalities to recycle diapers or incentivize the use of cloth/eco-friendly diapers? Please let me know in the comments.

['Sustainability', 'Parenting', 'Future', 'Disposable Income', 'Environment']

INFOGRAPHIC SPECIAL — VACCINE DEVELOPMENT How successful have we been with vaccine development for various pandemics? Comparing the vaccine development timelines since the earlier twentieth century Major technological advancements made in the field of Medicine has led to a significant increase in average life expectancy. However, it is a somewhat perplexing fact for many as to why we have not been able to develop a vaccine for diseases like AIDS for 40 years, whereas multiple COVID-19 vaccinations have already been rolled out in record time. No wonder the recently developed vaccines are being closely scrutinized by the experts for their safety & efficacy. For comparison purposes, It took approximately 25 years to develop a vaccine for the Spanish Flu which killed between 40–50 million people. Similarly, the first Ebola vaccine — an effort that took 43 years since the discovery of the virus. And we are still waiting for a cure for AIDS and yet we have an answer Previous vaccines have saved countless lives — 10 million deaths between 2010 and 2015 alone have been prevented, according to the data from the World Health Organization. And we are hoping the case is the same for COVID-19. The infographic above looks at the timeframes for vaccine development for every pandemic since the turn of the 20th century. It also highlights the major steps involved in the development of individual vaccines. Talking about COVID-19 vaccines, nearly 7.25 billion doses have been pre-purchased by countries and organizations around the globe — as many countries scramble to innoculate their populations. The second infographic below highlights that high & middle-income countries have hogged the purchasing process by ordering dosages according to their purchasing power. While the hope is that a global vaccine initiative like the COVAX can bring some equality in the vaccine distribution among high-income and low-income countries, it is going to be a long road ahead towards pre-COVID normalcy. In the meantime, here is the link for the COVID-19 vaccine tracker, if you want to follow the development process for various endeavors being undertaken right now. Image Credit: Visual Capitalist Stay informed with the content that matters — Join my mailing list

['Health', 'Future', 'Technology', 'Innovation', 'Science']

Space is huge. Some even believe it could be infinite. Since space is so huge, studying it produces a massive amount of data. Big data and AI is coming together to help answer some of the greatest unanswered questions in cosmology and space exploration. The role of AI in space exploration is becoming increasingly vital. Recently a group of physicists, mathematicians, data scientists, and engineers was formed to take the first ever picture of the supermassive black hole, and machine learning plays an important role in the project. Supermassive Black Hole A supermassive black hole appears to inhabit the center of the Milky Way galaxy, about 25,000 light-years away. Black holes suck in light, which makes them invisible. They can only be observed by looking for their immense gravitational pull. This pull produces a ring-like structure around the black hole. As the light approaches the event horizon of a black hole, the point beyond which it cannot escape, it bends and stretches. But the ring is very small, and due to diffraction, there are fundamental limits to the smallest objects that can be observed. This means in order to see smaller and smaller cosmic objects, telescopes need to get bigger and bigger. To view the event horizon around the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy a telescope the size of the earth would need to be built. That, of course, is impossible. However, there is a way in which this limitation can be overcome. The alternative solution is to connect telescopes from around the world, in an international collaboration called the Event Horizon Telescope (EHT). The EHT creates joins together telescopes and so creates a virtual telescope array the size of the earth. This is capable of seeing structures on the scale of a black holes event horizon. Dr. Katie Bouman, Ph.D., from the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) at MIT is one of the members of the Massachusetts-based group. Her role in the endeavor is pivotal. Each telescope in the worldwide network works together, linked by the precise timing of atomic clocks. Teams of researchers at each of the sight collect thousands of terabytes of data. This data is then processed in a lab in Massachusetts. So how exactly does machine learning aid this project? Individual telescopes receive only a part of the light from the ring wrapped around the event horizon. This photo misses many parts of the image. By using a deep learning algorithm the missing parts of the image are constructed. Animated image of a black hole AIs Exploring Mars Rovers on Mars are using investigating whether the red planet once harbored life and if it could support a human colony. They cannot be controlled by a human operator since it takes between three and twenty minutes for a signal to reach Mars. So if the rover ready to drive off a cliff, it would to too late to send the signal. Rovers have to be able to operate autonomously, and this requires some type of intelligence. Many companies, like Spire, SpaceKnow, Planet Labs, DigitalGlobe, and SpaceX are making millions of dollars from selling data from satellite observations and imagery. There are many potential applications of earth observation data. Monitoring weather, agricultural purposes, measuring gravitational differences across various land formations, and calculating the concentration of the different elements in specific areas, among others. A learning algorithm must manipulate a huge amount of data if all these potential applications are going to become reality. Curiosity Rover in mars The Future of the Space Industry Companies are willing to pay a lot for this kind of information. This data would be useful in a large number of sectors such as hydrocarbons, agriculture, mining, humanitarian, shipping, security, and national security. However, the raw data is complex and often mind-boggling to a human, and it has to be wrapped up and presented in a way so that a client can understand and use it. Space exploration and exploitation has a bright future, and AI is a central part of it.

['AI', 'Black Holes', 'Science', 'Space', 'Big Data']

Is there a science nerd or tree hugger on your Xmas list? Whether they are a scientist, teacher, or just have a love of learning, here are 10 titles that are perfect for the science lover on your list. Wildhood: The Astounding Connections Between Human and Animal Adolescents by Barbara Natterson-Horowitz, MD, and Kathryn Bowers It is easy to think of your teen as uniquely frustrating, but it turns out that all adolescents, both animals and humans, go through similar phases on their journey from childhood to adulthood. As a middle school teacher, and parent of two kids just out of their wildhood, I found this book intriguing. Behaviors that troubled me, like risk-taking and an over dependence on peer opinion, suddenly became a normal biological part of adolescence. Ecologists, teachers and parents alike will benefit from reading this engaging book filled with fascinating biological examples. I loved this book so much I wrote an entire blog about it. Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps that Explain everything About the World by Tim Marshall This is the book that I’ve tried to get all my friends and family to read. It will change the way you view history and politics forever. One of my pet peeves is that geography is no longer taught in high school and, once you read this book, you will understand why location, location, location is everything. Suddenly, the actions taken by China, Pakistan and other nations will all make sense. To truly understand another nation you have to understand the advantages and disadvantages of its geography. This should be required reading for all political science majors. If you enjoyed Guns, Germs and Steel you will love this book. Luckily, this book is shorter, engaging and much more accessible for all readers. Darwin’s Armada: Four Voyagers to the Southern Oceans and Their Battle for the Theory of Evolution by Iain McCalman I love the study of evolution and natural selection. Out of the many books I’ve read about Darwin, this is my favorite. This book places Darwin within the context of his peers. It tells the story of Thomas Huxley, Joseph Hooker, Alfred Wallace, and Charles Darwin. As young men, these four naturalists took their own voyages to South America, Australia, New Zealand, New Guinea, South East Asia and Antarctica. The book details their exciting journeys and discoveries. It then explains how all of their ideas came together into the theory of evolution through natural selection. The writing is superb and you feel like you were at the table with those scientific giants. The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America By Douglas Brinkley Teddy Roosevelt is my favorite president, and I love reading about his passion, energy and antics. This book details how he started the National Parks. Roosevelt was such an engaging character. I think many science lovers will identify with his love of camping and hiking. He was an avid hunter, but this book shows that hunters can be environmentalists because they want to protect nature. He was one of the first to recognize that fashion, which encouraged the hunting of egrets for hat feathers, could drive animals to extinction. This book is long and detailed, but it let’s you see what a true progressive T. Roosevelt was and how farsighted he was with regard to the need to preserve wilderness. The Naturalist Theodore Roosevelt: A Lifetime of Exploration, and the Triumph of American Natural History by Darrin Lunde This book is shorter and more engaging than The Wilderness Warrior. It is filled with stories of Roosevelt as a boy and young man. It opens with 8 year old Roosevelt seeing a dead seal and racing home to get his notebook and ruler to measure it and take notes about it. It then goes on to describe the natural history museum he created in his bedroom and how he learned taxidermy to create it. This book shows the life of a true nature lover with insatiable curiosity. It discusses the many natural history books he wrote, his work on the National Parks, and the American Natural History Museum in New York. The writing is a perfect example of the power of narrative nonfiction. Mr. Peales’s Museum: Charles Willson Peale and the First Popular Museum of Natural Science and Art by Charles Coleman Sellers Every time I travel, I always visit natural history museums. For me, the old ones filled with taxidermy and beautiful painted backdrops are the best. I discovered this book while doing a research paper on museums and loved it. If you are old enough, you probably remember the classic painting of George Washington that used to hang in public school rooms. Charles Wilson Peale painted it, and many other famous portraits of the founding fathers and their families. Peale and his family created the first natural history museum and perfected the art of taxidermy. One of the most fascinating parts of the book was how P.T. Barnum would tear apart taxidermy animals and create “freaks” by combining them. Barnum’s Museums of Curiosity pulled clients away from true natural history museums. I also learned the “magic” that early photography and films held for the public. This is a terrific book for lovers of science history and museums. Dr. Tatiana’s Sex Advice to all Creation by Olivia Judson Retelling these fascinating facts about animals’ sex lives will make you a hit at your next cocktail party. The book is written with a clever format. Each chapter begins with a Dear Tatiana letter from an insect, bird, squid or other animal. Tatiana, in Dr. Ruth fashion, explains what is “normal” behavior for that species and then compares it to others that are even more extreme. This is a book you can pick up, read a chapter, and set down–perfect for stashing in your purse for long waits. Here is one example: “After a lengthy lovemaking session, the giant octopus…hands over a spermatophore that is a huge bomb. Over a meter long, it contains more than ten billion sperm and explodes inside the female reproductive tract.” -Dr. Tatiana’s Sex Advice to all Creation I find that most science lovers are not prudes, and I’ll bet there is someone on your list that would get a kick out of this lighthearted book. The Log from the Sea of Cortez by John Steinbeck I’ve traveled extensively throughout Baja so I might be biased when it comes to this book. Steinbeck, the author of Grapes of Wrath, East of Eden, and other great novels, was great friends with a biologist Edward F. Ricketts. In 1940, the pair traveled on a sardine boat from Monterey, California, on a 4,000 mile voyage around the Baja peninsula into the Sea of Cortez. The men fished and collected samples the entire voyage. Reading their daily log brought home how much biodiversity has been lost in the Sea of Cortez. Steinbeck’s novella, The Pearl, took place in La Paz, and the love the author has for Baja shines through in his writing. The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s Eye View of the World by Michael Pollan Although he is probably better known for his books on healthy eating like The Omnivore’s Dilemma, this book is a natural history treat. Each chapter focuses on a different plant and goes into the history, folklore and science about it. My favorite chapter was on apples, where Johnny Appleseed is shown in a far different light then he is taught to school children. It turns out he was spreading apple seeds so pioneers could make alcoholic cider! Johnny also never wore shoes, and Pollan paints a wonderfully disgusting word picture of how hoary and gnarled they were. Another light-hearted read, this book is candy for science nerds and gardeners. A Lab of One’s Own: One Woman’s Personal Journey Through Sexism in Science By Rita Colwell Ph.D. and Sharon Bertsch McGrayne As a science teacher, I am constantly pushing my female students to select STEM careers. This book was an eye opener. The problem isn’t that there aren’t enough women majoring in science, the problem is that they are not given equal access to funding, lab space and selection committee positions. The author started science in the mid century and the beginning of her career is filled with female science heroes such as Rosalind Franklin, Eugene Clark and Barbara McClintock. It also has a recurring villain, James Watson. The author details the difficulties of women with science Ph.Ds from the 1950s through today. The chapters about her studies in cholera were fascinating. She also worked on the government bioterrorism task force when anthrax was sent through the mail in 2001. I love science history, microbiology and feminism so this book was a perfect fit for my interests. It might not be as interesting for a male reader or someone not interested in microbiology. Interested in nature and mythology? Sign up for my newsletter.

['Xmas Gift', 'Science', 'Teachers', 'Environment', 'Books']

Cranking up the volume of the Billy Joel Channel, I tell my bride: “He wrote this in the 1970s. It’s called ‘Miami 2017,’ — it was about the future.’’ My bride shook her head like she saw a dancing ghost as the song starts: “Seen the lights go out Broadway. I saw the Empire State laid low.’’ Broadway theaters, America’s finest, were supposed to be closed for one month due to the pandemic, but the shutdowns have been extended until at least June 2021. That single shutdown impacts 97,000 jobs for 15 months. Now 71, Billy Joel wrote this song in 1976 when he was 27, trying to imagine what his beloved New York City might be like in the future. He called the song “science fiction’’ like the 1981 film, “Escape from New York’’ or “Beneath the Planet of the Apes.’’ He titled his song “Miami 2017” (OK, three years off, but close enough). He figured he would be 68 by 2017, perhaps retired in a place like Florida. It’s told from the point of view of an older man describing a post-apocalyptic disaster ruining New York. A disaster sending New Yorkers fleeing to Florida? He describes New Yorkers (long proud they didn’t need cars) buying Cadillacs and fleeing New York. We then hear about forces who “turned our power down — And drove us underground.’’ Lock-downs in 2020 drove many underground. Barbers to gym owners went “underground’’ or openly defied emergency orders. Billy Joel added, “But we went right on with the show.’’ “I saw the ruins at my feet,’’ the song continues. “You know we almost didn’t notice it.’’ By August, the New York Post wrote about News Yorkers “fleeing the city in droves, moving to suburbs and other states.’’ Joel made a surprise appearance at a May 2020 “Rise New York’’ fundraiser, singing the song as the Empire State Building was lit up. But the pandemic was just the start of New York City’s problems. Many compared the decline to New York in the 1970s when Billy Joel wrote “Miami 2017.’’ As “30 days to slow the spread’’ became the “new normal’’ summer saw anxiety, depression, crime, and violence soar. The George Floyd case tore New York up with riots, looting, and attacks on statues and churches. A majority in a new poll feared America was on the verge of a new civil war. The song predicts churches burning, comparing the scene to civil war: “They burned the churches down in Harlem. Like in that Spanish civil war. The flames were everywhere, but no one really cared. It always burned up there before.’’ Another iconic moment of the pandemic was the U.S. Navy ship USNS Comfort being sent to New York City from the U.S. Naval base in Norfolk, Virginia, named in the song: “They sent a carrier out from Norfolk and picked the Yankees up for free.’’ The song predicts working-class Queens staying and references and “sank Manhattan out at sea,” alluding to a year when the rich who could work remotely left cities in greater numbers. In a year when history is forgotten or deleted as monuments are toppled, he sings, “There are not many who remember. They say a handful still survive. To tell the world about the way the lights went out and keep the memory alive.’’

['Arts And Culture', 'New York', 'Music', 'Culture', 'Writing']

You have to do things enough that the natural progression of what you are doing propels you to take the next step. It’s really why we need to show up every day and work on our thing. If we aren’t working on it we can’t progress with it. We can read all the self-help articles we want to, but if we aren’t in the natural progression of the thing no amount of tips can help us move forward. Reading gobs of articles will educate you, but if you aren’t ready for what they are saying you will just pile up information that can overwhelm you and make you procrastinate even more. I started writing about four years ago. I started reading anything I could get my hands on about how to create a blog and then quickly jumped to reading about how to write and market a book. I was cramming my head with information that I wasn’t ready for. I hadn’t even got into the swing of a daily writing habit and was already trying to figure out what book I should write. I was feeding myself with some of the best how-to articles out there before beginning the process of just writing and figuring out what the heck writing was going to mean to me. I was missing the main piece of the whole thing. No wonder I was having a hard time adding to it. How I Made $11,000 From Writing in 30 Days I click on it. I am guessing you might too, or some variation that has to do with your craft/art/creative thing. I could use $11,000 extra dollars. Well times that by ten. Yeah, I could use that. So I spend a lot of time clicking on articles like that. They provide helpful tips. I click on them every day, but if I am not consistently doing what it is I want to do, I will have nothing to apply those tips to. Reading lots of blog posts and listening to pod casts is not actually creating. Actually sitting down and creating is creating. Do you do that? Achieve Success Faster With These 10 Tips I am sure these tips would help someone become successful. I am sure these tips could help you if applied, at the right time. I write more and more every day. Obsess over it in fact. The more I simply write, anywhere, the more I want to write and the more I want to try writing. I found that I have naturally progressed to submitting articles to magazines and publications. Something I was never ready to do before I had a regular writing habit. It was something that I had read a lot about, and used to lay a big guilt trip on myself for not doing, but in reality all I really needed to do at first was just write. The natural progression of doing so would make submitting stories a natural step, but the habit needed to exist before I could apply tips to it. I also needed time to develop my thing. There was no way around the fact that I needed to show up every day for a long period of time before understanding what I really wanted to do anyway. There are no tips or shortcuts available to substitute for what genuinely takes time to figure out. Ten More Reasons Why You Should Quit Your Job and Work For Yourself This is why I started writing in the first place. I found myself in a career transition that was difficult and a job that I hated. My husband suggested I started writing and see if I could make it as a writer. Sounds great, but in reality we had bills to pay and I wasn’t in a state of mind to get anything going fast enough to subvert my need for a regular job. If you just picked up a pen, paint brush, modeling clay, or are learning how to code, concentrate on that really hard. Feed yourself with some good information, but understand that your progression will be your progression. It’s great to hear how everyone else did it, but in the end how we do things will be how we do things. Take things in and apply them when the time is right for you. You can find as many articles that say to quit your job as ones that say to keep it. So concentrate on your thing, a lot, and in time you will know all by yourself what you are ready to do. If you don’t you can always start reading articles again and use them to get new direction, but I’m betting you have what you need to get started. You Have to Show Up Every. Day. What we hate about work really. The fact I have to come here every day is so annoying. The same people, same desk, same tasks, same goals. Dang those employers. They know how to make money and get things done and they do it by getting people to show up every single day. There are penalties if we don’t. That consistency at work exists before anything else. We can have the best ideas, hire the best people, establish the most efficient processes, but if we don’t show up every day and do the work all that means nothing. Consistency comes before we can add anything else. I have seen too many people in my career think that there is some natural progression to life, with certain career milestones preceding whatever you may want in your personal life. Unfortunately, life doesn’t know it is supposed to follow a schedule. Ruth Porat I am not talking about making hard and fast rules. There is a time and place for outlines, planners, to-do lists, and business plans. Those are all fine and well, but first comes starting. We have to start the thing and then show up every day and do it. Get into that rhythm for a while and then start to filter in new information. Do it for a while longer and see how that fits into the bigger scheme of our lives. If you want to start a business start a business. If you are dabbling with something you hope will grow and develop into something substantial then by all means do some goal setting, make some to-do lists, and create a plan, but remember in the end you cannot subvert the need to consistently show up and do your thing so as to allow a natural progression of development to occur. As you do you will know what to do. An inner prompting will tell you it’s time for the next step. All those articles are going to help you know what the next step is. Nothing is more motivating then understanding naturally what we should do next. Those aha moments are irreplaceable. Once we understand what needs done few things can prevent us from doing them. At that point we need little help and outside motivation. We run at things with full force. That’s usually when we start making goals and formal plans. Trust the process to show you what is next and help you develop your thing in your way. Consistently feed yourself with information, but realize that there will be the right time to apply it and that time will reveal itself through the natural progression of development. Marcy Pedersen

['Development', 'Growth', 'Progress', 'Creativity', 'Writing']

“Surely all art is the result of one’s having been in danger, of having gone through an experience all the way to the end, to where no one can go any further.” ―Rainer Maria Rilke When people tell me that the mark of a writer is someone who commits to a word count or page count every day, I want to do two things: wipe their smug platitude clear across their face and laugh. Mostly, I laugh the laugh of crazed serial killers—the kind of back-of-the-throat guttural cackle that causes most people to slowly step away. I’ve been writing since I was a child, and the idea of starting my day in front of a blank page is just as comforting as gouging out my eyes with an acetylene torch. Over the past decade, I’ve had two of my books published by traditional houses while balancing demanding jobs and a full-time life. And guess what? I didn’t have time for the romanticized writer existence where one sips freshly brewed coffee while wearing their threadbare robe as depicted in bad movies and blog posts. Of course, all writers are the coffee-guzzling, unkempt superstitious sort. In college, the editor of the literary review approached me with a copy of my short story in hand. He looked at the paper and then up at me in confusion, as if he couldn’t reconcile the woman wearing a flannel shirt and baseball cap with the woman who wrote a story about her mother being her first hurt. After he complimented the story, he said in a smaller voice that I didn’t look like a writer, to which I responded, “Well, what the fuck is a writer supposed to look like?” You don’t need to write every day if that’s not your way; you just need to be committed to what you write. Back then, I had moxie. I was born to write, but I was also born to build brands, and this realization often created tension between the two worlds I inhabited. Book friends were astounded to discover that I earn a six-figure salary, and marketing friends held up my book and said, “You wrote this? Wow, I didn’t know you were a writer.” It’s possible to be more than one thing. Few people realize this simple, true fact. Writers don’t “look” a certain way. There is no one way to be a writer or to write a novel other than your way. I don’t toil away every morning in front of a Word document. Instead, I negotiate contracts with clients on conference calls, mentor marketing executives, beg for student loan deferments (“yes, I’ll hold”), build businesses (“yes, I’ll continue to hold”), and write when I can because my dark, experimental fiction isn’t paying the bills. Sometimes it’s okay, even downright necessary, to take the paycheck. While seeing your book prominently displayed on the new fiction table at Barnes and Noble is sexy (and also a beautiful fiction for most writers in its own right), having a home to come home to and a hot meal is even sexier. The constant of basic creature comforts far outweighs the suffering, starving artist trope. You don’t need to write every day if that’s not your way; you just need to be committed to what you write. Determination and persistence are the most valuable weapons in a writer’s arsenal. Writing comes more easily to me than most, but that doesn’t matter if I don’t commit myself to the work. Nothing happens until you move—until words get on the page. Let’s first get something crystal-clear. Even when you’re not physically putting thought to paper, you’re writing. You’re thinking about your characters on the way to work. You’re jotting down dialogue in bed at night. You’re doing research while eating lunch at your desk. You’re dictating scenes into your phone on the 405 because traffic hasn’t moved in an hour, and writing is better than having a rage blackout. Being a writer is about understanding that the work that goes into the writing is just as important and relevant as the writing itself. We fear and succumb to failure before we’ve typed our first word without understanding that success is comprised of a million little failures. Agatha Christie once said, “The best time for planning a book is while you’re doing the dishes.” This is how I’ve managed to publish two books and countless stories and essays over the past two decades. I created space and time for the work while understanding the pragmatic reality otherwise known as life. Neuroscience tells us that we’re wired to cleave to that which is safe and known. Experience and repetition define that knowing. Along comes an idea for a book—a dense forest rife with unknowns—and if given the choice, we’ll file our taxes and our nails over putting thought to type. That’s one of the many arcane ways we stand in our own way. We retreat into the comfort of complacency instead of risking the possible magic of a new reality. We fear and succumb to failure before we’ve typed our first word without understanding that success is comprised of a million little failures. We give up because the largeness of the novel is a weight too heavy to bear instead of thinking about writing as Margaret Atwood would have it: “A word after a word after a word is power.” You build a house brick by brick. You rely on drawings, schematics, measurements, and plans and make adjustments as you go. No one wakes one day and—poof—there’s the house. The act of building is the becoming, so why would writing be any different? You build a book word by word, line by line, paragraph by paragraph, page by page, chapter by chapter. And there you have it, what Sylvia Plath once called “the long short story.” We often forget the smallest of parts creates the beautiful whole. The first substantial revision of my second book in 2014. In Zadie Smith’s beloved essay “That Crafty Feeling,” she archetypes two kinds of writers: the Macro Planner and the Micro Manager. The Macro Planner lives for their notebook, Post-its, sketches, plot outlines, and character sketches; they’ve written the whole book in their head before they even sat down to type. They live for the blueprints and plans, and the house is pre-fab. Apparently, Graham Greene was a Macro Planner. Meanwhile, the Micro Manager plays the page as it lays. They start with the first line and somehow navigate their way to the last one, and they have no idea where the story will go. Smith puts it this way: Micro Managers build a house floor by floor, discretely and in its entirety. Each floor needs to be sturdy and fully decorated with all the furniture in place before the next is built on top of it. There’s wallpaper in the hall even if the stairs lead nowhere at all. While most of my waking life is engineered by my type-A personality, my writing life is ostensibly nomadic. As much as I want to create an outline and various endings, I always find myself wrapped up in a particular character and taking joy in seeing where the character goes. For me, the writing is more heated and ephemeral, and it’s that heat that keeps me curious and mobile. I am notorious for writing multiple drafts of a novel because certain plotlines didn’t work or the ending fell flat or some characters needed to be excised or I just realized I needed something in the middle of the book although I’m not quite sure what that something is. In my second book, Follow Me Into the Dark, I didn’t develop the principle plot twist until my third substantial rewrite. Now that I’ve sent you into a panic, know that I’ve shifted my process to be more of fusion between the micro and macro. I no longer walk into the complete unknown. Here’s how I do it: 1. Decide if You Can Live With Your Character or Idea Long-Term Over the years, I’ve read articles, books, and news reports, and I’ve felt the spark. Maybe I should write about dissociative fugue states! Maybe I should retell Jonestown from Jim Jones’ wife’s point of view! The sparks are the equivalent of standing in the supermarket checkout line and padding your cart with issues of Us Weekly and Snickers bars. The ideas offer instant gratification but nothing sustaining over the long haul. Then I road test each idea for a couple of weeks. Am I up for the research? Who are my principle characters? Do they fascinate me enough for 200 pages plus rewrites? Even if I don’t know the plot just yet (I almost never do), could I sketch out a vague idea of where the story could go? What are my three acts? I tend to map out the general idea for the book, and I spend a little more time on the characters. If I’m bored after two or three weeks, odds are I’ll be bored after a few months. 2. Start Sketching a Loose Character/Plot Outline If I don’t hate the plot or the people, I compose real character sketches. As you can probably tell, I avoid the word outline because “outline” used to mean shackles and commitment, but now I realize it’s a tool that reduces the number of rewrites. I keep the plot sketch loose—it’s merely directional. Because I’m physically unable to write a book linearly (trust me, I’ve tried), I spend a little more time on the structure. Will these be alternating chapters that are character-led, or is time the primary driver of the story? I often find that drivers tend to be plot, place, time, or character, and that helps me navigate the structure. The point here is getting to the first draft by any means necessary. I spend more time on timelines than plotlines, if you can believe it. Mostly, I spend time with the characters. I visualize them as real people. I hear them talking (not literally—you know what I mean). I hear their way of talk. What’s their vernacular, lexicon, speech patterns, vocabulary (is there a vocabulary I have to learn)? Where do they live and is their geography pertinent to them as a character? Who are they as people? What do they like? Who do they trust? I love writing broken people and exploring how they navigate their life, so for me, context is key. What’s their history? Do I need research for their history? For example, my lead character in my second book was a sociopath—Ted Bundy with a whisk, if you will—so I had to do a lot of research on sociopathic behavior. I commit to my characters because the more real they are to me, the stakes are higher and their actions and nuance are easier to map out. Character always leads me to plot. 3. Start Where It Feels Natural I’ve never started a book by writing the first line—that’s entirely too loaded and too much pressure. I pick the easiest point of entry, a scene, and I often start books in the middle. Scenes are excellent because they afford you velocity. Things are happening, and people are talking. For me, nothing happens until something moves. If I can’t see the periphery or the details of the scene, I’ll start with straight dialogue and fill in narrative later. All that matters to me is movement. 4. Know the Writing Will Be Garbage in the First Drafts Even the most prolific authors (okay, maybe Vladimir Nabokov with his notecards is the exception) have garbage first drafts. Jhumpa Lahiri has talked extensively about her process, which includes multiple messy drafts. No one’s reading your first draft. No one expects you to have a polished draft. The point here is getting to the first draft by any means necessary. If that means creating 50 pages of exposition that you sense you might have to toss later, awesome. That means you know your characters more, the plot has become clearer, and more importantly, you start to figure out where the characters and story can’t go. Even if you’re not writing, you’re writing. Polish isn’t the point—movement is. Get the story down and the characters talking, and later on, you can fuss about the carpeting and the drapes. That’s what editing is for; writing is about getting a story on paper—word by word, brick by brick. 5. Assess Each Chapter I didn’t do this practice until recently, to be candid, but it’s extraordinarily useful. I used to just write and write, and although I still do that to a certain extent, I do get a little more reflective after the draft I’ve written. I have a whiteboard (which used to be a spreadsheet) where I jot down the pertinent details of every chapter. Where did the plot go? What happened to the characters? What do I feel is missing? (This is more about your gut.) Were there any revelations? Places I didn’t expect to go? Having this board up while I write helps because I glance at it every so often to remind me where I am and where I could potentially go. It also serves as a working roadmap, providing guidance so I don’t veer too far off course. 6. Fill the Non-Writing Spaces Sometimes the words just don’t come. I’ve read the countless articles and books that tell you to write something, anything, and I’m here to tell you that’s nonsense. I don’t have three hours in the morning to waste on writing for the sake of writing. Instead, I can do research. I can meditate on the characters. Brainstorm plot points. Get specific on elements of the character, place, and story that are not yet known to me. Remember, even if you’re not writing, you’re writing. 7. Make a Writing Plan Each Month I’ve gone months without writing. From 2009 to 2013, I didn’t write at all. I don’t make a formal plan until I feel I have enough to go on. If steps one and two aren’t in play, I can’t waste time dreaming about the book. For me to prioritize the book in my life, it has to be real to me, which means I need a foundation. After I explore the idea of the story, my commitment to it, and character and plot sketches, then I map out a list dump of all the preliminary things I need to do to get started. Then I schedule the tasks into three five-hour buckets each week. More, if I’m lucky. I break down those buckets into two-hour sprints and focus on one task of the book. For example, the list for my second novel started with these tasks: Research on sociopathic behavior and serial killers. Subtask: Find two or three good books and 10 articles relevant to my research. Read them. Subtask: Find two or three good books and 10 articles relevant to my research. Read them. Narrow down the serial killer that most resembles my character and learn as much as I can about that person . Subtask: Find audio, psychological assessments, documentaries, etc. I chose Ted Bundy as a model, and I immersed myself, for better or worse, in all that was Bundy. My character mimicked much of his modus operandi down to his education and way of talk. I mapped out which traits I wanted to hone in on that fascinated me and were relevant to my character. What started as general research became a bulleted list of aspects of Bundy that could inspire my character. . Subtask: Find audio, psychological assessments, documentaries, etc. I chose Ted Bundy as a model, and I immersed myself, for better or worse, in all that was Bundy. My character mimicked much of his modus operandi down to his education and way of talk. I mapped out which traits I wanted to hone in on that fascinated me and were relevant to my character. What started as general research became a bulleted list of aspects of Bundy that could inspire my character. Map out general plot, structure, and character outlines. Subtask: Complete composites of each character (this is much like the customer segmentation work I do in marketing but with less data) and determine geography, timeline, and structure. Doing so opened up additional research (e.g., how people spoke in the 1950s and 1960s, Nevada, California). (Notice that I haven’t written a word yet with these tasks. And that’s okay.) Write out, in paragraphs, scene summaries that I’d ideally like to develop. Develop a scene. I make a monthly plan and modulate during the week. If I set aside time on Thursday to write the scene and it doesn’t happen, I’ll swap that task for another one on my list so at least something gets done, and I’m moving the book forward. Rinse, lather, repeat.

['Novel', 'Publishing', 'Writing', 'Creativity', 'Productivity']

Tapping the full potential of your ideas Photo courtesy of author Halloween was coming and I knew a ghost story. Bringing the tale of the priest, the farmer, and the traveler to the readers might seem simple — after all, the exorcism occurred over two hundred years ago. But, writing a compelling article required more than skill with words. There were historians to find and entice into an interview, a sunny village and a caretaker to photograph, a museum director to get on the phone, and old records to mine for information. As usually happens, once all the information became available, the story wasn’t as simple as I had thought. Unimaginable conflicts brewed even in the present day. Only after I pulled the parts together and really thought about things could I write a decent article and get it to my editor in time for a pre-Halloween publication. Taking the time to plan and organize the tasks involved in article writing sets the stage for a good article and a pleasant experience. Here’s a few things I’ve found helpful: Photo courtesy of author Identify the least controllable tasks Schedule and do them as early as possible. For instance, if you are writing an article about a historic garden only open on the weekends, call ahead to doublecheck availability and get that visit out of the way. You don’t want to be down to the wire and find you have only one day to do this — the day your child breaks out in a rash. Most interviews should be scheduled as early as possible in the writing process. Not only will this help assure you interview the critical people for your article, but you will also have time to follow up on the leads they’ll give you. Interviews almost always lead to new research or additional interviews or opportunities. If you wait till the end of your process, you won’t have time to schedule any follow-up work. You should approach article writing with an open mind and be ready to learn new, unexpected things. Remember, your best articles are going to show your readers something they don’t already know. Unless you’re a subject matter expect, you’ll also learn things along the way. Be open-minded and ready for the unexpected by getting your interviews and site visits out of the way early. Weather is a challenge and can ruin your site visit plans. If you are going to take or arrange photographs for your article, the weather can be your biggest friend or a real pain. Get out there early, before the hurricane. You can always do a second visit if, for instance, a lovely snow fall creates the perfect backdrop for your shot of sled dogs. Some activities — like interviews with a government official or a visit to a youth treatment facility — may require special permission. Those can take time. Plan for that. Identify low-key activities Writing articles also includes a number of relatively easy, mundane, but necessary tasks. Examples could be reading and taking notes on articles for background knowledge or scanning postcards for illustrations. Do these when you are having an “off” day or time. Photo courtesy of author Know your optimum times and settings for productive writing Every writer has their own rhythm. Know when you are best at creative work and set those times aside for actually writing and revising your article. If you have a special place (or coffee mug) that helps you do good work, use them. Photo courtesy of author Let your writing breathe Stop writing after your first draft and let your work rest. Wait at least overnight before you revise it. By taking a break, you’ll see more opportunities to improve your work. Take advantage of available tools and resources You can maximize what you’ve already purchased (your phone, computer, and software) by spending time learning more about their bells and whistles. Look up those user manuals. Build in redundancy to help guarantee you stay on track. For example, I schedule my work on a wall calendar, my phone, and in a folder on my computer, lessening the risk of missing a deadline. Consider using additional proprietary tools. You might like to use Trello to create online versions of boards, lists, and sticky notes. Trello has a free version. Scrivener offers writers a robust means of keeping facts at hand and offers has a free trial. You can find other online aids. Whether you use virtual aids or old school ring binders, making the effort to keep your workflow and information organized will enhance your article writing experience. While Ben Franklin may have said, “For every minute spent in organizing, an hour is gained,” organizing your article writing will give you much more than just free time. Being organized will benefit your readers, please your editor, and result in a better end product. You’ll have the space to be fully creative and express yourself the way you’d like.

['Article Writing', 'Time Management', 'Nonfiction', 'Startup', 'Writing']

What I Learned Writing My First 22 Articles on Medium A break down of my best and worst-performing articles so far Image by Author via Canva Here’s what I know — writing is hard. There’s also nothing else on the planet that I’d rather do for a living. While I am a full-time freelancer, I am new to Medium (joined in October 2020, wrote my first article at the very tail end of November 2020). As you probably already know, there is a steep learning curve here. I’m not the first to say it, nor will I be the last. I’ve studied my butt off in these few weeks to ramp up my knowledge on what to do (and not to do) on this platform. The jury is still out on whether or not I’m getting it right. However, based on what I read from successful writers on Medium, my stats are on track. They are trending in the right direction. I’m doing everything I know to do so far to make my writing valuable and to earn a nice ROI. One of the things that have helped me tremendously is articles like this one where writers break down their stats, strategies, and earnings. So, let’s get to it.

['Productivity', 'Writer', 'Life Lessons', 'Writing', 'Entrepreneurship']

Incentives can change behaviour In 2018, just over 7 million people in the UK smoked, or 14.7% of the population. That’s 5% less than in 2011, a remarkable reduction in seven years. How was this done? People’s behaviour changed through the use of incentives. The moral incentive encouraging smokers to stop has been well known for decades. Smoking’s terrible for your health. A smoker is 15 to 30 times more likely to either contract lung cancer or die from it than non-smokers. Advertising campaigns using shock tactics to communicate how bad smoking is have done a great job to reinforce its effects on health. There was a time when smoking was considered good for you, and the act of smoking was integrated into everyday society. It was the norm, and laws made it easy to smoke. It’s incredible to think there was a time you could smoke on planes. We’ve come a long way since then. Smokers are now given designated areas to smoke. You’re labeled as and feel like a ‘smoker’. An outsider, different from the rest. The convenience of smoking has now turned into an inconvenience. In shops and supermarkets, cigarettes are hidden out of sight, adding to the stigma associated with smoking. Then there’s the financial incentive. Government tax on cigarettes is high, making cigarettes an expensive habit worth giving up. An average pack of cigarettes is £8 ($10.40), 80% of which is tax. A combination of the three incentives has had a dramatic impact on the number of smokers in the UK. But the change could only happen with government intervention. Policies to stop people smoking have been central in driving behavioural change.

['Society', 'Climate Change', 'Psychology', 'Policy', 'Environment']

Why Your First Thoughts Make the Best Headlines A simple way to write headlines and a helpful tool to help you decide Illustration by Cynthia Marinakos. I often drive by a little shopping precinct near my local petrol station. One day, the most curious thing caught my eye — it was hopelessly out of place along the main road. A funny red blow-up man blowing around in the wind next to a sign. A promotional gimmick for a gym that’s hidden from the road. I’m not in the market for a new gym, so it didn’t entice me. It did make me aware there was a gym there though. When we think about writing headlines, it’s tempting to come up with something clever, funny, or intriguing to catch our reader’s eye. We wonder how we can entice readers with something unusual. In the Headline Hacks column, I’ve shared the most highly rated sensorial words and power words. I’ve let you in on proven headline formulas and templates that lead to magnetic titles. I’ve even dissected popular TED Talk headlines. Well, today I want to break headlines down to its simplest — a quick, easy way for you to build confidence in your headlines. This is one way I come up with headlines. It’s how I came up with the headline for this article without fussing or worrying about it. It’s this: Write headlines from the thoughts in your head. They will be specific. And come from a real curiosity, need, or problem. You’ll avoid clickbait because your thoughts are genuine and casual. Natural. For instance, say you have trouble cutting down how much you eat and want some help. Maybe a nutritionist, a health consultant, the latest research, or others in the same predicament have useful tips to share. What would you Google? Perhaps: How to stop overeating so I don’t feel tired all the time, or How to eat less and have more energy Let’s check what the headline analyzer tool, CoSchedule ranks these headlines and how it breaks them down: How to stop overeating so I don’t feel tired all the time — 74

['Creativity', 'Business', 'Psychology', 'Headline Hacks', 'Writing']

When I Realized Writing is More Than a Passion It’s a part of who I am Photo by Dariusz Sankowski on Unsplash In the beginning, I used to write for recreation. I’ve been told I have a vivid imagination, and I’ve always needed an outlet to express it. To pen down the stories swirling around in my head. Back then, I lacked the skill and dedication to write professionally. But as I read more, I learned more. Once I entered my late teens, I turned my focus from writing short stories to full-length novels. Ever since I saw the name “Enid Blyton” on my first children’s book, I knew I wanted my name on a book one day. Now was my time. But I didn’t realize one thing — writing novels is hard work. I’ve lost count of how many first drafts I started only to abandon them after the first few pages. I lacked the patience and perseverance to see it through to the end. So when I finished my first novella at the age of 19, I was elated. It was exhilarating, holding that book in my hands, seeing my name on the cover, hearing people’s plaudits and criticism about the story. It was more than everything I ever dreamed of. Since then, I’ve written another novella and a full-length novel. Another novel is set to release in the coming few days. On top of that, I’ve written a plethora of articles as well. I write a lot, is the bottom line. Which is all well and good, but… there’s always been something nagging at me. Something I couldn’t define. I never referred to my books as my books, just as the books. Whenever someone asked me what I did, I said I’m a law student. I completely forgot to mention I was a novelist as well. Everyone else called me a writer. Only I didn’t. Why? What was happening?

['Advice', 'This Happened To Me', 'Writing', 'Psychology', 'Creativity']

Bo Liu | Engineering Manager, Serving Systems team In 2015, the majority of content on Pinterest was pregenerated for users prior to login. It was stored statically in HBase and served directly upon entering the service. (More details can be found in the blog post Building a smarter home feed.) Although our earlier architecture helped us grow to 100 million monthly active users by 2015, it had several weak points that prevented us from building more dynamic and responsive products. For example, it was hard to experiment with different ideas and models on different components in the system. Since content was pregenerated, the features used to rank candidates could be weeks old, and we couldn’t leverage the most recent Pin/Board/User data, not to mention real-time user actions. We also had to pre-generate and store content for every user, including those who never returned. Moreover, we were constantly running a large number of concurrent experiments and needed to pre-generate and store content for each experiment. The storage cost was huge. Though a dynamic and responsive Pinterest is more attractive to Pinners, it imposes demanding requirements on our backend systems. To solve the technical problems, we built nine different systems that collectively power today’s fully dynamic and responsive Pinterest products. Though these systems were built for Pinterest, they solve common problems to many web-scale consumer-facing content distribution applications. Here, we’ll discuss these systems and how they changed the backend architectures powering the major Pinterest products, including Following Feed, Interest Feed, and Picked For You (recommendations). Challenges Firstly, a following graph, Owner-to-Board mappings, and Board-to-Pin mappings need to be stored and updated in real-time. Though we have this information in our MySQL and HBase clusters, it takes too long to query them from those data stores for online applications (more than one round trip per request, big fanout and large data scanning). Another big challenge was the lack of a high performance machine learning ranking system to rank thousands of pieces of content per request with a P99 latency of small dozens of ms. To provide feature data to this ML ranking system, some stateful services with batching and real-time update support are needed. These stateful services must provide not only KV data model, but also more complicated data models like counts, lists, etc. These stateful services must answer queries with single digit P99 latency given the latency requirement of the ML ranking system depending on them. Lastly, we need a candidate generation system to provide high-quality candidate sets in real-time for content recommendations. Following feed Fig. 1: Former Following Feed Fig. 1 depicts following feed circa 2015. Whenever a Pin was saved, an asynchronous task was enqueued to Pinlater, an asynchronous job execution system. This task would first retrieve all (direct and indirect) followers for the Pin’s board from MySQL via the follower service, and then it would send the (follower list, Pin) to a smart feed worker. The smart feed worker would leverage Pinnability to score the Pin for every follower and then insert the list of (follower, score, Pin) into HBase. When a user came to Pinterest, we scanned HBase with the user id as the prefix to extract the Pins with the largest scores for this user. This implementation consumed unnecessarily large storage space and made it hard to leverage fresh signals and experiment with new ideas. Additionally, the long latency for fetching the follower list (steps 2 and 3) and ranking (step 5) prevented us from experimenting online. Fig. 2: Current Following Feed In the current version of the following feed shown in Fig. 2, components in green are newly built systems, while the database shape indicates stateful services (we use the same terminology throughout this post). The mapping from user to directly- and indirectly-followed boards is stored and real-time updated in Apiary, which supports low latency queries suitable for online applications. Board-to-Pin mappings and some lightweight Pin data are stored and real-time updated in Polaris, which not only supports board based Pin retrieval but also filtering with passed-in bloom filter as well as lightweighted scoring to select high quality pins. When a request is sent to Feed Generator to fetch a user’s following feed, it concurrently fetches real-time signals for the user, boards followed by the user, and Pins seen by the user recently from RealPin, Apiary and Aperture, respectively. RealPin is a highly customizable object retrieval system providing a rich data model for object storage and data aggregation along the time dimension. We customized RealPin to track and serve real-time user signals. Aperture was firstly designed for content deduping; it stores all user events, including backend and frontend Pin impressions, and returns impression history of up to a few months for any user, all with single-digit P99 latency. Aperture was later adapted to serve the ads user action counting use case as described in the blog post Building a real-time user action counting system for ads. Feed Generator then sends to Polaris the board list and the bloom filter consisting of the impression history of the user. After retrieving, filtering and applying lightweight scoring, Polaris returns a list of Pins to Feed Generator. Lastly, this list of Pins and real-time user signals are sent to Scorpion for a second pass of full scoring. Scorpion is a unified ML online ranking platform powering the majority of Pinterest ML models in production. We have Counter service and Rockstore underlying Scorpion to provide count signals and user data, pin data, etc. Note that Scorpion aggressively caches static feature data in local memory, which is the larger part of all feature data required by ML models. Scorpion is sharded to achieve a cache hit rate over 90%. Interest feed Fig. 3: Former Interest Feed Fig. 3 depicts the 2015 version of the interest feed architecture, which is similar to the following feed described in Fig. 1. The main difference was content generation was triggered by daily jobs, and source data was stored in HBase instead of MySQL. Fig. 4: Current Interest Feed Picked for you (recommendations) Fig. 5: Former Picked For You (recommendations) The “Picked For You” architecture from 2015 is depicted in Fig. 5. Its content generation was also triggered by daily jobs. A periodic offline job generated a list of boards for each user as the seeds for Pin recommendation. These seed boards were batch uploaded to Terrapin for serving. Fig. 6: Current Picked For You (recommendations) Fig. 6 depicts the current “Picked For You” architecture. Pixie is a new service built for real-time board recommendation. It periodically loads into memory an offline-generated graph consisting of boards and Pins. When recommended boards are requested for a user, a random walk is simulated in the Pixie graph by using the Pins engaged by the user as starting points. (More can be found in the blog post Introducing Pixie, an advanced graph-based recommendation system.) The rest of the systems are similar to following feed. Brief technical discussions Throughout the process of building systems from scratch to enable fully dynamic and responsive Pinterest products, we needed to make design decisions with reasonable tradeoffs, solve technical problems, and optimize systems to meet the latency requirement for online applications. Back in 2015, the majority of Pinterest’s backend systems were implemented in Java, and we hadn’t built any systems in C++. As we can see from the previous sections, the new systems must achieve low long-tail latency with big fanout (sometimes all shard fanout), and some systems are CPU intensive (e.g., Scorpion, Pixie and RealPin). We chose to adopt C++11, FBThrift, Folly and RocksDB to build these systems. It was slow at the beginning since we had to install all dependencies, build several basic facility libraries (like stats reporting, request routing, etc.), and set up our build & release environment. It eventually paid off as we used our new foundation to get more and more efficient and effective systems built across the company. RocksDB is an embedded storage engine. To build sharded and replicated distributed systems on top of it, data replication was the first problem we needed to solve. We started with the write-to-all-replica approach and later moved to master-slave replication. Our systems are running on AWS, which models its network into Regions, Availability Zones and Placement Groups. Notably, the bill for cross-AZ network traffic is significant. We built a prefix-based AZ-aware traffic routing library that minimizes cross-AZ traffic and supports all possible routing patterns (e.g., single shard, multiple shard and all shard fanout). The library also monitors TCP connection health and gracefully fails over requests among replicas. One thing to note is we needed to leverage the TCP_USER_TIMEOUT socket options to fail fast when the OS on remote peer crashed. It is not uncommon for a VM instance to become unreachable on AWS for various reasons without shutting down TCP connections. If TCP_USER_TIMEOUT is not set, a typical TCP implementation could take over 10 minutes to report the issue to user space applications. (More details about data replication and traffic routing can be found in the Rocksplicator Github repo and blog post Open-sourcing Rocksplicator, a real-time RocksDB data replicator.) Over 10% of Pinterest’s total AWS instances run our systems. To reduce the operational overhead and service downtime, we integrated Apache Helix (a cluster management framework open sourced by Linkedin) with Rocksplicator. (More details can be found in the blog post Automated cluster management and recovery for Rocksplicator.) We did numerous optimizations and tunings when implementing and productionizing these systems. For instance, we needed to tune the RocksDB compaction thread number and set L0 and L1 to be of the same size to reduce write amplification and improve write throughput. One of the counter service clusters must support returning tens of thousands of counts for a single request with a P99 latency less than 20 ms. To achieve that, we switched to RocksDB plain table and configured it to something essentially like an in-memory hash table. We also had to switch to float16 to reduce data size and manually encode lists of returned counts into binary strings to save serialization and deserialization overhead. For big requests, counter service may also leverage multiple threads to process a single request. Though RealPin was designed as an object retrieval system, we customized it to run as an online scoring system for several months. However, we noticed it was a challenge to operate the system given it co-locates computation and storage. This issue became more serious as we started to use more types of feature data. Ultimately, we developed the new Scorpion system, which separates computation from storage and caches feature data on the computation nodes. As Scorpion is CPU intensive and running on big clusters, we needed to invest heavily in optimizing it. We carefully tuned the Scorpion threading model to achieve a good tradeoff between high concurrent processing and low context switch or synchronization overhead. The sweet spot is not fixed, as it depends on many factors such as if data is fetched from memory, local disk or RPC. We optimized the in-memory LRU caching module to achieve zero-copy; i.e., cached data is fed into ML models without any data copying. Batch scoring was implemented to allow GCC to better utilize SIMD instructions. Decision trees in GBDT models are compacted and carefully laid out in memory to achieve better CPU cache hit rates. Thundering herds on cache miss are avoided by object level synchronization. Data stored in Aperture is bucketed along the time dimension. We use a frozen data format for old data which is immutable and suitable for fast read access. More recent data is stored in a mutable format which is efficient for updates. The max_successive_merges RocksDB option was leveraged to limit the number of merge operands in mem-table from the same key. This setting is critical for Aperture to achieve low read latency since it may need to read a RocksDB key with a large number of merge operands, which are expensive to process at read time. To save storage space, RocksDB was configured to use different compression policies and multiplier factors for different levels. If these types of challenges interest you, join our team! And keep an eye on this blog for more posts and information on the open sourcing of some of our systems. Acknowledgements: In addition to the Serving Systems team, we’d like to thank our client teams for providing useful feedbacks, helping building and adopting the systems — Home Feed, Related Pins, Ads, Interest, Applied Science, Visual Search, Spam, etc.

['Engineering', 'AWS', 'Big Data', 'Machine Learning']

When should a startup begin planning for growth? The answer is now. The unconventional truth is that a startup should very rarely be acting out of survival — living from one sale to the next or from one month to the next. In fact, survival mode should only be reserved for those periods when uncontrollable external forces conspire to create a substantial impact to business as usual. You know, like a global pandemic that threatens to take down entire economies. But I’ll save how to do survival mode for another post. Because even when external circumstances dictate that a startup go into survival mode, every day that startup remains in survival mode brings it another day closer to failure. If a startup isn’t growing, it’s dying. So you should be thinking, planning, and acting in growth mode all the time. Here’s how to transition your company up and out of the muck. The moment of truth is CAC and LTV It’s said that if you want to create a successful business, find something you do well at low costs and high margins and repeat it over and over until something stops your progress. This is true. This is much easier said than done. And it’s nothing that you can just luck or viral your way into. One of the companies I’m advising hit their growth moment of truth last week. It was a moment we had been chasing for the better part of six months, and it came to fruition when they put real numbers for Cost to Aquire a Customer (CAC) and initial Lifetime Value (LTV) into a spreadsheet. This is the first step on the path to growth mode. Their CAC data covered every part of addressing their market, from various marketing channels to conversions to onboarding. They had rows and rows of data for each path to closing the sale — from optimal and desirable paths to costly and clunky paths — and the true costs associated with each. Their LTV data addressed each of their tiers of service, their churn, and what they could project moving forward. They threw out all the outliers — the freemiums, the VIPs, the beta testers — until they were working with real, defendable dollar figures. I should mention that those numbers sucked. High CAC, low LTV. But that’s fine. It’s like stepping on a scale for the first time in a long time. Those first few pounds are the easiest to lose. The growth levers are found between CAC and LTV The reason that CAC and LTV spreadsheet was a watershed moment is because now the company is no longer throwing darts. Instead of having to randomly decide which features and initiatives to prioritize, they can now create levers to reduce CAC and increase LTV. So imagine they put CAC on the left of a whiteboard and LTV on the right. Those levers are going to be created in that white space in the middle. And they’re going to be created by providing the kind of value that minimizes CAC for those customers with the highest LTV. Low cost, high margins, repeat. Now, if I could tell you exactly what features and initiatives you need to build to do that, I’d be your CEO. However, I can give you the guidelines that you should be building those features and initiatives around. Get to the levers The first step is to connect CAC to LTV, and that’s going to require some assumptions and some research. For example, your cheapest-to-acquire customers might not be your best customers. They may be costly to onboard and maintain, they may not value your product or service, and all that in turn may dramatically lower their LTV. Time to acquire is also a factor. For example, viral and word-of-mouth customers may be super cheap to acquire, but reaching a critical mass of these customers is the kind of time-based math that a lot of would-be entrepreneurs never consider. A company has to maintain an infrastructure to serve its customers and also needs to be able to take advantage of economies of scale. So there’s a natural break-even point of customers-over-time for the business. Draw lines from CAC paths to a unique LTV for each path, then break that LTV out annually or even monthly, and multiply it by the number of those customers you can close in a month. Then target the most profitable customers you can acquire the quickest. Pull the growth levers by delivering consistent, lasting value quickly Now that you’ve targeted your initial market, to need to serve their needs, so you start with this question: How quickly can we deliver consistent value that is lasting? Every choice you make from your feature set down to your customer messaging should answer that question. These are your levers. Quickly: The first thing we did after connecting CAC to LTV was throw out all the metrics that didn’t impact either of those things. The next thing we did was start tracking the time it took to get to each step on those paths. The first thing we did after connecting CAC to LTV was throw out all the metrics that didn’t impact either of those things. The next thing we did was start tracking the time it took to get to each step on those paths. Consistent: We started tracking functional areas of the product to determine where the most customers spent the most time, in terms of frequency. If there was a function the customers kept coming back to, that function became a priority, because there was value. We started tracking functional areas of the product to determine where the most customers spent the most time, in terms of frequency. If there was a function the customers kept coming back to, that function became a priority, because there was value. Lasting: For those areas that saw repeat visits, we measured how long in between visits and over how much time. The functions that the customers came back to regularly over long periods became a top priority, because there was lasting value. Minimize CAC, Maximize LTV, then expand Something will always stop your progress, even if that something is just saturation of the initial market. So you always need to prepare for what’s next. If you’ve minimized CAC, maximized LTV, and found those paths to deliver consistent, lasting value to customers quickly, you should have received plenty of clues along the way of where your next best market might be. There are many ways you can expand your market, but usually that expansion will run along one of these axes: Tier: From the product out, you can dive deeper into certain functions or add new, related functions. Getting more money out of existing customers is always a good idea, even if the results may be limited. Less market share, more revenue per customer. From the product out, you can dive deeper into certain functions or add new, related functions. Getting more money out of existing customers is always a good idea, even if the results may be limited. Less market share, more revenue per customer. Market: Expand the definition of your customer to the next closest type. Instead of tweaking to give the same customers more functionality, you’re tweaking to serve more customers with the same functionality. Expand the definition of your customer to the next closest type. Instead of tweaking to give the same customers more functionality, you’re tweaking to serve more customers with the same functionality. Location: For some types of business, especially services, you can essentially double your customers by bringing the same value to a different local or regional market. The important thing to remember when expanding is to crawl before you walk before you run. A lot of successful startups derail themselves by diving headfirst into a new market and not anticipating that every single market will be slightly to drastically different from the market they’re dominating. Dip a toe in first, check the temperature, then land and expand. Hey! If you found this post actionable or insightful, please consider signing up for my weekly newsletter at joeprocopio.com so you don’t miss any new posts. It’s short and to the point.

['Entrepreneurship', 'Business', 'Startup', 'Leadership', 'Productivity']

I have started this challenge right away, as I want to gain some momentum before the new year. You can also start right away if you prefer. The first book I have chosen is: “The Future of Humanity: Terraforming Mars, Interstellar Travel, Immortality, and Our Destiny Beyond Earth”. In this book, Prof. Michio Kaku shares his insights and predictions about the collective future of humanity. First, we need to overcome the hurdles of becoming a multiplanet species. Kaku cites the words of Konstantin Tsiolkovsky: “The Earth is our cradle, but we cannot be in our cradle forever.” We are at the beginning of a new era: The age of space exploration. Kaku analyzes this age through three stages. First, he covers the solar system, then other stars, and then life in the universe. Kaku reviews cutting edge technologies in robotics, nanotechnology and biotechnology that will enable us to make our homes among the stars. He reviews technologies of space travel, genetic engineering, robotics, artificial intelligence, asteroid mining, and terraforming. Humans need to increase their life span if they need to reach other stars, as it will normally take centuries to reach even the closest star system Alpha Centauri. Kaku says we will download our encoded consciousness in a different body or system once we can successfully beam our consciousness from one star system to another. Kaku’s book provides us tremendous hope and imagination that can serve as our mental fuel for multiple centuries ahead of us. Below are some remarkable quotes from this remarkable book:

['Creativity', 'Humanity', 'Books', 'Science', 'Space']

A photo shows Intel’s latest neuromorphic system, Pohoiki Springs, and one of the rows within it. The system unveiled in March 2020 integrates 768 Loihi neuromorphic research chips inside a chassis the size of five standard servers. (Credit: Intel Corporation) Intel’s most powerful “neuromorphic” chips use the human brain as a model The chip giant is designing computer systems with the computational capacity of 100 million neurons Computer chips in a traditional computer are the brains of the system but function much less like a human brain. Neuromorphic Computing is the emerging field in technology that continues to expand and evolve. The current CPUs and GPUs do a satisfactory job of processing complex calculations, but innovations like AI has created the need for computers that can process unstructured and noisy data in real-time — much like how our brain neurons do. Although traditional computer chips are pretty good at crunching complex and large sets of data, they lack the capability when it comes to abstract data, like spotting a difference between two different animals — something that our brain can do effortlessly. The data pathways in our brains are called neurons, which perform all these tasks. Researchers are now working to replicate the same process in computer chips. It was only recently that I wrote about how Scientists at the University of Bath now seem to have decoded the bizarre behavior of neurons and replicated it on tiny silicon chips. Intel has now gone one step further. It has produced the most powerful neuromorphic research system providing the computational capacity of 100 million neurons. This puts the new system at par with the brain of a small mammal. Pohoiki Springs is the latest and most advanced system which integrates 768 Loihi neuromorphic in a casing that is the size of five standard servers. The system lays the foundation for an autonomous, connected future, which will require new approaches to real-time, dynamic data processing. ~ Intel Blog Even better is the fact that such a complex system is not an energy-guzzling machine like other comparable servers. According to Mike Davies, director of Intel’s Neuromorphic Computing Lab, Pohoiki Springs has increased the capacity of the Loihi neuromorphic research chip by more than 750x, while operating at a power level of under 500 watts. Pohoiki Springs is a cloud-based system that will be made available to members of the Intel Neuromorphic Research Community (INRC) to further their research to solve more complex problems. Some of the promising future applications include the following scalable algorithms: Constraint satisfaction problems can be accelerated by exploring varying solutions in parallel. parallel. Finding optimal paths in graphs and patterns. Real-world optimization problems like maximizing the bandwidth of a wireless communication channel or minimizing risk in a stock portfolio. Neuromorphic systems basically replicate, communicate and learn like a human brain but at the hardware level. And the eventual goal is to use neuroscience to develop chips that function less like traditional computers and more like the human brain.

['Neuroscience', 'Technology', 'Innovation', 'Future', 'Artificial Intelligence']