fabiochiu/medium-articles huggingface dataset:
Вehold: the New Headquarter Concept
Tags: Development, Gamedev, Games, Crypto, Worldopo

With full development status update

Fellow Cryptolords!

Summer is over, winter is coming, and it’s a perfect time to tell you about Worldopo development.

3D Artists Status

Our 3D Artists are fully loaded with new building concepts. They’re creating excellent and optimized models. It’s not as fast as we want to owe to the deed to model each level separately, and there are five levels on each building. But Headquarters and few other assets, like Warehouse, are already done. So it goes well.

Here’s Preview on a Warehouse building

Back-End Status

The back-End team is implementing Headquarters functionality, which is a big task due to HQ’s complexity: as you, perhaps, remember, each Headquarters is a fully functional mini base given to players from the very beginning. This task is closely connected to Technology diagram and Professions: these are entirely new for Worldopo and provide structure to player in-game development.

Front-End Status

Our Front-End is busy with the new interface elements: Worldopo 2.0 will be far more complicated than ever before, so we need to reimagine the whole interface to make it as simple as possible. And catch all bugs hiding in the code!

Game Design Team Status

The Game Design team is now finished with the low-level gameplay development, and the team is ready to start the Hi-End part and WPT circulation. When the economy concept will be ready, we will begin to balance the game economy.

MVP-Release?

The good news is that you don’t need to wait until we finish the whole game: we’re thinking of MVP-release with limited functionality to give players the taste of Worldopo 2.0 ASAP. Then we’ll be adding new features in each release until the job is done.
Business
By: Mike Grossman
Tags: Comedy, Coffee, Startup, Business, Comics

Goofy Froot by Mike Grossman and Max Travers

Meet the rest of the Froots @ www.GoofyFroot.com

Keep it Fresh.

If you like this fly comic show it some love, hit recommend and share it with your homies. As always, keep it locked on Panel & Frame for more emerging voices in Comics, Literature, Art, and Film. Peace!
Balloons Bring Happiness To Everyone
By: Dr. Preeti Singh
Tags: Creativity, Words, Poetry, Happiness, Writing

Balloons Bring Happiness To Everyone

Selfless service for others

Photo by Jacob Chen on Unsplash

Beautiful balloons hanging down,

Bringing happiness to everyone,

We hang them on auspicious occasions,

Later on, crushing them under our feet.

The balloons do not care,

They are happy to give happiness,

So selflessly and so sweetly to others,

with no worries to be crushed under.

The balloons are everyone's friend,

Children and elders all enjoy it,

Yet they do not care for it.

This is the life of the poor balloons.

Empathising with you my dear balloons,

Will remember to hug you next time,

For you make our day happy and cheerful,

Deserving to be appreciated and thanked.
Deactivating Database Rows With One NULL Trick
By: Terris Linenbach
Tags: Rdbms, Sql, MySQL

Let’s say you’re implementing the requirement that rows should never be deleted from particular tables in a relational database. Perhaps this is a requirement from regulators. Or maybe the schema declares foreign key constraints (and — yes! — it should, at least in dev environments) but, for reasons such as performance and safety, without cascading deletes.

You’re not trying to use the RDBMS to store an audit trail of every modification, which is usually a bad idea, but you don’t want data to completely disappear, either.

What’s the best way to virtually delete (or deactivate) rows in a RDBMS?

The obvious solution is to add a column that holds a deactivated flag:

This is not the best way

deactivated TINYINT NOT NULL DEFAULT 0

Now consider adding a secondary unique index to the table. If you deactivate a row and later attempt to insert a row with the same natural key, the unique index won’t allow it.

This sounds like a good thing for most scenarios, but for pure relationship tables, it can be desirous to insert new rows instead of reactivating them. Please, reactivating rows is cumbersome and forces your developers to change their coding patterns.

There’s a better way: reverse the flag’s meaning and use NULL to indicate whether the row has been deactivated:

This is better!

active TINYINT NULL DEFAULT 1

NULL means the row is inactive, instead of 0.

The trick: Add the active column to unique indexes

When active is NULL, the index will ignore the entire row. Multiple rows therefore can have the same natural key, so long as active is not-NULL in at most one row.

Store the deactivation time

Also consider adding a column to hold a timestamp when the row was deactivated. This column will be useful in case you need to audit the database.

Implement a view layer to prevent bugs

Create one view per table that excludes rows in which active is NULL. By selecting from the views, you will never have to worry about a developer forgetting to add “active is NOT NULL” to every WHERE and JOIN clause.

Happy coding!
Depression Ruined My Finances
Tags: Life Lessons, Zuva, Self, Finance, Mental Health

During my peak depression days, my life spiralled out of control. I couldn’t answer the phone or speak to anyone, I got fired from my job and I dropped out of university for the second time. A year later and I am still trying to pick up the pieces.

Yesterday I got off the phone with the bank and it wasn’t good news. They told me that one of my accounts had defaulted. I’m only twenty-three so ruined may be a bit of an over-exaggeration however my finances are fucked. To put it lightly.

A default notice (sometimes referred to as a default letter or Notice of Default) is a formal letter sent to you by a creditor as a result of payments missed on a credit agreement between yourself and a credit provider.

Once you have one on your credit report, it stays on your report for 6 years, regardless of whether you have paid off the debt. It negatively impacts your ability to borrow money. As it pops up when creditors check your information when deciding if you are a good candidate to give a loan to.
Missed America (Haiku)
By: Tre L. Loadholt
Tags: A Cornered Gurl, To Kill, Love, Warriors Are Hard, Writing

Author’s Note: I decided to continue with this series. I will conclude again at Part X or whenever I feel the need to stop. The others can be found at Missed America Part V.
The Thing About Numbers
By: Maya Kosoff
Tags: Numbers, Control

Anyway, this whole thing leads us back to spin class. The leaderboard and your output numbers are even more apparent during the classes you take: you can see, in real time, how your score compares to everyone else’s who took the class you’re in now. You can also filter it so that you’re just looking at the people who are in the class with you right now. It is impossible for me not to actively compare myself to everyone else, not try to beat my own personal best every time, and not try to make a harmlessly gamified system into a bigger deal than it actually is. This is not dissimilar from the first time I went to Flywheel, where I was aghast to learn that there was a board in the front of the room that looked like the newsroom leaderboard. I was struck by the comparison between the Torqboard (I’m sorry, but this really is what it’s called) and the leaderboard at the website, and how they both made me feel — like I was constantly treading water, comparing myself to the people around me, trying to be the best, or at least not the worst, instead of just trying to beat my score from the last class. You could opt to have your name on the Torqboard, and it would track your score through the 45-minute class — a score that increased the harder you worked, the more resistance you added, the faster you pedaled — along with everyone else’s scores. I usually didn’t opt to put myself on the board, but I still tracked my progress against the people who did.

Now I have nothing but time, a moderate amount of self-loathing, and an endless ability to compare myself to my pseudonymous peers on the bike on Peloton. On your little Peloton screen, you can hide the leaderboard, and you can hide your own analytics, but I can’t imagine being motivated without knowing how fast I’m moving, or how much weight I’m adding under my feet, or how well I’m doing comparatively. I would have no intrinsic motivation to work harder if I hid my own progress (and everyone else’s!) from myself. I push myself to beat my PR every class and I beat myself up if I come a few points shy of it. If I don’t do so hot in one class I’ll just tack another onto my workout, which is one of the benefits of the thing: you have a gazillion classes there waiting for you to take.

I keep struggling with how to end this one neatly because it’s not like it’s over. I’m still held captive by numbers and I have been for as long as I can remember. My obsession with them has just taken a new form in recent months. Sometimes I wish I weren’t like this, but it’s inextricable from who I am, and I’m not even sure it’s always a bad thing: It’s part of what pushes me to succeed just as much as it’s part of what makes me feel like a failure sometimes. Realistically I’ll eventually get bored of the Peloton, or I’ll finally learn how to ride an actual, real bike on the streets of New York, or I’ll find something else to obsess over. Because it’s not really about the bike, or about my leaderboard ranking in a HIIT class or whatever—it’s about finding a crumb of control in a world that sometimes feels very much outside of my control.
Exploring the Tokyo Neighbourhoods: Data-Science in Real Life
By: Saptashwa Bhattacharyya
Tags: Machine Learning, Data Visualization, Data Science, Towards Data Science, Python

As a part of the final IBM Capstone Project, we get a tang of what data scientists go through in real life. Objectives of the final assignments were to define a business problem, look for data in the web and, use Foursquare location data to compare different districts within wards (municipalities) of Tokyo (choice of city depends on the students) to figure out which neighborhood is suitable for starting a restaurant business(‘idea’ also depends on individual students). As prepared for the assignment, I go through the problem designing, data preparation and final analysis section step by step. Detailed codes and images are given in Github and link can be found at the end of the post.

1. Discussion and Background of the Business Problem:

Problem Statement: Prospects of a Lunch Restaurant, Close to Office Areas in Tokyo, Japan.

Tokyo, where I am currently staying, is the most populous metropolitan area in the world. Currently ranked 3rd in the global economic power index, Tokyo is definitely one of the best places to start up a new business.

During the daytime, specially in the morning and lunch hours, office areas provide huge opportunities for restaurants. Reasonably priced (one lunch meal 8$) shops are usually always full during the lunch hours (11 am — 2 pm) and, given this scenario, we will go through the benefits and pitfalls of opening a breakfast cum lunch restaurant in highly densed office places. Usually the profit margin for a decent restaurant lie within 15−20% range but, it can even go high enough to 35%, as discussed here. The core of Tokyo is made of 23 wards (municipalities) but, I will later concentrate on 5 most busiest business wards of Tokyo — Chiyoda (千代田区), Chuo (中央区), Shinjuku (新宿区), Shibuya (渋谷区) and Shinagawa (品川区), to target daily office workers.

We will go through each step of this project and address them separately. I first outline the initial data preparation and describe future steps to start the battle of neighborhoods in Tokyo.

Target Audience

What type of clients or a group of people would be interested in this project?
Fight or Flight Makes You Weak
By: Declan Wilson
Tags: Society, Life, Protest, Ideas, Democracy

Photo by Hermes Rivera on Unsplash

The scientists call it our fight or flight reflex. When we encounter something that scares us, our instinct is to either run away or beat the crap out of it.

For evolutionary purposes, this is a good instinct to have. It ensured only the fastest or the strongest of our species survived. For today’s purposes, I’m not so sure.

When we encounter a movement or a person who’s ideas scare us, our fight or flight instinct creates the polarized world we live in today. Conservative versus Liberal. Pro-this versus Anti-that. Liberty versus Equality.

Pick a side, they say, there’s no middle ground. Fight them or run, either way, don’t get too close.

When we feel the urge to fight or flight from movements or people, there is a third option available to us — engage.

Engage means to stand still long enough to listen. Engage means to lower your fists and try, just try to set aside your preconceived notions before formulating an opinion. Engage means to ask questions and do the research.

Fight or flight is lazy. It’s weak. It ensures the same musty ideas percolate throughout the centuries.

Fighting leads to more hate and less empathy. Running leads to more fear and less discourse. Engaging at the very least leads to understanding, at most, peace.

Us versus Them.

It’s the same rhetoric uttered by the Fighters and the Flighters, no matter the argument. The Engagers know this and avoid the dangerous lure of cut and dry positions.

The Engagers understand that amidst every conflict there are persons. And each person has ideas based on their own fears and upbringing and intentions. The Engagers don’t have to agree, but they do have to listen, they do have to see the person separate from the idea.

It’s one thing to say “have an open mind,” it’s another thing to mute those with whom we don’t agree. If we fail to engage, we further divide ourselves into facets and factions. We grow weak as a society.

Fight or flight once served our species, but today, it’s tearing us apart.
Hong Kong Disneyland
By: Leonard Ng
Tags: Hong Kong, Disney, Disneyland

How exciting! Hong Kong Disneyland is going to start operation on Sept 12, 2005! The Disneyland Hotel is available for booking since yesterday. Amazingly, already there were more than 100 people called the booking center and reserved rooms just in one day! And I am one of them. I booked a sea view room to spend the birthday with my wife there. It would be the first weekend since it starts its operation. That’s why I would like to book early enough.

Let’s hope it would turn out to be a great place for us to visit in Hong Kong whenever we need to cheer up ourselves! At the moment Hong Kong is lacking such a dreamland kind of place to release our stress and unhappiness.
TowerX: A crypto exchange by TowerBee
Tags: Cryptocurrency, Blockchain, Bitcoin, Ethereum

TowerX will be launched in Q3, 2018.

We are delighted to introduce our latest project TowerX, which will be developed alongside the existing products already mentioned in our road map.

The Pre-ICO ended on 04 June 2018 and it was dominated largely by private investors. We raised a total of $2.2 Million (soft cap was $2 Million).

Why TowerX?

We are an investor friendly company and we are happy to do what investors want us to do. The private investors who participated in Pre-ICO stage want us to build an exchange which includes the best features available on existing exchanges.

Accordingly, we will be using our existing technical know how and our data center infrastructure to build a reliable and secure exchange. Since, we are a SaaS company working with big data and coding is our core strength, we expect the exchange to be live much sooner than expected. However, for the record, we have kept the target date of launch of TowerX exchange in Q3 2018.

ICO on exchange

The TowerBee crowd sale will be on the TowerX exchange which will also mark the launch of the exchange. The TBE token will be listed on TowerX immediately after the crowd sale is over.

Airdrop when?

We have promised earlier that that 2.5 Million TBE tokens will be airdropped after ICO is over and before listing on exchange. We standby our words and the TBE tokens will be airdropped just after crowd sale is over on TowerX.

The TBE tokens will be unlocked only after the Airdrop has been done. So, everyone will have access to their TBE tokens before the trading begins on TowerX platform.

Join TowerBee Telegram group for updates

Telegram: https://t.me/towerbee

Want to list your token on TowerX ? Email us at hello@towerbee.io
Messages
By: Harvey Aughton
Tags: Night, Poetry, Forest

They told me of the dark

The birds, they spoke to me in song

of distant winds riding over ridges

To the south

He told me of the dawn

The light rays climbing up from the earth

into the midst of the leaves whistling

A morning lament

She gave me the daylight

a siren captured in a bottle, mouthing

A message of warmth, of love, of mistrust

To the moon

They brought me the night

Shadows which traverse my eyes

Beside soft shelter nestled between

Buttressed roots
SEO resources for small business online marketing
By: Kittie Walker
Tags: Search Engine Marketing, Small Business, Resources, SEO, Search

Apart from being technically challenging, there’s so much conflicting information and ostensible misinformation on the topic of SEO that it’s not surprising many small businesses avoid it completely.

Unfortunately, not paying attention to SEO is becoming increasingly detrimental to the health of any online presence. The online landscape relies heavily on machines being able to understand what we write and for the time being, they need our help.

All of the guys below do SEO the right way. Learning from their advice and experience will benefit your business in the long run.

These links are not part of any affiliate marketing programme.

Moz, Rand Fishkin

Great advice both from the organisation itself and from members of the community. Their blog, Q&A section and Whiteboard Friday series are all worth checking out.

Conversation Marketing, Ian Lurie

He’ll always tell you exactly how it is. He is uncompromising, hilarious and a great teacher. This link takes you directly to his webinar “50 Tips in 50 minutes” which will get you on the right track in 50 minutes flat. The blog and webinar series are well worth a follow.

SEO by the sea, Bill Slawski

Bill takes a more technical approach to SEO and how the search engines work by delving into the patents they register. He manages to explain technical topics in layman’s terms, offering fascinating insights that will help you understand why SEO works the way that it does.

SEO Whistleblower, Stephen Chapman

In spite of the rather slow frequency of updates, Stephen always provides good advice and in-depth case studies.

This list is a little longer than intended and I still have some more topics to cover, but they can wait until next time. I know I’ve probably missed out a ton of people from this list. Who else do you think should be included?
Stake Claim
By: Matthew Leo
Tags: Poetry On Medium, Poetry, Life, Art, Writing

Stake Claim

A Poem Written From a Dark Place

Photo by Alex Conchillos from Pexels

Thus, it is here

Claim aloud! Claim aloud!

Stake claim with thy clouded mind.

To a mind sometimes not there.

Or here, fogged by doubt,

Eaten by guilt. Almost voided.

Like a hornet drowned in honey.

I taste and remain teetering.

My mind warring against itself

As if I were doing a headstand

On top of a sharp stick and then . . .

Look. No hands.

© 2020 Matthew Leo

Thank you so much for giving me some of your time. It means the world to me. If you enjoyed this poem, please click on the clappy hands at the bottom as many times as you feel it deserves. Please feel free to tweet, share on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram, or to whoever you think might enjoy it as well. Take care and Be well.

Your wordsmith,

Matt

Care to follow me further down the rabbit hole, Alice? Here are a few more poems I believe you will enjoy:
Bin there, Done that !
By: Balaji Sundararaman
Tags: Matplotlib, Distribution, Histograms, Data Analytics, Seaborn

Bin there, Done that !

..a peek under the hood of histograms

Photo by Paweł Czerwiński on Unsplash

For numeric features in a dataset, when we think of checking out its distribution, the first thing that we think of is a histogram. A histogram plots the number of observations for each range of the values of the numeric feature. These ranges are called as Bins. The shape of the distribution depends on the size (width or edges) of the bins.

In this blog we will look at:

How to access the bin edges of a histogram

How to set custom bin widths instead of the default

We will use the familiar iris dataset that comes built-in with seaborn.

Lets see how the histogram of one of the features sepal_length looks like:

Accessing the Bin Edges

Now, how can we know the exact bin edges used by seaborn? The values are stored in the patches attribute of the plot which also contains a list of the plot elements from which we can access the width of the bins as well as the height of the bars.

We can access all the bin edges using the below line of code

With Matplotlib histogram plots, it is much more straightforward to retrieve the bin edges and also the counts of observation in each bin. The plt.hist() functions returns the bin counts, bin edges and the patches.

Note that the bin widths can be slightly different with different functions or packages depending what binning strategy is used. For a detailed discussion on the various binning approaches, you can refer the below link:

If you are not interested in the accompanying plots and just want the numbers, well, look no further than numpy.

For some reason, if you are not happy with the default bin edges, then setting the bin size is easy. You can either specify the number of bins as an integer value in the bins parameter or pass a list of numbers for the bin edges.

Hope you liked this article. You may also like the ones below:

Thanks for reading. It would be great to hear your comments, feedback on bala@python4u.in. The code in this article can be accessed on https://github.com/bala-srm/histogram_bins/blob/main/hist_bins.ipynb
Le pubblicazioni su Medium in Italiano
By: Medium Italiano
Tags: Guida A Medium, Medium Italia, Pubblicazioni

NightReview

A nightly collection of the best articles of the day (with a weekend edition: eepurl.com/4ja8b). For longreads lovers.
The African Child
By: Moyosore Sheriff Quadri
Tags: African Poetry, African Literature, Poetry, Africa, Blue Insights

As an African child you are raised to aspire for the very best

They know how tough it is, so they raise you to trust no one

They teach you to avoid strangers until you become a stranger to them

You become what you want them to see because it is what they want you to be

They believe that the end justifies their methods

You know not to question them because it is the only way

Right ?

You grow older, you become what they want you to be, you have regrets;

You blame them for all of it

But you forget; Growing up, they did not have the best of things

They were not raised to aspire for the very best

They were raised to aspire for enough

They were raised to answer the question:

“you wan go school abi (or) you wan go learn work?”

“I wan go school”

With this phrase, they choose the harder route

With this phrase, they choose to be indebted to their families

With this phrase they grow up with the world on their shoulders

The pressure becomes a part of them

But this shouldn’t concern you;

At least you didn’t ask to be in their lives

You didn’t choose them!

They chose you

But yet it concerns you, it must!

You have to understand why it is the way it is;

They had to fight for everything

They are the African Child.
The Feast
By: Tarrant Smith
Tags: Short Read, Poetry, Family, Self Care, Holidays

Photo by Artem Sapegin on Unsplash

A mug warms the palms

of my chilled hands

as an Autumn sun rises.

It is the season of cozy —

of blankets and steaming drinks,

and of comfort food

sitting heavy on the stomach.

A ruffle of black foreboding,

the crow calls to his neighbor.

It is the gathering season —

to cook and jabber,

trading news and gossip

over a meal and drink

until one is expelled as tempers flare.

When the carcass on the oak table is

exposed and picked clean —

wrap your arms around me,

and soothe my butchered soul.

Hands entwined in gentle silence,

enfold me in your love until

the horizon is set ablaze and all fall silent.
We Killed the Cat
Tags: Creativity, Short Fiction, Short Story, Storytelling, Fiction

Rohit was always an hyperactive kid. He was irritating and unpredictable. And as everything unpredictable, there was some kind of wildness with him that made us afraid of him. He dictated things, and we went along with it. One day while going back to home, we decided to give Anjan a surprise. Anjan’s house was on the way and we knew that he kept a cat as his pet. The cat was usually found lying or moving around in the verandah.

Rohit said, “Let’s hide his cat.”

And we agreed. I did not want to, but I did. We waited outside the fence as Rohit moved very carefully towards the cat. He caught it by its neck, but the cat scratched him pretty bad. Rohit did not lose his grip on the cat, instead he bashed the cat into a large piece of stone that was lying on the front yard!

The only blood and flesh that I had seen till that point of time, was that of the frogs ran over by the vehicles. My heart stopped as I watched the tiny furry creature frantically moved, and finally came to a stand still. Rohit ran away. We stood there in shock, and were still there as Anjan came outside his home and ran towards the cat. He could not believe his eyes. He could not hold back his tears. I had never seen him cry, even when we bullied him so much.

I told him that it was Rohit. But he did not move or utter a word.

That was the last time I saw Anjan, till I again met him twenty years later in a help group. I did not recognize him when I met him again. I did not even recognize the condition I was in. I was told that I had worms eating away my legs.
What Is The “Self” Anyway?
By: Chad Prevost
Tags: Philosophy, Psychology, Books, Self

Toward A Workable Definition

Neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers continue to study the concept of the self (and they probably always will). While it is virtuous to know our terms and inquire into the nature of reality, a deep-dive into the topic of the “self” can also become more about sophistry and what we can do with language, than about getting closer to a workable definition. It is equivalent to inquiring into the precise length of a nondescript piece of string, or asking for the best way to get into “the pursuit of happiness” or defining abstractions like “freedom” or “sweetness.”

Should we quibble with the fact that from a very early age we recognize ourselves in the mirror? Chimpanzees, dolphins, and elephants have all passed the mirror test too, but is that the kind of self-awareness we’re talking about?

Not really.

The levels of self-awareness in a nutshell: that’s a mirror (Level 1), there’s a person in it (Level 2), that person is me (Level 3), that person is going to be me forever (Level 4), and everyone else sees me (Level 5). Level 5 takes a little while to develop, usually around the age of four or five. Level 3 self-awareness is usually arrived at by 18 months.

This may also be why 18-months-old is when most children begin to develop language skills. Language requires “a theory of the self as distinct from other people, and a theory of the self from the point of view of one’s conversational partners,” wrote cognitive scientist Elizabeth Bates in 1990.

Complex language sets us apart at a level that distinguishes us to the extent that we can say: I am a self.
Flames
By: Joe Barca
Tags: Safety, Poetry, Love, Passion, Trust

Flames

A Brief Respite

Photo by Sage Friedman on Unsplash

Photo by Stéphane Juban on Unsplash

Winter storm, fireplace

English tea and Madeleines

Blankets and familiarity

Old tomes, new poems

Joni Mitchell on the radio

I kiss you

I drift into you

I lift you — up

Pleasured moments

Heightened senses

I share time and space with you

A rhythm and a pace with you

A knock — at the door

The kids are home — early

We let go of “letting go”

We separate, walls reinstated

We return

To the “every day”

We find our way

To the glorious mundane

Joe Barca
There’s nothing such as really high returns for the right ICO
By: Beldex Exchange
Tags: Privacy Enabled Coin, Beldex Coin, Beldex, Cryptocurrency, Blockchain

Have you read what the Boston College Carroll School of Management has to say about the ROI (Return On Investment) of an ICO contributor? An average ICO contributor can witness a return on investment of about 82%.

What’s the wait for invest on an ICO today! But wait, the report raises questions such as coin utility, coin security, and the future of the ICO.

Coin Utility- A Coin that has been created should hold have utility features without which the liquidity takes a significant hit.

Beldex- BDX coins are the fuel to the decentralized apps for taxi and hyperlocal delivery with amazing features.

Beldex- BDX coins are the fuel to the decentralized apps for taxi and hyperlocal delivery with amazing features. Coin security- A coin that isn’t secured for usage will only attract limited miners and contributors, and this will lead to an unsuccessful ICO where you funds get trapped with the wrong coin.

Beledex uses, unique ring signatures empowered with ringCT technology to ensure safe transactions.

Beledex uses, unique ring signatures empowered with ringCT technology to ensure safe transactions. ICO future- Will a contributor be comfortable in investing on an ICO which is lucrative only at present and will hold no value in the future?

Beldex has a clear roadmap of how the coins will be shaped in the future and contributors.

So are you ready to get high returns from your partaking with the right ICO? Buy Beldex coins today, and the Pre-ICO begins from tomorrow!

Know more about this project:

Twitter | Facebook | Linkedin | Telegram
“You were a Butthole Surfer?!”
By: Edith Zimmerman
Tags: Parenting, Music

A guitarist who once opened for the Butthole Surfers flirts with the idea of at long last telling his kids he was in a nineties math band.
Storm’s Edge…
By: Diem Jones
Tags: Poetry, Life, Music, Wisdom, Love

Photo: Stephane Vetter

The wisdom of child’s speak never ceases to amaze me: Step on a line and break your mother’s spine; …picked a peck of pickled peppers; …up the hill to fetch a pail — then Jill fell down and Jack…; ring around the rosie’s to reach and touch your toesies…

From these fond, evocative sayings I recall, “a line is the thinnest thing in the Universe.”

So I began to wonder about crossing lines, which has been a recurring theme of my musings for over 55 years…I first asked about the other side of crossing a line — could I cross over and come back?

As an adult, working in the entertainment industry, “Crossing Over,” was desired goal by many Black performing artists who “crossed the line” to find paying paying audiences outside of the Black communities and becoming a Pop star after being an R&B star. While many applauded this accomplishment, since the financial enumerations were huge, some asked the question of these emerging Pop stars, “do you remember where you came from…are you now too good to do a gig in the hood…how can the people who helped you get there afford to see you now?”

Of course my grandmother would ask, “are you getting too big for your own britches?

I was part of a group of conscious soul seekers who sought to cross-over, under, around and back — daring the line to hold them back and inviting others to come along by showing the way….after all, “alone at the top” and “One is the loneliest number” became mantras for some of us who perscribed to pushing and leaning on the edge of time to break down walls of repression.

I have found whether it’s the edge of a cliff, edge of time or the edge of pernicious behavior — All deserve an experiential visit, but landing and standing on solid ground to be more accommodating for the evolution of my soul.

So on these times of dusky-dawn, I feel a storm I do not fear as I know there is another side and a landing on the which side of the line is my choice…
5 Pieces of Writing Advice I Paid for That Are Actually Terrible
By: Nate Miller
Tags: Editing, Writer, Advice, Writing, Writing Tips

5 Pieces of Writing Advice I Paid for That Are Actually Terrible

Especially for beginners

Photo by Sticker Mule on Unsplash

As someone who has not-so-proudly taken at least $1000 worth of writing courses I found on Medium, I can tell you the best thing they’re good for is meeting other writers and getting you to hit publish. Other than that, it’s usually just some dude trying to come up with enough content to make you feel like the price tag was worth it.

The last time I checked, you don’t have to actually pay anyone to do either of those things, you just have to do them.

But these courses promise us other great things too like:

“Make an extra $100,000 writing online every month.”

or

“Learn the strategy that made me $300 billion writing online.”

Of course, once you’ve taken the course (heh), any success you have is proof that the course works, and every idea in that course is now certified gold! Of course!

So you keep on worshipping a bunch of ideas some “pro writer” used to pad his class syllabus, accepting it as valuable writing advice. Well, I love to break it to you: some of it’s downright terrible. Today I’m gonna single out which writing advice is the worst and why.
One Path to the Stars?
By: Nalini Macnab
Tags: Spirituality, Wisdom, Philosophy, Truth, Stars

Photo by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash

Science has proven that we are all made of ‘star stuff,’ that every cell in our bodies is a living microcosm of the cosmos we believe surrounds us in space.

At Gaia’s heart, there burns a living star, and as our bodies are made from Gaia’s elements, our cells are fashioned in that image. This was understood in ancient times, has been theorized by contemporary researchers and is something we all ‘know’ instinctively, in our bones.

The stones are in the stars, and the stars in the stones. ~ Anon

We are finding our way home, through conscious embodiment of our deeply encoded frequencies, assisted by their counterparts in the cosmos. How we believe this happens, unlocks certain structures and specific paths.

The Egyptian path to the stars is documented in stone. The vast structures at Gizeh, Dendera, and other locations, were constructed as representative architectures for ascension. The coded design of these structures was built to withstand many cycles of time, thus insuring that the energetic signatures of specific paths would endure.

Amazingly enough, as these technologies seem long-forgotten, the vibratory alignments of these monuments and others are echoed at various cardinal points of the globe. This network of alignment anchors a holographic reality on the planet.

Most mantras, and other types of chant, build structures in the ether that translate into the physical world. The Atlanteans/Avalonians could both raise and raze walls of stone with sound. Choirs were trained specifically for these tasks, as architecture, alignment and vibration were known to correspond.

Indigenous flute compositions all over the world create specific structures with their melodies within which one experiences specific bandwidths of awareness. The sound creates a vibratory framework for experiencing reality.

In the Essene tradition, bejeweled vestments and sacred space ‘beyond the veil’ were physical representations of alignments necessary to vibrate at divine frequencies. These symbols were meant to be internalized, rather than projected onto something external to be followed. Has that inner knowing been truly lost, or have we been conditioned to misunderstand?

Every serious spiritual tradition in the world has practices that create specific structures within which one can ascend, ‘home to the stars.’

From a quantum perspective, is there one true path, or are we coming closer to understanding that every path loops back to itself, leading us heartward?

It is through the portal of the heart that we find our stars.

What if we are meant to become the tonality of our home vibrations and live that music while here? What if that was the point all along?

There are as many reasons for incarnating as there are incarnations. Look to the stars. As an infinite sea of unique and brilliant points of light, can they not show us what we are and what is possible?

~ Namaste ~
How To Let Go When You Feel Lost
By: Mary Ann Lopez
Tags: Self Improvement, Mindfulness, Life, Sucess, Love

Here are 6 steps to let go of whatever you need to release and start over:

1. Clean your house: I am not a huge neat freak. Well, only a little bit now and then. But, everything has energy. It’s not voodoo, it’s physics. If you want to shake things up, you need to clean your space. Toss old magazines, sell books you don’t read or need. Scrub the floors, clean the toilet. You get the picture. Then get some incense or sage and do a metaphysical cleansing. Smudging is an ancient practice that uses sage or other herbs or resins to purify and attract positive energy.

2. Kondo your house: If it doesn’t serve you. If it doesn’t bring good memories — like clothing I wore to the job I disliked — then sell it, donate it, rip it to shreds, get rid of it. You can’t let in better things if you’re hanging on to the past and things you don’t really need or want anymore.

3. Be kind to yourself: Make the decision to be kinder to yourself. I know I have been my own worst enemy, but to move ahead, the old ways have to go. If you have been down on yourself, it isn’t going to change overnight, but fake it till you make it. Anytime you have a negative thought, notice it, and change it. This practice will be a challenge, but, to quote Stuart Smalley: “You’re good enough. You’re smart enough and doggone it people like you.” The same goes for me.

4. Be kind to others: Make it a goal to be kinder to everyone whenever possible. What does that look like? Not commenting on every Facebook thread. Hang on to your two cents, especially when it isn’t helpful or kind. Helping others when you can and without needing to share or be recognized for what I’ve done. Doing it because it’s the right thing to do. See an older person in need of help in the grocery store, lend a hand. Have an extra dollar to give to someone in need, do it. And, do it because it’s the right thing. Don’t go and share on Facebook, “look at me.”

5. Trust: This is probably one of the hardest things to do when you’ve been made to feel small or have temporarily lost belief in yourself. To begin to trust yourself it’s important to get real quiet inside. There is a lot of noise in our heads, in the world. With so much noise we lose the innate ability to sense what is good for us. Get quite. Meditate, even for a few minutes. Write down what you want in your life. Trust your gut.

6. Do-Over: You are never too old. Whatever your age or place in life, you can begin again. Remember it’s your life to live. You get a do-over. Don’t let anyone else tell you any different. If they do, move on. Trust yourself. Be kind to yourself and welcome all the good things waiting for you.

How do you handle challenges? Share your thoughts in comments.
Sista chansen att söka Vinnova-stöd för ditt Civic Tech-projekt
By: Digidem Lab
Tags: Vinnova, Civictech, Vinnovaprojekt, Civic Innovation, Civic Technology

Network 🕸️ of people working with technology 👩‍💻 for the common good 👍 and digital tools for community 💞 + democracy 🖐️ + transparency 🔎

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The $1mm Dash Button
By: Michael Sippey
Tags: Dashbutton, Art, Amazon

Update: My friend Michael Ducker reminds me about Amazon’s order protection feature. As Amazon states on their site, “Dash Button Order Protection doesn’t allow a new order to be placed until the prior order ships, unless you allow multiple orders.” Assuming zero shrinkage due to theft or other lossage and a baseline of one 8-box pack shipped per day, the installation would run for 119 years. An exhibition of that length would require (a) expertise in hardware & software maintenance (including potentially application virtualization; will Amazon.com survive the next 120 years?) to keep the Amazon Dash Button itself operational, (b) a logistics and delivery infrastructure to reliably deliver one 8-box pack per day, (c) Kraft Foods to continue to produce the product, and (d) installation expertise to overcome the obvious challenges of maintaining a decades-lived one room store of mass manufactured food product. Thus, configuration of the “multiple order” variable should be left up to the institution in order to fit their curatorial time horizon.
Bitcoin surpasses $5,200 accompanied by few altcoins
Tags: Altcoins, Cryptocurrency Investment, Increase, Bitcoin, Cryptocurrency News

After a week with a significant upturn in the cryptomarket, this Monday Bitcoin experienced a new rise. During the day, the main cryptocurrency in the market has been around USD 5,200, surpassing it at times, after closing this Sunday at USD 5,127, according to Messari data.

Some of the main altcoins follow the increase, although most of the first 20 cryptocurrencies have red numbers. Among those that are on the rise, ether (ETH) stands out, with an increase of 7.23% during the last 24 hours. Its value is USD 176.

Etherum Classic (ETC) has also presented positive numbers with a 3.7% increase in the last 24 hours. Tron (TRX) and Monero (XMR) show an increase of more than 1%, while the largest drop has been experienced by Ravencoin (RVN), with a loss close to 7%.

Among the possible reasons for the BTC rise is a significant growth in exchange in the Chinese market, where an Exchange house ban leads to the use of OTC shops (which often involve large companies or “VIP” customers).

As Chinese market operations increase, this price may have a positive effect on the BTC price, which is US$5.174 at the time of closing of this memo.
How To Be Taken More Seriously as a Young Professional
By: Logan Beddes
Tags: Self Improvement, Career Development, Careers, Young Professionals, Professional Development

How To Be Taken More Seriously as a Young Professional

5 Timeless Tips I’ve Seen Work

Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash

Let’s face it. There is a clear bias against young professionals entering the workforce. We are entitled, high-ego, low-preparedness, all wrapped up in clothes we can’t afford. It can be a daunting task to push past these misconceptions for those that are trying to establish themselves as professionals in their field, but it’s not impossible.

The fight to be seen as a professional is one that I still fight every day. Every day I go to work and school, I am constantly mindful of how I present myself. With each article I write, I stop to consider how it will influence my professional image.

There are already a lot of factors working against you if you’re trying to break into a new field — your age doesn’t need to be one of them.

While you don’t have control over how people judge your abilities, there are some things that you can control that will put you in a more favorable position.

These five methods are things that I have been working on implementing into my professional life, and it has completely changed my perspective on what it takes to be taken seriously. By no means am I a poster child for any of these, but I have learned enough along the way that I can’t wait to share!

Photo by Brooke Lark on Unsplash

1. Start by Taking Yourself Seriously

I put this one first because it is the biggest challenge for me. I have the hardest time taking myself seriously. Recently, I wrote an article about improving your self-image so that I won’t go into too much detail with my struggles, but the principle still stands. If you don’t start taking yourself seriously, no one else will.

I first discovered this shortly after graduating from high school. I moved from Texas to California to proselyte for my church. It only took a day of knocking doors to realize that no one was going to listen to me if I didn’t change my self-image. I couldn’t play the role of the high school kid that I got used to playing. If I wanted to be taken seriously, I would have to take myself more seriously.

The same thing applies to general professionalism. You are a unique individual with a life that no one else has lived. There are experiences from your life that may seem dull to you but can provide insight and perspective to others that no one else’s experience can.

You deserve to be taken seriously. The fact that you are reading this shows that you are more committed than 99% of other young start-ups that want to be seen as a professional.

To be taken seriously means that you believe that you can accomplish whatever it is you set out to accomplish. Whatever your profession is, you can gain respect by having respect for yourself first.
Poshmark: UX Case Study
By: Alexis Vargas
Tags: Case Study, UX, Poshmark, Design Process, Design

Prioritization of Pain Points

While creating the affinity map, I noticed I had a quiet a few pain points. Based on the prioritization matrix , I focused on three pain points based on user and business priorities.​

Prioritization Matrix

Primary Focuses

The three pain points were the pain points I focused on.

Pain Point 1: Users used Bundles as a way to save their items for later and did not understand the intended purpose.

Pain Point 2: User used the Liking button as a way to curate their feed and not a save posts.

Pain Point 3: Users could not find items they were selling or saved.

Validation

In order to validate my solutions, I tested five people with a prototype of my design changes.

Results

Task 1:

1/7 users used the Like Button to save posts

Original Design: 1/7 users used the Like Button to save a Poshmark post. Alot of the users used Bundles, a feature where if you buy more than one item from the same seller then receive discounts. Users assumed the Like Button was a way to tell the algrothm to show more clothing items like the ones the user is seeing in front of them.

5/5 users used the Bookmark Button to save posts

Redesigned Design: 5/5 users used the Bookmark Button to save a Poshmark post. This visual change supported the user’s mental model.

Task 2:

0/7 users perceived the My Closet as the category to see their items they are selling

Original Design: 0/5 users went My Closet from the Setting page to see their items they are selling. Users assumed My Sales was the page the items they are selling would be placed.

5/5 users perceived My Sales page as the category to see their items they are selling

Redesigned Design: 5/5 users went to My Sales from the Setting page to find the clothes they were selling.

TAKEAWAYS

From this case study, I learned the importance of small tweaks in designs create the biggest impact. Based on my testing and validating, users completed tasks quicker and felt successful in their abilities to navigate the mobile application.
Non-fungible Tokens Coverage Series #25
By: Domraider Team
Tags: Crypto Collectibles, Blockchain, Crypto Gaming, Nft

Here are some of the latest and most relevant articles that you should hear about on the topic of Non-Fungible Tokens.

This article was originally published on the Auctionity Blog. If you want to keep up to date with the latest news of the NFT world, head to https://www.auctionity.com/non-fungible-tokens-coverage-series-25/
Augmented Reality — das wird lustig?
By: Reinhard Lanner
Tags: Handhelds, Google, Android, iPhone, Augmented Reality

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