Skaitiniai
What's it like to be old? My boss is younger than I am and is absolutely sure he knows more about my job than I do, even though I've been doing it since before he was born and he never did it at all. People on TV keep trying to sell me stuff like Metamucil, some new kind of cane or similar silly gadget, or a scam investment, none of which I want. My grandkids can't understand why I can't read things they're holding right in front of my face until I've spent twenty minutes finding, then cleaning, my glasses. My wife has heard all of my jokes and all of my excuses. She now criticizes the former and laughs at the latter, instead of the other way around. My friends sound like cranky old sticks-in-the-mud who wish they could turn back the clock to a time that wasn't nearly as wonderful as they claim to remember it was. A trip to the supermarket now tires me out and instead of going out with (surviving) friends, I really look forward to taking a nap on the couch. Really. The celebrities I recognize are senile and/or decrepit. The ones who are currently popular are appalling. I don't have enough money to retire but dream of it every day (See the above comment about my boss). Life is fantastic, except when it's not. Whichever it is now, pretty soon, it will be the other one. My advice: Pay attention.
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The key is finding a good balance between working hard and playing hard. Your career won't suffer if you take a week long vacation. Your health will be fine if you sometimes volunteer to do a weekend shift. Do both and you can be successful and happy about how you spent your youth.
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My advice at mid-50s to younger people is to learn 1. manage your energy for your long term health, 2. enjoy time with the highest quality people you can find (I mean that in terms of good language, hopeful, constructive/collaborative in nature and working on themselves, empathetic to all those around you), and lastly say "yes" to almost everything and enjoy to the max. If my life were a candle, every year it is slowly losing some if its brightness/energy through no fault or effort on my own. I had an unusual situation which aged me faster than I ever wished for-- lost my mid-30s wife to a rare cancer 3 years after diagnosis. A part of me died with her and my heart will never heal. Still I wake up hopeful every day. We are all along for a short ride, enjoy the hell out of it. It could/will disappear in an instant.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24531718
Music was one of the things where there was this very clear set of bundles in which the products were sold. It was incredibly profitable for the big music companies and for a lot of the artists. And that got completely pulled apart. But now, we’re getting new sorts of bundling in there.
It’s an effective growth strategy. Once you try to grow the business, it’s an easier out to stay focused on your core and then add things to it. And you become a big bundle again. Which then creates a new vulnerability that you didn’t have when you were the insurgent.
https://hbr.org/2014/06/how-to-succeed-in-business-by-bundling-and-unbundling
It costs time and money to access a lot of true and important information, while a lot of bullshit is completely free.
You either pay for your content, or your content is SPONSORED, or you are the product being sold.
The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it
We've lately been of the mind that comparing Android and iOS phones primarily on a specs, benchmarks, or hardware basis is folly. Most informed buyers - choose between Android and iOS on the basis of software, services, and extremely divergent philosophies about openness, customization, and privacy.
It can be astonishing to see the amount of passion or even vitriol in Android vs. iOS discussions across social media and the Web—and by extension, Galaxy S vs. iPhone discussions, since those are the most popular devices to run those operating systems in most markets right now. Yes, this is partly because of highly charged marketing messaging by players in both platforms, tribalist tendencies in people, and the need to justify one's own choices, especially if those choices were costly.
But at the heart of things, this division is actually because the two platforms represent different world views on many questions about the relationships human beings should or shouldn't have with tech companies, app developers, and devices. When you look at it through that lens, it makes perfect sense that the arguments can be so emotionally charged.
That doesn't mean it's acceptable to be mean or toxic about these differences. It's important to have productive discussions about the issues at hand. But debates comparing the new Galaxy phone to the latest iPhone ultimately aren't really about the megapixels, and we all know it.
As I showed before, LEGO has had $100+ sets for a while. However, only recently have they produced sets even more pricy than that. When we were kids, the $100 set was the pinnacle of LEGO. It was the set we all aspired to own. It was the set we all went straight to at the store. Of course we rarely ended up with that set, but that was our dream.
Now, the dream set is closer to the $400 range. It doesn’t mean that LEGO doesn’t make sub-$100 sets. They do, and more than ever. It just means that in comparison the $25 set looks a lot smaller than it did when the largest set was only $100. LEGO pricing has become a victim of its own expanding market.
Switzerland fought the war against quartz, and guess what, they lost" – and that is a great thing. That meant that the thriving mechanical watch industry of today occupied and continues to occupy an even more precious place in the world – that of the superfluous, but beautiful. The people that read our site for detailed images of A. Lange & Sohne chronographs and Vacheron Constantin tourbillons don't need these objects to tell the time – that’s already been taken care of. They are here to simply sit back and appreciate something that the world doesn’t need anymore.
Straipsnis apie IT komandas. Pradedant nuo stadijas, kurias praeina visos kompanijos, baigiant mūsų puikiai žinomais programerių lygiais ir kiek mažiau žinomomis klasėmis.
Pagal straipsnį galiu daryti išvadas, kad šiuo metu dirbu sėkmingoje kompanijoje, kuri juda restruktūrizacijos linkme, esu low middle lygio programuotojas ir pasižymių Хуятор'iaus ir eksperimentariaus savybėmis.
Both cereal and the daily news began as well-intentioned efforts to improve American lives. But just as cereal turned into sugar for the body, news turned into sugar for the mind.
Newspapers have folded under the weight of rising competition and falling advertising revenues. To save their businesses, they’ve pivoted from the expensive work of reporting and relied more on cheap tricks like turning tweets and press releases into articles.
Writers who want to attract an audience for their ideas have an incentive to stretch or distort facts to give them a compelling narrative arc. In doing so, some journalists omit important details, conflate fact with opinion, and change the meaning of the story.
Professionals are outfoxed at every turn by citizen journalists on Youtube, Periscope, and Twitter who are simply savvier, less constrained, more authentic, and less wooden.
Words don’t just explain the world. They change how we feel about it.
Out of all the money spent on advertising in America, roughly 40% of it goes to television. Even in the age of the Internet, television has kept its grip over American life by changing its product in response to the explosion of the image.
In media theory, the “Overton Window” is defined as the range of acceptable opinions in a society. It’s an invisible cognitive prison. Anything inside the window is fair game, but stretch beyond its borders in polite company and you’ll turn heads or be ostracized from conventional social groups.
The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion but allow very lively debate within that spectrum….
When media moves from text to images, societies start to worship glamour over truth, emotion over rationality, and youth over wisdom.
By encouraging image-based communication, television changed how we think. It paved the way for a dictatorship of the eye over the mind, which creates an emotionally turbulent world which prized looks over logic and passion over reason. It deluded people into thinking the world could be summarized in small nuggets of pre-packaged information. In response, people outsourced their thinking to multinational media companies who “keep them informed.”
In the trade-off between entertainment and education, entertainment will always have the final word.
Through billboards and banner ads, companies engineer problems so their products can solve them. For example, bad breath wasn’t a problem people discussed until advertising campaigns in the early 20th century invented the problem and swooped in to solve it with products such as toothpaste and mouthwash.
Advertisers are applied psychologists. Instead of selling products, they tell people that by buying their products, they will become better versions of themselves. Advertisers know it’s better for their products to be misunderstood than ignored, so they capture consumer attention by focusing on the emotional benefits of purchasing a product instead of using facts, figures, and statistics that most people will ignore.
Online publications compete to get stories first, newspapers compete to 'confirm' it, and then pundits compete for airtime to opine on it. The smaller sites legitimize the newsworthiness of the story for the sites with bigger audiences. Consecutively and concurrently, this pattern inherently distorts and exaggerates whatever they cover.
Bloggers increasingly write with the authority of a news publication but envy the credibility of journalists. Meanwhile, journalists increasingly write with the speed of the blogosphere but envy the independence of bloggers.
In my experience, people who say everybody should pay for news spend most of their time with people who also pay for news, so they overestimate people’s appetite for paywalled information.
Subscription publications will reinforce their readers’ perspectives because most people only pay for information they agree with. Thus, an increase in subscription-supported media won’t just fragment information sources. It will fragment society.
Obsessive news consumption leads to a negativity bias that distorts our worldviews because creation happens slowly, but destruction happens fast and seizes our attention. Therefore, the kind of rare events that jump to the front pages of the newspaper tend to be negative, while stories about steadily declining poverty rates or improvements in global health rarely make national headlines.
It's not the media's role to present the world as it really is. They (media) will always have to compete to engage our attention with exciting stories and dramatic narratives. It is upon us consumers to realize that news is not very useful for understanding the world.
The current philosophy is built upon the fundamental lie that news is worthy of consuming every day. Daily news is profitable because it’s an unnecessary habit. Just like cereal, once people make a habit of eating it during their morning routine, they tend to maintain the habit.
When we direct our attention to the daily shouts of breaking news, we overwhelm ourselves with irrelevant data and uncommon events. We give rare events too much publicity, which distorts our model of the world. In turn, we mistake chance for certainty and the infrequent for the inevitable. Instead of enriching ourselves with the wisdom of history, we drive ourselves insane with the madness of the moment.
The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.
One of the biggest benefits of writing online is realizing how often I'm wrong about the world. Whenever I publish an essay, I’m surprised by how many people respond with well-reasoned rebuttals I’ve never considered. As the responses have increased, I’ve been humbled by my inability to predict the future
No human will ever be able to understand the world. It’s too complex, and we can’t see culture because we’re overwhelmed by its invisible influences. At best, we can build local expertise and useful — but ultimately inaccurate — models of the world. Past a certain point, additional information deludes us because it makes us think we understand the world more than we actually do.
HEALTHY NEWS CONSUMPTION IS POSSIBLE
I. TRACK WHAT YOU CONSUME
The benefits of the Internet are only as strong as your ability to direct your attention. It’s a gift to people with self-control, but a curse to those without it. And while it hurts the average news consumer, savvy ones have never been smarter or more informed.
Fathers and mothers have lost the idea that the highest aspiration they might have for their children is for them to be wise — as priests, prophets or philosophers are wise. Specialized competence and success are all that they can imagine.
II. FOCUS ON NEWS THAT’S CLOSE TO HOME
People are expected to have an opinion on every story, but even the experts don’t have enough time in the day to familiarize themselves with every aspect of every story. Without the time to research what we read, we confuse what’s true with what feels right.
So skip the news cycle, but double-down on measured consumption. Ignore society’s recommendations for what to consume and refresh your learning habits like you’re shaking an etch-a-sketch. Remember, what you should consume looks nothing like what you were taught to consume, so rebel against the mainstream spotlight, find some trusted curators, chart your own path instead.
On the Internet, your rate of learning is limited not by access to information, but by the discipline to ignore distractions.
Kai kurios komandos Google viduje naudoja vidinį įrankį pavadinimu Snippets. Konceptas gan paprastas - tai tiesiog tekstinis laukas, kuriame užpildomi savaitės pasiekimai. Sekančios savaitės pradžioje manageris ir kiti komandos nariai gauna email suvestinę.
Principas atrodytų labai paprastas, tačiau jis pasiekia porą gan įdomių tikslų: pirmiausia meet'u metu nebereikia gaišti laiko status update'ams ir galima fokusuotis į kur kas mažiau nuobodžias temas, kaip kad techninės problemos ir jų sprendimo būdai. O taipogi tai padeda objektyviai įvertinti kas iš tiesų buvo pasiektą per savaitę. Kartais, kai praleidi visą savaitę medžiojant vieną bug'ą, atrodo kad visa savaitė tiesiog sudegė ir nieko taip ir nenuveikei, nors iš tiesų vis vien pasiektas koks nors progresas - pvz giliau susipažinta su sistemos veikimu ir atrasti edge case'ai ar pataisyti keli naujai atrasti bug'ai, patikslinta dokumentacija ar patobulinti automatiniai testai.
Nors tokia praktika, jog ji priliptų ir nebūtų numetama reikalauja fokuso ir disciplinos, tačiau nedarant tokių retrospektyvų dažniausiai dalį savaitės pasiekimų tiesiog užmiršti ir labiau prisimeni tai, ko nebespėjai padaryti per savaitę.
Toks procesas naudingas net jei tokie snippet'ai yra rašomi tik pačiam sau ir net nėra skaitomi.
Web development'o arba jei konkrečiau - būtent CSS vystymosi istorija.
Esu jau pakankamai senas, jog prisiminčiau, jog mokykloje dar teko pasižaisti su MS Frontpage'u ir puslapių struktūros dėliojimu lentelėmis. Taipogi esu susidūręs ir lipdoma paveikslėlių mozaika, vien tam, jog mygtuką padaryti su apvaliais kampais. Na ir galiausiai man vis dar atrodo lyg jQuery boom'as buvo dar ne taip ir senai. Tačiau įdomu pasiskaitinėti nuodugniau ir apie tai, kas buvo dar ir prieš tai.
Apie tai kaip buvo kuriami puslapiai iki kol pasirodė pirma CSS versija, apie tai kaip IE6 nugalėjęs Netscape'ą pasileido į visišką štilių ir web'as užsišaldė 5-erių metų laikotarpiui iki kol atsirado naujas rimtas konkurentas. Ir apie tai, kaip kai kurių dar anuometinių problemų sukurtos pasekmės, kaip pvz browser prefix'ai vis dar gyvuoja ir iki šių laikų.
Straipsnis puikus tuom, kad pateikia kontekstą, t.y. parodo kokios konkrečiai problemos buvo bandomos spręsti. Visus tuometinius pain points ir hack'us bandant juos apeiti.
Tikriausiai visi esame susidūrę su požiūriu ar ir patys jį propaguojame, jog deimantai iš tiesų nėra jau tokie vertingi, jog visa ši industrija iš esmės yra kartelinis susitarimas, kuris laiko dirbtinai išpūstas kainas.
Dar 82-aisiais The Atlantic paskelbė išties ilgą, tačiau puikią publikaciją, kurioje itin detaliai ir nuodugniai aprašoma kaip buvo sukurta visa ši deimantų rinka. Pradedant nuo to, kaip atradus milžiniškus deimantų šaltinius Pietų Afrikoje ir pradėjus juos kasti tonomis, buvo sukurta schema, užtikrinanti, jog tai netaptų dar viena commodity preke, apie tai, kaip po didžiosios depresijos ir I pasaulinio karo pardavimai nusirito žemyn ir kaip pasitelkus vieną lyderiaujančių JAV reklamos agentūrų, buvo sukurta pati sėkmingiausia reklaminė kampanija istorijoje, kurios metu buvo atrastas influencerių marketingas. Na ir baigiant tuo, kaip yra kontroliuojama antrinė rinka, sudaromas įspūdis, jog deimantai negali nuvertėti ir jų kaina nuolatos kyla ir galiausiai, kaip ši sužadėtuvių tradicija įskiepyta net Japonijoje - šalyje, kuri turi itin gilias tūkstantametes tradicijas.
The diamond invention is far more than a monopoly for fixing diamond prices; it is a mechanism for converting tiny crystals of carbon into universally recognized tokens of wealth, power, and romance.
N. W. Ayer suggested that through a well-orchestrated advertising and public-relations campaign it could have a significant impact on the "social attitudes of the public at large and thereby channel American spending toward larger and more expensive diamonds instead of "competitive luxuries." Specifically, the Ayer study stressed the need to strengthen the association in the public's mind of diamonds with romance. Since "young men buy over 90% of all engagement rings" it would be crucial to inculcate in them the idea that diamonds were a gift of love: the larger and finer the diamond, the greater the expression of love. Similarly, young women had to be encouraged to view diamonds as an integral part of any romantic courtship.
Since the Ayer plan to romanticize diamonds required subtly altering the public's picture of the way a man courts -- and wins -- a woman, the advertising agency strongly suggested exploiting the relatively new medium of motion pictures. Movie idols, the paragons of romance for the mass audience, would be given diamonds to use as their symbols of indestructible love. In addition, the agency suggested offering stories and society photographs to selected magazines and newspapers which would reinforce the link between diamonds and romance. Stories would stress the size of diamonds that celebrities presented to their loved ones, and photographs would conspicuously show the glittering stone on the hand of a well-known woman.
In addition to putting these plans into action, N. W. Ayer placed a series of lush four-color advertisements in magazines that were presumed to mold elite opinion, featuring reproductions of famous paintings by such artists as Picasso, Derain, Dali, and Dufy. The advertisements were intended to convey the idea that diamonds, like paintings, were unique works of art.
By 1941, The advertising agency reported to its client that it had already achieved impressive results in its campaign. The sale of diamonds had increased by 55 percent in the United States since 1938, reversing the previous downward trend in retail sales. N. W. Ayer noted also that its campaign had required "the conception of a new form of advertising which has been widely imitated ever since. There was no direct sale to be made. There was no brand name to be impressed on the public mind. There was simply an idea -- the eternal emotional value surrounding the diamond."
In its 1947 strategy plan, the advertising agency strongly emphasized a psychological approach. "We are dealing with a problem in mass psychology. We seek to ... strengthen the tradition of the diamond engagement ring -- to make it a psychological necessity capable of competing successfully at the retail level with utility goods and services...."
The idea was to create prestigious "role models" for the poorer middle-class wage-earners. The advertising agency explained, in its 1948 strategy paper, "We spread the word of diamonds worn by stars of screen and stage, by wives and daughters of political leaders, by any woman who can make the grocer's wife and the mechanic's sweetheart say 'I wish I had what she has.'"
De Beers needed a slogan for diamonds that expressed both the theme of romance and legitimacy. An N. W. Ayer copywriter came up with the caption "A Diamond Is Forever," which was scrawled on the bottom of a picture of two young lovers on a honeymoon. Even though diamonds can in fact be shattered, chipped, discolored, or incinerated to ash, the concept of eternity perfectly captured the magical qualities that the advertising agency wanted to attribute to diamonds.
Toward the end of the 1950s, N. W. Ayer reported to De Beers that twenty years of advertisements and publicity had had a pronounced effect on the American psyche. "Since 1939 an entirely new generation of young people has grown to marriageable age," it said. "To this new generation a diamond ring is considered a necessity to engagements by virtually everyone." The message had been so successfully impressed on the minds of this generation that those who could not afford to buy a diamond at the time of their marriage would "defer the purchase" rather than forgo it.
Galima gan nesunkiai įžvelgti panašumų tarp to kur buvo IT pasaulis maždaug 1970-aisiais ir tarp to, kur yra šiuo metu genų inžinerija. Ir nors dabar pirmosios kalbos sukasi daugiau apie ydų, kaip genetinių mutacijų ar ligų šalinimą, tačiau riba visgi yra labai slidi. Pvz nutukimo potencialo šalinimas dar genų lygmenyje - tai būtų gydymas ar visgi labiau panašu į genetinį patobulinimą? Akivaizdu, kad šiai sričiai tobulėjant ir išmokus susitvarkyti su pagrindinėmis problemomis, ties tuo tikrai nesustosime. Problema galbūt yra tai, kad išties dar ilgą laiko tarpą tokia galimybė potencialiai save pasitobulinti bus prieinama tik labai mažam, privilegijuotų žmonių tarpui ir net jei jų šalyje galimybės ir būtų apribotos, tačiau yra išties labai sunku reguliuoti, standartizuoti tokius dalykus ir skirtingos šalys įsiveda visiškai skirtingus reguliavimus, tad netruktų atsirasti ir genetinis turizmas.
Programėlė pirmą kartą viral patapo dar 2017-ais ir būtent tada ją teko išbandyti ir man. Pamenu, pasijuokiau, kad pasendinus patalpintą nuotrauką, joje atrodau išties panašiai į savo senelį. Tačiau banga kaip staiga uždėjo, taip ir praėjo. Tada atėjo 2019-tų vasara ir prasidėjo antroji ir šį kartą kur kas stipresnė banga. Pirmiausia vajus įsisiubavo po to, kai programėle pasinaudojo kelios pasaulio įžymybės ir populiarumas išaugo iki tiek, jog atrodo, kad ja pasinaudojo ko ne visi, kas tik naudojasi socialiniais tinklais. Tačiau net nespėjus tai bangai nuslūgti, prasidėjo antrasis vajus, tik šį kartą sėjantis paniką ir pasipiktinimą. O tai kilo dėl to, jog į viešumą iškilo faktas, kad app'są sukūrė Rusijos IT kompanija bei tai, kiek milijonų žmonių jau spėjo jiems atiduoti savo duomenis ir galiausiai tai, kad jų licencija yra labai plataus pobūdžio ir iš esmės leidžianti naudoti surinktą informaciją bet kokiems tikslams. Ir taip, aš pilnai suprantu susirūpinimą dėl privatumo (vieta iš priežasčių, kodėl Facebook'e aš nesu užsivadinęs savo tikru vardu ar pavarde jau daugybę metų), bet iš kitos pusės, pirmiausia manau, kad skandalas išsipūtė vien jau dėlto, jog tai rusų apps'as. Taipogi, žmonės savo nuotraukas talpina į bet kokias random programėles, o tada mąsiškai "susirūpina" savo privatumu ir skundžiasi Facebook komentaruose, kuris juo labiau garsėja savo privatumo pažeidimais, kurie yra kur kas didesnio masto, o savo licencijoje irgi turi labai panašių punktų apie tai, kaip gali būti naudojama patalpinta vartotojų informacija. Visa tai yra tiesiog hipokritiška. Tie žmonės, kuriems iš tiesų tai rūpi, jie savo privatumu rūpinasi jau senai, o kiti puolė į masinę isteriją tiesiog dėl herd mentality. Keli straipsniai ta tema:
Nemažas tačiau išties įdomus editorial'as apie paauglius Xbox hakerius. Smalsumas ir smulkios žaidimų žemėlapių vagystės virto į stambaus masto įsilaužimus, o patraukus jau ir FBI dėmesį, istorija baigėsi kalėjimais, darbo pasiūlymais ir mirtimi.
Turėdavau tokią mintį, kad jei esi benamis, ko gero turėtų būti didelė paskata tiesiog elementariai vogti. Nekalbu apie dideles vagystes, kaip kad automobiliai ar kitas brangus turtas kur rizika ir pasekmės galėtų būti dideli. Labiau apie nedideles vagystes, kaip pvz maisto produktai iš parduotuvės. Jei pavyksta - ok, turėsi ką pavalgyti. Nepavyksta ir pagauna - nuveš ir palaikys areštinėje, turėsi bent laikinai stogą virš galvos, bus šilta (labai aktualu gi žiemą), o jei užlaikytų ilgiau - tai dar ir pavalgyti gausi. Praktiškai win-win situacija.
Nesu tikras, kaip su šia logika yra mūsų šalyje, bet kai kur toks principas iš tiesų veikia. Vienas iš pvz yra Japonija, kuri ir taip turi gan stiprią senėjančios demografijos, mažo gimstamumo, vis labiau užsidarančios visuomenės problemas. Jei neturi artimųjų, kurie padėtų ir pasirūpintų, o pasiekus pensijinį amžių iš bazinės pensijos šalyje nepragyvenama, tai nieko kito nebelieka kaip bandyti vagiliauti. Tad nenuostabu, kad senolių nusikaltėlių lygis šalyje auga jau paskutinius 20 metų. Įdomus ir kiek netikėtas aspektas yra tai, kad pensija būnant kalėjime tai vis vien yra mokama. Tad padarai nedidelį ne smurtinį nusikaltimą, pasėdi kalėjime metus ir išeini jau susitaupęs ir bent jau kurį laiką turi iš ko pragyventi.
Long grid'as apie visus pagrindinius computational photography principus. Kitaip tariant, papasakojama kodėl nuotraukos vis gerėja, nors objektyviai iš esmės smarkiai nesikeičia ir apie tai, kad visos esminės fotografijos inovacijos pastaruosius 10 metų vyksta būtent dėka mobiliųjų įrenginių.
Istorija, labai puikiai parodanti kokie gremėzdiški ir darbų atžvilgių neefektyvūs gali būti korporatyvai. Tikri laiko siurbikai ir jis deginamas daugybėje susitikimų, laukime ir begalėje elektroninių laiškų. Skaitant kitų industrijoje dirbančių žmonių reakcijas į šį straipsnį, galima nesunkiai suprasti, kad tai toli gražu nėra vienetinis atvejis ir tokios ir panašios istorijos ištiesų nutinka nuolat.
The Martian autoriaus trumputė istorija apie dirbtinį intelektą, valdantį miestus. Kartais morališkai drastiškais būdais, tačiau visgi pasiekianti teigiamus rezultatus. Ar sutiktumei gyventi tarsi mašinos prižiūrimu gyvunėliu, kuriam realiai yra apribotos teisės, tačiau to kaip ir nepajauti ir visgi gyvenimas nuo to mažai corrupt, našesnis, geresnis ir jautiesi laimingesnis.
