Rolandt

Yesterday I finally took the time to write and run a script to delete all my tweets. So, the tweet announcing this blog post will be my first. Again.

There’s not too much to say about it, but here goes:

I like Twitter - the space, the community, and the product. I even think it’s kind of a good thing that you can’t delete tweets, and having seen the product-development arc of many other social platforms, I even think it’s a good thing that the daily Twitter experience doesn’t change that much. Abuse control is the only change to the platform that should be prioritized.

My relationship with Twitter - as a software company on which I publish - is not like my relationship with Facebook. Facebook is constantly testing the limits of what its users will tolerate. It long ago realized that normal social sharing wasn’t enough, so started controlling the mixture, spiking it with biases and signals that produce reams of eye-roll-inducing ‘rewiring’ and ‘seratonin’ referencing internet journalism.

Part of what I like about Twitter is that it seems fungible for creators in non-bullshit ways. I love art assignment bot and tinycarebot and love that they’re cheap experiments by creative people, not promoted ad campaigns. It’s a textbox and you can do what you want.

So, I’m making my Twitter presence ephemeral. What I write on macwright.org is the historical record. I’ll use Twitter as usual - an outlet for bad jokes and links to blog posts, but it’ll be a fresh start.

The long tail of 13,838 tweets wasn’t of much use for me, or other people. Twitter makes historical searches and API access inconvenient, and the culture is focused almost solely on the now. Most of the rare instances in which old tweets become relevant are ‘I told you so’ moments. The historical archive certainly helped build a more accurate marketing profile of @tmcw, and probably helps companies run unofficial background checks to check my ‘culture fit’.

For those uses, or if you’re just nostalgic, you can can buy a copy of my archive for just $5 and go wild.

For the social purpose of Twitter, an infinite archive feels incidental and unnecessary, so why treat it as sacred?

Tortoise performing in a house that’s about to be demolished

AI experts predict the future: Truck drivers out of jobs by 2027, surgeons by 2053 | ZDNet

Ten Year Futures | Benedict Evans

This post is really just a way for me to have easy access to some recent articles which pretty much show that by the time they have finished building the Kinder Morgan expansion, it will be redundant. There are two articles, one in The Tyee and one on DeSmog Blog, which cite research by David Hughes for CCPA.

As part of Alberta’s climate plan, announced November 2015, oilsands emissions are capped at 100 megatonnes per year which eliminates growth of future production.

According to Hughes’ analysis, when considering restrictions placed on Alberta oil production under the province’s greenhouse gas emission cap, “Kinder Morgan overestimated oil supply by 43 per cent in 2038.”

Arguments for the necessity of the Trans Mountain pipeline have also been overstated, according to the new analysis, because of alternate pipeline approvals.

In addition to the Trans Mountain pipeline Prime Minister Justin Trudeau also approved the Enbridge Line 3 project and more recently President Donald Trump approved TransCanada’s Keystone XL pipeline.

“If these projects are built, which seems likely, there will be a 13 per cent surplus of export pipeline capacity without the [Trans Mountain pipeline].”

 

But even more damning is Bloomberg’s review of the work by Rocky Mountain Institute and the IEA.

“If you take a large bite out of transportation fuels, then suddenly the economics of the whole downstream oil and gas business look dramatically different,”

So while the KM CEO stands up and blusters about “no concessions” it really begins to look all very irrelevant.

A bit like the 45th US President making a song and dance about withdrawing from a voluntary agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Quite how a deal that had no teeth at all – there are no mandated penalties for failing to meet obligations under the Paris agreement – can be characterised as “unfair” beats me.

Here are some hostages to fortune: there will not be a great boom in BC LNG. There won’t be a Transmountain  Pipeline expansion and there won’t be a Site C dam. They are all absolutely pointless because the rest of the world has already moved on, and renewable sources of energy are just getting more competitive every day.  And even if they weren’t, sensible people are already reaping the economic benefits of better energy efficiency which we seem to be missing out on.

Just like we seem to have ignored the possibility that BC could get all of its energy from geothermal resources (that links to an article from 2014!).

Filed under: energy, Transportation Tagged: energy efficiency, geothermal, renewable energy resources, technology

We May Be Closer to Full Employment Than It Seemed. That’s Bad News.

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: if you SUBSCRIBE to the Five things on Friday email newsletter, you are 100% guaranteed to get MORE STUFF than reading it here on My Happy Place.

You can do that by hitting the inconspicuous button that may or may not be below this sentence.

➡️  [SUBSCRIBE TODAY]  ⬅️

Shall we crack on?

//// ⭐️ ——— ⭐️ \\\\

1. THE MEEKER REPORT

I’m sorry, what was that?

Did you just say ‘James, I’d really like 355 slides of the latest Internet Trends that covers everything from Internet Advertising to Gaming, Healthcare, Media, and more?’ 

YOU DID?

GREAT! I got you covered.
_______________________________

__________________

That’s right, Mary Meeker is back with her yearly motherlode of global stats and facts about all things Internet-ty.

Recode had the exclusive, meaning it was first with the analysis too.

Both are a worthwhile read.

Pro tip: you’ll need coffee. 

//// ⭐️ ——— ⭐️ \\\\

2. THE IRREGULAR SECTION ABOUT WARREN ELLIS

Honestly. If you’ve been reading these for a while you know Warren Ellis comes up every now and then, if it’s not wanging on about one of his many writing projects then it’s something I’ve enjoyed from his casual thought dump, Morning Computer.

This week I’m going to talk to you about his newsletter, Orbital Operations. In short: it’s great. Really interesting (if you’re into that kind of thing) and, if I’m honest, a decent source of interesting things to me – from this week’s edition alone.

For example:

• Warren Ellis is the lead writer for the new Castlevania series on Netflix. His behind the scenes chat about it is super interesting and of course, here’s a trailer he shared too.
• In the same edition, he talks about what it means to write a fight scene (for what I believe is a book) and compares this Transporter 2 fight scene to any one of those in John Wick. While the latter are good, JW never fought a man with a firehose. Where’s the realism?
  (Oh – sidenote: I’m totally working that video into a talk at some point. It is excellent) 
• And this Deadpool blooper reel (that I had totally forgotten about).

So yeah, it’s awesome.

Go get some.

EDIT: I just found this in one of the recent editions –

Who even writes things like ‘micro-continuum of futures denoted by the colour of sand’?! – who?!

…

//// ⭐️ ——— ⭐️ \\\\

3. CAMPAIGN UNDERGROUND

Trade publication CAMPAIGN recently ran an evening of talks around behavioural insights and adjusting brand approach to marketing through consumer understanding.

Some people might read the above paragraph and dismiss it, ‘Er, well, of course, you need to understand consumers to market to them – duh’

Others might think ‘Behavioural insights, what?’

While the write-up of the event isn’t as comprehensive as actually being there, it does highlight a number of smart ways that big recognisable brands are thinking differently about how they approach advertising and communications in 2017.

Worth reading for further Google / Case Study Research alone.

Read ‘Six Things We Learned at Campaign Underground‘, by Stephen Graves.

Ps. On the tangential note of innovative thinking, ‘Where Good Ideas Come From’ is my favourite book on this topic and well worth a read if you’re yet to add it to your Kindle. 

//// ⭐️ ——— ⭐️ \\\\

4. MOSSBERG: THE DISAPPEARING COMPUTER

Walt Mossberg, in 1991:

“Personal computers are just too hard to use, and it isn’t your fault. The computer industry boasts that its products can help everyone become more productive. Maybe so. But many people can’t afford the time and money needed to get the most out of PCs.”

Over the past 25 or so years, Walt Mossberg has been a leading voice in the technology and computing industry. Witness to the age of the PC, smartphone, tablet, and the dawn of voice computing, Mossberg has not only seen it all but had something to say on it too.

And he’s retiring.

Mossberg’s final column, entitled ‘The Disappearing Computer‘ is a great read and, while bearing no real surprises, comes with the gravitas of a man who really has seen it all and has a bloody good idea of where it might all be headed next.

Nice one, Walt. You were ace.

//// ⭐️ ——— ⭐️ \\\\

5. GOOGLE V UBER: IN DETAIL

This one is a little old (I read it too late to include in last week’s edition) but still 100% worth your time.

Some of you may or may not know but Google (or Waymo, a the self-driving-car subsidiary of Alphabet, both of which used to be Google – details) launched a huge lawsuit against Uber after the former alleged an ex-Waymo-employee, one Anthony Levandowski (pictured about) misappropriated (read: ‘stole’) hundreds of gigs worth of data, before heading off to work for Uber. The same Uber that is also developing a self-driving car solution.

Yeah, you can see how sticky that is going to get, right?

Two things to know:

1. The latest news it that Uber has fired Levandowski for his involvement in the lawsuit and that really doesn’t look that good AT ALL.

2. The other thing to familiarise yourself with (and the original article that prompted me to add it to an edition of FToF), is this slightly-longer read by the Wall Street Journal entitled ‘How one engineer sparked a war’ – featuring, you guessed it, Anthony Levandowski.

Honestly, some of the sheer crazy that has reportedly happened in the history of this case is phenomenal. And that crazy is covered by all parties involved, not just that of those accused.

This is a really interesting read and an amazing insight into the world of how the San Francisco tech/valley set behave and think. Wow.

//// ⭐️ ——— ⭐️ \\\\

BONUSES THIS WEEK ARE AS FOLLOWS: 

CONTINUING THE TREND OF THE PAST FEW WEEKS, HERE ARE A TON OF RANDOM LINKS THAT MAY OR MAY NOT BE USEFUL TO YOUR LIFE.

• One joke, two tweets. Bang on observation, mind.
• 2013: Steven Soderbergh retires. 2017: Steven Soderbergh has a new film on the way.
• Previous FToF stars, ‘WHO TARGETS ME’ are doing amazing things. Read the latest.
• In London? Power Suit Social is back on June 7th. Looks good. 
• Beautiful + Useful: How to be alone.
• Related: I went to the cinema on my own for the first time since 1995 last night (Mortal Kombat, if you’re asking) – and I can tell you WONDER WOMAN is a solid movie. Definitely worth seeing. Gal Godot is fantastic.
• Gamers, here’s the complete untold history of HALO. <- LONG.
• Godzilla v Kong is happening. Sidenote: Kong 2017 is highly underrated and eminently watchable. Seek it out.
• This too shall pass.
• Peak Twitter (love this).

//// ⭐️ ——— ⭐️ \\\\

You are now at the end.

See you next week.

Until then…  you should consider SUBSCRIBING.

I saw a link to this via Andy Baio (http://waxy.org/). Way, way, long ago, I wrote several posts about the bookmarking service called Delicious. Just proves, if you hang around long enough, things you live through become ancient history.

Yes, way, way, long ago (as in 16 or so years ago), I blogged a lot about Delicious (or, at first, del.icio.us). (Like when Yahoo shuttered it.) For several years, I used the RSS feed of Delicious to post links like this. I have thousands of links bookmarked on two accounts at Delicious. I haven’t looked at it for years.

Delicious used to be a big deal. The Washington Post website even had a “bookmark this with delicious) attached to every article (17 years ago).

Here’s a post on the Pinboard.in Blog.

Pinboard Acquires Delicious

If you let so many people go, who would previously be rowing, you will not be able to keep all your ships. No news coming out of DNUG44 means that it will take some more time for the dust to clear. Keep asking IBM.

There’s Something Wrong With Connecticut | Henry Grabar:

Connecticut is a giant suburb, and corporations are moving back into the city centers they abandoned in the postwar boom times:

Corporations like General Electric once believed self-contained suburban campuses were pragmatic. First, they allowed companies to consolidate their vertically integrated operations in one place. In Warren, Michigan, north of Detroit, the General Motors production line could culminate with product displays in the famous Design Dome. Second, suburban office parks were cheaper than skyscrapers. Trans World Airlines said it would save several million dollars a year by moving from Manhattan to Westchester in 1987. Third, these relocations followed suburban employees who had sought the quiet, safety, and good schools of the suburbs. As my colleague Daniel Gross wrote of GE’s 1974 move to Fairfield, Connecticut, from midtown Manhattan: “The whole setup was designed to appeal to executives who wanted a suburban lifestyle — driving to work, sailing on Long Island Sound, puttering around two-acre yards, and golfing at local country clubs.”

Between 1955 and 1980, more than 50 corporations left New York City, including IBM, Gulf Oil, Texaco, Union Carbide, General Telephone, Xerox, PepsiCo, and U.S. Tobacco.

Connecticut exploited that trend to build itself into an economic powerhouse. It offered enormous tax breaks to lure trading floors to Stamford, Connecticut. Its posh suburbs drew high earners out of New York. But the state was more dependent on the firms than the other way around, and the incentives never stopped. Eventually, low business taxes meant the state came to rely disproportionately on its wealthy residents.

Connecticut never developed a Boston, Seattle, or Chicago, and now it’s too late to build one.

The good news is that Connecticut has several midsized cities at a time when midsized cities are supposedly coming into vogue, especially in contrast to their larger counterparts. Places like Portland, Maine, and Charlottesville, Virginia, have thrived. As a city, New Haven is also a safer and more prosperous place than it was a decade ago.

The bad news is that as the state’s budget deficit grows, the response from Hartford has been to put more obligations on struggling cities rather than on the financial sector. Connecticut’s metropolises are already impoverished and dangerous, starved by decades of suburban separatism and victims of the state’s highly segregated school system. Hartford is teetering on the verge of bankruptcy. But the state’s public spending has lagged behind the national average.

Decades of corporate poaching made Connecticut rich but never resuscitated the places it needs to compete. Now, in a time of budget stress and ongoing population loss, Republicans are pushing for the state to recover its status as a New England tax haven. The truth is that it still is one. Its top marginal income tax rates are lower than those in New Jersey and New York. According to accounting firm Ernst & Young, Connecticut’s total effective business tax rate is the lowest in the country.

The deeper, more daunting question is what besides a tax break will make Connecticut a place people want to live and work. The state still hasn’t found the answer.

@stoweboyd:

2 We live in a world where our security and prosperity are maximized when others enjoy the same | Susan Rice https://t.co/3yzfM02sbK

— Stowe Boyd (@stoweboyd) June 3, 2017

The post Learn dozens of new languages with Memrise [App of the Week] appeared first on MobileSyrup.

I had the opportunity on a recent trip to San Francisco, my first since 2005, to visit the new-to-me de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park, which opened shortly after my last visit. Interesting to see a relatively new work by the architects of Vancouver’s forthcoming (?) art gallery, particularly to see the way the spaces intersect in parts of the building that aren’t the tall white walls of the galleries themselves.

Friends who have seen it, or who saw these pictures, described it as “a battleship,” “menacing,” and “very male.” Its surface is largely punched-metal sheeting over a steel frame, including the cladding on the administrative tower, with a concrete inner structure.

 

There were some interesting plazas and indented courtyards that let a little of the park’s green curves into the museum’s space.

And a very dramatic foyer…

In spite of its imposing shape, it fitted quite well into the park, I thought. The big question is whether this scale of a building (albeit stacked up like hat boxes as they have proposed for Vancouver), and the kind of successful spatial penetrations they have here, can translate from sunny California at 38 degrees north latitude to our greyness at latitude 49.

Impressive, though, and an “icon” compared with SF MOMA, which you more or less stumble upon on the downtown city streets.

 

 

Standing in front of City Lights Bookstore, looking down Columbus Avenue past Vesuvio’s bar (with Jack Kerouac Lane coming in on the right-hand side) to the Transamerica pyramid – a new building when I lived in SF in 1974.

I had read so much, on this blog and elsewhere, of how changed SF was due to its proximity to Silicon Valley and its off-the-charts rents and housing costs, and was expecting hardly to recognize it. Instead, it seemed much as it always has in the 40+ years I’ve known it: slightly shabby, about the same numbers of homeless, more condos in the Mission and on Russian Hill but not an overwhelming change, neighbourhoods like Richmond (“the avenues”) and North Beach essentially the same. San Francisco seemed to be evolving in a controlled way, at least compared with Vancouver. Another observation: there were way fewer luxury cars. Vancouver seems much wealthier.

The Russian Hill to Pacific Heights skyline, now dotted with luxury highrises.

A recent post on this blog about real affordability indicated how well San Francisco is actually doing. With a minimum wage of $US 13, and the strong economy, what looks like a housing-price disaster…

…is much less of a problem due to the coupling of wages with costs and the availability of good cheap transit. Second-best in the USA isn’t bad.

But, for a Canadian carrying a pocketful of loonies, it is an expensive city.

On the BART to SFO.

The post Kobo Aura H2O review: A waterproof e-reader for everyone else appeared first on MobileSyrup.

Every week we bring you the latest in Canadian mobile news. Listed below is a quick overview of the top stories from the past seven days.

• BlackBerry KEYone now available in Canada [Read here]
• Google Home to release in Canada on June 26th, pre-orders now open [Read here]
• What Android Pay means for mobile payments in Canada [Read here]
• SyrupCast Podcast Ep. 123: The ‘Essential’ Android Pay pod [Listed here]
• Minister Bains to speak on improving telco affordability at Canadian Telecom Summit [Read here]
• How to use Android Pay in Canada [Read here]
• Huawei P10 and P10 Plus now available to pre-order from Rogers [Read here]
• Bell to launch improved LTE network to power IoT devices [Read here]
• Telus plans to open BlackBerry KEYone sales to all customers [Read here]
• CRTC directs Canadian telecoms to update networks for next-gen 911 services [Read here]
• TD and RBC may come to Android Pay in ‘the next several quarters’ [Read here]
• Here’s what to expect from Apple’s WWDC 2017 [Read here]
• LTE-M is the next step in Canada’s IoT revolution, and consumers should be excited [Read here]
• CIBC customers can now check their credit scores for free without penalty [Read here]
• LG’s mid-range Stylo 3 Plus phablet is now available in Canada [Read here]
• Canadian lawyers report rise in lawsuits related to social media and mobile devices [Read here]
• Telus is now delivering quad-band LTE-A service to the Samsung Galaxy S8 [Read here]

The post Top Canadian mobile stories from the past week appeared first on MobileSyrup.

The Single-Payer Party? Democrats Shift Left on Health Care | Alexander Burns, Jennifer Medina:

Democrats are shifting toward support of a single-payer health care system:

At rallies and in town hall meetings, and in a collection of blue-state legislatures, liberal Democrats have pressed lawmakers, with growing impatience, to support the creation of a single-payer system, in which the state or federal government would supplant private health insurance with a program of public coverage. And in California on Thursday, the Democrat-controlled State Senate approved a preliminary plan for enacting single-payer system, the first serious attempt to do so there since then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, vetoed legislation in 2006 and 2008.

With Republicans in full control of the federal government, there is no prospect that Democrats can put in place a policy of government-guaranteed medicine on the national level in the near future. And fiscal and logistical obstacles may be insurmountable even in solidly liberal states like California and New York.

Yet as Democrats regroup from their 2016 defeat, leaders say the party has plainly shifted well to the left on the issue, setting the stage for a larger battle over the health care system in next year’s congressional elections and the 2020 presidential race. Their liberal base, emboldened by Senator Bernie Sanders’s forceful advocacy of government-backed health care last year, is increasingly unsatisfied with the Affordable Care Act and is demanding more drastic changes to the private health insurance system.

In a sign of shifting sympathies, most House Democrats have now endorsed a single-payer proposal. Party strategists say they expect that the 2020 presidential nominee will embrace a broader version of public health coverage than any Democratic standard-bearer has in decades.

The Dems need a simple message to pull the opposition together. This is it.

I sometimes feel like the last believer in RSS. I've gone from being a determined member of a dwindling guild to being someone like the Protein Man.

I like to write on here, I'm not especially concerned about numbers but writing entirely for myself seems pointless too. RSS used to be a convenient way for people who wanted to read things to get them without me having to shout about every post on twitter.

So, the next most RSS-like thing seems to be some sort of newsletter. That's what I'm going to experiment with now. So, if you fancy, you can stick your email address in the box below and blogpost like things will appear in your inbox. Probably once a fortnight.

They will also appear here, if you're still in the RSS massive, because RSSxit DOES NOT MEAN RSSxit.

 

Enter your email address

powered by TinyLetter

How Interracial Love Is Saving America | Sheryll Cashin:

As of the 2010 census, the most reliable recent source, around 24 percent of adopted children in the United States were placed with a parent of a race different from their own, up from 17 percent in 2000. Christian groups in red states are part of this trend.

About 17 percent of new marriages and 20 percent of cohabiting relationships are interracial or interethnic. About one-quarter of Americans have a close relative in an interracial marriage. In the most recent Pew Research Center survey, 91 percent of respondents said that interracial marriage was a change for the better or made no difference at all.

Whites and blacks are still less likely to intermarry — they make up about 11 percent of newlywed heterosexual couples — but acceptance is growing. For whites in particular, intimate contact reduces prejudice. Whites with reduced prejudice, in turn, have a worldview similar to that of many minorities; that is, they support policies designed to reduce racial inequality.

Trump’s Incompetence Won’t Save Our Democracy | Masha Gessen:

Masha Gessen points out the the great evil geniuses of the past century, Hitler and Stalin, ‘struck many of their countrymen as men of limited ability, education and imagination — and, indeed, as being incompetent in government and military leadership’. Likewise Putin and Trump:

As someone who has spent years studying Mr. Putin — and as one of a handful of journalists who have had an unscripted conversation with him — I can vouch for the fact that he is a poorly educated, under-informed, incurious man whose ambition is vastly out of proportion to his understanding of the world. To the extent that he has any interest in the business of governing, it is his role — on the world stage or on Russian television — that concerns him. Whether he is attending a summit, piloting a plane or hang-gliding with Siberian cranes, it is the spectacle of power that interests him.

In the past few months, Americans too have grown familiar with the sight of a president who seems to think that politics consists of demonstrating that he is in charge. This similarity is not an accident (nor is it a result of Russian influence). The rejection of the complexity of modern politics — as well as modern business and modern life in general — lies at the core of populism’s appeal. The first American president with no record of political or military service, Donald Trump ran on a platform of denigrating expertise. His message was that anyone with experience in politics was a corrupt insider and, indeed, that a lack of experience was the best qualification.

In the past few months, Americans too have grown familiar with the sight of a president who seems to think that politics consists of demonstrating that he is in charge. This similarity is not an accident (nor is it a result of Russian influence). The rejection of the complexity of modern politics — as well as modern business and modern life in general — lies at the core of populism’s appeal. The first American president with no record of political or military service, Donald Trump ran on a platform of denigrating expertise. His message was that anyone with experience in politics was a corrupt insider and, indeed, that a lack of experience was the best qualification.

[…]

Mr. Trump has communicated repeatedly his apparent belief that the presidency should be a job of simple decisions and clear gestures. This was why during the campaign he reportedly asked a foreign policy adviser repeatedly why the United States can’t use nuclear weapons “if we have them.” That is why, in the wake of using the “mother of all bombs,” he bragged of giving the military “total authorization” — because why complicate things by restraining the generals? It is also why Mr. Trump announced on Thursday that the United States will pull out of the complex, sprawling, painstakingly negotiated Paris climate accord, which he apparently made no effort to understand but every effort to recast for his public in deceptive, primitive terms.

[…]

Mr. Trump has admitted that being president is harder than he thought. He does not, however, appear to be humbled by this discovery. More likely, he is, in keeping with his understanding of politics, resentful because his opponents — his predecessor, the elites, the establishment — have made things so complicated. If they had not, things would be as he thinks they should be: One man would give orders, and they would be carried out. He would not have to deal with recalcitrant legislators or, worse, meddlesome investigators. One nation, with the biggest bombs in the world, would dominate every other country and would not have to concern itself with the endlessly intricate relationships among and between all those other countries. The United States would run like a business, an old-fashioned top-down company of the sort Mr. Trump used to run, the kind of company managed through the sheer exertion of power.

[…]

it is Mr. Trump’s insistence on simplicity that makes him want to rule like an autocrat. Militant incompetence and autocracy are not in opposition: They are two sides of a coin.

OnePlus has so far done a great job in updating the OnePlus 3/3T to the latest version of Android and providing regular software updates to the handset. However, things are not so rosy with the company’s 2015 flagship, the OnePlus 2. Continue reading →

I am biking nearly every day to work and back (~ 3 km), but my trousers get damaged quite fast due to the created friction between my legs and the saddle. Which then means that I have to buy new ones rather frequently. Is there any way to prevent that?

Saddle in question:

One of the most iconic pieces of future technology ever shown in movies or television is undoubtedly the Nike self-lacing sneakers in Back to the Future 2.

Why? Likely in part because it’s a beautiful design that has since been realized by Nike with a limited-edition run, but also because everyone hates leaning down to tie up their laces. The sneakers promised to ease one simple problem in a neat, futuristic and well-designed manner — is there anything more we could ask of a shoe-related gadget?

The answer, according to Digitsole Smartshoe, is a resounding ‘yes.’ The company’s titular project is a technologically-advanced shoe that does much more than lace itself.

The Bluetooth 4.0-connected sneakers also promises tracking capabilities, a 3D walk analyzer, smart heating and cushion monitoring. Through an accompanying app (available on both iOS and Android) users can do things like individually warm their feet to a maximum temperature of 45 degrees Celsius or check out their propulsion level, impact force and stability, among other metrics.

The sporty-looking shoes, which charge via microUSB at the back of the heel, are rated IP66 dust and water resistant, meaning they’re completely dust tight and protected against powerful water jets though not necessarily immersion.

The Digitsoles come in U.S. men’s sizes up to 13 and U.S. women’s sizes up to 11 and weighs approximately 1.18 pounds per U.S. men’s size 7.5 shoe. The battery life, meanwhile, reportedly lasts two weeks without the use of the heating system or five to eight hours of heat depending on outside and body temperature.

Currently, the shoes are available for pre-order on Kickstarter at the price of $199 USD (about $260 CAD) with free shipping to Canada, 66 percent off the expected retail price of $599 USD. The estimated delivery is December 2017.

Verdict: Almost sticky

I love the idea of these future shoes. In particular, the heating element appeals to my perma-cold extremities.

But I just can’t pull off the hardcore basketball look that the Digitsoles would have me rock. People would start thinking I play sports, and that would be false advertising.

Besides, the price point is a little high for the two features I’m interested in — self-lacing and foot-warming. Perhaps, however, for someone more engaged in their foot health and walking habits, the sneakers would make more sense.

In any case, ordering a pair of these puppies puts you a step closer to emulating Michael J. Fox, which is almost enough to make me smash that ‘pledge’ button right now. Until the design improves a bit, however, I’ll wait.

Note: This post is part of an ongoing series titled Sticky or Not in which Senior Reporter Rose Behar analyzes new and often bizarre gadgets, rating them sticky (good) or not (bad). 

The post Go back to the future with Digitsole Smartshoes [Sticky or Not] appeared first on MobileSyrup.

BautistaNY added this as a favorite.

FARAH SANDHU rider statement: "It is amazing the amount of joy I feel as soon as I hop on a bike and ride. Whether it’s my own cherished baby, or a borrowed one in another country. Riding energizes me before work, and emotionally detoxes me after. (I'm a full-time psychiatric nurse on an acute care unit.) Whatever my bike face is, I'm smiling on the inside."

dandyhorse is pleased to present the photo essay BikeFACE! by Marc Bernhard

In 1890s Europe and North America, the bicycle was gaining popularity as a means of transportation, recreational activity and sport. However, medical opinion about the health benefits of cycling, especially for women, was mixed. One of the supposed risks for women was a condition known as “bicycle face.”

At the turn of the century the bicycle afforded many women increased freedom and autonomy, and the bicycle itself became a symbol of women’s emancipation. With the ridiculous prognosis of "bicycle face" we saw how cycling, feminism, patriarchy and medical opinion collided in the1890s.

Photographer Marc Bernhard says, "The purpose of BikeFACE! is to promote and celebrate women’s commuter, recreational and sport cycling. It is a series of studio images in which the subjects were invited to ride their bikes on a stationary trainer at full exertion to see what their bicycle face might look like. The series is meant to be a light-hearted, tongue-in-cheek reference to the historical anti-feminist ideas against cycling, by showing the strength, intensity and determination of women cyclists today."

Featured rider Farah Sandhu says, “ ...Whatever my bike face is, I'm smiling on the inside.”

dandyhorse is pleased to present this essay celebrating women cyclists in our city -- just in time for Bike Month! You can read more about "bicycle face" here.

We'll be rolling out each profile one at a time throughout Bike Month and adding all the links here.

 

CASSANDRA McWADE rider statement: "On my bike I feel free and happy and strong -- liberated from the nonsense of day-to-day life. My bike is my silent, dependable companion. I am the best version of myself when I'm riding."

dandyhorse is pleased to present the photo essay BikeFACE! by Marc Bernhard

In 1890s Europe and North America, the bicycle was gaining popularity as a means of transportation, recreational activity and sport. However, medical opinion about the health benefits of cycling, especially for women, was mixed. One of the supposed risks for women was a condition known as “bicycle face.”

At the turn of the century the bicycle afforded many women increased freedom and autonomy, and the bicycle itself became a symbol of women’s emancipation. With the ridiculous prognosis of "bicycle face" we saw how cycling, feminism, patriarchy and medical opinion collided in the1890s.

Photographer Marc Bernhard says, "The purpose of BikeFACE! is to promote and celebrate women’s commuter, recreational and sport cycling. It is a series of studio images in which the subjects were invited to ride their bikes on a stationary trainer at full exertion to see what their bicycle face might look like. The series is meant to be a light-hearted, tongue-in-cheek reference to the historical anti-feminist ideas against cycling, by showing the strength, intensity and determination of women cyclists today."

Featured rider Cassandra McWade says, “I am the best version of myself when I'm riding.”

dandyhorse is pleased to present this essay celebrating women cyclists in our city -- just in time for Bike Month! You can read more about "bicycle face" here.

We'll be rolling out each profile one at a time throughout Bike Month and adding all the links here.

 

Apple’s Worldwide Developer kicks off in San Fran^h^h^h^h Jose tomorrow at 10am with the slick and practiced reveal of all the coolness you’re going to want for Christmas. The following is my arbitrary scorecard for watching the event¹.

Operating Systems Yeah, all the operating systems are going to be updated. I’m giving 10 points each for iOS 11, macOS 10.13, tvOS 11, and watchOS 4 and an extra 10 points for each operating system that is released to the public. I’m not looking for a lot out of these operating systems upgrade although I remain excited about all of them except watchOS.

There are rumors of a social networking application. If Apple announces a new social networking application, there will be an automatic 25 point deduction from the final score. Social networking features inside of existing apps do not qualify for this penalty.

Bonus #1: If “collaboration,” “continuity,” or “courage” is used to describe a feature set on any platform I’ll award points each time. Maximum of 30 points.

Bonus #2: there are 30 points allocated for unpredictable OMFG operating system awesomeness.

Mac It’s all long shots in the Mac category. It’s way too soon for Apple to have a credible long term response to developers deep rooted concerned about hardware for developers. However, there are 25 points at the ready if Apple directly and confidently highlights within the event that they are addressing developer concerns regarding the Mac platform.

There are 25 points awarded if they say anything about the Mac hardware platform. Another 10 points are available if they announce plans to deliver Apple displays. Shit, make that 25 points.

Bonus: 25 points available for miscellaneous Mac hardware awesomeness.

iPhone This year is the tenth anniversary of the iPhone, and I’m pretty sure the hardware, when released, is going to blow your mind. You’ll need to brace yourself because you’re going to a see an impressive frameless piece of hardened glass that also happens to be a phone.

I deeply want to see the engineering feat to achieve absolutely zero buttons, cameras, and speakers on the front of the phone, but I am genuinely concerned that we end up with the maddening TouchBar situation where it’s not clear when you pressed a button or where a button is located.

There will be bonus points available if the camera bump is gone because that means Apple has revised, ya’know, physics.

However, as readers noted, iPhone hardware is usually announced in September, so I’m carving off 25 OMFG points just in case.

Catch-all This final category is a catch-all for all remaining product and services. Let’s start with a 15 point award for the announcement of the Siri Speaker with an extra 10 point award hiding in the wings if the product performs my first three voice commands correctly.

The iPad Pro seems like a no-brainer, but I’m super happy with my current fat iPad and Pencil, so I guess thinner and faster plus perhaps mimicking the frameless ascetic of the iPhone? Seems like a stretch. 15 points for the base upgrade plus ten bonus points for additional iPad “whoa.”

Finally, you can’t have a WWDC without the token “One More Thing” (OMT) award. The last time this was used was the long-rumored music service in 2015 which in my opinion was not worthy. The prior OMT was the Apple Watch and that is one more thing. There are 50 points on the line for a credible OMT, but just to make it interesting, there will be -50 points if the OMT is misused.

A quick review of the scorecard with potential points per category:

• Operating Systems: 140 points (With a potential -25 deduction)
• Mac: 100 points
• iPhone: 25 points
• Catch-All: 100 points (With a potential -25 point deduction)

I’ll be live tweeting the event, keeping score, and delivering loving snark. I’ll write-up the final result later this week.

Happy WWDC!

To gain commit rights on CPython, a pre-existing core developer nominates your for commit rights to python-committers. That nominator lays out roughly why you should be given commit rights, and then promises to watch your commits for a little while to help you with any sharp edges you might run into while doing your initial commits. Other core developers lay in with either support or opposition. Typically there is a few voices of support and no opposition (although opposition has occurred). In general, though, as long as no one objects and at least a couple of other people support the nomination then you get commit rights.

So why don't we give out commit rights more often? The Python development team is chronically understaffed so I get this question on occasion. And the answer is it's about trust. When you gain commit privileges you have the ability to change the code of a programming language that millions of people use to write software (let alone the billions of people who use some software or service that relies on CPython). At some point, core developers will commit code that someone doesn't double-check and it can lead to bugs, bad design, etc., and so there's a certain level of trust involved to allow someone to commit code to CPython without supervision. In other words you're being given the keys to the proverbial castle and so we need to trust that you won't trust the place when no one is looking.

This dependency on trust has two interesting side-effects. One is that you could argue CPython is not a pure meritocracy as we don't care if you have the technical skills to work on all parts of CPython, just that you can constructively contribute on some part and that we can trust you to know when (not) to do something you don't have the skill set to work on. In other words we're perfectly happy giving people commit rights to people who don't know how to write C code as long as the person also realizes that fact and thus doesn't try to touch the C code (until they are ready to). This is why our work to try and diversity the Python development team doesn't focus on teaching people C and how the interpreter works, but instead how to contribute effectively to CPython with the understanding that people will just leave alone anything they don't feel comfortable working with.

The other side-effect of focusing on trust is that we accept individual contributors but not companies as their own contributing entity. While we have never actually had a company come forward and say, "we want to contribute as a company", I have seen it in other projects. The issue with this (gracious) offer is it isn't the company making the commit but the individual contributor. If we were to trust a nebulous company then we wouldn't be able to to control that the person making commits on behalf of the corporation know what they are actually doing. This is why when companies ask me how they can best contribute to a project I say they need to let individual employees make contributions from their work accounts. That lets the project develop trust with the individual while giving the company credit for letting their people give back.

mkalus shared this story from Vancouver Sun.

---

 

I think that doing strategic work with organizations and communities is really about learning. If a group is trying to confront newness and changes in its environment and needs to come up with new strategies to address those changes, then it needs to learn.

I love the term “desire lines.” Most of my initial work with organizations tries to get at the desire lines in the organization; the patterns embedded in the culture that help or hinder change and resilience. Naming and making visible these entrained desire lines (including the ones that that group takes into the darkness of conflict and unresourcefulness) is a helpful exercise in beginning to first reflect and then disrupt and develop capacity. When a group can see their patterns, and see which are helpful and which are not, they can make the choice to develop new ones or strengthen the stuff that works.

When  problems are complex, then the people in the group need to focus on learning strategies in order to discover and try new things, rather than adopt a best practice from elsewhere.  It is, as Steve Wheeler says in this video, the difference between designed environments and personal choice:

“Students will always find their own unique pathways for learning. They will always choose their own personal tools and technologies. Our job is not to try and create pathways for them, but to help them create the pathways for themselves and the scaffold and support them as they go through those pathways.”

Hosting groups is always about learning – in fact one core question of the Art of Hosting community is “what if learning was the form of leadership required now?” To support learning, help groups find the desire lines for learning and good strategic work to address change that is owned by the group will follow.  That is how learning builds capacity and capacity builds sustainability.